“Much can be done to criticize and ridicule the politician’s behavior further. A particular way to do this is to dig into the archives…”  (Ekstrom & Johansson, 2008)

The “archives” are more accessible than ever. Anyone with an internet connection can quickly and easily uncover any tweet, post, or picture someone, somewhere, at some point decided to make public.

Our current president has generously provided loads of content for the public to review and there are plenty of people willing to sift through decades of video, interviews, and tweets to create digestible forms for public consumption. Articles, Instagram accounts, podcasts, even these flip flops attempt to twist the ever-present knife of scandal in the Trump Presidency.

I fear sharing every contradiction, gaffe, and misstep had only desensitized the public to scandal blurring the lines of what is and is not acceptable from our leaders. When even mundane activities like golf turn into a scandal, is the media twisting the knife or attempting death by a thousand paper cuts? Either way, it feels like a distraction.

Works Cited

Ekstrom, M., & Johansson, B. (2008). Talk Scandals. Media, Culture, & Society, 61-79.