Try to clear it up for you. Theres always a danger nothing is shocking. Thats why its helpful to take a step back sometimes and do a data driven reality check. A fascinating the New York Times analysis this week shows President Trump has attacked the russia investigation more than 1,100 times. He uses sig dhr moves of distraction, deflection and division. The larger goal, of course is to discredit the investigation through reputation. It resonates with his base. But faced with a blizzard of lies and fact free attacks normalization begins to creep in. So when the president calls for someone to look into saturday night live because it doesnt like their satire it gets cursary coverage now. It received something close to a collective shrug. What would be an extraordinary attack on the free press by almost any other president becomes just a free day at the office. But every once in a while we get a visceral reminder of the real cost. This week it came in the form of a chilling indictment of a former marine who works at the coast guard headquarters in washington. Hes a vowed White Nationalist who isictively plotting domestic terror attacks against the president s political opponents and cable news journalists as well asnist nbc joe scarborough, chris hayes and ari melber. Four months before that the deadliest newsroom shooting in American History at the Capital Gazette in annapolis. The problem is theres not culpability on the part of the president , but there is growing threats against the press, and thats nothing we can afford to ignore in free society. Joining me now how to confront the numbing of the american mide an allstar panel. And the former president and the yale professional of journalism, jacob wiseberg. There are choices we make in journalism every day, and one of the most difficult is how to cover the president s lies, mistruths vurls s some of the other things happening in the world that are larger and bigger in some respects than holding him to account, venezuela comes to mind. How do you make those judgments in the newsroom every day, between telling the president s account and whats happening in the larger world. Its very much both of those tracts are vital to the migds s mission as journalists. One, to be the underpinning of their information, and then what youre describing which is to hold power to account. And so when the president , you know, repeatedly says were the enemy of the people, the question then becomes how do we respond to that . One response would be adversarialy. The other would be to say this is what we do, were here to serve the public. And reminding them of that by not only necessarily showing them the president s attack but charles, let me go to you because one of our former colleague and friends david frum knowing in hez local paper the coast guard shooter in the into indictment was in the local section. And he took that as a sign of kind of the normalization and numbing. Is this a case of the difficulty covering the gun that didnt go off or the case of us becoming numb . I think were numb to some degree. I think to put it in a larger context of whats happening is important. People consider the media the fourth estate, right . Basically the Fourth Branch of government. What you have now is if you take that context and that framing, one branch of the government attacking the other. And, you know, its a very difficult thing to defend against. And the media unlike the other three branches, theres no election. There is no confirmation hearing. The media is enormous relative to the other branches. And as the definition of what the media is keeps expanding, you know, there become a lot of vulnerabilities both in term of credibility but also physical personal vulnerabilities. There are no guards at my house like there are at the white house. Theres no guards at my house like there are at the Supreme Court or congress. And so there are actual vulnerabilities to you as a journalist, but there are also credibility concepts around are we now lumping in everyone who blogs and does so seriously . And i think theres a lot of great journalism happening in that way, but also theres some jou journalism id be more skeptical happening that way. Jacob, one of the real conversations is the president simply talking as he does, spouting off, and we shouldnt overindex the impact. But every once in a while you start to see him change the conversation. And that was striking this week when we saw a Supreme Court justice picking up the mantel we should libel reform and a landmark case should be reexamined. Whats your take on that . I dont think its plausible. It was a 90 decision. And i think conservatives have long realized that freedom of the press protects conservative views as well as liberal views. In that case along with the pentagon papers case are the foundations of the modern interruption of the First Amendment. Theyre the pillars of what make the American Press the freest in the world. That used to we an idbe an idea United States government had an interest in developing abroad, and where democracies where emerging we were on the side of the free press. And now we have a president giving conditioning to dictators who are harassing the press and due trt in the philippines is an exam of someone who does that specifically citing fake news, enemy of the people. So the concern what trump does creates a kind of permissioning and climate where these Violent Attacks here are maybe not specifically atribtributable to trump. It happens during the Civil Rights Movement where libel law is being specifically wielded. The lawsuit was against an advertisement. This was actually an advertisement by a group of people trying to defend Martin Luther king and raise money for thim. And i think what is borne out of this Civil Rights Era decision is Holding Public figures such as the police, politicians you know, we see that redefined for celebrity and becoming more expansive. The New York Times versus sullivan really is speaking of how we cover and hold power to account, the underpinning of that belief in journalism. Jacob, just quickly because if i dont think folks appreciate how much the threat of lawsuit can have a chilling on speech. And sure theyre in a weaker position to stand up to wealthy bullies who may want to punish them because of something they dont like. What times v. Sullivan protect is honest error. Mistakes happen, and what that case says is that misstakz that arent intentional, mistakes vs. Lies are protected by the First Amendment in most cases. Were going to have to live it there. Up next, Jussie Smollett. The story received wall to wall coverage and why both police are reporting figures at the news media. Before we go to break its oscar sunday, so i thought it would be fun to have some fellow cnn anchors ask what their ffberate movie is and heres john berman. My favorite journalism movie is easy and its the coolest thing ever i occasionally get to speak to Carl Bernstein sometimes. Number two, quoup close and personal. Which segways to number three, which is broadcast news, which isnt fiction. It is actual footage of what it it is like in the television business. 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In clinical trials, prevagen has been shown to improve shortterm memory. Prevagen. Healthier brain. Better life. And i dont add trup the years. S. But what i do count on. Is boost® delicious boost® high protein nutritional drink has 20 grams of protein, along with 26 essential vitamins and minerals. Boost® high protein. Be up for life. Welcome back to reliable sources. As the strange saga of the Jussie Smollett case continues one of the biggest criticisms we hear is against the media. And we heard it from the Chicago Police department loud and clear. You all gave this more attention specifically than we do. This has been a heated national conversation. So lets lay out some facts. First, there were 7,175 hate crime incidents in 2017 according to the department of justice. Thats a 17 increase over the previous year. Not only that the number of hate groups in the u. S. Has increased 30 over the past four years. The hate crime hoaxes do occur, but they are very rare if possibly on the rise. According to the director at C State University in San Bernardino there have been at least 49 hate crime reports between 2016 and 2018. But often these cases are high profile and this can go back to the uva rape case falsely reported at stone, the new york city subway system. I think its important to put both things in perspective while liberals sometimes rush to judgment on the other side. Joining me now charles blow, l. J. Grammarson, and john mcwarter and contributing editor for the atlantic. Its great to have you all here. L. Z. , let me begin with you. We heard there was so much attention given to this one case and not nearly enough on the shootings in chicago or the other hate crimes borne out in the country. But you ought to recognize two things. One, shouldnt there be an assumption that the cases are legitimate, and two wasnt this going to be something thatkeep chard people out of the gates because of those elements . You know, i kind of chuckled a little bit having been in chicago, reported in chicago at the idea this case in particular sullied the chicago name as it relates to gun violence in particular. For the chief to insinuate this case dragged the chicago name through the mud 20 detectives over the course of three weeks for one case doesnt seem to be the norm based upon my own reporting in the city. I thought he was disingenuous just in terms of how chicago was positioned. Yeah, it was given extra attention because hes a celebrity and to pretend otherwise would be disingenuous of the media. By criticism is we dropped the word alleged very early in this, and when you had political commentators like myself you didnt correct us when we used the word alleged as well. Thats fascinating and important point. The underlying aspect of what you call victim hood chic, trying to said in some respects the sociology of hate crimes. Given the reality of these racist attacks and homophobic attacks, why would a person pretend that it had happened to them, and why isnt that something you hear about in 1946, in 1966 . Why is it that now we have a rachel dolozol whos white and part of her act is to fake these acts against her . Or somebody like Jussie Smollett a big star on a big tv and he doesnt have any mental problems, that it would make him more interesting and important to have been attacked . Thats something thats relatively new, and i think what were seeing is there is something you could call victim hood chic, where the idea is what makes you most interesting is that you have been the victim of some sort of bigotry. And its certainly true that these cases dont happen at the rate of thousands a year. If there had been 48 cases like this from 2016 to 2018, a certain crowd of usual suspects would be saying it was a National Crisis and what america is all about if it was, say, cop killings. If there were that many white men killing black men, everybody would say it worries me because its about the black sell image, it worries me anyone would think saying theyve been jumped by somebody white makes them more interesting than anything else they could possibly do especially because its a kind of capitulation to evil. And part of whats there in a sense is weve been honoring appropriately the victims of hate. So maybe theres a patina theyre reaching for. When we first talked about this, you said if this is true you must be a psychopath. Do you think thats true as what john is describing is victim hood chic. Im not even going to discuss that theory, but, yes, if he has made all this up, i dont know how else to describe what that would mean because oats not just that he would have made it up. The Robin Roberts interview is fascinating when viewed in lathe of what the police alleged he did. It was saying not only that this happened to me, that you guys are all wrong who are doubting what ive done, that i am a vigilante of sorts. He said that on stage as well, that im the gay tupac. I know once youre in, youre all in. O. J. Showed up at nicoles funeral and held the kids and cried. That is psychopath behavior. And for him to continuously go out and say theres no way if in fact he did what the police say he did, theres no huge break in reality there, and theres also a kind of commitment to the lie and to the persona that would be disturbing if this is true. L. Z. , i mean do you think this is something that simply reinforl reinfor reinforces the fact we all need to be skeptical or this is tragedy because it undercuts the real cases in such a fundamental way . We should always greet these sort of cases regardless of the players involved as alleged until theyve gone through the proper channels and legal system. To me that is the great lesson to be learned here from a media perspective is we assumed no one would do anything like this especially a celebrity because it makes no sense. Were supposed to run that through a filter, through the checks and balances of proper journalism, which an attack is alleg alleged until a jury or judge says otherwise. Thats an important point thats been missing from some of our debates at least as they play out in social media. Thats exactly what i think some of the conversation has been about. Where have the checks and balance, the presumption of innocences, the degree of skepticism,thality being said theres a rushing to the ramparts. Social media does make this worse because we end up talking to each other all day long about these things in visceral terms, telegraphic terms as if we were in a village 100 years ago. So all this happens faster and encourages the shouters. But actually i really do think in a case like this what were seeing is not that america, at least any sensible america is thinking that theres no such thing as a hate crime or a race crime. I think anne colter has said that. I generally dont know what reality shes in to tweet Something Like that out. We can both chew gum and walk at the same time. There are these hate crimes. But when somebody claims as a b and a half list star they get jumped in a heavy coat in the middle of the night by people saying the right things or hanging were a noose around their neck, we are right to be skeptical and just to wonder, and we might think of Jussie Smollett as relative unique no, thats not what civil rights is supposed to be about. And the larger problem is that it undercuts the historical memory of all these cases that have been all too real and still haunt us in the country. I want to thank you for joining us. Up next moving from movies to digital and on a role from revolutionizing it all. First, heres keith baldwins favorite journalism movies. Here are my top three. Broadcast news, a classic, of course. The post because of thumazing performances and because of quotes like, if we dont hold them accountable who will, and last but not least Mission Impossible fallout only because our wolf blitzer makes an important cameo. 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