Training Up A Columnist, Part 2 Topic: WorldNetDaily
A couple years back, we took to task Kyle Williams -- the homeschooled teenage columnist for WorldNetDaily -- for hewing a little too closely to the conservative line on the issues of the day. Kyle is 16 now, and he's starting to find his own voice, though it's one some of his fellow conservatives might not want to hear.
Kyle has been on a quest to develop a purer vision of Christianity. In the process, he has leveled a lot of criticism against "family values" conservatives such as Jerry Falwell and the Family Research Council's Tony Perkins for such offenses as villainizing gays and playing politics instead of saving souls.
In his Sept. 3 WND column, keeps it up by biting the hand that feeds him. He attacks the idea that God sent Hurrcane Katrina to destroy New Orleans for its tolerance of homosexuality or other similar alleged failings, singling out two people who WND has promoted over the years: Michael Marcavage of anti-gay Repent America and WND columnist Craige McMillan. Kyle calls them arrogant and insensitive to the plight of their fellow human beings.
Kyle snarkily adds: "At this point, I'm just waiting for Fred Phelps and his friends to show up on a New Orleans' highway with picket signs saying, 'God Hate Fags [sic].'" No snark needed here, actually;1) Phelps' followers are already picketing the funerals of troops killed in Iraq; and 2} Phelps holds the same views on Kristina and gays as Marcavage.
WND: Emotions Are Bad Topic: WorldNetDaily
The cries for help issued by Fox News correspondents didn't go over well with WorldNetDaily.
A Sept. 3 WND article appeared to be mocking Geraldo Rivera for getting emotional as he reported from New Orleans during an episode of "Hannity & Colmes." The headline reads, "Sobbing Geraldo: Let the people go!" According to the article, Rivera "was filled with tears in his eyes and his voice fluttered with sorrow as he made an on-air plea to authorities to allow the estimated 30,000 storm victims at the center to be allowed to move to a safer, cleaner area."
The article later quotes what it claims were Fox viewers actually mocking Rivera, but it doesn't say where exactly those quotes came from, so there's no way of verifying the authenticity of these quotes. That sort of anonymous, unverifiable reporting suggests the point of the article was to smear Rivera.
The article also goes after Fox News anchor Shepard Smith, who is also in New Orleans, claiming his "Hannity & Colmes" report had an "excited negative tone."
WND offers no advice as to the proper way Smith should have reported the desperate situation of the New Orleans refugees without involving any icky emotions.
We Have A Winnah! Topic: WorldNetDaily
WorldNetDaily beats NewsMax to the punch, finds a way to blame the Clinton administration for the Katrina aftermath.
The Blame Topic: The ConWeb
Note to Frank Salvato, the Media Research Center and others upset that people are blaming President Bush for the poor response to Hurricane Katrina:
Conservatives were blaming President Clinton for 9/11 the day of the attacks, and we don't recall you complaining about that.
The One-Source Wonder Blunders In Topic: WorldNetDaily
Jon Dougherty reminds us why he won that Slantie Award for his slanted, factually deficient reporting. From a Sept. 1 WorldNetDaily column:
[O]ffers of international aid and assistance to help us get back on our feet are not exactly pouring in [after Hurricane Katrina]. As of this writing, I've seen exactly two offers of assistance.
Meanwhile, a Sept. 1 CNSNews.com article reports the following:
As graphic and disturbing footage of the devastation left by Hurricane Katrina fills TV screens around the world, the U.S. government has received numerous messages of condolence as well as offers of assistance from more than 20 countries.
If Dougherty can't even keep up with the current events he writing about, it makes you wonder about the online mag he currently operates.
UPDATE: Another thing Dougherty might have noticed if he had bothered to do any research before writing his column: President Bush apparently doesn't want any international help.
UPDATE 2: NewsMax serves up its own version of Dougherty's whine, claiming that is "shameful" that "only 25 nations" have offered assistance, "and almost none have offered what America has so often provided: money."
David Horowitz's Favorite Moonbat Topic: Horowitz
A Sept. 1 post by Andrew Walden on Moonbat Central, the blog of David Horowitz's DiscoverTheNetwork.org, tries to disassociate conservatives from Repent America, the group who's blaming gays for Hurricane Katrina:
So what is the real difference between them and the left-wing MoonBats? There is none. ... But their agenda is clear: they are another example of national socialist Moonbats who are trying to sew confusion amongst conservatives and Republicans in order to prepare the ground for a new version of Ross Perot or Pat Buchannan’s third-party campaign. Such a third-party “paleocon” candidate is the necessary prerequisite for Democratic victory in 2008.
Walden might have made a more persuasive case if another branch of his boss' empire hadn't embraced the leader of Repent America a few years back. A March 14, 2001 article on Horowitz's FrontMageMag.com by Dan Flynn cited Michael Marcavage, now head of Repent America, as a prime example of "censorship of conservative ideas" on college campuses:
Criminalizing Dissent Temple University Senior Michael Marcavage sued his school in the fall of 2000 for violating his First, Fourth, and Fourteenth Amendment Rights. After hearing that there would be a school-sponsored performance of Corpus Christi (a play that depicts Jesus as a promiscuous homosexual), Marcavage organized a counter-event during his junior year that was to feature gospel singers, speakers, and a play that depicted Jesus in a more positive light. Although Marcavage didn't seek to censor the play that he found offensive, the school did censor his event. After informing him that he would not be allowed to hold his event, Marcavage alleges that he was assaulted by university administrators who had him involuntarily committed to Temple University Hospital's psychiatric ward. Hospital records show that an administrator signed the paperwork to commit Marcavage but doctors found nothing wrong with the junior and released him.
Wanna rethink that opposition to Marcavage's commitment, guys?
Unequal Treatment for Anti-Gay Extremists Topic: WorldNetDaily
An Aug. 31 WorldNetDaily article reports the views of Repent America and its leader, Michael Marcavage -- yes, the guy at the center of the "Philadelphia 5" non-controversy earlier this year -- claiming that Hurricane Katrina was God's way of destroying the "wicked city" of New Orleans, "a city that opened its doors wide open to the public celebration of sin." Specifically, an upcoming gay gathering called, "Southern Decadence," which Marcavage claimed would feature "drunken homosexuals engaging in sex acts in the public streets and bars."
Given that these views are pretty much the same as those of Fred Phelps, why is WND promoting only Marcavage and not Phelps?
The Daily Les Returns Topic: The Daily Les
Les Kinsolving apparently didn't get to go to Crawford, Texas, because we haven't seen a question from him in more than a month. But now that President Bush is back in Washington, Les is too, and he wants President Bush to endorse the shooting of looters in New Orleans:
KINSOLVING: What is the president's reaction to the 1968 statement of Philadelphia's Frank Rizzo that all looters would be shot, and then three looters were shot, and the looting in Philadelphia stopped?
As supporting evidence, Kinsolving writes: "In an unscientific poll at WorldNetDaily yesterday, nearly 62 percent of participants said looters should be shot on sight by authorities." Y'all know how we feel about unscientific polls cited in "news" stories.
NewsMax Stays Busy Topic: Newsmax
It's been more than two days since Hurricane Katrina hit, and NewsMax has thus far not found a way to blame it on the Clintons (yet).
Of course, that may be because NewsMax currently has its hands full defending the Bush administration against questions that it did not adequately prepare for a disaster of this magnitude.
Purity Test Topic: Accuracy in Media
When he's not obsessing about Rachel Maddow's lesbianism, Accuracy in Media's Cliff Kincaid would like to be able to determine who is a true conservative.
In a "Cliff's Notes" column attached to an Aug. 24 AIM Report, Kincaid has decided that MSNBC's Joe Scarborough no longer is a true conservative because he wouldn't have Ed Klein, author of the factually challenged "The Truth About Hillary," on his show:
Scarborough says the Klein book has too much speculation and too many unsubstantiated charges. But the Holloway story is nothing but speculation and unsubstantiated charges. It is curious that a former Republican Congressman, who is supposed to be a conservative, would come up with bogus reasons not to interview the author of a provocative book about Mrs. Clinton.
So, in Kincaid's eyes, conservatives are obligated to promote any book that attacks Democrats (and especially the Clintons), even if the charges contained in it are "speculation and unsubstantiated."
Oh, and Kincaid does manage to drop a reference to "the mannish Rachel Maddow."
Ask Farah Topic: WorldNetDaily
Why is the leader of a organization that claims to be "one of the largest news agencies in the world founded specifically for the Internet" stealing the work of others and presenting it as his own? Feel free to ask him. Or call his radio show between 3 and 6 p.m. ET at 1-877-232-4855.
(We would, but he doesn't acknowledge our existence.)
WND's History of Plagiarism Topic: WorldNetDaily
Joseph Farah's wholesale lifting of a Reuters news article (now in a handy color-coded version) is not an isolated incident at WorldNetDaily, as ConWebWatch has documented:
-- WND regularly copies and pastes from articles in other publications to run them under a WND byline.
-- In one case, either WND plagiarized from Ann Coulter, or vice versa.
-- WND was once forced to apologize for improperly taking information without credit.
Such liberal attitudes toward appropriating the works of others is rather ironic given the conniption fit WND once had when another publication used its material without properly citing it.
Guilty, Guilty, Guilty Topic: WorldNetDaily
Not only is WorldNetDaily's Joseph Farah guilty of undisclosed conflicts of interest and condoning the theft of government property, he's guilty of plagiarism as well.
A major chunk of Farah's Aug. 30 article on the government's seizure of gold coins stolen years ago was taken -- mostly verbatim -- from a Reuters article on the subject. Nowhere in his article does Farah credit Reuters for the information he lifted.
Farah did make one notable edit to the Reuters copy he stole. Where Reuters noted that the coins "survived destruction after the United States abandoned the gold standard in 1933 and ordered them melted down," Farah changed it to say that the coins "survived destruction after President Franklin D. Roosevelt mandated all privately owned gold confiscated in the U.S. in 1933 – ordering the coins melted down."
There's Gold In Them Thar Slanted Articles Topic: WorldNetDaily
Is WorldNetDaily's Joseph Farah saying that it's OK to steal from the federal government?That's the implication of an Aug. 30 article he wrote regarding the government seizure of gold coins believed to have been stolen from the Philadelphia mint.
Farah quotes a coin dealer who says, "What we appear to have is yet another example of the U.S. government overstepping its boundaries, further alienating American citizens from conducting free trade of personal property." But this case regards stolen property, for which nobody that we know of has affirmed a right of free trade.
Farah also goes off on a tangent over alleged threats to the "right to own gold." That's not the issue, either; nobody has the right to own gold stolen from others.
At the end of the article, a link titled "Read more about your right to own gold" takes readers to an plug for a booklet on the subject at metals dealer Swiss America Trading Corp. The link is not clearly delineated as an ad, nor is it disclosed that Swiss America is a sponsor of WND and and an adviser Farah's radio show.
Swiss America chief Craig R. Smith also writes a weekly column for WND in which it's usually not disclosed that he's even with Swiss America, let alone anything about Swiss America's financial relationship with WND and Farah.
Given that Farah is so squeamish about disclosing conflicts of interest, condoning theft isn't really that far of a leap. After all, he already condones murder.
Just An Observation Topic: WorldNetDaily
An Aug. 30 WorldNetDaily article tells us "what smart WND readers are buying" from its online store.
What might more interesting and informative (not to mention helpful to WND from a marketing standpoint) is a list of what stupid WND readers are buying.
