@NYGovCuomo thinks he can survive the bombshell report about his sexual misconduct from his own state AG because lots of corporate media outlets have worked hard to deceive the country into thinking Gov. Cuomo is a hero.
Don’t remember? Read on ⤵️
The only place to start is with @CNN, where Cuomo’s brother @ChrisCuomo works.
I’m sure you all remember what the love fest looked like back then. This is meant to be straight news coverage!
And of course it wasn’t just the network. There were plenty of their main voices who chimed in.
Perhaps the staunchest supporter proved to be @ananavarro, even after the sexual harassment allegations surfaced.
This quote from @ChrisCillizza always gets me, and I couldn’t not include it here.
Is it any wonder that one of @NYGovCuomo’s biggest cheerleaders throughout the process was his brother @ChrisCuomo?
The “Luv Guv dishing the real 24/7” quote didn’t quite hold up.
But CNN was far from alone among the broadcast networks. @MSNBC worked overtime to get Cuomo on and carried water for him even well after some of his scandals had started to come to light.
And like CNN, their leading voices were all-aboard the Cuomo train.
Here’s @JoyAnnReid providing a timely reminder that worshipping politicians is always bad but is particularly harmful when you’re meant to cover them.
It wasn’t just broadcast. Here’s a quote that’s always stuck with me from @washingtonpost writers @sarahellison and @bterris (straight news, not an opinion, mind you) that Cuomo is “the strongman who can admit he’s wrong.”
Some of the coverage from @nytimes about Cuomo was commendable and has held up well in retrospect.
Some of it has…well, not so much.
Here’s @NPR doing much of the same: applauding @NYGovCuomo’s personality traits.
NPR, do you still stand by Cuomo as someone “listening to the experts and sticking to the facts” as he rejects calls to step down?
A lot of what was written was too generous to even pass for PR. I mean it was just one long vanity project by Cuomo, with the press doing his bidding at seemingly every turn.
I’m running out of words to describe how over the top the media adulation of @NYGovCuomo was but I haven’t run out of outlets, unfortunately. @DEADLINE, @enews, @TODAYshow
Could anyone forget the evolution of the “Cuomosexuals” during all this? @latimes did a whole piece about it.
Is it any wonder that media outlets reporting on how the Governor had inspired a new sexuality were willing to look away from his scandals?
There are a bunch of others like this that I don’t have space to feature on their own or the mental strength remaining to analyze, including:
Some outlets didn’t take the bait. There was great coverage from a number of publications, including @NewYorker and @propublica, as well as both conservative outlets like NY Post and @WSJ, and local outlets (@NY1 and many others).
The real story was out there all along.
Despite that, plenty of opinion writers went to great lengths to make Cuomo into a hero that he wasn’t. Here’s thread favorite @JRubinBlogger.
I’m not sure that “empathy” is the word that comes to mind in all this, @maureendowd.
The entire Cuomo experience was a pretty good litmus test, though, of the outlets and voices who simply weren’t discriminating enough in their coverage of a public figure.
And speaking of, the funny people were, well, not exactly speaking truth to power. There were others but the worst of it was really led by @TheDailyShow.
I mean, based on what @NYGovCuomo has said about sexual harassment in the workplace, I don’t see how he can do anything but resign.
But what we can’t lose in all of this is that @NYGovCuomo is also responsible for the deaths of thousands of seniors across New York because of his disastrous handling of coronavirus. He’s escaped accountability to date.
Hopefully this development will bring attention to that.
The most important role of the press is to serve as a watchdog over people and institutions in power. The corporate press came down with a serious case of Stockholm Syndrome when it comes to @NYGovCuomo.
The results shouldn’t shock us.
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With the news that Trump freed the hostages and brokered an Israel/Hamas ceasefire, I thought it would be a good time to check in on the folks who compared the president to Hitler over the last few years, for reasons that I hope are obvious to you.
Remember? ⤵️
You may think the “Trump is literally Hitler” phrase is just a silly joke.
But for years, media outlets and left-wing voices on the internet have insisted that, no, really, Trump is just like Hitler.
Few have done so with as much gusto as @CNN.
Back in 2016, @CNN alleged that Trump rallies were just like Hitler rallies because…Trump had attendees raise their right hands.
A newly declassified CIA report on Joe Biden & Ukraine blows the doors off claims from the legacy press, in the lead up to the 2020 election and beyond, that Trump was pushing a “conspiracy theory” about Biden’s corruption.
Remember how the press buried Burisma? ⤵️
First, the facts. The report unearths how Biden blocked the release of intel from Ukrainian sources validating allegations of bribery tied to Biden’s diplomatic push to oust a prosecutor there in 2015, tied to his son Hunter’s work with the gas company Burisma.
You may remember this story because Biden’s having helped oust a prosecutor in a foreign country to allegedly protect his family’s corruption came up in the 2020 election.
To hear @ABC tell it, that was a “debunked Ukraine conspiracy theory.”
The media are melting down about former FBI director Jim Comey’s indictment, calling it Trump’s “retribution.”
But if prosecuting a political rival is such an outrage, why’d they cheer along when Biden went after Trump, Bannon & Navarro?
Some side-by-sides ⤵️
I want you to help me spot the difference in tone.
With Comey, @CNN put five — five! — reporters on the byline to declare the indictment was an “escalation” in “Trump’s effort to prosecute his political enemies.”
Where was that when Biden’s DOJ indicted Bannon? “A victory”
And @CNN wasn’t any better on Peter Navarro, another Trump aide indicted under Biden.
Rather than an “effort to prosecute…political enemies,” CNN quoted the prosecutor to tell the story.
Why is the claim of the government the framing of the piece under Biden? I have a guess.
The outrage over Kimmel’s canning is incredibly stupid, but it’s also enormously rich coming from the same media outlets who have cheered the government actually censoring people, particularly during COVID.
Let me know if you can spot the difference in tone? ⤵️
This @CNN headline made me think this story needed a thread.
Kimmel’s suspension is “straight from a European strongman’s playbook,” per @CNN’s @brianstelter.
When Biden cracked down on free speech during Covid, CNN hyped up the effort.
Few promoted the government’s actual attack on free speech more aggressively than the same @brianstelter now calling a comedian’s shelving evidence of autocracy, or something.
I know there’s a lot going on but we just had a media conspiracy implode that I think captures something important about the corporate press.
Did you hear about how Trump was allegedly going after John Bolton as retribution for his criticism?
Well…follow along ⤵️
We saw a week straight of media suggestions that Trump was abusing the powers of the state to deal out “retribution” to John Bolton following the news that the FBI (“Trump’s DOJ!” headlines rang out) raided his house.
We were in “unsettling” times, to hear @nytimes tell it.
The *Editorial Board* at @nytimes put out an even more dramatic statement, asking who Trump’s next payback victim after Bolton would be.
A single poll has bootstrapped a media narrative that DC residents are outraged by Trump’s takeover.
I poked around the cross tabs of the poll — of 600 or so of DC’s more comfortable residents — and I think it’s pretty suspect.
How come? Follow along: ⤵️
Let’s start with the poll. The @washingtonpost talked to 604 people, of whom 90% — 90%! — self-described as living in “very good” or “good” neighborhoods.
So, fine. 80% of people who like where they live in DC are upset.
But even beyond that, it’s worth asking whether this poll really captures DC’s opinion.
In the poll, only 31% describe crime as a “serious” or “very serious” problem in DC.
When @washingtonpost asked this same question in May, *50%* said it was a serious problem.