The Media Research Center remained concerned (for partisan purposes) with President Biden’s performance at the first debate and its fallout, with a particular obsession over non-right-wing media reaction to it. Curtis Houck went the salacious-gossip route in a July 5 post:
Puck senior partner Dylan Byers had a story out Wednesday night filled with some juicy details on supposed infighting amongst the Biden White House press corps. As he explained it in the subhead for his story, the post-debate fallout consists of the journalists who cover the cognitively failing Biden “pissed—furious at the White House, annoyed at each other—and ready to take the gloves off.”
[…]Then came the spice. Byers revealed “there is now a pervasive sense of resentment among the press corp toward the administration” and quoted one White House correspondent as having there’s been a “brewing” “hostility” toward the regime because they’ve “been so dismissive of” concerns about Biden.
This fell into two camps with one “feel[ing] a strong sense of vindication” and the other “undeniably apoplectic” and “chafing at the White House comms office for waving them off what is now inarguably a massive and truly historical issue—or covering their tracks”so they would, in the words of another reporter, “got their asses kicked on The Big Story.”
Now, the part about claws coming out. Byers said “there’s been some intra-press corps friction, as well” with reporters who’ve consistently called out Biden’s elderly state as a problem feel like they’ve been knifed by not only the White House, but lapdog reporters polishing the former’s apples[.]
Houck, of course, is one of Trump’s chief apple-polishers.
Jeffrey Lord served up similarly self-serving media-bashing in a July 6 column:
The resulting problem for the mainstream media now is stark and simple. If they couldn’t tell the obvious truth about Biden’s mental condition — why should they be trusted when trying to sell anything else?
The political world is filled with serious problems. Unemployment, job creation, inflation, how to handle Putin and Russia, Xi Jing Ping and China, the Iranian Mullahs, North Korea’s Kim Jong Un, the state of NATO and more.
Given that to be the case, one would think the media would be exercising a thorough review of its own offerings instead of peddling, day after day, fantasies about Biden opponent Donald Trump – while ignoring, day after day, the realities about Joe Biden’s actual mental condition.
[…]Perhaps, just perhaps, if the media had dealt truthfully from the get go about the state of Joe Biden’s cognitive problems – than Democrats, not to mention the country and the world – would not be in this situation to begin with.
But the media chose, at best, to ignore what so many in Biden’s White House circle knew was the hard truth about Biden and his mental health. Now the media’s own credibility is seriously – and justifiably – at issue. On anything and everything. And the fact that they have so seriously damaged that credibility by ignoring the hard facts in a major story?
There is a Biden collapse….and a further collapse of the media who could only repeat what they were told by their minders.
Intern Mary Clare Waldron had the job of hate-watching “The View” for a July 8 post:
After a weeklong hiatus The View is back, and has plenty to say to make up for lost time. Following a Democratic wave of panic which finally acknowledged the mental and physical state of President Biden, all five co-hosts took to the air to lay out their liberal opinions.
Like many other Trump-loathing commentators in the media, it was clear that these hosts didn’t know how to react to the debate, and ended up regurgitating many of the same diatribes of distress and blame the mainstream had already suffered from. But they landed on both sides of the internal Democrat squabble.
Whoopi Goldberg, in an attempt to lift the harsh criticism of the press stated, “I don’t care if he’s pooped his pants. I don’t care if he can’t put a sentence together…I have poopy days all the time, all the time. I step in so much poo you can’t even imagine. Now I’m not running the world, but I don’t know anybody who doesn’t step in stuff at some point.” An opinion not shared by many of the co-hosts, Goldberg’s attempt of consolation did very little.
[…]Hypocrisy as a coping mechanism, each host claiming the end goal of beating Donald Trump merited voting for the obviously aged current one.
Not unlike the MRC’s hypocrisy in its continued support of Trump despite his well-established pattern of amorality, adultery and crime, not to mention inciting an attempted insurrection.
Comedy cop Alex Christy dutifully wrote about late-night TV’s reaction in a July 9 post, which mostly involved whining that Trump was discussed more than Biden:
After a couple of weeks of vacation, the full slate of late night comedy shows returned on Monday to reveal their reactions to President Joe Biden’s poor debate performance and subsequent interview with ABC’s George Stephanopoulos. While nobody called for Biden to step aside, there were definitely calls for him to step up his game because democracy is allegedly at stake.
On CBS and The Late Show, Biden fundraiser Stephen Colbert lamented that Biden was not up to the task, “Trump proved once again that he is demonstrably a monster. He is a demonster! And keep in mind, keep in mind, Joe called for this debate, it’s the earliest they’ve ever had a presidential debate. And going into it, all Joe had to do was allay people’s fears that he was too old. But instead, Biden’s shakiness allowed Trump to get away with 90 minutes of lies, racism, and weird golf brags, which is why a lot of people are saying this was the worst debate performance of all time.”
[…]NBC Late Night host Seth Meyers set up his debate commentary by first attacking Donald Trump and the Supreme Court, “Trump’s ambition to turn the U.S. into a dictatorship will only be buoyed by a compliant right-wing Supreme Court that essentially just handed him royal powers. So, that’s the situation. A wildly dangerous criminal and pathological liar is leading a radical movement to dismantle American democracy and he’s within striking distance of the presidency.”
Christy took over hate-watching duties for a July 9 post on that day’s edition of “The View”:
The cast of ABC’s The View circled the wagons on Tuesday to express how “pissed off” they are that some people are calling for President Joe Biden to step aside while downplaying his lousy debate performance as the result of what happens when you’re 81 years old or when you’re “trying so hard to tell the truth.” Even co-hosts who were more open to discussing Biden’s issues were quick to point out that their support for him has not diminished.
Joy Behar was not feeling particularly joyous at the coverage of the two candidates, “I wasn’t here yesterday so, I was watching television all week and I’m a little tired of all the Biden-bashing that’s going on. I’m pissed off at it, frankly. There is a lot of Biden bashing going on and no calls for this sexually abusive felon to step down.”
Christy made no effort to justify his and his employer’s support for that sexually abusive felon.
Meanwhile, Tim Graham spent his July 10 podcast cheering that George Clooney was now calling for Biden to drop of of the race “just weeks after headlining a lucrative Hollywood fundraiser for Joe Biden’s re-election campaign.”