NEWS AND OPINION:
A historic perspective sometimes provides a helpful reality check about bias in the mainstream news media. Consider this:
“If Donald Trump or George W. Bush had a continuing hostage crisis that had lasted well over 100 days, you can bet the leftist media would plaster their shows with criticism of those administrations, probably punctuated with on-screen graphics counting how many days the Americans have been held captive. Something like: ‘Americans Held Hostage: Day 117,’” wrote Geoffrey Dickens, director of media analysis for Newsbusters.org, a conservative press watchdog.
“So with six American hostages still being held captive by Hamas, how much time (in just the month of January) have the networks aired blaming President Joe Biden and his administration for not having brought them home? Just 28 seconds,” Mr. Dickens said.
And the source of these revelations?
A team of analysts monitored the coverage focused on Americans held captive by Hamas terrorists that aired in January on ABC, CBS, NBC evening, morning and Sunday news shows. They found that the networks spent a total of 18 minutes, 6 seconds on this crisis.
“Of those 18 minutes, only 28 seconds of criticism of President Biden or his administration was aired. Even then the critiques weren’t very strong,” Mr. Dickens said.
“In terms of coverage devoted to the American hostages overall, NBC aired the most in January (13 minutes, 8 seconds), ABC spent 3 minutes, 53 seconds on the captive Americans. CBS only spent 1 minute, 5 seconds on the American hostages and their families’ pleas for help,” he noted.
“The ordeal is horrific, but make no mistake — if a Republican was in the White House the networks would be exploiting the hostage crisis for partisan reasons. The fact that they’ve been reluctant to criticize Joe Biden demonstrates how much they are in the tank for his re-election,” Mr. Dickens concluded.
SECURITY FRAMEWORK
Americans for Prosperity has released a comprehensive new border security and visa reform policy framework titled “Four Pillars of Border Security and Visa Reform.”
The new guidelines outline “foundational policy principles to guide lawmakers who are deliberating on solutions to address the crisis at the southern border and restore confidence in our nation’s immigration system,” according to a written statement.
“The United States must prioritize attracting the best minds from around the world to secure its leadership position and shape the ethical trajectory of these transformative technologies, the guidelines advised.
The outreach also calls for establishing “clear and predictable rules” in border matters.
“Our current immigration system, with its selectively enforced, confusing, and constantly changing regulations, incentivizes bad actors while penalizing law-abiding individuals. We must simplify these rules to create a system that benefits honest people while holding dangerous and unscrupulous individuals accountable,” the guidelines said. They also call for “transparency, accountability, and due process” — and suggest that regularly issued reports from the Department of Homeland Security should be both precise and easy to understand.
Who spoke at this event? The following Republican lawmakers gave remarks on the need to end the national security and humanitarian crisis at the southern border, from a list supplied by the host organization:
Reps. Cliff Bentz of Oregon, Jodey Arrington of Texas, Don Bacon of Nebraska, Jake LaTurner of Kansas, Chuck Fleischmann of Tennessee, Kelly Armstrong of North Dakota, Beth Van Duyne of Texas, Andy Harris of Maryland, Eric Burlison of Missouri, John Rutherford of Florida, Juan Ciscomani of Arizona, Mariannette Miller-Meeks of Iowa, Kat Cammack of Florida, Lisa McClain of Michigan, Rich McCormick of Georgia, Monica de la Cruz of Texas, Ryan Zinke of Montana and Dan Newhouse of Washington.
Find Americans for Prosperity — home to 4 million members in the 50 states — at Americansforprosperity.org.
NEVER A DULL MOMENT
“A ‘potentially hazardous’ football stadium-size asteroid will zip safely past Earth on Friday, and, in doing so, will reach its closest point to our planet for more than 100 years. It will also be at least several centuries before the space rock ever gets this close to us again,” reports LiveScience.com, an interesting news site.
“The massive asteroid, named 2008 OS7, is around 890 feet across and will pass by Earth at a distance of around 1.77 million miles, according to NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory. For context, that is more than seven times further away than the moon orbits Earth,” the news organization said.
Peek at the passing asteroid at Virtualtelescope.eu.
WEEKEND REAL ESTATE
For sale: Rock Mill, a Federal-style house built in 1810 on 326 acres in Jewell, Georgia. Eight bedrooms, four baths, living room, study, two parlors, recreation room, soaring original ceilings, wide-plank wood flooring and plasterwork, 12 fireplaces, “meticulous restoration”; 8,100 square feet. Property includes a “generous rocking chair” porch, three guesthouses with full kitchens, stables with nine stalls, two large storage buildings, four ponds, stream and pasture. Priced at $4.9 million through Meybohm.com; enter 516342 in the search function.
POLL DU JOUR
• 34% of registered U.S. voters would describe the state of the nation’s economy as “poor”; 55% of Republicans, 33% of independents and 10% of Democrats agree.
• 42% of Hispanics, 34% of Whites and 27% of Blacks also agree.
• 29% overall would describe the economy as “not so good”; 33% of Republicans, 30% of independents and 22% of Democrats agree.
• 26% of Hispanics, 28% of whites and 30% of Blacks also agree.
• 30% overall would describe the economy as “good”; 10% of Republicans, 32% of independents and 53% of Democrats agree.
• 27% of Hispanics, 31% of Whites and 33% of Blacks also agree.
• 6% overall would describe the economy as “excellent”; 1% of Republicans, 5% of independents and 14% of Democrats agree.
• 4% of Hispanics, 7% of Whites and 9% of Blacks also agree.
SOURCE: A Quinnipiac University poll of 1,852 U.S. adults conducted Jan. 25-29.
• Follow Jennifer Harper on X @HarperBulletin and on Facebook @HarperUniverse.