Why did something like Bridgegate hurt Chris Christie more than any of Trump’s scandals hurt him?
Shame is a necessary component of the mainstream media's "gotcha" game.
The media can only police public figures as much as public figures care what the media has to say about them. That's one revolutionary aspect of Trump's use of social media - his public image and communications strategy is completely divorced from established media channels that have long enforced the bounds of what "acceptable" political behavior is.
It is no coincidence that the people most ardently opposed to Trump (i.e., the media class) are also the ones who have the most to lose from his style of politics being normalized. They are really just lamenting the loss of their preferred station in the discourse.
The media class were most certainly not the people most ardently opposed to Trump, and I resent you saying that. Just because you weren't hurt by his administration's policies or the target of abuse from his cultish supporters doesn't mean that many other people weren't.
And give me a break - Trump has always needed the media more than they need him, even if they also benefit from the arrangement. Indeed, Donald Trump would be nothing
without the media (well, maybe in jail for tax evasion, fraud, embezzlement, etc.).
