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AP Suddenly Frets Over Drop Boxes

Brad Slager
Brad Slager  |  Oct 10, 2023
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10.10.23

Pounce of Prevention – ASSOCIATED PRESS

  • While it is the EXACT same story, the party affiliation dictates the coverage.

This is one of those times when media behavior could have fit into a few of our categories. Seeing the AP come around on the drop box controversy could have fallen under our Stealth Story Evolution label, and Both Kinds of Standards could also apply as impressions are dictated by who is involved.

The story, as reported, concerns reports of possible voting shenanigans taking place with these voting locations:

A woman approaches a drop box in the dark with what appears to be handfuls of ballots. At a different drop box, someone else is seen making multiple trips to insert ballots. At yet another, the same car stops on at least three separate occasions, with different people stepping out and heading to the box. It’s not a trailer for the latest conspiracy movie about rigged elections. Instead, the video footage has become central to a real-world controversy over potential fraud involving ballot drop boxes, a favorite target of right-wing conspiracy theorists.

If you picked up on the desperation of this interpretational reporting, it is for good reason. Because this story involves two Democrats vying for a mayoral seat in Connecticut, suddenly there is a recalibration of these accusations. Note when mentioning GOP members making this claim, it is a "conspiracy," but now that Democrats are making the exact same accusations of squirrelly behavior with drop boxes, it suddenly is transformed into a "real-world controversy" within the very same article. 

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The reporters are forced to take wildly divergent positions as a result of the party affiliation. Amazingly, as the Democrats making the accusations brings a newfound concern with drop box voter integrity, at the same time, "Republicans have seized" on the story and are using it to promote their "false narratives"...regarding the exact same accusations with these drop boxes!

Reporting on the Mirror – CNN

  • Meet the new Boss, same directives as the old Boss.

On Monday, CNN began the Mark Thompson era as he began his tenure as the network's new CEO. If you want to get a sense of the editorial approach we might come to expect from his network going forward, this pull quote has him leaning into the contemporary argument from the press used frequently to justify an anti-Republican/conservative position; both-sides-ism is a threat to the "truth":

"Let's not second-guess ourselves or get distracted by complicated arguments about balance or whataboutism or false equivalency. Let's cover political news proportionally and fairly but not be frightened of our own shadows."

Yes, why would you need to present both sides of a story when you as journalists know already what the proper side is to be reported?

Both Kinds of Standards – VARIOUS OUTLETS

  • So, to refresh: Republicans do not get to have "both sides" told, but murderous terrorists are given all the latitude.

On the note of limiting the telling of both sides of the story in the news, remarkably (or predictably), the press is full of enthusiasm regarding telling both sides when it comes to Hamas having just butchered at least 1,100 Israelis with war crime atrocities. 

At ABC News, we are told of the dire conditions Palestinians endured before the airstrikes from Israel in retaliation took place. The outlet was sure to describe the Gaza Strip as one of the poorest places on Earth, as the people basically live in an open-air prison. Left out of their coverage is how the Hamas leadership – who was voted into power in Gaza by these "prisoners" – spend their money on rockets and other armaments rather than building their infrastructure. Most of the utilities in Gaza are supplied by Israel, which has been described as committing genocide when it shut off the power and water after being barbarically attacked by Hamas leadership this weekend.

At NBC News, they delivered a lengthy thread made in order for everyone to be sure that in Gaza, the Palestinians, too, were incurring their share of deaths, and families were also suffering the losses. We must say that sympathy was hard to come by, not only due to the horrific attacks that took place leading to the reprisals but also because those Palestinians danced in the streets Saturday following the carnage.

David Zweig found an instance at NPR where they worked so hard to avoid using the term "terrorist" to describe the barbarism seen in Israel that it contorted the quotes from an Israeli official, cutting away from the passages where he used that word, only to replace it with their own commentary referring to the Hamas killers as "militants" instead.

Then there is the Washington Post, which tried so valiantly to deliver an equal amount of coverage and understanding for "both sides" that it sounded so sympathetic to the Palestinian cause as to be indistinguishable from a Hamas agitprop press release.

Stealth Story Evolution – FORBES

  • Exactly how many hands did this pass through before being greenlighted?

Since Saturday's attacks, it has been a contest between the administration and the media complex to see who could post the most brain-dead posts that would become deleted. Adding to the press pile was Forbes, which delivered this gem of an ill-thought (un-thought?) approach to the Israeli attacks that you needed to wonder just how biased and/or ignorant you need to be to work for that outlet.

Suggesting the retaliatory strikes from Israel are "unprompted" while at the same time acknowledging that Hamas had taken hostages is just perfection.

Artisanally-Crafted Narrative – MSNBC

  • "If we just give these murderers what they want, that should help!"

As if the impacted thinking has not reached its nadir in the media yet, we are in for a long slog! On MSNBC, Katy Tur spoke with global affairs "expert" Jane Harman, who suggested an approach to solving this current crisis – just give in!

She actually suggested that what Israel could do to get the hostages returned is turn over the Gaza Strip to Hamas. 

So…instead of negotiating with terrorists, we'll just surrender to them instead! Surely, this solution will not lead to more attacks and kidnappings, nope!

"Riffed from the Headlines" is Townhall's daily VIP feature with coverage of the deeply flawed aspects of journalism in the nation, where Brad Slager looks to bring accountability to the mishaps, malaprops, misdeeds, manipulations, malpractice, and manufactured narratives in mainstream media.