President Joe Biden will on November 29 speak to the nation to address a number of topics, likely including the growing concern of the Omicron COVID variant. With at least two cases recorded in Canada and positive identifications in numerous other countries, questions are being asked regarding the president's ability to deal with the new threat and how it will impact the lives and livelihoods of Americans. And yet, the activist media appears more concerned about how a fresh outbreak could negatively impact a president who is already polling deep underwater.
Amid concerns that the president acted too late in declaring a travel ban, Dr. Anthony Fauci warned that this variant could prove troublesome. On his tour of the Sunday shows, the White House chief medical advisor – and the face of the coronavirus response – suggested that the mutations inherent in the South African strain may circumvent current treatments.
"It might evade immune protection that you would get, for example, from the monoclonal antibody or from the convalescent serum after a person's been infected and possibly even against some of the vaccine-induced antibodies," Fauci said. He equivocated that "it's not necessarily that that's going to happen, but it's a strong indication that we really need to be prepared for that."
A Media Direction
NBC's Chuck Todd used his Sunday spots to lightly chastise the president, insisting that, in the wake of the new variant, Biden had been "premature" in declaring the virus defeated back in July. The news host tried to imply that this was not really much to do with the president. Speaking to Willie Geist, he said:
"One of the things about his COVID response, over the last couple of months, it can be argued he [Biden] has not been the face of the COVID response, not in some time … Not really since we declared our – back in July, when he declared our independence from the virus, obviously prematurely."
And appearing on his own show later in the day, Todd warned that, "Ultimately, this is also a political problem … Biden ran on taming the pandemic, and he prematurely declared independence from the virus back in July."
(Photo by Samuel Corum/Getty Images)
On ABC's Good Morning America, deputy political director Averi Harper lamented that the Omicron variant could cause problems for Biden's political agenda. She noted, "We know that New York's governor has declared a state of emergency, and we saw the markets took a nosedive on Friday all because of the Omicron variant. So, I would say this poses a significant challenge to the Biden administration, particularly on the economic front."
Harper continued, highlighting the real concern for those in the Fourth Estate, saying, "the omicron variant could pose a significant threat to that [economic] progress. And heading into an election year for the Biden administration, which is critical, it could spell trouble."
Fiddle On, MSM
With the stock markets cratering, businesses concerned that new restrictions might finally sink them, and the very real possibility of an increase in deaths due to the new Omicron strain, the activist media have decided that the priority is to shore up a failing presidency.
Rather than reflect on details such as transmissibility, deadliness, or government plans to safeguard Americans, the media folks have determined that the more significant danger to their way of life is the current administration being seen as ineffectual.
~ Read more from Mark Angelides.
