When CBS’ Norah O’Donnell gave a shout-out to the newly elected all-female city council in St. Paul, Minn., the Media Research Center’s Jorge Bonilla had a massive meltdown about it in a Jan. 9 post, with the word “AWFUL” in the headline:
The “AWFUL” in the title is not an indictment in se of CBS Evening News anchor Norah O’Donnell’s jubilant report on St. Paul, Minnesota’s new, diverse, all-female city council, but an acronym: Affluent, White, Female, University-educated, and Liberal; the type that would reflexively cheer this story. And in O’Donnell’s case, foist it upon others by selecting it to close out the evening newscast.
Here’s the report in its entirety, as aired on CBS Evening News on Tuesday, January 9th, 2024:
NORAH O’DONNELL: Finally, tonight, I think you’ll like this story. History was made in Minnesota’s capital city of St. Paul today. Or should we say, HER-story was made. St. Paul’s new city council was sworn in this afternoon, made up entirely of women. And get this: six of the seven council members are women of color, and they are all under the age of 40. Four of them are new members, and say that affordable housing and access to child care are some of their top priorities. Congratulations to them and the people of St. Paul. I am bettin’ that they get some stuff done.
The problem with this report, obviously, is that it reduces these elected officials to skin color and genitalia (unless O’Donnell’s trying to slip a “trans woman” by us, which would be a whole other story). O’Donnell doesn’t get into the substance of these women beyond their aforementioned immutability.
And when you look past identity and go to substance, OF COURSE this is a far-left city council. A quick review of each of the candidates’ campaign websites reveals their leftist inclinations and intentions upon taking office.
After noting that the women have advocated for things like affordable housing, tax equity and police reform, Bonilla huffed:
St. Paul’s City Council isn’t just diverse and all-female, but wildly woke. This is the substance that O’Donnell left out in her excitement about this “her-storic” event.
But O’Donnell is right about one thing. They’ll get some stuff done, all right. Commie stuff, though, which probably won’t make it into the next report on this city council.
The woke mind virus has truly corrupted our institutions.
Bonilla failed to explain how advocating affordable housing and tax equity are “commie stuff” that resulits from a “woke mind virus” (whatever that is).
That wasn’t even the only attack on Minnesota by the MRC that day — or that hour. Seventeen minutes later, Clay Waters raged that Minnesota raged that the state’s flag was redesigned, dismissing it as a “fringe issue”:
Taxpayer-funded PBS once again pushed a fringe issue into the forefront of the news. This time it was a purely symbolic one. Saturday’s PBS News Weekend, devoted a full five minutes to Minnesota’s move to replace its state flag, staggeringly described by PBS as “what one critic called a cluttered, genocidal mess,” with a less offensive, abstract design.
Well, that escalated quickly.
The online headline captured the politically correct motivation but without going crazy with “genocidal” rhetoric: “How Minnesota redesigned its state flag to remove insensitive imagery.”
Host John Yang first noted the original flag’s “culturally insensitive imagery” in the show’s introduction before going even further.
[…]The irony here, similar to that of the ridiculous kerfuffle over removing the American Indian from the Land O’Lakes butter packaging, was apparently lost on the liberal producers at PBS. Instead of an Indian riding on a horse, Minnesota now honors American Indians by eliminating all traces of them from the flag.
Waters went on to huff that “Rogin allowed a few Minnesotans to sound unimpressed with the new design, but there was no dissent from the whole woke ‘genocidal’ argument.” But Waters himself made no attempt to offer any dissent, even though he’s the one making a big deal about it.