Media: The Filibuster Is Only 'Fake' When Ted Cruz Does It

You might remember the media gushing over an eight hour U.S. Senate “filibuster,” launched by the openly socialist Bernie Sanders, back in December of 2010.  Only it wasn’t a filibuster. What Sanders did was exactly what Senator Cruz just did: he gave a long speech — which is not technically a filibuster. Only the media didn’t care about that distinction in 2010. It was only when Cruz aped Sanders that the media gave birth to the “fake filibuster” narrative.

In 2010, CBS News wrote, “Bernie Sanders Holds Old-School Filibuster Against Obama-GOP Tax Cut Deal.”

Today, CBS News not only calls Cruz doing the same thing a “speech,” they even fact-checked it.

The Washington Post lists Sanders’ so-called filibuster under a headline that lists “The longest US Senate filibusters.”

Cruz’s marathon session, however, is only headlined in the very same Post as a “speech.”

A quick search of the New York Times shows the “paper of record” describing Sanders’ speech as a “filibuster” on more than one occasion.

Cruz, however, gave a “speech.”

You get the idea. But let me quickly add NRO’s epic bust of the left-wing BuzzFeed.

Then:

Bernie Sanders (I-Vermont) is being a badass today and doing a real filibuster of the Obama tax cuts to counteract the bullshit fake filibusters everyone else has been trying to pull recently.

Now:

Sen. Ted Cruz has now held the Senate floor for 19 hours in a faux filibuster. pic.twitter.com/GgspEe4nTs

— BuzzFeed News (@BuzzFeedNews) September 25, 2013

So why is the media doing this, you ask?

Well, thanks to Frank Capra’s 1939 classic Mr. Smith Goes to Washington, there is a romantic underdog attachment to the idea of a filibuster; one man standing alone against The Political Machine to fight for what he believes in.

But the media loath Cruz and adore ObamaCare, which means that they could not allow the Texas Senator to look like Mr. Smith. Last night, I even heard CNN’s Dana Bash say, “This is not a ‘Mr. Smith’ type situation.”

The last thing the media wants is for Ted Cruz and his cause to look in any way sympathetic. So they stripped Cruz of the “filibuster” glow as one way to portray him as a right-wing crazy narcissist wasting everyone’s time as a way to raise his profile. The exact opposite of Mr. Smith.

Sanders, on the other hand, is not only a Socialist, he was fighting against extending tax cuts. To our media, that is a righteous cause fought by a righteous man. So even though Sanders’ filibuster was just as “fake” as Cruz’s, the media allowed him to retain the “Mr. Smith” glow.

 

Follow  John Nolte on Twitter @NolteNC