Don Lemon calls Biden-Putin controversy a ‘media-manufactured story.’ Really?

And it’s not as if Biden outlined any steps to remove Putin from office, noted Lemon. “Quite honestly, I think this is a media-manufactured story,” he concluded.

What about CNN? Just after Biden finished the speech in Poland that included the controversial line, White House correspondent Kaitlan Collins remarked to host Wolf Blitzer, “That line at the end, President Biden saying, ‘For God’s sake, this man cannot remain in power’ — that is not something we have heard from President Biden so far throughout this.”

Cue endless analysis and news bites. “Is that remark a gamechanger?” asked host Jim Acosta in a chat with a Hoover Institution expert. CNN also reported the White House’s clarification that there was no policy shift afoot. That wrinkle fueled yet more analysis. Acosta, for example, asked a member of Ukraine’s parliament: “Would you like to see the American government officially call for regime change in Russia?”

And so it went, into Saturday night. By Sunday, of course, the comments were a full-fledged political matter, so host Dana Bash on “State of the Union” pressed guests on the topic. “The administration has been clear that regime change is not U.S. policy,” said Rep. Jake Auchincloss (D-Mass.). “And this should not undercut a powerful speech from President Biden.”

Monday brought yet further permutations, as Biden himself fielded questions from White House correspondents on his off-the-cuff remark. “No. 1, I’m not walking anything back,” the president said after NBC News’s Kelly O’Donnell asked whether he regretted the statement. “I was expressing the moral outrage I felt toward this man,” Biden said in response to a subsequent question. “I wasn’t articulating a policy change.”

CNN’s Collins asked Biden: “If saying he cannot remain in power does not mean regime change, what does it mean?” The president again emphasized that he was expressing his outrage. Collins also asked why the president added the ad-libbed comment. “I was talking to the Russian people, telling them what we thought.”

The point here: If the remark was really a media-manufactured moment, CNN had a key spot on the production line.

The 24/7 network, which just launched a streaming service (CNN Plus), is nothing if not a controversy-extending machine. It has the time every day to devote to a single presidential gaffe; it has reporters at key institutions — the White House, Congress, State Department and so on — who can gather newsworthy responses; it has contributors and experts who can riff about the implications — and occasionally make news with those comments. And it has famous anchors — such as Lemon! — who can take to the airwaves to contextualize it all.

All that machinery can often misfire, elevating stories that don’t deserve such treatment. Biden’s errant comment about Putin’s rightful place, however, is not such a case: CNN and other outlets were correct to stage hourly analyses of the situation and to push Biden to explain his choice of words. It’s all part of the network’s process, one that Lemon drives on a regular basis. You can’t work at CNN and bemoan the industrial news complex.