NewsBusters Still Freaking Out About Redskins Criticism, Ignoring That Prominent Conservative Agrees Topic: NewsBusters
The Media Research Center continues to rage against critics of the Washington Redskins name. Randy Hall ranted in an Oct. 21 NewsBusters post:
Just when you think you've seen it all, along comes a political cartoon in the New York Daily News attempting to change the name of a National Football League team that's not even in their city.
The illustration posted on Thursday featured three flags, the first containing the swastika symbol of the Nazis, then the star-filled banner of the Confederates from the Civil War, and finally the logo of the Washington Redskins with a caption that read: “Archaic Symbols of Pride and Heritage.”
[...]
Of course, if liberals with too much time on their hands and members of the tiny Oneida Indian Nation succeed in getting the Redskins’ name changed, what other sports teams are next? The Cleveland Indians? The Atlanta Braves? The Kansas City Chiefs? The possibilities for extracting sports fans’ fun are endless!
Hall joins with his fellow MRC critics in failing to note that one of those "liberals with too much time on their hands" isn't a liberal at all. As we've documented, Charles Krauthammer -- such a rock-ribbed conservative that the MRC gave him its “William F. Buckley Jr. Award for Media Excellence” last month -- endorsed a name change because word meanings have changed over the years.
There is, however, a post by Brent Baker about how Krauthammer "is capable of delivering funny lines and humorous anecdotes."
Of course, mentioning that one of its favorite conservatives has taken a position it opposes, and was not doing so using funny lines and humorous anecdotes, would be inconvenient to its agenda. So the MRC remains silent.
WND Promote Bogus Story To Smear Transgenders Topic: WorldNetDaily
An Oct. 19 WorldNetDaily article certainly does its best to make transgender teens sound scary and perverted:
Girls at a Colorado high school are being forced to allow an older boy to use their bathrooms as the result of a policy of transgender accommodation, and the girls say they are being threatened with punishment if their complaints don’t stop.
The debate is happening at Florence High School in Florence, Colo., located near Colorado Springs. Matthew McReynolds, staff attorney at the Pacific Justice Institute, told WND parents of several girls are seeking a legal remedy after their daughters were required to share bathrooms with a male who maintains his true gender identity is that of a woman.
“First of all, it’s our position that a teenage boy’s presence into the bathroom for teenage girls is inherently harassing,” said McReynolds, who is representing the families of the girls involved. “It’s inherently violative of their privacy rights. It’s also intimidating when you have a boy like this, who is not a freshman, going in there with younger freshman girls. They feel violated. They feel intimidated, and that’s been expressed to us.”
Strange thing, though: Nowhere in the article do McReynolds cite any specific, documented instances of behavior the transgender teen is alleged to have engaged in.
That's because there aren't any. The unbylined article waits until the 20th paragraph to mention the school district's response to the claim:
In an interview with The Transadvocate, a transgender advocate blog, School Superintendent Rhonda Vendetti claimed only one parent has complained about a transgender student using girls’ bathrooms:
“Nothing has actually been verified with us,” she said. “This is one parent basically bringing their viewpoint about this situation to the media because they weren’t getting the responses that they hoped they would get from the district, from parents of students at the high school, or from the board and myself. So I think it’s just an attempt to elevate the situation to a point where maybe some more attention can be drawn to that in the hope of having a different outcome. But to our knowledge and based on our investigation, none of those things have actually happened. We do have a transgender student at the high school, and she has been using the women’s restroom. There has not been a situation.
“All the students of these parents who say they feel uncomfortable just about the fact that the student is allowed to go into the restrooms at the high school, into the stalls, they don’t believe that that is appropriate. That’s where it stems from. … The vast majority of our parents are supportive of the student.”
WND made no apparent effort to contact the school district for an opportunity to respond to McReynold's claims. Instead, it quotes another PJI official as attacking the superintendent for speaking with a particular news outlet: "It is very revealing that the superintendent is seeking sympathy from transgender activists instead of addressing the serious concerns raised in our letter."
Further, that "transgender advocate blog" also talked to another source WND couldn't be bothered to look up -- the transgender teen's family:
After Jane came out to her parents, she then began the process of transition. “It’s not like one day you’re a boy and then the next you’re a girl, my daughter went through a process to become who she is. Over that summer, she fully transitioned and returned to school as my daughter instead of having to hide who she is.”
When she went to her old school as herself, Jane flourished. When asked if she had experienced any bullying at the time she said, “Just some name calling.” Jane’s mother elaborated, “Before she transitioned, we would go to shopping and when she would try to use the male restroom, they would make rude comments.” I asked her if she meant that men in the restrooms would verbally abuse her daughter before she ever transitioned because she was perceived to be female even when trying to present as male. “She was scared to use the restroom. They made rude comments, language that she didn’t need to hear just because she was trying to go to the bathroom that she thought she had to be in.”
“Since she changed, she’s comfortable with life. She’s really feminine, but doesn’t do tons of makeup each day. She’s just a normal girl. If people see her on the streets, people don’t… didn’t know, you know? Before all of this stuff happened, none of this bothered anyone.”
[...]
“Jane is private about everything. She’s timid and shy and tends to be afraid to talk to people. That they’re saying that she’s going around harassing people… it’s just not true. The people who are doing these stories need to realize that the kid behind these stories has feelings and gets hurt.”
WND isvirulentlyanti-gay -- it has even served as an apologist for anti-gay activist Scott Lively's links to a proposed law in Uganda that would permit the execution of homosexuals -- so maybe its reporters think it will pick up some sort of tranny cooties if they talk to a transsexual or even somebody related to one.
Still, the fact that WND is uncritically promoting the PJI's discredited and dishonest take on this case is yet another reason why nobody believes WND.
Newsmax's Hirsen Rushes to Defend Ted Cruz Topic: Newsmax
James Hirsen devotes his Oct. 21 Newsmax column to defending Ted Cruz from that mean ol' liberal media:
The latest target of the news and entertainment media’s poison arrows is Sen. Ted Cruz.
The mainstream news media have joined forces with entertainment shows in a multi-pronged attack on Cruz that is reminiscent of the treatment meted out to former GOP vice presidential nominee Sarah Palin.
The tactics being employed by the mainstream news media in attacking Cruz were exemplified by ABC News as it conducted the first interview with the Texas senator since the partial government shutdown came to an end.
[...]
The so-called journalist declared to Cruz, “You more than any single individual were seen as the one that triggered this crisis to begin with,” and continued with his loaded questioning by asking, “How much do your colleagues just despise you right now?”
On an equally left-tilted mainstream media Sunday show, CBS’s “Face the Nation,” Washington Post columnist Dana Milbank snidely characterized Cruz as “a complete phony” who is just riding the tea party to get “really famous.”
Liberal cable news networks quickly jumped on the Cruz-bashing bandwagon.
Hirsen's response to this? Recite Cruz's resume:
After the overt display of broadcast malpractice, particularly on the part of the mainstream news media, perhaps the professionals involved might consider reporting on some of the factual background of Cruz.
Cruz’s resume contains a list of educational achievements and professional accomplishments of which few in our society could ever boast.
The senator graduated cum laude from Princeton University and magna cum laude from Harvard Law School. As so many of the journalists who have tried to “cross-examine” him have discovered, he possesses superb debating skills and for such he has been widely recognized.
Hirsen's appeal to authority doesn't address any of the media coverage he criticizes.
Ellis Washington: Still Flamboyantly Wrong Topic: WorldNetDaily
What is it with WorldNetDaily columnists getting their history wrong? First it was Barry Farber; now Ellis Washington writes in his Oct. 18 column:
President John F. Kennedy, on March 6, 1961, signed Executive Order 10925, which created affirmative action and required that government employers “not discriminate against any employee or applicant for employment because of race, creed, color, or national origin” and “take affirmative action to ensure that applicants are employed, and that employees are treated during employment, without regard to their race, creed, color, or national origin.”
Actually, Kennedy's executive order is a straightforward non-discrimination provision, and it does not define what "affirmative action" meant. As one history of affirmative action details, Kennedy's order was superceded by one issued in 1965 by Preident Lyndon Johnson that defined what kind of "affirmative action" was to be taken.
Washington's column is, of course, an anti-affirmative action rant, and of course he makes it about himself:
My strong contention in this column is to demonstrate that affirmative action is nothing but affirmative slave chains attached around the neck, wrists, ankles and minds of my people; that for over 50 years progressive whites have cynically used tokenism, race statists and quota systems to allow certain blacks to prosper (Democrats) – but for those people like myself (conservatives), affirmative action has done nothing to help us become fully integrated commensurate with our education achievements. The result is that I, and doubtlessly millions of other hardworking minorities, have had to eke out an existence on the margins of a society called America the Beautiful.
[...]
In a previous biographical essay about my own 30-year struggles to be judged not by the color of my skin and ideological worldview, but by the content of my character and actual scholarly achievements, I explain the things done in my career that no sitting member of the U.S. Supreme Court nor any law professors I know of have done, accomplished apart from affirmative action. Yet good non-racist white liberals, progressives and even establishment Republicans ignore these real achievements by blacks like me and hundreds of thousands or perhaps millions of other minorities of every variety because their achievements were outside the affirmative action slave system; therefore, their accomplishments in the minds of white progressives aren’t “authentic” and thus unworthy of notice, respect and emulation (e.g., Justice Clarence Thomas, Thomas Sowell, Star Parker, Allen West, Alan Keyes, Pastor Levon Yuille, Shelby Steele, etc.).
Given that Washington started this rant with an incorrect claim and has a history of irrational hatred of liberals in general and President Obama in particular, as well as a penchant for getting stuff wrong and masquerading (poorly) as Socrates, it appears that Washington has never considered the possibility that he has, in fact, been judged on the content of his character and his (scant) scholarly achievements -- and found wanting.
MRC Still Complaining That GOP Is Accurately Blamed For Shutdown Topic: Media Research Center
The Media Research Center, it seems, still can't handle the fact that the media is accurately reporting that Republicans are to blame for the recent government shutdown.
On the heels of his earlier mini-study complaining about this accurate reporting, Rich Noyes has cranked out a larger Oct. 17 study saying exactly the same thing. For the first time that we can remember, Noyes attempts an explanation for why the MRC focuses so narrowly on the TV networks and ignores cable news:
For millions of Americans, big political contests such as presidential elections and pivotal congressional hearings are still largely witnessed through the lens of ABC’s, CBS’s and NBC’s evening newscasts. According to Nielsen Research, more than 20 million viewers tuned in over the past two weeks for the Big Three’s take on the shutdown drama.
Noyes isn't going to tell you, of course, that the main complicating factor in complaining about cable news bias is Fox News, which like the MRC is a proud shill for the Republican Party, as well as pretending that Republicans had nothing to do with the shutdown.
As before, Noyes never why Republicans are not to blame for the shutdown -- he merely complains that they're being blamed and Democrats aren't. He never stops to consider that this may be because these news outlets are reporting facts and that it's false equivalency to claim otherwise.
Noyes finally conceded the possibility of some GOP responsibility at the very end of his study, then tries to take it back:
As the shutdown neared its end, the networks’ polls found the American public more critical of the GOP than either Democrats or the White House. While some blame can perhaps be assigned to Republicans’ lack of a unified conservative message, the incessant drumbeat of hostile, and slanted, media coverage surely took its toll as well.
Earth to Noyes: "Lack of a unified conservative message" was not the problem; conservatives' insistence on deviating from longstanding practice by trying to defund an approved program by holding the rest of the government hostage was.
WND's Barry Farber Botches Facts Topic: WorldNetDaily
Barry Farber's Oct. 15 WorldNetDailiy column is headlined "Obama's ham-handedness on Egypt." In it he writes:
Egypt’s Muslim Brotherhood apparently won the post-Mubarak election fairly. Despite Obama’s claims that this is tangible proof of cleanliness and godliness, let’s remind each other of two leaders who started out by winning free elections, namely, Hitler and Mussolini.
First, Obama was more about praising the fact that Egypt had successfully conducted its first-ever democratic election than the specific result. The Obama administration called for Morsi to form a government with "mutual respect" for all and "respecting the rights of all Egyptian citizens – including women and religious minorities such as Coptic Christians."
Second, Hitler wasn't elected. As we've previously noted, Hitler was never elected president of Germany -- he was appointed chancellor, then assumed the power of the presidency.
Perhaps Farber should re-title his column "Farber's ham-handedness with the facts."
MRC Hides Conservative's Endorsement Of Redskins Name Change Topic: Media Research Center
The Media Research Center got all huffy over the past few weeks as more people argued that the Washington Redskins is a name that is somewhere between insensitive and racist and should be changed:
NewsBusters' Tom Blumer grumbled that the Associated Press did "an 880-word writeup on this breathtakingly important subject" of President Obama's opinion on changing the team name.
Matt Philbin ranted: "Well Redskins fans, it’s over. The ruling has been handed down from on high – The Washington Post and USA Today. They’ve got a foam finger for you, but it’s not the index and you’re certainly not #1 to them, and they’re the ones who matter. They’ve decided your team name will change."
Tim Graham complained that the Washington Post did an article on an online contest to pick a new team logo.
Philbin did more ranting, declaring that the Post "has dedicated at least 31,562 print and online words to its crusade" and wants to be "the paper that brought down a mascot."
MRC chief Brent Bozell decried the "liberal media agitation" for changing the name, howling: "The word 'Redskins' is so apparently offensive they’ve made the team sound like a porn film. Here is the insanity: They'd be less offended -- and in some circles of the libertine community, openly supportive – if Snyder renamed the team the 'Foreskins.'"
Graham complained further that sportscaster Bob Costas expressed his opposition to the name, which he dismissed as "another liberal rant with no rebuttal."
But changing the name is not just a liberal idea -- but the MRC won't tell you that.
Conservative commentator Charles Krauthammer -- normally a friend to the MRC -- opined on Fox News that while he's "in low dudgeon over this," he supports changing the name because the word's meaning has evolved: But if it were personally my choice, I think it’s over the line. I do think, because of its history, it’s something that if you can change, you would change."
Krauthammer expanded on his views in his Washington Post column:
This is a matter of usage — and usage changes. If you shot a remake of 1934’s “The Gay Divorcee,” you’d have to change that title too.
Not because the lady changed but because the word did.
Hail Skins.
Strangely, Graham has not seen fit to attack Krauthammer for this view the way he did Costas. Then again, the MRC did give Krauthammer its “William F. Buckley Jr. Award for Media Excellence” last month with special praise for "his trenchant dry humor and perfectly-timed zings at various liberals in the media."
Krauthammer offered none of that in his support for changing the Redskins' name, apparently, so down the MRC memory hole it went.
WND's Klayman Laughably Claims His Obama-Muslim Smears Are Just Metaphors Topic: WorldNetDaily
As with his frequent client Joseph Farah (for whom he loses cases repeatedly), one must admire Larry Klayman's ability to lie so brazenly.
After Klayman took heat for ranting during last weekend's veterans protest in Washington that Americans should "demand that this president leave town, to get up, to put the Quran down, to get up off his knees, and to figuratively come out with his hands up" -- something so odious and unproductive to the purpose of the protest that even WorldNetDaily refused to report Klayman's remarks even though he has said such things repeatedly in his WND column -- Klayman issued a non-apology through his one-man Freedom Watch organization. Klayman claimed that his attack was "metaphorically stated," adding, "While these references were intended to be metaphoric and not literal, they do ring true nevertheless."
Klayman's claim that he was speaking metaphorically is an after-the-fact CYA action, not to mention a complete lie -- he has invoked the Obama-is-a-Muslim smear way too many times for it to be a metaphor, and he has never couched it in surrounding language that would indicate it's a metaphor (and he certainly did not do so during his speech).
Klayman's press release went on to cite what he claimed were "uncontroverted" fact about Obama and his purported Muslim sympathies. But one of them is a total falsehood: "Fourth, Obama has worn a ring for decades that is inscribed with the saying that his only god is Allah." As we've documented, even birthers rushed to discredit this Jerome Corsi (and Joel Gilbert)-promoted falsehood.
Interestingly, when Klayman rewrote his press release for use as his Oct. 18 WND column, that example disappeared. His lie about speaking metaphorically, however, remains intact.
Horowitz's TruthRevolt Copies NewsBusters, Ignores Basic Research Topic: Horowitz
A couple weeks ago, the David Horowitz Freedom Center started up a website called TruthRevolt, which claims as a goal to "unmask leftists in the media for who they are, destroy their credibility with the American public, and devastate their funding bases."It's headed by Breitbart's Ben Shapiro, who's perhaps best know around these parts for his petulant whining, as well as his ugly smear of Rahm Emanuel as a "kapo." So, yeah, Shapiro will be putting the "revolting" in TruthRevolt.
So far, though, TruthRevolt is covering much the same ground as NewsBusters -- even writing blogs on the exact same subjects. Perhaps that's why we've seen no mention of TruthRevolt on any Media Research Center website.
In addition, the website has earmarks of the David Horowitz cult of personality -- the TruthRevolt front page promotes two Horowitz books and "David Horowitz's Restoration Weekend."
TruthRevolt is also following NewsBusters' tradition of putting its right-wing agenda before solid research. An unbylined Oct. 17 item attacks "The View" co-host Jenny McCarthy for invoking a Jewish stereotype, then added, "But McCarthy is a leftist appearing in the mainstream media, and thus escaped scot-free."
In fact, both the mainstream media and the "leftist" media has been harshly critical of McCarthy for something much worse than invoking a Jewish stereotype: her promotion of the discredited theory that vaccines cause autism, which increased when she joined "The View." A quick Google search returns articles from the Los Angeles Times, USA Today, The New Yorker, The Nation, Huffington Post, National Geographic, MSN and NPR. It wasn't that hard to do.
We realize TruthRevolt is new to the media-monitoring game, but here's a pro tip: Do a little research before you spout off, lest you look even more like the uninformed partisans you are.
Aaron Klein Gets Schooled on WND's 'Christianist Xenophobia' Topic: WorldNetDaily
Aaron Klein really wanted to attack Obama administration adviser Mohamed Elibiary in an Oct. 18 WorldNetDaily article for using the word "Christianist" to describe right-wing activists:
Department of Homeland Security adviser Mohamed Elibiary has warned the tea party movement against attempting to change the U.S. political landscape through “Christianist Xenophobia.”
Elibiary further charged some “white identity/privilege types” have a problem with a “black president” and “brown Mexicans.”
“If #TeaParty wants US revived then we must swing Blue seats Red & that is only achievable thru Libertarianism, not Christianist Xenophobia,” Elibiary tweeted.
Asked by WND in an email to clarify his remarks, Elibiary replied: “’Christianist’ is a term coined about a decade ago and like ‘Islamist’ (for Muslims) and ‘Zionist’ (for Jews) refers to Christians who mix theology and nationalism.”
But Klein decided to push his luck and make it personal:
Elibiary said WND falls into his definition of “Christianist.”
“WND certainly would often times fall in this camp as well as perhaps a subset of Christianists that political scientists refer to as ‘Christian Zionists’ because of its foreign policy worldview through a dispensationalist end-time theology.”
Interestingly, Klein makes no effort to challenge what Elibiary actually said; rather, he reaches into his big bag o' guilt by association and spends the rest of his article attack previous alleged offenses by Elibiary.
Does that mean Klein agrees with Elibiary's description of WND and other far-right activists as "Christianist"? It sure looks that way -- it can be argued that Klein's silence equals assent.
Newsmax's Gizzi Blames Christie For NJ Senate Loss Topic: Newsmax
Before the New Jersey Senate election, Newsmax's John Gizzi touted the prospects of Republican Steve Lonegan against Democrat Cory Booker -- while largely ignoring polls showing Lonegan far behind and completely failing to mention offensive remarks by a key Lonegan strategist.
Now that the election is over, with Booker defeating Lonegan by double digits, Gizzi must find someone other than Lonegan to blame. Unlike NewsBusters' Matthew Sheffield's blame of the media, Gizzi uses an Oct. 17 Newsmax article to take it out on Republican New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, while hiding behind an anonymous source to do so:
Although most pundits believe the easy win by Democrat Cory Booker in the New Jersey special Senate election Wednesday was a foregone conclusion, there's another theory: If Republican Gov. Chris Christie had handled the situation differently, the outcome might have been quite different.
"Had Gov. Christie appointed a moderate-conservative with a known name — say, [state Senate Republican Leader] Tom Kean Jr. — after [incumbent Frank] Lautenberg died, and then scheduled the Senate race for the same day as the race for governor, Booker might just have been defeated," a former Republican U.S. House member told Newsmax.
Christie did none of the above.
Funny how conservatives have so much trouble blaming losses by conservative candidates on the candidate.
The Rich, Pathetic Irony Of Joseph Farah Complaining About The Lies Of Others Topic: WorldNetDaily
Joseph Farah devotes his Oct. 17 WorldNetDaily column to ranting about the alleged "lies and deceptions" made by President Obama in a post-shutdown speech. Farah counters these supposed lies with little more than spin and right-wing talking points.
Farah concludes his column by stating: "I fear for an America presided over by such a prolific liar – one who does it so effortlessly and so brazenly."
Farah is probably just afraid of having competition. He's more than demonstrated his ability to lie in the prolific, effortless and brazen manner he accuses Obama of doing -- though unlike Obama, Farah runs a "news" website where he presents his lies as the truth.
That makes Farah's lies far more pernicious that anything he has accused Obama of.
NewsBusters' Sheffield Blames Media For Cory Booker's Win, Because Why Wouldn't He Topic: NewsBusters
As we've detailed, Matthew Sheffield's efforts to present himself as a forward-thinking right-wing new-media guru is undermined by his kneejerk blaming of the "liberal media" for every conservative failure. Sheffield demonstrates that tendency again in an Oct. 16 NewsBusters post blaming Steve Lonegan's loss to Cory Booker in the New Jersey Senate race on, yes, the liberal media:
The Lonegan story is truly an inspiring one. Instead of consigning himself to a life spent dependent on the state and ruing his disability, he decided to make something of himself and became a successful businessman and political activist.
Unfortunately for him, however, the word has not gotten out. According to the Nexis news database, in the four and a half months that Lonegan has been running for Senate, newspapers covering the race have mentioned his disability just 59 times in the more than 1,000 articles they’ve written about the special election. According to Nexis, the New York Times has mentioned Lonegan’s blindness once.
In contrast, the media’s treatment of Lonegan’s opponent, Democrat Cory Booker, has until recently, been nearly orgasmic. Since June of this year, the local newspapers have used the term “rock star” to describe Booker 42 times.
Needless to say, Sheffield makes no mention of a key Lonegan's sexually charged attack on Booker.
Sheffield also laments that "There also has not been any released reporting on claims that Booker does not actually live in the city he purports to lead" without mentioning that it was forwarded by the utterly discredited conspiracy theorist Joel Gilbert, best known for forwarding the completely false claims that President Obama's mother posed for nude photos and that Obama wears a ring that says "There is no god except Allah" in Arabic.
The reason the media didn't cover this story is because it lacks credibility. Too bad Sheffield is too blinded by his right-wing loyalites to recognize that fact.
WND's Unruh Still Rejects Journalism, Can't Be Bothered With Balance Topic: WorldNetDaily
Basically, all you need to know about Bob Unruh's Oct. 16 WorldNetDaily article running to the defense of the American Family Association and other anti-gay and right-wing groups is that of the article's 64 paragraphs, only one hints at offering an alternative view.
Much of the rest of Unruh's article is devoted to attacking the Southern Poverty Law Center for calling the AFA, the Family Research Council and other similar groups "hate groups" for their virulent anti-gay activism. Unruh mentions only that the SPLC has pointed out "the demonizing lies about the LGBT community spread" by the FRC and other groups, but he makes no effort whatsoever to substantiate the claims, though he could have easily done so. Unruh also refused to contact the SPLC to give the group an opportunity to respond to the attacks against it that he reproduces so lovingly in his article.
But that's not all -- Unruh also rehashes old attacks on those who have pointed out the violence of fringe right-wing groups. For instance, he noted a study by U.S. Military Academy’s Combating Terrorism Center that "linked opposition to abortion and other “fundamental” positions to terrorism." Unruh even repeated a claim from "constitutional law professor" Herb Titus that the study's author was "has adopted the strategy of many left-wing members of the professoriate, concentrating on the behavior of a few in order to discredit many who hold similar views but who do not engage in any form of violence."
As we noted when Unruh first promoted this attack, it's rather ludicrous of Titus to attack the faculty of West Point as "left-wing members of the professoriate." Titus' criticism of "concentrating on the behavior of a few in order to discredit many" is also rather laughable given that's the exactstrategy of WND's Colin Flaherty in fearmongering about "black mobs."
Unruh also wrote: "The Obama administration declined comment on its decision to monitor Julio Severo’s unabashedly Christian Last Days Watchman blog." Unruh didn't mention that the monitoring accusation -- which came from Severo himself -- is unsubstantiated by an authoritative, unbiased source, or that Severo peddles hate and lies about gays.
The fact that Unruh has so little disregard for journalism that he thinks he needs to tell only one side of a story is just another reason why nobody bellieves WND. But then, Unruh rejected journalism the day he started work at WND.
The Media Research Center Heatheringbug has now spread to the MRC's ostensible "news" division, CNSNews.com. Here's Susan Jones' Oct. 16 article:
Rep. Peter King, a New York Republican, has become a favorite of liberal media outlets for his harsh criticism of his own party.
On Tuesday, King appeared on CNN, blasting his fellow Republican Ted Cruz as "a total fraud" and demanding that the House pass a clean stopgap funding bill to end the government shutdown.
[...]
King repeated his prediction -- made earlier on another liberal network -- that Cruz will try to "rewrite history" in the months ahead by accusing Republicans of surrendering: "He's going to say we were on the verge of winning back in October and Republicans panicked, they quit so soon...I can just see that nonsense coming from him that we have to really go out of our way to target him now and show that he's a false prophet and a phony."
Jones doesn't explain to her readers that her defintion of a "liberal network" is any network other than Fox News. Jones also fails to explain how anything King said is false or misleading in any way -- indeed, his prediction that Cruz would blame his fellow Republicans for surrendering turned out to be right on the money.
As with the MRC's other Heathering victims, Jones is simply lashing out at King for daring to deviate from right-wing dogma. That may make Jones a good ideological apparatchik, but it's certainly not "news" by any stretch of the imagination.