Friday, January 29, 2021

Mainstream Media Bias is Alive and Well

Cybersecurity Chief, Anne Neuberger (NBC)
When Anne Neuberger was chosen for a high position in the Biden administration, I had expressed pride in the fact that an observant Jewish woman from a Chasidic background was chosen for the job. I still feel that way despite the negative implications about her by the mainstream media. 

In yet another demonstration of mainstream media bias, NBC News ran a story essentially accusing Mrs. Neuberger of dual loyalty.  JNS reports the following: 

Mother Jones and NBC News have faced backlash over publishing articles on Wednesday about a top National Security Council official and her family foundation donating hundreds of thousands of dollars in recent years to the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, or AIPAC.

The stories about Anne Neuberger, the deputy national security adviser for cyber and emerging technology, were first written by David Corn of Mother Jones, and subsequently, by Ken Dilanian of NBC News. 

OK. Mother Jones is about as leftist a media source as one can get. So it is no surprise that they have tried to smear a supporter of Israel with a dual loyalty implication. But NBC? Any claim to unbiased balanced reporting by the mainstream media has yet again been exposed for the lie that it is. 

The Biden administration has slammed such criticism saying the following: 

‘no justification for false and ad hominem attacks based on ethnic, racial, or religious identity,’ after articles targeting Anne Neuberger and Maher Bitar. 

Maher Bitar is of Palestinian heritage. If that is the sole reason he has been criticized that is just as disgusting. My guess is that the criticism of Bitar did not come from the mainstream media. But in the case of Anne Neuberger it did. NBC News is a widely respected mainstream media outlet. When they say something, a lot of people listen.  

It cannot possibly be the case that government officials are not allowed to support causes dear to their heart - as long as it does not support America’s enemies, affect their character, or their work. When that support is for an ally, that should be doubly obvious. Has any public official ever been accused of dual loyalty for donating money to an organization that supports Canada? I doubt it. But when it comes to an Israel the dual loyalty canard is almost always eventually raised somewhere in the mainstream media. This time it was NBC. 

For their part NBC admitted their error, apologized, and transferred that article to their archives with a hyperlink to it in their apology.  Not sure how linking to an article they admitted was tainted constitutes any kind of meaningful apology.  But let us even say it does. That they published it in the first place proves their initial bias. They thought an implicit accusation of dual loyalty by a leftist publication was a legitimate story. 

I am not all that surprised by this. To the mainstream media, supporting Israel is almost unethical. While supporting the Palestinian narrative is not only ethical but virtuous. The truth be damned. The leftist view of reality is that the Palestinian underdog is always right. The left loves to focus on their suffering (which is legitimate) and blame it on the Israeli occupation (which is not legitimate). 

They never even hint at the fact that it is the Palestinian leadership that is at the heart of their suffering. Things like making heroes of terrorist martyrs is a false narrative that nonetheless fosters pride in Palestinians  who see terrorism as a legitimate form of resistance. So that supporting a martyred terrorst’s family with American money is seen as a just use for the money. Even though the US never intended it for that purpose. Obviously. (The Taylor Force Act passed by Congress should prevent that from ever happening again.) 

What about their legitimate suffering? What would surely take them out of their misery and poverty is acceptance of the generous offer by the US to  plow money into their economy. If they would just drop  demands that are impossible for Israel to accept, I believe they could make peace and end their suffering pretty quickly. 

But, no. Their leaders prefer to continue clinging to those impossible demands and back them up with terrorist violence. Israel needs to defend itself from that. Which is one of the reasons Palestinians suffer. The media only looks at their suffering and sees Israel as the cause. Which is why someone supporting Israel is seen by the media with a jaundiced eye.

Thankfully, Biden will have none of that. It’s just too bad the mainstream media won’t follow suit.