| | | | "500 Days of American Greatness" | | ...That's what the Trump White House and the GOP dubbed Monday. Trump allies seized on the 500-day milestone to sell his accomplishments. But I was struck by the number of other headlines that involved Trumpworld:
-- In a bombshell filing, Robert Mueller accused Paul Manafort of witness tampering...
-- George Papadopoulos' wife went on Tucker Carlson's show to appeal for a pardon for George...
-- Earlier in the day, Trump wrongly called the special counsel investigation "unconstitutional...."
-- He also asserted that he has the RIGHT to pardon himself, but suggested he won't do it...
-- He said the "fake news media" covers the Russia probe to "distract from the economy..."
-- The WashPost's scoop: "Scott Pruitt had aide do various personal tasks, including hunt for a used Trump hotel mattress..."
-- The NYT's headline following up on its scoop: "Trump Team Pushed False Story Line About Meeting With Kremlin-Tied Lawyer, Memo Shows..."
-- And there's so much more... | | This year's Super Bowl winners will not be visiting the White House. But Trump will be using the non-event to rally his base.
Most Eagles players had elected not to come to Tuesday's celebration... So the White House "canceled" the event... And replaced it with a "Celebration of America." CNN's Chris Cillizza says the W.H. statement about this was "absolutely appalling." It'll be interesting to see how cable news does, or doesn't, cover Trump's stand-up-for-the-anthem event... | | Pro-Trump media has a new attack line: They're bemoaning the "where's Melania?" news cycle, arguing that the coverage is disrespectful and worse. Sunday's "Reliable Sources" segment and newsletter item has been criticized by Boris Epshteyn, Greg Gutfeld, and Mike Cernovich, among others.
Of course, journalists would be asking the same questions about any first lady, particularly in this digital age. But the first lady's office is aligning itself with the right-wing media critics, saying the press corps is "rabid." And the story has shifted now that Melania was seen Monday evening.
>> More: I recommend Kate Bennett's CNN.com piece on this... She points out the "volume of concern" about FLOTUS "wasn't solely from the media..." | | "I'm not going to write anything about the whole last two years. The story's fixed now. 'Trump bad, Democrats good.' It's a fixed story. And, of course, it's a little more muddled than that. A lot more muddled than that..."
--Seymour Hersh, whose new book "Memoir" is out Tuesday, speaking with the NYT's Michael Grynbaum... | | Laurie Segall's interview with Tim Cook | | After Monday's WWDC announcements, CNN's Laurie Segall nabbed an exclusive TV interview with Tim Cook. A few of the highlights
-- Cook admits he uses his phone too much...
-- "I do not fear machines." Instead, Cook fears that humans are starting to think like machines...
-- He views privacy as a fundamental human right... | | | CNN's Seth Fiegerman writes: "Welcome to 2018, when tech companies hold major press events to introduce innovative ways to use their products less." Details here... | | >> One of the subplots of WWDC: Apple's contrasts with Facebook. "Apple has seized the opportunity to cast itself as the best behaved player in tech," Dylan Byers writes. Monday's development: "Apple is taking active steps to block Facebook's data collection practices..." Read more...
>> More: Via Joshua Benton, "these are the most important announcements Apple made for news publishers today..." | | -- Twitter is joining the S&P 500... replacing Monsanto... (CNNMoney)
-- Savannah Guthrie has scored the first TV interview with Scot Peterson, the resource officer who was on duty the day of the Parkland massacre... The officer who failed to go into the building... It'll air on "Today" Tuesday and Wednesday...
-- "In its continuing fight against a Russian tech entrepreneur who alleges being defamed by the publication of the infamous Trump dossier, BuzzFeed has scored an important ruling in Florida court that may ultimately immunize the news site from liability..." (THR)
-- Related: Joe Pompeo's brand new look at BF's "long struggle..." (VF) | | A new chapter in the cable news wars | | "Cuomo Prime Time" debuted Monday night on CNN... Chris Cuomo began the hour by questioning Rudy Giuliani... Then he sat down with Adam Schiff... Check out some of the highlights on CNN.com.
>> Here's the idea behind Cuomo's new show: One-on-one interviews with people on all sides will set the show apart. Details here via Variety's Brian Steinberg...
>> And here's the challenge: "We fully acknowledge that it's the hardest hour in all of news, and you have two really talented broadcasters in that hour," CNN president Jeff Zucker told Steinberg. Zucker's jab at Sean Hannity and Rachel Maddow: "One of them has already convicted Donald Trump and one of them has already exonerated Donald Trump. We are looking for the truth, and that's how we want to set ourselves apart..." | | | Gabriel Sherman is out with a new story about Murdochworld intrigue... One of the most interesting details came late: "After this article was published, Lachlan Murdoch emailed to say the story was 'total horseshit.'" See for yourself... | | Bill Clinton's next interviews | | Oliver Darcy emails: Bill Clinton seethed as NBC's Craig Melvin pressed him about Monica Lewinsky and the #MeToo movement. The interview was taped on Sunday... It aired on Monday's "Today" show... And it's been on a loop ever since.
>> NBC's interview stood in stark contrast to interviews Clinton did with other publications which chose not to grill the former president on Lewinsky...
>> It's unlikely this issue is going away. And Clinton is not backing down from the interview circuit. His spokesperson told me on Monday afternoon that Clinton and co-author James Patterson taped "LIVE with Kelly and Ryan" earlier in the day, will appear on "The Late Show with Stephen Colbert" Tuesday, PBS later in the week, and "The Daily Show" on the 26th... | | "America has failed Americans" | | ...That was S.E. Cupp on Monday's "Unfiltered," reacting to the new evidence that the death toll in Puerto Rico was much higher than the government claimed.
"Despite the magnitude of the tragedy caused by Maria, despite thousands of American families coping with the deaths of fathers, mothers, sisters, brothers, this disaster is being criminally ignored on almost every level, by our president, our Congress, and sorry to say, our media. This is a scandal or more accurately, 4,600 scandals," she said... | | -- "Raju Narisetti, most recently the CEO of Gizmodo Media Group, is joining the Columbia Journalism School faculty and will serve as the new director of the Knight-Bagehot Fellowship in Economics and Business Journalism..." (CJR)
-- Want to understand the aggressive expansion of The Athletic? Ben Mullin explains it all here... (WSJ)
-- Olivier Knox's new SiriusXM show, "The Big Picture," premiered on P.O.T.U.S. channel 124 on Monday...
-- The Information is calling for applications for the Class of 2019 of The Information Accelerator... It's "an initiative to fund, foster and support next generation news publications..." (The Information) | | The WSJ called this four months ago: "Nickelodeon Group President Cyma Zarghami is exiting the children's television network," Joe Flint writes.
Viacom Media Networks COO Sarah Levy "will serve as interim head of Nickelodeon until a successor is named." It's truly the end of a Nickelodeon era... | | A problem in Pittsburgh... | | | Tom Kludt emails: It's been a week since the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette has run the work of veteran cartoonist Rob Rogers -- but he keeps drawing. Rogers didn't comment much about his sideline from the paper on Monday, but he did indicate that another cartoon is in the works. "I am drawing for tomorrow but I am not sure what will become of that one yet," he said in an email. The paper's editorial leadership did not respond to a request for comment. Stay tuned... | | Auletta's friends at his "Frenemies" book launch | | | Ken Lerer threw a book party for media reporting legend Ken Auletta at the Top of the Standard on Monday night. Spotted: Tom Brokaw, Martin Sorrell, Rich Greenfield, David Carey, Joel Benenson, Lynn Sherr, John Avlon, Michael Weisman, Natalie Raabe, Judy Miller, Richard Johnson, Suzanne Vranica, Lloyd Grove, Carlton Sedgeley, Lucy Lepage, Merrill Brown, Jack Myers, Alex Leo, Alex Weprin, Barry Frey, Steven Brill, Steven Perlberg, many more... | | | For the record, part three | | | -- Dan Abrams' book "Lincoln's Last Stand" comes out Tuesday... Here's a look inside his launch party at Michael's... (Mediaite)
-- Ben Rhodes is NBC/MSNBC's newest contributor... (Free Beacon) Rhodes is on a book tour right now too... So he was on CBSN Monday night... (CBS)
-- I missed this the other day: Trump officially plans to nominate "a conservative documentarian and Stephen Bannon ally," Michael Pack, to lead the Broadcasting Board of Governors... (CNN)
-- Correction: We misquoted Bill Maher in last night's newsletter. He actually called Roseanne Barr's racist tweet "abhorrent, bordering on presidential." | | | Brian Lowry emails: LeBron James' biggest fans outside of Cleveland now work for ABC/ESPN. That's because the only thing that could deflate ratings that are basically holding steady with last year's big numbers would be a four-game sweep, which, like a five-game series, would mean sacrificing a whole lot of commercial spots in a possible game 6 and 7... | | By Megan Thomas:
-- Fans of both "The Crown" and "The Americans" can thank Vulture for this entertaining quiz... Who said it: Philip and Elizabeth or Philip and Elizabeth?
-- Deadline's scoop: "Legally Blonde 3" is officially in the works...
-- Looks like Tom Cruise earned his "Mission: Impossible Fallout" paycheck with a scary-as-HALO jump (high altitude, low opening). Cruise jumped out of a plane at 25,000 feet and fell at a rate of 200 mph. Paramount posted a teaser here... | | Lowry: "Star Wars" should resist bowing to the force of its most vocal fans | | | Brian Lowry emails: The way-below-expectations opening for "Solo: A Star Wars Story" is sure to trigger some soul-searching around Lucasfilm and Disney. But the studio should resist the force of the loudest, most belligerent "Star Wars" fans, who were actually rooting against the movie -- as some kind of punishment for their disappointment with "The Last Jedi" -- and who might draw all the wrong messages from their perceived "victory," stoked, much as in partisan politics, within like-minded online forums. More... | | | For the record, part four | | | By Lisa Respers France:
-- Woody Allen says he "should be the poster boy for the #MeToo movement" -- but not in a negative way...
-- Janet Jackson asked police to check on her one-year-old son this weekend while he was in his father's care. Jackson and Wissam Al Mana separated soon after she gave birth. Police said everything was fine...
-- Kanye West changed his album after his slavery comment controversy...
-- Andy Cohen celebrated his 50th with John Mayer, but they're not dating... | | How to catch up on Sunday's "Reliable Sources" | | | If you missed the program, you can listen to the podcast through Apple or other podcast apps... Read the transcript... Watch the video clips on CNN.com... Or watch it all via CNNgo or VOD... | | | HEY, WHAT DO YOU THINK OF THIS LETTER? Email your feedback and thoughts to brian.stelter@turner.com... the feedback helps us improve this newsletter every day... Thank you! | | | | | | |
