WND Embedded Russian Troll's Tweet In Article Topic: WorldNetDaily
We've already caught WorldNetDaily doing a fawning profile of a someone claiming to be a black woman who supports Donald Trump -- and who apparently doesn't exist, revealing the nonexistent vetting of facts at WND. Now, we've caught WND retweeting an account belonging to a Russian trolling operation.
Earlier this month, a Twitter account popular among conservatives and Trump supporters, under the name Pamela Moore, was revealed to be the creation of the Internet Research Agency, a "troll farm" funded by the Russian government that also operated thousands of other fake Twitter accounts. According to Philly.com, the "@Pamela_Moore13" account heavily promoted Trump's presidential campaign and was retweeted by Trump administration officials.
WND also forwarded a "Pamela Moore" tweet. In a June 16 article, Alicia Powe embedded several tweets attacking CNN for a tweet containing incorrect information. One of those was from "@Pamela_Moore13" screaming "CNN IS SO BIAS." The formatting on"Moore's" tweet has disappeared because the account was deactivated after it was exposed as a troll-farm production, but the content of the tweet and a now-dead link to the original is still there.
It's unlikely that WND could have known at the time that "Pamela Moore" was a fake and a Russian troll. Still, it doesn't look good for WND to have promoted her, since it rails against the idea that the Russian government tried to help Trump get elected.
MRC Attacks Country Musicians For Expressing An Opinion Topic: Media Research Center
Being perfectly fine with censoring journalists at the Country Music Awards is not the only recent foray into the country music realm the Media Research Center has undertaken recently.
MRC writer Corinne Weaver was in a lecturing mood in a Nov. 10 post that took country singers Tim McGraw and Faith Hill to task for expressing an opinion on guns in the wake of the Las Vegas massacre that killed dozens at a country music concert. Weaver started her post by huffily declaring, "Celebrities who don’t understand the meaning of political debates should stop alienating their audiences and keep to themselves."
It seems that to Weaver "the meaning of political debates" actually means "expressing only conservative-friendly opinions." The issue Weaver has with McGraw is that he committed the offense of thinking that we perhaps should look at the issue of gun regulation in the wake of repeated massacres. That set Weaver on a lecturing roll, with an added dose of rich-shaming:
But gun control is about the Second Amendment -- “the right of the People to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed.” Gun control is an infringement, and ineffective to boot.
[...]
Faith Hill added her two cents in the interview: “In reference to the tragedy in Las Vegas, we knew a lot of people there. The doctors that [treated] the wounded, they saw wounds like you’d see in war. That’s not right. Military weapons should not be in the hands of civilians. It’s everyone’s responsibility, including the government and the National Rifle Association, to tell the truth. We all want a safe country.”
Again, taking guns away from law-abiding citizens isn’t going to solve anything. In fact, it might make the situation much, much worse. Stephen Willeford, an NRA instructor, was able to stop the shooter in Sutherland Springs by shooting him, forcing him to drop his gun and flee. More people could have died.
While the pair is being hailed by liberal celebrity activists, such as George Takei and Julianne Moore, it’s important to remember their fan base is not necessarily privileged enough to leave the self-defense to their bodyguards. Parroting a stale cry that has become the left’s tiresome refrain in the face of every tragedy isn’t going to win anyone over.
How hilarious that Weaver thinks McGraw and Hill have suddenly turned into George Takei simply for expressing a non-controversial opinion. And that she thinks that any celebrity who expresses an opinion different from hers should just shut up and sing-- which is what she really means by the "alienating their audiences and keep to themselves" crack.
It's hypocritical as well -- Weaver's employer currently regularly gives a platform for the opnions of a wealthy country music celebrity, Charlie Daniels. Ah, but he expresses the correct (to Weaver) opinions on things (read: right-wing), so he gets a pass -- and certainly no condescending questions about whether he "understands the meaning of political debates" -- even as Weaver rages against other artists who say anything at all.
Anti-Muslim WorldNetDaily reporter Leo Hohmann goes the demographic winter route in a Nov. 12 article. He made sure to speak in the usual code words conservatives use when broaching the subject in order to hide the racial agenda:
If anyone wants to know why Western countries import so many migrants from the Third World, the answer may lie in the cultural norms that have dominated over the past 50 years.
Women are expected to go to college, become professionals in the work force, and “contribute” to the national economy.
But, as many of these countries are now discovering, the female contributions come with a cost.
With women having fewer babies, there comes a point when there are not enough worker bees to support the growing number of elderly who retire every year in countries like Germany, Italy, Greece and Spain.
All of these countries have dismal fertility rates of between 1.3 and 1.5 children per woman of child-bearing age. Sweden, the U.K. and the U.S. are not much better at 1.8 children per woman.
Economists agree that any nation with a fertility rate of less than 2.1 children per woman will not replace its aging population and ultimately fall into decline. Unless, they say, the nation uses immigration to make up for its birth dearth.
In 2016 America’s fertility rate fell to its lowest point on record, and in 2017 it stands at a frightfully low rate of 1.87 babies per woman. But the country’s population continues to increase because of historically high rates of immigration.
One country, Poland, has decided to try another route to reversing its paltry 1.35 fertility rate.
Rather than importing a younger work force from Africa or the Middle East, which is seen by some conservatives as a highway to national suicide, Poland has kicked off a national fertility campaign where it encourages its own women to have more babies.
In Hohmann's telling, "Western countries" means "white Christians," and "migrants from the Third World" means swarthy Muslims.
Hohmann effectively conceded this at the end of his article, in his reaction to "the left-leaning Salon" accuratelypointed out the racial undercurrent of such concerns, specifically Republican congressman Steve King's tweet referencing "cultural suicide by demographic transformation":
The left-leaning Salon reported it this way: “The text [demographic transformation] is a reference to a racist tenet – common among white nationalists and fascists – that people of color, immigrants and Muslims pose a threat to ‘white purity.'”
Globalists can’t have it both ways: Encouraging family planning, more women climbing the career ladder and having fewer children, then complaining about the aging population and smearing the reputations of everyone who balks at the idea of seeing their city, their state, their nation transformed into an Islamic enclave.
So Hohmann wants white women to be stuck at home cranking out babies to beat back the swarthy Muslim hordes? He's even more retrograde than we thought.
CNS Managing Editor Censors Trump's Frederick Douglass Faux Pas Topic: CNSNews.com
CNSNews.com managing editor Michael W. Chapman couldn't have been prouder to be a Trump shill than he was in a Nov. 3 "news" article:
Although completely ignored by the major news networks, President Donald Trump signed into law on Thursday legislation to establish the Frederick Douglass Bicentennial Commission, which will make plans to honor the 200th anniversary of the birth of Frederick Douglass (1818-1895), a slave who escaped to freedom and became a leading orator, abolitionist, writer, publisher, and statesman.
Douglass was a Republican who often criticized the slavery-supporting Democratic Party.
[...]
“Our Nation rightly honors the life of Mr. Douglass, a former slave who became an outstanding orator and a leader of the abolitionist movement," said President Trump. "I also welcome the participation of the members of the Congress in the valuable work the Commission will perform."
“… All Americans have much to learn from the life and writings of Mr. Douglass," said President Trump, "and I look forward to working with the Commission to celebrate the achievements of this great man.”
So proud was Chapman of Trump's achievement in signing a bill to honor Dougless that he completely ignored the fact that Trump once thought Douglass was still alive.
In Febraury, Trump blathered his way through a Black History Month event by saying, "Frederick Douglass is an example of somebody who’s done an amazing job and is getting recognized more and more, I notice" -- implying that he thought Douglass was a living person.
Chapman is surely aware of this; his website published an Associated Press article about the event noting that Trump's comments "drew immediate backlash on social media from critics who perceived it as a reference to a still-living Douglass."
Rather than remind readers of the relevant history of a faux pas made by the president for whom his "news" operation has become a servile stenographer, Chapman focused instead on detailing Douglass' religious leanings.
In other words, Chapman is censoring from his readers facts he thinks will harm his president. Is that what the managing editor of a real "news" operation does? Nope.
CNS, by the way, will trash even Frederick Douglass if doing so serves its agenda. And it apparently did in a Nov. 22 column by the Catholic League's Bill Donohue that's a long diatribe against Douglass and his "anti-Catholic bigotry," which he then turns into a thing about not tearing down "the monuments and markers of American icons.," adding: "Finally, nothing I have said should be read as a plea to remove the statue of Frederick Douglass from Central Park. It should stay."
Um, has that statue of Douglass been an issue? Not that we're aware of. Donohue was obviously alluding to questions about statues honoring Confederate generals, but he misses the obvious fact that they were not "American icons"; they fought a war against America.
Brazile Gives WND An Excuse To Push Seth Rich Conspiracy Theories Again Topic: WorldNetDaily
The recent controversy regarding Donna Brazile's new book gave WorldNetDaily all the excuse it needed to rehash one of its favorite (and discredited, not that they'll admit it) conspiracy theories, the death of Seth Rich.
Chelsea Schilling ran with it in a Nov. 6 article with all the drama she could muster:
It was just a botched robbery, they said.
Move along, there’s nothing to see here, they said.
Quit being paranoid and assuming there’s some conspiracy behind the random murder, they said.
So, if it were merely a botched robbery that killed DNC data staffer Seth Rich, why in the world would the former interim chair of the Democratic National Committee fear for her life, believing snipers might shoot and kill her after the mysterious murder of Rich?
In Donna Brazile’s upcoming book, “Hacks: The Inside Story of the Break-ins and Breakdowns That Put Donald Trump in the White House,” she writes about her fears following the July 10, 2016, unsolved murder of Rich. In fact, she dedicated the book to Rich, whom she calls a “patriot.”
The next day, when Brazile changed her story on a claim regarding purported "rigging" of the Democratic presidential primary by Hillary Clinton, the headline on Schilling's article about it conspiratorially blared, "WHO GOT TO HER?" Schilling also rehashed the Seth Rich stuff.
And when opportunistic troll Jack Burkman -- whose partisan exploitation of Rich's death WND has dutifully publicized -- trolled further by wanting to subpoena Brazile, WND's Alicia Powe was only too happy to give him a platform to proclaim that "Brazile knows the truth about Rich's mysterious death":
Brazile has provided incomplete information about what she knows, Burkman argues, but filing a lawsuit will force Brazile to say what she knows – under oath.
“If this were a random murder like police have maintained, why did Ms. Brazile fear for her own life?” he asked. “Brazile can clearly also offer critical information about what role the DNC [had in] Hillary Clinton’s primary win.”
“Brazile has openly admitted to liability in her book. She has admitted that she and others rigged the Democratic primaries in favor of Hillary Clinton. We are, therefore, expanding our complaint to include her.
“More importantly, she is now openly suggesting that the DNC may have killed Seth. Her comment that she felt compelled to draw her blinds and avoid the window is one of the most striking comments in modern American political history.”
Of course, Burkman doesn't actually give a damn about Seth Rich as a person -- he only exploit Rich's death as a way to attack Democrats in general and the Clintons in particular, and for a perverse love of the conspiratorial. It's something he shares with WND, so they are perfectly matched in that perverse dysfunction.
MRC Is Still Trashing Anita Hill Topic: Media Research Center
You'd think that with the recent spate of sexual harassment scandals -- some of which involving employees of the so-called "liberal media" -- the Media Research Center would adjust its policy of judging the veracity of the accusers by the claimed or suspected political orientation of the accused. But it hasn't -- the MRC still implicitly trusts the claims of accusations made against liberals, while ranging from indifferent to hostile regarding women who accuse conservatives of bad behavior.
For a quarter of a century, the MRC has repeatedly trashed Anita Hill for raising accusations of sexual harassment against conservativ icon Clarence Thomas. And as Hill's name has come up amid the current spate of scandals, it's trashing Hill anew.
The MRC's Nicholas Fondacaro suggested that Hill was a liar in a Nov. 19 post attacking "make-believe Republican" Matthew Dowd (apparently in Fondacaro's world, "real Republicans" must never hold their own to account) for bringing up Hill:
They basically called Anita Hill a nut and a liar in order to get Justice Thomas on the court. They empowered Bill Clinton, ” he continued to proclaim, devoid of any facts or reason. “ But in order to get those things, they decided the ends justify the means. They decided that a tainted person was better to get what they wanted.” He also claimed Trump’s supporters were guilty of siding with a tainted person just to get what they wanted. But his “tainted” label could also be applied to the Clintons.
Apparently, in Dowd’s version of history, there were no Senate hearings or Senator Joe Biden grilling Thomas in a “high-tech lynching” over Hill’s claims, or her evolving story, or all the testimonies from other women who contradicted her.
Yes, Foncacaro suggested Hill was lying in the very next paragraph after accusing Dowd of lacking "facts or reason" to back up his claim that Hill was attacked as a liar.
Two days later, Tim Graham proved Dowd right again as he once again portrayed Hill as a lying gold-digger who made her accusations solely in order to get a book advance and a cushy law-school job:
Republican Sen. Arlen Specter suggested Hill may have committed perjury, which outraged the liberals. Hill insisted she wasn’t making the allegations to make a buck....and then signed a million-dollar book deal and took a prestigious law professor job at Brandeis, where she still works.
Over at the MRC's "news" division CNSNews.com, Craig Bannister cranked out a "flashback" blog post insisting that "Hill’s claims were discredited by, among other things, the testimony of more than a dozen female former co-workers who came forward to declare, in no uncertain terms, that Thomas was 'a man of the highest principle, honesty, integrity and honor in all of his personal and professional actions.' They called Hill’s claims 'ludicrous' and 'unbelievable.'"
As evidence, Bannister cites a website called ConfirmationBiased.com (whose name Bannister gets wrong), which he writes was "launched to expose the political bias and inaccuracies of the 2016 HBO movie 'Confirmation'." But he doesn't mention that the attack website was created by Mark Paoletta, an attorney who worked on the team assembled under President George H.W. Bush to forward Thomas' nomination and who considers himself a personal friend of Thomas. It's hardly an objective view of things.
Yep, trashing women who threaten conservative politicians and media figures will always be a part of the DNA of the MRC.
WorldNetDaily managing editor David Kupelian devoted an entire Nov. 8 column to complaining about how liberals like to make people feel guilty. Then he adds this:
Such is the warp and weft of current American politics – all day, every day, to the point that America has grown used to it. The left advances a shockingly destructive agenda; the right complains; the left accuses the right of being fascists and Nazis … and the right shuts up.
[...]
The left’s guilt-tripping mania has gotten so bad – with constant attacks on President Trump as “Hitler” and his supporters as “white supremacists,” and violent antifa assaults on the constitutionally protected free-speech rights of others (while calling them “fascists”) – that some progressive activists have had enough and are finally sounding the alarm.
It seems that Kupelian has forgotten howmanytimes the website he operates likened President Obama to Nazis in general and Hitler specifically. He clearly had no problem in using his website to hurl that smear around as a cheap, crass political attack; in fact, Kupelian's WND was proud to do so.
Does this mean that he and WND were trying to guilt-trip America into ... something -- you know, the same thing he's spending an entire column railing against? Why, that makes him a total hypocrite -- you know, just like when he sold out his moral code to back Trump.
Let's not pretend that Kupelian has had a sudden change of heart and will repent the very behavior he now decries. He won't, because it served its purpose -- just like criticizing the very behavior he engaged in serves a purpose now.
MRC Is Totally Cool With CMA's Attempt to Censor Journalists Topic: Media Research Center
You'd think that a blatant attempt at media censorship -- in the form of the Country Music Association trying to bar journalists, under threat of credential revocation, from asking musicians questions about “the Las Vegas tragedy, gun rights, political affiliations or topics of the like” until backing down after the restrictions were made public -- would earn some criticism from even the folks at the Media Research Center.
Nope -- the MRC was cool with that, to the point that it pretended that no such draconian guideline ever existed.
A Nov. 8 post by Karen Townsend whined that CMA presenters made Trump jokes and referred to "the guidelines the CMA gave to participants," failing to mention those same guidelines tried to bar journalists from asking certain questions. Townsend surely knew that was the case -- it's the lead of the article she links to in backing up the statement.
Tim Graham followed up with even more whining:
The Washington Post was a day late in whining about the lack of gun-control advocacy (or as they put it, “courage”) at the Country Music Association awards. Music writer Chris Richards wrote a “Critic’s Notebook” commentary headlined “A monolithic silence from top artists at CMA Awards.” Online, the headline was “Country music is becoming the soundtrack of a nonexistent, apolitical no-place.”
Like Townsend, Graham completely ignored the fact that the CMA tried to censor journalists, even though it's prominently highlighted in the piece he's criticizing. From that piece:
Despite the circumstances, the telecast’s organizers were hoping for a business-as-usual night anyway. Last week, after CMA officials announced that they reserved the right to eject any journalist who asked an artist about their politics, Paisley immediately spoke out against that preemptive censorship, tweeting, “I’m sure the CMA will do the right thing and rescind these ridiculous and unfair press guidelines.”
And voila, they were promptly rescinded. But that didn’t embolden any of the artists to volunteer their thoughts on the state of the nation on Wednesday night, not even Paisley. “I love the way we’ve all come together,” he said during one interstitial segment, as if he might be warming up some spontaneous bombshells. Then he confessed that he’d “gone off script,” and returned to the business of introducing the next performer.
Graham just served up more whining: "This is how the liberal media operate: They expect TV awards show to produce liberal propaganda moments, and when they aren’t created, they get grumpy at the lack of 'progress.'"
And because the CMA's attempted censorship of journalists served its purpose of keeping politics out of an event the MRC didn't want it inserted into, Townsend and Graham approve of the means.
If drag queens interacting with children didn't exist in real life, WorldNetDaily would have to invent it as an excuse to go into freakout mode. Fortunately for WND, it didn't have to invent even more fake news in order to do so.
In an Oct. 16 article, WND got its perfect storm -- a drag queen reading to children at a library named for Michelle Obama. Alicia Powe is very unhappy:
The Michelle Obama public library in Long Beach, California, has presented to children who are part of its young readers program a huge array of diversity and “inclusion” agendas.
In one shot.
It was when Xochi Mochi arrived for a visit.
That made the program pro-LGBTQ.
And transgender.
And drag queen-friendly.
And Satanist-approved, with the character’s red-tipped, demon-like horns.
All to read to children for LGBTQ History Month.
An anonymous WND writer found other instances for a Nov. 13 article, and WND declared it a "phenomenon":
It was only days ago when WND reported Xochi Mochi made an appearance at the Michelle Obama public library in Long Beach, California, hitting the pro-LGBTQ, transgender, drag-queen friendly, Satanist-approved political hot buttons all in one shot.
Mochi was there to read to young children, a fad that is spreading, with new reports that there now are drag queen story hours for children as young as two years old in the United Kingtom.
It was the Daily Mail that reported that drag queens were being brought into taxpayer-funded nursery schools in the U.K., “so that children as young as two can learn about transgender issues” and be taught “LGBT tolerance.”
Nursery managers reported in the Mail that children need to have the indoctrination so they can “see people who defy rigid gender restrictions.”
In addition to calling this "indoctrination," the anonymous WND writer later calls having drag queens read to children part of an "agenda." WND offers no evidence to support either claim.
CNS' Jeffrey Forgets There Was A Recession, Makes Dumb Spending Claim Topic: CNSNews.com
CNSNews.com editor in chief Terry Jeffrey writes a lot about economic stuff. Perhaps he shouldn't, if his Nov. 14 article is any indication:
If Congress had frozen federal spending at the level it reached in fiscal 2008, the last full fiscal year before President Barack Obama was inaugurated, the federal government would have had a balanced budget from fiscal 2014 onward based on the actual revenues the federal government collected under the existing tax laws in those years.
However, rather than freeze federal spending after 2008, Congress permitted it to rise by $998 billion—or 33.5 percent.
Um, remember the recession that hit the U.S. during fiscal 2008? Jeffrey doesn't seem to -- he makes no reference to it in his article. He does, however, allude to recession-related things while complaining about the spending that has been associated with it:
But federal spending increased dramatically after fiscal 2008, jumping to $3,517,677,000,000 in fiscal 2009, driven in part by the Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP), which Obama voted for in the Senate and President George W. Bush signed in October 2008, and by the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act stimulus bill, which Obama signed in February 2009.
[...]
In fiscal 2009 through 2012, federal revenues fell short of the $2,523,991,000,000 the federal government took in during fiscal 2008. But in fiscal 2013, federal revenues climbed to $2,775,105,000,000; then, in fiscal 2014, they climbed to $3,021,491,000,000.
Why was there a TARP and a recovery act? Because there was a recession. Why did federal revenues drop between 2008 and 2013? Recession. Why did federal revenues increase above 2008 levels in fiscal 2013 and 2014? In part because of TARP and the recovery act.
Since Jeffrey is ignoring the existence of the recession, he also ignores that his hypothesis has a huge hole in it: If federal spending didn't increase in response to the recession -- as Jeffrey seems to have wanted to happen, and which runs counter to generally accepted economic theory -- it's likely that the economy would not have recovered enough to increase revenues starting in 2013.
In short, there are consequences to not increasing spending during a recession, and Jeffrey makes sure not to examine any of them in order to stay resolutely on point and completely divorced from the last decade of economic reality: "Had federal spending been frozen at the fiscal 2008 level through fiscal 2017, the federal government would have run a surplus of $332 billion in the last fiscal year."
Such fantasy-based analysis will not help CNS with maintaining any sense of credibiility.
With 'Thank Trump' Campaign, WND Officially Becomes State Media Topic: WorldNetDaily
No discerning news consumer has ever mistaken WorldNetDaily for a real news operation that was fair and balanced and was concerned about the truth. It's always been among the most highly biased "news" operations, and it became even more so with the advent of Donald Trump's presidential campaign, selling out any moral prinicples to back a thrice-married adulterer and misogynist just because it wanted to be on the winning side.
WND has sealed its status as pro-Trump state media with a new website for sending thank-you cards to Trump. No, really.
The WND article promoting the campaign lamented that "every day brings new slurs, attacks, 'fake news,' unsubstantiated allegations, threats of impeachment" against Trump -- which, ironically, if you substitute the name of Barack Obama for Trump, is what WND had been dishing out for the previous eight years.
As a good state-media outlet would, WND insisted that Trump had "a staggering, perhaps unprecedented, list of accomplishments for a first year in the White House." Then it was time for a little self-aggrandizement:
It’s all the idea of Joseph Farah, founder of WND.com, the world’s first independent online news service – a unique and innovative opportunity to Americans, and, in fact, the people of the world, to send thanks and encouragement for what the president has accomplished in his first year in office.
There is no cost to participate in this campaign.
“While there are always going to be some disappointments in the imperfect art of politics, the Trump White House has fulfilled dozens of campaign promises, changed the tone of Washington, reversed the headlong plunge into socialism and raised the spirits of Americans like no one since Ronald Reagan in 1981,” said Farah. “Such an occasion should not go unnoticed or overshadowed by the angry and vitriolic response from his disgruntled opposition. It’s time for the president to hear from those who elected him – and those who have come around since Election Day.”
The goal, Farah says, is to get millions of Americans participating in the campaign in a genuine display of sincere thanks and encouragement to Trump and his team for a “breathtaking” record of accomplishment in the face of unprecedented adversity and enraged opposition from Democrat politicians, the entrenched Washington establishment, what Trump calls the “fake news” media and street thugs, some paid and some violent, who have sought to disrupt and subvert the will of the people.
Farah is hoping the campaign will catch on fire with the help of social media activists spreading the word and the promotion of the campaign by alternative media outlets and talk radio.
“I don’t expect much help from the ‘fake news’ cartel,” said Farah. “But it wasn’t the ‘fake news’ cartel that helped elect Donald Trump president. It was the new independent press, including the pioneer in that area, WND.com. Now, Donald Trump needs encouragement to stay the course, turn up the heat, open up the throttle and continue fulfilling campaign promises one by one. That’s what this campaign is all about, in addition to demoralizing and defusing the angry, thuggish opposition led by the Democrats and establishment Washington.
How ironic that Farah is complaining about "fake news" when his website is one of the foremostpurveyors of fake news in America.
WND also slipped in this bit of self-promotion:
WND has run other innovative political campaigns in the past, including the famous “Pink Slip” project, which sent 9 million messages to Congress on pink paper threatening members with rejection at the polls in November 2010 if they did not act on their campaign promises. The campaign was so successful, it exhausted supplies of pink paper in North America. Republicans gained control of the House of Representatives in that election by picking up a historic 63 seats and another six in the U.S. Senate.
Some credit the “Pink Slip” campaign with the birth of the tea party movement, which followed in its wake.
As we documented, the "pink slip" campaign was a way for WND to cash in on its readers, which paid it a whopping $29.95 to send 535 letters to members of Congress in large boxes with hundreds of other identical letters, which presumably diluted any impact WND hoped to have. And the "some" that credit the campaign "with the birth of the tea party movement" is none other than WND itself; the link on those words goes to a 2014 WND article stating only that "Ultimately the pink slip campaign presaged the tea party movement and one of the biggest voter revolts in American history in 2010" -- not that it was an inspiration.
(Unlike the pink-slip campaign, WND isn't charging anyone for the Trump thank-you cards; apparently the only tangible benefit it gets is the email-harvesting aspect.)
Accompanying the campaign is a lengthy list of what WND claims are Trump's accomplishments since his election. There are 149 of them, so you can be sure there's lots of padding going on.For instance, the very first one on the list -- "After his election, Trump met with top tech leaders, including Mark Zuckerberg of Facebook, Bill Gates of Microsoft and Jeff Bezos of Amazon. According to Gates, it was 'a good conversation about innovation, how it can help in health, education, the impact of foreign aid and energy, and a wide-ranging conversation about power of innovation'" -- is utterly meaningless as an "accomplishment"; it's just a meeting.
And No. 150 -- "Trump issued a memorandum Nov. 16 determining that the U.S. has enough petroleum coming from countries other than Iran to permit 'a significant reduction in the volume of petroleum and petroleum products' purchased from the mullah-led nation" -- has a factual problem; the memorandum was actually issued on May 17, not Nov. 16. WND hides the fact that the U.S. currently prohibits U.S. purchases of crude oil from Iran, so this memo is utterly meaningless as well; indeed, it appears to be a reiteration of current U.S. policy as required by law than any new action by Trump.
Apparently, the only way WND thinks it can get any credibility (or revenue) of any kind is to become a "made man" in the form of pro-Trump state media. But WND has always been a joke; this will make it even more so.
MRC: Trump Wants To Investigate Sec. of State Hillary, Not The Hillary Who Ran Against Him Topic: Media Research Center
The Media Research Center's Kristine Marsh writes in a Nov. 14 post (random bolding is hers):
It seems the media can always find a new excuse as to why the Clintons’ numerous scandals over the years should be overlooked. Tuesday morning, the networks dismissively treated reports that Attorney General Jeff Sessions would be looking into hiring a special prosecutor to investigate the Clinton Foundation’s dealings with Uranium One and Hillary Clinton’s e-mails, casting blame on Sessions instead. All three networks also characterized the potential investigation as a partisan hack job orchestrated by President Trump against his former election “rival,” instead of against the former Secretary of State.
We hate to break it to you, Kristine, but the Hillary Clinton that was secretary of state is the very same Hillary Clinton who ran against Trump in 2016. If Trump is going after Secretary of State Clinton he is, by definition, going after candidate Clinton.
We're not seeing how Marsh thinks those are two separate people -- unless, of course, she's trying to justify an investigation because, you know, the Clintons.
We Want The Perv: WND Editor, Writers Stand Behind Roy Moore Topic: WorldNetDaily
WorldNetDaily's writers are making it clear: they want the pervert to win in Alabama.
A couple of WND writers have already come to the dubiousdefense of Roy Moore against allegations of a long history of perving on teenage girls. Now more are getting into the act, starting with WND editor Joseph Farah.
In his Nov. 14 column, Farah pleaded ignorance of the "nuances" of the Moore scandal beause he was "out of the country for the past two weeks." He claimed we "know very little" about Moore's Democratic opponent, Doug Jones, then contradicted himself by later asserting that "We know Doug Jones is pro-abortion, a defender of Planned Parenthood, a supporter of Obamacare, a politician who believes in man-made catastrophic climate change and wants to reorder our economic system to decrease levels of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, someone who thinks economic justice demands we raise the national minimum wage, a Democrats’ Democrat who opposes proof of eligibility to cast votes in national elections." Farah contradicted himself further by saying he somehow knew the claims against Moore are "unproved and unsubstantiated" and therefore should be ignored and that the accused perv is better than the Democrat:
We know the choice in the Alabama Senate race is between Doug Jones and Roy Moore.
We know that many prominent Republicans are distancing themselves from Roy Moore because of the unproved and unsubstantiated accusations against him because it’s difficult to defend against such charges – reckless though they seem to be.
With what we know and don’t know today, the choice is 100 percent clear. Roy Moore is a flawed human being, like all of us, but he is indisputably the best candidate for the job.
I would never defend or support a candidate for office I believed to be guilty of such serious moral offenses; there is simply no evidence they are real.
Since we know Democrats and the media have demonstrated over decades that they will happily discount even well-documented offenses against their own candidates and will use the flimsiest of accusations against their opponents, we should expect them to desperately slime Judge Roy Moore just as they are doing.
[...]
To me the Alabama Senate race is a referendum on fake news and corruption.
If it turns out some of the allegations against Roy Moore are true, there is a process for removing him from office. But we know enough about his opponent, by his own record and his own positions, that he is part of the problem, not part of the solution.
Therefore, I urge Republicans in Alabama – and Republicans everywhere – to support Roy Moore for the Alabama Senate seat. We should do so enthusiastically.
Farah didn't mention that as the publisher of Moore's autobiography, he and WND have a personal and corporate financial interest in the success of Moore's campaign.
Barry Farber's Nov. 14 WND column complained about the rush to judgment against Moore and the alleged lack of proof he did anything wrong:
Because it seems to me that if such a sexual allegation is leveled in the middle of a political campaign 40 years after the alleged depravity, and if those 40 years in the life of the alleged perpetrator were jam-packed with elections of various kinds and a prolific public life and if there’s absolutely zero proof of guilt, then maybe the party that leaked the matter to the Washington Post ought to try winning the oncoming election by other means, you know, issues and the like!
[...]
A famous New York-based media personality, who professes adoration for the Bill of Rights, couldn’t quit complimenting a popular talk host for asking Judge Moore if he ever dated a girl in her teens while he was in his 30s. The talk host wasn’t seeking any special credit for that question, but the famous personality just couldn’t quit. He kept repeating something like, “That was brilliant. You’ve personally ended the campaign of Roy Moore. Moore answered that brilliant question of yours three different ways!” I didn’t notice Moore shifting his answer three different ways. But then again I don’t want to see anybody executed out of “revolutionary conviction.” Where’s the proof?
[...]
There’s one “hero” whose name I unfortunately missed on the news. He told a profound truth, namely, “Even without this sexual allegation, the nomination of Judge Roy Moore is a bridge too far.” Aha! There you have it. Judge Moore and his right-wing, pro-God and pro-Ten Commandments beliefs are simply the wrong fit for far too many Americans.
It will be interesting to watch the result of so many non-Alabamans storming to choose the next senator from Alabama. You’ve heard the battle cry, “What doesn’t kill us makes us stronger!” If Judge Moore isn’t blown away by the prevailing firestorms, he may very well out-poll what he would have scored if this had never come up! Next time, the Washington Post might even demand proof!
Mason Weaver, meanwhile, likened Moore to famous perpetrators of misdeeds throughout history. Oh, and Doug Jones is bad:
The Republican leadership would rather have Doug Jones than Roy Moore to vote on our next Supreme Court justice. They would rather Doug Jones vote on tax reform, the wall, trade and the illegal invasion of America. The cry from weak Republicans can truly turn the easy victory of Moore into a Democratic victory and momentum change.
[...]
King David the murderer could not be king today. Moses and Saint Paul would have no place in our government. The people called Jesus a drunkard. There is no pleasing or appeasing them; there is no comforting them; they will never be satisfied. Rahab, the Madam in Jericho, could not be a heroine today. If all the left needed to do is to find imperfection in imperfect men, then they will rule over us.
Think about the eight years under Obama. Consider the misery we all suffered. Consider the cost going forward with his regulations, lifetime judges and the massive debt. Donald Trump is flawed, I am flawed, and you are flawed. But the people must be governed by humans, thus all candidates are flawed.
Let’s get the wall built, renegotiate international trade, build up our military, free America from Obamacare slavery and Make America Great Again, strong again and for the people again.
There is a lot of money, power and influence in poverty and slavery. Many people want to totally control you, but they can only influence you because they have no real power over you. Let’s not allow them to hypnotize or con us. Ignore the noise and support the candidate that will benefit your great-grandchildren.
Jane Chastain had no problem with Moore perving on teens because the girls' mothers approved so it couldn't possibly have been wrong:
In building a case against Judge Moore, the Washington Post relied on interviews with three women who claimed to have had dated or been asked for a date by Moore as teenagers when he was in his early 30s, with the full knowledge of their mothers. The worst the Post could come up with is that Moore, while dating the teens, was a gentleman, or in the case of the 14-year-old, stopped the alleged seduction attempt and took her home when asked.
So why would a young man who was well-known in the community risk everything he had worked for by attacking a teenager in his car behind the restaurant where she was working? By all accounts this eligible young man had no trouble getting dates. According to the Post, Moore was considered “good husband material” by their mothers.
In light of the somewhat sketchy dirt in the Post story, the Allred allegation staggers the imagination! It is completely out of character for what we know about Moore or what the Post even alleged.
It is no secret that men, more often than not, pursue younger women. If that were declared a crime, most men would be behind bars. Donald Trump, Mitch McConnell and the late Ted Kennedy are three high-profile examples – well-known politicians who snagged much younger and considerably more attractive wives.
[...]
My point is this: If Moore is guilty of sexual impropriety with a 14-year-old back in 1979, I would expect a man of his character to step aside. Moore has denied it, so unless it can be proved, the Republican Party should let him alone.
Is it possible that the political left may have deemed that some among their own are worth sacrificing if the result includes the successful neutralization of people such as Roy Moore and their ability to sustain ongoing distractions from crucial political developments? Taking the aforementioned contours of the political landscape into account, it is clear that there are crucial developments taking place nearly every day. Perhaps they began with Hollywood because, given the abysmal moral character thereof, it was simply an easy place to start.
Why orchestrate an industrial-sized sex scandal that might touch off witch hunts, paranoia and fear across an untold number of sectors? Well, what are the political left’s most ready go-tos? I’ll answer that: Race and sex. Race because of our national history and the sensitivities that have been cultivated around it, sex because those on the left are base-natured swine who have sex on the brain in perpetuity. It bears mentioning that we have also seen a significant increase in the left fomenting racial tension over the last few years, and race-related issues have highlighted the last several news cycles.
Plausibility of the theory aside, one would have to admit that this would certainly be true to form.
Larry Klayman manages to avoid mentioning Moore, but he doesn't have to as he pushes the idea that women who raise allegations of sexual harassment may be lying:
The hard reality is that there are plenty of legitimate claims by women about sexual harassment and abuse, but there also are multitudes of false claims conjured up by women to strike back at men. This occurs frequently, for example, in our corrupt and compromised family courts, where sleazy divorce and child custody lawyers, to win judgments for their female clients, conspire with them to make false claims that the husband sexually abused or molested his own children. And, statistics show that in about 90 percent of all such cases, these claims were manufactured for strategic reasons. What happens when these women are exposed as having borne false witness against their estranged husbands? The answer is nothing. They just walk off into the sunset with no legal repercussions.
In many of these cases, the aggrieved men live with the stigma of these false claims for the rest of their lives, and some, given the severe emotional distress, have even gone to the length of committing suicide, as their children and society had become alienated from them. But despite this, the women who made these claims generally couldn’t care less and just go on their merry way in life.
And then there are the false claims of sexual harassment, running so rampant in the last few weeks in particular. Today, despite the documented and serious crimes of the Harvey Weinsteins of the world – and now Sen. Al Franken – “Girls Are Now Running Wild,” “remembering” male crimes against females 30 and 40 years after the offenses are alleged to have occurred. And, for the most part these stale allegations, where the statute of limitations has run decades ago, are generally believed.
Yes, the “Feminist Salem Witch Trials” are now in full swing! And while some of the women coming forward have legitimate claims, I urge you not to prejudge men as guilty before they have been given the chance to be proven innocent.
Michael Brown tried to excuse the hypocrisy of evangelicals continuing to stand with Moore, insisting that it's mostly a "display of distrust of the left":
But before you condemn Moore’s Alabama supporters, and before you write off other conservatives who have stood with him, bear in mind that double standards are not the whole story (or, perhaps, even part of the story). Rather, there is extreme suspicion of the left and deep recognition of how many enemies someone like Judge Moore really has. And with some claiming there is clear evidence that the yearbook signature is a forgery, everything else becomes questionable.
For those on the left who think I’m trying to excuse the inexcusable – meaning, giving Moore any benefit of the doubt even for a moment – just ask yourself how you would have responded if Fox News and Rush Limbaugh claimed to have evidence of Barack Obama sexually abusing minors. To my readers on the left, what would your first reaction be?
We all agree that if the charges against Moore are true, then what he did is terribly ugly and evil, especially since he did so as a professing Christian and as someone in power. But let’s not get carried away with double-standard accusations right now, especially against conservative Christians in Alabama. There’s a lot more to the story that must be factored in.
For decades, feminists and their supporters in the Democratic Party have been engaged in a scorched-earth strategy to destroy white, Christian, conservative men with power. While they still engage in political attacks and target good men like Judge Roy Moore, they’re also taking down their own.
But the left doesn’t really care about truth, nor women for that matter. Most don’t care about due process, because for them, it’s not about justice – it’s about removing men from positions of power, dividing men and women and exploiting that division to advance their leftist political agenda.
In this highly charged environment, Christian men and women must step back so we don’t get caught up in the emotions and hysteria stirred up by feminists and the media. We need to discern and judge these allegations on a case-by-case basis.
We suspect the political orientation of the accused will be a big factor in which cases Peterson judges to be perpetrated by the fake allegations of evil women.
CNS Revives Old 'Catholics vs. Convicts' Meme After Miami Thrashes Notre Dame Topic: CNSNews.com
Somebody at CNSNews.com either really likes Notre Dame or hates the University Miami (or both).
CNS commentary editor Michael Morris cranked out a mean-spirited Nov. 13 blog post after the Notre Dame-Miami football game:
The Miami Hurricanes, also known as the “Convicts” in their rivalry game “Convicts vs. Catholics” with the “Catholics” of Notre Dame, roundly humbled the third-ranked Fighting Irish 41-8 on Saturday, Miami head coach Mark Richt saying about the win, “[P]raise God.”
“Both sides of the ball did play very well, and specials as well,” said Miami head coach Mark Richt after his team defeated the Irish. “And I want to say, praise God.”
[...]
According to the ESPN summary of the game, the “Convicts” (374 total yards) outgained the “Catholics” (261 total yards) in total yards, in time of possession (ND: 26:01 and Miami: 33:59), in first downs (ND: 13 and Miami: 18), in turnover margin (ND: four turnovers, none recovered and Miami zero turnovers, four recovered) and ultimately in the final score ( ND: 8 and Miami: 41).
Miami also clinched the ACC Coastal division Saturday when Virginia lost to Louisville. The Canes (“Convicts”) will play Clemson (8-1) for the ACC title.
Now, the "Catholics vs. Convicts" meme is an old one, coined in 1988 by T-shirt-making students at Notre Dame to hype a game between the two schools at a time when both were undefeated and after a couple of Miami players had gotten into legal difficulties.
Further, it doesn't really apply to the situation between the two schools (or is it a "rivalry" in a traditional sense despite what Morris claims, since the teams have met only four times since 1990). As SB Nation points out, the phrase didn't apply all that well back then (Notre Dame wasn't exactly a clean team either) and applies even less today.
It seems Morris is mad that Miami thrashed the Fightin' Irish on the field, and also apparently that the Miami coach said "Thank God" about the victory. How petty of him.
'It's OK To Be White' Trolls Make WND Happy Topic: WorldNetDaily
An anonymous WorldNetDaily writer is way too cheerful about some racially charged trolling in a Nov. 1 article:
There’s a manhunt on – or womanhunt, if that’s your gender preference – for “racists” in Massachusetts, Ohio, Louisiana, Washington, Alabama and Canada who had the audacity to terrorize by posting signs and stickers that read, “It’s OK to be white.”
It all started out as an idea on the 4chan and endchan online forums to troll the left, universities and the media and demonstrate a double standard when the issue of discrimination is involved.
Would-be trollers were encouraged to print out signs and anonymously post them, particularly on campuses, while wearing Halloween costumes to avoid being identified.
According to the plan: “The next morning, the media goes completely berserk. Normies tune in to see what’s going on, see the posters saying, ‘It’s okay to be white,’ and the media & leftists frothing at the mouth. Normies realize that leftists & journalists hate white people, so they turn on them. Credibility of far-left campuses and media gets nuked, massive victory for the right in the culture war, many more /ourguys/ spawned overnight.”
Basically, it worked. The intended targets took the bait – hook, line and sinker.
WND is no stranger to race-baiting, and it seems to be ramping up again lately, so this embrace of pro-white trolling is no surprise.