Topic: Media Research Center
The Media Research Center still wasn't done defending the honor of replacement theory after the Buffalo massacre. Tim Graham's May 18 column served up a whitewashed definition then -- as is Graham's style -- played whataboutisim over it:
In the wake of the horrible Buffalo supermarket shooting, liberal journalists lunged at the opportunity to blame the mass murder on conservative and Republican messengers.
On CNN, S.E. Cupp was especially egregious in accusing the right-wingers of “amplifying” a “white replacement theory,” claiming the Democrats expected the influx of immigrants (largely illegal) would eventually lead to red states turning blue. Whites are not being replaced. Democrats just hope they’re outnumbered.
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These attacks seem completely blind to the notion that their own liberal media outlets stir up racial animus, ethnic animus,and religious animus. They turn neighbor against neighbor. They thrive on getting people angry and afraid. They have ratcheted up the political tension for ages.
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There’s nothing wrong with being combative. Being divisive is essential to politics: vote for Us, not Them. But there is something transparently ridiculous in crusading against “divisive vitriol” in politics while you spray it with a fire hose.
A post by Bill D'Agostino pretended that noting that demographic changes might benefit Democrats was exactly the same thing as right-wingers portraying it as a racist conspiracy theory in an attempt to take the heat off Fox News host Tucker Carlson for obsessing over it -- and besides, Carlson isn't saying the quiet part out loud so it can't possibly be racist:
If speaking candidly about Democrat-engineered demographic change causes mass shootings, then the media are culpable for the tragedy in Buffalo.
In the wake of a racially-motivated mass shooting that killed more than ten innocents over the weekend, leftwing journalists have heaped blame onto Fox News’s Tucker Carlson, as well as politicians like Congresswoman Elise Stefanik (R-NY) and Congressman Matt Gaetz (R-FL) for promoting what they call “replacement theory.”
Though it’s hard to find a universally accepted definition of replacement theory, its central tenet appears to be that reducing the proportion of white Americans, relative to the total population, is an outcome that some in power are seeking deliberately. But if that’s a conspiracy theory, it’s one that both the media and the Democratic Party have subscribed to for decades:
It’s indisputable that America’s demographics are changing — the percentage of white Americans has been declining since the ’70s — and that Democrats view nonwhite or minority voters as a key constituency.
Since even the media will happily acknowledge those facts, it appears the magical ingredient turning this data-based reality into a full-blown white supremacist “conspiracy theory” is the notion that the demographic change is being orchestrated. Indeed, there are ugly interpretations of this theory that attribute the phenomenon to nebulous groups like “the elites,” or “the Jews,” or simply some shadowy “Them.”
But Carlson and Republican members of Congress have made it abundantly clear that they believe America’s shifting demographics are the intended outcome of the Democratic Party’s immigration policies. That’s no white supremacist theory; at worst, it’s a cynical political talking point.
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Given Democrats expect the growing nonwhite population of America to support them, how can anyone argue their incredibly lax immigration policies aren't aimed at securing an electoral majority? Did they not expect to benefit from their proposed “pathway to citizenship” for illegal immigrants?
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In the context of immigration, it seems the term “replacement” only became a dirty word once those in power realized voters didn’t view it as favorably as they did.
It’s no secret that the Democratic Party expects to benefit from America’s changing demographics (although some recent data calls that theory into question). But regardless of whether the “demographics are destiny” thesis proves true, the establishment media can’t run away from their track record of endorsing it as a strategy for their favorite political party.
Kyle Drennen complained that on MSNBC, "unhinged leftist and supposed marketing expert Donny Deutsch" called out the racism of replacement theory, going the whataboutism route in response:
He urged Democrats not to “run from this fist fight” and pleaded: “Call out Tucker Carlson, call out the politicians, and make this – make them own it. This is a Republican platform. It’s the racist Republican replacement theory.”
Deutsch was almost identically repeating the same screed he performed on Tuesday afternoon’s Deadline: White House, when he told host Nicole Wallace that Democrats should make the GOP “the party of Tucker Carlson” and horrendously tried to blame Republicans for the mass shooting at a grocery store in Buffalo: “You see the 10 people who got killed in Buffalo, you own that.”
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Despite MSNBC defensively accusing Republicans and Fox News of promoting “replacement theory,” it’s the leftist media that have routinely stirred up racial tensions by cheering demographic changes across the country as a political advantage for Democrats and doom for Republicans.
Drennen linked to D'Agostino's post as apparently the definitive statement on what the MRC narrative is on replacement theory, as did Nicholas Fondacaro in bashing "The View" co-hosts for talking about it:
As NewsBusters research analyst Bill D’Agostino reported, Democrats have viewed immigration policy as a means to achieve their policy agenda and it’s something we know liberals and the media have been vocal in touting for years. But it has since found its way to the Ministry of Truth for deletion.
But as the rest of the cast of The View were simply trying to paint the theory as a racist conspiracy theory, Goldberg didn’t seem to understand what was being discussed. On Monday, as they were going to a commercial break, she scoffed: “well, if it was that easy, wouldn’t your friends have disappeared?” “Think about it,” she requested.
Now Goldberg could just be being facetious in that she’s taking an issue that they claim is of dire importance to iron out and making a joke of it. She could also be trying to lie to viewers about what the theory is about and what people believe. The least morally objectionable is that she simply is that ignorant.
Chief MRC replacement theory defender Clay Waters was at it again in another May 18 post:
If “replacement theory” requires an unnamed cabal, it’s interesting that Republicans specifically blame not some “cabal” but Democrats. Also, Republican concern is less about culture per se than voting power: The fear is that Democrats are indeed trying to change the demographics of the country by importing new Democrat voters from Latin America, thus possibly changing the electorate in their favor (though with the recent trend in Hispanic voting patterns toward Republicans, who knows?) Many also favor voting rights for illegal immigrants. No “replacement theory” necessary.
Curtis Houck similarly huffed in his attack du jour:
CBS Mornings kept up its race-baiting campaign Wednesday in reaction to the act of terrorism against the black community of Buffalo, New York with a segment about the great replacement theory that tied Fox News and “many conservative politicians” to the racist alleged gunman and included the fear that black men might now be gunned down at random if they live in the Midwest.
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Co-host and Democratic donor Gayle King fretted that the “Buffalo shooting highlights once again how a once-fringe, racist, and anti-Semitic conspiracy theory is accepted by many Americans” with the great replacement theory being the “belief that there is a plot to replace white people with people of color.”
King then painted conservatives and Republicans (of which there’s over 70 million Americans) as riddled with white supremacists: “Now, it was first presented among white supremacists and on extremist websites. Now, many conservative politicians and pundits promoting some form of replacement theory.”
CBS then played clips from Tucker Carlson, Newt Gingrich, and Senator Ron Johnson (R-WI) that ranged from talking about the “theory” to merely opposing the Democratic Party’s immigration policies.
Waters returned to complain that thte New York Times wasn't following right-wing definitions of what replacement theory is and isn't: "Of course, Tucker Carlson was a target, accused of spreading 'replacement theory,' which has come to mean anything race- or immigration-related that a hostile liberal wishes it to mean." He then played his own version of whataboutism by referencing the shooting of three Asian-American women in Dallas in which the alleged perpetrator was "a 36-year-old black man." Who's the one playing the race card now, Clay?
Jeffrey Lord played historical whataboutism in his May 21 column, pretending that the Democratic Party of 100 years ago -- no, really, he cited a century-old New York Times editorial that criticized allowing blacks to vote and the party's platform from 1840 -- is exactly the same as the party of today:
So what do we have here in the wake of the Buffalo shooting?
What we have is a liberal media that is studiously stone cold silent on the Left’s and the Democratic Party’s 200-year plus history of the most vividly blatant racism imaginable. The very racism that the Buffalo shooter absorbed and used to murder ten human beings solely because of their skin color.
And so the liberal media projects the Left’s own history on race to….Tucker Carlson and Fox News.
Laughable? Yes. Disgraceful? Certainly. Will they stop projecting their own history on others?
Will they even stand up and demand Joe Biden and his party apologize for that history?
Not a prayer.
Lord seems not to have noticed that it's no longer 1840 and that the parties have changed places on racial issues.
