Look no further than the front page of the New York Daily News for evidence of the desperate state of newspapers today. Whereas the motto of broadsheet rival New York Times is "All The News That's Fit to Print," the motto of the Daily News has become "Hell, Whatever Sells Papers."
It's gotten to the point that CNN media critic Brian Stelter on today's Reliable Sources asked Daily News editor-in-chief Jim Rich, "Is there such a thing as too far for the Daily News?"
Based on the paper's recent provocations, one gets the impression the worst is yet to come.
After defending a page one cartoon depicting Donald Trump as a jihadist beheading the Statue of Liberty -- I kid you not -- Rich defended another front page that was inherently offensive to people who believe in God --
STELTER: Let's take a look at one of the most talked-about covers from your tenure as editor, this is from December 3rd, right after the attack in San Bernardino. It says (referring to a banner front-page headline), "GOD IS NOT FIXING THIS" (more accurately, the headline actually read, "GOD ISN'T FIXING THIS"), with all of the tweets from politicians, Republican politicians (Ted Cruz, Rand Paul, Lindsey Graham, Paul Ryan) saying their thoughts and prayers are with the victims. This was so hotly debated on Fox News and other parts of the conservative media. Do you feel that your message was lost?
RICH: I think it may have been by some people and that may have been unintentional or intentional in many cases and it was convenient to try to shift the conversation and the narrative onto the accusation that the Daily News somehow was condemning either, either God, religion or prayer.
Aside from the actual headline, where would anyone get that impression ...?
This was more than Stelter could let pass --
STELTER: Well, your headline said they were hiding behind "meaningless platitudes." (Stelter referring to the drop head beneath the main headline -- "As latest batch of innocent Americans are left lying in pools of blood, cowards who could truly end gun scourge continue to hide behind meaningless platitudes.") That would seem offensive to so many religious Americans.
RICH: Well, what I think religious Americans should be more offended by is the fact that the politicians have a track record, and these specific politicians have a track record, of hiding behind prayer and these meaningless platitudes. It's the only thing at this point that they're offering, for the most part, as a solution, to what is a tremendous problem facing the American people right now.
Translation: these politicians refuse to agree with our demand for Americans to disarm, an insistence awkwardly coinciding with the start of ISIS attacks in the United States.
It's not "meaningless platitudes" that Rich finds objectionable -- it's that the politicians he vilifies aren't mouthing the meaningless platitudes he prefers, for example, "end the gun show loophole" and "people on terrorist watchlists shouldn't be allowed to buy guns."
Stelter asked Rich about another Daily News front page labeling San Bernardino gunman Syed Farook as a "terrorist," along with the "murderous psychos" in Tucson, Newtown, Aurora, Charleston, and Colorado Springs, all "enabled by NRA's sick gun jihad against America in the name of profit." Included in the photos of these mass murderers was one of NRA executive vice president Wayne LaPierre --
STELTER: At that point do you all actually approach the line toward hate speech?
RICH: I think hate speech is (chuckles), I think we're going a little too far right now at this point if you're going to label that cover hate speech. Again we're just pointing out ...
STELTER: I'm just trying to put myself in Wayne LaPierre's shoes. He wakes up, he sees a tabloid newspaper cover distributed all around New York and online all around the world with his face, with the word (in bold red capitalized lettering) terrorist.
RICH: And once again, the point of that cover was to make sure that we, again, do not shift the conversation, which would have been very easy, to solely speaking about the terror angle on the shooting in San Bernardino, which 100 percent it was.
Yeah, there's a "but" coming --
RICH: But the bigger point is, this was tied to the gun violence issue.
If there's a "bigger point" here, doesn't that make the "terror angle" in the San Bernardino massacre 49 percent or less and not the "100 percent" Rich just claimed ...?
RICH: As far as Mr. LaPierre is concerned, we have spent the better part of three weeks reaching out to him every day. We've extended the offer for him to write an op-ed for us which would appear in our paper and online and we have heard nothing. So, the stonewalling and the bait-and-switch that goes on by the lobby, from the lobby that he represents, to us is a form of terrorism because it terrorizes the safety of innocent American people.
The man won't return our calls -- further proof he's a terrorist. And how can LaPierre doubt we're acting in good faith when we keep referring to him as "Jihadi Wayne"?
One thing for certain -- you'll never see the Daily News run the banner headline, ALLAH ISN'T FIXING THIS. Doing so would run the risk of introducing the paper's editors to actual jihadists more than willing to engage in genuine terrorism.
