I’ve stayed in hotels before where I was comped a free copy of USA Today each morning. I’ve never really considered how that works financially, but I presume that USA Today can boost its advertising rates as a result of the increased circulation. The hotels just like providing a service that their customers will appreciate.
I suspect that Trump will make sure that guests at his hotels no longer get free copies of USA Today now that the editorial board has declared him unfit to serve as president.
The people are really smart in cancelling subscriptions to the Dallas & Arizona papers & now USA Today will lose readers! The people get it!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) September 30, 2016
He’s definitely not happy that guests in most of his hotels woke up this morning and found this staring them in the face:
There’s a problem, though.
On Tuesday, the Arizona Republic editorial board endorsed Clinton, marking the first time it had backed a Democrat for president in its 126-year history. The Dallas Morning News, the Cincinnati Enquirer and the Houston Chronicle — all with traditionally conservative editorial pages — have also backed Clinton in recent months. The Enquirer has supported Republicans for president for nearly a century. The Morning News hadn’t backed a Democrat for the White House since before World War II.
And on Thursday, the Detroit News abandoned Republicans for the first time in 143 years by endorsing the Libertarian candidate, Gary Johnson. As it happens, Johnson — who didn’t qualify for the general election debates and has been widely mocked for his unfamiliarity with Aleppo and all world leaders worth admiration — has collected more newspaper endorsements than Trump.
There are no papers with national circulation that have endorsed Trump. I’m not aware of any major paper that has endorsed him.
So, I guess the easiest thing for Trump Resorts to do is just discontinue the practice of comping newspapers to their guests. They’ll need to remove them from the gift shops, too.
It would be amusing to know how few readers any of these newspapers have lost. I bet more people cancel if the paper stops carrying their favorite comic strip.
It’s a lot noise but probably very few actual cancellations. I went looking on line for some stats from when the Chicago Tribune endorsed Harold Washington for Mayor in 1983 and couldn’t find any info, but I recall that although the letters they got were extremely nasty – very much like a Trump rally today – the actual numbers of cancellations weren’t great, and that of those who did many resubscribed not long afterwards.
Chicago Tribune today bizarrely endorsed Johnson
Chicago Sun-Times just endorse Clinton
Tronc seems to be having issues.
right’
their endorsement was very weirdly written too
For your future reference: the paper has to charge in order for the distribution to count in the “paid circulation” stats. So the hotel gives you the paper unless you tell the desk clerk that you don’t want it, and if you say that, they’ll knock a quarter off your rate.
It’s really funny how people view their newspapers. As everyone now knows, the other day our Cincinnati Enquirer endorsed Hillary, and the howling from the righties was simply deafening. Everyone was going on and on about how it has always been a “liberal rag” for years and years, and this was the last straw for them. CANCELLING RIGHT NOW!!!
The fact is, the Enquirer has been a conservative paper for my entire lifetime. Hell, they hadn’t endorsed a Democrat for President since the early 20th century. The Republicans in this area just still can’t come to terms with the fact that their Party has nominated a racist, xenophobic, misogynistic demagogue as their nominee. The other day, on Facebook, their Opinion Editor was asked if they had received any death threats in response to the Clinton endorsement, like some newspaper editorial boards apparently have. Her pithy response was, “Not really”. I told her that was a pretty squishy, yet telling, answer. She just smiled.
We do indeed live in strange and troubled times.
When any of these traditionally rightwing-lean nooz papers have lately endorsed Clinton – saying, like USA Today, that Trump is unfit for office – all of the righties in the area have commenced to shrieking about how unfairly and horribly lib’rul the newspaper has been all along.
Conservativism can never fail. Only people & newspapers can fail conservatism.
My local newspaper, the Sacramento Bee, does have slight (but only slight) leftish slant, as it always has. But boyohboy, local conservatives rant and tirade about it as if was the Communist Daily Pravda or something. My observation is that conservatives anymore simply cannot tolerate anything that even slightly conflicts with their worldview. When something does conflict, it has be because that POV is insanely LIEbrul.
Hard to penetrate the armor. Of course, that was the goal, which has been accomplished.
Cognitive dissonance itself becomes very uncomfortable when reality intrudes upon delusion.
The delusional worldview that is allowed to survive and thrive via cognitive dissonance requires that the adherent to the delusion lash out at reality, and double down on their delusions, in order to go back to believing whatever it is they choose to believe.
You see it over and over again by almost everyone who is suffering from it. At some point in the future, assuming we get there, it will be seen as a mental disorder. Perhaps the DSM-10 will include it.
I wonder, all these conservative paper editorial boards who are endorsing Clinton for president, look a little deeper and see who they endorsed in the Repub primary. For example, I think the Dallas paper that endorsed Clinton endorsed Kasich in the primary.
Their politics haven’t changed, they just don’t like their politics being so nakedly displayed for all to see. I’m guessing these papers also endorse whoever the Republican candidate for Senate is in their state, assuming there’s a Senate race.
Also too, never underestimate the long game the right wing screamers have played when it comes to intimidating the media. I have a friend who was a WH correspondent for a newspaper and confirmed time and time again how the phalanx of screamers, over a decade + time frame, scared the bean counters of papers looking at lost revenue during the last decade and scared to death of losing subscribers. They in turn would lean on the editors to make sure reporters at least couched their stories in terms less libel to piss off the right wing nut job subscribers. It took a long time but look at what we have now? A generally gutless 4th estate.
Don’t worry. Once safely ensconced in the White House, President Donald will blithely ban newspapers entirely.
And his fans will clap and cheer because all the newspapers are turrbly LIEbrul!!11!!
The final solution to the newspaper crisis.
USA Today may not lose much; I don’t think Trump’s US properties are exactly full nowadays.
Looks like Trump Hotels will have to drop Internet access, too:
http://www.bloomberg.com/politics/articles/2016-09-30/trump-tweets-about-sex-tape-as-campaign-strugg
les-to-regroup
Trump Tweets About Sex Tape as Campaign Struggles to Regroup
The salvos are part of an ongoing struggle between Trump and his aides about how to coordinate a cohesive strategy against Clinton.
Jennifer Jacobs
Kevin Cirilli
September 30, 2016 — 6:06 AM PDT Updated on September 30, 2016 — 1:40 PM PDT
…Yet disorganization and dysfunction in some of the key states, including Florida, are taking a toll.
A Florida Trump aide resigned Monday because she said she’s uncomfortable with the lack of progress in the campaign. “It is clear the campaign is now going in a direction I am no longer comfortable with and I have decided to move on,” said Healy Baumgardner, who had established herself early on as a public face of the campaign on TV, then saw her role shift to Florida following several campaign shake-ups.
Baumgardner, a 20-year political operative who has worked on four presidential campaigns, said she looks forward “to honorably casting my vote for Mr. Trump on Election Day.”
Clinton is 4 percentage points ahead of Trump in Florida, according to a Mason-Dixon Polling & Research survey taken after the debate.
The campaign’s Trump Talk phone banking system is experiencing technical difficulties, said Florida campaign workers who requested anonymity out of fear of getting fired for speaking publicly. The lack of basic campaign staples such as yard signs and bumper stickers forces staff to repeatedly turn away excited Trump backers who want to show their support. There’s disagreement about spending $40,000 to wrap an RV in campaign advertising for a women’s bus tour in Florida…
Out here in CA the Santa Barbara News-Press endorsed Trump, but that paper’s owner is insane and it’s sucked for at least a decade.
Right, that’s the 4th paper to endorse Trump in the primaries – the other three are listed in my other comment.
Yep, that was during the primaries along with the New York Post, New York Observer, and the always reliable National Enquirer.
Since the primaries, as far as I am aware, Trump has received no newspaper endorsements.
So here is the scorecard and detail of the endorsements:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Newspaper_endorsements_in_the_United_States_presidential_election,_201
6
It’s amazing. It’s one thing for a politician to hem and haw about whether he or she endorses Trump based on the latest polls – I mean, they can always weasel out of whatever they said later. But an endorsement is stuck in the ground, never gonna change. And newspapers don’t have to worry about a primary challenge next election. (If ever a paper was going to go out of business due to subscription cancellations it would have been the Chicago Tribune after they endorsed Harold Washington in 1983.) So for reputation purposes the paper needs to get it right.
As much as we hate GWB, the fact is he was still within the window of respectability. (No, I agree he should be in prison for war crimes, but that’s the conventional viewpoint.) That choice was defensible. So would have been Rubio or even Cruz. But Trump – that’s the kind of stain that lives forever.
You’ll note that quite a few always-GOP papers have endorsed Gary Johnson. Very safe endorsement – zero risk there.
This really should be an issue come mid-October when the scorecard will be overwhelmingly Clinton, with Johnson in second place and None of the Above in third. Trump will have the same papers who endorsed him in the primaries (also available at that link if you look at the side bar) – New York Post, New York Observer, National Enquirer. What a mess.
You’ll note that quite a few always-GOP papers have endorsed Gary Johnson. Very safe endorsement – zero risk there.
I don’t know about that. Johnson is proving himself, to those that don’t know already, quite the idiot.
So would have been Rubio or even Cruz. But Trump – that’s the kind of stain that lives forever.
Why would Cruz or Rubio have been? Both are also idiots. Both would also sign whatever McConnell & Ryan would put on their desk. Is the difference that Trump does the equivalent of drunk tweeting at 3am? Trump is the GOP and the GOP is Trump.
Phil, you need to look at the reputation of newspaper endorsements from a different, um, Perspective. Not as a leftie who is focused on this election. Think long term and think centrist – by which those in the press mean center-right.
Johnson is an idiot. This fact will be forgotten by all but the political junkies 3 weeks after the election. Someone looking back on a Johnson newspaper endorsement will say “Oh, this GOP paper avoided Trump, but didn’t want to endorse the Democrat. Makes sense.” The fact that Johnson is nearly as unsuited to the job as Trump won’t enter their mind.
Yes, I agree that Rubio and Cruz are idiots, and I agree that putting them into power with a GOP congress ensures a catastrophe – especially environmentally. But I’m firmly on the left, as are you. I also think that any paper that endorsed GWB – especially for 2004 – is a borderline war criminal. That’s NOT the centrist point of view. From the centrist point of view Bush was a reasonable choice, and so would be Rubio or Cruz.
It’s a big problem that the centrist viewpoint is what it is. But that reality provides the context for why GOP newspapers are avoiding Trump. You see, Trump is crazy – the GOP leadership knows this. Whether Trump wins or loses, an endorsement of him will be a stain that never goes away. If he loses he’ll be seen even by centrists as the catastrophe that was barely avoided. If he wins – OMG, don’t think about it.
GOP politicians, OTOH, are dancing a tightrope of trying to placate all at once: Trump’s base; the GOP voters who don’t like Trump but think everyone should vote for him any way (these are largely ex-Cruz voters), and the minority of the GOP, mostly in leadership, who sees him for the threat he is. Few are willing to risk outright non-endorsement of Trump for fear of being primaried, which they would be.
My view is that there is a difference between Rubio and Cruz vis-a-vis Trump. Policy wise they are as reactionary, if not more extreme.
However, If one ignores the policy positions and looks only at personality and temperament, they don’t seem to be as dangerous for the country and our democracy. They have, if nothing else, better impulse control.