The New York Times has been accused of slanting its 2016 political coverage toward Hillary Clinton while stiffing Bernie Sanders. Well, in Thursday’s edition, there was balance: the paper’s coverage was equally effusive for both Democrats. While Hillary Clinton got a mawkish front-page celebration of her supposedly personal, secret work with black mothers whose children had been killed in confrontations with police, Sanders also made the day's front page, with a fawning report on his crowd-getting abilities in progressive Greenwich Village, “Sanders Carries Fight on ‘Status Quo’ to Village.” Patrick Healy was reverential:
Locked in a fierce fight with Hillary Clinton to win the New York primary, Senator Bernie Sanders took his plea for a political revolution to the heart of Greenwich Village on Wednesday and heaped particular scorn on Wall Street to the delight of several thousand jubilant supporters.
Speaking on a cloudless night in Washington Square Park, the famed arch dramatically lit behind him, Mr. Sanders said he drew inspiration from the trade unions, gay rights activists and others fighting to “change the status quo.”
He repeatedly denounced “corporate greed and the rigged economy,” taking aim at the big banks just to the south, and said that defending the interests of regular Americans was the abiding cause of his presidential campaign.
The photo caption underlined the story’s reverential tone: “In buildings along the park, New York University students and workers pressed against windows to watch Senator Bernie Sanders and the vast crowd below on the chilly night.”
With Sanders admirers waving placards reading “Democracy v Oligarchy, Humanity v Greed” and ‘‘Not Me -- Us,” the rally had the feel of some of the Occupy Wall Street protests in 2011 and 2012, with the predominantly young crowd cheering Mr. Sanders every time he railed against major companies and executives and promised to impose higher taxes on Wall Street. People waited for hours in lines that stretched several blocks to get into the park, and they seemed spellbound at times as Mr. Sanders held forth against the wealthy and the powerful -- in particular, Mrs. Clinton.
Healy is no slouch at defending Hillary Clinton against Republican attacks, so in that sense his reporting is balanced – he lauds all Democrats with equal passion.
Sanders campaign aides said that about 27,000 people attended the rally, a striking number; Barack Obama also filled the park during a rally in 2007, but his campaign said only about 20,000 people had registered.
But no matter the exact count, the rally was an event that went viral on social media and drew people who flew to New York specifically for the event. In buildings along the park, New York University students and workers pressed against windows to watch the senator and the vast crowd below on the chilly night.
