AMERICA’S REPORTERS AND EDITORS ARE LIARS

BY JOHN HINDERAKER IN MEDIA BIAS

It is impossible to overstate how low “journalism” has fallen in the United States. Becket Adams, in the Examiner, gives us a classic example.

In her press briefing yesterday, White House Press Secretary Kayleigh McEnany said:

The president has said, unmistakably, that he wants schools to open. And I was just in the [Oval Office] talking to him about that. And when he says “open,” he means, “open in full” – kids being able to attend each and every day at their school.

The science should not stand in the way of this. And as Dr. Scott Atlas, and I thought this was a good quote, [said], “Of course we can do it. Everyone else in the western world, our peer nations, are doing it. We are the outlier here.” The science is very clear on this that, for instance, you look at the [Journal of the American Medical Association] pediatric study of 46 pediatric hospitals in North America that said the risk of critical illness from COVID is far less for children than that of seasonal flu.

The science is on our side here. We encourage for localities and states to just simply follow the science. Open our schools.

Got that? The science supports the president’s view that we should open the schools. (Which it certainly does, by the way.) So how did the press report these remarks?

CNN’s Ana Cabrera claimed, “WH Press Secretary: ‘When he (Trump) says open, he means open – in full – kids being able to attend each and every day at their school,’ McEnany told reporters at the press briefing. ‘The science should not stand in the way of this.’”

“From the White House podium: ‘Science should not stand in the way’ of reopening schools,” CBS News White House correspondent Weijia Jiang said elsewhere.

Reporter Jim Heath, who brags in his Twitter media profile that he is a Walter Cronkite Award-winner, said, “‘The science should not stand in the way of this.’ You just can’t make this stuff up. 108 days until the election.”

“‘The science should not stand in the way of this,’ [McEnany] says of fully re-opening schools,” said NBC News’s Josh Lederman.

The Daily Beast claimed in its headline from the briefing, “Kayleigh McEnany: ‘Science Should Not Stand in the Way’ of Reopening Schools.”

Tweeted CBS News, “McEnany: ‘The president has said unmistakably that he wants schools to open…When he says open, he means open and full, kids being able to attend each and every day at their school. The science should not stand in the way of this.’”

“The White House press secretary says ‘science should not stand in the way’ of reopening schools,” the New York Times claimed in the headline to a live blog post.

The Guardian similarly claimed on its live blog, “White House: ‘The science should not stand in the way’ of reopening schools.”

“White House press secretary Kayleigh McEnany on school reopenings: ‘The science should not stand in the way of this,’” said the Washington Post’s official Twitter account.

The Washington Post also published a headline that reads, “‘The science should not stand in the way’ of schools reopening, White House press secretary says.”

A sound adage holds that you should never assume malice when stupidity is a sufficient explanation. Here, the only explanation is malice. No one is as stupid as America’s reporters and editors pretend to be. The sooner their companies go out of business, the better.

https://www.powerlineblog.com/archives/2020/07/americas-reporters-and-editors-are-liars.php