THIS IS CNN: Jeff Zucker, inventor of centrist panic-porn.

It would be simplistic to say that Zucker turned CNN into a centre-Left version of Fox News. What made Zucker a visionary is that he saw the potential for a centrist-branded panic industry and knew how to repurpose a legacy outlet in order to dominate this unexploited market. Before Zucker, aversion to Fox-style anger porn was a core aspect of American centre-Left identity. Consumers of legacy media insisted they weren’t as vulgar and emotional as those people. Zucker knew they were lying to themselves.

Centrists were no less angry and no less vulnerable to television-induced radicalisation — which is addictive and perhaps even sickly enjoyable for the radicalised — than any other group of people. Zucker’s coverage choices reflected this dark but in retrospect very obvious psychological insight, namely that those who prided themselves on their membership in polite society were every bit as titillated by panic and outrage as the yokels and Trumpists they increasingly despised.

Where do Zucker’s cast of characters go from here? Critics wondering why Brian Stelter still has a job after Zucker scandal. “‘Honor his legacy?’ What legacy is that? Zucker promoted his mistress, turned his network into a propaganda channel for a corrupt governor, and sunk CNN’s ratings into the dirt. By the end of Zucker’s reign, he only had one show in the top 25 — and that was Chris Cuomo’s. That’s one hell of a legacy from Zucker, and the fact that his network and its chief media critic keeps wanting to paint him as some kind of sympathetic hero speaks volumes about credibility throughout the organization.”