Do you remember how bad the media’s “Covid lab leak” - the hypothesis that the virus came from a lab - coverage was?
I thought I did. But it was a more dramatic example of uniform media malpractice than even I remembered.
So I revisited it. Buckle in, it’s long. ⤵️
It started in Feb 2020 when @SenTomCotton suggested looking into the CCP lab studying bats near the initial cases in Wuhan.
The media were outraged. In a since-updated piece, @washingtonpost said the idea was a “conspiracy theory that has been repeatedly debunked by experts.”
It wasn’t just WaPo. Shortly thereafter, @nytimes trotted out a similar allegation, calling the lab leak hypothesis a “fringe theory” and a “tale” designed to inflame social media.
@CNN’s @ChrisCillizza said Cotton was “playing a dangerous game” with his suggestions.
@USATODAY, in a since-updated fact check, said that Cotton’s claims were “false” because “overwhelming scientific evidence” said so.
A quick pause here to point something out. What the media were up in arms about wasn’t the veracity of the lab leak idea.
Just that people thought it was *plausible*. That it “may” be true, as @SenTomCotton said.
Look how close the lab is to the first cases. “May” is too much?
Anyway, back to the coverage. This was the dawn of what I like to call “experts say” reporting, where an outlet finds someone with credentials who agrees with them to make the point the outlet wants to make.
Here’s @NatGeo, @Forbes, @CBSNews & @washingtonpost doing that here.
There were some even more dramatic examples I want to call out.
Maybe my all time favorite is from @NPR who, with the confidence that only that station posses, claimed that the lab leak theory had been “debunked” in April 2020.
This @ABC headline presented without comment
It was really a banner time period for outlets using “fact checkers” as a political weapon with no connection to facts, as @CNN does here.
The word of the year had to be “debunked,” which many outlets seemed to believe meant “we don’t like this idea.”
It’s impossible to ignore how this story intersects with Trump & his admin.
Once he said he believed the lab leak idea, the press decided it must be a lie.
Some really rich headlines here from @business (really?), @VICE (remember them?), @CNN (“crushed”!) and @BusinessInsider.
It’s really the condescending tone here from @chrislhayes that gets me.
Apropos of absolutely nothing, I want to remind you that @NPR is funded in part by your tax dollars.
More on your tax dollars soon.
Just a quick aside. The press at the time purported to be very upset that Trump was using the same language that they had used a few weeks before, to describe the virus as Chinese.
Here’s @CNN.
Then a poll came out finding that lots of people believed the lab leak theory: about a third of Americans.
The press leapt to tar the believers as rubes & the people who convinced them as charlatans.
There’s a lot of this but a few from @CNN, @Forbes, @voxdotcom & @thehill.
One moment you may’ve forgotten: in April 2020, Trump stopped US funding to the lab in question in Wuhan.
Read: up until then, your tax dollars were paying for dubious research in an autocratic regime that maybe started a plague.
Naturally the media applauded that move, right?
Wrong. The press were incensed Trump would stop giving your tax dollars to a shady lab in China.
@CBSNews said it was “jeopardizing” a Covid cure. @nytimes did much the same. @ABC blamed the bad move on “conspiracy theories” as @VanityFair pointed to “right-wing disinformation.”
One phenomenon that really stuck with me is how the press elevated China’s claims in an effort to, I presume, stick it to Trump.
Look at how @nytimes, @CNN and @TIME put the U.S. and China on equal believability footings.
This wasn’t a mere momentary blip. All the way until December, @AP was writing up the lab leak as a conspiracy theory that survived online “despite facts.”
Right.
The enormous irony of the @AP story about Covid “conspiracy theories” is the image that accompanies it.
“Wear a mask outside” the 1984-esq wall art reads.
The real facts aren’t as hospitable to what the media was claiming in 2020.
Further investigation into the lab leak in 2021 gave the idea a respectability even the mainstream media couldn’t ignore. They started to change their tune. Here’s @nytimes
Then in 2023 Biden’s own Department of Energy said that the lab leak theory was the most likely explanation for Covid’s origins.
The side-by-sides of the original reporting vs the newly indisputable facts are what I see when I close my eyes at this point. @NPR
You probably don’t need me to spell it out for you, but you really can’t overstate the impact of the failure. When we should’ve been investigating what happened, the press had given social media platforms cover to censor the mere mention of the lab leak.
The media cheered along.
As a result of the media refusing to consider a politically inconvenient idea — and their need to throttle its very mention — we may never definitively know what caused a pandemic that’s killed millions and irrevocably changed the course of modern life.
And it may mean that some people get off scot-free for what they’ve done to play a role in that disaster.
Hard to imagine that wasn’t the goal all along, in my humble opinion.
There’s a lot more to this story than I could fit into a thread.
As @joshrogin rightly notes, I was remiss to not mention that not everyone in the media got to the story wrong. Josh was one of the real bright spots in media coverage of this episode, like this piece from April: washingtonpost.com/opinions/2020/…
If you enjoyed this thread, I would really encourage you to subscribe to my newsletter, @holden_court.
In the coming days, I’m planning to announce more opportunities to discuss this and other reporting that I’ll be offering for free for a limited time. open.substack.com/pub/drewholden…
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Whatever happened to Harris and Biden’s “strongest economy ever” that the media spent so much time hyping up in the lead up to the election?
I revisit the claims, and explain why they were off the mark about the economy all along, in my latest @AmerCompass.
Quick🧵thread🧵⤵️
It can be easy, in the wake of an election, to forget just how dominant a media narrative was.
One that’s already fading from view was how “great” the economy was, and why it would benefit Harris on Election Day. americancompass.org/its-still-the-…
As a refresher, check out this headline from @axios about the data.
@YahooFinance upgraded Biden’s economic grade to an A. That captures the press sentiment at the time quite well.
In recent days, the mainstream media has taken nakedly ridiculous claims about the tattoos of @PeteHegseth, Trump’s SecDef nominee, to spin up a story alleging he’s an extremist.
It’s an egregious example of politically driven “journalism.” I unpack why. ⤵️
The story really started with @AP, who ran an article claiming that two tattoos that @PeteHegseth has have ties to extremism, citing an extremely thin (and downright suspect) report.
They used that to label him a potential “insider threat” in their headline.
It wasn’t until 3 paragraphs in that a reader was told what that claim rested on: a tattoo of a Latin phrase. They’d go on to mention “concerns” about a cross tattoo as well.
Would be great if Trump’s unconventional picks for his cabinet inspire the media to consider a nominee’s credentials.
They might want to look at the current HHS Secretary, Xavier Becerra, who brings to the table the medical experience of being in Congress for 12 terms.
Or perhaps Obama’s former HHS Secretary, Sylvia Matthews Burwell, who had just finished her stint lobbying for Walmart.
Or Donna Shalala, Clinton’s former head of HHS, whose credentials were as a university administrator and feminist.
I know it seems silly, but the media meltdown about Trump working at a McDonald’s is clarifying about why trust in the press has cratered.
Before we get to that, let’s revisit some of the most deranged takes. ⤵️
The press’s response to Trump deciding to troll Harris for her unsupported claims that she worked at McDonald’s by working at the chain himself sent the media into a tizzy.
Here’s @CNN, suddenly apologetic about a corporation in the political limelight.
My favorite take came from @nytimes, who appeared outraged that…Trump didn’t wear a hairnet.
The media is already trying to memory-hole the (first) attempted assassination of former President Trump.
I suspect many of you have felt it happening, but I walked through the details for The Spectator, and wanted to share some of them here.
Follow along ⤵️
First, I just want to level-set to make sure I’m not crazy.
Someone tried to kill the former POTUS, who, according to a variety of polls, is the odds-on favorite to return to that office. Tons of details didn’t make sense.
Seems like the press story of the year, right?
Well…
So far, the press doesn’t seem to think so.
It started as soon as the shots rang out. Do you remember how bad & unhelpful the headlines were?
I’ve got screenshots. @USATODAY @NBCNews (“popping noises”) @CNN (“injured in incident”) @latimes (“loud noises want through the crowd”)