A new poll from Civiqs for Daily Kos shows that voters overwhelmingly know that convicted felon Donald Trump and President Joe Biden are basically the same age. So why does the traditional media keep covering them as if Biden is so much older? And why is the media—looking at you, The New York Times—so obsessed with ignoring the orange elephant in the room: Trump’s brain?
According to the new survey, 73% of registered voters correctly answer the age question saying Biden is a few years older—that includes 81% of regular Fox News viewers (although 5% of them say Biden is more than 10 years older, because Fox). That’s about the same as the 78% of regular MSNBC viewers who correctly identify the small age gap.
But the traditional media remains intent on portraying Biden as knocking on heaven’s door. The Wall Street Journal recently ran a massive hit piece on Biden pushing the GOP narrative in an article titled “Behind Closed Doors, Biden Shows Signs of Slipping.” Their sources? Republicans.
That’s to be expected of Rupert Murdoch’s WSJ, but the Times is hot on its heels in amplifying that narrative. As Daily Kos’ Mark Sumner detailed, the Times “filled every slot on its editorial page with a piece attacking Biden’s age and memory. That didn’t just include the Times’ conservative columnists calling for the president to step down, but the paper’s editorial board jumping in to tell you that Americans think Biden is too old.”
At the same time, the Times was insisting that Trump “does not appear to be suffering the effects of time in such visible ways.” Okaaaay.
That’s mild compared to a recent Times story celebrating Trump’s post-conviction “hypermasculine appeal, and his defiance.”
What the NYT has not been devoting entire editorial pages to talking about is the convicted felon and his bonkers rallies. Like the one in Gettysburg in April. “Gettysburg, wow. I go to Gettysburg, Pennsylvania, to look, and to watch, and, uh, the statement of Robert Lee—who's no longer in favor, did you ever notice that? No longer in favor—’Never fight uphill, me boys. Never fight uphill.’” That’s some serious cofeve.
Nor does the Times talk about Trump’s reverence for the “late great Hannibal Lecter,” and his most recent foray into an off-script existential discussion about whether it’s better to be killed by a shark or electrocution in the water. Not to mention telling the Las Vegas MAGA crowd voters in a daytime rally in a heatwave “I don’t care about you. I just want your vote. I don’t care.”
And no, the Times has nothing to say about that. Six rally attendees were hospitalized for heat exhaustion.
Voters might care about both candidates’ ages, but they know enough about it at this point. What the Times and other traditional media should be talking about is which candidate has the mental fitness—and no criminal convictions—to serve.
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