One of Newsmax's most prominent voices in promoting bogus election fraud conspiracy theories has been columnist Michael Dorstewitz. In a Nov. 16 column, for instance, he uncritically repeated Rudy Giuliani's claim that voting-tech company Dominion "actually is a company owned by two Venezuelans that's been in business for about 20 years and been disqualified in so many places it would make your head spin." That's not true, and it's one of the claims Newsmax had to walk back in an attempt to avoid getting sued for defamation by Dominion and another voting tech company, Smartmatic.
Dorstewitz touted in a Nov. 23 column: "Trump-Pence campaign lawyers claim they can prove election fraud and other acts of misconduct on a massive scale. Also, state courts, secretaries of state and election officials made eleventh hour changes to election procedures that constitutionally may only be made by state legislative bodies. Too many people just aren’t buying it."
In a Jan. 2 column -- promoted at one point as the top story on Newsmax's front page -- Dorstewitz wrote:
Each time a member of the big media reports on someone referring to acts of fraud or even irregularities in the Nov. 3 presidential election, they describe them as "baseless claims" or "unproven."
Such words are included in almost every wire story since election day published by the Associated Press, Reuters, Bloomberg, and others.
Actually, there are many examples of vote fraud that took place during the 2020 election, and serious evidence of voting irregularities relating to the mail-in ballots.
Dorstewitz then cited a bunch of claims, scrupulously ignoring the evidence that most, if not all, of them have been discredited.
On Jan. 4 Dorstewitz touted the Republican attempt to deny Biden from being certified by the Electoral College:
Ever since Republican lawmakers announced they intend to mount an objection to the Electoral College vote when a joint session of Congress meets Wednesday, Democrats and mainstream media have denounced it as undemocratic.
But the caterwauling from the left brings to mind a line from Shakespeare’s "Hamlet," that "The lady doth protest too much," and thus loses all credibility. Are they really that afraid of the truth?
At least a dozen senators and 140 House members are expected to object to the certification of Joe Biden’s Electoral College victory as the 46th president.
They’re calling for an electoral commission to go over the results in key states for 10 days before they’re certified.
In addition to evidence the 2020 election may have been rigged, it doesn’t pass the smell test. It doesn’t make sense that Biden, who hasn’t had an original thought in 78 years and 45 days, won the election, despite the fact that:
His party lost at least 11 House seats
He lost heavily in the bellwether states of Florida, Ohio, Indiana, and Iowa
He lost nearly every bellwether county in the country
He bested Hillary Clinton’s 2016 performance in only a few cities
He offered no evidence to back up his "bellwether county" claim; his claim that Biden largely underperformed Hillary is a lie.
Dorstewitz's record of dishonesty and fraud doesn't bode well for Newsmax's attempt to frame itself as a reasonable alternative to Fox News (not to mention trying to keep from getting sued over publishing said falsehoods).
Newsmax's Hirsen Still Spinning Election-Fraud Conspiracy Theories Topic: Newsmax
Smirky Newsmax columnist James Hirsen has become quite enamored of bogus right-wing election-fraud conspiracies, and that hasn't really stopped. We've noted his Dec. 7 column likening the election to a bank heist, but he's done more of that.
In his Dec. 14 column, Hirsen lashed out at the Supreme Court justices who refuse to take up the highly dubious Texas lawsuit trying to intervene in the elections of other states:
To the heartbreak of millions of Americans who were hoping that the U.S. Supreme Court would give justice a fighting chance in the current fog of electoral war, seven of the nine members of the High Court simply slunk away last Friday without even lending an ear.
Approximately one week ago, shortly before midnight, the state of Texas filed a lawsuit directly with the high court.
In that suit, Texas challenged the election procedures that had taken place in the states of Georgia, Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin.
The seven members of the high court, who took the position that Texas and the other co-plaintiff states would not be allowed to have their case heard, committed a fundamental error.
The justices may have been influenced by a slew of legal prognosticators, some of whom had taken to the Democratic-dominated media to ridicule the Texas attorney general for having initiated the action in the first place.
[...]
The threshold issue that was before the Supreme Court was whether the constitutional prescription for the selection of electors had been violated by non-legislative actors.
This was, and will always remain, central to the functioning of our republic, and it is a premise that is vitally important for all of the justices to recognize.
Seven simply did not.
These wayward seven failed to allow the case to move forward.
In his Dec. 28 column, Hirsen ranted about Americans allegedly being victims of intelligence-style PSYOP tactics over the election:
There has been a concerted effort to perpetuate two falsehoods: first, the claim that no such evidence of election fraud exists; the second, the repeated mantra that the election is "over" and everyone needs to "move on."
The first falsehood supports the fallacious premise that the 2020 presidential election was conducted in a legitimate manner. It was not.
Even former Attorney General William Barr, among others, admitted that there was fraud.
The second falsehood seeks to sweep the rigged election under the rug.
The nation cannot.
The Republic ceases to exist without free and fair elections.
At present, approximately half of the country believes that the election was conducted in an illegitimate manner.
These are the folks who are not just distrustful of the way the election was conducted.
They are the folks who have lost trust in their government; lost trust in their elected officials; lost trust in the complicit news media; lost trust in the social media; lost trust in the tech companies; and on and on.
No doubt, the use of PSYOP on an unsuspecting public played a major role in the vanquishing of their trust.
However, this type of undermining typically leads to cynicism, which can be unhealthy for an individual and fatal to a society.
But Hirsen is engaged in his own PSYOP here. His goal as a right-wing activist is to instill that distrust in people for the benefit of Trump -- otherwise, why would he spend the past two months ranting about how the election was stolen from Trump, something he would know is not true if he had ever bothered to closely examine the evidence?
Hirsen wants people to be distrustful of government and the media and to be cynical about the state of things. That's his job. That's what Newsmax pays him to do.
Newsmax Columnist Calls Biden A 'Manchurian President' Topic: Newsmax
Calling someone a "Manchurian candidate" has been a reliable form of attack by right-wingers against political candidates they don't like. Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton and even John McCain have been portrayed as one. Right-wing lawyer Michael Dorstewitz, in his Dec. 14 Newsmax column, is now arguing that Joe Biden is one:
Life imitates art. "The Manchurian Candidate" was a 1962 political thriller that depicted an American soldier who was captured during the Korean War. He was brainwashed to later assassinate a political figure as part of an international Communist conspiracy.
In this case former Vice President Joe Biden wasn't brainwashed — he's a willing participant. And the assassination isn't of a political figure but of the United States.
Biden will most certainly reverse the Trump administration's policy of holding the Chinese Communist Party responsible for its past misdeeds, either by underestimating the threat that China presents, or out of a desire for monetary gain. He'll allow China to increase its influence on the United States and would permit manufacturing to migrate back to China, taking American jobs with it.
[...]
Today, the Electoral College meets to officially elect the president. Biden is expected to receive 306 votes; Trump, 232.
Assuming that holds until the January 20 Inauguration Day, the Manchurian President will be sleeping in White House that night.
That's not the only attack Dorstewitz has launched against Biden. In his Dec. 23 column, he attacked Biden's religious faith:
But it’s one thing to spend an hour in church once a week. It’s another thing altogether to actually live your faith, and with Biden, it’s all showboating. In reality, Biden’s neither honorable nor devout.
Biden has aligned with his party’s stance on abortion for decades, notwithstanding the church’s belief that life begins at conception, and destroying that life is murder. He at least supported the Hyde Amendment for decades, which in most cases prevents public funds from being used to pay for abortions.
But that fell by the wayside last year when he realized he had to fall in line if he had any hope of winning the Democratic presidential nomination. A desire for power trumped adherence to his faith.
Dorstewitz even brought up petty, nearly 50-year-old attacks on how Biden met his wife, Jill, first advanced by her bitter first husband and later promoted by the Media Research Center.
If Joe Biden has his way, the Second Amendment right to keep and bear arms could be nearly legislated out of existence.
And that would have the blessing of the Communist Party of China.
The New York Post’s Nels Frye observed back in March that President Xi Jinping and the People’s Republic of China were rooting for former Vice President Joe Biden to emerge victorious in November’s general election.
Newsmax's Ruddy Gushes Over Trump, Defends His Refusal To Admit Reality Topic: Newsmax
Newsmax CEO Christopher Ruddy began his Dec. 20 column with some serious sucking up to his friend, President Trump:
Donald Trump's late father Fred loved quoting a poem by Edgar Guest, one he kept framed on his desk.
It read, in part, "Success is failure turned inside out – The silver tint of the clouds of doubt, You can never tell how close you are, It may be near when it seems so far; So stick to the fight when you're hardest hit – It's when things seem worst that you must not quit."
For Fred's son, the key to winning was always about never quitting, even to the bitter end.
It's no surprise then that our President is fighting to that very last moment.
His vote challenge has been reasonable after an unusually close race in six states where he differed with Joe Biden by 1% of the vote or less.
A Newsmax poll conducted by McLaughlin & Associates found that 67% of Americans agreed it was fair for the President to seek a recount and challenge in those states.
Ruddy didn't mention that McLaughlin worked as the pollster for Trump's re-election campaign, so its objectivity and accuracy can be reasonably questioned.
Ruddy then defended his outlet's treatment of the election results: "Despite some media claims and even a skit on Saturday Night Live, Newsmax has never denied the official results. We called all contested states for Biden and described him as President-elect as of December 14th, when the Electoral College voted him so." Then, it was time to defend Trump's doomed efforts to overturn the election, with a side shot a one of his right-wing media competitors:
However, the major decision, including one made by Fox News, to crown Biden President-elect before the contested results were final, smacks of bias.
All major media stood down in making a call when Al Gore made his vote challenge in 2000. Why did Trump not have the same courtesy?
Trump has been a victim of media malpractice from the start.
A key factor why Biden took the battleground states with razor-thin margins was due to the media's suppression polls. These polls showed Biden winning in a landslide, dampening donor and voter support for Trump.
The Fox News Poll was particularly harmful, whose final polls had Biden winning by 10 points (he won the popular vote by 4.)
Ruddy then pontificated: "So where does Trump go from here? Well, the answer is upward." He further pontificated:
After his presidency, Trump will also become an unequalled global political and media force.
Trump will be surprised how much influence he has as a former President, without the limitations placed on being the actual President.
My late friend Ed Koch was seriously depressed after leaving New York's mayoralty. He later admitted to me that he became more influential outside of office as a media and political powerhouse.
Trump will do the same, but much more.
John Fund's recent column on Trump's successful presidency quotes David Shribman, a historian at Carnegie Mellon University, who thinks Trump will be "remembered in history as the most consequential president in three-quarters of a century and the most significant one-term president in nearly 175 years."
It's a good judgement for Fred Trump's son, a winner in every sense of the word.
Ruddy made no mention of the biggest immediate challenge his own operation faces: libel and defamation lawsuits. The day before Ruddy's column was posted, Newsmax walked back its attacks on Dominion Voting Systems and Smartmatic, two companies Newsmax has accused -- falsely, it appears -- of manipulating votes to make sure Trump lost. Perhaps that's where his focus should be now instead of on Trump-fluffing.
Newsmax Downplays Another Legal Entanglement Topic: Newsmax
While Newsmax has gotten increased attention as a Trump loyalist, it's also received attention of the negative kind as well: lawsuits and threats of lawsuits over its content. But Newsmax is largely hiding that from its readers.
On the Nov. 30 edition of right-winger Howie Carr's radio show, which Newsmax TV simulcasts, right-wing lawyer Joe DiGenova went on a tirade against Christoper Krebs, the former head of the federal Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agencywhom Trump fired after he stated that the presidential election was secure. "That guy is a class A moron," diGenova said. "He should be drawn and quartered, taken out at dawn and shot."
That's a pretty clear threat -- so much so, that Krebs quickly filed a lawsuit against DiGenova and Newsmax for defamation. Newsmax responded in a CNBC article with an attempt to distance itself from diGenova:
Newsmax said: “Newsmax TV airs the The Howie Carr Show, a Boston-based syndicated radio program it licenses, as a simulcast for one hour each weekday. Mr. diGenova appeared by phone on that simulcast as a guest and made comments that were inappropriate. Mr. diGenova is not a paid contributor to Newsmax and has no official ties to him.”
“Mr. diGenova has appeared on Newsmax since then on two occasions stating he made the comment ‘facetiously’ and apologized,” the right-wing media outlet said.
“He stated that he intended no harm to Mr. Krebs. Newsmax believes that claims made by Mr. Krebs in his suit of a ‘conspiracy’ and defamation against him are a threat to free speech and his legal action endangers all media organizations that seek an open discourse of ideas and news.”
You won't read that at Newsmax, however -- it has censored news of the lawsuit. The only reference you'll find to the controversy is a Dec. 5 article by Eric Mack in which DiGenova appeared on a different Newsmax TV show to walk back his threat against Krebs, insisting that it was "made in complete jest" and "a poor attempt at humor. They were hyperbole during a political discussion," adding, "I meant no suggestion of harm or intention to harm Mr. Krebs or his family, and I apologize for any misunderstanding of my intentions."
Actually, diGenova's intentions were all too clear -- and that's why Krebs is suing him and Newsmax.
Joe Biden’s policies would certainly be devastating to our constitutional republic but so would his illegitimate rise to power should he be elected president.
Fair and honest elections have been the bedrock of our constitutional republic.
The power of the government derives from the consent of the governed.
Biden has refused to accept the irregularities in the 2020 Election.
[...]
Biden’s refusal to acknowledge the profound questions of the 2020 election is evidence of his radicalization. Only a radical leftist who has joined communist revolutionaries like Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., and Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y., wouldn’t be alarmed by all of this.
Democrats spent $40 million taxpayer dollars and over 2 years investigating the 2016 election. Why isn’t Biden demanding an investigation in the 2020 election?
The entire Democratic Party was up in arms about election interference and they now have widespread proof of it and they’re silent.
The American people are entitled to an honest and transparent election.
Any legitimately elected American president would want a good-faith effort to verify and validate the results. Only a socialist, like Hugo Chavez, for example, would assume power through widespread voter fraud.
One month after the still-unresolved Nov. 3 presidential election, the proverbial elephant in the living room of ongoing election challenges in six states is the pre-meditated attempt to corrupt the election process through unprecedented, inherently corrupt mail-in ballots.
In Pennsylvania during election week last month, I officially observed manifestations of this deliberate attempt to corrupt the election process, which former Speaker of the U.S. House Newt Gingrich has declared, "an open invitation to theft."
I also observed widespread election fraud.
[...]
The direct and circumstantial evidence already presented publicly by the Trump litigation team on Nov. 19, 2020, is enough to rebut any presumption of government regularity.
In this light and considering the inherent nature of mail-in ballots, the U.S. Supreme Court should direct the State legislatures at issue to: (a) disregard all mail-in ballots; or (b) if feasible, hold new elections without mail-in ballots.
Is there sufficient evidence of fraud for courts to overturn the results that one or more states reported for the 2020 presidential election?
While that may be the question the law requires President Trump's legal team to address, it's the wrong question for America.
Those of us able to apply common sense and logic untethered to legal presumptions and requirements can ask a more basic question: Is our electoral system structured to provide free and fair elections? Anyone willing to take an honest look at the process understands that the answer is "no." The American election system is riddled with invitations for fraud.
[...]
In other words, the entire American electoral system lacks structural credibility.
The question America should be asking itself is not why many people believe that the 2020 election was stolen. The question is how anyone could believe that a system structured to invite fraud at every turn nevertheless yielded an honest and accurate result.
Think of it as a bank heist, one in which armed robbers crash through the front doors and hightail it to different sections of the building.
One approaches a teller and shoves a gun in his face.
One sneaks over to the main computer and hacks away. Another goes into the vault and locks it behind him, so he can swap out real hundies with counterfeit ones when no one is looking.
That pretty much sums up what the Democrats did, election-style.
The 2020 presidential election was stolen out from under the American people.
And the crooks used a number of means to bring their devious plan to fruition.
Evidence of fraud is there for anyone to see, but the corporate media seem to be engaging in one of three strategies: stating that none exists; ignoring it altogether; or subjecting it to a "fact-checking" process.
Newsmax Walks Back Attacks On Smartmatic After Getting Legal Notice Topic: Newsmax
Last week, Newsmax was among right-wing media outlets who received a legal notice from Smartmatic, an election technology company that his been named in various election fraud conspiracy theories, demanding a retraction of false and defamatory claims made about the company. Newsmax has censored news of Smartmatic's letter on its website, but it defended itself in a statement to CNBC:
Newsmax, in a statement, said that “Newsmax itself has never made a claim of impropriety about Smartmatic, its ownership or software.”
“Individuals, including plaintiff’s attorneys, Congressmen and others, have appeared on Newsmax raising questions about the company and its voting software, citing legal documents or previously published reports about Smartmatic,” Newsmax’s statement said.
“As any major media outlet, we provide a forum for public concerns and discussion. In the past we have welcomed Smartmatic and its representatives to counter such claims they believe to be inaccurate and will continue to do so.”
But late on Dec. 19 (a Saturday night, a news dead zone), it quietly published an unbylined article, credited only to "Newsmax Wires," headlined "Facts About Dominion, Smartmatic You Should Know."
Newsmax began by stating that "Newsmax would like to clarify its news coverage and note it has not reported as true certain claims made about these companies." Then, the walkbacks began:
There are several facts our viewers and readers should be aware. Newsmax has found no evidence either Dominion or Smartmatic owns the other, or has any business association with each other.
We have no evidence Dominion uses Smartmatic’s software or vice versa.
No evidence has been offered that Dominion or Smartmatic used software or reprogrammed software that manipulated votes in the 2020 election.
Smartmatic has stated its software was only used in the 2020 election in Los Angeles, and was not used in any battleground state contested by the Trump campaign and Newsmax has no evidence to the contrary.
Dominion has stated its company has no ownership relationship with the House Speaker Nancy Pelosi's family, Sen. Dianne Feinstein's family, the Clinton family, Hugo Chavez, or the government of Venezuela.
Neither Dominion nor Smartmatic has any relationship with George Soros.
Smartmatic is a U.S. company and not owned by the Venezuelan government, Hugo Chavez or any foreign official or entity.
Smartmatic states it has no operations in Venezuela. While the company did election projects in Venezuela from 2004 to 2017, it states it never was founded by Hugo Chavez, nor did it have a corrupt relationship with him or the Venezuelan government.
Newsmax has uncritically forwarded false attacks on Smartmatic and Dominion. On Nov. 15, for instance, Eric Mack uncritically quoted Rudy Giuliani ranting: "Dominion, when you look into it with just a little bit of investigation, you find out that Dominion uses a software, Smartmatic, which is a company that goes back to 2004. It was founded by two Venezuelans and Cesar Chavez. It has a terrible history of having fixed elections in Argentina, having fixed elections in Venezuela. It was all outlined in 2008 by the House of Representatives."
On Nov. 17, it uncritically quoted Dick Morris saying on a Newsmax TV show, "I do not necessarily believe it was a retail fraud, you know, vote by vote, count by count. ... I think it may well have originated in the Dominion software, in the Smartmatic software that the polling people, voting people used."
One can even go back to 2016, when a Newsmax article documented an appearance on Fox News by Trump supporter Betsy McCaughey, who claimed that "More investigation is needed to be made into Smartmatic, a British voting machine company that is 'very involved' with billionaire George Soros' 'left wing globalist enterprises." McCaughey went on to claim that there is "airtight case against Soros to tilt this election," as he's "very close to Hillary Clinton."
Like Fox News -- which did a similar walkback after receiving a similar legal notice from Smartmatic -- Newsmax does understand the power of a threatened lawsuit over something it couldn't possibly defend.
UPDATE: Newsmax TV host John Tabacco read on the air the article Newsmax posted on its website.
Dick Morris is not the only dubious figure pushing never-proven election fraud claims at Newsmax. Eric Mack writes in a Dec. 2 article:
Those denying the evidence of voter fraud -- and not the witnesses brought forth by the Trump campaign legal team -- might be the ones lying to Americans, former NYPD Commissioner Bernie Kerik said Wednesday evening on Newsmax TV.
"If they lie in these affidavits, there's a five-year penalty to go to prison: Nobody's lying," Kerik said on Wednesday's installment of "Stinchfield," from outside a Michigan oversight hearing. "They're not lying. They're not making this stuff up. This is evidence.
"And for the attorney general or anybody else to say they haven't seen any evidence of voter fraud, then they're not looking."
Kerik, a seasoned law enforcement leader, is tasked with collecting the evidence for the legal team and told host Grant Stinchfield it is "frustrating" that local enforcement, the FBI, and the Justice Department are not acting on the sworn evidence.
"We're not getting any traction with law enforcement, that I can tell you, and it's frustrating," Kerik said. "When you listen to this evidence, you listen to these witnesses who have sworn affidavits under the penalty of perjury as a felony, you have to think to yourself, 'I hear them.'
"I know the FBI and the Department of Justice have to be watching this."
State election laws are being flouted and violated, negligently and maybey even criminally, according to Kerik.
Mack leaves out a couple things: Kerik is a convicted felon who spent four years in prison on tax fraud and perjury charges whose image Newsmax tried to rehabilitate before prison and hs been continuing to do after prison (it book division even published a novel he wrote). Kerik was pardoned by Trump earlier this year, which -- on top of being a buddy of Trump lawyer Rudy Giuliani, who was New York City mayor when he was police chief -- may be why he's so invested in pretending Trump's election-fraud fictions are fact.
That's what's hiding behind Mack's delcaration that Kerik is a "seasoned law enforcement leader."
More than two-thirds of the nation says it is fair for President Donald Trump to ask for a recount in key states, according to a new Newsmax/McLaughlin & Associates poll released Thursday.
Sixty-seven percent of likely voters backed Trump's recounts where the vote margins in his race with Joe Biden were 1% or closer, which applies to states like Georgia, Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, and Arizona.
Despite the close contests, 65% of Americans say the election will ultimately be decided honestly. But fully a third of all voters, 35%, said that there was significant fraud.
"This seems to be a very disturbing and high number for the country that always prided itself to be the world's leading democracy," pollster John McLaughlin said. "The highest level of fraud concerns are among Trump voters at 70% and Republicans at 65%."
What Newsmax didn't tell you, just like the Media Research Center didn't: McLaughlin & Associates was the pollster for Trump's campaign, meaning it has a certain bias and conflict of interest in conducting polls that support narrative pushed by the Trump campaign.
Additionally, Trump has been giving Newsmax's TV operation lots of attention of late, meaning that it's entirely likely that Newsmax did this poll as a way to garner even more attention from Trump -- with, hopefully, the resulting eyeballs of right-wing viewers that will watch its channel.
In short: This just screams "stunt" and "lack of credibility." There's no real reason to trust this poll.
Dick Morris Rants About 'Election Fraud' At Newsmax Topic: Newsmax
Despite years of laughably failed prognositications, Newsmax inexplicably thinks Dick Morris deserves a platform to suck up to President Trump. And since Trump's current platform is making baseless and discredited claims that the election was stolen from him, Morris is ranting about that too.
"I think that the issue of scale, you have obstruction from the secretaries of state, you have obstruction from the courts, the Democratic-controlled courts, and it's very hard to penetrate that to get evidence enough to reverse several million votes, but there certainly is enough episodic evidence to establish a pattern of fraud," Morris told Tuesday's "American Agenda."
Morris also questioned Attorney General Bill Barr's statement earlier Tuesday that the Justice Department had uncovered no evidence of widespread voter fraud that would tip the results of the presidential election.
"I'd like to know the number of people they had doing it and what they did," Morris said. "But this fraud was so deeply concealed within the voting machines that it was almost undetectable. You would need a top-level forensic computer expert to go in there and detect it.
"These voting machines were designed by people who worked for Hugo Chavez with the sole intention of creating a system that could be hacked without anyone knowing about it, results that could be flipped, votes that could be altered, and I'm not sure DOJ probed it to that level."
Questionable claims about Chavez -- the Venezuelan leader who died seven years ago -- are a staple of right-wing conspriacy theories about the election.
Morris got his own column on Dec. 2 to rant further about this, plus the upcoming Georgia Senate runoff:
After the stolen presidential election of 2020, Georgia Democrats are looking to compound their malfeasance by stealing the two outstanding Senate runoffs there and, with them, control of the U.S. Senate. Republicans, who should be kicking themselves for letting the Democrats steal Georgia in November, are about to let them do it again in the January, 2021 second round Senate elections.
We can’t let them steal Georgia a second time.
If we lose the Senate, the White House, and the U.S. House of Representatives, the Democrats will use their victories to alter fundamentally our entire system of government.
[...]
This nightmare scenario will happenunless the Georgia State Legislature and the state’s governor (all nominally Republicans) act now to stop the very same election fraud that delivered the state to Joe Biden in November.
The very same inspectors, election officials, and rigged vote tabulating machines are standing by to do in January what they did in November. And they will do it unless we stop them.
Morris then demanded thatthe runoff use "hand counting of ballots" be used in the runoff and a list of voters be made public in order to "review them to spot irregularities like unregistered voters, votes from people who have moved away, and votes from persons who are deceased."
Trump Didn't 'Smash The Left,' Though Newsmax Gave Horowitz's Book One Last Spin Topic: Newsmax
Throughout 2020, Newsmax has heavily promoted a book it published through its Humanix division by right-wing activist David Horowitz, called "Blitz: Trump Will Smash the Left And Win" (while not telling readers that it published the book). But as one reviewer noted, the book didn't actually predict Trump would win re-election, but mostly attacks Democrats.
Well, the election showed that Trump didn't "smash the left" -- he lost (his claims to the contrary notwithstanding). Two days arter the election, Newsmax sent out an email promotion for the book purportedly written by Horowitz. Not only did it lop off the book's subtitle (since that turned out to be disproven by the election results), it's mostly a rant against Fox News for 1) calling Arizona for Trump, and 2) failing to have him on to promote "Blitz," and 3) give an early endorsement of Trump's still-unproven claims the election was stolen from him (overenthusiastic bolding in original):
Fox News, again, refused to call Florida for most of the night . . .
Despite the fact it was clearly won by Trump and other networks like Newsmax and CNN had called Florida for Trump!
Meanwhile, with just 14% of the ballots counted in Arizona, and people still waiting in line in some places to vote, Fox called Arizona for Biden.
Clearly, Fox has gone AWOL.
The first warning sign apparent to me was BLITZ.
In past years, I was always on Fox. Every book I did was touted by Fox — EXCEPT BLITZ.
Why?
BLITZ exposed George Soros and the billionaires out to stop Trump.
I named names.
It was clear to me Fox wanted to stop Trump.
They even “confirmed” phony claims Trump called our troops “suckers and losers” — and every step of the way tried to belittle him.
Despite Fox’s ban on me and BLITZ, it’s been 10 weeks on the New York Times bestseller list . . . #1 on Amazon.
[...]
Whether or not the big media and the Democrats in states like Pennsylvania allow a fair vote and Donald Trump becomes president again, you still needto get BLITZ.
It exposes the whole fraud of the left, the media, and the Washington swamp insiders.
These will be the people President Trump will have to fight — or the same people who will back up “President Biden” — God forbid!
Folks, I can’t tell you how shocked I am that this election is being stolen from President Trump.
Except, of course, it is not, as the continued lack of substantiated evidence continues to show. It's worth noting, however, that this is the last email promotion of the book Newsmax sent out, meaning that it's effectively dead.
Newsmax TV Basks In Trump's High-Profile Attention Topic: Newsmax
Newsmax CEO Christopher Ruddy has long been a buddy of President Trump -- it was touting Trump's presidential ambitions way back in 2011 -- and that's finally paying off in a serious way, with Trump promoting Newsmax TV (and its competitor One America News) as he feuds with Fox News.
Immediately after the eleciton, Ruddy parroted the Trump line by repeating his "concern" that Democrats were stealing the election and noting that Newsmax had not called Arizona for Biden the way Fox News did, which he portrayed as "media malpractice." From there, Newsmax was taking shots at its much bigger rival while also engaging in self-promotion. For instance:
Newsmax has also been baskinginattentionfrom other media outlets over its Trump-raised profile. It's also brought speculation that someone else could buy it and turn it into a Trump-centric media channel, leading Ruddy to declare that "Newsmax would never become ‘Trump TV,'" though that's what it effectively is already. As Mediaite noted in an interview with Ruddy: "While Ruddy insists Newsmax is a news network and not Trump TV, its current success is mostly based on telling viewers that there is credence to Trump’s false claims he won the election until it was stolen." But he also made sure to flatter his friend, saying on Newsmax TV that a "Trump TV" channel would be successful.
There's also been some backlash to all the attention. A Mediaite commentary called out Ruddy's friendship with the Clintons (though, as we've noted, this hasn't stopped Newsmax from attacking the Clintons), donated tpo other Democratic candidates, and (gasp!) doesn't reflexively despise George Soros.
All in all, it's an interesting time to be Christopher Ruddy right now.
If smirky Newsmax columnist James Hirsen was complaining about "moral projection" before the presidential election, it's fair to say that the pro-Trump writer was clearly engaging in amoral projection afterwards.
Hirsen went all-in on election fraud conspiracy theories in his Nov. 9 column, falsely declaring that "Last minute rule changes, software glitches, count halts, ballot dumps, and statistical anomalies made their ugly appearances this election-go-round, all to the benefit of one party only" (italics in original). As a purported example of this, he claimed: "In Michigan, Democratic presidential candidate Biden at one point received a block of 138,000 votes. Nearly all of the votes added to his tally. This is a statistical impossibility." In fact, that was a typo that was quickly fixed.
Hirsen also asserted:
Dominion Democracy Suite software was used for tabulating ballots in Michigan’s Antrim County. A reported "glitch" caused at least 6,000 Republican votes to be counted as Democrat votes, according to Michigan GOP Chairwoman Laura Cox.
When corrected, the miscalculation, which was first reported by a county clerk, changed the results of the county from candidate Biden to President Trump.
Forty-seven other counties in Michigan may also have suffered a similar glitch, due to the same software. If each of these counties, when corrected, were to have a switch-over of 6,000 votes, it would result in President Trump receiving 282,000 additional votes, likely changing Michigan’s election results.
In fact, the "glitch" was a human error, not a problem with the Dominion software, and nothing similar happened in the 65 other Michigan counties (not 47, as Hirsen claimed) that used Dominion software.
Hirsen was still in conspiracy-theory mode in his Nov. 16 column, demanding that states override the popular vote and get Trump re-elected:
Despite repetitive denials emanating from a multitude of Democratic and media sources, it's clear that there has been unprecedented and widespread voter fraud as it relates to the all-important 2020 presidential election.
Although several lawsuits have been filed and are in the process of being adjudicated, the ultimate antidote for the toxin that has infected our electoral system does not rest in a state or federal judiciary.
Instead it rests in the state legislature.
[...]
President Trump’s supporters need to keep the faith — in the Constitution, in the truth, and in him.
Hirsen got all emo in his Nov. 23 column by couching his conspiracy theories in what he insisted was a "dark night of the soul" for America:
In essence, half the population is now being told to reject what they have seen with their own eyes, heard with their own ears, and know in their own hearts; that on election night, the vote counting of several states was halted, with no explanation given.
When it once again commenced, suddenly there were massive quantities of votes that came in for the Democratic presidential candidate.
In congressional, state, and local races, voters turned away from Democratic candidates, yet they still managed to vote for the Democratic candidate for president.
In record numbers, Black Americans chose the Republican candidate.
Nevertheless, the Democratic presidential candidate somehow received 11 million more votes than former President Barack Obama did in 2008.
[...]
And the same people who spread false information about Russia-gate and Ukraine-gate are now urging folks to move on, claiming that there is nothing to investigate and that the American people should graciously accept their candidate of choice.
First: Those "record numbers" of Black voters for Trump still meant that only 8 percent of Black voters voted for him. 92 percent did not.
Second: there are more Americans than there were in 2008 and 2012, and many of them were motivated to vote against Trump, so it makes sense that Biden got more votes than Obama.
Hirsen tried to end on an optimistic note: "What follows the lowest of low points is an unexpected breakthrough that enables the protagonist to overcome seemingly impossible odds and secure victory. I like to think of it as 'The Bright Light of the Spirit.'" The problem, of course, is that he believes that the dishonest, amoral, reality-denying Trump is the protagonist.
Huh? Newsmax Columnist Wants Child-Sex-Trafficking Suspect Released On Bail Topic: Newsmax
Yes, Jonna Spilbor spends an entire Oct. 27 Newsmax column demanding that Ghislaine Maxwell -- alleged co-conspirator with convicted child sex trafficking criminal Jeffrey Epstein -- be released on bail, complaining that she's being held under "unusually restrictive, if not punitive, conditions":
As a lawyer who has analyzed, written extensively about, and provided commentary on a national scale for many a high-profile case — including those with serious sex crime components (Michael Jackson, Kobe Bryant, the Duke Lacrosse case, Bill Cosby and most recently, and Harvey Weinstein) this harsher-than-most handling of Maxwell’s case immediately struck me as beyond odd.
In an era where we witness routinely a veritable parade of high-profile defendants marching into their arraignments with lawyers on their arms after breakfast, and marching out with GPS monitors on their ankles before lunch, why is Ms. Maxwell not being afforded the same constitutional deference as so many her other famous predecessors?
It's a more than fair question.
Her treatment in the legal arena thus far has been anything but equitable.
Perhaps the most glaring anomaly in this case, is the judge’s decision to lock Maxwell up, pre-trial, with no opportunity for pre-trial release, as if her guilt is a foregone conclusion.
A dangerous proposition for anyone who appreciates the presumption of innocence.
I know I do. You should too.
Spilbor handwaved the idea that Maxwell should be seen as a flight risk by declaring, "A person who’s on society’s outrage meter can’t go to a local diner without being detected. Besides, we have the technology to tether defendants inside any jurisdiction." Except that the vast majority of Americans couldn't pick Maxwell out of a lineup, and she would be unlikely to be out and about anyway.
Spilbor then tried to make the case that Maxwell could very well be innocent while also playing the blame-the-victim card by complaining that some accusers have allegedly "procured very visible opportunities" to tell their stories:
In a case where the central allegations are nearly three decades old and supported, if at all, by the untested credibility of the accusers themselves, denying Maxwell any meaningful pre-trial opportunity to push back against these accusations and the motivations behind them — which will necessarily include, like it or not, questioning the veracity of those who have provided evidence to be used against her — represents a complete deprivation of due process.
Add to that, the fact that numerous women — possibly including one or more of the anonymous accusers in the criminal case, although your guess is as good as Maxwell’s —have procured very visible opportunities with Netflix, and other media outlets, to publicly tell their stories, while prosecutors simultaneously implore the judge to keep the accusers’ identities under wraps, renders the decisions made from the bench thus far not merely detrimental, but absurd.
[...]
We must keep in mind an arrest marks the beginning, not the end in the judicial process.
Ghislaine Maxwell is not guilty. Not yet, anyway.
And have we considered, maybe not ever?
While defendants do indeed have rights in America, perhaps going to the mat for someone who -- regardless of what her guilt is ultimately ajudicated to be -- has had clear and close contacts with a convicted child sex trafficker is perhaps not the smart thing for Spilbor to do.
AAPS' Dubious Doc Shills For Trump And HCQ, Attacks Fauci Topic: Newsmax
Dubious doctor Jane Orient of the fringe-right Association of American Physicians and Surgeons spent her Oct. 28 Newsmax column touting President Trump's "America First Healthcare Plan" -- despite the fact that it's not an actual replacement for the Affordable Care Act and Trump hasn't really tried to implement it beyond a few executive orders -- and fearmongering about what she claims Joe Biden will do to healthcare.
Orient also gushed over how Trump "mentioned hydroxychloroquine (HCQ) favorably" as a treatment for coronavirus -- not a surprise, since we last saw her touting a fake study purporting to defend the efficacy of the drug --But she didn't mention that Trump apparently did not take HCQ during his recent bout with the virus.
Also unsurprisingly, Orient attacked Dr. Anthony Fauci for committing the sin of insisting on rigorous medical standards:
Dr. Anthony Fauci has been very negative about early COVID-19 treatment as "unproved," and Biden has declared Trump as being "totally irresponsible" for taking HCQ for a time until last May.
At age 80, Dr. Fauci himself may not be in his position much longer, but he exemplifies the mindset of federal bureaucracies.
He was in charge early in the AIDS epidemic. In 1987, when patients were dying of pneumocystis pneumonia, activists pleaded with Dr. Fauci to issue guidance that suggested prophylactic treatment with Bactrim, a safe sulfa drug, based on studies done in transplant patients in 1977.
Dr. Fauci refused, insisting on the "gold standard" of randomized controlled trials (RCTs).
Since the National Institutes of Health refused to fund trials, activists raised the money themselves. By the time the results were ready, two years later, 17,000 patients had died needlessly. Since efforts to develop an HIV/AIDS vaccine have so far failed, the standard of care is now pre-exposure and post-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP and PEP).
In a 2020 re-play with COVID-19, Dr. Fauci disregards the experience of thousands of physicians who treat patients worldwide, demanding RCTs.
In referencing Fauci and AIDS, Orient is parroting an attack from Harvey Risch, a Yale professor turned HCQ obsessive. But Risch's advocacy has been discredited.
One of Newsmax's most prominent voices in promoting bogus election fraud conspiracy theories has been columnist Michael Dorstewitz. In a Nov. 16 column, for instance, he uncritically repeated Rudy Giuliani's claim that voting-tech company Dominion "actually is a company owned by two Venezuelans that's been in business for about 20 years and been disqualified in so many places it would make your head spin." That's not true, and it's one of the claims Newsmax had to walk back in an attempt to avoid getting sued for defamation by Dominion and another voting tech company, Smartmatic.
Smirky Newsmax columnist James Hirsen has become 
Calling someone a "Manchurian candidate" has been a reliable form of attack by right-wingers against political candidates they don't like. 
Newsmax CEO Christopher Ruddy began his Dec. 20 
While Newsmax has gotten increased attention as a Trump loyalist, it's also received attention of the negative kind as well: lawsuits and threats of lawsuits over its content. But Newsmax is largely hiding that from its readers.
Last week, Newsmax was among right-wing media outlets who 
Dick Morris
Despite years of 
Throughout 2020, Newsmax has 
Dubious doctor 
