MRC's Graham Censors The Facts About Sharyl Attkisson's Shoddy Reporting Topic: Media Research Center
The Media Research Center's campaign of propping up Sharyl Attkisson continues in a Nov. 21 NewsBusters post by Tim Graham, in which he highlights how "former CBS reporter Sharyl Attkisson told Glenn Beck about the latest document release forced by Judicial Watch, which demonstrates Obama's Department of Justice was working to squash Attkisson's reporting on the Obama administration."
Graham omits the reason why the Obama administration would complain about Attkisson's reporting: it's inaccurate. Media Matters notes that the Attkisson report the Obama administration singled out is, in fact, wrong. Nevertheless, Attkisson repeats the false claim in her new book.
Graham also grumbles that the Obama administration allegedly worked with a reporter to criticize Republican Rep. Darrell Issa's investigation into Fast anmd Furious: "This is how journalism works. Reporters accept large chunks of information from friendly sources, in this case in writing an article against Issa." Graham didn't mention that Attkisson, the object of his adoration, does the same thing -- only in this case, her "friendly source" is Issa. Indeed, much of Attkisson's anti-Obama reporting depends on leaks from Issa's committee, and she repeatedly praises him in her book.
Graham also notes Attkisson talking about "the attempt to manipulate her work computer" -- omitting, of course, that the only solid evidence she has presented so far of this indicates her computer was suffering from a stuck backspace key.
If we were the MRC, we might say that Graham is censoring the facts from his readers.
Obama's 'Cloward-Piven-Ebola Strategy,' According To Joseph Farah Topic: WorldNetDaily
Somebody might want to let Joseph Farah know that there isn't an active case of Ebola in the United States right now.
Farah devoted his Nov. 23 WorldNetDaily column to "trying to figure out why Barack Obama appears to be doing everything in his power to spread the Ebola virus." It's all about the Cloward-Piven strategy, apparently:
The Cloward-Piven Strategy is mainstream leftist ideology. It’s the Rosetta stone for understanding what progressives do and why they do it. It seems to make no sense on the surface to non-leftist ideologues. It seems like irrationality, stupidity or even insanity. But it’s not. It’s pure evil from the pit of hell.
It’s the kind of thinking that led to the gas chambers. It’s the kind of thinking that led to the gulags. It’s the kind of thinking that led to the guillotines.
Let’s recall that Obama first set out to kill the flawed but greatest health-care system the world had ever known. He lied repeatedly about what he was doing. He misrepresented his intentions and his goals. Once he got what he wanted and people could see it didn’t work the way they thought it would work, he told them they just didn’t understand. He told them it was their imaginations that they were losing their health-care insurance, paying more for medical services and being denied treatment.
You see, if you follow the Cloward-Piven Strategy, your goal was never to provide better and more affordable health care. It was to destroy the system and replace it with complete government control.
[...]
Here, for instance, is what Obama said about his Ebola strategy. Just read between the lines: “But let’s keep in mind that as we speak, there are children on the streets dying of this disease, thousands of them. And so obviously my first job is to make sure that we’re taking care of the American people, but we have a larger role than that. We also have an obligation to make sure that those (African) children and their families are safe as well because ultimately the best thing we can do for our public health is also to extend the kind of empathy, compassion and effort so that folks in those countries as well can be rid of this disease” (emphasis added).
Do you understand what’s going on here now?
Does this help?
Are things beginning to make more sense to you now?
The moral of the story is simple: Never underestimate the evil motives of the satanic death cult euphemistically called “progressivism.” It’s not about progress. It’s about regression: It’s about making the state (read: “them”) the ultimate arbiter of right and wrong. We all know where that leads, though it’s awfully hard to believe it’s happening again – here!
We understand that Farah is an inveterate liar with a severe case of Obama derangement who will cynically evoke memories of Nazis and gulags to score cheap political points. And he will accuse Obama of spreading Ebola in the U.S. even though there are no active cases of it.
Yes, Newsmax TV Show On JFK Assassination Was A Discredited Conspiracy Theory Topic: Newsmax
Remember that big "I Killed JFK" conspiracy theory special on Newsmax TV? Yeah, we didn't watch it either. But someone else did, and it turned out to be exactly what we predicted.
According to Inquisitr, the Newsmax show featured the confession of James Files, who says he was the man on the grassy knoll. Inquisitr notes Files' credibility problems, adding that "whether you believe James Files’ story depends largely on whether you trust Newsmax as a news source, and many people don’t believe a word of it."
As we previously noted, promoting a shady character in a JFK conspiracy theory is probably not the best way to position Newsmax TV as a credible news source.
The 'Californication' of Gina Loudon Topic: WorldNetDaily
Gina Loudon begins her Nov. 23 WorldNetDaily column by asserting, "It’s official. I am Californicated. I swore it would never happen to me, but it has." In it, she complains about supposedly excessive regulation found in the state where she resides and whines that her "individual liberties" are being infringed. Indeed, she's feeling very oppressed, asking at one point, "Why can’t I enjoy a cocktail in the passenger seat in the privacy of my own car, with my husband driving?"
But Loudon is silent about one very literal source of "Californication" that comes from her own family.
Earlier this year, it was revealed that Loudon's 18-year-old daughter was in a relationship with a 57-year-old actor. In a weird attempt at damage control, Loudon devoted a column to it, lamenting that the media was trying to "exploit sensationally" her daughter's relationpship while trying to do the same thing herself by, in part, accompanying her column with a sultry-looking image of herself and her daughter.
That, not burdensome regulation, is what most people think of when they hear the term "Californication" (not to mention that TV show and that Red Hot Chili Peppers album). Loudon's sad attempt to redefine the word -- especially given her own family history -- is a failure.
MRC Unhappy Obama's Immigration Action Is Accurately Described Topic: Media Research Center
Kyle Drennen uses a Nov. 21 Media Research Center item to express his unhappiness that NBC's Andrea Mitchell accurately described Obama's action on immigration:
On her 12 p.m. ET hour MSNBC show on Friday, host Andrea Mitchell asserted that President Obama's executive order blocking deportation of millions of illegal immigrants was somehow "not amnesty": "...what this is not, as the President said, this is not amnesty. People have to apply, the applications won't be taken until the spring. There's a window where Republicans could act. So it's not what people are describing, the critics."
Even Meet the Press moderator Chuck Todd couldn't quite swallow that spin: "It is a temporary amnesty as far as these people are concerned." Mitchell countered: "Well, it's a relaxation on deportations." Todd observed: "But obviously the definition of amnesty's been perverted so much in different ways." Mitchell declared: "It's not amnesty in the sense that you get citizenship and the past is forgiven." Todd agreed: "That's right."
Despite his unhappiness with Mitchell for pointing out that Obama's immigration action is "not amnesty," Drennen never explains why it purportedly is -- which must mean that Mitchell is correct.
As we'vedocumented, MRC writers love to ignore the actual definition of "amnesty" to use the word to describe any action that might be beneficial toward illegal immigrants.
WorldNetDaily reporter Bob Unruh is a loyalstenographer for right-wing legal groups. He proves it again in a Nov. 23 article:
A Marine veteran of the Iraq war who refused to retreat when his daughter was forced in a high-school class to affirm “Allah is the same god that is worshiped in Christianity and Judaism” hasn’t given up on his mission.
John Kevin Wood and his wife, Melissa, now are being represented by the Thomas More Law Center in a lawsuit against La Plata High School in Maryland over “Islamic indoctrination” in an 11th grade World History class.
The case drew national attention when John Wood was banned from entering school property after he objected to assignments to affirm statements such as the “Quran is the word of Allah revealed to Muhammad in the same way that Jews and Christians believe the Torah and the Gospels were revealed to Moses and the New Testament writers.”
In grand Unruh tradition, he gets the vast majority of his information from the right-wing Thomas More Law Center and makes no effort to contact the school district in question for a response. If Unruh had bothered to do some actual reporting instead of stenography, he would know that some of his information is wrong.
As Snopes points out, Wood was not "banned from entering school property" for objecting to the assignment. School officials say Wood "threatened to cause problems that would potentially disrupt the safety" of the school.
The school also points out that the lesson is not “Islamic indoctrination” but, in fact, an analysis of the culture of the Middle East, and students are not religiously indoctrinated.
Unruh is not simply acting a the Thomas More Law Center's stenographer (for which we hope they're paying him well for his abandonment of journalistic principles), he's also regurgitating the TMLC's anti-Islam propaganda, such as the baseless claim that "The assignment required her to affirm that ‘Allah is the same god that is worshiped in Christianity and Judaism’ and that the ‘Quran is the word of Allah revealed to Mohammad in the same way that Jews and Christians believe the Torah and the Gospels were revealed to Moses and the New Testament writers.’ "
CNS Editor Whines About 'Pro-Gay Propaganda' Topic: CNSNews.com
CNSNews.com assistant commentary editor Michael Morris managed to pull himself away from fawning over Mark Levin long enough to spew a little homophobia.
In a Nov. 19 post, Morris complained that ESPN highlighted the first openly gay Division I men’s college basketball player, even though he was his team's "number three, and the game’s number four, scorer of the evening."Morris ranted that ESPN was engaging in "pro-gay propaganda," ranting that he hoped the team's next game "has more to do with the game and each respective teams’ play on the court and less to do with the players’ sexual preferences and an otherwise obvious pro-gay agenda."
The next day, Morris whined about Secretary of State John Kerry marking a "Transgender Day of Remembrance," claiming he makes "two glaring mistakes":
He forgets to mention where “hate and violence against gender non-conforming people” seems to be the greatest. According to a Gallup poll, the United States, while not ranked the highest “good place” for gays, is still relatively high on the list of places that are safe for gays to live, at (70 percent), while nations like Iran and Egypt were “too sensitive [of areas] to [even] ask.”
Secretary of State Kerry’s presser also runs afoul when he says, “That’s why standing with the transgender community is the first step in ensuring they enjoy the same freedoms as everyone else,” because this implies that the transgender community does not already have the same freedoms of others.
Morris is curiously silent about Uganda, where gays do not have the same rights as others. That may be because CNS publishes commentaries by anti-gay activist Matt Barber, who in a recent column claimed fellow anti-gay activist Scott Lively was suffering a "crucifixion" for being held to account for encouraging anti-gay sentiment in the country.
Nevertheless, Morris concludes by ranting about the Obama administration's purported "propagandized attempt to condone, on behalf of the entire U.S. population, the trans community’s lifestyle." Morris is using misleading right-wing phraseology to deny that transgenderism is not innate and merely a "lifestyle" one can easily change.
But fans of Morris' Mark Levin sycophancy shouldn't fear: A Nov. 25 post is dedicated to regurgitating the right-wing radio host's words blaming "the reckless liberal media" and "the lawless administration" for violence in Ferguson, Mo.
Posted by Terry K.
at 10:08 AM EST
Updated: Wednesday, November 26, 2014 10:11 AM EST
NEW ARTICLE: Jesse Lee Peterson Has Issues With Women Topic: WorldNetDaily
The WorldNetDaily columnist and right-wing-endorsed commentator is quick to defend those accused of domestic violence and sexual assault -- and to blame their problems on "radical feminists." Read more >>
The MRC's War On (And Jealousy Of) Jon Stewart Topic: Media Research Center
The Media Research Center has been focusing its ire on "Daily Show" host Jon Stewart in recent days.
MRC officials Brent Bozell and Tim Graham devoted their Nov. 21 column to bashing Stewart and sneering at the people who enjoy his brand of political satire -- or, as they call it, "his snarky conservative-trashing show" -- calling them "flatterers, sycophants, and every other synonym in the thesaurus for obsequious."
Bozell and Graham whined that Stewart responded to right-wing "mockery of Obama's patriotism" in the criticism of the president's salute with a coffee cup in his hand. But they don't mention is that President George W. Bush did the same thing while holding a dog, and not only did it not get held up for public ridicule at the time, the MRC complained that it was brought up as a way to "muddy the waters" over their criticism of Obama.
Bozell and Graham don't mention one reason why they are so upset at "The Daily Show" -- earlier this year, Stewart mocked Bozell for complaining that a Spanish-language channel was helping its viewers to comply with Obamacare.
Graham went off again in a Nov. 24 NewsBusters post, downplaying Stewart's influence because he "generally draws about 1 to 1.2 million viewers, less than ABC's Nightline draws at 12:30 in the morning. It typically gets beat by a second airing of The O'Reilly Factor." Graham, of course, doesn't mention that Stewart's audience is more desirable to advertisers than O'Reilly's: 65 percent of Stewart's audience is under 50, while 64 percent of O'Reilly's audience is over 50.
Graham also ranted that Stewart "makes more than $25 million a year," but doesn't explain what that has to do with anything.
An then there was Jeffrey Lord's Nov. 22 NewsBusters attack on Stewart. Lord takes offense at Stewart for arguing Fox News right-winger Sean Hannity is "acting" rather than pushing sincerely held beliefs, but rather than respond to Stewart's charges (other than to insist that Hannity "a deeply well-grounded, thoughtful man with boundless empathy"), he launched an ad hominem attack on Stewart, accusing him of being "loathsome, disingenuous, cynical and devious" because ... well, there are toomany white people on his show, and he once aired an edited video, which completely justifies Hannity doing the same.
Lord also cites economist Peter Schiff's complaint about how his "Daily Show" interview was edited, highlighting his statement that the "mentally retarded" would be happy to work for $2 an hour. Lord didn't mention that Schiff likes to engage in stunts like protesting a minimum wage hike in a Walmart parking lot.
Lord concludes: "Jon Stewart is a funny guy. A talented guy. But there are words for what comedy’s Jon Stewart and academia’s Jon Gruber are about. The words 'devious' and 'loathsome' are but two."
The truth is, however, that the MRC is totally jealous of Stewart's success, and it wants a piece of that action.
In September, the MRC sent to its mailing list accusing Stewart of being among the comedians who "advance a leftist agenda under the guise of comedy and brainwash America's young people each and every day. Is it any wonder that the youth of America are turning into leftist Obama zombies?"
The email went on to solicit donations to upgrade the MRC's sad little web comedy show, "NewsBusted" (a title, by the way, that the MRC stole from us):
When we started NewsBusted, we wanted to change that by creating at least one comedy show where socialism isn't worshiped and where American values aren't derided.
NewsBusted is the one comedy show where joke writers aren't afraid to serve up the ridicule that Barack Obama, Joe Biden, Harry Reid, and Nancy Pelosi so richly deserve.
Quality television audio & video production doesn’t come cheap. For nearly seven years, our production team has been using the SAME standard definition camera, the SAME microphones, the SAME lighting system, the SAME editing bay, the SAME graphics package, and the SAME sound mixing board… NewsBusted is long overdue for a high tech upgradeand 2015 is the year to do it!
How does investing thousands of dollars (well, other poeple's dollars) in a comedy show further the MRC's ostensible mission as an "educational" organization -- not to mention qualify under tax law as being tax-deductible? We don't know either.
We do know, however, that "NewsBusted" probably wouldn't survive if it was subjected to the free market where ratings and viewership matters -- the same place where Stewart and "The Daily Show" are thriving. Which makes the normally free-market MRC's jealousy of Stewart that much more ironic.
WND's Klein Plays Word Games To Attack GOP Benghazi Report Topic: WorldNetDaily
We've noted how WorldNetDaily ignored the release of the Republican-led House committee report on the attacks on the diplomatic facilities in Benghazi -- which just so happened to shoot down WND reporter Aaron Klein's claim that the CIA was using the Benghazi facility to ship arms from Libya to Syrian rebels.
It took three days for Klein to respond, and he's in full spin mode in a Nov. 24 WND article, which he claims is an "extensive review" of the "five major problems with the new House report." Klein tries to avoid the discrediting of his own claims by playing word-parsing:
The new report states the “CIA conducted no unauthorized activity in Benghazi and was not collecting and shipping arms to Syria.”
The report noted multiple media outlets have reported allegations the CIA collected weapons in Benghazi and facilitated weapons from Libya to Syria.
“The eyewitness testimony and thousands of pages of CIA cables and emails that the committee reviewed provide no support for this allegation,” states the report.
As evidence the CIA was not involved in weapons transfers, the report documents that “each witness reported seeing only standard CIA security weapons at the base.”
“No witness testified that non-CIA weapons were brought to the Annex.”
However, most mainstream allegations about weapons transfers did not claim any weapons were stored or transferred through the CIA annex.
But that's exactly what Klein effectively claimed. As we've noted, Klein asserted that "The U.S. special mission in Benghazi and the nearby CIA annex were utilized in part to coordinate arms shipments to the jihadist rebels fighting the Syrian regime, with Ambassador Christopher Stevens playing a central role."
Klein continues with more word-parsing:
The new report utilizes specific phraseology to deny the CIA was involved in collecting any weapons in Benghazi. It states the CIA “was not collecting and shipping arms to Syria.”
However, the use of the word “and” leaves open the possibility the intelligence community was collecting weapons that were not shipped to Syria.
The report further states: “The Benghazi Annex was not itself collecting weapons. The Committee has not seen any credible information to dispute these facts.”
This phraseology, particularly the use of the word “itself,” leaves open the possibility another facility was involved in a weapons-procurement effort.
The report hints the State Department, not the CIA, may have been leading a weapons collection effort.
Klein then tries to change the subject:
The denial of weapons transfers is at odds with numerous major news media accounts of U.S.-aided weapons transfers by Arab countries to Mideast rebels.
The New York Times reported March 25, 2013, that the covert aid to the Syrian rebels started on a small scale and continued intermittently through the fall of 2012, expanding into a steady and much heavier flow later that year, including a large procurement from Croatia.
The Times reported that from offices at “secret locations,” American intelligence officers “helped the Arab governments shop for weapons … and have vetted rebel commanders and groups to determine who should receive the weapons as they arrive.”
In March 2011, Reuters exclusively reported Obama had signed a secret order authorizing covert U.S. government support for the rebel forces in Libya seeking to oust Gaddafi, quoting U.S. government officials.
Also that month, the London Independent reported “the Americans have asked Saudi Arabia if it can supply weapons to the rebels in Benghazi.”
But the question is not whether the U.S. attempted to steer weapons to Syrian rebels, it's whether that was done through the CIA annex at Benghazi. The fact that Klein tries to broaden the subject to obscure how he's been discredited is a tacit admission that he knows the committee report is correct.
Klein loves playing word games: He also complains that "The new House Intelligence Committee report repeatedly refers to the U.S. building in Benghazi as a 'Temporary Mission Facility.' However, the State Department has carefully labeled its facility in Benghazi a 'U.S. Special Mission.'"
Klein also fails to admit that the report was issued by a Republican-led committee, though it's referenced in the headline.
If the most damning things Klein can come up with to attack the GOP-led report are word games, they're simply not as "major" as Klein wants you to believe.
The fact that Klein is sticking to his anti-Obama narrative even as credible investigators demolish the underpinnnings of his claims is just one more reason why nobody believes WND.
CNS Ignored Benghazi Report, But Highlighted Criticism Of It Topic: CNSNews.com
The Republican-led House Intelligence Committee released a report on Friday that debunked many right-wing conspiracy theories about the attack on a diplomatic facility in Benghazi, Libya. CNSNews.com -- despite claiming to be a "news" organization, ignored the report.
CNS did not notice the report until nearly three days later, when a Nov. 24 article by Susan Jones framed it in an attack by Republican Sen. Lindsey Graham, who called the report "full of crap."
CNS was apparently busy covering other issues it deemed more important, like how much golf President Obama played over the weekend. Priorities!
CNS' Starr Peddles Oil Industry Propaganda on Keystone Pipeline Topic: CNSNews.com
CNSNews.com reporter Penny Starr has long been a reliable propagandist for the fossil fuel industries (which is a major donor to the Media Research Center). She proves it again in a Nov. 17 CNS article in which she shills for the proposed Keystone XL pipeline. Starr heavily quotes those with a direct financial interest in getting the pipeline built, including longtime buddy the American Petroleum Institute:
The American Petroleum Institute, the trade association that advocates on behalf of the U.S. oil and gas industry, on Monday issued a plea to Obama about the pipeline and its benefits.
“Mr. President, do not outsource the 42,000 American jobs this pipeline represents, to move Canadian and U.S. energy resources from North Dakota and Montana, to U.S. refineries on the Gulf Coast,” API President and CEO Jack Gerard said in a statement.
“Americans are embracing our domestic energy renaissance but they can’t fully benefit from it unless there is a robust infrastructure system to transport the fuels they demand,” he added.
[...]
TransCanada, the company in charge of the Keystone XL pipeline construction, calls it “the definition of shovel-ready infrastructure project,” and cites the State Department’s own findings. (The department is in control of the project’s destiny because of its “international” element.)
“Almost overnight, Keystone XL could put 9,000 hard-working American men and women directly to work,” TransCanada says on its website. “The U.S. State Department’s Final Supplemental Environmental Impact Statement found that the project would support more than 42,000 direct and indirect jobs nationwide.”
But Starr doesn't report the full context of the State Department's job predictions. PolitiFact points out that the 42,000 jobs that would be "support[ed]" by the pipeline doesn't mean that 42,000 jobs would be created. The vast majority of those jobs are temporary and would last only as long as the pipeline is being constructed, and a number of them already exist. The operation and maintenance of the pipeline after construction will create only about 50 jobs.
Starr goes on to regurgitate more claims from TransCanada:
“Keystone XL Pipeline will have the capacity to transport 830,000 barrels per day of crude oil from Canada and the continental United States to refineries on the Gulf Coast, where it can displace much of the higher-priced oil those refineries currently import from overseas,” TransCanada says.
“This view is backed up by a December, 2010 U.S. Department of Energy study which states: ‘Increased Canadian oil imports will help reduce U.S. imports of foreign oil from sources outside of North America.’”
But as the Christian Science Monitor reported, Canadian oil exports to the U.S. will increase whether or not Keystone XL is built. And Reuters notes that a significant amount of the crude oil coming through Keystone XL would be exported.
Because Starr is in propaganda mode, she won't report any of those inconvenient facts to her readers.
House GOP Shoots Down Aaron Klein's Benghazi-Syria Conspiracy Topic: WorldNetDaily
Since the attack on diplomatic facilities in Benghazi, Libya, in 2012, WorldNetDaily's Aaron Klein has pushed the (anonymously sourced) claim that the Benghazi facility was used to ship arms from Libya to Syrian rebels. That claim is a centerpiece of Klein's failed book on Benghazi, as Klein's own website describes:
The U.S. special mission in Benghazi and the nearby CIA annex were utilized in part to coordinate arms shipments to the jihadist rebels fighting the Syrian regime, with Ambassador Christopher Stevens playing a central role, documents an explosive new book released today.
The activities, which included a separate, unprecedented multi-million-dollar weapons collection effort from Libyan militias who did not want to give up their weapons, may have prompted the Sept. 11, 2012, attack, charges the new book.
The findings and more are revealed in the new work by radio host and WND reporter Aaron Klein, “The REAL Benghazi Story: What the White House and Hillary Don’t Want You to Know.”
Klein asserts the arms-to-rebels scheme that ran through Benghazi “might amount to the Fast and Furious of the Middle East, the Iran-Contra of the Obama administration.”
[...]
According to information cited by Klein, Stevens served less as a diplomat and more as an arms dealer and intelligence coordinator for assistance to the so-called Arab Spring, with particular emphasis on the Syrian rebels.
Just one problem with that narrative: The newly released Republican-led House report on Benghazi discredits the accusation:
Multiple media outlets have reported allegations about CIA collecting weapons in Benghazi and facilitating weapons from Libya to Syria. The eyewintess testimony and thousands of pages of CIA cables and emails that the Committee reviewed provide no support for this allegation.
Committee Members and staff asked all wigness what they observed at the Benghazi Annex and whether they had any informationto support allegations about weapons being collected and transported to Syria. Each witness reported seeing only standard CIA security weapons at the base. No witness testified that non-CIA weapons were brought to the Annex. Security personnel and officers testified they had complete access to the Annex and would have observed any weapons, such as MANPADs, stored at the facility. Security personnel and officers also testified that nobody told them to hide or withhold any information from the Committee. This record is consistent throughout the Committee interviews by members and staff.
According to testimony from CIA Deputy Director Morell and confirmed by other witnesses, the CIA's mission in Benghazi was to collect foreign intelligence. From the Annex in Benghazi, the CIA was collecting intelligence about foreign entities that were themselves collecting weapons in Libya and facilitating their passage to Syria. The Benghazi Annex was not itself collecting weapons. The Committee has not seen any credible information to dispute these facts.
Don't expect a correction from Klein on this, let alone WND recalling Klein's book due to the false information contained in it. Not only is that not how WND rolls -- indeed, WND has yet to acknowledge the existence of the House GOP report on Benghazi, even though it has been out for nearly two days -- Klein's book tanked badly enough that the effort is barely worth it. As of this writing, "The REAL Benghazi Story" has slid to No. 80,072 in sales at Amazon.com less than three months after its release.
MRC Attacks 'Hippie-Hypocrite' Neil Young Topic: Media Research Center
It was apparently a slow day at the Media Research Center a couple weeks back, because Geoffrey Dickens decided to have a fit about Neil Young appearing on "The Charlie Rose Show" and featuring a clip of Young singing a song opposing fracking:
Within seconds after playing the clip the PBS host also asked Young about his new memoir in which the singer “covers everything from his love of cars and painting to his crusade for Mother Earth.” However, Rose never once asked the environmental activist if he felt guilty about all the fossil fuels he’s used in his cars or his painting. Rose also never mentioned all the fossil fuels used in the promotion of Young’s over 50 year-long career in the production and transport of his vinyl records, tapes, CDs. Rose also didn’t bring up the fossil fuels that were utilized in sending Young, his band and crew members on all those tours over the years.
Wow. Dickens is bashing Young for using "fossil fuels" in his painting? Really, Geoffrey? And Dickens seems to have overlooked the fact that he converted one of his beloved cars, a formerly gas-guzzing 1959 Lincoln Continental, to run on cellulosic ethanol.
Besides, Dickens is about a decade late in calling out Young's alleged hypocrisy. The Toronto Star reported:
A vocal champion of environmental issues for most of his career, Young nevertheless managed to conveniently ignore the dichotomy inherent in his fetish for gas-guzzling, fume-belching classic automobiles until he and Crazy Horse took their earth-conscious rock opera Greendale on the road in 2003.
One day after the accompanying movie was finished, Sarah White — a friend of Young’s daughter enlisted to play an activist protesting against oil companies and a “villainous, anti-environment, pollution-spreading corporation” called POWERCO in the Greendale film — cornered him and, “with all of the intensity of youth unbridled,” called him a hypocrite for going out on tour with a fleet of fossil fuel-reliant trucks, buses and airplanes immediately after making a stand against the very same sort of wastefulness onscreen and on record. It stung. And it stuck.
“She was absolutely right,” he writes in Special Deluxe. “Imagine a character in my own story telling me that I was hypocritical for not practising what I was preaching. That was a seminal moment.”
“Yeah, it made a big difference to me,” Young now says of that conversation. “I had the feeling already that we had to do something different, but this young lady made a very clear point. It’s just knowledge. You just accrue knowledge. If you’re interested in something, you gather knowledge.”
From that point on, as documented in Special Deluxe’s sharpened third act, Young set about dutifully reconfiguring his tour transportation to ensure that it ran on renewable, lower-emission biofuel whilst versing himself in the science of climate change and renewable energy to a customarily “obsessive” degree.
If Dickens had bothered to do any actual research before writing his item, he would have learned not only about the converted Lincoln but also that Young has been running his tour transportation on biofuel for years.
But then, the Media Research Center isn't really about "research," it's about promoting an ideology and trotting out tired old insults like "hippie" to smear anyone who opposes them.
When Barack Obama and his political henchmen get done with his plan to transform this country, we’ll end up being a country of one state.
He’s taking us apart bit by bit. When he’s done, we’ll no longer be the United States – 50 states with rights and obligations, with states’ rights preeminent – but one country under the thumb and rule of the federal government with no individual states rights.
We’ll not be the United States because at every level, he and his minions in legislatures, the courts and the bureaucracies are overriding state laws and enforcing federal restrictions instead.
Richard Nixon was driven from office in shame for actions that do not begin to rise to the level of this health-care fraud. Enough of the talk. We demand action on behalf of the American people. We need state attorneys general and Congress to take immediate action to have Obama punished for defrauding the American people. In fact, I would further argue that the lawyers who argued in support of Obamacare also knowingly participated in the lie and that they should be held accountable as well.
At a time when the country needs an actual leader at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, the great Community Organizer in Chief comes shining through again to illuminate exactly why he’s unfit to be president of the United States.
Facts are irrelevant to Barack Obama, and it’s obvious he still harbors lingering resentment for having to hold a beer summit with his friend Henry Louis Gates and Sgt. James Crowley. In the case of Obama meeting secretly with the Ferguson protest leaders, it’s obvious who truly “acted stupidly” in once again displaying a complete aversion to being a leader interested in healing wounds instead of pouring salt on them.
But then again, Democrats nationwide attempted to utilize the unrest in Ferguson to drive black voters to the polls, filled with the type of racial resentment that must keep Obama and Holder awake at night thinking there’s a Klansman behind every door they encounter.
Obama knows that all of these options leave the GOP between a rock and a hard place, and that is exactly the way he wants it. He is daring them to try and impeach him, believing that they will suffer the same fate they did when they went after Clinton. He is betting that the American people won’t go for it and the Republicans will be ruined if they do. The White House is using impeachment as bait in the hopes that the GOP will destroy its own credibility. Why do you think most of the impeachment talk is coming from his party and not the Republicans?
When Rush Limbaugh contradicts Obama’s statement that he (Obama) is not an emperor, he tacitly accepts the ideological paradigm Obama actually professes. Of course, I’m reasonably sure he does not intend to do so. An emperor is one who commands the law by virtue of his power. So far, Obama has successfully demonstrated his power to do pretty much as he wills. So, according to his Marxist paradigm, he is an emperor.
Would-be dictators and bullies must be opposed, resisted and defeated. It will not be acceptable for Congress to sit on its hands after Obama’s usurpation. It must act not as a matter of partisan competition but on behalf of the Constitution itself and the sovereignty of the American people, which it has a sacred duty to safeguard.
Now that Obama is declaring war on the Constitution and attempting to further emasculate Congress, it must draw and use every weapon in its constitutional arsenal to nullify Obama’s action – and to deter future tyrants from following his disgraceful example.
If the president could have carried out this executive order the whole time legally, THEN WHY HASN’T HE? If it’s legal for the Executive to do this, then Congress’ action or inaction is completely irrelevant. The only possible conclusion is that this whole episode is entirely political at best, completely illegal at worst.
And that, ladies and gentlemen, is why many, including myself, simply don’t trust this man. He is a deceiver. I’ve said this in private, and I will say so now publicly: Whenever this president speaks, I feel like saying, “I have never heard nothing in so many words.”
One can’t resist noting that on Oct. 2, 2014, we at Freedom Watch petitioned the Department of Homeland Security to deport Barack Hussein Obama, due to his use of falsified identity documents. Perhaps Obama has a personal soft spot for not wanting the United States to deport people not legally in the country. Freedom Watch calls for all illegal aliens to be returned to their country of birth, including Obama.