When Journalism Sings Backup for Fearmongers

How Billionaire-Owned Media Turns Fear Into Clicks

Here we go again. Here’s how wild journalism has gotten in 2025:

How D.C. crime became a symbol — and a target — for MAGA and beyond

The Washington Post just dropped a 3,000-word deep dive on Trump’s hostile takeover of the D.C. police department complete with MAGA rally quotes, blood-on-the-sidewalk imagery, and Nixon-era flashbacks and somehow managed to build the whole set list on Trump’s stage.

They do sprinkle in the stats showing violent crime is down, but they bury them halfway down the tracklist, after you’ve already been hit with the power chords of “roving mobs,” “bloodthirsty criminals,” and “wild youth.”

It’s like playing “Rock the Casbah” by The Clash but swapping out the anti-authoritarian hook for a verse written by the guy ordering the airstrikes.

And listen when an outlet with The Post’s reach leans on Trump’s soundbites to frame the opening act, it’s not just setting the mood. It’s scoring the whole show in his key. Readers walk away humming his chorus, even if the bridge contains the truth. That’s the power of front-loading fear: by the time the facts roll in, the hook’s already stuck in your head.

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The Fear Is Loud. The Facts Are on Mute.

The piece opens with Trump painting a Mad Max-level D.C., holding up charts comparing the city to South American cartel zones, and declaring, “Entire neighborhoods are under emergency curfews.” That’s not just a quote — that’s a political music video with The Post providing the camera work. This man is out here talking like there’s a warlord on every corner and a tank parked outside your CVS. And you, the reader, are supposed to watch it like it’s a trailer for a movie you never asked to see, except this one comes with National Guard deployment and real-life consequences.

Then we get, “roving mobs of wild youth, drugged-out maniacs and homeless people.” Oh, so it’s Grand Theft Auto: D.C. Edition now? You can almost hear the bass drop while The Post lets that ride without cutting in with a big bold “Crime is at a multi-year low.” Ask yourself why is the bassline of fear always louder than the treble of truth? That’s not an accident, that’s sound engineering for propaganda.

Or how about Jeanine Pirro’s gem: “I can’t touch you if you’re 14, 15, 16, 17 years old and you have a gun.” She delivers it like she’s auditioning for a Fox News chyron, complete with the dramatic flair of someone trying to scare grandma out of walking to the mailbox. And yet here it is, repackaged in a paper with Pulitzer cred, as if it’s just another brick in the wall of “the conversation.” You can’t normalize hysteria without a platform and The Post just handed her the mic.

The MAGA influencer Benny Johnson said his family had seen “drug deals and arms deals constantly” outside their previous home in D.C., which he called “a deadly war zone” and “welfare narco-state.” And The Post just drops that in there like it’s an establishing shot in a Netflix docuseries, no follow-up, no fact-check, just vibes. Katie Miller, the wife of White House Deputy Chief of Staff Stephen Miller, posted Monday on X that for years she hadn’t felt safe enough to bring her children “to museums and monuments without fear of being shot or car jacked.” That’s not just personal testimony that’s an open invitation to feed the ‘city in chaos’ narrative, and The Post prints it without pushing back. Man, if my neighbor told me there were ‘arms deals constantly’ outside, I’d at least ask if they owned a telescope and a police scanner before I ran it on A1.

And the climax: “President Trump wasn’t messing around. ARREST THEM ALL. SAVE THE CAPITAL.” You don’t just print that without context unless you’re handing out backstage passes to the fear concert. When the chorus is that blunt, you either challenge it or you sing along. They sang along.

It’s adrenaline-pumping stuff. You can practically see the helicopters circling the Washington Monument in your mind. But by the time The Post tells you violent crime is actually at multi-year lows, your nervous system’s already been tuned to Trump FM. And if you’re tuned in long enough, you stop noticing who’s playing the set you just start dancing to their beat.

That’s strategic framing, giving the headliner’s narrative top billing while the data is the undercard act, playing to a half-empty room. And the half-empty room is us, distracted, half-listening, and halfway to believing it.

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The Setlist of Symptoms — Without Naming the Song

They name every element in the scene, each with its own ready-made soundbite for the fear playlist:

• MAGA influencers posting horror stories, like Benny Johnson claiming his family saw “drug deals and arms deals constantly” outside their home, branding D.C. a “deadly war zone.”

• Kari Lake’s dog stepping on a syringe — her post screaming, “Just another day in Washington, D.C.,” as if the National Mall were a minefield.

• A tourist joking about wearing a bulletproof vest, saying, “Man, you’ve got to dodge bullets when you’re at the sites,” which The Post repeats before quietly noting they actually felt safe.

• Nixon calling D.C. the “crime capital” in the 60s, proof this record’s been spinning for half a century.

• Right-wing pundits demanding mass arrests, like Graham Allen’s “ARREST THEM ALL. SAVE THE CAPITAL,” tossed in without interrogation.

But they don’t lead with the most important lyric, that this fear script has been remixed every damn election cycle for decades, always with the same ugly racial undertones and the same cynical political payoff. It’s the journalistic version of giving you the bassline, the drums, the vocals, but never telling you the song is about a full-blown authoritarian power grab and that omission isn’t polite, it’s straight-up bullsh*t.

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From Reporting to Stagecraft: The Security Theater Play

When you open with a president’s overblown fear narrative and follow with color commentary from the hype squad, then tack on the actual crime stats as an afterthought, you’re not just reporting. You’re reinforcing the vibe and hardwiring it into the reader’s mental playlist.

It’s the same old chorus:

• Inflate the threat

• Cast the city as ungovernable

• Justify extraordinary measures

And here’s where it gets real — this framing works just as well on frustrated moderates and Black residents tired of seeing violence in their neighborhoods as it does on the MAGA base. That’s the real political hook, the kind that can flip votes or drain trust without a single law changing.

If you’re reading this and thinking, Well, I know better, consider this: repetition works on everybody. You don’t have to believe the words for the emotional charge to stick. Fear is sticky. Familiarity is sticky. And when a national paper lets fear ride shotgun in the lead paragraph, it’s not just informing you, it’s training you to hear the next round of alarm bells without asking who’s ringing them or why.

The danger isn’t just in the story they tell — it’s in the habit they build. Once you’ve been conditioned to nod along with the framing, the next “emergency” gets easier to sell, the next power grab feels less outrageous, and the line between safety and control blurs until you can’t remember which side you’re standing on.

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Say the Goddamn Words

Call it a manufactured crisis.
Call it a racialized law-and-order play.
Call it the oldest song in the American campaign book, just sped up for 2025 — the political equivalent of a remixed “Rock the Casbah” where the anti-authoritarian hook gets swapped for the ruling class’s anthem and the chorus is screaming straight-up fear porn.

And let me be real: don’t you dare let a billionaire-owned outlet run the verses without telling you what genre you’re listening to or whose damn playlist you’re on. In the Clash’s song, the Sharif hated the music because it threatened his power. Here, the gatekeepers are cool with the music as long as they get to write the lyrics, crank the fear knob to eleven, and cut the bridge to the truth before it even hits your f***ing ears. That’s not just bias no no that’s selling you a bootleg track designed to keep you dancing to their beat while they pick your pocket.

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If you’ve read this far, it’s because you already feel the danger and you know it’s not just about bad framing. It’s about living in a moment where billionaire owners can pull entire stories, gut investigative teams, or throttle coverage that threatens their friends in high places. We’ve watched reporters get blacklisted for asking the wrong questions, seen critical pieces buried in the algorithm, and watched newsrooms trade courage for click-through rates. That’s not paranoia y’all that’s the reality of a press under siege.

Every time a paper like The Post lets fearmongers set the first verse, it’s not just a journalistic lapse, it’s an assist to power. And if you think the next target isn’t independent outlets like this one, you’re dreaming. Here’s your shot to test it for yourself: grab a free 7‑day trial and unlock the entire archive for every post, every receipt, every deep dive —and see exactly what you’ve been missing. If you want coverage that doesn’t just play the hits for power and then fade out before the truth drops, keep it going after your trial and upgrade to a paid subscription.

🎸 Independent voices are the only ones still willing to smash the amp at the end of the set like the pilots in “Rock the Casbah” cranking the volume after the Sharif leaves but keeping that amp plugged in takes people like you willing to back it.