Cardi B’s interview with Bernie Sanders is more real than anything you'll find in mainstream media

An old white male socialist and a young black female rapper walk into a nail bar. It sounds like the start of a bad joke, but what ensues is a more honest talk about the issues facing Americans than mainstream media ever produces.

It’s easy to make fun of Cardi B interviewing Bernie Sanders at a nail salon in Detroit. On optics, it is somewhat entertaining — and at first glance, they are an odd pair.

Fox News had a field day with the visual. One contributor mused that “Bernie has the stripper vote locked down.” Conservatives claim it “makes no sense” for the wealthy rapper to complain about what the government is doing with her “f**king tax money” while supporting a higher-taxes socialist for president.

It’s unthinkable at Fox News, that a rich and famous American might be happy to pay high taxes, if that revenue was going toward useful public services like health care and education. It’s easier to assume that a young, black entertainer couldn’t possibly have thought this through.

The rapper went viral with a rant about taxes last year, demanding “receipts” from the government, but it takes all of two minutes to decipher that her complaint is not with high taxes per se, it’s about where that money is going.

“What are we gonna do about wages in America?” Cardi asks Bernie.

Me as a New Yorker — not now, but you know, when I was not famous — I just felt like no matter how many jobs I get, I wasn't able to make ends meet. I wasn't able to pay my rent, get transportation and eat.

When do you ever hear a sentence like that on CNN, MSNBC, or Fox News? The  answer is almost never, because establishment media personalities care more about the latest Russia conspiracy theory than they do about regular people.

The reason for that is simple: They can’t relate. The millionaires who control the narrative on a channel like CNN, have a totally skewed perception of what normal working people care about. Hint: It’s not Russia or constant panel debates about whether or not Donald Trump is a racist. 

No one cares about the specifics of the Steele dossier when they can’t put food on the table or find a job that pays a living wage. No one cares about what it says on page 347 of the Mueller report when they can’t afford health insurance.

To the millionaires like Jake Tapper and Rachel Maddow who set the news agenda, the people who vote Democrat are the liberal elites who they hang out with at fancy restaurants in their New York and LA bubbles; the fairweather do-gooders, who complain about Trump ad infinitum — but ask them to reach a little deeper into their very full pockets? Well, that’s going to be a problem.

They’re the ones who are happy to vote for a candidate like Joe Biden, who promises the super-rich that “nothing would fundamentally change” if they pick him. Cardi B’s interview with Sanders puts a spotlight on that hypocrisy.

“Certain people like to brag that there is more jobs now in America, but what are they paying in these jobs? They practically pay nothing,” the rapper continues.

She then asks if it’s possible to eliminate student loan debt, because “so many people are suffering” and it “discourages the youth” from going to college. She talks about her admiration for Franklin D. Roosevelt and the New Deal (“that’s the reason we have Social Security”).

Comfortable media elites can laugh and scoff at the Bernie-Cardi pairing all they want (late night host Jimmy Kimmel joked that the two “used to work at the same club”) — but people listen to her. She ended the interview with a shoutout to her “millions of followers,” asking them to “feel the Bern.” 

The talking heads of mainstream media should check their blindspots now, because they won’t be laughing if their establishment bias helps put Trump back in the White House for round two.

Or maybe they will. After all, he’s great for ratings — and they’ll still be raking in the cash.