Topic: Media Research Center
You've heard of the Friday night document dump, when politicians release bad news before a weekend begins in the hope that it's overlooked by the media because journalists would rather be doing other things on the weekend.
Well, the Media Research Center managed to create something altogether new: the Friday night petition dump (though the intent probably wasn't to be ignored).
Late on April 8, the MRC's political action division, MRC Action, posted a petition attacking liberal philanthropist George Soros:
Demand the Media Tell the Truth About George Soros and His Plan to Undo America
Left-wing billionaire George Soros has launched a campaign whose sole purpose is to advance his radical, globalist world order agenda while diminishing American sovereignty...and the liberal media are in on it.
For years, Soros has used his billions to influence elections, fund radical anti-American organizations including ACORN, La Raza, MoveOn.org, NOW and the Center for American Progress -- an organization that is feeding progressive talking points to the Obama administration.
In fact, Townhall recently listed Soros #1 in their 50 Most Dangerous Liberals in America publication, and still the media are mum about his true intentions and desires for America.
And the media should take the word of a niche, small-circulation right-wing publication that has a history of putting bias before facts because ... ?
The petition continues:
George Soros is bad for America, and the media aren’t saying a word. That’s why the Media Research Center -- the nation’s foremost liberal media watchdog has launched its national “Demand the Media Tell the Truth About George Soros” petition -- alerting the public, and holding the liberal media accountable for their active participation in Soros’ anti-American plans in bringing our nation down.
The MRC is asking for the help of liberty-loving Americans, to rally 25,000 citizen-signers of our petition. They will use this grassroots coalition as leverage against the media to report the truth about George Soros and his true intentions for our nation. As a people we must expose the threats to our freedom and way of life, and push back against those (including the media) that are attempting to reshape our nation.
No evidence is offered to back up the MRC's claims; rather, it states, "After signing our petition, click submit to go to our special FREE report."
It's not explained why the MRC dumped this petition on a Friday, thus guaranteeing it would be ignored outside of its niche audience. An accompanying NewsBusters post suggests one reason by noting that there are a pair of Soros-related conferences this weekend:
Starting Friday and continuing through the weekend, two George Soros sponsored conferences will take place in New England. In Boston, a "media reform" conference discusses means to “Change the World,” by changing the media. And, while we certainly agree that the media need changing, we’d prefer change that reflected the values of hard-working Americans as opposed to those of a billionaire socialist intent on taking the U.S. down a notch.
A second conference 150 miles north in Bretton Woods, New Hampshire will feature lefty academics and activists planning the best way to remake the global economy with a one world government, global currency, and even more power for anti-American forces in the United Nations.
Unmentioned is the fact that the MRC has accepted funding from a certain other billionaire with a radical agenda -- the Koch brothers.
Releasing a petition on Friday night is hardly the best way to generate attention for it. But the MRC has a bad habit of being incompetent with publicity.
(Full disclosure: My day job is with Media Matters, which has received funding from Soros.)
