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Tuesday was a glorious day for those who believe that the free press is all thats keeping America from being made great again. It saw the right escalate its war on the media, in part because of mistakes committed by CNN and The New York Times. Those errors may have been troubling, but they were corrected quickly and unambiguously.

Far more troubling was the response of the pro-Trump camp, which zealously sought to discount all journalism on the basis of those two mistakes, to weaken an emboldened press corps by revealing its supposed anti-Trump biases. Those biases may exist, but if they do, the White House has done a marvelous job of confirming them at every opportunity with its own incompetence, maliciousness and dishonesty.

What the president really wants was best articulated in a New York Times interview with chief White House strategist Stephen K. Bannon earlier this year. The media should be embarrassed and humiliated and keep its mouth shut and just listen for a while, the splenetic nationalist said. The media here is the opposition party.

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Tuesdays developments were unrelated, except they showed how eagerly Trumps supporters will pounce on the media mistakes while ignoring the presidents penchant for conspiracy theories and alternative facts, if not outright deceptions. They see nothing wrong with holding CNN to a far higher standard than the White House, to scrutinize the words of a Times editorial while dismissing Trumps tweets as harmless presidential fun.

CNNs troubles stemmed from a story, published last Thursday, about Anthony Scaramucci, a New York financier and Trump supporter. The article made allegations about Scaramuccis supposed dealings with Kirill Dmitriev, who heads a Russian investment fund. Scaramucci complained to CNN head Jeff Zucker, reportedly threatening a $100 million lawsuit. The story was retracted, three staffers resigned and Scaramucci tweeted, Apology accepted. Everyone makes mistakes. Moving on.

Related: Trump's perfect press secretary

Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump gestures and declares "You're fired!" at a rally in Manchester, New Hampshire, June 17, 2015. REUTERS/Dominick Reuter

But while Scaramucci took the high road, Trump took the low one. He lambasted CNN in tweets unbefitting a candidate for the Palookaville Municipal Advisory Council, let alone the leader of the free world:

His deputy press secretary, Sarah Huckabee Sanders, channeled the same contemptuous attitude at Tuesdays daily White House press briefing. She railed against the constant barrage of fake news that is directed at this president. Of course, she couldnt name a single story that was fake. Sanders did, however, take a swipe at CNN, which she said had been repeatedly wrong and had to point that out or had to correct it.

Yes, absolutely. When a news outlet is wrongand every news outlet gets it wrong sometimesit acknowledges its mistakes and corrects them. Meanwhile, Trump trots out his press secretary to lie about inauguration crowds while spreading lies about the FBI, Hillary Clinton and anyone else he sees as an opponent. Its no secret that Trumps favorite show is Fox & Friends, which CNNs media reporter Brian Stelter calls Trumps safe space because it showers the president with positive attention.

Tuesday also saw Sarah Palin, former Alaska governor and Republican vice presidential nominee, file a lawsuit against The New York Times, for an editorial published in mid-June. The Times editorial in question, titled Americas Lethal Politics, came after the shooting of Representative Steve Scalise in northern Virginia. The shooter, James Hodgkinson, was a vociferous supporter of Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders.

In its editorial, The Times alluded to the 2011 of shooting of Representative Gabby Giffords by Jared Lee Loughner. The original piece suggested Loughner was motivated by right-wing rhetoric. It specifically cited a map published by a political group affiliated with Sarah Palin. The editorial, as originally published, described the map as showing Giffords and 19 other Democrats under stylized cross hairs.

But the descriptions of Loughners intentions, and Palins map, were both erroneous. The Times was forced to issue a two-part correction:

An editorial on Thursday about the shooting of Representative Steve Scalise incorrectly stated that a link existed between political rhetoric and the 2011 shooting of Representative Gabby Giffords. In fact, no such link was established. The editorial also incorrectly described a map distributed by a political action committee before that shooting. It depicted electoral districts, not individual Democratic lawmakers, beneath stylized cross hairs.

That wasnt enough for Palin who filed suit against the Times on Tuesday. Notably, two of the lawyers she is using successfully litigated the invasion of privacy suit filed by Terry Gene Bollea, professionally known as Hulk Hogan, against the gossip website Gawker, which had published a sex tape of Bollea in sexual congress with the wife of a friend. Bollea was awarded more than $100 million by the jury, a decision that led to Gawkers demise.

Michael J. Naborski, a partner in the Los Angeles office of Pryor Cashman LLP whose expertise is defamation, says Palin may well have standing in her suit against the Times. A media defendant does not automatically escape the possibility of liability under a libel claim by issuing a retraction or a correction, he told me in an email. Palins attorneys will certainly argue that the two corrections were insufficient as a matter of law to even qualify as a correction and retraction. But even if they were, they did not serve to mitigate any of the damage caused to her reputation and feelings by the initial article.

Lets get something basic out of the way. The Times should have gotten the facts right, especially in an editorial that was presumably reviewed by multiple members of its editorial board. I say this as someone who spent several years as a member of the editorial board of the New York Daily News. While the role of the unsigned editorial has no doubt diminished, it remains the voice of the newspaper (specifically, its publisher). The facts around the Giffords shooting were not obscure or in dispute. The Times had a duty to get them rightand, given its journalistic talent, should have done so. It doesnt have to like Palin, but it does have to be honest about what she did and didnt say.

At the same time, the paper swiftly corrected its errors. Thats what a publication is supposed to do. Thats what CNN did, too. The free press cant be flawless, but it must be accountable.

Palin, meanwhile, is preposterous in complaining about offended sensibilities, as much as Trump is crowing about CNNs supposed deceptions. The suit her lawyers filed says that it took Mrs. Palin years to overcome the detrimental impacts of the false speculation that she caused Loughner to commit murder. Unfortunately, members of the media perceive Mrs. Palin as a convenient target for attacks against conservative policies and a subject likely to spark readership interest.

One wonders why Palins tender sensitivities werent similarly injured during the 2008 presidential race, when her campaign rallieson behalf of GOP nominee John McCainfrequently descended into expressions of hatred against then-candidate Barack Obama. She eagerly stoked that anger, accusing Obama of palling around with terrorists, leading some to wonder if violence against the Democratic candidate was inevitable.

Palin didnt get any calmer after the election, when she joined the bastion of civility and sensitivity that is Fox News. She called the president Barack Hussein Obama, using his foreign-sounding middle name to suggest the he wasnt quite American. Last year, during the presidential race, she called Obama a special kind of stupid. Later, after Trump won the 2016 election, she went to the White House with country singer Ted Nugent, whod once told Obama to suck on my machine gun and deemed Hillary Clinton a worthless bitch, among many other inciteful statements.

Sarah Palinvoice of conservative values and beacon of faith and family, according to her Times lawsuitdidnt appear troubled by any of that.

But as Niborski explains, it is possible that what she really wants isnt money. Part of the goal of certain plaintiffs is not necessarily to win a libel case, but rather to force media defendants to spend money on defending themselves, and therefore make it less likely that they will target a certain public figure in the future. In other words, Palins goal is to punish the Times, just as it was Bolleas goal to punish Gawker.

There was another media-related development on Tuesday, one that didnt involve a lawsuit. David A. Fahrenthold of The Washington Post found that some of Trumps golf resorts are decorated with a fake Time magazine cover that crows about his Apprentice being a television smash.

It takes a certain kind of chutzpah to attack the free press while using fake magazine covers for decor. More than that, it takes a profound insecurity, the kind of thing most people overcome in high school. What Trump fears, above all, is not that we will uncover some Nixonian plot involving Russia. Rather, what makes Trump afraid is that we, the people, will see him for his astonishing smallness of spirit, his lack of vision, his boundless vanity.

A man who wraps himself in fakery will see fakery everywhere.

Continued here:
Donald Trump vs. CNN: How the White House Just Escalated Its War on the Free Press - Newsweek

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell's failure to ram through an Obamacare repeal bill before the July 4 recess does more than reveal tribal divisions ravaging the Republican Party.

It also highlights President Donald Trump's role -- or lack of one -- in forging a GOP majority to squeeze the bill through the Senate, on an issue that has grave implications for the fate of the rest of his presidency.

Almost as soon as McConnell shelved a bid to vote on the measure this week, senators piled into a blue Capitol Police bus to head down to the White House for a brainstorming session with Trump.

The contrast was obvious to the euphoric Rose Garden rally that Trump hosted with GOP House members after they passed their Obamacare repeal bill in May. This time, Republicans sat around tables in the East Room expressing frustration at negative ads being aired against moderate Sen. Dean Heller, who has opposed the bill.

The delay in the Senate vote represents a failure -- that could yet be temporary -- by the GOP that has a monopoly on power in Washington yet can't yet honor the fundamental promise it has made to its voters for years.

But in this Washington cloud, there could be a silver lining for Trump.

A significant effort to reshape argument on the bill, to breach deep party divides on the issue and to sell a vision of health care reforms to Americans, could do a lot of good to a presidency that has been under siege for months.

It would also suggest that the President has a decent chance of building support for the rest of his agenda, that includes a push for tax reform and a program to repair the nation's decaying infrastructure.

But early signs are not encouraging for those who hope that the President can mine a golden seam of political support to get the bill passed.

Before grim faced senators, the President spoke in vague terms about the bill, showing the lack of specificity that has hampered his attempts to wield political influence on Capitol Hill.

"We are going to try and solve the problem. So, I invited all of you. ... We are going to talk. We are going to see what we are going to do," Trump told the group, before offering an assessment that did not seem to reflect the aggravated state of Republican debate over the bill or address the specific concerns many senators have with the bill.

"We are getting very close," he said. "This will be great if we get it done," he said, before asking reporters to leave the room.

By now, everyone knows in Washington that the President is not keen on thrashing through the details of a bill to try to win wavering votes.

In fact, he's often seemed ready to embrace any measure that he could portray as a political win -- whatever it contains.

There's certainly no sense that he is driving the debate towards an outcome that would fit into any ideological vision of his presidency. More often, he's shown more appetite to simply slam Obamacare than offer solutions.

Even Trump's supporters would admit that the President is yet to impose his considerable persona on Washington or shown he has the political skills and stock of capital to pilot legislation through Congress.

His consistency is also in question, since he labeled the House health care bill "mean," hanging members out to dry after celebrating its passage with them.

"Here's what I would tell any senator: If you're counting on the President to have your back, you need to watch it," GOP Sen. Lindsey Graham said Monday.

"This President is the first president in our history who has had neither political nor military experience," Maine Sen. Susan Collins told reporters on Capitol Hill Monday.

That impression will have to change if the President is to play on the loyalty of Republican senators who are against the bill, who McConnell said used their White House meeting, to explain their reservations to Trump.

Trump is the most unorthodox President in memory, and has broken many political norms. But if he is to amass a significant legislative legacy, he may have to put more political skin of his own in the game.

"He would knock peoples' socks off if he came forward with a venture of his own proposing," said Bruce Buchanan, a presidential historian at the University of Texas at Austin, who doubts Trump has such a play "in his playbook."

The next few weeks, as McConnell and Trump seek to unpick the GOP deadlock over the Senate proposal, pose a stern test for the President.

He must calm moderate senators scared about the consequences of voting for a measure the Congressional Budget Office says will lead to 22 million more people without coverage over the next decade.

Senate Republicans are also split on issues like cuts to the Medicaid expansion under Obamacare, the prospect of rising premiums for low income and working class Americans, and fears that opioid addicts could lose vital treatment.

Bringing Republicans together will test the clout of a president whose approval rating has dipped below 40% and has little support outside his, albeit solid, base. It will also reveal just how much loyalty Republican senators feel towards a President who has often departed from the orthodoxies of his own party.

Trump's stock on Capitol Hill may have taken a dent after a group that supports him, America First Policies, started airing ads against Heller in Nevada.

At the White House Tuesday, Heller and other senators complained, calling for party unity. Heller, a source said, brought the issue up first, while joking that he was disappointed that they used Matt Damon's face instead of his in the ad.

Trump may also need to up his persuasion game because though he's been speaking to holdout senators it's not clear he has changed many minds.

Utah Sen Mike Lee, a conservative who opposes the bill because he believes it does not do enough to strip down Obamacare, spoke to Trump by phone on Monday.

An aide said the tone of the call was "positive" but was also at a "high level" with no sign Trump addressed specific policy details.

McConnell said Tuesday that the President had been helpful and engaged. But he also appeared to hint that Trump would have to do more.

"We always anticipated the president would be very important in getting us to a conclusion. After all, under our system, he's the man with the signature," he said, adding that for Trump to show his cards earlier would have been a waste of time.

But Trump's time is now.

"There have been presidents that have been able to break through and Senate Majority leaders that have been able to put together a coalition," said Julian Zelizer, a CNN political analyst.

"(But) McConnell has been dealing with a President who has not been totally invested in this fight and is not selling to Americans what the idea is, behind the change other than people are going to lose many benefits."

CNN's MJ Lee, Lauren Fox and Jim Acosta contributed to this report.

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Donald Trump has a chance to step up for a signature win - CNN

Paul Manafort, the onetime manager of the Trump presidential campaign, retroactively reported that his consulting firm had received more than $17 million in payments from a Ukrainian political party with ties to the Kremlin.

And in this weeks magazine, a Nixon biographer makes the case that President Trump has essentially misunderstood the F.B.I.s role. Since Watergate, the agency has come to view itself as an independent check on the president.

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Syrian and Russian officials rejected an American accusation that Syria was preparing for another chemical attack. Above, President Bashar al-Assad visiting troops at a Russian air base in western Syria.

President Trump conferred by phone with President Emmanuel Macron of France on finding a common response should the attack take place. Mr. Macron seized the opportunity to invite Mr. Trump to Paris for Bastille Day next month.

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Googles record 2.4 billion euro fine for violating European antitrust rules highlights the aggressive stance E.U. officials have taken in regulating many of the worlds largest technology companies.

Googles legal battle with the E.U. is far from over, but for now the focus will probably shift to changes the company will have to make to comply with the decision. Google is facing two separate antitrust charges related to Android, its mobile software.

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Its picnic season, and we have tips on how to make yours a success. (Two simple ones, often forgotten: Bring trash bags and enough water.)

Making a get-together a potluck, and moving it outside, instantly ensure things are more affordable and communal. Our food writer tagged along with a family that has perfected the art of the picnic in the park.

_____

Chancellor Angela Merkel of Germany and Wilbur Ross, the American commerce secretary, said they wanted to revive talks on a trans-Atlantic free trade deal.

Li Keqiang, Chinas premier, affirmed his countrys desire to be seen as the worlds new leader in free trade, in a speech at a World Economic Forum conference in Dalian, China.

Nestl said it was prepared to spend billions of dollars on stock buybacks and acquisitions. Heres a short history of the Swiss conglomerate, which sells more than 2,000 brands around the world.

Heres a snapshot of global markets.

Rogue police forces in Venezuela attacked the Supreme Court, dropping grenades from a helicopter, officials said. [The New York Times]

Few details have emerged in the car bombing in Kiev yesterday that killed a colonel in Ukraines military intelligence. [Kyiv Post]

The issue of same-sex marriage moved to the center of Germanys national election campaign. Martin Schulz, the left-wing candidate, demanded a parliamentary vote this week. [The New York Times]

Meanwhile, the Chaos Computer Club, a Hamburg collective, is working on hacker-proofing the German election in the fall. [Bloomberg Businessweek]

A court in the Netherlands ruled that the Dutch government was partly liable for the massacre of about 350 Muslim men in the Bosnian town of Srebrenica in 1995. [The New York Times]

Nicola Sturgeon, Scotlands first minister, postponed plans for a second independence referendum after her partys setback in Britains general election. [The Scotsman]

In Britain, the authorities identified more buildings with flammable facades, or cladding, similar to what was used on the London highrise that caught fire this month. The authorities in Germany evacuated a building with similar cladding. [The New York Times]

Tips, both new and old, for a more fulfilling life.

What prospective university students do online could have consequences in real life.

Ransomware is in the news. Heres how to protect yourself.

Recipe of the day: Somali-style rice, flavored by rich stock and an aromatic spice mixture.

Our photographer visited the charred countryside of Portugal, where survivors of the countrys worst wildfire in decades confronted anger and grief.

FIFA published an investigators top-secret report into the bidding for the 2018 and 2022 World Cups, which was widely reported to have been tainted by corruption.

Our Interpreter columnist explains why right-wing populism has not upended politics in Canada. (Theres no mention of Prime Minister Justin Trudeaus footwear, but our fashion team explored his sock diplomacy.)

In memoriam: Michael Nyqvist, the Swedish actor perhaps best known for the Dragon Tattoo trilogy, died at 56. And Alain Senderens, a founding father of nouvelle cuisine, died at 77.

Today is the 48th anniversary of the riots at the Stonewall Inn in New York City, a watershed moment in L.G.B.T. history.

The protests against a police raid helped galvanize the movement for gay rights. Former President Barack Obama made the bar an official U.S. monument last year, but Stonewall was already famous around the globe.

The name has come to be synonymous with gay pride. Among those invoking it: The Stonewall Hotel in Sydney, Australia, which is not actually a hotel, but a three-floor bar and club.

Theres also Stonewall in Britain, a charity that fights for the rights of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender individuals. Stonewall Japan says it has 2,000 members. Stonewall Javeriano, a student group in Colombia, has attracted attention outside the country for its existence at a Catholic university.

In the U.S., Stonewall is the name of a museum and archive in Fort Lauderdale, Fla., because the riots gave visibility to a community that had previously faced a life in the shadows, its executive director said.

And to make sure future generations learn its history, theres a new effort to record the oral histories of those who took part in the 1969 uprising, announced this month, with funding from Google.org.

Karen Zraick contributed reporting.

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This briefing was prepared for the European morning. We also have briefings timed for the Australian, Asian and American mornings. You can sign up for these and other Times newsletters here.

Your Morning Briefing is published weekday mornings and updated online.

What would you like to see here? Contact us at europebriefing@nytimes.com.

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Cyberattack, Donald Trump, Syria: Your Wednesday Briefing - New York Times

BBC News

Irish reporter's unexpected encounter with Trump BBC News Irish reporter Caitrona Perry had an unexpected encounter with US President Donald Trump during his telephone conversation with Taoiseach (prime minister) Leo Varadkar. Mr Trump told Mr Varadkar Irish media were in the Oval Office and called over ... President Trump Was on a Diplomatic Call. He Paused It to Single Out a Female ReporterTIME Donald Trump Just Had The Weirdest Phone Call With Ireland's New LeaderHuffPost Did Donald Trump flirt with Irish reporter Caitriona Perry during diplomatic phone call?Telegraph.co.uk NDTV -Mirror.co.uk -NEWS.com.au all 122 news articles »

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Irish reporter's unexpected encounter with Trump - BBC News

Talk about fake news.

Time magazine has asked the Trump Organization to remove copies of a fake magazine cover featuring Donald Trump from its golf clubs walls.

The request came Tuesday after a Washington Post report found framed copies of Trump on the cover of Time displayed in at least five of Trumps clubs. The magazine cover, dated March 1, 2009, features the headline: Donald Trump: The Apprentice is a television smash!

However, there was no Time magazine published on March 1, 2009. Nor was Trump ever on the cover that year. And there are a number of design inaccuracies. I can confirm that this is not a real TIME cover, Time spokeswoman Kerri Chyka told the Post.

Just last year, Trump boasted about his Time magazine cover appearances. I think I was on the cover of Time magazine twice in my life and like six times in the last number of months, he said in July 2016. Perhaps he was counting the fake one before launching his presidential bid in 2015, Trump had only been on the cover once before, in 1989, according to Time.

Its not known who made the fake cover, but anyone with decent Photoshop skills could pull it off. There are also a number of websites that let users upload their own photos to make a mock magazine cover, usually to be used as gag gifts or to tout childrens athletic achievements.

Sports Illustrated, which also falls under the Time Inc. TIME, +0.00% umbrella, responded to the odd development with a wink Tuesday:

Fellow faux cover boy Rep. Gerry Connolly (D-Va.) also chimed in:

In real news, Trump could soon be on friendlier terms with Time. National Enquirer owner David Pecker, a longtime friend of Trumps, is considering buying the struggling publisher, according to a new report by The New Yorker.

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Time magazine wants Donald Trump's fake covers taken down - MarketWatch