US President Joe Biden reiterates his administration’s commitment to restoring Roe v. Wade during a campaign stop at Hillsborough Community College’s Dale Mabry campus in Tampa, Florida, April 23, 2024. Photo: OSV News/Kevin Lamarque, Reuters Martina Purdy
In the 1950s, Americans would tune in to a popular game show called Truth or Consequences. Contestants were required to answer an almost impossible question accurately or perform a silly stunt.
Answering truthfully often led to even more complicated questions, so contestants often skipped the truth part and opted for the consequences, however ridiculous, even if they knew the answer.
The host would complement them for being such “good sports” and would always end the show with the words, “Hope your consequences are happy ones”.
There was a lesson in this show which ran for years, and that lesson was ingloriously played out on US television days ago during the US Presidential Debate. The consequences however for skipping over the truth were not happy ones for the country.
Minutes into the debate, President Joe Biden, aged 81, gave one of several incomprehensible answers before his opponent, former President Donald Trump, declared: “I really don’t know what he said at the end of that sentence. I don’t think he knows what he said either”.
How was it that the moment of truth was given to Trump, a politician with a notorious reputation for breaking the ninth commandment (thou shalt not bear false witness)?
Trump’s comment ended the pretence: the emperor had no clothes, as the story goes.
Media
The blame for this lies mainly with the Democrats and the White House staff but the media – those charged with informing and relaying the truth – are not without culpability. While there are many excellent and trustworthy journalists, there is something seriously wrong with the system.
The White House Press Corps is an incestuous pack, who have inherited a system in which access is denied when journalists do not play nicely with the political elite. This erosion of journalistic integrity goes back decades and will only be broken when the extremely competitive press pack unites against it for the common good.
The problem now is there has been a significant erosion of confidence in public trust not just in politics but the media also.
Trump’s ‘fake news’ mantra too often has a ring of truth about it not just in America but here in Ireland where readers are turning to less traditional news sources.
It is not their job to manipulate the facts. Their job is to report and inform and let the people decide”
The White House press corps, it could be argued, should have been more tenacious in confronting the truth about Joe Biden’s competency well before this debate. It does seem though that besides wanting to stay in favour with the White House, they viewed Trump as a much greater threat.
That may be true, but it is not their job to manipulate the facts. Their job is to report and inform and let the people decide.
Back in February, the Hur report concluded that there was insufficient evidence to prosecute President Biden over his handling of classified documents. The report also suggested however that the President was not fit to stand trial, stating he would present himself in court as a “well-meaning elderly man with a poor memory”.
At the time the New York Times highlighted “disparaging remarks” made by Hur about the President’s memory. The same New York Times just published an editorial urging Biden to drop out of the race.
Back in February, The National Review reported much soul-searching in the White House Press Corps post-Hur about their own role in reporting Biden’s competency to run the country.
We know politicians and their spin doctors lie. In fact one wonders if the psalm ‘artists in perfidy’ was not written for them. Remember the old joke. How can you tell when a politician is lying? His lips are moving.
Vital
That is why the role of the media is so vital for a healthy society and a healthy democracy.
It may sound cynical but one of the guiding principles I was taught in journalism school was this: “When your mother tells you she loves you, check it out”.
Facts matter.
Even now there are still those in and out of politics playing a game of Truth or Consequences.
Former Democratic President Barack Obama is playing the game, peddling the notion that “bad debate nights happen”.
Although dismissed in some quarters, this helps shift the narrative.
Remember the film Argo, when the Hollywood producer declared cynically: “If you want to tell a lie, get the media to tell it for you”.
There is also a lesson in Sunday’s gospel about the woman with the chronic haemorrhage who reached out to Christ, the Truth incarnate. Pressing up against the truth takes courage and is risky but it brings healing and freedom. Either we live in the light of truth or perish in the darkness of error.
The BBC also broke its own rules for accuracy about a week ago when it gave the misleading impression that trans women’s milk was as good for babies as breastmilk”
A BBC documentary series, The Rise of Nazi Germany, reveals how the truth is essential for freedom and democracy. It poses the question “Who cares about the truth”? and reveals how Nazis came to power through a variety of means, not least controlling news and newspapers.
Maybe the BBC should recall these lessons when it comes to reporting facts. A recent headline: “Transgender woman guilty of rape after night out.” The story repeatedly called this rapist a ‘she’. Huh? The BBC also broke its own rules for accuracy about a week ago when it gave the misleading impression that trans women’s milk was as good for babies as breastmilk.
Truth
Russian writer and Soviet dissident Alexander Solzhenitsyn left us some sage advice on truth and the protection of freedom: “Let us refuse to say what we do not think.”
The United States celebrates its liberty on this Fourth of July. And, as voters ponder who to elect to safeguard that liberty, they might also consider who is actually running the country. One thing is sure: it is not Joe Biden.