The New York Times is running a story that shows President Donald Trump lost nearly a billion dollars in failed businesses over the course of a decade. As expected, many in the media are out in force, noting that it is more proof that Trump is a con man and a liar.

The stories of Trump’s failed businesses are stories that were run at many right-leaning outlets back in 2016 – including here at RedState – and would not be new to the media if they had covered Trump honestly back then.

It is funny, truly funny, to see many of the same people who gave Trump enormous coverage in the primaries and paved the way for his nomination call him a con man acting like a wealthy mogul in order to increase his own popularity and social value. Essentially, they are outing themselves as the people who fell for his con in the primaries.

Anyone who paid attention in 2016 knew the stories of Trump’s failures in the business world. They already knew about the string of failed experiments Trump attached his name to. The media had access to these stories, but instead gave countless hours of TV coverage, inches of print coverage, and thousands upon thousands of tweets about his crowd sizes, his audiences, his message, and everything else about his campaign. They gave him millions in unpaid advertising in their news programs, papers, magazines, and websites, and they now have the audacity to point out that Trump is a “con man” who has failed at every business venture he’s attempted.

You know what he hasn’t failed at? He hasn’t failed at conning the media into giving him free airtime. He hasn’t failed at making them oppose him so vigorously that his conflicting messaging, questionable statements, and outright lies don’t penetrate to the American public. He gets them to constantly lose their minds over every little thing even remotely related to his presidency so that all people see are crazed media figures lashing out.

Despite all their negative coverage, Trump’s favorability isn’t tanking. It’s low, but it’s steady, and even showing signs of increasing. The economy is doing much better because of his regulatory rollback, and jobs are being created at a much faster rate than the Obama Administration could have ever dreamed of inspiring. Americans saw smaller tax bills (or bigger tax returns) in April and instantly knew what happened.

That isn’t a con. That isn’t a lie. That is what the public sees. For all Trump’s faults, his administration is actually doing a lot of things right. The insane coverage and the speculation over what Trump might or might not do/cause to happen don’t make a difference compared to the results.

So, while the media is busy outing themselves as “victims” of a “con man” and opposing him every step of the way despite being a large reason as to why he’s in office right now, Trump is going to continue doing what he’s been doing, and they are going to fail to understand why they don’t have any effect on that.