The Taliban's rapid rise to power after President Biden's poorly-planned withdrawal of American troops from Afghanistan is a humanitarian disaster for the people of that country, especially women and children; a potential death sentence for the thousands of Afghans who helped U.S. forces during the past 20 years; a strategic debacle for the U.S.; and a moment of sick celebration for radical terrorists all over the world.
So what would you call a journalist who’s so shameless that they’ll actually defend these catastrophic policy blunders from the Biden administration?
Unfortunately, that’s not the setup to a joke, and there are multiple correct answers: MSNBC’s Joy Reid, CNN’s Brian Stelter, Salon politics reporter Amanda Marcotte, professional Biden compliment dispenser Matthew Dowd. All of them (and more) continue to dig in their heels and insist that things in Afghanistan are proceeding in an acceptable, even praiseworthy fashion.
On the August 17 edition of MSNBC’s The ReidOut, host Joy Reid resorted to tone-deaf whataboutism in defense of the President: “What about the 626,000 Americans who died of COVID because of Donald Trump?”
Her attempt the following evening was no less embarrassing: “President Biden stands firm on his decision on Afghanistan, while Republicans pretend that they got everything exactly right for the past four years.”
The Biden defenders are also lashing out at their colleagues in the media who are accurately reporting on the Afghanistan disaster. On the August 22 edition of CNN’s Reliable Sources, host Brian Stelter pondered: “Has the coverage been out of proportion, out of step, with the American public?”
Stelter’s guest, Republican strategist-turned-anti-Republican pundit Matthew Dowd, complained that the media’s reaction was “way over the top, and unconnected to a perspective on the issue from the beginning.” His co-panelist, Salon senior politics writer Amanda Marcotte, agreed: “It disappoints me that the press is behaving in this way.”
Dowd has been back on CNN several times since, and each appearance has been more laden with praise for Biden than the last. On Tuesday's Erin Burnett OutFront, he further disgraced himself:
[Biden] has done an extremely good job in this situation… I actually think the President, for what he was dealt and what he has done over the course of the last week, should be congratulated on the way this was done. Now, there’s many things left to handle over the course of this situation. I think the President’s done unbelievable yeoman’s work.
If there’s anything good that’s come of the whole Afghanistan debacle, it’s that the true hacks in the news media have exposed themselves in their fumbling attempts to shield the Biden administration from blame.
