CNN vs The Whitehouse

As our nation seems to be daily moving farther and farther apart ideologically, the recent confrontation between the White House and CNN’s Jim Acosta seems to perfectly capture where we stand today as a society.  

Over the past few days, I’ve seen posts explaining how Acosta “put his hands on” a White House intern, followed by “Acosta never touched her,” followed by “his credentials being suspended is a violation of the freedom of the press.”

The most disturbing element of this entire saga is not the drama between CNN and the White House.....it is us.  We the people have become so blinded by our own loyalties that we seem to be intentionally blinding ourselves to the reality of a situation that has played out before our collective eyes.  Sadly, as people, we seem intent on seeing the situation from the perspective of the side for which we root.  

If we the people are ever to be “We the People” we must at least learn to be honest with ourselves about the theatrics we are presented by BOTH the government that oversees us and the media that exploits us for the financial gain of good ratings.  

During this exchange, Acosta asked the President a question.  The President answered the question before, Acosta who didn’t like the answer, began to challenge it with not just follow up questions, but follow up commentary about his perception as to the reality of the situation.  When told to hand over the mic, he became confrontational with the President, who became confrontational with him back.  An intern came over to retrieve the mic and Acosta pulled away, trying to maintain control of the mic. His left hand made contact with the lady’s arm.  

The claim of the White House that Acosta “put his hands on” this young lady is a very gross exaggeration of what occurred as the contact was slight.  

At the same time Acosta’s claim that he “never touched her” is equally false as he clearly “touched” her however incidental that contact might have been.  

CNN has since accused the White House of doctoring the footage of the incident to make it appear the contact was more aggressive than it was, a claim that may very well be valid.   Yet the hypocrisy of CNN to accuse the White House of doctoring footage is glaring, as they have already been caught several times manipulating footage of events to make them appear different than they were.  The selective editing of a video involving the sister of Sylville Smith comes to mind. She was made to appear as if she was calling for peace, when the entirety of the incident shows she was calling for violence in a different neighborhood.

The president then takes a few moments to scold Acosta for being rude, another hypocritical act from a man who takes to Twitter to berate people on a regular basis.  

After all of this, when Acosta’s press credentials are revoked, there are hysterical cries that the freedom of the press is under assault by this action.  This completely disregards the fact that Acosta on many, many occasions seeks to grandstand with the White House and monopolize the media time by interrupting and essentially robbing all of the other press outlets time to ask questions of their own.  

What “We the People” might want to eventually consider...is that when the White House calls CNN “fake news” and CNN accuses the White House of being divisive and fear mongering....rather than take sides.....perhaps we should be open to the possibility that both of them are right.