On the Left, few forms of mainstream journalism are more detested than political reporting. It often substitutes the horse race for substance, dresses up conventional inside-the-Beltway wisdom as real analysis, and resorts to the false balance of he-said-she-said instead of establishing what is actually factual.
Political reporters took a serious hit after Donald Trump won the Republican primary and then the presidency, and Bernie Sanders mounted a dead serious challenge to the Democratic Party’s anointed candidate. Trump is now using his bully pulpit to wage an assault on empirical reality, clinging to his own “alternative facts” and labeling the media as an opposition party purveying “fake news.”
My guest today is Dave Weigel, a reporter at the Washington Post who is amongst the best in the game. Weigel has also worked for Slate and, in his early years, at the libertarian outlet Reason. He doesn’t come from the Left, but he gets us better than any mainstream reporter out there.