We Already Have Our Dijon Mustard Scandal 2.0

[Sirius_]

https://www.nytimes.com/2021/01/19/us/politics/biden-peloton.html

It doesn’t exactly comport with his “regular Joe from Scranton” persona, but beyond the politics of it, the bike could present cybersecurity risks.

[Santander]

He should get a Water Rower like me.

[emailking]

Those things have secret admin modes where you can disable the camera/microphone/wifi. Can also mechanically disable them, shouldn't be a problem. As for the cost, I mean if you get a cheap one it's not going to last you more than a few years if that.

[GeneralMacArthur]

Peloton is just an Android device attached to a bike.  You can jailbreak it and use it to play Candy Crush.

[Progressive Pessimist]

I thought it was going to be over Leonard Cohen's "Hallelujah" being played at the memorial-a song about straight up f***ing that is often misused. Of course, Trump used the song too after his RNC speech. Not that hypocrisy ever stopped the GOP before.

Then again, the more apt comparison to this would be to when Republicans briefly clutched their pearls over Hillary Clinton's campaign accidentally playing the first few seconds of Billy Joel's "Captain Jack" (a song about drug addiction) instead of "New York State of Mind" while she was running for the Senate back in 2000.

[Alben Barkley]

New York Times is totally Democratic Party hack propaganda, of course. It’s not like they constantly go out of their way to find the most absurd, nonsensical things possible to write inane critical “think pieces” attacking Democrats for in a futile attempt to “both sides” everything.

What’s funny about it is that they’re still going to be bashed by conservatives anyway, so the lengths they go to in order to court them are just cringeworthy.

[Hammy]

New York Times is totally Democratic Party hack propaganda, of course. It’s not like they constantly go out of their way to find the most absurd, nonsensical things possible to write inane critical “think pieces” attacking Democrats for in a futile attempt to “both sides” everything.

What’s funny about it is that they’re still going to be bashed by conservatives anyway, so the lengths they go to in order to court them are just cringeworthy.

They've gone the way of CNN. But judging how some GOPers are being held up, it seems simply criticizing Trump once or twice is enough to get one labeled a Dem hack by the right.

[Absentee Voting Ghost of Ruin]

https://twitter.com/TheDweck/status/1351761581072289792

[Pericles]

I guess the headline "US President is a normal, decent human being" is a bit boring, we'll just have to read it in.

[Hammy]

https://twitter.com/TheDweck/status/1351761581072289792

Wait, this is the big "controversy"? Yet the lead up to the election was "Biden is old and falling apart"

[Alben Barkley]

https://twitter.com/TheDweck/status/1351761581072289792

Wait, this is the big "controversy"? Yet the lead up to the election was "Biden is old and falling apart"

Welcome to a new Democratic administration.

I'm not sure about you specifically, but I understand many on this site are too young to really remember what it was like when Obama took office. He was so clean cut and scandal-free (he earned the title "No Drama Obama" for a reason) the media was forced to desperately concoct whatever kind of ridiculous things they could find to criticize him for that it was comical. It did not matter if it made any sense at all or not.

So no, the fact that the previous angle was "Biden is old and frail" is irrelevant. If the media wants the new angle to be "Biden is TOO active and vigorous," that will be what they roll with.

Again, this is why I've always found the whole idea that the "liberal" media is shilling for the Democrats to be blatantly absurd. The media just wants clicks, headlines, sensationalism. Doesn't matter much to them whether that comes from genuine scandal (almost always supplied by Republicans) or some fluffy nonsense "nothing burger" like this. That was true in the Obama years, it was true in the Clinton years, it was true during Hillary's campaign.

Part of it (especially it seems in the NYT's case) is seemingly rooted in a desperate desire to appear "balanced" and "non-partisan" even if the facts really do lean to one side. Part of it is just a drive to make stories. But in any case, it's real and it's honestly pathetic. Hopefully, more people will recognize these non-stories for the absurdities they are now that they can always be contrasted to Trump.