| | | | Good evening from the NYC -> DC train... | | Question: What's missing from news coverage of President Trump's first 100 days this week? Answer: Trump's voice. We're seeing him infrequently and hearing from him even less often... Perhaps his aides are shielding him from Q's... | | | No room for the press pool? | | Dylan Byers explains: Trump canceled multiple open press events this week -- one Tuesday, one Thursday -- allowing him to avoid questions about the Wikileaks CIA dump and his baseless accusation that Obama had wiretapped him in Trump Tower. White House deputy press secretary Stephanie Grisham said the cancellations "were game time decisions" made by her: "I determined the rooms were too full to accommodate press and equipment," she told me.
I don't buy that: The pool is small. There's always enough room. Trump did hold one open press event on Thursday. But when asked about the Wikileaks matter by a reporter, he simply smiled and did not respond... | | | Tillerson traveling to Asia without the press corps? | | "As of now, when Secretary of State Rex Tillerson travels to Asia next week, the press won't be along for the ride," HuffPost's Michael Calderone reports. This "break with precedent" is being appealed by top editors and bureau chiefs...
The latest: "Acting State Department spokesman Mark Toner said in a press briefing Thursday that officials are still working out the logistics of the trip, and could not say definitively if they'll accommodate any press on Tillerson's plane..."
Jake Tapper reacts on Twitter: "Tillerson about to embark on first major trip to Asia in the midst of North Korean crisis. Not bringing any reporters. Not bringing press on a trip like that is unusual & insulting to any American who is looking for anything but a state-run version of events." | | Wikileaks. Cyberweapons. Smart TVs. Signal. We cover it all on the mid-week "Reliable Sources" podcast... this week's guest is CNNMoney investigative reporter Jose Pagliery... he describes how Wikileaks' announcements tend to be "sensationalist:"
"They dump these massive troves of documents and they say, 'Journalists, you go through them.' Now, that lines up very well with their militant transparency mission, but what it actually doesn't do is allow us to slowly, carefully digest this and say 'Here's what's most important.'" He describes what is important from the latest leak and how journalists should guard against hack attacks... listen to the podcast here... | | Conservative media types are embracing a wild new WikiLeaks-related conspiracy theory: that "the CIA hacked DNC, then framed Russia." BI's Maxwell Tani explains it here. He says RT, Sean Hannity, Ann Coulter, and Rush Limbaugh have all invoked the theory in one way or another... | | Mark Halperin and John Heilemann have been the subject of book world chatter for months. Were they hanging it up? Choosing not to write a third "Game Change?" It was quiet... too quiet...
And on Thursday, we found out why: H&H have, indeed, signed up for a third campaign tell-all. Penguin Press will publish the untitled book in early 2018. "Despite all the coverage," there are so many unanswered questions... "We think there's still an awful lot to write about here," Heilemann told Alexandra Alter... Read the Q&A here... | | | HBO commissions miniseries | | Sandra Gonzalez writes: At the same time Penguin bought the book, HBO bought the miniseries. Jay Roach will direct and Tom Hanks is among the executive producers. Here's the press release. Oh, to be a fly on the wall during THOSE casting sessions... | | Brian Lowry emails: An HBO "Game Change" follow-up on the 2016 election seemed inevitable, but it's worth noting that Halperin and Heilemann will be working with two of the bigger rivals in the TV industry. In addition to renewing their affiliation with HBO, the pair continue to do the documentary series "The Circus" for Showtime... | | Frank Pallotta emails: Hold on, let me put down the Torchy's taco. Okay! Hello and greetings from a rainy Austin, Texas! I am here once again here for the SXSW conference, which kicks off Friday.
This year's lineup has plenty of big media and entertainment names such as "Game of Thrones" creators D.B. Weiss and David Benioff, Oscars president Cheryl Boone Isaacs (I wonder what she could possibly talk about!), NYT exec editor Dean Baquet and several CNNers like Jake Tapper. Former VP Joe Biden will speak as well.
This is my third go covering SXSW for CNN, and what strikes me most is how the conference has somewhat morphed from a tech conference to a media one, so stay tuned over the next week and I'll give you all the fun details from deep in the heart of Texas... | | -- "An anti-Trump tabloid pulls back" -- Joe Pompeo explains why circulation considerations have affected the tone of the NY Daily News front page... (Politico)
-- Jim Bankoff tweets: "Can't emphasize enough how big a deal this is for our industry." He's talking about Conde Nast "joining NBC Universal and Vox Media to sell ads across their combined digital properties..." (Ad Age)
-- A reality check from the FT's Matt Garrahan: revenues from Facebook Instant Articles and Google AMP are "falling short of expectations..." (FT)
-- "People gasped when they walked in." Former "Today" hosts Ann Curry and Tamron Hall "were spotted hobnobbing at Polo Bar on Tuesday night..." (Page Six) | | WSJ's Jeffrey Trachtenberg with the latest on the Time Inc. sale:
"A group that includes Jahm Najafi, chief executive of private investment firm Najafi Cos., and private-equity firm Pamplona Capital Management has emerged as a bidder for Time Inc..." The process "appears to be nearing completion. The presence of Mr. Najafi and Pamplona indicates that the process is still competitive..." | | | Samantha Bee apologizes for mocking cancer patient's haircut | | CNN's David Williams reports: "Samantha Bee apologized on Thursday for a segment on her show that made fun of a cancer patient's haircut. The clip on 'Full Frontal' showed several men, who producer Mike Rubens said had 'Nazi hair,' at CPAC. One of the men in the piece was Kyle Coddington. He's a contributor for the Outset Network, which reported that he recently completed his first round of chemotherapy and radiation treatments."
Coddington tweeted at Bee: "Please delete this episode. I look like a balding potato... Also, it's not a Nazi haircut. Richard Spencer's is, but mine's from cancer..."
The show tweeted this apology: "We deeply apologize for offending @_that_kyle in our CPAC segment. We only learned of his condition today & have removed him from the piece."
-- If you'd like to contribute $$ toward Coddington's cancer expenses, here's the GoFundMe page... | | "The White House said he was a private citizen at the time. But there's been a lot of lying, Julie. And––there's been a lot of lying, there's been lying about who you talk to and by lots of people, and almost inevitably and invariably, they were lying about talking to the Russians about something. It's too much lying and too much Russia and too much smoke, and now they're investigating. Where are we in this thing?"
--Shep Smith asking the AP's Julie Bykowicz about Michael Flynn on Fox News Thursday afternoon... This quote went viral... | | | "Stuck in a 1950s view of male-female relations" | | Dylan Byers and Tom Kludt followed up on Wednesday night's revelation of another settlement between 21st Century Fox and a former employee. Dylan emails:
It's notable that more than seven months after the ouster of Roger Ailes, Fox News is still scrambling to deal with sexual harassment allegations against executives and on-air talent. The pervasiveness of the complaints, which have targeted not only the network's powerful founder but also primetime host Bill O'Reilly and now former Fox News Latino exec Francisco Cortes suggests a culture of misogyny and sexual objectification that extended beyond Ailes' office. Indeed, current and former employees described the Fox News environment to me as archaic, and stuck in a 1950s view of male-female relations -- despite the leadership's claim that there is zero tolerance for "behavior that disrespects women." Read the full story here... | | -- "MGM is in talks to acquire the 81% of Epix it does not already own from two of its partners in the premium U.S. channel, Viacom and Lionsgate..." (Reuters)
-- Premiering on Friday, April 7: "You the Jury," a Fox reality show hosted by Fox News' Jeanine Pirro, with viewers serving as jurors by voting in real time via an app... (Variety)
-- "In honor of Dateline's 25th anniversary, superfan Kristen Bell turned the tables" on Keith Morrison... (EW)
-- I missed this yesterday: Lots of newsy quotes from NBC News boss Andy Lack about polling, Trump, and Megyn Kelly... (Politico) | | Dan Rather "is working on a book of essays about patriotism titled What Unites Us, due Nov. 7 from Algonquin, telling his readers, 'I couldn't have done it without all of your encouragement,'" USA Today's Jayme Deerwester reports. He'll elaborate on his recent Facebook posts... | | | "A central paradox of the Trump presidency" | | In the White House, Trump's TVs "stay on all day," the AP's Jonathan Lemire writes in this latest look at the president's media diet. "Trump usually rises before 6 a.m. and first watches TV in the residence before later moving to a small dining room in the West Wing... The president often checks in at lunch and again in the evening, when he retires to the residence, cellphone in hand."
Lemire: "It is a central paradox of the Trump presidency. Despite his fervent media criticism, Trump is a faithful newspaper reader who enjoys jousting with reporters, an avid cable TV news viewer who frequently live-tweets what he's watching... No recent president has been so public about his interest in his media coverage, nor seemed so willing to mobilize the powers of the federal government based on a media report that he has just read, heard or watched..." | | Jake Tapper tweets a preview of his weekly "State of the Cartoonion..." It's about Harvey Levin's meeting with Trump... | | Remembering Biggie Smalls | | Megan Thomas emails: On March 9, 1997, rapper Christopher "The Notorious B.I.G." Wallace was shot and killed. Twenty years later, the hip hop legend's murder remains unsolved, but his music remains just as relevant. Read Lisa France's piece here...
-- Sean 'Diddy' Combs tweets: "We miss him, 20 years later. Time heals all wounds but this one hasn't healed yet." | | | "Game of Thrones" returns July 16 | | Sandra Gonzalez emails: HBO has finally unveiled the premiere date for "Game of Thrones" Season 7. Mark your calendars for July 16! The network made the reveal during a Facebook Live stream that took a cue from the show and was full of drama. The Internet had some fun with it... Read more here...
-- Brian Lowry adds: This July window means that after back-to-back wins as outstanding drama, the upcoming season of the show won't be eligible for this year's Emmys, but rather the ceremony after that in 2018... | | | Lowry reviews "Kong: Skull Island" | | Brian Lowry emails: Although I wasn't a fan of "Kong: Skull Island," the movie is nevertheless interesting as part of Warner Bros. and Legendary's plans to launch a new (or rather, updated) franchise, wedding the Kong and Godzilla properties. That includes announced plans for a Godzilla vs. Kong movie in 2020 -- almost 60 years after the two clashed in a Japanese film. Of course, dreamt-of studio franchises need cooperation from the audience, magnifying the import of this weekend's opening... | | | Samuel L. Jackson revives debate about British black actors in American roles | | Sandra Gonzalez emails: In this piece, Chloe Melas and I examine an issue recently resurfaced by Samuel L. Jackson, who argued earlier this week that too many black British actors are being given roles that should go to African American actors. At the time, he specifically referenced the film "Get Out," which stars a British actor. It's certainly a complex issue... Click here to check out the full story... | | | Why "This is Us" resonates | | More from Sandra Gonzalez: You know I love me some "This Is Us," and this is one of the best explanations of the show's appeal I've read in some time. John Jurgensen interviewed social psychologist Randolph Cornelius, who said: "Moving back and forth in time lets us in on a perspective we'll never have on our own lives. Our sense of self is a story we tell ourselves. In a way, that's what this show is about." | | | And if you haven't watched yet... | | This is Brian again, getting the last word... Sandra's item compels me to remind you... If you haven't watched "This is Us" yet, there's still time to catch up before the season finale. All of the episodes are on Hulu... You'll love it... If you're feeling motivated, I bet you could binge on all 17 episodes before Tuesday's finale! | | What do you like about this newsletter? What do you dislike? Send your feedback to reliablesources@cnn.com. We appreciate every email. See you tomorrow... | |  | | 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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