Journalists Offered Reward to Ask Trump About U.S.—Wakanda Relations

[Potoooooooo]

https://thegrapevine.theroot.com/journalists-offered-reward-to-ask-trump-about-u-s-waka-1822087122

Want to know what would happen if a reporter seriously asked President Donald Trump how that bilateral trade agreement with Wakanda is panning out?

You’re not the only one. On Saturday, A widely-shared tweet from Sara Benincasa, a screenwriter and author, called for a journalist to “very seriously” ask Trump “his opinion on our nation’s relations with Wakanda”—the fictional country from Marvel’s Black Panther comics.

It’s no stretch of the imagination to believe Trump would deliver an answer. This is, after all, the same man who made up a whole-ass African country (“Nambia”—whose health system is “increasingly self-sufficient,” apparently).

Benincasa offered $300 of her own money and, after many users chimed in with their support, said she would start a “crowdfunding or Venmo situation” that would allow others to contribute to the purse. The stipulations: The question needs to be asked by a member of the media, and the question and answer must be recorded live on video.

 

[Potoooooooo]

President Trump after your recently reported comments on Africa, are you concerned that the Black Panther movement is gaining traction in Wakanda?

 

[ZiprHead]

While I think it would be funny, any journalist that does this will be an unethical jerk.

 

[Patooka]

While I think it would be funny, any journalist that does this will be an unethical jerk.

Umm...Infowars and The Gateway Pundit have White House Press Credentials now. Ethical journalists aren't allowed to ask the President questions anymore. It's become a circus so might as well have some fun.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

While I think it would be funny, any journalist that does this will be an unethical jerk.

Why? What's so evil about exposing someone bullshitting?

 

[Jimmy Higgins]

While I think it would be funny, any journalist that does this will be an unethical jerk.

Why, he'd just say it was a shithole... or was it shithouse?

 

[Keith&Co.]

While I think it would be funny, any journalist that does this will be an unethical jerk.

Not at all. The industry has a long and cherished history of capitalizing on open-mike gaffes. Some even intentionally sparked by the reporter.
MAYBE taking the $300 for asking the question would be ethically murky, but you have to assume that someone on FFvC's staff has seen this article. He may be warned. But he'll only be armed for this particular question.

So I wonder if a journalist is prepared to ask about Jumangi. Or Opar. Barsoom. Arendelle....

Will he be able to say "I don't know about that nation, let me seek an expert" or will he bloviate...?

 

[ronburgundy]

While I think it would be funny, any journalist that does this will be an unethical jerk.

Just the opposite. It is journalists responsibility to expose the objective fact that the leader of still the world's most powerful nation is a pathological liar and dangerously stupid. This would be a valid method of doing so.

 

[ZiprHead]

While I think it would be funny, any journalist that does this will be an unethical jerk.

Just the opposite. It is journalists responsibility to expose the objective fact that the leader of still the world's most powerful nation is a pathological liar and dangerously stupid. This would be a valid method of doing so.

I disagree. It's wavering into James O'Keefe territory.

 

[blastula]

Yes, James OKeefe could should ask it. He could get away with it without being fired.

 

[ronburgundy]

While I think it would be funny, any journalist that does this will be an unethical jerk.

Just the opposite. It is journalists responsibility to expose the objective fact that the leader of still the world's most powerful nation is a pathological liar and dangerously stupid. This would be a valid method of doing so.

I disagree. It's wavering into James O'Keefe territory.

Not remotely similar. It would be a completely public question, not an illegal recording of a private conversation. The public would have access to everything that was said by all parties, rather than the cherry picked, strategically edited recordings that O'keefe has released.
Also, it would simply give the public relevant factual information about Trump, rather than purely emotional propaganda (such as releasing that a single Planned Parenthood worker, out of likely hundreds talked to, agreed to take a donation from a racist, which has no relevance to how the organization uses its money).

It would merely be a rare instance of investigative journalism rather than the press uncritically parroting lies of public figures, which about all it does anymore. If the US president is just making up nonsense answers to questions about things he has no understanding of, that is something the public should know about.

 

[Jimmy Higgins]

While I think it would be funny, any journalist that does this will be an unethical jerk.

Just the opposite. It is journalists responsibility to expose the objective fact that the leader of still the world's most powerful nation is a pathological liar and dangerously stupid. This would be a valid method of doing so.

I disagree. It's wavering into James O'Keefe territory.

Wah! There is a big space between Rick Mercer and John O'Keefe.

Seriously, don't click the O'Keefe link.

Regardless, exposing Trump's ignorance for a moment is hardly out of the realm of historical things done to politicians. This stuff goes back a while. O'Keefe is a blogosphere hitman, who takes video, heavily edits it, and then presents it as unedited. A reporter getting Trump to look dumb(er) isn't exactly demonstrating something that isn't true.

 

[dismal]

Well, but if the reporter isn't immediately arrested and shot it defeats the whole "Trump is literally Hitler" narrative.

 

[Potoooooooo]

it is not the first time this has happened http://www.nytimes.com/1993/01/13/us/isn-t-freedonia-next-to-oz.html

 

[blastula]

it would be sweet if he answered, like, "I would have tremendous relations with the beautiful nation of Wakanda if it were real, but we all should know it's fictional. I believe it was first mentioned in the comic book Iron Man in issue 75, the one with martians on the cover. Thank you for that question. Finally a topic I know something about!"

 

[Elixir]

While I think it would be funny, any journalist that does this will be an unethical jerk.

Not at all. The industry has a long and cherished history of capitalizing on open-mike gaffes. Some even intentionally sparked by the reporter.
MAYBE taking the $300 for asking the question would be ethically murky, but you have to assume that someone on FFvC's staff has seen this article. He may be warned. But he'll only be armed for this particular question.

So I wonder if a journalist is prepared to ask about Jumangi. Or Opar. Barsoom. Arendelle....

Will he be able to say "I don't know about that nation, let me seek an expert" or will he bloviate...?

Even Trump knows that "Jumangi" is not a real country. The real one is Jumanji.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

While I think it would be funny, any journalist that does this will be an unethical jerk.

Just the opposite. It is journalists responsibility to expose the objective fact that the leader of still the world's most powerful nation is a pathological liar and dangerously stupid. This would be a valid method of doing so.

I disagree. It's wavering into James O'Keefe territory.

O'Keefe selectively edits material to make it appear damning when it isn't. (And it's something I would like to see stomped on by Congress. Simple requirement: If you publish excerpts of recordings you must make available the whole recording {censored as needed to protect sources, but not more than that} from which the excerpts came. To fail to do grants the other side a rebuttable presumption of wrongdoing in a libel/slander suit.)

Inviting someone to stick their foot in their mouth and then recording them doing it isn't the same thing at all.

 

[Potoooooooo]

it would be sweet if he answered, like, "I would have tremendous relations with the beautiful nation of Wakanda if it were real, but we all should know it's fictional. I believe it was first mentioned in the comic book Iron Man in issue 75, the one with martians on the cover. Thank you for that question. Finally a topic I know something about!"

 

[Loren Pechtel]

The problem with this is any reporter who asked it would likely be banned from future press conferences.

 

[Jolly_Penguin]

The problem with this is any reporter who asked it would likely be banned from future press conferences.

It would be worth it.