WaPo Forced to Change SOTU Headline After Liberals Have a Meltdown
The Washington Post’s new slogan, after Donald Trump’s election, has been “Democracy Dies in Darkness.” Thankfully, the newspaper’s capitulation to its own liberal readership was caught in the full light of Twitter.
The capitulation, as noted by The Daily Caller, had to do with President Trump’s State of the Union speech on Tuesday. The Post had originally titled its front page package on the address, “A call for bipartisanship.”
Then the Post shared it on its Twitter feed, and all hell broke loose.
Here was the original headline:
Here's the front page of tomorrow's Washington Post: pic.twitter.com/5HQmDNoa4r
— The Washington Post (@washingtonpost) January 31, 2018
And here was the unmitigated meltdown that happened on social media when The Washington Post called the speech what it was — a call for bipartisanship.
Are you actually kidding? His mouth said he wanted to work together but the policies he presented, the framing of the policies – it was all designed to be actively appalling to Democrats. There was nothing bipartisan about it at all.
— Tom Coates (@tomcoates) January 31, 2018
Actually, there was quite a bit that was bipartisan about it (even if top Democrats didn’t answer the call.)
Trump asked lawmakers to come together on a plan for immigration, infrastructure, and other problems facing the country. He also saluted American heroes, which would have appealed to even liberal Democrats not all that long ago.
But the Post’s readers weren’t buying it.
I'm genuinely disappointed in the Washington Post for this headline. I expect you guys to be able to see through the rhetoric and actually see it for what it was – epic country-wide trolling designed to rally Republicans and set Democrats teeth on edge.
— Tom Coates (@tomcoates) January 31, 2018
https://twitter.com/Count_Phantom/status/958568709207003136
Like as a joke?
— Dylan (@YatesMcBain) January 31, 2018
https://twitter.com/LikusPJ/status/958569460167790592
Congrats on a headline you absolutely, positively won't regret tomorrow.
— Kevin M. Kruse (@KevinMKruse) January 31, 2018
It didn’t take long for the WaPo to announce that the headline was altered after the first edition.
This page was updated after the first edition. Here is the final front page. pic.twitter.com/nfR7p2wEPB
— The Washington Post (@washingtonpost) January 31, 2018
In fairness, it’s not unusual for a large newspaper to change headlines between editions on a major story. And the new headline is hardly an attack on the president. But in an era when the established news outlets have dropped even a veneer of “objectivity” in their zeal to revenge Hillary Clinton’s embarrassing loss in 2016, giving a newspaper like the Post the benefit of the doubt borders on naive.
The new headline used a quote from Trump’s speech. But to a slavering anti-Trump activist in D.C. and its suburbs, “A ‘new American moment’” could have just the right ambiguous, ominous tone the newspaper was looking for.
The Post’s decision to change its headline had to have some connection to the whiny “cancel my subscription” meltdowns that made up a goodly portion of its readership’s reaction to the first one. I suppose any publication is ultimately answerable to its readership, but by so obviously capitulating to it, The Washington Post has proven exactly what it is. I don’t want to hear anything more about how “Democracy Dies in Darkness,” especially when the paper’s objectivity (such as it was) died long ago.
One can imagine readers’ responses to this one. “Not as bad, but where’s the reference to Hitler?” “Sorry, but you’re no longer part of #theresistance, WaPo! Give up your pink hat!” “WORSE THAN NIXON IMPEACH NOW!!”
Actually, one doesn’t need to imagine, thanks to the magic of Twitter:
In its second attempt at a cover, Wa Po is still sanitizing and normalizing DT’s speech. #sotu pic.twitter.com/kC4BVVep42
— Nia Phillips Spencer (@niaaspencer) January 31, 2018
https://twitter.com/beccafrank/status/958678218562768897
— Jake Snider (@jakehsnider) January 31, 2018
From the sounds of things, an informed democracy dies not in darkness, but in groupthink and reactionary anti-Trump bias.
Do better, indeed.
Please like and share on Facebook and Twitter with your thoughts on the WaPo’s capitulation to its readership.
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