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Even the sports pages can be a platform for anti-Trump editorializing. After the Washington Commanders were drubbed by the Detroit Lions, the front page of The Washington Post sports section carried a piece by columnist Barry Svrluga trashing Trump's appearance at the game, and in the Fox broadcast booth. He called it "sportswashing."

"What played out Sunday was a microcosm of Trump's presidency and his relationship with American sport. It's sportswashing, using these games to distract from the important matters of our times," he wrote. There was "something rich about Trump sitting and smiling in the box of Commanders owner Josh Harris and his partners ... while the District and so many of its citizens struggled with the shutdown."

This Democrat rag can't acknowledge that the shutdown was created and dragged out by recalcitrant Democrats. They aren't factored into the plight of those struggling D.C. denizens. Who was holding out, keeping them from getting their food stamps and paychecks?

Svrluga was angry that people had forgotten how Trump was on the wrong side of the culture war in 2020 when NFL players knelt in protest during the National Anthem against "social injustices" like police brutality. Liberals still can't imagine that many NFL fans didn't appreciate what felt like a double-middle-finger salute to the flag, or that many didn't like quarterback Colin Kaepernick wearing pig socks to mock the cops.

Riots and murders after George Floyd's death in police custody were blended into a "reckoning" by Svrluga: "Five years after the country endured what was framed in the moment as a racial reckoning -- in which police practices were questioned, scrutinized and in some cases overhauled -- the city that the Commanders represent is being monitored by National Guard soldiers, the American military overseeing American citizens at Trump's behest."

Somehow, this columnist can't abide the president noticing that the nation's capital has long had a violent-crime problem. This passage makes it sound like the National Guard troops are a shameful menace.

He wasn't alone. Michael Rosenberg at Sports Illustrated proclaimed, "Trump can't quit the NFL, but the NFL has quit him." Really? "Yes, most owners will still support him, as most billionaires do. But the NFL itself is providing a blueprint for how to tussle with the President: Don't."

Rosenberg gushed over how NFL commissioner Roger Goodell did not dismiss his chief diversity officer Jonathan Beane. The "Rooney Rule" requiring teams to interview minority candidates for coaching positions remains in place. "A lot of corporate behemoths bent on this issue to please Trump. The NFL has not."

He was also delighted by the NFL hiring Spanish-language rapper Bad Bunny for the Super Bowl halftime show, even though the salacious hip-hopper avoided scheduling any concerts in America, claiming he was worried ICE would raid his concerts. Rosenberg lauded Goodell: "There is no way Bad Bunny's ICE raid comments slipped past him. Whether the contract was already signed or not, Goodell went ahead and made the halftime announcement, and he has stuck by it."

Rosenberg claimed Trump has "failed" all year to insert himself into the NFL conversation, until he attended the Commanders game. Trump has visited a pile of recent sporting events, including the Yankees game on Sept. 11, the U.S. Open men's final, and the Ryder Cup golf competition.

Surely, this round might please sports fans, showing Trump enjoys what they enjoy. If a Democrat attended all these things, Svrluga and Rosenberg would probably adore it as deftly displaying a common touch. It wouldn't be "sportswashing" bad news. Everything magically ends up as good news in the Preferred Party.

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Tim Graham is director of media analysis at the Media Research Center and executive editor of the blog NewsBusters.org. To find out more about Tim Graham and read features by other Creators Syndicate writers and cartoonists, visit the Creators Syndicate website at www.creators.com.

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