Eric Boehlert: Sorry Chuck Todd, America is not hopelessly "divided" over Covid

[babylonsister]

https://pressrun.media/p/no-chuck-todd-america-is-not-divided

Sorry Chuck Todd, America is not hopelessly “divided” over Covid
Both Sides nonsense
Eric Boehlert
1 hr ago


snip//

Make no mistake, there is a loud and dangerous right-wing minority in this country building roadblocks and creating havoc as we try to put the pandemic behind us. They often stage noisy and demented protests at local school board meetings, leveling unhinged attacks on local officials who are trying to keep children and teachers safe. (In Tucson, police were called when protesters threatened to make a citizen's arrest on a school principal and zip tie her.) The media’s constant desire to portray them as representing half the country is lazy and inaccurate.

Instead of portraying the dangerous zealots accurately, the media downplay the threat by presenting anti-vaccine and anti-mask fanatics as being the mirror opposite of Democrats and progressives who embrace science and common sense. If there’s a “divide,” that means there are two equal, opposing forces, right? The press much prefers to tell the tale of Both Sides facing off over Covid, instead of detailing a deranged and radical minority waging war on mainstream America.

The country as a whole is not divided over Covid in any traditional sense, so how and why does the press keep pushing that narrative? One way journalists pull it off is by using fuzzy math. They do it by pointing to polling data that shows Democrats and Republicans on polar opposite ends of the issue and loudly announcing that America suffers from an incurable political and cultural rift.

snip//

So when the media breathlessly hypes polls that show 70 percent of Republicans oppose mask mandates, that doesn’t mean 70 percent of one half of the country opposes the rule. It means 70 percent of a shrinking minority party in this country stand opposed. (i.e. Roughly 20 percent of the total U.S. population contests mask requirements for schools today.)

We’re only truly “divided” when it comes to the Covid carnage in this country. In blue states in the Northeast the pandemic remains essentially over. That’s where low case, death, and hospitalization numbers remain the norm. In Florida and Texas, the virus is claiming victims at will, as Republican governors do everything in their power to put citizens at risk. Soon, the number of Covid deaths in both Florida and Texas could surpass the number of Americans who died in the Vietnam War.

The press ought to focus on that divide, and detail how the Republican Party and its leaders have made a conscious decision to prolong a deadly pandemic, even though a free and effective vaccine is available to stop it. It represents a stunning chapter in American history. Instead of focusing its attention on a conservative movement that is quite clearly killing its own, the press wallows in the shallow confines of its Divided narrative.

[Sherman A1]

1. Nice narrative

That and two bucks will buy you a cup of coffee.

[spanone]

2. K&R

[Tomconroy]

3. Kind of quibbling over language to no real point.

To me 20 percent is kind of a divide of some significance.

[jaxexpat]

9. Down here in Flahduh, it's a thing.

I'd guess it's about 50-50 masked vs unmasked. It would help if the general public were reminded just how small the maskless group really is. Treating them as one side of a national argument is misleading us all.

[Dream Girl]

10. 80% is a substantial majority.

[whathehell]

13. No, words are important, and the word "divide" here is strongly

imdicative of a half and half situation. 20% is not even close to that.

[Tomconroy]

35. 'Equally divided' would suggest half and half.

[whathehell]

37. Equally divided doesn't "suggest" half and half..

It states it unequivocally..Divided suggests it.

[Tomconroy]

38. Now you sound like the article.

[whathehell]

39. Whatever.

[quakerboy]

31. And its not 20%

Something like 47% of americans arent vaccinated. 33% if you count out the under 12's



And thats assuming that a significant chunk of vaccinated folks arent still on that bandwagon, and only got the jab because of a persistent relative, friend, boss, etc. Which isnt a very safe assumption.

[Walleye]

4. Soon it will be clear that the actual divide it between the healthy people and the seriously ill

And it seems most of the seriously ill are ending up that way by their own choice. It would be Monty python material if it weren’t so grotesquely real

[twodogsbarking]

5. Many Reps got vaccines and wear masks.

Not all are aligned with the anti-crowd. There is some unity.
Chuck sells drug commercials to drug companies. TV.

[BlueJac]

6. Agree 100%

I will not watch Chuck Todd,a waste of my time

[dchill]

23. I'll at least wait until he figures out how to make a complete sentence...

...and deliver it on air.

[FakeNoose]

8. Boehlert is correct of course, NBC will stir up controversy and keep it going

... all for the ratings, the talking points, and the fake Repuke outrage.

[OldBaldy1701E]

36. And, that is all they care about... ratings and the income it brings. (n/t)

[mathematic]

11. No, a divide does not mean there are "two equal, opposing forces"

Did this dude lose his dictionary? Yes, obviously the country is divided over covid. This guy just wants to peddle outraged-at-the-media clickbait.

[spooky3]

18. I don't think so. The word "divide" would be meaningless

In polling if we didn’t infer roughly half vs. half. On any issue there will be some percentage that disagrees with the majority. If Boehlert were wrong, as you claim, reporters would describe EVERY result as “divided.”

Boehlert has been a excellent critic of media bias for a long time.

[mathematic]

19. is this a joke?

divide: noun, a wide divergence between two groups, typically producing tension or hostility

Are you telling me that's not an accurate way to describe covid attitudes in america? Adults are heckling teenage children speaking out at school board meetings and that's not a divide? Airline passengers are literally committing acts of violence when told they have to wear a mask. When was the last time somebody got kicked off a flight because they thought the corporate tax rate should be 28%?

[spooky3]

20. No, it's no more a joke than is your post.

Where does one draw the line IN POLLING, if not roughly half? At 40%? At 10%?

His point was clear.

[Yo_Mama_Been_Loggin]

12. Controversy sells news

And Chinless Todd is one of the worst when it comes to both siderism.

[Tommymac]

14. Chuck Todd is Intellectually lazy, incompetent PLUS Bought and Paid for by the Corporate Bosses.

An unholy trinity.

MSNBC plays both sides of the fence just for $$$$, and to support the War Cartels - Red in the AM, Blue in the evenings. Shame on them.

Sad to think it is the best mainstream MSM network the Progressive Liberal Left has.

[relayerbob]

16. " If there's a "divide," that means there are two equal, opposing forces, right?"

Um, no. And most of the rest of this is equally biased, reinforcing the division it is trying to pretend doesn't exist. The final paragraph is not only nonsense, but Boehlert clearly isn't paying attention to most of the media, only to those parts that doesn't fit his narrative. Hmm, makes him into exactly what he is complaining about.

[ancianita]

17. Boehlert is on it. Correct numbers need repeating so that the 77% who did NOT vote GOP

know THEY WON, and in the years ahead, they need to keep the 20%

[BlueIdaho]

21. Fuck Todd - what a useless dittohead.

He is the stone around the neck of NBC news operation.

[Rocknation]

22. Once again, Boehlert solves the Mystery of the Missing Journalistic Context

Last edited Wed Sep 8, 2021, 03:34 PM - Edit history (4)

Fighting to create the illusion that Trump and his policies were popular with at least half the population is precisely why he lost the popular vote twice -- and by a margin twice as large the second time.

Boehlert has called them out about this once before: https://www.democraticunderground.com/100215229582


Rocknation

[peggysue2]

24. Spot on commentary

Time to assign blame where it belongs: The Republican propaganda machine. Yesterday I read the headline (and then scanned) an Atlantic article, beseeching the vaccinated to stop 'death-shaming' the anti-vaxxers, some of whom can be reached if 'we honestly and generously inhabit their point of view.'

After reading the article? The only thing I felt was general annoyance and anger. The whole speil reminded me of how Americans needed to understand Trump's appeal to rural America, how people felt disenfranchised and left behind. And then, we had 4 years of chaos and mayhem where the organizing principles in these groups were hate and outrage followed by more hate.

Maybe the author (Elizabeth Bruenig, I think) has the patience to speak with her uncle as if he were a 15-year old, dissecting his 'hesitancy' reasons. Personally I don't have that patience because people are dying, children are on ventilators struggling for their next breath and a pandemic that could have been contained has surged once again.

Maybe the uncle who feels put upon by the accusation that his decision is killing people should think again. Because his decision and those 25-30% of Americans who have come up with all sorts of excuses are killing people.

And that is unforgivable.

[StClone]

25. Bothsiderism, a snake with one head whose other end scares you with its rattle.

[Moebym]

26. Chuck Todd wants his horserace

His boxing match, his football game. He wishes he were an actual sports commentator instead of a pundit.

The stakes are far higher than who takes home the Triple Crown or the Super Bowl championship trophy, but you wouldn't know it by how some folks in the news media treat these life-and-death issues. Illness and death statistics may as well be scores.

[Blue Owl]

30. But is the horse de-wormed?

[littlemissmartypants]

27. The press fails to include an important contingent in their fuzzy math calculations.

That is the "independents" aka the unaffiliated voters block.

6 facts about U.S. political independents
https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2019/05/15/facts-about-us-political-independents/

9 states where registered independents outnumber major political parties
https://ivn.us/2018/08/08/9-states-registered-independents-outnumber-major-political-parties/


What the 2020 electorate looks like by party, race and ethnicity, age, education and religion
https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2020/10/26/what-the-2020-electorate-looks-like-by-party-race-and-ethnicity-age-education-and-religion/


Nationwide Voter Registration Data by Party
https://ballot-access.org/2020/10/24/nationwide-voter-registration-data-by-party/


Fastest growing voter demographic
https://ivn.us/2016/02/24/independent-voter-registration-by-state/

Wikipedia
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Independent_voter

Kick.

Thanks for sharing this, babylonsister.

❤ pants

[bucolic_frolic]

28. Chuck Todd is unaware of reality & it must be difficult to do a show every day in that state of mind

To my ear he is all opinion and too little background on a wide range of subjects.

[The Wizard]

29. 30%

are insane and should be in FEMA camps.

[StarfishSaver]

32. I feel the same way whenever anyone describes 'the racial divide"

racial divide would be if white people were on one side and minorities were on the other. But that's not the case

In reality we have white people and minorities on one side and racist white people on the other.

There is no "racial divide." The real divide is between racists and non-racists.

[True Blue American]

34. Agree!

One side makes no difference. We do not think race, we accept people.

[True Blue American]

33. I read every one of Eric's columns.

He is a huge dose of reality among the nasty gossip mongers in today’s cable news that simply feed right wing non news.

We have to hear over and over Trump’s latest babbling as if they mean something.