NewBusters Publishes Questionable Cartoon Of Barbie With POW Uniform
Topic: NewsBusters

For some reason, NewsBusters has published an editorial cartoon of a "Combat Barbie" that includes a prisoner-of-war uniform as an accessory:

The cartoon was drawn by Gary Varvel of the Indianapolis Star. At the newspaper's website, readers have criticized the cartoon for being sexist.

WND Illustrates Article On Gays In Boy Scouts With Jerry Sandusky
Topic: WorldNetDaily

Earlier this week, WorldNetDaily used "1984"-style imagery to illustrate an article on immigration reform, even though the two have absolutely nothing to do with each other. Now, WND is illustrating a story on the Boy Scouts of America considering reversing its ban on gays with a picture of convicted child molester Jerry Sandusky.

The front-page image:

The article itself, by Dave Tombers, uses the same image:

Tombers' article is heavily biased, quoting only anti-gay activists who make claims Tombers does not challenge or fact-check.

MRC Writer Bashes Al Gore Book He Hasn't Read
Topic: Media Research Center

Mike Ciandella uses a Jan. 28 MRC Business & Media Institute post to attack Al Gore's new book "The Future: Six Drivers of Global Change" as nothing more than Gore "pushing the eco-agenda." But Ciandella shows no evidence of having actually read the book.

Ciandella cites as his sources a "promotional video" for the book and a New York Times review -- not the book itself. Another clue that Ciandella didn't read the book is that his post appeared the day before Gore's book actually went on sale.

Ciandella goes on to complain: "Despite Al Gore’s insistence that it is an accepted scientific fact, more than 1,000 scientists are on record dissenting from the so-called 'consensus' on climate change." But how many scientists are there? A lot. Meanwhile, this graphic is more illustrative of the scientific consensus on climate change:

It's worth noting that the Media Research Center receives part of its funding from the oil industry.

NEW ARTICLE: Vox Day Has Issues
Topic: WorldNetDaily
Theodore Beale's nom de plume may have stopped writing his WorldNetDaily column, but he'll be remembered for his wild conspiracy theories and racially charged, misogynistic rhetoric. Read more >>

Newsmax Falsely Spins Reagan Home Story To Attack Obama
Topic: Newsmax

Marti Lotman writes in a Jan. 30 Newsmax article: "The University of Chicago Medical Center has announced plans to turn Ronald Reagan’s childhood home in Chicago into a parking lot for President Barack Obama’s library."

That's a complete, utter lie.

As Media Matters explains, while it is true that the University of Chicago Medical Center is planning to tear down a house where Reagan lived for a year when he was 4 years old, there is no evidence whatsoever that it would be torn down for an Obama presidential library -- in fact, a location for the library has not even been chosen -- and the university certainly did not "announce" it would do what Lotman said it did.

Even the Washington Times Communities article from which Lotman lifted her item never claimed that the university made such an announcement. Rather, it engages in a lot of baseless speculation and cites only unnamed "opponents of the demolition " as claiming it would be torn down for an Obama library -- which, again, has not even been awarded to the university as of yet.

Apparently, the idea of Obama trashing Reagan's legacy was too good for Newsmax to fact-check. Or even to double-check basic reading comprehension.

UPDATE: WorldNetDaily latched onto the bogus story as well, reproducing part of the Washington Times article, presumably without permission.

WND's Kinsolving Can't Stop Spewing Homophobia
Topic: WorldNetDaily

Raging homophobe Les Kinsolving is back at it again in his Jan. 28 WorldNetDaily column, in which he complains that the pastor at President Obama's inauguration "included in his benediction an endorsement of same-sex marriage (as did Mr. Obama) with no such inaugural devotional endorsement of many other alternative sexual orientations."

After reproducing a statement by the presidential inauguration committee about how the Obama administration has a "vision of inclusion and acceptance for all Americans," Kinsolving sneers: "This inevitably raises the consideration that 'all Americans' include pedophiles, polygamists, polyandrists, urophiliacs and zoophiliacs – among other alternate sexual orientations."

Kinsolving just loves to equate homosexuality with pedophilia and bestiality, despite the complete lack of factual basis for doing so.

NewsBusters' Finkelstein Doesn't Know What Amnesty Means
Topic: NewsBusters

Mark Finkelstein writes in his Jan. 29 NewsBusters post of "the current proposals on 'the pathway to citizenship'—AKA amnesty—being floated."

Hate to break it to you, Mark, but creating a path to citizenship is NOT amnesty.

The Gang of 8 immigration reform proposal, for instance, does not call for any sort of amnesty -- which most non-demagogic activists would describe as citizenship without preconditions. ABC reports:

Arguably the most significant detail is the inclusion of a pathway to citizenship for many of the nation's 11 million undocumented immigrants, but the process of obtaining citizenship is neither easy nor short.

Under the "Gang of Eight" plan, undocumented immigrants would be required to register with the federal government. Those without a criminal record would be eligible for "probationary legal status" if they pass a background check and pay fines and back taxes. The status would allow them to live and work legally in the U.S., but they would remain ineligible for federal benefits such as welfare of Medicaid.

Does that sound like amnesty to anyone? Only to people like Finkelstein, apparently. but calling it "amnesty" does not make it so.

Erik Rush Still Not Bringing His Prime Crazy To WND
Topic: WorldNetDaily

Erik Rush still isn't bringing his most insane conpsiracy theories to WorldNetDaily.

Rush uses a Jan. 25 column at Canada Free Press to rant that President Obama wants to take our guns away, just like Mao and Stalin did:

Obama, with the eager cooperation of the American press and the anti-gun lobby, are creating the perception of Second Amendment proponents as manifestly evil. Not misguided, not wrong – but evil. As such, he will set the stage for all “reasonable” Americans to support the wholesale dismantling of the Second Amendment, and if this means wholesale firearms confiscation and the bloodshed to which this will no doubt give rise, so much the better. This will give him legitimacy in his move of declaring martial law – in fact, he will have “no choice,” so it will appear.

This will be, as we’ve seen in so many other nations, the move across the threshold into totalitarian rule. We must never forget that this is a person who grew up studying and admiring Mao, Lenin, Stalin, and Castro – men who murdered hundreds of millions in their ascent to total dominion over their respective nations. Just this week, it was reported that a former senior military staffer revealed Obama’s new litmus test for top military brass: Can they give the order to fire on American citizens?

P.T. Barnum (of Barnum and Bailey Circus fame) was a practiced con artist. He taught his people well in the art of distraction; while folks were watching the right hand, the left hand was pulling the trick off right under the nose of the audience. Amazed, they would declare in wonder, “How did they do that?” The answer, of course, was that it happened right under their noses, while they were watching, and they had just been misdirected. Those who have researched the President’s multitudinous executive orders alone know that the Obama administration has mastered this technique.

There is no real discussion in America about gun ownership in America at any level that matters; Obama will confiscate them all – or at least he will attempt to do so. The question is: Will America see how it is being tricked before it is too late?

If I was WND, I'd be demanding that Rush publish his most crazy stuff at the home of his column. 

(h/t Right Wing Watch)

CNS' Starr Hides Ted Nugent's Provocative Attacks
Topic: CNSNews.com

Penny Starr's Jan. 23 CNSNews.com article on Ted Nugent's statements at a gun show stated that he "criticized New York City’s Democratic Mayor Michael Bloomberg for focusing the gun control debate in the United States on deer hunting."

But Nugent said a lot more. As Media Matters documents, Nugent also ranted about President Obama, claiming he is "actually is attempting to re-implement the tyranny of King George that we escaped from in 1776. And if you want another Concord Bridge, I got some buddies."

Curiously, Starr did not find this highly provocative statement newsworthy.

Meanwhile, a Jan. 23 CNS blog post by Gregory Gwyn-Williams Jr. alludes to Nugent's inflammatory statement, but he waters it down by claiming that Nugent said only that "anyone who seeks to undermine the 2nd Amendment must be treated like King George." In fact, Nugent was specifically referring to Obama with his King George reference.

WND Uses 1984-Style Image To Illustrate Obama Immigration Reform
Topic: WorldNetDaily

For reasons known only to them, WorldNetDaily has decided to illustrate a story about President Obama's plans for immigration reform with an image doctored to include Obama in a "1984"-style setting.

Here's the front-page promotion for it:

The article by Taylor Rose contains the same image:

Rose repeatedly uses the word "amnesty" to describe Obama's plan for comprehensive reform, even though the word implies a pardon without preconditions, something Rose knows is not happening since he nonsensically writes that Obama will have "requirements for amnesty."

Noel Sheppard's Headline Cliche Trifecta
Topic: NewsBusters

NewsBusters associate editor Noel Sheppard loves his headline cliches, but he has managed to outdo himself: He wrote three posts in three hours with the word "schools" in it.

At 9:37 on Jan. 27, Sheppard wrote a post with the headline "Pat Buchanan Schools Eleanor Clift: 'You Don't Read What the Founding Fathers Believed or Say'."

At 11:15, a new Sheppard post carried the headline  "22-Year-Old Woman Schools Piers Morgan: I Need an AR-15 to ‘Have Enough Ammo to Get the Job Done’."

Then, at 12:29, came a Sheppard post with this headline: "George Will Schools Donna Brazile: America's 'Going To Be an Assisted Living Home With an Army'."

Laziness or hackery? We report, you decide.

Aaron Klein Anonymous Source Watch
Topic: WorldNetDaily

Aaron Klein asserts in a Jan. 27 WorldNetDaily article that "President Barack Obama has already secretly pledged to the Palestinians he will press Israel into a new round of so-called land-for-peace negotiations." His source? An unnamed, untraceable, anonymous "top Palestinian Authority negotiator." No other backup for his claim is provided, and no named souces whatsoever appear in Klein's article.

It's Klein's longstanding, journalistically questionable practice to hide behind anonymous sources to hurl attacks at the Obama administration.

Bozell Ignorantly Gloats Over Imminent Demise Of 'Liberal Media'
Topic: Media Research Center

For someone who heads an organization purportedly dedicated to "media research," Brent Bozell knows stunningly little about the media.

An interview with Bozell is quoted thusly in a Jan. 25 CNSNews.com blog post:

"Think of a cornered rat. When you do have a rat in a corner, what does that rat do, instinctively? It goes for the jugular," Bozell said, predicting the traditional liberal media's ultimate demise:

"This is what's happening with the press. They're losing numbers - dramatically - the networks have lost fifty percent of their audience. Newsweek was sold for a dollar and they're closing it down now. The NYT could be liner for a parakeet cage."

You know who else got sold for a dollar? The Washington Times. As we've detailed, neither of the conservative newspapers in Washingtion, the Times and the Examiner, are subject to a free market like the New York Times and the Washington Post -- they're owned by rich benefactors who can afford to lose millions of dollars (billions in the case of the Wasghington Times) in the service of generating biased journalism to promote an ideology.

Bozell manages to display an amazing degree of self-unawareness as the interview continues:

Bozell said that liberal media won't see the light and change - they'll just get "ugly" and more vicious "as the ship goes down":

"Their numbers are becoming dramatically smaller. So, what's their reaction? They could look at those number and say, my goodness, look at Fox: it's going up. The only newspaper in the world that seems to be doing well is the Wall Street Journal. Maybe, they're doing something right.

"They're not going to do that. They're going to get more and more militant and fighting back as the ship goes down. Look at CNN, MSNBC."

Wait -- Bozell just likened the media to cornered rats, and he's complaining about media viciousness? Yes -- the terminally angry activist who likened President Obama to a "skinny ghetto crackhead" is complaining about how the media is so mean.

Is Bozell that stupid, or is he just a mendacious liar? We report, you decide.

Hillary Clinton Derangement Syndrome, WorldNetDaily Division
Topic: WorldNetDaily

In addition, liars like Hillary Clinton need to pay a price for their contempt, incompetence and deceit.

There is a remedy. Congress can and should throw her in prison for a while to see if that refreshes her failing memory and jogs her mind as to the facts the American people demand to know about Benghazi-gate.

I don’t care whether or not she is still secretary of state. It makes no difference. She was, like Barack Obama himself, responsible for the disaster in Libya. Even while making excuses at every opportunity, she claimed responsibility.

-- Joseph Farah, Jan. 24 WorldNetDaily column

This week, during the congressional hearings concerning the terrorist attacks in Benghazi, Libya, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton finally testified about her role in the breakdown of security at the consulate, which resulted in the deaths of our ambassador and three others. At several points during even the mild questioning about why she had not as secretary of state taken steps to beef up security despite warnings before the terrorist attack, Hillary lost control and bore her vicious fangs.

To me, and I hope the nation and the world, this shows again why she is not fit to be president. If she has a place to fill, the more fitting venue would be a prison cell, lest we not remember who she really is.

-- Larry Klayman, Jan. 25 WND column

If I were in the Foreign Service, I would be very worried about my security after her testimony. As an American, I am worried about our national security.

-- Pamela Geller, Jan. 27 WND column

Do you realize we know more about Barbara Walters’ fall and cut head than we do about Hillary Clinton’s reported fainting spell, fall and concussion?

Think about it.

[...]

Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, we’re told, had a stomach flu, then was dehydrated (how did they know?) and fainted (where?) and hit her head (on what?)

We’re told she wasn’t hospitalized (why?), and doctors said she should work at home.

Then we’re told she had a blood clot in her head (how did they find out at home?), but it wasn’t serious. Apparently she was hospitalized, but she’s out now, wearing glasses that show modifications to correct double vision.

Like it or not, this appears to be another administration cover-up. What are they hiding about Clinton’s mysterious illness, then her fall and the outcome?

-- Barbara Simpson, Jan. 27 WND column

It’s easy to understand why Hillary is the bitter harridan she has become. At the dawn of what was to become her career she became involved with a serial philanderer who has no respect for law, propriety and/or women.

Hillary the radical feminist whose theism dictated that men were only needed for sperm donations not only became involved with a man who represented everything feminists condemned, but she became the very thing feminists accuse stay-at-home mothers and conservative women of being, i.e., dependent on men for their advancement.

As Hillary looks back in the mirror of her life, she sees embarrassment, abandonment, and, worst of all, she realizes that she has had to swallow her pride time after time as the pernicious lecher she married was accused of philandering and sexual assaults.

She made the decision to stay with him because it was the only way she was going to have even a remote chance of becoming the public figure she has become.

-- Mychal Massie, Jan. 28 WND column

Would any Republican official ever, anywhere get away with the what-difference-does-it-make defense?

Would the inner Torquemada in Hillary ever let that kind of an answer slide?

I’m sure she must have been listening to “Bohemian Rhapsody” just before she entered that Senate hearing room.

-- Joseph Farah, Jan. 28 WND column

MRC Transgender Freakout Watch
Topic: Media Research Center

The Media Research Center's ongoing transgender freakout continues with a Jan. 24 Culture & Media Institute item by Kristine Marsh complaining about a Huffington Post piece about how a young transgendered girl wrote an essay about President Obama not mentioning transgenders in his inaugural speech.

Marsh takes umbrage at the mere existence o fthe 11-year-old Sadie, sneering that she is "a boy pretending to be a girl," then bashing her mother for purportedly having "inflicted the condition on her child."

Marsh then rants: "Unfortunately there is a disturbing trend of parents encouraging gender confusion in children as young as three or four, liberal educators and activists working to normalize it, and plenty in the media happy to enable them." One of those links goes to one of the MRC's most bizarre transgender freakouts, in which a J. Crew designer was accused of "blatant propaganda celebrating transgendered children" for painting her young son's toenails pink.