Drew Holden Profile picture
Mar 2, 2021 27 tweets 23 min read Read on X
🧵Thread🧵

You want bad @NYGovCuomo takes? Then you’ve come to the right place.

It’s good to see folks recognize his failure. But apologies are in order from those who built him into a pandemic hero while he played a villain

Here’s a top-10🧵of the worst culprits (+bonuses)⤵️
10. @Amy_Siskind

I was never holding my breath for Siskind to be a good faith actor but the sheer depravity of her content (this is only a sampling) makes it impossible to keep her off the thread. ImageImageImageImage
9. @voguemagazine (and @chelseahandler and @MollyJongFast)

Listen, my expectations for Vogue weren’t high, but just look at these headlines and ask yourself “is it any wonder @NYGovCuomo got away with what he did?” ImageImageImage
Honorable mention. @BuzzFeed

There were too many great ones to limit this to ten. Adding Buzzfeed to the thread simply because they forced me to read these words.

(Also, given some non-coronavirus headlines, it may be time to retire that survey.) ImageImage
8. @ananavarro

An often overlooked member of the Cuomo News Network team, Ana gets bonus points because she often pretends to be a conservative.

My favorite tweet, though, is from 2013. ImageImageImageImage
7. @MSNBC

There’s only so much you can expect from an openly partisan media outlet, so the bar here was already low.

But giving @NYGovCuomo an unchallenged opportunity to come on and defend his nursing home death scheme? Well. That makes the countdown. ImageImageImageImage
Honorable mention. @CheriJacobus

A thread favorite, Jacobus misses the top ten but certainly managed to keep it weird. ImageImage
6. @washingtonpost (@sarahellison and @bterris)

This article may be the worst of the Cuomo coverage from a mainstream outlet not named CNN, and that’s really saying something. google.com/amp/s/www.wash… ImageImageImageImage
A brief aside here to point out that, with only a couple of exceptions, all of the people in this thread bill themselves as critics and/or objective.

If DCCC says this kind of stuff, well, that isn’t news.

But these folks ARE the news.
5. @neeratanden

Back to the program. Pretty incredible to me that Tanden, famous for being a mean person on the internet, had nothing but incredibly complimentary things to say about Cuomo. ImageImageImageImage
4. @CNN

It takes a lot to have so much badness that, even spread across an entire network, it’s still damning. But from their nightly Cuomo Bros saga to their ridiculous coverage, CNN has earned this spot. ImageImageImageImage
Honorable mention. @SethAbramson, a man who needs no introduction.

I will point out, though, that each of these tweets were within two weeks of Cuomo’s having signed a decree requiring nursing homes to accept coronavirus patients. ImageImageImageImage
3. @JRubinBlogger

It is a testament to the outrageous level of Cuomo fangirling that Rubin barely cracks the top three. Here’s just a sampling of some of her remarkable tweets about Cuomo that have aged...imperfectly ImageImageImageImage
(This will always be my favorite tweet of all time) Image
Honorable mention. @SteveSchmidtSES

Where stupid goes, Schmidt and company are never far behind. The Cuomo situation was unsurprisingly no different. And this from a man who still pretends to be conservative about a liberal Governor. ImageImage
2. @JoyAnnReid

I’ll let the tweets speak for themselves. Just barely missed the top spot on the countdown. ImageImageImageImage
1. @ChrisCillizza

Even above his network, Cillizza’s fangirlish coverage stands alone as the most egregious.

We can leave it to history whether @NYGovCuomo was a “terrific bureaucrat” who “benefited from radical transparency” but let’s just say that I’m skeptical. ImageImageImageImage
There you have it, folks. The worst of the worst, in my eyes, accounting for both content and reach.

There are a lot of takeaways here, but I think one of them is pretty simple: stop worshipping politicians.

Lots of them are just bad people, and eventually the truth will out.
Perhaps the best takeaway is that, when a fawning mainstream media & blue check environment tells you a Democratic leader is without blemish, it probably just means that there are no blemishes that those folks are interested in talking about, even if many might exist.
It’s important to call out that, interspersed with these awful examples, there was a lot of reporting - particularly from local outlets - that was really, really good.

Here are a few examples from @NewYorker, @propublica, @NY1 and @ABC7 ImageImageImageImage
And this was also true among lots of conservative outlets and individuals, like @WSJ, @FoxNews (especially @JaniceDean) and the NY Post. ImageImageImage
But in a lot of ways, this just makes it even more intellectually & morally bankrupt that so many people talked about @NYGovCuomo the way they did.

So many of his faults and failures were already on the record.

These people just willfully ignored them. Which is unconscionable.
Post script honorable mention - if you can make it through anymore cringe, please watch and listen to this whole video from @TheDailyShow.
And let’s just say that the coverage of @GovRonDeSantis was...a little different. Previous 🧵 for your reference/those mentioning it.
This may finally be the time some of these folks block me.
Folks will ask on occasion if they can support the work that goes into these. I’m flattered, but your local food bank needs that money a lot more. For those in DC, Capital Area Food Bank does great work. capitalareafoodbank.org
Special shout out to @MollyJongFast for finding a way to concede she was wrong while seemingly blaming everything and everyone but herself. thedailybeast.com/my-cuomo-crush…

• • •

Missing some Tweet in this thread? You can try to force a refresh
 

Keep Current with Drew Holden

Drew Holden Profile picture

Stay in touch and get notified when new unrolls are available from this author!

Read all threads

This Thread may be Removed Anytime!

PDF

Twitter may remove this content at anytime! Save it as PDF for later use!

Try unrolling a thread yourself!

how to unroll video
  1. Follow @ThreadReaderApp to mention us!

  2. From a Twitter thread mention us with a keyword "unroll"
@threadreaderapp unroll

Practice here first or read more on our help page!

More from @DrewHolden360

Apr 17
🧵Thread🧵

I launched a newsletter, called Holden Court, about the media, what they get wrong & why it matters. The goal is to reach beyond what my 🧵s have on Twitter & to build a better recent history of media & media criticism.

You can sign up at the link in my bio. More ⤵️
At that link you can read my launch piece and get a better idea of what it is that I’m trying to do.

The piece also walks through a recent example of bad media coverage that I worry we’re already forgetting about: the start of Covid. Image
My general premise for the newsletter is that media criticism could be a lot better; more driven by what the media actually does and says and more set in recent context, rather than an impressionistic sense that the media is hopelessly off-track.
Read 8 tweets
Apr 16
I’m launching something new, so naturally I figured the best explainer was a 🧵thread🧵.

Introducing Holden Court, my Substack about the media, what it gets wrong, and why it matters.

You probably know the drill, but more details & links to sign up in the tweets below. ⤵️ Image
Holden Court aims to unpack media failures, particularly when the media misses in unison on important political topics. But I’ll also have one-off content, Q&A opportunities, a mailbag and maybe virtual (or even in person) happy hours, too.

Sign up here: open.substack.com/pub/drewholden…
That doesn’t mean the threads are going away. But the amount of context and nuance I can capture in a thread is limited. So the Substack will (hopefully) provide that more robust analysis, aiming ultimately at *why* the media misses the way that it does.
Read 8 tweets
Mar 19
🧵THREAD🧵

“15 days to slow the spread” kicked off four years ago Saturday, sending the media into perhaps its most deranged cycle of my lifetime.

I dove back into some of the worst lockdown media coverage from those early days.

Buckle in, this one’s long. ⤵️
The real worst of the coverage was when states started reopening. The media outrage was palpable. Republicans wanted people to die, we were told.

Remember @TheAtlantic’s “Georgia’s Experiment in Human Sacrifice”? You may’ve forgotten how wild the text of it was. I did.
Image
Image
But that wasn’t a one off sentiment. The belief four years ago among the media was that allowing people to leave their homes was tantamount to killing people.

@washingtonpost called it a “deadly error” — not in an opinion piece, mind you, but in a “health” news headline. Image
Read 23 tweets
Mar 12
🧵THREAD🧵

Another media conspiracy, this time that Trump attacked a Secret Service agent on Jan 6, imploded yesterday.

Remember when the media—in unison—reported the “bombshell” allegations as fact?

I do. And I’ve got screenshots.⤵️
You’re familiar with the story I suspect but just in case: when former aid Cassidy Hutchinson testified Trump had “lunged” for a secret service steering wheel on Jan. 6, the media rushed to print the salacious (& false) claims as true.

Here’s @NBCNews @CNN @ABC @washingtonpost


Image
Image
Image
Image
Trump was allegedly going to drive himself to the Capitol to take part in the riot.

That’s what @CBSNews @Independent @NPR @NewsHour said.


Image
Image
Image
Image
Read 18 tweets
Mar 7
🧵Thread🧵

Does it feel like the media call the border a “crisis” more lately? You aren’t imagining it.

After dismissing the term as Biden’s border crisis mounted, the press have broken it out to try to blame the GOP. @FreeBeacon

I break it down. ⤵️
freebeacon.com/media/watch-ho…
The new change is stark. I went thru @nytimes digital archive.

Since Biden said the border wasn’t secure in late Jan, “border crisis” appeared in 26 NYT stories, even as crossings declined.

When crossings peaked in Nov & Dec, but there was no one but Biden to blame?

5 mentions
So what changed? Well, Biden empowered the press by saying the border wasn’t secure in late Jan. Then Republicans voted against a “bipartisan” border deal.

After that, the media were off to the races: yes, there was a border crisis, and it was the GOP’s fault. Here’s @CNN.
Image
Image
Read 16 tweets
Mar 5
🧵Thread🧵

What happened to the media’s legal “experts” who said Colorado was right to kick Trump off the ballot? Remember them? I do. @FreeBeacon.

Quick trip down memory lane after even the liberal SCOTUS justices rejected Colorado’s claims. ⤵️
freebeacon.com/media/watch-su…
Here’s a link to the video which is incredible. Lot of media hosts and talking heads were convinced Trump was toast. (H/t @thaleigha_ for making this gem).

The “experts” said so!
Print reporting read the same way.

@nytimes cited an “expert” who said Colorado’s case was “legally sound” and that the only thing that could stop it was politics.

Why, then, did the 3 liberal justices also side against Colorado?
Image
Image
Read 12 tweets

Did Thread Reader help you today?

Support us! We are indie developers!


This site is made by just two indie developers on a laptop doing marketing, support and development! Read more about the story.

Become a Premium Member ($3/month or $30/year) and get exclusive features!

Become Premium

Don't want to be a Premium member but still want to support us?

Make a small donation by buying us coffee ($5) or help with server cost ($10)

Donate via Paypal

Or Donate anonymously using crypto!

Ethereum

0xfe58350B80634f60Fa6Dc149a72b4DFbc17D341E copy

Bitcoin

3ATGMxNzCUFzxpMCHL5sWSt4DVtS8UqXpi copy

Thank you for your support!

Follow Us!

:(