Paramount Caves to Trump’s Extortion, Disgraces CBS, Pays a $16M Bribe to Settle a Bogus Lawsuit

In yet another capitulation by Big Media to the ravenous whims of aspiring authoritarian Donald Trump, Paramount Global has succumbed to the insidious intimidation of a tyrannical threat intended to quash the freedom of the press guaranteed by the Constitution’s First Amendment. It’s just the latest assault on the media that Trump frequently refers to in Stalinist terms as “the enemy of the people.”

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Donald Trump and Media - ABC, CBS, NBC, MSNBC, CNN, FOX

On Wednesday morning it was announced that Paramount had agreed to a settlement of the lawsuit that Trump had brought against CBS News, alleging that the network had defamed him by editing part of an interview with Kamala Harris. Never mind that the the editing (which was nominated for an Emmy) was proper and routine and done only for time and clarity. To Trump it was an assault on his tender sensitivities…

SEE THIS: Snowflake Trump Whines He Suffered ‘Mental Anguish’ From the 60 Minutes Interview of Kamala Harris

The settlement was nothing more than Paramount bowing to the extortion of a mob boss president who was only interested in exacting revenge on a news organization that had the audacity to present a fair and balanced interview of a political opponent and to report the truth about him. As reported by CNN

“CBS News parent Paramount Global has agreed to pay $16 million to resolve a legally dubious lawsuit filed by President Donald Trump over a ’60 Minutes’ news report last fall.” […]

“Legal experts maintained that Trump’s suit was frivolous and that CBS was on solid ground to fight and win the case in court. But corporate priorities trumped journalistic principles. Paramount has been trying for months to complete a lucrative merger with Skydance Media, and the deal requires approval from the Trump administration, in part because CBS owns local stations that are licensed by the government. This gave Trump a form of leverage over Paramount.” […]

In short, Paramount paid a bribe to Trump in order to get him to allow their multibillion merger with Skydance Media (owned by Trump associates Larry and David Ellison) to proceed with approval from Trump’s FCC. The fate of the merger was of – shall we say paramount – concern to the chairwoman of the corporation, Shari Redstone, who stands to make hundreds of millions of dollars when the merger is completed.

The settlement that Paramount agreed to was for $16 million that would cover Trump’s legal expenses, with the remainder going to his eventual presidential library. But far worse than that, it establishes a precedent for bullying news enterprises in order to shape their reporting or to make them pay for being honest and independent. And despite the fact that there was no apology or other statement of wrongdoing or regret, Trump still claimed that he scored a total victory. His legal team said that…

“[The settlement] holds the Fake News media accountable for their wrongdoing and deceit. CBS and Paramount Global realized the strength of this historic case and had no choice but to settle.”

None of that statement is remotely related to reality. It’s hard to sue for $20 billion in damages – which was the original amount sought by Trump – and settle for 0.08% of that, and spin it as a strong case that Paramount “had no choice but to settle.” Particularly when Trump couldn’t even get any kind of an apology, and the funds would not be going directly to him, but to his library, if there ever is one.

Nevertheless, the damage done to the reputation of CBS News is significant and enduring. It was a decision by their corporate parent to sacrifice the network’s credibility in order to enrich their owners. And their weakness makes it harder for other news organizations to stand up to the kind of criminal protection racket tactics that Trump is so notorious for engaging in. Hopefully any other media outfit facing this in the future will have more courage than than the cowards at Paramount.

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Snowflake Trump Whines He Suffered ‘Mental Anguish’ From the 60 Minutes Interview of Kamala Harris

The reputation that Donald Trump has tried so fervently to fabricate for himself has always been a feat of fiction. He wants the world to regard him as a tough guy and a macho man, despite never having displayed any of the characteristics that would make that version of himself plausible.

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Donald Trump, Snowflakes

To the contrary, Trump is a five-time draft dodger who insults real military heroes as “suckers and losers.” He runs away from any challenging questions from scary journalists, who he maligns as “fake news” instead of providing an actual answer. And more recently he has been tagged with the label of being a T.A.C.O. – Trump Always Chickens Out – as a result of his failing to stand behind the phony facade he has presented on his tariff agenda.

SEE THIS: EAT THE TARIFFS? Trump Admits that His Tariffs Will Raise Prices, But Blames it on Walmart

So no one should be surprised that Trump is now making a claim that utterly destroys his pitiful aspiration to be admired as a strongman. In his lawsuit against CBS News his lawyers are asserting that he has suffered “mental anguish” having watched their 60 Minutes interview of Kamala Harris. The Associated Press (who Trump has banned from presidential avails) is reporting that

“President Donald Trump suffered ‘mental anguish’ from CBS News’ editing of a ’60 Minutes’ interview with Democratic opponent Kamala Harris last fall, his lawyers are arguing in court papers. Trump’s status as a ‘content creator’ was also damaged by attention given to the interview, lawyers said.”

Poor baby. Imagine having to endure the words of your political opponent spoken in the sort of coherent, complete sentences that you’re incapable of. It must be unbearable. So naturally you have your lawyers plead to the court that you, and even your cult disciples, were irreparably harmed, saying that “this led to widespread confusion and mental anguish of consumers, including plaintiffs.”

Of course, the facts of the case strongly favor 60 Minutes. What Trump preposterously says was “illegal” editing that should result in CBS being taken off the air and losing their broadcast license, was nothing but the ordinary editing of news interviews for time and clarity. And the segment was so professionally done that it has been nominated for an Emmy for – get this – “Outstanding Editing.”

MORE THERE: 60 Minutes Interview of Kamala Harris that Drove Trump to Sue CBS is Nominated for an Emmy

Unfortunately, Trump is using this lawsuit as a cudgel to coerce the CBS parent corporation, Paramount Global, to settle the case for millions of dollars. And there is the not-so-veiled threat that if they don’t settle, Trump’s FTC will refuse to greenlight the billion dollar merger that Paramount is pursuing with Skydance Media. Which is a blatantly illegal mob-style shakedown. And yet, Paramount is considering the settlement demand. Which is likely the reason that 60 Minutes producer, Bill Owens, and CBS News President Wendy McMahon have both resigned citing the corporate interference in their journalism.

In the meantime, let’s all keep Trump and his tender fee fees in our thoughts as he struggles to bear with the severe mental anguish of having media that refuses to worship him adoringly at all times. It must be a living hell for the Big Crybaby-in-Chief.

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60 Minutes Interview of Kamala Harris that Drove Trump to Sue CBS is Nominated for an Emmy

The crusade by Donald Trump to suppress the media, intimidate journalists, and bring an end to America’s constitutional protection of the free press, has accelerated since his reoccupation of the White House. His determination to emulate the sort of autocratic control that his idols (Vladimir Putin, Xi Jinping, Kim Jong Un, etc.) enjoy is the keystone of his MAGA Cult movement.

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Kamala Harris, Donald Trump baby

Among Trump’s brazen efforts to clamp down on independent news organizations and reporting is his lawsuit against CBS for what he claims was their “illegal” editing of an interview of Vice-President Kamala Harris near the end of the 2024 election campaign. It was just another attempt by Trump to use meritless legal tactics to bring the media to heel with threats and the abuse of the power of the presidency.

SEE THIS: Trump Threatens CBS Over Kamala Harris Interview on 60 Minutes He Says Was ‘Possibly Illegal’

Trump was furious at CBS and 60 Minutes for reporting in a manner that was consistent with honest and professional journalism. He posted a frothingly rabid comment in October of last year on his failing Twitter ripoff, Truth Social, saying that…

“60 MINUTES SHOULD BE IMMEDIATELY TAKEN OFF THE AIR – ELECTION INTERFERENCE. CBS SHOULD LOSE ITS LICENSE. THIS IS THE BIGGEST SCANDAL IN BROADCAST HISTORY. Kamala should be investigated and forced off the Campaign”

Trump is going to have an aneurism after he learns that the Academy of Television Arts and Sciences has just announced that the interview that triggered Trump’s wrath has been nominated for an Emmy in the very category that ruffled his scales. As reported by the Associated Press (which Trump has banned from presidential events)…

“Last fall’s ’60 Minutes’ story on Kamala Harris — the subject of Trump’s $20 billion lawsuit against CBS — was nominated for an Emmy Award Thursday for ‘outstanding edited interview.’ Trump, in his lawsuit, complained that the interview was deceptively edited to make his Democratic election opponent look good.”

That’s right. The interview that Trump baselessly asserted was “illegal” and “election interference” due to its editing, has been nominated for an Emmy for “Outstanding Editing.” Could there be a better example of the irrational inanity of Trump’s impotent whining?

Well, actually there can be. Because Trump is still doing it with even greater force of idiocy. A few days ago Trump posted a new comment absurdly claiming that “The case we have against 60 Minutes, CBS, and Paramount is a true WINNER.” He reiterated his false accusation that the interview was improperly edited. But then he escalated his legal threats to include the New York Times because they published an article that correctly reported that legal experts regarded his case as “baseless.” He wrote that…

“[T]he Failing New York Times, which is Fake News both in writing and polling, claims that ‘people’ said that the case is baseless. They don’t mean that, they just have a non curable case of TRUMP DERANGEMENT SYNDROME, possibly to the point where the Times’ interjection makes them liable for tortious interference, including in Elections, which we are intently studying.”

It is also notable that Trump’s legal threats are both a conflict of interest and a flagrant abuse of power. As David Corn of Mother Jones reports, Trump is simultaneously suing CBS and it’s corporate parent, Paramount, while his FCC chair, Brendan Carr, is reviewing a proposed merger between Paramount and Skydance Media. So Trump can extort a settlement from CBS under the threat of declining to approve the merger.

That wholly inappropriate scenario may have contributed to the resignation of 60 Minutes executive producer, Bill Owens, whose reason for leaving after 37 years included the complaint that he “would not be allowed to run the show as I have always run it. To make independent decisions based on what was right for 60 Minutes, right for the audience.”

Hopefully CBS will not capitulate to Trump’s demands. What is clear is that everyone who has done so previously has paid a price for it, financially and reputationally. And those who have stood up against him have prevailed. That’s because the law, and the Constitution, and the people are on the side of unfettered freedom of the press. And it’s why Trump’s totalitarian efforts to undermine it will fail in the end.

UPDATE: An outraged and deranged Trump is predictably whining that the 60 Minutes interview “has now been nominated for an award by the totally discredited Emmys. Did 60 Minutes and its Corporate Parents apply to get an Emmy for an illegally falsified interview?”

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Trump Escalates His War on the Press – and the Courts – with Predictably Preposterous Results

The road toward totalitarianism that Donald Trump has taken since he was reelected last November is becoming ever more clear with each day of his reoccupation of the White House. Despite being reprimanded and constrained by judicial injunctions, Trump continues to ignore the courts and forge his own unlawful path to satisfy his autocratic cravings.

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Donald Trump

Earlier this year, Trump acted out his aspirational dreams of being America’s first dictator by banning the Associated Press from presidential events because they refused to obey his petty and unconstitutional demand to refer to the Gulf of Mexico as the Gulf of America. It was a blatant violation of the First Amendment’s protection of the free press.

SEE THIS: The Media Must Boycott Trump’s Phony Press Conferences Until He Stops Censoring Journalists

Undaunted by the principles of press freedom and the rule of law, Trump has now defied a court ruling to allow the AP into his media avails. According to Mediaite…

“Despite a recent injunction reinstating access, an AP spokesperson confirmed their journalists were denied access to an Oval Office press event on Monday. ‘Our journalists were blocked from the Oval Office today. We expect the White House to restore AP’s participation in the pool as of today, as provided in the injunction order.’”

The AP is being extraordinarily naïve if they really expect Trump to comply with the law. He has already demonstrated his disrespect for law and order by refusing to comply with a judge’s ruling to facilitate the return of a Maryland father that Trump’s immigration regime unlawfully sent to a gulag in El Salvador.

As a result of Trump’s efforts to banish credible journalists from the White House press pool, we are seeing more questions like the one that Trump received on Monday about his recent physical examination. Brian Glenn, a “reporter” from the rabidly right-wing MAGA outlet, Real America’s Voice (and Marjorie Taylor Greene’s boyfriend), raised the subject with an adoring preface and a sickly sycophantic slant in the following exchange…

Reporter: You got a perfect health report. Everybody in the press wants to know this. How do you do it Mr President? … How do you stay so healthy? … How in the world do you do it? I’m 55 years old and I can’t keep up with you.
Trump: Because I enjoy what I’m doing […] Thank you. That’s a nice question. I like this guy!

Q: You got a perfect health report. Everybody in the press wants to know this — how do you do it Mr President? How do you stay so healthy?TRUMP: Because I love what I'm doing

Aaron Rupar (@atrupar.com) 2025-04-14T15:26:26.285Z

HOLY SHIH TZU! Could this get any closer to parody? Why didn’t the reporter just ask why Trump is so handsome, smarter than Einstein, and better fit than an NFL quarterback? Which is not far from what Trump’s alleged physical report claimed. It says that he is 6’3″ and 224 pounds. Which is almost identical to that of Patrick Mahomes of the Kansas City Chiefs.

The question above was not the first of its kind. Last week a “reporter” from MyPillow’s Mike Lindell network asked

“Trump looks healthier than ever before. I’m sure everybody in this room could agree. Is he working out with Bobby Kennedy and is he eating less McDonald’s?”

Are these reporters so infatuated with Trump that this is their way of asking him out on date? Notice that in both questions the reporter spoke for everyone else in the press pool, asserting that they all agree that Trump is a superior human specimen. However, most of the rest of the country doesn’t hold these perverse views. In fact, they are increasingly repulsed by Trump and his performance in office.

According to a new CBS News poll, “Most Americans recognize that the economy is getting worse.” Although there is a sharp partisan divide showing that 80% of Democrats say the economy is “bad” while 62% of Republicans say it’s “good.” Overall, Trump’s disapproval rating shot up to a majority 53% from 47% two short months ago.

What’s more, the percentage of Americans who say the economy is getting worse rose 11 points from 42% to 53% between November and March. And who is to blame for the worsening economy flipped in the past month from Biden by 4 point to Trump by 33 points – a 54% majority saying Trump is to blame.

Meanwhile, Trump continues to attack the media. His latest salvo is another swipe at CBS 60 Minutes over Sunday’s program that featured an interview of Ukrainian President Zelenskyy, and a story about Greenland. Trump posted a rambling rant on his failing Twitter ripoff, Truth Social, saying that…

“I am so honored to be suing 60 Minutes, CBS Fake News, and Paramount, over their fraudulent, beyond recognition, reporting. They did everything possible to illegally elect Kamala, including completely and corruptly changing major answers to Interview questions.” [And that…]

“They should lose their license! Hopefully, the Federal Communications Commission (FCC), as headed by its Highly Respected Chairman, Brendan Carr, will impose the maximum fines and punishment, which is substantial, for their unlawful and illegal behavior.”

This psychotic scrambled egghead is still obsessed with Kamala Harris. And he is imagining “unlawful and illegal behavior” where none exists. Over which he has given orders to his FCC chair to commence some sort of punitive proceedings. These are the acts of an aspiring authoritarian who seeks to muzzle the media and ship his critics off to foreign prisons. And if the American people don’t rise up to reject it, many of them may find themselves in the same boat.

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Trump Hurls Hate and Fear at All of the Media He’s Suing Following the ABC News Capitulation

The forecasts of doom that have proliferated since Donald Trump managed to squeak by to win a second term occupying the White House are coming true even before he’s been inaugurated. And the reality is proving to be even worse than the predictions. He is promising to rule in the model of his totalitarian heroes, and his proposed Cabinet is a House of Horrors.

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Donald Trump

Last week ABC News agreed to settle a lawsuit filed by Trump against the network for $15 million. The suit alleged that “This Week” anchor George Stephanopoulos had defamed Trump by asserting that he had been found liable for rape by the jury in the defamation case filed by writer E. Jean Carroll. However, it was the judge who, after the fact, said that Trump’s assault amounted to rape, as the term is generally understood. The jury only found that Trump was liable for sexual abuse. And Trump seems to regard being a confirmed sexual abuser as a victory.

SEE THIS: TRUMP WINS? ABC News Settles His Lawsuit Confirming that He Was Found Liable for Sexual Abuse

Following the ABC News settlement, Trump is already talking excitedly about his efforts to punish other media with vengeance-fueled lawsuits. It is his way of terrorizing the free press that he refers to in Stalinist terms as “the enemy of the people.” So in an impromptu press conference Monday morning, Trump lashed out at the media in his typically hostile manner.

Trump began his rant about suing the media (at 30:33 in the video below) with an inane threat to sue the Des Moines Register over a poll that showed him losing the election, which he called “fraud” and “election interference.” Then he went to discuss his lawsuit against CBS News saying that…

“We’re filing one on 60 Minutes, where they took Kamala’s answer, which was a crazy answer, a horrible answer. And they took the whole answer out and they replaced it with something else she said later on in the interview. […] And that was fraud. and election interference by their news magazine, a big part of CBS News.

Of course, none of what he said is remotely true. 60 Minutes did nothing more than to make routine edits for time and clarity. Nothing they did impacted the content or context of the interview. But that didn’t stop Trump from demanding that the license for CBS – and ALL broadcast networks – be revoked. [Note: The federal government does not license networks, only individual stations]. And he was just getting started. He continued…

“We’re involved in one, which has been going on for a while very successfully, against Bob Woodward, where he didn’t quote me properly from the tapes. And then on top of everything else, he sold the tapes. Which he wasn’t allowed to do.”

Once again, Trump is lying. Woodward taped his conversations with Trump for the book, RAGE!, and used them for that purpose. Furthermore, he quoted Trump verbatim, and has the tapes to back that up. In the book Woodward documented how Trump lied and downplayed COVID when he knew just how deadly it was. But he still wasn’t finished. He went on…

“And we have one very interestingly on Pulitzer, because reporters at the New York Times, Washington Post got Pulitzer prizes for their wonderful, accurate, and highly professional reporting on the Russia, Russia, Russia hoax. Well, it turned out to be a hoax, and they were exactly wrong.”

This may be the most absurd lawsuit of them all. Trump isn’t suing the New York Times or the Washington Post. He’s suing the Pulitzer committee at Columbia University, who are entirely within their rights to award prizes as they see fit. What’s more, Trump claims that the articles documenting his unsavory associations with Russia “turned out to be a hoax,” that “now everybody admits.” Which could not be farther from the truth. Even the Republican led Senate Intelligence Committee report affirmed the Trump/Russia connections.

SEE ALSO: GEEZ! Trump is STILL Obsessed With the ‘Russia, Russia, Russia Hoax’ that is NOT a Hoax

Trump also spent some time flattering his Ministry of Propaganda, Fox News. He babbled that…

“Sean Hannity got it right. Many people got it right. Tucker [Carlson] got it right. Jesse [Watters] got it right. Laura [Ingraham] got it right. Jeanine [Pirro] got it right. A lot of people got it right. They didn’t get anything. They gave it to reporters that got it absolutely wrong. And now everybody admits it was a hoax. And I want them to take back the Pulitzer prizes and pay damages. […]

I feel I have to do this. I shouldn’t really be the one to do it. It should have been the Justice Department, or somebody else. But I have to do it. It costs a lot of money to do it. But we have to straighten out the press. Our press is very corrupt, almost as corrupt as our elections.”

The only things that any of them got right, at least from Trump’s perverse perspective, was their unwavering adoration of Trump and conformity to his worldview. And any deviation from that will result in punitive measures that will be carried out by his administration, overseen by his nominee for FBI Director, Kash Patel, who has sworn to “come after the people in the media.”

Will the media allow this unconstitutional persecution of the free press to proceed? Hopefully the surrender by ABC News isn’t the consensus answer to that question.

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Fox News Edits Trump Video in the Same Way that They Accused CBS, Which Trump Said Was Illegal

The bar for hypocrisy by Donald Trump and his MAGA media apologists has been set so low that a cockroach couldn’t limbo underneath it. But that doesn’t stop them from trying. Case in point… Fox News has been revealed to have engaged in behavior that they previously castigated CBS for, even though CBS did not do what Fox alleged, but Fox did.

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Fox News, Fake News

A couple of weeks ago, Vice-President Kamala Harris was interviewed on CBS’ 60 Minutes. This interview has been an annual tradition for presidential candidates of both parties for fifty years. This year, however, Trump chickened out, which was probably a rare wise decision on his part given the increasing frequency of his abhorrent commentaries and humiliating mental glitches that has caused him to cancel multiple media events.

SEE THIS: Scaredy Trump Has Retreated to the Safety of His Fox News Bunker While Canceling Other Media

Following the Harris interview, Trump lashed out at CBS with a preposterous accusation that the network had improperly edited the discussion in order to make her look better. Trump raged that the interview was “A giant Fake News Scam by CBS & 60 Minutes…which is totally illegal.” He called for CBS – and all the other broadcast news networks – to have their licenses revoked (FYI: broadcast TV networks are not licensed by the federal government). But even that wasn’t enough to satisfy him. He also demanded that Harris drop out of the race.

MORE HERE: Tyrant Trump Demands ALL TV News Licenses Be Revoked and Kamala Harris Concede the Election

As it turns out, there is a network that improperly edited a campaign event for a presidential candidate. And no one will be surprised to learn that it was Fox News and the candidate was Donald Trump.

Trump staged a totally phony photo-op at a barbershop in the Bronx. The shop, and all of those present in it, were pre-screened Trump supporters. And now the segment that Fox News produced there has been exposed for its blatant deceit. As reported by CNN

“Trump was seen taking questions and making small talk with Black and Hispanic barbershop customers and workers [but] Fox edited out many of Trump’s rambling comments and false claims. Participants had to repeatedly follow up when Trump meandered away from the original point of their questions.

CNN reported that the editing by Fox News deliberately excised some of Trump’s most noxious comments. They included his repeating the nonsense about Haitian migrants in Springfield, Ohio, eating cats and dogs, his incoherent rambling in response to a question about taxes, and his gushing praise for Hungarian dictator, Viktor Orbán.

A Fox News spokeswoman admitted that the barbershop segments “were pre-taped and edited…for time and clarity.” Which, according to CNN’s analysis of the raw footage, is false. There was a clear attempt to alter the impression made by Trump at the fake campaign stop. However, Fox’s excuse is exactly what CBS said about its editing of the 60 Minutes segment, which Trump insisted was illegal. So it’s apparently okay for Fox News to do it, but a criminal offense if CBS does.

An attorney for CBS replied to the threat made by Trump to sue the network, saying that…

“‘It begs logic to argue that 60 Minutes hid the first part of the Vice President’s answer to the question,’ [CBS SVP Gayle C.] Sproul wrote. ‘It did not. The public is aware of that part of her answer because 60 Minutes itself publicly distributed it by providing it to Face the Nation for promotional purposes and posting it on X and other 60 Minutes-branded social media for the same reason.'”

This isn’t the first time that Fox News has manufactured such a brazenly biased charade and passed it off as “news.” They recently aired a program that they promoted as a citizens town hall with Trump. However, the audience was stacked with MAGA devotees whose questions were marinated in a glutinous purée of adoration for Dear Leader.

SEE ALSO: Fox News Hosts a MAGA-Only ‘Town Hall’ that is Actually a Lie-Riddled Trump Campaign Infomercial

The fact that Fox News is so committed to shilling for Trump and other MAGA Republican politicians and policies is not exactly a new discovery. But the fact that they are so bad at it after so many years of practice is pretty pathetic. And as their partisan goals get farther from reach – such as Trump’s candidacy – we can expect them to crawl even farther out on the limb of dishonesty and journalistic misconduct.

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Tyrant Trump Demands ALL TV News Licenses Be Revoked and Kamala Harris Concede the Election

Ordinarily, a presidential candidate would conduct their campaign in a manner that would amplify his or her most appealing character traits and suppress or minimize those most likely to alienate or repulse voters. But the campaign of Donald Trump is, to say the very least, anything but ordinary.

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Donald Trump Tyrant Dictator

During his short career in politics, Trump has managed to project an extraordinary variety of repulsive traits. They include his rancid prejudices (racism, misogyny, xenophobia, etc.), his pathetically infantile responses to well deserved criticism, his pitiful ignorance of life in America (government, history, law, culture, etc.), his noxious and delusional narcissism, and perhaps most troubling, his affinity for foreign dictators that mirrors his own authoritarian aspirations. The latter he actually said aloud to his Fox News pal, Sean Hannity…

SEE THIS: Trump Cloddishly Dodges Hannity’s Softball Questions About Whether He Would Be a Dictator

Now, as Election Day draws nearer, Trump is continuing to emphasize the personality defects that repel the most people. In a series of utterly unhinged rants on his floundering Twitter ripoff, Truth Social, Trump lashed out at the media that he despises with rhetoric that confirms his dreams of tyrannical power. It was an absurd extension of his previous outburst threatening to revoke the broadcast license of CBS for airing a 60 Minutes interview of Kamala Harris. Now he is including ALL broadcast networks. He began by bellowing

“A giant Fake News Scam by CBS & 60 Minutes. Her REAL ANSWER WAS CRAZY, OR DUMB, so they actually REPLACED it with another answer in order to save her or, at least, make her look better. A FAKE NEWS SCAM, which is totally illegal. TAKE AWAY THE CBS LICENSE. Election Interference. She is a Moron, and the Fake News Media wants to hide that fact. An UNPRECEDENTED SCANDAL!!! The Dems got them to do this and should be forced to concede the Election? WOW!”

Needless to say, Trump has no evidence that CBS altered anything that Harris said in the interview, other than routine editing for time. Trump is manifesting figments of his severely perverse imagination. Furthermore, there would be nothing illegal about such editing if it did occur. Consequently, Trump’s demand that Harris “be forced to concede the Election.” is what psychiatrists would describe as “NUTZ!” It’s an impotent demand that Trump is making because he knows that he is losing. But he was just getting started. He continued his rant saying that…

“60 Minutes is a major part of the News Organization of CBS, which has just created the Greatest Fraud in Broadcast History. CBS should lose its license, and it should be bid out to the Highest Bidder, as should all other Broadcast Licenses, because they are just as corrupt as CBS — and maybe even WORSE!”

Once again, CBS did nothing wrong. But Trump’s “solution” to what his diseased brain is concocting is to revoke the licenses of ALL broadcast networks. Because that’s precisely what his idols (Vladimir Putin, Xi Jinping, Kim Jong Un, etc.) would do. Never mind that networks are not licensed by the federal government, only individual stations. What Trump is proposing is, nevertheless, an open assault on the First Amendment of the Constitution and contrary to American principles. But why would Trump care about that now. He never has before. Then he wound up by saying that…

“With me, 60 Minutes does the exact opposite! They take everything I say, realize how totally BRILLIANT it is, and take it out. So, with Kamala they add, with ‘TRUMP,’ they delete. Like the Democrat Party, THEY ARE A THREAT TO DEMOCRACY!”

Once again, Trump is suffering from bizarre hallucinations. He didn’t do (aka chickened out of) the 60 Minutes interview this week, so there was nothing he said to delete, and certainly nothing that was “brilliant.” Even if he were referring to an interview from 2020, it was Trump who cut it short, walking out before it was completed. Lately he has been demanding that Lesley Stahl apologize to him for something that she never said in that interview.

What Trump is whining about in these comments should be a bright red flag for American voters. Trump is promising that, if returned to power, he would abuse it in the same way that his totalitarian heroes do. And if he would abuse power to oppress the media, he would abuse it to oppress every other institution – and even individuals – that he finds objectionable, or that are insufficiently worshipful of him.

That should be the message that Americans take into the voting booth this year. And they must vote for Harris and Walz if they want to preserve America’s free press and, even more foundational, America’s democracy.

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Trump Threatens CBS Over Kamala Harris Interview on 60 Minutes He Says Was ‘Possibly Illegal’

Donald Trump has spent the past nine years castigating the media in the most vile terms. He regularly insults journalists as “stupid,” “lying,” “corrupt,” and biased against him, simply because they report the things he actually does and says. He maligns them with the same language that Stalin used, calling them “the enemy of the people.”

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Donald Trump, Constitution

Trump’s fear and fury at the press is a core feature of his perverse persona. He labels any reporting that isn’t sufficiently worshipful “fake news.” Even his official Ministry of Propaganda (aka Fox News) isn’t safe from his seething animosity. And his anger extends far beyond mere insults and tantrums. He often issues impotent threats if a news network has the audacity to engage in responsible journalism. For example…

SEE THIS: Wannabe Dictator Trump Threatens to Revoke ABC News Broadcast License in Fox News Interview

On Wednesday morning Trump was so bothered by a recent media event that he unleashed a rambling and rancid rant on his failing social media scam, Truth Social. The object of his outrage was the 60 Minutes interview of Vice-President Kamala Harris on Monday. Trump had agreed to participate at first, but later chickened out because he objected to their insistence on {gasp} fact-checking. And now, after the fact, Trump is lashing out with another lame and utterly preposterous threat. He raged that…

“I’ve never seen this before, but the producers of 60 Minutes sliced and diced (‘cut and pasted’) Lyin’ Kamala’s answers to questions, which were virtually incoherent, over and over again, some by as many as four times in a single sentence or thought, all in an effort, possibly illegal as part of the ‘News Division,’ which must be licensed, to make her look ‘more Presidential,’ or a least, better. It may also be a major Campaign Finance Violation.”

What Trump is whining about is that 60 Minutes edited the Harris interview, something that is done routinely in television journalism for legitimate reasons, including time constraints, clarity, and relevance. Trump’s assertion that some answers were edited “four times in a single sentence” is downright bonkers. And there is no indication whatsoever that Harris’ answers were altered to effect some political advantage. Trump’s complaint doesn’t even make sense, because he’s accusing CBS of edits that resulted in the answers being “virtually incoherent.” How would that help Harris?

Most troubling is Trump’s charge that the 60 Minutes interview was in some way “illegal.” As usual, Trump doesn’t provide any evidence of a crime, nor any statute that has been violated. He simply believes that if it bothers him it must be against the law. So he latches onto the fact that TV stations (not network “news divisions”) must be licensed to use the public airwaves. Which is his way of threatening CBS with the revocation of its license if they do not comply with his tyrannical demands.

This threat is consistent with Trump’s abhorrence of the free press. And it’s also consistent with his flaming hypocrisy. He has never complained that Fox News regularly (albeit futilely) edits his interviews to make him look better. He has never accused Newsmax of campaign finance violations for their slobbering sycophancy. And he doesn’t seem to object to the constant sane-washing of his demented speeches by the rest of the so-called “mainstream” media. Which leads us to the rest of his Truth(less) (anti)Social comment…

“This is a stain on the reputation of 60 Minutes that is not recoverable – It will always remain with this once storied brand. I have never heard of such a thing being done in ‘News.’ It is the very definition of FAKE NEWS! The public is owed a MAJOR AND IMMEDIATE APOLOGY! This is an open and shut case, and must be investigated, starting today!”

The public is indeed owed an apology – from Trump. His hostility toward the press is another example of his imminent threat to democracy. And his attempts to intimidate the media are antithetical to the Constitution that he has said he would “terminate.”

If this is “an open and shut case,” why is Trump yammering about it on his website that no one but his glassy-eyed cult followers read, rather than filing a complaint with the FCC or the Justice Department? Maybe because even he knows that he’s full of **it.

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Kamala Harris is Blitzing Media that Donald Trump is Too Afraid of To Do

On July 21, 2024, President Biden made the courageous, selfless, and patriotic decision to withdraw from the presidential election and endorse his Vice-President, Kamala Harris. It was a decision that dramatically altered the political landscape and set the stage for a historic race and, if successful, America’s first woman to serve as President.

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Donald Trump, Newspapers, Baby, Hate

From the day that Harris became the Democratic candidate, Donald Trump and his MAGA Republicans in politics and the press embarked on a vicious campaign of slander and deceit in an effort to drag down her favorability with voters (which hasn’t worked). And the MAGA media was instrumental in that coordinated campaign of character assassination…

SEE THIS: Crybaby Trump Tells Fox News that They Should Only Put on Sycophantic Trump-Fluffers

Much of the criticism that emanated from the Trump camp centered on the allegation that Harris was avoiding interviews with the press. The Trumpists, and especially Trump himself, accused her of having a “low IQ” and being too “stupid” to engage the press. These are the sort of typically infantile insults that are the hallmark of Trump’s stunted emotional state.

To be sure, Harris was not prioritizing such events in the early days of her campaign. But it wasn’t due to any lack of ability or intellect. It was because she had just become a candidate with an unusually compressed time line leading up to Election Day.

Now that some of the pressures from building a campaign team, managing the Democratic Party convention, and participating in debates, has eased, Harris is scheduling more media avails. This week it was announced that she will be interviewed on “The View;” she will guest on “Late Night with Stephen Colbert;” she will visit with Howard Stern; she will be interviewed on Univision; and she will appear on the traditional “60 Minutes” pre-election episode.

This is a media blitz that is well-timed with only a month to go before Election Day, and while early voting has already begun in some states. And it is likely just the beginning.

Trump on the other hand, is continuing to shelter himself in his Mar-a-Lago bunker. He only leaves to hold his cult rallies in safe communities before his glassy-eyed disciples. What media he engages in is limited to MAGA-friendly outlets like Fox News, Newsmax, and obscure podcasts hosted by fringe characters with extremist views. And even those bookings are phone-in affairs that he can conduct in his jammies in his Palm Beach home/hotel.

It is notable that the media with whom Harris is meeting this week are broadly popular programs that reach millions of Americans. And with the exception of Colbert, they are not particularly partisan. They are, however, precisely the sort of press that frightens Trump. “The View” is a show hosted by outspoken women from both sides of the aisle. And Trump hates women. Trump also hates comedy, so the Colbert and Stern bookings would scare the pants off of him.

MORE HERE: Crybaby Trump: I Hate it When People Laugh at Me, and When Kamala Harris Laughs at All

Trump also hates people of color, so Univision won’t be on his agenda. And while Trump initially agreed to do “60 Minutes,” he later chickened out, because it’s actually a hard news program, which he hates with a passion.

Now that Harris is making herself more available to the press, and Trump is cowering in his whine cellar, will the media abandon its portrayal of Harris as being averse to interviews? Will they accurately point out that it is Trump who trembles with fear at the thought of meeting the press? Or even meeting with Harris for another debate?

Time will tell. But with Election Day coming soon there isn’t much time to correct the false impressions that the media has been spewing for weeks. And the past performance of the press this year is less than impressive. Sadly, they appear to be just as afraid of Trump as he is of them.

UPDATE 10/15/2024: In the week that has passed since this published, Harris has continued to schedule more interviews with a broad variety of media, including Fox News. Trump, on the other hand, has remained in his MAGA-fied bunker. He did a town hall hosted by GOP governor, Kristi Noem. And he just canceled an interview with CNBC, which has been a friendly spot for him.

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Marjorie Taylor Greene Interview on 60 Minutes Was a Propaganda – and Ratings – Flop

On Sunday night CBS News humiliated itself by presenting a sappy personal profile of Republican QAnon representative, Marjorie Taylor Greene, on its perennial news magazine, 60 Minutes. The interview was conducted by Lesley Stahl who, while having a renowned reputation as a journalist, made some amateurish mistakes in both her questioning and framing of the extremist congresswoman.

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Marjorie Taylor Greene, QAnon

The interview was rife with flagrant falsehoods by Greene, along with her attempts to rewrite history (videos below). She denied her grossly offensive comments about Democrats, about whom she used tortured and twisted logic to malign as pedophiles. She refuted her prior statements approving of shooting Nancy Pelosi. She pretended that she had nothing to do with posts on her Twitter account asserting that the mass shooting at the Parkland school was a “false flag” operation by gun safety advocates. That’s not the first time that she made that charge. She said the same thing about the mass shooting in Las Vegas.

All of these, as well as many other disgusting sentiments, were well documented and a few were displayed on screen as Greene issued her denials. And anyone who has been paying attention knows the depths to which Greene’s extremism descends.

RELATED: Marjorie Taylor Greene Floats Fascist Proposal for Red States to Prohibit Democrats From Voting

The good news is that Green’s interview was not widely disseminated. The Nielsen ratings for 60 Minutes Sunday night were the second lowest for the season to date. And this episode was 33% lower than last weeks episode. Greene was the headliner for the program and, thus, is entitled to full credit for its failure.

Apparently America wasn’t interested in tuning in to her bullpucky. Perhaps fittingly, Nielsen reported that 6.66 million people watched the show. That’s an audience figure that should please the demonic demographic within the Republican Party.

It was irresponsible for CBS to give Greene a virtually unchallenged platform to advance her crackpot conspiracy theories. Stahl should make a point of following up the interview with a fact check and rebuttal on next week’s program. That probably won’t happen. But at least we can be encouraged by the low interest of American TV viewers in Greene’s gibberish and lies. Hopefully the only thing that people remember from this interview is how nuts the GOP has become to elevate someone like Greene.

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