WND Dithers, Then Excuses Trump's Vile Misogyny
Topic: WorldNetDaily

After the news of Donald Trump's vile sexual remarks broke on Oct. 7, WorldNetDaily first responded only with an article it stole from the Washington Post that it didn't even place in its front-page breaking-news carousel. What did make the carousel, however, were two articles trying to portray Bill Clinton as a sexual predator -- a blatant attempt to distract from the news of the day.

It was almost a day before WND posted an original article about it, focusing on Trump's apology, baselessly portraying him as "humbled." For at least part of that day, however, WND promoted that article in its carousel without a photo, leaving just a headline in a black box:

When it came time for today's WND columnists to opine, though, all who wrote were willing to overlook Trump endorsing sexual assault. WND editor Joseph Farah went the boys-will-be-boys route, insisting that Trump is just a "cad," and quickly going the shame route (on voters, not Trump):

But choosing not to vote for Trump because of his shameless misbehavior 11 years ago, caught on a covert video conveniently and coincidentally withheld until one month before Election Day, is not smart. It’s not the right thing to do for your country, for our economy, for our national security, for the righteous revolt Trump has led this year against the permanent, bipartisan political establishment that has already come dangerously close to destroying America’s heritage of liberty, justice and prosperity.

Experience more of Joseph Farah’s no-nonsense truth-telling in his books, audio and video products, featured in the WND Superstore

If I thought Trump were in this race for his ego only, it might be different. I don’t. I think he genuinely wants to do something for his country. And I think he may be the only person who can do that at this time – and certainly he’s our only choice with a month left I the race.

That’s the choice we have. And guess what? I think the choice is crystal clear.

[...]

So, what’s it going to be America? Vote for a cad or a criminal?

Count on my vote for the cad.

Farah is also unclear on who the Democratic candidate is, asserting: "It’s sad to say, but your choice boils down to sending a cad to the White House or returning a rapist, one who was actually impeached in connection with a series of serial assaults and lying under oath about them." Farah doesn't mention that Trump has been credibly accused of rape.

Trump true believer Gina Loudon, meanwhile, dismissed the whole thing as mere "locker-room-style banter" and is mad not that Trump said such vile things, but that more will be coming out because "the Democrats have turned to the page in the leftist playbook that tells them to dig up dirt and assassinate the character of their opponents because they must distract from the issues." Loudon has bought Trump's alleged apology hook, line and sinker because she insists he's now a better man:

Times like these are when Donald Trump shines, and he now has a unique opportunity to turn this into a win.

Mr. Trump has a chance to connect even further with the American people on a personal level because of this controversy. Every American voter has said something in private that they regret.  If he gives a contrite apology and talks about his transformation on the campaign trail, he can turn these attacks into a big win.

Pamela Geller, meanwhile, not only handwaves Trump's "naughty" words ("This is much ado about nothing. It’s how guys talk"), she -- and we are not making this up -- praised Trump's "decorum" in his sleazy conversation, and went full Clinton Equivocation:

The uproar over Trump’s remarks is manufactured and opportunistic outrage. For example, I was actually surprised by the decorum in Trump’s conversation. He was respectful of the married woman’s refusal. He was surprised that if you’re famous, you can get all the sex you want. He was unashamedly heterosexual in his desires. Though he said he wanted to grab p—-, he didn’t force someone’s head “down,” a la Bill Clinton. He appreciates “beautiful” and wants to kiss her face, not have her immediately perform oral sex a la Bill Clinton, and he wants to be pleasing to her with Tic Tacs for his breath – very considerate. A pass, a kiss, is not rape. For that, you’d have to ask Juanita Broaddrick.

Geller conludes with a dab of Hillary derangement: "It’s the end of us – the end of freedom – if Hillary Clinton becomes president."

CNS Unemployment Numbers Distortion Watch
Topic: CNSNews.com

CNSNews.com keeps doing the unemployment shuffle, with Susan Jones' article on September's job numbers fixated as usual on the labor force participation rate, which is meaningless as an indicator of employment since most of the people who aren't employed are retired or students.

That's something Jones once again fails to explicitly acknowledge in her reporting. This time, though, she serves up a bland dictionary definition: "The labor force participation rate is the percentage of people in the civilian noninstitutionalized population, age 16 or older, who are either working or actively seeking work. People who are no longer looking for work, for whatever reason -- retirement, school, family, or they've just given up -- are not participating in the labor force."

Farther down in her article, Jones offers up further elaboration:

[Federal Reserve Chair Janet] Yellen told Congress last month that the participation rate is feeling "significant downward pressure" from the aging of the population, as more and more Baby Boomers retire and leave the labor force.

"Aging of the population maybe one factor," Rep. Andy Barr (R-Ky.) told Yellen at the hearing of the House Financial Services Committee. "The other factor is that unemployment is coming down, not for a good reason, but for the wrong reason -- namely, that there's a frustrated workforce out there that's completely given up looking for work."

But this doesn't appear until the 13th paragraph of her article, while the second paragraph asserts that "94,184,000 Americans were not in the labor force in September, 207,000 fewer than in August, and the nation's labor force participation rate" without elaboration.

Is it too much to ask for Jones and CNS to explain the truth about the labor force participation rate in a straightforward manner early in the article, when it counts? Apparently so. 

WND -- Which Loves Likening Obama to Hitler -- Is Shocked Some Are Likening Trump to Hitler
Topic: WorldNetDaily

WorldNetDaily is shocked -- shocked! -- that anyone, let alone five writers published by the Washington Post over nine months, would liken Donald Trump to Hitler. Managing editor David Kupelian huffs in an Oct. 5 piece: "What can one say to a newspaper that repeatedly compares a gutsy, outspoken billionaire businessman-turned-presidential candidate to a mass-murdering monster?"

Well, one could start by posing this question to Kupelian: What can one say to a website that repeatedly compares the first black presidential candidate to a mass-murdering monster?

Because that's exactly what Kupelian's WND did to Barack Obama.

In 2008, WND gave ample space to Hilmar von Campe, a former Hitler Youth who apparently didn't forget what he learned about the Nazis' Big Lie technique in likening Obama to Hitler:

• "Socialist Hitler destroyed free society in a few months. Socialist Obama is close to his steppingstone." -- Oct. 28, 2008
• "Germany at the beginning of the ’30s was in deep economic trouble with about 6 million unemployed. Hitler became the savior for millions of miserable people who adored the likeable deceiver but did not have the slightest idea what he was up to. The same is true for America now in the worst economic and financial crisis ever. Obama appears as a savior without people analyzing his character and record." -- Nov. 15, 2008
• "There was another Nazi organization that had the same task as all other institutions, namely to keep people under control and influence their thinking. It was the Service to Work (Arbeitsdienst). Young men had to serve half a year before entering into military service. It seems that Obama likes this Nazi feature because he has proposed, in addition to the idea of a civilian national security force, a plan to create a national community service program. ... His plans point to where he wants to lead the American nation: onto the same road Germany took in 1933. Americans, do you want to go in that direction?" -- Nov. 25, 2008
  

WND even defended von Campe's smears by asserting that "As a person who survived the nightmare of Adolf Hitler, von Campe believes he carries a sober responsibility to warn Americans how quickly free society can be destroyed through socialist ideology."

WND has published numerous other Obama-Nazi comparisons, as well as columns defending them.

Kupelian also quoted right-wing blogger Jeff Dunetz denouncing the Trump-Hilter comparisons. Dunetz noted that unlike Hitler, Trump hasn't "forced people to tattoo numbers on their arms," "murdered people, cremated their remains and buried them in mass graves," "wrote a book called 'Mein Kampf' in which he spoke of his hatred toward Jews and previewed his 'final solution,'" "conducted horrible, painful medical experimentation on humans," nor did he "round up people he doesn’t like, force them into box cars like cattle and deliver them to concentration camps." Dunetz added: "Until there is evidence of the above, any comparison of Donald Trump to Hitler and/or the Nazis is not only false, inappropriate, and an example of careless writing."

Guess what, Mr. Kupelian? None of those things apply to Obama either, yet you and your published numerous instances of likening Obama to Hitler and other Nazis. Which makes you an utter moral hypocrite for denouncing others for engaging in behavior you condoned and promoted.

Kupelian concludes:

One final consideration. There were at least 16 different plots to assassinate Adolf Hitler, including most famously “Operation Valkyrie” (the so-called “20 July Plot”), which was made into a blockbuster movie starring Tom Cruise as the heroic German army officer, Col. Claus von Stauffenberg. Even the revered Lutheran pastor and theologian, Dietrich Bonhoeffer, was executed by German authorities for his role in this particular plot. The people who attempted to assassinate Hitler – to slay a psychopathic monster, to stop a genocide, to end a terrible war – are rightly regarded as patriots and heroes.

So, what does this say about the Washington Post – and others in the “mainstream media” who consider themselves America’s arbiters of truth – continually comparing Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump with Hitler? Does such “journalism” legitimize threats and violent attacks on Trump and his supporters?

If someone, God forbid – convinced he is a modern-day von Stauffenberg, heroically attempting to rid the world of this generation’s Hitler – were to shoot Donald Trump, would the Washington Post deserve any of the blame?

I say yes.

Does that mean we could assign some of the blame if some would-be modern-day von Stauffenberg, heroically attempting to rid the world of this generation’s Hitler, were to shoot Obama? We say yes -- just like we say WND has some actual blame for Anders Breivik's massacre of dozens in Norway (Breivik cites WND six times in his manifesto) and Dylann Roof's massacre of nine African-Americans in a Charleston, S.C., church (he parroted WND's racially charged, pro-apartheid rhetoric).

To The Lazy MRC, Rob Reiner Will Always Be 'Meathead'
Topic: Media Research Center

Rob Reiner has done a lot of things in the nearly 40 years since his acting stint on "All In the Family" -- namely, being the director of popular and acclaimed films -- but that doesn't matter to the Media Research Center. It's much easier for them to go for the cheap, lazy insult and call him "Meathead" every time he say something they don't like.

The latest to lazily insult Reiner is Callista Ring, who complains that Reiner accurately notes that there's a "serious strain of racism" that runs through the followers ot Donald Trump. Her headline references "Meathead Rob Reiner" and and huffs, "Like Hillary Clinton, Rob Reiner would toss an awful lot of Americans into a 'basket of deplorables.' Or in Meathead’s case a bunker of Archies."

Ring doesn't really bother to disprove Reiner, instead whining that Reiner was "reeking of liberal elitism" and writing things like "What a surprise, another liberal accusing people of racism simply for not agreeing with him."

That's kneejerk right-wing ranting that's just as lazy as insisting on calling Reiner by the name a character he hasn't played in 40 years.

Hillary Derangement Syndrome, Supersize WND Edition
Topic: WorldNetDaily

Am I saying there’s no chance Hillary Clinton will win? Not at all, though I think it unlikely. Between her devoted media harpies, her team of around-the-clock doctors and a campaign staff well versed in the practice of propaganda and cover-up, there’s always a chance they might just literally carry her over the finish line to victory.

Still, it remains my humble prayer that this past week signals the beginning of the end for Hillary Clinton’s political aspirations. Even so, I also pray she might live a long and healthy life in the private sector – a life with plenty of time to bounce cute little grandkids on her knee.

When they visit her in prison.

-- Matt Barber, Sept. 16 WorldNetDaily column

Despite mounting evidence that Hillary Clinton is hiding serious health problems, she will press on in her campaign because of a crazed lust for power, which ultimately will propel her to self-destruction, contends a longtime critic.

That’s the dire prediction of someone who has been following Mrs. Clinton’s progress from the beginning, “Billy” Clinton’s childhood friend and former romantic partner Dolly Kyle, the author of “Hillary The Other Woman.”

“I really think she has been ’cruisin’ for a bruisin’, as we say in the South, because she’s such an angry person and so driven by this inner rage,” said Kyle. “People like that eventually break down, physically.”

[...]

“What’s even more absolutely clear is that she is not psychologically fit to be president. She is mentally unfit. I wouldn’t hire her to babysit my grandchildren. I wouldn’t trust her with matches in the kitchen. She doesn’t have the ability to think through a situation and come to a logical conclusion. She proved this in Benghazi when she couldn’t respond to legitimate requests for help. She had all the resources of the United States of America, and she turned over and went back to sleep.”

-- Sept. 18 WND article

The real issue is why, in this age of widespread acceptability of the gay and lesbian lifestyle, and as Hillary asks for the vote of gays, lesbians and transgender people, would she, by material omission, continue to appear to hide her sexual preference? Is she ashamed of it, and if so, is she worthy of claiming to be the champion of gays, lesbians and transgenders?

I do not endorse any candidate for elective office and never have. But gays, lesbians and transgenders have to wonder why Hillary would call Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump a “racist” against people of an alternative lifestyle, and then continue to lie about her own sexuality. For gays, lesbians and transgenders, this is an affront to them personally. This continued deceitful hypocrisy by Hillary has to call into question her own commitment to gay, lesbian and transgender rights.

-- Larry Klayman, Sept. 30 WND column

Hillary Clinton is not good at very much.

She’s not good at portraying a human.

She’s not good at speaking off prompter.

She is not good at endearing herself to the voting populous.

But she is good at two things: She is good at lying and good at distracting.

-- Gina Loudon, Oct. 2 WND column

You cannot be weak with evil. You must deal forcefully with the wicked as God himself stands with you.

Donald Trump knows Hillary Clinton is an evil woman. But in their first debate, he held back on her. Now is not the time to be “nice.” We are at war with crooked Hillary, lying media and corrupt politicians, for the future of this country. You’ll notice Hillary does not hold back on Trump.

Hillary and her media’s vicious attacks on Donald Trump are a distraction from reality – they focus on “problems” that don’t exist, like “racism” and “sexism.” He must be strong and wise to defeat the lie.

-- Jesse Lee Peterson, Oct. 2 WND column

Last month, I gave you a long list of reasons Hillary Clinton does not deserve to become president.

You can reference those if you like.

Personally, I think that column would make a good handout if you want to influence your friends and family members before Election Day.

But today I’d like to focus on one good reason to say no to Hillary in 2016.

It’s called “Clinton fatigue.”

If you’re like me, you are just plain sick and tired of this woman. You find her annoying, insufferable, unbearable, DEPLORABLE, detestable, arrogant, intolerable, haughty, imperious, pompous, presumptuous, shrill, cold, calculating, contemptuous, self-important, autocratic and lacking any appeal whatsoever.

Do I have that about right?

And the big question I have for every American – from those already supporting Donald Trump to those who supported her opponent, Bernie Sanders, in the Democratic primaries – is this: Can you even imagine enduring four years of this witch as president?

I’m sorry, it’s that personal for me.

I don’t really care about her health. I care about mine.

-- Joseph Farah, Oct. 4 WND column

Trump cannot make this point for us. Catholics have to convince their believe-as-you-please brethren, including their priests, of one salient fact: A vote for Tim and the Alinskyite Hillary is a vote for that “first radical,” the demonic fellow Alinsky so openly admired.

-- Jack Cashill, Oct. 5 WND column

MRC Research Too Thin to To A Proper Ref-Working on VP Debate Moderator
Topic: Media Research Center

The Media Research Center really wanted to do some serious ref-working on CBS' Elaine Quijano before the Oct. 4 vice presidential debate. When she was chosen as debate moderator, Tim Graham admitted that "the MRC doesn't have a thick file" on her; evidence of that lack of thickness was Graham trying to present as "classic anti-Tea Party tilt" a Quijano report that noted the indisuputable fact that there was "small but passionate minority" in the tea party movement that was "voicing what some see as racist rhetoric."

So bereft of material was the MRC that Graham had to resort to guilt by association, using a Sept. 29 post to attack Quijano because the husband of a CBSco-worker of Quijano's was prepping Tim Kaine for the debate. But even Graham had to concede that there was no there there, admitting that "There is no allegation of suspicious coordination between Quijano and the Barnett-Braver household. But the perception of what Dan Rather would call 'tick-tight' CBS associations creates a perception problem."

Funny, we don't recall Graham being concerned about the "perception problem" when Fox News' Greta Van Susteren had a husband who was working as Sarah Palin's lawyer.

After the debate, of course, MRC chief Brent Bozell trotted out yet another "the moderator is biased" press release that he probably drafted before the debate even began:

Elaine Quijano is given the honor of a lifetime and she can only muster one tough question for Sen. Tim Kaine, the Democrat? Miraculously, she was able to craft EIGHT challenging questions to Gov. Pike Pence, the Republican.

Once again, it's one standard for the Democrat, a different one for the Republican. This is a broken record. Softballs for Democrats, curve balls for Republicans.

Did no one inform Elaine Quijano that the role of a moderator is to ask questions and take a step back while the candidates DEBATE? Quijano and Virginia’s over-caffeinated senator repeatedly challenged and interrupted Gov. Pence. By the looks of it, he didn't mind the 2-1 disadvantage.

When are Republicans going to learn that the network media are just Democratic Party operatives with press credentials?

The idea that debate moderators should not correct false claims during a debate  is part of the MRC's war against facts, a tactic made necessary because Trump seemingly lies all the time.

Somebody should tell Bozell that partisan ranting is not "media research." (Oh, wait, somebody did, but the MRC censored it.)

Meanwhile, rest assured that the MRC is working the refs for the next debate: it has a new article up on "the worst examples" of the "liberal bias" of the next debate moderators, ABC's Martha Raddatz and CNN's Anderson Cooper.

CNS Managing Editor Gives A Forum to Spokesman for Rabidly Anti-Gay Group
Topic: CNSNews.com

CNSNews.com managing editor Michael W. Chapman loves to give a platform to gay-bashers like Franklin Graham. He does it again in an Oct. 3 post:

World Congress of Families spokesman Don Feder, during a discussion on Kenya's Crosstalk program about the LGBT agenda in Africa and the United States, said that civil society cannot allow homosexuals "to be the role model" because it is "dangerous" and, he added, "if Africans look seriously" at how homosexuality is affecting the United States, "they should be horrified." What's happening with transgender bathroom policy "is absolutely insane," he said.

“The problem is this is a way people are living and they’re demanding that it be respected," said Feder in reference to LGBT persons in America on the Sept. 28 edition of Crosstalk, an affiliate of TBN. "They’re demanding that all of society be changed for their comfort and their convenience."

"We’re not saying that these people have to be persecuted," said Feder, an author and former Boston Herald columnist.  "We’re not saying that you can’t have compassion for them -- of course, you can. But you can’t let this be the role model. And you can’t allow Christians and other religious people to be persecuted because they refuse to go along with this agenda.”

“You know, other people have demanded minority status based on their religion, based on their race," said Feder, a graduate of Boston University Law School. "This is the first group that demands minority status based on what they do in their bedrooms. And that’s what makes it so dangerous."

"And if you look at the United States, I mean if Africans look seriously at the United States, they should be horrified by what’s going on," he said.

You might rembember the fundamentally dishonest Feder from a few years back when he was promoting a film about "demographic winter"-- fear that white Christians aren't having enough babies and will soon be overrun with brown Muslims.

His current gig is being spokesman for the World Congress for Families, a notorioiusly anti-gay group. For instance, it supported a Russian law banning homosexual "propaganda" -- that is, anything positive about homosexuality.

While Chapman noted that Feder was in Kenya, he didn't say why. That occasion was the African Regional Conference of Families in Nairobi, which was designed to perpetuate discrimination against the LGBT community -- note Feder's statement that "We’re not saying that these people have to be persecuted," which does not explicitly rule out persecution of gays.

As Right Wing Watch notes, Kenya is hardly in need of encoragement on the anti-gay front: "Same-sex intimacy is currently illegal in Kenya, though there is an active movement to change that. Nigeria enacted a harsh anti-gay law in 2014 that has sparked vigilante violence; some American Religious Right groups backed that law or have spoken out against the Obama administration’s efforts to oppose similar legislation around the world."

Will WND Defend Birtherism From Racism Claims?
Topic: WorldNetDaily

WorldNetDaily used to be very sensitive to the charge that birtherism was racially motivated. In 2009, for instance, WND editor Joseph Farah huffed that it was a "smear" to make the claim, as Farah interprets it, that to say Obama "should be held to the same standard as previous presidents and his opponent with regard to establishing constitutional eligibility to serve" is racist, ranting, "They think their job is to label anyone who doesn’t close their eyes, lie down and enjoy the rape of America as a racist." He then declare, "I will never be intimidated into ceasing to stand up for the Constitution and for America."

(Though Farah apparently was intimidated into doing so when it came to applying Ted Cruz to his birther standard.)

Now, the "racist" claim is flying around birtherism -- and now there's some science to back it up. Vox has highlighted a survey conducted by political scientist Philip Klinkner, which found that a stronger belief in birtherism correlated tightly with increasing levels of racial resentment. Vox continued:

It’s possible the correlation was coincidental: The study acknowledged that whiteness, Republicanism, and racial resentment all tend to correlate, so maybe this really reflects that partisan beliefs, not racial resentment, drive birtherism. But when Klinkner put all of these factors through a statistical control model, he found that racial resentment significantly correlated by itself with birtherism.

To prove this, Klinkner also looked at Democrats who believed Obama was born outside the US. He found, “Among those with the lowest levels of racial resentment, party had little influence as both Democrats and Republicans had a low probability of believing in birtherism. As racial resentment increased, however, the probability of birtherism increased for both Democrats and Republicans, but more among the latter.” So partisan beliefs did play some role, but racial resentment played a significant role as well.

So an all-white Fox News panel may disagree, but birtherism really was driven, at least in part, by race and racial attitudes.

The Vox article came out last week, but WND is been silent about it. Is it because WND concedes the racism aspect? (WND does like to fan the flames of racial resentment, after all.) Or is it just trying to shut up about birtherism in order to help chief birther Donald Trump get elected? (WND didn't really want to talk about it after the subject came up during the first presidential debate.)

But you know what they say: silence equals assent.

MRC Complains That Yet Another Historic Event Is Described As Historic
Topic: Media Research Center

The Media Research Center continues to be mad that historic events are called historic in the media. Kyle Drennen grouses in a Sept. 22 post:

On Thursday’s NBC Today, co-host Matt Lauer proudly announced that the network had received an Emmy award for its biased coverage of the Supreme Court’s 2013 ruling legalizing gay marriage across the country. Lauer told viewers: “By the way, the News and Documentary Emmy awards were held last night and NBC News and MSNBC picked up this one for our live coverage of the Supreme Court's landmark decision on same-sex marriage.”

He continued: “As always, we are very proud of the people who work here and the efforts that they put forward on a daily basis.” Co-host Savannah Guthrie chimed in: “Proud of the whole team.”

Lauer, Guthrie, as well as correspondents Chuck Todd, Peter Alexander, and Pete Williams were all named in the presentation of the award for “Outstanding Live Coverage of a Current News Story - Long Form.” In addition, MSNBC anchor Thomas Roberts and legal correspondent Ari Melber were included for the cable channel’s reporting.

During a live NBC News special report on the day of the court decision – June 26, 2013 – the Today hosts, along with Todd, celebrated the ruling as one that “has potential to go down in the record books...[with] the significance of something like Brown versus Board of Education.” Later in that same one-sided coverage, Alexander gushed that the outcome of the case was “very personally satisfying” for President Obama.

That kind of liberal cheerleading helped guarantee the network’s Emmy win.

How, exactly, is it "liberal cheerleading" to acknowledge the historic nature of the same-sex marriage ruling or note that Obama supported the ruling? Or how that supposedly garnered NBC the Emmy? Drennen doesn't explain -- he's just speculating and imposing his own right-wing bias on news he doesn't like.

WND Skews The News To Protect Its Favorite Right-Wing Judge
Topic: WorldNetDaily

WorldNetDaily has long been a fan of Roy Moore, the right-wing, anti-gay Alabama Supreme Court judge -- it even published a book by him. So it's no surprise that WND took an interest in the Moore being on trial for ordering judges in the state to defy federal law and not issue marriage licenses to same-sex couples.

Of course, WND expresses that interest by uncritically quoting Moore's supporters and bashing his critics, when it's not completely ignoring them.

Bob Unruh's Sept. 28 article on Moore's trial before a Court of the Judiciary panel quickly goes into attack mode, comlaining that the complaint against more that resulted in the trial was "raised by the leftist Southern Poverty Law Center" and spends much of the article bashing the SPLC, including rehashing Floyd Corkins' attack on the right-wing Family Research Council even though the SPLC had no contact with Corkins before the attack (Corkins claimed he located the FRC on the SPLC website's list of anti-gay groups). Unruh quotes only Moore's attorney, Mat Staver of the right-wing Liberty Counsel, and makes no attempt to lay out the evidence against Moore -- that is, act like a fair and balanced journalist.

Unruh's Sept. 30 article on Moore losing his case and being effectively removed from office (he was suspended without pay for the remainder of his term) was similarly biased -- once again putting the lie to WND editor Joseph Farah's laughable assertion that "WND reporters and editors are always encouraged and required to seek out multiple sources and contrary viewpoints in news articles" -- Unruh quotes only one line from the ruling, its final statement that Moore should be removed from office but did not reach a unanimous decision to do so, but he fails to mention any of the evidence used toreach that conclusion. Unruh also claims he tried to contact the head of the Court of the Judiciary panel that ruled against Moore, but this was an empty gesture -- he and WND should know that judges rarely talk to the media about their rulings -- that doesn't excuse his failure to cite the evidence against Moore.

By contrast, Unruh gives plenty of space to Staver to rant at will about the ruling against his client and to Moore himself to rant about this "politically motivated effort by radical homosexual and transgender groups," and he bashed the SPLC again.

It's this kind of reporting -- flagrantly biased, disinterested in reporting facts that don't advance its far-right agenda -- that have put WND into serious financial trouble. The fact that Unruh still has free rein to skew and distort doesn't bode well for WND's future.

NEW ARTICLE: Working the Refs, MRC Style
Topic: Media Research Center
The Media Research Center is lobbying debate and forum moderators to get them to take it easy on Donald Trump -- and it complains that others are doing the same thing (with seemingly more success). Read more >>

WND's Kupelian Still Trying to Shame Evangelicals Into Voting for Trump
Topic: WorldNetDaily

The mind of WorldNetDaily editor is still in major snappage mode as he continues to convince himself to abandon his moral principles -- and try to shame others into doing the same -- and vote for Donald Trump. Witness this Sept. 29 WND article, in which Kupelian concedes yet again that Trump is evil, to the point where he's effectively likening Trump to Stalin (but Hillary Clinton is Hitler):

Both Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump are very flawed candidates and flawed human beings, which means Americans of good conscience should refuse to vote for either one of them, right? After all, choosing the lesser of two evils is still “choosing evil.” Right?

Wrong, says award-winning journalist David Kupelian, who goes so far as to call such thinking “deluded.”

During a recent appearance on theDove TV, Kupelian mocked those who proclaim, “I don’t like either one of these people; I’m not going to vote.”

“That is – pardon me – immature, infantile thinking,” Kupelian told host Perry Atkinson on the program “Focus Today.”

Kupelian, WND’s managing editor and the best-selling author of  “The Snapping of the American Mind,” was discussing a recent viral commentary he wrote, titled “Trump, Clinton and ‘the lesser of 2 evils’ foolishness.”

During wartime, Kupelian said during the TV broadcast (watch it below), conscientious leaders are daily forced to choose between the lesser of two evils. For example, he said, when the U.S. bombed Hiroshima and Nagasaki during World War II, killing over 200,000 people, President Harry Truman was choosing the lesser of two evils. The greater evil would have been to invade Japan, which would have caused much more death on both sides – an estimated 400,000 to 800,000 American fatalities and up to 10 million Japanese deaths.

Likewise, the U.S. allied with Stalin during World War II, even though he was one of history’s worst mass murderers. But at the time, partnering with Stalin represented the lesser of two evils, since it helped America defeat Hitler’s cancerous spread.

So, squeamish Americans need to show a little moral courage and vote for the “lesser of two evils” this November, according to Kupelian, who says it’s pointless to waste a vote on a third-party spoiler candidate.

Of Trump and Clinton, Kupelian said, “We’re going to have one of these two people, and one is clearly better than the other, and we need to face that and stop being babies.”

And, once again, Kupelian turns on the shame:

“To look at the current election between Trump and Clinton and to conclude they’re both equally evil, now it’s not so much an issue of the lesser of two evils argument, it’s more a matter of delusion,” Kupelian argued.

He said there’s no way a rational person can regard Trump and Clinton as equal options. Clinton promises to continue the disastrous policies of Barack Obama that are crippling America both domestically and around the world, while Trump promises to move the country in a new direction by putting America first again.

“Somebody who makes the case that these are equally evil, I say, respectfully, there’s something seriously wrong with their perception,” Kupelian stated.

He warned evangelical Christians not to sit out this election as in 2012, when 42 percent of them didn’t vote. Evangelicals represent a large natural Republican constituency, and Kupelian urged them to realize a President Hillary Clinton would be antithetical to their values.

“Somehow their emotions have gotten in the way,” said Kupelian, “because this is a common sense thing. We have two candidates, you pick the better candidate, you vote for him, otherwise you’re saddled with the worse candidate, and you are condemning your children and your friends’ children to grow up in a country – you’re bequeathing to them a different country than the one your parents gave you. It’s not fair.”

Kupelian is still insisting, without offering evidence to back it up, that "There is goodness in Donald Trump," but he then adds, "I don’t know if there is or not in Hillary; I’m not going to condemn her. I don’t know where she’s going when she leaves this world, but right now, just taking her at her word, at what she says she’ll do, she will destroy the country."

Kupelian is transparently lying about not wanting to condemn Hillary -- he is the managing editor of a website where condemning Hillary has replaced obsessing over Barack Obama's birth certificate as its main editorial mission.

MRC Excuses Trump's Misogyny By Invoking Clinton Equivocation
Topic: Media Research Center

Funny how the Media Research Center's defense of Donald Trump has little to do with actually defending him. Rather, it invokes the Clinton Equivocation -- the right-wing idea that Trump and other conservatives get a pass for a given offense because a Clinton is presumed to have done it first and worse.

The MRC does this again in a Sept. 30 post in which Sarah Stites gives Trump's long record of misogyny a pass because Clinton:

Sleazy and misogynistic men have roamed the halls of the Capitol Building and White House for years. However, the media tend to disproportionately target those on the political right.

Following Monday’s debate, the media went wild attacking Donald Trump for his fat-shaming of former Miss Universe Alicia Machado, devoting nearly 20 minutes to the scandal. In order to brand him a complete cad, some outlets went further, unearthing other damning examples from his past. Yet, although Trump has earned this evisceration, it’s clear to see that the media has often given a pass to worse behavior displayed by liberals or at least avoided noting their party affiliation.

In the following slides, you’ll find some of those liberal lions that the media has downplayed – from JFK to Bill Clinton to Anthony Weiner.  

Stites not only gives Bill Clinton's "scandalous sexual past" its own entry, he gets dinged again in a separate entry for officiating at Anthony Weiner's wedding.

Is WND's Cahn Allied With ISIS On Destruction of Pagan Ruins?
Topic: WorldNetDaily

WorldNetDaily gave its main cash cow, Jonathan Cahn, to wax prophetically, as he's wont to do, about a recreation of the arch from the Temple of Bel (Baal, as Cahn insists on using) at Palmyra, Syria, going on display in New York City. As one would expect from a guy who wrote a book called "The Harbinger," Cahn declared this a harbinger as well:

The idea that anything linked to an ancient Canaanite god would be erected in America would seem unthinkable. But just as it was with the nine ancient harbingers of judgment, so it has now taken place – the Sign of Baal has manifested on American soil.

It took place on a rainy Monday afternoon, Sept. 19, 2016. It happened in the city of the harbingers of judgment – New York City. No one who erected it or who unveiled it had any idea what they were doing – just as with the harbingers – but they did it anyway.

One of the centers of Baal worship in ancient times was Palmyra, Syria. The city contained not one but two prominent temples to Baal. The Romans erected an arch there to lead to the Temple of Baal. So the worshipers of Baal would walk through the arch and approach the temple in which they would venerate their god. This arch that led to the Temple of Baal was reproduced down to the smallest detail and erected in New York City.

[...]

As I stared at the ancient object being set up in New York City, I was struck in the same way as I was when I saw the nine prophetic signs of “The Harbinger.” Since 9/11, America has not only not returned to God – it has rebelled against Him in an ever deepening, ever intensifying and ever accelerating apostasy. It is eerily following the judgment template of the harbingers and the footsteps of ancient Israel as it headed to destruction.

And now, against all odds, the sign of Baal has appeared on American soil, the sign of a nation that had once known God, having fallen away, the sign of the god of the harbingers, the sign of national apostasy, the sign of judgment.

Missing from Cahn's article -- as well as from the accompanying video, which distractingly adds ominous-sounding background music and an echo to Cahn's voice to make him sound more authoritative -- is a bunch of important information: the full history of the temple, the fate of the original arch and why a replica was created. Cahn wants you to think this was done apropos of nothing other than to fulfill his own prophecies.

While the temple started as a worship site for a pagan god, the temple was converted into a Christian church during the Byzantine Era and, later, a mosque. The temple's remains were destroyed by ISIS during its occupation of Palmyra last year, and the arch is all that remains.

The recreation of the arch -- which was also on display in London --  was spearheaded by the Institute for Digital Archaeology, a joint venture between Harvard University, the University of Oxford and Dubai’s Museum of the Future that promotes the use of digital imaging and 3D printing in archaeology and conservation. The recreations are meant to celebreate World Heritage Week, as well as serve as an act of defiance to ISIS' attempts to erase evidence of the Middle East’s pre-Islamic history.

A few days later, WND did a follow-up article rehashing much of what Cahn said. This article did admit the original temple was destroyed by ISIS and quoted officials calling it an act of "solidarity" with those "lost in Syria," and "a symbol of freedom," but adding that "Cahn said it was anything but a symbol of freedom." Cahn is not quoted as further discussing the destruction by ISIS.

Which raises the question: Does Cahn endorse ISIS' destruction of a priceless, centuries-old historical artifact?

While Cahn and ISIS do not share religious views, they seem to align with their hatred for certain ancient relics -- ISIS because it thinks any shrines or statues implying the existence of another deity are sacrilege and idolatry, Cahn because he despises pagan gods. (Again, never mind that the Temple of Bel had also served as both a church and a mosque.)

Cahn never discusses the historical value of the temple or mentions ISIS, much less condemn it -- all he cares about is that he can exploit the situation for his own gain --  and one would think ISIS' destruction of a 2,000-year-old temple would be worthy of some criticism, if only on a historical level.

So it seems Cahn is cool with ISIS on this act of destruction, and perhaps with the obliteration of other pagan-linked site and artifacts by ISIS. Is that the kind of person who should be taken seriously?

NewsBusters' Blumer Still Trying to Blame Birtherism on Clinton, Not Trump
Topic: NewsBusters

NewsBusters' Tom Blumer just can't stop spinning the birther stuff in Donald Trump's favor. We've already noted that Blumer is obsessed with insisting that Hillary Clinton and her campaign started birtherism, which -- even if it was true -- doesn't explain why Trump pushed the issue for years.

In a Sept. 21 post, Blumer calls on an unusual source for backup: "Larry Johnson, who runs the No Quarter USA blog, which was a heavily visited pro-Hillary site in 2008 but is anything but that now." Blumer doesn't mention that the reason nobody wants to visit Johnson's site anymore is because he spent years pushing one of the biggest hoaxes of the Obama years: that there is a secret recording of Michelle Obama railing against "whitey." That purported "whitey tape" never surfaced, and years later, Johnson tried to handwave it by claiming he was the victim of a Democratic "dirty trick."

Blumer cited Johnson again in a Sept. 25 post, in which he mostly rants about Sidney Blumenthal allegedly shopping the claim in 2008.

Blumer tried again in a Sept. 27 post by citing another less-than-solid source: Trump surrogate Omarosa. He also cites another purported Clinton birther link: "the matter was hand-carried into long-term general visibility when Philip J. Berg, a Pennsylvania Democrat and a former deputy attorney general in that state, filed suit in federal court in August of 2008, 'alleging that Obama was born actually in Mombasa, Kenya and that the 'Certification of Live Birth' on Obama's website is a forgery.'" But Blumer offers no evidence that the Clinton campaign had anything to do with Berg's actions; indeed, Berg himself has said that he had "no direct contact with the Hillary campaign."

And who embraced and promoted Berg's legal actions? No prominent Democrat or even any prominent Hillary supporter -- it was WorldNetDaily, which in turn was the birther whisperer to Trump. Note the utter lack of involvement by Clinton.

Blumer then tries to shut down the whole discussion by harrumphing: Trump put the issue to bed with the statement he made on September 16 when he announced that 'Hillary Clinton and her campaign of 2008 started the birther controversy. I finished it. President Barack Obama was born in the United States, period.'"

Yeah, no, that's not how that works. None of Blumer's posts address the real issue at hand: that Trump continued to push the birther issue for five years after he "finished it" in 2011. That means Trump is lying.

Will Blumer concede that about his preferred candidate? Don't count on it.