Unreal: Tim Walz Made First Visit to North Carolina Thursday and Here's What the Press Chose to Focus on

As RedState has reported, before Thursday Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz had not sat down for a formal interview nor any other type of interview since being chosen as Democratic nominee Kamala Harris' vice presidential running mate nearly a month ago.

The reason given for this was that "The danger in sending him out to do big solo interviews is that he might not have a full command of where Harris is on every issue."

Pathetic as it was, it made sense in a way considering the top of the ticket, Harris herself, also has the same problem, which presumably was also the reason why Harris didn't sit down for her first interview (where she included Walz by her side) until over a month and a half into her presidential campaign - with a friendly media outlet to boot.

Most of what is known about Walz has been based on his record as governor, on past statements and media reports as well as what he's claimed while on the campaign trail.

So one would think at this stage in the game, with some 70 or so days left before Election Day, that his first stop in North Carolina - which they feel is winnable - for a campaign event would see Walz peppered with questions from the mainstream press about his positions on the issues.

Instead, we got a lot of stories about... his visit to a local Cook Out and his milkshake flavor preferences:

Democratic vice presidential nominee Tim Walz visited North Carolina Thursday and a focal point for the local press was to highlight... his milkshake preferences. And people wonder why trust in the media is at a low point. #ncpol #ncmedia pic.twitter.com/0cipr79vKI
— Sister Toldjah 💙 (@sistertoldjah) August 30, 2024

Walz ordered a mint chocolate chip milkshake and Cooper got an M&M shake.
— Korie Dean (@koriedean) August 29, 2024

Sadly, this brought back memories of a similar moment for then-Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden, who - in the midst of his 2020 basement campaign where access to him was tightly controlled - was asked the burning question of what type of milkshake he ordered by one of the reporters who was traveling with his campaign:

“What flavor did you get?” - you don’t need to ask the candidate this question. Find out from staff.

Two weeks out, a party nominee should be asked more substantive questions.

This isn’t the first Iowa trip! https://t.co/SSYC37yfgp
— Yashar Ali 🐘 (@yashar) October 18, 2020

It also reminded me of CNN's weird obsession with then-President Donald Trump's food choices, with hard-hitting "reports" like the one they did in May 2017 on Trump’s ice cream eating habits, which referenced a Time magazine story that focused on how he ate his ice cream:

Just think about all the REAL news @CNN is not covering while they are shrieking about Trump's ice cream. pic.twitter.com/ErwR9tKkNC
— Diana247 (@Diana24724) May 11, 2017

I get that sometimes there are slow news days and that these stories are good "filler" when there's not much else to report on. But we are not in one of those slow news periods and in fact, are in desperate need of more information on and about the guy who wants to be second in command for four years.

That any time at all was spent on the milkshake purchase is yet another x mark against the press and provides us with yet another example of why they are no longer taken seriously and are no longer trusted.