I remember being shocked that the liberal media actually gave substantial coverage to Joe Biden's botched withdrawal from Afghanistan in August 2021. It was truly a watershed moment of Biden's presidency that sent his approval ratings into negative territory for the first time. Biden has never recovered from that moment, and indeed, his poll numbers have only gotten worse, reaching new lows as he seeks a second term in the White House.
Liberal media outlets have made it their job to defend him and his presidency, excuse his mental lapses, and claim that the economy is in good shape. Yet after the release of the special counsel report on his mishandling of classified documents, many outlets that have been reliably defending him for years couldn't deny the disaster that the report created for Biden.
It was amazing. Yet at the same time, there were still plenty of media pundits defending Joe Biden and making excuses for the contents of the report and the disastrous speech he gave Thursday night.
"[S]ome of the things that people are now putting on him as age are things that may have been exacerbated by age, but it's also how he is, right?" CNN's Erin Burnett said in response to the report. "He's very open about how he has struggled in life, right, with a stutter. He is someone who often has gone down verbal cul-de-sacs and meandered into another story. That's part of who he is; that's his brand for the past 50 years."
Really? Biden's poor memory is part of "his brand?" Is that the most ridiculous thing you've ever heard? Oh wait, she wasn't done.
"Right now, people see some of those things in a different light," she continued. "How is he supposed to overcome that when that's actually kind of who he is?"
And believe it or not, CNN's John King agreed with her. "I think the reason — the way he has overcome it for 40-plus years is to let people see it will see a lot of it, see a lot of it. So you realize some of it just is baked in, as you said."
"Yeah," Burnett agreed.
"The stutter, God bless him," King continued. "I mean, the man deserves a lot of credit for fighting through that in a very public way with a camera aimed at him every second of every day, for someone to go through that and put up with it. It takes a lot of courage and he just whether you're Democrat, Republican, independent, you people with hardships have to deal with hardships. He deserves a ton of credit for that."
First of all, it's hard to wrap my head around the fact that they are conflating Biden's stutter with his poor memory as if they're the same problem and suggesting that we ought to be celebrating Biden for his bravery, not terrified that he is essentially the most powerful man in the world.
Ahead of Biden's address, CNN Erin Burnett defends his "verbal cul-de-sacs" and how he "meanders into another story" as just "his brand for last 50 years."
— Nicholas Fondacaro (@NickFondacaro) February 9, 2024
She whines, "How is he supposed to overcome" how people see him now "when that is who he is?" pic.twitter.com/DJkkOuxNnl
And then there was public self-pleasurer Jeffrey Toobin's defense of Biden.
"By the way, it was outrageous that Hur put in some of that stuff in this report," he said. "That had no place in it. There is no reason why this report had to be 300 pages. There is no reason why this fairly straightforward case had to be treated this way."
Toobin: It was outrageous that Herr put in some of that stuff in this report. That had no place in it. There's no reason why this report had to be 300 pages. There is no reason why this fairly straightforward case had to be treated this way. The job is to put up or shut up pic.twitter.com/QkzMDmsmJL
— Biden-Harris HQ (@BidenHQ) February 9, 2024
And don't get me started on MSNBC.
MSNBC panel: How dare that “partisan” special counsel launch "cheap shot, derogatory attacks" against Biden by saying he has a "poor memory." pic.twitter.com/uQ9RD5uuJ0
— Townhall.com (@townhallcom) February 9, 2024
The response to his speech wasn't much better. While most reasonable people recognize it was a disaster, Biden's loyal defenders in the media defended him.
"That is a pretty effective performance by Biden," Jonathan Chait of New York Magazine claimed.
Really?
CNN contributor Kate Bedingfield, who previously served as Biden's White House Communications Director, dismissed Biden's mistaking Egyptian leader Abdel Fattah al-Sisi as the “president of Mexico” as not being a big deal.
"Was it a perfect answer? Is it great to misspeak? No, it's never great to misspeak," she conceded. "I promise everybody on this panel, right now has misspoken and said the wrong name or the wrong -- you know the wrong date in a conversation. But, you know, he is explaining in great detail the work that he's doing to try to ease that crisis. And so I don't think that we should lose sight of the fact that he is explaining the work that he is doing as president and get so hung up on one word."
CNN is now defending Biden for thinking that Mexico is on the border of Gaza
— End Wokeness (@EndWokeness) February 9, 2024
"Everybody here has misspoken!" pic.twitter.com/zS9um6bd0K
It is certainly true that everyone has misspoken at times. But only Biden can say he confused Egypt with Mexico during a press conference he called to quell concerns that he is cognitively impaired — especially in the same week he twice claimed to have spoken with world leaders who were dead.
