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Wednesday, January 16, 2019
MRC's Bozell & Graham Hint That Khashoggi's Murder By Saudis Was Justified
Topic: Media Research Center

The Media Research Center largely stayed away from the right-wing conspiracy-mongering surrounding murdered journalist Jamal Khashoggi. But no more, apparently. MRC bigwigs Tim Graham and Brent Bozell devoted their Jan. 4 column to attacking Khashoggi over something else.

In a CYA effort, the pair graciously concede that killing journalists is bad: "The gruesome murder of Saudi dissident journalist Jamal Khashoggi shredded the idea that Saudi Arabian royalty should be praised for reforming itself. Princes who chop political opponents into little pieces are not nice people." Having got that nicety out of the way, they grouse: "That said, puh-leeze stop it with the adoration of a man who deserves none of it."

Graham and Bozell's bone of contention is that the Washington Post, for whom Khashoggi wrote columns criticizing Saudi Arabia, was apparently collaborating with officials from Qatar, which the duo make sure to inform us is "a nemesis of Saudi Arabia," and that the Post "buried these facts in paragraph 19 on page A-14, in a massive 5,000-word story," when it "deserved to be the lede." They then huff: "So Khashoggi was railing against one set of authoritarians ... with the research assistance and 'drafting' and "shaping" of another set. This doesn't make his ruthless murder any less heinous. But it ought to curtail all the 'Free Thinker Just Bearing Witness' rubbish."

It sure sounds like Graham and Bozell are trying to justify Khashoggi's murder, if only because they hate the Post so much.


Posted by Terry K. at 2:43 PM EST
WND's Erik Rush Adds Hermain Cain Revisionism To His Obama Derangement
Topic: WorldNetDaily

Erik Rush starts off his Jan. 2 WorldNetDaily column by ranting about newly elected Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and her "Green New Deal," which he dismisses as a "hideous legislative package." Soon enough, Rush is having yet another fit of Obama derangement:

If you consider the aggregate of grounds upon which people vote for candidates, Barack Obama was elected as our president in 2008 for no other reason than his status as an ethnic minority. His high crimes and unconstitutional measures and those of certain of his surrogates and cabinet members were overlooked by his detractors for the same reason. Even his political opponents were loath to criticize or condemn him despite his gross deficiencies, because none wanted to risk being labeled as racists; indeed, this was borne out with any who did dare to do so.

We have this dynamic to thank for the passage of Obamacare, which is financially damaging (if not crippling) Americans to this day. Crimes attendant to the Fast and Furious gunrunning scandal, the IRS nonprofit-targeting scandal, the NSA domestic spying scandal, Benghazi and a host of others were handily ignored on the same basis.

Most importantly, it was known well in advance of his election by avowed lefties and closeted socialists in the GOP that Obama would be given this latitude simply because he was black. This is why he was positioned to run for the office in the first place.

From there, it was a quick trip to some revisionist history:

The same rationale can be applied to why the Beltway machine was so threatened by Herman Cain during the 2012 election cycle, and why they saw it as an imperative to take him out of the running decisively and early on. Like Donald Trump, Cain was a true outsider – and worse, he was black. In their eyes, it was entirely conceivable that voters might jump one black ship for another, because it was already plain at the time that Obama’s governance was abysmal. A vote for Cain would have allowed voters to save face in the name of diversity, but his election would have derailed the statist agenda for at least four years.

So, a sex scandal was concocted to knock Herman Cain off of the campaign trail, and it worked. Those who followed the story may recollect strong indicators that the Cain sex scandal originated with GOP operatives rather than Democrats.

But Cain's sex scandal wasn't "concocted" -- it was very real. While the article to which Rush links lists only allegations and places them as equivalent to allegations against Bill Clinton and John Edwards (which he would never describe as "concocted"), it's indisputable that two women who accused Cain of sexual harassment while he was head of the National Restaurant Association received a total of $80,000 in settlement money.

Looks like Rush is doing the concocting here.


Posted by Terry K. at 1:29 AM EST
Tuesday, January 15, 2019
Shocker: CNS' Jeffrey Finally Calls Out GOP For Contributing to Federal Debt
Topic: CNSNews.com

We've documented how CNSNews.com editor in chief Terry Jeffrey has been quick to blame Democrats for running up the national debt while refusing to call out Republicans for their roles in running up that same debt. Shockingly, Jeffrey has finally gotten around to specifically laying blame where it deserves.

Weirdly presented as his weekly column instead of a "news" article like most of his debt-related tirades, Jeffrey headlined his Jan. 9 piece "Republican House Increased Debt $7.9 Trillion in 8 Years." He even calls out his favorite president, Donald Trump, in doing so:

The recently deposed Republican majority increased the federal debt by $7.9 trillion in the eight years it controlled the House of Representatives.

At the close of business on Jan. 4, 2011, the day before the Republicans took control of the House, the debt was $14,014,049,043,294.41, according to the Treasury.

On Jan. 3, 2019, the last day before the Republicans turned control of the House back to the Democrats, the debt closed at $21,929,258,046,653.58.

So, under the Republican House majorities in four Congresses, the debt climbed $7,915,209,003,359.17.

That works out to approximately $989,401,125,420 per year, or $2,710,688,015 per day, or $112,945,334 per hour, or $1,882,422 per minute.

In fact, under the Republican-controlled House, the federal debt increased at an average rate of $31,374 per second.

Some Republicans may claim they should not be blamed for the massive increase in the federal debt during the eight years they controlled the House. They may say: "For four of those eight years, the Democrats controlled the Senate." Or: "For six of those eight years, Barack Obama was president."

But the Constitution says, "No Money shall be drawn from the Treasury, but in Consequence of Appropriations made by Law."

And no law may be enacted unless it passes the House.

A Republican-majority House approved every one of the federal spending laws enacted over the past eight years.

Not only that, but all of the spending laws enacted since Jan. 20, 2017, when President Donald Trump was inaugurated, have been approved by a Republican-majority House, a Republican-majority Senate and a Republican president.

That was the first half of Jeffrey's column; the latter half was devoted to arguing that "The federal debt did not climb by nearly a trillion dollars a year under a Republican-controlled House because the government did not tax enough. It climbed because the government spent too much.


Posted by Terry K. at 9:33 PM EST
Rashida Tlaib Derangement Syndrome, WND Edition
Topic: WorldNetDaily

Rashida Tlaib is a Palestinian-American who ran unopposed and became one of the first two Muslim women elected to Congress alongside Ilhan Omar, D-MN (a Somali-American elected in 2016). Democrats also elected Kyrsten Sinema, the first openly bi-sexual elected to the U.S. Senate. The newly elected Senator from Arizona refused to be sworn in on a Bible.

Rashida Tlaib, Ocasio-Cortez, Ilhan Omar and Kyrsten Sinema are a new breed of radical Democrats hell-bent on trying to destroy this president. Tlaib and Ocasio-Cortez belong to the Democratic Socialists of America – an anti-American group that has no respect for the U.S. Constitution. These extremist Democrats are not interested in working with President Trump or Republicans to end the government shutdown and secure the southern border with Mexico. Their goal is to impeach this president and undermine the rule of law. They want bigger government, higher taxes, open borders, and they embrace radical Islamists and want to weaken the U.S. military. Their socialist agenda is evil, and it’s antithetical to everything that makes America the greatest and freest nation on this side of Heaven. We cannot allow them to succeed!

[...]

Newly elected Democrats are more radical than their predecessors. Lowlife Democrats like Rashida Tlaib and Ocasio-Cortez have no respect for the rule of law. They abhor the constitution and the Judeo-Christian values that shaped this great nation. If we continue electing socialists, Muslims and pro-open border politicians who refuse to enforce our laws and protect our sovereignty – we will lose more American lives and eventually lose our country.

-- Jesse Lee Peterson, Jan. 6 WorldNetDaily column

And so we have Rashida Tlaib, a 42-year-old Democrat, a lawyer, elected to Congress with 163 thousand votes from the 13th District in Michigan – one of the poorest sections of that state.

Most Americans outside of Michigan didn’t follow the election, so we had no idea of what Ms. Tlaib was like – at least until last Thursday night, after the new members of Congress were sworn in.

At a gathering that evening, she was feeling her oats with the victory and told the crowd that she told her son about winning and what would happen: “We’re going to go in there and we’re going to impeach the motherfu***r!”

Whew! Them’s fightin’ words, no matter where you’re from! But coming from a woman, a Muslim, just elected to Congress and just hours after her swearing-in, against a man who was elected president with 63 million votes – shows an ego and brashness she’s been hiding under her hijab.

[...]

If you’ve wondered if politics has scraped the bottom of the barrel, this is the proof.

-- Barbara Simpson, Jan. 6 WND column

Rep. Tlaib is the first female Palestinian-American in Congress and a Muslim. She planned to take the oath of office using former President Thomas Jefferson’s own Quran – changing her mind after she may have learned that his copy of Islam’s holy book helped persuade Jefferson to launch all-out war against the Islamist Barbary pirates.

One of Rep. Tlaib’s first acts as a national lawmaker reportedly was to modify a world map in her office to replace “Israel” with a state named “Palestine.”

[...]

How did a leftist Muslim from the Detroit area win seats in the Michigan legislature and now in Congress? Michigan has roughly 300,000 Arab-Americans, the highest proportion of any state, and two-thirds of them live in the four counties of the Detroit area.

This ethnic population is a magnet for more Arab immigrants, and a money magnet for Democratic candidates such as John Kerry who come fundraising and in search of Arab-American votes. Kerry, for example, gave a targeted speech to this audience condemning Israel and its wall that has successfully thwarted terrorism.

Henry Ford recruited “as far abroad as Iraq and Syria to find enough workers to assemble his cars,” Craig R. Smith and I wrote in our book “The Great Withdrawal,” and “imported the ancestors of today’s sizable Michigan Arab-American population.”

[...]

Tlaib was elected in Michigan’s 13th Congressional District, the third-poorest district in the United States. For 53 years it was represented by radical leftist Democrat John Conyers. Conyers’ website included a button that instantly translated everything from English to Arabic to serve his large ethnic voter base; Tlaib’s congressional website will almost certainly do likewise.

-- Lowell Ponte, Jan. 1 WND column


Posted by Terry K. at 4:47 PM EST
MRC's Sports Blogger Goes Into Cognitive Dissonance Mode Again Over Ray Lewis
Topic: NewsBusters

Mysterious NewsBusters sports blogger Jay Maxson just loves how former NFL star Ray Lewis is so religious -- so much, in fact, that Maxson conveniently forgets Lewis' involvement in a double murder that he ultimately plea-bargained down to obstruction of justice, and that Lewis has yet to come fully clean about his involvement in the deaths.

Maxson went into cognitive dissonance mode again in a Jan. 3 post complaining that a "lefty" sports blog called Awful Announcing "shamed" Lewis "for his faith." Maxson was mad that Awful Announcing pointed out how Lewis "uses every opportunity to talk about how religious and holier-than-thou he is," specifically claiming that current NFL star Odell Beckham Jr. "has removed God from his life" in relation to a off-the-field incident involving a model and "potential drugs" that did not result in any league sanctions against Beckham.

Maxson also noted another of the blog's slams against Lewis: "Ah, yes, the man known for his guilty plea to obstruction of justice after the murders of two men really should be the life counselor to a man who has never been criminally charged with anything." But Maxson strangely let that pass without comment, declining to address the conflict between his involvement in that crime and his current "holier-than-thou" status.

Maxson doesn't seem to understand it's not necessarily about Lewis being an judgmental religious man now, it's that he has never reconciled that religiosity with his violent past, let alone fully make amends for it. Unless Maxson can address that issue, perhaps he/she should stop whining about people criticizing Lewis for being overly religious.


Posted by Terry K. at 12:49 AM EST
Monday, January 14, 2019
Mitt Romney Derangement Syndrome
Topic: Newsmax

Borrowing several of the tropes from the Democrats, writing an op-ed in The Washington Post, the house journal of the liberal establishment, Romney virtue-signaled his approval of some of the president’s policies, but curiously lambasted Mr. Trump’s failure to live up to the "mantle" of the presidency.

Romney cited Trump's "words and actions."

Sen. Romney was rather unspecific in his smearing of the president, though he did claim that "A president should unite us and inspire us to follow 'our better angels.'"

The implication seemed to be that Donald Trump has not done this, but one sympathetic to the president and his promise to "Make America Great Again," along with his administration’s superb economic accomplishments, could certainly see where the Lincolnesque appeal to "our better angels" was a part of Trump’s appeal.

Say what one might about Donald Trump, he does follow the rules. He has not ignored adverse court rulings or administrative pronouncements, and he has only sought to implement his policies through adherence to the traditional prerogatives of his office, and working with Republicans in Congress to obtain his legislative goals.

Romney’s op-ed made clear that he cannot be counted on to aid this president’s efforts.

[...]

By now seeking to cast obloquy on Mr. Trump, Sen. Romney has not only engaged in the kind of mendacity routinely employed by the President’s Democratic critics, but he seems to be putting his own desire for notice and purported integrity ahead of his loyalty to his party and his president.

Blind adherence to a leader is, of course, not always wise, but where, as is true of President Trump, he is doing the very things he promised.

Where those very things gained him an Electoral College majority, one would think the senators of his own party would support him, as Lindsay Graham, R-S.C., and Rand Paul, R-Ky., former senatorial critics, now appear to be doing.

Mitt Romney’s op-ed is profoundly disappointing, unwise, and disloyal. It can only please Mr. Trump’s enemies.

-- Stephen B. Presser, Jan. 7 Newsmax column


Posted by Terry K. at 6:35 PM EST
CNS Obsesses Over Congresswoman Using Swear Word In A Bar
Topic: CNSNews.com

When newly elected Rep. Rashida Tlaib declared of President Trump at a party at a bar with other activists that she'd like to "impeach the motherfucker," CNSNews.com was ON IT.

Susan Jones kicked off the tsk-tsking in a Jan. 4 article noting that the "consensus" at CNN was that Tlaib "had gone too far." She also cited an op-ed Tlaib co-wrote discussing the need to impeach Trump in which she asked, "This is not just about Donald Trump. This is about all of us. What should we be as a nation? Who should we be as a people?" Jones lectured in response: "Tlaib has made it clear that she and others who agree with her should be the ones to answer those questions -- not the voters who elected Trump."

The same day, Craig Bannister lamented that House Speaker Nancy Pelosi "said she has no intention of trying to limit the vulgarity of her party."

Two days later, CNS seemed to have settled on a strategy on referencing Tlaib's comment about Trump in the headline and/or lead paragraph of every story it published on her.

An anonymously written Jan. 6 article had to go back seven years, to a 2012 speech she made as a Michigan state legislator, to find something to attack Tlaib with in addition to her Trump comment. The headline reads "Rep. Tlaib Who Called Trump ‘Motherf*****: ‘Stop Having Sex With Us, Gentlemen. Find Somebody Else to Do It With’," and the lead paragraph restates that Tlaib is "the newly elected congresswoman who last week called President Donald Trump a 'motherf****r'."

A Jan. 7 article by Patrick Goodenough again restated that Tlaib is "the new congresswoman from Michigan who last week called President Trump a 'motherf****r'." The same day, an anonymously written article broke with the pattern by not referencing the Trump statement at all but, rather, highling that she "told the New York Times in August that her 'Allah is she.'"

That's five articles in four days after Tlaib made her Trump statement. But CNS wasn't done.

On Jan. 8, Bannister highlighted how Democratic Sen. Joe Manchin claimed to offer an apology to "all Americans" for Tlaib's "deplorable" comments.

An anonymously written Jan. 11 article resumed the pattern by carrying the headline "Rep. Rashida—Trump’s a ‘Motherf*****’—Tlaib Gives First Floor Speech—on Drunk Driving" and stating in the lead paragraph that Tlaib is "the newly elected congresswoman who stirred controversy by calling President Donald Trump a 'mother*****.'" -- even though that had nothing to do with the subject of the article, which summarized her first House floor speech on the subject of drunk driving.

And yet another anonymously written article, on Jan. 14, carried the headline "Rep. Rashida (Trump’s a ‘Motherf*****’) Tlaib Says ‘Congress Will Never be the Same’ With Her in It" and stated in the lead parafraph that Tlaib "gained significant publicity for declaring President Donald Trump as “mother*****.'"The anonymous CNS writer didn't note that this was the seventh article CNS had published since that remark was made -- six of which referenced the remark and five of which put the remark in the headline even though most of those article were not about the remark.

In other words, CNS itself is going out of its way to give Tlaib's remarks "significant publicity." It's hypocritical for it to complain about that.

By contrast, CNS was much more deferential to a Republican politician to similarly used a swear word. After President Trump reportedly used the term "shithole countries" in reference to other countries from which immigration is purportedly undesirable, Jones uncritically repeated a statement from Trump denying he used the word, and later claimed that "not everyone is distracted by the president's poor word choice," citing Fox News host Tucker Carlson's assertion that "Trump said something that almost every person in America actually agrees with."


Posted by Terry K. at 2:33 PM EST
Updated: Monday, January 14, 2019 6:13 PM EST
NEW ARTICLE -- Slanties 2019: Into the Slantie-Verse
Topic: The ConWeb
As the web the ConWeb weaves continues to spread under new writer Donald Trump, it's time once again to highlight the worst ConWeb reporting and craziest ConWeb opinions of the year. Read more >>

Posted by Terry K. at 9:26 AM EST
Sunday, January 13, 2019
MRC's Acosta Derangement Syndrome
Topic: Media Research Center

The Media Research Center absolutely despises CNN correspondent Jim Acosta. So it's no surprise that it spend the end of 2018 and the beginning of 2019 nurturing that hate.

The MRC's leading Acosta-basher, Curtis Houck, served up a year-end article on the "worst Acosta moments of 2018," unprofessionally sneering in the headline, "Jimmy, Jim, Jim" and rehashing thte MRC's cheering on attacks on Acosta by the Trump White House and attendees at Trump rallies.

In a Jan. 8 post, Nicholas Fondacaro huffed that it was "obnoxious" for Acosta to point out that, in reference to President Trump's prime-time address calling the situation at the souther border "a crisis of the heart, a crisis of thte soul," the Trump administration's policy of jailing children seized on the border was heartless and soulless.Fondacaro further whined: "CNN has become so entrenched in their Trump Derangement Syndrome, that they’re 'fact-checking' whether or not the President has feelings and emotions like a normal human being."

On Jan. 10, P.J. Gladnick insisted that Acosta underwent a "hilarious self-owning" by pointing out that there were parts of the U.S.-Mexico border that did not have a steel-slat fence and there was no "national emergency" there.Gladnick concluded: "Exit question: How long before @realDonaldTrump retweets Acosta accidentally making the case for why a border wall (or steel slat fence) is needed?"

Gladnick got his wish, and pathological Acosta-hater Houck couldn't have been happier, unable to stop gushing:

A day after a trollish tweet for the ages that united people across the right side of the aisle against the media for a day-long dunk squad session, President Trump responded to a question Friday afternoon from CNN chief White House correspondent/carnival barker Jim Acosta by telling him “good job” on his Twitter videos on Thursday in McAllen, Texas that inadvertently made the case for a border wall.

Houck concluded of Trump's bashing of Acosta: "Oh snap!" Is such juvenile ranting and derangement any way for a professional "media researcher" to behave?

Houck further showed his immaturity in a post headlined "Watch Tucker Carlson Mercilessly Lampoon Jim Acosta for His Epic Self-Own at the Border," which slobbered voer "Carlson’s Hall-of-Fame-worthy tomfoolery." What Hall of Fame? Houck never enlightens us -- he's more obsessed with finding any excuse to attack Acosta then to raise even the meekest objection to Carlson's sympathy for white nationalism.

UPDATE: We missed one bit of Acosta derangement from Houck last week. Under the clickbaity, hyperbolic headline "BOOM! Kellyanne Conway Nukes ‘Smart***’ Jim Acosta When He Delivers Low Blow," Houck declared:

Speaking to reporters Tuesday afternoon on the West Lawn of the White House, near to where the networks have their cameras setup for live shots, White House counselor Kellyanne Conway demolished CNN chief White House correspondent Jim Acosta for being a “smartass most of the time.”

This came in response to when, instead of continuing to ask questions about the President’s primetime address, Acosta went personal and attacked Conway by chiding how Trump doesn’t have an “alternative facts problem like you do.”

Interesting that Houck doesn't think Conway's insult of Acosta was a "low blow," and that Acosta didn't "nuke" Conway by accurately pointing out her "alternative facts problem." That's what Acosta Derangement Syndrome does, apparently.


Posted by Terry K. at 10:23 PM EST
Updated: Friday, January 18, 2019 5:57 PM EST
Your Monthly CNS Stenography Tally, Year-End Edition
Topic: CNSNews.com

How did CNSNews.com finish out the year in stenography for its favorite sources? Let's tally up the numbers for December.

Judicial Watch: 0

Franklin Graham: 2

Plus a bonus item rehashing a 2014 post quoting Graham's father, Billy Graham.

Mark Levin: 6

In addition, CNS published two posts touting the merger of Levin's CRTV with Glenn Beck's The Blaze  (though without mentioning controversial CRTV hosts like Gavin McInnes and Eric Bolling), as well as Levin receiving an "Impact Award" from the right-wing group United in Purpose, which was so important to CNS that it reported this a day before before reporting on its publisher, Brent Bozell, receiving the same reward.

White House press secretary, by Melanie Arter: 2

(Arter reported on the only press briefing Sanders held in December.)

Year-end totals for 2018

  • Judicial Watch: 46
  • Franklin Graham: 31
  • Mark Levin: 135
  • WH press secretary: 84

One has to wonder: How much did Levin pay CNS to tout him at least once every three days?


Posted by Terry K. at 4:01 PM EST
Updated: Sunday, January 13, 2019 4:02 PM EST
Saturday, January 12, 2019
What LGBT Stuff Is The MRC Freaking Out About Now?
Topic: Media Research Center

The anti-LGBT freakouts at the Media Research Center keep on piling up.

Annie Piper complained that the Thanksgiving episode of "This Is Us" "was a heartwarming Thanksgiving episode - that is, until one head-turning scene." That would be when, according to Piper, a 10-year-old character apparently came out as gay, though all that actually happened was that an adult said to the girl that she's growing up and could talk to her about her "first boyfriend," to which the girl responds, "or girlfriend."

Nevertheless, Piper went into freakout mode: "It isn’t enough for TV shows to push the LGBTQ agenda on adults, now they’re pushing it on kids who really shouldn’t be trusting their inhibitions and feelings at such a young age."

Gabriel Hays got all huffy over Angela Ponce, the transgender contestant from Spain at the Miss Universe Pageant: "Regardless of how anyone feels about Ponce’s gender-bending campaign, betting on her is probably a smart move, considering the showbiz industry is doubling down on an LGBTQ agenda by the hour. Ponce herself has claimed that such a whirlwind victory would be of utmost importance “to promote gender diversity and equality.”

When Ponce failed to place, Karen Townsend was around to complain not only that she "was awarded her very own segment during the show" but that it wasn't fully in English, as apparently all meaningful TV is supposed to be: "Plus size supermodel Ashley Graham narrated a segment about Ponce’s time in the spotlight and subtitles were used as Ponce only spoke in Spanish. It’s all about diversity and acceptance, y’all."

Townsend then lectured: "Contrary to what Miss Spain claims, a person’s body at birth does indeed determine the sex of a child. It’s all pretty basic science. You might even say that this science is settled. There are only two sexes of human beings. An operation that mutilates body parts doesn’t change that."

But the MRC still wasn't done whining about Ponce: Brad Wilmouth intentionally misgenders her in complaining that one show "took the time to celebrate the first time that a transgender contestant has gotten to participate in the Miss Universe pagent even though he ended up losing."

Wilmouth later complained that "On NBC Nightly News on Christmas night, the show devoted a full report to the story of a lesbian couple in Illinois whose gay pride flag was stolen from outside their home." That's pretty much all there is to that, though Wilmouth does go on to whine that this story was covered while "ignoring the story of a Muslim who is also black committing a hate crime."

The mysterious Jay Maxson was outraged that a writer criticized Chick-fil-a's sponsorship of the Peach Bowl because it supports, in Maxson's words, "organizations devoted to God’s design for sexual intimacy through the context of marriage." Maxon then huffed that the writer thinks "Chick-fil-A's sponsorship of the Peach Bowl and events like the Pittsburgh Marathon represent a sports world that puts money over the well-being of a demographic whose suicide rate and rate of self-harm should be alarming to everyone. As if Chick-fil-A is responsible for the individual decisions made by people who choose not to follow biblical values."


Posted by Terry K. at 11:01 AM EST
Transgender Derangement Syndrome, WND Edition
Topic: WorldNetDaily

First, when you watch the video, it’s immediately clear that the customer is a man who identifies as a woman. He is “sir” by birth, even if he now identifies as female.

Listen to his voice and look at his face.

He can take hormones and grow breasts. He can surgically alter other parts of his body.

That still does not make him “ma’am.”

This is not to deny that some men have very feminine characteristics, by nature, and that some women have very masculine characteristics, again, by nature.

It is just to say that this transgender woman is not a biological female. This “sir” is not “ma’am.”

[...]

Of course, there are women who carry guns and women who start fights and women who say, “Let’s take this outside!”

But when you watch the video from the game store and when you watch the Ben Shapiro video, once thing is abundantly clear. These are males, not females, as their chromosomes and cells will attest.

As we come to the end of 2018, it’s good to remind ourselves of these realities.

As much as we have compassion on those who genuinely struggle with their gender identity. As much as we do not minimize their pain. As much as we want them to find wholeness. We do not collaborate with social madness.

And I say that with all respect, sir.

-- Michael Brown, Dec. 31 WorldNetDaily column

Surgery that alters one’s appearance doesn’t change a person’s sex – it changes their appearance. Putting on a wig and a dress doesn’t change one’s sexual identity any more than putting on a baseball uniform makes someone a baseball player.

Therein is the damnable lie of transgenderism. A person can undergo surgery, butchering his or her body to falsely shape it into that which it was not created, but that doesn’t change what they were born. It only changes the way they look. Trying to walk, talk and adopt behavioral characteristics of the sex you were not born is an effort in futility. It makes one a pretender; it doesn’t change sex.

We need not do anything to remain as we were born, but to alter our appearance into something else requires surgery, massive amounts of drugs, prosthetics and psychological counseling. It requires learning how to pretend to be what one was not born, from speech to walking and sitting.

A man wearing women’s clothing or a woman wearing men’s clothing cannot dictate that you or I reference them as what they clearly are not. A woman wearing men’s clothing and making every effort to conceal her breasts is still a woman. A man altering his voice, wearing makeup and women’s clothing is still a man. There can be no law that threatens you or me with legal action because we refuse to engage in others’ psychosis.

Ergo, threatening me or anyone else with bullying tactics intended to advance this false narrative is worthy of condemnation in the strongest possible terms.

Transgender activists are pushing what amounts to nothing less than an assault against you, myself and everyone else who refuses to embrace the lie that a person either by surgery or irrational thought can change the sex he or she was born. They are attempting to use judicial terrorism to force us into recognizing their deviancy as normal.

-- Mychal Massie, Dec. 31 WND column


Posted by Terry K. at 1:05 AM EST
Friday, January 11, 2019
CNS Managing Editor Omits Crucial Info In Contraceptive Article
Topic: CNSNews.com

CNSNews.com managing editor Michael W. Chapman does his best to ramp up the dread in a Jan. 2 blog post:

Grace Marwick, a former law student and now insurance claims handler, revealed that she developed a blood clot on her lung as a result of taking the contraceptive pill and, if the doctors had not uncovered the problem when they did, it could have caused her to suffer a stroke or killed her, reported the New York Post and several British papers on Jan. 1. 

Marwick was a law school student in Ipswich, Suffolk, about 80 miles north of London in 2015. In May of that year, the doctor's office at the school prescribed her the pill Gederel 30/150 as a form of contraception.

Chapman obviously seized upon this item to indict all contraception as harmful. Just one problem: Marwick's story doesn't actually fit Chapman's narrative.One hint of that is Marwick's message about her experience, which Chapman waits until the final paragrapf of his host to note: "I just want to warn other women and encourage them to be careful and to go straight to the doctor’s if they have any unusual symptoms at all."

But the key piece of evidence is something Chapman ignores completely. Both the New York Post and Daily Mail articles to which Chapman links make this important note: Marwick is now taking a different contraceptive pill, which she says "seems to be fine."

In other words, Marwick's incident was an unfortunate side effect of a specific pill -- indeed, packaging for Gederel 30/150 lists a slightly elevated risk of a blood clot as a possible side effect.

Chapman's attempt to implicitly smear all oral contraceptives as dangerous by withholding crucial information from his readers shows that he cares more about advancing a right-wing agenda than telling the truth.


Posted by Terry K. at 1:53 PM EST
WND Touts 'Neo-Nazi Lawyer's' Frivolous Lawsuit Against SPLC
Topic: WorldNetDaily

The headline on the anonymously written Jan. 3 WorldNetDaily article sure sounds ominous: "SPLC sued for targeting, destroying lawyer's career." The lead paragraph goes even further: "The far-left Southern Poverty Law Center, which recently paid out millions of dollars to a target of its 'anti-hate' campaigns, has been sued by a lawyer who claims SPLC paid for stolen documents in an attempt to get him fired and destroy his future work prospects."

After that big beginning, things get strategically vague. There's a lot of ranting about "stolen documents" regarding the lawyer in question, Glen K. Allen. It's not until the eighth paragraph that WND gets somewhat close to identifying the issue at hand:

PJMedia reported Allen previously had purchased books published by the National Alliance and made donations to the group, but “he firmly disavowed the National Alliance.”

The report said he defended the group’s legal rights because “consistently with our American traditions of free expression, freedom of association, and the rule of law, is entitled to legal representation, like other unpopular groups, and should be encouraged to seek it.”

But he denied he is racist and pointed out he’s done considerable work for individuals and groups involving all races.

[...]

SPLC also accused him of being a “neo-Nazi lawyer” and insinuating that the lawyer’s work for the city of Baltimore was racist.

At no point in the article doees WND explain what the National Alliance is, or exactly why Allen is denying he's racist or the whole "neo-Nazi lawyer" thing (the rest of the article is mostly a rehash of right-wing attacks on the SPLC). As the SPLC details, the National Alliance is an aggressively neo-Nazi group whose founder wrote a book called "The Turner Diaries," which inspired Timothy McVeigh to blow up a federal building in Oklahoma City.

The lengthy PJ Media article does a somewhat better job than WND of tying all this together (albeit remaining one-sided and unbalanced). In short: An accountant for the National Alliance gave the group's records to the SPLC, which included the fact that Allen was a dues-paying member of the National Alliance for years, donated at least an additional $500 to the group and purchased a Holocaust denial DVD and entry to a Holocaust denial conference held by the group, and that at one point he was identified as the group's lawyer. Allen contends that the membership information is stolen property and his association with the group should have remained confidential, and that the revelation of the link has effectively ended his career as a lawyer. Allen also insists that his association with the National Alliance was a "mistake" and denies he's a racist, though PJ Media never presses him on his Holocaust denial beliefs; instead, it whitewashed (as it were) his record by touting how Allen has done work for black youths and tried to volunteer "for a pro bono project to help Holocaust victims obtain compensation."

But PJ Media got strategically vague as well. Of Allen's association with the American Eagle Party, it wrote that the SPLC "also slammed the American Eagle Party as racist, which the lawsuit denounces as a 'fraudulent characterization.'" In fact, the SPLC describes the American Eagle Party as "an offshoot of the racist American Freedom Party" that embraced conspiracy theories but was also "promoted heavily on Stormfront."

So. basically, Allen is not denying his neo-Nazi leanings -- despite his protestations that he's not a racist and that his "present outlook... is a mixture of Ron Paul Libertarianism, First Amendment advocacy and civil debate," his apparently still current American Eagle Party ties appear to belie that -- but, rather, he's mad that they were made public and he can't get a job as a lawyer as a result. Of course, if you're a neo-Nazi and a lawyer, "neo-Nazi lawyer" is not an inaccurate descriptor.

In most cases, the truth is an absolute defense. Allen doesn't seem to understand that, and WND cares only about using Allen's lawsuit to launch a dubious attack on tthe SPLC.


Posted by Terry K. at 1:59 AM EST
Updated: Friday, January 11, 2019 9:24 AM EST
Thursday, January 10, 2019
MRC Roots Through Reporter's Instagram Account To Attack Him As 'Socialist'
Topic: Media Research Center

The Media Research Center's Tim Graham was in fine whining mood in a Dec. 23 post, ranting that a Washington Post profile on Adam McKay, director of the new movie about Dick Cheney, "Vice," was somehow another example of the paper publishing "the most embarrassing laudatory dreck supporting its favorite socialist elites," because McKay considers himself a democratic socialist.

But it wasn't enough for Graham to attack a newspaper or a person it featured. He then went needlessly personal attacked the article's author, Jeff Weiss. Graham declared that "Weiss is such a socialist he posted a happy picture of himself posed with statues of his heroes Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels at the Marx-Engels forum in Berlin, created under the East German communist regime."

Graham apparently spent no small amount of time rooting through Weiss' personal Instragram accounty until he found the photo. Graham provided no other evidence that Weiss is a "socialist" -- indeed, Weiss' Instragram feed shows him to be a music obsessive rather than a political ideologue -- and seems to have discounted the possibility that Weiss was merely a tourist who posed ironically with the statues.

This is how terrible a media critic Graham is -- he has to smear a journalist based on a single Instagram photo in order to own the Washington Post.


Posted by Terry K. at 9:36 PM EST

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