In 2024, as in 2020, the Regime Media are engaged in intense firefighting over an inconvenient story with potentially devastating effects on the election of Joe Biden to the presidency of the United States. In 2020 that story was Hunter Biden’s laptop, which the media suppressed and dismissed as Russian disinformation with the help of social media. In 2024, that story is Joe Biden’s painfully evident cognitive decline.
There are no 51 intelligence officials, or perhaps neurologists, that have as of yet signed a letter stating that the relentless stream of videos documenting Biden’s decline have “the hallmarks of a Russian disinformation operation.” But the media are ready, willing, and able to adopt The White House’s “cheap fakes” talking point as they try to wish this story away. In fact, here’s CBS’s Chief White House Correspondent Nancy Cordes, doing precisely that as she kicks off her report on America Decides:
NANCY CORDES: You’ve probably heard of deep fakes, but just last week, as President Biden was at the G7 summit in Italy, cheap fake clips went viral on social media, and were picked up by some news outlets. Take a look at this clip, for example. It shows Biden and other world leaders watching a skydiving demonstration before the president is seen walking away and looking in another direction. Outlets claimed that he was sort of just aimlessly wandering around, the clips amassed millions of use with just a few hours, when actually he, if you widen out, you can see that he was talking to one of the members of the military that was participating in that demonstration. So how prevalent are cheap fakes and how big of a problem will they be in this election?
We must begin by fact-checking the fact-check, which tries to negate claims that Biden wandered off by explaining that he was simply talking to the parachutists that had performed their exhibition at the G7. Biden wandered away from a group photo, and the Italian Prime Minister Georgia Meloni is clearly seen making her way through the crowd and wrangling Biden back into the photo. This set of facts is not in dispute.
The same can be said for former President Barack Obama leading Biden off stage at the Hollywood fundraiser hosted by Jimmy Kimmel. Unedited video shows this. This is not a “cheap fake”, nor is it disinformation. No matter how hard the media may wish it to be so.
But Cordes wants to firefight, so she embraces The White House’s language on these inconvenient viral videos that pop up on a near-daily basis. It is at this point that she brings in Rhona Tarrant, CBS’s resident “disinformation expert”, in order to further gaslight viewers into thinking that these viral videos were somehow manipulated or deceptively edited.
In trying to cast doubt on the authenticity of the G7 and Hollywood fundraiser videos, Tarrant suggests that viral videos where Biden bumbles through sentences are also manipulated.
Cordes, for her part, repeatedly wonders out loud about the impact these videos might have on the election. The end goal, as always, is to Protect the Precious.
In their collective firefighting against the cognitive decline videos, the Regime Media have gone far beyond obsequiousness and servility- descending into outright Orwellianism. The Media have taken on the role of The Party as depicted in George Orwell's1984,and like The Party, they now command you to "reject the evidence of your eyes and ears".
It is very clear that the Regime Media thinks Biden needs to be protected from the impact of the endless flow of videos documenting his mental decline. And in so doing, they have signaled they will pull out all the stops. Just like they did in 2020, when Biden needed to be protected from Hunter’s laptop. Biden’s ongoing and well-documented cognitive decline is the 2024 version of Hunter’s laptop.
Click “expand” to view the full transcript of the aforementioned interview as aired on CBS News Now’s America Decides on Tuesday, June 18th, 2024:
CBS NEWS NOW
AMERICA DECIDES
6/19/24
5:22 PM
NANCY CORDES: You’ve probably heard of deep fakes, but just last week, as President Biden was at the G7 summit in Italy, cheap fake clips went viral on social media, and were picked up by some news outlets. Take a look at this clip, for example. It shows Biden and other world leaders watching a skydiving demonstration before the president is seen walking away and looking in another direction. Outlets claimed that he was sort of just aimlessly wandering around, the clips amassed millions of use with just a few hours, when actually he, if you widen out, you can see that he was talking to one of the members of the military that was participating in that demonstration. So how prevalent are cheap fakes and how big of a problem will they be in this election? Well- let's take a look with Executive Editor of CBS News Confirmed, Rhona Tarrant, who joins us now from Studio 57 to explain. Hi, Rhona, it's great to see you.
RHONA TARRANT: Hi.
CORDES: So, tell us how long cheap fakes have been around. I'm assuming they've been around since the beginning of the media because, you know, anybody can take an image and manipulate it to make it look like it suggests something that didn't happen.
TARRANT: That's exactly it. It really is a case of old techniques meets new technology. So, as you said, cheap fake videos, and that’s videos that are edited in a really simple way-- those have been around as long as political videos have existed. So there’s a few ways, for example, that people might be familiar with. One is, there might be a long video and you take a very short clip and you take out key context.
CORDES: Mmm-hm.
TARRANT: Another is, maybe you slow something down and it makes it sound like someone is slurring their words, or another is you might splice several pieces together and it makes it sound like someone said something they didn't. What’s different in this selection and the last two elections in the presidential elections is number one, everyone has access to mobile phones were they can edit, and number two, most people have social media accounts where they can publish this stuff. So it's worth saying that these are not anything new. You know, when Trump was president, these targeted him, as well, but what we are seeing in the last few weeks is really the steady stream of videos that are targeting President Biden and, in particular, taking aim at his age.
CORDES: Right. And they are being picked up by news outlets that know that they are fakes, and- or know that they are misleading, but post them anyway. Rhona, is there any way to measure the impact that these videos could have on the 2024 election in comparison to other forms of misinformation?
TARRANT: You know, that’s a really great question. I think, you know, in terms of what our team has been tracking, we have seen seso- called cheap fake videos. They are targeting Biden and they are targeting Trump, however we have seen- particularly in the last few months, the videos targeting Biden are getting a lot more traction online, and in particular, the ones that target Biden's age, so, for example, like you have said, claiming that he is wandering off, when really he's having a conversation with somebody. These videos are effective because they are, they are called cheap fakes for a reason. They are quick, they’re easy to publish, and oftentimes, they have big impact on people who are just scrolling through their phones. They watch it for five seconds and they move on. Also what's interesting about this is we've heard a lot about the fear of deepfakes in this election, and we've seen that deepfakes haven't really shown up in the way that maybe people were worried about them showing up.
CORDES: Right.
TARRANT: But these videos that are edited in a really basic way with technology that's been around for a long time, are effective- effective to the extent that The White House is addressing them.
CORDES: Deep fakes, as opposed to cheap fakes are, you know, videos or audio that has been completely created by A.I. So think of the robocall that was sent around to Rhode Island- not Rhode Island- New Hampshire voters a few months ago that sounded just like Joe Biden telling them not to vote, but it was a total fake. So, Rhona, how can voters best discern between videos that are real and videos that are not?
TARRANT: So- social media platforms, sometimes they will attach fact checks to these videos. And so sometimes on X you might see Community Notes or on Facebook you might see fact checks. However the reality is, for the vast majority of them, they’re not going to have anything attached. So, unfortunately, it really is on the viewer. The number one piece of advice I would have is always check your sources. So, if you see something on an account, is this a partisan account? Is it pushing for a particular candidate, and does it have a history of posting misinformation? And the second thing, which I think is really important, is always seek another source. So don’t just take it from one account. Make sure that you’ve got a second source or even a third source, and most importantly, make sure that’s a credible source.
CORDES: And CBS Confirmed is one the most credible. Rhona Tarrant, thank you so much for breaking it down with us, I appreciate it.
TARRANT: Thank you.
