The Beltway media is churning over the collapse of Afghanistan, covering the scenes of crowds (mostly unattached men, have you noticed?) rushing the Kabul airport attempting to flee from their country. Their question of why we didn't know beforehand that the Afghan military and government would disappear like smoke in a high wind is a fair one. But, as the WaPo's media columnist Margaret Sullivan points out, their rush to assign blame lacks perspective:
"If ever a big, breaking story demanded that the news media provide historical context and carefully avoid partisan blame, it’s the story of the fall of Afghanistan to the Taliban.
Instead, what we largely got over the past few days was the all-too-familiar genre of 'winners and losers' coverage. It’s coverage that tends to elevate and amplify punditry over news, and to assign long-lasting political ramifications to a still-developing situation.
And when news consumers have been tuned out of a story — as they are, unfortunately, with most international coverage — this quick-take journalism can be damaging and misleading.
Evidence of this nuance-deprived, overstated coverage was obvious throughout big and small news organizations over the weekend and across the political spectrum." (our emphasis)
In a media environment that prizes and rewards "hot takes," sound-bite analysis and scoops, it's not surprising that this is occurring. Yesterday, after President Biden's speech (which most media tellingly called "defiant") in which he accepted responsibility for overestimating the time it would take for the Afghan military and government to fall, MSNBC's Nicole Wallace had this observation about the disconnect between public sentiment and media / political critics:
"Ninety-five percent of the American people will agree with everything he just said. Ninety-five percent of the press covering this White House will disagree."
While that's not always a good thing, it serves to highlight the war fatigue that this country has. The task ahead, as we've pointed out, is to manage a bad situation by extracting our citizens and as many of the Afghans who helped us over the last 20 years as humanly possible (to hell with the visa bullshit), while protecting our remaining forces. If that can be done in the days and weeks ahead, and the Taliban remains hands-off, that will be a "win" as the Beltway media might put it.
BONUS: Eric Boehlert has a detailed takedown of the media's behavior that's well worth a read.
BONUS II: Erik Loomis at LGM covers Biden's speech and the reaction to it by the media.
BONUS III: Josh Marshall on DC media in peak screech over Biden "defiance."
BONUS IV: Nailed it --
There are two things that “objective” reporters are allowed to openly root for: deficit reduction and foreign interventions
— Matt O'Brien (@ObsoleteDogma) August 16, 2021
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