<div dir="ltr"><a href="http://prospect.org/article/media-will-be-trumps-enemy-long-hes-president">http://prospect.org/article/media-will-be-trumps-enemy-long-hes-president</a><br><div><br></div><div><p dir="ltr" style="margin:0px 0px 26px;padding:0px;border:0px;font-variant-numeric:inherit;font-stretch:inherit;font-size:16px;line-height:26px;font-family:"droid serif",cambria,georgia,"times new roman",times,serif;vertical-align:baseline;color:rgb(51,51,51)"><span id="gmail-docs-internal-guid-0077d6eb-c8be-4d47-cd6a-4b5fda4056bc" style="margin:0px;padding:0px;border:0px;font-style:inherit;font-variant:inherit;font-weight:inherit;font-stretch:inherit;font-size:inherit;line-height:inherit;font-family:inherit;vertical-align:baseline">Trump got to the White House on a campaign that presented itself as an assault on entrenched power, both economic and political. He would storm the castle on behalf of ordinary people, then throw out those whose boots had been on the little guy's neck for so long.</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="margin:0px 0px 26px;padding:0px;border:0px;font-variant-numeric:inherit;font-stretch:inherit;font-size:16px;line-height:26px;font-family:"droid serif",cambria,georgia,"times new roman",times,serif;vertical-align:baseline;color:rgb(51,51,51)"><span id="gmail-docs-internal-guid-0077d6eb-c8be-4d47-cd6a-4b5fda4056bc" style="margin:0px;padding:0px;border:0px;font-style:inherit;font-variant:inherit;font-weight:inherit;font-stretch:inherit;font-size:inherit;line-height:inherit;font-family:inherit;vertical-align:baseline">But here's the problem: Once you've become the most powerful person in the country (not to mention the world), shaking your fist at the powerful becomes rather awkward. You can't decry "Washington" when you run Washington.</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="margin:0px 0px 26px;padding:0px;border:0px;font-variant-numeric:inherit;font-stretch:inherit;font-size:16px;line-height:26px;font-family:"droid serif",cambria,georgia,"times new roman",times,serif;vertical-align:baseline;color:rgb(51,51,51)"><span id="gmail-docs-internal-guid-0077d6eb-c8be-4d47-cd6a-4b5fda4056bc" style="margin:0px;padding:0px;border:0px;font-style:inherit;font-variant:inherit;font-weight:inherit;font-stretch:inherit;font-size:inherit;line-height:inherit;font-family:inherit;vertical-align:baseline">So Trump needs an enemy to use as a foil, [and] </span><span style="font-family:inherit;font-size:inherit;font-style:inherit;font-variant-ligatures:inherit;font-variant-caps:inherit;font-weight:inherit"> </span><span style="font-family:inherit;font-size:inherit;font-style:inherit;font-variant-ligatures:inherit;font-variant-caps:inherit;font-weight:inherit">the press is the natural choice, because he's already been railing against it, it has obvious power, it's going to be critical of him (or at least critical enough that he'll have something to point at), and it can be cast as part of the elite without any suggestion that, like the economic elite, it's actually in cahoots with him.</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="margin:0px 0px 26px;padding:0px;border:0px;font-variant-numeric:inherit;font-stretch:inherit;font-size:16px;line-height:26px;font-family:"droid serif",cambria,georgia,"times new roman",times,serif;vertical-align:baseline;color:rgb(51,51,51)"><span id="gmail-docs-internal-guid-0077d6eb-c8be-4d47-cd6a-4b5fda4056bc" style="margin:0px;padding:0px;border:0px;font-style:inherit;font-variant:inherit;font-weight:inherit;font-stretch:inherit;font-size:inherit;line-height:inherit;font-family:inherit;vertical-align:baseline">But this is a fight that Trump can't win over the long run, even if he's being cheered on by his supporters. The media has an even bigger megaphone than him—indeed, they are the megaphone—so they'll always be able to push back, even if they don't always do it as skillfully or thoughtfully as they should. But more importantly, when Trump rides into battle against the media, he's not doing it on anyone's behalf but his own. He can't say, "I'm attacking the media in order to help you, the people"—or maybe he can say it, but it won't be very convincing. It's a pure expression of his narcissistic self-absorption.</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="margin:0px 0px 26px;padding:0px;border:0px;font-variant-numeric:inherit;font-stretch:inherit;font-size:16px;line-height:26px;font-family:"droid serif",cambria,georgia,"times new roman",times,serif;vertical-align:baseline;color:rgb(51,51,51)"><span style="margin:0px;padding:0px;border:0px;font-style:inherit;font-variant:inherit;font-weight:inherit;font-stretch:inherit;font-size:inherit;line-height:inherit;font-family:inherit;vertical-align:baseline"><span style="font-family:"droid serif",cambria,georgia,"times new roman",times,serif">But we're going to get a lot of that in the days to come. And since Trump would satisfied with nothing less than an American version of Pravda spread out over the entire news media, he'll never be pleased, and he'll never stop fighting those who report on him.</span><br></span></p></div></div>