But The New York Times covers it by burying it in the 13th paragraph of a story about President Trump's overnight Twitter barrage. The Washington Post has a front-page story that leads with the Biden statement -- the headline is "Biden Accuses Trump of ‘Recklessly Encouraging Violence’ in Response to Portland Shooting" -- but only the first two paragraphs of the story are devoted to Biden's words, while the other 19 paragraphs are about Trump's tweetstorm, other reactions to Trump's statements, and assertions from Trump surrogates. And this story ostensibly about Biden is illustrated by a photo of Trump with his wife and Don Junior at the White House on Thursday. Trump is raising a proud clenched fist.
Why did Hillary Clinton lose in 2016? She lost for many reasons, but one was the media's willingness to let her opponent Bigfoot his way to a disproportionate share of press coverage. Trump was seen as great copy and great television, so the media yielded the floor to him every time he beat his chest and demanded attention, dismissing most efforts by Clinton to Change the subject to serious issues. And here we are.
CNN, to be fair, has a story that really is about the Biden statement. But the Times and the Post are falling into the old traps. Is that how it's going to be until November?
No comments:
Post a Comment