WND's Klein Still Serving As A Mubarak Mouthpiece Topic: WorldNetDaily
WorldNetDaily's Aaron Klein keeps up his desperate efforts to prop up the Mubarak regime with a Feb. 6 article attacking the dictator's opposition as linked to George Soros.
Klein complains that Soros-funded Open Society Institute's Middle East and North Africa Initiative "has provided numerous grants to a wide range of projects that promote so-called democratic issues across the region, including in Egypt, where the Muslim Brotherhood stands to gain from any future election." Klein also criticized the OSI's Justice Initiative for having "helped represent Muslim Brotherhood leaders seeking election or more authority in the country."
But Klein doesn't mention what the initiatives has done, let alone explain why things like protesting Egypt's detention of a man for 15 years without a trial or even any charges filed against him is "so-called democratic" instead of actually democratic.
In all, this is just another pathetic attempt by Klein to aid his favorite dictator.
"Few are recognizing what an opportunity the House Republicans have to force Washington to downsize," says Joseph Farah, editor and chief executive officer of WND and the author of the petition and organizer of the "No More Red Ink" campaign. "If Republicans in the House unite around this idea, there is nothing the White House or the Senate can do to exceed the debt limit. This is a golden opportunity for real change in policy that must not be frittered away in favor of deals with the Democrats."
The second phase of the "No More Red Ink" campaign allows Americans to send a "red ink" letter to every member of the House majority urging them to vote "no" on raising the debt limit. The letters are individually addressed to each member, with guaranteed delivery by Fed Ex for a cost of just $29.99. It would cost an individual more than $100 in postage alone to send the 242 letters with no guaranty of delivery and certainly nowhere near the impact.
And nowhere near the profit for WND. It charged $29.95 to send out factually inaccurate "pink slips" to all members of Congress; now, it's sending half as many "red ink" letters for the same price. More money for WND!
UPDATE: A Feb. 6 WND article states that it has "shipped the first 125,000 'red ink' letters to House Republicans." As with the "pink slip" campaign, counting by numbers of letters sent sound much more impressive than it actually is. Divide 125,000 by 242, and you get a mere 516 people who paid WND their hard-earned $29.95. Multiply those numbers, though, and WND has already grossed more than $15,000 on this venture -- and you know it didn't cost WND nearly that much to print and ship those letters.
WND's Klayman: Obama Is Pretending To Be A Christian Topic: WorldNetDaily
Larry Klayman kicks off his Feb. 5 WorldNetDaily column this way:
Thursday was the National Prayer Breakfast in Washington, D.C. Weakened politically and likely at this point in his administration to lose the 2012 presidential election, the "mullah in chief," Barack Hussein Obama decided to show his face at the annual event and pretend that he is a believer in Judeo-Christian culture and ideology. But, as has been true throughout his presidency, Obama's actions speak much louder than his insincere if not fraudulent words.
Klayman then served up a, shall we say, alternative history of the past year:
We all remember last year's Obama outrage; canceling the White House commemoration of May's National Day of Prayer and instead celebrating the Muslim holy month of Ramadan in the people's house. To add insult to injury, the president used the occasion to effectively endorse the Ground Zero mosque. What we witnessed before this shocking display was a chief executive who went out of his way to humiliate Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, when he first interrupted and then left the Jewish leader waiting during a meeting in the White House, while Obama went off to have a cozy dinner with first lady Michelle. That's not to mention the administration's generally hostile attitude and approach toward Israel and its now obsessive "outreach" to radical Arabic interests. Couple this with Obama's dissing of and failure to support the Persian freedom movement in Iran, a natural ally of Israel and the West if there is regime change, and we have the backdrop of a president, true to his black Muslim Chicago roots, not only obsessed with the radical Arab world, but also hostile to Jews, Christians and Persians.
Klayman then fell into line with his fellow dictator-lovers at WND by claiming Obama was "literally throwing President Hosni Mubarak, a 30-year ally of the United States and Israel, under the proverbial bus."
All of this showed Obama's true colors – even if we did not need to be reminded given his conduct of the last few years. He has a knee-jerk reflexive ultra-leftist reaction to world events and exhibits a frightening degree of disloyalty toward American allies who have stood with the United States and Israel. This may stem from his own heritage as the son of a anti-colonialist, America-hating Kenyan father, or it may have been also acquired over the years from Obama's association with the likes of Rev. Louis Farrakhan of the Nation of Islam, the Rev. Jeremiah Wright of the Trinity United Church of Christ, Bill Ayers, a noted anarchist and domestic terrorist, and, of course, his own wife, Michelle – who is a liberal extremist. But whatever the cause, the president is a highly dangerous man bent on destroying vital U.S. strategic alliances and undermining Israel and the Iranian freedom movement in particular.
All in all, a fine exhibition of Obama derangement.
NewsBusters Silent About Bozell's Desire to Slug Chris Matthews Topic: NewsBusters
A Feb. 4 NewsBusters post highlights MRC chief Brent Bozell's weekly appearance on Fox News' "Hannity," and how he complained about "the mainstream media personalities who have credited President Obama with the popular uprising against dictator Hosni Mubarak in Egypt."
But curiously, the post is silent about one part of Bozell's appearance, though it's in the accompanying video. After Hannity plays a clip of Chris Matthews, Bozell responds: "My first reaction is, let's put aside civility for just a minute and to say, I'm just so sick and tired of these disgusting, horrible, despicable attacks, I'm going to slug you and deck you one of these days. But that's wrong. That's the wrong reaction."
You'd think a media critic threatening violence against a TV commentator would be news. Apparently it's not at NewsBusters -- especially with the threat-maker is the guy who runs the joint.
Aaron Klein's Strange Connection To Journalist Attacked in Egypt Topic: WorldNetDaily
As WorldNetDaily's Aaron Klein sides with a dictator, that dictator's supporters are beating up and detaining journalists. And it turns out one of those attacked journalists has a previous connection to Klein.
Olaf Wiig is a freelance cameraman who regularly works with Fox News, and he and Fox correspondent Greg Palkot were severely beaten by pro-Mubarak supporters. In 2006, Wiig and another Fox News reporter, Steve Centanni, were kidnapped in Gaza and held for two weeks before being released.
As we detailed at the tine, when Klein reported on the story for WND, he claimed that a $2 million ransom had been paid for the reporters' release, and he suggested that Fox News had paid it. Fox News was quick to shoot down that claim, which led to much huffiness on the part of WND editor Joseph Farah insisting that Klein had never made such a claim. That's only technically true; while Klein did not assert that Fox News had paid a ransom, nowhere did he state that it didn't.
Klein, meanwhile, followed up with a column that was part defense ("No source stated or implied the money came from Fox News") and part suck-up ("I cannot stand idly by while others misrepresent and falsify my words to wrongly smear America's best cable news network").
The suck-up worked -- Klein has regularly appeared on Fox News and its Fox Business sister network since that time, most recently on Jan. 31 pontificating about Egypt.
It's incredibly ironic that a news cameraman whose kidnapping Klein misreported on has been attacked by a dictatorial regime Klein is helping to cling to power.
Obama Derangement Syndrome Watch Topic: Accuracy in Media
Ironically, the only actual and natural ally the U.S. has in the Middle East, Israel, has been beaten about with Obama’s absurd demands that it not construct new housing in its own capitol, Jerusalem.
In the first two years of Obama’s presidency, it has become obvious to everyone, friend and foe alike, that he is anti-Israel. Perhaps he was trying to signal some kind of accommodation with Iran? Or maybe he just doesn’t like a Jewish presence in the Islamic Middle East?
[...]
The problem, of course, is that we have a President who is intellectually, emotionally, philosophically, and in all other ways not up to this crisis.
WND Hides Full Story On Planned Parenthood Videos Topic: WorldNetDaily
A Feb. 4 WorldNetDaily article by Bob Unruh uncritically touts the dubious entrapment videos made at Planned Parenthood clinics by anti-abortion activist Lila Rose with the headline "Sex-trafficking ring cover-up documented in 2nd video." But Unruh doesn't report what Planned Parenthood did after the events depicted in that second video.
As Media Matters notes, following the meeting with Rose's band of entrapment artists, Planned Parenthood reported the conversation to the FBI. Rather than report that, though, Unruh uncritically repeated Rose's unsupported attacks on Planned Parenthood.
Telling only one side of the story is not journalism -- but then, WND doesn't do journalism.
John Lott's brief Feb. 1 Newsmax column asserts that "Virtually no criminal guns are obtained from gun shows" and "Background checks do not stop criminals from getting guns." The FBI begs to differ.
CNS' Latest Gotcha Question Is False Topic: CNSNews.com
Nicholas Ballasy -- the CNSNews.com ambush reporter who we last saw getting pwned by Barney Frank -- tells about his latest gotcha attack in a Feb. 1 article:
Four senators who say they want to cap federal spending over the next 10 years declined to say whether they would support cutting the wages of even a single federal employee.
Federal workers in 2009 made an average of $123,049 in salary and benefits, which is more than twice the average of $61,051 that workers made in the private sector, according to the Bureau of Economic Analysis.
But the idea that federal workers make twice as much as private-sector employees is not a meaningful analysis. FactCheck.org points out two serious flaws with the BEA analysis Ballasy is citing:
The BEA figure is inflated by including compensation that is actually paid to benefit retirees, not just for current workers. The figure is at least several thousand dollars too high, by FactCheck's calculations.
The average federal civilian worker is better educated, more experienced and more likely to have management or professional responsibilities than the average private worker.
Further, according to FactCheck, other studies have found that while lower-skilled federal workers make more than private sector workers (but not as much as the flawed numbers Ballasy cites), high-skilled federal workers make less.
WND Keeps Shilling For Its Favorite Dictator Topic: WorldNetDaily
The Mubarak mouthpieces at WorldNetDaily are apparently all in for their favorite dictator -- and the unsubstantiated sources it's relying on to push its attacks on President Obama.
A Feb. 3 article by Bob Unruh keeps up the attack by repeating a pair of unverified claims:
There have been reports that Barack Obama's administration secretly met with the Muslim Brotherhood to discuss the future of Egypt after President Hosni Mubarak and that Washington has told the Egyptian army it should remove Mubarak from office.
The first is from an article by Aaron Klein whose only source is an anonymous "Egyptian intelligence official" who can be presumed to be working for the Mubarak regime.The second comes from DEBKAfile, which -- like Klein -- cites no on-the-record sources.
The Jerusalem-based DEBKA is considered a sympathizer of right-wing Israeli politics, which like WND wants to see Mubarak stay in power. It's also known for peddling false rumors alongside whatever scoops it manages. Further, DEBKA used to have a business arrangement with WND, which sold DEBKA's intelligence newsletter through its online store and publish regular articles based on DEBKA claims.
Unruh then repeats some random columnist for an Egyptian paper mouthing the Mubarak -- and WND -- line that Obama has an agenda of subversion against Israel. WND picked that up from a group called MEMRI that is known for selectively translating Arabic media and for having, yes, a bias toward rifht-wing Israeli politics.
Indeed, MEMRI offered no translation of the entire column cited by WND, and Unruh filled out his article from other columnists MEMRI offered translations of.
This gives us further insight into WND's fealty toward a dictator -- it's following the orders of right-wing Israelis. As we know, Klein is fond of Israeli right-wingers -- has repeatedlyparroted the right-wing Israeli line and even whitewashes far-right Israeli extremists. He has even proclaimed his admiration for extremist activist Meir Kahane, who advocated expelling all Arabs from Israel and whose Kach party (and its successor Kahane Chai) has been outlawed in Israel for its connections to violence.
If Klein is so cozy with such violent extremists, why would he lead WND in cozying up to a brutal dictator?
By the way, here's the fruit of Klein's propping up of Mubarak: the long list of journalists who have been threatened, attacked or detaining while covering the unrest in Egypt. And here's the video of CNN's Anderson Cooper and his camera crew getting attacked by Mubarak supporters.
Does Klein have a conscience? Does he remain so blinded by his hatred of Obama that he doesn't whose blood ends up on his hands in the process of feeding that hate? OR does he think the journalists who have been attacked in Egypt deserve it?
It's time for Klein to explain why he is so actively working against America -- and for WND to explain why it's paying Klein to do so.
WND Publishes Homophobic Screed By 'Pink Swastika' Author Topic: WorldNetDaily
WorldNetDaily has already embraced the discredited anti-gay book "The Pink Swastika," even as editor Joseph Farah baselessly insists it hasn't been. So it's a very short leap for WND to print anti-gay screeds by the book's author.
And that's just what WND does. Here's Lively's homophobic rant regarding Uganda:
Uganda is being murdered. The nation once was called "The Pearl of Africa" by Winston Churchill, a lush and beautiful country as fertile as the Nile Delta. It is the nation that retained its self-rule through centuries of African colonialism, the society that survived even the atrocities of the cannibal cultist Idi Amin, the culture that has been thriving in Christian revival for over a dozen years.
This great and honorable nation, alone in Africa to have all but conquered the scourge of AIDS through abstinence, and whose first lady led a holy gathering of thousands of believers on the eve of the millennium, dedicating her homeland "to Jesus Christ for a thousand years," this Uganda, a shining light in the Dark Continent, is being murdered.
The murderers are the lavender Marxists, the now-global network of sexual revolutionaries bent on remaking the entire world in their own perverted image, whose juggernaut has toppled even once-mighty Britain, crushing under their lavender boots after eight centuries the symbol of its Christian power: the Magna Carta, whose first principle had proclaimed "The English church must be free!" These revolutionists of Sodom, who march triumphantly through all the major cities of the Western world to flaunt their defeat of moral law, and who hold both Hollywood and the heart of America's president in their iron grip, these very same zealots have fixed their malevolent gaze on Christian Uganda.
Lively is reportedly one of the inspirations behind a Draconian anti-gay law in Uganda, which would permit the death penalty for homosexuality. Accuracy in media's Cliff Kincaid and WND's own Molotov Mitchell have defended that law while peddling the lie that it doesn't kill gays for being gay.
Lively also defensively weighs in on one of the apparent fruits of the homophobic sentiment he's whipping up there, the murder of Ugandan gay activist David Kato:
Ugandan homosexual activist David Kato was recently beaten to death with a hammer, a horrific crime. These very media have rushed eagerly to judge this a hate crime and to blame those, like me, who have spoken against homosexuality in Uganda. It is the central (but patently false) narrative of the left that all criticism of homosexuality leads inevitably to violence and murder. Yet the killer has now been caught and confessed that he was a live-in male prostitute who murdered Kato for failing to pay him as promised. The "gay"-hate narrative has failed, the Ugandan rejection of "gay" culture has been vindicated, and the finger-pointing media have pulled quietly back into the shadows – for now.
That explanation for Kato's death is what Ugandan police are claiming, but Reuters reported that Ugandan police have offered no evidence to back up their claim, and some have noted that police may try to cover up a motive of homophobia in Kato's death to protect the Western aid upon which the country relies.
The disregard of human life if that human is homosexual is the agenda WorldNetDaily has signed onto when it partnered with Lively. Is WND comfortable with that?
Graham Prematurely Gloats Over Alleged NPR Errors Topic: NewsBusters
Tim Graham uses a Feb. 1 NewsBusters post to gloat over NPR purportedly getting things wrong in its coverage of the hoax video pushed by anti-abortion activist Lila Rose conducting a sting against Planned Parenthood clinics. But is NPR really as wrong as Graham claims?
Graham writes:
The headline was "Group Behind ACORN Undercover Videos Sets Up Planned Parenthood 'Sting.'" Yes, "sting" may be what you call it when liberal journalists take a hidden camera to expose malfeasance, but if the videographers are pro-life, the word goes into quotes. Peralta began: "The same group that went undercover at ACORN offices back in 2009 is now going after Planned Parenthood." Wrong.
NPR was forced to correct: "An earlier version of this post stated Live Action was associated with James O'Keefe. They are not, and O'Keefe was not a part of this undercover video."
While it appears that Live Action did not conduct the ACORN stings, NPR overstated its correction. Live Action is very much associated with O'Keefe -- Rose collaborated with O'Keefe to devise the scheme to entrap Planned Parenthood clinics using the same methods O'Keefe used to entrap ACORN and participated in some of those early entrapment efforts, and Live Action's newsletter, the Advocate, lists O'Keefe as an adviser.
Graham then notes that NPR is calling Live Action a "conservative group," which he (and Rose) insists is misleading: "Political reporters may find it natural to assign pro-life activists to the right, but not only are there pro-life Democrats and even pro-life socialists -- there's the problem that political reporters almost never describe 'abortion rights' groups as liberals."
Of course, generally speaking, it is hardly inaccurate to assume that anti-abortion groups like Live Action as "conservative," given that opposition to abortion provisions is a central part of Republican politics. Rose has provided no evidence that she is not conservative in her politics or that her motivation comes from anything other than a right-wing viewpoint, so until she does, the description of her group as "conservative" should stand.
WND Keeps Up Whining That Gibbs Didn't Answer Question That Wasn't Asked Topic: WorldNetDaily
WND keeps up its record of complaining that Robert Gibbs didn't answer a question that wasn't asked with a Feb. 1 article:
Barack Obama's press secretary, Robert Gibbs, has let pass an opportunity to explain what the president believes about state legislatures whose members are working on requirements for presidential candidates to be required to document their eligibility under the U.S. Constitution.
The question was going to be raised at yesterday's press briefing by Les Kinsolving, WND's correspondent at the White House. However, Gibbs declined to recognize Kinsolving, and dozens of other reporters on hand, for any questions.
[...]
He also wanted to ask whether placing at the head of the Democratic National Committee Paul Gaspard, "a Saul Alinsky-inspired ACORN operative," was representative of the president's national tone.
As we've previously noted, Kinsolving has not explained why a right-wing hack like himself working for a so-called "news" organization whose only real mission these days is to destroy a sitting president by any means necessary (treason, anyone?) is entitled to ask questions every day of the White House press secretary, no matter how biased or stupid.
CNSNews.com's selective obsession with the number of soldiers killed in Afghanistan continues like clockwork with a new article by Edwin Mora detailing how many were killed in January.
Also, as usual, the word "Iraq" does not appear in the article. Thus, when Mora writes that last year "was the deadliest year of the war for American troops" in Afghanistan, it lacks the context of the fact that it's still far lower than the casualty rate in the peak years of the war in Iraq.
And when Mora writes that "approximately one American soldier has died in Afghanistan each day since Obama officially became president," you don't learn that an average of approximately two soldiers died every day of the Iraq war under George W. Bush's leadership.
