Topic: WorldNetDaily
It's a new month -- which means, as it turns out, that WND needs more money ... again.
WND editor Joseph Farah began his July 29 column by declaring: "You’ve been reading the headlines about the war Google, Facebook and the rest of the Internet Cartel have been waging against conservatives, Christians and independent media like WND. Of course, I have been telling you about this since January of this year – candidly, openly, no holds barred, no sugar-coating."
In fact, Farah has been decidedly less than candid in his previous begging-for-money efforts, being obtuse about exactly what its financial situation is and where all the money readers are giving him is going. Surprisingly, though, Farah is being a little more candid, giving us actual numbers at last to illustrate WND's financial situation:
We’ve seen our revenues plunge from $10 million in 2016, to $6 million in 2017, to what is expected to be about $4 million in 2018, if we’re lucky. This is a direct result of years of discrimination, bias, hatred, mischaracterizations, skewed algorithms designed to favor leftist, anti-God media and worldviews, which all of these corporations share.
Unfortunately, Farah is continuing to ignore the fact that WND's own highly biased and too-frequently-false content is a key factor in WND's continuing downward spiral (unless "bias" and "hatred" is referring to WND's own editorial policies). His insistence on blaming others for his situation -- plus apparently taking his eye off WND's financial ball to write a book -- isn't really distracting from the elephant in the room.
The deflection continues later in his column, whining that "Those who stand up for God, righteousness, basic morality, liberty, family, free enterprise, smaller government, borders, national sovereignty, the Constitution and the will of the people are called 'haters,' 'Nazis,' 'fascists,' 'racists' and worse" -- conveniently ignoring that his website called Obama many of those same things (and worse).
After once again making the bogus declaration that WND is part of the "independent media," Farah got down to the nitty-gritty: WND needs "a minimum of $100,000 in August to make ends meet," plus by Farah's aforementioned book, which apparently "is an important part of WND’s recovery, rebirth and revitalization plan for later this year."
Perhaps if Farah was even more candid and described that "recovery, rebirth and revitalization plan," WND might raise even more money.
But apparently he's holding that back. Farah's column the next day once again touted "the future revitalization of WND later this year, once again framed the failure of WND as the death of the First Amendment, once again failed to discuss WND's problematic content as a factor in its death spiral and even more laughably portrayed WND as among "the few remaining journalistic voices of fairness and balance." Really, Joe: has WND ever been the first media outlet anyone thinks of when the words "fairness" and "balance" come to mind?
Farah did offer a little more information about how its crowdfuinding effort went earlier this year, saying it raised "about $300,000" in the first three months of 2018 -- but he didn't itemize where that money went.
Farah's July 31 column was more of the same deflection and name-calling: conspiratorial ranting about the "Internet Cartel" conspiring against WND and the "the fascistic thuggery of the left-wing zealots in control of communications," calling the Southern Poverty Law Center "terrorists" for documenting right-wing hate (including at WND), and ignoring the fact that conspiratorial ranting helped get WND to this point.
In his Aug. 1 column, Farah complained about WND's "revenues collapsing thanks to the Internet Cartel’s vicious anti-Donald Trump predilection, then mixed a little more candidness with even more conspiracy-mongering:
We’re operating on the edge. But we weren’t through 2016. Our revenues were quite predictable from 2010 through 2016 – pretty much always around $10 million or greater. But no one got rich at WND – not me, not other shareholders, not other employees. Instead, if we grew, we plowed those resources into more content, more reporting, better reporting, better books and more of them – movies too.
It all came crashing down so quickly after the 2016 election there can be no other explanation as to its cause. The Internet Cartel was going to make WND and other independent media pay for the election of Donald Trump.
Farah still insists on refusing to recognize the truth: If the "Internet Cartel" is punishing WND for anything, it's for publishing fake news. And he doesn't even seem to believe that purveyors of fake news should be punished.
Until and unless Farah can address WND's lengthy history of problematic content, WND has not earned the right to continue existing. All the begging for money Farah does will never counteract that basic fact.
