During the recent White House Correspondents Dinner, Alex Thompson, currently at Axios, steps up to accept the Aldo Beckham Award for Overall Excellence and says that the media did a poor job covering President Biden’s mental and physical decline during the final years of his presidency. The one thing he says that really sticks out to me, something for which he should be somewhat commended, is that “admitting error builds trust.”
Sadly, while he does “admit error” and say that the media didn’t do a good job of covering that particular story, he doesn’t go so far as to admit that not covering that story was, in many cases, a conscious choice. He instead puts the blame on the people around President Biden in the White House who “hid” the story from everyone.
In my opinion, the White House did a piss poor job of hiding things. It was obvious to most casual observers that something was wrong with the president. The media not only chose to ignore those things, but accused people who didn’t choose to ignore it of being conspiracy theorists, and went along with the White House when its press office said video evidence of the president’s confusion were deceptively edited or wholly fabricated.
I hate to give people any credit for a half-assed effort, but it is nice to see someone at least saying “we pulled a boner and need to do better.”
h/t jubbergun
