Sometimes it takes comedy to cut through the fog and propaganda. Back in the day, my husband and I were devoted watchers of The Daily Show–a time when Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert skillfully skewered the pompous and self-important. (Admittedly, these days, we look at those we thought of as the “bad guys” with something approaching fondness. Compared to Trump and his collection of nutcases and incompetents, they look positively cuddly…)
Recently, the satirical Borowitz Report took on the legacy media’s obsession with President Biden’s decline while in office–an obsession fed by a book accusing his staff of “hiding” the effects of aging. His take was perfect.
In a bombshell report that stirred controversy on Tuesday, a prominent conspiracy theorist claimed that Joe Biden concealed his health problems by making the American economy boom for four straight years.
“Biden thought he could hide his health issues by making the U.S. economy the envy of the world,” the conspiracist, Harland Dorrinson, said. “Low unemployment, a surging stock market, and a stable dollar all played their parts in the cover-up.”
Strengthening NATO and bolstering relationships with allies were also key components of Biden’s elaborate scheme to hide his health woes, Dorrinson said.
“Biden kept the media distracted by making the US trusted and respected around the world,” he said. “Trump would never do that.”
The Biden presidency wasn’t perfect, but it was transformational, repairing the international damage done during Trump’s first term and growing the economy “from the middle out” as he liked to say. Perhaps, as he faded, some of those advances were managed by the highly competent people around him, but they were real. The government worked. Rather than focusing on the substantial progress being made, however, the legacy media jumped on every gaffe, every stumble.
That disproportionate attention to the ravages of age would have been less offensive had the same degree of attention been paid to Trump’s far more obvious mental illness and decline. But the same media that criticised Biden unmercifully has continually sane-washed Trump.
I agree with Robert Hubbell, who finds the differences in coverage maddening and incomprehensible. Noting the recent “tell-all” book by Jake Tapper and Alex Thompson claiming that Biden’s advisors “covered up” his “decline,” he wrote:
Let’s put aside for a moment that several of the key figures who allegedly witnessed events described in the book have said publicly, “Not true. It didn’t happen.”
Let’s put aside for a moment that Jake Tapper and Alex Thompson were writing a book about an alleged “cover up” when they were actively reporting on Joe Biden’s presidency, but never mentioned the “cover up” that they were allegedly discovering through 200 interviews.
Let’s put aside the implausability of the notion that one could “cover up” the cognitive state of a man who was appearing daily at campaign events, delivering addresses to Congress where he outwitted the entire Republican caucus, providing interviews to major media outlets, and guiding America through a period of stable foreign relations and successful domestic policy.
If it was a “cover-up,” it didn’t prevent major media outlets from reporting daily on Joe Biden’s age, stutter, stiff gait, and alleged gaffes.
Hubbell does agree that there was a coverup.
Donald Trump was, and is, cognitively impaired. And that fact is being covered up by the media every single day.
We all know it. The press knows it. His advisors know it. But the media gives a fraction of the coverage to Trump’s much more serious manifestations of cognitive decline than to the anonymous reporting in Jake Tapper’s sensationalized book.
Hubbell is absolutely correct when he says that the coverage media is giving today to claims about a former president who guided our nation through one of the most successful presidencies in the modern era is shameful when compared to the normalizing coverage of an “obviously cognitively impaired president who is violating the Constitution on a daily basis and running an administration that seems to be an open cesspool of graft.”
As Norman Orenstein observed, “I have a hard time watching journalists high five each other over books on WH covering up for Biden. A diversion from their own deep culpability in Trump’s election. False equivalence, normalizing the abnormal, treating Trump as no real danger were the norm, not the exception.”
Hubbell is entirely correct when he accuses the legacy media of failing America–of failing to provide appropriate coverage of the threat posed by Trump. “And they keep doing it. To their everlasting shame.”
Well, iden and Trump are on the same page when it comes to genocide. Kill Them All seems to be the norm in DC when it coms to Palestinians.
I wonder who will be next? The homeless? The elderly and anyone deemed deplorable to the political class?
When your loyalty blinds you to the truth, you can always shoot the messenger. Sad.
Competent Cabinets are now a distant dream. I would bet dollars to donuts that every member of Biden’s Cabinet could define Habeus Corpus correctly.
Borowitz was the reason I subscribed to the New Yorker. Comedy keeps me sane in times like these. I think back to Lyndon Johnson, who wrote a letter to the Smothers Brothers encouraging them to continue to do their comedy when CBS was threatening to cancel their show. That changed my opinion of the President. He might have been a mean sob, but he clearly understood the Constitution and the fact that the President should expect to be lampooned.
For a real view of the daily news, I like the Daily Show, Colbert, Jimmy Kimmel, and Seth Myers. Of course I read the the New Yorker, Atlantic, Wapo, and reports like the Mueller Report because I know that these are dangerous times.
What’s also pathetic – beyond sad – is the Commander-in-Chief who was a draft dodger with a paid-for bogus medical exemption addressing the fine men and women of the USMA graduation and talking about Al Capone and trophy wives. The “media” didn’t cover that up.
Actually, Ian, your call on genocide is off-base – as usual. We’ve been compelled to support Israel, albeit blindly, since 1948 as part of the guilt trip from ignoring a REAL genocide. Netanyahu is the guy bombing the shit out of Gaza while our capitalist arms makers keep getting rich off of arms sales. Isn’t it one of their mouths who once said, “War is good for business and business is very good.” So, no, Biden and Trump are NOT on the same page with regard to ANYTHING. Biden is old, Trump is an old psychopath. BIG difference.
Vernon, define a REAL genocide?
I guess genocide can only happen to folks who look like you?
And, I know you’re not very disciplined when it comes to social media, but is it possible to bstain from your usual cockwomble?
Sure and they did it last time when DT was in the White House. Or when he was running against Hillary Clinton. It was humorous, watching the insanity unfold and then Jim Comey claiming that he never figured Trump would win and that’s why he wanted to make everything seem fair. Calling for more investigations on Clinton. You couldn’t make up the ignorance if you tried. Joe Biden really did preside over a very short golden age, something that no one here will ever see again. The sheer magnitude of the lunacy taking place this time around, will ensure that very outcome. DT Taking money, and gifts worth millions upon millions of dollars, and no one really blinks. The grift level, and the criminality is so astonishingly brazen, it almost seems unreal. Laws are being broken every single day, by someone who’s a convicted felon, and also POTUS.
And, even if the Marshalls burst in to the White House and arrested this felonious grifter, the AT, (After Trump) trust level of the rest of the planet, probably would not be regained at a level seen PT, (Pre Trump) ever!
The thing is, why did any of this even happen? It seems so illogical, and yet, it did happen. How could you get such a large group of acolytes actually disrobing this senile Perv in an obscene display of x-rated adult pornographic Kabuki broadcast live to the world. What does that say for this American exceptionalism? Exceptionally deranged? Exceptionally perverse? Exceptionally criminal? Exceptionally narcissistic? Exceptionally psychotic? Or exceptionally evil!
Even if you use previous audio visual screeds, that show DTs complete 180 soapbox contradictions concerning supposed conduct of others, While he is presently doing the exact thing He is spouting in previous screeds!
These acolytes don’t see a clear and present danger to the country, they see an opportunity to loot and not be penalized. It’s gone beyond ideology, and into a full-blown criminal conspiracy of self enrichment.
You wonder why these things can happen, because it is so irrational? It should be impossible. And yet, the criminality is just sliding through the system as if it were coated in grease…
Concerning the media, it’s just elated that they have all of these things to talk about because they have been sidelined with ineptitude for so long, now it’s BOGO sensationalism. It’s almost like watching reruns of “Better Call Saul.” Only it’s on steroids! The absolute ease of criminal behavior amongst all cast members, is a marvel to behold. The new normal? Shame on the Media, and shame on the politicians!
You know how they used to show someone living in a delusionary reality getting slapped in the face and snapping them out of it? Well those people are too scared even attempting something like that because of the absence of separate but equal judiciary and legislative branches of government.
I mean, hey, most of these mega media types have birthright citizenship don’t they? They see the handwriting on the wall, they don’t want to get shipped off to some island gulag somewhere, or prosecuted and locked up in Guantanamo or something. It’s easy to gang up on someone they know will not use the laws in a criminal manner, because the weaponization of the Justice department and judiciary right now, stops everyone in their tracks. Don’t expect the legislative branch to put up an argument.
As history is presently being erased on a mega scale, you better start taking prints of what you see on the internet, because it won’t be there for long. I’ve already noticed plenty that’s not there anymore. And I might say, too bad folks didn’t pay attention to what was happening. It wasn’t rocket science to see what was going on, and everyone just laughed, no way could that happen! And yet, here we are! This won’t ever be fixed, everyone will be looking back at the good old days. Everyone better start learning Mandarin! Things are going to explode like a Musk Starship!
Legacy media is a fraud. They covered up Biden’s deterioration and Trump’s criminality. Comcast owns NBC Universal, which owns MSNBC (liberal) and NBC News (conservative) news networks. They also own NBC Entertainment that hosted The Apprentice even though Trump was a rapist and pedophile. He should have been in prison, but he was on your television instead.
Tapper and company are just covering their asses for shining up the Biden turd. They were told to cover up Biden’s decline and did until Biden’s debate appearance, which was horrible for the ten minutes I watched.
How many times did they hold Biden accountable for genocide? They manipulated the college protesters into being pro-Hamas or pro-terrorists to fit the White House’s AIPAC-owned administration. They tried to paint the Chinese-backed TikTok as a “national security risk” to justify banning it. Also, who benefited from all the censorship of independent journalists under Biden and Trump?
When our “news channels” are owned by international Entertainment conglomerates, it’s all about profits and shareholder returns. Do you think they care about telling us the truth? They’ve got advertisers to think about!
American Exceptionalism does not equal Joe Biden or Donald Trump. They aren’t the problem, though. They are a symptom of the problem, and so is the propaganda media. History will show how they all contributed to the Gaza Holocaust of the Palestinian people. You’d think the Jewish people in Israel would be a little more empathic toward murdering others, but as Sorg likes to point out, this is our destiny as the “superior” human race.
Ian,
This country was based on genocide! Joe Biden’s history shows that he had concern for the citizens of this country, and also the well-being of citizens in other countries. Was he perfect? No! Who is in this world we live in? But he is light years ahead of the person in charge now.
Genocide begets genocide, the Palestinians had to have known the repercussions of their actions. And yet, we did it anyway. Why? So they can scream and complain, and use the aforementioned repercussion as a sounding board against their arch enemy. They flipped the script. What happened after 9/11? How many thousands were slaughtered after the twin towers fell? United States was over there slaughtering for decades! Which, the United States is very good at. There was a lot of practice concerning the Native Americans, liberated slaves, importing slaves, the Chinese, relegating Japanese to concentration camps in this country! I’ve got more, it’s history!
By the way, have you read Vernon’s books? I have, and they actually did really well predicting what’s happening now. So I would suggest you take a look at your critical flabbergast and do some research!
Ian, at the risk of damaging your tiny brain, a REAL genocide is one that is planned, infrastructure put in place and executed on a massive level. You know, like the one during WW II. All “other” so-called genocides are just normal human behavior. We are the only species who sets out to destroy other members of the species on a large scale. So, in a sense, using the term genocide is redundant.
As far as my discipline is concerned, sonny, you can’t carry my briefcase. You have NO idea what my social media activity is, so, typical for you, you make shit up to satisfy your deeply damaged psyche.
Re:J Sorg.
Your faux religiosity is duly noted.
I share critical flabbergasted among these credible organizations.
Amnesty International
Doctors Without Borders
Human Rights Watch
International Court of Justice.
I doubt any amongst them read the books mentioned and need any glib advice from a christo-fascist such as yourself.
Genocide is genocide.
Those of us who bother to learn physics know that everything can be defined as a system. This imaginary boundary contains matter and energy because it processes matter and energy that it takes in and gives out.
My house is a system that takes in matter, energy, and information, processes them, and returns them to the system containing it.
Our government is another system that houses processes that do the same. Global government contains national governments, and state governments are subnational governments.
Economies are systems that process natural resources by taking them in and giving them back in a changed form. As systems, we are individually and collectively subsystems of the system within our borders, including our government system. A herd of nested Russian Dolls.
Biden spent his entire life learning our government system. As a system, though, he was also diminished by age. Trump spent his whole life in a real estate system that he literally stole from the rest of his family. He is both narrow in perspective and diminished by age and guilt, and perhaps, like his father, by dementia too.
As someone who has fed a system by hiring and firing professional employees, I know firsthand how professional labor is processed. I learned about the sorting of experts by competency and experience. I have hired professionals with latent competency and zero experience and those with some demonstrated competence by experience.
Biden seemed to follow what I learned about that system, and Trump did not. He instead hired and fired based on the principle of preferring yes men over professionals.
That is HUGE!
Who knew being against st a genocide would bring on the venom from such admirable peace loving folks?
Wonderful group you have here. No wonder why so many are leaving the DNC.
To all the Biden detractors, reread the Borowitz Report in today’s post. Unlike Trump 1, Biden began actually working as president on Day One – not holding pointless press conferences. Agree with his policies or not, he actually knew how government works best. He selected a cabinet composed of professionals who understood their roles and the missions of their agencies. The focus on Biden’s shortcomings by the media and echoed by some on this blog helped keep voters at home or worse – actually voting for others. In spite of the commentaries to the contrary, the president’s job is to represent and protect us, regardless of our political leanings. The lesson of the Biden presidency is that we no longer deserve a real working president or a functional congress.
The US is caught in a political bind. We honor our documented alliances, like with Ukraine and Israel, but we also accept the inevitability of a changing world. Look at the changes wrought by real or imaginary elections in Russia, Ukraine, Israel, and Palestine.
Unfortunately, the world changes faster now than our documented and real alliances can keep up with. Netanyahu leading Jewish Middle Eastern Israel, and the merry-go-round of Arab Muslim national leaders makes the Middle East a constantly changing kaleidoscope of intrigue.
Biden had learned to honor our documented alliances despite a changing world because sometimes that is the right thing to do. Trump has learned to follow personal real estate deals over any other responsibility.
That also is HUGE!
The shame and disloyalty of President Joe Biden’s own Democratic party was pounced on and devoured by the media to be used to feed the public the excuse they were looking for to sit at home on election day or to grasp the “If you can’t beat em, join em!” faction of the MAGA party.
With no medical training, it is my belief that the prostate gland is not connected to the brain stem. Maybe Trapper and others have more medical sources for their media outpouring. Those in the Democratic party who aided and abetted the MAGAs to the current Fascism forgot two old adages as they ousted our president into the oblivion of obscurity after more than 50 years service to this nation. “Do not change horses in mid-stream.” and “Never bring a knife to a gun fight!” They ousted President Joe near election day and put up Vice President Kamila with little support and less time to provide a strong campaign. Those old white men “on our side” tripped on their own dicks in their rush to feed their egos before the public realized they were of the same generation as President Joe Biden, whatever his health problems are are also their own. And, just as prostate gland is not connected to the brain stem, neither is prostate cancer caused by old age; ask any young man in his 40s who has been diagnosed with it.
But; all of the above is worth no more than a fart in the wind, and the wind of time these days is blowing nothing good in its path. I’m finding it more difficult each day to NOT unsubscribe from the Democratic officials and organizations who ignore my survey responses to their begging for more and more money. They do not accept my valid Democratic memberships or candidate support because I do NOT donate on line, I mail my checks directly to the sources.
Theresa Bowers asked yesterday what we would be willing to die for; I am willing to die to get out of their way before Trump and MAGA can kill me off as part of their Final Solution to rid this country of democracy, Rule of Law and to end the Constitution of the once UNITED States of America.
daleb @ 9:06 a.m. KUDOS and thank you for standing up for the real American, now forced into obscure historical mentions in our future history books.
The legacy media, it appears, is just like Faux News, there only for the “entertainment” value. And, of course, the money.
So, capitalism is destroying itself, as Marx thought it would.
Is there a major news outlet that is screaming about the monster plane present?
Thanks for the blog, Sheila. I was beginning to go along with the Original Sin premise(s) but you have aroused my inner self’s push back on what seemed obvious. The accomplishments of the Biden administration were superlative – I never questioned that – but I also felt the need to always out the truth, however difficult that may be. This, however, turns out to be an example of a red herring, attempting an obfuscation of one of the most successful administrations in history. Yes he was in cognitive decline – I could have wept at his debate performance – and I don’t know how long that was going on. It is sad to think that Joe Biden’s legacy will be diminished by this unfortunate blend of events, and even more unfortunate that we ended up with a creature in the WH who doesn’t give a damn about the dreams, aspirations and very significant manifestations that followed. He is instead bent on their obliteration, along with our Constitution and our beloved country.
Sheila, would you have allowed this kind of discussion in your university classes? Cmon folks: enough with the immature ad hominem attacks. You yell at your allies while the enemy storms the gates.
And I would include as allies the mainstream media, despite its shortcomings. The reporters and writers are mostly conscientious professionals doing their best to cover this fascist regime. The corporate media owners? Not so much. They are cowardly and money-hungry.
Don’t blame the media for the failures of American voters, not to mention the failures of many Democratic powerbrokers. Thank whatever goddesses there be for brave judges and grassroots organizers and some legislators and governors who serve the public interest.
Steve–You are correct. In fact, I was about to send private messages to the commenters posting those ad hominem attacks; instead, I will post here a reminder that disagreements are encouraged but personal attacks and name-calling will get commenters blocked. So KNOCK IT OFF.
Ian,
And as far as flabbergast, what teeth do any of the organizations you’ve mentioned have? What have they done to prevent genocide? The genocide museum in Skokie Illinois is a fantastic facility, and if you actually decide to visit one of them around the country, you’ll realize the reason why there was a holocaust is exactly what is happening today. Does one Holocaust, authorize another? You like to flaunt faux outrage to demonize individuals who have had “Bested” you in commentary.
Do you even know the definition of fascist? You have any idea where it came from or how it started? Do you have any idea of the origin of the name? You can go look all of that up now, because you’ve never mentioned it in your comments before. So I would surmise if you do now, you have gotten on the Google machine!
But hopefully you do your research! I can quote you chapter and verse out of the Muslim holy books, I can quote you chapter and verse from the Mosaic law, I can quote you chapter and verse from the Christian Greek scriptures! All of these describe fascism before it was even labeled a thing.
I can tell you the reasoning behind the Roman Church, and why it became the Roman Church, emperor Constantine’s reasoning for it, after centuries of slaughtering Christians. And that the Christians the Roman Church birthed, we’re not anywhere close to the originals that followed Christ when he was alive on this Earth, of course that’s if you believe in that sort of thing.
So yeah, what your opinion is of myself, or Vernon, even though Vernon and my belief system are much different from each other. But that’s how you form a relationship of understanding. Unlike others here. I would and do trust Vernon, because he’s not a hypocrite! You get the drift? Pete is another I would trust, JoAnn also! Different understandings, different beliefs, but the same desire see what’s wrong, fixed!
What I can see concerning the major events of history, but this is something different. And more than likely is something that will not be fixed. Besides, there’s only one that speaks as a fascist that I’ve seen, I’m sure the mirror darkly reflects well, if not, use a little more light.
I remember when Russia began to attack Ukraine and Biden in the middle of the night at great risk, rode the train into Kiev to walk with Zelensky and defy Putin. Biden bravely stood ground and made US position clear.
As far as Bidens health matters, I think the strain of the office of president did take a toll on him. I saw him physically weakened during the disastrous debate with trump, but I didn’t hear any deranged thoughts or delusions, just low key hushed intact responses. It was reported he was taking antihistamines for bad cold, and now we know he probably was in beginning stages of prostate cancer that drains tremendous energy away from the main systems in the body.
On the other hand, trump was loudly spouting his word salads and preposterous lies and projections and attacking Biden. Seems a lot of Americans like viewing a fight and admire the trappings/image of a strong man.
Joe gave us a needed reprieve from the right-wing, autocratic movement circling the globe, but his justice department was slow to the draw. The deference that trump got from his appointees has been ill fated.
A lot of reporters that I watch are doing their best and asking hard questions during the white house press conferences. They are met with scripted answers and being admonished for asking the questions. Authoritarians have problems with facts and don’t mind gas lighting inquiring minds.
Trump says he supports Isreal but accepts a multimillion dollar flying palace from the head of Qatar. It’s been reported that Qatar has supported Hamas. This is another obvious example where trumps loyalties lie.
back to the topic, and ignoring the trolling
The press ignored Wilson’s incapacitation. The press ignored when Alzheimer’s really affected Reagan, who, as an actor, could still deliver lines on his twin passions hating “communism” (the original McCarthy ‘cancel culture’) and blind belief in laissez-faire.
The press stepped in to pick on Biden, but gave Trump a pass.
A sad state of affairs.
Some day I might, with Sheila’s permission, expound upon war, genocide, and the true meaning of Oct. 7, but not today. I don’t believe in feeding trolls.
Thank you Sheila for using the Borowitz Report of all things to inject some sanity into the subject of Joe Biden’s ‘fitness’, and to Rose for bringing up his actual performance in the face of ill heath that night. Yes, compared to Trump’s false and miseading barrages, Biden made a poor initial showing. The fact that the moderators had announced in advance that there would be no fact-checking opened the sewer to full blast.
In addition, besides other ‘incidental’ travel, Biden spent most of the first half of June traveling twice to Europe (D-Day + and G7), followed by back to back fundrasers on opposite coasts. What kind of strain would that schedule have placed on anybody!? On the night of the debate he was on medication that initially appeared to impair his responses.
What nobody knew until a week after his stepping down, is that Biden had also been heavily involved in major complicated and sensitive prisoner swap negotiations which succeeded in large part due to his mental acuity (so heavily trashed by so many) and which took place for many months before and up thru the debates, and finally wrapped up in the weeks after.
As the Borowitz Report pointed out, Biden had an incredibly successful presidency, especially in light of the hostile political climate. Then BOOM! Instant feeble doddering old fool according to the media and the GOP, and we were drowned in blasting waves of that noise.
And they’re not done with it.
THANK YOU for this comment, Sheila Kennedy! We needed a bit of confirmation reality that no one else seemed willing to share.
If Israel actually wanted to commit genocide against the Palestinians, don’t y’all think they would be more competent and efficient at it? Perhaps at least as competent as the USA has been at committing genocide against the First Peoples on our territory.
Thanks to Len for mentioning about Reagan and his Alzheimers. At the time some people were wondering who was running the White House, Nancy??
Ian,
aybe you should roofread before youhit ubmit.