The big media sleep
Related highlights:
New York Times still pushing Chinese propaganda, staffers still don’t care
ABC correspondent gushes that Biden nominees 'really do reflect America'
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Establishment journalists and commentators have no intention of covering the incoming Biden administration as vigorously and combatively as they covered the Trump White House.
Don’t take my word for it. They will tell you themselves in so many words that they are perfectly content to just kick back and let the “boring” Democratic president-elect and his team do their thing.
“This administration will be of the Georgetown dinner variety,” Politico’sAnna Palmer and Jake Sherman report. “A return to briefing books and policymaking by political professionals who aren’t likely to try to burn down the White House over petty disagreements and jockeying to get in the good graces of the president.”
They add, “In other words, if the Trump White House was like downing a vat of Tabasco sauce over the past four years, the Biden White House will be like sipping unflavored almond milk.”
It is as if they have forgotten that Joe Biden was the vice president for all eight years of the Obama administration, when scandals and body counts were aplenty. It seems they have likewise forgotten that many of Biden’s current and likely administration picks also worked for an administration that droned U.S. citizens, spied on U.S. citizens, and created power vacuums across the Middle East, including the one that led to the rise of the Islamic State.
But, hey! At least the Biden administration, which will be filled with Georgetown careerists and cronies with impeccable records of failure, will be boring compared to the Trump White House, which defeated ISIS and sought to bring home U.S. troops from America’s never-ending unofficial military engagements.
Also, while we are on the topic of Politico’s likely coverage of the Biden presidency, enjoy the following line from its report on Antony Blinken, the likely next U.S. secretary of state: “Those who know Blinken describe him with words like ‘polished,’ ‘smooth,’ and ‘kind,’ and often add that he plays the guitar well.”
If you think that is excessively friendly, also check out this Nov. 23 tweet from Bloomberg News’s Jennifer Epstein: “George H.W. Bush was known for his socks, maybe Biden will be too? Today he wore dark blue socks adorned with lighter blue dogs. (Yes, there are plenty of more substantive things to tweet about but we can have some fun sometimes too.)”
Kill me now.
But, wait! There is more.
“Biden is going with expertise, professionalism, competence, & decency with his cabinet picks. How boring is that?” asked Walter Cronkite- and Emmy award-winning broadcast journalist Jim Heath.
Added Mathieu von Rohr of the proudly anti-Trump Der Spiegel, “Welcome to the refreshingly boring Biden presidency.”
At Politico, Eric Geller marveled as Biden's allies engaged in a coordinated messaging campaign to praise the president-elect’s choice of administration officials, saying, "It's really weird to see this kind of calm, rational, coordinated messaging again.”
Ah, yes. Nothing sets the professional journalist’s heart aflutter quite like a competent propaganda campaign promoted by lifetime Washington careerists on the behalf of an incoming president.
If you think those in news opinion business will apply to the Biden White House even an ounce of the aggression they used on the Trump administration, you are kidding yourself.
Said Washington Post columnist Brian Klaas, "It's truly astonishing what it feels like to see name after name of diverse Biden nominees – some familiar, some less so, but all extraordinarily competent with deep expertise and experience. No TV show personalities, no unqualified grifters, no idiotic relatives. So refreshing."
"I don’t know about y’all,” said CNN legal analyst Sophia Nelson, “but I have noticed a calm descending on my spirit. Why? Because I know #Trump is going to be out of all of our lives soon! So looking forward to boring #Biden and joyful #Kamala dancing in the rain!”
Yes, the Biden presidency will be different in that members of the press will no longer obsess over trivial palace intrigue stories, unverified gossip from disgruntled staffers, bogus tips from congressional aides and intelligence agents, and faulty “bombshells” sourced entirely to anonymous sources, including those “familiar with the president’s thinking,” but that does not mean it will be scandal-free or "boring." On the contrary, given that Biden is filling his White House with Obama alumni, we can probably expect more scandals along the lines of extrajudicial dronings, disastrous regime changes, and illegal domestic surveillance campaigns spearheaded by perjurers.
But at least the Biden administration will be professional about it! And no more bad tweets.