How The Local News Decline Left Everyone Blindsided by Trump (Twice)

 Since 2004, more than 2000 local newspapers have gone out of business. Readership of local papers has plummeted by millions. More than 2000 counties do not have even have a daily paper in circulation. This problem is well documented, but Americans and the media class are still trying to grapple with the powerful loss of local community journalism that we have seen in this century. As the business model has waffled and the papers shut down, Americans have increasingly had to rely upon national publications for their news, or their own curated newsfeeds with content from hundreds of sources that may not adhere to journalistic principles. As a result, everyone has become more disconnected.

Americans on either side of important issues no longer understand each other. They see each other as the characterizations that are often presented on cable news, and not as the real people in their communities that may have a nuanced opinion about one of the many defining, complex issues of life today. Often it is the case the there is not just two sides on these complex issues, but the tribal fighting of in Washington and the media's obsessive compulsion to cover it and all the political minutia that comes with it makes these issues seem black-and-white. More often, there is not even coverage of the issues themselves, only the politics of who is winning. This presentation divides us, and for many, turns us away from traditional news sources. But when we turn away from shared sources of news, we lose our sense of the country's temperature. In 2016, practically nobody saw Trump's win coming. Even ardent Trump supporters, and perhaps Trump himself, were caught pleasantly surprised. National media were among the most off guard, and that was clearly evident on election night itself. This was a group of "elite" reporters that were so out of touch with local communities that they had no idea what was coming, especially so in the deciding states like Pennsylvania and Michigan.

Despite the wall-to-wall coverage and the media marvel that was Donald Trumps often vile 2016 campaign, media elites completely missed that he stood an actual chance at winning. You might think, that four years later, there would be an effort to correct the course. But this did not happen. Local news remains on its deathbed, and the national media has hardly learned anything. They assumed that after four years characterized by chaos, Americans would send Trump home in one the most decisive losses ever delivered. And while yes, Trump lost the popular vote by a clear margin, he came within under 100,000 votes of winning the three swing states that he won in 2016 that would have made him a two term president. For as decisive as it may seem, it was rather close in other ways. And, through it all, Americans continue to lose connections with each other. Facebook newsfeeds are full of lies and division, but many millions of people rely on it exclusively. Our shared public square is toxic and devoid of critical discussion. We continue to drift apart. It may be too late to simply restore local papers and hope we can heal. Millions have developed new news habits that will be hard to break, given the satisfaction they deliver by convincing its digesters of their moral superiority. A helpful start would be a national media that makes an effort to really understand the America it serves, but I suspect that in the years of President Biden, they will wholly forget Trump happened, and brush off his rise as an anomaly of sorts. Should another Trump come about, the media will likely miss it once more.