“The startup’s tagline, “Not owned by anybody,” is a pointed reference to billionaire Washington Post owner Jeff Bezos and other moguls who, in Rubin’s view, have “bent the knee” to President-elect Donald Trump.”
Quite.
I imagine it’s difficult for anyone to work in the mainstream media these days knowing more often than not you’re part of the problem, whether you do good work or not.
Source: Brian Stelter, CNN
New York CNN — Veteran opinion columnist Jennifer Rubin is becoming the latest in a long list of Washington Post figures to leave the troubled institution.
Rubin is partnering with former White House ethics czar Norm Eisen and launching something new: a startup publication called The Contrarian.
The startup’s tagline, “Not owned by anybody,” is a pointed reference to billionaire Washington Post owner Jeff Bezos and other moguls who, in Rubin’s view, have “bent the knee” to President-elect Donald Trump.
“Our goal is to combat, with every fiber of our being, the authoritarian threat that we face,” Rubin told CNN in an interview ahead of the publication’s introduction.
Rubin also called out the Washington Post for recent failings, giving specific examples.
Rubin cited numerous controversies, including Bezos blocking the editorial board’s planned endorsement of Vice President Kamala Harris in October and Amazon, which Bezos founded, making a $1 million donation to Trump’s inaugural fund. She said a major factor in her exit was the Post’s recent refusal to publish a satirical cartoon by Pulitzer Prize-winning cartoonist Ann Telnaes showing Bezos and others on bended knee. Telnaes resigned as a result.
And here’s a bit of what she wrote in her first substack.
Corporate and billionaire owners of major media outlets have betrayed their audiences’ loyalty and sabotaged journalism’s sacred mission — defending, protecting and advancing democracy. The Washington Post’s billionaire owner and enlisted management are among the offenders. They have undercut the values central to The Post’s mission and that of all journalism: integrity, courage, and independence. I cannot justify remaining at The Post. Jeff Bezos and his fellow billionaires accommodate and enable the most acute threat to American democracy—Donald Trump—at a time when a vibrant free press is more essential than ever to our democracy’s survival and capacity to thrive.
I therefore have resigned from The Post, effective today. In doing so, I join a throng of veteran journalists so distressed over The Post’s management they felt compelled to resign.
