The further to the left or the right you move, the more your lens on life distorts.

Saturday, November 28, 2020

Goodbye to a "Golden Age"

In an odd way, a biased, dishonest, corrupt, and incompetent main stream media did achieve their purpose over the past four years. Their coverage of Donald Trump and his administration was so confrontational and chaotic, and so full of outright lies, distortions and omissions, that it was exhausting to many who spent time with the media's output. As a consequence, it might just be that some (maybe a lot) of voters just wanted it all to stop and voted for a cognitively-challenged candidate who the media would fawn over because ... (1) he's a Democrat and (2) he's woke.

The same media clowns that spent four years making a mockery of journalistic ethics are asking, what now? Now that Trump is soon to be gone, exactly what will the trained hamsters "report" or write op-eds about? After all, there can be no scandals in a Democrat administration. Every policy decision will be brilliant and cannot be questioned. Capitulating to our adversaries will be a sign of nuanced brilliance, not craven stupidity. Economic wreckage precipitated by high taxes that hurt the middle class, minorities, and the working poor will be blamed on "capitalism" and "oppression," never on a leftist ideology that specializes in creating economic wreckage.

And of course there's the virus. COVID-19 will be characterized as an unfortunate pandemic that is being conquered by Joe Biden's brave and empathetic plan. And should Joe's plan not work to reduce "cases" (a ridiculous measure, but since it was pushed by the Dems, they now have to live with it) , it'll all be back-referenced to Trump's "incompetence." No one will mention that Joe's plan is identical to Trump's, and few will note that it was Trump, not a single Democrat, whose Operation Warp Speed resulted in a vaccine long before the :"experts" said it could happen.

And through it all, Joe Biden's obvious early stage demensia will be absolutely off-limits. Questions from the Dems' trained hamsters in the media  will be so gentle they'll be laughable. Nothing even remotely challenging will be asked. And no one will even mention Burisma or the odd anomalies that occurred on election day.

T. Becket Adams comments on the end of what Vanity Fair (without irony) called "the Golden Age of Journalism." In what will be a 180 like no other 180, the trained hamsters of "the golden age" will no longer be the combative "heroes' only they think they are. Instead, they'll become saccharine pussy cats who will fawn over Joe Biden as he brings us back "from the brink." So along with Adams, let's say:

... goodbye, then, to journalists elevating as worthy of public notice obvious liars and lunatics, including convicted felon Michael Avenatti … and conspiracy theorist Louise Mensch — all because they oppose the administration.

Goodbye to weekly “bombshells” that land with a “splat!” instead of a “boom!”

Goodbye to near-daily input from presidential historians turned political assassins …

Goodbye to White House correspondents pretending as if they are reporting from an active war zone or claiming they feel safer covering authoritarian regimes.

Goodbye to the Holocaust being invoked against the administration on a near-daily basis.

Goodbye to members of the press cheering America's enemies who may have insulted or upstaged a White House official.

Goodbye to the steady flow of news stories covering how reporters feel about covering the presidency.

Goodbye to members of the press pretending as if failed GOP “strategists” have a genuine concern for the future of the country and not just the health of their bank accounts.

Goodbye to news cycles based entirely on unverified gossip from disgruntled former administration staffers.

Goodbye to the seemingly endless stream of palace intrigue stories featuring people no one knows doing things no one remembers.

Goodbye to White House correspondents being celebrated exclusively for their histrionics and activism and not because they serve the public interest. Goodbye also to the pure theatrics of White House press briefings …

Goodbye to journalists pretending as if their lives are in danger because someone in the administration criticized them …

Goodbye to news cycles based entirely on the say-so of anonymous sources, especially those “familiar with the president’s thinking.”

Goodbye to industry-wide meltdowns over innocuous and harmless events, including the renovation of the White House Rose Garden.

Goodbye to wise-ass on-air news headlines, as they have given way already to saccharine and heroic descriptions of the president-elect:

Goodbye to true statements by White House officials being flunked as “false” or “mostly false” because of some tiny technicality cited by fact-checkers. We say goodbye also to fact-checkers being treated as celebrities and heroes.

Goodbye to stories about how the president is "raging,” “unraveling,” and “fuming." We say goodbye to reports about how the president is “isolated” and articles about how it is the “end” for the president.

Goodbye also to news cycles suggesting (or stating outright) that the president is mentally deranged.

Goodbye, but not farewell, because there is high probability that Biden and his emerging Team of 2s will capitulate to the hard-left demands of the new Democratic Party—and face plant on both domestic and foreign policy issues. That just might lead to a GOP election rout in the House and Senate in 2022 and (if protections against "voting irregularities" can be instituted over the next four years) another GOP president who will be the catalyst for yet another "Golden Age" of journalism.