Thread by @DrewHolden360

🧵THREAD🧵

Biden’s disastrous debate performance brought to a screeching halt a multi-year campaign from the media to present the president as mentally fit.

Do you really remember how hard the press pushed you not to trust your lyin’ eyes on Biden’s decline?

Start here ⤵️

I suspect most of you remember the allegations from the White House that videos showing Biden behaving erratically were “cheap fakes.”

The media rushed to repeat this claim. Look at the extent @nytimes went to say you didn’t see anything and that Biden was fine.

Perhaps the wildest was @washingtonpost, who gave “Four Pinocchio’s” to videos showing Biden displaying cognitive problems, dismissing them as fakes, “pernicious” efforts “to reinforce an existing stereotype.”

Part of their defense was that Biden “doesn’t dance.”

Really.

Just look at this headline from @AP.

And it only gets worse from there.

Again, your lyin eyes are the problem. Not Biden. Allegedly.

@AP took specific issue with one supposed “fake”: a video where Biden freezes and needs to be led off a stage.

The video looks brutal.

But why would you believe what you can see, rather than Biden’s and Jimmy Kimmel’s comms teams?

@TheWrap blamed Biden’s stutter.

Really. Line highlighted.

@NBCNews lamented how hard all these deceptive “cheap fakes” were for our noble fact checkers.

But this headline was everywhere.

An obviously dubious statement from a White House official was repeated as gospel truth.

Here’s @ABC, @NBCNews, @thedailybeast and @CNN.

Really. I’m not exaggerating. There are even more at my full write up (link is in bio) but here’s another four boxer courtesy of @washingtonpost, @CBSNews, @Salon and @RollingStone

But what you may have forgotten are the ways that this was just the latest attempt from the press to hide the fact that the president might lack the mental wherewithal to execute the duties of his office.

Remember the special counsel report on Biden’s documents?

Back in February, special counsel Robert Hur determined that Biden lacked the mental fortitude to face a jury without seeming like a feeble, affable old man.

The press were incensed. @nytimes threw up the roadblocks, saying we needed more evidence to make a real diagnosis.

@washingtonpost claimed that what had been disclosed about Biden was just like anyone mixing up the names of their children.

Nothing to see here!

It was a popular refrain. Here’s @AP doing the same. Just like mixing up your kids’ names!

How silly! Even the leader of the free world does it!

@CNN assured us that it was nothing to worry about, Biden was fine, especially at his age.

They quoted a comms professor as their authoritative source.

These built off longstanding claims that criticism of Biden’s mental capacity were “ageist.”

Here’s @TIME pushing that claim repeatedly.

And some more from @Forbes, @NPR, @TheView and @Will_Bunch

Perhaps the richest of them all came last year from @nytimes.

Biden was so spry and vigorous that his young staff couldn’t keep up! Everyone was saying so!

It reads like North Korean propaganda.

The debate dashed this narrative that the press had worked so hard to build. Biden has lost even the editorial boards of @nytimes, @BostonGlobe and more.

It’s time, the press laments, to move on. And maybe we should’ve seen this coming.

I don’t think it’s a mystery why this topic wasn’t covered well, @CNN

That isn’t to say that some outlets haven’t maintained the fiction.

Biden had a cold at the debate. That was the problem, they claimed. I won’t let @CBSNews, @axios, and @NBCNews forget.

Or @AP…whatever this is.

It should go without saying, but the media actively working to hide from the American people that the commander and chief is exhibiting signs of serious cognitive decline is an enormous problem.

As I conclude in my newsletter (again, link in bio):

And that the press, I don’t think it’s a stretch to say, pushed this fiction to give one side a leg up in the election?

I think the media’s word for that is “election interference”

I know it’s hard to believe, but there are many more examples of the media covering for Biden’s mental state than what I could fit in this thread.

Full write up is at my newsletter, @Holden_Court. Link is here: open.substack.com/pub/drewholden…

@Holden_Court Some of these side by sides are just brutal.

@Holden_Court I’m very curious how these two NYT headlines can exist in the same universe

@Holden_Court If anyone here is friends with George Clooney please let him know!

@Holden_Court This is just so incredibly rich to report on now.

The Biden ship is sinking, guys.

@Holden_Court The ship is sinking.

@Holden_Court I’m losing my mind.

@Holden_Court As usual, @BridgetPhetasy is 100% right, here.

@Holden_Court @BridgetPhetasy It appears the Dems aren’t concerned.

@Holden_Court @BridgetPhetasy It does not appear that things are getting better.