I had only a brief time to scan the news after our family’s Thanksgiving celebration. Here are a few brief notes:
Four-day pause in Israel’s war on Hamas.
By the time you read this newsletter on Friday, the world will be twelve hours into the four-day pause in Israel’s war on Hamas. Hopefully, the first set of hostages will be free. Although details are still emerging, all indications are that pressure by and assistance from President Biden facilitated the exchange and pause in hostilities. See Slate, One Factor Behind the Gaza Cease-Fire Deal: A Massive Shift in the U.S. Relationship With Israel.
In a fair media environment, the good news of the hostages’ release and Biden’s role would be the top stories. But as the media celebrates the impending release of the hostages, the media is stuck on a story largely of its own making—that President Biden resisted a cease-fire and is therefore responsible for ongoing hostilities and civilian casualties. See Washington Post (a page-one article on Thursday evening), Biden’s resistance to cease-fire could alienate youth voters in 2024.
Given that Biden just played a pivotal role in securing a temporary pause in fighting, the prominence of the story seems agenda-driven rather than reality-driven. I read the Post’s article with interest, waiting for the factual predicate for the statement that Biden’s resistance to a cease-fire could “alienate youth voters in 2024.”
I was expecting the Post to cite to a reputable poll—but was prepared for a janky internet survey where respondents earn free gift cards for answering online questions. But the source of the Post’s story was inferior to a gift-card scam survey. As explained by the Post,
conversations with more than a dozen students here (U. Mich.) underscore that Biden’s handling of the war threatens to diminish enthusiasm for him among young voters ahead of the 2024 election. . . . [A] number of liberal students here expressed openness to third-party candidates and frustration with a likely Trump-Biden rematch.
Uh, okay. So, the Post spoke with “more than a dozen students” (13?) about Biden and found that “a number”—3? 5?—were “open” to third-party candidates. That level of imprecision as the predicate for a headline story is worse than reckless—it is intentionally misleading. In the Post’s own telling, “some” of the students were not open to third-party candidates. What was the breakdown? The Post chose to omit that detail.
Of course, the point of the Post’s story was to regurgitate a series of polls taken earlier in the month that found younger voters criticized Biden’s support for Israel—all of which were premised on the notion that Biden was resisting a cease-fire when, in fact, he was working in the background for a pause in the war to allow for the inflow of humanitarian aid and release of hostages.
The disconnect between what Biden is doing versus the media’s portrayal of his policies is frustrating and maddening. The eagerness of the media to find younger voters willing to criticize Biden or express “openness” to third-party candidates seems designed to drive public opinion against Biden rather than testing public opinion. We can (and should) ignore the polls, but we can’t ignore the media’s attempt to distort reality by creating a false narrative.
The NYTimes has been responding to reader backlash over its biased reporting regarding Biden and Israel’s war on Hamas. Readers must continue to write letters to the editor, email journalists, and post comments on social media criticizing biased reporting. We should ignore the polls, but we must help shape the narrative.
Right-wing politicians and commentators falsely claim an accident was a terror attack.
A fiery automobile accident on the US-Canadian border led to false reports by Fox News and right-wing politicians that “terrorists” were attacking the US at our northern border. The false reports of a terror attack persisted in right-wing media and on Twitter for more than 24 hours after officials issued statements saying that there was no sign of terrorism. A dozen Republicans falsely described the auto accident as a terror attack. See Newsweek, Full List of Republicans Who Called Canada Border Explosion a Terrorist Attack.
Despite the fact that there was NEVER any evidence that the accident was a terror attack, that did not stop MAGA extremists from criticizing President Biden for allegedly “being on vacation” during a terror attack.
Most of the Republicans who claimed that the auto accident was a “terror attack” also claim that the assault on January 6 was a “peaceful” tour of the Capitol.
Apart from the blatant hypocrisy of Republicans, their response illustrates that they are primed to blame Biden for any terror attack that may occur—regardless of what he was doing at the time, where he was when the attack occurred, and whether anyone could have prevented it.
Concluding Thoughts.
President Biden issued a Thanksgiving greeting to all Americans by making a call to Al Roker, who was reporting on the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade. Per Axios,
President Biden in a Thanksgiving message on Thursday said Americans should "come together" and "focus on dealing with our problems and being together and stop the rancor.
[Biden continued,]“We have to bring the nation together and treat each other with a little bit of decency, and I think that's where the vast majority of the American people are.”
Trump issued his own Thanksgiving “greeting” on Truth Social, a greeting filled with nastiness, invective, and felonious violations of his bail agreement and two gag orders. I won’t repeat his comments here because I don’t want to ruin the glow of the Thanksgiving holiday. Besides, there are leftover desserts in the fridge, and they aren’t going to eat themselves.
I will be in touch over the weekend to open the Comments section.
Dear readers, for context, I have removed a few comments today about the political solutions for Israel dealing with Hamas. Although the original comment was intended to be a good faith discussion of that issue, it included a phrase that has angered other readers, who responded in an uncivil manner. So, I have removed the original comment and replies. Please keep comments focused on ideas and views, not on each other.
Whenever someone says, "a number of people are saying...," I remind myself that zero is a number.
The media's feeding of the false narratives thru its bogus polls is dangerous and destructive, rivaling the words and actions of the Defendant.