Judge Laurence Silberman warned in his recent dissent in a defamation case about the power of the media, how the almost complete liberal control of the media, in coordination with “Silicon Valley,” could control what information we have access to, and what a threat to our freedom that can truly be.

It seems fairly obvious that what’s happening at the border is a crisis. If it weren’t, they wouldn’t be trying to open up facilities everywhere to deal with the overflow, they wouldn’t be talking about shipping some to other states near the northern border with Canada and to the coast, and they wouldn’t be just releasing some outright into the country without a notice to appear — a completely unprecedented move. You wouldn’t have Democrats like Rep. Henry Cuellar (D-TX) up in arms, as we’ve reported.

But the reactions of two liberal media bastions were concerning. The Washington Post tried to spin that this was all just a “seasonal shift,” that there was no real “surge.” Joe Biden then tried that same defense during his press conference. And after his press conference, then WaPo quietly edited their original story to pull back from claiming it wasn’t a “surge”; now, they changed it to “it was a predictable surge.” They, understandably, got a lot of flack for the change from folks on social media.

“There’s no migrant ‘surge’ at the U.S. southern border. Here’s the data.”

“The migrant ‘surge’ at the US southern border is actually a predictable pattern.”

🤡🤡🤡

Washington Post draws heat for changing a story on immigration https://t.co/rMd4aTa8Af via @nypost

— Rasmussen Reports (@Rasmussen_Poll) March 27, 2021

From NY Post:

A post that ran on March 25 initially carried a headline that read: “There’s no migrant ‘surge’ at the U.S. southern border. Here’s the data.”

The revised headline reads: “The migrant ‘surge’ at the US southern border is actually a predictable pattern.”

There were also changes in the accompanying text. The original version, for example, read: “what we’re seeing in other words isn’t a surge or crisis, but a predictable seasonal shift.”

The new version doesn’t weigh on whether it is a surge or not but says simply: “What we’re seeing right now is a predictable seasonal shift.”

But WaPo aren’t the only ones playing these language games.

Associated Press Vice President and Editor-at-Large for Standards, John Daniszewski warned reporters against the use of different words in describing the border crisis. Chief among the directions? Don’t call it a ‘crisis.’

Next part of @AP memo pic.twitter.com/CtnxdsAXkU

— Julio Ricardo Varela (@julito77) March 25, 2021

The current events in the news – a sharp increase in the arrival of unaccompanied minors – is a problem for border officials, a political challenge for Biden and a dire situation for many migrants who make the journey, but it does not fit the classic dictionary definition of a crisis. [….]

Therefore, we should avoid, or at least, be highly cautious, about referring to the present situation as a crisis on our own, although we may quote others using that language. [….]

Daniszewski gave a definition of crisis then that seems to fit exactly what is happening.

If using the word “crisis,” we need to ask of what and to whom. There could be a humanitarian crisis if the numbers grow so large that officials cannot house the migrants safely or in sanitary conditions. Migrants may face humanitarian crises in their home countries. In theory, there could be a security or a border crisis if officials lose control of the border, allowing people to enter unencumbered in large numbers. But, in general, avoid hyperbole in calling anything a crisis or an emergency.”

Oddly, they had no problem calling it a “crisis” under President Donald Trump when the surges were smaller, as Becket Adams at the Washington Examiner observed. But hey, who needs consistency of thought and principle when you have narrative?

Sen. Ted Cruz summarized it well, with a joke that’s unfortunately quite on point.

True fact: the FEC now requires the AP to print, at the bottom of every story,

“I’m Joe Biden, and I approve this message.” https://t.co/TIqfTE8EDd

— Ted Cruz (@tedcruz) March 27, 2021

HT: Twitchy