Gutfeld on the humiliating Telegraph-Melania Trump debacle
If President Trump's war with fake news creates media accountability then the past two years have been worth it.
The British paper The Daily Telegraph issued a humiliating apology Saturday, admitting an article titled "The Mystery of Melania," was full of fake news about the first lady. They took it all back and paid her "substantial damages."
There’s no point in recounting the story’s lies. They're the same stuff you've heard many times before, part of a larger industry built on unknown sources and bitter bias.
And it shows you the kind of year the media is having – and it’s only been three weeks:
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP SLAMS DAILY TELEGRAPH OVER MELANIA TRUMP STORY
But you have BuzzFeed’s debacle; the Covington smear; layoffs at clickbait mills like BuzzFeed and the Huffington Post; CNN mocked for pretending they stumbled onto Roger Stone's arrest … And now this brutal Telegraph humbling.
These events have one thing in common: accountability. It’s new and it’s good for everyone. Especially you.
Because - you may not know how false the Melania coverage is - but you can bet she does.
And that’s the point: you never know what fake news is, until it’s about you.
Ask anyone who’s ever been the subject of a story. Unless they're vacuous actors pumping a socially conscious film, it’s never good.
It’s why, love him or hate him, Trump’s war with fake news makes the past two years worth it. His disruption has exposed the hidden levers in so many dark arts - from trade to immigration to copy-editing and fact-checking.
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So if only one result from the Trump era is a media that thinks twice before destroying someone for fun and profit - then I'd call that a win.
Wouldn't you?
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