The journalists at Good Morning America on Tuesday could barely contain their contempt at Donald Trump’s “strange” and “bizarre” fascination with Fox & Friends. The President retweeted several stories from the Fox News show and this apparently doesn’t sit will with those at GMA. Yet the ironic part is that ABC skipped an ObamaCare story that Trump tweeted about. Apparently, it didn’t occur to the reporters that such bias is why the President goes around the mainstream media.
George Stephanopoulos sputtered, “The President already up and active on Twitter this morning. He seems simply to be doing a running commentary on Fox & Friends and retweeting their stories.”
Regarding the various topics Trump tweeted about, Stephanopoulos chided, “What's so strange about that is presumably this is the kind of thing he could learn from his own intelligence officials, yet he seems to publicize it when he sees it on television.”
Karl mocked, “He gets the presidential daily briefing a little later in the morning. The first brief is, apparently, Fox & Friends.” Co-host Robin Roberts marveled, “Quite bizarre.”
Bizarre? Strange? One of the stories Trump retweeted was this:
CNN.com explained, “Anthem (ANTM) is pulling out of Nevada's Obamacare exchange for 2018 and cutting its presence in Georgia's marketplace roughly in half, the company announced Monday.”
In the entire two hours of Tuesday’s GMA, the topic never came up. Stephanopoulos, Karl and Roberts should spend less time being disgusted by the appeal of Fox News for the President and more time making sure they actually cover stories not favorable to liberals.
Stephanopoulos even spun Trump’s Twitter fight with Democratic Senator Richard Blumenthal:
Yesterday, that extended tirade against Senator Richard Blumenthal attacking him for failing to serve in Vietnam even though he was in the Marine reserves at the time and comes from a president who didn't serve at all.
No. The President’s “tirade” wasn’t about Blumenthal “failing to serve” in Vietnam. It was that the Democrat lied about being there. Quite a difference.
[Good Morning America’s bias was brought to you by Lancome makeup, Excedrin and Crest.]
A transcript is below:
Good Morning America
8/8/17
7:05amGEORGE STEPHANOPOULOS: As a brand new poll from CNN shows the President’s support from his Republican base is slipping. Strong approval of the President has dropped from 73 percent in February to 59 percent now. Let’s get more on this from our chief White House correspondent Jon Karl and, Jon, let's begin with the polls right there. The president was out yesterday tweeting that his base is getting bigger every day. This poll at odds with that.
JON KARL: Directly at odds with that and, George, we've seen the President's numbers come down as we've mentioned before. Historically low for a president this early in his first term. And, George, the team at the White House really has a choice here to make. Does the President try to reverse those numbers by expanding his base, by reaching out to those who are not traditional Trump supporters or do they further try to energize his base and it seems that that's the direction that they believe that he needs to go, which is to go further to the right, further to energize and to get going his hard core supporters. But right now, those supporters seem to be softening.
STEPHANOPOULOS: That certainly seems to be the tact he's taking with his tweets as well. Yesterday, that extended tirade against Senator Richard Blumenthal attacking him for failing to serve in Vietnam even though he was in the Marine reserves at the time and comes from a president who didn't serve at all.
KARL: Exactly right, who actually got more deferments than Senator Blumenthal and he's also been going at the New York Times quite aggressively. Most of his tweets over the last 24, 36 hours have been about Sidney [sic] Blumenthal or about the New York Times continuing to call the New York Times the failing "New York Times, so much so that "The Times is responding, George. They’ve actually put out a statement to respond to the President on this. Take a look at this. The Times saying the facts matter. We just reported 3.3 million paid subscription, our most ever and growing profit, income and revenues. Our stock is up nearly 50 percent this year.” So, directly responding to the President and trying to speak to the President’s own language.
STEPHANOPOULOS: Jon, the President already up and active on Twitter this morning. He seems simply to be doing a running commentary on Fox and Friends and retweeting their stories.
KARL: It's really something else, George. We've seen this over and over again. This morning, most interesting is he retweeted a story on Fox & Friends that seems to be based on a leak of classified information about spy satellites over North Korea, U.S. spy satellites, exactly the kind of leaks that the White House has been condemning, but there the President is apparently interested in what's on Fox & Friends.
STEPHANOPOULOS: And what’s so strange about that is presumably this is the kind of thing he could learn from his own intelligence officials yet he seems to publicize it when he sees it on television.
KARL: Yeah. He gets the presidential daily briefing a little later in the morning. The first brief is, apparently, Fox & Friends.
STEPHANOPOULOS: Jon Karl, thanks very much. Robin?
ROBIN ROBERTS: Quite bizarre.
