oh boy. wi-fi fast enough for the whole family is simple, easy, awesome. in many cultures, young men would stay with their families until their 40 s. welcome back to morning joe, live from oxford, mississippi. more now from that conversation we had yesterday with a grouch voters down here in oxford. some backed trump for president and some did not. here s their thoughts. the president has called the press an enemy of the people. do you think the press sometimes acts in ways that makes them the enemy of the people. i don t think that they are the enemy of the people. sometimes i think that they have been given a bad rap in presenting not only just the
first amendment and, i mean the press is protected in the very first amendment of the united states constitution. when he calls us the enemy of the people it makes us feel he doesn t understand us. having gone around and interviewed trump supporters, you know i often will ask, i have great conversations and, you know, they will seem to like me and say they like me. i get to the point do you think we re an enemy of the people, do you think i am. they say yes. it throws me off. disconcerting. i m just a little small town guy. journalism is a big job. you don t get paid a lot. and everybody hates you. well joining us now journalism professor at the university of mississippi and fellow at the center for southern journalism and politics, curtis wilke and political reporter for mississippi today. good to have you both.
the other thing, though, what we re seeing today is this is what dictators do. this is a dictatorial exercise of power that should frighten and call on all republicans to say mr. president, you cannot do this. you are trying to inhibit the free speech of people who may be in opposition to you, but they have a right to express themselves. this is an act of authoritarianism and demagoguery which defines who donald trump is and his total disregard for the first amendment as we have seen when he calls the press the enemies of the people. now the national security and intelligence bureaucracy that has served the nation well through the last 20, 25 years is also being called, in essence, an enemy of the people by a president whose actions are inimical to the interests of the people of this country. and that s really what all this is about, and this is noise to distract from his own inimical
brilliant move it is to attack the press as the enemy of the people. instead of having the spotlight on trump and his alleged misdeeds, on his daily misdeeds against this country, it turns against the press, the press as generals would have said or the enemy of people. enemy of the people is a loaded term. it does go back to roman times. but there the modern era the first person i can find who really used it is robespierre in the french revolution. a student of russian affairs, it s the enemy of item t people in russia. under stalin during the purges, if you were called an enemy of the people, it was a death sentence. and given all of trump s other ties, to russia and things russian and people associated with russia, it hardly seemed a coincidence that he calls our press the enemy of the people. and anderson, our press is not
instead of having the spotlight on trump and his alleged misdeeds, on his daily misdeeds against this country, it turns against the press, the press as the enemy of the people. enemy of the people is a loaded term. it does go back to roman times. but in the modern era, the first person i can find who really used it is robespierre in the french revolution. as a student of russian affairs, it s the enemy of the people in russia. under stalin during the purges, if you were called an enemy of the people, it was a death sentence. and given all of trump s other ties, to russia and things russian and people associated with russia, it hardly seemed a coincidence that he calls our press the enemy of the people. and anderson, our press is not above criticism. sure. it s made of human beings. human beings are flawed. i have when i thought the press deserved it, i have