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Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsForeign reporter visiting US stunned by Trump press conference.
Lenore Taylor
The Guardian September 20, 2019
As a regular news reader I thought I was across the eccentricities of the US president. Most mornings in Australia begin with news from America the bid to buy Greenland, adjustments to a weather map hand-drawn with a Sharpie or another self-aggrandising tweet. Our headlines and news bulletins, like headlines and news bulletins everywhere, are full of Trump.
As a political reporter for most of the last 30 years I have also endured many long and rambling political press conferences with Australian prime ministers and world leaders.
But watching a full presidential Trump press conference while visiting the US this week I realised how much the reporting of Trump necessarily edits and parses his words, to force it into sequential paragraphs or impose meaning where it is difficult to detect.
The press conference I tuned into by chance from my New York hotel room was held in Otay Mesa, California, and concerned a renovated section of the wall on the Mexican border.
I joined as the president was explaining at length how powerful the concrete was. Very powerful, it turns out. It was unlike any wall ever built, incorporating the most advanced concrete technology. It was so exceptional that would-be wall-builders from three unnamed countries had visited to learn from it.
There were inner tubes in the wall that were also filled with concrete, poured in via funnels, and also rebars so the wall would withstand anyone attempting to cut through it with a blowtorch.
The wall went very deep and could not be burrowed under. Prototypes had been tested by 20 world-class mountain climbers Thats all they do, they love to climb mountains, who had been unable to scale it.
It was also wired, so that we will know if somebody is trying to break through, although one of the attending officials declined a presidential invitation to discuss this wiring further, saying, Sir, there could be some merit in not discussing it, which the president said was a very good answer.
The wall was amazing, world class, virtually impenetrable and also a good, strong rust colour that could later be painted. It was designed to absorb heat, so it was hot enough to fry an egg on. There were no eggs to hand, but the president did sign his name on it and spoke for so long the TV feed eventually cut away, promising to return if news was ever made.
He did, at one point, concede that would-be immigrants, unable to scale, burrow, blow torch or risk being burned, could always walk around the incomplete structure, but that would require them walking a long way. This seemed to me to be an important point, but the monologue quickly returned to the concrete.
In writing about this not-especially-important or unusual press conference Ive run into what US reporters must encounter every day. Ive edited skittering, half-finished sentences to present them in some kind of consequential order and repeated remarks that made little sense.
In most circumstances, presenting information in as intelligible a form as possible is what we are trained for. But the shock I felt hearing half an hour of unfiltered meanderings from the president of the United States made me wonder whether the editing does our readers a disservice.
Ive read so many stories about his bluster and boasting and ill-founded attacks, Ive listened to speeches and hours of analysis, and yet I was still taken back by just how disjointed and meandering the unedited president could sound. Here he was trying to land the message that he had delivered at least something towards one of his biggest campaign promises and sounding like a construction manager with some long-winded and badly improvised sales lines.
Id understood the dilemma of normalising Trumps ideas and policies the racism, misogyny and demonisation of the free press. But watching just one press conference from Otay Mesa helped me understand how the process of reporting about this president can mask and normalise his full and alarming incoherence.
https://news.yahoo.com/foreign-reporter-visiting-us-stunned-060052263.html
malaise
(268,980 posts)He's a fucking moron
olegramps
(8,200 posts)What will we do if he is reelected? It is truly a great concern. I am somewhat concerned when I see the what I consider division within our parties candidates. Perhaps I am just being too cautious because of the possible consequences if this madman is reelected. Trump's presidency has been like attending the Mad Hatter's tea party. It is so damn bizarre that we have come to actually just accept his behavior as common place. It seems that we have become immune to being shocked by the daily revelations that we are experiencing.
malaise
(268,980 posts)He may not even be in the WH next year this time
yardwork
(61,604 posts)Trump will be re-elected unless Democrats come together to beat him.
JHB
(37,160 posts)Nobody loves Trump more than people who get high off the fumes of axe-grinding.
BSdetect
(8,998 posts)It's that scary right now.
He's going to try whatever sick and stupid trick he can think of (with russian help) to stay in power.
We ain't seen nuthin' yet.
TommyCelt
(838 posts)...this trump really REALLY wants to win.
Prosecuting a president trump is infinitely more difficult than prosecuting a citizen trump.
jrthin
(4,835 posts)redstatebluegirl
(12,265 posts)Tipperary
(6,930 posts)I am not nearly as certain about that.
ehrnst
(32,640 posts)This is something more, something on top of that.
Dementia.
empedocles
(15,751 posts)PrincelyBindle
(4 posts)Maybe the Reporter got exactly what Trump is saying.
Guilded Lilly
(5,591 posts)without one second of let up for years and I doubt we will ever fully recover from this epidemic Cretinoid Plague.
Character, decency and intelligence in America have been decimated.
TommyCelt
(838 posts)...no legs, on queer street, kissing the canvas, insert boxing metaphor here.
Demovictory9
(32,454 posts)Hermit-The-Prog
(33,342 posts)I've never listened longer than it takes to mute the tv. I also wear hearing protection when grinding metal, which makes a sound almost as unpleasant as Dotard Donald.
Takket
(21,564 posts)Last edited Fri Sep 20, 2019, 07:15 AM - Edit history (1)
Instead of trying to clean it up for us. They have no obligation to try and make him sound intelligent.
yardwork
(61,604 posts)Ligyron
(7,632 posts)But then they realized the truth was their enemy more and more so they pretty much put a stop to it.
maddiemom
(5,106 posts)His answers defied description. His handlers probably came up with his "chopper chats" to help obscure the frightening truth.
LuckyLib
(6,819 posts)unedited Dumpster. He is bat shit crazy and the media does not need to clean him up for public consumption.
LittleGirl
(8,287 posts)5 year old intelligence anymore. I. Just. Cant.
I too wonder if the journalists are doing us any favors.
pansypoo53219
(20,976 posts)underpants
(182,794 posts)✅
tblue37
(65,340 posts)tanyev
(42,553 posts)I've been struck by how many articles I've seen that directly quote or reproduce an image of one of his tweets, only to follow it up with a paragraph "translating" it. "The president appears to be referring to the policy in which the.....blah, blah, blah." STOP IT, MEDIA!
If there's some type of context in which his 144 characters of argle-bargle make a little more sense, that is the White House's problem. If his comments need 'splaining, make Kellyanne Conway do it. DON'T DO THEIR JOBS FOR THEM!
moonseller66
(430 posts)Our headlines and news bulletins, like headlines and news bulletins everywhere, are full of Trump.
Those last three words pretty much give a new meaning to an old degrogatory exclamation.
And he and his supporters really are..
"Full of...Trump"
Mike 03
(16,616 posts)Johnny2X2X
(19,063 posts)He's borderline an idiot on most issues, he's a genius at marketing and scamming though.
In a lot of countries you'll have a really smart leader sounding like an idiot on purpose (Boris Johnson) to manipulate his supporters. Trump is the opposite, he's actually really that stupid and incapable of coherent thought.
lagomorph777
(30,613 posts)Fascinating point. Even well-meaning reporters and editors, in trying to convey Trump's crazy messages, can actually make him seem less demented than he is.
yonder
(9,664 posts)The reporter speaks English and Trump simply speaks AmoronCon with a Griftish accent.
Brother Buzz
(36,423 posts)to to present his trophy at the 2019 Presidents Cup golf tournament in Australia in December.
https://www.sfgate.com/entertainment/article/The-Latest-Australia-s-PM-at-White-House-for-14455034.php
Undoubtedly the orange anus will drop this line at another not-especially-important or unusual press conference:
This tournament is about respecting the office, respecting the president of the United States
dewsgirl
(14,961 posts)Brother Buzz
(36,423 posts)really, really liked them.
Anything's possible with Commander Cuckoo-Bananas in charge.
dewsgirl
(14,961 posts)enters his clusterf*ck of a brain.
NotASurfer
(2,149 posts)Report as follows:
"At (insert event here), Trump said: (quote his entire remarks, verbatim)"
As I understand they used to report Yogi Berra that way back in the day. Same idea only terrifying
Sneederbunk
(14,290 posts)3catwoman3
(23,975 posts)You would HAVE to listen to his ravings and ramblings.
I hit the mute button any time he comes on. Reading about him is bad enough. At least I don't have to listen.
dewsgirl
(14,961 posts)I didn't realize his bizarre, press conferences have been cleaned up to the extent that they are.
Mr.Bill
(24,284 posts)tclambert
(11,085 posts)Where was the Secret Service? They should have tackled him to save him from frying his precious flesh.
Liberty Belle
(9,535 posts)I've heard this from two different sources who have seen this at two different parts of the wall.
The whole thing is a worthless waste of money and a cruel symbol of division that accomplishes absolutely nothing.
They drag towels to hide their tracks, or use "border booties."
SleeplessinSoCal
(9,112 posts)Link to tweet
?s=09
canetoad
(17,154 posts)To US journalists.
Stop trying to parse his words into intelligible sentences. Just report exactly what he said.