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September 5, 2024 - 11:45am
In the past month, Democratic presidential nominee Kamala Harris has sat down to conduct just one full-length interview with a reporter, a joint appearance with her running mate, Minnesota Governor Tim Walz.
Within that same period of time, Donald Trump and his running mate J.D. Vance have done 37 interviews. In a country with a press fixated on the public interest, this would be a crisis. Someone running for a position through which they control the country’s nuclear arsenal is barely exposing herself to the press. In fact, many of Harris’s policy pivots are happening via aides telegraphing them to reporters. This means that she doesn’t have to even sit down and explain why she has shifted from one view to another.
But much of the media has decided that none of this matters because she’s up in the polls. The New Republic, for instance, featured a piece stating bluntly in its headline that she “doesn’t need policy to win”.
Writer Peter Rothpletz, who currently works for ex-CNN personality Don Lemon, noted that some of the few policy proposals Harris has put out were coldly received in the press, such as her intention to take on food price gouging. “Harris should hang out in the coconut tree and not release any economic plans that can’t fit within a Venn diagram. To win, Harris doesn’t need policy,” he advised. “She just needs vibes.”
Vibes seems to be the word of choice for those in the press who are covering for Harris’s lack of transparency or substance. Bloomberg Opinion columnist Nia-Malika Henderson dismisses the idea that policy matters at all in this election, saying that “in a contest between white papers and vibes — which is really just cooler shorthand for emotion and feeling — vibes usually carry the day.” She even goes backwards in history to make her case, stating that Hillary Clinton lost her 2008 race to Barack Obama “not over miniscule policy difference but over vibes”.
Her revisionist history lays bare what’s wrong with the claim. While Obama was a master storyteller and had a strong emotional bond with his fanbase, he ultimately took Clinton down by pinning her to her support for the war in Iraq — a more than “miniscule” policy disagreement that motivated millions of young people to support him over his Democratic rival.
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SubscribeActually, its not a failure; it’s a bloody disgrace.
and it is intentional
Exactly right that it’s intentional. It’s about Groupthink, not investigation or accountability. Watch the Eric Weinstein interview. Suddenly the truth about the “failure” of the corporate “journalists” is exposed. They’ve not failed at all, because their whole reason for being has shifted. They are only robotic mouthpieces who are allowed to exist as long as they prop up the current narrative, whatever that may be. Warning: This interview is pretty depressing.
https://youtu.be/PYRYXhU4kxM?si=RlQQ0KlvGLbalhzA
A travesty.
The job of the press is to hold all people accountable, no wait…they’ve been doing that with one group of people only for decades now. Hmmm, maybe the press should start being held accountable?
The obvious reason is that the MSM do see their job very much as to ensure Harris wins. Nothing else matters, not truth, not journalism, not policy and certainly not real informed democracy.
Welcome to the Idiocracy!
A substance-free cypher overseeing the US military and a 25 trillion dollar economy! Why burden the electorate with policy statements? What could go wrong?
It wouldn’t be Harris pulling any levers should she win. That’s the point of her candidacy, and those who’re bolstering it.
Always better than an unstable narcissist with ego problems. Can you think of anyone like that?
Kamala would answer questions from reporters, but she is on the phone.
That’s her latest ploy. Stick in some headphones when there are journalists nearby.
The point is, the press largely think it is their job to support the D, whoever that is. Did Biden until it was clear he’d lost it.
Americans are going to have to prove they are not the idiots the world thinks they are. This is their last chance,
With the two candidates on offer today I think that’s an impossible ask !
I know it appears there’s not much of a choice, but no President, nominee or politician has come under as much scrutiny as Trump has. He served Four years, he has a record. He is now the Republican party, not some back room boys steering things. He’s made it clear who he is.
Contrast that with who Harris is, or pretends to be, how she got the nomination, her record as Vice President and the power behind her. To vote for Harris is to chose to vote in ignorance in the hope of what?
the question is why the press is going along with it, when its job is not to help Harris win the election.
In theory, that’s not the job of the press. In practice, however, that’s exactly what is happening – the legacy media is working as the PR wing of the Harris campaign and it is doing so openly.
It shows the bias of much of the media.
If the journalistic profession had any credibility left, it would ostracise Dana Bash forever for conducting this dreadful interview. But it doesn’t have any credibility left, so everyone is just carrying on as if it wasn’t a total disgrace.
I recommend watching Megyn Kelly’s take-down of it – vicious and extremely funny.
Who is Megyn Kelly?
I didn’t think it was great, but it was better than I expected. The bar was very very low though. Yet compare her treatment of Harris to her treatment of Vance. That says it all. Apparently, the Harris team also convinced CNN to delete 18 minutes of the interview.
The “Harris is up in the polls” BS is pure propaganda, and polls are not a gauge but a tool used to sway opinion. The media are not “letting her get away with it”, they are actively hiding her for her – and their – own good. If this isn’t completely obvious, then the author has no business writing articles like this one.
Except you believed every word of the polls when they showed your orange hero winning. But now that he is getting annihilated its all BS?!?!? Sure!
You guys are getting very angry about how this is going, aren’t you?
Surely even you have to admit that Harris is a hole in the air? Or are you just the same as the Trumpies?
Turn off Fox News and do your own research. She has plenty of solid policy proposals. Just because you don’t know about them doesn’t mean they don’t exist.
Compared to Trump’s bloviating she’s a full on policy wonk. When you add that she is young-ish, positive and likable compared to Trump’s grotesque lies, horrific personality and utter ignorance then its little wonder that she is creating an unbeatable lead.
What policy proposals has she stated and what’s the rationale behind them? And don’t regurgitate stuff the campaign team has leaked to the regime media – actual policy proposals from her lips.
What policy proposals has Trump stated, and what is the rationale behind them? And what is the likelihood that Trump will pay any attention to his own proposals (or even remember them) down the line?
Silly comment. He has an entire section on his website.
She has plenty of solid policy proposals
Such as?
Yet more evidence that you should stay away from the substantive stuff and stick to insults. You’re good at that.
The polls are almost a dead heat, easily within the margin of error.
Please stop feeding the ugly troll who can’t spell. I was wondering if a “policy wok” was a new Asian kitchen tool.
No doubt you were all really impressed by Trump’s “townhall” with the hard-hitting fact-based journalism of Sean Hannity!!!
Quit whining like a bunch of little babies – you’re as bad as Trump!
He’s done plenty of hostile interviews. You can fool yourself, but the rest of us are not fools. At least he showed up for the press conference with the Association of Black Journalists. Where was Harris?
Ah, Jimbo rides to the rescue of his fat orange hero! So predictable!
The interview with the NABJ was not hostile – it had one of Trump’s primary bootlickers on the panel! He just made a complete mess of it with his ridiculous insults and lies.
My gut tells me that the Orange Monster is gonna kick DEI Barbie’s ass. Ideologically all-over-the-place badman vs. intellectually shallow/philosophically vapid/devoid-of-any-real-principles “good enough” woman. A megalomaniac vs. an empty suit; a cult leader vs. the party bosses’ selected puppet; too much heat vs. barely any light. Whichever character wins, the country has already lost — its collective mind, its collective integrity, its collective soul. Madness &/or shallowness is on its way to “victory” 🙁
I would suggest many American presidents have lacked integrity. It’s almost par for the course.
Complaining about the regime media makes me feel like an old man shouting at clouds. Nothing will change, but here we are. The vast majority of those 37 interviews by Trump and Vance were not just adversarial, they were hostile.
Walz’ brother and other family members have openly voiced their support for Trump. Not a whisper in the regime media – nothing. When Trump’s cousin openly criticized him, the regime media literally made her a star. She was platformed everywhere for ever. Now she has a lucrative gig on substack.
“Walz’ brother and other family members have openly voiced their support for Trump.”
Family members? Jimbo, your Trump love is making you stupid. These putzes are related to Walz via his great-uncle – his grandfather’s brother – I’m guessing they aren’t spending every Christmas together. And the T-shirt grammar error is so perfectly on brand!
As for the brother, it sound like he’s bitter and that Tim Walz hasn’t spoken to him in years. He’s also rescinding the comments – not that that has stopped Trump claiming an endorsement.
Is this really the best the floundering Trump campaign can do? No wonder he’s dropping like a stone in the polls!
The New York Times concealed Biden’s dementia, so the protection of Harris is nothing new.
The media has strayed a long way from its obligations.
Well they are bought off. This is just another indication of how biased they are.