It’s more than a bit ironic that Sen. Harry Reid (D-Nev.) is threatening to work right up until Christmas to pass legislation that could allow federal dollars to pay for the deaths of untold numbers of unborn children.
In the days before Jesus Christ was born in a manger in Bethlehem, another bureaucrat, King Herod, was responsible for what would be called the Massacre of the Innocents, after he ordered all male infants to be killed to prevent the prophesied King of the Jews from replacing him on the throne.
Thank God, indeed, that abortion was not legal when the angels visited Mary to announce the immaculate conception of the Son of God, who would not only be born but would conquer death so that every human being could spend eternity in paradise.
Thank God, also, that Herod’s scheme did not succeed in killing the Man who was born to save all of mankind, including the generations yet to be born.
For those who deny that the health-care bill crafted by Sen. Harry Reid -– or Herod Reid as it seems fitting to call him –- does not allow for taxpayer dollars to be used to pay for an abortion, let me quote here from page 120 of the more than 2,000 page document that is available for review.
Starr appears to be merely regurgitating unverified claims by anti-abortion activists -- as apparently lifted from another CNS article -- that the compromise agreed to by Sen. Ben Nelson, in some convoluted way, permits federal funding for abortion.
Remember that Starr is not a columnist -- she is a reporter. In any other news organization, a reporter who expressed such an extreme opinion would have been disciplined -- at the very least, barred from reporting on the subject -- but at CNS, such a vengeful opinion will probably earn Starr a raise. After all, it does fit in with her anti-abortion activism as expressed through baseless, unbalanced attacks on Planned Parenthood.
CNS purports to endeavor "to fairly present all legitimate sides of a story." It's unclear how Starr or CNS believe smearing a politican as a baby-killer fulfills that goal.
CNS Column Repeats Misleading Claims About Stolen Emails Topic: CNSNews.com
In a Dec. 18 CNSNews.com column, professional global warming skeptic Patrick Michaels asserts that the stolen emails from the University of East Anglia's Climatic Research Unit shows that climate scientists were "seriously manipulating the scientific literature that goes into the august IPCC scientific reports" and "blacklisting certain professional journals." He adds:
One series of these e-mails called out the journal Climate Research, which had the audacity to publish a paper surveying a voluminous scientific literature that didn't support Mann's claim that the last 50 years are the warmest in the past millennium. Along with the CRU head Phil Jones and other climate luminaries, they then cooked up the idea of boycotting any scientific journal that dared publish anything by a few notorious "skeptics," myself included.
Their pressure worked. Editors resigned or were fired. Many colleagues began to complain to me that their good papers were either being rejected outright or subject to outrageous reviews — papers that would have been published with little revision just a few years ago.
In fact, as Media Matters detailed, the Climate Research paper in question -- a 2003 paper by Soon and Baliunas, which was underwritten by $53,000 from the American Petroleum Institute -- did have problems, and even the editors of the journal admitted that the paper's analysis was deeply flawed and should not have been published as written.
Further, regarding papers that emails by Penn State University scientist Michael Mann showed he expressed a desire to keep out consideration by the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, Michaels' viewthat Mann was successful in doing so is belied by the fact that at least some of those papers did make it into IPCC reports.
Earlier this year, we detailed how CNSNews.com repeatedly and baselessly suggested that the Obama administration demanded that an "IHS" symbol (a monogram derived from the Greek letters for Jesus) be covered during a visit by Obama to Georgetown University, despite the utter lack of evidence that there was ever a specific demand from anyone to do so.
Months later, CNS is still pushing that bogus story. A Dec. 17 article by Nicholas Ballasy and Edwin Mora claims that, in purported contrast to Obama's visit to Georgetown, "Obama has spoken at a number of venues while standing or sitting in front of other prominently displayed symbols and monograms that were not covered up and that thus received national exposure and publicity thanks to the president. These have included the monogram for the American Medical Association (AMA), the monogram for the AARP, and the symbol of the Human Rights Campaign, the nation’s most prominent gay rights organization."
Unmentioned by Ballasy and Mora: It can be presumed that speeches at which the AMA and AARP logos were displayed likely had something to do with the content of the speech. Obama's speech at Georgetown, however, was about the economy, which does not dovetail with religious symbols.
As before, Ballasy and Mora are still suggesting that the Obama administration specifically demanded that the IHS be covered up -- and again, no evidence is presented to support the claim.
This obsession with a manufactured slight shows just how desperate Terry Jeffrey and CNS are to smear Obama.
UPDATE: Indeed, Obama's speech at Georgetown was a policy speech on the economy, not targeted directly to a Georgetown or religious audience.
Shapiro Smears the Hell Out of La Raza, Obama Nominee Topic: CNSNews.com
Ben Shapiro spews numerous false and misleading claims in his Dec. 16 column, published by CNSNews.com and WorldNetDaily. Many of them are related to the National Council of La Raza -- including the false assertion that el Plan Espiritual de Aztlán, a statement urging Hispanics to "[reclaim] the land of their birth," was a "founding document" of NCLR.
Shapiro also falsely smears Mari Del Carmen Aponte, a former NCLR board member whom President Obama nominated to be U.S. ambassador to El Salvador, as "an alleged former spy for Fidel Castro." In fact, the FBI cleared Aponte of allegations that she had been recruited as a Cuban spy.
CNS' Jeffrey: Obama Supporters Are Young, Poor Heathens Topic: CNSNews.com
A strategist casting a cold eye on the Gallup poll tracking President Barack Obama’s job approval rating might be tempted to give our president the following advice: Sir, you need more unmarried, unchurched, poor and inexperienced Americans.
[...]
For the week of Dec. 7-13, Obama’s overall approval was 49 percent, with some groups rating him significantly higher than that and some rating him significantly lower. Among people who seldom or never go to church, Obama did relatively well. Fifty-three percent said they approved of the job he is doing. Among those who go to church monthly or nearly weekly, 53 percent approved. But among weekly churchgoers, only 42 percent approved.
If there were not a class of citizens in this country who go to church every week, a majority of Americans would still approve of the job Obama is doing.
Obama also did very well among the unmarried. Fifty-nine percent approved of the job he is doing. Among married people, however, only 42 percent approved.
If marriage could be eliminated in this country—leaving only the never married, the divorced and the cohabitating—a majority of Americans would still approve of the job Obama is doing.
Similarly, younger people were far more likely than older people to give Obama a positive rating. Fifty-nine percent of Americans 18 to 29 said they approved of the job he is doing. But only 50 percent of those 30 to 49 approved, only 48 percent of those 50 to 64 approved, and only 40 percent of those 65 or older approved.
If everyone in this country were under 30, a majority of Americans would still approve of the job Obama is doing.
[...]
Many Americans who are not among the married, churchgoing or prosperous today, would in the normal course of things become those things tomorrow. In this free country, younger people tend to grow older, get married, prosper and, in many circumstances, find their way back to church if they have strayed from it.
A bigger welfare state such as Obama envisions where more people are dependent on government and where the industrious must bear a greater financial burden to support the government will make it harder for all our children to live the American dream—and join the demographic categories that disapprove of the job Obama is doing.
CNS Columnist Plays the Nazi Card Topic: CNSNews.com
A Dec. 10 CNSNews.com column by Bob Parks ("the video producer for the Media Research Center ... and the editor of the blog 'Black & Right'") plays the Nazi card by referencing the "Final Solution":
Can you imagine the horror if it were implied that the cute little white girl in the video was going to have to give up her life so others could live the way they were accustomed? Can you imagine the outrage if the unborn children of the Upper West Side or Pacific Palisades became fair game because it was considered "the most effective way to reduce the likelihood of catastrophic global warming"?
Sorry, but that will never happen because white environmentalist liberals deem themselves more worthy of survival than any Hollywood celebrity accessory. The children of the Third World are worthy of their pity, but as Rachel Carson cared more about her environmental pet project (which has needlessly sentenced millions of black and brown children to a diseased death every year since 1972), the United Nations and climate change activists care more about being right.
[...]
While they hobnob around Copenhagen in gas-guzzling limousines, enjoy only the finest chow and booze, we need to remember what their ultimate goal is: Environmentalists consider their Final Solution to be based on science, but it's really all about them. It always has been, and what are a few million dead black babies if the environmentalists get to save the planet so they can rule it?
Parks even headlined his column "COP15's Final Solution."
Is CNS Censoring Words Out of Comments? Topic: CNSNews.com
At the end of the CNSNews.com version of Brent Bozell's latest column (bashing the show "DeGrassi: The Next Generation" for "deliberately pushing its gay agenda to youngsters"), a commenter's post states: "And it's not like it's on Nickelodeon proper. It's on TeenNick. A network for TEENS. Teens with hormones, who are starting to think about *** and sexuality-- whether you like it or not." Later in the post, it states, "Being *** hurts no one."
Confused by the asterisks? It seems the commenter was too. That resulted in another comment by the same person:
For readers, the first *** in my earlier post is s-e-x. and the second *** is g-a-y. It's weird they're blanked out because the original article uses both words. If these words can't be displayed on a NEWS site, then how are our teens supposed to get accurate information, and have frank discussion on anything regarding sexuality. After seeing this unnecessary censorship and nervous tip-toeing around issues of serious importance to today's youth, I think we probably need shows like Degrassi now more than ever. Thank God for Nickelodeon.
The commenter appears to be right -- words like "sex" and "gay" are replaced, automatically or otherwise, by asterisks. Some of the comments in a Dec. 3 article on a California school on "a pro-homosexual workshop given to 8th grade students in a leadership class" replace the words "gay" and "sex" with asterisks, even though those same words appear in the article ("gay" is limited to quotes, since CNS' preferred word is "homosexual"):
"At age 13 most of these kids have already been sexualized. These programs start in first grade - I saw a clip where a *** man was singing a song to 6-year-olds praising the "virtues" of being ***."
"Why do we need pro-homosexuality programs? Is the *** community recruiting? Is this a religion now?"
"Since the *** Ed classes started in the schools, we not only have more teen crimes like sexual assualt, but more teens having babies, and the dumbing down of teenaged America also started about then."
It's a strange bit of prudery that CNS doesn't appear to trust its commenters to use words like "gay" and "sex" in commenting about articles on gayness and/or sex. Are they really so incendiary that only professional journalists are permitted to use those words? (Again, CNS reporters aren't permitted to use "gay" unless it's in quotes.) CNS' comment threads aren't exactly hotbeds of vulgarity and promiscuity as it is; most readers are well-behaved, if right-wing reactionary.
CNS might want to explain this censorship things to its readers -- as well as why it frowns upon the usage of "gay" in its news stories.
Jeffrey's Claim That Senate Bill Funds Abortion Debunked Topic: CNSNews.com
Media Matters details how Terry Jeffrey's claim in a Nov. 19 CNSNews.com article that the Senate health care reform bill "would mandate federally subsidized abortion" is false. In fact, the section of the bill Jeffrey cited explicitly prohibits the use of federal funds to provide coverage for abortions that are currently restricted under Hyde, and requires segregation of non-federal funds from federal funds to pay for those procedures in a manner similar to that used in many states that cover such abortions under the federally subsidized Medicaid program.
Will CNS publish a correction? It's not exactly known for doing so.
CNS Reporter Still Misleading on Judicial Nominee Topic: CNSNews.com
CNSNews.com's Christopher Neefus goes all in on smearing judicial nominee David Hamilton, using a Nov. 19 article to repeatedly brand him as a "former ACORN fundraiser."
What Neefus fails to report: Hamilton worked for ACORN for only one month out of college.
Neefus has previously refused to tell his readers the full truth about Hamilton and ACORN.
A Nov. 17 CNSNews.com article by Christopher Neefus details how "epublican Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-Ala.), the ranking Republican on the Senate Judiciary Committee, said Monday he plans to filibuster President Obama’s first judicial pick, Judge David F. Hamilton."
At no point did Neefus note that Sessions' position is a reversal from the one he held in 2003, in which he said of filibustering judicial nominees: "People on both sides of the aisle have understood it to be wrong. They have understood it to be in violation of the Constitution. . . . Mr. President, these nominees are entitled to an up-and-down vote. If a Member does not like them, he or she can vote against them. But it is time to move these nominees."
Neefus made no apparent attempt to contact supporters of Hamilton to respond to Sessions' criticism. Instead, Neefus' article is nothing more than right-wing anti-Hamilton talking points, right down to stating that Hamllton "began his career, as a fundraiser for the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now (ACORN)" without mentioning that it was only for a month right after he graduated college.
CNS Again Baselessly Asserts 'Amnesty' Topic: CNSNews.com
A Nov. 13 CNSNews.com article by Penny Starr carries the headline, "Napolitano Announces Obama Administration Plan to Give Amnesty to Illegal Aliens." But not only does the article fail to define "amnesty" -- as CNS frequently fails to do -- the word "amnesty" appears nowhere in the article.
Starr goes on to selectively quote Napolitano in her first paragraph, stating that the Obama administration favors a "fair pathway to earned legal status." This is immediately followed by Napolitano's full quote: "A tough and fair pathway to earned legal status will mandate that illegal immigrants meet a number of requirements—including registering, paying a fine, passing a criminal background check, fully paying all taxes and learning English." As noted above, no explanation is given as to how this could be considered "amnesty."
CNS Ambushes Senators on Health Care Question Topic: CNSNews.com
CNSNews.com is ratcheting up its manufacturedstory that the health care reform bill is unconstitutional, publishing separate stories about threedifferentsenators ambushed by CNS for their opinion on the supposed issue.
As in previous stories on the issue, CNS fails to acknowledge the views of non-conservative experts who believe the bill's mandate that all American obtain health insurance is constitutional.
The crusade even gets an echo in Walter Williams' Nov. 12 column (published at CNS, of course), which begins by noting that "At Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s Oct. 29th press conference, a CNSNews.com reporter asked, 'Madam Speaker, where specifically does the Constitution grant Congress the authority to enact an individual health insurance mandate?'"
In his Nov. 11 syndicated column, published at CNSNews.com and WorldNetDaily, Ben Shapiro writes:
The photo-opped dead/wounded soldier routine is one of Obama's favorites. Back in July 2008, Obama canceled a planned trip to visit wounded troops at Rammstein and Landstuhl U.S. military bases in Germany because, as MSNBC reported, Obama "could not bring any media. Only military photographers would be permitted to record Obama's visit."
That attack was discredited long ago -- no evidence has ever surfaced to support the claim that Obama canceled the Landstuhl visit because the media would not be able to attend.
Further, Shapiro misleadingly frames the quote from from the MSNBC report he is citing. Here's how the quote Shapiro uses appears in the July 24, 2008, MSNBC "First Read" article he is apparently citing:
A U.S. military official tells NBC News they were making preparations for Sen. Barack Obama to visit wounded troops at the Landstuhl Medical Center at Ramstein, Germany on Friday, but "for some reason the visit was called off."
One military official who was working on the Obama visit said because political candidates are prohibited from using military installations as campaign backdrops, Obama's representatives were told, "he could only bring two or three of his Senate staff member, no campaign officials or workers." In addition, "Obama could not bring any media. Only military photographers would be permitted to record Obama's visit."
At no point does the MSNBC report claim, as Shapiro suggests, that Obama canceled the visit because he could not bring media with him.
CNS Auditions Another Bogus Story Topic: CNSNews.com
CNS is auditioning another scary, nit-picking story about health care reform. A Nov. 10 article by Karen Schuberg tries to peddle the idea that the health care reform bill "does not prohibit the use of federal funds to pay health care providers who provide 'end-of-life care' that involves denying food and water to a patient."
After quoting spokespeople for two Republican congressmen parroting the supposed alarm about this lack of mention, it's not until the 11th paragraph that Schuberg gets around to telling her readers that there is no story here:
Aaron Albright, press secretary for the majority Democratic members of the House Education and Labor Committee, told CNSNews.com the bill does not address the question of payment for end-of-life care. “We leave the current system intact,” Albright said.
When asked if the health-reform bill would rule out the use of federal funds to reimburse health-care providers who withdraw or withhold nutrition or hydration, Albright said it was a “false question.”
“We do not change any practice, or any law, or anything like that,” Albright said. “(End of life decisions) will be left up to the patient and their doctor and their family.”
Schuberg does her best to ignore this, insisting that "a source close to Republican members of the committee" claims that "it would be up to the government--Medicare and the Department of Health and Human Services--to develop guidelines to specifically prevent government-funding going toward withdrawal of feeding tubes and water." Why was this person given anonymity? Schuberg doesn't say.
CNS likes to auditiondubious stories in the hopes of providing more anti-Obama for the right-wing base, even after their dubiousness has been exposed -- often by CNS itself.
Galen Falsely Claims Owens Flip-Flopped on Health Reform After Election Topic: CNSNews.com
Rich Galen writes in his Nov. 9 CNSNews.com column:
Among those voting for the health care bill was the new Congressman from NY-23, Bill Owens, who had said during the campaign that he was opposed to the public option.
Here's an abridged version of the conversation which went on between majority leader Steny Hoyer and Owens as he was about to be sworn in:
Welcome to Washington, Bill. Here are your two futures: Vote for the Speaker's legislation and we'll do everything we can to get you committee assignments which will help you in your district.
Vote against it and your committee assignment will be the Committee on the District of Columbia with a seat on the Sewage & Sanitation subcommittee.
See how this works?
In fact, as we noted, Owens expressed his support for health care reform before the election.
