Media sad over Biden's great poll numbers
CNN’s John King just said Biden’s “polling numbers are a little better than Donald Trump’s.” Biden is at 55% approval; Trump was at 42%. That's a lot more than a little. So why minimize it?
It’s been a sad weekend for the mainstream media. You see, Joe Biden’s poll numbers have been really good, generally, and way better than anything Trump ever had. So, many in the media have decided to minimize just how good Biden’s numbers really are.
I was watching CNN’s Sunday show yesterday, and did a double take when they suggested that Biden’s numbers just weren’t that good, as they flashed “54% approval” on the screen.
54% isn’t that good? Seriously?
And as I write this on Monday, I’m watching CNN’s John King tell the New York Times’ Maggie Haberman that Biden’s “polling numbers are a little better than Donald Trump’s.” Trump’s approval rating was consistently in the low 40s. Biden’s is now at 55%, according to the latest poll King just showed. How is 13 points better than Trump, and a net positive compared to a net negative, only just a little better?
Other Sunday shows must have been as bad, as there was quite the gnashing of teeth on Twitter last night about how the media didn’t seem to understand that a positive Biden approval rating was actually a good thing.
In CNN’s case, they suggested that Biden’s 54% approval in the first 100 days of his presidency was far below what previous presidents (other than Trump) had. And that meant Biden wasn’t very popular compared to earlier presidents, AND he wasn’t accomplishing his promise of bipartisanship.
Today, CNN’s poll expert Harry Enten pushed back. He noted that Biden’s approval rating hasn’t wavered much in the first three months of his term, while Trump’s, Obama’s and Bush’s all did. Trump’s numbers have always been far below Biden’s, in negative territory, and Bush’s dropped below Biden’s at one point. (In Obama’s case, his approval numbers were always great, but hey, Obama rocks.)
Then, Enten noted that you should look at Biden’s Coronavirus approval rating as compared to Trump. Biden wallops Trump. (Deservedly so.)
One more thing. Biden beat Obama in the 2020 election, 51.3% to 46.9%. If Biden is now at 55% approval, that means Biden convinced an additional ~4% of the voters to support him, even though they didn’t vote for him. There’s a word for that, we call it “bipartisanship.”
We live in an era in which half of Republicans believe that the January 6th attack on the US Capitol building was peaceful (it wasn’t) and perpetrated by left-wing activists (it wasn’t). And a majority of Republicans still believe the election was “stolen” from Trump (it wasn’t). We’re not dealing with sane people here, and we’re not dealing with the same electorate that Barack Obama or George W. Bush faced. It’s absurd to suggest that Joe Biden is somehow “less popular” than George Bush or Barack Obama when the very definition of a popular president has changed since their time.
For nearly thirty years now, Republican politicians, and their enablers at Fox News, talk radio, and online, have perfected the art of the lie with a GOP electorate that is as gullible as it is yearning for an iron first. Republican leaders quickly learned that their voter base was unusually susceptible to lies. Then Trump went even further, finding that the GOP electorate also likes a sprinkle of fascism on top of its dishonesty. How is a Democratic president to govern people so willfully disconnected from reality, and more generally, so un-American in their political outlook?
Suggesting that Joe Biden isn’t very popular because the Republican electorate has lost its mind is as dishonest as claiming that Biden hasn’t been bipartisan enough because Republican politicians refuse to compromise with him on anything.
Finally, there’s the issue of why the media is even playing this game. I suspect, sadly, that they’re suffering from Trump whiplash. The media was so critical of Trump — deservedly so (over half a million Covid deaths come to mind, as does Trump firing Comey to hinder the FBI’s Russia probe) — that they now feel they have to find fault with Biden, even if they have to stretch the truth to find it.
After four years of Trump, you’d think American journalists would have learned. You’d be wrong.
Other Interesting Stuff
An amazing tornado photo from yesterday:
Rick Santorum doesn’t seem to understand what happened to Native Americans:
Speaking of which, Turkey’s neo-fascist dictator is lobbing silly threats:
Republicans have created a new lie about President Biden:
A Republican Senator (who’s a doctor, no less) complains that Democrats need to give Republicans “an incentive” to get vaccinated. Here’s one: Don’t die.
This is a neat new Google ad:
I was flying to Chicago yesterday to finally see mom after 18 months of Covid quarantine, and the woman next to me kept letting her mask slide below her nose, while the flight attendants said nothing. I mentioned it on Twitter, and someone sent me this:
And finally, this is apparently a popular sandwich in the United Kingdom. Twitter was unimpressed:
It’s a beautiful day today in Chicago. Taking the dogs for a walk in a bit, when it hits a balmy 75 outside. (Hey, it’s Chicago in April.) Enjoy the day wherever. I’ll be back later this week.
JOHN
PS Sasha was a very good girl at the airport gate on the way to Chicago yesterday:
Great piece. And let's remember, after Trump became President the media bent over backwards to give him the benefit of the doubt. It took them years to be consistently accurate and call out the Republican lies and incompetence. And when Biden passes and promotes legislation that is broadly popular among Democrats AND Republicans, that's bipartisan!