Yellow Gold Man Journalism
The Paul Truesdell Podcast
Principal Storyteller and Analyst:
Paul Grant Truesdell, J.D., AIF, CLU, ChFC, RFC
Founder & CEO of The Truesdell Companies
The Truesdell Professional Building
200 NW 52nd Avenue
Ocala, Florida 34482
352-612-1000 - Local
212-433-2525 - New York
Truesdell Wealth, Inc.
https://truesdellwealth.com
The Truesdell Companies
https://truesdell.net
The Truesdell Companies was a proud sponsor of the Eirinn Abu benefit concert for Tunnel to Towers, on February 28th at the Circle Square arena in Ocala, Florida. For more information, visit: https://eirinnabu.com or https://eirinnabu.com/event/5760795/695871447/eirinn-abu-and-tunnel-to-towers-foundation-concert
Events
The Ultimate Christmas Gift
The Story Your Family Will Cherish Forever
Casual Conversations
Friday, June 13 – 6:30 pm
Reservations Required - Call or Text: 352-612-1000
Creative Estate Distribution
Beyond Essential Estate Planning Documents
Casual Conversations
Friday, June 27 – 6:30 pm
Reservations Required - Call or Text: 352-612-1000
No Cost or Obligation – Reservations - Seating Limited - Desserts with Coffee, Tea, - Beer, Wine, - Soft Drinks, or Mocktails.
Disclaimer
You are listening to the Paul Truesdell Podcast, sponsored by Truesdell Wealth and the other Truesdell Companies. Note. Due to our extensive holdings and our clients, always assume that we have a position in all companies discussed and that a conflict of interest exists. The information presented is provided for entertainment and informational purposes only. Truesdell Wealth is a Registered Investment Advisor.
Rough Outline
The Drudge Report Meets Adam Goldman: When Yellow Journalism Goes Full Circle
How a sarcastic FEMA joke exposed the intellectual bankruptcy of modern media and the death of common sense in American journalism
When obvious sarcasm becomes front-page news: A tale of two yellow journalism traditions and the readers too dim to tell the difference
From Hearst and Pulitzer to headlines and hot takes: Why America's media can't recognize wit when it slaps them in the face
The day American journalism proved Oscar Wilde right about sarcasm being the highest form of intelligence—by completely missing the point
Yellow journalism emerged in the 1890s when William Randolph Hearst and Joseph Pulitzer waged circulation wars through sensationalized headlines, unverified claims, and manufactured outrage. Their scare tactics and emotional manipulation helped push America into the Spanish-American War by turning a tragic accident—the USS Maine explosion—into a conspiracy requiring military intervention. The defining characteristics of this journalistic disease remain unchanged: sensational headlines designed to grab attention rather than inform, reliance on anonymous sources with obvious agendas, partisan framing that transforms routine events into constitutional crises, and the deliberate manipulation of public emotion over facts.
Fast-forward to 2025, and we witness this same yellow journalism playbook being executed with surgical precision across the modern media landscape. The Drudge Report's latest headline screams "FEMA FAIL NEW CHIEF UNAWARE OF 'HURRICANE SEASON'" while Adam Goldman's New York Times piece breathlessly reports FBI "upheaval" and "fear and uncertainty." Both stories follow the identical template their predecessors used to sell papers and start wars.
But here's where things get deliciously ironic—and where the intellectual gulf between high and low-brow journalism becomes a chasm worthy of ridicule.
Let's examine the FEMA story with the kind of analytical precision that apparently escapes both Drudge readers and Reuters reporters. FEMA Director David Richardson, during what sources describe as a daily briefing, allegedly said he "had not been aware the country has a hurricane season." The Reuters story immediately notes that "it was not clear to staff whether he meant it literally, as a joke, or in some other context."
Anyone with functioning brain cells and a basic understanding of human communication would recognize this as obvious sarcasm. Picture the scene: You're the new director of a disaster agency, sitting in a room full of bureaucrats who've spent decades perfecting the art of bureaucratic resistance. Some perpetual pain-in-the-posterior asks, "Mr. Director, do you think FEMA is ready for hurricane season?"—the kind of loaded, gotcha question designed to create problems where none exist.
The intelligent response? A sarcastic deflection: "Oh, there's a hurricane season? I had no idea we needed to be aware of such things."
As Oscar Wilde observed, "Sarcasm is the lowest form of wit, but the highest form of intelligence." The brilliance of sarcasm lies in its demand for cognitive sophistication from both speaker and audience. Research from Haifa University demonstrates that understanding sarcasm requires multiple brain processes—language areas interpret literal meaning while frontal lobes and the right brain understand social and emotional context. In essence, sarcasm serves as an instant IQ test.
And boy, did a lot of people fail spectacularly.
George Carlin, that master of intellectual comedy and surgical social commentary, understood this dynamic perfectly. Carlin had the verbal skill to make audiences laugh while dropping insightful messages, earning him the title "Master of Sociological Comedy" for his ability to point out hypocrisies. His humor appealed to those capable of grasping multiple layers of meaning simultaneously—the kind of audience that would immediately recognize Richardson's comment as obvious sarcasm rather than literal ignorance.
But here's the tragedy of our current media ecosystem: it's dominated by people who would be confused at a George Carlin performance and accept headlines from The Onion as gospel truth. The Drudge Report appeals to what we might charitably call the "headline-only reading demographic"—people who consume information in meme-sized chunks and mistake boldface type for journalism. These are the same intellectual giants who forward chain emails and believe everything they see on social media.
Meanwhile, Adam Goldman's supposedly sophisticated New York Times analysis suffers from the opposite problem—it takes itself so seriously that it misses the forest for the trees. Goldman transforms routine administrative changes into evidence of institutional collapse, treating every personnel decision as a potential constitutional crisis. His reporting style represents yellow journalism for the NPR crowd—longer sentences, more anonymous sources, but the same fundamental dishonesty dressed up in prestige journalism clothing.
The beautiful irony is that Richardson's sarcastic response—if that's indeed what it was—demonstrates exactly the kind of intellectual agility we should want in leadership positions. He deflected a loaded question with humor while simultaneously exposing the absurdity of the inquiry itself. In a sane world, this would be evidence of quick thinking and communication skills.
Instead, we get pearl-clutching from Democrats like Chuck Schumer, who apparently lacks the cognitive bandwidth to recognize sarcasm when he encounters it. Representative Bennie Thompson's response—"If you don't know what or when hurricane season is, you're not qualified to run FEMA"—perfectly illustrates the intellectual bankruptcy of taking obvious sarcasm at face value.
This is where The Onion's approach becomes instructive. America's finest news source succeeds precisely because it exaggerates truth to the point of absurdity, forcing readers to engage their critical thinking faculties. Headlines like "Local Man Passionate Defender Of What He Imagines Constitution To Say" work because they require intellectual engagement to appreciate the underlying commentary.
The problem with both Drudge-style sensationalism and Goldman-style institutional stenography is that they treat their audiences like imbeciles incapable of nuanced thinking. Drudge feeds his readers a steady diet of outrage porn designed to confirm their existing biases, while Goldman provides his audience with sophisticated-sounding justifications for institutional resistance to democratic oversight.
Neither approach serves the cause of actual journalism, which should involve helping citizens understand complex issues rather than manipulating their emotions for clicks or partisan advantage.
The FEMA story perfectly encapsulates this intellectual divide. Those capable of recognizing sarcasm—the Carlin crowd, if you will—see an obviously sarcastic response to a loaded question. Those operating at the Drudge demographic level take the comment literally and manufacture outrage. The Goldman crowd treats it as evidence of broader institutional dysfunction requiring their expert interpretation.
Lost in all this manufactured controversy is any serious discussion of FEMA's actual preparedness, the agency's real reforms, or the legitimate questions about disaster response capabilities. Instead, we get a perfect storm of yellow journalism: sensational headlines designed to grab attention, anonymous sources with obvious agendas, and deliberate misinterpretation of obvious sarcasm to create controversy where none should exist.
Perhaps most frustrating is the complete absence of intellectual humility from any of the players involved. The reporters who missed obvious sarcasm won't acknowledge their error. The politicians capitalizing on the manufactured controversy won't admit they're being deliberately obtuse. And the readers consuming this garbage won't question whether they might be missing something.
This is yellow journalism for the digital age—faster, more pervasive, and somehow even less intellectually honest than its print predecessors. At least Hearst and Pulitzer were honest about their goal of selling newspapers. Today's practitioners hide behind claims of serving democracy while producing content that actively makes citizens less informed and more polarized.
The tragedy isn't that sarcasm exists in government—it's that we've created a media ecosystem so intellectually impoverished that obvious humor becomes front-page news. We've dumbed down public discourse to the point where wit becomes controversy and quick thinking becomes evidence of incompetence.
George Carlin would have had a field day with this story. He understood that "there's a humorous side to every situation—the challenge is to find it." The humor here isn't in Richardson's comment—it's in watching an entire media ecosystem demonstrate its complete inability to recognize obvious sarcasm when it smacks them in the face.
Welcome to American journalism in 2025, where yellow journalism has devolved so far that it can't even recognize yellow journalism when it's staring at it in the mirror.
Principal Storyteller and Analyst:
Paul Grant Truesdell, J.D., AIF, CLU, ChFC, RFC
Founder & CEO of The Truesdell Companies
The Truesdell Professional Building
200 NW 52nd Avenue
Ocala, Florida 34482
352-612-1000 - Local
212-433-2525 - New York
Truesdell Wealth, Inc.
https://truesdellwealth.com
The Truesdell Companies
https://truesdell.net
The Truesdell Companies was a proud sponsor of the Eirinn Abu benefit concert for Tunnel to Towers, on February 28th at the Circle Square arena in Ocala, Florida. For more information, visit: https://eirinnabu.com or https://eirinnabu.com/event/5760795/695871447/eirinn-abu-and-tunnel-to-towers-foundation-concert
Events
The Ultimate Christmas Gift
The Story Your Family Will Cherish Forever
Casual Conversations
Friday, June 13 – 6:30 pm
Reservations Required - Call or Text: 352-612-1000
Creative Estate Distribution
Beyond Essential Estate Planning Documents
Casual Conversations
Friday, June 27 – 6:30 pm
Reservations Required - Call or Text: 352-612-1000
No Cost or Obligation – Reservations - Seating Limited - Desserts with Coffee, Tea, - Beer, Wine, - Soft Drinks, or Mocktails.
Disclaimer
You are listening to the Paul Truesdell Podcast, sponsored by Truesdell Wealth and the other Truesdell Companies. Note. Due to our extensive holdings and our clients, always assume that we have a position in all companies discussed and that a conflict of interest exists. The information presented is provided for entertainment and informational purposes only. Truesdell Wealth is a Registered Investment Advisor.
Rough Outline
The Drudge Report Meets Adam Goldman: When Yellow Journalism Goes Full Circle
How a sarcastic FEMA joke exposed the intellectual bankruptcy of modern media and the death of common sense in American journalism
When obvious sarcasm becomes front-page news: A tale of two yellow journalism traditions and the readers too dim to tell the difference
From Hearst and Pulitzer to headlines and hot takes: Why America's media can't recognize wit when it slaps them in the face
The day American journalism proved Oscar Wilde right about sarcasm being the highest form of intelligence—by completely missing the point
Yellow journalism emerged in the 1890s when William Randolph Hearst and Joseph Pulitzer waged circulation wars through sensationalized headlines, unverified claims, and manufactured outrage. Their scare tactics and emotional manipulation helped push America into the Spanish-American War by turning a tragic accident—the USS Maine explosion—into a conspiracy requiring military intervention. The defining characteristics of this journalistic disease remain unchanged: sensational headlines designed to grab attention rather than inform, reliance on anonymous sources with obvious agendas, partisan framing that transforms routine events into constitutional crises, and the deliberate manipulation of public emotion over facts.
Fast-forward to 2025, and we witness this same yellow journalism playbook being executed with surgical precision across the modern media landscape. The Drudge Report's latest headline screams "FEMA FAIL NEW CHIEF UNAWARE OF 'HURRICANE SEASON'" while Adam Goldman's New York Times piece breathlessly reports FBI "upheaval" and "fear and uncertainty." Both stories follow the identical template their predecessors used to sell papers and start wars.
But here's where things get deliciously ironic—and where the intellectual gulf between high and low-brow journalism becomes a chasm worthy of ridicule.
Let's examine the FEMA story with the kind of analytical precision that apparently escapes both Drudge readers and Reuters reporters. FEMA Director David Richardson, during what sources describe as a daily briefing, allegedly said he "had not been aware the country has a hurricane season." The Reuters story immediately notes that "it was not clear to staff whether he meant it literally, as a joke, or in some other context."
Anyone with functioning brain cells and a basic understanding of human communication would recognize this as obvious sarcasm. Picture the scene: You're the new director of a disaster agency, sitting in a room full of bureaucrats who've spent decades perfecting the art of bureaucratic resistance. Some perpetual pain-in-the-posterior asks, "Mr. Director, do you think FEMA is ready for hurricane season?"—the kind of loaded, gotcha question designed to create problems where none exist.
The intelligent response? A sarcastic deflection: "Oh, there's a hurricane season? I had no idea we needed to be aware of such things."
As Oscar Wilde observed, "Sarcasm is the lowest form of wit, but the highest form of intelligence." The brilliance of sarcasm lies in its demand for cognitive sophistication from both speaker and audience. Research from Haifa University demonstrates that understanding sarcasm requires multiple brain processes—language areas interpret literal meaning while frontal lobes and the right brain understand social and emotional context. In essence, sarcasm serves as an instant IQ test.
And boy, did a lot of people fail spectacularly.
George Carlin, that master of intellectual comedy and surgical social commentary, understood this dynamic perfectly. Carlin had the verbal skill to make audiences laugh while dropping insightful messages, earning him the title "Master of Sociological Comedy" for his ability to point out hypocrisies. His humor appealed to those capable of grasping multiple layers of meaning simultaneously—the kind of audience that would immediately recognize Richardson's comment as obvious sarcasm rather than literal ignorance.
But here's the tragedy of our current media ecosystem: it's dominated by people who would be confused at a George Carlin performance and accept headlines from The Onion as gospel truth. The Drudge Report appeals to what we might charitably call the "headline-only reading demographic"—people who consume information in meme-sized chunks and mistake boldface type for journalism. These are the same intellectual giants who forward chain emails and believe everything they see on social media.
Meanwhile, Adam Goldman's supposedly sophisticated New York Times analysis suffers from the opposite problem—it takes itself so seriously that it misses the forest for the trees. Goldman transforms routine administrative changes into evidence of institutional collapse, treating every personnel decision as a potential constitutional crisis. His reporting style represents yellow journalism for the NPR crowd—longer sentences, more anonymous sources, but the same fundamental dishonesty dressed up in prestige journalism clothing.
The beautiful irony is that Richardson's sarcastic response—if that's indeed what it was—demonstrates exactly the kind of intellectual agility we should want in leadership positions. He deflected a loaded question with humor while simultaneously exposing the absurdity of the inquiry itself. In a sane world, this would be evidence of quick thinking and communication skills.
Instead, we get pearl-clutching from Democrats like Chuck Schumer, who apparently lacks the cognitive bandwidth to recognize sarcasm when he encounters it. Representative Bennie Thompson's response—"If you don't know what or when hurricane season is, you're not qualified to run FEMA"—perfectly illustrates the intellectual bankruptcy of taking obvious sarcasm at face value.
This is where The Onion's approach becomes instructive. America's finest news source succeeds precisely because it exaggerates truth to the point of absurdity, forcing readers to engage their critical thinking faculties. Headlines like "Local Man Passionate Defender Of What He Imagines Constitution To Say" work because they require intellectual engagement to appreciate the underlying commentary.
The problem with both Drudge-style sensationalism and Goldman-style institutional stenography is that they treat their audiences like imbeciles incapable of nuanced thinking. Drudge feeds his readers a steady diet of outrage porn designed to confirm their existing biases, while Goldman provides his audience with sophisticated-sounding justifications for institutional resistance to democratic oversight.
Neither approach serves the cause of actual journalism, which should involve helping citizens understand complex issues rather than manipulating their emotions for clicks or partisan advantage.
The FEMA story perfectly encapsulates this intellectual divide. Those capable of recognizing sarcasm—the Carlin crowd, if you will—see an obviously sarcastic response to a loaded question. Those operating at the Drudge demographic level take the comment literally and manufacture outrage. The Goldman crowd treats it as evidence of broader institutional dysfunction requiring their expert interpretation.
Lost in all this manufactured controversy is any serious discussion of FEMA's actual preparedness, the agency's real reforms, or the legitimate questions about disaster response capabilities. Instead, we get a perfect storm of yellow journalism: sensational headlines designed to grab attention, anonymous sources with obvious agendas, and deliberate misinterpretation of obvious sarcasm to create controversy where none should exist.
Perhaps most frustrating is the complete absence of intellectual humility from any of the players involved. The reporters who missed obvious sarcasm won't acknowledge their error. The politicians capitalizing on the manufactured controversy won't admit they're being deliberately obtuse. And the readers consuming this garbage won't question whether they might be missing something.
This is yellow journalism for the digital age—faster, more pervasive, and somehow even less intellectually honest than its print predecessors. At least Hearst and Pulitzer were honest about their goal of selling newspapers. Today's practitioners hide behind claims of serving democracy while producing content that actively makes citizens less informed and more polarized.
The tragedy isn't that sarcasm exists in government—it's that we've created a media ecosystem so intellectually impoverished that obvious humor becomes front-page news. We've dumbed down public discourse to the point where wit becomes controversy and quick thinking becomes evidence of incompetence.
George Carlin would have had a field day with this story. He understood that "there's a humorous side to every situation—the challenge is to find it." The humor here isn't in Richardson's comment—it's in watching an entire media ecosystem demonstrate its complete inability to recognize obvious sarcasm when it smacks them in the face.
Welcome to American journalism in 2025, where yellow journalism has devolved so far that it can't even recognize yellow journalism when it's staring at it in the mirror.