Topic: CNSNews.com
CNSNews.com goes from cherry-picking negative numbers about jobless figures under Obama to focusing on the positive ones now that Trump is president. Read more >>
Monday, July 31, 2017
NEW ARTICLE: The Trump Flip on Unemployment Reporting
Topic: CNSNews.com CNSNews.com goes from cherry-picking negative numbers about jobless figures under Obama to focusing on the positive ones now that Trump is president. Read more >>
Posted by Terry K.
at 2:24 PM EDT
Fake News: WND Claims 'Obama Holdovers' At State Scrubbing ISIS Genocide
Topic: WorldNetDaily WorldNetDaily's Bob Unruh thinks he has a scoop, according to a July 28 article:
Unruh's introduction includes at least one blatant lie, that Obama said "the U.S. wasn’t a Christian nation." He did no such thing. But it appears Unruh's larger claim -- that "Obama holdovers" at State are eliminating any reference to genocide by ISIS -- is, shall we say, fake news. He's simply regurgitating press releases from the right-wing ACLJ, who apparently does not name any of the alleged "Obama holdovers" purportedly doing this. How do we know? Even the Obama-haters at Breitbart wouldn't back up the story. Former CNSNews.com reporter Penny Starr, now at Breitbart, writes that the State Department said the claim was "categorically false," adding:
Looks like this is another piece of fake news from a "news" organization that has published so much of it.
Posted by Terry K.
at 12:06 AM EDT
Sunday, July 30, 2017
MRC, CNS Diss Caitlyn Jenner By Mangling Her Name And Gender
Topic: Media Research Center It is the style policy of most major news organizations that transgenders are identified by the name they prefer and the gender by which they live publicly. The Media Research Center's purported "news" division, CNSNews.com, does not follow that policy, mostly because it hates the LGBT community. Thus we have a July 17 article by Annabel Scott repeatedly referring to "Bruce 'Caitlyn' Jenner" and identifying Jenner as "he." Scott did not explain why she deviated from standard journalistic practice. Even less bound to standard journalistic practice is the MRC itself. Transphobic sports blogger Jay Maxsonmangled Jenner's identity further in a July 27 NewsBusters post in which he referenced "Olympic decathlon champion Bruce (nee Caitlyn) Jenner." Maxson appears not to know that "nee" means formerly, which means Maxson is falsely claiming that Jenner changed her name from Caitlyn to Bruce, instead of the other way around. That's not the only thing Maxson got wrong, though; he also claimed that Jenner was among "lefties" who criticized President Trump's declaration of a ban on transgenders in the military. In fact, according to Scott's CNS article, Jenner has been a Trump supporter and says he believes in limited government.
Posted by Terry K.
at 9:43 PM EDT
Updated: Sunday, July 30, 2017 9:44 PM EDT
AIM's Newest Writer Follows in Kincaid's Conspiratorial Footsteps, Declares Media Literacy Is 'Liberal Indoctrination'
Topic: Accuracy in Media Cliff Kincaid has disappeared from Accuracy in Media. An AIM employee for more than 30 years, Kincaid hasn't written an article for AIM in a month, but near as we can tell, neither AIM nor chairman Don Irvine has made any statement regarding his job status. Curiously, though, it has been begging for "freelance writers to write about media bias for our website" on its Twitter account. Kincaid is no longer listed as employee on AIM's website, though he was in June (editor Roger Aronoff has similarly disappeared) If Kincaid is gone, though, AIM has an apparent replacement in Brian McNicoll (though it appears he too is a freelancer and not a full-time AIM employee).McNicoll proves he's following in the conspiratorial steps of Kincaid with a July 25 column in which he rants that libraries are engaging in "liberal indoctrination" by teaching people how to understand the media and be on the lookout for fake news:
Probably a lot less than what could go wrong if the likes of McNicoll and AIM try to do so.
Posted by Terry K.
at 8:06 PM EDT
Saturday, July 29, 2017
With Transgender Decree, CNS Is Back on the Trump Plantation
Topic: CNSNews.com CNSNews.com may have briefly left the Trump plantation over the president's attacks on Jeff Sessions, but it came running back when Trump decreed that transgenders should no longer serve in the military. As longtime LGBT-haters themselves, CNS quickly embraced Trump's decision. Susan Jones' article on Trump's tweets did surprisingly include reaction from critics, although she wrongly labeled Tom Perez as head of the "Democrat National Committee" (using "Democrat" instead of "Democratic" is a longtime conservative insult of Democrats, even though "Democratic National Committee" is the official name and Jones is actually violating journalistic standard practice by not using the actual name). Gage Cohen followed up with a blog post noting that Trump's decree "has the potential to save taxpayers up to $8.4 million dollars per year" in military medical costs. He didn't mention that the military already spends five times that amount on Viagra pills alone and 10 times that mount on erectile dysfunction treatments in general. CNS published a column by self-proclaimed ex-transgender-turned-anti-transgender activist (but who was actually just misdiagnosed) Walt Heyer and also a blog post by Craig Bannister redundantly summarizing Heyer's column. CNS also published a column by the right-wing Heritage Foundation's Ryan Anderson praising Trump and bashing transgenders, asserting that "biology isn't bigotry, and we need a sober and honest assessment of the human costs of getting human nature wrong." And of course, no CNS gay-bashing would be complete without managing editor Michael W. Chapman quoting his favorite bigot, Franklin Graham, ranting that we don't need people in the military "who are confused about their gender" and insisting that "President Trump is laser focused on making our military better and stronger. ... Pray for him as he faces critics and opposition."
Posted by Terry K.
at 10:52 AM EDT
WND Reporter Ramps Up the Trump-Fluffing
Topic: WorldNetDaily The editor's note at the top of Garth Kant's July 16 WorldNetDaily article, gushingly headlined "The 5 pillars of Trump foreign policy unveiled," stated that it would be the "first in a series of special reports by WND White House reporter Garth Kant examining President Donald Trump’s foreign policy." This being WND, of course, there was not of lot of "examining" and much more defense of -- and praise for -- Trump. To give an example of his fealty to Trump, Kant begins by prominently citing none other than dubious Trump toady "Dr. Sebastian Gorka" to baselessly assert that Trump would "fill the vacuum created by eight years of feckless Obama lack of leadership." Kant knows how to suck up to Gorka and help him overcompensate: by calling him "Dr." even though he has only a Ph.D., not a medical degree, and that Gorka's doctoral thesis for a Hungarian university has been widely mocked as unworthy of a undergraduate student in the U.S. Kant's article was filled with more gushing, delcaring at one point that Trump's "moral clarity means returning to such basic concepts as an objective right and wrong, and good and evil. And the imperative to confront evil." The fact that Trump apparently has no personal sense of right and wrong doesn't seem to bother Kant. Regarding Trump's speech in Poland, Kant slobbered that the president "was not afraid to defend Western values, again and again" and that "The speech was hailed as soaring and inspirational by the president’s supporters." (Kant himself included, presumably.) He huffed regarding the speech's critics:
Kant didn't mention that his own employer effectively agreed with the ethnocentric bent of Trump's speech. Kant concluded with even more gushing:
Needless to say, that July 18 follow-up continued the gushing, with Kant complaining that the media won't fawn over Trump the way he does:
This from a so-called reporter whose dislike of President Obama and his administration was so visceral that he used WND to spread lies about Attorney General Loretta Lynch. This time around, the Trump suck-up Kant is quoting is Newt Gingrich, to whom Kant gives an uncritical platform to tout how he "came up with a series of principles to help explain Trumpism, which may be equally useful in understanding the president’s foreign policy strategies. Kant gushed even further about Trump's "uniqueness," declaring that "Trump had effectively turned the overwhelming liability of an intimidating adversarial press into an asset by feeding the networks’ hunger for ratings. Yet his appeal was so unique, the major media could not understand it." Sounds like there's a certain White House Kant is auditioning to get a job in.
Posted by Terry K.
at 1:01 AM EDT
Friday, July 28, 2017
MRC Tries to Play The Clinton Equivocation to Defect From Trump Jr.'s Scandal
Topic: Media Research Center The Clinton Equivocation to deflect from Republican -- and now Trump -- scandals will never die at the Media Resarch Center, apparently. Geoffrey Dickens writes in a July 13 MRC post (boldface his):
Dickens leaves out a few inconvenient facts in recounting this -- namely, that this has since been revealed to be a partisan attack. As we've noted, Schweizer's book was funded by a group called the Government Accountability Institute, which was headed by one Steve Bannon, who later joined the campaign of Hillary Clinton's opponent, Donald Trump, and is now a top aide to Trump in the White House. Dickens asserts that, according to Schweizer, "Bill Clinton was in Moscow for a particularly well-compensated speech" around the time that the deal was being considered. But as PolitiFact points out, the amount of money paid for that speech was not out of line with similar Clinton speaking engagements. Dickens did concede that the uranium deal had to be signed off by "a committee, including Clinton’s State Department, but also including the Departments of Treasury, Justice, Defense, Homeland Security, Commerce, and Energy, plus the U.S. Trade Representative, and the Office of Science and Technology," as well as the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, which meant that Clinton by herself could not either approve or stop the deal. But Dickens then claimed that Schweizer "countered that argument" during an interview; in fact, all Schweizer did was more conspiracy-mongering. In other words, there's no actual scandal here, no matter how much the MRC quotes a Trump-associated hitman to claim otherwise. The MRC's Clinton Equivocation is becoming a crutch to use instead of conducting genuine "media research."
Posted by Terry K.
at 3:26 PM EDT
Dubious WND Doc Rants About Filthy, Disease-Ridden Immigrants Again
Topic: WorldNetDaily Elizabeth Lee Vliet -- a doctor affiliated with the far-riught-fringe Association of American Physicians and Surgeons -- plays the filthy-immigrant card (as she loves to do) in a July 21 WorldNetDaily column:
Vliet mentions nothing about vaccinations, which if done to the level recommended by the vast majority of medical experts not affiliated with the AAPS, would provide herd immunity that would protect Americans from many of these diseases. Perhaps that's because the AAPS opposes mandatory vaccination. Indeed, as we've documented, some disease outbreaks in immigrant communities are caused by outsider anti-vaccine activists spreading fear about vaccines. Perhaps Vliet should address that issue -- and confront the AAPS about it -- before going on another anti-immigrant tirade. Ah, who are we kidding? She's totally dedicated to immigrant-bashing to address that issue:
Vliet doesn't mention that Trump wants to cut the CDC's budget by 17 percent.
Posted by Terry K.
at 12:43 AM EDT
Updated: Friday, July 28, 2017 10:17 AM EDT
Thursday, July 27, 2017
SHOCK: Trump Stenographer CNS Defends Sessions Against Trump
Topic: CNSNews.com So it appears there is a limit to which CNSNews.com will serve as a servile stenographer and cheerleader for President Trump. Trump's repeated Twitter attacks on his own attorney general, Jeff Sessions, got CNS' attention, and it fell in line with the rest of the right-wing media to let Trump know that this was a bridge too far for them by hurling "news" articles and columns at the issue:
There's also a story about the White House press secretary being asked about "the conservatives rallying behind Sessions," and not one but two pleas from the MRC's favorite radio host-slash-business partner, Mark Levin, for Trump to leave Sessions alone. Why, it's almost as if CNS has a highly partisan editorial agenda dictated from outside the organization that has nothing to do with actual news and everything to do with advancing its right-wing ideology. UPDATE: So committed to defending Sessions is CNS that editor in chief Terry Jeffrey penned an entire column on it, asserting that "American [sic] needs an honorable person leading the Justice Department, which is why Attorney General Sessions needs to stay."
Posted by Terry K.
at 8:41 PM EDT
Updated: Saturday, July 29, 2017 10:22 AM EDT
Fake News: WND Spreads 'Satanic' Smears
Topic: WorldNetDaily In a July 23 WorldNetDaily article, Alicia Powe spreads false and unsubstantiated smears of purportedly "Satanic" behavior against various and sundry people in entertainment and politics. For instance, she quotes somebody named Christopher Everard, in the midst of accusing the entertainment industry of having "an anti-Christ thread," ranting that "Singer Katy Perry’s latest album cover is brazen with satanic iconology." This claim is never substantiated. Powe also writes:
Powe is lying. As an actual news organization, the Washington Post, explained, while "spirit cooking" was the name of an art installation by Abramovic in which some of those things happened, the actual dinner was normal and involved none of that stuff Powe wants to fearmonger over. Do Powe and WND have the integrity to honestly and forthrightly correct their false smear against Podesta and baseless attack on Katy Perry? History suggests otherwise.
Posted by Terry K.
at 12:45 AM EDT
Wednesday, July 26, 2017
MRC's Double Standard on Insulting Comments About The Looks of Others
Topic: Media Research Center The Media Research Center's Katie Yoder rants in a July 24 post:
It seems Yoder has forgotten that her boss, MRC chief Brent Bozell, said President Obama looked like a "skinny ghetto crackhead." That seems relevant if Yoder wants to further express any kind of moral superiority over Madison. By the way, Madison later apologized and deleted his tweet (as Yoder later noted in an update). By contrast, Bozell has never apologized for his ugly, racially charged smear of Obama. Yoder might want to keep that in mind as well the next time she attacks someone else for mocking the appearance of another.
Posted by Terry K.
at 9:07 PM EDT
WND Still Attacking 'Bible Answer Man' for Not Being Christian Enough
Topic: WorldNetDaily In April, we wrote about how WorldNetDaily's Art Moore effectively declared that the only acceptable form of Christianity is evangelical Protestantism by attacking Hank Hanegraaff, who hosts a radio show called "Bible Answer Man" but also recently converted to the Greek Orthodox faith, which Moore doesn't really elucidate is also a form of Christianity. Well, Moore is keeping up the attack on Hanegraaff for apparaently not being Christian enough in a July 22 article:
Moore doesn't explicitly state that the family members attacking Hanegraaff have no authority over him since they're no longer involved in the ministry, though he does concede that one daughter "whose husband ... is CRI's webmaster, did not sign the statement.": Moore stacked the article against Hanegraaff to ensure he couldn't properly respond because he's ill, as Moore effectively admits:
Much of the rest of Moore's article consists of repeating parts of that statement, countered by attacks on Hanegraaff's faith.
Posted by Terry K.
at 12:45 AM EDT
Tuesday, July 25, 2017
MRC Promotes Levin's Temper Tantrum Over Book Sales
Topic: Media Research Center We've documented how the Media Research Center and right-wing radio host Mark Levin have had a mutual promotion agreement -- Levin touts the MRC on his radio show, and the MRC touts Levin on its network of websites. As far as we know, that business deal is still in force; at least, the MRC promoting Levin's latest book like it is. On July 6, MRC chief Brent Bozell and lieutenant (and ghost-writer) Tim Graham penned a column complaining that the media (well, the media outside the right-wing bubble) was ignoring Levin's book. There was no disclosure of their history of business deals. That got the attention of CNN's Brian Stelter, who invited Levin on his show "Reliable Sources." Levin petulantly declined, essentially saying he didn't want to be on stupid CNN anyway. The MRC indulged Levin's petulance further with a July 21 CNSNews.com article by Gage Cohen featuring Levin whining that the New York Times' nonfiction bestsellers chart bumped his book down from No. 1 to No. 2, while Nielsen Bookscan kept him in first place. Bozell then followed up, doubling down on the hate on his Twitter account, in which he huffed that the Times was "shameful losers" for accurately reporting its numbers, then screeched that the Times was publishing "leftist 'Fake Book Lists,'" -- all despite offering no evidence that there is anything fake or falsified about the Times' data. Oddly, Bozell didn't link to his own website's article as backup; instead, he used an article by the Washington Examiner's right-wing lackey Paul Bedard (with whom the MRC also has a promotion deal). Perhaps Bozell and the MRC could act a little more like the media watchdogs they claim to be and a little less like the self-dealing promoters they appear to actually be.
Posted by Terry K.
at 10:20 PM EDT
Fake-News WND Editor Bashes 'Fake News' CNN
Topic: WorldNetDaily WorldNetDaily editor Joseph Farah whines in his July 19 column:
How ironic that Farah is raging at CNN for being "fake news" when his own website is one of the most notorious peddlers of fake news. Indeed, the signature story in WND's history -- Barack Obama's "eligibility" to be president -- was nothing but fake news. Farah goes on to rant against CNN correspondent Jim Acosta, whom he claims went into an undefined earlier interview with Farah with the intent "to vilify, to defile, to slander and to ruin":
Of course, "highly partisan political activist posing as a newsperson, with an intent to vilify, to defile, to slander and to ruin" is an accurate description of every single WND employee, including Farah. Remember how WND tried to personally destroy Obama, up to and including portraying him as the Antichrist. Farah also complains that CNN is on a "search for selective facts to buttress a pre-conceived narrative" -- again, what WND does pretty much all the time. In other words, Farah is projecting -- ascribing faults to CNN that are really about his own operation. If Farah has no problem being the founder and leader of such a biased "news" operation, why should he care what CNN does?
Posted by Terry K.
at 4:22 PM EDT
Monday, July 24, 2017
MRC Censors News About Withdrawing Its Own Award From Hannity
Topic: Media Research Center The Media Research Center was in a little bit of a controversy in recent weeks. In early June, New York Times columnist Bret Stephens used his column to attack the idea of the MRC bestowing its annual William F. Buckley Award for Media Excellence. Stephens declared that while neither Hannity nor the MRC were "particularly noteworthy," giving an award named after Buckley -- who had nourished a brand of conservatism that was "fundamentally literary -- to a conspiracy-monger like Hannity ushers in the "post-literate conservative world." When Stephens ushered in his move to the Times from the Wall Street Journal a month before with a column questioning climate change, the MRC touted how Stephens made "liberal snowflakes" upset by it. But it stayed silent aout Stephens' diss of the MRC's planned award. A June 29 NewsBusters post by Randy Hall praised MSNBC for adding Stephens as a commentator -- but he stayed silent about how Stephens bashed the MRC's award. Last week, however, CNN's Jake Tapper broke the news that the MRC has decided not to give the award to Hannity, reportedly after Buckley's son, author Christopher Buckley, "expressed great dismay" at the idea and contacted the MRC to express his disapproval. The MRC, meanwhile, was spinning it as a "scheduling conflict," and Hannity had a Twitter meltdown over the revelation, insisting that he was "unable to attend." This is big news in the conservative world. But you won't read about it on any MRC-operated website. We found no reference to the controversy on NewsBusters, CNSNews.com or MRCTV. The main Twitter feed for the MRC, as well as the NewsBusters feed, also ignored it. The only mention we found was a single tweet by MRC chief Brent Bozell, in which he advanced the questionable scheduling-conflict storyline: "MRC awarded Hannity the Buckley award. Hannity subsequently told us he couldn’t make it. We chose not to hand out the award this year." In other words, the MRC got scooped on its own story and is trying to keep the truth from its own readers. It's a reminder that the MRC hates the truth when it involves something unflattering about its fellow conservatives -- and especially itself.
Posted by Terry K.
at 10:52 PM EDT
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