Topic: CNSNews.com
CNSNews.com loves to repeat the same pro-Trump talking points in stories on impeachment -- even doing stories days apart that featuring Trump's GOP defenders saying the same exact thing. Read more >>
Monday, December 23, 2019
NEW ARTICLE -- CNS On Impeachment, Part 2: Copy and Paste
Topic: CNSNews.com CNSNews.com loves to repeat the same pro-Trump talking points in stories on impeachment -- even doing stories days apart that featuring Trump's GOP defenders saying the same exact thing. Read more >>
Posted by Terry K.
at 8:35 PM EST
MRC Gives Film's False Defamation of Journalist A Pass
Topic: Media Research Center The Media Research Center loves the new Clint Eastwood film about Richard Jewell, the security guard who was initially suspected -- wrongly, as it turned out -- of involvement in the bombing at the 1996 Olympic Games in Atlanta, in no small part because it fits the MRC's anti-media narrative. Right-wing film critic Christian Toto was given space at the MRC to hype it: an October post a month and a half before the film's release hyped Eastwood's alleged courage it making a film that was "casting a critical eye on reporters, and a Nov. 23 post gushed at how the film "savages the mainstream press." Meanwhile, in a Dec. 5 post, P.J. Gladnick mocked a writer who pointed out that the film plays into Trump's (and the MRC's) anti-media talking points. Tim Graham and Brent Bozell also cheered the film and invoked it to push bogus "fake news" attacks on the media. But Eastwood's film has fake news too: Without evidence, it pushes the inflammatory idea that a reporter for the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, Kathy Scruggs, slept with an FBI agent in exchange for information.And the MRC is defending the lie. Kristine Marsh did so with a bit of whataboutism in a Dec. 10 post: "The idea that reporters have traded sexual favors with sources to get information is not a wild conspiracy theory. There have been a number of cases just this year where female reporters from The New York Times, CNBC and MSNBC have been implicated in reporting on classified information they received from the government officials they were in relationships with." But Marsh didn't address the fact that there's absolutely no evidence that Scruggs ever did so. Gladnick got mad at the Journal-Constitution for demanding that the movie carry a disclaimer pointing out that things in the film are not accurate, including the portrayal of Scruggs, giving a "dramatic license" pass the MRC wouldn't grant if the character in question had been a conservative:
Gladnick was also mad that the Journal-Constitution won the defamation lawsuit Jewell had filed against it. Clay Waters also gave a dramatic-license pass to Eastwood by noting that a New York Times reporter "admits the movie “follows the standard practice for movies based on real-life events by taking liberties with certain facts....” Then he lets a source, Kelly McBride of the Poynter Institute, throw in ageist insults against Eastwood." Hew then huffed that "in 2016 the paper sneered at those who would fact-check films based on true stories." On Dec. 16, Alexa Moutevelis touted how the film's attack on the media is "in favor of the right." She mentioned that the film told a "lie" about Scruggs -- then never discussed it again, again crowing that Eastwood "justifiably knocks the media." Apparently, the MRC is totally cool with false smears as long as it's people they despise -- in this case, any journalist who's not a right-wing sycophant -- being smeared. (Image via Slate)
Posted by Terry K.
at 2:46 PM EST
WND Is Also Sad Chick-fil-A Stopped Hating Gays As Much As WND Does
Topic: WorldNetDaily We've noted how CNSNews.com got sad that Chick-fil-A changed its charitable donation strategy to de-emphasize groups that support anti-LGBT causes. The anti-gay columnists at WorldNetDaily has also been feeling that sadness. Professional gay-hater Scott Lively declared that "Christians are reeling from the stunning betrayal of Chick-fil-A last week, but I called it in 2014." After complaining that right-wingers have "been duped by the progressives into playing a game of [liberals'] invention we are absolutely guaranteed to lose," he huffed further:
Michael Brown begged Chick-fil-A to change its mind:
Jerry Newcombe, meanwhile, complained that the Salvation Army, which is one of the groups Chick-fil-A has stopped funding, is suffering from "mislabeling," adding, "To think of the Salvation Army – which does so much good work for people of every race, creed, color, sexual-orientation, whatever – as somehow anti-gay is preposterous." In fact, the Salvation Army has been linked to anti-gay activities in the past. Then Newcombe defended the idea that the Salvation Army is anti-gay:
Newcombe concluded by huffing: "Shame on those who would slander the Salvation Army as a 'hate group.' Talk about 'fake news.'" So hating gays is not "hate"?
Posted by Terry K.
at 1:19 AM EST
Sunday, December 22, 2019
MRC's Double Standard On Surprise Presidential Military Visits
Topic: Media Research Center The Media Research Center's Alex Christy grumbled in a Nov. 29 post:
If you know anything about the MRC, you will not be surprised to learn that it dismissed a surprise military visit by a Democratic president as a stunt and did not view it as "a bipartisan tradition that everyone can support." When President Obama paid a visit to Afghanistan on Memorial Day weekend in 2014, the MRC was angry that it was being reported on positively. Geoffrey Dickens suggested the visit was done as a distraction from "the VA scandal":
Jackie Seal, meanwhile, played whataboutism:
If it weren't for double standards, the MRC wouldn't have any standards at all.
Posted by Terry K.
at 9:34 PM EST
Again! CNS Recycles GOP Talking Points Just Days Apart
Topic: CNSNews.com Remember that time CNSNews.com devoted two articles days apart to repeating the exact same Republican talking points from the vey same person? Well, they did it again. In a Dec. 12 article under the headline "Sen. Lindsey Graham: ‘I Don’t Need Any Witnesses at All – I Am Ready to Go’," Melanie Arter wrote:
Then, on Dec. 16, under the headline Sen. Graham: 'I Don't Need Any Witnesses'," Susan Jones wrote:
So dedicated is CNS to pushing the Republicans' pro-Trump, anti-impeachment narrative that it devoted two articles four days apart to repeating the exact same talking point. That's not how a news organization -- that's how a propaganda operation works.
Posted by Terry K.
at 1:44 AM EST
Saturday, December 21, 2019
What Transgender Stuff Is The MRC Freaking Out About Now?
Topic: Media Research Center The Media Research Center's freakouts about transgenders are so frequent they have their own tag at NewsBusters. How have they been freaking out about them lately? (Besides the MRC Latino transgender freakout and the endorsement of mean-spirited "South Park" mockery, that is.) Gabriel Hays spewed hate at a video game that includes a playable transgender character: "And really, in a video game world filled with Star Wars and World War II shooters, who can’t appreciate verisimilitude in the thrill-a-minute world of the sexually confused? ... No, there’s no agenda here, just a special interest group with a rainbow axe to grind in whatever industry will let it in."Lindsay Kornick complained that the show "Empire" "somehow managed to also squeeze in a transgender storyline to boot. I guess there’s always room for a little more liberal pandering." She further complained: "The only shocking part of this is how totally unoriginal this whole routine has become. We’ve already seen the story of the transgender character wanting to “live her truth” against haters, transphobes, and medical science. We’ve already heard all the constant assertions that this is “beautiful” and somehow natural despite only affecting a tiny percent of the population." Clay Waters declared that a New York Times story about eroding transgender rights "is the latest overheated, un-journalistic genuflection to the aggressive side of the transgender movement, while conveniently conflating “gender identity” with post-surgery transgender people." Waters then pushed the right-wing talking point that transgenders don't deserve media coverage because there are so few of them: "If transgenders are less than 1% of the population (true), why does the Times cover them so obsessively?" Gabriel Hays claimed one transgender woman -- or, in his mean-spirited interpratation, an "indignant biological male" who is "particularly obnoxious" -- had a "vendetta against biology" because a gynecologist refused to examine her and "complained that, since she identifies as a woman, people have to treat her like one, even medical doctors who are intimately aware that this type of rationalization is insane," asserting that "vast majority" of gynecologists "probably didn’t sign on to play make-believe with the mentally ill.Hays declared that this person "is not to be trusted considering her penchant for playing the victim and passion for accusing incredulous bystanders of discrimination." But isn't playing the victim and accusing others of discrimination what conservative like to do as well? Hays melted down in another post:
Elise Ehrhard groused that the writers for the reboot of the series "The L Word" "are trying to keep up with the woke crowd by hiring real female-to-male trans actors for supporting roles and portraying them in line with transgender public relations," then attacked one transgender actor in the show for being insufficiently grateful to her Chinese-refugee parents: "A mother secretly saved her baby girl from the cruelty of the Chinese government only to have that little girl one day reject her own femaleness because of radical trans ideology." What ideology is making Ehrhard say such ridiculous and hateful things? Hays returned to highlight how "Harry Potter" series author J.K. Rowling "angered radical LGBTQ folks on social media for tweeting a defense of a person fired for believing that there are only two genders. adding: "Yes, the left has completely sold out to this lunacy and the fact that someone as previously woke as Rowling is getting heat for this speaks volumes."
Posted by Terry K.
at 2:43 PM EST
Erik Rush's Anti-LGBT Meltdown
Topic: WorldNetDaily
-- Erik Rush, Dec. 4 WorldNetDaily column
Posted by Terry K.
at 11:37 AM EST
Updated: Sunday, December 22, 2019 10:43 PM EST
Friday, December 20, 2019
MRC Can't Stop Complaining About Ex-Fox News Anchor For Not Being A Good Right-Winger
Topic: Media Research Center Shepard Smith left Fox News a while ago, but the Media Research Center still can't stop ranting about him ruining the right-wing Fox News experience for them. Shep-hater extraordinaire Tim Graham huffed in a Nov. 22 post:
Needless to say, Graham offers nothing but guilt by association to back up his claim of a link between the CPJ's earlier remarks and Smith's donation. He also makes no effort to rebut Smith's fairly standard defense of journalism -- perhaps because he's such a rabid right-wing partisan that he wouldn't know a genuine journalist if one shook his hand. The next day, Jeffrey Lord -- another right-wing partisan unfamiliar with objective journalism -- whined further about Smith's speech:
Lord, meanwhile, would shut down any and every media outlet who is insufficiently laudatory of President Trump and the conservative agenda, if he had his way. Lord concluded by huffing: "What we have is yet another gathering of journalists, this time led by Shep Smith, selectively - very selectively - supporting a free press. In Shep’s case, he apparently couldn’t abide the thought of Tucker Carlson’s free press rights and so, according to the Times, he left. Shocking? Not." Nor is it shocking that Lord and Graham are bashing Smith for failing to be a right-winger like them.
Posted by Terry K.
at 2:55 PM EST
Why Didn't CNS Writer Tell Readers She Had Answered Lindsey Graham's Question The Day Before?
Topic: CNSNews.com When you're dedicated to mindlessly and uncritically repeating pro-Trump Republican talking points like CNSNews.com is, you forget that sometimes you've already answered some of the questions you've been dutifully writing down, and you forget to tell your readers that. Susan Jones wrote in a Dec. 11 article about Republican Sen. Lindsey Graham ranting that the Horowitz report exposed a "massive criminal conspiracy" (though not that the report also found that political bias didn't motivate the FBI into investigating Russian connections to the Donald Trump presidential campaign). She went on to write:
Jones didn't tell her readers that she answered Graham's question in an article just the day before. Under the helpful headline "IG Explains Why FBI Didn't Warn Trump Campaign About Suspected Russian Interference," Jones wrote:
Jones could have told her readers this in her Dec. 11 article; after all, the information was fresh in her mind, given that she had provided a detailed explaination of it the day before. Instead, she chose not to because furthering a Republican narrative of raising suspicions about any investigation into Trump -- never mind that the facts are much less sinistser -- was more important than her journalistic duty to tell readers the truth. Lazy stenography is the worst kind of journalism, and CNS is becoming an increasingly egregious offender.
Posted by Terry K.
at 1:09 AM EST
Thursday, December 19, 2019
The MRC's Drag Queen Freakouts
Topic: Media Research Center The Media Research Center's loathing of drag queens is so intense that even WorldNetDaily loves to rehash its lies about them. We've noted how the MRC got triggered over a drag queen in the audience at a congressional impeachment hearing, but that's far from the only freakout its writers have had lately. On Nov. 12, Matt Philbin had a drag-queen meltdown:
If you so filled with hate that think that drag queens can only be seen as "mentally disturbed men" and "dudes with 5 o’clock shadow dressed in lingerie,"and you think CBN is a reliable, objective source of news, then perhaps you expect a little mockery to come your way. In their Nov. 30 column, Tim Graham and Brent Bozell sneered at the American Music Awards, where "Kesha brought along the rapper Big Freedia, a deep-voiced gay male who dresses like a drag queen and uses she/her pronouns." In a Dec. 11 post, Julie Mitchell ranted at the mere idea of drag queens doing a Christmas song:
So is ranting about people who don't celebrate Christmas the way you demand that they should, but Mitchell won't talk about that.
Posted by Terry K.
at 5:35 PM EST
Updated: Thursday, December 19, 2019 5:36 PM EST
CNS' Anti-Gay, Pro-Catholic Message Fail
Topic: CNSNews.com CNSNews.com managing editor and nasty gay-basher Michael W. Chapman wrote in a Dec. 4 post:
The right-wing Catholic message of Chapman's post, however, by CNS' decision to post the same day a column by its favorite right-wing Catholic, Bill Donohue, discounting actual child abuse at the hands of Catholic clergy:
If more-Catholic-than-thou folks like Chapman and Donohue were actually interested in doing right by those victimized by Catholic priests, church officials ranting that a video is "child abuse" wouldn't look so ridiculous.
Posted by Terry K.
at 12:36 AM EST
Updated: Thursday, December 19, 2019 12:38 AM EST
Wednesday, December 18, 2019
MRC's Double Standard On Politician Health Conspiracy Theories
Topic: Media Research Center The Media Research Center's Kristine Marsh complained in a Nov. 27 post:
Marsh is mildly misquoting what Trump said. He did not say the media "suggested" he had a heart attack; he said the media reported it -- not the same thing. And Marsh is totally lying that some in the media (not the entire media, as she claimed) had no "reason to" speculate about Trump's health after a surprise visit to Walter Reed Medical Center; given Trump's lengthy record of lying to the American people, there's no reason to take anything that comes out of his White House at face value, and speculation is a given. Marsh also hides a double standard: The MRC justified -- and added to -- speculation about Hillary Clinton's health in 2016. The link she provided to prove that Stelter said speculation about her health was sexist went to a Curtis Houck post that also pushed the conspiracy theory that her having "admitted to not remembering a whole host of important details in her July 2 FBI interview about her e-mail scandal" was a legitimate reason to speculate about her health, and thar refusal to speculate was, according to Houck, "the latest and most despicable example of the media covering for a liberal." As we also documented at the time, MRC blogger Jeffrey Lord declared that a long-ago book claiming that Hillary had trouble keeping up with her energetic husband, Bill Clinton, in the early days of his presidency was somehow evidence that she "would have even more stamina problems a full 23 years later" and, thus, justified speculation about her health. So, yeah, the MRC is once again being hypocritical. So what else is new?
Posted by Terry K.
at 2:18 PM EST
WND's Kupelian Touts Bogus Letter Denying Climate Change
Topic: WorldNetDaily David Kupelian's article for the current issue of WorldNetDaily's sparsely read Whistleblower magazine -- with the theme of the Green New Deal being "the Democratic Party's ultimate coup d'etat -- is a lot of ranting and getting things wrong about climate change. He tries to discredit the idea of climate science by citing views about the climate from the 19th century, as if education and knowledge about the subject hasn't changed over the past 125 years. Then he touts non-experts as experts; at one point he devotes several paragraphs to how "Village News Publisher Julie Reeder explained" how "the earth, ironically, is getting greener every day." But Reeder has no apparent background in environmental science; she runs a small-town newspaper in California. Kupelian then highlighted:
But that letter is meaningless. As actual experts point out, few of the signatories are professionals in biology, ecology, or environmental science, and the claims cited in it ranges from being cherry-picked to misleading to just plain wrong. But telling the truth is not on Kupelian's agenda -- propping up a right-wing narrative is. And a key part of that is attacking the bogeyman that is Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and the Green New Deal she's championing with a big ol' WND-style conspiracy theory:
Spoken like a guy who's worked at WND for a couple decades.
Posted by Terry K.
at 12:53 AM EST
Tuesday, December 17, 2019
NEW ARTICLE: The Trump-MRC Narrative on Impeachment
Topic: Media Research Center The Media Research Center's idea of "media research" on President Trump's Ukraine scandal and impeachment investigation is to slavishly repeat pro-Trump talking points. Read more >>
Posted by Terry K.
at 6:52 PM EST
CNS' Coverage Of 4 Impeachment Legal Experts Ignored 3 Of Them
Topic: CNSNews.com CNSNews.com editor in chief Terry Jeffrey spent his Dec. 11 column complaining that Democrats aren't interested in finding the whole truth about "what Trump was trying to do with the Ukraine":
Strange that Jeffrey cites only Turley here -- or maybe not so much. In covering the Dec. 4 hearing in which legal experts testified about the issues involving impeachment, CNS complaetely ignored the testimony of the three experts chosen by Democrats. It did, hjwever, devote two articles to the arguments of Turley, the expert chosen by Republicans:
Not only did CNS ignore the testimony of the Democrats' chosen witnesses, CNS' Susan Jones tried to baselessly cast aspersions on their qualifications. In one article, Jones dismissed them as "three liberal witnesses, billed as constitutional and legal experts." By contrast, Turley was repeatedly and uncritically described with full credentials as a "George Washington University Law School professor" who, as Jones highlighted in another article, was "not a Trump supporter." The only article CNS did about the hearing that featured a Democrat in the headline had nothing to do with the hearing's content at all or anything said at it by a Democrat or one of the Democrats' witnesses; the piece by Melanie Arter featured how "Rep. Al Green (D-Texas) took to the House floor Wednesday to complain that 'not one person of color' is represented among the constitutional scholars testifying at the House Judiciary Committee’s impeachment inquiry hearing." The fact that Jeffrey's column quoted only the one expert who supports his preconceived notions about impeachment of a Republican president is further proof he's falling down in his duty as a self-proclaimed journalist to report the truth. With such biased, incomplete reporting, it appears that Jeffrey and CNS are the folks who, as Jeffrey's headline stated, "don't want to know the truth." And they falsely present themselves as journalistswho claim to be interested in the truth -- remember, CNS' mission statement claims that it "endeavors to fairly present all legitimate sides of a story," and once again it couldn't be bothered to do so here.
Posted by Terry K.
at 12:36 AM EST
Updated: Tuesday, December 17, 2019 9:01 AM EST
|
Find more neat stuff at the ConWebWatch store! Buy through this Amazon link and support ConWebWatch!
Entries by Topic
All topics « Accuracy in Media Capital Research Center CNSNews.com Free Congress Foundation Free Republic Horowitz Media Research Center NewsBusters Newsmax The ConWeb The Daily Les Washington Examiner Western Journalism Center WorldNetDaily
Watchers
Media Matters for America County Fair The Daily Howler LGF Watch SullyWatch Fact-esque Malkin(s)Watch Reading A1 (NYT) John Gorenfeld (Moonies) NewsHounds (Fox News) Media Watch CJR Daily The Counterpoint (Sinclair) BlatherWatch (Seattle Radio) Watching OlbermannWatch
Blogs
Talking Points Memo Eschaton Suburban Guerrilla World O'Crap Sadly, No! Oliver Willis Angry Single Mom Orcinus Bartholomew's Notes on Religion PFAW's Right Wing Watch Altercation Max Blumenthal
Support Bloggers' Rights! |