Journalists, love them or hate them, are bound by the responsibility of reporting the news from the outside. They are tasked with asking questions, even if answering them exposes the announcement’s weaknesses. Especially if asking questions exposes the holes. They are bound by ethics and meant to report news without inserting themselves into it. They should question things rather than only cheering. Social media pundits aren’t bound by those responsibilities, oftentimes driven by analytics alone. Popularity in print ought to come from telling the damn story, telling it well, and telling it fairly and in its entirety. Likes and shares should follow good work and the opportunity to do more work is earned by previous proof of professionalism and ability.

The president’s love of the tweet has long been a source of contention, but his bizarre announcements about the cattle industry are out of line. His meddling in the cattle markets is inappropriate, and his habit of surrounding himself with cattlemen with a social media following is nothing short of frustrating. Some of the cattlemen at the capital are my friends and I know them in real life, and they are distilling their experiences at the White House speaking about the cattle market to their audiences and some are doing it well. They are not advisers and they are not speaking for the entire industry. Popularity and expertise aren’t always the same thing.

Attempts to restructure the entire meatpacking and processing structure via a social post is asinine. The Big Four packers are the ones left standing because they are the ones with the resources to process meat at a rate high enough to feed the country and some years, like this one, do it at a loss of millions of dollars per day, per plant. There is a place for small and midsize packers, but they alone can’t replace the big guys. Love them or hate them, the cattle business needs them and bastardizing one link on the food supply chain weakens the entire chain.

The Wall Street Journal reported that Joesley Batista, one of the billionaires in control of Brazilian-owned meat-packing behemoth JBS, met with Trump about lowering tariffs and importing beef just days before Trump announced that he would allow 300,000 metric tons of tariff-free imported beef trim to lower prices for consumers. This should have raised more hackles than it apparently did. Manipulating supply weakens the industry’s footing, especially when the leader of the free world tosses it out there after visiting with the Batistas. The brothers are known for corruption allegations, bribing Brazilian officials and have served time in prison, so the announcement following their chit chat at the White House should be eyed with great suspicion.

The president can tweet all he wants about rebuilding the U.S. cattle herd, but the limiting factor right now is grass. Pasture conditions across cattle country are miserable and producers are hanging on to every cow they can, but without grass and hay and silage (not to mention all while burning $6 red diesel) the herd cannot grow.

Mandatory Country of Origin Labeling has been a longtime debate among cattle producers. The USDA has put into place a voluntary labeling program that may add value to the beef sold into that program. The majority of the beef that would have to be labeled as a product of a different

country isn’t what is wrapped neatly in a package in the meat case and is seen only by the guy throwing it on the flat top in the back of the restaurant. They can’t all be rib eyes, man. If a cattle producer is calling into question the safety of the U.S. food supply so they can peddle a few pounds of direct-to-consumer beef, they are subpar producers. The U.S. beef supply is safe, abundant and affordable as it can be. Frightening consumers to sell a few pounds of burger with some AI-produced flyer on The Facebook should be grounds for a punch in the nose.

The current beef prices, low herd inventory and high consumer demand is what they teach on day one of Economics class. It’s not something to be remedied with a series of ping pong match-type announcements. Cattle producers, feeders and packers are making decisions based on the market and patterns and trying to anticipate the future market behavior as they make decisions with the calves they just weaned and the cows they just preg checked. The cattle business is a long game and quickie solutions volleyed into the social media vacuum unnecessarily complicate an already difficult business. And they really ruin a Friday for a journalist who goes to print that day.

Choose data and experts over tweets and selfies and choose beef whenever you can.

Rachel Gabel writes about agriculture and rural issues. She is assistant editor of The Fence Post Magazine, the region’s preeminent agriculture publication.