According to a recent Gallup survey, 63 percent of Americans say they have "not very much" trust in the media or "none at all." CNN chief media correspondent Brian Stelter finds this distressing. Those numbers suggest that many American don't trust his own network's diligent "reporting."
Over the weekend, Stelter suggested an alternative explanation for the public's lack of trust in the mainstream media. Educated people don't trust Fox News, he argued, and Fox News has brainwashed intellectually inferior Americans into distrusting reliable news sources such as CNN, the network that touted convicted felon Michael Avenatti as a serious presidential contender, aired chummy gabfests featuring disgraced brothers Chris and Andrew Cuomo, and was successfully sued for defaming a teenage boy.
CNN deserved the public's trust, Stelter insisted, because the network was committed to "reporting" and "doing the work," as opposed to "repeating" talking points and other forms of cheap punditry, which doesn't sound like CNN at all. Stelter and his colleagues have devoted their lives to speaking truth to power, for example, by spellchecking Donald Trump's tweets and analyzing his Diet Coke consumption.
The day after Stelter's sorrowful rant, CNN aired a superb "reporting" segment that will presumably be studied in journalism classrooms for decades to come. "George Clooney calls Trump a 'knucklehead,'" the CNN chyron read as anchor John King maintained his consummate professionalism by relaying the details of the celebrity's remarks to the viewing audience.