It goes without saying that most columnists at the New York Times are about as “in touch” with the concerns of average Americans across the country as CNN’s Brian Stelter is in touch with cold, hard reality when it comes to the goings-on in the Biden administration.

Most notably we see this with Paul Krugman, whose Nobel Prize in economics sits somewhere collecting dust while he continues to regale us with tall tales about how the American people are apparently too stupid to understand that the economy is not that bad or something, even though gas in some parts of the country is over $6 a gallon and costs for staple items in grocery stores are skyrocketing to the point people are having to scale back their shopping lists dramatically.

But we’re going to leave Paul Krugman alone for a moment and instead focus on his colleague Thomas Friedman.

While Friedman isn’t as well known as Krugman is for mindlessly spouting off gibberish spin in hopes of making Democrats (and himself) look knowledgable and competent, he nevertheless gave Kruggie a run for his money this week in a column where he recapped a recent lunch date he had with President Joe Biden. In the process, Friedman unintentionally reaffirmed the gross disconnect between the Biden White House and the American people as well as how Biden is ridiculously over-sheltered by his infamous handlers.

Check out how it started out:

President Biden invited me for lunch at the White House last Monday. But it was all off the record — so I can’t tell you anything he said.

I can, though, tell you two things — what I ate and how I felt after. I ate a tuna salad sandwich with tomato on whole wheat bread, with a bowl of mixed fruit and a chocolate milkshake for dessert that was so good it should have been against the law.

The rest of it was a desperate plea by Friedman to get Americans to believe that Biden is not only misunderstood but is treated unfairly by Fox News and so-called “Big Lie” Trump Republicans, 10% of whom Friedman says Biden needs to win over in order to be able to govern effectively.

Even admittedly leftist journalists were calling it “beyond parody”:

Beyond parody pic.twitter.com/EiCcVOzB7Y

— Ken Klippenstein (@kenklippenstein) May 23, 2022

My RedState colleague and Lie-Able Sources host Brad Slager suggested that the Pulitzer Committee, which has already awarded Friedman three – count’em – three awards, go ahead and get busy on the next one:

The Pulitzer Committee can go ahead and engrave a medallion for Distinguished Editorial Writing.
Friedman had this one seen up! pic.twitter.com/d43UbVpyGh

— Lie-Able Sources (@LieAbleSources) May 24, 2022

Imagine wanting to be viewed as a serious person with viewpoints that should be listened to and taken seriously and starting your column out in such a way that not only gushes about your (probably expensive) lefty lunch plate but then lavishes praise on a heavily insulated president who would not allow you to quote anything he said on the record – a president who has become notorious for avoiding the media over the 16 months he’s been in office, in part by going along with the Biden Hideout Strategy and in other instances allowing comms people dressed up as the Easter Bunny to forcibly rescue him from a questioning press corps while he looks on confused and out of sorts.

In summary, though, both Biden and Friedman got what they wanted out of this. Biden didn’t have to face tough questions from actual reporters and got a nice little puff piece from a sufficiently obedient media figure with a respectable following in the process while Friedman further ingratiated himself with the left-wing power elite in Washington, D.C. for who style over substance is critical to their “success” at the ballot box:

Some reporters are genuinely in this industry for the attention/proximity to power and it shows more and more with each passing day. https://t.co/fyywvK91PC

— Adam M. Rhodes (@byadamrhodes) May 23, 2022

‘Nuff said.

Flashback –>> Watch: The Question of ‘Why Isn’t Joe Biden Doing More Interviews’ Gets Definitively Answered