Ruddy's O'Reilly Defense Pays Off With Fox News Endorsement Topic: Newsmax
Remember Christopher Ruddy's enthusiastic defense of Bill O'Reilly in the face of his exaggerations and falsehoods? Well, it paid off in the publicity department.
Jim Meyers happily writes in a March 4 Newsmax article:
Fox News host Bill O'Reilly offered up praise for Newsmax on his show Tuesday night, calling our website's fact-based reporting "refreshing."
"Last night we had a segment on how nasty the upcoming presidential campaign is likely to be because of the defamatory websites," O'Reilly told viewers.
"Well, there are some exceptions to the sewer. Check out Newsmax.com. It had some very interesting political analysis. Chris Ruddy and the guys actually try to gather facts, which is refreshing.
"That's the tip of the day."
Meyers does admit that "O'Reilly was no doubt subtly responding" to Ruddy's defense of him. But if O'Reilly didn't mention he was endorsing Newsmax because it defended him, doesn't that actually further the idea that O'Reilly is dishonest?
O'Reilly's endorsement would also seem to contradict Fox News' stance against Newsmax, which operates that TV news channel that directly competes with Fox. Last week, Fox attacked Ruddy for being friends with Bill Clinton and donating to his foundation.
But O'Reilly effectively negated that attack with his endorsement, which is all that matters to Newsmax.
WND's Farah Is Just Not Down With All That Science Stuff Topic: WorldNetDaily
Joseph Farah devoted his Feb. 26 WorldNetDaily column to a screed against science -- specifically attacking National Geographic for highlighting "the war against science":
Sadly, I don’t have the time or space to refute and rebut every aspect of this full-throated endorsement of modern “science” as the new priesthood, whose conclusions are questioned at the threat of excommunication, not to mention humiliation in rational circles.
In short, if you doubt any conclusions of the modern scientific establishment, you’re not only a rube, but you are dangerous.
Apparently, in the 20th or 21st centuries, “science” finally worked out all the bugs of the past and is now certain about all the big and little questions of life. There are no more mysteries. There is no more ambiguity. There are no more unknowns. There are no more doubts about matters like man-made catastrophic climate change, that evolution explains everything we need to know about the origins and diversity of life on the planet, vaccinations, genetically modified food and just about everything else.
Science is the final arbiter. Even though science has made innumerable blunders in the past, today science has it 100 percent right and there is no room for skepticism, this National Geographic opus concludes. If you question anything about science’s conclusions (as if all scientists are united on any of these matters), you might as well join the Flat Earth Society.
There are no nuances. There are no big questions left to answer. The new priesthood has spoken.
It never occurs to National Geographic that what they call “science” is actually a government-science complex with immense power, money and influence that is merely frustrated with its inability to coercively persuade everyone of their infinite wisdom even with control of the schools, the colleges, the universities, the major media, the museums, the zoos, the observatories, the medical schools, etc.
Among the things Farah's upset with is National Geographic's stand on the side global warming existing and vaccines helping people. But he engages in some old-school paranoia as well:
As for me and my house, we reject fluoride. It’s getting harder and harder when the government adds this poison, which accumulates in your body, to your water supply. But we manage.
If Farah so soundly rejects science, is it any wonder why he's so unable to recognize the truth that his website publishes lie after lie?
MRC Rushes To Defend Ben Carson Over His Anti-Gay Comments Topic: Media Research Center
The Media Research Center's philosophy: If a journalist dares to question a conservative about his views, you are clearly a liberal or, even worse, an "activist."
The headline on Matthew Balan's March 4 NewsBusters post sums up that philosophy nicely: "LGBT Activist in CNN Anchor's Clothing Cuomo Hounds Carson on Marriage." Balan is appalled that CNN host Chris Cuomo would dare to question conservative darling Ben Carson about his views on homosexuality:
On Wednesday's New Day, CNN's Chris Cuomo likened traditional marriage legislation to legalizing slavery as he interviewed Dr. Ben Carson. When the conservative personality suggested, on the issue of same-sex "marriage," that "civil issues of that nature should be determined at the state level," Cuomo retorted, "What if people of a state vote for a law...that winds up infringing on the rights of a minority – like happened very often with slavery; like, many would argue, is happening now with people who are gay?"
The anchor acted as a left-wing activist on the subject, as he has done in the past, as he and Dr. Carson sparred for the remainder of the interview segment:
Balan buried Carson's bizarre claim that being gay is a choice because "a lot of people who go into prison – go into prison straight – and when they come out, they're gay."
Apparently, Balan believes any claim made by a conservative is never to be challenged by the media.
When Carson's claim proved to be too toxic for even him to defend, he walked it back in a Facebook post.
But that's not the lead of Kristine Marsh's March 5 NewsBusters post. Instead, Marsh helps Carson play the victim by hyping his assertion -- made to Sean Hannity, whom Carson knows will never challenge his anti-gay views -- that CNN "prodded" him to answer a question about the nature of homosexuality, then "spun his comments."
Marsh simply pasted a screenshot of Carson's Facebook walkback of his comments, declining to comment on the complete nature of his capitulation. Carson also declared he supports civil unions for gays and anti-discrimination laws that cover gays -- both positions that right-wingers like the MRC abhor.
LGBT writers have questioned the sincerity of Carson's apology given his victim-playing on Hannity's radio show. But Marsh didn't mention that, either.
NEW ARTICLE: Knowing Farah By His Fruits Topic: WorldNetDaily
WorldNetDaily editor Joseph Farah loves to claim that President Obama's isn't a real Christian. But do Farah and his website adhere to Christian principles? Read more >>
The conservative media continues to line up behind Bill O'Reilly. Newsmax's Christopher Ruddy adds his whitewash in a March 2 column, declaring the controversy about O'Reilly's fabrications and exaggerations to be "much ado about nothing." Ruddy did try to go into specifics, unlike the Media Research Center.
While Ruddy says that NBC's Brian Williams was punished to severely for his exaggerations, he's fully on board with the right-wing meme that criticism of O'Reilly is a liberal conspiracy:
So why the targeting now of O’Reilly on very flimsy accusations?
For one thing, media outlets and liberal groups are upset about conservatives' criticism of NBC anchor Brian Williams.
[...]
Perhaps the O’Reilly brouhaha is a case of professional jealousy at work.
David Corn, who wrote the Mother Jones story, is a former Fox News contributor who didn't have his contract renewed, according to Joe Concha, columnist for Mediaite and host of "The Daily Wrap" on Newsmax TV.
O'Reilly has also been at the very pinnacle of cable news for so long — more than 15 years — it must infuriate his detractors.
He has also become a fantastically successful best-selling author. His latest, "Killing Patton," is currently No. 6 on The New York Times list of best-selling nonfiction books.
Then there is the fact that O'Reilly has always been somewhat of a maverick who doesn't play the establishment media game. But the attacks on his credibility have gone far enough. Some attacks are so ridiculous they are close to joke status.
After presenting video evidence to back up his reporting on one of the so-called fabricated stories, O'Reilly told viewers of his cable show: "I want to stop this now. I hope we can stop it. I really do."
Yes, stop all of this horseradish.
But isn't the idea that O'Reilly is the victim of a liberal conspiracy just as much a load of horseradish?
WND Pretends It Never Portrayed Obama As The Antichrist Topic: WorldNetDaily
A March 1 WorldNetDaily article by Leo Hohmann forwards speculation that the new prime minister of Greece, Alexios Tsipras, is the Antichrist. This is dutifully followed by "prophecy experts" shooting down the idea, as well as such speculation about anyone.
Hohmann kicks things off with WND fave Joel Richardson:
Joel Richardson, author of the best-seller “The Islamic Antichrist” as well as “Mideast Beast” and “When a Jew Rules the World,” is as interested as anyone in the rise of the world figure the Bible calls the antichrist. He’s written two books that deal explicitly with that topic. But, he says, it can become a distraction.
He points to all the misses of the past few decades in which well-known global figures were seen as the embodiment of Satan on earth – Ayatollah Khomeini, President Clinton, Javier Solana and nearly every pope.
[...]
President Obama is in his final years in office, but rest assured, Richardson said, this article will be followed by dozens of comments declaring that it would be remiss for any good antichrist speculator to ignore the fact that Obama is indeed the lawless one, the Son of perdition.
You know who helped fuel speculation that Obama is the Antichrist? Joel Richardson.
In 2009, Richardson wrote a WND column headlined "What Obama and the Antichrist have in common." Despite writing that he wanted to "make it very clear that in no way do I believe that President Obama is the Antichrist," Richardson made sure to draw parallels between the two: "Today, throughout the Islamic world, the masses are yearning for and longing for a populist messiah figure known as the Mahdi who, according to their very own prophecies, will employ precisely the same methods as Obama."
Hohmann goes on to quote another WND fave, Carl Gallups:
Stalin, Mussolini, Hitler, various popes, various U.S. presidents, and other powerful world leaders have made the list. And, it is no secret that many Christians claim to see “antichrist spirit” characteristics in any number of current world leaders. Again, their batting average has been abysmal and if these prophecy gurus were baseball players they would not even make it in the minor leagues.
“There can be little doubt that the ‘spirit of antichrist’ continues to grow stronger with the passing years and the continual degradation of the world’s attitude toward the Word of God and Jesus Christ,” Gallups said. “The advice I give to Christians who inquire upon this subject is: carefully discern the times, rightly divide the Word of truth, stay cognizant of the growing spirit of deception and deceit so that we might speak biblical truth and relevance to the decaying culture around us, and keep the main thing – the main thing. Winning souls, equipping the saints, and effectively advancing the Kingdom of Jesus Christ in hearts and lives.”
And who is one of those minor-league prophecy gurus whose batting average has been abysmal in identifying a certain U.S. president with Antichrist tendencies? Carl Gallups.
Under the pseudonym PPSimmons, Gallups made a YouTube video in 2009 -- promoted at WND, of course -- claiming that “the Greek word for ‘lightning’ is ‘astrape’, and the Hebrew equivalent is ‘Baraq,’” and that "If spoken by a Jewish rabbi today, influenced by the poetry of Isaiah, he would say these words in Hebrew ... 'I saw Satan as Baraq Ubamah.'"
As blogger Richard Bartholomew pointed out at the time, Gallups misinterprets the biblical text he's quoting from and mistranslates the Greek into Hebrew.
Curiously, Hohmann never mentioned Richardson's or Gallups' previous adventures in linking Obama to the Antichrist -- or any of the other WND writers who have made similar claims. Just a couple weeks ago, WND's Joe Kovacs presented the claim that "the night Obama was first elected president in November 2008, the three-digit winning lottery number in Illinois, the state in which Obama resided at the time he was running, was 666" as evidence Obama is the Antichrist.
C'mon, WND, don't walk back your Obama derangement now -- own it! That's the only reason people read WND these days, after all!
MRC Upset That CPAC (Where MRC's Bozell Spoke) Is Accurately Painted As 'Hardcore' Extremist Topic: Media Research Center
Jeffrey Meyer is shocked -- shocked! -- that anyone would identify the Conservative Political Actuion Conference for what it is. From his March 1 NewsBusters post:
On Friday’s PBS NewsHour, New York Times columnists David Brooks and Mark Shields used their weekly appearance to trash the attendees of the annual Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) as representing the extreme far right of the Republican Party.
So-called conservative columnist David Brooks opined that “[t]here’s conservatives, and then there’s conservatives, and then conservatives, and then way over on the other side of the room is CPAC...So this is like the hardest of the hardcore.”
The anti-CPAC discussion began with Mark Shields smearing the conference as promoting “the kind of language of no consensus, no compromise, compromise is capitulation, compromise is surrender.”
Meyer didn't identify how any of that is incorrect. He also didn't disclose that his boss Media Research Center chief Brent Bozell -- who has feuded with CPAC for years -- spoke at this year's gathering, a sign that the group has moved sufficiently rightward for Bozell's tastes.
Bozell and the MRC have boycotted CPAC in previous years for letting gay and atheist groups take part; Bozell also pulled the MRC out CPAC mid-gathering over a snit about getting a sufficiently prominent speaking spot.
And can Meyer plausibly argue that "no consensus, no compromise, compromise is capitulation, compromise is surrender" is not the core message of the majority of CPAC speakers, including Bozell himself?
The MRC talked trash about CPAC when it allowed a group Bozell opposed to take part. This year, the MRC is hiding the extremism of CPAC's speakers.
Cheryl Chumley Descends To WND Topic: WorldNetDaily
Cheryl Chumley has kicked around right-wing media for years, most recently at the Washington Times. Apparently the Moonie Times is too credible for Chumley to be associated with.
Last week, WorldNetDaily announced via tweet that Chumley has joined "the WND Editorial Team." Whether that means she'll be writing news or opinion is irrelevant because WND doesn't really distinguish between the two. WND had already published Chumley's book "Police State USA" last year, so she had a relationship with WND.
Chumley's record of deceptive and misleading reporting will make her fit right in at WND. For example:
In 2009, Chumley wrote a shoddy Capital Research Center report on ProPublica that accused it of having a liberal bias; at no point did she identify any inaccuracies in ProPublica's reporting, only that it defied the right-wing media agenda.
In 2010, Chumley wrote a Washington Examiner article on the right-leaning Franklin Center, which funds numerous blogs and "watchdog" websites. In contrast with her attack on ProPublica, Chumley played the Franklin Center's political leanings (and the resulting bias) and completely ignored the fact that the FranklinCenter has refused to disclose from where its funding comes -- transparency that's critical to the credibility of news operations.
Last year at Newsmax, Chumley promoted a petition signed by "31,072 U.S. scientists" discounting the idea of global warming as a fact. As we've noted, few of those signees have degrees in fields related to climate science and, the signatories are only a tiny, fringe fraction of the more than 10 million college science graduates created in the past 40 years.
And because any new WND employee must be a confirmed carrier of Obama Derangement Syndrome, we have Chumley ranting on a fringe website that "the best chance to turn back the Islamic onslaught – the most hopeful option is to hold out for 2016 and the next presidential election."
So, yeah, with this record of shoddy reporting, WND is definitely Chumley's kind of place. It's also a sign of the utter lack of credibility WND possesses that it has a ready place for her.
MRC Attacks The Messenger, Won't Admit O'Reilly Is A Liar Topic: Media Research Center
In promoting the Brian Williams controversy, the Media Research Center wanted to make sure you knew that Williams was a liar. With Bill O'Reilly, not only does the MRC refuse to concede he has lied, it's attacking anyone who dares to point out that inconvenient fact.
Jeffrey Lord made the MRC's O'Reilly agenda clear in a Feb. 28 NewsBusters post declaring that O'Reilly lies are irrelevant:
There is a lesson from all of this O'Reilly story, a reminder of exactly how the American Left works. Make no mistake. This story of what Bill O'Reilly did or did not say or do decades ago during the Falklands War is not what this latest dust-up is really all about.
The first objective here was to try and ruin Bill O'Reilly's career. To get him off of Fox News and shut him up. Not coincidentally sending a torpedo into Fox News itself - and more. Much more.
The disturbing fact is that Bill O'Reilly is but the latest figure in what is called "conservative media" to have this experience. And worse? This obsessive drive to destroy - not disagree with, but destroy - conservatives or even those like Bill O'Reilly who do not self-identify as a conservative, (O'Reilly sees himself as a traditionalist or "T-Warrior" as in "traditionalist warrior" and is well out there, as here saying that "I vote all over the map") has spread well beyond conservative media.
Lord makes no mention of Williams -- probably because he cannot plausibly claim that the right-wingers who glommed onto that controversy were not motivated by an "obsessive drive to destroy" Williams. Indeed, as we noted, the MRC was fundraising off it.
The MRC's hypocritical strategy was made even more clear in a March 2 MRC item by Mike Ciandella huffing that "liberal groups attacking Fox News host Bill O’Reilly about his past reporting got more than $15 million from left-wing billionaire George Soros." It's so insidious, according to Ciandella, that "Even some outlets pushing this story that are not funded by Soros have Soros connections."
At no point does Ciandella dispute the accuracy of what this outlets are saying about O'Reilly -- he's just trying to kill the messenger.
And that's the MRC's agenda. Conservatives never lie and anyone who point out that they do obviously has a nefarious puprose. It's easier than admitting the truth.
WND Columnist Still Spouting Her Prime Derangement Elsewhere Topic: WorldNetDaily
Andrea Shea King's weekly column for WorldNetDaily that covers various to-dos on the Internet is pretty dull as far as such things go. But as we've previously noted, her right-wing insanity rears its ugly head outside of WND.
It did so again on her Internet radio show where, as Right Wing Watch documented, King called for members of Congress who decline to attend today's speech before Congress by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to be "hanging from a noose in front of the U.S. Capitol Building." She further channels Ed Wood by declaring that those who elect members of Congress she doesn't like are "stupid, stupid people."
So why is King stuck writing a boring tech column for WND when she's obviously capable of bringing the derangement expressed by fellow columnists like Erik Rush and Marisa Martin? It's a mystery.
Not News at CNS: Gaffes And Birthers At CPAC Topic: CNSNews.com
CNSNews.com sent a full complement of reporters to cover the speeches at this year's Conservative Political Action Conference -- chief among them from their boss, Brent Bozell.
But curiously, CNS' reports on the speeches quoted only the red-meat attacks. Missing was any hint of gaffe or controversy.
Ali Meyer's story on the speech by Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker plays up his anti-Washington attacks, such as calling the District of Columbia “68 square miles surrounded by reality.”Meyer failed to mention a serious gaffe by Walker in which he likened pro-union protesters to ISIS.
Strangely, CNS did publish (but buried by refusing to promote on its front page) an Associated Press article about Walker's gaffe.
(Meanwhile, the MRC's Kyle Drennen huffed that NBC reported on Walker's "blunder," while happily noting that "CBS didn't deem the comments newsworthy.")
When two CPAC speakers -- Donald Trump and Rick Santorum -- pandered to extremists by making birther-friendly comments, CNS not only refused to report on them, it neglect to report on their speeches at all.
Given how long Bozell has worked to bend CPAC to his right-wing will, he certainly doesn't want any controversy over extremist statements overshadowing the festivities. Through selective and biased, reporting, his "news" division is making sure that doesn't happen.
WND's Farah Retcons His Birther Obsession Topic: WorldNetDaily
A "retcon" (retroactive continuity) is an attempt to reframe past events to serve current needs. While the term is generally applied to comic book plots, it applies in real life as well.
Witness Joseph Farah retconning WorldNetDaily's birther obsession in his March 1 WND column:
Before the 2008 election was held, I tried to warn America of what was coming.
If we ignored what the Constitution explicitly said regarding the eligibility of presidential candidates, then the founding documents that held our nation together and set it apart from the rest of the world would be rendered meaningless.
We would no longer be governed by the rule of law, I predicted. We would be governed by the rule of men.
Now, more than six years later, we are saddled with a president who knows no one is going to hold him accountable to the law. After all, if we didn’t take the Constitution seriously on a matter of the few and simple eligibility rules it set forth regarding the presidency, why would the Congress, the courts and the people hold him accountable other laws of the land?
The results are in. The evidence is clear. The history has been written.
[...]
It gives me no satisfaction that I saw this coming and that I pointed it out over and over again over the last six years. I would have preferred to be wrong. I would have preferred that Obama respected his oath of office. I would have preferred that he faced real opposition when he didn’t. I would have preferred if America’s system of checks and balances on power worked the way they were intended. I would have preferred that a federal judge or the Congress of the people held Obama accountable to the Constitution back in 2008.
It would have saved America a great deal of pain and suffering.
Even worse, Americans don’t seem to have learned a lesson yet.
Farah cannot claim WND's birther obsession is about the rule of law because it was never about that; it was always about trying to destroy Obama for failing to be as right-wing as Farah is. It ignored its own reporting that experts found Obama's birth certificate to be authentic (which prompted another retcon attempting to redefine "authentic") to smear Obama with fraudulentdocuments and manipulating into existence an incompetent and biased "cold case posse" to give a legal patina to its hateful obsession. And as all of WND's birther conspiracy theories were discredited, WND hid the truth from its readers.
Not only did all of WND's anti-Obama efforts fail, they destroyed what little credibility WND had. Farah's cowardly refusal to hold Ted Cruz to the same "eligibility" standards he's holding Obama simply underscores the fact that his jihad against Obama is politically motivated.
And now Farah -- an inveterateliar -- wants us to believe that his birther obsession really was all about warning the country about the rule of lawand not personal destruction? Please.
MRC Not Interested In Correcting False Anti-Gay Post Topic: Media Research Center
WorldNetDaily wasn't the only one to fall for a false anti-gay story peddled by a right-wing legal group.
In a Feb. 6 MRC TV post, Kristine Marsh uncritically repeated the Pacific Justice Institute's claim that "a Bay Area high school’s freshman English classrooms were taken hostage by the school’s “Queer Straight Alliance” group and grilled about each student’s opinions on gender and sexuality."
Marsh quotes only from a PJI press release, adding that PI and its leader, Brad Dacus, "have good reason to complain. This isn’t the first incident of sexual propaganda and intimidation students have undergone at Acalanes High School."'
But as Media Matters reported, the story is bogus. Unlike Marsh, Media Matters contacted the school district, which confirmed that PJI's biased version of events "does not reflect what actually took place."
Will Marsh correct her blog post? It appears unlikely -- it's been nearly two weeks since PJI's deception was exposed, and her post remains uncorrected.
WND's Bid To Stop Loretta Lynch Ends In Failure Topic: WorldNetDaily
Remember a few weeks back when WorldNetDaily tried to raise a ruckus over the nomination of Loretta Lynch as attorney general? Well, never mind.
If you'll recall, WND tried to make a big deal out of Lynch, in her work as a federal prosecutor, supposedly letting HSBC off with just a ($1.9 billion) fine over money-laundering allegations, prompting WND to lie once again about how it broke the HSBC story. But WND never identified what exactly Lynch had done, giving the appearance that this was all about its pathological Obama-hate instead of actual facts.
Well, it didn't work -- not surprising given the well-earned lack of respect WND is given in the real world. Lynch's nomination advanced out of the Republican-controlled Senate Judiciary Committee with three GOP senators joining Democrats in approving the nomination.
WND, meanwhile, seems to want to bury this failure: It devoted no original reporting to Lynch's advance, instead stealing an article from TownHall on the subject.
As so many times before, a hate-based partisan WND crusade ends in failure. After all this time, WND has apparently notgotten the message that nobody believes them.
CNS' Hunter Finds Even More LGBT-Related Federal Spending She Objects To Topic: CNSNews.com
After a brief detour, CNSNews.com deputy managing editor Melanie Hunter is back to cherry-picking federal spending to find another example of LGBT-related spending she disagrees with.
In a Feb. 25 CNS article, Hunter complains that "The National Institutes of Health has awarded $251,173 in taxpayer funds to the University of California Los Angeles to use 'social-network based intervention' to promote the use of an HIV-prevention drug regimen among 'transgender women' in Peru."
This is the ninth article Hunter wrote has written since December highlighting LGBT-related federal spending, versus one article on spending that's not LGBT-related.
Remember Christopher Ruddy's enthusiastic defense of Bill O'Reilly in the face of his exaggerations and falsehoods? Well, it paid off in the publicity department. 
Joseph Farah devoted his Feb. 26 WorldNetDaily 
The Media Research Center's philosophy: If a journalist dares to question a conservative about his views, you are clearly a liberal or, even worse, an "activist."
A March 1 WorldNetDaily 
Jeffrey Meyer is shocked -- shocked! -- that anyone would identify the Conservative Political Actuion Conference for what it is. From his March 1 NewsBusters 
Cheryl Chumley has kicked around right-wing media for years, most recently at the 
In promoting the Brian Williams controversy, the Media Research Center 
Andrea Shea King's 
CNSNews.com sent a full complement of reporters to cover the speeches at this year's Conservative Political Action Conference -- chief among them from their boss, 
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WorldNetDaily
Remember a few weeks back when WorldNetDaily tried to raise a ruckus over the nomination of Loretta Lynch as attorney general? Well, never mind.
After a 
