| | | | | That's a quote from President Donald Trump. While Trump was walking to the parade viewing platform in Lafayette Park, CNN correspondent Jim Acosta asked, "Mr. President, how would you describe the day, sir?" Trump responded: "Unbelievable. Beautiful. Thank you." | | "United in their astonishment at the president's unorthodox address" | | "In his first moments as president, Donald Trump flabbergasted television's pundits," The Orlando Sentinel's Hal Boedeker writes.
NYT's Michael Grynbaum adds: If cable news "was relatively predictable in its tonal divides — MSNBC remarking, again and again, on the lackluster size of the crowd; Fox News airing a rah-rah video about Mr. Trump's victory with a patriotic soundtrack — the major networks were remarkably united in their astonishment at the president's unorthodox address..." | | Bannon's views heard around the world | | "IT BEGINS: PRESIDENT TRUMP" Is the Friday night banner headline on Breitbart News. The site, which was led until recently by Trump's chief strategist Steve Bannon, highlighted the nationalist rhetoric of Trump's speech and Bannon's apparent influence. Breitbart linked to Newsweek's Matthew Cooper, who writes: "If you judge President Donald Trump by his inaugural address, you can say that Steve Bannon, his nationalist adviser, is winning the battle for his soul..."
Scroll down for much more about Friday's festivities... | | Friday afternoon was about the speech and Friday evening was about the fashion. CNN's Erin Burnett, Dana Bash and a cast of commentators specifically chosen for the evening were at the inaugural balls... They noted that Trump traded in his usually loose-fitting suits for a more tailored tux...
More from Maeve Reston: "Melania Trump stunned the crowds in a sleek, modern, off-the-shoulder column dress. Melania's gown was designed by Hervé Pierre, who formerly worked with Carolina Herrera, in a collaboration with the new first lady..."
Scroll down for much more about Friday's festivities... | | Saturday: the women's march | | | So far the story of the Women's March has been told primarily by the marchers themselves -- people who have been organizing online and sharing their journeys via Instagram, Twitter, Facebook, and other forms of communication. CNN social producer Amanda Jackson was on a flight full of protesters heading to DC from Atlanta... Here's her story about it... | | On Saturday the marches -- in DC and elsewhere -- will compete with Trump for mainstream media attention. I'm expecting a "split screen day," with Trump attending a prayer service and maybe making other stops around the nation's capital while the protesters speak out against him...
-- Related: By CNNMoney's Tanzina Vega: "Ahead of march, women of color on what's at stake under Trump" | | Sunday: "Reliable Sources" | | | Live in DC: Jeff Mason, Lynn Sweet, Karen Tumulty, David Fahrenthold, Michael Oreskes, Frank Sesno, and more... Join us at 11am ET Sunday on CNN... | | What the NYT decided not to print about Trump and Russia | | | A must-read column by NYT public editor Liz Spayd: "Times editors knew the federal authorities were looking into allegations of ties between Donald Trump and Russia. But they decided not to report it." Dean Baquet is quoted defending the paper, but Spayd says "I have spoken privately with several journalists involved in the reporting last fall, and I believe a strong case can be made that The Times was too timid in its decisions not to publish the material it had..." Read more... | | View from the W.H. briefing room | | While in college, I was very lucky to take one of Martha Joynt Kumar's classes. Kumar is a presidential scholar who frequently works from a desk in the basement press room at the White House. So I asked what she saw on Friday -- here's what she said:
"Kellyanne Conway and Hope Hicks just came through to meet reporters in the Press Room, including coming down to the basement to see what it looks like. She looked at the 'coat of paint.' Shortly before their visit, Steve Bannon came by for a quick fly-by. The first of the visitors was Sean Spicer, who talked to reporters who questioned him about the remainder of the day and the schedule ahead. He advised reporters to 'stand by' for the schedule in the weekend ahead as well as the coming 'eight years.' He said the 'substance' will begin on Monday, with staff getting settled in their space over the weekend." | | | Mike Memoli snapped this picture of Sean Spicer checking out the podium... | | Spicer's jab at the press | | | When the press pool was allowed into the Oval Office on Friday evening, there was some confusion about whether the bust of MLK was still there. Pool reporter Zeke Miller of Time initially couldn't see it and sent word that the (previously controversial) bust had been removed. But it was still there... and Spicer tweaked Miller on Twitter, calling the incident "a reminder of the media danger of tweet first check facts later..." Miller apologized to his colleagues, and Spicer tweeted, "Apology accepted..." | | | Yes, Trump's crowds were markedly smaller than the crowds for Obama's inaugurals. Everyone knew that would happen, right? Trump might care more about this comparison: the ratings. Some social media users sent me pictures of blank TVs -- symbols of silent protests against Trump. Was that common? Nielsen #'s will tell us in the days ahead. Viewership varies quite a bit from president to president... But here are a couple data points: Coverage of George W. Bush's first inauguration averaged 29.0 million viewers all day long... His second had just 15.5 million... Coverage of Obama's first inauguration averaged 37.8 million... And his second had 16.0 million... | | Trump's inaugural address was "very consistent to the Trump brand, absolutely," Jake Tapper said on CNN afterward. "I have to say, I think it's fair to say this is one of the most radical inaugural speeches we've ever heard."
All across the dial, anchors referenced the gloomy tone of the speech. The AP's David Bauder writes: "ABC's Tom Llamas called it the first speech of Trump's re-election campaign... The speech was a repudiation to many of the politicians who surrounded Trump, analysts said... While the speech was dark, 'if you were a Trump voter, you heard everything you wanted to hear,' said CNN's John King..."
I personally appreciated King's implicit fact-check of the speech right afterward. He pointed out the low unemployment rate, declines in illegal border crossings, etc... | | More from Bauder: "On Fox News Channel, overwhelmingly the news source of choice for Trump supporters, analyst Dana Perino called the speech 'very muscular.' Tucker Carlson said it was populist, not conservative. 'Not poetic, but quite strong,' Brit Hume said. 'He painted this dark landscape of circumstances in America and promised to fix them all...'"
Later in the day, I noticed some Fox commentators saying that Trump won't have to literally accomplish what he promised to accomplish -- just making "progress" would be enough... | | "Carnage" and other new words | | | Kudos to the WashPost: This list of words that had never been uttered in any U.S. inaugural address -- until Friday -- underscores the dark feel of the speech. Twelve of the new words: Bleed, carnage, disrepair, Islamic, ripped, rusted, sad, sprawl, stolen, tombstones, trapped, and unrealized. | | There was a conscious effort by broadcasters and other news outlets to interview Trump voters on the Mall. Jacob Soboroff's 12:45 walk-and-talk with Pam and Jackie on NBC stood out to me. "He did use the word God, too, which is not something that usually is done by the presidents," Jackie said, happily surprised by it.
Back in the studio, Chuck Todd reacted right away: "I don't think I've ever heard a president speak and not say 'May God Bless America' after every single speech. But the point is... there were two versions of the Obama presidency that the public saw. There's a version that one half of the public saw, that the version that the other half THINKS they saw or perceived. And, boy, it is THAT perceived divide here, almost an informational divide. I mean, there's this woman there who truly believes that she had not heard presidents talk about God up there anymore. Obviously it's just not true. But I think it sort of surfaces the information divide we have." | | Question for the next four years.. | | | Will this "information divide" get worse or get better in the age of Trump? | | Van Jones said he found a "positive thing" in Trump's speech: "He did not attack the press."
"One of the standard features of a Trump speech is the attack on the media," Jones said on CNN afterward, "and he scrupulously avoided that. I thought that was an encouraging moment." | | Kohn: "We risk being the scribes of our own demise" | | Another progressive CNN commentator, Sally Kohn, told me that she's worried about the media's "inability to adapt" to Trump's "madness."
She elaborated: "That first press conference was deeply unsettling and ominous. If mainstream press don't figure out a way to stand together, he's going to keep playing them -- an extension of what he did during the campaign, frankly, but worse. We risk being the scribes of our own demise." | | Republican FCC commissioner Ajit Pai is Trump's pick "to lead the FCC in the new administration," Politico's Alex Byers and Tony Romm reported Friday afternoon, citing "four industry sources."
Reached via Twitter DM, Pai told me he couldn't comment.
Obama's pick to lead the FCC, Tom Wheeler, who just stepped down as chairman, believes it's true -- he tweeted congrats to Pai. Byers + Romm note that Pai "could take the new role immediately and wouldn't require approval by the Senate because he was already confirmed to serve at the agency."
-- What it means: "As chairman, Pai will be able to start the process of undoing the net neutrality order and pursuing other deregulatory efforts..." | | | This issue of Time will hit newsstands on Monday... | | Anarchists unwittingly helping Trump? | | Brian Lowry emails: Much of the analysis of Trump's inaugural address focused on how dark it was. But the coverage of protests that quickly followed fed into that vision, and for Trump supporters will surely buttress his "law and order" calls from the campaign. At one point in the 2pm hour, Fox News reporter Griff Jenkins had to quickly move out of the path of advancing police as they sought to secure the location.
Can TV news ignore such situations? Obviously not. But to the extent live coverage of such events appears chaotic, it reinforces Trump's rhetoric, even with newscasters stressing that the number of violent protesters was relatively small. The images are stronger than the words.
Anti-Trump conservative Rick Wilson pointed out via Twitter that those engaging in violence were helping Trump. Those protesters are savvy enough to know conflict will attract the media's attention. In that, attempts to disrupt the inauguration and Trump's campaign strategy are strategically aligned... | | Rioters caused some sporadic property damage in downtown DC on Friday morning, but the news coverage was mostly confined to the web until the early afternoon, when there were no live pictures of the inauguration to show. All the politicos were in a closed-door, camera-free luncheon when new clashes erupted on K Street. "MSNBC, CNN and Fox all jumped into on-the-street, breaking-news mode," The Baltimore Sun's David Zurawik writes. Much of the protest action was right outside the WashPost headquarters building... | | | Washingtonian: "Grasping for Metaphor, Reporters Flock to Burning DC Garbage Can" | | Photographers caught up in the melee | | National Press Photographers Association general counsel Mickey Osterreicher tells me that several photographers were pepper-sprayed during Friday's chaos. One injury was reported among members of the media -- a photog for WJLA, the ABC affiliate in DC... | | "Fox News crew car involved in two cars set on fire on 13th, unmarked SUV," a reporter at Fox's DC affiliate tweeted around 5pm. A Fox News spokesperson confirms that protesters damaged a vehicle belonging to the network... | | | Nigel Farage joins Fox News | | | "Fox News has hired Nigel Farage, the former leader of the U.K.'s Independence Party and an early supporter of the 'Brexit,' to serve as a paid contributor," Politico's Kelsey Sutton reports. Fox announced Farage's role on Friday morning. He's obviously been a big Trump supporter... | | "This is the lid on the Obama presidency" | | Quoting the final report from Obama's press pool:
"At the top of the stairs, they turned and waved for the applauding crowd. As a light drizzle began, the aircraft started rolling and disappeared from view. Takeoff was at 1:45 p.m. This is the lid on the Obama presidency." | | The peaceful transfer of Twitter | | "The Obama administration handed over the Twitter handles for official accounts like @POTUS, @FLOTUS, @VP, @WhiteHouse and @PressSec to the incoming Trump administration" right at noon, CNNMoney's Seth Fiegerman reports.
How it works: "The accounts for Trump's team start fresh. All of the tweets from the previous administration were removed and archived on a set of newly created accounts, including @POTUS44, @VP44 and @FLOTUS44... Perhaps most importantly, Trump's administration will inherit the millions of followers for each account..." | | | "A phrase in President Trump's heavily populist speech mimicked a speech delivered by Bane, the super villain played by Tom Hardy in the Batman film 'The Dark Knight Rises.' You better believe the internet noticed," NYT's Mike Isaac writes... Details... | | | Dylan Byers, in Park City for the Sundance Film Festival, writes: "Even here, the new political reality is inescapable. Trump's inauguration took place just hours before the opening parties, casting a relative pall over the festivities... Al Gore is in town to premiere his latest climate change documentary, 'An Inconvenient Sequel.' The much-discussed comedy 'The Big Sick' seeks to offer a new portrayal of Muslim life. Outside the theaters, Chelsea Handler will be leading the Women's March against the man she has described as 'Our Predator-in-Chief.'" Read more... | | Hollywood's questions in the Trump era | | | Quoting from Dylan's story: "Questions abound: What is Hollywood supposed to do? How is the creative industry supposed to respond? What is the role of liberal culture in the Trump era? On the political front, Hollywood, like much of the progressive community, is still in the planning stages... But there is also the question of what Hollywood creates -- the films and shows and other art it makes in response to the new reality. And with that, another question: Does it even matter?" | | What Vanity Fair EIC Graydon Carter told Dylan:
"Both Trump and Obama are very much representative of what America is, it's just two different sides of America. I don't think you can speak beyond your bubble in this fragmented media environment. The days of 'The Ed Sullivan Show' and the final episode of 'Mash' are long gone." | | | A distressing new trailer for "House of Cards" | | | Frank Pallotta emails: Netflix's "House of Cards" released a teaser for its upcoming fifth season about an hour before President Trump was sworn in. It shows children saying the Pledge of Allegiance on a dreary day at the U.S. Capitol. The camera then zooms out to show an American flag blowing in the wind, but with it hanging upside down, a classic signal of distress. Strong imagery on a historic day from the administration of President Frank Underwood... | | | What do you like about this newsletter? What do you dislike? Send your feedback to reliablesources@cnn.com. See you Sunday from DC! | |  | | We'd love to share our other newsletters with you. Check out Five Things for Your New Day, CNN's morning newsletter. Give us five minutes, and we'll brief you on all the news and buzz people will be talking about. | | | Get Reliable Sources, a comprehensive summary of the most important media news, delivered to your inbox every afternoon. | | | | | |
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