Trump: NY Times 'Caught in a Big Lie' Over Patriots Photos

[DonViejo]

Source: The Daily Beast

President Donald Trump on Thursday slammed The New York Times for allegedly distorting the record on the New England Patriots’ attendance numbers at the team’s White House visit on Wednesday versus those in past years. “Failing @nytimes, which has been calling me wrong for two years, just got caught in a big lie concerning New England Patriots visit to W.H.,” Trump tweeted. He was referring to a side-by-side comparison on Twitter showing the turnout for the team’s visit to the White House under Trump versus its last visit under President Obama in 2015. The latter photo showed visibly more people in the photo, but the Patriots fired back in a tweet, saying the 2015 photo showed football staffers standing with the players, while on Wednesday they were sitting with the crowd on the South Lawn of the White House. More players attended the Obama visit in 2015 (50) than the Trump visit this year (34), but the total Patriots delegation was around the same. Many players decided not to attend the White House visit this year, with some citing politics as their reason.

Link to tweet

Link to tweet

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Read more: http://www.thedailybeast.com/cheats/2017/04/20/trump-ny-times-caught-in-a-big-lie-over-patriots-photos.html?via=desktop&source=copyurl

[burnbaby]

1. Dear Lord

who cares!

[nikibatts]

66. In the meantime, Trump has more warships heading toward N.K. than Obama. Must win something

before 100 days.

[deek]

74. perfect response! n/t

.

[Docreed2003]

2. The most thin skinned, self conscious man in the world

You're the freaking president Donnie...have some self respect and just not respond if it's something that offends you. Geez

[steve2470]

11. +1 nt

[Hayduke Bomgarte]

50. If he had self respect he'd

Be respected by one.

[unblock]

3. i remain in awe of the magnitude of just how incredibly childish this guy is.

"wahh!! quit saying that more people showed up at johnny's party! so what if johnny's got more friends than me! if you count parents, i had just as many people at my party as johnny did! so you're a liar! wahhhh!"


on the other hand, i'm grateful that this kind of crap keeps him occupied so he's not focused on further damaging our country....

[oberliner]

4. The NY Times did screw this up

Crap like this makes us look bad.

[MGKrebs]

7. They are purposely tweeking him now.

It's as if they just want him to snap.

[Ilsa]

65. I think you're right.

They want to see and expose how frayed his nerves will become over a nothing PR event.

[SCVDem]

8. Do you work for the NYT?

Not my problem. Dump is insane.

[oberliner]

32. Nope

But when I saw the photo, I posted on here that it was a mistake. There are so many serious things to focus on with Trump. Incidents like this do not help that effort.

[mr_lebowski]

75. Well, considering there's 52 players on a team and only 2 no-shows for Obama ...

Vs. 18 no-shows for Herr Gropenfuhrer ...

That's 9 TIMES more FAILURE than what Obama had.

Ergo, the picture actually underestimates the true discrepancy significantly.

[leftynyc]

13. We look bad? Who's we?

Who gives a crap about this other than degenerate donnie and his pathetic need to constantly have the "biggest"?

[oberliner]

26. Reasonable human beings

Just saying it takes away from the multitude of serious criticisms of Trump to jump on these silly things that turn out to be specious.

[leftynyc]

35. I'll agree it makes the Times look bad

(for the record, I dropped my subscription after the election, went without until last month when I signed up for digital subscription). My objection was your use of the word "we". "We" had nothing to do with it.

[BumRushDaShow]

16. No - they are trolling him

It's hilarious actually.... especially since everyone knows he will react to stuff like this and as predicted, he did.

[notdarkyet]

20. I couldn't help but laugh at his peevishness. I don't blame NYT. It's fun to fk with him,

Because it's so easy.

[oberliner]

30. The NY Times shouldn't be in the business of trolling

Especially in such a sloppy, inaccurate way.

Just my opinion.

[BumRushDaShow]

68. Note the "rules" of social media aren't really translatable to published articles.

There was really nothing "sloppy" or "inaccurate" about what they tweeted. The number of that team's members that came to this year's event (34) WAS less than the number who came for the 2015 event (50), regardless of any other ancillary staff. End of story.

[oberliner]

72. The tweet was both sloppy and inaccurate

If they had posted a picture of the 34 people at the 2017 and the 50 people at the 2015 event, then that would been accurate, but that's not what they did.

The tweet was inaccurate in that the picture from 2015 was of players, coaches, and staff while the picture from 2017 was only of players.

(Clearly, the NYT recognized that it was inaccurate since they removed the tweet, changed the photo in the article the tweet referenced, and added a statement explaining the error).

It was sloppy in that the NYT didn't bother to check if both pictures depicted the same thing before publishing them online.

There is just no need for crap like that which creates the impression that the NYT is not above looking for silly small things to mock Trump about without doing minimal fact checking to ensure accuracy.

[BumRushDaShow]

77. Again, you seem to miss the trolling part

particularly when you have President, who routinely lies, exaggerates, and spews forth nonsense continually while attacking the 4th estate, which is necessary for a democratic society. The NY Times has been reporting on him, his father, and the rest of his family, for almost 90 years.

He needs to be mocked and note the tweet being referenced in the OP is from their Sports department, not their main "The New York Times(@nytimes)" twitter account. But you knew that right?

[oberliner]

78. NYT Sports editor Jason Stallman took full responsibility for the questionable tweet.

“Bad tweet by me. Terrible tweet,” he told Yahoo News in a statement. “I wish I could say it’s complicated, but no, this one is pretty straightforward: I’m an idiot. It was my idea, it was my execution, it was my blunder. I made a decision in about four minutes that clearly warranted much more time. Once we learned more, we tried to fix everything as much as possible as swiftly as possible and as transparently as possible. Of course, at that point the damage was done. I just needed to own it.”

[BumRushDaShow]

80. That account is not the main NYT twitter account

and tweets/social media are not "news", despite them being interpreted by some as such... Your insistence on making 140 character utterances (some with pictures and video) equivalent to full news articles speaks volumes and suggests a need for more levity.

[oberliner]

81. My only point was that it was a screw up by the NY Times

I'm glad the NY Times Sports Editor who was responsible has owned up to his error in judgment.

[BumRushDaShow]

82. No it wasn't a "screw up" by the NY Times

It was a trolling from the Sports department.

[oberliner]

85. Yes, it was

The NY Times Sports Editor admitted to the screw up.

See the quote I provided for you above.

[BumRushDaShow]

88. You completely missed the point of what I wrote

which is not surprising.

[oberliner]

89. I get that you think the NY Times Sports editor was trolling Trump

I guess I am saying:

1. If you are going to troll Trump, you should do so with accuracy (i.e. 2 photos of just the players showing how many more players went when Obama was POTUS).

2. The NY Times shouldn't troll Trump with silly stuff like this because it cements the impression among Trump supporters that they are unable or unwilling to cover him fairly

[BumRushDaShow]

93. "Trolling" by its very nature often mocks

and can run through the spectrum from satirical to pure ridicule as a commentary on certain behavior by the mocked party. Twitter's very nature allows for sharp rebukes and quips due to the format's text limitation.

For you to attribute anything more than that to something coming from a subsection of that newspaper shows that you are unable to distinguish reality from commentary.

As a newspaper, their purpose is to not only report but as part of their function, to investigate, and editorialize. And no one on "our side" should give a shit about what "impression" any "Trump supporters" have because they certainly have an inordinate amount of megaphones through which to express their views - notably on television and radio, which is consumed by the public far more than print. The NYT has had plenty of regular contributors (including conservatives like William Safire & George Will & Bill Kristol over the years) to expound on "the other side's" point of view.

The question now becomes whether you plan to demand publicly on DU, that Breitbart or Blaze or the NY Post or Chicago Tribune or MSNBC or CNN or Fox News accurately report on liberal/progressive news or how about demanding that the current President use the official @POTUS account instead of his personal one?

[oberliner]

96. The NY Times sports editor admitted he screwed up

I don't know why you can't just take his word for it.

[BumRushDaShow]

97. The fact that he took the time to tweet what he did initially

knowing what the response would be (which he got) illustrates exactly what more sophisticated people can "see" and chuckle about while others "miss it" entirely and wring their hands, regardless of his later statement about it. I.e., the common "It's better to ask forgiveness than permission" method of operation.

He got the Pavlovian reaction that was expected and it only served to amplify the shallowness of the current occupant of the WH. I don't know why you don't see that.

[oberliner]

98. OK

I do see where you are coming from.

[Achilleaze]

18. The hell they screwed up. Trump's crowd is small. Obama's was big.

Trump is trying to spin reality to soothe his ego by adding "special circumstances" after the fact as his excuse for 34 Patriots doing something actually Patriotic and avoiding the republican five-time draft dodging, lie-spouting republican sleazeball, Comrade Casino.

Where was sports superhero Tom Brady? Where were the other 33 Patriots? They were ignoring & dissing the republican egofreak.

Trump's crowd is tiny. Obama's is much bigger. republican comrades are just going to have to find a way to reckon with the actual facts as reported by the NYT and elsewhere.

[oberliner]

27. They screwed up

They compared one picture of the Patriots players, coaches, and staff to another that only had the players.

Here's the full photo from this year:

[Achilleaze]

37. Where's superstar Tom Brady & the other 33 Patriots?

Comrade Casino and his republican cabal can line up all the flunkies & paid claques they want to try and make things look impressive. But there's still 34 Patriots Superbowl Champions missing & dissing the republican 5-time draft dodger.

Small turnout.

Very small.

[oberliner]

53. Brady didn't go when Obama was POTUS either

For what that is worth.

[former9thward]

54. Brady was with his mother who has cancer and is not doing well.

In addition Wednesday was his parent's 48th and possibly last anniversary. I am sure you will make that political also.

[Fast Walker 52]

84. well, let's compare this to the full pic from 2015

and the point is still fewer players went this year, which is what the NYT was trying to point out, I think.

[oberliner]

87. The full pictures show the same number of people

Last edited Fri Apr 21, 2017, 12:08 PM - Edit history (1)

The total number of people that went to the WH from the Patriots was about the same.

The difference in players could have been indicated by two photos of just the players. That would have shown that there were sixteen fewer players this time.

[Fast Walker 52]

94. fine, but did they intentionally mislead or just were sloppy here?

[oberliner]

95. Here's the quote from the NY Times Sports editor who sent the tweet

“Bad tweet by me. Terrible tweet,” he told Yahoo News in a statement. “I wish I could say it’s complicated, but no, this one is pretty straightforward: I’m an idiot. It was my idea, it was my execution, it was my blunder. I made a decision in about four minutes that clearly warranted much more time. Once we learned more, we tried to fix everything as much as possible as swiftly as possible and as transparently as possible. Of course, at that point the damage was done. I just needed to own it.”

[madokie]

43. 34 fewer

is fact

[oberliner]

60. Not true

There were 34 players total who went to the WH in 2017 and 50 who went in 2015, so it's 16 fewer.

But regardless, the comparison photos are unfair because one is just of the players and the other is of the players, coaches and staff.

[Blue_Tires]

48. My leftist heart bleeds for him

1. I'm in favor of anything that winds him up

2. I missed the memo that said we're supposed to fight Trump fair...

[oberliner]

61. I think it hurts the fight against Trump

And creates the impression that the media is out to get him (an impression he attempts to cultivate).

Better to stick with the countless very fair and serious criticisms of him - especially in a source like the NY Times.

[LanternWaste]

90. I'm quite certain you allege it hurts.

I'm quite certain you allege it hurts Democrats.

[oberliner]

92. I do think stuff like this hurts Democrats

Not a whole lot - but a little bit.

[adigal]

59. Did you see what they wrote? "Patriot's turnout" not the players

I think they are messing with him now, too!

[oberliner]

62. You may be right that they were trolling him

But I just think it's better for the NY Times to hold itself to a higher standard.

[adigal]

63. I agree, if only cause it allows Trump to pretend he misunderstood

I don't think they care anymore what he and his supporters think. I just had a guy on Facebook rant about how amazing Trump is, one of the top presidents ever, I am an ignorant fool, Obama is headed to jail. I asked where he got his news, asked for links. I provided a link to rebut one of his crazy claims and he blocked me. LOL!! They are hopeless. Like Jim Jones' cult members.

[oberliner]

64. It's important to remember that these people get their "news" from Sean Hannity

And others of that ilk.

If you listen to Hannity or any of the others you get the sense that there is a huge swath of American that is living in an alternate reality.

[Bradical79]

67. They reported accurately

Less players showed up for trump. Not sure how they screwed up.

[oberliner]

73. No they didn't

This is the tweet:

NYT Sports ✔ @NYTSports
Patriots' turnout for President Obama in 2015 vs. Patriots' turnout for President Trump today: http://nyti.ms/2o4Kwj7

With the tweet was a photo from 2015 of the players, coaches, and staff juxtaposed with a photo from 2017 of only the players.

Reporting accurately would show photos of just the players from both events or the entire Patriot group, including coaches and staff, for both events.

Here's a photo from 2017 including players, coaches, and staff:

[Fast Walker 52]

83. How exactly did they screw up? I don't get it at all.

[oberliner]

86. They made a comparison between photos

One was just the players and the other was the players, coaches, and staff.

That was the screw up.

There should have been two photos of the players or two photos of the players, coaches, and staff.

[exboyfil]

5. In all seriousness the NYTimes

should not be deceptive. On the other hand it shouldn't be the Commander in Chief correcting them - that is the job of Spicer and his ilk.

I thought the photo looked odd at the time. Don't give this moron an opportunity to question your integrity.

[oberliner]

55. Yes, exactly

Agree completely - glad others share this perspective.

[Kathy M]

57. I agree also

[mercuryblues]

6. The NYT

did this because they knew the reaction they would get from Don the Con.

[machoneman]

10. Maybe but....

it is true that far more PLAYERS attended President Obama's homage.

[underpants]

9. For someone so obsessed with crowd sizes you'd think they'd have staged that better

Just saying.

[Cooley Hurd]

21. Just fill the south portico stairs with staffers. I'm sure near-sighted Easter Bunny needs a gig...

[C Moon]

12. The jackass has nothing better to do than to obsess over a New Times article?

[BannonsLiver]

14. Here are some facts

Fact 1: 68 players were invited. There were 34 that showed up.

Fact 2: In 2015, there were 50 players that showed up. Last time I checked 50 is a larger number than 34.

Fact 3: The number of support personnel, front office staff that showed up either in 2015 or 2017 is not relevant to this discussion. It's about the players, not the pencil pushers.

So once again, Fuck Trump and the horse he rode in on.

[oberliner]

29. Then they should've contrasted two photos of just the players

Which would have shown more players in 2015 than 2017.

Instead, they showed two pictures: one from 2017 of just the players and one from 2015 of players, coaches, and staff.

[BannonsLiver]

40. I'm not here to critique the Times

The purpose of my post was to point out the fact that there were 16 fewer players in 2017 relative to 2015. What people want to think about the Times is their business. I have zero fucks to give on that front.

[LenaBaby61]

49. "So once again, Fuck Trump and the horse he rode in on."

Mental illness is one hell of a drug. Plus, almost everytime his lips move, he's lying. That's FACT.

Scary thing is that he's the president (installed I know) of the USA. He's not running anything, his blackmailer and puppet master putin IS.

[Judi Lynn]

69. Nothing wrong with the truth, still. Thank you, BannonsLiver! n/t

[George II]

15. It's tough to count, but I counted 50 people (give or take one or two) in yesterday's picture, and..

....more than 100 in the 2015 picture.

Why would 50 people NOT be in the picture this year?

And the NY Times simply stated "turnout". The plain and simple fact is that there were only 34 players there yesterday.

[onenote]

22. Apples and oranges.

The 2015 picture was of the players plus others from the Patriots organization that attended. The 2017 picture was only the players. There is a 2017 picture that shows players and others from the Patriots organization that would have been the more appropriate comparison.

The Times screwed up and they know it, which is why the paper's sports editor responded as follows: “Bad tweet by me. Terrible tweet. I wish I could say it’s complicated, but no, this one is pretty straightforward: I’m an idiot. It was my idea, it was my execution, it was my blunder. I made a decision in about four minutes that clearly warranted much more time. Once we learned more, we tried to fix everything as much as possible as swiftly as possible and as transparently as possible. Of course, at that point the damage was done. I just needed to own it.”

[George II]

23. Even the Patriots, in their tweet, acknowledge that there were "over" (let's say approximately)....

....40 staffers on the steps in 2015, and they were on the lawn yesterday.

This is donny math - as I said, there were roughly 50 on the steps yesterday, and more than 100 (actually about 110) in 2015.

So, 50 + 40 = 90, much less than 110, and there were more than 50 players in 2015 but only 34 in 2017.

[onenote]

31. Here's the full team/staff in 2017 photo

https://www.democraticunderground.com/?com=view_post&forum=1014&pid=1756924

The Times screwed up. They didn't need the picture. They could have, and should have, simply run the story about the number of players who showed up this year compared to 2015.

[rickford66]

41. When you have a photo, why use "roughly", "about", "more than" etc.

State the actual number. The Patriots and the WH can count I hope.

[George II]

44. I didn't do an exact count, not easy to do with either of those pictures. Give it a try.

[rickford66]

45. I didn't mean to criticize you, sorry.

It was a general comment where an exact number is obvious. The WH, the Patriots and the Secret Service know exactly how many showed up.

[George II]

47. Thanks. As best I could count there were 50 in yesterday's picture and somewhere in the order of...

....110 in the 2015 picture (I tried three times and "lost count" over 100). And the Patriots said there were 40 staffers on the lawn yesterday.

[onenote]

52. It's pretty clear from the full team/staff photo that there were more than 40 staffers attending

this year.

Which is consistent with the Patriots' assertion that there were more Patriots' organization personnel present this year than ever before.

This is such a flippin' tempest in a teapot. More players stayed home. More members of the organization came. And the Times shouldn't have compared two pictures that weren't really comparable.

[greymattermom]

17. So the white house staff knows how important these images are to Trump

Why didn't they get everyone who showed up to stand on the stairs? Event planning is a skill, and all aspects of the event need to be planned beforehand. A lot of their events seem to have glitches.

[George II]

24. Maybe they didn't want to be seen with him on the steps? And where was "Danny"? ...

[Blue Idaho]

19. More than half of the team were no-shows

Deal with it Donald...

[George II]

25. I suppose NBC Sports is lying too, eh donny?

http://profootballtalk.nbcsports.com/2017/04/19/34-patriots-players-make-trip-to-white-house-34-dont/

34 Patriots players make trip to White House, 34 don’t

The New England Patriots made the annual Super Bowl championship trip to the White House on Wednesday. A total of 68 players from the active roster, practice squad, and injured reserve list were invited.

Via CSN New England, 34 of the players went. Another 34 didn’t.

Not all players skipped for political reasons, but multiple Patriots made it clear that they opted not to attend due to issues with the administration. In the past, players have skipped the event for similar reasons, including for example former Ravens center Matt Birk, who chose not to go due to President Barack Obama’s support for Planned Parenthood.

Two years ago, 50 showed up for the White House visit following the team’s victory in Super Bowl XLIX.

[Voltaire2]

28. Basically he is insane. And has nukes.

What could go wrong?

[KittyWampus]

33. Under Obama the Staffers WANTED to be seen in the pix. And fewer players did show up.

[truthisfreedom]

34. Basically it comes down to this: Are 45's lips moving? Is he tweeting?

Then more bullshit is being disseminated. End of story.

[NewRedDawn]

36. Such a small little man

in a big fat blob body.

[davsand]

38. This is the biggest issue we face today?

Seriously? Queeg keeps coming to mind.

[lark]

39. Poor widdle rich baby, just wants massive amounts of love.

He gets so pouty, whiney and gee, just stupid, when anyone suggests that Obama had more of anything. Hair Furor just goes ballistic. Of course, all the "love" he's had was really about getting his $$, but he's too stupid and arrogant to know that. He thinks the women just loved him, they didn't and sued him 22 times for sexual assault. His defective brain just can't understand complications or details. Sad for us that someone so lacking in intellectual depth, kindness, caring or even plain humanity has stolen our government.

[Kaleva]

42. Why does Trump draw attention to the fact that fewer Patriots showed up for him...

then for Obama?

[Dammit Jim]

46. Deapite his racist comments, he wants to be Obama

Simple.

[Freethinker65]

51. Not exactly a "BIG LIE". Few people actually care about this event, even less the size of photo-ops

But the Times should have left out the miseditorializing and stuck with the facts of who did, and did not, partake.

[JDC]

56. Such a small, petty little man

[riversedge]

58. there is a pic on twitter of the helmet Obama got signed by all: Helmit to Trump has NO

signatures on it. Will post if see it again.

[bluedigger]

70. All this really says is Kraft is a nice boss.

The Times (and everyone else) are naughty for not using comparable team photos if they were available, a significant number of team members declined to attend this year (94%>64%), and Kraft filled the empty seats on the plane with any Pats employees that wanted to go. You don't think they fly United, do you?

[onetexan]

71. what a freaking loser

then again that's nothing new. I'm sure all this pricking by the media and people who don't support him must irk him terribly and hurt his ego like hell

[onecaliberal]

76. My God is he 3 months old? For fucks sake, shut the asshole up already.

[itcfish]

91. Who cares about a photo?

Your lies are much bigger and have very serious consequences.