Shockingly, the March employment numbers were so bad that CNSNews.com covered them as if President Obama, not President Trump, was in office.
Susan Jones wrote disappointingly in her lead article by leading off with that Obama-ear staple, obsession over the labor force participation rate:
The number of Americans working in March declined by 201,000, dropping from 156,949,000 in February to 156,748,000 in March, according to the data released today by the Bureau of Labor Statistics.
The labor force participation rate also fell by two-tenths of a point, from 63.2 percent to 63.0 percent.
The economy added 196,000 non-farm jobs in March, with notable gains in health care and in professional and technical services, said the Bureau of Labor Statistics report.
The unemployment rate was unchanged at 3.8 percent, within a tenth of a point of the 3.7 percent Trump-era low.
Jones did do somsething that she rarely did under Obama, though, pointing out that "not changed much in recent years" because of "the growing number of retiring Baby Boomers" -- thus giving Trump a pass Obama didn't get.
Even the usual sidebars didn't come off as well as usual. Terry Jeffrey had to admit that manufacturing jobs declined and government jobs increased in March. Jeffrey did try to spin things by claiming that "there has now been a net increase of 466,000 manufacturing jobs during Trump’s presidency" and that federal hiring decreased. Even Craig Bannister had to admit that the new obsession with Hispanic jobs didn't pan out, since the Hispanic unemployment rate increased by 4/10 of a percent.
But remember, all these numbers are simply fodder for the larger Media Reserch Center to exploit. And according to the MRC, there weren't any bad numbers at all. Julia A. Seymour declared that "The strong March jobs report 'should end' concerns that a recession is 'lurking' as one Hill op-ed suggested," and later complained thatthe media didn't report those numbers positively -- despite the MRC's own "news" division being unable to do so -- and that unemployment remained "extremely low."
Another WND Columnist, Another Bad Take on Mosque Massacre Topic: WorldNetDaily
WorldNetDaily filled out its trifecta of bad takes on the New Zealand mosque massacre with a March 24 column by Barbara Simpson. She starts off by a fit of whataboutism, whining that attacks on Christians didn't get the same news coverage:
Hours of broadcast as well as internet and print news are filled with thousands of words about the killings. Most are sympathetic for the victims.
That is as it should be; but what is wrong with overall media reportage is there is virtually NO coverage of the mass killings of Christians across the world by militant Islamists – the same day, the same week.
Did you know that the same day as the New Zealand shooting, more than 20 Christians in the Philippines were shot in their church by Muslim militants?
The same week in Nigeria, Christians were the continued targets of militant Islamists, with 53 dead and 43 homes destroyed. The day before, another village was a target – 17 dead and multiple homes destroyed. A month prior, 16 were killed in another village.
Did you see any headlines about those killings? Did you get inundated with sympathy for the dead Christians, or anger against the Islamist killers?
No, you did not. Media ignored it and them.
(Media Research Center employees Matt Philbin and Allen West are similarly tired of hearing about dead Muslims and would rather hear about dead Christians instead.)
Simpson then complained about an "over-reaction by non-Muslims"in New Zealand to the massacre, one of which was "Extra protection is being given to mosques by armed police even though New Zealand police usually aren’t armed." Apparently, protecting Muslims is a bad thing in Simpson's eyes.
Finally, Simpson rants that we're being too nice to those evil Muslims:
The death count in Europe of people killed in Islamist attacks total in the thousands. Those attacks continue.
Never forget, in the United States more than 3,000 Americans were killed in one day by Islamist terrorists who perpetrated the World Trade Center attacks, and many more have died since.
At what point do we have the courage to report the truth of what is going on – or have we lost already because of lack of courage?
The problem is, the media have turned into a mass movement with homogenized thinking. There is so little original thought, perceptive analysis of what is transpiring and what it all means, that media are rendered impotent except for their ability to rile up the unthinking masses and spread untruths and innuendo.
Simpson knows untruths and innuendo, having made up quotes from an anti-genocide researcher to support her factually incorrect assertion that blacks in South Africa are committing "genocide" against the minority white population.
MRC Mad At CNN For Accurately Reporting Trump Is Not Exonerated Topic: Media Research Center
As we know, the Media Research Center just hates accurate reporting when it makes its look bad. And the MRC's Bill D'Agostino was mad that CNN pointed out that, according to William Barr's summary of the Mueller report, President Trump has not been completely exonerated on the issue of obstruction of justice:
Attorney General William Barr's inclusion of the phrase “does not exonerate” in his summary on Sunday afternon of the Mueller report has become a much-needed security blanket for liberal journalists. For the past 24 hours, CNN analysts, commentators, correspondents, and hosts have clung to the phrase, repeating it ad nauseam in a vain attempt to reassure themselves that maybe — just maybe — President Trump might still be found guilty of obstruction of justice.
MRC analysts looked at the past 24 hours of CNN coverage (from 5:00 p.m. Eastern on March 24 to the same time the following day), and found a total of 120 instances in which hosts or other journalists asserted that President Trump had not been exonerated. Those 120 cases did not include quotes from Democratic politicians or other explicitly partisan sources.
[...]
About one third of those 120 instances were journalists reading aloud the same phrase found in Barr’s summary of the Mueller report, which read:
…while this report does not conclude that the President committed a crime, it also does not exonerate him.
Every show featured at least one direct reading of that line, while some uttered it at a considerably higher rate.
That's right -- D'Agostino is mad that CNN directly quoted from Barr's letter.
D'Agostino then cast doubt upon whether that claim was even true: "As far as the veracity of the claim that the President has not been exonerated? That’s only true of [sic] one believes Special Counsel Mueller is the only individual capable of doling out said exoneration. Mueller himself left the determination of whether to prosecute President Trump for obstruction of justice up to the Attorney General, who in turn determined that the President was not guilty of any such crime."
So, apparently, it's OK if the media reports a false claim as long as it makes Trump look good.
AIM Justifies Right-Wing Attacks on AOC Topic: Accuracy in Media
In a March 25 Accuracy in Media post, Brian McNicoll took offense to a writer, Zach Beauchamp, who believes that repeated right-wing media attacks on Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez are driving down her popularity numbers. McNicoll huffed in response with, yes, right-wing attack lines:
It’s not that she has threatened to recruit primary opponents for Democrats not sufficiently socialist for her taste. It’s not that she has proposed a massive government takeover of the energy and construction industries that could cost as much as $94 trillion in the first decade – the entire U.S. federal budget now is less than $5 trillion – and that could not garner a single vote in the U.S. Senate.
Or that early drafts of the deal called for people to be paid with taxpayer dollars if they are “unable or unwilling to work” and that all jobs should be unionized.
Or another bizarre line of questioning when she tried to get a Wells Fargo Bank executive to admit responsibility for a spill on a pipeline that had not even opened.
When Beauchamp noted that Ocasio-Cortez has gotten "disproportionate attention" for a first-term congresswoman in right-wing media -- and garnering more mentions then Democratic presidentical candidates -- McNicoll insisted right-wingers are just scrutinizing her more closely because she's a "threat":
A more likely explanation is Republicans have paid better attention to her policy proposals and realize the threat they pose to the U.S. economy. Beauchamp points to the fact she has been mentioned more on Fox News than Democrat presidential candidates, such as Sens. Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts and Bernie Sanders of Vermont.
But Warren and Sanders largely have stuck to their scripts in terms of policy. It has been Ocasio-Cortez who has proposed measures that pose the most serious threat.
McNicoll conclued by insisting that right-wingers like him attack Ocasio-Cortez not because they "hate and fear her" but because she "has the most disturbing policies."
CNS Blogger Hides Fact Mueller Probe Is Largely Paying For Itself Topic: CNSNews.com
Craig Bannister rewrites a press release in a March 25 CNSNews.com blog post:
Taxpayers didn’t get their money’s worth from Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s $25 million investigation into President Donald Trump, a new Rasmussen Reports surveyshows.
More than half of those surveyed in the national poll of 1,000 likely voters, conducted March 25-26, 2019, said taxpayers did not “get a good return on their investment” – double those who said they did:
But Rasmussen didn't its poll respondents -- and, thus, Bannister didn't tell his readers -- that the Mueller investigation is likely to nearly break even, if not actually turn a profit, because of the assets seized from defendants in the investigation, mainly former Trump campaign manager Paul Manafort. He has surrendered assets valued at $26.7 million, including an apartment in Trump Tower and an estate in the Hamptons.
In other words, Mueller's investigation has largely paid for itself, which is a very good return on investment by any definition, particularly when it involves a government probe. Too bad Bannister didn't feel the need to tell his readers the full truth.
WND Can't Stop Lying About Margaret Sanger Topic: WorldNetDaily
If there's one thing WorldNetDaily loves to do at least as much as spreading conspiracy theories, it's spreading lies about Planned Parenthood founder Margaret Sanger. Spoo much so, in fact, that two WND columnists told similar lies about her on the very same day.
Mychal Massie ranted in a March 25 column of failed satire:
As Christians, we can rationalize our support for baby killing, selective though it may be, as doing God’s work. After all, Obama invoked God’s name saying, “God bless Planned Parenthood” because they do “good work.” Hillary Clinton calls murdering unborn babies “humane.” Clinton also lauded baby killing as a “fundamental human right.”
We can invoke the exact same language Margaret Sanger used when referencing blacks, the poor and immigrants. We’ll call the babies we’re targeting “human weeds.” We’ll argue it’s forward thinking to prevent our families from knowingly having babies with genes that indicate homosexuality and undesirable abnormal behavioral genes. By killing them as they’re being born we prevent what Sanger called, “reckless breeders, spawning … human beings who never should have been born.”
We’ll claim Sanger’s words for our purposes. Sanger said: “The most successful educational appeal to the Negro is through a religious appeal. We do not want the word to go out that we want to exterminate the Negro population, and the minister is the man who can straighten out that idea of it ever occurs to any of their rebellious members” (Margaret Sanger, 1939).
Massie is not only spreading the lie that Sanger referred to blacks (or anyone else) as "human weeds," he's falsely taking that "exterminate the Negro population" out of context -- as we've documented, the full context of that statement involved recruiting black leaders for Sanger's "Negro Project," which aimed to bring birth control to black communities, to allay suspicions blacks might have had about whites like Sanger being involved.
That was joined by Larry Tomczak's column the same day shilling for the anti-abortion film "Unplanned," in which he engaged in the same false propaganda:
Margaret Sanger, the founder of Planned Parenthood, was a eugenicist who influenced Hitler, declaring, “We want a world freer, happier, cleaner – we want a race of thoroughbreds!” She strategically established her first clinic in Harlem in 1930 because that’s where the black people she labeled “human weeds” lived. She described it as “an experimental clinic established for the benefit of the colored people.”
Planned Parenthood “clinics” love to prey on the plight of poor black women. That’s why they plant many of their abortion chambers in their neighborhoods.
To learn more about Sanger who wanted to “exterminate the Negro population” and her multimillion dollar organization that still is supported by your and my tax dollars (this must be stopped!), I encourage you to read a book written by my friend Dr. George Grant, “Killer Angel: a Short Biography of Planned Parenthood’s Founder, Margaret Sanger.
Actually, Sanger opened her first clinic in Brooklyn in 1916. While Sanger did open a clinic in Harlem in 1930, it was supported by black leaders like W.E.B. Du Bois and Mary McLeod Bethune and the city's leading African American newspaper.
Tomczak is also lying when he claims "many" abortion clinics are in black neighborhoods; in fact, the majority are in white neighborhoods.
And that book Tomczak is recommending? Don't trust it. For instance, Grant claims the term "human weeds" appears in Sanger's book "The Pivot of Civilization" (it does not) and tries to argue that the "Negro Project" strategy "was of course racial" with the goal of getting blacks "to cooperate in their own elimination," the opposite what Sanger researchers have found. Grant also smears Sanger as a slut, asserting without evidence that "She went from one lover to another, sometimes several in a single day."
Publishing such easily debunked lies does not do anything to restore trust and credibility to WND.
MRC Thinks Chick-fil-A Was 'Smeared' Because Anti-Gay Donations Were Accurately Reported Topic: Media Research Center
When is telling the truth a smear? When someone reports accurately on the political activities of a fast-food chain.
The headline on Gabriel Hays' April 1 Media Research Center post blared, "NY Airport Bans Chick-Fil-A Over Malicious ThinkProgress Smear." What was that "smear"? ThinkProgress accurately reported that Chick-fil-A Chick-fil-A donated $1.8 million in 2017 to organizations like the Fellowship of Christian Athletes and Salvation Army, as well as to other anti-gay organizations, and the airport in Buffalo, N.Y., declined to allow a Chick-fil-A restaurant based on that reporting.
Accurate reporting that has consequences? That will not do for Hays, who went into a frothing rant:
Another airport has just banned Chick-Fil-A from setting up shop on account of the fast food chain’s financial ties with Christian groups. Buffalo, New York’s regional airport just followed a San Antonio airport’s lead in being delusional enough to trust the judgment of crazy lefty outlet ThinkProgress and banned Chick-Fil-A on account of their supposed anti-LGBTQ discrimination.
ThinkProgress wrote about the latest installment of #boycottChickFilA with all the smugness of someone who just cheated their way to victory and got away with it -- which is, of course, what the outlet’s crazed lefty journalists did. They claimed the company promoted “anti gay positions” via donations to Christian non-profits and now more pencil-necked lawmakers feel the need to embrace the petty outrage game.
[...]
“Setback?” How cute. To think that a boycott by a few deranged progressives will slow down Chick-Fil-A’s momentum is absurd. How delicious will it be when these people are found to be discriminating against the proud Christian chain for its religious affiliation?
For those of you counting at home, that four whacked-out attacks on ThinkProgress in three paragraphs: two variations of "crazy," one reference to "deranged," and a claim that it "cheated their way to victory and got away with it."
Hays then rushed to Chick-fil-A's defense, denying it was targeting the LGBT community with the donations, and besides, the company can donate to anyone it wants:
Chick-Fil-A feels that it has every right to donate to the Fellowship of Christian Athletes and Salvation Army, for example. Still, ThinkProgress spun the negativity, claiming that the franchise’s donation of “$1.8 million in 2017” to such Christian groups amounts to an attack on LGBTQ rights. Yes, these groups believe in traditional marriage, but that is their prerogative as well as it’s Chick-Fil-A’s. It also certainly doesn’t mean that LGBTQ employees or customers are in Chick-Fil-A’s crosshairs.
It’s just heavy spin to destroy a political enemy and, in the case of the ThinkProgress-inspired San Antonio Chick-Fil-A ban, investigations are underway to prove it was an unfair hitjob.
Spinning things in order to destroy a political enemy? Isn't that what Hays is trying to do to ThinkProgress here?
This is not the first meltdown Hays has had over accurate reporting. When the San Antonio airport similarly declined to allow Chick-fil-A a slot over the donations a couple weeks earlier, Hays declared that the company is "Jesus-loving" and "may actually believe in biology," then reframed the anti-LGBT stance of evangelical Christians in order to portray them as victims: "Traditional Christians tend to stick with the belief that homosexuality is not an optimal life choice, so of course LGBTQ groups want them wiped off the map -- even at the expense of free speech or freedom of religion." Hays also claimed ThinkProgress was engaged in "bullying" by, yes, accurately reporting the company's anti-LGBT leanings.
NEW ARTICLE: CNS' New Authoritarian Friends Topic: CNSNews.com
The Trump-lovers at CNSNews.com embrace right-wing foreign leaders who are trying to emulate Trump but have even more extreme policies. Read more >>
Newsmax's Hirsen Cheers On The Myth Behind The 'Unplanned' Movie Topic: Newsmax
James Hirsen spent his March 25 Newsmax column gushing over the then-upcoming movie "Unplanned," cheering on the story it tells:
The movie boldly tells the true story of Abby Johnson, one of the youngest individuals in the country to ever have served as a Planned Parenthood clinic director.
After working at an abortion clinic for eight years and winning an “Employee of the Year” award, Abby had the enormously disturbing yet incredibly enlightening experience of having to assist with an ultrasound-guided abortion. What she witnessed was absolutely horrendous: a tiny baby inside the womb, who was in the struggle of his or her life, having to suffer through the gruesomeness of dismemberment.
Following the experience, Abby summoned up the courage necessary to leave her financially lucrative position and extensive employment stint. She walked away from the nation’s largest abortion provider and set out to launch a ministry that would help other former Planned Parenthood employees to transition out of abortion related work.
Except that's not the "true story" at all. As we documented, Planned Parenthood has stated that there were no ultrasound-guided abortions on the day that Johnson claims, Johnson did not assist on any abortion that day, and the only abortion patient that day who comes closest to the person described in Johnson's story was too early in her pregnancy to require the use of ultrasound. (Johnson stands by her version of the story and suggested Planned Parenthood doctored records to make her look bad.)
The rest of Hirsen's column is straight PR for the movie as well, parroting the producers' complaints that the film got an R rating for graphic scenes and complaining that "a teenage girl can obtain an actual abortion without her parent’s permission, but the same teenage girl is not allowed admission into a theater, minus the supervision of an adult, to view a film that includes a scene that merely depicts the real life procedure." Sticking to the script, Hirsen doesn't dare ask why the producers couldn't simply make cuts to the scene to achieve a PG rating.
Hirsen concluded his column with an over-the-top endorsement: "In honor of all the babies who have had to endure the procedure that Abby witnessed and worse, let’s all go see 'Unplanned,' and perhaps we can escort some teens and other youth who are secondary victims in this whole abortion tragedy."
NewsBusters Blogger Still Denying Trump-Epstein Link Topic: NewsBusters
As we've documented, NewsBusters blogger Mark Finkelstein is very much in denial that convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein has with President Trump and tries to steer the conversation at every opportunity to former President Clinton's links to Epstein, despite the fact that, well, Clinton hasn't been president for nearly two decades.
Finkelstein slid even more into denial in a March 28 post, whining that MSNBC's Joe Scarborough "is test-marketing a new line of attack: attempting to tie President Trump to convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein" and "fantasizing about the possibility that Epstein was at the table at Mar-a-Lago when Trump reportedly mentioned to wealthy friends that he had made them money with his tax cuts." Finkelstein huffed in response: "Just one problem with Joe's fantasy: as Scarborough presumably knows, Epstein couldn't have been there. As reported in the Washington Post, according to court documents Trump has barred Epstein from Mar-a-Lago for assaulting an underage girl."
Well, temporarily overlooking the fact that Finkelstein seems to be conceding that being banned from Mar-a-Lago means Epstein must have been a regular there and, thus, linked to Trump, let's take a look at that Post article Finkelstein is citing. It notes that Trump was an "occasional guest" of Epstein, adding:
One woman, Virginia Giuffre, sued Epstein’s longtime friend Ghislaine Maxwell, who she said recruited her in 1999 from Trump’s Mar-a-Lago Club to be Epstein’s “sex slave,” starting with “massages” and moving to sex acts. Giuffre had worked at the club as a 15-year-old locker room towel girl. She settled with Maxwell last year.
In a different civil case against Epstein, records showed that he had attended parties at Mar-a-Lago and that Trump flew on Epstein’s private jet at least once. Trump told New York magazine in 2002 that Epstein was “a lot of fun to be with. It is even said that he likes beautiful women as much as I do, and many of them are on the younger side.”
During the 2016 presidential campaign, another young woman, known in court records only as Jane Doe, said Trump had raped her when she was 13, in 1994, at a party at Epstein’s New York mansion. But the woman dropped her lawsuit and canceled a news conference at which she was expected to spell out her allegation.
On top of that, Trump's labor secretary, Alex Acosta, is a former prosecutor who cut a deal with Epstein that got him a short jaill stint despite the severity of the charges against him.
That's a lot of links to Epstein. Why doesn't Finkelstein want to admit that these ties exist? Indeed, Finkelstein is so desperate to district that he adds a note at the end of his post: "If there is one President who deserves to be tied to Epstein, it is, of course, Bill Clinton. He reportedly flew 26 times on Epstein's private Boeing 727, AKA the 'Lolita Express,' ditching his Secret Service protection on several occasions."
Finkelstein continuing to deny the truth about Trump and Epstein just makes him look even more pathetic.
WND Still Keeping Up Its Anti-Vaccine Crusade Topic: WorldNetDaily
WorldNetDaily's anti-vaccine crusade continues with a March 22 article fretting about social media sites like Facebook and Instagram blocking anti-vaxxers -- or, in WND's view, "allowing only one side of the debate over vaccines." WND pretends to be reasonable by offering a skewed framing of the issue: "The debate focuses on the fact that while vaccines undoubtedly prevent many illnesses and deaths, they have triggered extreme reactions, including death."
Of course, WND doesn't concede that these "extreme reactions" are just an infintesimal fraction of the damage and death caused by the diseases themselves.
WND then calls on the fringe-right Association of American Physicians and Surgeons, laughably trying to give it credibility it doesn't deserve by calling a "prominent physicians' organization." It uncritically quotes an AAPS letter to lawmakers that tries to argue against making the measles vaccine mandatory:
“Are potential measles complications including death in persons who cannot be vaccinated due to immune deficiency a justification for revoking the rights of all Americans and establishing a precedent for still greater restrictions on our right to give – or withhold – consent to medical interventions?
“Clearly not.”
Patients know there are complications from vaccines, even routine shots like the MMR, because they “are listed in the manufacturer’s package insert.”
“Even disregarding adverse vaccine effects, the results of near-universal vaccination have not been completely positive. Measles, when it does occur, is four to five times worse than in pre-vaccination times, according to Lancet Infectious Diseases, because of the changed age distribution: more adults, whose vaccine-based immunity waned, and more infants, who no longer receive passive immunity from their naturally immune mother to protect them during their most vulnerable period,” AAPS advised lawmakers.
You know what's another way to avoid a more severe form of measles? Getting the vaccine and booster shots. The AAPS seems not to have considered that possibility.
Flip-Flop: MRC Trashed Clintons After Probes Cleared Them, Attacks Anyone Who Does The Same To Trump Topic: Media Research Center
As Trump loyalists, the Media Research Center was eager to portray Attorney General William Barr's brief summary of the Mueller report as the final word on Trump's complete exoneration -- and not, you know, the actual report, which the MRC has yet to see -- and portray anyone who doesn't accept the Barr summary as delusional partisans who won't accept reality. Typical is the March 27 column by MRC bigwigs Brent Bozell and Tim Graham:
The psychedelic balloon of liberal hope in Robert Mueller is no more. It started to leak helium months ago, and some liberals worried that his final conclusions might be ... "disappointing."
They wanted the special counsel to deliver the goods, the evidence of collusion. This would not make Donald Trump an ordinary run-of -the-mill felon. This would make him complicit in an effort to subvert the federal government. Donald Trump would be a traitor.
What a pound full of sick puppies.
To wish this against your own president is its own form of anti-Americanism, if one contemplates the ensuing constitutional upheaval at home and the truly frightening international scenarios abroad. Russia, China, Iran and North Korea would run wild, as would every dangerous terror movement across the globe.
A patriotic liberal would set aside personal and political hostilities and celebrate the vindication of his president. We're not seeing this because the loudest of President Trump's detractors — especially in the press — are radicals, not liberals, and they're quite willing to endure existential chaos if that's the price for Trump's removal.
Needless to say, Bozell, Graham and Co. acted exactly the same way they now deride when the various invesigations into President Clinton and his wife uncovered nothing more damning against them than Bill Clinton lying about sex.
Indeed, for years after Clinton left office, the MRC -- and Graham in particular -- got mad any time someone pointed out the inconvenient fact of the Clintons not getting charged with anything, insisting that that didn't mean they weren't guilty.
Clearly, Robert Ray’s (and Kenneth Starr’s) office investigated the FBI files matter and brought no criminal charges. But as usual, the Clintons always suggest that if they’re not indicted, then they have "done nothing wrong." They would say that even if they were indicted.
[...]
I’d say Ray’s text dismissing culpability in the FBI files matter seems to go beyond the legal questions to suggesting that there was somehow no scandal or wrongdoing anywhere in the chain of acquisition and archiving of Republican FBI files by the Clinton team. But then consider that this same Robert Ray also concluded that Hillary Clinton provided "factually false" testimony in the Travel Office case – even though he declined to prosecute it as "beyond a reasonable doubt."
Graham even got mad at us for pointing this out. in a 2008 post, Graham got indignant after we pointed out that he and Bozell, in their anti-Hillary book "Whitewash," ignored the context in which the independent counsel decided not to charge Hillary in response to the firings in the White House travel office by finding that while she made false claims (a key charge against her from Bozell and Graham), it was determined she had not deliberately lied:
In his article, Krepel is playing the same old Not a Crook card to exonerate his heroine. We said Ray found her testimony to be factually false. He notes that Ray declined to prosecute, citing "insufficient evidence." The Clintons and their Arkansas toadies like Krepel athletically raise the bar, implying that the Clintons didn’t lie unless they were indicted for it. But our goal in the book was not to establish that she should have been indicted. It was the simple fact that she lied when she claimed to be uninvolved in the Travel Office firings.
As we note in the book, Hillary’s lawyers baldly claimed to the General Accounting Office: "Mrs. Clinton does not know the origin of the decision to remove the White House travel office employees...She had no role in the decision to terminate the employees." That's not how Robert Ray saw it.
Our book isn’t claiming Hillary should be behind bars. Our book is claiming that the media cannot be relied upon to investigate the Clintons with any vigor, especially the television networks. See our very next sentence after we quote the Ray report: "Why didn’t any reporter unearth anything about Hillary’s direct involvement in the Travelgate scandal on his or her own? Why did the public have to wait more than two years to learn this critically important aspect of the story?"
Graham then served up the conspiracy theory that Robert Ray, the final independent counsel who succeeded Ken Starr, declined not to charge the Clintons with anything because he wanted to run for Senate in 2002 and "the Clintons and their media friends would punish him severely for any indictment."
Claims like that belie Graham's assertion that he's not arguing that "Hillary should be behind bars" -- it's obvious he thinks she shoud be, regardless of what the independent counsel ruled. Now he's going to attack anyone who dares to point out that not only does the Barr summary not completely exonerate Trump, the Mueller report hasn't even released yet so we can judge for ourselves.
Another MRC Employee Is Tired Of Hearing About Mosque Massacre Topic: CNSNews.com
Matt Philbin is not the only Media Research Center employee tired of hearing about dead Muslims and would rather change the subject to dead Christians. MRC "senior fellow" Allen West complains in his March 25 CNSNews.com column:
We were heavily inundated with the story of the tragic mosque shootings in Christchurch, New Zealand that left 50 people dead. There is no excuse for this action, and it should be wholeheartedly condemned by all, without any reservation. The fact that anyone would enter a place of worship and murder the congregants is unconscionable, and reprehensible. When anyone across the world is targeted because of their religious faith, we should all stand in unison and ensure that behavior, that deranged mentality, is severely punished. Now, I will critically disagree with the immediate reaction of the New Zealand Prime Minister, Jacinda Ardern, who issued a decree banning all semi-automatic firearms. I find that quite interesting, especially since the individual who chased down the mosque attacker did so with a semi-automatic handgun. In the end, it seems that a tragedy was leveraged for a politicized agenda, and there have already been some in America championing the same course of action, enabled by a complicit media.
However, at the same time, there was another mass shooting of people of a certain religious group that has been rather dismissed by major media outlets.
As Philbin did, West then rehashes a report on Christians allegedly being killed in Nigeria. It seems that West is not the only one trying to leverage a tragedy for a political agenda.
West then descends into his usual tired liberal-bashing with rehashed slurs of Margaret Sanger:
I find it seriously hypocritical that the progressive, socialist left has an issue with statues of Civil War Confederate Generals, and yet do not complain about an organization called Planned Parenthood that was founded by a white supremacist, racist, who spoke at Ku Klux Klan rallies, Margaret Sanger. Why is there no outrage about the fact that her vision, which entailed murdering the “weeds” and “undesirables,” black babies, has come to fruition? After all, this organization, Planned Parenthood, founded by a white supremacist, has over 70 percent of its clinics and service locations in minority communities, according to LifeNews.com. And since Roe v. Wade, over 17 million black babies have been murdered in the womb, a true definition of genocide, that is hardly reported.
But what do we hear about from some on the left? Yes, we need to give blacks reparations. Who cares about reparations when the left’s policies of killing born and unborn babies is destroying the future of the black community? This is exactly the vision of Margaret Sanger.
As we pointed out the last time West endeavored to libel the dead, Sanger was not a virulent racist, nor did she ever refer to black people as "weeds." And the very link West supplies to support his claim that Planned Parenthood "has over 70 percent of its clinics and service locations in minority communities" discredits it: the linked article actually states that "79% of Planned Parenthood’s surgical abortion facilities are located within walking distance of African American and/or Hispanic/Latino communities" -- a big difference from what West claimed. And as we've previously documented, the anti-abortion group study the article is referencing defined "walking distance" as a two-mile radius -- a very long walk for a lot of people.
It's just like an MRC "senior fellow" to be so committed to spreading lies and misinformation.
MRC's Houck Still In Throes of Acosta Derangement Syndrome Topic: Media Research Center
It seems there's no end in sight for Media Research Center writer Curtis Houck's ongoingtirade of Acosta Derangement Syndrome.
In a March 18 post, Houck sneered that Acosta was an "armchair psychologist" for raising the question -- "manufactured storyline," according to Houck -- of President Trump's mental fitness after a weekend-long Twitter bender. Houck concluded with a larger anti-CNN screed, whining about "narratives" that are "manufactured to fit what CNN wants to spoonfeed to its liberal audience and poor souls at airports and doctor’s offices, which is one of fear and division." As if Houck isn't in the business of narrative manufacturing himself.
One of those narratives, of course, is that Acosta is a lying, unstable grandstander, and Houck manufactured that further the next day in a post headlined "MELTDOWN!" in which he asserted that Acosta offered "another lengthy diatribe and meltdown to the delight of his colleagues." How so? By pointing out that the right-wing Daily Caller served up a "softball" to the president. Houck ran to the defense of the Daily Caller reporter, gloating about he purportedly "dropped the hammer" on Acosta by claiming that "Rather than tell the President what was happening on a particular issue, I asked him to tell me." Houck exclaimed: "What an idea!"
If the president had been liberal and Acosta was the one to ask a similar question, Houck would undoubtedly be the first to accuse Acosta of asking a "softball" question.
Houck was further triggered when Acosta accurately pointed out that it's ridiculous for conservatives to claim they're being discriminated against on social media since they have such a massive presence there, led by Trump himself:
For regular or even infrequent readers of NewsBusters, alarm bells should be going off for just how idiotic of a statement this was by Acosta. The easy answer to is to go check out any of the work by our colleagues at MRC TechWatch or the Free Speech Alliance, but here’s a few specific examples of online censorship:
None of those examples, however, mentioned how social media platforms like Facebook have routinely sucked up to conservatives in response to their every lilttle complaint, which would seem to undermine Houck's narrative. Indeed, the MRC maintains a presence on those platforms to this very day, and no presence whatsoever on alternative platforms --perhaps because it knows that for all its attempts to rebrand them as promoting "free speech," they're little more than a outlet for racism and far-right conspiracy theories.
Houck handed the Acosta Derangement baton to Ryan Foley for a March 29 post complaining that Acosta asked a "leading question" of the governor of Puerto Rico regarding Trump. Instead of yet another Houck-esque rage-fueled rant, Foley merely complained that Acosta "asked an extremely weak follow-up question."
At least someone at the MRC understands that it doesn't look professional to act like an Acosta-hating rage-bot.
WND's Massie Glad Muslims Got A Taste Of Their Own Medicine With Mosque Massacre Topic: WorldNetDaily
Mychal Massie joins fellow WorldNetDaily columnist Jesse Lee Peterson in issuing bad takes on the New Zealand mosque massacre with his March 18 column, arguing that Muslims got a taste of their own medicine with the massacre:
Muslims around the world are saddened, fearful and outraged. And they should be. No people deserve to be slaughtered as those worshipers were. As an American I can empathize with their loss and their feelings of disbelief. I can relate to their fearful questions regarding what motivated Tarrant to commit such a grievous act.
I can empathize, because as an American I’ve experienced the same feelings and voiced the same questions, which brings me to my point. No real Christian should wish evil upon people for the atrocities they commit against us. Ergo, I am not rejoicing when I make the following point.
It’s my prayer that good comes from this horrific evil, because it causes Muslims around the world to realize how I and other Americans felt:
In 1993, when Muslims bombed the World Trade Center, leaving six Americans dead and 1,000 injured.
In 1995, when Muslims murdered five U.S. military personnel in a Saudi Arabia bombing.
In 1996, when Muslims bombed King Aziz Air Force Base in Dhahran, Saudi Arabia, leaving 23 Americans dead and 300 injured.
In the 1996 Khobar Towers bombing in Saudi Arabia, that left 19 dead and 500 injured.
In 1998, when Muslims murdered 224 and left 4,000 wounded and injured in the bombings of the U.S. embassies in Africa.
In 2000, when Muslim suicide bombers attacked the USS Cole, which left 17 American sailors dead and 39 injured.
On Sept. 11, 2001, when Muslims murdered 2,996 innocent Americans and injured over 6,000 others – Americans who were guilty only of going to work that day.
On Sept. 11, 2012, when Muslims murdered Tyrone Woods, Ambassador Christopher Stevens, Glen Doherty and Sean Smith in Benghazi.
Massie is almost certainly lying when he says he is "not rejoicing" when he wrote this. He relilshes any opportunity to spew hate at anyone he despises, particularly Muslims. But he wasn't done lecturing:
This is a time for Muslims worldwide to reflect upon how Americans felt watching newsreels and seeing still photographs of Muslims beheading Daniel Pearl, Nick Berg, James Foley and Steven Sotloff. And how Americans felt seeing these same Muslims playing catch with the severed heads of those just mentioned.
This would be a golden moment for Muslims to think about how Americans felt after the San Bernardino, California, murders of co-workers by a Muslim couple. They should think about how Americans felt after the Muslim terrorism at the Boston Marathon and the Pulse Nightclub in Orlando, Florida, that left 49 Americans dead and 53 wounded. They should think about the suffering of family members of the Fort Hood murders by a Muslim serving in our military.
Now would be a good time for Muslims worldwide to reflect upon the loss of life, pain and suffering in the aftermath of their unprovoked attacks in Paris, Malaysia, the Philippines, Africa, the U.K. and the rest of the world.
I’m not trying to rub salt in an open wound, nor am I being insensitive. I’m saying this is a perfect time for Muslims worldwide to come together and reflect upon the global loss of innocent life caused by killers in allegiance to their religion.
If that were to happen, good would come from evil. But they will not do that. Their leadership will spin tales of woe and prescribed acts of violence against them. They will expect and insist that the world not just mourn their loss, but reinforce and establish protocols to protect and legitimize Muslims’ murderous rampages.
Completely absent from Massie's column, of course, is any mention of how white people show feel about a fellow white person perpetrating such a massacre. That would have been a better demostration of how he was not "rubbing slt in an open wound" than this column.
Massie concluded by playing whataboutism: "What happened to the people in that mosque in Christchurch is unjustifiable in every quantifiable definition of the word. But so is what Muslims have been doing around the world for centuries, including their murderous religious rampages against the global humanity of today." Somehow, we're just not feeling that Massie really thinks the massacre was "unjustifiable."
Shockingly, the March employment numbers were so bad that CNSNews.com covered them as if President Obama, not President Trump, was in office.
WorldNetDaily filled out its 
As we know
In a March 25 Accuracy in Media 
Craig Bannister rewrites a press release in a March 25 CNSNews.com 
If there's one thing WorldNetDaily loves to do at least as much as spreading conspiracy theories, it's 
When is telling the truth a smear? When someone reports accurately on the political activities of a fast-food chain.
James Hirsen spent his March 25 Newsmax 
As we've 
WorldNetDaily's 
As Trump loyalists, the Media Research Center was eager to portray Attorney General William Barr's brief summary of the Mueller report as the final word on Trump's complete exoneration -- and not, you know, the actual report, which the MRC has yet to see -- and portray anyone who doesn't accept the Barr summary as delusional partisans who won't accept reality. Typical is the March 27 
Matt Philbin
It seems there's no end in sight for Media Research Center writer Curtis Houck's 
Mychal Massie joins fellow WorldNetDaily columnist 
