Not even NBC News pays attention to NBC News.
The network suggested Tuesday that former President Barack Obama’s attacks this week on President Trump represent a first for the former commander in chief.
“For nearly four years,” NBC reports, “Obama refrained from attacking his successor, respecting a time-honored tradition even as President Donald Trump launched hundreds of Twitter attacks against him.”
It adds, “[Obama] kept largely silent as Trump falsely claimed that Obama had spied on his campaign. … As he took to the trail on Biden’s behalf in the 2020 race’s closing days, the gloves came off.”
This is not even close to being true, and I am not even talking about the part where NBC asserts falsely that the Obama administration did not spy on the Trump 2016 campaign (it did).
Obama has attacked Trump consistently since the GOP incumbent first took office in 2017. But don’t take my word for it. Just watch NBC.
In August, NBC published basically the exact same storyline as the above when it covered Obama’s address at the 2020 Democratic National Convention. “President Obama’s unusual flaying of his successor served as a historical marker — and a powerful political weapon for the Democratic ticket,” read an analysis published by the network.
Nor is NBC alone in promoting the false idea that Obama has not “flayed” his predecessor on a regular basis.
On Jan. 20, 2017, just 10 days after Trump was inaugurated, the former president went after Trump on immigration. “Obama,” the Washington Post reported, “in a rare move for an ex-president, breaks silence to criticize Trump on immigration.”
In October of that year, the Associated Press reported, “Breaking tradition, former presidents sparring with Trump.”
Later, in September 2018, ABC News published an analysis titled, “In a dramatic course change, Obama breaks tradition and blasts Trump.”
The New York Times reported two months later, “Once Reluctant to Speak Out, an Energized Obama Now Calls Out His Successor.”
What is even happening with this narrative? It is as if the people at NBC and elsewhere all got a high from making history with Obama, and they have been desperate ever since to find new ways to maintain that buzz, including repurposing the same junk two, three, or even four times.
In September 2019, Esquire published a headline that read, “President Obama Just Went After Trump in a Rare Direct Attack.”
“Obama Takes Rare Swipe At Trump By Naming 2 Things A President Shouldn’t Do,” HuffPost reported later.
This year, Forbes declared in a headline in March, “In Rare Knock On Trump, Obama Compares Coronavirus Response To Climate Change Denials.”
“Obama slams rollback of vehicle emission standards in rare rebuke of Trump,” CNN reported in April.
Reported Business Insider in June, “Obama slams Trump for his ‘shambolic’ and ‘mean-spirited approach’ to governance in rare public rebuke.”
At what point does this stop being “rare?”
