CNS Feeling The Need To Once Again Exploit Chicago Crime For Political Purposes Topic: CNSNews.com
The last time we checked on CNSNews' sporadic, agenda-driven obsession with violence in Chicago, it had spent last summer touting it. Despite that emphasis -- and despite the need to portray Donald Trump as a law-and-order president and get him re-elected -- CNS didn't do much with Chicago as the election got closer. A Sept. 9 article by Susan Jones touted how an initiative launched under Trump-appointed Attorney General William Barr called Operation Legend that "dispatched more than one thousand skilled federal agents to Chicago and eight other cities to fight violent crime" was allegedly a success," with Jones uncritically writing:
"Operation Legend's success is perhaps most dramatic here in Chicago," Barr continued. "When the operation was announced on July 22, homicides in the city were up 51 percent over 2019. Over the previous weekend, more than 60 people had been shot in Chicago with over a dozen fatalities.
"Other violent crime, including looting and rioting, was increasing also. And the signs pointed to the problem getting even worse with the campaign to demonize and defund the police gaining traction, and criminals increasingly believing they could operate with impunity."
Barr said federal agents and grant money, working in partnership with local law enforcement, have now made more than 500 arrests in Chicago, and of those, 124 people face federal charges. "Many of those defendants are now detained pending trial rather than causing harm on the streets."
Barr said in the first five weeks of Operation Legend in Chicago, murders dropped by 50 percent over the previous five weeks. August saw a 45 percent decrease in murders compared to July and a 35 percent decrease compared to June.
"The bottom line is that Operation Legend has played a critical role in cutting Chicago’s murder rate roughly in half since before the operation."
Managing editor Michael W. Chapman -- the leader of the Chicago obsession -- did only one body-count article before the eleciton, an Oct. 13 article stating that "Although the national media largely ignore the rampant gun violence in the Windy City, the local media in Chicago reported that 53 people were shot, five fatally, over this past weekend (Oct. 9-12)."Chapman did not mention Barr's Operation Legend, which supposedly cut crime in Chicago.
Chicago crime wasn't mentioned again for seven months. Now, with Joe Biden as president, Chapman could implicitly blame him. He wrote an April 13 article:
According to the Chicago Tribune, which maintains an extensive database on homicide and death by gunfire, at least 585 blacks were killed in the last 365 days in the Windy City. These homicides far exceed the number of Hispanics killed (71), whites (43), and Asians (2) in the last 365 days.
In addition, The Tribune reports that 155 blacks have been killed so far in 2021, which is the highest number for the first three months of a year since 2017.
[...]
Also during the last 365 days, there were 203 homicides which involved death by shooting.
On top of that, 585 blacks were homicide victims during the last 365 days. The data show that most of the homicide victims are in their 20s and 30s.
Unsurprisingly, Chapman didn't mention the Trump administration's Operation Legend, which supposedly solved this issue.Also: Isn't the Tribune part of the evil "liberal media" that CNS and its parent, the Media Research Center, trash for a living? Chapman didn't explain why he considers this "liberal media" source to be credible.
Chapman served up more body counts in an April 21 article that began by noting that "Over the weekend in Chicago, at least 27 people were shot, three of whom died, including a 7-year-old girl who was sitting with her father in a car at a McDonald's drive-thru when she was killed." It was again based on Tribune reports. Chapman followed with an April 28 article: "4 people were killed and 21 wounded in shootings. The majority of the homicides in Chicago are the result of gun volence, according to the Chicago Tribune, and the "majority of the victims of homicide in Chicago are young, black men."
Chapman inexplicably took a week off -- perhaps there weren't enough shootings for him to write an article about -- but retuirned on May 11:
Chicago experienced another violent weekend with 26 shootings, 5 of which were fatal, according to the Chicago Sun-Times. As homicide data show, the majority of victims in Chicago are young, black men. In the last 365 days (through May 10), 590 black Chicagoans have been killed, reported the Chicago Tribune.
Isn't the Sun-Times also part of the "liberal media" too? Apparently, if the numbers are right -- and can be exploited for political purposes -- they're suddenly trustworthy too.
MRC Cheers How Fox News Advances Right-Wing Talking Points Topic: Media Research Center
The Media Research Center is essentially the PR arm for Fox News, so it loves to reward the channel for giving copious play to the right-wing narratives it so loves (though it will never out-and-out state that it's rewarding it pedding right-wing propaganda). Nicholas fondacaro wrote in a March 18 post:
It had been days since the evening newscasts of ABC, CBS, and NBC delivered any kind of substantive follow-up to Democratic New York Governor Andrew Cuomo’s nursing homes deaths and cover-up scandal, even as new damning information developed. This was not the case for the Fox News Channel’s Special Report as they aired an exclusive interview on Thursday with a nursing home administrator who sat in on phone conferences in which Cuomo was consigning many elderly folks to death.
Throughout the day, Fox News had aired portions on other news shows. And it’s common for the broadcast networks to use such clips from each other to pad out their programming. This was not the case Thursday, as all three of them gushed about President Biden calling Russian President Vladimir Putin a “killer.”
In stark contrast, Fox News correspondent Aishah Hasnie spoke to an insider who wanted to speak out about Cuomo’s disastrous leadership. “Michael Kraus is the administrator of Silver Lake Specialized Care Center in Staten Island, New York. And for the first time, he and his team are telling us what really happened behind closed doors when Governor Andrew Cuomo issued that controversial March 25 order,” she reported.
The headline on Fondacaro's piece? "Real Journalism." Of course, he thinks anything on Fox News that goes into own-the-libs mode is "real journalism."
The next day, Joseph Vazquez gushed at how sibling channel Fox Business "wasn't having it" on the Biden administration's statements on tax hikes by uncritically putting forward right-wing financial types to attack it:
Forbes Media Chairman Steve Forbes agreed with DeAngelis and said that the tax hike on “families” was the “first of the many taxes to come when they do that next reconciliation bill where they’re going to have massive tax increases.” Forbes said the tax hikes would include the “very destructive capital gains tax.” In addition, Forbes warned about Democrats trying “to ease the restrictions on state and local tax deductions. So, they’ll raise the rates more, but allow more deductions. [It’s] another way of bailing out people who are living in the [badly managed] blue states.”
Forbes lambasted the leftist tax agenda: “Big tax increases, convoluting the code and hurting economic growth. All this happy talk about ‘great economy ahead,’ I take it with a grain of salt.”
[Correspondent Jackie] DeAngelis turned to Strategic Wealth Partners CEO Mark Tepper: “Mark, you did talk about the capital gains tax and how that could impact the markets as well.” She continued: “[Raising taxes on families] would certainly impact the markets because it would come down to families, households — have less money to spend, they have less money to put into the economy, um, and they’re going to have to sort of really pull and shore up those budgets. That impacts people.”
Under the headline "This Is How You Do It," Brad Wilmouth declared on April 2:
In a Wednesday morning segment debunking just some of the left's lies about the Georgia voting law, the Fox News Channel again demonstrated for consumers why the network not only delivers important information (while others parrot leftist propaganda), but clean-up in the ratings.
For this instance, Fox & Friends co-host Brian Kilmeade brought on Governor Brian Kemp (R-GA) to methodically walk through some of the left's false claims, including their disinformation campaign around topics such as early voting and access to food and water while waiting in line.
Unlike if he had appeared before some belligerent CNN or MSNBC host, Kemp was allowed to explain that anyone can still supply water or food to voters as long as they stay outside a minimum distance from both the polling place and the voters. After Kilmeade explained that poll workers can still have refreshments at the polls, Kemp recalled that, in fact, anyone can do so at the proper distance:
Yes, Wilmouth was quite happy that Fox News let Kemp spread his talking points without challenge. Oh, and that boast of Fox News cleaning up in the ratings was linked to a Fox News press release, as a good Fox News lackey would.
In a headline blaring "Instead of Going With Dem Word Games Like Lib Media, Fox Calls Them Out," Fondacaro cheere: "During Tuesday’s edition of Special Report, Fox congressional correspondent Jacqui Heinrich walked viewers through how Democratic lawmakers were twisting and perverting the English language to fit their political machinations. This support for words have meaning ran counter to the liberal media, who just didn’t go along with the Orwellian redefining of words but actively took part and promoted it." Speaking of Orwellian, we don't recall Fondacaro getting upset at Fox News redefining "fair and balanced" as promotion of right-wing talking points.
Fondacaro gave Fox News another cookie for essentially repeating the MRC mission statement on April 14:
It’s become obvious to most people paying attention over the past four to five years that the liberal media had become activists consumed by their hatred of President Trump; it’s a fact that’s indisputable. And ever since Joe Biden became President, the liberal media had shifted their focus towards beating down all Republicans and gaslighting their viewers into thinking they’re the enemy. Well, on Wednesday’s Special Report, Fox News media analyst Howard Kurtz walked viewers through the media’s schemes.
“Tonight, we take a closer look at what appears to many viewers to be a seismic and long-term shift left on the part of the mainstream media. So, is it happening? And, if so, what are the reasons and the ramifications,” anchor Bret Baier teased at the top of the segment. The segment itself was very detailed as Kurtz showcased the liberal media’s favoritism for Democrats at different levels.
Kurtz -- and, thus, Fondacaro -- didn't explain why Fox News isn't considered "mainstream media" despite the fact that, as Fondacaro's co-worker Wilmouth pointed out, it regularly cleans up in the ratings, nor did they explain why Fox News shouldn't be held just as accountable for its heavy right-wing bias.
Wilmouth returned to gush on April 15: On Wednesday, Fox News Channel again demonstrated that it's keeping people well-informed about important issues while other networks were spreading misinformation. At 6:07 am, Fox & Friends host Brian Kilmeade explained that the accidental shooting of 20-year-old Daunte Wright in Minnesota was a "tragedy," but he had a serious crime on his arrest warrant."
It's almost as if the MRC is on the Fox News payroll.
CNS Complained About Slow U.S. Sanctions Against Russia -- But Barely Reported On Them When They Happened Topic: CNSNews.com
CNSNews.com's coverage of Russia has become oddly anti-American under President Biden. Patrick Goodenough served up another example, complaiing in an April 14 article:
The Biden administration has been pledging “costs” and “consequences” for malign Russian behavior for several months but at a time when a large troop buildup on Ukraine’s borders has sent tensions soaring, a senior State Department official on Tuesday called for patience, while suggesting that steps may be coming soon.
“Be patient,” the official told reporters accompanying Secretary of State Antony Blinken on a visit to Brussels dominated by the crisis. “Stay tuned.”
On the day of President Biden’s inauguration the White House announced that he had tasked the intelligence community to carry out a review of Russian actions including hacking, election interference, the attempted assassination of dissidents, and allegations of bounties offered on the lives of U.S. troops in Afghanistan.
Since then administration officials have repeatedly cited the review, asserting that there will be consequences for Moscow’s damaging actions.
The Biden administration announced sanctions against Russia the very next day -- but Goodenough did not see fit to devote a story to that. Instead, it was given only passing mention in an article in which the headline was that the administration admitted “low to moderate confidence” in a claim that Russia had offered terrorists bounties to kill U.S. troops in Afghanistan which "Joe Biden repeatedly flayed President Trump over the allegations" during the presidential campaign, hyping how "White House press secretary Jen Psaki on Thursday dodged a question on whether the president now regrets that." OF course, Goodenough didn't mention others have pointed out that "low to moderate confidence" in the story does not necessarily mean it was false, and paying bounties to kill U.S. soldiers is not exactly out of character for Putin's Russia.
In between, Goodenough wrote an article featuring how "Russia is “working actively” to move away from the U.S. dollar and Western payment systems, Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said during a visit to Iran this week" -- thus implicitly blaming Biden for the situation. But later in the artiucle, he admitted that "Russia has been pivoting away the dollar since 2014, when the U.S. and many European governments targeted senior Russian officials and sectors of the Russian economy for sanctions in response to Moscow’s annexation of Crimea and support for separatists in eastern Ukraine," while also adding that "some economists have argued in recent years that Washington’s sanctions policies could weaken the dollar’s global leadership in the long run."
That's some severe anti-Biden bias happening at the MRC.
NEW ARTICLE: Joseph Farah Loves The Big Lie Topic: WorldNetDaily
The WorldNetDaily editor is clinging so fiercely to bogus election fraud conspiracies that he has even thrown his own daughter -- who worked in the Trump administration -- under the bus. Read more >>
MRC Obsesses Over Farakhan Link To Capitol Attack -- But Wouldn't Identify Massacre Suspect As Christian Topic: Media Research Center
The Media Research Center was quick to seize on alleged links between Noah Green, who struck and killed a Capitol Police officer with his car before he was shot and killed, and Nation of Islam leader Louis Farrakhan. Kristine Marsh huffed in an April 5 post:
The media quickly lose interest in investigating the political beliefs of murderers if they don’t happen to be right-wing white guys. Last Friday afternoon, a black man who called himself a follower of Nation of Islam leader Louis Farrakhan, rammed his car into the Capitol building barricades, killing one police officer and injuring another. But on this morning’s broadcasts, both NBC and CBS completely omitted that inconvenient detail.
After months of wailing over fears of right-wing extremism, NBC and CBS couldn’t be bothered to note the radical beliefs of the attacker. Instead, both networks used their reports to fret about the January 6 attack and push for more fencing around the Capitol.
Marsh did update her post to note that NBC later "decided to take note of Green's radical views."
Tim Graham complained on April 8 that the Washington Post didn't give Green's link to Farrakhan link the prominence he demanded: "So there are only three stories that mentioned Green's fandom for Farrakhan -- it was never mentioned in a headline, and was routinely buried in late paragraphs on an inside page. That's how you downplay an angle you do not like one bit." Graham offered no evidence that the angle was deliberately downplayed.
GHraham returned on April 18 to complain further -- and to implicitly defend a participant at the Jan. 6 pro=Trump Capitol riot:
On Friday's NBC Nightly News, they focused on recent political violence against the Capitol Police, but they were obviously more interesting in tagging the "far right" for recent violence, and not the "far left." When the April 2 Capitol cop killing came up, the assailant Noah Green was not named, and his love for Louis Farrakhan was also spiked.
Lester Holt touted “a milestone today in the investigation of the deadly riot at the US Capitol, the first guilty plea.” He turned to NBC Justice Department correspondent Pete Williams, and they were naming names and applying labels.
In a brief report, Williams reported "It was a member of the far-right Oath Keepers who has agreed to tell investigators what he knows" about the January 6 Capitol riot. John Schaffer of Indiana, 53, pleaded guilty to entering the Capitol with bear spray and trying to obstruct the electoral vote count. The government dropped a charge of assaulting Capitol Police with the spray." Schaffer called himself a "founding life member" of the Oath Keepers, Williams underlined.
[...]
Schaffer may have shown criminal intent in his behavior on January 6 but he didn't kill a Capitol Police officer. But he was named, and Noah Green was not.
Graham omitted the fact that, unlike the Oath Keepers with Schaffer or any other Capitol riot participant, the Nation of Islam disavowed Green's actions -- which Graham knows happened because he repeated it in his April 8 post while complaining that the Washington Post "allowed the Nation of Islam to defend itself intensely."
Speaking of inconvenient facts, there's one thing you won't find at the MRC: a post identifying Robert Aaron Long, the suspect in the Atlanta massacre that killed eight people -- six of them Asian -- as a Christian, even though he was an active member of an evangelical Christian church. The church kicked him out after the shooting, but it has not spoken about the church's beliefs that may have led him to commit the massacre. On the other hand, the MRC did try to deny the very existence of anti-Asian hate crimes in the wake of the massacre.
CNS' Jones Still Complaining Trump's Mental Health Was Questioned Topic: CNSNews.com
CNSNews.com has spent thepast year pushing the malicious right-wing narrative that President Biden is purportedly suffering from "cognitive decline." Now that he's president, CNS has been shamelessly pushing that smear every chance it can, making him look as bad and senile as it can by pulling incidents out of context:
And CNS' big headline from Biden's March 25 press conference was that he purportedly suffered a "four-second mental meltdown," whatever that is.
All of which makes an April 19 article by Susan Jones doubly petulant. nShe started by complaining: "At the end of a joint interview with Senators John Cornyn (R-Texas) and Chris Coons (D-Del.) on Sunday, 'Fox News Sunday' host Chris Wallace cornered Cornyn for questioning whether President Joe Biden is 'really in charge.'" After lamenting that "Cornyn was defensive" in his response by denying he was questioning Biden's mental health, she huffed: "Message to viewers: It's not okay to question Biden's mental competency when it was not only okay -- it was imperative -- for Democrat [sic] partisans to question President Donald Trump's."
By that standard, Jones and her CNS co-workers are Republican partisans because they apparentluy believe it's imperative to question Biden's "cognitive decline," given all the articles they have published on it.
Jones, by the way, is bizarrely sensitive about people questioning Trump's mental health, even though there was ample evidence to do so. In August she groused, "Liberal activists in the media are now focusing in particular on Trump's mispronunciations ("Yosemite") and twisting his words ("It is what it is") to make it look like he doesn't grasp the severity of the pandemic, for example. The intent is to portray Trump as cognitive impaired." And her April 19 article contains a like to a 2017 article she wrote complaining that MSNBC's Joe Scarborough went on an "anti-Trump diatribe" staing thim "to be mentally unfit for office and in the early stages of dementia."
Jones appears to be conceding that, by her own definition, she's a Republican activist, not a reporter, and it's never OK for a CNS employee to question Trump's mental heatlh.
MRC Throws 'Whore' Slur At CBS -- Despite Its Own Whorish Behavior Topic: Media Research Center
We've noted how the Media Research Center likes to slur media outlets as "whores" for doing the same kind of promotional things for corporate siblings that the MRC's own "news" outlet, CNSNews.com, does for its parent org (yet our use of the word has put us in Twitter jail). It has done so again, but for a slightly different reason.
An April 6 item by Scott Whitlock carries the headline "CBS WHORES Out for Crony Capitalism, Backs Biden Billions to Electric Cars in 'Infrastructure'." He went on to rant:
CBS This Morningon Tuesday went all in on the billion dollar boondoggle for electric cars in Joe Biden’s “infrastructure” bill. With no explanation of just how expensive this part of the plan is, the journalists backed the idea of GM (with the heavy hand of the government) switching to all electric by 2035.
Co-host Gayle King cheered, “Part of President Biden's infrastructure bill would help people buy greener electric cars which you know are more expensive. General Motors plans to stop making gas-powered cars by 2035.” Reporter Ben Tracy gushed, "The tail pipe is an endangered species."
He parroted, “Automakers are also counting on the federal government. President Biden's infrastructure plan calls for 500,000 EV charging stations across the country by 2030.”
Of course, by his own definition, Whitlock is a whore because he's parroting right-wing talking points in the service of his employer and the larger conservative movement, for which he receives payment (which, of course, makes him closer to an actual whore than CBS). His insistence of imposing motives on CBS' reporting where there may not be any is a form of whoredom as well. And for all his whining about "crony capitalism," we're pretty sure Whitlock didn't care as much when the cronies were part of a Republican-led government.
Meanwhile, CNS has contined to whore itself out for its owner by serving up even more stenography of its boss:
This kind of whoredom, of course, is the entire reason CNS exists. Do you really think Bozell and Co. are interested in running a truly independent, fair and balanced "news" operation?
WorldNetDaily editor Joseph Farah haslongembraced bogus election conspiracy theories, so it's no surprise that he's all in favor of the Republican-driven recount in Maricopa County, Ariz., as expressed in his April 23 column:
They're busy counting votes in Arizona, again.
You might recall this was the state that was called early on election night by the Fox News team – but took days to reveal a "victory" by Joe Biden by 10,000 votes of 3.2 million supposedly cast. Why were they so sure?
Oh, and for the record, there were no illegal alien votes disqualified. None! They were not searched for. Neither were the voter rolls cleaned. And don't forget about the people who went to the polls and were told, "You've already voted. You're not eligible."
If you believe that, you probably voted for Joe Biden because he was the most articulate, most prescient, most lucid, most visionary, most capable presidential candidate in American history.
It's just that some voters in Arizona are stubborn. They can't believe that Biden got some 81 million votes nationwide in the election, more than Donald J. Trump's 74 million and Barack Obama's 69 million. He did this without campaigning! He got just enough votes to outpoll the most popular president and beloved leader ever.
Farah offered no evidence that anyone in Arizona went to the polls and was told they already voted.
HE went on to assert that "Republicans have chosen an independent firm called Cyber Ninjas, a Florida-based cybersecurity company" to run the audit -- but Cyber Ninjas is not "independent" at all, given that its CEO has been spreading the same kind of elecction conspiracy theories Farah has.
Farah also claimed, "And just so no one will be disappointed by the results, the audit will be livestreamed for public viewing, and officials say there will be 24-7 private security inside and outside of the Veterans Memorial Coliseum in Phoenix throughout the process." In fact, the audit has been far from transparent; it took a court order to force Cyber Ninjas to make its policies and procedures public, violations on pen color usage were found, it wasn't until days after the audit started that journalists were granted full access to it, and reporters are being barred from observing the audit for specious accusations like a tweet deemed to be objectionable.
Still, Farah ranted:
Why would we want to know the truth? How could we not insist on knowing the truth?
Was Joe Biden's win legitimate, or was Donald Trump robbed? We must know!
[...]
This may be the beginning … of getting to the truth.
This may be the beginning … of getting our country back!
IN his April 28 column, Farah defended the audit from critics such as Rachel Maddow:
So what is Rachel Maddow afraid of? Is she afraid that we're going to overturn the whole national election? Or is she afraid we might learn how they perpetrated the biggest election fraud ever? And what are the hosts and guests on CNN and other networks afraid of? Why are they resorting to hysteria, rage, insanity?
And why is Fox News not even paying attention to the Arizona audit? Why are they pretending nothing is happening here?
Something's happening here, all right.
Ordinary Americans are holding their leaders accountable. Nay, they are being leaders, and they are going to continuing being leaders. They realize we don't have any choice in our system of government. This is the state of our nation we've been left with.
As criticism mounted of the audit -- to the point that even the Justice Department has expressed concerns about it -- Farah used his May 7 column to, um, conterintuitively claim that all the criticism means the audit is being run perfectly, or something:
It seems the Justice Department wants to be sure no one uncovers proof of shenanigans in the election of 2020. Why?
Because Cyber Ninja may engage in rooting it out by personally canvassing voters – looking for actual fraud. For instance, the suspicion is that illegal votes were cast by voters registered to certain addresses. The Justice Department does not want Cyber Ninja to ask them about the addresses, because this supposedly would be construed as "voter intimidation."
The Justice Department did not want to conduct the investigation – and they sure don't want anyone else conducting one.
Hmmm.
Who else opposes the audit?
How about every Democrat you can think of.
What do they have in common? They all know that the fraud will be uncovered and ultimately send Joe Biden packin'.
That's not the case in the short term. The hand count will not change the results because officials in the states have already certified them. Sen. Fann insisted that the audit is meant to restore trust in the system and influence changes to the law.
But President Donald Trump has celebrated the audit, insisting it will show Arizona was a "scam election" state. And this is what bugs the Democrats. He'll likely be running for the president in 2024, and if cheating occurred, it won't be Republicans to blame.
This is the kind of thing that only makes sense in Farah's conspiracy-addled brain.
MRC Psaki-Bashing, Doocy-Fluffing Watch Topic: Media Research Center
How has Media Research Center writer Curtis Houck been attacking White House press secretary Jen Psaki and man-crushing on hostile Fox News reporter Peter Doocy since the last time we checked? Let's find out!
Fox News White House correspondent Peter Doocy joined the Briefing Room rotation on Friday to cap off another whirlwind week and, as the fourth reporter called on during Press Secretary Jen Psaki’s Q&A, he brought up President Biden’s past opposition to court-packing (as he seems to be moving toward doing just that) and the latest headlines from the Biden border crisis.
And on the courts, Doocy got a key assist from none other than CNN chief White House correspondent Kaitlan Collins.
Doocy started with the Supreme Court and brought up comments Biden made in 1983 in light of Biden’s appointing of a commission to study court reform (which should be read as nothing more than a leftist power grab).
When he brought up 1983 before his question, Psaki interjected with a weak dad joke about how she was impressed with Doocy’s trip aboard the “time back machine.”
Weird how Houck believed that Kayleigh McEnany could be as snarky as she wanted to be, while Psaki gets shut downb for allegedly making a "weak dad joke." It's almost as if his severe right-wing bias influences these posts of his.
On April 12, Houck didn't have to man-crush on Doocy because "New York Magazine correspondent Olivia Nuzzi put Press Secretary Jen Psaki on the defensive as she asked about whether the Biden administration’s continued mask usage despite having been vaccinated and discouragement of social interaction has contributed to vaccine hesitancy." Houck failed to mention that one of the groups with the largest rate of vaccine hestiancy is Republican men, who likely aren't taking their cues from Biden.
Houck whined of the April 15 briefing that "Thursday’s White House press briefing quickly devolved into a predictable pattern of near emptiness in terms of answers from Press Secretary Jen Psaki, who ducked questions on issues such as the debunked Russian bounties story, the Johnson & Johnson coronavirus vaccine, and her party’s attempt to pack the Supreme Court." Of course, Houck loved when that "emptiness" from the podium emanated from McEnany.
Houck grew outraged that pressers from both Biden and Psaki on April 16 didn't entertain hostile right-wing reporters -- and, because he's incapable of seeing anything in other than black-and-white terms, he pushed the MRC narrative that if hyou're not a hostile right-wing reporter like Doocy, you're a pro-Biden sycophant:
The White House press corps has never been a fan of guns or the Second Amendment, so it was no surprise on Friday when multiple reporters hammered President Joe Biden and Press Secretary Jen Psaki from their left flank on gun control. In one instance, a reporter compared gun violence to the coronavirus pandemic and demanded their responses be of equal vigor.
Capping off his first foreign head-of-state visitor to the White House in Japanese Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga, Biden wrapped up his week with a brief, joint press conference with Suga (which followed the traditional two-and-two model of two reporters from each country’s press corps being called on).
[...]
ABC’s Maryalice Parks likewise sounded like someone from Everytown or the Giffords Center, expressing frustration with hearing Psaki<“talk over and over again about the President’s support of the House bills, but right now it just doesn’t seem like they’re — you guys have those votes in the Senate.”
Houck had a different hostile Fox News reporter to cheer on -- and even more sneering hatred of Psaki -- for the April 19 briefing:
White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki began her week with a briefing so bad that there’s no way to go but up. On Monday’s episode, Psaki arrived with a short fuse and clashed with multiple reporters over basic immigration questions, and blew a gasket at the Fox News Channel’s Kristin Fisher over the administration’s mixed messaging on the refugee cap.
Fisher started with an admission of confusion and an open invitation to clear things up on the White House’s flip-flopping on what number of foreign refugees could be allowed entry into the U.S.: “I’m still just a little bit confused about what changed between 1:00 pm. on Friday and around 4:30p.m. on Friday to go from, ‘We’re not raising the refugee cap to, we are raising it by May 15th.’ What – what changed in those three and a half hours?”
By then, Psaki had fielded numerous questions on it, but Fisher merely wanted the record corrected. Instead, Psaki claimed “we never said we’re not raising the refugee cap” and the administration had always been clear.
Fisher tried to interject, but Psaki demanded she be allowed to in order to reassert that there was never a doubt that they would maintain Trump immigration levels (though that’s exactly what they had said they would do).
Remember: In Houck's world, Fox News reporters are always right and Psaki is always wrong. That's because narratives are more important at the MRC than the truth is.
WND Censors Important Fact About Capitol Police Officer's Death At Riot Topic: WorldNetDaily
Joseph Farah wasn't the only WorldNetDaily person to omit important information about the medical examiner's report on the death of Capitol Police officer Brian Sicknick in order to keep right-wing narratives alive.
An anonymous WND staffer wrote in an April 19 article:
The chief medical examiner in Washington, D.C., says the death of Capitol Police Officer Brian Sicknick after the Jan. 6 riot was due to natural causes – complications from a stroke he suffered the day after the violence.
Democrats have blamed the crowd of mostly Trump-supporting activists who marched to the Capitol and broke in in protest of Congress' certification of Joe Biden's election victory.
The Washington Examiner reported Francisco Diaz, the chief medical examiner in D.C., told the Washington Post that Sicknick died after suffering two strokes.
He explained there was no allergic reaction to chemical irritants.
The 42-year-old officer died a day after the riot.
Capitol Police had blamed the protesters for the death, apparently without evidence.
This anonymous WND writer joined Farah in omitting the fact that the medical examiner also said that "all that transpired" at the Capitol riot "played a role in his condition." That can be interpreted as meaning that while no single incident from the riot directly caused Sicknick's death, the riot did contribute.
Such incomplete reporting doesn't boost confidence in the veracity of what WND publishes -- and, more importantly, doesn't make people want to republish what appears at WND, which is the goal of the WND News Center, its latest gambit to stay afloat.
In a letter to House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) and Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.), which was largely ignored by the left-wing media, more than 1,500 Orthodox rabbis explained that the pro-LGBT Equality Act "is a direct attack upon our religious values."
Further, Rabbi Avrohom Gordimer, chairman of the Coalition of Jewish Values' Rabbinic Circle, said "the law even explicitly rejects religious freedom as a defense, meaning it provides Anti-Semites with a new way to persecute the religious Jewish community.”
Chapman simply and lazily copied-and-pasted from the group's website to describe it: "According to its website, the Coalition for Jewish Values (CJV) 'represents over 1,500 traditional, Orthodox rabbis in matters of public policy.' The coalition 'advocates for classical Jewish ideas and standards in matters of American public policy. The CJV begins from the premise that something can be called an authentic Jewish value only if it is rooted in Biblical and Rabbinic teachings through millennia of Jewish history. Neither spurious references to 'Tikkun Olam' nor the use of Biblical verses plucked out of context transform personal views into Jewish tenets.'" No mention, of course, of the group's kneejerk right-wing Trumpism.
On April 9, Champan uncritically forwarded the group's assertion that "By deciding to renew funding for the Palestinian Authority and the United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA), the Biden administration is funding terrorism." Five days later, Chapman uncritically presented evidence of just how far-right the Coalition for Jewish Values is with its attack on the Anti-Defamation League for criticizing Tucker Carlson's turn to white supremacy:
In a letter to Anti-Defamation League CEO Jonathan Greenblatt, the Coalition for Jewish Values, which represents more than 1,500 traditional, Orthodox rabbis, strongly criticized the ADL leader for calling on Fox News Channel to fire conservative commentator Tucker Carlson for his alleged "white supremacist ideology."
The coalition also criticized the ADL for its apparently selective denunciation of anti-Semitism.
[...]
"Your recent attack on Tucker Carlson of Fox News, calling it 'white supremacist' to question whether particular policy choices enable illegal immigrants to nullify the votes of American citizens, is merely one example," reads the letter.
Interestingly, Chapman made no note of the evidence, if any, the group had to support its contention that Carlson isn't echoing white supremacy by invoking the "great replacement" theory that immigrants are replacing white people in the U.S. in order to make it more liberal -- an argument regularly invoked by white nationalists and white supremacists.
Chapman further promoted the group's endorsement of Carlson's racist conspiracy theory (and another attack on the ADL) in a May 10 commentary (surprisingly, labeled as such, not passed off as "news" as CNS typically likes to do):
The ADL "does not speak for Jews and no longer even is a Jewish organization," said Rabbi Dov Fischer, the Western Regional vice president of the CJV in an article for The American Spectator.
Rabbi Fischer also stressed that the Biden administration's immigration policy is designed precisely to allow as many illegal immigrants into the country as possible, as part of a decades-long policy, to "replace" American voters and secure a Democrat-majority electorate.
[...]
"Carlson is absolutely correct," wrote Rabbi Fischer, referencing a recent column by Jeffrey Lord in The American Spectator. "Voter 'replacement' is exactly, precisely what the Biden-Pelosi-Schumer Democrats now are endeavoring to do, with the U.S. Supreme Court's nine seats next in their sights."
"Of course we now are watching, before our very eyes, a concerted effort to replace the electorate that was electing Republicans," said the rabbi. "And look where newcomers are being sent, all those unaccompanied children who are wrapped up by Biden’s administration in aluminum foil and placed initially in Obama–Biden cages — places like San Diego, one of the last redoubts of conservatism in California, and Texas, the red state with the most electoral college votes. Understandably, North Dakota Gov. Kristi Noem has spoken out forcefully, telling Biden that she will not let her state be next."
"How can anyone objective not see what is happening?" he added. "The reason that Biden insists that the chaos at the border is not a 'crisis' is plain to see: it is planned chaos, aimed at overrunning the system to leave no choice but to move millions of future Democrat voters ultimately into states where they can turn those tides as they have in the American Southwest."
CNS also gave space to Moshe Parnes, the CJV's "southern regional vice president," for an April 27 column further whining about the situation on the border while gushing that how "under Trump, the border was—for all intents and purposes—finally secured."
And CNS' mission statement to "fairly present all legitimate sides of a story" takes another hit.
MRC Still Complaining That TV Cop Shows (Except 'Blue Bloods') Aren't Fawning Over Police Enough Topic: Media Research Center
The Media Research Center has been whining for months that TV cop shows are covering racial justice issues based on what's actually happening in the world instead of blindly parroting the right-wing narrative that the police are always right and it's unfair to make them out to be victims, like its favorite show "Blue Bloods" does. That hasn't stopped. Dawn Slusher served up a typical rant on March 6:
CBS’s Magnum P.I. reboot teased viewers in Friday night’s episode, “The Long Way Home,” by making it seem like they might follow in the footsteps of their fellow cop drama Blue Bloods and depict the unfair treatment police and their loved ones are facing in today’s anti-cop culture. But sadly, they not only dropped the ball, they kicked it out of the park by instead stating, “the system is broken,” and defending BLM activism, which has led to violence and riots, as “a form of patriotism.”
[...]
I guess it was too much to hope for there to be more than one show in Hollywood willing to defend the hard work, dedication, and sacrifice of the majority of good police officers.
On March 12, it took both Karen Townsend and Alexa Moutevelis to complain that an episode of "Chicago P.D." featured how "a black cop accuses his white partner of being racist while they work together on a police shooting case." They then attacked the actor who plays the black cop for stating that his job was to "his job is to "make black people look good" to white audiences," insisting "That was liberal-speak for convincing white people that they are all racists who must be re-educated.
Julia A. Seymour went after a hospital drama, "New Amsterdam," on March 24 for an episode in which a nurse said that police were “just a different kind of unsafe” than violent patients, declaring this to be "anti-cop." Four days later, she groused: "In order to show Chicago cops in the worst possible light, Showtime’s Shameless made up a rule observed by the police force – "We're here to serve and protect the rich," going on to sneer, "This is the last season of Shameless. Frankly, I don’t think it will be missed."
Anyone who thought Law & Order: Special Victims Unit was finished with kowtowing to Black Lives Matter will be severely disappointed. The latest episode of the NBC drama reminds that there’s always time to scold the police, just like there’s always time to call new voting laws racist.
[...]
Funny how when Portland and Minneapolis are set on fire by BLM and Antifa activists, Law & Order still finds time to have not one, not two, but three episodes warning viewers about white supremacists and other conspiracy groups. NBC does know they can criticize both, right?
Network television has officially jumped the shark in its desperate efforts to defend the domestic terrorist organization Black Lives Matter. This week on CBS's court drama Bull, an earnest defense attorney actually said with a straight face that BLM is "not opposed to the police."
[...]
Black Lives Matter protest slogans include "ACAB" ("All Cops Are Bastards") and “Fuck 12” ("Fuck the Police"). If those slogans are not "anti-law enforcement," I do not know what is. And considering that in 2019 the number of unarmed black men fatally shot by police in the United States was a total of 14 people in a country of 330 million, BLM was never really about addressing a supposed epidemic of evil cops targeting black men. BLM was a corporate shakedown operation that used terror to rake in billions for its founders and Democrat Party [sic] entities.
[...]
Violence does indeed follow BLM wherever it goes. Its "mostly peaceful protests" have left a tragic trail of billions of dollars in damage, dozens dead, and many more injured. Such violence is likely to continue in the coming months, especially with the George Floyd murder trial wrapping up and people like Rep. Maxine Waters (D-CA) encouraging more violence.
But Hollywood cannot dare let that truth come out of the mouths of its shows' main characters. The role of television heroes in 2020 and 2021 are to keep pushing the same lies that legacy media pushed all last year about BLM protests being "mostly peaceful." And as the gaslighting continues, more innocent communities will be terrorized while BLM founders buy more mansions.
Ehrhard returned to grouse on April 22 that "CBS's cop drama S.W.A.T. signaled to its audience this week that those who question critical race theory and the Black Lives Matter agenda are really white supremacists. ... As long as Hollywood continues playing these sort of games with their messaging, Americans will feel afraid to speak up about real issues that harm all Americans for fear of being lumped-in with genuine villains. This twisted media and entertainment tactic makes authentic dialogue in our country impossible." Of course, the MRC's knee-jerk binary narrative that all cops are good and all protesters against police brutality are violent and evil (see above Ehrhard screed) isn't exactly encouraging authentic dialogue.
But the MRC did find a couple shows in its normal (for right-wing activists) pro-cop, anti-BLM propaganda. Ehrhard gushed on April 8:
Could common sense actually be returning to network television cop shows? Are some Hollywood scriptwriters waking-up to the insanity of the left's radical anti-police activism?
CBS's normally BLM-friendly cop drama S.W.A.T called out the anti-police crowd's woke hypocrisy and unfairness in this week's episode, 'Sins of the Father,' on April 7. In the episode, quintessential good guy Sgt. Deacon Kay (Jay Harrington) was excited about his son's school career day. Deacon planned to speak to the kids about his work as a police officer. Then he got a call from his son's teacher telling him the parents do not want a cop presenting to their kids.
[...]
So while a show like S.W.A.T. has too often pushed BLM propaganda to placate the woke Hollywood powers that be, they deserve credit for sneaking in certain truths this time around.
Four days later, Ehrhard was back in her "Blue Bloods" safe space:
Throughout the 2020-21 television season, Blue Bloods has been the rare network cop show that has refused to kowtow to the woke BLM mob.
The show did it again this week with an episode that called-out politicians and media for condemning cops based on civilian complaints devoid of any context.
[...]
Wow, a show that asks the public to see the full picture and try to see the complex and dangerous situations police officers face every day. That is radical in an age when Black Lives Matter torches cities, vilifies officers and demands communities defund police departments.
[...]
Blue Bloods is a unique network show with a conservative star in which a close-knit family regularly gathers around the dinner table and says grace before eating. If it is not renewed, network television will mostly be left with woke cops shows that are now prone to seeing the boys in blue ;as the villains.
Larry Tomczak's Biden Derangement Syndrome Topic: WorldNetDaily
Joe Biden is in the Oval Office cockpit as Obama's docile lieutenant for the leftist policies of the radicalized Democratic Party. Did you know he has a weekly phone chat with socialist leaders Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren? As the undisputed head of the fawning Democrats, Barack and the team are integrally involved in the decision-making process as they hand off stacks of official-looking executive orders. Joe dutifully signs them at his desk flanked by ready media "reps" in photo-op positions.
Does he really know what he's signing? Did he read the record number of 28 executive orders he signed with lightning speed in his first days (almost more than FDR did in an entire month)? Anyone get the feeling someone is moving aggressively to make changes as fast as possible?
Adherents to the Democratic Party (like my parents who loved Truman and Kennedy) recognize the leftist metamorphosis of Joe Biden. They also fear he is in cognitive decline and not competent for the job.
I am not a medical authority, but I join scores of Americans who observe what's taking place and are uncomfortable as we come to grips with the reality that Mr. Biden is basically a figurehead "puppet" for those deliberately using him in his weakened state.
His handlers have worked tirelessly to shield "Hidin' Biden" from letting his guard down and being exposed in embarrassing situations. Everyone knows he was concealed for over 50 days in the basement during the campaign and finally gave a press conference. The State of the Union address has been dodged with the usual "COVID concerns."
[...]
Was the rough and ready Donald Trump an expression of God's mercy for our nation in our time of crisis? Was he similar to a Winston Churchill, whom God provided to stand courageously and help rescue people from the coming peril? Was there sufficient fraud in the 2020 election for Dems to rob it? Biden's middle name is Robinette - "robin' it." Interesting.
Here's the deal: The O'Biden team, is like a runaway freight train demolishing almost all of the policies of the pro-life, pro-family, pro-traditional marriage, pro-religious freedom Trump administration.
Instead of seizing the opportunity to rightfully pay tribute to America, our system of justice plus honor the outstanding work of the judge and jury in a fair trial that featured due process and meticulous investigation envied by much of the world, Mr. Biden engaged in a shameful indictment of our nation, insulting hundreds of millions of Americans. Former speaker of the House and statesman Newt Gingrich was stunned by his reckless rhetoric.
"It was murder in the full light of day, and it ripped the blinders off for the whole world to see the systemic racism the vice president just referred to – the systemic racism that is a stain on our nation's soul; the knee on the neck of justice for black Americans; the profound fear and trauma, the pain, the exhaustion that black and brown Americans experience every single day … tackle systemic misconduct in police departments, to restore trust between law enforcement and the people they are entrusted to serve and protect."
These words were a slap in the face to millions of Americans as he trashed the United States of America before the entire world. This was something so reprehensible and unprecedented, and in fact, never in our history has a sitting president blatantly insulted America as he did.
[...]
When Biden stood at the podium was he a puppet-like pawn of the leftist, anti-America progressive movement? In his diminished state of cognitive decline, is it possible he was clueless to the seriousness of what he was communicating before the entire global community?
The man who stood before us 100 days ago and in his Inaugural Address said he was going to "unify" and "bring us together" is polarizing us horribly. He's partnering with the radical Democratic progressives intent on replacing traditional America with a secular, socialistic system of centralized government control. The key to their strategy is to continue hammering a fallacious narrative of an evil, racist America that can only be rescued and rebuilt by following a savior-like Biden and his power-hungry socialist cohorts.
NEW ARTICLE: MRC Defends An Extremist, But Hides Her Extremism Topic: Media Research Center
Just like its "news" division did, the Media Research Center portrayed Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene as an innocent victim of "censorship" by social media while censoring the extreme views and offensive acts that got her in trouble. Read more >>
CNS Columnist Upset Minorities Aren't Competing With White People To Get COVID Vaccine Topic: CNSNews.com
CNSNews.com columnist Hans Bader is weirdly obsessed with making sure white people get the coronavirus vaccine. He wrote in his April 8 column:
The State of Vermont recently drew criticism for giving racial minorities priority in access to the COVID vaccine. Lawyers and law professors (including me) said that racial preference was unconstitutional. But at least Vermont didn't waste doses of the vaccine.
The state of Virginia did. It kept at least 11,000 doses of the COVID vaccine unused due to its extreme push for racial "equity." That will result in increased transmission of COVID-19 among Virginians of all races, notes James Bacon, the former publisher of Virginia Business.
In Danville, Va., so few local residents were getting shots from a COVID-vaccination clinic that people, mostly white, were driving in from out of town to avoid the long waits elsewhere. Danville is over 51% black; Virginia as a whole is only 20% black. The administration of progressive Gov. Ralph Northam became concerned about the “equity” implications of so many more white people getting vaccinated than blacks. So the Northam administration restricted access for out-of-town walk-ins. Only people separately scheduled through a state registration system would be allowed.
That largely shut down vaccinations in Danville. Danville’s vaccination clinic had the capacity to administer up to 3,000 vaccinations per day. But in early April, it was averaging only 184 shots per day, according to an article in the Danville Register & Bee. So the Northam administration's way of promoting “equity” in vaccinations was to prevent white people from getting them, even if that did not result in more vaccinations of black people.
Of course, Bacon isn't the puiblisher of Virginia Business anymore; it's apparently not enough of a deal to even mention mention on the bio page on his own blog. Beyond that, the estimate that 11,000 vaccine doses went "unused" is an estimate and not a reflection of actual reality.
Further, for all the whining that white people weren't getting the vaccines they are apparently entitled to, there was no explanation by either Bader or Bacon about whether they did their part to help people who are disadvantaged or lack the internet access needed to make an appointment to get a vaccine -- the main way of getting one at the time. Are those people on their own, where they will get trampled by better connected white people?
Rhode Island excluded whites from vaccinations given out at Providence's Dunkin Donuts Center on April 10, where 3,000 doses were available. As a result, many of those doses were left unused.
As Erika Sanzi of Parents Defending Education notes, this vaccination "event was only for BIPOC residents of the state —they ended up with tons left over. So many people desperate to get one but can't because" of so-called "equity." To get the vaccine, you had to be "Black, Indigenous, Asian, Hispanic" or "People of Color."
The total exclusion of whites was unnecessary to help minorities. But Rhode Island has reserved for minorities only, in Providence and Woonsocket.
This was discrimination for discrimination's sake, so it was doubly unconstitutional. Rhode Island didn't have a "strong basis in evidence" for giving minorities a preference at all. But even if minorities deserved a preference, to ensure that they would get the vaccine, totally excluding whites made no sense, because that wasted many doses of the vaccine.
Bader's source for the unsubstantiated 3,000 "unused" claim is a tweet from a right-wing education activist. Bader then rehashed an argument he has made before to assert that minorities are not deserving of better access to the vaccine than white people:
Lower vaccination rates among blacks reflected reluctance to take the vaccine, rather than racial bias in administering the vaccine. Surveys showed blacks were far more reluctant than whites to take the vaccine when it first became available. Higher COVID rates among blacks and Hispanics in many states have resulted from occupational and other non-racial risk factors, rather than discrimination by state governments.
This is just victim-blaming on Bader'spart. As we noted the last time Bader made this argument, Blacks and Hispanics really are at risk of catching coronavirus, and even if they are in occupations that expose them to greater risk of catching it, that's all the more reason to prioritize them for vaccines.
It seems Bader wants a more Darwinian process for vaccine access, where the well-connected get it immediately and everyone else must scramble for leftovers -- strange since conservatives normally don't like Darwininan concepts.