Is The MRC Really Harrassing Comcast Board Members At Home? Topic: NewsBusters
An unbylined March 29 NewsBusters post finds the most newsworthy aspect of a recent Ed Schultz radio segment to be that he kinda-sorta portrayed Media Research Center chief Brent Bozell as a "pig" for leading a campaign to get him fired from MSNBC, taking this as evidence that "we're getting to him it seems."
Unremarked upon, meanwhile, was another thing Schultz said: "[Bozell] wants Phil Griffin fired. I mean, Comcast, they're calling Comcast board members at home. That's the rumor that I'm hearing. I haven't confirmed it but that's what I'm hearing."
Is that true? Seems a bit stalker-y if it is. Then again, given MRC official Tim Graham's seeming acquiescence to beligerent and distasteful tactics as long as the goal is worthy enough, this might actually be happening.
The MRC might want to explain exactly what it's doing to force Comcast, which now owns the majority of NBC, to fire Schultz and Al Sharpton.
WND's Mercer Cites VDARE to call Trayvon Martin Shooting a 'Statistical Anomaly' Topic: WorldNetDaily
Ilana Mercer has a few issues with black people, as we've detailed. In her March 29 WorldNetDaily column, Mercer weighs in on the Trayvon Martin shooting, and says pretty much what you'd expect her to, complete with a cameo from the white nationalists over at VDARE:
Don Lemon, a (pi—poor) prime-time reporter for CNN and a pillar of the RIC, gave the hoodlum from Congress a most sympathetic hearing. Lemon’s RIC comrades in the corporate media were careful to air only images of a cherubic-looking Trayvon, aged 12.
Taken off his Twitter account, however, Trayvon’s image is much more menacing, with a Twitter feed to match.
“@NO_LIMIT_NIGA,” as Trayvon called himself, tweeted and retweeted about “ThickD-ckThursday,” a favorite “PickUpLine”: “My you have a longue tongue..What do you use it for?” And, having dispensed with the poetry, got dirty: “f–k a b–ch, any b–ch, who you want? Take yo pick, but you gone have to take yo time.”
Granted, Trayvon’s tweets are not germane to the facts of his slaying. They are, nonetheless, telling.
[...]
Courtesy of Patrick Buchanan’s “Suicide of a Superpower” come the FBI’s crime figures for 2007: “Blacks committed 433,934 violent crimes against whites, eight times as many as the 55,685 that whites committed against blacks. Interracial rape is almost exclusively black-on-white, with 14,000 assaults on white women by African-American males in 2007. Not one case of white sexual assault on a black female was found in the FBI study.” (Page 243)
“In the same time period as the Trayvon Martin incident,” documents VDARE’s Peter Bradley, “a multitude of anti-white attacks by blacks occurred that remained strictly local news.”
[...]
On the facts, an honest conversation about race would quickly dispense with the canard that blacks are habitually persecuted by whites. They are not.
Such a dispassionate, contextualized discussion of the reality of crime in the U.S. would invariably lead to the conclusion that the alleged “white” offender in the Trayvon travesty must be regarded as a statistical anomaly.
MRC's Graham Apparently OK With Anti-Abortion Activists Targeting Children Topic: NewsBusters
Tim Graham doesn't seem to care much for the idea that turnabout is fair play.
In a March 30 NewsBusters post, Graham suggests there was nothing at all wrong with anti-abortion protesters targeting the 11-year-old daughter of the Maryland landlord who leased space to an abortion clinic by picketing at her middle school, calling them merely "aggressive," and besides, they were "near (but not on) the property of the middle school his daughter attended."
Again: Anti-abotion protester didn't target the abortion doctor or his family. They targeted the 11-year-old daughter of the doctor's landlord. And Graham is apparently perfectly fine with that. He did concede, however, that "Most pro-life activists prefer protesting at a clinic location than near a school, which can (and did) lead to bad publicity, or worse." But he didn't condemn the protest; instead, he played the equivocation game by pointing out "what happened to James Pouillon when he repeatedly protested abortion outside Owosso High School in Michigan. He was shot dead in 2009."
The landlord's response to such intrusive attacks, however, has drawn Graham's ire. He's really unhappy that, as the Washington Post reported, the landlord is collecting the names and phone numbers of anti-abortion protesters who made harrassing calls to his home "by the dozens, at all hours," and formed a network of supporters who called them back and “In a very calm, very respectful voice, they said that the Stave family thanks you for your prayers.”
Graham huffed that the Washington Post let the landlord "present himself as perfectly tolerant of peaceful pro-life protests as a First Amendment exercise," adding:
Do we know every pro-abortion caller is "calm and reasoned"? More "calm and reasoned" than the protest calls they receive? Dvorak saves words like "tormentors" for the people who oppose ripping out the limbs and vacuuming out the skulls of unborn babies in the third trimester of development. "Turnabout is fair play" is the headline. So Dvorak and the Post don't take the position of "two wrongs don't make a right." They find it "clever" that if you called Stave once, you deserve "up to 5,000 calls in return."
But Graham has made it clear he doesn't really see targeting an 11-year-old girl for something her father did is "wrong." He's just upset that the landlord is fighting back against invasions of his family's privacy by using like-minded tactics against the protesters. Apparently, anti-abortion protesters can be as "aggressive" as they want, but their targets aren't allowed to respond.
CNS Misstates Cause of Sandra Fluke's 'Notoriety' Topic: CNSNews.com
In a March 29 CNSNews.com article on a Feminist Majority Foundation summit, Penny Starr describes Sandra Fluke as "the Georgetown Law student who gained notoriety in recent weeks for telling members of Congress that she and other students were suffering because their birth control costs were not covered in their health insurance plans."
Um, no. Her "notoriety" comes from being smeared as a "slut" and a "prostitute," among many other denigrating things, by Rush Limbaugh.
Starr also falsely states that Fluke said she herself was "suffering because their birth control costs were not covered in their health insurance plans." In fact, Fluke never discussed her sex life or her financial situation during her congressional testimony.
WND's Farah Unhappy That Newsmax Has A Richer Sugar Daddy Than He Does Topic: WorldNetDaily
Joseph Farah spends his entire March 27 WorldNetDaily column whining about his business rival, Newsmax's Christopher Ruddy. There are dark hints of betrayal and related things, but Farah's complaint really comes down to one thing: Newsmax has a richer sugar daddy than WND.
Farah whines:
For the next year or so, I did everything in my power to help Ruddy pursue that story and others involving the Clinton scandals. When the New York Times Magazine did a story about “The Clinton Haters,” Ruddy and I were in the middle of it. When Hillary Clinton talked about “the vast right-wing media conspiracy,” we were in the middle of it – along with a guy named Dick Scaife.
Unlike Ruddy and me, Scaife had money – lots of it. He soon hired Ruddy to pursue the Clinton scandals at his newspaper, the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review.
I warned Ruddy about Scaife. I never trusted him. I told Ruddy he would compromise his values if he went to work for Scaife. He didn’t listen.
Today, Dick Scaife and Chris Ruddy own Newsmax – some would suggest my competition.
And, there is no question that Newsmax was founded to be WND’s competitor. They were going to replicate our success on the Internet – but with nearly unlimited financial resources.
Over the years, I have observed with some disappointment the changes in values and character that Chris Ruddy has demonstrated. He still belongs to all the right conservative groups. He still sponsors the Conservative Political Action Conference every year. But, make no mistake about it, he is no more conservative than Mitt Romney – in fact, less so.
Farah is flattering himself by suggesting Newsmax is a WND ripoff. WND started in April 1997, while Newsmax launched in September 1998, so it's unlikely that WND at that point had much "success" to "replicate." Besides, WND and Newsmax -- along with the Media Research Center's CNSNews.com, founded around the same time -- all had the same mission: to destroy President Clinton.
While Farah has historically kept quite about WND's finances, it's doubtful that it's doing as well as Newsmax, which has diversified into financial and health newsletters and claimed $50 million in revenue in 2010. (granted, it used shady techniques to promote its financial products and borderline quacks like Russell Blaylock as health columnists).
Farah appears to be jealous that Newsmax has a sugar daddy like Scaife -- though presumably Farah wasn't bad-mouthing Scaife like this when the organization he founded in the 1990s, the Western Journalism Center, accepted $330,000 from him. Meanwhile, WND has had to make do with backers like Robert Beale, a convicted felon currently in prison for tax evasion.
Farah is also incensed that Ruddy went over to the not-so-dark side and gave up his obsessive hatred of everything Clinton:
For instance, would Romney dare praise Bill Clinton? Ruddy and Scaife do.
Would he revel in the accomplishments of Hillary Clinton? Ruddy and Scaife do.
Would he go so far as to praise another big-government, boondoggle, unconstitutional, rip-off program devised by Barack Obama? Ruddy and Scaife do.
Ruddy even wrote a shamelessly glowing profile of Bill Clinton back in 2007. I couldn’t believe my eyes when I read it.
[...]
Bill Clinton was a monster as president – a man who ruthlessly went after his enemies, including me, with politically motivated Internal Revenue Service audits. He lied under oath. He was impeached – and should have been convicted. I know for a fact Ruddy feared for his life when he was investigating him. Now, Bill Clinton is a saint?
What all this basicallycomes down to: Farah is jealous that Newsmax is a much more successful, profitable and prestigious organization than WND. Such pettiness is unbecoming for someone who purports to be a professional journalist, but being thin-skinned is how Farah rolls.
Newsmax's Kessler: 'Obama Blames America for Shooting Tragedy' Topic: Newsmax
Ronald Kessler joined the rest of the right-wing media in looking for any reason to bash President Obama by attacking his remarks on the death of Trayvon Martin. From Kessler's March 26 Newsmax column, headlined "Obama Blames America for Shooting Tragedy":
True to form, President Obama has used the tragic shooting of an unarmed black teenager to prejudge the case and blame all Americans.
Referring to the death of 17-year-old Trayvon Martin in Florida, Obama said from the White House Rose Garden, “You know, if I had a son, he’d look like Trayvon.”
By drawing attention to Martin’s race, Obama suggested that the shooting was racially motivated.
Well, no, he didn't. But that won't stop Kessler from building up to full rant mode (and, of course, work in his favorite racial obesession, Jeremiah Wright):
Obama’s comment on the shooting is in line with his claim that police in Cambridge, Mass. “acted stupidly” because they arrested a black Harvard professor who was being obstreperous. And it is consistent with Obama’s dark view of America, a view he shares with the Rev. Jeremiah Wright Jr., his minister and mentor for 20 years. Wright said America created the AIDS virus to kill off blacks. Never mind that a supposedly racist country elected Obama president.
As noted in my story “'The Obamas' Confirms Worst Fears About the President," confidantes of the president say he attributes criticism of his policies to prejudice against blacks. In his speeches, Obama routinely refers to children “no matter what they look like” to suggest that opponents of his policies are racists who don’t want blacks to succeed.
In much the same way, Obama has pitted the poor against the rich, undercutting the most basic American ideals. He has even endorsed the Occupy Wall Street movement, which seeks to redistribute Americans’ wealth and encourages envy.
To those of us who have exposed genuine discrimination against blacks, what is heartbreaking about this public emphasis on race is how it has set back race relations. If this were a truly colorblind society, no one would mention race or notice skin color.
But Obama and many Democrats who follow his example by using any excuse to cry racism have turned back the clock to the 1960s, when the first thing we thought about when seeing a black man was the color of his skin.
Besides adding $5 trillion to the national debt since he took office, that is Obama’s shameful legacy.
WND's Unruh Again Disappears Arpaio From Lausuit Story Topic: WorldNetDaily
We detailed last month how WorldNetDaily's Bob Unruh wrote a story about a homeschooling couple's lawsuit against Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio, among others, that somehow managed to avoid mentioning Arpaio's name, despite the fact that the lawsuit is called Loudermilk v. Arpaio.
Well, Unruh has done it again. A March 26 article by Unruh reports on how the U.S. Supreme Court "refused to intervene in a case in which deputies threatened parents with the forced removal of their children unless they agreed to let social workers, who did not have a warrant or probable case, search their home." Unruh has once again failed to mention that Arpaio is one of the plaintiffs.
Then again, WND is trying to stay on Arpaio's good side after he delivered the (shoddily researched) birther investigation WND wanted, so airbrushing inconvenient facts is what we can expect from WND.
CNS Bombshell: John Holdren Owns A Car! Topic: CNSNews.com
CNSNews.com's weird obsession with Obama adviser John Holdren continues with a March 23 article by Fred Lucas and Matt Cover featuring this shocking discovery:
Obama Science Czar Dr. John P. Holdren, an ardent environmentalist who has called for an end to the auto industry since the '70s, owns two automobiles.
According to the Massachusetts Department of Transportation, Holdren and his wife, Dr. Cheryl E. Holdren, have active registration plates for a 2000 Subaru Legacy and for a 2004 Toyota Prius – with both of them co-owners of both vehicles.
That's right -- CNS considers somebody owning a car to be news. Sad, isn't it?
WND Happy That State-Controlled Foreign Media Is Covering Birther Conspiracies Topic: WorldNetDaily
WorldNetDaily's Chelsea Schilling is positively giddy in a March 27 article:
While many U.S. mainstream media outlets spike news about the Obama eligibility investigation, Russia’s government radio is keeping the world abreast of the scandal that has caused “the biggest censorship and blackout in the history of journalism.”
The Voice of Russia – successor of Radio Moscow, the official station of the Soviet Union – published an exclusive interview with Sheriff Joe Arpaio March 26 titled, “Obama’s birth certificate may be forgery.” As WND reported, Arpaio and his Cold Case Posse announced there is probable cause indicating the documents released by the White House last April purported to be Obama’s original, long-form birth certificate and Selective Service registration card are actually forgeries.
The Voice of Russia is state-controlled. As such, it can be presumed that ultimate controlis in the hands of Vladimir Putin, who most can agree is not a friend of the United States.
There's a pattern here: Last month, Schilling touted an birther article in Pravda.
This is how desperately WND is clinging to its birther conspiracies -- it's taking refuge in old Soviet propaganda mouthpieces.
MRC's Gainor Still Hearts 'Pink Slime'; Ammonia Is An 'Added Bonus' Topic: Media Research Center
The Media Research Center's Dan Gainor is still indulging his love of "pink slime," the controversial meat byproduct -- he has a new column complaining that ABC's "strategy" to attack "pink slime" has "put at least 600 jobs in jeopardy as the targeted company suspended operations in three separate plants."
"Few companies can survive an extensive media assault – even when it’s on a safe and legal product we’ve all been eating for two decades," Gainor declared. He's still trying to make this stuff appealing:
The meat, often called lean finely textured beef, is made up of beef that is just harder to get at. It requires special processing so the meat isn’t lost. It’s treated to get rid of the fat and included with the rest of the ground beef. The USDA declares it healthy, but it is less expensive. As an added bonus, it is treated tiny amounts of ammonium hydroxide to make it safer to eat.
Most people wouldn't call the addition of something normally found in household cleaners and furniture stain an "added bonus." Instead, Gainor laments that "None of the broadcast stories mentioned that the company takes the extra step of adding ammonium hydroxide in an effort to prevent deadly E. coli bacteria."
Gainor followed this up with a March 28 appearance on Fox News, in which he complained that "pink slime" is an "activist-driven name" that's "wildly unfair." (There was no discussion of the fact that the product is pink and slimy, thus making "pink slime" merely a descriptive term.) He described the company that makes the product as "award-winning," and is producing not only "leaner beef" but "safe beef."
Richard Bartholomew catches WorldNetDaily's Chelsea Schilling playing down the reason why Glenn Beck and Jerry Boykin were criticizing the "Kony 2012" video: They thought the video may have been funded by George Soros and/or the White House.
The video, of course, was created by a group called Invisible Children. Bartholomew reports that WND has good reason to play down criticism of the video: WND Books editor Megan Byrd used to work for Invisible Children.
NEW ARTICLE: The Root of Obama Derangement Topic: Newsmax
Newsmax columnist and former Libertarian Party presidential candidate Wayne Allyn Root has fantasized about Obama's resignation, likened the president to Hannibal Lecter, and peddles exaggerations and falsehoods about him. Read more >>
WND Afraid to Name Media Matters in Headline Topic: WorldNetDaily
Misogynistic radio host Rush Limbaugh took to the airwaves to childishly attack Media Matters (disclosure: my employer) as "jock itch." Needless to say, WorldNetDaily's resident Limbaugh-phile, Joe Kovacs, found this newsworthy enough to make a "news" article out of.
But, strangely, Kovacs found himself unable to identify who Limbaugh was childishly smearing in the headline of his article. It reads, "Now Rush Limbaugh calls someone 'jock itch.'"
Is WND really so afraid of Media Matters that it is afraid to name the group in a headline? Apparently so.
MRC Baselessly Accuses Planned Parenthood of 'Vicious Attacks' Against Komen Topic: Media Research Center
In a March 23 Media Research Center item, Kyle Drennen wrote that NBC's Brian Williams "touted the handiwork of Planned Parenthood's vicious attacks against the Susan G. Komen foundation." What were these "vicious attacks" by Planned Parenthood? Drennen doesn't say -- perhaps because there weren't any.
For instance, here's a Feb. 1 Los Angeles Times article quoting Planned Parenthood officials after Komen decided to cut off funding to Planned Parenthood clinics:
"We had the sense this was coming and that they were under pressure," said Sue Dunlap, chief executive of Planned Parenthood Los Angeles. "I find this really disappointing. I think when women's health is more of a political conversation than a conversation about healthcare and taking care of people, then we've gone too far."
Officials for Planned Parenthood Federation of America said they learned of Komen's new stance on funding late last year and asked the Komen board of directors for a meeting to resolve any issues or questions related to funding. The meeting did not take place, said Cecile Richards, the federation's president.
"We are alarmed and saddened that the Susan G. Komen for the Cure Foundation appears to have succumbed to political pressure," Richards said in a statement. "Our greatest desire is for Komen to reconsider this policy and recommit to the partnership on which so many women count."
Critical? Sure. "Vicious"? Not so much. Same with a statement from Richards a few days later:
"In recent weeks, the treasured relationship between the Susan G. Komen for the Cure Foundation and Planned Parenthood has been challenged, and we are now heartened that we can continue to work in partnership toward our shared commitment to breast health for the most underserved women. We are enormously grateful that the Komen Foundation has clarified its grantmaking criteria, and we look forward to continuing our partnership with Komen partners, leaders and volunteers. What these past few days have demonstrated is the deep resolve all Americans share in the fight against cancer, and we honor those who are at the helm of this battle.
"Planned Parenthood has been a trusted partner with the Komen Foundation in early cancer detection and prevention services. In particular, Planned Parenthood helps the Komen Foundation reach vulnerable populations - low-income women, African-American women, and Latinas - especially in rural areas and underserved communities where Planned Parenthood health centers are their only source of health care. With Komen Foundation grants, over the past five years, Planned Parenthood health centers provided nearly 170,000 clinical breast exams and more than 6,400 mammogram referrals. With the outpouring of support over the past week, even more women in need will receive lifesaving breast cancer care."
Again, nothing "vicious" there. Indeed, one could argue that there was no incentive for Planned Parenthood to be vicious because it wanted to continue to receive Komen's funding, and vicious rhetoric would have alienated Komen officials. As it turned out, Komen eventually reversed its decision.
Even though almost half of registered voters tell pollsters they are not convinced Barack Obama’s birth certificate is authentic – and even though the first official U.S. law enforcement investigation into the matter established “probable cause” that the document released with great fanfare by the White House last April is a computer-generated forgery – a virtual media blackout remains in effect on the most controversial story of the Obama presidency.
Even when one of several bombshell findings of Arizona Sheriff Joe Arpaio’s six-month investigation into Obama’s constitutional eligibility was rated last week by Internet ranking service Alexa.com as one of the most-read news stories in the entire world – due almost entirely to coverage by WND and the Drudge Report – not only the establishment press, but most of the “conservative” media as well, looked the other way.
WND, of course, is engaging in its own media blackout by hiding from its readers the reasons Arpaio's investigation isn't being (and shouldn't be) taken seriously, as is WND's birther obsession:
WND instigated the investigation by having Jerome Corsi give a presentation on his birther conspiracies to a tea party group, which then petitioned Arpaio for an investigation.
Corsi served as a de facto member of Arpaio's "cold case posse" by doing research for it.
WND is raising money for the posse, while skimming an undetermined amount off for itself.
The posse refused to talk to anyone who did not reinforce birther conspiracies, such as John Woodman, thus skewing the findings.
WND has refused to report on Woodman's findings, nor has it reported that birther lawyer Phil Berg debunked the idea that Obama is using a fraudulent Social Security number.
WND published numerous flattering articles about Arpaio in an apparent attempt to obtain a favorable result from his posse. Most people would call that bribery.
WND worked so closely with the posse that it published an article about the posse's findings at the same time the posse was presenting them to the public.
Corsi and posse leader Mike Zullo are trying to profit from the investigation by issuing a quickie e-book about the findings, depriving the posse of revenue by doing so.
WND and Arpaio are apparently coordinating releases from the posse, in possible violation of professional ethics.
WND won't say a thing about any of this. Gee, wonder why?
