Mediaboss Marketing

By Joe Raedle/Getty Images.

On Thursday morning, the president of the United States, the commander in chief of the armed forces, the guy who signs executive orders, got mad at a news anchor. In retaliation, he claimed she got plastic surgery:

Trump was lashing out at Mika Brzezinski, host of Morning Joe and a person with whom he was once friendly. Though Trump says he doesnt watch the program anymore, the tweets came after Brzezinski said on the show, Nothing makes a man feel better than making a fake cover of a mag about himself, lying every day and destroying the country (shes referring to the fake Time magazine cover that hangs in several of his golf clubs). Its a crude statement thats earned outrage even from members of the party Trump theoretically leads, but also a typical response from a public figure who has a rocky history of handling embarrassment.

While the unprecedented attack on a news figure by the president of the United States brought up all manner of reasons to slap ones forehead, let us take this chance to focus in on a particular: this plastic surgery thing. Plastic surgery is a fairly normalized practice, especially in Los Angeles and New York, especially among the moneyed elite of those cities. And Donald Trump is a moneyed elite from such a coastal province, one whos demonstrated a fascination with the more superficial qualities throughout his life. Is it possible that he himself has gone under the knife, making his Thursday tweets both indefensible and hypocritical? Ivana Trumps divorce deposition, which was recounted in The Many Lives of Donald J. Trump by author Harry Hurt III may have some answers.

In 1990, Ivana Trump said under oath that her husband flew into a fit of rage due to the pain and displeasure with a scalp reduction surgery, performed in 1989. Also known as alopecia reduction, the surgery is intended to correct balding, and involves cutting the bald spot out and sewing the remaining skin back together. The tightened scalp can cause headaches and swelling. The man who allegedly performed the surgery was Ivanas own doctor, Dr. Steven Hoefflin. Hes most famous for extending his services to Michael Jackson, Elizabeth Taylor, and Joan Rivers, among other stars. Hoefflin also performed liposuction on the chin and waist of our now president, according to Ivanas deposition. (She rescinded part of the deposition, which included rape allegations, in a 2015 statement).

So not only did Trump himself possibly once have plastic surgery, but his Trump Taj Mahal once offered $25,000 worth of plastic surgery to a casino winner. At this point its not odd that Trump would act hypocritically on any subject, especially appearance, especially womens appearance (see his comments on Carly Fiorina, Megyn Kelly, Arianna Huffington, Rosie ODonnell, Heidi Klum, Alicia Machado, and Ted Cruzs wife). But you do have to wonder why he would offer up a reason to drudge up this unsavory association, one that he and his lawyers have gone to great lengths to strike down. In the Lost Tycoon, Trump denied both the incident and the plastic surgery, going out of his way to swipe at Hunt in the process. Its obviously false, Trump also said in 1993, according the Daily Beast, and originally reported by Newsday. Its incorrect and done by a guy without much talent [Hunt] is a guy that is an unattractive guy who is a vindictive and jealous person.

Interesting word choice there.

Losing to wind next to his helicopter in Scotland.

Losing to wind at Andrews Air Force Base in Maryland.

Losing to wind as he heads to Indiana.

Losing to wind while hes in Scotland to discuss bankrolling an anti-wind-farm campaign in order to fight an off-shore development near his luxury golf resort.

Losing to wind in the presence of Tom Brady.

Losing to wind while waving.

Putting up a good fight but ultimately losing to wind in Scotland.

PreviousNext

Losing to wind next to his helicopter in Scotland.

By Michael McGurk/Alamy.

Losing to wind at Andrews Air Force Base in Maryland.

By Nicholas Kamm/AFP/Getty Images.

Losing to wind as he heads to Indiana.

By Timothy A. Clary/AFP/Getty Images.

Losing to wind while hes in Scotland to discuss bankrolling an anti-wind-farm campaign in order to fight an off-shore development near his luxury golf resort.

By Danny Lawson/PA/A.P.

Losing to wind while he talks to Patriots owner Robert Kraft before a game.

From Splash News.

Losing to wind at the house on the Isle of Lewis, Scotland, where his mother was born before she immigrated to the United States in 1929.

From PA/Alamy.

Losing to wind while boarding the Marine One helicopter at Joint Base Andrews, Maryland.

By Jonathan Ernst/Reuters.

Losing to wind while leaving One World Trade in New York.

By Timothy A. Clary/AFP/Getty Images.

Losing to wind in the presence of Tom Brady.

From Boston Herald/Splash News.

Losing to wind while waving.

By Rob Carr/Getty Images.

Putting up a good fight but ultimately losing to wind in Scotland.

By Michael McGurk/Rex/Shutterstock.

Read the original post:
A Brief Recap of Donald Trump's Own Alleged Plastic Surgery - Vanity Fair

Late Night host Seth Meyers looked at all the things President Donald Trump and Fox News Channel have been doing to distract their followers from the fact that the GOP controlled Senates Trumpcare embarrassment.

The Congressional Budget Office projected this Trumpcare bill will leave about 22 million people uninsured, forcing Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell to scrub his plans to rush the bill written in secrecy to a vote, because it lacked the needed support inside his own party.

So what has Trump been up to, Meyers faux-wondered.

Yesterday he got up bright and dearly to retweet four different stories in a row from Fox & Friends attacking the Russia investigation and Democrats.

Fox & Friends showered Trump with so much praise theyre starting to sound like the helicopter parents of a shitty private school kid, Meyers snarked. Our Donnie would never collude with Russia! How dare you! Do you know how much money we give to this school?!

Among the stories Trump retweeted was a link to monologue from Fox News Channel primetime star Sean Hannity, who may have done more harm than good, Meyers thinks. Because while trying to defend Trump, Hannity repeated a certain lurid rumor about POTUS.

Cue clip of Hannity reading a recent New York Post headline: Sketchy Firm Behind Trump Dossier Is Stalling Investigators.

Oh, interesting! Hannity sneered, adding, Remember, thats the dossier that talked about Trump at a Ritz Carlton in Moscow, with two prostitutes urinating on his bed?

Well, we do now! Meyers smiled, telling Hannity: You are a terrible wingman!

So obsessed with media praise is Trump that he has a framed Time magazine cover hanging in several of his golf clubs, featuring Trumps image and headlines that way The Apprentice is a smash! and Trump Is Hitting On All FrontsEven TV!

This according to Washington Post reporting.

Except, of course, the cover is a fake, as WaPo added, and non-Fox-News cable news TV has been feasting on since Tuesday.

This would be the saddest thing Ive ever ever heard, if it wasnt the funniest thing Ive ever heard, Meyers acknowledged.

Trump did not like this report from the Washington Post and took a page out of the Strongman Playbook and attacked Amazon, whose CEO also owns Washington Post, Meyers explained.

Trump accused Amazon of not paying internet taxes.

Just one thing: there is no internet tax, Meyer noted of Trumps stab at a bright shiny media-distracting light.

While Trump tweeted, far more urgently in Washington, the Senate was trying to ram through its Trumpcare plan.

The vote delayed, McConnell has time to cut backroom deals. Question is, what role will Trump play? Meyers said, cutting to Texas Sen.John Cornyn saying, delicately, were trying to hold him back a little bit.

The rest is here:
Seth Meyers: Sean Hannity Makes Terrible Donald Trump Wingman - Deadline

Vice Medias Motherboard tech site has retracted two articles supposedly revealing discord at Disney Parks about Donald Trumps presence in the Hall of Presidents attraction citing factual errors and questions about sourcing for the pieces.

After a thorough investigation into the sourcing of two stories, Heres the Secret Backstage Trump Drama at Walt Disney Worlds Hall of Presidents and Behind the Scenes of Disneys Donald Trump Hall of Presidents Installation, and the identification of several factual errors, we have decided to retract both pieces, Motherboard said in an editorial note posted Wednesday in place of the two articles.

The note added, We are conducting a full editorial review to pinpoint how this source was vetted, and how these stories were approved and published in violation of our usual editorial workflow. We fell short of our standards, and regret the error.

The Motherboard story published on Monday, June 26, alleged that there was internal debate at Disney about whether Trumps animatronic figure would be speaking in the exhibit. The story also claimed, citing an anonymous source, that Trumps team was insisting on writing the entire speech for his robotic avatar in Disney Worlds Hall of Presidents.

That led Disney Parks to issue a statement that Trump will in fact be represented in the Hall of Presidents with a speaking role. The earlier Motherboard story, Heres the Secret Backstage Trump Drama at Walt Disney Worlds Hall of Presidents, published May 19, had cited an anonymous source close to Walt Disney Imagineering who claimed the animatronic Trump will probably not have a speaking role.

Disney is among Vice Medias investors, holding a $400 million stake in the millennial-skewing media company.

View post:
Vice Retracts Articles About Donald Trump's Animatronic Robot at Disney World - Variety

Although Donald Trump has repeatedly appeared on the cover of Time Magazine in the last year, the company is asking that a framed cover image of Trump be taken down from the walls of several golf clubs.

That's because the cover hanging in several Trump Organization clubs is a phony, a Time spokesperson confirmed to NBC News.

The March 1, 2009, cover was first identified as fake by The Washington Post in a story published on Tuesday, and several markers give away that the cover isnt genuine.

The magazine's red border is thinner on the Trump cover than a real cover and is missing a thin, white border on the inside of the red. A barcode in the right-hand corner is the same as a design tutorial created by a Peruvian designer, according to the Post.

Headlines on a real cover appear across the top of the page. The fake covers headlines appear down the right side.

Another factor complicating the authenticity of the Trump cover Time didnt publish a March 1, 2009, cover, according to the Post. It published a cover featuring actress Kate Winslet the following day.

On the mocked-up cover, which is framed and hung in some of the Trump golf clubs, according to the Post, Trump appears with arms crossed beneath a banner that reads, TRUMP IS HITTING ON ALL FRONTS EVEN TV!

In the lower left corner, beneath Trumps name, a headline reads, The Apprentice is a television smash!"

Other headlines discuss real stories that appeared in the Kate Winslet issue, including a story about then-President Barack Obamas plan for health care and another about global warming.

Related: Sarah Palin Sues New York Times Over Editorial Linking Her to Violence

Its unclear who mocked up the fake cover and why, and its also not known if Trump himself was ever aware of the fake cover.

The Trump Organization did not immediately respond to NBC News request for comment.

Washington Post reporter David Fahrenthold, who broke the story, said he had tallied seven locations where the cover was spotted as of Wednesday morning, and was continuing to look for additional sightings.

Scott Keeler, a photojournalist for the Tampa Bay Times, posted a photo on Twitter of the framed Time cover hung on the wall of Trumps Palm Beach resort Mar-a-Lago.

Despite the fake cover, Trump has appeared on the front of the magazine several times. First, before he got into politics, Trump appeared on a 1989 cover holding an ace of diamonds next to his face.

The teaser read, This man may turn you green with envy or just turn you off. Flaunting it is the game, and Trump is the name.

After announcing his campaign to become president and his election, Trump has appeared on the cover of Time in both photos and illustrations more than a dozen times.

See the original post:
Time Asks Donald Trump's Golf Clubs to Remove Phony Magazine Cover - NBCNews.com

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.

Daily Emails and Alerts- Get the best of Newsweek delivered to your inbox

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