First it was Senator Dianne Feinstein. Now it’s Senator Leahy and Bernie Sanders.

With Joe Biden at the top of the party, it seems like an odd time to start purging the octogenarians. 

“Senate’s octogenarians face the age question and whether it’s time to exit,” a Washington Post headline reads.

That comes from the same paper pushing the candidacy of Joe Biden. But the contemporary media has come to be very good at not noting the basic and obvious contradictions between its talking points and glaring reality.

Between Jane Mayer’s sleazy New Yorker hit piece targeting Senator Dianne Feinstein and the Los Angeles Times urging her to resign so that Governor Newsom can appoint both a black and Hispanic senator, the Democrats are suddenly trying to get fresh blood the hard way. The Washington Post article takes most of its shots at Republicans, where it has no influence, but also throws a few punches at Democrats, including Feinstein, but also name checks Leahy and Bernie Sanders.

I have little sympathy for Feinstein, who’s suddenly finding out how ruthless and racist the party she served lo these many years is when she’s on the receiving end, let alone the truly nasty likes of Leahy or Sanders, but these are decisions that the voters get to make. And if the Senate is full of people who seem to be there forever, that’s the result of a partisan political system in which politicians build connections that they can coast on for generations. Senators move through the system surrounded by staffers who all but read their minds and who have deep roots in the political systems of their own states. That makes them hard to dislodge.

It also means that they can do a whole lot of damage on their way out. Just ask the McCain family.

But all of this is a question for the voters. Not for a D.C. paper owned by the CEO of Amazon.  

Voters had the opportunity, however limited it may be in California, to settle the issue. And they did. But the media has gotten into the toxic habit of acting like it gets to make those decisions on behalf of the voters. Which, in the Washington Post’s case, really means on behalf of Jeff Bezos. 

Right now the media has decided that it should oust a bunch of older senators to make way for the next wave of AOCs. And if Biden gets into the White House, that same argument will be used to oust him.