MRC Defends Trump After CNN Town Hall Topic: Media Research Center
The Media Research Center's main complaint about Donald Trump's town hall on CNN last month was that it didn't suck up enough to him. Afterwards, it defended him from all criticism. A May 11 post by Alex Christy nitpicked a CNN fact-check of Trump because it "did not accurately portray" Hillary Clinton's beliefs on abortion -- but had to put words into Hillary's mouth to do so:
Washington correspondent Sunlen Serfaty joined Thursday’s CNN This Morning to fact-check some of the claims former President Donald Trump made on Wednesday night’s town hall including the claim that Hillary Clinton supports late third trimester abortions. Serfaty would defend Clinton against the charge, but she did not accurately portray Clinton’s beliefs.
Serfaty claimed that Trump’s “comments were very misleading” for accusing “Democrats and specifically Hillary Clinton of supporting abortion late into the third trimester.”
[...]
First, what Roe allowed is not necessarily the same thing as what Clinton supported. Secondly, Serfaty omitted half of Clinton’s position. In 2016, Clinton did indeed say that third trimester abortions should be legal for reasons relating to the health and life of the mother, but she also added:
I have met with women who have, toward the end of their pregnancy, get the worst news one could get. That their health is in jeopardy if they continue to carry to term. Or that something terrible has happened or just been discovered about the pregnancy. I do not think the United States government should be stepping in and making those most personal of decisions. So you can regulate if you are doing so with the life and the health of the mother taken into account.
What is Clinton’s definition of “terrible” and what could be discovered that justify a third trimester abortion? Clinton didn’t say.
Nicholas Fondacaro complained it was pointed out that the town hall audience was too biased in favor of Trump:
The liberal ladies of ABC’s The View were in a tailspin from the get-go during Thursday’s episode, as the majority of them fumed over CNN’s town hall with former President Trump the previous evening. But instead of keeping her animosity trained on Trump, co-host Joy Behar immediately started taking swings at the average Americans in the audience. Their crime? Being Republicans and fans of the former President, or as she called them “not American.”
P.J. Gladnick also groused that Politico (accurately) predicted that Trump would lie:
"Litany of lies."
Is there any way that you would ever hear Politico describe any Democrat, such as Adam Schiff of the fake news Trump-Russia collusion hoax fame, that way? Of course not.
However on Wednesday, just hours ahead of Donald Trump's town hall on CNN, Politico Playbook used another alliteration to brand him as a liar. "Farrago of falsehoods."
Kevin Tober was upset that even other CNN anchors didn't like how the town hall turned out:
Exactly twenty-four hours after CNN’s town hall with former President Donald Trump Wednesday night, CNN host Anderson Cooper responded to the unhinged leftist outrage that immediately spread on Twitter in the immediate aftermath of the town hall. Instead of trying to calm his left-wing audience down, Cooper poured gasoline on the fire during Thursday's AC360 by telling them they'd be right if they wanted to ditch CNN for good.
“Many of you have expressed deep anger and disappointment. Many of you are upset that someone who attempted to destroy our democracy was invited to sit on a stage in front of a crowd of Republican voters to answer questions, and predictably, continued to spew lie after lie after lie,” Cooper opened his show.
Adding: “I get it. It was disturbing. It was disturbing to see and hear that person refer to a black law enforcement officer as a thug, an adjective he used many times to describe black men and called Kaitlan Collins, the moderator nasty, which is what he calls any woman who stands up to him."
[...]
Cooper's rant showed that CNN boss Chris Licht had a major problem on his hands as the on-air talent was seemingly attempting something of a mutiny. The Hill's media and politics columnist, Joe Concha urged for heads to roll at CNN once again, and not just Cooper's.
Strange that Tober thinks the problem is with longstanding CNN personnel who understand the network and not with the new guy.
Fondacaro raged at "The View" hosts again, this time for pointed out how CNN host Kaitlan Collins got steamrolled by Trump:
In the opening theme music of ABC’s The View, the lyrics proclaim: “This is for my girls all around the world. Stand up with your head up. Own your power. Speak your truth.” But on Friday’s edition of the show, fill-in moderator Joy Behar and racist co-host Sunny Hostin toss the women empowerment mantra out the window as they lashed out at CNN town hall host Kaitlan Collins for not being imposing enough to stop former President Trump. Hostin went as far as to hint a man would have done a better job.
Tim Graham ran to the defense of Trump in his May 12 podcast:
It was a banner week for bias, with a lot of shameless behavior. Media liberals were outraged at CNN's Trump town hall (including CNN liberals), with the constantly interrupting questions and the MAGA-pleasing answers. We predicted Kaitlan Collins could come in with her hair on fire, and we were right. She didn’t shriek, she tried to remain calm. But on many questions, the former president was not really allowed to finish a sentence.
During his last tour of Fox News, Trump was allowed eight-minute answers. CNN didn't want to give him more than eight words.
The CNN town hall with Trump roughly breaks down to three portions. The first 25 minutes obsessed over scandals: Election denial, January 6, the E Jean Carroll rape allegations. Then came a half hour on issues: Inflation, debt ceiling, guns, abortion, immigration, and Ukraine. At the end, there was more election denial, and a squabble over the Mar-a-Lago documents. Collins couldn't mention the federal raid. Then in the aftermath, CNN stars line Anderson Cooper and Jake Tapper whined about all the lies....that they just platformed.
Jeffrey Lord spent his May 13 column complaining about "the fury vented by CNN staffers in the wake of the CNN Town Hall with former President Donald Trump," declaring that "it is, it is very safe to say, representative of the mindset of so many elites not just inside CNN but well beyond into the larger media. It might be said that while this episode appears to be about CNN employees versus America, in reality it is emblematic of the liberal media versus America."
A May 14 post by Tober touted a Fox News talking head coming to Trump's defense:
Fox News Channel’s MediaBuzz host Howard Kurtz used the opening monologue of his show to slam the leftist media for melting down over CNN hosting a town hall for former President Donald Trump. Proving again that those at media outlets like MSNBC, The Washington Post, New York Times and others want total subservience to the radical left-wing agenda, Kurtz even aired a clip of MSNBC’s resident racist demagogue Joy Reid who lashed out at CNN.
[...]
He then made the obvious point that it’s not like Trump went unchallenged during the event, in fact, quite the opposite: “This wasn't a rally where he just gets to pop off. And whatever you think of Trump and his stormy tenure, shouldn't journalists question him as part of the campaign?”
“As it turned out, the town hall turned into an absolute train wreck, even many people at CNN being sharply critical. But the alternative, banning Trump from the airwaves, is suppression of speech, and that is not journalism,” Kurtz said.
Tober didn't mention that Kurtz works for a network that wants total subservience to the right-wing agenda.
WND Still Shilling For Tucker Carlson Topic: WorldNetDaily
WorldNetDaily continued to be Tucker Carlson's PR division as it touted everything it could about his plans after Fox News fired him. In addition to publishingarticles it took from the right-wing Western Journal, it has published its own articles as well:
An April 26 article by Peter LaBarbera claimed that Carlson's firing "has drawn renewed attention to one of his detractors, the self-proclaimed 'Never Again Trumper' and former Republican House Speaker, Paul Ryan, who sits on the Fox Corporation's Board of Directors."
An anonymously writen May 4 article hyped that Carlson "has considered running his own GOP candidate forum for the 2024 presidential election."
A May 9 article by Joe Kovacs touted Carlson's decision to post videos to Twitter. WND has linked to nearlyeveryCarlsonvideoposted since they began appearing in early June.
A May 11 article by Kovacs cheered that Carlson "did, in fact, tell a reporter this week that he would be running for president and announcing his candidacy this week. But then, within moments, Carlson admitted he was just joking." Kovacs attacked the reporter Carlson pranked as having a "leftist ideological slant" for no actual reason beyond that he accurately reported on leaked internal text messages showing Carlson to be the jerk we all knew him to be.
An article it stole from right-wing site Just the News hyped that Carlson's first video "had more than 100 million views in less than two days since its launch." In fact, Twitter's "tweet view" counter is so broad that it counts merely scrolling past a tweet as a "view," making it utterly unreliable as a viewing metric.
A May 16 article by Bob Unruh touted: "An undercover video obtained by OMG News, run by James O'Keefe, shows a Fox insider revealing that Tucker Carlson's dismissal was part of the settlement with Dominion Voting Systems."
A June 8 artlcle by Unruh noted the legal wranting between Carlson and Fox News, followed by a June 12 article complaining about a cease-and-desist letter Fox sent to Carlson.
Then there was a May 25 article by Peter LaBarbera carrying the declarative statement "Tucker is Americans' most trusted news source." But the poll LaBarbera said nothing about "trust," as he seemed to concede in his opening paragraph: "A new survey by Gallup and the Knight Foundation reveals that Tucker Carlson, recently ousted by Fox News despite being their top show host, is the 'most followed or watched public figure in the United States for information,' dominating legacy media news names like NBC's Lester Holt and ABC's David Muir." Being "followed or watched" does not equal trust. LaBarbera went on to botch his version of the list, getting a couple numbers wrong and list NBC's Lester Holt twice. (Apaprently, having a competent copy editor is an expense WND can no longer handle.)
Meanwhile, Joseph Farah and Wayne Allyn Root weren't the only WND columnists who weighed in on Carlson's firing. Jim Darlington's April 28 column was "An open letter to Tucker haters about the truth he taught us" in which he repeated not "truth" but Carlson's misinformation and propaganda:
You know the election of 2020 was an exercise in treason. You were there. You saw what was done. We all did. You can say there is no God, but He will disagree. You can say the election was fair and honest. Or you can say the vaccines were safe and effective.
You know that Joe Biden is a corrupt and thoroughly compromised puppet, who was selected as our presidential figurehead solely by virtue of his willing ascent to every lie placed before him and his unique and in-your-face talent for delusional embellishment. You know his presence in the White House is a purposeful mockery, telling us of our impotence to even know who is truly governing us.
You know that it is impossible for us to avoid the most obvious. That every policy of this administration has been directed at our destruction and that every implausible justification is pure rot.
[...]
We didn't need to gift the Taliban with $80,000,000,000-plus worth of U.S. military equipment. We didn't need to gift the Chinese the biggest military airbase in the region, fully equipped. We didn't need to move the military out before securing the evacuation of American civilians and the Afghans who had been our allies.
[...]
You know Ukraine was one of the prime troughs of corruption, at which the Biden crime family fed. You know that the U.S. State Department squashed efforts, early in the war, for a cease-fire, then amenable to both sides in the conflict. You can't pretend to be ignorant of the unbeatable odds that millions, if not billions of the U.S. "aid" going to Ukraine are finding their way back into the coffers of the American left, for the purposes of buying additional elections.
We didn't need to become a nation confused over what a man is and what a woman is, or whether 7-year-olds need an insane rationale for choosing which sex to be, training manual to follow.
[...]
We didn't need the House speaker's refusal to honor the president's request for the National Guard to control the expected protests January 6. We didn't need the incitement of the Capitol Police lobbing stun grenades into peaceful crowds. We didn't need for a host of coordinated operatives to lead the breach of the Capitol. We didn't need the unanswered killing of U.S. citizens, by those same police. We have not needed the attribution of "white supremacy" to a racially mixed crowd of protesters, for whom the Capitol Police opened doors. We didn't need two and a half years of political persecution and unlawful imprisonment of those who stood in the gap against the coup that has taken us to the brink of chaos.
To correct just a couple of Darlington's falsehoods: Ther U.S. didn't leave $80 billion in military equipment to the Taliban, Trump made no request to Pelosi to activate the National Guard the day of the Capitol riot (and it was not in her power to activate them even if he had), and Ashil Babbitt was committing an act of domestic terrorism when she was killed by law enforcement inside the Capitol.
WND also posted a May 3 video by messianic Jew and onetime WND gravy train maintainer Jonathan Cahn titled "Was Tucker Carlson actually removed by the spirits?" After a lot of gobbleldygook about spirits and "demonic powers" and transphobic ranting, he declared that Carlson "stood in [the spirits'] way" and, thus, was targeted, citing Carlson's anti-abortion rantings likening abortion to "child sacrifice" and alleged exposure of the "dark trinity." Cahn also shoehorned in lots of promotion for his latest book.
Another Gun Massacre, Another MRC Deflection Topic: Media Research Center
With the May gun massacre at an outlet mall in Texas, the Media Research Center continued its pattern of refusing to actually talk about the gun's central role. Nicholas Fondacaro tried to steer things toward mental health, not guns, in a May 8 post:
Following yet another mass shooting where the shooter showed warning signs of struggling with his mental health, on Monday, the ladies of ABC’s The View denied that there was a mental health crisis in America as they turned their nose up at efforts in Texas to address it. They even went so far as to suggest mass shooters weren’t mentally ill and wildly assert that “war weapons” and murders only exist in America.
After playing a soundbite of Texas Republican Governor Greg Abbott vowing that his state was “working to address that anger and violence by going to its root cause, which is addressing the mental health problems behind it,” the cast sat silently in disgust.
First to speak up was faux conservative co-host Alyssa Farah Griffin, who chided that “[t]here's a disconnect between what the American public wants to see on gun safety and what elected officials in Washington and states want to see.”
Fondacaro then played games with polls:
Citing an outlier poll from Fox News, Farah Griffin opined that “87 percent of Americans support background checks for guns.” Background checks already existed and are required in all states, they're federally mandated. She also boasted that “81 percent support raising the minimum age to get a buy a firearm to 21,” which would effectively make many adults second-class citizens who can’t exercise their constitutional rights.
Meanwhile, a recent ABC News Washington Post poll lost month showed growing oppositionto so-called “assault weapon” bans. Interesting how they ignored that one.
That's right -- Fondacaro is trusting a poll from the hated "liberal media" instead of his beloved Fox News because it better fits his narrative. Oh, and he also raged at co-host Sunny Hostin for being "mentally unstable and racist" because he doesn't understand how metaphors work.
A few hours later, he lashed out at "The View" again, this time for pointing out reports of the shooter's white supremacism despite apprently being of Hispanic heritage:
As a follow-up to their earlier conversation on Monday where they denied that mental illness played a key role in mass shootings, even proclaiming that the mentally ill were immune from committing mass shootings, the radical cast of ABC’s The View dove to a new level of lunacy as faux-conservative co-host Ana Navarro proclaimed that blacks and Hispanics were not “immune” from “being a white supremacist.” It’s an accusation that has been leveled at black and Hispanics just for voting Republican.
Returning from a commercial break that ended a heated shouting match between co-host Sara Haines and Sunny Hostin, moderator Whoopi Goldberg whined about the focus on mental health. “We're talking about the insanity of people not recognizing that there are very specific issues,” she said. Of course, the issue she wanted to focus on was race.
“Race apparently turns out to be an issue in a lot of these killings,” she proclaimed, citing the Charleston, South Carolina church shooting from 2015. “We've seen it. People getting shot because they're black. We've seen people getting shot because they're there. We've seen them getting shot because they're Latina.”
[...]
Hostin, a taunch racist, was “glad” Goldberg “brought up the race” angle. And without providing evidence, she pushed the narrative that the Hispanic man responsible for the Allen, Texas shooting was a white supremacist. “But this shooter who happened to be Hispanic and Latino, which is very bizarre to me, had a white supremacy moniker on him,” she said.
Fondacaro then whined that an authority on law enforcement was referenced:
Before doing her habitual quotation of FBI Director Christopher Wray, she lashed out at those who call out her racism. “And so, you know, Christopher Wray – These are not my words. So people don't start with the I’m a race-baiter crap!”she spat.
“Christopher Wray said the biggest threat to our democracy is white supremacy and domestic terrorism. He testified before Congress,” she declared before lashing out again, this time at Republicans for trying to tackle mental health instead of curtailing gun rights, saying they “should be ashamed of themselves.”
Also latching onto the race angle, Navarro made her proclamation on white supremacy. “Look, being Hispanic or being black does not – or being anything, does not make you immune from being racist, from being radicalized, from being a white supremacist, from being evil, from being homicidal,” she asserted.
Fondacaro waited until the final paragraph of his post to concede that Navarro "was right that non-white people can be most of those other horrible things she listed; particularly racist." But he immediately played whataboutism by whining that "she wouldn’t dare call out Hostin for her history of making racist remarks."
In fact, the shooter had Nazi tattoos and a fascination with neo-Nazi ieology, so Fondacaro looks like slightly less of a clown for making his concession. Fondacaro didn't want to talk about that any further, though.
Then it was time to move on to other anti-gun control narratives, with a post by Curtis Houck cheering how a Republican congressman enter the "far-left lair" of "CBS This Morning" to spout those narratives. Houck even dismissed the fact that one massacre victim's face was blown off, callously declaring that it "would be the case with any gun if they’re shot point blank or enough times."
The vast majority of Americans are not as weirdly blase about gun violence as Houck.
CNS Blogger Pouts That 'Comer Caves' Topic: CNSNews.com
Craig Bannister wrote a very pouty June 8 CNSNews.com blog post under the even poutier headline "Comer Caves, Allowing Media/Dems to Lie About Contents of FBI Records Alleging Biden Bribery Scheme":
On Monday, House Oversight Committee Chair Rep. James Comer (R-KY) warned that, if he doesn’t take possession of the FBI document alleging a bribery scheme involving President Joe Biden, media and Democrats will deny his reports and label them crazy conspiracy theories.
On Wednesday, Comer canceled Thursday’s scheduled contempt of Congress vote against FBI Director Christopher Wray, who continues to refuse to turn over the document containing the “highly-credible,” long-time FBI source’s allegations.
But, on Monday, Rep. Comer told reporters that he wouldn’t cancel the contempt of Congress vote, unless he had the document “in hand,” because that was the only way he could get the media and Democrats to admit what it reveals.
“Mr. Chair, why do you need the document in hand?” one reporter asked Comer, questioning the need to “move forward with contempt when the FBI says they are cooperating in good faith.”
Without the physical document to show to the public, media will continue to parrot the Biden Administration’s “conspiracy theory” claims and dismiss the source as unverified, Comer explained:
Bannister wants us to believe that Comer is operating in good faith -- which seems unlikely given that he has released no documentation of his numerous claims about the Biden family. He's also making claims based on a document he doesn't even have poseesion of, which makes those claims -- including his assertion that the source is "highly-credible" -- even more dubious. It can be argued that given the lack of evidence behind his claims, Comer is the one who's peddling crazy conspiracy theories.
If Comer can't back up what he says, he shouldn't be sayhing anything at all -- and Bannister shouldn't treat him as anything other than a partisan actor with an agenda.
MRC Transgender Hate Watch Topic: Media Research Center
The Media Research Center's transphobicwar continues apace. Chief transphobe Tierin-Rose Mandelburg found another child to attack in a March 31 post:
“I’ve known I was a girl so long that I don’t remember life as a boy.”
Well kid, you have your whole life ahead of you to blame your parents for that.
9-year-old Sunny Bryant gave a speech at the Texas State Capitol building this week protesting a TX bill that would prohibit kids from permanently damaging their bodies.
Senate Bill 14 would ban physicians from providing puberty blockers, hormone therapy or surgeries for children. These acts of, what the left calls “gender-affirming care,” are extremely dangerous for anyone, especially children who haven’t fully developed yet. The ban would save many children from life-altering damage. Yet activists and even some kids like Sunny disagree.
At the start, the moderator asked “you are against the bill?” The child had to look to his mother to verify his answer before turning back to the mic. Clearly this child was confused.
[...]
Hearts should break for this kid. As his mother stood next to him, coaching him on the speech she wrote, he stood and presented lie after lie. He’s not to blame though. His parents and whoever else helped feed a delusion are at fault. Let the child be a child and worry about Christmas presents or who’s going to be “it” first in tag or who can hold their breath longest in the pool. A child shouldn’t be worrying about things like this because they shouldn’t be involved in things like this.
Any child, especially a nine-year-old, that thinks he or she is “transgender” is a victim of child abuse. Period.
Jay Maxson called on America's greatest transgender-hating transgender person for an April 6 post (but not before misgendering her and attacking her for being transgender, of course):
Can you imagine if Bruce Jenner had gone the transgender route before he won the Olympic decathlon in 1976? He would have thoroughly demolished all female competition, it would have made a mockery of women’s competition … and I think he knows it. Now known as Caitlyn, Jenner has launched the Fairness First PAC to fight against males wreaking havoc in female athletics.
The man who fathered six children with three wives vaulted out of the closet as a “transgender woman” in 2015. But, like Martina Navratilova, he’s a famous ex-athlete who wants to prevent males from destroying the integrity of female sports. Jenner announced his new political action committee Tuesday, and tweeted his belief that equality should take precedence over inclusion:
[...]
The former Olympic champion has heard all the vitriol before and continues to stand courageously against the radical alphabet mob. He won’t back down in his fight for present and future generations at risk from the insidious trans movement.
Maxson called on a Republican presidential candidate whose campaign thet MRC helped launch in an April 7 post:
To all woke advocates of transgender madness: try justifying this. Fallon Fox, a male transgender who fights over-matched women, broke the skull of one of his victims. Republican presidential candidate Vivek Ramaswamy, who posted a video of the male mauling that woman, was rightly outraged in calling transgenderism a “cult” and a “mental health crisis.”
The horrible beat-down happened in 2014, but Ramaswamy is citing this as Exhibit A for why men do not belong in women’s athletic competitions. He also criticized Bud Light and Nike for entering into partnerships with a trans activist, citing it as an example of large corporations' consistent push to engage in "the worst kind of woke capitalism.”
To make this travesty of justice worse, male trannie Fallon Fox tweeted in 2020, “I enjoyed it. See, I love smacking up TEFS (sic) in the cage who talk transphobic nonsense. It’s bliss!”
Maxson didn't mention until much later in the article that the sport involved here is mixed martial arts, where broken bones are not uncommon. Also, Fallon's 2014 opponent, Tamikka Brents, didn't suffer a skull fracture in the fight (though she did have an orbital bone fracture and a concussion).
The next day, Clay Waters huffed: "On National Public Radio’s Morning Edition Wednesday, new show host Michel Martin invited a Kansas-based reporter to join her in a rhetorical frenzy against an 'extreme' transgender bill recently passed by the Kansas legislature that 'basically erases' transgenders by refusing to indulge the fantasy that one's biological sex is based on personal belief." He later whined, "No one at NPR -- host or guest -- feels the need to explain common-sense opposition to spreading gender dysphoria. It's just a useful tool for Republicans."
An April 10 post by Mandelburg hyped how "A worried mother from Maine is suing her local school board for keeping her child’s “transgender” identity a secret from her," adding: "Schools and so-called “trusted adults” have been on the prowl for vulnerable young kids and teens so that they may imprint their indoctrination methods and facilitate and army of LGBTQ people. The amount of groomers in schools these days are too many to count and the school where [the mother's] innocent daughter attended is no exception." Mandelburg didn't mention that the school district has called the stories circulating about the case "a grossly inaccurate and one-sided story" and that is prohibited by confidentiality requirements from publicly responding. She also failed to explain how any of this qualifies as "grooming." Mandelburg had another transphobic meltdown the following day:
Gone are the days where only little girls dream of being ballerinas. Now, grown men can pursue dreams of being “female” ballet dancers too.
Sophie Rebecca, a former IT technician and biological man, was accepted to the prestigious Royal Ballet Academy back in 2017 as the company’s first transgender artist. Recently, amid the transgender firestorm in the world, Rebecca’s story has sparked more controversery.
According to Reduxx Magazine, the 6ft, 3in Rebecca biological man passed his Royal Academy of Dance Intermediate Foundation ballet exams in 2017 with a Merit and reportedly has performed in the United States professionally ever since.
Supposedly he once said, “I knew from a young age that I was trapped in the wrong body.”
Guess what? He still is, according to his standards.
A number of users called out Rebecca for his unfair advantage and the fact that he really sucks as a ballerina.
[...]
It’s not only unsafe for this man to be parading as a woman as his body is the shape of a man and isn’t designed for female ballet moves, but its also unfair for the actual women who’ve worked their whole lives to get to even the most minimal of roles or positions. Rebecca did none of that.
Not to mention the fact that he’s getting all this special attention and treatment simply because he’s pretending to be a woman.
This is disturbing and, frankly, insulting.
Most normal people, meanwhile, find Mandelburg rabid transphobia highly disturbing and insulting. But the MRC apparently pays her by the insult, so insulting is what she does.
Another MRC transphobe (until he mysteriously lost his job a week later), Matt Philbin, complained in an April 14 post that transgender people point out how they're victimized by people like him:
The Washington Post’s Anne Branigin wants you to know that “The surge of anti-trans attacks has made the stakes higher than ever for trans storytellers and performers.” The attacks are almost too heinous to recount: the nine-year-olds shooting up drag bars; the NCAA swimmer who, with malice aforethought, tried to say hurtful things about brave transgender athletes who just want to compete as the women they weren’t born to be.
As for the stakes – well, that sounds dramatic, but it really isn’t. This installment of the The Post’s “Trans in America” is just a reminder that, no matter what your eyes and ears tell you, trans people are still victims. “Trans rights are being rolled back around the country,” Branigin writes, “and some trans creators are facing fervent backlash against their work.”
We’ll have to take her word for it on those “rights,” and it really stinks that people don’t like your solipsistic books or movies or whatever. (At some point, even the most skilled self-portraitist slams into the laws of supply and demand.) But being misunderstood is an important part of the victim ethos.
[...]
But here’s the thing: when you go from a dockside bar to Nike spokes-whatever, you’re gonna get pushback from people who respect biology, theology and 5,000 years of civilization. You can accuse those people all you want of being the aggressors in the culture wars, but it doesn’t make it so. And it doesn’t make trans people victims.
Philbin also thinks the new "Peter Pan" film isn't white enough, so maybe nobody should take his opinions seriously. (Us pointing that out may very well be the reason he's out of his MRC job.)
Newsmax Gushed Over Trump's Performance at CNN Town Hall Topic: Newsmax
Newsmax, as a loyal Trump sycophant, is excited about all things Trump, was particularly excited on the town hall he did on CNN May 10. The day before, Jeffrey Rodack previewed things from a pro-Trump point of view:
Former President Donald Trump is touting his scheduled Wednesday appearance on CNN.
In a post on Truth Social on Tuesday, he wrote: "I'll be doing CNN tomorrow night, LIVE from the Great State of New Hampshire, because they are rightfully desperate to get those fantastic (TRUMP!) ratings once again. They made me a deal I couldn't refuse!!! Could be the beginning of a New & Vibrant CNN, with no more Fake News, or it could turn into a disaster for all, including me. Let's see what happens? Wednesday Night at 8:00!!!”
Its first article on the town hall itself, an overall summary, was a balanced wire article, and a second wire article focused on the E. Jean Carroll defamation lawsuit he had lost the day before . These were followed by a couple of Newsmax-generated articles by Solange Reyner touting other claims Trump made:
Rayner also werved up her own summary of the town hall, which quoted only trump and didn't note any criticism or offer any fact-checks.
The next day, an article by Rodack cheered how Trump dominated and made CNN look bad:
Liberals were left fuming over CNN's town hall with Donald Trump as the former president firmly took control of the event.
The town hall, hosted by CNN's Kaitlan Collins, aired Wednesday night from New Hampshire.
Progressives such as Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y., directed their anger squarely at CNN.
[...]
The Times also reported CNN Chair Chris Licht defended the network from the backlash it is receiving.
On a network-wide editorial call on Thursday, Licht complimented Collins, on "a masterful performance," the Times noted. "We all know covering Donald Trump is messy and tricky, and it will continue to be messy and tricky," he said. "But it's our job.
Newsmax also gave space to its fellow Trump sycophants to praise his performance. A May 11 article claimed:
Conservative talk show host Dan Bongino said former President Donald Trump's performance during a CNN town hall was so good Wednesday night that he effectively wrapped up the 2024 Republican presidential nomination.
"I'm going to say after last night, I don't know what you guys think, the primary is over," Bongino said during his opening monologue Thursday of "The Dan Bongino Show" podcast.
"It's over man. ... Trump was in rare form last night and just lit CNN on fire to the point where CNN was questioning CNN at the end of the night.
Another sycophant parroted that in a May 12 article:
Former President Donald Trump's performance on CNN's town hall this week resulted in a win for both him and the network that President Joe Biden, if he were in the same situation, could never match, Rep. Matt Gaetz said on Newsmax Friday.
"President Trump showed a comfortable command of the room," the Florida Republican said on Newsmax's "Eric Bolling: The Balance." "He had an exquisite knowledge of the facts. He brought receipts to counter some of the false narratives that have been put out by a lot of mainstream media and he interacted with people asking questions in a very warm and comforting and almost host-like way."
But Biden, Gaetz told Bolling, "could not do 90 minutes with Kaitlan Collins without needing a nap in the middle and a drool rag at the end of it."
A May 15 article by the apparently unironically named Charlie McCarthy let Trump take a victory lap:
Former President Donald Trump said he's surprised by how "traumatized" CNN employees were after his town hall on the network last week.
CNN employees and liberals were fuming after Trump firmly took control of the event held in New Hampshire on Wednesday.
"I was surprised by the level of hostility," Trump told The Messenger. "I thought they would be neutral and even better than that so they could get the viewers back. And they had one of the best [viewership] days in years. So you would think they would claim success.
McCarthy went on to uncritically repeat numerous boasts by Trump without any attempt to fact-check him.
WND Criticizes Convictions Of Proud Boys Over Capitol Riot, Fret Trump May Be Next Topic: WorldNetDaily
WorldNetDaily has something of an affinity for violent extremist groups and trying to downplay their violent extremism. It tried to soften the violent-thug image of the Proud Boys before the Capitol riot -- which didn't age well -- though it then mostly threw them under the bus to protect Donald Trump. It also laughably insisted that both the Proud Boys and the Oath Keepers as "groups that mostly have acted in patriotic situations" -- as if the Capitol riot violence was somehow "patriotic" -- and it also tried to whitewash the Oath Keepers in an attempt to defend a politician who affiliated himself with the group.
But as members of the Oath Keepers and Proud Boys went on trial for their roles in the Capitol riot, WND stayed largely silent. WND gave attention to the arrest of Oath Keepers leader Stewart Rhodes in early 2022 on seditioius conspiracy charges, with one article gave space to a conspiracy theorist to rant about why it took a year to arrest him, and a June 2022 article hyped Rhodes claiming from prison that "the partisan committee set up by House Speaker Nancy Pelosi lied to the American people" about the riot. But it offered no original coverage of Rhodes' trial, and even his conviction on seditious conspiracy charges in November was noted only by a wire article it stole from the Associated Press.
Similarly, WND offered no original coverage of the trial of several Proud Boys members earlier this year, but its writers started weighing in after the defendants were convicted. Peter LaBarbera fretted in a May 4 article that the convictions could lead to Trump being prosecuted for instigating the riot, which LaBarbera downgraded to a "melee":
Critics and supporters of Donald Trump said the government's successful prosecution of four "Proud Boys" J6 protesters on "seditious conspiracy" charges in a Washington, D.C. court could pave the way for him being criminally prosecuted in the same, Democrat-friendly court system.
After seven days of deliberation, a D.C. jury containing members with openly leftist sympathies Thursday found ex-Proud Boys chairman Enrique Tarrio and three other other members of the anti-left group guilty of "seditious conspiracy" and other related charges for their actions in the "Stop the Steal" melee on Jan. 6, 2021 at the nation's Capitol.
"The legal maximum penalty for either seditious conspiracy or obstruction charges is 20 years in prison," the Washington Post reported. Further details of the ruling can be found at UnCoverDC.com, which called the verdict a "highly politicized miscarriage of justice."
Julie Kelly, the leading conservative pundit chronicling what she calls the Biden administration's "abusive" J6 prosecutions and extremely harsh treatment of J6 prisoners, tweeted Thursday: "A rogue judge, dirty prosecutors, and biased DC jury just handed Merrick Garland's handpicked special prosecutor the biggest gift of his career: a roadmap to indict Trump on seditious conspiracy and other crimes."
LaBarbera then complained that "Liberal corporate media leaned heavily on the left's "violent insurrection" narrative to report on the Proud Boys conviction and huffed that there was "extreme bias" during the trial.
LaBarbera's article was illustrated by a smiling photo of Proud Boys leader Enrique Tarrio taken by Matt Keener, who wrote one of those WND attempts to soften the group's image -- a fawning November 2020 profile of Tarrio dewsigned to counter perceptions of the group as a bunch of white supremacists (never mind that there is a notable Proud Boys faction that is quite proud to be white supremacist and anti-Semitic).
Rachel Alexander -- who usually sticks to manufacturing conspiracy theories about Arizona elections -- attacked the convictions in her May 8 column, similarly fretting that Trump might be next:
Five Proud Boys were convicted by a jury last week for criminal acts related to Jan. 6, 2021, but no one really believes they did anything more violent than BLM and Antifa. Thousands of the latter cases involving violence have been dismissed. U.S. District Court Judge Timothy Kelly allowed the Proud Boys to be portrayed to the heavily biased jury using language selected for its incendiary value to portray a distorted picture, including telling the jury about actions by others that weren't even taken by the five.
It didn't help that the mainstream media includes language in most articles about J6 as "storming the Capitol" instead of a "mostly peaceful protest." The five could have easily done the latter, because they brought no weapons, assaulted no officers, and Proud Boy leader Enrique Tarrio wasn't even at J6.
Prosecutors repeatedly played clips of Donald Trump in an effort to manipulate the Trump-hating jury. Trump said, "Stand back and stand by" and encouraged supporters to come to J6 with, "It will be wild." Neither of those sound like a call to violence; Trump frequently talks in hyperbole. But one juror admitted afterward when asked why he voted to convict, that Trump's remarks were "part of it."
Alexander then insisted that Tarrio's call to his followers of "whatever happens ... make it a spectacle" -- arguably evidence of premeditation -- was meaningless: "Tarrio's instruction to create a 'spectacle' at the Capitol was used to make jurors think he intended violence – but the Proud Boys are well-known for their pattern of reacting to violence, not starting it." She then tried to claim that the lack of violent reaction to the convictions somehow proved that the right isn't violent:
It's now being ignored that there was no violent reaction across the country in response to the verdicts. The irony here is that it's really the left that engages in violence when they don't get their way; the facts have to be distorted and provocateurs planted within right-wing protests to attempt to portray the right as violent.
The Proud Boys may not be the preferred style for most folks on the right. But that's why the left is targeting them; it's easier to distort their actions and fit them into a crime than it is the rest of us, so left-wing prosecutors are picking them off to establish precedents that are a gross abuse of the law, precedents that can then be used against anyone on the right.
Never mind, of course, that Alexander herself is distorting people's actions and trying to fit them into a crime by invoking Black Lives Matter and Antifa as shorthand for alleged violence on "the left."
NEW ARTICLE: COVID Misinformation Continues At The MRC Topic: Media Research Center
The Media Research Center just can't stop portraying spreaders of COVID vaccine falsehoods as "victims" for being held accountable -- and it can't stop spreading its own false or dubious COVID-related claims. Read more >>
MRC's Durham Defenders Back In Business After Final Report Released Topic: Media Research Center
The Media Research Center spent a goodchunk of last year hyping John Durham's investigate-the-investigators probe attacking previous probes of Donald Trump, repeatedly hyping his work even as both prosecutions he attempted in court resulted in aquittals of the accused. When Durham issued a final report of his investigation -- in which he complained that Trump was investigated but did not recommend new charges or even offer recommendations on how to handle future investigations -- the MRC rushed to Durham's defense yet again. Nicholkas Fondacaro spent a May 15 post complaining that the Durham probe was essentially (and property) dismissed as a nothingburger:
On Monday, Special Council [sic] John Durham’s long-awaited report into the origins of the Trump-Russia investigation fell out of the blue. The report faults the FBI and says they should never have opened Crossfire Hurricane since it was entirely based on “leads provided or funded by Trump's political opponents.” Despite how Durham spelled out the fact that the Trump-Russia probe was based on “raw, unanalyzed and uncorroborated intelligence,” ABC’s World News Tonight and NBC Nightly News stood behind it.
ABC chief Justice correspondent Thomas reported that Durham’s report found the FBI “never should've launched a probe in the first place, since ‘neither U.S. law enforcement nor the intelligence community appears to have possessed any actual evidence of collusion.’”
He noted: “The bureau relied on ‘raw, unanalyzed and uncorroborated intelligence.’ Noting that ‘there was significant reliance on investigative leads provided or funded (directly or indirectly) by Trump's political opponents.’” He even admitted the infamous Steele Dossier was part of that effort.
But Thomas still insisted that then-candidate Donald Trump provided all the evidence the FBI needed to open the investigation:
Fondacaro praised a different reporter for spoutng a conservative-friendly narrative: "In stark contrast, on CBS Evening News, senior investigative correspondent Catherine Herridge didn’t hold back on Durham’s swipes at the FBI. She noted he called out how 'senior FBI personnel displayed a serious lack of analytical rigor' and 'relied on investigative leads provided or funded by Trump's political opponents.'"
The next day, Alex Christy groused about another commentator pointing out the failure of the Durham investigation:
MSNBC Morning Joe co-host Joe Scarborough reacted to Special Counsel John Durham’s report that was fiercely critical of the FBI and the Trump-Russia probe by dismissing it as a waste of taxpayer money and that the main takeaway of the report is how bad Durham and Republicans look.
In one of his typical rants, Scarborough tried to find a silver lining, “The only good news is at least his four-year taxpayer funded boondoggle, that was funded by working Americans, paying him to walk through the fevered swamps of Trumpism is over.”
[...]
Bursting MSNBC’s bubble is not the same thing as destroying one’s reputation, but after a ranting about the GOP’s poor relationship to the FBI and at no point considering the demise of the Russia collusion narrative might have something to do with that, Scarborough returned to Durham, “Four years, millions and millions of dollars, and nothing to show for it but some really bad, humiliating headlines for pro-Trump newspapers.”
Curtis Houck similarly whined that pro-Durham narratives weren't followed in non-right-wing media:
Trump-Russia probe Special Counsel John Durham’s report dropped late Monday afternoon and, with only one criminal conviction (via a plea agreement), the liberal media were ebullient in celebrating the lack of mass indictments some billed as a foregone conclusion. It was nonetheless damaging as it found “neither U.S. law enforcement nor the Intelligence Community appears to have possessed any actual evidence of collusion in their holdings at the commencement of the Crossfire Hurricane investigation.”
On CNN and MSNBC, they were only missing in their initial coverage was champagne bottles as they falsely claimed “there’s absolute nothing new here,” there was still Trump-Russia collusion, and Crossfire Hurricane was wholly necessary.
Hours after the Department of Justice released the long-awaited report from Special Council [sic] John Durham into the origins of the Trump-Russia investigation, finding the FBI had no evidence and no reason to open the investigation to begin with, former FBI deputy director-turned-CNN senior law enforcement analyst Andrew McCabe finally crawled out from his hidey-hole Monday night to address the story. Of course, AC360 host Anderson Cooper gave him the floor to freely lash out at Durham and continue to lie about the investigation.
Going to McCabe only a couple minutes into his timeslot, Cooper noted that McCabe’s “name comes up 58 times in the Durham report” and tried to spin the fact that the Durham report found “the FBI never had evidence of collusion.” He asserted “[t]hat's not a legal term” when everyone understood that to be shorthand for Donald Trump being a Russian asset.
“What's your response?” Cooper simply teed up McCabe to defend himself, with little citation from the report to press his guest on. McCabe was fired for lying to federal investigators about his leaking to the press regarding the Hillary Clinton-e-mail probe.
Actually, McCabe was fired by Donald Trump just days before his retirement in a fit of retaliation over, and he was eventually awarded his full pension. But Fondacaro continued his attacks, huffing that "Cooper gave McCabe free rein to lash out at Durham and the investigation. McCabe proclaimed that Durham’s work 'was never a legitimate investigation,' just a 'political errand' for Trump."
Houck returned to rant about another person who didn't adhere to right-wing narratives:
In much the same way he did hours earlier on Monday’sNBC Nightly News, NBC Justice correspondent Ken Dilanian — who should be known as CIA Ken for his fealty to the agency — surfaced on Tuesday’s Today show to further spin for his real bosses in the intelligence community on Special Counsel John Durham’s report on the Trump-Russia probe.
Dilanian was shameless from the get-go in dismissing the report that found the Trump-Russia collusion investigation should have never even be launched: “Durham’s report is filled with blistering criticism of the FBI...but critics say Durham’s investigation ultimately fell flat, even though it lasted more than a year longer than the actual Russia investigation by Special Counsel Robert Mueller.”
Channeling the criticisms of the Clinton special counsels on their length, Durham similarly tut-tutted over the fact that “Durham brought just two criminal cases that ended in acquittals and his report called for no major changes.”
[...]
[ABC's Pierre] Thomas closed by implying the probe was a waste: “Durham’s investigation, which cost more than $6.5 million, falls far short of proving that there was a deep state conspiracy against Trump. Durham only convicted one lower level FBI official of misconduct...and two major trials ended in acquittal.”
Worse yet, he further justified the hounding of Team Trump based on the Trump Tower meeting.
So, was it the Trump Tower meeting, Trump calling out to Russia to “find” Hillary Clinton’s missing e-mails, or George Papadopoulos? Hard to keep it all straight!
Houck didn't explain to his readers what the Trump Tower meeting was, let alone why it should not have resulted in an investigation.
The MRC also published a May 17 column by Ben Shapiro defending Durham, as well as a May 20 column by Jeffrey Lord claiming that Pulitizer Prizes awarded to the New York Times and the Washington Post for their work exposing connections between the Trump campaign and Russia were somhow invalidated by Durham's investigation, though he offered no specific claim in any of that work that Durham contradicted.
Calrson's Firing Sends WND's Root Into Conspiracy Mode Topic: WorldNetDaily
When Fox News settled the defamation lawsuit Dominion filed against it for a whopping $787 million, WorldNetDaily columnist Wayne Allyn Root had a fit, insisting that the settlement didn't affect his pet election fraud conspiracy theories. When Fox News fired right-wing host Tucker Carlson shortly afterward, it was for another fit by Root, and he delievered in his April 29 column, which began this way:
Did you hear about the new Fox News TV series? "Two spoiled brats and a clueless RINO." It's the tragic story of Rupert Murdoch's two spoiled-brat sons from liberal, woke Europe, and the quarterback running their Fox News playbook: hapless, clueless, bitter Paul Ryan.
Fox News in a matter of days ended relationships with the No. 1 host on cable TV (Tucker Carlson) and the No. 1 host of weekend cable TV (Dan Bongino).
Great moves, if you want to be the new Bed Bath & Beyond.
[...]
Think of what destroyed Bed Bath & Beyond. The company made one fatal decision: to fire Mike Lindell and stop selling "My Pillow" products. What a terrible miscalculation. Their audience was middle-class America: the Silent Majority. That audience is overwhelmingly conservative. From the moment they fired "My Pillow," their sales imploded. Bed, Bath & Beyond committed economic suicide by offending their own base of customers.
As we've noted, what actually bankrupted Bed Bath & Beyond was spending money on stock buybacks instead of investing it in business operations, not refusing to sell products from a discredited conspriacy theorist.
Root then moved on to insulting the Murdoch family that runs Fox News, sneering that "Rupert Murdoch is a very old, out-of-touch billionaire who is now semi-retired and busy trying to marry gals 30 years younger" and that his children "are kids that were born on third base and think they hit a triple." He also lashed out at Fox News board member Paul Ryan: "Paul Ryan is a clueless deep state RINO (Republican in Name Only) who has no idea how real conservative patriots think. His life is dedicated to destroying former President Donald Trump – because Paul Ryan is blind with rage and envy at how conservatives hate him, but love and adore Trump. Paul Ryan is "The Grinch" of GOP politics. His heart is filled with rage and envy."
Because Root is a salesman at heart (albeit one that believes in crazy conspiracy theories), Root plugged his own book:
I just wrote a No. 1 bestselling book, "The Great Patriot BUY-cott Book." It's about the huge divide in America. I believe conservative patriots need to start building a parallel conservative economy. We need to separate from the extreme, radical, madness and destruction of the Left. We need to spend our money only with companies led by conservatives. We need to punish and defund the Left.
But my book is also about the main issues that the Silent Majority and real conservatives care about:
No. 1: The communist takeover of the USA … and along with it, the weaponization of government.
No. 2: Rigged and stolen elections (the hallmark of communism).
No. 3: The COVID-19 vaccine disaster – the deaths and crippling injuries from this poison vaccine, and the cover-up by Big Pharma, government and the mainstream media.
No. 4: The fraud and corruption of the Ukraine war funding and how the deep state is leading us into World War III.
Fox News doesn't want to talk about those issues. Fox News is scared to death of those issues. My book went to No. 1 bestseller without one FNC interview.
Root offered no evidence that his book is a "No. 1 bestseller." He was already moving on to a new/old conspiracy theory:
I believe the final decision about firing Tucker was based on his commentary just a few days ago about the dangers and deaths from the COVID-19 vaccine and how mainstream media are responsible for taking bribes (i.e., hundreds of millions in advertising sales) from Big Pharma to cover up the biggest health care scandal in human history. Think about how many of their own loyal viewers may have died because Fox News covered up the truth?
Keep in mind James O'Keefe of Project Veritas exposed and humiliated scores of liberals with his undercover videos for many years – and he never faced any repercussions. But as soon as his undercover videos exposed the alleged corruption and deception of Pfizer and the COVID-19 vaccine, his own board fired him within days.
Just like Tucker. Come out against Big Pharma, expose the vaccine dangers and suddenly your job (no matter how successful you are) evaporates overnight. That's the power and hold Big Pharma has on the media.
Actually, O'Keefe was fired because of financial improprieties, including spending company money on himself.But why let the facts interfere with a pet conspiracy theory?
Root ended with another conspiracy-related comment: "I believe Fox News is finished. The question is, what's their next move? Maybe Fox News is about to sell the network to Pfizer. Maybe Pfizer plans to convert Fox News to a 24/7 vaccine propaganda network."
Newsmax Continued To Defend Trump On Arraignment Day Topic: Newsmax
Newsmax had beenfreakingout over Donald Trump's latest indictment, and when arraignment day came on June 13, it ramped thins up even more. A paywalled article called the indictment and coming trial an "October surprise," followed by a fairly straightforward article by Jeffrey Rodack about efforts to allow cameras during the arraignement. Then came the usual attack-and-defend mode:
Trump sycophant Dick Morris, meanwhile, cranked out a column that day trying to divert attention away from the indictment to, yes, Hillary Clinton:
The real loser here is Hillary Clinton.
The indictment has had the effect of turning the political clock back to 2016 and Hillary’s e-mail scandal.
Even as people see President Trump in the dock for keeping a small number of classified documents at his home, we all wonder why Hillary, who did not just have classified documents but actually erased more than 30,000 of them, has escaped trial.
And, if Hillary is the real defendant in how this case is playing out politically, her co-defendant is Joe Biden.
Actually, there's no comparison between the two. Hillary did not have 30,000 classified documents -- in fact, none of those emails on her personal server were marked as classified, and an investigation found that Clinton did nothing illegal. By contrast, Trump had documents that were clearly marked as classified and had his lawyers lie to the feds about whether all classified documents in his possession had been returned.
Morris then ranted about how Hunter Biden had been "purportedly bribed," and that "The Trump indictment is nothing but a tactic to take coverage away from the $5 million bribe Zlochevsky is alleged to have paid to then vice-president Biden." But there's no actual evidence to back it up at this point -- hence Morris' weasel words "purportedly" and "allegedly" -- whereas with Trump there are tapes.
CNS Blog Attacks Biden Over Litigation Started Under Bush Topic: CNSNews.com
A May 26 post at the deprecated CNSNews.com blog at MRCTV carried the headline "Farmers Cheer SCOTUS WOTUS Decision Returning Property Rights to Landowners from Biden’s Clutches." Craig Bannister wrote:
The nation’s farmers are cheering Thursday’s Supreme Court ruling that American citizens, not the Biden Administration, have the right to manage the water on their property.
In 2014, the Obama Administration concocted and issued the Waters of the United States (WOTUS) rule, greatly expanding the federal government’s claim to control of water in the U.S. - including on private property - under the guise of an Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) initiative. The rule was repealed by President Donald Trump, but reinstated last year by President Joe Biden.
In Thursday’s Sackett v. Environmental Protection Agency decision, the Supreme Court issued a unanimous decision that the EPA can’t prohibit Idaho residents Michael and Chantell Sackett from building a home on their property near a wetland.
In fact, the case has nothing to do with either Biden or Obama. The Sacketts' litigation began in 2008 -- when George W. Bush was president, meaning that the litigation predates the WOTUS rule Bannister is complaining about.
As to expected from a biased writer like Bannister, he quoted only conservative-leaning groups cheering the ruling, such as the Farm Bureau, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and Associated Builders and Contractors. Bannister added that "ABC’s statement calls on the Biden Administration to “refrain from regulatory overreach that harms taxpayers and job creators” -- even though, again, the litigation had nothing whatsoever to do with the Biden administration.
MRC DeSantis Defense Brigade Watch Topic: Media Research Center
The Media Research Center has to defend Ron DeSantis from a variety of criticisms ranging from education to pudding, so it's gotten good at being an arm of his PR operation. Here's some of how the MRC defended DeSantis in March and April:
A March 17 post by Kevin Tober cheered that a reporter was fired for accurately describing the content of a DeSantis press release:
During her latest bout of DeSantis derangement syndrome, MSNBC’s vile and vitriolic ReidOut host Joy Reid brought on disgraced former Axios journalist Ben Montgomery who on Monday was fired for calling a press release from Florida Republican Governor Ron DeSantis’s office “propaganda.” To attempt to illustrate her false belief that DeSantis is waging a war on the press, Reid used Montgomery's appearance on her Thursday night show to hold what seemed like a therapy session.
After pointing out that Montgomery was fired after his juvenile email was posted on Twitter by Florida Department of Education communications director Alex Lanfranconi, Reid bemoaned that “there is a bullying aspect and a lot of trolling” in the DeSantis administration.
“They tried to bully my dear friend and colleague Andrea Mitchell for asking a question not even to DeSantis, to the Vice President, Kamala Harris,” Reid whined, referencing a partisan interview conducted by Andrea Mitchell in which she asked, without evidence, why DeSantis doesn’t want schools to teach about slavery.
Doubling down on the very thing that got him fired in the first place, Montgomery proclaimed DeSantis’s press release “was propaganda” and “a waste of my time.”
Not wanting to be held accountable for his actions, Montgomery played the victim and claimed that Axios firing him for exposing himself as a leftist activist “has a chilling effect on the entire news media.”
Tober didn't explain how Montgomery's assessment of the DeSantis press release was incorrect in any way.
Alex Christy spent a March 24 post complaining that DeSantis' time as a Navy lawyer at Guantanamo Bay dealing with was brought up:
MSNBC keeps coming up with reasons to oppose a potential presidential campaign by Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis. The latest reason came on Thursday from The 11th Hour guest host Mehdi Hasan and Crooked Media podcaster Juanita Tolliver where they lamented DeSantis’s popularity will likely increase because he “tortured” prisoners at Guantanamo Bay.
Referencing the recent interview DeSantis did with Piers Morgan, Hasan teed up a clip of the controversy, “Juanita, DeSantis was also asked about the Washington Post reporting on his time in the Navy at Guantanamo Bay, including allegations that he advised the use of force feeding against prisoners participating in hunger strikes. Have a listen.”
The clip showed DeSantis claiming that force feeding was something he had no authority on, “I was a junior officer; I didn't have authority to authorize anything. There may have been a commander that would have done feeding if someone was going to die, but that was not something that I would have even had authority to do.”
By dishonestly portraying the DeSantis clip as representative of the Post article, Christy ignored the actual content of the article, in which DeSantis is quoted as an advocate of force-feeding, adding that "He has described the hunger strikes as part of a '“jihad' against the United States, and characterized claims of abuse from detainees and their lawyers as attempts to work the system — foreshadowing his conservative views as a lawmaker on issues ranging from constitutional rights to military and criminal justice."
Christy then whined that it was also pointed out how DeSantis is in a right-wing bubble:
Back live, Hasan wondered if DeSantis’s popularity would soon fade, “Juanita, do you think that this part of DeSantis’s record is going to get more attention in the future? I mean, there's so much more that could come out about him, his time in the Navy, his time in Congress, his time before politics, as a teacher. So far he's been cocooned in his safe right-wing space of Florida for so long.”
Despite being only a governor, DeSantis has faced a hostile press that has consistently lied and misled about what he is doing. The idea he is being cocooned in a right-wing safe space is ridiculous.
Not as ridiculous, however, as one of the maintainers of that DeSantisg safe space denying that it exists.
WND, Farah Had A Sad Over Tucker Carlson's Firing Topic: WorldNetDaily
WorldNetDaily first reacted to Fox News' firing of right-wing propgandist Tucker Carlson by trying to blame Ray Epps. But like other ConWeboutlets, it went into fret-and-defense mode for him:
An April 25 article by Bob Unruh hyped that for a short time, he posted on his website an ad offering those who sign up on his site to be given details about 'what Tucker's up to next.'"
Later that day. Joe Kovacs promoted a video Carlson post teasing his future plans.
An April 28 article by Peter LaBarbera touted how "Tucker Carlson is viewed much more favorably than Fox News, the cable network that just let him go, among middle-aged and older voters, Republicans and conservatives, according to a new survey by Rasmussen Reports, a favorite polling firm on the right."
A May 1 article by Kovacs focused on Tucker's continued status as a Fox News employee.
Meanwhile, editor Joseph Farah -- who was one of those suggesting Epps got Carlson fired -- continued to be a total Tucker stan. He was spewing conspiracy theories and going Godwin about the firing in his April 25 column:
Call it for what it is – election interference, Biden protection, next year's version of the laptop from hell.
I speak of the firing of Tucker Carlson, the bravest, most fearless man on television. No one else came close – not in a million years. Connect the dots.
You had Chuckie Schumer's spleen-felt televised message to Rupert Murdoch, directing him to fire Carlson or, at least, censor his promised multi-part series on the Jan. 6 hoax. It was effective. It turned it into a one-part series. Then there were Tucker's gutsy references to the fraudulent elections of 2020. That must have stuck in Murdoch's craw. Then came Sunday night's "60 Minutes" ode to Ray Epps, the one man safe from the Liz Cheney's House Unselect Committee of Jan. 6 – and CBS predictably blamed Tucker again. One would have to be blind or a Democrat not to see the fix was in.
America is in deep, deep trouble.
First they came for Andrew Breitbart, in 2012. Then they came for Matt Drudge, in 2018. Then they came with COVID-19 just in time for the election of 2020. Then, in 2022, they came for WND and some other defiant ones in the internet (via demonetization). Then they came for Tucker Carlson.
Am I being overly dramatic by drawing parallels to the era of Nazis? Not on your life! Figure out what I am saying. The Deep State plays for keeps.
And being utterly shameless, he managed to turn this pro-Tucker rant into self-victimhood and a money beg:
Will he be back on television, ever? Why not? Ask yourself that question. He had the ratings – even for Fox. But it was not enough. That's the way the media work now. It happened years ago for WND, too. We were the first. We were popular. We stood here for 25 years. But Google took away the money. Facebook took away the money. Amazon took away the money. All we have left is your support.
Don't let the woke mob and the ruling elite take it away.
Please consider helping us continue to expose the Deep State that has canceled Tucker by making a generous tax-deductible donation to the nonprofit 501(c)(3) WND News Center. You can designate a one-time gift or a repeating monthly donation, using credit/debit card or PayPal.
Farah spent the first half of his April 26 column taking credit for building Newsmax leader Christopher Ruddy's success in right-wing media, whining at one point:
His idea was always to start a TV station – which he finally achieved in 2014. I was not impressed and have not become a fan. It was not ever very conservative, and lately, one of his ex-hosts, Grant Stinchfield, told me a story of how Newsmax advised him to "attack" Tucker Carlson. In fact, in this news report and video Stinchfield claims his refusal to attack Tucker was the reason he was fired from Newsmax. So, not a chance Tucker will ever work there.
Actually, Newsmax wants you to forget it ever criticized Carlson for being a pro-Russia shill -- which seems like as good a reason as any to criticize him -- because it's trying to woo him to Newsmax. Farah, however, wants Carlson to go even further right:
How about Tucker joining Glenn Beck and Blaze Media? He likes Glenn Beck and so do I. But it's not TV. So, I don't think so.
That leaves MSNBC and CNN. Incredibly bad blood there for Tucker.
So that about does it. Where else can Tucker Carlson go?
I would cajole Tucker to consider a quiet, up-and-coming new TV network, Real America's Voice. It may soon supplant Fox because it lives up to its name. They have some stars in their constellation – Steve Bannon, Charlie Kirk, the aforementioned Grant Stinchfield, Dr. Gina Loudon, who once worked at WND, and Fox's super-talented Ed Henry, not to mention John Solomon – a real journalist. There are others worth mentioning, but you can do a little research on the next great network in America.
[...]
But former President Donald Trump is very aware of Real America's Voice. It broadcasts every Trump event, every rally, every speech. He loves it. And so do his fans. You've probably seen many of them televised on WND via Real America's Voice.
I would say it's the only game in town.
It's the kind of career move Tucker would consider – unless he wants to run on Trump's ticket. That's another possibility – but I would love to see Tucker back on TV.
You might remember that Loudon wrote a WND column defending her teenage daughter's relationship with a 57-year-old man, which WND quietly disappeared a few years later as she tried to boost her standing in pro-Trump circles.
For his May 1 column, Farah was angry to learn that people outside his right-wing bubble hate Carlson:
For most of us, the firing of Tucker Carlson by Fox News left us with a hole in our heart and our lives – much like the untimely death of Rush Limbaugh. The only difference was one hour a day versus three hours a day to look forward to.
But for the fake media and Big Tech, the censorious class, they were beside themselves; they got what they wanted. In their eyes, it was like a dream-come-true, what they had been hoping for, longing for, yearning for.
How else can you characterize the hateful reviews of what he said day after day as the only Big League journalist and commentator walking out of step with the crowd? Honestly, they will soon have nothing else talk about and write about – nothing left about which their spleens could hope to ooze more toxic bile. They're like the walking dead. They got their victim – but there's nothing left to eat.
Who am I talking about?
Well, most of you probably didn't have time to keep up with all of Tucker's detractors. They were legion.
[...]
Wow! The jealously and hatred of these impostor journalists is palpable, isn't it? There's no shortage of them. They're just everywhere. From the New York Times to the truthfully named Daily Beast, they are all obsessed with Tucker. Why? Because he has a different point of view and articulates it clearly and accurately. That's his "sin." His only one apparently.
It can't possibly have anything to do with Carlson's history of lies and eagerness to use lies and conspriacy theories to destroy the lives of innocent people like Epps.
MRC Hates Twitter's New CEO For Not Being Far-Right Enough Topic: Media Research Center
Twitter's newly appointed CEO, Linda Yaccarino, has indisputable right-wing bona fides: President Trump appointed her to serve on a White House commission and she follows numerous right-wing and far-right Twitter accounts. But that's not far-right enough for the Media Research Center. Joseph Vazquez devoted a May 15 post to being mad that Vaccarino once argued in favor of content moderation on Twitter -- which he insists on framing as "censorship" without explaining why hate and misinformation must be allowed to spread unchecked:
Twitter owner Elon Musk’s newly appointed World Economic Forum-tied CEO for the platform recently tried to corner him into committing to reinstalling some of the same Orwellian censorship structures of the old regime. Gee, what a shocker (sarcasm).
Then-NBCUniversal Chair of Global Advertising and Partnerships Linda Yaccarino pressed Musk during an interview at the 2023 MMA Global POSSIBLE Miami Event on whether he would pledge to reinstate an “influence council” akin to the old censorship-obsessed regime. “So Twitter 1.0 had a very well-populated, much loved influence council,” Yaccarino mourned. She propped the “council” up as a supposedly necessary “recurring feedback loop from your key stakeholders — your advertisers — where they had recurring access or would have recurring access to you.”
The kind of so-called “influence” Yaccarino pushed involved giving advertisers some control over Twitter’s “product development, ad safety” and — of course — “content moderation,” which is a cute euphemism for censorship.
Musk didn’t take the bait and deflected Yaccarino’s attempts to corner him. “It’s totally cool to say that you want to have your advertising appear in certain places in Twitter and not in other places. But it is not cool to try to say what Twitter will do.” Musk was adamant that if his stance meant “losing advertising dollars, we lose it. But freedom of speech is paramount.” Musk also asserted that a so-called influence council would make him “wary of creating a backlash among the public because the public thinks that their views are being determined by” elitists.
But this begs the question in retrospect: why would Musk appoint a clearly liberal individual to lead a platform that is apparently not nearly as committed to protecting free speech? Yaccarino chairs the Taskforce on Future of Work and sits on the Media, Entertainment and Culture Industry Governors Steering Committee at the globalist WEF. WEF has actively promoted asinine views pushing Big Tech censorship.
Vazquez didn't mention that his defintion of "free speech" on Twitter that must be allowed to spread unchec apparently includes hate speech -- it's indisputable that anti-Semitism has spiked on Twitter since Musk took over. As a result of this, advertisers are fleeing the platform; Twitter ad revenue dropped by more than half since last year -- after all, no advertiers wants their ad to be posted next to a hate-filled tweet. (One might call it a case of "go anti-woke, go broke.") Meanwhile, Yaccarino has done the requisite sucking up to Musk that presumably helped her get the job.Also, Musk has made a mess of Twitter's finances in other ways, refusing to pay bills for rent, cloud services and other things, and Yaccarino is trying to fix that.
If Twitter continues to be overrun by hate speech, it will scare users away who want nothing to do with that. Yaccarino appears to understand that. Musk and Vazquez do not. Yaccarino wants to save the company; Musk and Vazquez want to own the libs.
The Media Research Center's main complaint about Donald Trump's town hall on CNN last month was that it didn't suck up enough to him. Afterwards, it defended him from all criticism. A May 11 post by Alex Christy nitpicked a CNN fact-check of Trump because it "did not accurately portray" Hillary Clinton's beliefs on abortion -- but had to put words into Hillary's mouth to do so:
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