After Gushing Over McEnany, MRC's Houck Gives Thumbs-Down To Psaki As WH Press Secretary Topic: Media Research Center
In sharp contrast to the obsequious and embarrassing fawning and gushing he did over Trump's final White House press secretary, Kayleigh McEnany, Curtis Houck and the rest of the Media Research Center have had their knives out for Biden press secretary Jen Psaki literally from the first day she started on Jan. 20.
That day, Nicholas Fondacaro whined: "As the liberal media were eagerly awaiting the first White House press briefing, chief Washington correspondent Andrea Mitchell spun a false tale about Press Secretary Jen Psaki’s “great reputation” at the State Department. Of course, what they weren’t telling viewers was that her press shop manipulated an official briefing video of Fox News catching them in a lie about the Iran nuclear deal" when she was woking for the State Department in 2016. Fondacaro did not mention thenumerouslies McEnany was caught in during her tenure.
Houck served up a harsh review of Psaki's very first briefing that day and the media covering it:
On Wednesday night, the White House press corps made their embarrassing debut before White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki, going from raging hyenas under Kayleigh McEnany to snoozing lapdogs for Psaki with a combination of boring, straightforward, and unserious questions with only a select few probing queries.
This was in stark contrast to the first briefings from Trump White House Press Secretaries Sean Spicer, Sarah Huckabee Sanders, and Kayleigh McEnany (with Stephanie Grisham never having held an in-person briefing during her tenure).
Houck didn't admit that his assessment was in stark contrast to his own lapdog-esque behavior over McEnany's allegedly sick burns and unveiled contempt of the media she was supposed to be briefing. He then touted biased right-wing reporters who asked biased questions of Psaki:
It was following this walk-in-the-park that Fox News’s Peter Doocy got his chance and asked two of the three toughest questions of the nearly 30 Psaki faced[.]
[...]
The other tough question came from EWTN’s Owen Jensen as he grilled Psaki about what this new administration’s abortion policies will look like:
[...]
Between Doocy and Jensen, note how all three questions were tough, but free of condemnations, juvenile comebacks, and snark. Amazing how so many were unable to do that for four years.
Houck seems genuinely amazed that reporters can ask questions "free of condemnations, juvenile comebacks, and snark" when the press secretary is also free of them.
Houck then took it upon himself to do "reviews" of Psaki's press briefings. His review of Psaki's Jan. 21 briefing shows that he has found a new person to fanboy over in Doocy:
White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki returned for a second briefing late Thursday afternoon and, after Dr. Tony Fauci and the press corps had a friendly, laugh-filled chat about the evils of the Trump administration, she took her turn for yet another relatively pressure-free briefing.
However, Psaki faced a few exceptions, led by the Fox Business Network’s Blake Burman on the Keystone XL pipeline, the Fox News Channel’s Peter Doocy on Amazon and President Biden not wearing a mask at the Lincoln Memorial, and the Las Vegas Review-Journal’s Debra Saunders on religious liberty.
And with the others so pedestrian, we found it worth highlighting those that were actually doing their jobs.
Doocy had two back-and-forths and the first pertained to Biden’s blatant disregard Wednesday night for an executive order he had signed hours earlier mandating mask use on federal land (which would include National Parks).
Of course, Houck demanded "pedestrian" questions from themedia under McEnany and attacked the reporters who asked the kind of questions that he now portrays as them "doing their jobs."
For the Jan. 22 briefing, Houck complained: "Despite the fact that Donald Trump is no longer the President and the liberal media now have their friends returned to the White House, the White House press corps couldn’t shake their Trump addiction. On Friday alone, Trump and his administration were pertinent to roughly 16 out of the 45 questions to Press Secretary Jen Psaki (including 15 of the first 23), according to a NewsBusters count." Houck seems to have forgotten that Trump had very recently been impeached after inciting an insurrection on the Capitol, making it very much a valid subject for questioning.
He concluded by further complaining: "So in the first three Biden White House briefings, we’ve had roasts of the Trump administration (alongside Dr. Tony Fauci), softballs, and now a Trump obsession. It’s quite the opposite of the Trump briefings, which came off like Swamp versions of UFC matches." But Houck will never admit the role that McEnany and the other Trump press secretaries played in creating that atmosphere.
WND Reacts To The Capitol Riot, Part 2 Topic: WorldNetDaily
The liars and traitors who accuse him of inciting riotous behavior are worthy of scorn and contempt. Antifa and Black Lives Matter joined forces in disguising themselves as participants in the Jan. 6 rally, using a peaceful protest as cover to commit violence and more than likely murder as well.
President Trump has held countless rallies across America that were attended by staggering numbers of people at every venue – and there were no riots or violent behavior. Yet the media in association with pusillanimous Republicans are blaming President Trump for something in which he played no role.
[...]
President Trump will always be my president. I will never again support any insider the Republican Party promotes. I take what they have done to my president as a personal insult. They relieved their bowels on me and on all those who believed it right to support a man who held fast to what we believed.
President Trump is now being savaged with the intent to destroy all that he accomplished and to destroy him as a man.
I implore President Trump not to despair. He served with honor and faithfulness to God, country and American interests. We, the thinking People of America, will always remember and applaud your service, Mr. President. And as long as we have life, we will neither forget nor overlook what Republicans and Democrats did to our president. Because what they did to you they did to us.
The left is trying to get rid of President Trump before the end of his term, saying he incited an insurrection in the speech he gave near the White House on Jan. 6. House Democrats have drafted Articles of Impeachment with over 150 sponsors. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi compared Trump's actions to those of President Nixon's in Watergate. Dozens of Democrats and some Republicans are also calling on Vice President Mike Pence and the Cabinet to remove Trump through the 25th Amendment, saying he is no longer fit for office.
[...]
They use a lot of vague, lofty language but are short on specifics. They say he "gravely endangered the security of the United States government." They claim he "threatened the integrity of the democratic system, interfered with the peaceful transfer of power, and imperiled a coordinate branch of government." What do they cite as his dangerous words? Saying he won the election by a landslide. He encouraged "imminent lawless action" that "interfered with the peaceful transition of power." They assert that he will "remain a threat to national security, democracy and the Constitution if allowed to remain in office."
Does this meet the definition of incitement under the criminal code? In the past, Congress has looked to the criminal code to weigh impeachment offenses. The Supreme Court case Clarence Brandenburg v. Ohio established the legal standard for violent speech, which is speech that is "directed to inciting or producing imminent lawless action and is likely to incite or produce such action."
So let's look at what Trump actually said: "I know that everyone here will soon be marching over to the Capitol Building to peacefully and patriotically make your voices heard." This is the opposite of inciting violence. This is speech protected under the First Amendment. In fact it is the heart of free speech, the right to march in political protest.
As for remaining a threat if he stays in office and thwarting the peaceful transition of power, the Democrats failed to mention in their Articles that after the violence started, Trump tweeted twice denouncing it, then followed up with a video denouncing it again. He conceded the election, saying his "focus now turns to ensuring a smooth, orderly and seamless transition of power."
From here on, under their new relentlessly repeated revisionist narrative, Trump will be the American Hitler and every Deplorable a white supremacist. In their minds, and to the Blue Pill Public, this will justify their every action against conservative speech, thought, symbol, organization and person. The reprehensible rhetoric and tactics of the far-left Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) hate group will become public policy. BE WARNED: Especially in the early stage, any militant bluster or bravado from Trump supporters will be characterized as hate speech and/or sedition. Marxist Brownshirts will look eagerly for people to make examples of. If you doubt me, just ask Adolfo Martinez who is serving 16 years in prison for the unforgivable crime of burning a "gay pride" flag.
How can the MAGA movement not just survive the purge but emerge from it stronger when it finally wanes? Use your 20/20 hindsight and consider what you would do if you were a Russian Christian during the Bolshevik takeover of 1917.
On Jan. 6, 2021, a right-wing mob of a few hundred people broke away from a peaceful right-wing protest involving tens, if not hundreds, of thousands of American conservatives and forced its way into the U.S. Capitol. One Capitol policeman was killed after being hit in the head with a fire extinguisher, and one of the right-wing Capitol invaders was shot by a Capitol police officer. (A handful of others who died in the vicinity of the Capitol did so of nonviolent causes.) Aside from smashed windows, the mob seems to have done little damage to the Capitol. Their intent is still not clear. It seems to have been largely catharsis. They hurt no legislators, and if they intended to overthrow the government, they were delusional.
Beginning the next day, the American left used the Capitol mob just as the Nazis used the Reichstag: as an excuse to subjugate its conservative enemies and further squelch civil liberties in America – specifically, freedom of speech.
[...]
Another lie was the immediate labeling of the mob attack on the Capitol as "insurrection." All left-wing media and Democrats now refer to the event as an "insurrection," a term defined by almost every dictionary as "an act or instance of revolting against civil authority or an established government." As morally repulsive as the actions of the mob were, they did not constitute a revolt against civil authority or an established government. Disrupting the work of legislators for a few hours – as wrong as that was – does not constitute a "revolt."
But what proves the left's "insurrection" label is a lie is that Democrats and their media never once labeled the left-wing riots of 2020 – which involved the destruction by fire and/or occupation and vandalizing of police stations, and the establishment of "autonomous zones," which, by definition, revolted against "established governments" – as an "insurrection." The enormous number of businesses burned down, looted or otherwise destroyed was barely covered by the mainstream media, and their violent perpetrators were almost never prosecuted, let alone condemned, as engaging in an insurrection. Dozens of people were killed in these riots, yet there was more outcry and condemnation against the hours-long occupation of the U.S. Capitol than against six months of left-wing violent riots.
Then, like the Nazi regime after the Reichstag fire, the left immediately moved to further curtail civil liberties, specifically conservatives' ability to promote their ideas. Twitter and Amazon made it impossible for the alternative to Twitter, Parler, to exist, all in the name of preventing another right-wing "insurrection."
In the name of the Capitol "insurrection," the Democrats announced they would impeach the president of the United States, though he had only 14 days left in office.
Let me put this bluntly: Those who have not listened personally to Trump's speech on Jan. 6 at the Save America rally, who nevertheless assert as an established fact the narrative put forth by leftist news sources that Trump incited people to riot, are allowing ignorance to set their tongues wagging. We know that news agencies have their own biases and that there is often more to a situation than meets the eye. In a world full of emotional manipulation, lying propaganda and psychological warfare used to stir human passions, how do we look past media hype to arrive at a true picture of particular situations?
[...]
Many of these eyewitnesses testify to how a relatively small group of individuals who did not exhibit the same spirit or, in some cases, even look like the majority of people present, began to cause trouble at the Capitol building. While a small group advanced aggressively on the Capitol and entered it, many others moved away from the building, realizing that something quite evil and wrong was taking place. People were in fact surprised and confused at what they saw happening.
One witness said he heard a troublemaker say to his colleagues, "We need to shake things up so that these people will look bad." A a result of such experiences, many eyewitnesses who were present believe that the small group of rioters was composed – at least, in part – by Antifa members and other violent revolutionary types disguised as Trump supporters. These infiltrated the rally precisely to give the press corps an opportunity to paint Trump supporters as a group of lawless insurrectionists, ready to explode like a stack of dynamite in order to overthrow the government through mob violence. The experience of many eyewitnesses who were present, whose personal testimony contradicts the narrative of the leftist media, needs to be considered.
[...]
The last thing Trump would have wanted, obviously, is for idiots to ruin everything by rioting – which is what some knuckleheads did, either "lunatic fringe" supporters whose contempt for the rule of law finds no support in Trump's speech, or Antifa operatives who disguised themselves as Trump supporters.
Personally, I don't believe for a moment that Trump organized this event to incite acts of violence, vandalism, or insurrection, which makes no sense, if you think about it logically. This is clearly a deceitful narrative created by the left, prior to the facts being fully investigated and known, in order to achieve a political end – to turn public opinion against Trump and his supporters and to provide a pretext for censoring Trump by closing his social media accounts. Their goal is to make Trump look like a dangerous criminal, a lawless insurrectionist, which neither he nor those who support his policies are. That way, Trump's voice and conservative, populist message will be silenced as people feel intimidated to echo that message. Those who rioted were denying everything that the rally and that Trump' s message stood for– which was actually a call for the rule of law to be upheld and to prevail – a goal totally at odds with lawless rioting.
The fallout from last Wednesday will likely continue for a long time. The pitchfork brigade that frightened those in the Capitol for a few hours will likely become the face of "conservatives" on direct mail pieces of the Southern Poverty Law Center and their ilk.
But those inside the Capitol were not typical of the vast majority of conservatives, including those who attended the D.C. rally. Pastor and columnist Larry Tomczak was there.
[...]
One now-repentant participant inside the Capitol is quoted in the New York Post (Jan. 8): "My decision to enter the Capitol was wrong, and I am deeply regretful to have done so. Without qualification and as a peaceful and law-abiding citizen, I condemn the violence and destruction that took place in Washington."
But, of course, if he's looking for forgiveness from the left, he will not find it. There is no redemption from the left.
Senators reneged on their promise to object to the Biden electors from Georgia and elsewhere, but senators have no role under the 12th Amendment to interfere with this process. They relied on the disputed Electoral Count Act of 1887, which even liberal scholars have condemned as unconstitutional.
The various senators who sanctimoniously speak out against Trump now have no constitutional authority to pick the next president, or certify electors. The 12th Amendment is clear: The House of Representatives, convening by state delegation, is required to pick the next president when no candidate has a legitimate majority of the Electoral College.
The same 138 Republicans who properly objected to certifying Biden electors could still meet under the Constitution to rectify the election of the next president. While Pelosi and Democrats are grasping for other provisions of the Constitution to try to destroy the Republican Party in the waning days of Trump's first term, the 27-20 GOP majority by state delegation could reelect him.
[...]
Leftists have taken over the narrative of the rally at the Capitol last Wednesday and completely misrepresented what Trump said, and what his supporters did. Far from the liberal portrayal of a "riot," which has a goal of stealing, vandalizing and injuring, the unarmed protesters were akin to anti-Vietnam War protests of the 1960s, and many similar ones ever since.
When four protesters were shot and killed at Kent State University in 1970, it was considered a national calamity. But the killing at the Capitol of unarmed pro-Trump 14-year Air Force veteran Ashli Babbitt, who had honorably served our country during four tours in Iraq and Afghanistan, is barely mentioned by liberals.
For those of us who saw it, the scene remains embedded upon our psyche, perhaps rekindled as we witness Donald Trump's final days. We see Trump, like the sea captain, left to ponder how his ship of state came to hit an iceberg – his in the form of the Jan. 6 Capitol building break-in by a group of supposedly all pro-Trump supporters – leading to tragedy.
One who probably enjoyed watching the Titanic captain's demise is Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi. As Trump faces his few remaining days in office, his nemesis, Pelosi, plots a similar end for him.
While Trump has accepted< responsibility for hitting his iceberg, the fallout from it is fueled by the same political enemies he fought his entire term.
[...]
Pelosi supposedly is Catholic, although she prioritizes politics over religion by supporting abortion. During Catholic services, attendees make a proclamation from John 14:27, "Peace I leave you, my peace I give unto you." To a heartless witch, this proclamation means nothing, perhaps justifying for Pelosi an appropriate replacement – the letter "w" for the letter "b."
CNSNews.com loves quoting black right-wing activist Candace Owens' conservative rantings, no matter how dubious -- even while it censors the controversies she gets into. Since we last documented this in August, the love has continued, mostly from writer Craig Bannister:
In that last one, posted Dec. 11, Bannister uncritically repeated Owens' claim that "I am not afraid of any virus that has over a 99% survival rate" -- a dishonest argument that callously handwaves the fact that hundreds of thousands of people have died from it.
Bannister let Owens get away with more dishonesty in a Jan. 7 item:
The rise and fall of any nation always follows the same path, Blexit leader and conservative commentator Candace Owens said Wednesday.
Owens tweeted that the progression of a country takes nations through a common sequence of nine stages, the first and last of which are always the same – bondage:
Bondage,
Faith,
Courage,
Liberty,
Abundance,
Selfishness,
Complacency,
Dependence,
Bondage
Attaining abundance is, ironically, the very thing that ultimately proves to be a nation's undoing, Owens appears to suggest in her tweet:
“Nations always progress through the following sequence: From bondage to great faith; From faith to great courage; courage to liberty; liberty to abundance; abundance to selfishness; selfishness to complacency; complacency to dependence; From dependence back into bondage.”
Owens’ Blexit movement seeks to introduce conservative values to the nation’s urban communities.
Bannister presents this as an original thought from Owens -- in fact, it's something that's been bouncing around the internet for years. We first wrote about it back in 2004 when a slightly longer verison of that list of stages had already been bouncing around right-wing email lists since 2000. The words were being attributed to 18th-century Scottish history professor (though there's no actual evidence it originates with him), which evolved somewhere along the line to "Alexander Tyler."
That dishonesty, of course, hasn't stopped Bannister from promoting Owens' alleged pearls of wisdom since then:
NEW ARTICLE: WND Finally Gets Serious About Saving Itself Topic: WorldNetDaily
It's taken nearly two years of begging for money and giving away scammy cybercurrency, but WorldNetDaily has at last done a couple things to try and secure its future. But its business model of publishing fake news and conspiracy theories remains unchanged. Read more >>
MRC's Double Standard On TV Weatherfolks With An Agenda, Continued Topic: Media Research Center
We've documented how the Media Research Center has promoted Fox News weatherperson Janice Dean's rage against New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo, vindictively blaming him for the deaths of relatives residing at a long-term-care facility in the state early in the coronavirus pandemic purportedly because of a policy under Cuomo in which COVID-19 patients were discharged from hospitals to nursing homes -- while dismissing NBC weather guy Al Roker for talking about climate change.
Since then, though, fact-checkers have ruled Dean's claim to be mostly false, since experts believe that the spread of coronavirus in nursing homes was more likely caused by visitors and employees rather than from patients transferred there in an effort to open up hospital space for other victims of the virus. Nevertheless, since we last checked in, the MRC has continued to push Dean's emotional greviances as authoritative.
In August, Curtis Houck wrote that Dean "was set to address a committee of New York legislators investigating the state’s response to the coronavirus pandemic and specifically Governor Andrew Cuomo’s nursing home policy, but she was never given a chance to speak due to fears that her presence would be uncomfortable," going on to tout how "FNC shows have given Dean over 17 minutes of airtime since she was axed from the hearing."
Fox News meteorologist Janice Dean bluntly spoke out on America's Newsroom Monday morning on the International Emmys granting an award to New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo for being a Democrat -- er, for his wonderful COVID briefings. Both of Dean's in-laws died in New York nursing homes from COVID-19 after Cuomo pushed COVID patients into nursing homes to recover.
Fox host Sandra Smith asked Dean for reaction, noting this would be the first Thanksgiving without her in-laws.
[...]
The Washington Examiner reported that in October, Dean joined a throng of protesters who filled a casket placed outside of a Brooklyn nursing home with about 6,500 copies of Cuomo’s new book on the coronavirus.
Graham clearly has no problem with blatant political activism by a supposedly objective news person -- at least, if that person works for Fox News.
Houck returned Jan. 4 to cheer another bout of Dean's activism:
On Monday morning, Fox News senior meteorologist Janice Dean continued her unrelenting fight against Governor Andrew Cuomo (D-NY), penning a lengthy, 3,500-word-plus FoxNews.com item recapping Cuomo’s arrogance, failure to lead, and refusal to admit wrongdoing with his reckless coronavirus nursing home order.
Following an appearance on Fox & Friends, Dean revealed that an attempt to seek comment from Cuomo’s office was met with more bullying and stonewalling instead of admission for why coronavirus patients were placed in nursing homes.
[...]
And with outlets ranging from ABC to CNN continuing to play footsie with Cuomo instead of holding him accountable, it’s left to Dean and hurting families (plus a few outlets committed to real journalism) to continue the fight.
In a Jan. 14 post, Houck got huffy when someone pointed out that Dean's job is supposed to be a weather person, not a political activist:
In a Wednesday story for the Daily Mail, New York Democratic Governor Andrew Cuomo’s administration sunk to a new low, lashing out like a grade-school Mean Girl at Fox News senior meteorologist Janice Dean, dismissing her fervent push for answers on behalf of deceased elderly New Yorkers (such as her late in-laws) because she’s no more than a weather lady.
Cuomo spokesperson Richard Azzopardi told the Daily Mail: “Last I checked she's not a credible source on anything except maybe the weather.”
So you shouldn’t trust someone using platform to a voice for families across the state and country who lost elderly family members to the coronavirus (and whom most were never able to say goodbye to) because she’s just the weather person? Would Azzopardi and Cuomo say the same about victims of gun violence?
[...]
Just last week, Dean penned a lengthy FoxNews.com column containing a deep dive into Cuomo’s actions, why they led to the deaths of untold numbers of seniors, how he has yet to answer for what happened (other than to blame others), and what this all means. So perhaps that helped set them over the edge.
Perhaps its another case of liberals believing that speaking truth to power doesn’t apply to them.
And nothing against the good men and women at ABC and NBC, but if this were something, say, a Ron DeSantis spokesperson said about a meteorologist on Good Morning America or Today, you can bet your life everyone from the CNN media team to late comics to MSNBC’s Never Trumpers to even entertainment blogs would be calling for their firing.
What Houck won't tell you: He's mad that other people are treating Dean the way the MRC treats Roker.While the MRC has come to Dean's defense, it has repeatedly bashed Roker for talking about climate change or doing anything other than weather.
In June, Kyle Drennen sneered that "former Vice President Al Gore hailed weatherman Al Roker for his “consistent advocacy” pushing the liberal climate change agenda. Co-host Craig Melvin then asked Gore how people could maintain the supposed environmental “progress” caused by the devastating coronavirus pandemic, adding that "Friday was not the first time Gore showed up on the morning show to praise Roker’s climate activism. Back in 2018, he appeared on 3rd Hour Today cheer the longtime NBC weatherman for his “long-time attention to the climate crisis.”
(In a 2018 post on that appearance, Drennen unironically complained, "It’s remarkable how unabashed the media can be when it comes to promoting the pet issues of liberal politicians.")
Drennen -- who is apparently the MRC's designated Roker-basher -- complained in September: "On Wednesday, NBC’s resident climate crusader Al Roker was in awe of actor and far-left radical Jane Fonda as he hailed the 'Hollywood icon' for 'her dedication to the climate crisis.' The Today show weatherman cheered Fonda’s extreme calls for an end to fossil fuels and implementation of economically destructive Green New Deal." Drennen dismissed Fonda as a "left-wing loon" and, by association, Roker. A coule days later, Drennen appeared on MRC executive Tim Graham's podcast to bash "the climate crusades of NBC weatherman Al Roker."
On Jan. 20, Drennen whined that "On NBC’s Today show Wednesday morning, just hours before Joe Biden’s inauguration, weatherman Al Roker hoped to be able repeat an embarrassing display during the 2013 inauguration when he yelled at then-Vice President Biden like an adoring groupie during the inaugural parade. That moment sparked a long-running 'bromance' between Roker and Biden that clearly continues to this day."
On Wednesday, NBC’s Today show weatherman and adoring Joe Biden groupie Al Roker could barely contain his excitement over the President planning to issue executive orders that would force through radical climate change policies. Roker gushed over Biden preparing to declare climate change a “national security priority” and treated a top White House environmental advisor to a softball chat to promote the left-wing agenda.
[...]
The longtime climate crusader seized on recent natural disasters to boost the Biden agenda in his first question to [Biden climate adviser Gina] McCarthy: “Well, according to NOAA, nearly 10.3 million acres of land destroyed by wildfires last year, record-setting 30 storms named during the Atlantic hurricane season. Globally, the second hottest year on record....Why is climate change a matter of national security?”
The MRC would never take such a dismissive tone with Dean, who's steering much further out of her lane than Roker is.
Is Newsmax's Hirsen Regretting Promoting Those Election Fraud Conspiracy Theories? Topic: Newsmax
We'vedocumented how smirky Newsmax columnist James Hirsen promoted bogus right-wing election fraud conspiracy theories. Is he regretting that now in the wake of the Capitol riot?
IN his Jan. 4 article -- two days before the riot -- Hirsen wrote a column embracing another conspiracy theory, the "Great Reset" (already pushed by conspiracy theorists like WorldNetDaily). He invoked Aldous Huxley and ranted, "The list of infringement upon our freedoms at the hands of modern day autocrats goes on forever. I think in order to avoid our own "Brave New World," we need to counter The Great Reset with The Great Return."
But is his first column after the riot, on Jan. 11, Hirsen was rather abruptly singing a different tune. While not referencing Trump or the riot, Hirsen went all existential on us:
It’s a strange world in which we find ourselves.
The start of the New Year confirmed to many of us that some individuals we thought we knew so well weren’t the same folks we thought they were.
Many of them appeared to have transformed into a newn persona literally overnight, leaving people, who had supported, admired, and trusted them, in a state of disbelief, distress, and overwhelming sadness.
The depth of duplicity to which they had sunk shocked us to the core.
But it did something else too.
It set us on a path to find out how human beings can cause so much hurt, do so much damage, and care so little about what they'd done.
I would like to offer one explanation, which is based upon my academic background and application of sociological, cultural, and media psychology principles.
There is an insatiable human need to be loved.
[...]
In my assessment, this would explain why so many people, the likes of which I described above in my opening, caved so easily to other influential individuals and groups, whom they most longed to please, and whose continuous acceptance they still desperately desire.
It is a hollow choice that these people made.
And they may soon come to know that fame is fleeting, but misfortune oftentimes lingers.
In his next column, on Jan. 25, Hirsen expounded on the dangerous nature of cults. Is he talking about QAnon? Is he talking about fanatical Trump supporters like himself? Again, he doesn't say. But his message echoes his earlier column:
I contend that the word "cult" has actually crept into our common vernacular and is creating a significant problem. Because societal members think they are talking to one another, when they are really talking past one another.
They are operating on distinctly different denotations and connotations of the word, which will inevitably result in confusion and friction between parties.
Sadly, some people are simply unaware of what is taking place. Other people are being deliberately provocative and are actually desirous of the negative outcomes that are flowing.
If Hirsen has had some kind of post-riot awakening toward Trump, his supporters and his own behavior, it would be nice if he wasn't being so oblique about it. Come right out and admit it, Jim! Tell us why the riot disillusioned you about Trump and made you question your own beliefs. Explain to us why you no longer stand by the election fraud conspiracy theories you promoted.
In short, tell us how you screwed up and say you're sorry. You can do that, can't you?
WND Reacts To The Capitol Riot, Part 1 Topic: WorldNetDaily
As to yesterday's speech, at no point in Trump's commentary did he encourage or cajole people in any way to attack the Capitol. His rhetoric was charged – without a doubt. He and his supporters are clearly emotional about what they believe is, if not outright fraud, at least the strong perception of impropriety with regard to the election processes in various states. The frustration is especially (and understandably) high given that there's never been a decision on the merits of the claims in any of the court cases brought by the president's team.
[...]
Don't you find it odd that President Trump might have had the intent to unleash a mob which would have the effect of stopping the process he's been pushing since early November, and in which he's invested all his hope for a second term as POTUS? Certainly he knew, as any reasonable person does, that an attack on the Capitol would not succeed and would only cast the attackers and their benefactors in the worse possible light.
Might it not make more sense that those wishing to undermine the integrity of the republic, those who have been burning, looting and destroying our cities since May 2020, would interfere with the constitutional electoral process through force and violence?
[...]
Regardless of what you think about President Trump and his performance as president, it is wholly irrational to believe that he, by his comments, intentionally inflamed a crowd of his supporters to storm the Capitol. This claim against Trump is simply another in the endless list of alleged wrongdoing by a president whose only offense seems to be that he loves his county.
Congress certified the Electoral College vote for Joe Biden in the middle of the night, just like how Jesus was convicted by the Jewish high priests in the middle of the night, just like five states committed election fraud last Nov. 3-4 in the middle of the night.
Riots took place in D.C. Wednesday. The media are playing those scenes over and over, unlike what they did last summer when Antifa and BLM were burning down American cities. The police killed an unarmed woman, 17-year Air Force veteran Ashli Babbitt.
Congress used those riots to punt on its responsibility to "defend and protect" the United States Constitution. It refused to look at the irregularities and constitutional violations by those five states that changed election processes without legislative approvals as per the Constitution. It ignored the ballot harvesting that happened with COVID as the excuse. It ignored the vote switching from Trump to Biden as recorded for the Georgia Legislature and proved in Michigan.
[...]
Why are some Americans rioting over the election? Because they, too, are frustrated. They are not getting anyone to investigate their grievances.
Pretend the riots over election fraud were done by Black Lives Matter or Antifa. What would those politicians be saying? Pretend that Ashli Babbitt, the woman killed by the police, was black and shot during a BLM protest. How would the media be treating this?
Just like the Supreme Court, the Congress punted on its responsibility. The ramifications of that will last for generations, as the bad guys now have free will to defraud Americans.
MAGA men and women are just that: The best of people in the worst of times. These good people converged on D.C., Jan. 6, to protest the certification of the Electoral College vote.
They, who have "nothing before them," had come to demand that something be done by those who had "brought [them] forth into this wilderness," yet sit "by the fleshpots [on the Potomac] and [eat] bread to the full." (My adaptation of Exodus 16:3.)
Cassandra Fairbanks, of the Gateway Pundit web-hub, framed her report about the protest that ensued just right: "Patriots Have Stormed the Capitol Building – Masses Breaching Federal Barriers – Cops Losing Control."
Yes, patriots. Rage that had been simmering over an election whose results lacked constitutional credibility had finally come to a boil.
[...]
Here's the difference between pro-Trump patriots and BLM detritus:
The latter, BLM, trashed, looted and leveled their countrymen's livelihoods, their businesses. MAGA men and women stormed the seats of corruption.
All this is background, so I can ask you to think about what you do see – as well as what you don't see.
What you do see if you watch or listen to the mainline media, is that Trump's MAGA movement has crashed and burned, as a result of the president's own personal failings, now writ large over the nation. The Democratic Party was somehow – perhaps through the grace of A-men and A-Woman – able to persuade enough demoralized Democrats, BLMers and Antifa supporters to vote for a man who campaigned from his basement and socially distanced himself from reporters and opinion scribes.
What you don't see is celebrations breaking out among 80 million Joe Biden voters who crawled across broken glass to vote and have now gathered around state capitols singing patriotic Marxist hymns. Nor do you see them pitching in and helping small businesses rebuild their burned and looted shops. They also aren't questioning why a flu-like illness with a low death rate should shut down our economy, turn governors into lawmaking monarchs running police states, close schools and businesses, and shut down houses of worship (a constitutionally protected activity).
You also don't see Democrats (OK, mainline commentators) wondering about the implications of electronic election fraud (both now and in the future). They don't opine about corrupt election officials who shepherded the stolen election and then fired whistelblowers. Nor do you hear speculation on what it means to the nation when the newly elected president's son has been paid hundreds of millions of dollars by the Chinese Communist Party (perhaps the most repressive regime in the world).
Finally, you don't see them speculating on the character traits of a man whose character they have spent five years assassinating. If they did, they might have some hint of what lies just ahead for them. Perhaps investing themselves so deeply in the lies they prepared for us at each broadcast, they have become immune to Truth, even when it is staring them in the face.
Not only are they beating up Trump on his policies and on his efforts to find and prove election cheating, but they now accuse him of fomenting the rioting at the Capitol. Apparently, all because he asked those in Washington to go to the Capitol to show their support of Congress in their anticipated vote.
Thousands did, but some others were there with another goal – to cause disruption and chaos. And they succeeded – not only challenging outside security but getting inside the building, into public areas and private offices, stealing and causing damage.
[...]
Bottom line, these guys play for keeps, and they have pulled out all the stops in their efforts to destroy Donald Trump. It began when he declared his candidacy, continued through his presidency and now continues as he tries to show that, in fact, these last election results are fraudulent.
As Limbaugh said, "They want a scalp."
They may want that, but Donald Trump is not ready to provide it. He's a fighter for what he believes is true and right, and he's maintained that throughout his presidency. Talk about strength.
The events of the last couple months have sickened me. To see Trump – and by extension, the will of the American people – betrayed by the highest powers in the land is revolting. The Supreme Court refused to hear evidence of the stolen election. The GOP has lost the Senate for the next two years. Chuck Schumer will become majority leader. And of course, Vice President Pence had a genuine "Et tu, Brute?" moment when he stabbed the president in the back after refusing to block Biden's electors.
"Although a slew of evidence was released in recent weeks in the form of sworn affidavits and expert testimony, the claims were repeatedly denied by leading election officials and lawmakers," observes Janita Kan of NTD. "Critics and members of the media have also characterized the claims as 'baseless.'" Bulltucky.
As John Whitehead with the Rutherford Institute put it, "Either way, no matter which candidate lost to the other, it was always going to be the Deep State that won."
Anti-Semitic? MRC Portrays Jewish CNN President As A 'Puppet Master' Topic: Media Research Center
The portrayal of a Jewish leader has a puppet master is an anti-Semitic trope that has been around for centuries. The Media Research Center has done so quite literally in attacking George Soros, depicting him as "the media's puppet master" to scare a few bucks out of gullible conservatives. The MRC has even declared Soros as a Jew conservatives are permitted to hate, pre-emptively absolving them of anti-Semitism in doing so.
But the MRC -- specifically, NewsBusters managing editor Curtis Houck -- has been portraying another prominent Jewish leader as a "puppet master": CNN president Jeff Zucker.
The first time Houck did this was in a March 2018 post, in which he complained that "CNN president and puppet-master Jeff Zucker ripped the Fox News Channel (FNC) as 'state-run TV' and 'pure propaganda machine' that 'does an incredible disservice to this country.'" His purported justification of this was "an April 2017 New York Times Magazine profile of Zucker. In it, Zucker was exposed as a puppet-master choreographing big interviews and feeding questions in the ears of Anderson Cooper and Jake Tapper. Down to the analysts, commentators, and Trump coverage, Zucker has behaved like a ringmaster with political panels and Trump controversies framed like a primetime drama."
It can be argued that, in this respect, Zucker is no different from Fox News founder Roger Ailes, who did much the same thing there (and, yes, was called a puppet master). Yet you'll never hear Houck or anyone else at the MRC describe Ailes in that manner; indeed, a 2015 post by Tim Graham complained that he was described that way.
Yet Houck persisted in tagging Zucker with the epithet:
Somehow, CNN and puppetmaster Jeffrey Zucker thought it would be a smart idea to move New Day co-host Chris Cuomo, punishing those of us who stay up late. -- May 11, 2018
In nearly 14 minutes, CNN showed why the network run by puppetmaster Jeffrey Zucker was not only hostile to those not willing to endorse the network’s views (snarky chyrons and all) but views them as their enemy and thus must be silenced. -- Aug. 5, 2019
Not to be left out, Hannity had a little something for CNN puppetmaster Jeffrey Zucker, wondering if he’s“proud of this political hit job putting a [sic] operative's life in danger...to help Obama sycophant, this guy, Jim Sciutto, whoever he is.” -- Sept. 11, 2019
After the show’s last commercial break, Carlson brought up one of the many Project Veritas videos released this week which pertained to CNN boss/puppetmaster Jeff Zucker insisting his network would be focused on impeachment no matter what. -- Oct. 17, 2019
And even better yet, he live-streamed Tuesday’s meeting and jumped in to reveal himself to CNN boss and puppetmaster Jeff Zucker. -- Dec. 2, 2020
As we learned Tuesday in the Project Veritas videos, CNN puppetmaster Jeff Zucker was feeling his oats because, somehow, the network’s sophomoric chyrons need to be nastier. -- Dec. 2, 2020
In an email to CNN employees, CNN head, “Dwarf King,” and puppetmaster Jeff Zucker announced the decision, citing a “steep decline in airport traffic because of COVID-19, coupled with all the new ways that people are consuming content on their personal devices.”-- Jan. 13, 2021
Hand in hand with this slur is the MRC's portrayal -- again by Houck, with help from fellow MRC writer Nicholas Fondacaro and others -- dismissing CNN employees as "Zuckerbots," automatons incapable of doing their jobs without constant guidance from their "puppet master":
As my colleague Nick Fondacaro likes to suggest, CNN anchors and analysts have morphed into Zuckerbots. To see what he's talking about, check out a New York Times Magazine profile of CNN under Zucker and you'll see why. For CNN under Zucker, so much of their coverage and outbursts is staged and all about theater. -- Houck, Feb. 15, 2018
Stelter concluded by stressing that “there are ethical questions about even having this conversation at all.” This Zuckerbot appeared all too eager to throw those “ethical questions” aside as he declared “we can’t tiptoe around it anymore.” -- Ryan Foley, Aug. 26, 2019
And in the other case, the Zuckerbots paint all other forms of media criticism as akin to leveling death threats. -- Houck, Oct. 10. 2019
Unfortunately, CNN’s Zuckerbots weren’t interested in this point of view.-- Houck, Oct. 21, 2019
Earth to Zuckerbots, far and wide: Since when was someone above criticism? And especially skepticism toward those that you cover? -- Houck, Nov. 19, 2019
There’s no bottom for CNN and Jeffrey Zucker puppet Brian Stelter. ... Predictably, the Zuckerbot’s insinuation about FNC and its viewers was picked up like clockwork by both Axios and The Daily Beast. -- Houck, Aug. 3, 2020
Tuesday afternoon’s CNN Newsroom brought us another example of how personalties on the Jeffrey Zucker-led network and his puppets were anything but civil, fair, mature, serious, and sober. ... So let’s try to get through some of this. After stacking the deck with a lead-in from former conservative journalist-turned-Zuckerbot Kaitlan Collins, Keilar asked Schlapp why Trump trusted Florida’s voter system but not the rest of the country. -- Houck, Aug. 4, 2020
Swoon for her “dystopian” vision of America, the Zuckerville collective praised it by calling on violent rhetoric; touting her as going “for the jugular” against President Trump. ... The Zuckerbots were glorifying Obama’s bleak vision of America because that was the narrative they’ve been feeding their viewers for years now, and they needed to capitalize on it during the election. -- Fondacaro, Aug. 18, 2020
Of course, chief political correspondent Dana Bash completely agreed like the good Zuckerbot that she was. -- Fondacaro, Oct. 22, 2020
With this Zuckerbot refusing to acknowledge the sacrifices that involve serving in law enforcement, McEnany was left to remind him that they help keep him safe[.] -- Houck, Dec. 28, 2020
CNN alsomade a slew of other personnel moves, including the promotion of conservative journalist-turned-Zuckerbot Kaitlan Collins to Acosta’s title, moving Phil Mattingly and Biden suck-up Arlette Saenz to the White House beat, Abby Phillip to host Sunday’s Inside Politics, and “adult” Jake Tapper’s The Lead permanently expanding to two hours (after having been so in the election build-up). -- Houck, Jan. 11, 2021
Back when S.E. Cupp wasn’t a glorified Democrat and Zuckerbot, she had an HLN show that didn’t treat conservatives, Republicans, libertarians, and any non-lefty as enemies. -- Houck, Jan. 20, 2021
Houck, Fondacaro and the rest of thte MRC crew would never similarly describe Fox News employees as "Ailes-bots." (Or, say, themselves as Bozellbots.)
It says somethibng about Houck's near-pathological hatred for CNN that he is either oblivious or uncaring about depicting Zucker with such an ugly anti-Semitic trope and smearing CNN employees as the victims of a Jewish "puppet master."
CNS' Ongoing Freakout Over Biden and Transgender Rights Topic: CNSNews.com
CNSNews.com wants to hate Joe Biden, transgender people ... and anything Biden does to help them. It's been obsessing -- and fearmongering -- about that for months.
We've already seen that CNS has sent interns out twice last year to pester members of Congress about Biden's "intent to order public schools to allow transgender students to use the bathrooms, locker rooms, and sports teams of their choice." But it primed those gotcha questions with months of fearmongering about Biden wanting equal treatment for transgenders:
These are all "news" articles, and they weren't posted because CNS approves of this -- it's a way to generate right-wing clickbait. Interestingly, most of these are anonymously written, credited only to "CNSNews.com Staff," though CNS' search engine shows many of them were posted through the account of Jeffrey -- the guy who calls transgender equality "evil."
Also note that there is particular fixation on trans athletes, even though any Biden orders proposed or issued would not specifically mandate that transgender athletes play on or against girls' teams and are more broadly ban discrimination. Which is why CNS also published these articles:
WND Reacts To The Capitol Riot, Part 1 Topic: WorldNetDaily
The events that occurred in the nation's Capitol yesterday are more than just disturbing. They strike at the very heart of our system of government, one that purports to be based on the rule and law and the peaceful transition of power from one party to another. It seems that everybody in the media is convinced that President Trump instigated the violence and encouraged the mob by his comments to hundreds of thousands of supporters gathered on the National Mall to hear his speech.
Did Trump's comments spontaneously instigate an angry mob and induce them to storm the Capitol to save his presidency?
If such is humanly possible any more, let's look at this critically.
[...]
Don't you find it odd that President Trump might have had the intent to unleash a mob which would have the effect of stopping the process he's been pushing since early November, and in which he's invested all his hope for a second term as POTUS? Certainly he knew, as any reasonable person does, that an attack on the Capitol would not succeed and would only cast the attackers and their benefactors in the worse possible light.
Might it not make more sense that those wishing to undermine the integrity of the republic, those who have been burning, looting and destroying our cities since May 2020, would interfere with the constitutional electoral process through force and violence?
[...]
Regardless of what you think about President Trump and his performance as president, it is wholly irrational to believe that he, by his comments, intentionally inflamed a crowd of his supporters to storm the Capitol. This claim against Trump is simply another in the endless list of alleged wrongdoing by a president whose only offense seems to be that he loves his county.
Congress certified the Electoral College vote for Joe Biden in the middle of the night, just like how Jesus was convicted by the Jewish high priests in the middle of the night, just like five states committed election fraud last Nov. 3-4 in the middle of the night.
Riots took place in D.C. Wednesday. The media are playing those scenes over and over, unlike what they did last summer when Antifa and BLM were burning down American cities. The police killed an unarmed woman, 17-year Air Force veteran Ashli Babbitt.
Congress used those riots to punt on its responsibility to "defend and protect" the United States Constitution. It refused to look at the irregularities and constitutional violations by those five states that changed election processes without legislative approvals as per the Constitution. It ignored the ballot harvesting that happened with COVID as the excuse. It ignored the vote switching from Trump to Biden as recorded for the Georgia Legislature and proved in Michigan.
[...]
Why are some Americans rioting over the election? Because they, too, are frustrated. They are not getting anyone to investigate their grievances.
Pretend the riots over election fraud were done by Black Lives Matter or Antifa. What would those politicians be saying? Pretend that Ashli Babbitt, the woman killed by the police, was black and shot during a BLM protest. How would the media be treating this?
Just like the Supreme Court, the Congress punted on its responsibility. The ramifications of that will last for generations, as the bad guys now have free will to defraud Americans.
MAGA men and women are just that: The best of people in the worst of times. These good people converged on D.C., Jan. 6, to protest the certification of the Electoral College vote.
They, who have "nothing before them," had come to demand that something be done by those who had "brought [them] forth into this wilderness," yet sit "by the fleshpots [on the Potomac] and [eat] bread to the full." (My adaptation of Exodus 16:3.)
Cassandra Fairbanks, of the Gateway Pundit web-hub, framed her report about the protest that ensued just right: "Patriots Have Stormed the Capitol Building – Masses Breaching Federal Barriers – Cops Losing Control."
Yes, patriots. Rage that had been simmering over an election whose results lacked constitutional credibility had finally come to a boil.
[...]
Here's the difference between pro-Trump patriots and BLM detritus:
The latter, BLM, trashed, looted and leveled their countrymen's livelihoods, their businesses. MAGA men and women stormed the seats of corruption.
All this is background, so I can ask you to think about what you do see – as well as what you don't see.
What you do see if you watch or listen to the mainline media, is that Trump's MAGA movement has crashed and burned, as a result of the president's own personal failings, now writ large over the nation. The Democratic Party was somehow – perhaps through the grace of A-men and A-Woman – able to persuade enough demoralized Democrats, BLMers and Antifa supporters to vote for a man who campaigned from his basement and socially distanced himself from reporters and opinion scribes.
What you don't see is celebrations breaking out among 80 million Joe Biden voters who crawled across broken glass to vote and have now gathered around state capitols singing patriotic Marxist hymns. Nor do you see them pitching in and helping small businesses rebuild their burned and looted shops. They also aren't questioning why a flu-like illness with a low death rate should shut down our economy, turn governors into lawmaking monarchs running police states, close schools and businesses, and shut down houses of worship (a constitutionally protected activity).
You also don't see Democrats (OK, mainline commentators) wondering about the implications of electronic election fraud (both now and in the future). They don't opine about corrupt election officials who shepherded the stolen election and then fired whistelblowers. Nor do you hear speculation on what it means to the nation when the newly elected president's son has been paid hundreds of millions of dollars by the Chinese Communist Party (perhaps the most repressive regime in the world).
Finally, you don't see them speculating on the character traits of a man whose character they have spent five years assassinating. If they did, they might have some hint of what lies just ahead for them. Perhaps investing themselves so deeply in the lies they prepared for us at each broadcast, they have become immune to Truth, even when it is staring them in the face.
Not only are they beating up Trump on his policies and on his efforts to find and prove election cheating, but they now accuse him of fomenting the rioting at the Capitol. Apparently, all because he asked those in Washington to go to the Capitol to show their support of Congress in their anticipated vote.
Thousands did, but some others were there with another goal – to cause disruption and chaos. And they succeeded – not only challenging outside security but getting inside the building, into public areas and private offices, stealing and causing damage.
[...]
Bottom line, these guys play for keeps, and they have pulled out all the stops in their efforts to destroy Donald Trump. It began when he declared his candidacy, continued through his presidency and now continues as he tries to show that, in fact, these last election results are fraudulent.
As Limbaugh said, "They want a scalp."
They may want that, but Donald Trump is not ready to provide it. He's a fighter for what he believes is true and right, and he's maintained that throughout his presidency. Talk about strength.
The events of the last couple months have sickened me. To see Trump – and by extension, the will of the American people – betrayed by the highest powers in the land is revolting. The Supreme Court refused to hear evidence of the stolen election. The GOP has lost the Senate for the next two years. Chuck Schumer will become majority leader. And of course, Vice President Pence had a genuine "Et tu, Brute?" moment when he stabbed the president in the back after refusing to block Biden's electors.
"Although a slew of evidence was released in recent weeks in the form of sworn affidavits and expert testimony, the claims were repeatedly denied by leading election officials and lawmakers," observes Janita Kan of NTD. "Critics and members of the media have also characterized the claims as 'baseless.'" Bulltucky.
As John Whitehead with the Rutherford Institute put it, "Either way, no matter which candidate lost to the other, it was always going to be the Deep State that won."
MRC Tries To Portray Hawley As A Victim Over His Book Getting Canceled Topic: Media Research Center
If the Media Research Center can find a way to portray conservatives as victims, no matter how unjustified, it will. Joseph Vazquez eagerly played the victim card in a Jan. 8 post:
Rule of thumb: Always be skeptical of a company that tries to act woke, especially when CNN blowhard Brian Stelteris pushing it.
Publishing company Simon & Schuster tried to do just that by canceling publication of Missouri Republican Sen. Josh Hawley’s upcoming book “The Tyranny of Big Tech.” The firm arbitrarily pinned blame on him for the Capitol Hill riot. The company wrote in a statement on Twitter: “[W]e take seriously our larger public responsibility as citizens, and cannot support Senator Hawley after his role in what became a dangerous threat to our democracy and freedom.”
But, there may be political reasons why the company decided not to publish. Federal Election Commission (FEC) records revealed that Simon & Schuster CEO Jonathan Karp donated exclusively to Democrats this electoral cycle. Karp donated $350 to former Democratic presidential candidate and leftist Beto O’Rourke in 2019, while he was President and Publisher of Simon & Schuster Adult Publishing. So, a Democrat donor is head of the company that canceled a Republican senator’s book. No conflict there, right?
Stelter touted the news on Twitter, writing: “This just in: @SimonSchuster ‘has decided to cancel publication of Senator Josh Hawley’s forthcoming book, THE TYRANNY OF BIG TECH.’" Stelter proceeded to parrot some of the highlights from the Simon & Schuster statement, but he didn’t mention anything about the company’s CEO being a Democrat donor.
Vazquez is simply making stuff up. Does he really believe that Karp canceled Hawley's book because he once donated $350 to a Democrat in Texas (and another $100 to liberal donation aggregator ActBlue)? If Karp is so partisan, how does Vazquez account for Hawley's book initially ghetting approved for publication under Karp's watch? How dumb do he and his employer think we are?
Vazquez also lied when he claimed Hawley as "arbitrarily" being blamed for his role in inciting the Capitol riot. There is plenty of evidence to support his incitement role, such as his push to overturn the election and to continue to do so even after the riot.
Vazquez's post is less reality-based examination and more politically driven speculation. But then, the MRC cares much more about the narrative than it does the truth.
P.S.: Hawley's book was quickly snapped up by right-wing publisher Regnery, so Vazquez need not fret about whether Hawley will be unable to cash in on his newfound notoriety.
WND also published a Nov. 17 column by Teresa Blazewicz laughably declaring that "Sidney Powell's battle for democratic freedom in the United States today mirrors the battle Joan of Arc fought on behalf of her country so many years ago."
But when Powell was dismissed by Trump's legal team, WND's Joe Kovacs was concerned since she was "appearing with President Trump's campaign lawyers at news conferences through last week," then touted how "Powell said she was going to file a lawsuit of 'biblical' proportions in order to 'blow up' 2020 election results based on alleged fraud involving electronic voting machines in Georgia." Blazewicz returned on Nov. 24 to buck up Powell after her dismissal from the Trump team, insisting that "Sidney Powell is a serious lawyer who has poignantly stated that she never says anything she cannot prove, and who has had, up until this moment, a generally unassailable reputation."
But it started becoming clear (to WND, at least; the rest of us figured it out some time earlier) that the only master of deception here was Powell. On Jan. 8, Unruh reported Dominion's $1.3 billion lawsuit against Powell for her lies about the company falsely claming its machines changed vote counts.Unruh tried to put a positive spin on things, declaring that "In a defamation case, Dominion must prove the falsity of the statements. Allaw.com noted truth is an 'absolute defense' in such claims, and pretrial discovery in the case will enable Powell to question Dominion official under oath and obtain evidence."
WND's admiration for Powell, though, ultimately went down with a whimper as Kovacs used a Jan. 19 article to recount how Powell withdrew her "Kraken" lawsuit:
Sidney Powell, the high-profile attorney who vowed to "release the Kraken" in a lawsuit alleging widespread fraud in Georgia resulting in a presidential victory for Joe Biden, has voluntarily dropped her legal action less than 24 hours before Biden's inauguration.
In a motion filed at the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals, Powell and other attorneys agreed with defendants including Gov. Brian Kemp and Sec. of State Brad Raffensperger to have the case dismissed.
"This civil action brings to light a massive election fraud," her original lawsuit had indicated.
"I feel very optimistic the truth will get out," Powell had said in November concerning her actions trying to prove fraud helped steal the election away from President Trump. "Of course, everybody on the face of the earth now is trying to suppress it, including people in our own government.
"But I won't quit until it's out and (we) release the Kraken," she said, invoking a line from the mythological monster fantasy film "Clash of the Titans."
Powell was a guest on numerous TV and radio programs, alleging Dominion Voting Systems, the company supplying voting machines for Georgia and other states, was rigging the election in favor of Biden.
WND hasn't mentioned her since --perhaps to keep it out of further defamation lawsuit scrutiny, since it already opened itself up to that when it published James Zumwalt's attack on a Dominion official.
MRC Gives Levin A Platform To Whine About His Radio Syndicator Topic: Media Research Center
If right-wing radio host Mark Levin has a complaint, it can count on a sympathetic ear from the Media Research Center, as demonstrated by the years the MRC's "news" division, CNSNews.com, has spent cranking out Levin stenography. So when Levin feels the need to rant about coverage of a new directive from the company that syndicates his radio show, Tim Graham has a pillow for him to cry on:
Early on Monday morning, Washington Post media reporter Paul Farhi posted a hot story headlined “Talk-radio owner orders conservative hosts to temper election fraud rhetoric.” It said “Cumulus Media, which employs some of the most popular right-leaning talk-radio hosts in the United States, has told its on-air personalities to stop suggesting that the election was stolen from President Trump — or else face termination.”
Cumulus executive Brian Phillips insisted Cumulus and its program syndication arm, Westwood One, “will not tolerate any suggestion that the election has not ended. The election has been resolved and there are no alternate acceptable ‘paths.’”
Farhi put Mark Levin at the center of his story about "orders," but Levin told NewsBusters “I never received that memo, and my crew never received that memo. This story is done by a reporter who has never spoken to me – ever." He said if he received that memo, "I would make sure the entire nation would hear about it." He added "I would like a correction and an apology from the Post, but I won’t hold my breath.”
Farhi would not comment to NewsBusters on Levin’s accusation that there was no attempt at contact. Isn’t it fascinating when reporters say “no comment”?
Of course, the basic story is true -- Cumulus did, in fact, issue a memo to that effect. Whether Levin personally received a copy is irrelevant. Indeed, the question is whether Levin is receiving special treatment; the company's directive appears mostly directed to local hosts, while national hosts like Levin are apparently not being held to it.
But Levin wasn't done whining to Graham:
Levin also told NewsBusters the Post was “unprofessional” in another story last Thursday suggesting he somehow played some role in a protester dying of a heart attack at the Capitol: “Greeson appeared to have an account on the right-wing social media site Parler filled with recent obscene and violent posts, fueled by misinformation spread by right-wing radio host Mark Levin, the Proud Boys and others.”
Levin also complained the “reprobates” at Mediaite used the Post story against him. The site’s Ken Meyer energetically slimedLevin and Dan Bongino as inciters of an “insurrectionist mob.”
"My broadcasts are on my website going back four years," Levin said. "I haven't incited anything." He said his protests have all been about the election decisions made in four states that he says violate the Constitution, including the way elected judges in Pennsylvania overrode the state legislature in setting election rules.
It's not clear what specific case Levin is referring to, but actual scholars of constitutional law (which Levin also claims to be but apparently isn't) have said that courts have discretion to interpret election law.
Also, it's hilarious that Graham ismocking the Post reporter for declining to comment on his gotcha question when the MRC routinely refuses to publicly comment on controversies regarding it, i.e., the fact that MRC chief Brent Bozell spent years slapping his name on columns Graham ghost-wrote. Y'know, Tim, it's never too late to share your opinion about that with the world.
The idea of a "Great Reset" was tailor-made to be turned into a conspiracy theory. Devised by the World Economic Forum -- the folks behind the annual meeting of the world's elites at Davos, Switzerland -- as a plan to restart the world's economy after the coronavirus pandemic that writer Naomi Klein described as containing "some good stuff that won’t happen and some bad stuff that certainly will and, frankly, nothing out of the ordinary in our era of 'green' billionaires readying rockets for Mars. Indeed, anyone with even a cursory knowledge of Davos speak, and the number of times it has attempted to rebrand capitalism as a slightly buggy poverty alleviation and ecological restoration program, will recognize the vintage champagne in this online carafe."
Needless to say, WorldNetDaily glommed onto this. An entire issue of its sparsely read Whistleblower magazine was devoted to this, and the promotional blurb fully went there:
The first and most pivotal phase of the Great Reset plan under cover of COVID is, of course, winning the 2020 presidential election through a dizzyingly multifaceted attack on the integrity of the U.S. election system itself, in conjunction with a unified campaign by Big Media and Big Tech to elect Joe Biden at all costs.
Biden is fully on board with the “Great Reset.” In fact, the Biden presidential campaign chose as its official campaign slogan the seemingly innocuous phrase, “Build Back Better,” which happens also to be the slogan of the “Great Reset” coined by its originator and main advocate, World Economic Forum founder Klaus Schwab.
Under cover of the COVID-19 pandemic, Schwab insists the entire world must “act jointly and swiftly to revamp all aspects of our societies and economies,” meaning, as he explains, “we need a ‘Great Reset’ of capitalism.” In other words, socialism.
[...]
Prince Charles is a key advocate for the Great Reset, as is International Monetary Fund chief economist Gina Gopinath, U.N. Secretary General António Guterres, as well as heads of many major corporations, including Microsoft.
[...]
Unfortunately, as Whistleblower shows, the world’s elites do not really want equality for everybody. Historically, from Stalin to Mao to Chavez, Marxist/socialist leaders have never been truly interested in everyone being equal. That’s just happy-talk to seduce the masses. What they want, first and foremost, is power, they want wealth and privilege for themselves, they want glory, they want revenge on their enemies, and they want worship.
“In a word,” writes Whistleblower Editor David Kupelian, “they want to be gods. The original temptation in the Garden of Eden was, ‘Ye shall be as gods.’ (Genesis 3:5) But when humans try to become gods, they turn into devils. And the agenda planned by these would-be rulers is both insane and evil.”
Kupelian went even further in his essay from the issue from which the promotion blurb was adapted, which started by ranting about events from "Big Media openly siding with the senile and corrupt Joe Biden while portraying President Donald Trump as a mentally ill, racist would-be dictator, to November’s breathtakingly rigged election – likely the most crooked and corrupt in our history." And since China is the right-wing bogeyman du jour, he ranted about how the Chinese want to put a barcode on everybody:
Since the coronavirus originated in China, and since Joe Biden is profoundly compromised with regard to China because of his family’s corrupt financial activities with that nation, and since Big Tech and so many U.S.-based mega-companies are in total thrall to China both for its vast retail markets and its cheap labor pool, it is reasonable to wonder: How exactly does China fit into the plan to “reset” the world under cover of COVID?
That’s easy: China is the leader.
Recently, in a chilling story headlined “Give Everyone a Barcode? China Trying to Use COVID Fears to Launch Global Tracking System for Humans,” the Christian Broadcast Network reported: “China's communist leader Xi Jinping is calling for countries across the world to accept a global COVID-19 tracking system that uses QR codes in an attempt to expedite international travel.”
It was during a Nov. 21 virtual G20 leaders' meeting that Xi proposed the "global mechanism" to deploy an electronic barcode that would help determine travelers’ health status.
Kupelian went on to reference the Biblical "mark of the devil" stuff, of course. And he concluded by declaring that "America indeed needs a great reset, but not one envisioned by deluded, power-obsessed, sociopathic elites. Rather, the reset we truly need is a repentance-fueled revival that will invite God’s renewed blessing on us and restore our nation to its former greatness and goodness."
CNS Tries To Mainstream Another Far-Right Member of Congress Topic: CNSNews.com
Marjorie Taylor Greene isn't the only newly elected extreme-right-wing Republican member of Congress CNSNews.com has been trying to mainstream. Rep. Lauren Boebert, like Greene, has expressed support for the QAnon, and she has also praised the thugs in the Proud Boys. And as with Greene, CNS has no interest in talking about her extremism.
Articles by Patrick Goodenough on Nov. 5 and Nov. 18 touted Boebert alongside Greene as the new "pro-life women" elected to the House. On Nov. 24, managing editor Micchael W. Chapman was quite giddy that Boebert "reportedly has asked what the rules are to carry a gun on Capitol Hill and in her congressional office," touting how she "is from a largely conservative district in western Colorado. She is a defender of the Second Amendment and operates a restaurant called Shooters Grill, in Rifle, Colorado. She is sometimes seen sporting a Glock pistol on her hip."
Susan Jones penned a gushy article about Boebert on Jan. 5:
Colorado's newly elected U.S. Republican Rep. Lauren Boebert on Tuesday described herself as "a 34-year-old woman who wants to protect herself in this dangerous city, here in our nation's capital" -- by carrying a gun.
"You know, it's very interesting that here in the United States of America that there is so much controversy over our Second Amendment rights," Boebert told "Fox & Friends" on Tuesday morning.
[...]
Boebert, the owner of a "gun-themed restaurant" in Rifle, Colorado (as the Denver Post described it) is allowed, as a member of Congress, to carry a gun in the Capitol, except in certain restricted areas.
In a post-riot Jan. 15 article, Melanie Arter featured how Boebert "called out Rep. Sean Patrick Maloney (D-N.Y.) on Thursday for implying that she gave a tour of the U.S. Capitol building to 'insurrectionists' a day before the Capitol riots." It wasn't until the seventh paragraph that Arter got around to admitting that "Maloney didn’t name Boebert in his interview as the person who gave the tour."
None of these articles mention Boebert's extreme views, even though CNS is not shy about highlighting what it considers extreme views of Democratic politicians.
In sharp contrast to the obsequious and embarrassing fawning and gushing he did over Trump's final White House press secretary, Kayleigh McEnany, Curtis Houck and the rest of the Media Research Center have had their knives out for Biden press secretary Jen Psaki literally from the first day she started on Jan. 20.
The liars and traitors who accuse him of inciting riotous behavior are worthy of scorn and contempt. Antifa and Black Lives Matter joined forces in disguising themselves as participants in the Jan. 6 rally, using a peaceful protest as cover to commit violence and more than likely murder as well.
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