TruthArchive.ai - Tweets Saved By @DrewHolden360

@DrewHolden360 - Drew Holden

🧵Thread🧵 I know it’s difficult to keep track of all of Tim Walz’s “stolen valor,” exaggerations & false claims about his time in the military. I tried to compile as many as I could, as well as a few egregious cases of the media spinning for him. Buckle in, there’s a lot. ⤵️

@DrewHolden360 - Drew Holden

First, the false claims. To avoid a sort of journalistic stolen valor, I want to be clear: others did this work. I’ll try to source as well as I can, starting with the latest Walz whopper: saying he took part in the Afghanistan surge in a 2010 debate. From @NoVA_Campaigns: https://t.co/reRsMT3FJi

@DrewHolden360 - Drew Holden

There’s been a lot of good reporting. Perhaps none better than from @ChuckRossDC of the Free Beacon. His first is on that Afghanistan claim, citing Walz’s repeated description of himself as a veteran of “Operation Enduring Freedom,” the gov’t name of the fight in Afghanistan. https://t.co/3MG577LFv6

@DrewHolden360 - Drew Holden

@ChuckRossDC also scooped that Pelosi thanked Walz for his “service on the battlefield.” Rather than point out that he wasn’t ever on a battlefield, Walz thanked her back. https://t.co/L4He0ti8me

@DrewHolden360 - Drew Holden

Walz has trotted out other versions of this “battlefield” claim. As @JDVance pointed out recently, Walz—while trying to ban “assault weapons”—compared them to weapons he had carried “in war.” The problem? Walz has never been on a battlefield. Or in a war. https://t.co/HLC6o8Dwmx

@DrewHolden360 - Drew Holden

In fact, when Walz’s unit deployed, he retired, leaving his soldiers in the lurch without one of their senior officers. Unsurprisingly, the soldiers who did deploy don’t exactly think fondly of Walz. @CaitlinDoornbos & @jchristenson_ talked to them. https://t.co/S3xpxZifbn

@DrewHolden360 - Drew Holden

And Walz has also made it a habit to mislead about his rank when he retired. Here’s @AsheSchow with the explainer: https://t.co/9TI03MwCIB

@DrewHolden360 - Drew Holden

And, finally — and pivoting us to the spin on this — the campaign claimed that Walz chaired the House Veterans Commitee. He didn’t, but as @PhilipWegmann points out, tons of outlets didn’t bother to fact check these claims, including @AP and @nytimes https://t.co/Pz05Il0QH9

@DrewHolden360 - Drew Holden

@CBSNews did, too, on Instagram. Theirs is allegedly a “fact-check.” What facts are here? And how are they checked, exactly? https://t.co/uspgTILHfY

@DrewHolden360 - Drew Holden

Most outlets corrected their reporting when it became clear that none of them bothered to interrogate what the Dems had told them about Walz’s supposed chairmanship. But not @USATODAY. Might be a good time to correct! https://t.co/LAzjxxRkuC

@DrewHolden360 - Drew Holden

That wasn’t all from that @USATODAY piece, though. They also claimed that these attacks were an example of “swift boating,” a reference to criticisms of Kerry in 2004, used as a stand-in for unsubstantiated or baseless claims related to a candidate’s military service. https://t.co/3gjkazKsBm

@DrewHolden360 - Drew Holden

Lots of other outlets have done this, too. Here’s @politico, @CNN, @washingtonpost and @NPR (because I can only have four screenshots in a tweet). https://t.co/i2L0tzyrQr

@DrewHolden360 - Drew Holden

And two more from @MSNBC and @NYMag. The only problem? None of these claims are unsubstantiated! Non-mainstream journalists did the actual work of investigating them. Perhaps the corporate press could learn a thing or two about what real journalism entails. https://t.co/OHW2YfVdau

@DrewHolden360 - Drew Holden

Because there’s more where that came from. Rather than investigate the actual claims, @CNN fact checked the criticism from @JDVance. https://t.co/ALfqHIVDrA

@DrewHolden360 - Drew Holden

@washingtonpost fact checked the real reporting from @ChuckRossDC and the @FreeBeacon. The “facts” elucidated by their “checking” here are less than convincing. Give them a read. https://t.co/zyWGDpHht5

@DrewHolden360 - Drew Holden

@AP did this, too. The convenient timing of his retirement apparently isn’t evidence of anything. Nothing gets by these guys. https://t.co/ZPdQajLk88

@DrewHolden360 - Drew Holden

Back to @CNN, who went out of their way to validate my disdain for “analysis.” They called @JDVance’s criticism a “troll.” Actually providing the public scrutiny to someone seeking to be one heartbeat away from the nuclear codes. That’s somehow a “troll.” Okay. https://t.co/O9ARVdtbf7

@DrewHolden360 - Drew Holden

And then there were the efforts to obfuscate by providing context. I thought it couldn’t get worse than this @nytimes headline. Then I read the piece. Here’s just a couple highlights (more at my newsletter piece on the subject.) https://t.co/pg6c9xuCsb

@DrewHolden360 - Drew Holden

I’m running out of space but I couldn’t leave out this ridiculous headline from @MSNBC. https://t.co/FhG1DA6mZ0

@DrewHolden360 - Drew Holden

For the takedown of @voxdotcom, read this great thread from @peterjhasson https://t.co/K28wer7lTf

@DrewHolden360 - Drew Holden

I joined the @MegynKellyShow alongside @redsteeze to talk about some of this. If you didn’t catch it, give it a watch/download. The whole episode is well worth your time. I’m on at the end. https://t.co/N9xeVijfdy

@DrewHolden360 - Drew Holden

I know you don’t need me to tell you why this matters. But instead of applying the least bit of scrutiny or accountability for a Democratic candidate for VP, the media are actively trying to hide the blemishes on his resume.

@DrewHolden360 - Drew Holden

Apparently, the press would rather talk about Walz’s vibes. How about some journalism instead? https://t.co/m4i5HSgnyl

@DrewHolden360 - Drew Holden

🧵THREAD🧵 Do you remember how bad the media’s “Covid lab leak” - the hypothesis that the virus came from a lab - coverage was? I thought I did. But it was a more dramatic example of uniform media malpractice than even I remembered. So I revisited it. Buckle in, it’s long. ⤵️

@DrewHolden360 - Drew Holden

It started in Feb 2020 when @SenTomCotton suggested looking into the CCP lab studying bats near the initial cases in Wuhan. The media were outraged. In a since-updated piece, @washingtonpost said the idea was a “conspiracy theory that has been repeatedly debunked by experts.” https://t.co/kAQFbA4baF

@DrewHolden360 - Drew Holden

It wasn’t just WaPo. Shortly thereafter, @nytimes trotted out a similar allegation, calling the lab leak hypothesis a “fringe theory” and a “tale” designed to inflame social media. @CNN’s @ChrisCillizza said Cotton was “playing a dangerous game” with his suggestions. https://t.co/Xr7eXaNaKE

@DrewHolden360 - Drew Holden

@USATODAY, in a since-updated fact check, said that Cotton’s claims were “false” because “overwhelming scientific evidence” said so. https://t.co/ZMTekytd3L

@DrewHolden360 - Drew Holden

A quick pause here to point something out. What the media were up in arms about wasn’t the veracity of the lab leak idea. Just that people thought it was *plausible*. That it “may” be true, as @SenTomCotton said. Look how close the lab is to the first cases. “May” is too much? https://t.co/9v5eRdLKJP

@DrewHolden360 - Drew Holden

Anyway, back to the coverage. This was the dawn of what I like to call “experts say” reporting, where an outlet finds someone with credentials who agrees with them to make the point the outlet wants to make. Here’s @NatGeo, @Forbes, @CBSNews & @washingtonpost doing that here. https://t.co/3Of32wYYzl

@DrewHolden360 - Drew Holden

There were some even more dramatic examples I want to call out. Maybe my all time favorite is from @NPR who, with the confidence that only that station posses, claimed that the lab leak theory had been “debunked” in April 2020. https://t.co/Ne6JWdYX4L

@DrewHolden360 - Drew Holden

This @ABC headline presented without comment https://t.co/4wp49FkL0F

@DrewHolden360 - Drew Holden

It was really a banner time period for outlets using “fact checkers” as a political weapon with no connection to facts, as @CNN does here. The word of the year had to be “debunked,” which many outlets seemed to believe meant “we don’t like this idea.” https://t.co/aj0x6LZND5

@DrewHolden360 - Drew Holden

It’s impossible to ignore how this story intersects with Trump & his admin. Once he said he believed the lab leak idea, the press decided it must be a lie. Some really rich headlines here from @business (really?), @VICE (remember them?), @CNN (“crushed”!) and @BusinessInsider. https://t.co/bkeOZBe4WN

@DrewHolden360 - Drew Holden

It’s really the condescending tone here from @chrislhayes that gets me. https://t.co/WmVM5FUKTr

@DrewHolden360 - Drew Holden

Apropos of absolutely nothing, I want to remind you that @NPR is funded in part by your tax dollars. More on your tax dollars soon. https://t.co/QTqJzNOM1K

@DrewHolden360 - Drew Holden

Just a quick aside. The press at the time purported to be very upset that Trump was using the same language that they had used a few weeks before, to describe the virus as Chinese. Here’s @CNN. https://t.co/QIF55kIfYK

@DrewHolden360 - Drew Holden

Then a poll came out finding that lots of people believed the lab leak theory: about a third of Americans. The press leapt to tar the believers as rubes & the people who convinced them as charlatans. There’s a lot of this but a few from @CNN, @Forbes, @voxdotcom & @thehill. https://t.co/fZkWphnC6g

@DrewHolden360 - Drew Holden

One moment you may’ve forgotten: in April 2020, Trump stopped US funding to the lab in question in Wuhan. Read: up until then, your tax dollars were paying for dubious research in an autocratic regime that maybe started a plague. Naturally the media applauded that move, right?

@DrewHolden360 - Drew Holden

Wrong. The press were incensed Trump would stop giving your tax dollars to a shady lab in China. @CBSNews said it was “jeopardizing” a Covid cure. @nytimes did much the same. @ABC blamed the bad move on “conspiracy theories” as @VanityFair pointed to “right-wing disinformation.” https://t.co/nMSKxc2teb

@DrewHolden360 - Drew Holden

One phenomenon that really stuck with me is how the press elevated China’s claims in an effort to, I presume, stick it to Trump. Look at how @nytimes, @CNN and @TIME put the U.S. and China on equal believability footings. https://t.co/cPc63kEHQX

@DrewHolden360 - Drew Holden

This wasn’t a mere momentary blip. All the way until December, @AP was writing up the lab leak as a conspiracy theory that survived online “despite facts.” Right. https://t.co/sD2wZohlnx

@DrewHolden360 - Drew Holden

The enormous irony of the @AP story about Covid “conspiracy theories” is the image that accompanies it. “Wear a mask outside” the 1984-esq wall art reads. https://t.co/p8ugGHMZi7

@DrewHolden360 - Drew Holden

The real facts aren’t as hospitable to what the media was claiming in 2020. Further investigation into the lab leak in 2021 gave the idea a respectability even the mainstream media couldn’t ignore. They started to change their tune. Here’s @nytimes https://t.co/Hjh4DTOTqs

@DrewHolden360 - Drew Holden

Then in 2023 Biden’s own Department of Energy said that the lab leak theory was the most likely explanation for Covid’s origins. The side-by-sides of the original reporting vs the newly indisputable facts are what I see when I close my eyes at this point. @NPR https://t.co/nfPLdQDpzA

@DrewHolden360 - Drew Holden

You probably don’t need me to spell it out for you, but you really can’t overstate the impact of the failure. When we should’ve been investigating what happened, the press had given social media platforms cover to censor the mere mention of the lab leak. The media cheered along. https://t.co/5OM3y7iocN

@DrewHolden360 - Drew Holden

As a result of the media refusing to consider a politically inconvenient idea — and their need to throttle its very mention — we may never definitively know what caused a pandemic that’s killed millions and irrevocably changed the course of modern life.

@DrewHolden360 - Drew Holden

And it may mean that some people get off scot-free for what they’ve done to play a role in that disaster. Hard to imagine that wasn’t the goal all along, in my humble opinion. https://t.co/SK7ZMOA6Vw

@DrewHolden360 - Drew Holden

🧵THREAD🧵 “15 days to slow the spread” kicked off four years ago Saturday, sending the media into perhaps its most deranged cycle of my lifetime. I dove back into some of the worst lockdown media coverage from those early days. Buckle in, this one’s long. ⤵️

@DrewHolden360 - Drew Holden

The real worst of the coverage was when states started reopening. The media outrage was palpable. Republicans wanted people to die, we were told. Remember @TheAtlantic’s “Georgia’s Experiment in Human Sacrifice”? You may’ve forgotten how wild the text of it was. I did. https://t.co/vJSpfbSRo8

@DrewHolden360 - Drew Holden

But that wasn’t a one off sentiment. The belief four years ago among the media was that allowing people to leave their homes was tantamount to killing people. @washingtonpost called it a “deadly error” — not in an opinion piece, mind you, but in a “health” news headline. https://t.co/glcV9j2cKK

@DrewHolden360 - Drew Holden

What we should’ve been doing instead, to hear the press tell it, was employing “harsh steps,” @nytimes said. “Americans must be persuaded to stay home” and “travel restrictions should be extended” they said. https://t.co/7MM2v07hum

@DrewHolden360 - Drew Holden

@politico thought the same thing. In their magazine, the outlet called for a “national quarantine” which they dubbed a “common-sense” approach. https://t.co/LKnHLjUU0n

@DrewHolden360 - Drew Holden

@CNN was among the most crazed. They went after the supposed morality behind the “Open it Up” movement, which they called “downright dangerous.” The people who thought it was okay to go outside were “downright dangerous.” https://t.co/631gWX81BQ

@DrewHolden360 - Drew Holden

I want to pause here to point out something important. Yes, Covid killed millions of people. But this wasn’t the bubonic plague we were talking about. And states like Florida were able to safely reopen, as I, @CurtisHouck and others pointed out back in the thick of it. https://t.co/SgtxZOkAAA

@DrewHolden360 - Drew Holden

Anyway, back to the coverage, because it was just so ridiculous. @USATODAY kept with the deadly theme, calling reopenings “Russian roulette.” Again. This to describe letting people go to stores. https://t.co/y5DmCmIWez

@DrewHolden360 - Drew Holden

You can’t overstate the fear mongering from the press. Here’s @TIME giving tips and tricks to how you can stay hidden in your home if your state reopens. The picture selection to accompany these pieces is an editorial choice. https://t.co/HuAvlJAiR0

@DrewHolden360 - Drew Holden

And, of course, reopening was racist. You may remember that, in those halcyon days, everything was — this was the summer of race after all — and reopenings and lockdowns were no exception for @voxdotcom, @AP, @NewsHour & @Salon. https://t.co/AbnIKk8N1G

@DrewHolden360 - Drew Holden

But the craziest example is from @ABC. Whenever I see “analysis” in a headline, particularly about news that intersects with liberal sacred cows, I expect what follows will be preposterous. This was no exception. https://t.co/pg0RLSEsva

@DrewHolden360 - Drew Holden

You may think the 33 word headline from @BusinessInsider is bad, but the photo selection really elevates the embarrassment all involved should feel about the choices made for this piece, in retrospect. https://t.co/kjCDVpvTr3

@DrewHolden360 - Drew Holden

Like the Business Insider piece, lots of outlets really leaned into the panic porn when it came to reopening schools. @Reuters made sure to include the case counts as a counter to Trump in the headline. How they wanted their readers to feel about his comments is clear. https://t.co/fMldWE2Ezq

@DrewHolden360 - Drew Holden

Maybe they were channeling @rweingartin, the head of the teachers association and then-media darling. Remember when kids were going to be fine even if they had to sacrifice because they were “resilient”? I do. https://t.co/wUfvdAdbqz

@DrewHolden360 - Drew Holden

A quick aside: @rweingarten has taken to claiming that she and her org always wanted to keep schools open. It isn’t true. Weingarten long pushed for schools to be closed. This is why I take screenshots. https://t.co/hn60XklVAQ

@DrewHolden360 - Drew Holden

There were lots of other outlets who pushed to close schools. Here’s @CNN, advising their readers that schools weren’t safe for kids. https://t.co/o974lksUEY

@DrewHolden360 - Drew Holden

@ABC fact checked the idea that kids got better faster, calling the claim “misleading.” It wasn’t. Even the Times admitted - again, this isn’t hindsight - around the same time that kids recovered quicker. But ABC wanted to stoke fear. I can’t see another explanation. https://t.co/dpJm2Qawmq

@DrewHolden360 - Drew Holden

@washingtonpost called school reopenings a “fantasy” https://t.co/0svjEV3l7A

@DrewHolden360 - Drew Holden

I’ll let this @guardian headline speak for itself. https://t.co/8czuBqznEN

@DrewHolden360 - Drew Holden

It’s an understatement to say there were consequences to the lockdowns the press cheered for. Learning loss devastated kids. For the rest of America, lockdowns had a huge toll on mental and physical health. https://t.co/X3RZXafWK4

@DrewHolden360 - Drew Holden

None of this should’ve been a surprise. We knew that lockdowns had serious consequences. I wrote about it for @nytopinion…in 2020. https://t.co/s3DKWzKU2y

@DrewHolden360 - Drew Holden

You probably won’t be surprised that, even after the consequence became clear, the media haven’t learned any lessons. The outside still isn’t safe, so say @nytimes, @washingtonpost & @CNN. These were just last summer. Will the press ever get over it? I’ll bet the under. https://t.co/5CwnwKRtR5

@DrewHolden360 - Drew Holden

🧵THREAD🧵 A deadly blast hit Gaza yesterday. Hamas blamed Israel. The media rushed to parrot their claims. Evidence suggests they were lies. @FreeBeacon Here are the outlets who carried water for a terrorist group to smear Israel ⤵️ https://freebeacon.com/media/here-are-the-media-outlets-that-uncritically-regurgitated-hamas-propaganda/

WATCH: Here Are the Media Outlets That Uncritically Regurgitated Hamas Propaganda When a hospital in the Gaza Strip blew up on Tuesday night, U.S. and international news media uncritically reported Hamas terrorists' claims of an Israeli massacre. The White House and Israel have since refuted that account, citing imagery, intercepts, and open-source information. freebeacon.com

@DrewHolden360 - Drew Holden

When Donald Trump walked slowly down some wet stairs the entire mainstream press lost its mind.

@FreeBeacon - Washington Free Beacon

BREAKING: Biden Takes Hard Fall at Air Force Academy Graduation https://freebeacon.com/biden-administration/watch-biden-takes-hard-fall-at-air-force-academy-graduation/

WATCH: Biden Takes Hard Fall at Air Force Academy Graduation President Joe Biden fell Thursday after handing out diplomas to graduates at the Air Force Academy in Colorado Springs. The president was brought to his feet by three men on the stage soon after the fall. freebeacon.com

@DrewHolden360 - Drew Holden

Have we tracked down an explanation of Biden’s fall yet @washingtonpost?

@DrewHolden360 - Drew Holden

As always. @JRubinBlogger

@DrewHolden360 - Drew Holden

Hopefully the creeps at @ProjectLincoln are getting to the bottom of this

@DrewHolden360 - Drew Holden

Never change, @CNN

@DrewHolden360 - Drew Holden

Looking forward to “Biden’s Fall Raises New Health Questions” from @nytimes with a subhead about Biden’s age.

@DrewHolden360 - Drew Holden

Gonna get this tattooed.