While most of the world reacted to Prince’s death with sadness and gratitude for his life’s work, the occasional idiot managed to sneak in a silly word or two about the matter. The conjoined realms of politics and 24-hour cable news were no different, for while President Barack Obama uttered a few kind remarks about the musician’s passing, MSNBC’s Morning Joe actually compared the singer to Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump. Not to be outdone by their competitor, CNN posed an actual, we’re-totally-not-making-this-sh*t-up question about how it all relates to the 2016 election cycle.
During the channel’s Early Start program, anchor John Berman asked visiting panelists Nia-Malika Henderson and David Gregory about the matter point-blank:
“Today the big story isn’t the election for the first time in a long time. It’s Prince. The passing of Prince. Does this freeze the race a little bit, and maybe benefit Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump who were coming off of big wins?”
Yes, a very famous person who made a massive contribution to human popular culture had died less than 24 hours prior. Yes, the current news cycle can’t focus all of its time and effort on a single story (unfortunately). And yes, the disruption to business-as-usual for newsrooms that Prince’s death has caused (and will continue to cause) can’t be allowed to continue at the expense of necessary matters like politics. But doesn’t “benefit” seem like a bit of a strong word?
Gregory didn’t say a single thing throughout the 50-second clip. Henderson, however, chimed in with an “I don’t know” and the requisite additional explanation that typically follows such a phrase:
“Maybe so. It’s this rare moment that we’ve had with Prince, who was this big figure. I think a rare figure, where everybody liked him. Right? In terms of inter-generational… He crossed racial lines as well. It’s kind of a rare, collective moment. But in terms of the politics of the campaign, we’ll have to see on Tuesday whether these trends we’ve seen thus far hold up.”
Aside from Joe Scarborough’s suggestion that both Trump and Prince were “shape-shifters,” which some Trump fans might see as a positive comparison, Henderson is right. It’s much too early to tell whether or not Thursday’s dour news cycle will have any positive effects on Clinton, Trump and the other three presidential candidates’ campaigns and the media’s coverage of them.
(via Mediaite)