Topic: CNSNews.com
As we've documented, President Trump and Republicans can count on CNSNews.com to not only promote their talking point du jour but to repeat it as often as needed -- even multiple articles on the same day. And they've done it again.
When House Leader Nancy Pelosi signed the articles of impeachment against Trump for delivery to the Senate, Republicans worked up some outrage because she used commemorative pens to do so -- even though commemorative pens are a Washington staple for signing legislation and other important documents. (Senators got commemorative pens at President Clinton's impeachment trial, which seemed to have gone unnoticed by Republicans.)
But outrage must be manufactured, and CNS was all to happy to manufacture it with a pair of Jan. 16 articles. At 11:27 a.m., Melanie Arter wrote under the headline "Conway: Pelosi Celebrating with Fist Bumps, High Fives and ‘Commemorative Pens’":
While the Democrats are gearing up to send the articles of impeachment to the Senate and celebrating the president’s impeachment, President Donald Trump is talking about the trade deal with China and the Dow Jones Average hitting 20,000 for the first time in history, Kellyanne Conway, counselor to the president, told Fox News on Thursday.
“The president is still talking about the monumental trade deal with China yesterday. The Dow Jones getting past 20,000, and making history in that way. Yesterday indeed was historic, but for a different reason than Pelosi's fist bumps and high fives and commemorative pens. They acted like a bunch of southpaws getting major league baseball contracts,” Conway said in an interview with “America’s Newsroom.”
A mere six minutes later, at 112:33 a.m., Craig Bannister deliver a blog post under the headline "McConnell: Pelosi Handed Out ‘Golden Pens on Silver Platters, Souvenir to Celebrate’ Impeachment":
“The House’s hour is over,” Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell declared Thursday in a floor speech slamming Democrats for putting on a “partisan performance” celebrating the signing of articles of impeachment by handing out souvenirs and posing for smiling photos.
In a contrived signing ceremony Wednesday, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) signed the articles of impeachment, one letter at a time, using golden pens delivered to her on a silver platter – which she handed out as souvenirs, McConnell said:
[...]
In all, Pelosi gave out more than two dozen pens she used to sign the articles of impeachment.
Neither Arter nor Bannister mentioned the relevant fact that there were commemorative pens at Clinton's impeachment. then again, relevant facts are not what Trump and Republicans want from CNS right now.
