Comey Firing Provides Bright Dividing Line for Media Coverage

The nation’s political divide has been on full display in the news media in the hours since FBI Director James Comey’s abrupt ejection from his post May 9 — and the lines are brighter than ever.

On CNN, the legal journalist Jeffrey Toobin was in full-on meltdown mode, denouncing President Trump’s firing as “a grotesque abuse of power” and “the kind of thing that goes on in non-democracies.” Over on Fox News, the mood was more sanguine — even celebratory. “This was overdue, and everyone in Washington knows that,” Tucker Carlson declared at the top of his 8 pm broadcast, before introducing a series of guests who echoed his excitement.By May 10, the left-leaning HuffPost featured a one-word, all-capital headline: “Nixonian.” The right-leaning Breitbart News approvingly declared President Trump’s move “the latest in a political outsider’s crusade against entrenched Washington.”