Parrots and phony poll ‘findings’

It’s a pity.

Had they taken time to read what Baker wrote, they would’ve found a pretty obvious and glaring falsehood.

To wit, they would’ve noticed the governor engaged in outright fiction when he suggested Massachusetts native and former Capitol Police officer William Evans died last year from injuries sustained during the Jan. 6 riot.

This simply isn’t true.

Evans was killed on April 2, 2021, after a motorist slammed a vehicle into the barricades outside the Capitol complex. The motorist, Noah Green, was discovered later to be a supporter of the Nation of Islam, specifically its leader, Louis Farrakhan.

To put it as plainly as possible, Evans’s death had nothing to do with the Jan. 6 riot.

Yet here’s what Baker said in his statement: “The despicable attempt on the part of former President Trump and his allies to undo what generations of Americans fought and died for, the right to free and fair elections, will stain this nation’s history forever. Thankfully, the Capitol Police and every law enforcement officer and member of the U.S. Military there that day stepped into the violence and successfully restored order.”

The statement then added, “One of the officers who lost his life protecting the Capitol last year was William Evans, a North Adams native who tragically leaves behind a beautiful family. His sacrifice, and his colleagues’ actions, will stand as shining examples of heroism and bravery.”

Amazingly, local Massachusetts media shared the governor’s statement without bothering to note the bogus premise of tying Evans’s death to the riot.

“Governor Baker statement on this one year since the Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol,” WCVB newscaster Antoinette Antonio said.

MassLive State House reporter Alison Kuznitz added, “On the one-year anniversary of the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol, Gov. Charlie Baker mourns the loss of North Adams native William Evans.”

Boston’s NPR affiliate, WBUR, simply tweeted, “Mass. governor shares this on the anniversary of the January 6 insurrection.”

None of them, not a single one, took a moment to point out Evans died months after the riot in an unrelated vehicle-ramming attack.

Phony poll findings

It takes a special type of media bias for a major newsroom to cherry-pick the findings of its own polling data to cast Republicans in the worst possible light.

Last week, just before the one-year anniversary of the Jan. 6 riots, CBS reported on a new CBS News/YouGov survey, claiming it showed a majority of self-identified Republican respondents have a favorable opinion of the attack on the Capitol.

“Most Americans — including most Democrats, but just a fifth of Republicans — call [Jan. 6] an insurrection and describe it as an attempt to overturn the election and the government,” CBS reported.

The survey, which was conducted between Dec. 27 and Dec. 30 and whose margin of error is plus or minus 2.6 percentage points, surveyed 2,063 adults.

The CBS report then claimed the poll found only 21% of Republicans chose the word “insurrection” to answer the question: “What happened at the Capitol on January 6, 2020?” CBS also reported that only 18% of Republicans chose the phrase “trying to overthrow the government,” while 47% chose “patriotism” and 56% chose “defending freedom.”

Republicans “stand apart from others in offering descriptions [of Jan. 6] that are less harsh,” the network claimed.

CBS even made a splashy graphic to accompany its report, showing the percentage breakdowns for each of the four response options.

“A year ago, most Republicans strongly disapproved, but today, their disapproval is spread between strongly and a bit more only somewhat disapproving,” CBS said.

Amazingly, there’s something missing from CBS’s graphic and its presentation of the data. When YouGov asked the same question, respondents were given six options from which to choose, not four.

The two options missing from CBS’s graphic are “trying to overturn the election and keep Donald Trump in power” and “a protest that went too far.”

The survey found an overwhelming number of respondents, 76%, chose “a protest that went too far.” Breaking down the responses by party affiliation, YouGov found 60% of self-identified Democrats characterized Jan. 6 as “a protest that went too far,” while a much larger 80% of Republican respondents said the same.

I’m sure it’s just an oversight that CBS omitted from its now-viral graphic the percentage breakdown of the number of Republicans who characterize the riot as “a protest that went too far.”

Just an oversight, I’m sure.