Surveying some of Thursday's local and regional papers, starting with the @PressTelegram. Southern California News Group's papers have this quote, "IT'S UP TO US TO STOP THE SURGE," across the front page
The Chicago Tribune's front page is a play on words about the vaccine: "Waiting on pins and needles"
This is a stark front page of the @IndyStar, sharing Indiana Gov. Eric Holcomb's warning that "the state of Indiana is on fire" due to Covid, with doctors and nurses "overwhelmed."
Here is Thursday's lead story in the weekly paper in Massac County, Illinois: "Since the last edition of the Metropolis Planet, six more deaths in Massac County are confirmed as the result of COVID-19"
In Maine, hospitals warn of staffing shortages. In North Carolina, a curfew as cases surge. In New York, "tough times on the menu" for local restaurants. In Louisiana, New Orleans "nears bar shutdown."
I'll conclude with @MessengerOnline in Madisonville, Kentucky, which paired two Covid stories: One about nurses pleading for the public's help, one about a poll showing that only half of Americans are ready to take the vaccine. Banner headline is a quote: "IT IS LIKE A NIGHTMARE"
• • •
Missing some Tweet in this thread? You can try to
force a refresh
This is madness, but I think it's worth unpacking for a couple of reasons. First, Trump's woefully bad sources of info. You should watch the @OANN clip that served as his source material
This is Trump's source: "Reports Thursday found Biden's live stream address got only one thousand views online." Source? A random guy's tweet. Then this "news anchor" called Biden's speech "another baseless attempt to pose as the winner of the recent elections."
I get it. Everyone's mind is made up about Trump. Biden is the story now. But the pollution from this pro-Trump propaganda still needs to be measured. Watch that @OANN video and remember: Staffers conceived it, scripted it, gathered elements, wrote banners, read it, and aired it.
When Barack Obama and his editors at Crown picked this week to publish the first volume of his memoirs, they hoped that the election results would be clear, that Biden would be busy with transition work, and that there wouldn't be any widespread unrest. Correct on all 3 counts...
Tuesday is a wide-open launchpad for "A Promised Land," which is expected to be the best-selling book of 2020, just as Michelle Obama's "Becoming" was in 2018. The book tour is doubling as a warning about a "deeply divided" media landscape. Short #thread
In every interview, Obama is talking about media. When @GayleKing asked about the 72 million people who voted for Trump, he said, "The power of that alternative worldview that's presented in the media that those voters consume, it carries a lot of weight." cbsnews.com/news/barack-ob…
Trump just retweeted a dozen Twitter users who are trashing Fox News and promoting Newsmax. Here's my new story about Newsmax + a thread about what is going on...
On Newsmax, voter fraud innuendo is everywhere. Conspiracy theory chatter is constant. And perhaps most importantly, Joe Biden is NOT president-elect. They say they haven't called the race. (They don't have a decision desk.) They're tapping into a real vein of rage on the right.
Before election day, Newsmax and OAN were just annoying flies on the Fox elephant's back. But something dramatic has happened: Newsmax's audience has BALLOONED. Final week of October, the channel averaged 65,000 viewers. Election week: 182,000. Monday: 347,000. Tuesday: 437,000.
Thread of @jaketapper's reporting: "I spent some time today talking to Republican officials on both ends of Pennsylvania Ave, and what they say is, no one out there should worry that our democracy is in actual jeopardy..."
"They say this is all part of walking President Trump through this process emotionally and that they assume that while he may never concede, he will leave. There will be, they say, a peaceful transition of power to the Biden-Harris administration on January 20. They say that."
"But they say it on background," @jaketapper added, "because they don't want to upset President Trump and they don't want to get death threats from his supporters. You may or may not find that reassuring."
While we wait, let's take a look at some of Friday's front pages from newspapers across the country and around the world...
In the UK, the Daily Star tabloid says "GRUMPY TRUMPY SET TO LOSE BIGLY." Metro: "BIDEN HIS TIME."
Via the Newseum website, here are battleground state front pages – the @AJC's headline about Biden "nearly" pulling even with Trump in Georgia is already out of date
The main reason 2020's election night is going to be different "is because it takes longer to count those mail-in ballots." Here's a thread with what CNN DC bureau chief @SamFeistCNN told me...
Could the networks project a winner on Tuesday night? If "we know the results and there is a clear winner in FL and NC and AZ – these are all states that are likely to finish their count on Election Night – we could very well know a winner." But if it comes down to PA, then no.
Feist noted that we'll know the results of mail-in and early votes in FL and NC early on Election Night. But in other key states -- like PA and WI -- "it's going to take them a while." There could be red shifts in some states, blue shifts in others. Watch: cnn.it/3mLrSGP