The great Rush Limbaugh said often that he knew the mainstream or “drive-by” media like the back of his hand. Not many things are more predictable than the media, and their prepared narratives designed to fit any story. Some all-time favorites include: all minorities are liberal and vote Democrat — if they do not they are “sellouts” or “Uncle Toms”; every union member wholeheartedly supports the Democrat Party; and all Republicans and conservatives are racists. For most of the mainstream media, all you have to do is make your story fit the narrative. How convenient, and how incredibly lazy.
But sometimes, inconvenience rears its ugly head for the media, and they are forced to participate in some serious pretzel-twisting in order to make a story fit. The latest possible attempt by the media to take a story and try to fit a square peg into a round hole is one that may still be developing. On Monday night, 19-year-old Sai Varshith Kandula of Chesterfield Missouri, a St. Louis suburb, was arrested after he crashed the U-Haul truck he was driving into security barriers near the White House. He is facing multiple charges including “Threatening to kill/kidnap/inflict harm on a President/VP/family member,” assault with a dangerous weapon, reckless operation of a motor vehicle, destruction of federal property, and trespassing. And the cherry on the cake: A Nazi flag was removed from the cab of the truck. You can almost see the media gleefully clapping like a 3-year-old at a birthday party.
🚨#BREAKING: A U-Haul truck rams into security barriers outside the White House
📌#Washington l #DC
Currently multiple law enforcements and the secret service along with bomb squad are on the scene after a U-Haul truck crashes and rams into security barriers outside near the… pic.twitter.com/QNO28VJMEx
— R A W S A L E R T S (@rawsalerts) May 23, 2023
Time for the media to take that tidbit and run right? Well, not so fast. A look at Kandula’s Missouri driver’s license clearly does not depict a MAGA hat-wearing white guy, and his name is not John Smith. You might think that is a problem for the media. That is where narrative flexibility comes in. And nowhere is that flexibility better on display, than in statements and actions by the squad. Representatives Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY), Ilhan Omar (D-MN), Ayanna Pressley (D-MA), Rashida Tlaib (D-MI), and Cori Bush (D-MO) have extensive histories of racist and antisemitic tropes and seemingly have no qualms about expressing those views. Why, because they can.
We can play the corrupt media game too.
If Sai Varshith Kandula is a White Supremacist Nazi then so are they.
This is how the liberal label game is played, right? pic.twitter.com/PO1TaF9ark
— 𝐂𝐂 (@ChatByCC) May 23, 2023
The most recent came in the form of Tlaib planning to host an event called “Nakba,” which is a Palestinian term for the founding of Israel. It roughly translates to “catastrophe.” She has called Israel an “apartheid state,” and accused it of ethnic cleansing. How did the media report on this? They didn’t.
Speaker McCarthy wants to rewrite history but the apartheid state of Israel was born out of violence and the ethnic cleansing of Palestinians.
75 years later, the Nakba continues to this day. https://t.co/s5P35dgqv0
— Congresswoman Rashida Tlaib (@RepRashida) May 1, 2023
Omar has made comments that are undoubtedly antisemitic. She has tweeted: “Israel has hypnotized the world, may Allah awaken the people and help them see the evil doings of Israel.” She has compared the U.S. and Israel to Hamas and the Taliban, and has also replied to House Speaker Kevin McCarthy’s criticism of comments made by both her and Tlaib about Israel with: “It’s all about the Benjamins baby.” She has claimed that Israel “demands” allegiance from American politicians in Washington D.C. The reaction from the media was to explain what Omar “really” meant.
Ocasio-Cortez and Pressley may be the tamest when it comes to Democrats and antisemitism. In 2021, Pressley condemned Israel for attacks on Palestinians, and the U.S. for sending aid to Israel, “that is used to demolish Palestinian homes, imprison Palestinian children, and displace Palestinian families.” As a freshman member of Congress, New York Jewish organizations criticized AOC for refusing to meet with them. In 2022, Bush fundraised with Neveen Ayesh, government relations coordinator for the Missouri chapter of American Muslims for Palestine. Ayesh once tweeted, “I want to set Israel on fire with my own hands & watch it burn to ashes along with every Israeli in it. Call it what you want to call it idc.” Media response to any of this? Crickets.
What is the one common denominator here? They are all Democrats. Are they also white supremacists as so far, Sai Varshith Kandula is being portrayed? According to the media, hardly. So what happens when we learn more about Kandula? One of two things: He is from a suburb of St. Louis that is fairly conservative and red. If the Nazi flag is the only incriminating thing they find, congratulations Sai, you are a white supremacist. If authorities find, after combing social media pages and other things of the sort, that he had any kind of leftist ties, or if he voted for Democrats, the end. The story goes away, and the media goes in search of the next “white supremacist.”
If Kandula gets the white supremacist moniker, whatever his ethnicity is, it will have the prefix of “white-fill in the blank,” ala George Zimmerman and his “white Hispanic” status. The media white supremacy double standard is the gift that keeps on giving.
