If you’ve been paying attention to the news circuit over the last few days, you have probably heard a little about the “Trump University” scandal.
What is this all about you ask? Well, let’s start from the beginning.
In 2005, Donald “The Hair” Trump started a “school” (and I use that term loosely) to effectively teach students the ways of business and real estate. The program was built around expensive seminar trips where the paying students were promised the opportunity to learn from “handpicked” professionals, or even Trump himself.
You can the YouTube intro for the school just to see for yourself what I'm talking about.
As I’m sure you can guess, this whole thing was a scam. So the unofficial university shut its doors to the tune of three lawsuits, one with over five thousand victims, in 2010.
But, I don’t want to stand here and tell you all why Donald Trump shouldn’t be president because of this; I’m pretty sure you hear plenty of that already. Instead, I want to talk about something different.
You see, once I saw the article about the scam coming to light, I wanted some more information. So, I googled it, and from a quick Google search and skimming three articles, I learned this:
1) The basics about the event, as described above.
2) The vast majority of the articles written about the university were published within the last year, and a large number of them occurred in the last week.
3) When you search “Trump” on the New York Times archives from the year 2010, you get ZERO articles about these lawsuits and the “Trump University” issue.
I find this fascinating and a little bit concerning.
It’s fascinating because it speaks volumes about how the media focuses on issues. I went back 50 pages into Google News searching “Trump University article” to try and find something about the lawsuits from when they were originally filed. 50 pages of media articles got me back to about July, 2015. What the media is focusing on and why they are focusing on it now are completely fascinating, and they also bring me to why I find this a little concerning.
The presidential cycle in the United States is longer than in any other country in the world. That leaves a lot of time for media to cover the back stabbing, and, frankly, catty discourse between candidates. And believe me, it’s been a roller coaster this cycle. The political climate could be turned into a very successful soap opera. So much time is spent throwing shade at other candidates that no one stops and thinks about what some of these attacks mean. The Trump University Scandal says a huge amount about the attentions of the American people and how media works.
You see, this Trump University fraud isn’t actually unique. There are a troves of fake universities issuing degrees either to people who just pay for the piece of paper without the training or, alternatively, schools that have classes and professors, but isn’t accredited. This is a major problem around the globe. These schools are licensing people who don’t have the skills they say they have. Uneducated people are roaming the job market and damaging society because of it. Imagine for a second that someone got a degree in anesthesiology, but never went to medical school. Now they’re in charge or keeping you or your family member unconscious during surgery. Yeah, that sounds like a recipe for trouble. Now remember that someone in the country is in this exact situation right now, and it could be you next.
The problem is, the media firestorm over this isn’t about the horrible practice of degree mills, but discrediting the GOP front runner. The only reason this Trump University story has gained any traction five long years after the incident is because Trump has traction. He’s a loud mouth without a filter. He’s provocative and infuriating and any article about him soars in page counts. Articles about Donald Trump are very popular right now. So, the media is going to give the audience what they want, which is more political melodrama, instead of talking about the actual issues in the world.
We can see this everywhere. Huge numbers of media outlets and opinion blogs are crying out in outrage over Trump’s dishonesty in the “Trump University” issue, and all since Rubio (I believe) brought to the front of the media’s mind. But, like I described before, very few care about the actual wide spread issue and pretty much NO ONE cared about the issue in 2010, when it was of immediately occurring. The New York Times certainly didn’t. Do you what to know something they did care about though? The possibility of Trump running for president in 2012. I guess some things never really change.
