Our nation’s political media is broken, and it doesn’t plan
on fixing itself anytime soon.
Many of us hoped there would be a reckoning after it became
clear the news media had spread Russian propaganda in the form of hacked
e-mails and social media content. Instead, the news media doubled down on the
palace intrigue stories, fueled by the hate clicks of millions of liberals who loathed the former President.
The massive blue wave of 2018 changed little. Neither did
Joe Biden’s win. Nor did the dual Senate wins in Georgia to turn the Senate
blue. The American people were making it very, very clear that they no longer supported
MAGA or its impact on the country. The media, for some reason, ignored them.
The biggest myth in this country is the liberal media bias,
as day after day, the national news cycle is determined by what Republicans
say. For four years, the last guy’s tweets determined what the media would
cover. Early in President Biden’s term, whatever Republicans are fake outraged
about, starting with “unity” and now onto the “mean” tweets of his nominee for
the OMB director, rule the day’s news cycle.
I guarantee you that no one outside of Washington, D.C.
cares about the “mean” tweets of a potential Cabinet member, unless those
tweets are racist or bigoted. The tweets from Neera Tanden were neither. But it
still allowed Republicans to play the fake outrage game – as if anyone could
possibly them seriously after the past four years.
Unfortunately for us, the political media did take them
seriously. The worst of these instincts were on full display earlier this week
when a Washington Post reporter called up a specific “mean” tweet for Sen. Lisa
Murkowski to get her reaction.
As a former newspaper reporter, I was horrified by this lack
of journalistic ethics. While asking for comment is common practice, calling up
an old comment that is specifically being used by the opposing party to fit
your pre-written Republican outrage story is absolutely not.
Still, the worst part of this entire ordeal was the other DC
political reporters jumping in to defend her, most using the excuse that they
had done the same thing with tweets for the past four years.
It was bad journalism then. It is bad journalism now. Bad
journalism is bad for our country.
So, it’s good that Joe Biden is President right now, because
he is not going to play these Page Six gossip games with the media, and neither
are his spokespeople and administration.
That’s bad journalism. There is no news value being provided
to the general public. It’s merely an endless fishing expedition in an empty
lake.
I commend President Biden for staying above the fray. He did
this admirably on the campaign trail when many wanted him to hit back and fight
with the Republican candidate. Biden knew better. His momentary lapses were memorable
– “Will you just shup up man?” – not because they were mean, but because he was
exasperated with the situation. He spoke for an entire country, weary from the constant fighting and chaos.
The news media, though, was addicted to the chaos. People like
Jim Acosta and Katy Tur became household names because they publicly sparred
with the last guy. They all got book deals. Reporters like Ashley Parker openly
discussed “how exciting” the last era was, because she’s an entitled white
woman freed from the burden of worrying about racism or hunger. There was even
one reporter who compared covering the last White House to the “excitement” of
hitting the beaches in Normandy.
Could a group of people be more out of touch with the
general public?
This week, the COVID relief bill is working its way through
the Senate after passing the House last week. The bill, according to polls, has
roughly 75 percent approval from Americans, with an astounding number of
Republicans being on board. You’d think the political media would be focused on
this shocking example of Americans coming together to agree on something during
a time of such great polarization.
Of course, you’d be wrong. The political news media has been
focused almost exclusively on Republicans opposed to the bill, as well as the
white power rally that took place in Orlando known as CPAC.
Thankfully, President Biden says he doesn’t watch a lot of
cable news. I hope it stays that way. What he’s done so far is very popular
with the American public. He’s made it clear internally that all the matters
right now are the economy and COVID.
If only someone would tell our national news media. Instead,
it’s another news cycle of MAGA that no one asked for.
Comments
Post a Comment