Pulitzer Prize Winning-Conservative Journalist Leaves GOP Over Trump

[Fincayra]

In jest or not, I wonder how many infractions I'd get if I was to say something aimed at the opposite side of politics!

I'm tempted to find out for myself.

[callipygoustp]

I'm tempted to find out for myself.

I'm furiously clicking the refresh button in anticipation of getting one.

[Eviscero]

Conservatives couldn't possibly get Pulitzer Prizes because conservatives are all stupid.

Not that hard to get a Pulitzer. Only a matter of time before they start giving them out for exceptionally well-crafted Tweets.

[Pangean]

I actually agree. It's one of the attributes of modern journalism that I think contributed to its downfall.

The thing is he isn't a journalist. He is an writer of opinions. I hardly think a labeled opinion writer is the downfall of modern journalism. More worried about the stenographer brigade of journalists to be honest or the faux equivalence legion more than someone like Will.

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Honestly, I think the only true Republicans are the ones who have the balls to call Trump out and call out the direction that he wants to take the party in. Trump isn't remotely in-line with most conservative/Republican ideology and is primarily banking on bigots and folks angry with the lack of action on the part of the Republican party for the past 8 years.

I have infinitely more respect for folks like Will and many of the bigger name policy/campaign/etc. folks who are either refusing to support Trump at all (his campaign is apparently having trouble getting the more experienced campaign staff from other campaigns to sign on since they don't want to be associated with him) or are flat out against him to the point where they're making the symbolic gesture of leaving the party.

The RINO's are the ones that are happy to throw conservatism and their principles under the bus because they'd rather have a maniac under the Republican banner in the White House than have a Democrat that, even with Bernie pushing her to the left, is far more centrist.

I think one of them said at some point "There’ll come a time when the love of country will trump hatred of Hillary". Not sure the RINO assigners understand that.

[Deletedaccount1]

The thing is he isn't a journalist. He is an writer of opinions. I hardly think a labeled opinion writer is the downfall of modern journalism. More worried about the stenographer brigade of journalists to be honest or the faux equivalence legion more than someone like Will.

He is a columnist and commentator. I should have been more specific in the thread title.

[Tempguy]

So the fact that his party was hijacked by folks that enabled Trump to win a nomination was fine?

Good to know I can ignore this guys opinion since he believes in treating the symptoms and not the sickness.

[Hammerfest]

Not that hard to get a Pulitzer. Only a matter of time before they start giving them out for exceptionally well-crafted Tweets.

So apparently it's really easy to get a Pulitzer now...

[Venant]

So the fact that his party was hijacked by folks that enabled Trump to win a nomination was fine?

Good to know I can ignore this guys opinion since he believes in treating the symptoms and not the sickness.

Isn't it terrible when democracy gets hijacked by voters.

[Deletedaccount1]

So apparently it's really easy to get a Pulitzer now...

He won it in 1977.

[Glnger]

If he is happier having Hillary be president he was a republican in name only aka a RINO so there is no real loss here.

if he's happy with Hillary as president he's a republican that grew up several decades ago, sorry to spoil your fox news circle jerk.

[Stormspellz]

If he is happier having Hillary be president he was a republican in name only aka a RINO so there is no real loss here.

ie: If you don't stick to the script you aren't a real person/Republican

[Tempguy]

Isn't it terrible when democracy gets hijacked by voters.

You know that the parties are not an example of democracy right? They are private organizations

[Glnger]

There is a reason why the press is covered by the first amendment to the constitution. It is also part of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights put forth by the UN after World War 2. The need for a free press has existed as long as the modern concept of democracy has existed.

How 'free' the press is can be measured on a sliding scale, but I would suggest that having the freedom of the press impinged upon by biased private financial interests is just as bad as a press that is controlled by state censorship. I believe we have gone too far to one extreme on the scale, creating a press media that largely exists only as a propaganda arm of one party or another. Try watching Fox and then watching CNN or MSNBC, and you will realize that these 'news channels' seem to exist in their own respective versions of reality.

they actually all represent the same corporations, making them all "corporate media". Republicans call all news other than Fox News "liberal" I think the split in the democratic party, and how the "liberal" media responded as Clinton's mouthpieces for an entire year of election coverage makes it pretty clear that the media is corporate biased, not liberal/conservative biased.

Watch MSNBC for a week straight, and count how many times they talk about the TPP, money in politics, corporate ownership, or the military industrial complex.
(MSNBC proudly air commercials for Ratheon, Halliburton, Boeing, and General Electric), those same corporations also advertize on Fox and CNN as well. I can't imagine why these companies are paying for adverts, you know because the average MSNBC viewer owns a military of their own that they need to outfit.
I always wanted an Aircraft carrier of my very own.

[Misuteri]

George Will, probably the most famous conservative journalist in America has left the Republican Party citing his disapproval for Donald Trump as the primary reason.

From CNN,



Is this the start of a civil war in the Republican party?

This isn't a civil war.

It's the overthrow of an out of touch and eliteist leadership in the party itself and its "experts and opinion makers".

The same thing has happened for the D's this year or Sanders would have been just another sacrificial lamb/foil that he was supposed to be but those other two guys on the stage of the first D debate turned out to be.

The D's have a candidate that hasn't officially suspended his campaign. That's a much more divisive and civil war barometer than a talking head and baseball aficionado taking his bow tie screaming "Screw you guys, I'm going home."

Now, if only he'd take Karl Rove with him.

[Gsara]

Trump doesnt make it easy now for those Republicans since he is flip flopping on immigration, gun control, and tax cuts. Of course most of us know Trump is full of shit anyways and nothing he says is anything you can rely on to happen.

[Wilderness]

There is a reason why the press is covered by the first amendment to the constitution. It is also part of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights put forth by the UN after World War 2. The need for a free press has existed as long as the modern concept of democracy has existed.

How 'free' the press is can be measured on a sliding scale, but I would suggest that having the freedom of the press impinged upon by biased private financial interests is just as bad as a press that is controlled by state censorship. I believe we have gone too far to one extreme on the scale, creating a press media that largely exists only as a propaganda arm of one party or another. Try watching Fox and then watching CNN or MSNBC, and you will realize that these 'news channels' seem to exist in their own respective versions of reality.

You seem to be mixing up "freedom of the press", ie the government being unable to censor the press, with an unbiased press. The former is very important, the latter has probably never existed. I've been reading a lot of early US biographies and history lately due to Hamilton being awesome and if you think today is bad holy crap did those people attack each other in the press back then. At times people were literally thrown in prison for printing opinions and different political viewpoints from the controlling political party. That's where freedom of the press becomes hugely important. Not that bias can't exist, but that everyone and anyone's bias can be expressed.

[Brubear]

If he is happier having Hillary be president he was a republican in name only aka a RINO so there is no real loss here.

Can we make up our mind here? Because I keep getting told by Sanders supporters that Clinton is a DINO, but now I'm being told that people who would prefer Clinton over Trump are RINOs.

WHICH IS IT?!

[Glnger]

Can we make up our mind here? Because I keep getting told by Sanders supporters that Clinton is a DINO, but now I'm being told that people who would prefer Clinton over Trump are RINOs.

WHICH IS IT?!

The fact that ANY republican can honestly believe that Hillary is a "liberal" is a true and clear showing at just how powerful/quickly Fox News was able to get a firm grip on the balls of "conservatism".
We ought to separate republicans into pre/post Fox News
We could do the same for the Democrats too, but for corporate media, which fox news is.

[Gen4Glock21]

Journalists shouldn't be part of political parties, it is anathema to the concept of an unbiased media that reports useful information in order to create a more informed citizenry. It is absurd that the majority of media in the United States serve as propaganda engines.

Agreed, if they have a political leaning they should do everything they can, to at least remain neutral when writing stories that inform. Some articles literally tell you how they lean politically just by the title of the article.

[Chetnik]

I posted this thread because it got me interested in switching my party affiliation from the Republican Party of Florida to the Libertarian Party of Florida.

Political party affiliation is cancer. I changed to Republican from No Party Preference to vote Trump in the primaries, and it's been a non-stop torrent of advertisements in the mail ever since. As soon as California is verified by the SoS, I'm going back to No Party Preference.

Now if you're talking about voting Libertarian over Republican in November, I have to ask why? In a system like ours, there's never any point in voting for a third party. A vote for a third party is a vote saying "I'm perfectly OK with whoever of the two major parties wins." It's clear that you lean more right, since you're talking about going Libertarian, so I have to ask why would you give a vote of no preference if your preference is more in line with the center-right party instead of the center-left party?