Emily Richards writes in a July 13 CNSNews.com article:
A British professor's new model of solar cycles predicts that the Earth could be heading toward a "mini ice age" that would create conditions not seen since 1645 during the "Maunder minimum" - when London’s Thames River froze over.
Solar activity may fall by as much as 60 percent during the 2030s, according to Mathematics Professor Valentina Zharkova of Northumbria University in England.
If you look closely at the original press release, the study’s author, Valentina Zharkova, never implied a new ice age is imminent—only that we may see a sharp downturn in the number of sunspots. Yes, the sun is a variable star, but its output is remarkably stable. The amount of energy we receive from the sun just doesn’t change fast enough to cause a rapid-onset ice age in just a few decades.
The root of the problem here may be a poorly worded quote in the press release implying an imminent 60 percent decline in solar activity. Yes, numbers of sunspots can vary by that much or even more on an 11-year cycle, but the sun’s output—the total amount of energy we get—is extremely stable and only changes by about 0.1 percent, even in extreme sunspot cycles like the one Zharkova is predicting.
[...]
But let’s play devil’s advocate: What if Zharkova is right about the decline in solar activity? There’s still no need to worry (or to become complacent about global warming). Even assuming sunspots are in the process of shutting down, as happened during the Maunder minimum and Little Ice Age, it wouldn’t matter much.
An interesting new study published in June showed that a sharp decline in solar activity to record lows could have a relatively large impact on regional climate over a period of decades. But even the return of a Maunder minimum type slowdown in solar activity—an extreme scenario, by any measure—would slow global warming by only about a half-degree in northern Europe. That’s essentially negligible, on a global scale.
Unsurprisingly, Richards contacts nobody to respond to the study. Also unsurprisingly, CNS published an July 20 op-ed by H. Sterling Burnett, one of the climate deniers at the right-wing Heartland Institute, to reinforce the bogus claim:
Another recent scientific paper projects an imminent cooling without any caveats about it being regional in nature or overwhelmed by human carbon dioxide emissions. A paper published by the Royal Astronomical Society indicates the Sun will likely go silent within 15 years, leading to an extended period of colder temperatures. Lead author of the report Valentina Zharkova of Northumbria University has said, when tested against actual data and measurements, the model the researchers developed to test the relationship between fluctuating magnetic waves on the surface of the Sun and their impacts on solar activity and Earth’s climate had an accuracy rating of 97 percent.
With new research emerging nearly daily to indicate Earth is cooling because of decreased solar activity, it certainly seems wise to shift our concern about future climate to how best to respond to colder temperatures and associated climate effects.
Slate notes that climate deniers like Burnett "have a particular fascination with sunspot cycles," but that the correlation between sunspot activity and global temperatures is weak at best.
Slate adds: "In reality, sunspots fluctuate in an 11-year cycle, and the current cycle is the weakest in 100 years—yet 2014 was the planet’s hottest year in recorded history." Betcha Burnett and CNS won't bring that up.
It seems the deniers have failed again by deliberately ignoring information that undermines their case. Burnett is a paid flack, of course, but what's the excuse for CNS, which purports to be a news organization? Oh, yeah, they get paid to do that as well.
CNS Censors Fact That Congressman's Outrage Is Hypocritical Topic: CNSNews.com
Penny Starr channels a little manufactured outrage in a July 16 CNSNews.com article:
Rep. Trent Franks (R-Ariz.) said Wednesday it is a “disgrace” that taxpayer dollars go to support Planned Parenthood, the largest abortion provider in the United States.
“Overall, about half of Planned Parenthood’s money comes from taxpayers,” Franks told CNSNews.com following a press conference by members of the House Pro-Life Caucus on the alleged sale of organs from aborted babies by Planned Parenthood abortion clinics. “And this is an organization that supports the murder of 3,000 children in America every day.
“The fact that we’re funding it is a disgrace that beggars my ability to articulate,” Franks said.
But Starr has omitted one key fact: Franks knew about the dishonestly edited video that prompted his comments weeks ago.
Roll Call reports that Franks is among several members of Congress who were shown the video made by anti-abortion extremists weeks ago, but they said nothing until now. Franks spun wildly when called on it, insisting that “The hope was to have as much information as possible so that the authorities could be notified effectively before the media.”
While the Roll Call article was posted a few hours after Starr's, CNS made no effort to update the article with this important information suggesting that Franks' concern is nothing but politically motivated hypocrisy.
Then again, that kind of politically motivated hypocrisy is what fuels CNS, isn't it?
WND Repeats Discredited ISIS Link to Chattanooga Shooting Topic: WorldNetDaily
Leo Hohmann writes in a July 16 WorldNetDaily article about the Chattanooga shootings:
An ISIS affiliated Twitter account tweeted 15 minutes before the attack started a “warning” to America with the #Chattanooga hashtag (see screenshot above article). Could this have been the signal that started the attack? Authorities refused to comment on that Thursday, but a similar Twitter message came just before the ISIS attack in Garland, Texas in early May. This pattern suggests ISIS may have sleeper cells it is able to activate within the United States.
Hohmann's article prominently features the alleged ISIS tweet (at right), though it's curiously not captioned as such, identified only later in the article.
In fact, Hohmann is making a false claim. As Media Matters documents, the right-wing activists who initially promoted the false claim that the ISIS tweet came just before the Chattanooga shootings misread the Twitter timestamp by not accounting for time zones. The tweet actually was issued a few hours after the shooting, not shortly before.
There's also no purported "pattern" of ISIS warning of shootings in the U.S. The issuer of the "similar Twitter message" before the Garland shooting was actually issued by one of the gunmen, Elton Simpson, not by someone higher up in ISIS.
Despite this tweet having no actual link to the Chattanooga shooting, Hohmann's boss, WND editor Joseph Farah uses it to illustrate his July 17 column ranting that the shooting was Muslim terrorism despite authorities having yet to even definitively establish that the shooter, Mohammad Youssef Abdulazeez, was a Muslim: "Hello? Since when do Christian or non-Muslim Arabs name their kids Mohammad?"
Farah then goes on to repeat the false claim his writer made, stealing it word-for-word: "An ISIS-affiliated Twitter account tweeted 15 minutes before the attack started a 'warning' to America with the #Chattanooga hashtag (see screenshot above article). Could this have been the signal that started the attack?"
If Farah had done even a modicum of research before writing his column, he would have known that the answer is no.
MRC Still Complaining About Accurate Reporting Topic: Media Research Center
It seems the Media Research Center isn't done being upset that the story about the secretly recorded Planned Parenthood official is being accurately reported.
A July 15 NewsBusters item by Curtis Houck complained that TV newscasts accurately identified the Center for Medical Progress, which released the dishonestly edited video, as “anti-abortion activists," whining about "the media’s long-standing refusal to use the 'pro-life' label for conservatives." But the CMP is unquestionably anti-abortion and they're activists, so it's absolutely accurate to describe them as "anti-abortion activists."
Houck even seemed put out that the media is reporting Planned Parenthood's side of the story at all, huffing that one newscast included "more points from Planned Parenthood about how they are 'only trying to help women who want to donate fetal tissue after abortions.'" Funny, we thought the MRC wanted the news fairly reported.
Houck didn't mention the fact that the original video the CMP released was dishonestly edited and did not portray the full context of what actually happened.
Ken Shepherd follows that up with a July 16 post complaining that the Dailiy Beast accurately identified CMP leader David Daleiden as an "extremist":
If you can't counter the message, character-assassinate the messenger. That, apparently, is Daily Beast writer Samantha Allen's tack regarding the sting video wherein a Planned Parenthood official discusses selling aborted-baby body parts above break-even rates to medical researchers.
Allen devoted her July 16 piece, "Maker of Planned Parenthood Video Called Abortion 'Genocide'" to trashing pro-life activist David Daleiden[.]
At no point does Shepherd dispute the accuracy of anything the Daily Beast reported about Daleiden, including the "extremist" descriptor, nor does he explain how reporting indisputably accurate information about Daleiden equates to "trashing" or character assassination. One could say the real character assassin here is Daleiden himself with his deceptive video dishonestly attacking Planned Parenthood -- a deception Shepherd, like fellow MRC employee Houck, does not acknowledge.
CNS Goes Into Race-Baiting Mode on Obama Topic: CNSNews.com
The Media Research Center's creeping WND-ization continues by picking up WorldNetDaily's obsession with race.
In a July 13 CNS article, Susan Jones complained that President Obama used his weekly media address to promote his faie-housing initiative. She expressed particular concern that white suburbs might become less white, fretting that communities "must spend the [federal fair-housing] money in ways that move inner-city minorities, for example, into subsidized housing in wealthier, whiter suburbs."
Apparently, Jones doesn't think minorties have any place in those "whiter suburbs."
Since CNS has given up reporting actual news and instead has embraced its role as one more propaganda arm of the MRC, Jones engages in some trolling of Obama. After noting Obama's statement that children living just a few blocks apart may "lead incredibly different lives," Jones sneered: "President Obama could have used his own daughters as examples. They attend an elite private school in Washington, in a city where many poor blacks struggle in failing public schools."
Jones might look to her employer as an example of how her fellow conservatives are handling the issue. A couple years back, the MRC moved its headquaters from Alexandria, Va., a town with a 66.8 percent white population and a 22.4 percent black population, to Reston, Va., a town with a 70.1 percent white population and just a 9.7 percent black population.
The move also put the MRC in one of those "wealthier, whiter suburbs" Jones fears will be overrun by poor brown people; the median income of Alexandria is $85,706, while in Reston it's $107,962.
MRC Is Mad That AP Is Accurately Reporting On A Story Topic: Media Research Center
As one might expect, the ConWeb is all over the story of a secretly recorded video of a Planned Parenthood official talking about how it disposes of some of the fetal remains following an abortion, including selling them for research with the permission of the woman -- even though they are so far highlighting the deceptively edited, out-of-context claims and ignoring the full story.
The Media Research Center's Ken Shepherd does a terrible job of playing media cop, ignoring the deceptive, sensational reporting of his ConWeb peers and instead devoting a July 15 NewsBusters post to bashing the Associated Press for reporting the story accurately:
We've long known that the Associated Press is loathe to refer to unborn children as unborn children, preferring the clinical term "fetus." But in covering a shocking new story about how Planned Parenthood sells fetal tissue from aborted babies for profit, the AP bent over backwards to use clinical euphemisms to soften the blow of the ghoulish practice.
Yes, Shepherd is attacking the AP for using a medically accurate term instead of the emotionally charged one he would prefer. Of course, he can't claim his preferred term is an accurate one, medically or otherwise; if you have to qualify the word "children," that means it's inaccurate to use "children" in this context.
But that's what the MRC's "media research" is down to these days.
Interesting that Shepherd is mad about accurate reporting but not about the deceptively edited video first released by the anti-abortion activists who secretly taped the Planned Parenthood official, or the ConWeb outlets who ignore that fact in their reporting of the story.
UPDATE: Shepherd might want to look a little closer to home to vent his outrage over accurate reporting -- say, across the hall at MRC headquarters. At MRC division CNSNews.com, its lead article on the story is an AP article that references "fetuses" instead of his preferred (and inaccurate) phrase. But as in CNS tradition of putting biased headlines on AP articles, it rewrote the headline to refer to "baby body parts," which is just as inaccurate as Shepherd's insistence that the AP refer to "unborn children."
WND Columnist: Multiculturalism Is Just Like Having AIDS Topic: WorldNetDaily
It’s fashionable to promote multiculturalism in the name of diversity.
According to the most avid supporters, “We all just need to get along. We need to get over our differences and live in peace.”
The problem with this is that it assumes there is no right or wrong. It assumes all beliefs are of equal value. Christianity and Islam are equals. Free enterprise and socialism are equals. Everyone just needs to accept that others beliefs are of equal value to their own.
Such thinking is like the AIDS virus.The human body is designed to fight off colds and flues and to heal from various wounds. Attacks on the health of the body are spotted and biological combat commences. The AIDS virus turns off the body’s defense mechanism. AIDS stands for “Immune Deficiency Syndrome.” It tells the body, “You’re OK,” when it’s not OK.
Multiculturalism says, “Don’t worry about a little socialism. It won’t hurt you.” It says, “Don’t be a stickler about God’s laws. Other people don’t believe them, and they’re just fine.” It says, “Don’t harp about traditional families. Be modern. Accept anything in the name of progress and diversity.”
CNS Gives A Platform to Anti-Gay Kenyans Topic: CNSNews.com
A July 7 CNSNews.com article by Patrick Goodenough pounds home the anti-gay message in realation to President Obama's upcoming visit to Africa. Goodenough quotes no fewer than seven Kenyan political and religious officials denouncing homosexuality and attacking Obama for even considering discussing the issue of gay rights in Kenya.
Despite the fact that CNS' mission statement claims that it "endeavors to fairly present all legitimate sides of a story" Goodenough made no apparent effort to contact any Kenyan official who would not engage in gay-bashing.
Goodenough is apparently so concerned with giving Kenyan gay-bashers a voice that he can't be bothered to tell us what the laws on homosexuality in Kenya are. He obliquoely refers to the situation by noting that "Homosexuality is frowned on in many African countries" and that "same-sex sexual acts are illegal in 76 countries around the world, 36 of them in Africa." But curiously, Goodenough never explains the situation in Kenya.
Homosexuality is illegal in Kenya, punishable by up to 14 years in prison. Tthe Kenya National Commission on Human Rights states that gays "are discriminated, stigmatised and subjected to violence because of their sexual orientation." Additionally, gays "often face arbitrary arrest, are often detained at the police stations, subjected to torture and unnecessary harassment by the police who extort money from them and are only released after bribing their way out."
Goodenough and CNS, it seems, are totally down with all of that Kenyan anti-gay hate.
CNS Publishes Birther Lawyer Again Topic: CNSNews.com
Last month, CNSNews.com demonstrated the creeping WND-ism that is taking over the Media Research Center by publishing an anti-gay marriage column by Herbert Titus, a WorldNetDaily favorite who's perhaps best known for claiming that Barack Obama can't be president because he did not have two parents who were American citizens and that his "loyalties" purportedly lie with his Kenyan-born father.
Well, apparently CNS can't get enough of Titus' legally suspect opinions, so he's back in a July 6 column declaring that the Supreme court's ruling on same-sex marriage is "illegitimate and unlawful" and "Worthy only to be disobeyed." Titus concludes his article by he will "will continue to release articles" on how Americans can breakt the law -- a strange position for a so-called legal expert to take.
Well, Titus' view on Obama's eligibility and the definition of "natural born citizen" can be found nowhere in U.S. jurisprudence, which makes anything he has to say on any legal issue rather suspect. We also don't see Titus running around enforcing his extremely narrow definition of "natural born citizen" on Ted Cruz the way he was on Obama, so that makes him a hypocrite as well.
Those flaws, apparently, make him the perfect person to write op-eds for CNS, apparently.
WND Can't Stop Stringing The Birthers Along Topic: WorldNetDaily
WorldNetDaily isn't done stringing its faithful birthers along, it appears.
Following Aaron Klein's interview with Joe Arpaio -- in which Klein failed to ask Arpaio any meaningful birther-related questions -- Art Moore interviews cold case posse chief Mike Zullo for a July 9 article. Under the pretense of explaining away Zullo's claim of forthcoming "universe-shattering" evidence he made in late 2013, Moore uncritically lets Zullo declare that "there is no credible evidence of where Obama was born" and doesn't bother to challenge Zullo's claims that the unnamed thing that's keeping his purported investigation "under lock and key"could "prevent me from ever disclosing what this is."
As his fellow WNDer Klein did, Moore fails to ask Zullo about important revelations that have surfced that discredit his investigation:
The documentation that what Arpaio, posse leader Mike Zullo and other birthers have claimed as evidence that the online version of Obama's birth certificate released by the White House is a manufactured fraud -- the various layers in the PDF document -- are easily reproduced by using a common Xerox scanner to scan in the document.
Arpaio's admission in the documentary "The Joe Show" that the only reason he latched onto the birther movement was to generate donations to his own re-election campaigns.
The statement by former posse member Reilly that Hawaii's verification of Obama's birth certificate constitutes sufficient proof that Obama is a "natural born citizen" -- and puts the lie to any claim by Arpaio that the investigation is fair and designed to clear Obama.
Moore also curiously fails to make any mention in his article of another fellow WNDer, Jerome Corsi, even though Corsi not only was (and may still be) a member of the cold case posse, it was his presentation to the Surprise Tea Party that, as Moorepoints out in his article, spurred Arpaio to set up the cold case posse in the first place.
Corsi's books on the issue aren't even promoted in Moore's article -- just a category list of "the resources you need to understand the critical constitutional issue ignored by Washington and establishment media — the essential qualifications for the person responsible for the nation’s security." And, yes, WND is still trying to desperately unload copies of Corsi's "Where's the Birth Certificate?" for 99 cents.
It's almost as if Corsi and WND now ashamed of their role in forwarding the birth certificate issue or something.
Nevertheless, Moore tries to demonstrate his own birther bona fides:
Some scholars point to the Naturalization Act of 1790, passed shortly after the Constitution was issued, as a guide. It defines a natural-born citizen as the offspring of two U.S. citizens, regardless of the place of birth. While the law was repealed by the Naturalization Act of 1795, which removed the term “natural born,” some argue the 1790 law, passed only three years after the Constitution was signed, represents the intent of the Framers.
Regardless of his place of birth, Obama would fail the 1790 Naturalization Act test, because his father was a Kenyan visiting the U.S. as a student.
Of course, given that the Naturalization Act of 1790 was repealed in 1795, it does not have the force of law. Moore avoids mentioning another inconvenient fact WND doesn't want to talk about: WND's favorite presidential candidate, Ted Cruz, would also fail Moore's test.
We've written Moore to ask for an explanation of his omissions. We'll let you know if he responds.
More Bad And Misleading Reporting, Courtesy of CNS Topic: CNSNews.com
We know CNSNews.com is not the place to go for fair and balanced reporting, especially under managing editor Michael W. Chapman. We've found even more examples of misleading reporting.
It was clear from the start that a July 1 CNS article by Lauretta Brown would not be a fair take on high school health clinics that offer contraception, what with the headline blaring, "Seattle 6th Graders Can’t Get a Coke at School, But Can Get an IUD." In the third paragraph of her article, Brown makes this declaration about long-acting reversible contraception such as IUDs:
LARCs are associated with serious side effects, such as uterine perforation and infection. IUDs, specifically, can also act as abortifacients by preventing the implantation of a fertilized egg.
Brown is falsely potraying IUDs as being unsafe by highlighting only the "serious side effects." In fact, a 2013 study found that less than 1 percent of users developed complications or serious side effects, and even the fact sheet Brown uses to fearmonger about IUDs admits that "Serious complications from use of an IUD are rare."
Brown's claim that IUDs are an abortifacient because it can "prevent the implantation of a fertilized egg" is a false reading of medical science. The medical definition of an abortion is removal of an implanted egg from the uterus; therefore, if it's not implanted, it's not an abortion.
Further, 50 percent of a woman's fertilized eggs never naturally implant into the uterus, so it seems that under Brown's definition, nature (or God, if you will) is the biggest abortionist of all.
Oh, and Brown never establishes in her article that any sixth-grader in Seattle has ever asked for an IUD -- only that it's theoretically possible -- so that further shoots down her biased attack.
Barbara Hollingsworth serves up her own chunk of bad reporting in a July 7 article:
Obamacare is exhibiting early signs of a “death spiral” as hundreds of insurance plans listed on the federally-run exchanges in 37 states and the District of Columbia request double-digit premium increases for 2016, says David Hogberg, a health care analyst and senior fellow at the National Center for Public Policy Research (NCPPR).
A “death spiral” – which is the insurance pool equivalent of a bankruptcy - occurs when rising premiums force younger, healthier people to drop their insurance coverage due to the increased cost. But their exodus leaves the remaining “risk pool” older, sicker and more expensive to insure than before, necessitating further rate hikes.
Thirteen percent of the people who signed up for Obamacare in 2015 have already been dropped from coverage because many of them failed to pay their share of the subsidized premiums, The New York Times reported.
And that's before the premiums on many policies are due to skyrocket next year.
Hollingsworth fails to mention, as she usually does, that the NCPPR is a right-wing organization that has long attacked Obamacare, so its analysis can't exactly be trusted. At no point does Hollingsworth make an effort to seek anyone to counter NCPPR's "death spiral" fearmongering, making her article completely unbalanced.
Because of that, readers will never know that anti-Obamacare forces like the NCPPR have been howling about a "death spiral" for years, only to be consistently proven wrong.
Further, large rate increase requests mean nothing, let alone a "death spiral." As Mother Jones' Kevin Drum notes, insurance companies always request large rate increases, and they will in the end be more reasonable. Further, Drum notes, more people are likely to continue paying their subsidized premiums in the future because the penalty for not having insurance will increase this year.
But Hollingsworth doesn't bother to tell you that either. That's the standard of reporting CNS has these days.
NEW ARTICLE: Silence Equals Assent Topic: WorldNetDaily
WorldNetDaily has so far refused to respond to our documentation of how its racially charged rhetoric may have influenced Charleston shooter Dylann Roof. Is that an admission that we're right? Read more >>
At CNS, 'Honky' Is Unprintable Topic: CNSNews.com
In a July 1 CNS blog post, Melanie Hunter highlights a "Nightly Show" clip in which "actor Joe Morton, who plays Rowan Pope or Papa Pope on ABC’s 'Scandal,' used a racial slur to describe Confederate flag supporters during an impromptu in character monologue."
That slur? It's apparently so offensive to Hunter and CNS that she can't even bear to type out the word.
In her transcription of Morton's monologue, she notes that he (in character) referred to white supportersd of the Confederate flag as "h---- m----- f-----." We'll grant Hunter the "m----- f-----" -- CNS does claim to be a family publication, after all -- but what's that other word that she apparently thinks rises to the level of the N-word in unprintability?
Honky.
The MRC-doctored clip of Morton rather clumsily drops the audio on the offending phrase, but the clip at Comedy Central confirms that Morton did indeed say "honky."
Sure, "honky" is a racial slur, but is it really so offensive to white people -- or anyone, really -- that it must be relegated to H-word status? Who even says the word these days in a manner other than invoking 1960s black radicalism or channeling George Jefferson? We're not aware of anyone who puts the word on that kind of footing -- including CNS itself.
CNS published the word in its full glory in a July 2014 column by Matt Barber in an anti-liberal rant over the Hobby Lobby decision:
Addressing the high court's Hobby Lobby decision last Tuesday, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., fumed, "We have so much to do this month, but the one thing we're going to do during this work period - sooner rather than later - is to ensure that women's lives are not determined by virtue of five white men."
To which Justice Clarence Thomas replied, "Say what, honky?"
So, in CNS' eyes, is "honky" a word only white people can use, like some complain that the N-word can only be used by blacks?
And as Wikipedia notes, "honky-tonk" can be considered a derivative of the "honky" insult. So does that mean at CNS, honky-tonks are now known as "h---- -tonks"? Or "caucasian-tonks"?
And conservatives complain about alleged liberal political correctness.
Gay Marriage Derangement Syndrome, Mychal Massie Edition Topic: WorldNetDaily
Anyone one who believes homosexuals do not have an end game that has yet to be accomplished “have eyes and see not,” and “have ears and hear not.” Homosexuals are not after equality; they, not unlike Muslims, are after conquest – and just like all terrorists, they have carefully conceived a plan they’ve been carrying out by any means available. But unlike Muslim terrorists, they are not patient, and that may well be their downfall – but I get ahead of myself.
The recent Supreme Court ruling dictated that regardless of one’s faith or personal convictions, we must now accept homosexuality. But therein is the bastardization of the truth. The homosexual agenda is not about just forcing America to embrace homosexuality. It is much more insidious than that – and your federal government not only knows this, but they are complicit in this Erebusic agenda.
[...]
The evidence and research show that the lesbians and transgenders are the useful idiots pursuant to the true homosexual agenda. I further believe that their use of the civil rights struggles of blacks was nothing more than an ends to a means.
My contention is that the true homosexual goal is a nation of male sodomites. If I am right, it is one of the greatest insipid and draconian acts of treachery perpetrated against a civilized society since the beginning of time.
Satan never comes to the table without an end game beyond that which is clearly visible. From my reading of the homosexual manifesto and “Redeeming of the Rainbow,” I have reached the conclusion that the homosexual agenda is 100 percent about homosexual men. It is not about lesbians and the transgendered as such, and it most certainly has nothing to do with concern for blacks.
It is much more sinister than that. I believe the homosexual agenda’s secretive end game is a country of homosexuals – not lesbians and not the transgendered. They are not unlike the mythical “purebred” vampires of celluloid fame, who look down upon all who are not singularly homosexual.
You don’t have to take my word for it. Read their manifesto, the book and the articles I referenced above in totality and see for yourself.
WND Dances to Arpaio's Birther Tune Again Topic: WorldNetDaily
WorldNetDaily and Sheriff Joe Arpaio have long been in cahoots when it comes to promoting birther conspiracy theories. After all, it was a birther lecture by WND's Jerome Corsi to a tea party group in Arizona that was designed to manipuate Arpaio into launching a "cold case posse" to examine Barack Obama's birth certificate -- a posse that included Corsi as one of its members, thus guaranteeing it could never be fair or comprehensive.
While both WND's birtherism and the posse's activities have dropped considerably after Obama's re-election -- which WND's birther obsession was intended to prevent -- It's never stopped completely, WND has never admitted its birther conspiracies have been completely discredited, and the posse's incompetence has been demonstrated by former posse member Brian Reilly.
WND has no problem playing up the birther conspiracy when it feels like doing so, and a radio interview with Arpaio by WND re[porter (and birther) Aaron Klein provided the perfect opportunity, as a July 5 WND article documents:
In a radio interview broadcast Sunday, Arizona Sheriff Joe Arpaio affirmed he is “pretty well convinced” President Obama’s birth certificate, as released by the White House in 2011, is a “fraudulent, fake document.”
“I’ve been in law enforcement 55 years,” stated Arpaio. “I think I know a fraudulent, fake document. I’m not a computer expert. I rely on my people. But I’m pretty well convinced it’s a fake document.”
The famous sheriff was being interviewed for “Aaron Klein Investigative Radio,” broadcast on New York’s AM 970 The Answer and Philadelphia’s NewsTalk 990 AM.
The clip Kelin and Arpaio accompanying the article is a short one, so we can assume that Klein couldn't be bothered to ask Arpaio about the following:
The documentation that what Arpaio, posse leader Mike Zullo and other birthers have claimed as evidence that the online version of Obama's birth certificate released by the White House is a manufactured fraud -- the various layers in the PDF document -- are easily reproduced by using a common Xerox scanner to scan in the document.
Arpaio's admission in the documentary "The Joe Show" that the only reason he latched onto the birther movement was to generate donations to his own re-election campaigns.
The statement by former posse member Reilly that Hawaii's verification of Obama's birth certificate constitutes sufficient proof that Obama is a "natural born citizen" -- and puts the lie to any claim by Arpaio that the investigation is fair and designed to clear Obama.
But Klein, being the birther that he is, is sticking to WND's policy of not admitting the birthers were ever wrong, even as the evidence continues to pile up. And he no doubt helped Arpaio convince a few more suckers to donate to Arpaio's campaign.