Jeff Bezos killed Washington Post endorsement of Kamala Harris
1078 comments
·October 25, 2024lapcat
Newspapers publish opinions for the same reason that they publish comic strips: people want to read them. Readers seek them out. Newspapers are a business and have to give their customers what they want.
The problematic aspect here is that the current business owner, Jeff Bezos, has a conflict of interest. Bezos is making a bad business decision for The Washington Post, sacrificing it and losing readers for the sake of his other business interests, i.e., government contracts. It's unlikely that an independent owner with no conflict of interest would make the same decision.
nickff
You seem to be implying that he made a decision based on other business interests, against those of the Post, but there is no support for that in the article. Do you have a source which describes this motive?
It seems like not endorsing candidates might be good for the Washington Post's business, by improving its perceived impartiality. In addition to this, the WaPo seems to have spent much of its history not endorsing candidates, and it has been doing (financially) poorly recently; perhaps this is a return to more profitable and credible roots.
sgnelson
While you may not take this as proof it affected this exact decision, it's hard to ignore it as a possible reason.
https://www.cnbc.com/2020/02/10/amazon-wants-to-depose-presi...
tbrownaw
Updates...
JEDI was cancelled (article also mentions results of investigations into Amazon's claims): https://www.cnbc.com/2021/07/06/pentagon-cancels-10-billion-...
The lawsuit got tossed because it didn't matter any more: https://www.reuters.com/legal/government/us-judge-ends-amazo...
The replacement program somehow includes all three of the usual suspects, plus Oracle: https://www.defense.gov/News/Releases/Release/Article/323937...
dmix
Bezos wants to help elect someone who (his lawyers allege) killed a gov contract favourable to his own business? Or did I misread your comment.
JKCalhoun
> In addition to this, the WaPo seems to have spent much of its history not endorsing candidates
In recent history, apparently the last time they did not endorse a candidate was the 1980's.
perihelions
- "You seem to be implying that he made a decision based on other business interests, against those of the Post, but there is no support for that in the article. Do you have a source which describes this motive?"
There's support in that Trump personally met with Blue Origin's C-suite, on the same day the Washington Post spiked their Harris endorsement—an apparent reward to Bezos, and one that put his business interests in the spotlight.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/elections/2024/10/25/2024-ele... ("Trump met with Bezos’s Blue Origin executives after The Post’s non-endorsement")
edm0nd
>by improving its perceived impartiality
Can WaPo really be perceived as "impartial" if we know they already were going to endorse Harris?
markvdb
That is possible if their editorial staff honestly believe two things:
- The rule of law and the republic as a process are superior to anything else.
- One of the candidates does not subscribe to these sufficiently.
In that case, and given the political duopoly, they could still claim to be impartial towards candidates. Their only allegiance/partiality would lie with the rule of law and the republic as a process.
hoppyhoppy2
There's a difference between the opinion staff and the news staff.
>The Post’s decision has roiled many on the paper’s opinions staff, which operates independently from The Post’s news staff, a long-standing tradition of American journalism designed to separate opinion writing from day-to-day news coverage.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/style/media/2024/10/25/washin...
smsm42
It would take way more for WaPo to not be in a position where mentioning it in one phrase with "impartiality" wouldn't sound like an absurdist joke. They can walk this road, but so far there's absolutely no indication they want to, and Bezos twisting their arms can't be taken as such evidence.
raverbashing
Apparently Blue Origin executives were meeting with Trump yesterday
tempestn
There is direct support in the article. Amazon lost a $10B contract because Trump doesn't like Bezos, which is because he owns the WP, a paper that is generally critical of Trump. By killing this endorsement, he's buying some goodwill from Trump, at the cost of alienating the bulk of WP's readers.
lapcat
> there is no support for that in the article.
Untrue. At the top, "KEY POINTS: In a 2019 lawsuit, Amazon claimed it lost a $10 billion Pentagon cloud computing contract to Microsoft because Trump used “improper pressure ... to harm his perceived political enemy” Bezos."
ipaddr
If the capital gains / wealth tax plan goes ahead it would cost Jeff much of his fortune. $10 billion over ten years is peanuts.
nickff
[flagged]
culi
Really this is a lesson in why the corporate news model is doomed to fail. Upping my contributions to serious investigative journalist organizations like ProPublica
primitivesuave
One of ProPublica's greatest recent victories (in my opinion) was the FOIA lawsuit to secure public release of PPP loan information, along with other COVID relief loans like EIDL. Aside from the sheer scale ($1 trillion) and the rampant fraud [1], there were politicians from both sides of the aisle who took these forgivable business loans while delaying other forms of government relief.
1. https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3906395
anon291
Pro publica doesn't endorse
seizethecheese
I disagree. This is the exception rather than the rule. The more corporate, the more likely to give the people what they want.
digdugdirk
Isn't that contrary to the purpose of news organizations? They should give the people what they need to know, not what they want.
goosejuice
How do you square that with social media being the source of news for many?
dfxm12
I just hope this will finally put to bed any ridiculous mentions of "liberal media bias", or that the tech sector has some liberal bias.
theWreckluse
I think new-tech/mass-consumer-facing tech is always going to have a liberal bias - that just plays well with the dynamics of getting new users to use your procuct. It's only once a company/organization establishes itself as a mega Corp will we see the conservative idealogy exerting it's want to sustain/conserve the accumulated power.
mensetmanusman
Why would it put it to bed? It’s worth people knowing that the media leans over 90% left from all the stats that exist.
DonHopkins
[flagged]
kernal
Ridiculous is thinking there is no legacy liberal media bias. Take the top 100 political articles from WaPo and the NYT from this year and tell me how many are anti Republican. I’m guessing nearly all of them.
michaelhoney
it’s true that reporting the facts about what the 2024 incarnation of the GOP does makes them look bad
defrost
Many express fondness for Reagan era Republicans and lament their absence.
There's support for Liz Cheney, a former chair of the House Republican Conference, coming out against Trump et al.
Are you sure "anti-Republican" is what you're seeing and not just calling out the MAGA faction for their behaviour?
pokerface_86
why don’t you take a look at the republican party’s policies and think about why that is?
rayiner
The media isn't even just liberal. It's off the charts liberal even among liberals. Among journalists, Democrats outnumber Republicans 10 to 1: https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2023/dec/30/only-34-us-....
This is reflected in news coverage. Consider how they cover things like Voter ID or proving citizenship to vote, which 80% of people support: https://news.gallup.com/poll/652523/americans-endorse-early-...
Or consider how papers coverage policies like affirmative action that supermajorities of Americans oppose: https://www.forbes.com/sites/vinaybhaskara/2023/07/10/americ...
oezi
> Among journalists, Democrats outnumber Republicans 10 to 1
This seems to be a general observation when looking at college educated people that they lean more towards the Democratic party.
Hard to combat such a bias.
paul7986
Funny in terms of liberal technology is testing Chat GPT of any political biased.
Based off asking it the following 3 questions it might just be...
"Hey GPT, whose your spirit animal between Barrack Obama and Donald Trump?" It provided a neutral answer providing the pros of both dudes.
"Hey GPT, whose your spirit animal between Obama and Hitler?" It clearly chose Obama saying how rightfully so awful Hitler was.
"Hey GPT, whose your spirit animal between Trump and Hitler" It did not choose Trump at all rather just gave the rightfully so negative feedback about Hitler.
No fan of Trump or politics in general but if it happily chose Obama yet avoided Trump that seems odd (Trump is no way close to a genocider).
fma
Conservatives keep moving the goal post. I see a less criticism of conservatives due to the fear of being labeled as bias. i.e. the coverage of Biden's cognitive decline vs Trump's cognitive decline.
anon291
Trump just spoke with Rogan for three hours unscripted and showed none of the obvious cognitive decline that Joe did.
That's fine... For some, age does not really slow them down. For others it does. People just need to be real about it.
gotoeleven
[flagged]
graemep
> Jeff Bezos, has a conflict of interest
He is the outright (ultimate, through a holding company) owner of The Washington Post.
Therefore there is no conflict of interest. He gets to decide what its interests are.
I think it is worth asking whether it is in the public interest to allow people with other extensive business interests to own influential media businesses, but that is usual these days. Most media is owned by media (and sometimes more) conglomerates with many interests around the world.
lapcat
This is unhelpfully pedantic.
My point is that Bezos would likely make a different decision for The Washington Post if he wasn't concerned about retaliation against his other business interests, and in fact he allowed the paper to make political endorsements in the past.
anon291
Jokes on bezos though because he's never going to be able to redeem himself to the GOP after the banning of parler.
j_maffe
> He gets to decide what its interests are.
No he doesn't. He can choose to do with it whatever he may like. But whether it's in its interest or not is a property purely derived from the current state of the journal and the market. Whether he likes it or not.
And, yes, the issue stems from business ownership of a so-called "independent" news outlet which has clear conflict of interest. Which is something that we should not accept and continue fighting against, whether it's usual or not.
lurking15
> so-called "independent" news outlet which has clear conflict of interest
If a majority of staff at a news outlet are liberal/progressive isn't that clearly a bias and hard to call independent?
I just notice that people tend to only call out institutional bias in one direction
graemep
"But whether it's in its interest"
How do you define "its interest"?
It is a business. It does not have interests of its own. its owners have interests - in this case its the one owner who has that. Its staff may have interests, as may other people, and there is always a public interest.
> the issue stems from business ownership of a so-called "independent" news outlet which has clear conflict of interest. Which is something that we should not accept and continue fighting against
I agree it is a problem, but, as far as traditional media goes, it is a lost cause. Can you see anything that will cause big media businesses to split themselves?
make3
this is absolute BS. Journals are meant to have a split between the editorial board and their owners, because the credibility and ethics of the journal comes first. People don't read, or shouldn't want to read anyways, a paper that is just whatever the fuck Bezos decided was good that week; things should be as unbiased as possible.
bjourne
> Newspapers publish opinions for the same reason that they publish comic strips: people want to read them. Readers seek them out. Newspapers are a business and have to give their customers what they want.
The customer is predominantly the advertiser. Newspapers publish opinions to have something to fill the empty space surrounding the advertisements.
dingaling
Indeed, I'd assumed paper use opinion columns because they're cheaper than news.
waihtis
Calling it a "bad business decision" just reveals your political preference. People who get their opinions from journalists is a constantly shrinking crowd. Today I mostly see only people of age 50+ who still actively think journalists can provide an accurate worldview for them.
heresie-dabord
> Newspapers are a business and have to give their customers what they want.
If this is all we expect of journalism in a Democracy, then the current state of the "business" of "news" in the US should be satisfactory to all.
lapcat
> If this is all we expect of journalism in a Democracy
Straw man. I didn't say that.
It's not a maximum, but it is a minimum. Newspapers require money to operate, and they're competing for attention in a capitalist economy. No attention. no money, no newspaper. In a democracy, you can't force-feed newspapers to the population. They voluntarily choose to read or not read.
The "good news" is that many people in a democracy are interested in the hard truth. Nonetheless, it helps to package that along with softer marketing and entertainment.
akira2501
> Newspapers are a business and have to give their customers what they want.
Isn't that supposed to be news and not worthless institutional opinions on the presidential office?
> It's unlikely that an independent owner with no conflict of interest would make the same decision.
An unconflicted owner wouldn't endorse either candidate. In general, hopefully, but in this election, particularly.
reverius42
Having an editorial opinion is not the same thing as having a conflict of interest. In general readers don’t expect newspapers to contain only news, but also opinions and editorial decisions. Candidate endorsements are a typical part of what’s expected.
0x457
> Isn't that supposed to be news and not worthless institutional opinions on the presidential office?
That's the goal of Journalism. Newspaper only goals: sell newspapers, sell ads in those newspapers (and since it we live in the age of internet - their website).
> An unconflicted owner wouldn't endorse either candidate. In general, hopefully, but in this election, particularly.
unconflicted owner's opinion shouldn't effect editorial staff opinions.
yieldcrv
that's my stance as well
WaPo needed someone to make a difficult decision, conflict of interest or not, to just rip the bandaid off of their imprisonment of endorsing candidates
that's over now. the end. the market is going to forget this was ever a thing.
Molitor5901
To play Devils Advocate for a moment: Why do we need, or even want, a newspaper to endorse a President? How does it not undermine a paper's journalistic ethics to be neutral and fair?
coldpie
I actually agree with you, newspapers really shouldn't be doing this. Our major local paper in the Twin Cities basically torched its reputation by endorsing wildly unqualified candidates for city offices (like, one guy they endorsed for Minneapolis city council didn't even live in Minneapolis). They recently decided to stop doing endorsements at all, which I think is the right decision.
But that's not what happened here. The editors did their normal endorsement process, but the owner of the paper stepped in and personally overrode their process for this one particular endorsement. That's a way different story from deciding to stop doing endorsements.
Molitor5901
Another point that just occurred to me: Who is the endorsement supposed to influence? I think in America at least, the national media has become so hyper partisan in the eyes of its readers, that an endorsement of a newspaper is really just preaching to the crowd. What difference does that endorsement really make?
At the national level, I don't think it really makes a difference if a newspaper endorses a candidate for President. Those who read and value the opinions of that newspaper are more inclined to vote for the endorsed candidate anyways.
throwaway48476
I think it's like wearing a jersey for your favorite sport franchise. It's not meant to influence anyone outside the group but reinforce group cohesion.
kcplate
It influences no one, but it sends a pretty loud message to the Democratic party that (now two, LATimes did same thing) normally reliable media orgs have lost confidence in the democrat party’s ability to bring forth a competitive candidate against Donald Trump.
bogantech
> But that's not what happened here. The editors did their normal endorsement process, but the owner of the paper stepped in and personally overrode their process for this one particular endorsement.
He owns the paper, they just work there.
kcplate
Honestly it’s surprising to me that people really think that the news side of a media company operates with complete autonomy from the business side. They might claim it exists but that’s a fallacy.
I worked at a major daily newspaper 30 years ago and I personally know of two cases in my short tenure there where news stories were killed because they didn’t want to piss off important advertisers. I am also aware of a story involving a family member of one of the executives that was let’s say “barely” reported. Other local media organizations interestingly had much more detail than we carried.
News has always been and will always be first—a business.
bitshiftfaced
[flagged]
drewbug01
“Had”, not “has”, a long history of not endorsing candidates. They’ve been endorsing since the 80s.
The proper framing is “the owners stepped in to change the policy, to mirror the same policies they had before the 80s”.
Whether that’s right or wrong to do is a separate question. But framing this as though it has been editors going rogue or something is just not what’s happening at all.
Molitor5901
I saw that but I'm not sure I see the "long history". From Eisenhower to Carter, then from Carter to now, that's not much of a long history of non-endorsement. The Post is taking a very strong stance here and it will be interesting to see if this stands up in 2028. The LA Times may have left the door open to future endorsements, but not the Post.
Better question: Why now? What changed for them? Was it declining revenue/readers, an overhaul of ethics or process? I can't wait to read the tell all some day about these decisions.
transcriptase
[flagged]
johnnyanmac
you see how incedisive so many people are and sadly realize that yes: an endorsement from a big newspaper can mean a lot.
zmmmmm
Endorsements are published by the editorial section which is specifically separated from the rest of the newspaper so to not undermine the neutrality of the journalism in the other sections.
Opinion and analysis has always been part of news publications, and plays an accepted role in adding layers of interpretation onto the raw "facts" that is crucial in making those facts interpretable by readers who aren't expert in the subject matter.
smsm42
The idea that editorial team has some kind of expertise, unavailable to general population, that allows them ecxlusive ability to properly understand current events, seems to have no factual support at all. They are professionals in giving their opinions, it doesn't make their opinions be better that anybody else's. Experience suggests they are usually worse.
zmmmmm
> The idea that editorial team has some kind of expertise, unavailable to general population
That doesn't make sense to me - they literally spend all day every day absorbing, summarising and writing about context as their full time job. They are trained formally at assessing, evaluating and questioning facts. You can criticise the end result, but I can't see how it's reasonable to say they aren't far better positioned to have an informed opinion than the average reader who gets up in the morning with no training and tries to understand a slew of facts dumped on them without context.
bjtitus
That would seem to negate the entire point of any editorial column then, right? If we don't care about their opinion, what's the point of reading in the first place?
fma
So - cancel the opinion section while we're at it I guess?
bee_rider
It seems like the newspaper editorial section really ought to endorse somebody to make their biases clear, if nothing else. What are we to believe, that a bunch of people whose job it is to write opinion pieces don’t have an opinion about the election in their own country? Haha, yeah, sureeee…
zahlman
>the editorial section which is specifically separated from the rest of the newspaper
It hasn't felt like this to me for many years, for pretty much any outlet.
Cyph0n
Layers of interpretation = surfacing the bias of the editorial team so you can look for it in the non-oped sections of the paper
zmmmmm
You can take that way if you want. But you aren't doing it justice if you just view it as purely cynical deliberate manipulation rather than a true effort at enhancing the reader's understanding.
Essentially they offer a framework of reasoning around the facts presented that the reader can use to make their own evaluation. Like if someone reports that 122,211 electric vehicles were sold last year. Is that a lot? Is that not a lot? You would need to start comparing to previous years, what external factors might be influencing sales. There is intrinsically no way to do that without introducing selective bias about what is considered or not. But the reader at least gets that context to enhance their own understanding.
keiferski
In practice there is little or no distinction. The list of top articles always includes opinion pieces, the choice of “neutral” fact articles to publish (and the headlines used) signals bias, and on a basic common sense level a newspaper isn’t going to publish an opinion piece that goes against the opinions of their workers/owners. Every time an opinion piece is published that goes against this, it’s a huge brouhaha.
Interestingly on another note, opinion writers are often actually less qualified than you’d expect, because the business model of a newspaper doesn’t really work for accumulating expertise vs. a specialized magazine/Substack / etc. The only way to have consistent opinion pieces is to have a generalist, not a specialist.
colordrops
> crucial in making those facts interpretable by readers who aren't expert in the subject matter.
That's pretty charitable. In my experience most opinion and "analysis" is typically heavily biased and in service of some agenda.
ekianjo
> to not undermine the neutrality of the journalism in the other sections.
There is no neutral publication. Of there is an editorial board there is by definition no neutrality.
wordofx
[flagged]
zmmmmm
> If trump said 1+1=2
He says things like "I wish I had general's like Hitler's" or his political opponents are the "enemy within" and he would harness the military against them if he gets in power, and that migrants are criminals.
I really don't know how you can equate something as uncontroversial as "1+1=2" with such controversial and divisive statements.
rat87
It is a neutral statement that Trump is objectively terrible. By contrast it is propaganda to defend him when he claims 2+2=5, which he does on a regularly basis.
And this doesn't have anything to do with "the left" a ton of conservative Republicans have admitted that Trump is objectively terrible.
https://www.wpr.org/news/conservative-commentator-charlie-sy...
chairmansteve
[flagged]
fma
[flagged]
strunz
He lies about absolutely everything, so everything he says should be met with skepticism.
janalsncm
I guess we need to think about what it means to be “neutral”. If half of Americans believe the earth is flat, is the neutral stance to say it’s unclear? Or is it to figure out what the truth is? In my mind there’s a difference between journalists and pollsters.
Of course with endorsements you can technically bring up the is/aught dichotomy. The facts may be what they are but that doesn’t necessitate any particular action. While this is technically true, I never see anyone complaining about the ethics of testing products and endorsing good ones. Wirecutter is basically doing the same thing with headphones and running shoes. Yet I only ever see pushback on political endorsements.
In short, umpires are neutral and fair but the fact that some teams win a lot more than others doesn’t mean they’re not doing their job.
christophilus
That’s because if you praise a terrible toaster, life for most Americans is unaffected. If you endorse a political candidate, and nudge the election in one direction or other, roughly 50% of Americans will see that move as hostile.
janalsncm
The principle is the same though, whether you’re recommending candidates or toasters. Just because one has more impact than the other, doesn’t make it less ethical to investigate and recommend.
mensetmanusman
Politics is simply preference. The shape of the earth is not.
janalsncm
It’s a bit more than that in my mind. Political candidates at this point are telling vastly different stories about the reality we live in. The changes they want to make follow from the story they are telling.
It’s not that politicians share a common set of facts and just have differences of opinion about how to best accomplish the same goal. They are telling vastly different stories. In some sense, the more compelling story wins.
So I see a pretty direct connection between facts and political preference.
maxerickson
It's not automatically unethical for a journalist to advocate for something.
I guess if they entirely stopped publishing self authored editorials it might be "neutral" to not publish a particular one. But that isn't what is happening.
jll29
The main thing for journalists is to strictly separate news reporting from editorial opinion pieces and clearly mark which is which.
Molitor5901
"The main thing for journalists is to strictly separate" a journalists personal opinion and political leanings from the news they are reporting. That is possible but it takes a strong editor to say no, you're trying to push your own personal opinion of the facts based on your political beliefs, when it should be up to the reader to decide that.
Dalewyn
A journalist's job is to journal something, nothing more and nothing less.
If a purported journalist wants to influence or otherwise lead his audience somewhere, he is many things (commentator, advocate, activist, influencer, etc.) but he is not a journalist.
ignoramous
> If a purported journalist wants to influence ... he is not a journalist
maxerickson
Declaring your misunderstanding doesn't make it so.
"Engineers make implements of war" or so.
adriand
Journalism and a robust news media are a critical part of democracy. We can’t have a functioning democracy without them, just like we also need an independent judiciary, independent educational institutions and so on. As such, journalists are on the “side” of democracy. It is no accident that fascists and authoritarians attack the news media. They have to in order to gain and keep power.
The correct posture, therefore, of the free press when a charismatic authoritarian is on the cusp of power is opposition. So-called “neutrality” is not just foolish, it betrays their entire reason for being!
johnnyanmac
Devil's advocate: you can be more than one thing at once. And newspapers never promised to only be for journalism.
sleepybrett
These are not journalists, these are the OPINION EDITORS. You know, the op-ed page, the page that contains NO journalism.
It has been a long tradition for the OPINION EDITORS of newspapers to endorse one or more positions of various political races, especially the presidential race.
vr46
This is a completely wrong and perhaps deliberately misleading impression of journalism and journalists. Healthy journalism absolutely provides critical analysis.
karmakurtisaani
> How does it not undermine a paper's journalistic ethics to be neutral and fair?
Where did you get this? Every news source has some bias, journalists, editors and owners of the media house are not some ideal beings. The good ones are honest about their bias.
As to endorsing a candidate, it's absolutely for the paper to decide. Endorsing a candidate might alienate some readers, not endorsing others.
sbuttgereit
To play Devil's Advocate to the Devil's Advocate... I would posit that journalistic neutrality isn't possible: and if that's the case I'd rather the journalist or publication wear their biases on their sleeve.
I can read a biased story, with values very different to my own, and still draw conclusions that are still meaningful. Mind you, I would expect omissions and couching that is flawed, but understanding the thinking of those I oppose is valuable and allows me to see their blind spots (or my own for that matter).
But a news organization or journalist being clear about their values and politics also disposes of the harmful notion that they've actually achieved some sort of objective reading or that they're being complete and well rounded. There's a deceptiveness in that pretense which some readers (watchers) may actually take for truth and not think more critically about what they're consuming than that.
anyonecancode
I think if Bezos had announced this change in policy in, say, Feb 2021, it would have landed differently.
quesera
I think this is exactly right.
I'm 100% on board with impartial reporting, with the caveats that a) endorsements are of the Opinion section, and b) the fact of the matter is that only the higher-minded news orgs would attempt impartiality -- so it's really just ceding the argument.
And LATimes and WaPo endorsements almost certainly won't have an effect on this election.
But, this reeks of cowardice. If you wanted to return to the journalistic standard of impartiality, that's a great thing to do when the pressure is low. Feb 2021 would have been perfect.
Less than two weeks before the most contentious election in modern history? And specifically when one candidate has threatened news organizations and their owners with retribution (legal, commercial, extralegal) for stories they don't like?
That's capitulation, not impartiality. If you believe in the mission of journalism, the honorable option would be to anti-endorse any candidate who threatens that mission.
If you don't believe in that mission, then what are you doing operating a newspaper?
Bezos is a coward.
johnnyanmac
100%. Or even January 2024. Shutting down the operation last minute is simply suspect in so many areas.
ein0p
[flagged]
foogazi
The editorial page runs on opinion - I expect them to opine
iambateman
Let’s zoom out from the present election and remember how Bezos took over…
The first thing he said was “The paper’s duty will remain to its readers and not to the private interests of its owners.”
We, the readers, should require an apology from Bezos for breaking his promise to keep this separate from his other concerns.
Until that happens, one must assume that WaPo is permanently compromised in the favor of Bezos’s interests.
It’s not about Kamala, it’s about literally everything.
fallingknife
I don't doubt that, but what company isn't compromised in favor of its owner's interests?
kuschkufan
[flagged]
adr1an
I took the same comment on a different way. To me they're referring to the fact that there are many other media outlets. Not only the big ones that do the same. But the smaller, "independent", that deserve more readers.
granted, they may also have interests or agendas. They point is we need decentralization!
fallingknife
[flagged]
Teever
Does an apology matter? Do we really need one?
How will an apology from Bezos improvement life?
What would improve mymlife are clear concrete actions not measly words.
iambateman
Honestly, it’s all words unless the paper itself is sold to an independent nonprofit solely devoted to journalism.
mc32
Independent journalism that delves into both/all sides and does not rely on soundbites and extracting things out of context and has no agenda but the truth Like during Covid they would allow vigorous debate about efficacy, lockdowns, deplatforming, etc.
It's a dream but would not last. All sides would attack it for being for whoever the boogeyman they think is.
null
anonzzzies
So, like Musk with X.
screye
The Venn diagram of those who'd be influenced by a WaPo endorsement and committed Kamala Harris voters is a perfect intersection. For 50 years, WaPo has endorsed the democratic candidate [1] for president. No mystery here. It's a pointless endorsement.
lostdog
The endorsement lets them write why they support the candidate. Laying out the reasons is what could be convincing, and is what's also being blocked here.
warner25
I think the intuition of the parent comment is right, but you also make a fair point[1]. I just wonder if you genuinely believe that any prospective Trump voter could be convinced by any argument to vote for Harris at this point. I mean after all the things that have already been written and said by so many, even by Trump himself, and have failed to convince ~47% of Americans that he's unfit to be the president.
Honestly, I look at the billions of dollars being poured into political ads, and I can't help but think that it's all a tremendous waste because it's hard to imagine that there's anybody left who didn't already form a strong opinion about Trump at some point over the past ten years.
[1] Like even assuming that prospective Trump voters don't read this newspaper, an especially novel or powerful argument could get picked up and spread by other outlets that do reach prospective Trump voters.
llamaimperative
Undecided voters will decide the election, yes they exist and yes they can change opinions
smokedetector1
Political ads have many purposes, including convincing people to vote for their candidate, instilling a sense of urgency/motivation/purpose to actually get out and vote, and then second order goals like general PR/familiarity for the party, etc.
Glyptodon
I don't really expect that there are Trump voters who could be convinced to vote for Harris by the op-ed, but I do think there could be voters who may have been on the verge of reconsidering Trump who may hear something like this story (of Bezos stopping an endorsement) as something that makes them identify their moment of reconsideration as a mistake because they think Bezo's behavior should be perceived as supporting the concept that Democrats and other anti-Trump parties are the ones off-kilter.
refurb
But this change doesn't stop any of the journalists from writing editorials endorsing a candidate, including laying out reasons, correct?
The difference is that the paper as a whole won't endorse a candidate?
metabagel
On the other hand, Trump is using the L.A. Times non-endorsement to attack Harris. So, it does matter.
Endorsements express the values of the paper and gives people more information about the candidates and what is at stake.
rozap
And it opens to them up to retribution from Trump if he wins, which is his entire method of operating. From a game theory perspective it doesn't make sense for them to do an endorsement when a mob boss type character is about to get elected.
noirbot
Let's be clear who "them" is. It's Bezos. The people at the paper wrote up the whole thing and then were blocked by Bezos and the CEO of the paper.
You can argue it's game-theory sensible, but it certainly tells you that Bezos doesn't care to put any of his vast money at risk for any cause at all.
rozap
Yes but we know this about him.
addandsubtract
"Lets not oppose nazis in case they gain power again."
You're morally and humanly bankrupt if you believe and act this way.
JeremyNT
> You're morally and humanly bankrupt if you believe and act this way.
Those characteristics are, if not strictly required, at least overrepresented in billionaires. It seems like a reasonable approximation for how Bezos might perceive his situation here.
You don't usually get to be a billionaire by caring very much about morality.
llamaimperative
Well, lots of people did and do and will behave that way. Cravenness runs amok.
rozap
Yes exactly, we're talking about Jeff Bezos here.
selimthegrim
1988 isn’t 50 years
unethical_ban
They skipped 88 because the editorial board decided they didn't want to endorse.
Ankaios
Well, I guess now democracy dies in anticipation of darkness.
euroderf
Things that go trump in the night.
greenthrow
So many times HN posters have extolled how Bezos hasn't interfered with the WaPo and those of us who expressed concern about his purchase were chicken littles. It has never been true and it's plain as day now. He bought it for the same reason Musk bought Twitter. To have control over a media outlet he values.
ajross
Well, it might have been true until now. Certainly there's no previous good evidence for Bezos-directed coverage or editing at the Post.
But regardless: you were right. I was one of the folks who viewed him as a basically benign entity who, sure, had opinions of his own, but clearly would never put his fingers on the editorial scale. And I was wrong, and he isn't.
Slava_Propanei
[dead]
vagab0nd
If you have that kind of money, why wouldn't you do that?
ribosometronome
They're not really saying Bezo or Musk are acting illogically. He's lamenting everyone who has set with their heads buried in the sand and pretended they aren't doing the things they're doing.
EasyMark
Not really, there was no proof, just speculation with no evidence. In this case there is plenty of evidence that Bezos put his finger on the scale. See the editor resigning and likely there will be others to follow. He said he was hands off when he bought it, but here we are.
mmooss
Because you believe in something more than personal gain. The US and other countries were built by elites who believed in more; it's the current generation that are failing.
UniverseHacker
Or at least forming your own vision of what you want the world to be like based on your own values, and seeing the world move that way as "personal gain."
I think people nowadays choose some generic and pointlessly bland vision of personal success instead of having their own vision based on their own values out of narcissism. The more generic, the more people will agree that you are successful.
gwern
> The newspaper also published an article by two staff reporters saying that editorial page staffers had drafted an endorsement of Democratic nominee Kamala Harris over GOP nominee Donald Trump in the election.
This is a bizarre way to use his control as a owner. If you own a newspaper or tabloid, we know from Trump how you use it effectively: you practice 'catch and kill', or you kill your own inconvenient stories, or you sic your reporters on the enemy disproportionately (while still scrupulously reporting only true things), or you selectively amplify stories from elsewhere.
You don't... kill editorial board endorsements (while still publishing an article on it!). Is there a single person in a swing state who, despite being bombarded by advertising for years, is now going to vote for Trump but would have voted for Harris once they saw the Washington Post endorsed Harris instead? "Ah, well, if WaPo says so, I guess I was wrong about her! I wasn't expecting them to endorse the Democratic candidate!"
I can only read this as Bezos trying to kiss up to Trump, who is narcissistic enough to actually take personally a foregone editorial board endorsement of his opponent.
mmooss
It's in fact a very powerful endorsement of Trump, IMHO:
gwern
If it's so powerful, why is Bezos also apparently now pushing for a lot of changes in the actual writing and ordered conservative writers added to the op-ed board? https://www.nytimes.com/2024/10/25/business/media/washington... and started defending it publicly: https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2024/10/28/jeff-bezo...
daft_pink
Is anyone really changing their mind based on some newspaper endorsement? I’m pretty sure everyone knows who they’re gonna vote for at this point.
mandevil
This is extremely similar to the sudden announcement of policies by all the major newspapers that they were not going to publish documents that they thought were stolen by foriegn intelligence services from political campaigns: it is a reasonable position to have, and if announced well before the election season started would be completely unobjectionable. Doing it when they announced it, however, is significantly changing the rules in favor of one candidate.
Doing it after the board had already written up a document endorsing a candidate (demonstrating clearly that it was not a policy of anyone but the owner, who decided to be an utter coward at the last minute) sends a clear message that even one of the richest men in the world is scared of possible backlash against him.
nickspag
It should also come with a reckoning on their role in the recent history that led to this change and it should be clearly communicated.
And the standard to/not publish should be clearly laid out and justified in their own words.
moduspol
Now we'll never know who the Washington Post's editorial board would have endorsed.
At least Taylor Swift was able to make her recommendation, so I know I'm all set.
cflewis
Actually we do, the reporting in WaPo itself said they had already put together the copy for Harris and were ready to run it.
The newsroom basically did all they could to say it without saying it.
ImJamal
The person you are replying to understands this and was being sarcastic. Everybody already knew who they wanted to endorse well before this came out.
chairmansteve
Elon hasn't swayed your opinion then?
AStonesThrow
[flagged]
justinclift
I'm pretty sure the poster you're replying to was being sarcastic. ;)
bitwize
Taylor Swift is a billionaire from record and concert ticket sales alone. Between that and her endorsement of Harris, we're lucky to have one billionaire out there with legitimate wealth, unafraid to use it to effect positive change.
standardUser
It's more about how a presidential candidate has repeatedly made credible threats to go after specific media companies using the power of his office if he wins. That candidate also happens to have a terrifyingly broad idea of what those powers are. That's in the context of a 9-member Supreme Court where 3 are his own appointments and 2 are appointments from a previous president with similarly broad ideas about presidential power.
And no, not everyone knows how they're going to vote, as crazy as that seems, but I agree that newspaper endorsements are a tiny factor, especially in this election.
dymk
That’s what an undecided voter is, and that demographic is the one effectively deciding the next president, so yes these endorsements are consequential.
greenthrow
It's east to think that way but if it didn't matter, Bezos wouldn't have squashed it.
chairmansteve
It matters to Trump, therefore it matters to Bezos.
Probably not a single voter cares.
unethical_ban
I care that half the country is preparing to elect a man who blackmails newspaper owners due to their own vanity.
neves
The problem is the the billionaire owner of the newspaper is censoring it, not the number of votes that will change.
SavageBeast
Is it censorship when your boss forbids you publishing your personal opinion as the official position of his company?
It's funny reading the comments here but has anyone considered that Bezos may in fact support Trump? Bezos is a billionaire and Harris seeks to target them to fix the deficit.
Its just possible Bezos supports Trump and it makes economic sense too, though its terribly unfashionable to come out and say such a thing.
jdgoesmarching
Yes, that is censorship. It used to be unpopular around here. Maybe you’re fine with it when an anointed shareholder does it, but that’s what it is.
It’s a big deal that a major historic news organization’s editorial board is overruled by the owner, whether or not you agree with the decision.
voltaireodactyl
Yes. Censoring is an action, the power dynamic at play is not relevant to whether something is or is not censoring. What you’re asking is “is this specific act of censorship somehow immoral or illegal?” And the answer is no, as I expect you already believe.
But it wasn’t censored for no reason, and it’s entirely reasonable to question the motives that led to this specific act of censorship.
mandevil
If all Bezos cared about was having lower taxes for billionaires he could have simply hired a bunch of people who believed in that and had them be the editorial board, and they would endorse whomever he wanted.
The fact that he had the editorial board he had (1), which wrote up an endorsement of Harris several weeks ago for his approval, and then he suddenly decided it was better not to endorse at all? That fits cowardice much more closely than it does pure economic interest.
This isn't government censorship, obviously, but do remember that the only point of the Editorial Board is to write opinion pieces and have them published in the paper. That is their entire job! They aren't reporters, they don't go out and ferret out news. They have opinions, and they write them out and get published in the paper. And they wrote out an endorsement of Harris, and suddenly it was announced (to the board only slightly before it was announced to the rest of the world, according to published reports) that they weren't going to endorse for President any more. That's a fact pattern that leads one strongly to Jeff Bezos' personal cowardice as the most parsimonious explanation.
1: At least before the resignations come in, I expect the board to be very different in a few weeks.
EasyMark
A newspaper isn't a "regular" business. There's a reason why the press has explicit protection in the Constitution. It is a special entity, and now Bezos has killed a 40 year tradition because he's afraid Trump will come after him if he wins. So this is likely a Hail Mary to try and save himself from potential imprisonment and fines from a Trump administration. I would have preferred they just come and support Trump if that's what Bezos wanted instead of waffling.
tbrownaw
> I’m pretty sure everyone knows who they’re gonna vote for at this point.
I already did (yay early voting), but I was pretty close to just flipping a coin. Not for red vs blue, but for the lesser evil vs one of the more amusing third parties.
meowster
I know at least one person who votes based off a publication. As for changing minds, I have no idea if this person even considered who to vote for until the publication releases their endorsements.
jrflowers
I like that many people here have speculated that Bezos simply wants to avoid the ire of a possible Trump administration. This is very charitable, so much so that it ignores another reasonable guess a person could make based off of the same objective information that we all have — that this action is an endorsement, and the person that chose to endorse a candidate did so because he wants them to win.
On one hand you can imagine that Bezos somehow wants a Harris presidency but doesn’t want to appear that way out of fear, but that sounds more fantastical and wishful than “The guy whose company is currently trying to wholesale eliminate the National Labor Relations Board(1) likes Trump’s policies and wants him to win”, especially when you think about what’s going on with the other guy(2) that’s trying to destroy the NLRB.
Sometimes when people indicate they want something to happen it is because they want that thing to happen.
1
https://www.reuters.com/technology/amazon-joins-companies-ar...
2
https://gizmodo.com/elon-musk-leaps-into-the-meme-history-bo...
laidoffamazon
I think the act of spiking the endorsement sends a stronger signal than the lack of endorsement. He could always make his own endorsement, but he didn't.
I don't know what's in his head. I just know that Trump sources are saying it's because of fear of reprisal [0]
[0]: https://x.com/gabrielsherman/status/1849960615197966648
matwood
I think it can be both. In scenario planning it makes sense for billionaires with large business empires to vote for Trump. One, the few details that can be determined from his platform are around lowering taxes on the very rich and making it easier for them make more money. Two, Trump has been pretty clear in his rhetoric he holds a grudge and will use the government to punish anyone who he perceives is against him. Taken together, there is little to no downside in supporting Trump, even if Harris wins. It's not like Harris is threatening to throw people she doesn't like out of the country. Whereas vocally supporting Harris where Trump wins runs the risk of becoming a target.
By the way, I think Musk did the same math. He likely thinks/knows Trump is an idiot, but it's almost all upside supporting him and little downside. Plus, Musk is likely still upset he was left out of a Whitehouse summit on EVs a few years ago. Regardless of what people think of Musk that was BS, and I wonder if that snub is part of what led him to come out in support of Trump so vocally.
jrflowers
> By the way, I think Musk did the same math.
“Elon Musk has been in deep-cover WWE-level kayfabe for the past several years” is an opinion you literally have to make up out of thin air and hopes. There is nothing public indicating that that is true. His enthusiastic and wholehearted embrace of the value set endemic amongst Trump supporters has been and continues to be very much on public display. The dude posts nonstop about culture war bullshit all day when he’s not showing off that he’s carrying around two shields in Elden Ring for some reason.
Billionaires are not aircraft carriers or nation states. They do not have a special type of existence that bestows their opinions or decisions with a deeper complexity or meaning than any other person exercising whatever level of power they have access to. “Jeff Bezos is a guy that has the power to decide what’s printed in a newspaper and exercised it in support of his preferred candidate” as an opinion only sounds outlandish to a non-billionaire because people aren’t comfortable with the idea that for one guy, changing what goes in the newspaper is easier than buying a bumper sticker.
chrisco255
Endorsements have never been without the blessing and influence of the owner of that paper or institution. The extent that an owner lets the editorial team pick an endorsement is the same extent to which they align philosophically. It's an illusion of choice or independence.
If papers were meant to be more neutral, I suppose they would need to be owned as cooperatives by the subscribers themselves, assuming the subscribers were balanced and philosophically diverse.
eapressoandcats
The key point here is that despite all their biases, the Washington Post and The New York Times were at least perceived as independent, with both of them famously publishing articles that would upset those in power. If their owners feel the need to spike articles unfavorable to the administration, then no more Pentagon Papers etc.
silexia
Both publications pretty much only employ far left journalists, and have terrible reputations with Republicans for biased reporting.
thijson
I agree. I was reading about Rupert Murdock's start in Australia. He was able to swing an election there through his ownership of a few newspapers. Newspapers don't have the same pull as they did back then. Now I guess it's the online platforms like Facebook, X, or Reddit. Reddit seems to be captured by the Democratic party.
There used to be a concept of journalistic integrity, to just report the facts, not to put any spin on them. These days that's totally abandoned, it's considered entertainment.
ajross
Has an owner ever killed an already-written endorsement 11 days out from an election? You're right that there is an implicit assumption that an owner condones the paper's operation. But to exert control like this so specifically and in such a baldly partisan way is unprecedented, thus the resignations both at the Post and the LA Times.
It's one thing to hire an editorial staff with whom you agree, it's quite another to step in and overrule their attempt to do the job you hired them to do.
karmasimida
It is ironic because Washington Post is the most left leaning of all major news paper. Their endorsement is really a no-op, because there is really only one candidate they could ever consider.
deepsquirrelnet
And yet here we are without an endorsement. Significant by your own admission.
karmasimida
[flagged]
refurb
That doesn't logically follow at all.
We're "here without an endorsement" because the media machine decides to talk about it, not because it's significant.
The most influential power the media has is what they decide to write about and what they don't. They don't report the news, they make the news.
addandsubtract
It doesn't need to follow any logic. Trump is going to use it as an argument and his base is going to parrot it.
All: when commenting, please stick to this story, and don't do flamewar or generic electoral battle as that's not what the site is for.
https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html