Media Jolts
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When it comes to American publications this election season, precedent is falling faster than Mike Pence’s aides can contract COVID.
For the first time in its nearly 100-year history, Time magazine replaced its cover logo with the word “VOTE.” Time’s editor-in-chief explained this was to mark the historic moment, “arguably as consequential a decision as any of us has ever made at the ballot box.”
Of all the four-letter words the editors could’ve chosen to replace “Time,” methinks “vote” is certainly the most benign.
The New England Journal of Medicine, around for over two centuries, has never taken sides in an election. Now it’s toodles to tradition.
“When it comes to the response to the largest public health crisis of our time, our current political leaders have demonstrated that they are dangerously incompetent. We should not abet them and enable the deaths of thousands more Americans by allowing them to keep their jobs,” editorialized the journal.
If President Trump read, he’d be scandalized.
The folks at Scientific American began their editorial by noting they haven’t endorsed a presidential candidate in the magazine’s 175 years. “This year we are compelled to do so.”
The publication stated, “The evidence and the science show that Donald Trump has badly damaged the U.S. and its people — because he rejects evidence and science.” And is generally a doodoohead, I could feel the editors wanting to say.
Next I turn to a regional publication, because I know just what a shocker this shift is. Having grown up in New Hampshire and been a freelance writer there, I can say confidently that the New Hampshire Union Leader, the state’s biggest newspaper, has traditionally been so conservative it made G. Gordon Liddy look like a radical fairy. The paper hasn’t endorsed a Democrat for president in over 100 years. Until now.
“Joe Biden may not be the president we want, but in 2020 he is the president we desperately need. He will be a president to bring people together and right the ship of state,” declared the Union Leader.
Four years ago, the editorial board endorsed Libertarian candidate Gary Johnson, rather than endorse Trump or Hillary Clinton. But one Trump term has been enough to push this conservative beacon completely over the cliff and into Democratic waters.
I bet the editors can’t wait till Biden wins and they can start shredding him like God intended.
