In the midst of taking potshots at Anthony Weiner in a June 20 Newsmax article, James Hirsen felt the need to take a particularly nasty shot at Al Gore, smearing him as an "eco-cult leader."

Believing in global warming makes you a cult member, Really, Mr. Hirsen?

This must be some of that media psychology Hirsen claims to have a master's degree in. As if Hirsen's devotion to Mel Gibson was any less cult-like.

Posted by Terry K. at 7:21 PM EDT

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We've detailed how newly minted WorldNetDaily "senior reporter" F. Michael Maloof was part of a clandestine team of intelligence researchers who were pushing the false claim that Saddam Hussein was linked to 9/11. It appears that's far from the only thing Maloof will lie about.

In a June 18 WND article, Maloof writes:

The dissidents are from the MEK, or Mujahidin-e Khalq, and are opposed to the Shi'ite Iranian regime which has considerable influence over al-Maliki, who also is Shi'ite.

Saddam Hussein had used the MEK, which the U.S. at one point had declared to be a terrorist group. In backing Hussein, the MEK was used by the Hussein regime to perform internal security. At one point during the Hussein period, there were a considerable number of MEK camps spread throughout Iraq.

Following the U.S. invasion, the MEK began to work with U.S. Special Forces and ultimately the organization was removed from the U.S. terrorist list.

In fact, as of June 16, MEK remains on the State Department's list of terrorist organizations.

Why is this important? Because, as Maloof hints above, WND would like to downplay the terrorist history of MEK and portray it as a U.S. ally because of its anti-Iran stance.

WND didn't start out that way. A January 2003 article by Ken Timmerman, part of WND's content-sharing agreement with the now-defunct Moonie magazine Insight, attacks the New York times for publishing a full-page ad for MEK, which he points out is "an Iraqi-based terrorist group" that "claims to have thousands of armed members based in military camps in Iraq, financed and equipped by Saddam Hussein."Timmerman goes on to highlight the members of Congress that have accepted donations from MEK-linked individuals and groups, among them current WND columnist Tom Tancredo. Larry Klayman is even quoted as saying that people who support the MEK are "terribly misinformed."

By the start of the Iraq War, however, WND began to change its tune.A May 2003 article touted an MEK claim that "Iran is building an arsenal of biological weapons incorporating six pathogens, including anthrax and smallpox," adding that "weapons experts and intelligence officials consider its previous claims about Iran's weapons programs to be largely reliable."

A January 2004 article, however, noted that MEK is "an Iranian terrorist group supported by Saddam Hussein" and that the Red Cross would not accept proceeds from a MEK fundraiser for victims of an earthquake in Iran.Paul Sperry wrote in an April 2004 article that MEK is "an Iranian dissident group that has killed Americans."

WND flipped again in a November 2004 article by Jerome Corsi, noting that a group called the National Council for Resistance in Iran that made claims about Iran's nuclear program was a "shadowy organization" that is the political arm of the MEK, designated "a foreign terrorist organization." Corsi then added: "The problem is that information about Iran's nuclear weapons program previously released by the NCRI has turned out to be true."

In 2007, an WND article by Art Moore was touting an Iranian dissident who called the MEK "Iran's best-organized and most capable opposition group." Moore also quoted "Iran scholar" Michael Ledeen as saying that he opposes U.S. involvement with the MEK, stating that while the MEK is "is a first-class espionage organization that has provided valuable information to the West," the group operates in a "cult of personality" and "I just can't imagine they are going to be an effective force in a non-violent revolution, which is what I favor." But Moore also cited a study by the pro-MEK Iran Policy Committee (a group that included retired Army Gen. Paul Vallely, last seen at WND ranting that the long-form birth certificate President Obama released is a forgery)

WND's whitewashing of MEK began in earnest after that. An October 2009 article declared that MEK "is regarded as an Iranian exile group, while a June 2010 article touted how MEK "opposes the current Iranian regime and is known to have worked with Special Forces."

That brings us to now, with WND's Maloof peddling the false claim that the U.S. no longer considers MEK a terrorist group. And that's just one of the many, many reasons WND's reporting cannot be trusted.

Posted by Terry K. at 1:43 PM EDT

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As we've noted, NewsBusters is more than willing to invent accusations of racism by its perceived enemies, but it has a certain blind spot when it comes to racially charged rhetoric by its allies.

Taht blind spot has grown to massive proportions, as evidenced by a June 18 post by Noel Sheppard that makes every effort to deny the obvious.

Sheppard complains that "America's liberal media are having a field day claiming that an Obama impersonator at a Republican event was pulled off the stage Saturday for telling racial and gay jokes." But that's not the truth! Reggie Brown was pulled offstage at the Republican Leadership Conference because he told too many jokes about Republicans: "The crowd seemed to be getting antsy as Brown started going after the various GOP presidential candidates. This was after all a Republican event."

Besides, Sheppard wrote, those racial jokes weren't offensive at all:

I've watched the entire eighteen minutes, and in my view, the jokes Brown made were pretty tame especially if compared to what late night comedians say about Republicans on almost a daily basis.

Brown's jokes weren't nearly as caustic as some of the stuff Wanda Sykes said at last year's White House Correspondents' Dinner.

[...]

As NewsBusters has been reporting for months, the goal of the Obama-loving media is to paint all Republicans as racists and homophobes in order to gin up support for the president they helped get elected in the first place.

Was that what they were doing with their coverage of this event?

So being intolerant of humor targeted at fellow Republicans is somehow more acceptable than being intolerant of racist humor? That, it seems, is what Sheppard wants you to believe.

UPDATE: Corrected the name of the event the Obama impersonator appeared at.

Posted by Terry K. at 8:49 AM EDT

Updated: Monday, June 20, 2011 7:54 PM EDT

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New research demonstrates that in fact men are not maturing, and that is largely due to the female left's desire to obliterate male nature – resulting in the slow death of the delicate dance between men and women.

[...]

The modern generation has been sold a bill of goods. Baby boomers, that notorious generation from whence feminism came, taught their children that males and females are exactly the same, that their behaviors and desires are, or should be, identical. Thus, women and men today pursue identical lives – with no recognition of the unique qualities each gender brings to the table. The result is a blurring of gender roles that has driven a wedge between the sexes. According to the Pew Research Center, approximately 39 percent of Americans say marriage is becoming obsolete. Put another way: Men and women have no idea how to get along.

As a woman making these claims, I've been called a traitor to my sex. I've even been called a misogynist. Naturally, you can guess from which camp these accusations are being made. But the truth is that I'm simply pointing out what many of us know in our hearts to be true but are afraid to say: that the feminist movement is the worst thing that's ever happened to this nation.

-- WND-published author Suzanne Venker, June 18 WorldNetDaily column. Venker, by the way, committed the arguably feminist act of divorcing her first husband after he didn't accede to her desire to move out of New York.

Posted by Terry K. at 12:20 AM EDT

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The federal government is attacking Catholic colleges! The Media Research Center says it, so it must be true!

Paul Wilson provides the shocking details ina June 15 MRC Culture & Media Institute article headlined "Media Ignore Labor Attacks on Catholic Colleges," asserting that the federal government is leading an "assault on religious freedom."

And how are the feds conducting this dastardly attack, you ask? Is it oppression? Arrests? Enhanced interrogation?

Um, not exactly. The NLRB is merely ruling that professors at Catholic schools have the right to form labor unions.

That, of course, is not the way Wilson portrays it. Rather, he asserts that the NLRB ruled that the two Catholic schools in question "lacked enough of a religious character to be exempt from provisions of federal labor law," meaning that the schools were "forced by the NLRB to recognize an adjunct faculty union."

What Wilson doesn't tell you, however, is the reasoning behind the NLRB's rulings. For instance, in the case of Manhattan College, the NLRB noted that the school receives no significant financial assistance from the Catholic Church or the Catholic sect it's affiliated with, that the school has declared itself to be "strikingly different from that of parochial schools and Catholic high schools where indoctrination in the faith and insistence on religious observance is seen as part of their mission," and that it asserts that its has "no intention" of imposing "Church affiliation and religious observance as a condition for hiring or admission, to set quotas based on religious affiliation, to require loyalty oaths, attendance at religious services, or courses in Catholic theology."

Similarly, in the case of Wilson's other example, Xavier University, the NLRB noted that the school's articles of incorporation "does not contain any reference to religion, God, Catholicism, Sisters of Mercy, or CMHE; instead it speaks only to the purpose of education," that the school "does not investigate the religious beliefs of its students, faculty, or trustees," and that it "has no requirement for faculty, including adjuncts, to espouse or emphasize Catholicism in their teachings or imbue students with the tenets of the Catholic faith."

The real question here is why these institutions are trying to hide behind their religious affiliations to apparently mistreat their faculty members  to the point that they feel they must form a union. Instead, Wilson tries to portray this as a religious freedom issue. How is mistreating your employees an issue of religious freedom? It's almost as silly as that nutrition "ministry" WorldNetDaily loves so much that's crying religious discrimination when the feds want it to prove its claims that its nutritional supplements cure cancer.

So, no, the NLRB is not attacking Catholic colleges; it's merely ordering them to recognize faculty unions. Wilson never explains why that's a bad thing.

Posted by Terry K. at 10:08 PM EDT

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We've detailed how Tim Graham has emerged as the Media Research Center's chief gay-basher. Here's what he's done on the subject over the past week:

On June 15, he freaked out about "gay Russ Feingold-donating PR man" who questioned the idea that Romney was a hockey fan.

On June 16, he declared that CNN's Don Lemon was a "gay-vangelist" and appeared to be offended that Lemon "'learned' that the Bible should never be taken literally" after he prayed to God to change his sexuality, and he definitely was offended that Lemon "compared gay acceptance to slavery, segregation and female suffrage."

On June 17, Graham asserted that GLAAD are "gay censors" who want "to drive any conservative point of view off CNN and other cable news networks." As if Graham doesn't want the gay point of view driven off the air.

Posted by Terry K. at 1:17 AM EDT

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Ron Paul doesn't want the federal government involving itself with the institution of marriage. I would agree if the federal government had not already involved itself by helping to destroy the institution through federal court decisions. When the courts exceed their authority, Congress not only has power to correct them, it has the absolute duty to do so.

There is only one reason the marriage laws of the several states have been rewritten – because of state and federal courts that involved themselves in legislating rather than adjudicating.

It started in 2003 with the Lawrence v. Texas Supreme Court case that struck down anti-sodomy laws in a sovereign republic. It continued in Massachusetts when the Supreme Judicial Court ordered the Massachusetts legislature to legalize same-sex marriage. (It continued, by the way, when then-Gov. Mitt Romney capitulated to the out-of-control court by ordering state and county employees to begin performing those marriages instead of challenging the court's egregious excesses.) It continued again when an activist federal judge (one whom, as a homosexual living with a same-sex partner, had a recusable conflict of interest in the outcome of the case) overruled the express will of the people of California by overturning Proposition 8, which affirmed marriage as an institution between one man and one woman.

Instead of recognizing the federal courts' destructive role in the marriage issue, Ron Paul retreats to a libertarian position that denies 6,000 years of human history by saying government shouldn't involve itself in marriage. I'm afraid you just can't put the genie back in the bottle. Government has been involved in marriage for thousands of years – and in the United States since its founding.

I could continue with more examples of Ron Paul's ostrich-like constitutional views.

-- Joseph Farah, June 17 WorldNetDaily column

Posted by Terry K. at 12:05 PM EDT

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Wait and see what will happen if this ego-maniac in chief gets re-elected and achieves his objective to obliterate America and turn it into a communist nation. As he proudly boasted at an April, 2011, fundraising event, “I have had the most successful legislative initiative of any president over the last 50 years.”

One term in office seems to not be enough to find out what Obama stands for and to see that all his promises to those who had elected him have been a failure. He is seeking another. Another for what? Failed economic policies, high unemployment, poor record on human rights, and his unwavering loyalty to China — all betray his deep-seated Marxist-socialist convictions and beliefs.

[...]

Can the United States survive Obama’s second term? Will it turn out to be yet another attempt to destroy this country? Will the American people give Obama another four years in office to complete his destructive experiment by throwing this country’s economy and defense at the mercy of the People’s Republic of China?

While clamoring for closer cooperation between Democrats and Republicans, Obama actually does everything in his power to set them apart.

My hope is that the American people are too smart to be fooled again by Obama’s treacherous promises. They will finally understand and reject Obama’s policies so fatal to this country. They will vote him out of office by making another presidential choice.

-- Lev Navrozov, June 15 Newsmax column

Posted by Terry K. at 3:12 PM EDT

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Apparently, Jerome Corsi's disdain for people who ridiculed birthers like himself is exploding into all-out war -- and, it seems, libel.

In a June 16 WND article, Corsi declares war on one such person:

At the center of the network of Obama radical activists who forged and distributed a fraudulent Kenyan birth certificate in August 2009 was former California lawyer William L. Bryan.

Bryan posts as an Obama operative under the username "PJ Foggy" and lives in Raleigh, N.C., where he runs a flower shop.

Under the cover of his username, Bryan and his associates have engaged in an aggressive campaign to disrupt any and all attempts to pursue legal challenges to Obama's eligibility, while seeking to ridicule in vile and abusive terms those who dare advance or support publicly such legal efforts.

In a manner reminiscent of Donald Segretti's dirty tricks during the Watergate era, interfering in the 1970s with the political campaigns of such Democratic Party presidential hopefuls as then-Sen. Edmund Muskie of Maine, Bryan and his associates have utilized the Internet to plan and promote their disruptive name-calling efforts.

Just a couple problems with Corsi's vengeful attack. Bryan says "There was never any time in which the State Bar of California even suggested disbarment as a punishment." Further, according to a Facebook response by Bryan at the end of Corsi's article, Corsi also apparently violated Bryan's privacy by including a picture of his children in the article, as well as "called for his 4560 Facebook friends to harass me and gave them enough info to find the phone number and address of my flower shop, where several innocent women who work there are terrified."

All this, by the way, seems to stem from Corsi and WND getting suckered by a fake "Kenyan birth certificate" for Obama. Corsi, by the way, has yet to explain how he and WND went from claiming that Kenyan documents proved the certificate was real to claiming that Kenyan documents proved it wasn't. But that's the kind of thing that happens when you publish something bothering to confirm its veracity beforehand, which WND did here.

A June 17 WND article (curiously unbylined but will be presumed to have been written by Corsi until proven otherwise) attacks "A radical leftist sidekick of Bill Bryan." As with Bryan, Corsi provides no evidence that this person is "radical" other than opposing Corsi's birther agenda.

Corsi even slips in a plug for Larry Sinclair, who "claims in a book entitled 'Barack Obama & Larry Sinclair: Cocaine, Sex, Lies & Murder' that Obama, when he was an Illinois state senator, committed homosexual acts with him while the two were using cocaine" -- even including a link to Sinclair's book at Amazon.com. Sinclair is a WND darling whose claims (which, like the fake birth certificate, WND made no attempt to verify before publishing) have been utterly discredited, though that has not stopped Corsi from hinting that they are true.

Does Corsi's war against his critics mean that we are his next target? After all, we've exposed his buffoonery in exposing the fraud of documents he obtained in Kenya in an attempt to smear Obama, as well as his ignorance about economics and the personal vendetta he waged in WND against a co-author who endorsed a presidential candidate Corsi didn't like.

So, yeah, using WND to settle personal scores is very Corsi (not to mention very Joseph Farah). We'd be a bit more worried about this unhinged vengenace if we didn't know WND's track record on libel lawsuits.

Posted by Terry K. at 1:48 PM EDT

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Accuracy in Media's Cliff Kincaid is trying to gin up outrage over a non-scandal -- the claim that CIA director and secretary of defense nominee Leon Panetta is somehow disqualifed for both jobs because he purportedly had "had a close and personal relationship with a member of the Communist Party by the name of Hugh DeLacy, whose record included meeting with communist espionage agents." He writes in a June 14 AIM article:

Rather than have boxes of material dumped on us, as happened in the case of Palin, we have researched hard-to-find Congressional hearings, conducted interviews and examined clippings from decades ago, university archives and the Congressional Record. It’s the kind of reporting that Bob Woodward of the Post was known for during Watergate.

Funny, we thought Woodward was best known in Watergate for meeting with a secret source in a parking garage. Is Kincaid doing that?

Not really -- he's just red-baiting. And he's doing something else as well -- he's collaborating with a foreign national to bring down an American official.

Kincaid states that he is working with "my friend and associate Trevor Loudon" to attack Panetta. Loudon, right-wing activist, is a resident and citizen of New Zealand who is obsessed with communism and has fed many of Aaron Klein's guilt-by-association attacks on President Obama and his advisers. (Klein is repeating this attack on Panetta as well, crediting Loudon but not Kincaid.)

Why is Kincaid conspiring with foreigners to attack Americans? Does he hate America that much? 

Posted by Terry K. at 11:10 AM EDT

Updated: Friday, June 17, 2011 2:52 PM EDT

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NewsBusters isn't the only one to invent a racism scandal. Newsmax's James Hirsen follows in its footsteps by writing in a June 13 article:

Recently, “Daily Show” host Jon Stewart made Herman Cain the butt of his unimaginative jokes, and his patter about the GOP presidential contender turned out to be not so coded.

Stewart aired video footage of Cain. The former Godfather’s Pizza CEO and current GOP presidential candidate was addressing the issue of the thousands of pages of Democrat legislation that admittedly was not read by them prior to passage. Cain said that bills should be limited to three pages.

After showing the footage, the Comedy Central star displayed a billboard that read: “Herman Cain 2012 — I Don’t Like to Read.”

The racist threads woven into this comedic sketch are that the black man has difficulty reading and lacks intelligence. Neither Jesse Jackson nor Al Sharpton saw fit to call a press conference.

As with NewsBusters, Hirsen's "racist threads" are imaginary. And as with NewsBusters, Hirsen has been silent about actual "racist threads" in Fox News host Eric Bolling's "hoodlum in the hizzouse" attacks on President Obama.

It seems Hirsen would rather invent racism accusations about his political enemies than condemn actual racism among his allies. Just like NewsBusters.

Posted by Terry K. at 1:20 AM EDT

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WorldNetDaily columnist is proud to let his seething hatred of the Obamas wave in public. In the wake of his assertions that the Obamas are worse and polio and should be "dragged thru the streets," Massie responds to critics in an expanded tweet:

finally doofus libs that r haunting over our tweets got 1 of my quotes rite bho n his big saddle butt wife r worse things 4 nation since polio - i hope they don't expect me 2 feel bad or ashamed by wat i said - i'd like 2c them bothdragged out of the w/h n hauled off 2 jail 4 crimes against the Constitution violating our personal liberties - liberal jackos dont get upset when Justice Thomas, Michelle Malkin, or other conservatives of men and women are attacked by their minions - bho and buttzilla r marxists and racists - i didn't make it up all u have 2 is play back her own words - having said that I think the entire lot of them shud be hauled off 2 a penal colony n i hope they dont like wat i'm saying

Yes, Massie called Michelle Obama "buttzilla."

It's rather interesting that a man who up until now was best known for beating people over the head with his thesaurus has so thoroughly embraced Twitterese spelling conventions as if he was in junior high.

Posted by Terry K. at 2:04 PM EDT

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Last week, we noted how NewsBusters invented the claim that a joke about Herman Cain by Jon Stewart on "The Daily Show" was "racially charged" even though no evidence was presented to support the claim. When it comes to actual racially charged statements on a ideologically simpatico channel, however, NewsBusters isn't so quick to rush to judgment.

While Media Research Center employee Geoffrey Dickens was writing his baseless attack on Stewart, Eric Bolling was using the June 10 edition of his Fox Business show "Follow the Money" to say of a meeting between President Obama and the president of Gabon: "It's not the first time he's had a hoodlum in the hizzouse." Bolling repeated the point later in the show, saying, "It's not the first time he's had a hood in the big crib." Bolling later said, "So what's with all the hoods in the hizzy?"

This isn't the first time Bolling has used disparaging, racially charged rhetoric to smear Obama; he previously wrote that Obama was "chugging 40's in IRE while tornadoes ravage MO." 

NewsBusters got all hot and bothered a few weeks ago when liberal Ed Schultz said on his radio showthat conservative Laura Ingraham was a "right-wing slut" -- even demanding that he be suspended from his MSNBC show for the remarks, even though they never appeared there. They got what they wanted, and expressed pride that Schultz was "humiliated" into an issuing a apology.

Bolling, by contrast, spent a mere 14 seconds disingenously claiming that he went "a little fast and loose with the language," even though his racially charged statements appeared in apparently scripted, pre-taped segments.

Where's NewsBusters' outrage? Or is it too busy inventing more bogus racism allegations against liberals to bother?

Posted by Terry K. at 1:06 PM EDT

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This must have been nirvana for Ronald Kessler: writing a June 13 Newsmax column about how one of his favorite people, National Rifle Association president David Keene, is slobbering all over one of his other favorite people, Mitt Romney.

It's a veritable summit of fluffing!

Posted by Terry K. at 10:52 AM EDT

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WorldNetDaily wants you to think that Michele Bachmann really likes WND.

About an hour after Bachmann announced during the June 13 Republican presidential debate on CNN that she had filed papers for her candidacy, a WND article by Joe Kovacs asserted that she, after Herman Cain, was "the second Republican contender to have virtually announced their candidacies previously in WND."

Kovacs is taking some liberties with the facts, as WND is wont to do. The only evidence Kovacs provides that Bachmann "virtually announced" her candidacy at WND is an August 2009 article in which she, according to Kovacs, "hinted she was interested in the presidency."

Expressing interest in running for president is not an announcement of same. It's not even a "virtual announcement" of same. WND is simply trying to convince its readers that it's relevant as it pisses away what's left of its credibility on desperately trying to prove that the birth certificate President Obama released is fake.

Oh, and speaking of Cain: It's worth noting that while Fox News suspended paid commentators Newt Gingrich and Rick Santorum when their presidential ambitions became clear, Cain remains a (presumbly paid) WND columnist even after announcing his candidacy -- indeed, WND published Cain's column making that announcement. WND, it seems, can't even be bothered to keep up the pretense anymore that it's a real news organization.

Posted by Terry K. at 2:15 AM EDT

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