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For media, Biden's first news conference notable for what's missing

74 Comments
By DAVID BAUDER

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With only 10 reporters called upon, some were left out, including anyone from The New York Times. So were reporters from outlets popular with conservatives, and favorites of Trump when he took questions as president.

This is worrying. The full range of media outlets need to be included.

25 ( +29 / -4 )

After this press conference the far right media (US and 'foreign') still claiming Biden lacks the intellectual wherewithal needed to be Commander in chief should be silenced. Except of course for the likes of Tucker Carlson, Hannity, Ingraham, Alex Jones, Brietbart/RT reporters etc. who will continue to try to convince their followers to believe false information 'reasonable people' wouldn't accept, i.e. their big lieS.

-14 ( +15 / -29 )

 And what a huge difference in how the media treated Trump to how they’re treating Biden

An example of the above Fox having direct and exclusive access to 45 where he could push his big lieS without being questioned. Then Fox reporters could get away with repeating 45's big lieS knowing their legal defense team would defend them claiming 'no reasonable people would believe something that wack'. Then there's 45 plugging and lauding One America News. Among so many others.

-14 ( +10 / -24 )

Readers, please learn the difference between loosing and losing. It's an all too common mistake made by many contributors to the discussion board.

0 ( +0 / -0 )

Oh dear. Well, you know what they say, you can’t know it all.

0 ( +5 / -5 )

So let me get this straight: This was the President's first news conference. There were only 25 reporters there, 10 questions were allowed total (and they were pre-screened prior to this), and not a single one was about COVID?

https://thefederalist.com/2021/03/25/after-nine-weeks-without-press-conference-biden-relies-on-pre-selected-list-of-reporters-at-first-one/

https://thepalmierireport.com/biden-calls-on-pre-selected-reporters-during-first-press-conference/

https://greatamericanpolitics.com/2021/02/biden-white-house-press-office-caught-pre-screening-press-briefing-questions/

No matter which side you are more in favor of, this is not good. If the US has a free and open press, why were there only pre screened and selected reporters there? This does not bode well for the future.

18 ( +26 / -8 )

https://thefederalist.com

https://thepalmierireport.com

https://greatamericanpolitics.com

The websites you use are clearly showing your bias. You should try reading something less mind-blowingly right-wing too once in a while.

-10 ( +9 / -19 )

It was worthy of ridicule when leftists first started telling us not to believe our eyes and ears, to interpret things through abstract academic lenses. 

What in god's name are you even talking about?

-6 ( +9 / -15 )

I miss the days when the US had a law called the Fairness Doctrine. Many here are probably not old enough to remember the difference in how the media behaved then and now. The Fairness Doctrine was eliminated during the Reagan administration which is 40 years ago now. Reportage was better, there was usually an editorial by a senior manager of the station and stations were required by law to offer the opposing point of view to be given, on the air. Sometimes the person giving the opposing view as clearly uncomfortable being on life TV but often it was well delivered by someone who gave some thought to what they were going to say. It was all done politely and by requiring the opposing view to be heard, stations were kept honest and didn't descend into partisan echo chambers. The Fairness Doctrine applied to radio as well with similar results.

12 ( +15 / -3 )

Watch live: President Biden holds first press conference — 3/25/21

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H_6BhfTDw4Q

Not a particularly challenging first press conference for Joe Biden.

14 ( +17 / -3 )

He didn’t spend half of question time complaining about how badly he was being treated, so I guess it was a good start.

The one about the GOP not being around in 2024 was hilarious and will probably burn a lot of trump boys..

-13 ( +6 / -19 )

He was being hit with feather dusters.

13 ( +16 / -3 )

The media back to playing slave to their masters in the Democrat party. Pre-approved questions and rehearsed answers is the usual Biden routine. Nothing about how he assumes white supremacy at the drop of a hat, nothing about Cuomo’s #MeToo problem- not to mention his own. No questions about the kids in cages down at the border, the release of border crashes into the country without court review or covid tests.

11 ( +20 / -9 )

Democracy ahhhh. Social media blocks trump, backtrack on policies (lie) and hand pick journalists. China anybody?

11 ( +20 / -9 )

President Biden uttered more complete sentences in today’s conference than donald uttered in his entire presidency!!!!

-9 ( +7 / -16 )

Wow! Pretty unimpressive stuff. Some of it almost a parody. Poor the States if this is the best we can do.

13 ( +18 / -5 )

Competence on full display.

In the SNL sense?

It’s refreshing to have an adult in the WH again

So being unable to speak at times and speaking incoherently and being confused is now seen as being an adult?

That was a horrible train wreck and if you listen closely you could even hear some of the gasps when the guy was speaking. This was just horrible and sad to watch.

7 ( +14 / -7 )

Masquerade is all, rehearsed, prepared, prescreened journalists to make sure they only asked nice things and no confrontation style questions to put the Pottyus in a difficult situation.

Its a joke but expect nothing less from the democrats to try to cotton wool the old guy.

11 ( +16 / -5 )

Masquerade is all, rehearsed, prepared, prescreened journalists to make sure they only asked nice things and no confrontation style questions to put the Pottyus in a difficult situation.

Its a joke but expect nothing less from the democrats to try to cotton wool the old guy

Exactly, not to mention Biden reading line by line and going over his prepared speech notes and to call the friendly only selected reporters. Any other conservative hard hitting relevant questions weren’t even asked. Trump at least to his credit answered all of these people, miss the sparing. Biden is just not capable of that, he’s not that quick enough.

10 ( +15 / -5 )

Given how low the bar was set fro Pres. Biden, he did manage to survive his first "grilling" by the press.

It was remarkably non-spontaneous though. I have never seen a president refer to prepared notes the way that Biden did. It really makes it seem that the questions were pre-selected, as were the reporters. Even with those stipulations in place, he still managed to sound tired and wooden.

Compare this to the raucus and adversarial nature of a Trump press conference, with the president engaging directly with the press and handling the back-and-forth with multiple reporters shouting at him.

3 ( +11 / -8 )

That is what conservatives think of as competency 

Looking like a deer caught in the headlights, well, yes.

According to conservatives, yes. That’s why you all loved Trump’s unintelligible ramblings.

Trump didn’t stumble, he may have said, nutty things at times, but he didn’t stop, stare or look confused and bewildered, didn’t sweat and didn’t try to focus the way Biden did, big, big difference.

Now you know what rational adults get like during the flaming clown car if Trump’s administration.

Huh? So you’re saying that Biden was going down in flames? Well, I think so...

7 ( +12 / -5 )

Trump at least to his credit answered all of these people,

No he didn’t. He often pulled his smacked arse face and called them fake news.

Better than talking about injecting bleach at press conferences I suppose.

-6 ( +5 / -11 )

At least Biden can read, unlike so many conservatives.

Not very well, especially today...again, listen to the gasps and this from a more Biden friendly press.

Not a surprise given conservatives don’t understand what relevant means.

speaking coherently qualifies as relevant, what happened today was anything but..

Conservatives do think deflection and obfuscation is answering questions.

That was Biden and the heart- wrenching thing about it was, the guy wasn’t even trying...

Biden would do well to emulate Trump and just pivot to playing the victim card or storming out of the press conference.

I don’t even think he knew he was on stage, those silent moment proved that.

7 ( +12 / -5 )

"Joe Biden's first presidential news conference was notable for what was missing after predecessor Donald Trump: no contentious exchanges with reporters, no Fox News and no questions about COVID-19."

Sounds like China.

No questions about Covid 19 or Tibet.

8 ( +14 / -6 )

Which were three times as bad when Trump was trying to give a news conference.

Because he didn’t tow the liberal line, Biden didn’t tow any line, he couldn’t even get on the tractor.

That disqualifies Trump and a lot of conservative posters here.

Hardly, he was pretty much specifics issues when it came to immigration, DACA

He was just following Trump’s lead.

If he did, he would have been more transparent, especially about the border and these facilities keeping these kids..

Trump was out of it most of the time.

After the news conferences, yes.

5 ( +10 / -5 )

Because he didn’t tow the liberal line,

Readers: Please learn the difference between 'tow' and 'toe'. I'm aware that poorly educated first language speakers confuse them.

1 ( +8 / -7 )

ModeratorToday 07:40 am JST

Readers, please learn the difference between loosing and losing. It's an all too common mistake made by many contributors to the discussion board.

Well said and thank you for finally taking someone to task over this. Another common mistake is writing "noone" for "no one", which always makes me think of Peter Noone of Herman's Hermits.

8 ( +10 / -2 )

Wow, what a difference a few months can make....

After four years of outright lies, two-year old tantrums, and lines like; "it's totally under control, it's just one person from China, it will all be fine"....we finally get competence, honesty, and maturity....

While the Repub party self-implodes...and Trump's taxes and the Trump Org finances get fine-toothed by a former John Gotti prosecutor...

No wonder they want to keep talking about Dr Seuss...

0 ( +9 / -9 )

Trump couldn’t toe any line because he can’t see his toes.

Biden couldn’t even keep the press focused.

So, we have Trump to thank for the current mess at the border. Got it.

DACA was started under Obama without the approval of congress. So much for the legislative branch.

What you’re saying is Biden shouldn’t be putting children in cages like Trump did. Got it.

Bur when Obama did it and Biden TOLD these people to come, that’s ok, I understand Trump’s position, they shouldn’t be here and they should go back. Joe and Barrack were saying come all, but then put them in cages and pretended to spin to the media that the kids are ok when we saw the latest video that they’re not. Like I said, I don’t believe any Washington politician when it comes to the border, I believe the CBP and the video over some political act in an air conditioned room hoping that I’ll believe his spin on the issue.

Before and after the news conferences too. Trump basically tweeted in during his entire presidency.

Biden can’t even do that much!

2 ( +9 / -7 )

So refreshing to see an adult there, and no tantrums. And no stories about 'Someone came up to me and said, Sir......'

-2 ( +7 / -9 )

The problem with trump's boys is that they think a press conference without a temper tantrum, lies, obfuscation and nastiness to the press, is not a press conference.

It might take time for them to get used to rational, mature & normal behavior but I am fully confident they will!!!!

-1 ( +6 / -7 )

I only wished Biden would have mentioned Sidney Powell and her defense in her defamation case filed by Dominion...

*Powell goes so far as to say that "reasonable people would not accept such statements as true"...*

https://edition.cnn.com/2021/03/24/opinions/sidney-powell-defense-big-lie-opinion-rodgers/index.html

She admits to The Big Lie - it was all a scam and a fraud...and essentially called all Trump supporters who believed it "unreasonable"....or stupid enough to fall for it...

This story needs to be told - it might help de-program some of the cult...

1 ( +7 / -6 )

The world witnessed a true dumpster fire that masqueraded as a presidential press conference. You know it was bad when Biden gets called out for embellishing the, uh, truth by a CNN 'fact checker".

-1 ( +7 / -8 )

The new guy seems different from the old guy, but still has trouble with facts: https://www.factcheck.org/2021/03/factchecking-bidens-first-press-conference/

The summary:

Biden claimed that former President Donald Trump “eliminated” over $700 million in aid that Biden helped get for Central American countries. That didn’t happen, but the Trump administration did reallocate some money and temporarily suspended other funding.

The president used the wrong statistics when saying that “nothing has changed” regarding “children” trying to enter the U.S. at the southern border. There was a significant 63% uptick in unaccompanied children being apprehended from January to February.

Biden said, “We’re sending back the vast majority of the families that are coming.” But in February, 41% of those in a family unit apprehended at the southern border were expelled.

The president said “over 50%” of Republican voters supported the American Rescue Plan Act. Some polls show that but others show a majority opposed the COVID-19 relief legislation.

He repeated two familiar talking points on taxes, including the misleading claim that “83%” of the benefits in the GOP’s Tax Cuts and Jobs Act are “going to the top 1%.” That only becomes the case in 2027 when most of the individual income tax cuts are set to expire but corporate tax cuts remain.

Biden got it wrong when he said there were five times as many cloture motions “last year alone” than there were “between 1917 and 1971.” There were twice as many motions filed last year than there were from 1917 through 1970.

Nobody's perfect.

2 ( +3 / -1 )

So you’re saying he’s acting like a conservative. 

I’m saying he’s acting like typical Biden, but much worse and I thought it couldn’t get worse, but I was wrong.

Congress makes laws, the president implements

And Obama bypassed the legislative branch on DACA and that’s how this mess started, so back in 2014 when his administration were putting kids in cages, the media was dead silent...hmmm.

Back to the mess at the border Trump left . . .

Where literally thousands of immigrants were scared to come over, they were saying that over and over in a lot of interviews, walls work, ask the politicians that surrounded themselves in a giant fence surrounding the Capitol.

And Trump was too incompetent to fix the problems at the border.

He did, but the Dems put road blocks to try and stop the wall, it’s documented and ask any CBP agent. Oh, that’s right, the liberal press never wants to talk to these border patrol agents, goes against their open door policy rhetoric.

But, Biden can do just a little more than Trump,

He can get tired more easily than Trump so I give him credit.

1 ( +6 / -5 )

Powell goes so far as to say that "reasonable people would not accept such statements as true"...

That defense is hilarious!!!

The only problem is that donald's bigots are not reasonable, rational people.

If they were reasonable and rational they wouldn't be donald's bigots!!!!

-1 ( +6 / -7 )

Yeah. ‘Sleepy Joe’ who is now President, won the election fair and square by a considerable margin and is cleaning the mess up very nicely. ‘Sleepy Joe’ wiped the floor with you.

Why don’t we hear about election fraud anymore? Afraid of lawsuits? Even Sidney is now saying in her defense that she was just theorizing and that no reasonable person would believe her “theories” about Dominion and all that other nonsense.

“Reasonable” people. Uh-huh.

-1 ( +6 / -7 )

So, all those memes saying Biden is not in command of the issues and is an addled old man didn’t age too well.

-1 ( +4 / -5 )

What you mean is Biden is just a little better than Trump

Meaning, the guy was bad when I was a kid and it just seems to worsen with each passing day

Obama determining how to implement the laws passed by Congress was responsible for the mess at the border?

With DACA, yes, along the border that was the Democrats.

Like the walls surrounding all of Trump’s properties.

EXACTLY! See, walls do work, ask the politicians in Washington at the Capitol and the ones that have bige fences.

You're saying Trump was too incompetent to best Dems.

No, I'm saying the Dems are purposely incompetent to not seal the border, you can add reckless and heartless to those acolytes.

It is hard for sober people to keep up with those that take uppers constantly.

All the more reason in understanding as to why Biden is not up for the job.

0 ( +6 / -6 )

I can't believe the Pubs kicked the immigration problem on to the next administration, and left it for the dems to deal with.

The modern history of the US is a back and forth of Republicans wrecking things, then the democrats getting blamed for the pain of fixing them.

0 ( +6 / -6 )

Like the walls surrounding all of Trump’s properties.

EXACTLY! See, walls do work

Non-existent walls which Mexico didn’t pay for don’t.

1 ( +5 / -4 )

Exactly! Trump has been repugnant for a very long time. 

Ok, we have Biden now NOT Trump, and given his disastrous diatribe or whatever that was, how do you think he will handle transparency from now on?

Then go and lol at the data and you can see walls don’t work for huge areas like a border!

Yeah, they do, the Mexican government admitted that illegals have been saying that. No one with a Trump shirt tried to come down while he was in office and particularly the CBP said so, I tend to trust the people working the border over some political hit in Washington on the other side of the country writing and trying to tell their sidekick msm pundits that kids not bathing and sleeping on top of each other is a normal thing. Nice try.

Which means that the dems outsmarted Trump for four years. Agreed.

In other words, so what if the country is screwed now and China, the growing and real threat serious threat are laughing their butts off at this guy. This is all too easy.

Biden’s not up for the job because he’s sober.

But babbling and incoherent, that's scary as hell, very, very scary.

0 ( +4 / -4 )

It was interesting that Biden followed Trump's lead on not calling on fake-news outlets.

I guess that's the new name of the game in politics. Once again, the pubs are whining about a situation they created.

It's their MO.

0 ( +5 / -5 )

But babbling and incoherent, that's scary as hell, very, very scary.

If Biden starts rambling on about the US bombing British air bases in the 19th century, if he suggests nuking hurricanes, if he suggests injecting a disinfectant, if he shares his hallucinations seeing thousands of Muslims dancing in New Jersey after 9/11, then I'll start to worry. Trump set the lowest bar - ever.

0 ( +4 / -4 )

Biden’s not up for the job because he’s sober.

But babbling and incoherent, that's scary as hell, very, very scary.

Looking at US presidents in my lifetime based on ability to speak, not performance in office:

Carter - Very articulate.

Reagan - A good communicator but his brain was in severe decline and could descend into drivel.

Bush 1 - Generally spoke gibberish.

Clinton - Very articulate.

Bush 2 - Didn’t have a grasp of basic grammar a non-native speaker could manage.

Obama - Very articulate.

Trump - Babbled incoherently and lied non-stop. Could contradict himself in the space of one sentence.

Biden - Mind on the decline. Stumbles with words.

The US has survived presidents talking gibberish. The lion’s share coming from the GOP in modern times. No need to panic.

0 ( +5 / -5 )

But babbling and incoherent, that's scary as hell, very, very scary.

Who cares what he sounds like, if he's an effective president?

See, the pubs think that being able to get a bunch of people excited is the qualification for being a good leader. It's why Trump was baffled that he lost, even though he had crowds of sycophants kissing the ground he walked upon.

Biden's leading through competence.

But hey, keep whining about him being more coherent than Trump or Bush 2 ever were. That's what the country needs. Or maybe you could whine about health care, and your supposed replacement a little more.

0 ( +6 / -6 )

So why didn’t Trump handle China? Don’t dodge, just answer the question.

Trump kicked the China problem down the road for future administrations.

What a loser.

-2 ( +5 / -7 )

Trump’s diatribes were as disastrous as his immigration policy,

Yeah, but people feared him at least people knew the guy was unpredictable, but now back to Biden as the President, you think China fears this man? Russia definitely doesn't. By the way, he still is avoiding Putin, not good.

I completely agree. As far as transparency,

So when will the press be allowed to see these kids, even Jake Tapper was annoyed by the lack of access.

Walls are sooo effective against ladders or shovels.

Well, not everyone has one and by the time they use those, the CBP are on them like flies on turd, so it's a deterrent, like your dog or even the door on your house.

Just ask the 9 year old that climbed Trump’s wall in under a minute.

Ahhh, then why didn't all these kids in the detention center scale the wall? Ahhhh, gotcha!

So why didn’t Trump handle China? Don’t dodge, just answer the question.

He did, that's why China was so ticked off and did what they could to get him out of office and No President ticked them off or refused to bow to them, unlike this President and the other previous Presidents.

0 ( +5 / -5 )

PTownsendToday  07:03 am JST

With only 10 reporters called upon, some were left out, including anyone from The New York Times. So were reporters from outlets popular with conservatives, and favorites of Trump when he took questions as president.

This is worrying. The full range of media outlets need to be included.

Fox News and the media wingnuts aren't man enough to talk with or listen to a real POTUS. They want to keep making up fairy tales in order to feel 'cool' or 'on top'. They're juvenile idiots that just can't handle the fact that America has a real President again, one who won't sass off like a 7 year old lippy-ass punk.

-1 ( +5 / -6 )

Covfefe.

5 ( +7 / -2 )

By donald's standards, a press conference where reporters are not insulted, minorities not demonized and women not objectified, is a success.

2 ( +5 / -3 )

And those who criticize Biden for having a briefing book, at least he was not suggesting injecting bleach or shining lasers where the sun dont shine.

if donald used a briefing book he would have said something truthful, for once!!!

0 ( +4 / -4 )

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