Rex Huppke Profile picture
Jan 18, 2018 8 tweets 2 min read Twitter logo Read on Twitter
1/ While the #FakeNewsAwards fervor continues, let me highlight the horribleness of Trump's anti-press nonsense by telling you about what the reporters I work with here in Chicago do. Unlike columnists like myself who get to spout opinions, the remarkable and dedicated...
2/ ...women and men at the Chicago Tribune report the news of the day, chronicle the deaths of people who've made differences in the community, kneel down and take to grieving parents at crime scenes, stand and observe while meetings are held, ask powerful people questions...
3/ ...that they don't want to be asked. They stand in the rain or snow for hours, they follow protest marchers across the city, the go places where most people would be too afraid to go. They investigate, they hold people accountable. Without our reporters doing what they...
4/ ...do, we wouldn't know about the unfair water rates that gouge poor Chicagoans while wealthy suburban families pay less. We wouldn't know about the state's failure to screen babies for a deadly disease. We wouldn't know about corrupt practices that shield police from...
5/ ...scrutiny. I have and have had the pleasure of working alongside people who have quite literally risked their lives to make sure a story is told. And not one person, not one journalist I've known has ever produced "fake news." It's a bullshit term used by a bullshit...
6/ ...con artist who is degrading one of the most important parts of our democracy - the free press. Every shout of "FAKE NEWS!", every non-specific and snide reference to "the mainstream media" or "the liberal media" is a smack in the face to people who bust their asses...
7/ ...while actually doing something that makes this country better. And that's a hell of a lot more than Donald Trump has ever done. My colleagues wouldn't say this. They're too professional and they know the boundaries of their jobs. But I'll say it. This Fake News garbage....
8/ ...is a disgrace, and this president is a disgrace for peddling it so often. It shouldn't be tolerated. Journalism matters, and it will matter long after this ugly chapter of American history is over. END

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More from @RexHuppke

Sep 9, 2021
1/ All righty, folks, let's sit down a moment, collect our breath and address the volcanic right-wing pants-crapping currently brought on by Biden's announcement of various vaccine mandates. For starters, good job, guys! You're doing that thing where you absolutely freak out...
2/ ...and throw around words like "tyranny" and "Marxism" and whatever else you found in the "Modern Conservative's Inaccurate Scare-Word-of-the-Day Calendar" you bought in the gift shop at Mar-a-Lago when you were there hoping to get a whiff of one of Donald Trump's farts.
3/ Rather than actually taking a moment to reflect on, you know, all the people dying and whatnot, you all are Pavlov's-dogging it right to "BIDEN DID A SOCIALISM ON ME!!!" bullsh*t, which only serves to raise the blood pressure of your already COVID-infected base.
Read 15 tweets
Aug 27, 2018
1/ Mollie Tibbetts' funeral was today. It seemed to go a bit unnoticed, particularly by the many very concerned souls who pounced on the young woman's murder to raise holy hell about immigrants and to parrot Trump's sickening line about parents being "permanently separated."
2/ I imagine those very concerned souls took note of Mollie's funeral. I assume they read every word about the funeral, and learned that the family members who spoke described a positive, loving woman who cared for everyone. They certainly must have seen how her father told...
3/ ...the people gathered there: "So, let’s try to do what Mollie would do. Let’s say what Mollie would say." Or how her brother envisioned his sister in heaven tapping into the minds of people like Martin Luther King Jr., Abraham Lincoln and Harriet Tubman.
Read 7 tweets
Jul 12, 2018
1/ If I may have a moment of your time...

I just wrapped up a five-part series of columns, reflections on a divided America in the age of Trump. I enjoyed writing them immensely. They're not the kind of columns that tend to grab attention online, more kind of essay-ish thingies.
2/ I tweeted links to them as they ran, but I'm going to put all five in this thread, in case anyone cares to read through them as a compiled series. I don't know if they offer any great revelations about anything, and some bits are just kind of silly.
3/ But I like them, and as with most writers, it takes a lot for me to say I like something I wrote.

Anyway, enough preamble. Here's Part 1:

chicagotribune.com/news/opinion/h…
Read 8 tweets
Jun 29, 2018
1/ This will likely contain some adult language. Don't say I didn't warn you.

I held off on commenting on the Capital Gazette tragedy. The facts needed to come out. We don't know everything yet, but we know enough.

The killer had harassed journalists and editors at the paper.
2/ It had gone on for years. Recently there were threats of violence via social media.

How many of us have gotten those? Most, if not all. Some more than others. Some get stalked, latched onto by unhinged readers who become obsessive, vile. Sometimes they toe the line between...
3/ ...actionable threats and vitriolic nonsense. Sometimes they cross the line and you contact the police, though there's little they can do. It can be scary, unnerving, but we adapt to it and go about our jobs, knowing most of it is noise.

This time years of noise built to...
Read 16 tweets
May 2, 2018
1/ Here's a thread about journalism. Specifically about the reckless and absurd use of the term "fake news." I made a mistake in my column that was published Monday online and in Tuesday's print edition. It was the column about a lost dog, Finn, who was found after four days.
2/ In the column, I said the woman who found Finn worked part-time at an animal hospital in Chester, Ind. That was the mistake. The hospital is in Chesterton, Ind. I screwed up the name and didn't catch it when I was back-reading the column. Those of you who like me might say...
3/ ...something like, "Oh, that's no big deal." And while I'd appreciate that, it's not true. It is a big deal. Because any mistake is a big deal. I hate them. All journalists hate them. Even the slightest screw-up keeps most of us up at night. The importance of accuracy has...
Read 12 tweets
Mar 19, 2018
1/ We live in an age of staggering stupidity. That much is known. What seems to get overlooked is a widespread willingness to not only elevate dumb people but to pay them extremely well and treat them as though their dumb opinions have just a much as value as other opinions.
2/ I say this not as some self-declared genius. I don't consider myself to to be all that smart. But I'm confident in the things that I do know, and willing to learn about things I don't know so I can form an opinion that isn't dumb. I'm not perfect, at all.
3/ But I don't pretend to know things I don't know, and I hope that keeps me from seeming dumb. Unfortunately, there are many people out there who are just dumb. They have dumb ideas. They have demonstrably dumb opinions. They dumbly think they can behave in ways that are...
Read 14 tweets

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