Media Incompetent at Covering Trump Calling Fire Response Incompetent

It's time to stop looking at media that automatically look wherever Trump points

Jan. 13: Trump appears unable to assess fast-moving crises … Knee-jerk pronouncements cast doubt on Trump’s capacity for emergency response … Baseless allegations suggest Americans can’t rely on Trump’s judgment … Trump’s willingness to lie jeopardizes nation’s ability to prepare and respond to systemic threat … There, see, it’s not so hard to write appropriate headlines after all! …

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Donald Trump’s weekend pronouncements about the Los Angeles wildfires were taken seriously just after he officially entered the books Friday as convicted of 34 felony charges. (Screengrab / Reuters still via VOA video.)

Soon-RePresident Donald Trump yesterday called out unnamed “incompetent pols [who] have no idea” how to put out the Los Angeles wildfires. “What’s wrong with them?” he asked presumably rhetorically.

Sen. John Barasso (R-WY) said yesterday that “gross mismanagement” was to blame for the fires. And it’s so bad that he’s ruling out federal aid for California without “strings attached” to make them do things the Barasso way, like a Barasshole.

On disreputable platforms such as Twitter and Fox, Trump cheerleaders offered up specifics for Trump’s and Barasso’s vague allegations. Namely: Diversity. Fox’s Jesse Watters said officials had decided to “scrub white males from the fire department.”

It’s an obviously stupid thing to say, obviously attributable to Fox’s commitment to hiring diversity, which explains how a white guy with no journalism experience and a record of fucking up gets to be a TV anchor.

Now, there’s no one way to report on all these criticisms. And different valid ways news outlets might have informed Americans about Republican claims and Trump’s assessments, offered just about a week before he becomes — somehow impossibly are you shitting me — president again. So let’s review some of the ways America did learn about this, from the liberal media.

Here’s the New York Times, the world’s number-one newspaper:

And here’s the Washington Post, which as of press time still exists despite being owned by someone so stupid he’s got more money than just about anyone but Elon Musk, whose brain is burdened by even more money than Jeff Bezos has:

And here are two headlines from CNN, which also still exists but also sadly is on the decline under the “leadership” of a multi-millionaire, apparently unable to figure out how to make money while having more resources than anyone in the world to bring video to the world in a world increasingly turning toward video:

caption...

The gist of all this criticism-covering is that Republicans are criticizing the politicians, policies, preparation, and response relevant to the devastating fires, and that these criticisms are drawing attention to possible shortcomings and creating political difficulties for the Democrats in question.

But there’s, uh, no mention of the fact that both Trump and Watters were pulling shit out of their collective ass. Did either of them cite an after-action report? Or a McKinsey assessment? Testimony at a hearing? Anything? No? Okay, but, um, isn’t that important?

As mentioned, we could have had entirely valid alternate coverage of Trump’s remarks. Here’s an only slightly tongue-in-cheek version of the news as a parallel Earth full of Newsfuckers got to read it yesterday in their universe’s paper of record, The Fucking News:

Trump’s statement doesn’t tell us anything about the wildfires or the people in charge. It’s revelatory about him, a confession that he has no idea how to assess whether things are true or not true or good or not good. An earlier Trump statement referred to a non-existent “water restoration declaration.”

The most important aspect of Trump’s statements is not that they cause headaches for Democrats or “raise questions” about water resources but that they demonstrate that Trump is extraordinarily deficient in his emergency-response capacities, let alone his epistemological abilities.

And, look, of course there are questions to be asked about how Gov. Gavin Newsom (D-CA) and Mayor Karen Bass (D-Los Angeles) prepped/responded. Yes, the fire chief did warn about the impact of some of Bass’s cuts — but whether Bass cut the budget overall isn’t a mystery. And the media don’t have to preference questions about the budget over the answers, when we already have the answers!

And yet, here’s the Los Angeles Times headlining the (non-good-faith) question, even though the story itself has the answer:

How tricky does it get to explain whether Bass cut the Fire Department budget? My precious, complex-answers-reading Newsfuckers, it takes an entire sentence to explain it in paragraph four:

And The New York Times devotes an entire article to gotcha-ing¹ Bass for breaking her promise not to travel outside the country while she was mayor.

That promise, the Times declares, was “spectacularly broken.” (Fun fact, “spectacular” is subjective!)

This isn’t a defense of Bass, who clearly broke a campaign promise. It’s a critique of the Times’ priorities. Did Bass being out of the country have any bearing on her city’s preparedness or response? Or was her promise a response to simplistic political and media pressures that the Times is now perpetuating?

Where’s the New York Times article on the issue that TFN discussed last week — the known and predicted result of developing in places where developers shouldn’t be developing?

Oh, weird, it’s in The Lever! Here’s The Lever’s report from Friday on the massive, blaring warnings ignored for decades as developers steamrolled woke lawmakers and also the environment to build houses where houses should not be.

Despite the fact that it’s so early in the fact-finding process, there is one defense of Bass that TFN is prepared to offer.

Most of the known fatalities — 16 of 24 — have come from the fire that started in Eaton Canyon. Well, the Eaton fire isn’t even in Los Angeles.

So where the fuck is the Eaton fire? It’s in Altadena, in the fifth district of Los Angeles County.

And yet here’s an article headlined “Anger and resentment rise in Los Angeles over fire response,” which starts in Altadena:

“After being largely reduced to ashes by wildfire, Altadena was being patrolled by National Guard soldiers on Friday.

“For residents of this devastated Los Angeles suburb, the arrival of these men in uniform is too little, too late.”

In other words, We’re tired of your excuses, Altadena Mayor Karen Bass!

So who is in charge? The Altadena website informs us the county’s fifth district is managed by County Supervisor Kathryn Barger.

A Republican.

So Barger must really be getting raked over the coals embers by the liberal media, right for how she’s county supervising the county that’s had the most fatalities?

The Los Angeles Times ripped Barger a new one in a column headlined “How L.A. County Supervisor Kathryn Barger plans to help Altadena rebuild.” Savage!

And here’s an example of the kind of devastating takedown the piece offers on Barger: “She adjusted her sunglasses, which complemented her pearl earrings and necklace.” Zing!

Now, in fairness, is there any basis for blaming Barger for any of this? Let’s see!

Lied about fees for online fundraising. Oversaw a county Fire Department with a structural deficit. Admitted the dangers of losing home insurance and said she was working on it but thousands of destroyed homes are still thought to have been uninsured.

And you wanna talk diversity? The county of which Barger is a supervisor diversified the county Fire Department to include more women but then gave them men’s uniforms. So now the county’s firefighting women have to hike up their pants while fighting boat fires and they have body parts exposed to flames and toxins due to the ill fit but at least they have room for their dicks. Or they can stow their boobs between their legs. While fighting fires backwards and in heels.

Now, do any of these critiques of Barger actually matter? Maybe! Probably. This is complicated shit and no one is perfect and no one in the world has prepared appropriately for the onslaught of climate-change disasters. Because you can’t.

But the point is we don’t know yet. In fact, Barger is so well thought of she might as well be a Democrat. She even taxed developers to pay for governmenting with more firefighters. Of course, if she actually were a Democrat, and if she were less, shall we say, blonde, and if she were running a major city, there’s also a good chance she’d be getting the kind of coverage Bass is getting.

Our media are focusing asymmetrically on asymmetrical bullshit instead of highlighting systemic issues.

For instance, Trump and recidivist CEO Elon Musk took a break from trying to cut $2 trillion in federal spending to criticize Bass for cutting Bass spending.

Los Angeles firefighters were competing for water with private firefighters — who fight to save the money of the people with the money. That’s a systemic issue because a disgraceful 45% of America’s firefighters are in the private firefighting industry, fighting only the fires called in by the Invisible Hand of capitalism.

SILOS One problem we face in our media is the silos that tend to keep political reporters and editors from weaving in stuff that none of the right politicians have decided should be part of the discourse.

For instance, on Earth-TFN, competent political coverage of Trump’s “incompetent” remark might include Trump’s incompetence in failing to note that on Friday the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration announced that 2024 was the hottest year ever for America. Which just might have had some impact on the brush dryness in Los Angeles, which is in America.

Or Earth-TFN, media might have mentioned Trump’s failure to mention Friday’s other news. Europe’s climate monitor said Earth has surpassed the so-called tipping point² for devastating climate change two years in a row now. Global temperatures are now “beyond what modern humans have ever experienced” on the planet, which is where Los Angeles is.

SO WHO CAN SAVE US? With everyone hunting for scapegoats, insurance companies are drawing some ire over the fires. That’s because they’ve been stripping thousands of homes of their home insurance due to the increasing threat of fires caused by the governance of politicians that insurance companies donate to.

So who can do something about these insurance companies? According to Newsweek, some folks have a candidate in mind, and his name is Luigi Mangione³.

‘D’ in ‘DNC’ Stands for ‘Depressing’

There’s very little coverage out there of this weekend’s debate among the candidates running to chair the Democratic National Committee (DNC). Which tells you something.

At Saturday’s first of four debates, Politico reports, the DNC chair candidates were united in their disdain for insider consultants. Minnesota Democratic-Farmer-Labor Party Chair Ken Martin said “D.C. consultants … [will] be gone.” State Sen. James Skoufis (D-NY) would “kick [DC insiders] to the curb.”

Wisconsin Democratic Party Chair Ben Wikler went with a kinder/gentler approach: “No commitments to anyone who’s been on a campaign payroll before.”

And while your generally sympathetic TFN is sympathetic to a throw-the-bums-out impulse, this also smacks of know-nothing-ism. If everyone’s agreed the DC consultants fucked up last year, tell us how. And why they were listened to. And who chose to use them.

Before we toss out the DC consultants, let’s have a real, names-and-all reckoning of who said/advocated what and why it was wrong. Empiricism!

Stacey Abrams just endorsed Wikler, saying, “Ben has proven that with year-round voter protection, smart organizing and clear messaging, we can win — especially in states where our rights are being eroded.”

The endorsement echoed two consistent themes: Organizing and messaging. What TFN isn’t seeing in this race is organizing for what and messaging about what?

It’s fair to argue that DNC chairs shouldn’t be predisposed to particular politics, as that might bias them against future candidates. But shouldn’t the ideal chair have both a clear vision of what the party should be organizing and communicating about and the ability to refrain from rigging future primaries?

Does the party really want a chair who doesn’t give a shit what the party’s fighting for?

Musk Watch

RECALL Tesla CEO Elon Musk’s self [sic]-driving [sic] on-board Tesla computers are so poorly made that they’re self-short-circuiting. And they’re self-short-circuiting so badly that even Tesla had to self-admit it. They’re now recalling 239,382 Teslas. (h/t)

Features reported by Electrek to be experiencing problems, or just Musk-out failing — as a result of bad-car-making by the man who’s so stupid he has more money than anyone — include:

• Safety features

• Auto wipers

• Auto high beams

• Cameras

• GPS

• Navigation

• Range estimation

• Excessive power use

• Faster battery degradation

Computer replacements may take months. Because billionaires aren’t good at doing things.

TUNNEL VISION ProPublica reports that the same guy who can’t make cars good is getting virtual carte blanche to undermine the entire city of Las Vegas. Literally.

According to ProPublica, Musk’s Boring Company is being allowed to dig a 0.8-mile tunnel under Vegas with virtually none of the burdensome regulations and oversight that typically slow big projects so that people can say something about them.

The so-called Vegas Loop is both privately operated and gets no federal funding, so Musk is basically able to do what he wants, thanks also to the Vegas tourism industry letting Musk do what he wants. ProPublica says the project essentially realizes Musk’s approach of forgoing thorough study and permission-getting beforehand and simply fining companies if shit goes wrong later.

Because why wouldn’t you trust a private sector in love with the fantasy of moving fast and breaking things?

Okay, you want fines — when it’s too late to undo the damage — to incentivize best practices? Throw in prison time and personal fines for the executives involved and we’ll talk.

MORE RECALL The GOP civil war continues to simmer. Steve Bannon, the sometime-consigliere and populism whisperer of Donald Trump, wants to recall Tesla’s faulty, malfunctioning, potentially life-threatening CEO.

In a new interview, Bannon says he wants Musk “run out of here by Inauguration Day,” calling him “a truly evil guy” pursuing “techno-feudalism on a global scale." Welcome to left-wing populism, sir!

In a weird mix of wokeness and racism against South Africans, Bannon says, “Why do we have South Africans⁴, the most racist people on earth, white South Africans, we have them making any comments at all on what goes on in the United States?”

Fun fact: “We” do not have that, Trump has that. And the why we have that is that Bannon and his Bannon-esque ilk helped elect him.

Three Quickies

• Vice-President-elect JD Vance says RePresident-elect Donald Trump shouldn’t pardon people who stormed the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, “If [they] committed violence on that day.” He also said, “If you protested peacefully on January 6th, and you had [Attorney General] Merrick Garland’s Department of Justice treat you like a gang member, you should be pardoned.” Vance didn’t specify who should be treated like a gang member or if they’re Black. It’s also worth noting that if you were “protesting peacefully” while illegally on federal property as part of a mob threatening to rape and kill elected representatives and install your chosen leader of the country in the name of Jesus then you have committed violence.

• Fellow Substacker and generous TFN booster Robert Leonard offers a helpful, news-you-can-use-and-not-die reminder — in a trenchant rumination on healthcare and health insurance — that Wednesday, Jan. 15, is the final day for Obamacare enrollment. Due to a weird glitch between the Roman and lunar calendars, Wednesday, Jan. 15, is also the final day to enroll in Affordable Care Act plans.

• Looming second-time First Lady Melania Trump reportedly is giving a preview today of her new Amazon documentary that Jeff Bezos’s company is spending $40 million to make, most of it presumably on special effects to make characters appear realistic. Trump says the documentary will include “moving to the White House, packing … [and] moving into the White House.” So basically it’s an Amazon unboxing video. And honestly the Trumps didn’t even have to move their shit, they could’ve just had Amazon ship them $40 million worth of tacky furniture.

TCB

HERE’S WHAT TFN’S NOT TELLING YOU! I’ve gotten in the habit of aping that annoying relic of the clickbait era — headlines that don’t tell you what the news is but tell you that the story will tell you what the news is. I did it last week and should’ve just headlined it “Trump’s Threats Are Illegal.” I’ll try do to better in the future. I mean, Wait Till You See What I’ll Try To Do Better in the Future!

IN THE REARVIEW Take a look at who we just passed on the Substack leaderboard with which I’m inexcusably obsessed!

SUPPORTING TFN Instead of posting this weekend, I spent both days researching — and even interviewing a source just like a real reporter! — for some reporting I’m racing to get out this week over on the Jonathan Larsen Substack before the Trump nomination hearings.

However, without posting anything, TFN took in zero revenue over the weekend. (My original reporting rarely yields new paid subscriptions; I do it anyway because I have a problem.)

I realize TFN’s sanity-checks and insanity smackdowns have real emotional value for you Newsfuckers, because you tell me so. But to improve our reality and not just emotionally cope with it, we need better understanding of what’s happening and why. That’s why I do original reporting, too. That no one else is doing. You can support both my reporting and TFN’s sanity-salvaging by donating or upgrading to paid subscriptions.

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Go get ‘em, kids!

1. I wasn’t sure whether that works better than gotchaing or gotching, so my apologies if I didn’t go with your preference.

2. I’m aware of the thinking that “tipping point” is a misleading and unhelpful way to think about global temperatures. And it can induce helplessness. There’s still stuff we can do and that is being done, so no despairing, please. TFN is a no-despairing zone for the comfort of our patrons.

3. Murder is still wrong. For now.

4. Musk is a U.S. citizen. About as wretched as refuse gets.