PIttsburgh - we need to talk
PIttsburgh - we need to talk

At this point it is generally understood that 98 percent of the news media are crooked. If you disagree, you are part of the problem.

Or part of the news media…or a part of Trump Derangement Syndrome…or a part of BDS.

I would be equally alarmed if the media were the other way around – 98 percent Conservative.

But a Leftist agenda-driven sloganeering news media is what we’ve got – but do we really need to help them?

I am talking to you over there in Pittsburgh who play the sucker for the networks. Just because someone from ABC-TV, NBC-TV or CBS-TV sticks a microphone in your face, and asks your opinion about the Tree of Life murder, or how you feel about Trump, or the Pirates, or the Steelers, remember, this is still a free country. You don’t have to answer.

Most of the time, you will look silly. You will make the news, and if this is what you want, beware, you will go on record as being a loudmouthed idiot.

Even if you speak carefully and intelligently, know that back in the editing room they can, and do, cut you to pieces, so whatever your message was, it is no more.

They are using you!

I saw how it was done in Israel, when researching this book. Reporters from the major worldwide networks would stage Arab protests and riots.

They manipulated, scripted, produced and directed their productions to make it appear that the complaints against Israel were happenstance, rather than choreographed.

Fake news – you betcha. Likewise, of course, in the United States, where the media seek enablers, and find them.

How did it happen that people of all faiths took to the streets to assemble against Trump in the vilest ways?
Like this woman, supposedly a Presbyterian minister, shrieking at Trump to go home. This is how her grandchildren will know her. That video snapshot of her, shouting full throttle, “you are not welcome here,” will float around the Internet forever…and it is doubtful that she is a minister, or even Presbyterian.

I know Presbyterians, but none like that, and how did it happen that people of all faiths took to the streets to assemble against Trump in the vilest ways?

Is this a Pittsburgh thing?

These weren’t bums. These were well dressed congregants emerging from churches and synagogues pumping fists and shouting slogans as if Trump had anything to do with any of this. The networks, glad for any words and pictures that contribute to their madness against Trump, duly filmed, recorded and broadcast these scenes of mobs marching towards a hanging.

No Einsteins in that picture.

Pittsburgh Proud? Surely the majority.

But it was deranged Progressives who made the headlines and tarnished the town…and in ways quite far-reaching and disturbing, as Rochel Sylvetsky convincingly explains.

This is not what Warhol meant by “15 Minutes of Fame.” Or maybe it was, considering that those moments are indelible whether you are at your best or worst.

The worst of it is something to consider next time a reporter asks for your wisdom…and next thing you know you were played for a fool.

And remember, what you say for the cameras in Pittsburgh does not stay in Pittsburgh.

New York-based bestselling American novelist Jack Engelhard writes regularly for Arutz Sheva.

He is the author of the international book-to-movie bestseller “Indecent Proposal” and most recently the classic noir novel “Slot Attendant,” plus the two inside journalism thrillers “The Bathsheba Deadline” and “News Anchor Sweetheart, Hollywood Edition.” Engelhard is the recipient of the Ben Hecht Award for Literary Excellence. Website: www.jackengelhard.com