Soros Derangement Syndrome At The MRC (For Both George And Alex) Continues Topic: Media Research Center
After spending the summer hating George Soro's son for the offense of being, well, George Soros' son, the Media Research Center returned to its usual obsessivehatred of Soros himself. We've already noted that the MRC made a point of highlighting that Soros has given money to the Southern Poverty Law Center in bashing the SPLC for pointing out the extremism of the right-wing Moms for Liberty, as well as its cheering of Ron DeSantis for taking a shot at Soros during the first Republican presidential debate. It has had other anti-Soros freakouts as well from late August through September, largely of the guilt-by-association variety:
The main target of the MRC's manufactured outrage, though, was again Alex Soros, George's son who is poised to take over his empire of philanthropy. Tom Oholan raged in a Sept. 6 post:
Leftist billionaire Alex Soros warned that his Open Society Foundations is not done with Europe, promising to remain active there and even increase aid in some cases.
In an August 31st op-ed titled “No Soros retreat from Europe,” the Open Society Foundations chairman responded to claims that the leftist group would scale back its work in Europe under his leadership. Soros discussed promoting expansion in the E.U., Ukraine, the Roma and a variety of projects he continues to fund in Europe.
The article also made clear that Soros idolizes the E.U., as he wrote that “the European Union still stands as a global beacon of the values that shape our work.” He even went so far as to say that “like my father, I regard the E.U. as one of modern history’s great triumphs.”
[...]
During the same panel, Alex Soros compared Trump to Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban, saying that Orban was “much tamer” the first time he served as prime minister than during his present term. " But when they come back, they know where the bodies are buried,” Alex Soros claimed of Orban and presumably Trump, He added that Trump had been working to win over the military and referenced “what the Heritage Foundation is trying to do by purging things.”
Surprisingly, Olohan did not dispute Soros' description of Trump's second-term plan as "purging things"; indeed, he linked to the right-wing Heritage Foundation's Project 2025 plan, which is specifically designed to make the federal government "more friendly to the right" by, yes, purging many federal employees -- a largely non-political workforce that has long been immune from partisan politics -- and replacing them with political loyalists more interesting in pushing right-wing Christian agendas than making government work for all Americans. Olohan also described Soros as "anti-American" without offering any evidenceto back it up; perhaps he believes that not supporting an amoral, credibly accused crimninal and serial adulterer is somehow "anti-American."
Speaking of whom, a Sept. 11 post by Joseph Vazquez touted Trump's nasty yet childish insult of Alex Soros:
Former President Donald Trump blasted leftist billionaire George Soros’s extremist heir for pledging to use his father’s ungodly fortune to interfere in the 2024 election.
Alex Soros wrote an op-ed for Politico refuting any notion that his major shakeup at the Open Society Foundations meant there would be any “Soros Retreat from Europe.” In fact, Alex, who described himself as “more political” than his father, heaped praise on the dystopian European Union as a “global beacon of the values that shape our work.”
But a 2024 win for Trump, claimed Alex, would mean doom for the EU. “As someone who spends up to half their time working on the Continent and thinks former United States President Donald Trump — or at least someone with his isolationist and anti-European policies — will be the Republican nominee," Alex mourned. "I believe a MAGA-style Republican victory in next year’s U.S. presidential election could, in the end, be worse for the EU than for the U.S.”
To that end, Alex pledged, “We are adapting OSF to be able to respond to whatever scenarios might emerge, on both sides of the Atlantic.” Trump didn’t mince words in his Sept. 10 response on Truth Social. “We can’t let this spoiled little degenerate win.”
“[Alex’s] daddy controls the D.A.’s and A.G.’s in America. They are destroying our Country. Mitch McConnell is helping them do it by doing NOTHING! An EMBARRASSMENT to the Republican Party. GET TOUGH REPUBLICANS,” Trump continued.
Open Society Foundations (OSF) Chairman Alex Soros bragged about how his father has funded the legalization of illicit drugs while speaking to an audience of globalists.
During the Clinton Global Initiative 2023 Meeting last week, Alex opened up to The Washington Post Associate Editor Jonathan Capehart on a number of issues, including his father’s radical agenda on drug policy, which Soros dubbed “harm reduction.” Soros claimed, “If you look at what the foundation invested in, in its beginnings, we made a lot of things that weren’t, let’s say ‘sexy’ at the time, we brought them into the mainstream,” before adding, “but one of the reasons why we are attacked the way we are is because we are supporting harm reduction in drug policy all across the world, which was a huge, and still is a huge stigma.” Soros went on to discuss how his father had upset religious groups by supporting abortion and contraception, before providing a specific example of his father’s legacy on drugs. This legacy includes giving over $3 million from 2016 to 2021 to Harm Reduction International which advocates for “needle and syringe programmes” and “drug consumption rooms,” and pushing for the legalization of marijuana.
Olohan offered no evidence that anything Soros is proposing is ineffective, let alone "radical."
Olohan also spent a Sept. 13 post complaining about that other people don't obessively hate Soros the way he does (or, more accurately, is paid to do):
A leftist MSNBC host smeared Republicans as anti-Semitic for daring to call out radical billionaire George Soros for using his ungodly fortune to reshape society to match his open society worldview.
MSNBC host Mehdi Hasan stepped on a rake by attacking critics of Soros. Hasan’s X post read, “The same Republicans who love billionaires, big money donations, dark money, etc, but now indignantly insist that their obsession with Soros isn’t antisemitic, really have to explain what it is about Soros that they so object to. It can’t be his money or donations.” In the words of The Daily Wire host Michael Knowles, “Isn't there a difference between donating to good things and donating to bad things?” Of course there is.
Hasan is not the first lazy media talking head to make Soros’ vendetta to “bend” the “arc of history” seem innocent and his critics seem racist. But since Hasan asked for an explanation, the Media Research Center would be happy to provide the answer.
Olohan didn't explain why an agenda that merely disagrees with right-wing ideology must be smeared as "bad things." He then offered a rehash of its anti-Soros freakouts over the past few years, though without the anti-Semitism of earlier efforts. He then huffed:
If a man who thinks like this puts $32 billion into influencing media, education, criminal justice and other fields, it behooves Republicans, Americans, and people throughout the world to be as interested in him as he is in them.
MRC Free Speech America Vice President Dan Schneider weighed in on the irony of Hasan’s accusations, “The only reason Hasan is defending Soros is because they are birds of the same radical feather. It is absurd to claim that someone is antisemitic simply because they oppose the radical views of somebody who happens to be Jewish. It is in fact Hasan, who has advocated for policies that harm the sovereignty of Israel.”
Of course, Olohan and Schneider didn't mention how the MRC has invoked the anti-Semitic "puppet master" trope against Soros.If Schneider doesn't want the anti-Soros attacks from the MRC and other right-wingers to be dismissed as anti-Semitic, they should stop making anti-Semitic attacks and withdraw and apologize for the ones they have made. But because the MRC doesn't believe in acknowledging past mistakes, let alone apologizing for them, Schneider will never do that.
Newsmax Misleads About Trump Support For Union Auto Workers Topic: Newsmax
The pro-Trump stans at Newsmax tried to create a narrative that Donald Trump supports striking union autoworkers despite his anti-union record as president. After Trump announced he would make a speech in Detroit as counterprogramming to his refusal to participaten in the second Republican presidential debate, Eric Mack hyped his purported solidarity with thet striking workers in a Sept. 17 article:
"The United Autoworkers are being sold down the 'drain' with this all electric car scam," Trump posted Sunday on Truth Social. "They'll be made in China, under Crooked Joe's China First policy. Autoworkers, vote for Trump — I'll make you victorious & rich."
[...]
"If your 'leaders' won't endorse me, vote them out of office, now," Trump's statement continued. "With the Democrats & Crooked Joe calling the shots, you'll be jobless & penniless within 4 years."
[...]
Trump is asking for the autoworkers to back him over Biden.
"Remember, Biden is a crook who has been paid millions of dollars by China, & others," Trump's statement concluded. "He is a Manchurian candidate!!!"
Newsmax did, surprisingly, tell the truth about Trump's visit in a Sept. 26 article by Mark Swanson:
United Auto Workers President Shawn Fain said Tuesday he sees "no point" in meeting with Donald Trump when the former president visits the Detroit area on Wednesday, saying Trump "serves the billionaire class and that's what's wrong with this country."
Fain made the comments in an interview with CNN, the same day that President Joe Biden joined the striking UAW workers on the picket line in Belleville, Michigan.
Trump is skipping the second GOP presidential debate Wednesday night to meet with a group of mostly retired UAW workers in Macomb County — at a nonunion plant.
That did not go unnoticed by Fain.
"I find a pathetic irony that the former president is gonna hold a rally for union members at a non-union business," Fain said.
A Sepet. 27 wire article previewing Trump's speech noted that he would be speaking at a "non-union auto supplier," but with an added plug stating that "Newsmax will air Trump's speech live and in its entirety Wednesday night, starting at 8 p.m. ET." But Newsmax coverage of the speech itself downplayed or misled about the non-union connection:
An article by Eric Mack misleadingly stated that Trump spoke to "Michigan's blue-collar workers and United Auto Workers union members" and made no reference to him speaking at a non-union shop.
Another article by Mack stated that Trump gave "a campaign stump speech in Clinton Township, Michigan, which aired live and in its entirety on Newsmax"; the only reference to unions in the article was a mention that Trump claimed that "Biden is pandering to the United Auto Workers labor union bosses."
Newsmax did an interview with Trump after the speech, which Mack dutifully wrote up. Again, he misled about Trump's union statnce:
Former President Donald Trump trashed United Auto Workers President Shawn Fain for choosing to meet with President Joe Biden over him.
"If he didn't want to meet with me, then I don't like him very much," Trump told Newsmax's John Bachman in a backstage interview Wednesday night after Trump delivered a speech to working-class voters in Clinton Township, Michigan, which aired live and in its entirety on Newsmax.
"But that's foolish not to meet. What is he going to do? Meet with Biden? The man doesn't know he's alive. Biden can't put two sentences together. He has no idea what's going on."
A Sept. 28 article by Theodore Bunker about a Newsmax TV interview with the head of the auto parts firm where Trump spoke did admit the company was non-union, but he uncritically peddled the man's claim that there were union workers in attendamce who supportted Trump:
Nathan Stemple, the president of the automotive parts manufacturing business where former President Donald Trump spoke Wednesday, told Newsmax on Thursday that that "the experience was just one in ten lifetimes for us."
Trump spoke to a crowd of non-union auto workers at Drake Enterprises in Clinton Township, Michigan, the same night that his rivals for the Republican presidential nomination participated in the second GOP primary debate.
Stemple said on " National Report" that "there were tens of thousands of people outside of the rally, all up and down our street, up and down the adjoining streets … that whole experience was just one in ten lifetimes for us."
Actually, many of the purported "union workers" at the rally were ringers.
MRC Still Melting Down Over Criticism Of Ginni Thomas Topic: Media Research Center
The Media just can't stopdefending Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas and his right-wing activist wife, Ginni, from any and all criticism. Kevin Tober lashed out at one critic in a Sept. 11 post:
On Monday night’s The ReidOut on MSNBC, noted racist Jason Johnson filled in for the vacationing Joy Reid and did his best to fill the air with as much bile as she does. It appeared as if he succeeded since he opened the latter half of the program by smearing Justice Clarence Thomas’s wife Ginni Thomas as the most “destructive force in the American jurisprudence in the last 30 years.”
“I want this to be really clear. There has not been a more destructive force in the American jurisprudence in the last 30 years than Clarence Thomas' wife. They're the most destructive force in American jurisprudence,” Johnson howled.
He wasn’t done there. Johnson painted the power couple as comic book villains by smearing them as “a Voltron of evil.”
The reason behind this latest character assassination was based on a hit piece from the left-wing rag Politico.
Johnson cried that some of the “key players involved included Texas billionaire Harlan Crow, Federalist Society Leonard Leo, and Trump political consultant Kellyanne Conway.”
“What Politico uncovered was that the justice's wife was essentially running a political organization that will push conservative ideas through the courts and into her husband's lap,” Johnson claimed.
Tober offered no evidence whatsover that Johnson is a "noted racist" or that Politico is a "left-wing rag" -- to the contrary, Politico's owner operates numerous right-wing outlets. Tober also failed to identify anything false or misleading in the Politico piece he's criticizing, effectively putting the lie to his "hit piece" dismissal.
Despite Tober's factual deficiencies and failure to back up what he wrote, his post got rehashed in a Sept. 30 end-of-month summary by Geoffrey Dickens, again without bothering to substantiate the attacks.
NEW ARTICLE: Vladimir Putin's Favorite WND Columnist, Part 2 Topic: WorldNetDaily
WorldNetDaily's Scott Lively admits he's a Putin apologist, and he has even appeared in Russian media to help the country justify its invasion of Ukraine while blaming the "deep state" for provoking it. Read more >>
MRC Censors Fox News' Fake News About A Gold Star Family Topic: Media Research Center
The Media Research Center tried to work up outrage that the attacks on President Biden and his administration by Gold Star families whose family members died in Afghanistan were supposedly being ignored by non-right-wing media. Kevin Tober set the narrative -- while giving Fox News a cookie for advancing the conservatively correct narrative -- in an Aug. 7 post:
As we approached the two-year anniversary of the disastrous and deadly withdrawal of American troops from Afghanistan in which thirteen U.S. service members died, the families of those brave Americans were still seeking answers and accountability. Only to be stonewalled by the Biden administration. On Monday, House Republicans held a hearing and heard testimony from the family members of the thirteen Americans who died in Afghanistan due to the botched withdrawal. Fox News covered the hearing live in the afternoon while also providing viewers who may have missed it a full recap during Special Report. All three evening news networks thumbed their nose at the Gold Star families by ignoring the hearing.
Instead of covering the hearing, ABC’sWorld News Tonight, CBS Evening News, and NBC Nightly News wasted airtime by covering the Mega Millions lottery numbers (ABC), the anti-American women’s soccer team losing in the World Cup (CBS), and another update on an investigation into a plastic plant fire (NBC).
Special Report anchor Bret Baier had the story which was one of the first he covered during Monday’s newscast. According to congressional correspondent Aishah Hasnie, this was the first time “the Gold Star families of 13 U.S. service members killed by a suicide bomber at Kabul Airport [told] their stories together in public.”
Craig Bannister repeated the complaint -- with added political exploitation by the MRC -- in an Aug. 22 post:
Given a week to reply, the presidents of ABC, NBC, and CBS have refused to respond to Media Research Center (MRC) Founder and President Brent Bozell’s letter asking why they didn’t cover the testimony of Gold Star parents who lost loved ones in President Joe Biden’s botched withdrawal from Afghanistan.
[...]
“Gold Star families are being disrespected by the country their children died for. What could be more important to cover on your network than this?” Bozell asked the news presidents of the three networks, in separate letters sent Tuesday, August 15. The letters set a response deadline of Monday, August 21.
As of Tuesday morning, not one of the three networks had replied.
“This wasn't a partisan event. These parents likely span the political spectrum,” Bozell notes.
[...]
“Unfortunately, we cannot attribute your lack of coverage to mere oversight,” Bozell tells the executives, noting that other media outlets, such as Fox News, covered the event on the same day that it happened.
The networks’ news blackout wasn’t just disrespectful of the Gold Star parents, it was also a great disservice to the country, Bozell tells the network news presidents.
Of course, given right-wing media's eagerness to exploit the situation, it very much was a "partisan event." Bannister added that Bozell noted "examples of the heart-wrenching testimony of the grieving Gold Star parents," including "Christy Shamblim, mother-in-law of Sergeant Nicole Gee said, 'When our leaders call this evacuation a success, it is like a knife in the heart.'"
When NBC covered the story a few days later, Tober was quick to credit his employer's partisan activism in an Aug. 29 post -- though he offered no proof that this was actually the case -- while complaining that CBS and ABC "continued to leave their viewers in the dark." Tim Graham pressed the narrative again in his Aug. 30 podcast:
Gold Star families who lost loved ones in the botched withdrawal from Afghanistan are not happy with President Biden, or the State Department, or the Pentagon. This might explain why the networks have tried to avoid these people, since they seem like guardians of whatever popularity Biden still has.
[...]
They can give you hours and hours of live coverage of the House January 6 Committee, but they can’t do two minutes on this? Instad, we saw reports on Amazon raising its purchase minimum to qualify for free shipping (ABC), and a water main break in New York's Times Square (CBS).
Despite all this claimed respect for Gold Star families, the MRC censored the fact that, as all of the above was going on, Fox News lied about one of them. Military.com reported:
The Marine Corps worked behind the scenes last month in an attempt to convince Fox News to retract its false story claiming a Gold Star family was forced to pay $60,000 to ship the remains of a Marine killed in Afghanistan, according to emails obtained by Military.com.
A service spokesman notified the news network that it was pushing an incorrect story and accused it of using the grief of fallen Marine Sgt. Nicole Gee's family to draw in readers, the email exchanges, released through a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) Request, show. Fox News eventually deleted the story with no correction, and it never reached out to the Gee family with an apology as the Marine Corps requested, the family said.
The Fox News story came from Republican Rep. Cory Mills, a freshman congressman from Florida, who claimed Gee's next of kin were strapped with the $60,000 charge after a meeting with the families of Abbey Gate bombing victims, a suicide attack where 13 service members were killed outside of the Kabul airport in 2021.
Gee's family never paid a dollar to transport her remains, and the Marine Corps let Fox News know -- in no uncertain terms -- that the July 25 story was false in a series of emails over the following days.
"This headline correction is still misleading and your story is still false," Maj. James Stenger, the lead spokesperson for the Marine Corps, wrote to Fox News in an email after the publication changed the headline and body of the story in an attempt to soften the accusation.
"Using the grief of a family member of a fallen Marine to score cheap clickbait points is disgusting," Stenger wrote. The spokesman was one of several military officials frustrated with the story, according to the documents.
Comments from Gee's family, the Pentagon and the nonprofit that actually stepped in to pay for the flight before the Defense Department became involved were eventually added to the story before it was taken down, Military.com reported, but none of the changes were marked as updates or corrections.
A few days later, Fox News finally issued a lame apology: "The now unpublished story has been addressed internally and we sincerely apologize to the Gee family." No explanation was provided for why it stuck by the story for so long or a more comprehensive correct or apology was not provided.
Graham, Tober and the rest of the MRC would never let you hear the end of it if a non-right-wing outlet spread lies about a Gold Star family. But the MRC works hard to defend Fox News and gives it special protection from criticism. As we documented, it handwaved the revelation that Fox News deliberately lied to its viewers about election fraud -- lies that resulted in Fox News paying $787 million to Dominion in a defamation lawsuit settlement -- because its viewers don't care that they're being lied to and pushing right-wing narratives is more important than the truth.
This highly selective and partisan approach to "media research" not only makes the MRC's purported concern about Gold Star families look hollow and hypocritical -- it's one big reason why few people take the MRC seriously.
WND Columnist Purports To Make 'Good Faith' Attempt To Spread Bogus Election Fraud Narrative Topic: WorldNetDaily
Michael Schisler is an occasional WorldNetDaily columnist who has peddled COVIDconspiracytheories, so it's unsurprising that he would dip a toe into conspiracy theories about the 2020 election, and he also got into the whole "mass formation psychosis" thing that right-wing conspiracy-mongers bought into when their COVID conspiracy theories were debunked. He used his Sept. 15 column to complain about "outlier" numbers in the election, using that to hint at fraud he doesn't actually prove:
For 2008 through 2016, only on-trend increases and decreases in the metrics examined are seen, with no outliers. This may be surprising to some, given the loser's claims about the 2016 election.
Then we have 2020, Biden vs. Trump.
The outliers in this election cycle will be described as "unprecedented" if they are both record setting numbers within the modern election era and also have outlier characteristics.
An all-time U.S. record-shattering 47.8% of all Americans were recorded as casting their legal vote in 2020. This represents an unprecedented 14.6% increase over the previous election.
For perspective, 2008 is the second-highest on record with only 42.6% of all Americans voting in the Obama vs. McCain election. This represents a below average 2.9% increase over the previous election.
For context, the average percent of citizens voting in the modern era is about 38%. For elections in year 2000 and later, the average is slightly higher at about 40% (excluding the outlier 47.8% recorded for 2020).
In 2020, Biden was awarded an unprecedented 29.1% more votes than the previous the election winner (Trump 2016).
[...]
Other notable re-election stats with outlier characteristics:
In his re-election bid of 2012, Obama underperformed his first term vote totals by -5.1% yet won his bid for re-election. Obama is the only president in all of U.S. history to underperform his first term vote totals by any amount, yet secure a second term.
In 2020 Trump outperformed his first term vote totals by 17.9%, which is the fourth-highest outperformance in the modern era, behind only Nixon, Reagan and Bush Jr. (who all won), yet Trump lost his bid for re-election. Trump is the only president in all of U.S. history to outperform his first term vote totals by any amount and lose his re-election bid.
Not only does Schisler not bother to explain how this adds up -- let alone mention the COVID pandemic that likely played a role in creating the outliers he's complaining about -- he effectively undercut what he spent an entire column by his own disclaimer at the end:
Disclaimer Notice: The data presented in this article was computed from raw election stats and commonly available population data on a good faith basis. However, the accuracy of the source data, computations and statements made are not guaranteed, and for legal purposes should be considered opinions of the writer.
But there'sno reason to treat any claim by a wannabe election denier as being made in "good faith" -- ignoring that the election has been repeatedly analyzed and found not to have any significant fraud issues in order to still peddle a bogus narrative is the very defintion of bad faith.
MRC's Toto Wants You To Think Unfunny Anti-'Woke' 'Comedy' Is Hilarious Topic: Media Research Center
Christian Toto started his Sept. 30 Media Rsearch Center column by complaining that comedians don't make nasty jokes about President Biden nearly enough for his biased taste:
Mainstream comics leave countless jokes on the table.
Just consider the Biden administration, for starters. The material practically writes itself, from the president’s near-daily short circuits to VP Kamala Harris’ word salad speeches.
Ideology keeps getting in the way.
The same holds for the woke mindset. Comedians ignore how the Left labels every third word as racist, problematic or downright offensive.
Think “peanut gallery,” “hooligan,” “American,” “immigrant,” “grandfather” and “submit.” So many hate crimes in just one paragraph, no?
Toto, of course, is demanding that comedians inject right-wing ideology into their acts. He then praised comedian Bill Burr for how he allegedly "skewered woke platitudes with wit and wisdom," though the example he provided showed none of this; it simply mocked the #MeToo movement. This led to Toto praising Burr's new film, "Old Dads":
The Oct 20 release, starring, directed and co-written by Burr, follows three men who embraced fatherhood later in life. They run headfirst into a Gen Z culture they neither understand or appreciate.
The film co-stars two underrated stars, Bobby Cannavale and Bokeem Woodbine as Burr’s fellow “Dads.”
The trailer leans hard into the generational divide between the titular fathers and their peers. When a younger dad tells Burr’s character, Jack, to treat his child’s injury with Neosporin, not dirt, the older Dad snaps.
“Why don’t you go on Twitter and share this story where you’re the hero,” Burr says. He’s wrong … and he still has a point about virtue signaling.
Again, Toto highlighted a so-called joke that isn't terribly funny. Indeed, reviews indicate that this is the problem with the entire film; one reviewer stated that "Old Dads" is "a meandering, unfunny assault on PC culture that would seem perfectly in place in the 1990s alongside 'Illiberal Education' by Dinesh D’Souza and the rantings of Pat Buchanan. It’s so dated there’s even a mention of Halliburton." Another reviewer noted about the character Burr's character plays:
Yet there’s a monkey wrench sitting in the middle of the movie. And that’s Jack’s rageaholic personality. Forget the over-controlled, virtue-signaling era. Jack’s anger really is over-the-top and inappropriate, and would be during any era. So even if you welcome a satire of the new corporate-approved hypersensitivity, since Jack’s rage is a more glaring problem than any of that it undercuts the film’s satirical bite. I realize that rage has long been Bill Burr’s calling card, but if he had made Jack a more restrained character, quietly infuriated by everything around him, “Old Dads” would have been funnier and scored more points.
Yet Toto wants you to believe that Burr's hate is a feature, not a bug, and the movie is better than it appears to be:
Just don’t expect “Old Dads” to skewer the woke characters alone, or for Jack to cling to all of his old ways. Burr is too smart a storyteller to turn his film into a sermon preaching to the anti-woke choir.
The fact that he’s mocking the cultural movement in the first place is consequential and overdue.
Looks like Toto is the one for whom ideology keeps getting in the way.
WND Hyped RFK Jr.'s Switch To Independent Run -- Then Turned Against Him Topic: WorldNetDaily
WorldNetDaily has been a veryenthusiasticpromoter of Robert Kennedy Jr.'s presidential campaign -- not because it actually wants him to win, but because it might hurt President Biden's re-election plans. When Kennedy left the Democratic race to run as an independent, WND was initially supportive. An anonymously written Oct. 9 article hyped the move:
Robert F. Kennedy Jr., long feared by Joe Biden supporters as a major challenge in the 2024 presidential race, now has announced he'll run as an independent, meaning Biden will not be able to dispose of his candidacy before election day, if then.
The Washington Examiner reported Kennedy confirmed Monday he'll switch from the Democratic Party, where he was up against Biden, to an independent bid for the White House.
"During a Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, speech which his campaign billed as a 'historic announcement,' Kennedy, 69, spoke in front of a sign that read 'declare your independence,'" the report said.
"I'm here to declare myself an independent candidate," he said.
[...]
Just days ago, Politico had reported on the fears among Biden supporters of this very move, and how they were scheming to remove such challenges.
It was Reid Hoffman, the founder of LinkedIn, who "convened a Zoom call with 30 other like-minded donors this week to address a persistent fear among national Democrats: Third-party candidates who could undercut Joe Biden’s campaign."
But Kennedy has no real constituency among Democratic voters -- much of his campaign support has come from Republicans who, like WND, are hoping he will serve as a Biden spoiler, and much of his media support has come from right-wing outlets like WND and Fox News, whom Kennedy has praised.
The next day, WND published a statement by Kennedy explaining his decision, under the quote-marked headline "I'm a Kennedy from a Democrat family. But I'm running for president as an independent." But that quote does not appear anywhere in Kennedy's column -- that was the headline from the Fox News version of the statement. The tell is that even Kennedy would not have used the "Democrat family" construct; use of "Democrat Party" phraseology comes exclusively from right-wingers like Fox News who consider it a juvenile insult to refuse to use the party's proper name.
But as it because clear that an independent Kennedy would pull more votes from Donald Trump than from Biden, WND started to turn on him. Slavishly following the Republican narrative flip-flop on Kennedy, Peter LaBarbera went on the attack in an Oct. 12 article:
The Republicans' gloves are off regarding Democrat-turned-Independent Robert F. Kennedy Jr.'s 2024 presidential candidacy, and if Sean Hannity's Tuesday interview with RFK is any indication, their new theme song might be: "The Thrill is Gone," by blues legend B.B. King.
With some polls showing Kennedy could hurt Trump more than Biden in a potential three-way race, what is also "gone" are the friendly puff interviews heralding Kennedy as a brave primary challenger to President Biden – victimized by the same "rigged" Democratic Party nominating system that protected Hillary Clinton's against the surging candidacy of socialist Bernie Sanders in 2016.
"I hope you don’t mind, but I did a little research on you," Hannity said toward the beginning of his Fox News interview with Kennedy, according to Mediaite. "You’re pretty liberal. You know, you’ve called for curbing logging, oil drilling, fracking. You wanted to eliminate it. You called it had a victory for democracy. You wanna curb U.S. fossil fuel extraction. 'Keep it in the ground,' you once tweeted. You want a ban on fossil fuel extraction, a ban on fracking.
Hannity continued: "You called the NRA once, a 'terror group.' You supported, over the years, Democrats – Gore, Kerry, Obama, Hillary. You praised Bernie Sanders multiple times. You support affirmative action. So, why is this party of yours – why didn’t they want to allow you to compete? ‘Cause that’s as pretty liberal of a record as anybody I know."
[...]
Meanwhile, the Republican National Committee is leading the way in exposing Kennedy as a "Radical Democrat," the title of their new report on the nephew of President John F. Kennedy.
"While Robert F. Kennedy Jr. is now running under the guise of being an independent, he is just another radical, far-left Democrat," states the Oct. 9 report, subtitled, "Make No Mistake – RFK Jr. Is Just Another Liberal Who Wants to Ban Fossil Fuels, Raise Taxes, and Pass a Green New Deal."
"RFK Jr. is an energy radical who wants to end fossil fuels," says one section header in the document.
LaBarbera did note the flip-flop:
Liberal media pundits and other leftist Democrats – and RFK Jr. supporters – are blasting Hannity for his turnaround on RFK Jr., but it was to be expected given two political realities: 1) polls revealed Kennedy could dig into likely GOP nominee Trump's support in 2024; and 2) coverage by most conservative media of RFK's actual (left-leaning) record has been superficial in not digging into his more liberal positions.
The former Democrat's longstanding opposition to vaccines and his fervent support of free speech and against COVID mandates have made him popular on the Right. Many conservatives and independents who are drawn to RFK Jr. see government and corporate "COVID tyranny" – and the willingness of so many Americans to succumb to hysteria and obey irrational edicts by both – as one of the most disgraceful chapters in U.S. history. Many of those same people, though supporters of Donald Trump, were troubled by his bragging about developing the rushed COVID vaccines, which have been tied to myocarditis and are now widely distrusted, and his deference to Anthony Fauci and White House Coronavirus Response Coordinator Deborah Birx during the pandemic.
But Kennedy's other advocacy, including his aggressive support for a "green" agenda, has not received nearly the coverage as his stances on COVID and government "weaponization" under Biden.
[...]
Claiming that Fox News hosts promoted RFK Jr.'s candidacy only because they thought it would hurt Biden's chances in 2024, leftist video podcaster David Pakman said in a broadcast analyzing Hannity's "ambush" interview that it has now "pulled a 180 on RFK."
"Fox is scared of the monster it created," Pakman said Wednesday in a video titled, "Hannity AMBUSHES RFK Jr. now that he's a threat to Trump," which had 124,000 views by press time.
He said Hannity "sandbagged" Kennedy because "the new line for Republicans and right wing media is RFK might reelect Biden and hurt Trump because MAGA people are like, hey, [RFK is] anti-vax but maybe less nuts than Trump. That sounds interesting."
Despite that, LaBarbera failed to mention the fact that his employer also heavily (and ironically) promoted Kennedy's campaign when he was running as a Democrat, and that he too is part of this right-wing flip-flop.
LaBarbera followed that with another attack on a Kennedy policy unfavored by right-wingers in an Oct. 19 article:
Harkening back to the societal damage of Jim Crow segregation, now-Independent presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr. has come out for reparations, causing a backlash among conservatives who once praised his candidacy as a centrist alternative to leftist Democrats.
[...]
Response by conservatives on X to the Kennedy reparations story was immediate and a sign that it could be devastating to his attempt to cast himself as a moderate. The son of assassinated liberal Democratic presidential candidate Bobby Kennedy was already reeling after a tough interview last week with Fox News host Sean Hannity, in which Hannity grilled him for his progressive past statements on the key issues like environmental ("green") regulations. Said Hannity: "You’re pretty liberal. You know, you’ve called for curbing logging, oil drilling, fracking. You wanted to eliminate it. You called it had a victory for democracy. You wanna curb U.S. fossil fuel extraction. 'Keep it in the ground,' you once tweeted. You want a ban on fossil fuel extraction, a ban on fracking."
LaBarbera did note that "Now that RFK Jr.'s candidacy is seen by both the Right and Left as potentially taking votes from their prospective 2024 presidential candidate (at this point likely Trump vs. Biden), his past statements and positions on a host of issues are coming under renewed scrutiny." But he failed to disclose that WND was a supporter of Kennedy's campaign when he was running as a Democrat, and that it was only when Kennedy moved to running as an independent that he felt the need to examine those stances.
MRC Condones Misinfo About Israel-Hamas War On Twitter (Well, X), Shows Double Standard On 'Censorship' Topic: Media Research Center
Twitter (well, X) hasn't exactly covered itself in glory during the Israel-Hamas war. Given how Elon Musk gutted Twitter's anti-disinformation teams in the months before the war started, the inevitable happened: Twitter was awash with disinformation about the war in the days after it started, with old and fake photos and even footage from video games being presented as dispatches from the front lines. And even after the disinformation has been identified, Twitter has allowed the accounts spreading it to remain active, while there have been massive delays in putting "Community Notes" fact-checks on the false posts. Musk actually made things worse by promotingaccounts filled with falsehoods and disinformation (not to mention anti-Semitism), including a fake video falsely attacking CNN. (He was ultimately shamed into deleting his post promoting the anti-Semitic account as a "good" source.)
The Media Research Center is cool with all of this -- it wants misinformation to spread unchecked, and it attacks any effort to try and stem it as "censorship." When Business Insider pointed out all this information, Catherine Salgado spent an Oct. 11 post playing whataboutism:
As the devastating Hamas-Israel War rages on, Business Insider launched an attack of a different kind against Elon Musk and X—while failing its own anti-“misinformation” standards.
Palestinian Hamas terrorists invaded Israel over the weekend, committing appalling atrocities and killing at least 1,200 Israelis, acts which the Palestinian Authority (PA) refused to condemn. X (formerly Twitter) has been a hotspot for citizens, officials and war victims to share video and images, but Business Insider asserted that “misinformation” is “rife” on the platform.
Yet, even while screeching that “Social media has never felt more dangerous,” Insider’s Hasan Chowdhury called terrorists “Hamas fighters” and never mentioned any of the Hamas atrocities. In fact, the word “terrorist” doesn’t appear once in his entire article.
Chowdhury described the horrific Hamas attack without even mentioning that Hamas had killed anyone. “Hamas fighters crossed the border into Israel on Saturday, prompting Israeli forces to respond with air strikes on Gaza,” wrote this supposed champion of truth. These are the “fighters” who beheaded babies and soldiers and gunned down entire families. But, according to Chowdhury, who scraped up a mere three examples of the alleged misinformation epidemic for his piece, it’s Elon Musk spreading fake news.
“Some of the worst offenders are those who pay for visibility and verification through Twitter Blue, now known as X Premium,” Chowdhury announced. He particularly slammed Musk, “The billionaire directed his 159 million X followers to two social-media accounts that previously posted fake news.” Why is Chowdhury the arbiter on online truth, especially when he described terrorists as “fighters”?
At no point did Salgado offer any comment about the spread of disinformation about the war on Musk's Twitter. Instead, the MRC was busy doing PR for Musk. Joseph Vazquez gushed in an Oct. 9 post under the lionizing headline "ENTER ELON":
X owner Elon Musk called out the Supreme Leader of Iran for his disgusting celebration of the terrorist group Hamas and its barbaric attack on Israel.
Musk — instead of going along with absurd liberal media narrative attempting to draw a false equivalency between Israel and Palestine — went straight for the jugular: “Khamenei’s official position is clear that the eradication of Israel is the actual goal, not just supporting Palestinians.” In Musk’s view, “That will not happen. All that actually happens, decade after decade, is a never-ending cycle of violence and vengeance.” MRC President Brent Bozell praised Musk for standing against the Iranian tyrant. “Elon Musk isn't afraid to speak the truth," Bozell said. "He doesn't hide behind his companies or use his platform to promote a woke agenda like many CEOs. He actually uses his voice to hold tyrannical anti-Semites accountable."
Vazquez also stated that "Khamenei's post clearly violates X rules against the 'Glorification of Violence,' as the platform clearly outlined in a label placed over Khamenei’s post." But earlier this year, Salgado specifically criticizied this policy, insisting that "This issue with this Twitter policy is that it can very easily be misapplied" and declaring, "Elon Musk’s Twitter should be wary of being too vague or subjective in its policies, as missteps could seriously damage Twitter’s recent pro-free speech trend." Vazquez tried to get around this by quoting a co-worker:
Finally, Twitter has an owner who understands the difference between true incitements to violence and constitutionally protected speech,' praised MRC Business Vice President Dan Schneider in a statement. Schneider also blasted Musk’s dystopian predecessors at Old Regime Twitter for their sordid double standard of consistently allowing the Ayatollah to spread incitements to violence on the platform while repeatedly targeting Americans’ speech on the platform for the non-crime of expressing differing opinions on a myriad of issues (e.g. elections, COVID-19, culture) that slap against approved, left-wing axiomatic views:
The Big Tech oligarchs have long protected the Ayatollah Khamenei’s incitement to violence rhetoric; language that is clearly not constitutionally-protected speech. Yet at the same time, these Big Tech oligarchs have taken down political speech that they happen to disagree with.
But under the same logic, the ayatollah is also expressing "differing opinions," and the MRC's free-speech absolutism should allow his views to stand.
An Oct. 13 post by Luis Cornelio touted more actions by Musk that, under different circumstances, he would call "censorship":
Elon Musk’s X (formerly known as Twitter) took forceful actions against Hamas-tied accounts ahead of the disturbing “Day of Jihad.”
While leftist platforms like YouTube allow Hamas terrorists to call for a day of against Israel with impunity, X began purging accounts tied to Hamas. The rabid terrorist group unleashed a string of attacks against Israel that left over 1,300 Israeli citizens dead, in addition to numerous Americans. X CEO Linda Yaccarino announced the move in a three-page letter posted on the platform.
“We are deeply troubled by the large-scale and unprecedented terrorist attack on Israel and by the loss of innocent lives,” Yaccacino said on Oct. 11 in response to a letter from E.U. Commissioner Thierry Breton. Breton pressed companies earlier this week about their efforts to curtail Hamas’ reach. “There is no such place on X for terrorist organizations or violent extremist groups and we continue to remove such accounts in real time, including proactive efforts,” she added.
By contrast, the MRC complained that Twitter deleted all posts referring to a "transgender day of vengeance" earlier this year, raging that "The 'Trans Day of Vengeance' censorship event alone accounted for no less than 14 million times that users were harmed from Big Tech censorship." What the MRC wouldn't disclose is that Twitter blocked all posts referencing the alleged event, including ones from right-wing transphobes. Again, the MRC is exhibiting a double standard.
Salgado returned for another Oct. 13 post attacking Breton -- whom Cornelio had just praised -- for advocatinbg "censorship,"appearing to argue that Hamas shouldn't be "censored" after all:
A European Union (EU) Commission official has taken a page from the U.S. government’s anti-free speech playbook and demanded that multiple social media companies step up their censorship.
In an Oct. 11 letter posted to X (formerly Twitter), Belgian EU Commissioner Thierry Breton insisted that Facebook and Instagram’s parent company Meta take “diligent and objective action following notices of illegal content in the EU.” Breton pointed to content regarding the “terrorist attacks carried out by Hamas against Israel” but did not clarify what he meant by “illegal content.” He also insisted Meta should be “tackling disinformation in the context of elections,” in accord with the EU Digital Services Act (DSA), a direct censorship request. The commissioner was yet more condescending in a letter to X/Twitter, accusing the platform of “disseminat[ing] illegal content and disinformation.” TikTok received a similar lecture. Breton even threatened all the tech companies by stating that “penalties can be imposed” for non-compliance. Did Breton take note of how effectively censorship was used in America to shield government officials and candidates?
“European liberal elites learned from the United States’ deep state how to suppress a story on how to save their skins in the next election based on how effective it was to suppress the Hunter Biden laptop story,” said MRC Free Speech America VP Dan Schneider in reaction to the letters. “They’re trying to hide their own complicity and anti-Semitism as European voters wake up to the horrors of the Hamas regime.”
Salgado's so-called proof was the MRC's conspiracy theory that alleged suppression of the laptop story caused Trump to lose, based on dubious polls it bought from Trump's election pollster and a polling firm founded by Trump adviser Kellyanne Conway.
What's Mychal Massie Melting Down Over Now? Topic: WorldNetDaily
Let's examine Labor Day. Excluding those who believe "denial" is a river in Egypt, honest people in the news/information and political fields, said being an oxymoron notwithstanding, will admit that "Crooked Joe Biden" is the extension of Mr. "I think about sex with men 24/7" Obama's tenure in office. And he has continued "the fantasizer's" wretched legacy masterfully, unless you're the working class. In that case, it's aggravated immiseration, which amounts to societal assault and battery. The legacy is one of crushing labor, malicious regulating of small businesses, the asphyxiation of economic growth and the polarization of business fact from business fantasy. But, I'm getting ahead of myself.
Labor Day is masked as the end-of-summer paid holiday that celebrates the working class in America and the establishment of labor unions for the betterment of workers.
In reality, Labor Day is a communist holiday. I find it impossible not to define Labor Day as a holiday born out of socialism by definition. Socialism is based upon the theory of ownership by the people; whereas under communism the government/state owns and controls property, industry and economic resources.
[...]
The purpose of presenting my point of view today is not to show the historical origins of Labor Day as such nor the political persuasion of its origin; rather it's to point out that Obama's violation of American laborers is steeped in a tradition that at its core is anti-American worker – and how Biden has continued Obama's tradition of same.
They have enhanced the financial coffers of industrialized extermination of children, even with the Supreme Court overturning Roe v. Wade. They've given their union henchmen in the public school system right to deprive parents of determining what we want for our children. They've given their union henchmen in public schools the authority to indoctrinate our children with hellish sexual practices and abnormalities as well as the revision of factual history.
Obama imposed mandatory health measures and mandatory participation in murderous practices that went against the faith and conscience of many in the medical profession. Biden mandated the same, plus sanctions for a government-funded laboratory created flu located half a world away that resulted in the utter destruction of countless private businesses. The senseless mandates were used to undermine our First Amendment rights. The sanctions opened the door for the erosion of our Second Amendment right to own and bear arms by ginning up false psychological concerns.
Bernie Sanders has never worked a day in his worthless life. He became a socialist politician because it ensured he would never have to work a day in his miserable life. Being a politician isn't a job. It's supposed to be a service. America should never have succumbed to Erebusic political myiasis and their belief that political office is a paid career for a privileged few. Politicians do not work; they suck off the udders of public dependence. They pimp and prostitute favors to the highest bidders, which is where lobbyists come into play, including those representing the likes of the Muslim Brotherhood. But, I digress.
Sanders became a multi-millionaire because he and his communist wife specialized in seizing upon every exploitable opportunity in which they found themselves.
[...]
Apparently, the people to whom Sanders was lying at the rally [for striking auto workers] had spent the time prior to his speech on a nepenthe binge, which resulted in their forgetting they were being deceived by an elapid that rivals the one that approached Eve in the Garden.
[...]
That said, I do believe there's another reason for these strikes that's lurking in the shadows. I believe they're a variant combination of Cloward-Piven and Hegelian Dialectics designed to sink the economy to the point that it cannot be turned around by President Trump, if as expected he wins back the White House.
If he doesn't win, no harm is done; the neo-Leninist Obamanites continue to transform the country into a dystopian wasteland. If President Trump does win back the White House, he will be singularly blamed for the economy from day 1.
Democratic governors and presidents, including Obama, the reprehensible backseat-limousine-sexual-bon vivant, are destroying the lives of children by fiat. They're advocating and codifying secrecy laws that prevent parents from having input or even knowledge that their children are being brainwashed and conditioned to believe they aren't the gender they were born.
It was Hillary who said it takes a village to raise our children, which was code-speak for the schools, medical professionals and predatory sexual advocates destroying the emotional and mental well-being of our children. Democratic lawmakers have passed laws on every level, starting at the lowest rung of municipalities, making it a criminal act for parents to seek counseling for their children who are indoctrinated into believing they're another gender.
Who would have thought Democrats wouldn't use the government to their malevolent ends? Only those who weren't paying attention and/or listening to those such as myself who have been warning the public – in my case for over a half century.
[...]
While commie Democrats are the most violently racist and bigoted political construct, they have had their traitorous sellout Negros and a sellout Jew.
Those sellout Negros were Jesse Jackson, Elijah Muhammed and Al Sharpton; but none were/are more elapidae than William Ellison, W.E.B. Du Bois and Obama. Ellison is a sellout conveniently overlooked by pigment mongers and falsifiers of history. (See: "Jesse Jackson Treats Blacks Like This Southern Slaveowner." See also: "Dixie's Censored Subject Black Slaveowners" by Robert M. Grooms.)
The sellout Jew is George Soros.
But, the greatest sellout of all is Obama. He betrayed America, stood by and watched in real-time as Americans were murdered in Benghazi, was responsible for the his Attorney General Eric Holder's illegal gunrunning operation into Mexico, praised God for abortion and set relationships back at least 100 years. And if we are to believe the chatter, and I for one do, he is the using Biden as his third term in office and plotting to use the Obama woman for his fourth term, which I don't believe.
On Sunday’s edition of Inside with Jen Psaki, the former Biden press secretary mocked a Republican strategy session where pollsters suggested the term “pro-life” isn’t helping the GOP, so they suggested the term “pro-baby” instead. This spurred Psaki to compare babies to....broccoli and a lump of coal.
“I hate to break it to you, but if you call broccoli 'candy,' it's still just broccoli. If you tie a really nice bow around a lump of coal, it is still coal under there.”
And to think it’s terribly dehumanizing to call a biological male “he” and “his.” Apparently, comparing a baby to broccoli and lumps of coal is good, swaggering comedy. Democrats have suggested abortion is about a "choice," not a child. The act of abortion is far more dehumanizing than language.
"The branding isn’t the problem here! The policy is the problem,” Psaki insisted. “It is hard to roll out an effective rebrand for a product that customers hate.”
The "product" is saving babies from the Planned Parenthood slaughterhouse. Democrats get piles of money and logistical support from the slaughterhouse operators.
Carherine Salgado served up a similar "dehumanizing" complaint in an Oct. 5 post that raged against "Charley, the abortion chatbot," designed to provide "abortion options in every zip code" for interested women:
“Disturbing — and dehumanizing,” said MRC Free Speech America & MRC Business Director Michael Morris. “That’s the least that can be said about the creation of an AI chatbot meant to help facilitate ending the lives of the most vulnerable among us — unborn children. It is just like the left to literally remove the living, human element in such an important life or death situation.”
The complaints of "dehumanizing" by Graham and Salgado are quite hypocrirtical, given that the MRC has no problem labeling undocumented migrants with the dehumanizing label " illegals" -- even as it was issuing the above complaints:
WND's Haynes Doesn't Want Confederate Memorial Removed Topic: WorldNetDaily
Carole Hornsby Haynes made her contribution to WorldNetDaily's continued veneration of the Confederacy with a Sept. 6 column complaining that a Confederate memorial inside Arlington National Cemetery will be removed:
In the midst of a national racial and political upheaval, Republicans cut a deal for the Fiscal Year 2021 National Defense Authorization Act that created a Naming Commission to "remove all names, symbols, displays, monuments and paraphernalia that honor or commemorate the Confederate States of America … or any person who served voluntarily with the Confederate States of America from all assets of the Department of Defense." As a part of that provision, Arlington National Cemetery has been ordered to remove the 109-year-old Confederate Memorial, conceived and built with the sole purpose of healing the wounds of the Civil War and restoring national harmony.
Actually, not so much. the cemetery's own website states that "The elaborately designed monument offers a nostalgic, mythologized vision of the Confederacy, including highly sanitized depictions of slavery," adding of the figures that are part of the monument:
Two of these figures are portrayed as African American: an enslaved woman depicted as a “Mammy,” holding the infant child of a white officer, and an enslaved man following his owner to war. An inscription of the Latin phrase “Victrix causa diis placuit sed victa Caton” (“The victorious cause was pleasing to the gods, but the lost cause to Cato”) construes the South’s secession as a noble “Lost Cause.” This narrative of the Lost Cause, which romanticized the pre-Civil War South and denied the horrors of slavery, fueled white backlash against Reconstruction and the rights that the 13th, 14th and 15th Amendments (1865-1870) had granted to African Americans. The image of the faithful slave, embodied in the two figures on the memorial, appeared widely in American popular culture during the 1910s through 1930s, perhaps most famously in the 1939 film “Gone with the Wind.”
Haynes went on a tirade about the "Radical Republicans of the 1800s," suggesting that they were to blame for provoking the Civil War by increasing tariffs that allegedly "resulted in an enormous transfer of wealth from the South to the North, decade after decade." She then went into full Confederacy-defending mode:
The present-day vilification of the Confederacy is part of a long-term ideological war being waged against the conservative South for the purpose of destroying Southerners as a people and rendering them socially, politically and economically impotent. These secular humanist propagandists, in their zeal to demonize the Christian South, have made the word "slavery" synonymous with "guilt" and "the white South."
[...]
President William McKinley, Union soldier-turned-president, proposed the concept of the site at Arlington for the graves and memorial to honor those Americans against whom he had once fought. He understood what today's monument smashers do not seem to get: that Confederate soldiers were not fighting to preserve slavery. In 1860 only 5% of Southern whites owned slaves, and less than 25% benefited economically from slavery. Yet 258,000 Confederate soldiers, few of whom owned slaves, died in the war. The Confederate soldier who wrote the inscription for the Confederate Memorial understood it well and so do most veterans who have fought in America's wars.
Haynes concluded by declaring that "It's up to the American people, the majority of whom do not want the Confederate Monument removed, to stop the cultural cleansing of our nation." She offered no evidence that a "majority" of Americans do not want the monument removed, nor did she explain why removal of monuments to losing, traitorous causes amounted to "cultural cleansing."
MRC's Jean-Pierre-Bashing, Hypocritical 'Fatal Attraction' Edition Topic: Media Research Center
In writing up the Oct. 10 White House press briefing, Curtis Houck accused any reporter who asked a question that dared to raise concerns about Palestinians getting caught in the crossfire of war between Hamas and Israel as being "pro=Hamas":
Tuesday’s White House press briefing was largely clear-eyed about the horrors caused Friday by Hamas terrorists in Israel with over a dozen Americans dead and nearly two dozen unaccounted for. There were some tough questions from usual corners, but also some predictably pro-Hamas questions standing up for the plight of modern-day Nazis.
And, amid that chaos, two reporters in the front row had the wherewithal to ask about news from late Monday that President Biden spent the previous two days being interviewed by Special Counsel Robert Hur into his handling of classified documents.
The worst question was actually the last one of the briefing as Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre heard this question from Anita Powell of taxpayer-funded Voice of America:
Can you guarantee that members of the Muslim diaspora or immigrant communities can still feel safe, can still exercise their civil liberties, and exercise their criticism of — of Israel’s behavior? Was — was that part of the conversations and can you ensure those communities that they have all those rights?
That, readers, is your tax dollars at work in ensuring those supporting mass murder, rape, beheadings, and mutilation have rights.
Yes, Houck reaally thinks that not reflexively hating Muslims means that you somehow support terrorists. Meanwhile, he gave cookies to Fox News employees who asked conservatively correct questions: "At the other end of the spectrum, Fox’s Jacqui Heinrich pressed National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan on how Hamas ally Iran had recently been greenlit to receive $6 billion in frozen funds," adding that "Fox News reporter Ryan Schmelz made sure that America’s porous southern border was invoked."
In his writeup of the Oct. 11 briefing, Houck helped a right-wing reporter go all "Fatal Atrraction:" on Jean-Pierre for not giving him the attention he demands:
The tail end of Wednesday’s White House press briefing was marked by a contentious moment when the White House’s ever-inept Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre refused to call on theNew York Post’s Steven Nelson despite having skipped over him for nearly five months and his paper since July 7.
Jean-Pierre was searching for a final reporter to call on when Nelson chimed in, “[y]ou haven’t called on me in two seasons, Karine.” Before he could finish another thought, Jean-Pierre scoffed with a smirk on her face that, “I’m not calling on you today.” Instead, she picked the Washington Examiner’s Christian Datoc.
Datoc started to ask his question (instead of let Nelson speak), but Nelson began ripping Jean-Pierre as she repeatedly told Datoc to “go ahead”:
[...]
Nelson relented when she again called on Datoc and told Nelson that she was “calling on somebody who I haven’t called in a long time as well.”
Question: If this were, say, CNN, or another leftist outfit during the Trump years that was being ignored, do you think the rest of the press corps would have ceded ground to let them rant? If so, why didn’t the press corps rise up in the New York Post’s defense?
As you might imagine, Houck treated a similar situation differently when it happened under the Trump administration. In his writeup of the a Nov. 20, 2020, press briefing, Houck wrote that "White House Press Secretary Kayleigh McEnany held a formal press briefing for the first time in almost two months and, as expected, she didn’t disappoint," in part by "smacking down the hurt feelings of liberal reporters like CNN’s Kaitlan Collins after they weren’t called on":
Following her trademark closing statement (more on that shortly), McEnany closed her binder and thanked those called on for “very good and substantive questions,” but still irked by Thursday’s Coronavirus Task Force briefing, reporters began screeching (including Brian Karem blabbering about sedition).
When Collins complained about there not having been more Q&A, McEnany leaned back into the podium microphones to say,“I don’t call on activists.”
Collins replied: “I’m not an activist and you haven’t taken questions since October 1st and you just took about five.”
Needless to say, Houck is not about to admit that Nelson is the activist he clearly is, even though he works for a highly biased right-wing rag that's still operating only because of the largesse of Rupert Murdoch.
Houck went on to whine about Jean-Pierrre's supposed "pettiness" and that "May 31 was when Jean-Pierre last let Nelson ask questions," but he had no complaints when McEnany went to months without even bothering to hold a briefing, and he certainly didn't call her petty for deliberately ignoring a reporter. Talk about a double standard.
Newsmax Frets Over 14th Amendment Challenges To Trump's Candidacy Topic: Newsmax
Like WorldNetDaily, Newsmax is annoyed that some are pressing the idea that Donald Trump should be removed from 2024 presidential election ballots because of a clause in the 14th Amendment that bars anyone engaging in "insurrection or rebellion" against the U.S. from holding public office. Newsmax actually reported on nacent efforts in this area in February 2021 -- a month after the Capitol riot -- in an article by Charlie McCarthy noting that "some Democrats have discussed invoking the 14th Amendment of the Constitution to keep Trump from office.
A July 7 article by Charles Kim groused that "political activist organizations" were pushing the idea in several states. Newsmax has noted some of those efforts as well, in araticles that skew toward pro-Trump sentiments:
Of course, Newsmax made sure to document Trump's own rantings on the subject, in a Sept. 5 article by Sandy Fitzgerald:
Former President Donald Trump is accusing states that are trying to use the 14th Amendment to disqualify him from the 2024 ballot of staging a "trick" to steal the election from him and give it to President Joe Biden.
"Almost all legal scholars have voiced opinions that the 14th Amendment has no legal basis or standing relative to the upcoming 2024 Presidential Election," Trump posted on his Truth Social page Monday night, reports The Washington Examiner.
"Like Election Interference, it is just another 'trick' being used by the Radical Left Communists, Marxists, and Fascists, to again steal an Election that their candidate, the WORST, MOST INCOMPETENT, & MOST CORRUPT President in U.S. history, is incapable of winning in a Free and Fair Election," he added.
Newsmax also gave airtime to a non-practicing attorney and former Fox News host to shoot down the idea, as noted in a Sept. 5 article by Jack Gournell:
Some opponents of former President Donald Trump who are trying to use the 14th Amendment to disqualify him from serving another term won't succeed because it doesn't apply in Trump's case, Megyn Kelly tells Newsmax.
First, Trump hasn't even been charged with insurrection, "nor can he be," Kelly, a former attorney and current radio host, said Tuesday on "Eric Bolling The Balance." A section of the 14th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution states that no person who has committed insurrection against the United States shall serve in any federal office.
But Kelly told Bolling that the amendment was clearly a provision designed to get at those who had participated in the Confederacy during the Civil War.
[...]
The amendment was meant to deal with a specific problem at that specific time, and "I think that will be reflected in any sane court decision," Kelly said. "I'll predict that right now easily, and it could be more than a 6-to-3 vote. ... It could be unanimous on this it's such an absurd argument. This is an act of desperation."
Like WND, Newsmax also published Betsy McCaughey's column complaining about the efforts. It found another person to bash the effort in a Sept. 8 article:
Colorado Republican Party Chair Dave Williams told Newsmax on Friday that efforts to keep former President Donald Trump off the ballot in 2024 using the 14th Amendment is "laughable" but need to be watched.
"I think this is outrageous," Williams said on Newsmax's "National Report." "It's undemocratic, and it's apparent that there are a number of folks, especially in the Democrat Party, that are concerned that Donald Trump is a viable candidate, that Joe Biden is going to lose, and so they are engaging in election interference, and they have solicited the help of supposed Republicans — phony conservatives — to help keep a qualified candidate off the ballot."
"It's not constitutional, it's not democratic, and the Republican Party is not going to stand for it," he added.
Yes, invoking the Constitution is somehow "not constitutional."
Newsmax published a Sept. 25 wire article featuring Trump climing that his First Amendment free speech rights trump the 14th Amendment invocation, while an article that day by Fran Beyer cheered that "A push by activists to block former President Donald Trump from being on the 2024 ballot in several states has reportedly been a bust because officials are reluctant to act without any court guidance." In a Sept. 29 article, meanwhile, Nicole Wells seemed a little dismayed that the idea is catching on:
A slim majority of voters say that former President Donald Trump, who is running for the 2024 GOP presidential nomination, is disqualified from doing so under the Constitution’s 14th Amendment, according to a new Politico-Morning Consult poll.
Following questions on the Constitution and Trump’s behavior in the wake of the 2020 election, a 51% majority of voters said the 14th Amendment prohibits the former president from running again, versus 34% who said he is not disqualified from running.
In an unusual political twist, liberal activists allied with conservative attorneys have claimed that Trump is ineligible to run under the section of the 14th Amendment that states individuals “engaged in insurrection or rebellion” against the United States or who have “given aid or comfort to the enemies thereof” are barred from holding public office.
Another wire article that day noted the effort taking root in Michigan. An Oct. 2 wire article reported that the Supreme Court rejected one 14th Amendment challenge, and an Oct. 13 wire article noting the challenge was allowed to stand in Colorado. A Nov. 1 article by Charles Kim, weirdly placed in Newsmax's health-news vertical, reported on further developments in the Colorado case.
UPDATE: A Sept. 11 column by Deroy Murdock fretted about it as well:
This legal theory might make sense if Trump had been imprisoned for insurrection or rebellion. It might hold water, if he had been convicted of insurrection or rebellion.
This boomlet even might boast a thimble full of steam, if the Justice Department, a state attorney general, or some county prosecutor had indicted him for insurrection or rebellion.
Unfortunately for Trump haters, this never happened.
Murdock offered no evidence that the 14th Amendment requires a conviction or other legal action on insurrection or rebellion.
WND Thinks Fringe Anti-Vaxxer Org Is A 'Major Medical Group' Topic: WorldNetDaily
WorldNetDaily's Bob Unruh tried to sound evenhanded in an Sept. 12 article, but then immediately grow conspiratorial:
One of the products of the COVID-19 pandemic that came out of China and circled the globe, killing millions, was a new and heightened awareness of vaccines and other shots that government medicos want everyone to take.
But what remains still in dispute is just exactly what good, or bad, they did. How helpful, or injurious, were they?
Now the U.S. government is approving the rollout of a whole new list of COVID shots, even though the strain now circulating is far more mild than those of years gone by.
It is important for some in the elite levels of government to continue to have the public in fear because it is a way to exercise vast controls over the American population: No shot? No airline ticket. Or no meeting in public. Or no access to schools. Or this is the only process for you to vote. And worse.
It seems important for Unruh and WND to continue to have the public in fear of COVID vaccines. Which led up to the point of his article:
But now a major influencer in the medical world, Peter McCullough, and the World Council for Health, are recommending a go-slow approach not just to COVID shots, but others that have become so common.
McCullough, of course was one of the medical experts who was censored repeatedly during the earlier battles with COVID because of his medical conclusions he drew about the pandemic.
For example, Meta stifled his comments, and those from "America's Frontline Doctors," because they offered preventative treatments for COVID, especially focusing on Americans who distrusted the rush-job shots that actually now have been documented as causing significant injury to many.
[...]
McCullough now has issued a statement, on behalf of the WCH, that cites it as the "first international body of physicians, scientists, and health professionals to issue a cautionary statement on the ever-expanding routine childhood vaccine schedule."
He explained, "This is in response to growing concerns over the safety of many vaccines given early at life during the same administration."
Unruh laughably described the World Council for Health as a "major medical group" in his headline; in fact, it's a fringe anti-vaxxer group with no significant following or influence outside the anti-vaxx community. McCullough, of course, is a discredited COVIDmisinformer -- and WND favorite -- who has been repeated exposed as spreading misinformation about COVID treatment and vaccines.
Unruh went on to uncritrically repeat anti-vaxx propaganda from the group:
Then there's the "unprecedented" surge in autism, asthma, allergies, inflammatory bowel disease, diabetes, obesity, depression and more" and the causes of those catastrophes "have not been established."
Worse yet, "Much of what we have been told about the success of early vaccines, including smallpox and polio vaccines is emerging as untrue. Clean water, modern plumbing, hygiene, refrigeration, and improved nutrition are real factors that have correlated with the dramatic reduction in many infectious diseases over the past century."
Nor have the necessary evaluations been completed to determine whether vaccinations forced on children alone, or together with others, are linked to poor health outcomes compared with children who remain unvaccinated.
Worsening the threat, the findings noted, national regulators have been turning a blind eye to the evidence linking childhood vaccinations with autism, and evidence linking the shots to asthma, allergies and more.
Specifically regarding COVID-19, the conclusions warned, "evidence from independent experts and official international databases show that the COVID-19 vaccines are not effective and are not safe, raising serious questions around the authorization of the COVID-19 vaccines for babies and children."
Unruh offered no reality-based viewpoint to counter the medically dubious propaganda the World Council for Health is spouting here.
After spending the summer hating George Soro's son for the offense of being, well, George Soros' son, the Media Research Center returned to its usual obsessive hatred of Soros himself. We've already noted that the MRC made a point of highlighting that Soros has given money to the Southern Poverty Law Center in bashing the SPLC for pointing out the extremism of the right-wing Moms for Liberty, as well as its cheering of Ron DeSantis for taking a shot at Soros during the first Republican presidential debate. It has had other anti-Soros freakouts as well from late August through September, largely of the guilt-by-association variety:
The pro-Trump stans at Newsmax tried to create a narrative that Donald Trump supports striking union autoworkers despite his 
The Media just 
The Media Research Center tried to work up outrage that the attacks on President Biden and his administration by Gold Star families whose family members died in Afghanistan were supposedly being ignored by non-right-wing media. Kevin Tober set the narrative -- while giving Fox News a cookie for advancing the conservatively correct narrative -- in an Aug. 7 
Michael Schisler is an occasional WorldNetDaily columnist who has peddled 
Christian Toto started his Sept. 30 Media Rsearch Center 
WorldNetDaily has been a 
Twitter (well, X) hasn't exactly covered itself in glory during the Israel-Hamas war. Given how Elon Musk 
Let's examine Labor Day. Excluding those who believe "denial" is a river in Egypt, honest people in the news/information and political fields, said being an oxymoron notwithstanding, will admit that "Crooked Joe Biden" is the extension of Mr. "I think about sex with men 24/7" Obama's tenure in office. And he has continued "the fantasizer's" wretched legacy masterfully, unless you're the working class. In that case, it's aggravated immiseration, which amounts to societal assault and battery. The legacy is one of crushing labor, malicious regulating of small businesses, the asphyxiation of economic growth and the polarization of business fact from business fantasy. But, I'm getting ahead of myself.
Tim Graham complained in a Sept. 11 
Carole Hornsby Haynes made her contribution to WorldNetDaily's continued 
In writing up the Oct. 10 White House 
Like 
WorldNetDaily's Bob Unruh tried to sound evenhanded in an Sept. 12 
