It’s been four days since former President Donald Trump vowed to make American streets flow with blood if he is not elected in November. The media has moved on to provide other valuable information to a grateful public.

And if you believe that…

The #bloodbath farce is the latest media-driven hysteria that only serves to confirm for Trump and his supporters that the establishment media are “enemies of the people” who cannot be trusted to honestly report the time of day. It’s hard to argue with them when it comes to news about the Donald. 

Less partisan or politically interested observers wistfully yearn for the “good old days” when journalists simply reported the facts of the stories they covered, regardless of their political biases, without slant or distortion. But like most memories of the 20th century, the hard-nosed, objective, just-the-facts-ma’am journalist reporting the news without prejudice or bias is a myth. Journalists were never unbiased and have distorted the news, by slant, omission, or pure fabrication, for all of American history.

The idea of the unbiased, apolitical journalist is largely a product of the Progressive Era, as are the myths of the apolitical bureaucrat, the apolitical government scientist, the apolitical government schoolteacher, etc.

These myths were central to the progressive movement because its primary goal was to replace the free decisions of individuals with the coerced decisions of government “experts.” It was essential that people believed these decisions were made purely on their technical merits and “benefit to society” and were not, in part or in whole, made for political reasons.

Nowhere was belief in this myth more important than in journalism, the conduit through which flowed the information upon which people would base their support or resistance. That’s why journalists are constantly glorified by the establishment, including by other journalists. Throughout the 20th century, they were lionized in books and films. But who were they really and did any truly “speak truth to power” in service of the public?

The early Progressive Era featured “muckrakers” such as Upton Sinclair and Ida Tarbell. The mid-20th century brought us Edward R. Murrow and the irreproachable Walter Cronkite. The later 20th century gave us Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein.

Supposedly, these are all heroes whose courage and relentless pursuit of the truth informed the public and checked the powerful. So says the myth. Reality begs to differ.

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Tom Mullen is the author of It’s the Fed, Stupidand Where Do Conservatives and Liberals Come From? And What Ever Happened to Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness?