Summary
Sen. Bill Hagerty (R-TN) dismissed the necessity of FBI background checks for Donald Trump’s cabinet nominees, claiming the public prioritizes implementing Trump’s policies over vetting appointees.
On ABC’s This Week, Hagerty criticized Biden officials and supported Trump’s expedited transition process, despite reports that many nominees, including Pete Hegseth and Tulsi Gabbard, have bypassed FBI checks.
Moderator Jonathan Karl expressed concern over abandoning standard vetting practices, but Hagerty argued the FBI is “weaponized” and insisted checks would be completed quickly, though no evidence supports his claims of agency bias.
The folks who are shocked seems to be because they can’t interpret beyond the exact literal words they say.
I think way too many people in journalism were taught that they should be stenographers who should be mostly concerned about having access to politicians, and being overly gun-shy of being labeled “liberal” (ZOMG! Not liberal!).
Thing is, the nuts will call them “liberal” no matter what, so playing the bullshit “objective” game of trying to find “both sides” to every story, no matter how much one side is fucking lying their ass off, is just not going to prevent the wingers from calling corporate outlets “liberal”.
It’s an abdication of journalistic responsibility, this refusal to contextualize and explain. It’s all just repeating the surface of what people said today, without any attempt to communicate what’s at stake and why it matters. This is the journalistic equivalent of the useless manager who does nothing but forward emails.
My local news channel yesterday kept repeating “so called hush money”. It’s not so called he was fucking convicted.