Contents
- The News Media Becomes Infotainment
- Trump Creates Reality
- Equality or Quotas
- The Democrats’ Losing Strategy
- Resources
If you’ve felt like the media is gaslighting you, politics is theater, and every argument about DEI is either too self-righteous or deliberately obtuse, welcome to 2025, where reality is a choose-your-own-adventure book.
Bill Maher has been an expert in starting and shaping interesting conversations since the days of Politically Incorrect. His Club Random Podcast is among the most valuable resources available today to hear real, candid conversations with interesting people.
In a recent conversation with Don Lemon, the two discussed the decline of legacy news, Donald Trump, DEI, and why Democrats are still their own worst enemy.
Whether you agree with them or not, one thing is clear: America’s public discourse is a mess, and few seem interested in cleaning it up.
The News Media Becomes Infotainment
The golden age of journalism is dead.
What’s left is a clickbait-addicted, corporate-controlled shell of its former self.
Don Lemon knows this firsthand. “I don’t have to pretend that I don’t have to give false equivalence,” he told Maher, discussing why he prefers his independent YouTube show. He no longer has to “invite someone on to lie” just to create drama.
Maher takes aim at The New York Times, lamenting that it used to be “the paper of record” but now blurs the line between opinion and news.
“I never feel like I’m hearing the full story,” he said. “I’m hearing narrative.” Media outlets aren’t asking “What’s true?” anymore. They’re asking, “What will our audience want to hear?”
It’s not paranoia. A 2023 Gallup poll found that only 32% of Americans trust the media (Scott Adams says 25% will get the wrong answer on any question).
Journalism isn’t supposed to be about giving people what they want. It’s supposed to be about what they need to hear. But that’s inconvenient, and inconvenient doesn’t sell.
Trump Creates Reality
“Trump’s superpower is that he lies so much, it’s just baked into the cake,” said Lemon. Trump doesn’t live in reality—he creates reality.
I tend to agree with the second part of that assessment. Trump does create reality. That’s a powerful gift for a world leader.
Maher agreed with Lemon, saying, “They take him seriously but not literally.” The problem is, people believe what they want to believe. If Trump says Ukraine’s president has a 4% approval rating (when it’s actually 57%), his base doesn’t fact-check—they just roll with it.
What neither seems to understand is that lying politicians are as American as apple pie. Would we rather have the leader who skews minor facts to illustrate an already compelling narrative or a leader who invents straight-out lies for political gain (Russia Hoax?).
Equality or Quotas
Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion all sound like nice words. Who doesn’t want fair opportunities?
But as Maher pointed out, the execution sometimes raises eyebrows. “We had fires here recently, and our fire chief was a lesbian. Do I think a lesbian can do that job? Of course. But did they say, ‘We need a lesbian first’?”
Lemon pushed back, arguing DEI is about broadening the pool of candidates, not about enforcing quotas.
Maher appears more closely connected to reality. The problem with DEI is that it by definition reduces the pool of qualified applicants for any position.
Do we get the best fire chief, or do we get the best lesbian fire chief? We might get lucky and those two could overlap, but odds are that these are two different people.
The Democrats’ Losing Strategy
Democrats love a good self-sabotage.
Instead of standing firm, they spend their energy virtue-signaling and canceling their own. “Look at Al Franken,” Maher lamented, pointing out how the left ousted one of its own over “minor allegations” while the GOP “embraces open corruption.”
Interesting. I’d like to hear an example of this open corruption the GOP embraces. Early reports from DOGE seem to indicate a lot of open corruption on the Left (but both sides, to be sure).
Lemon suggests that the GOP wins because they understand that people don’t always vote based on logic. They vote based on feeling.
That’s at least part of it. Logic alone doesn’t get you to the correct answer on every question.