Topic: WorldNetDaily
Why is WND afraid to tell the full truth about the birther attorney's questionable lawyering work to its readers? Perhaps because her credibility reflects that of the birther movement WND leads. Read more >>
Tuesday, October 27, 2009
New Article: WorldNetDaily Can't Stop Whitewashing Orly Taitz
Topic: WorldNetDaily Why is WND afraid to tell the full truth about the birther attorney's questionable lawyering work to its readers? Perhaps because her credibility reflects that of the birther movement WND leads. Read more >>
Posted by Terry K.
at 12:36 AM EDT
The Right Wing-PayPal Connection
Topic: WorldNetDaily A few weeks back, it was revealed that James O'Keefe -- who has gained right-wing fame for his clandestine videos of ACORN -- received thousands of dollars for a previous stunt from Peter Thiel, a co-founder of the online payment site PayPal with major conservative credentials (despite being gay). Interestingly, Thiel is not the only PayPal alum with their toes in right-wing activism. Eric Jackson is the former marketing director for PayPal, and Norman Book is its former financial systems manager. After leaving the company following its acquisition by eBay, the pair in 2004 founded World Ahead Publishing, with the goal to publish conservative-oriented books. In 2006, WorldNetDaily selected World Ahead to be its latest partner in its WND Books imprint. And in 2008, WND purchased World Ahead outright. As part of the deal, Jackson was named executive vice president of strategy of WND (he has since left that position; he currently "advises startups and non-profits on their business and product strategies"), while Book was named (and remains) executive vice president of operations.
Posted by Terry K.
at 12:10 AM EDT
Monday, October 26, 2009
CNS, Baehr Mislead on 'Antichrist'
Topic: CNSNews.com As we've detailed, the provocative and gruesome Lars von Trier film "Antichrist" is the right wing's new obsession. Now CNSNews.com has jumped aboard the outrage bandwagon with an Oct. 26 article by Pete Winn. Winn misleads from the beginning, asserting that "Antichrist" "opened nationwide on Friday." Winn didn't mention that it opened on only six screens. Winn then wrote that Ted Baehr of Movieguide -- not identifying Movieguide as a right-wing group -- "has launched a campaign to get the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA) to alter its rating" to NC-17, adding that "Baehr said the MPAA does sometimes change its ratings, and it does sometimes change them under public pressure." In fact, the MPAA cannot "alter its rating" of "Antichrist" because it was never submitted to the MPAA for a rating in the first place. The movie was released in theaters unrated, as are many foreign films in limited release in the U.S. Baehr's petition demanding that the MPAA rate the film NC-17 is similarly clueless, calling the film "Hollywood’s latest assault on our tender and impressionable children." But "Antichrist" is not a Hollywood production; it was made by a Danish director with a mostly Danish crew and entirely foreign money.
Posted by Terry K.
at 6:02 PM EDT
Newsmax Repeats False Claim About Fox News, Feinberg
Topic: Newsmax As evidence of "President Obama's decision to employ bare-knuckled Chicago tactics in his street fight with Fox News," David Patten cites the following in an Oct. 25 Newsmax article:
But that storyline has been discredited. As we've noted, Talking Points Memo uncovered what actually happened, and there's no evidence that anyone in the administration "directed that Fox News would not be included":
Will Patten correct his article? Don't count on it.
Posted by Terry K.
at 9:45 AM EDT
Another Unbalanced Anti-Abortion Article From CNS
Topic: CNSNews.com An Oct. 23 CNSNews.com article by Karen Schuberg -- which claims that "Abortion kills more black Americans than the seven leading causes of death combined" -- is a highly biased affair. Most notably, conservative anti-abortion activists are not identified as such. While Rev. Clenard H. Childress Jr.'s identification as "founder of BlackGenocide.org" is arguably self-explanatory, Schuberg identifies Freda Bush only as "an obstetrician and gynecologist in private practice in Jackson, Miss." In fact, Bush is affiliated with the Medical Institute for Sexual Health, which is a conservative group that argues for abstinence-only sex education, even to the point of arguing against condom use as ineffective against sexually transmitted diseases even though, as Slate reports, teaching people to protect themselves by using condoms can successfully reduce the spread of disease. Only one person on the conservative side quoted by Schuberg, "Dr. Alveda King, niece of slain civil rights leader Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.," is labeled as a "pro-life activist." In fact, as we've noted the last time CNS granted Alveda King the "Dr." honorific, her doctorate is not in medicine and appears to bemerely honorary. By contrast, Schuberg cites only one source on the pro-choice side, from the Guttmacher Institute, which she describes as "a pro-abortion group." And the Guttmacher Institute was not permitted to respond to the more inflammatory claims the anti-abortion activists made, such as King's assertion that "abortion has done what the Klan only dreamed of" and Bush's reference to Margaret Sanger being "a known eugenist, also had a Negro project" (without explaining that the Guttmacher Institute is an outgrowth of Planned Parenthood, which was founded by Sanger). CNS has a long history of labeling bias and unbalanced reporting on abortion.
Posted by Terry K.
at 8:18 AM EDT
Compare and Contrast, NewsReal Division
Topic: Horowitz
-- David Swindle, Oct. 24 NewsReal post
-- Paul Cooper, Oct. 24 NewsReal post
-- Michael Rulle, Oct. 21 NewsReal post
Posted by Terry K.
at 12:07 AM EDT
Sunday, October 25, 2009
Obama Derangement Syndrome Watch
Topic: WorldNetDaily
-- Ellis Washington, Oct. 24 WorldNetDaily column
Posted by Terry K.
at 12:39 PM EDT
Will MRC Retract False Claim About Feinberg Interview?
Topic: Media Research Center So the Media Research Center's Tim Graham is trying to make a big deal of claiming that Media Matters (disclosure: our employer) promoted purported inflammatory quotes by Rush Limbaugh that turned out to be unsourced, if not fake. Actually, as Media Matters' Eric Boehlert pointed out, a blog post merely quoted a columnist who cited the statements, then updated it to note that the quotes were in question. Now, it's the MRC's turn to retract a false claim -- an actual one this time. An Oct. 23 MRC press release "applauded ABC, CBS, NBC and CNN for uniting with competitor news network Fox News in response to the Obama White House excluding Fox from an interview with “pay czar” Kenneth Feinberg." The release went on to quote MRC chief Brent Bozell as saying:
The problem? Bozell's version of events -- that Fox News suffered a violation of its First Amendment rights by being deliberately excluded from the Feinberg interview until other journalists stood up for it -- appears to be completely false. As Talking Points Memo detailed, the facts are much less sinister:
Further, pretty much everyone involved is shocked that Fox News (along with its MRC fellow travelers) is blowing this up into a First Amendment issue:
So, when can we expect that retraction from Bozell, Graham and Co.? We'll be watching.
Posted by Terry K.
at 10:17 AM EDT
WND Scaremongers About Swine Flu Emergency Order
Topic: WorldNetDaily As expected given its previous freak-outs on the subject, WorldNetDaily's first instinct after President Obama's declaration of a national emergency over the H1N1 flu virus was to fearmonger. The subhead of WND's Oct. 24 article by Drew Zahn reads, "Is president's proclamation formality, or institution of Obama martial law?" Zahn then offered the possibility that "the Obama administration might use the declared emergency to suddenly expand government power," citing a writer for InfoWars -- not explaining that InfoWars is affiliated with conspiracy-monger extrordinare Alex Jones. Zahn also cited "a WND reader in an e-mail" who allegedly wrote, "Here we go with martial law" (remember, WND loves anonymous sources). Zahn framed these as "rumors" that were "quick to flame" because the news media offered "little explanation" about what the emergency declaration meant. Zahn curiously doesn't completely dismiss the InfoWars assertion that "we may witness a move toward martial law, forced vaccination and internment of those who refuse," and indeed suggests that it's a realistic possiblity. It's not until the seventh paragraph that Zahn finally breaks away from the fearmongering:
Why didn't Zahn lead with that instead of indulging in fearmongering and media-bashing accusations? Because fearmongering is what WND has historically done on the swine flu. WND has embraced the views of muckraking writer Wayne Madsen on the subject, even though has a historty of making wild, discredited claims. WND has also accused Obama of "trying to cause a panic over a possible H1N1 virus" in order to "create enough fear that the American public will acquiesce to the passage of Obamacare." That little conspiracy theory went unmentioned in Zahn's article, but don't doubt that it will resurface with Obama's emergency declaration. After all, WND readers eat that stuff up -- WND's poll of the day on the declaration features 25 percent of respondents saying, "I don't care what anyone says, I'm concerned this is the beginning of martial law."
Posted by Terry K.
at 12:14 AM EDT
Updated: Sunday, October 25, 2009 12:18 AM EDT
Saturday, October 24, 2009
Floyd Brown Still Lying to Promote Obama Impeachment
Topic: WorldNetDaily Anti-Obama activist (and Western Journalism Center chief) Floyd Brown recently took his call to impeach President Obama -- which we've previously detailed is littered with lies and distortions -- to the Western CPAC conference. It didn't go over too well; as HotAir's Ed Morrissey pointed out, Brown's presentation was "[o]ne of the worst – and worst defended – ideas at WCPAC," adding that "Brown misstates history, draws ridiculous parallels to the Nazi era, and takes the wrong lessons from the Clinton impeachment, which at least had the virtue of coming from an actual impeachable offense." Needless to say, Brown didn't take this well, so he ran to (where else?) WorldNetDaily, which had previously embraced his impeachement call, to defend himsel. Citing Morrissey's criticism, Brown wrote in an Oct. 23 column:
Apparently, getting his facts straight is a mere "peripheral issue" to Brown (as is lack of an actual impeachable offense), for he launches into another falsehood-laden bill of particulars against Obama. Brown repeats his previous claims that Obama "vindictively fired" Gerald Walpin as AmeriCorps inspector general without Obama was acting on a unanimous request from the AmeriCorps board of directors that Walpin be fired due to questions about "his capacity to serve." Brown also claimed: "Barack Hussein Obama appointed countless "czars" to oversee everything from the closing of Guantanamo to the food we eat. These czars don't have to be approved by the Senate." In fact, one-third of the "czars" tallied by Fox News were confirmed by the Senate or are in positions created by statute, and many of those positions had counterparts in the Bush administration, which we don't remember Brown complaining about.
Posted by Terry K.
at 9:35 AM EDT
Meanwhile ...
Topic: Accuracy in Media The Washington Independent's David Weigel details how attendees at Accuracy in media's 40th anniversary conference wanted speakers to delve into birtherism -- and not to debunk it. We've previously noted how AIM's Cliff Kincaid has apparently bought into the birther stuff.
Posted by Terry K.
at 12:59 AM EDT
Friday, October 23, 2009
WND's Unruh Repeats Hate-Crime Bill Lies
Topic: WorldNetDaily Bob Unruh just can't stop lying about the hate-crimes bill. An Oct. 22 WorldNetDaily article by Unruh about the bill's passage in Congress repeats many of the same falsehoods we've previously documented Unruh making:
Unruh even repeats his falsehood about Gordon Klingenschmitt, asserting again that he "was involuntarily removed from the U.S. military after he prayed 'in Jesus name.'" In fact, Klingenschmitt was removed for disobeying an order that he not appear in uniform at media events or political protests.
Posted by Terry K.
at 10:20 AM EDT
Another Empty Article from Aaron Klein
Topic: WorldNetDaily We've detailed how WorldNetDaily relies on anonymous claims to attack the Obama administration -- even granting anonymity to terrorists. He does so again in an Oct. 21 article claiming that "some Mideast leaders are considering hardening their positions against the U.S., believing they may extract more concessions from a conciliatory Obama administration." There is not a single named, on-the-record source in Klein's article. He cites:
This runs counter to WND editor Joseph Farah's assertion that "Aaron Klein doesn't use anonymous sources" and Farah's own dismissal of anonymous sources as "usually quotes made up out of whole cloth to help make the story read better."
Posted by Terry K.
at 8:33 AM EDT
Newsmax Runs to Kerik's Defense -- Again
Topic: Newsmax You had to figure with as much work Newsmax has put in to rehabilitating the reputation of Bernard Kerik that it would try to figure out a way to spin the revocation of Kerik's bail on the corruption charges he faces. We get exactly that in an Oct. 22 article by John Noble playing up Geraldo Rivera's assertion that Kerik "is a 'patriot' whose civil rights, including the right to a fair trial, are being trampled upon by an overzealous federal prosecutor and federal judge." (It was only a few months ago that Newsmax was happily repeating Lou Dobb's description of Rivera as "intellectually challenged.") Noble is in full protection mode on Kerik, even blaming the reporter to whom a Kerik associate leaked confidential court papers for reporting the leak to prosecutors:
Is Noble really saying that Seper should not have reported the violation that Modafferi's apparently illegal release of court-sealed information represents? We thought the boys at Newsmax were all law-and-order types. Noble goes on to editorialize that Kerik faces "a laundry list of charges, many trivial," which are based on "flimsy evidence." As we've detailed, Newsmax has a long history of whitewashing the corruption charges against Kerik, even doing so in a Newsmax magazine piece. Is Kerik really worth this much rehabilitation effort, considering the magitude of the charges against him and his latest antics? Newsmax apparently thinks so.
Posted by Terry K.
at 6:24 AM EDT
WND Just Can't Stop Lying About Obama Appointees
Topic: WorldNetDaily WorldNetDaily has a long history of making false and distorted claims about Obama administration officials. Media Matters documents the latest example -- three articles, two by Bob Unruh, falsely claiming that Education Department official Kevin Jennings "counseled a 15-year-old student to keep quiet about being seduced by an older man." In fact, not only was the student in question 16 (and thus of legal age) at the time of his counseling by Jennings, there's no evidence whatsoever that that Jennings told the student to "keep quiet." UPDATE: An Oct. 23 article by Unruh repeats the lie as well.
Posted by Terry K.
at 12:58 AM EDT
Updated: Friday, October 23, 2009 9:02 AM EDT
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