Topic: Newsmax
Newsmax has felt compelled to make sure readers know that several columns -- mostly making dubious claims about the coronavirus pandemic -- were written by a "non-clinician." Read more >>
Monday, June 28, 2021
NEW ARTICLE: Newsmax's 'Non-Clinician' Blues
Topic: Newsmax Newsmax has felt compelled to make sure readers know that several columns -- mostly making dubious claims about the coronavirus pandemic -- were written by a "non-clinician." Read more >>
Posted by Terry K.
at 1:11 PM EDT
Another Day, Another 'Existential Threat' At WND
Topic: WorldNetDaily WorldNetDaily is facing yet another "existential threat," according to a May 23 article by managing editor David Kupelian. Unfortunately, he doesn't make the best case for saving WND by lying at the very top:
1) None of this has to do with an "existential threat" at WND. 2) Just because right-wingers are selling books about a purported Marxist threat to gullible readers doesn't mean there actually is a Marxist threat. 3) If anyone is expressing pathological anger, it's Kupelian. Finally, Kupelian serves up some particulars:
Kupelian finally gets the SPLC's description of WND correct -- for years, WND had falsely claimed that the SPLC called it a "hate group." (Not that it wouldn't be an accurate description.) And the SPLC's readout that WND is filled with "manipulative fear-mongering and outright fabrications" doesn't need to be translated, and even if it did Kupelian's translation would not be accurate.
As we've pointed out, the likely real reason YouTube demonitized that video defending Lindell is because it included a clip from the podcast of Steve Bannon, who has been banned by YouTube for making false claims about election fraud.
None of which provides proof that the virus was "created intentionally" at the Wuhan lab. Oh, and the U.S. money to an alliance that was working with the Wuhan lab did not go to gain-of-function research.
It's hard to find a way to twist "hate speech" -- which, again, WND is filled with -- as "defending the innocence of our nation’s children," but Kupelian sure gave it a shot.And, of course, those ad companies are private businesses who can choose who to have as its business partners.
Facebook is also a private business and is under no obligation to promote WND's content -- especially given how hateful and error-ridden it is -- or to provide a reason for doing so. Kupelian then ramped up the victimization even more:
Kupelian seems to have forgotten about the years in which its major funder was Robert Beale -- father of longtime WND columnist Vox Day -- a businessman who later became famous for going on the lam rather than face tax evasion charges, and then threatening a judge. And if WND is only "beholden to no one but God," we have to wonder how it's explaining to the Almighty why it publshes so much false and hateful misinformation. He can't be pleased that WND is doing that in His name. Then, finally, we got to the sales pitch of Kupelian begging readers to donate to the WND News Center; it's amusing given how often WND has defended tax protesters to see Kupelian make a point of stating that the News Center is "approved and designated by the IRS as a public charity." Of course, Kupelian provided no numbers regarding how much money it needs to get out of its "existential threat," nor did he explain how exactly the money will be spent. Kupelian made one last pitch: "If you help us, we will be able to boldly report, like no one else, on the tremendous forces of anarchy, insanity and spiritual darkness that are now washing over our beloved republic. Help us push back against the tide of darkness!" Notice that he didn't say anything about telling the truth.
Posted by Terry K.
at 12:05 AM EDT
Updated: Monday, June 28, 2021 12:06 AM EDT
Sunday, June 27, 2021
MRC's 'Explainer Videos' On Election Laws Don't Explain Why Republicans Are Pushing Them
Topic: Media Research Center The Media Research Center has gotten into "explainer videos" as a way to advance its right-wing agenda. It has put out a couple of "explainer videos" to push Republican narratives that Republian-pushed state laws aren't design to suppress voting by non-Republicans despite the fact that only Republicans and conservatives support them. In an April 15 video focused on GOP-pushed changes in Georgia's election laws, the voiceover said of changes regarding drop boxes: "They claim it limits drop boxes, but this one's objectively not true. Before the law was passed, there was no law rin Georgia requiring drop boxes. The law doesn't limit them, it establishes them." That's misleading and hides the full story. PolitiFact told that full story:
In other words, the law restricts drop box usage much tighter than it did in 2020, so it is not merely an establishment of their usage as the MRC wants you to believe. The video also framed new restrictions on absentee ballots as a voter ID issue, but as PolitiFact pointed out, the law bans counties from doing mass mailouts of absentee ballots. In its lawsuit against the Georgia law, the Department of Justice pointed out that a top Republican officials in Georgia effectively admitting that election law changes were designed to suppress votes for Democrats, including one official who quoted Donald Trump in saying that mass absentee ballout mailings are "extremely devastating to Republicans and conservatives in Georgia." Regarding thte law's prohibition of giving food and water to people waiting in line to vote, the voiceover said: "Sounds extreme, until you consider what happened in Georgia's 6th District, when Democrat [sic] activists started handing out bottles of water to people in line, while urging them to vote Democrat. This is why we can't have nice things. Every state has laws against campaigning at the polls; this is just closing a loophole." The video offers no substantiation that this particular incident happened or his suggestion that only Democrats were doing this and, thus, ruined "nice things" (yes, the video put those words on screen, which is where the screenshot at upper right comes from). Yes, every state has laws against campaigning at the polls, but no proof is offered that the "Democrat activists" were violating it thorugh this particular instance of handing out water to people in line. The video concludes by stating, "Don't fall for political talking points masquerading as news." Ironic from a video pushing political talking points masquerading as a fact-check. This was followed up with a June 16 "explainer video" once again justifying the Republican-pushed election changes (though the video never admits Republicans were driving them), with the voiceover complaining that "durin the pandemic, states adopted a lot of new and exotic voting techniques ... so now states are moving to update their rules to make sure only eligible voters are voting." But the video offers no evidence there was any significant number of non-eligible voters who voted that would make the election law changes necessary. The voiceover then resorted to the Republican narrative that the changes are about nothing but "making elections more secure." The voiceover then offered a defense of these Republican-pushed laws (which he won't admit) that are being targeted by evil liberals in Washington pushing laws like HR1: "Here we have a host of election laws passed in statehouses around the country by lawmakers elected by the people. For a small cadre of liberals in Washington, D.C., to override all of that on a purely party-line vote would seem extremely un-democratic." But weren't all of those state laws passed on party-line votes in majority-Republican legislatures? The vioceover then complained that "the media" want you to "think Democrats are just trying to protect voter rights." Is that like how the MRC wants you to think that Republicans care only about "election integrity"? The voiceover concluded bny huffing that "partisan journalists have abandoned reporting the news in favor or reporting propaganda and political advocacy." Apparently, our narrator never watched Fox News. Again; Not once in either of these videos is it admitted that these restrictive voting laws wereput intoplace by Republicans, nor did it explain why we're not supposed to believe that Republican-promoted election laws aren't designed to help Republicans. Seems like these "explainer videos" have some more explaining to do.
Posted by Terry K.
at 7:43 PM EDT
Updated: Sunday, June 27, 2021 7:45 PM EDT
CNS Can't Stop Attacking Pelosi Over Capitol Riot Response
Topic: CNSNews.com For months, CNSNews.com has been attacking House Speaker Nancy Pelosi over the Jan. 6 Capitol riot and its aftermath -- even though she and other Democrats had nothing whatsoever to do with it, and even though it was led by pro-Trump forces on the same side that CNS is on. (Remember, CNS helped amplify Donald Trump's bogus claims of a stolen election, which played a major role in inciting the rioters.) A January article by Melanie Arter featured how "Acting DHS Deputy Secretary Ken Cuccinelli told Fox News’s 'The Story with Martha MacCallum' on Tuesday that House Speaker Nancy Pelosi requested more National Guards be sent to Washington, D.C., even requesting 'crew-manned machine guns' – a sharp contrast between how she reacted when President Donald Trump wanted to use the military to deal with the violence from nationwide Black Lives Matter protests." In February, CNS not only served as a echo chamber for Republican arguments that she was somehow responsible for the Jan. 6 Capitol riot but also for GOP attacks on her response to it:
Later that month, an anonymous article complained that "The 'task force' of advisors that House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D.-Calif.) put together after rioters stormed the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6 has recommended that Congress immediately approve funding to design and install 'mobile fencing' around the Capitol." In an April 14 article, Craig Bannister seemed to be mocking a statement Pelosi made regarding the riot:
Even though Bannister eventually said Pelosi was joking, that's not theimpression readers had from the headline, which lacked any reference to humor: "Pelosi Says She Would’ve Used Her Spike Heels to Fight Off Capitol Rioters." Months after the riot, CNS was still complaining about Pelosi talking about it. An anonymous June 16 article carried the headline "Nancy Pelosi: ‘January 6th Was Unquestionably One of the Darkest Days in the History of Our Democracy'" -- apparently once again annoyed that Pelosi was talking about it -- but it was actially a bill to award Congressional Gold Medals to law enforcement officers who tried to protect the Capitol on Jan. 6. That, by the way, is the only article CNS did referencing the medals to law enforcement; it certainly wasn't going to tell readers that 21 Republicans -- including CNS faves Marjorie Taylor Greene, Lauren Boebert and Matt Gaetz -- voted against awarding the medals.
Posted by Terry K.
at 3:19 PM EDT
Updated: Sunday, June 27, 2021 3:35 PM EDT
Saturday, June 26, 2021
MRC Writer Argues JoJo Siwa Is Obeying Satan By Not Being Heterosexual
Topic: Media Research Center There are few things the Media Research Center loves more than to judge women -- and celebrities especially -- who fail to be heterosexual, and they take an unseemly interest in their alleged sex lives (or lack of one). When child star JoJo Siwa -- now a 17-year-old -- announced she was "part of the LGBTQ community," and pansexual, telling readers that "you can be in love with whoever you want," Veronica Hays had a massive meltdown in an April 12 post that she began by screeching, "They're turning the kids gay!":
If those children were to become little righrt-wing drones -- through the same kind of indoctrination she thinks the "LGBTQ cabal," whatever that is, is doing -- Hays presumably would have no problem with that. When Hays is dismissing people as minions of Satan simply for believing differently from you, as Hays is doing here, there is no way to have a civil conversation with her -- the vicious, seething hatred is just too palpable.And it shows the intolerance, homophobia and transphobia that has always been slightly under the surface at the MRC.
Posted by Terry K.
at 9:59 AM EDT
Irony: WND Columnist Is Concerned About 'Press Deceit'
Topic: WorldNetDaily Laura Hollis began her May 20 WorldNetDaily column by huffing under the headline "Is press deceit a pathology, or closer to insanity?":
Hollis is conveniently ignoring the fact that the outlet that publishes her column is one of the most deceitful media operations out there. Of course, like any right-winger, Hollis' definition of "the press" only includes outlets she can attack as "liberal," even though many national media outlets like Fox News has an unambigulous right-wing bias. After ranting about alleged media suppression of speculation about the source of the coronavirus in China -- as if talkinga baout that would have saved any of the 5600,000-plus people who died of it in the U.S. -- Hollis then took on a related subject:
Most people who care about medicine think it should be advanced with legitimate trials, not anecdotes, and actual medical experts have not found hydroxychloroquine to be effective in treating COVID-19. In pushing an ineffective drug in order to own the libs -- not to mention refusing to hold her publisher to the same standards she holds the "lliberal media" -- it appears Hollis is the one who going from beyond pathology to insanity.
Posted by Terry K.
at 12:14 AM EDT
Friday, June 25, 2021
MRC Psaki-Bashing, Doocy-Fluffing Watch, Fauci Email Edition
Topic: Media Research Center The Media Research Center's Curtis Houck kept up his Psaki-hating, Doocy-loving White House press briefing schtick into June, as his writeup of the first presser of the month showed:
Actually, the Fauci emails weren't that big of a deal, and unemployment benefits aren't causing worker shortages. But those things are part of the right-wing narrative, so Houck must mindlessly repeat them -- and he obsessed about the Fauci emails again the next day, while adding another right-wing narrative and introducing Doocy's Fox News colleague in asking hostile questions:
Houck continued his -- and Fox News' -- obsession with the Fauci emails for the June 4 hearing:
Houck certainlyperforned his duty as right-wing narrative pusher by repeatedly obsessing over Fauci's emails -- almost as if he had instructed to do so.
Posted by Terry K.
at 8:51 PM EDT
Updated: Friday, June 25, 2021 8:52 PM EDT
WND Makes Another Inconsistent Correction
Topic: WorldNetDaily WorldNetDaily is maddeningly inconsistent on which of the many false and misleading claims it publishes on its website it chooses to correct. In his May 19 column, Sean Harshey declared that "The Great Coronavirus Panic of 2020 is increasingly being revealed to have been the greatest partisan political scam in history," claiming that the reaction to the pandemic was a ploy to destroy President Trump. In the midst of that, Harshey huffed that "the CDC admitted that calculations used to compile COVID death rates were improperly inflated due to hospitals counting COVID deaths to include cases where a patient died from some other cause, such as a heart attack. The unhinged attacks by liberals on President Trump and conservatives based on COVID death counts were manufactured propaganda." Four days later, WND attached a lengthy correction to Harshey column:
By contrast, WND has let numerous lies about the pandemic and the election stand uncorrected. And Harshey's own March 3 column counterfactually claiming that Antifa was responsible for the Trump-supporter-led Jan. 6 Capitol riot hasn't been corrected. Interestingly, Harshey appears to have stopped writing for WND; his weekly column of May 26 is the last one published. Somehow we doubt that shame over getting something wrong played any sort of role in this.
Posted by Terry K.
at 3:42 PM EDT
Updated: Friday, June 25, 2021 7:26 PM EDT
CNS Attacks Yet Another Biden Nominee
Topic: CNSNews.com CNSNews.com has found itself yet another Biden administration nominee to attack. This time, CNS' target is David Chipman, nomated to be head of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms. Chipman's nomination merited only a passing mention by Melanie Arter in an April 8 article otherwise focused on President Biden's efforts to curb gun violence. But by the time his confirmation hearing rolled around in late May -- and Chipman's support for gun-control efforts made it to the radar of right-wing activists -- CNS was ready to attack, cranking out a whopping five articles related to it. A May 28 article by Susan Jones complained:
An article by Melanie Arter went on to complain that Chipman "refused Wednesday to define what assault weapons are, saying that would be up to Congress to define." This was followed by two attacks on Chipman by Republican senators:
There was also a fifth article written by Jones, which carried the headline "ATF Director-Nominee Asked If He will Prosecute Hunter Biden for Lying on Background Check Form." But the article was deleted from the CNS website without explanation; the URL now returns an error message. None of the four extant articles (and, we can presume, the disappeared one as well) quoted any Democratic senator questioning Chipman; indeed, none mention the presence of Democratic senators at all. So much for CNS' mission statement to "fairly present all legitimate sides of a story." Meanwhile, CNS has yet to report that Chipman's nomination was advanced out of ommittee to the full Senate for a vote.
Posted by Terry K.
at 1:16 AM EDT
Thursday, June 24, 2021
How Is MRC Writer Gabriel Hays Freaking Out About Transgender People Now?
Topic: Media Research Center Since Media Research Center writers like Gabriel Hays are paid well to engage in freakouts over transgender stuff in entertainment, readers continue to be subjected to them. Back in March, the transphobic Hays melted down over Sports Illustrated featuring a transgender swimsuit model:
That, of course, is not how it works. Hays, of course, is not-so-uniquely being a transphobic asshole -- but, hey, that's what the MRC pays him for. A few days later, Hays huffed over the former Ellen Page transitioning and taking the name Eliot:
Hays showed up again on April 1 to lash out at chef Padma Lakshmi for daring to argue that parents who won't "accept your child for who they're telling you they are" are bad parents:
Hays had another meltdown on April 12 over the GLAAD Media Awards:
Hays can't even handle words used in a way he doesn't like if they suggest transgender people are in any way human. From a May 7 meltdown:
Hays had another language freakout in a June 2 post:
Hays wants to throw away transgender people, period, so perhaps he's much further on the path to hell than anyone at NPR.
Posted by Terry K.
at 8:28 PM EDT
Updated: Saturday, September 25, 2021 2:48 PM EDT
Newsmax Pushes Dubious Pro-Trump, Anti-Biden Polls
Topic: Newsmax Nick Koutsobinas wrote in a May 18 Newsmax article:
Koutsobinas didn't tell you, however, that the Trafalgar Group has a pro-Trump bias and a less-than-stellar record; as we've noted, Trafalgar "weights its polls to account for a 'social desirability bias,' or the so-called shy Trump voters who are embarrassed to tell pollsters they support his candidacy," and Trafalgar's polling gets a C-minus rating from FiveThirtyEight. That's not the only dubious poll Newsmax has touted. The apparently unironicaly named Charlie McCarthy wrote in a May 19 article:
McCarthy didn't mention that McLaughlin was the pollster for Trump's re-election campaign, making these results look less than objective. McLaughlin has also been wrong in the past, most notoriously so in 2014 when it claimed polls showing Republican Eric Cantor ahead of his primary rival, Dave Brat, by 34 points; in the actual election, Brat beat Cantor by 11 points. But principals John and Jim McLaughlin have their own Newsmax column, so the management is less than eager to call them out. And in their column that came out the same day as McCarthy's fluffing of its poll results, the McLaughlins reminded us of just how in the tank they are for Trump: The McLaughlins don't seem like the kind of folks who can be trusted to conduct truly objective polling.
Posted by Terry K.
at 5:27 PM EDT
NEW ARTICLE: Correcting The Hypocritical Record
Topic: Media Research Center The Media Research Center loves to attack the "liberal media" for correcting mistakes -- even as it makes stealth edits to hide falsehoods and gives its fellow right-wing media a pass for its mistakes. Read more >>
Posted by Terry K.
at 3:30 PM EDT
Are You Serious? CNS' Coverage On Mask Mandates Is Partisan And Silly
Topic: CNSNews.com Over the past couple months, CNSNews.com has engaged in reverse mask-shaming and tried to force political motives on federal mask guidance, so it clearly has no interest in treating the issue seriously. As it is apparently mandated to do by its Media Research center parent, CNS automatically takes the side of Republicans and conservatives, as seen in a May 12 article by Susan Jones hyping how "Several Senate Republicans chided the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention on Tuesday for what Sen. Susan Collins called "conflicting, confusing guidance" from CDC, especially as it relates to schools, summer camps, and mask mandates." The next day, Melanie Arter served up more reverse mask-shaming under the headline "CNN Asks WH Aide Why Biden Wore Mask Indoors Meeting with Fully Vaccinated Congressional Leaders." Arter returned on May 14 to transcribe a mask attack from Fox News:
Arter did not allow anyone to respond to Saphier. Later that day, Arter scrounged up a "former acting CDC Director" to attack mask guidance. In a May 17 article, Jones was still on her kick of manufacturing a political motive for changes in mask guidance, huffing that "Dr. Rochelle Walensky, director of the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, went on all the Sunday talk shows to explain her agency's sudden and confusing about-face on face masks," adding that "She told "Fox News Sunday" that political pressure had nothing to do with the sudden change in CDC masking guidelines." the next day, Jones complained that New Jersey wasn't ready to lift mask mandates just yet. Arter served up another political attack in a May 18 article: "Adm. Brett Giroir, former coronavirus testing czar for the Trump administration, told Fox News on Tuesday that the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) dropped the ball when it came to messaging about mask guidance and coordinating with the White House." On May 19, Craig Bannister promoted a right-wing gotcha attempt in which "Sen. John Kennedy (R-LA) asked Walensky to 'in one minute, summarize for me what the recommendations are today from your agency about wearing masks,'" conceding that "the CDC director obliged." On May 20, Jones gave space to Republican House members whining that Nancy Pelosi won't lift mask mandates on the House floor until all House members are vaccinated:
Jones did not allow Pelosi or any other Democratic House member respond to Norman or his fellow GOP mask complainers. Also on May 20, managing editor Michael W. Chapman gushed at how "Iowa Gov. Kim Reynolds, a Republican, signed a bill into law that prohibits the public schools from imposing mask mandates on their students. Chapman devoted six paragraphs of his seven-paragraph article quoting Reynolds and two Republican state legislators touting the legislation; the final paragraph quoted a "Democrat [sic] State Rep." criticizing it. Not exactly fair and balanced, eh, Mike? Speaking of balance, Jones finally served up a little in a May 21 article quoting Pelosi defending her House mask mandate, saying that "unvaccinated lawmakers are selfish, and she suggested they eventually may be required to vote from the House gallery instead of the House floor." And on May 24, Bannister demonstrated the unseriousness of CNS' agenda-driven mask coverage by devoting an article to the opinions of a washed-up right-wing actor:
Nothing says "legitimate opinion" quite like a guy who hasn't done much since that "hercules" role a few decades ago.
Posted by Terry K.
at 12:57 AM EDT
Updated: Thursday, June 24, 2021 4:04 PM EDT
Wednesday, June 23, 2021
MRC Plays Dumb On Crowder's Latest YouTube Suspension
Topic: Media Research Center The Media Research center wants you to think that Steven Crowder is just a misunderstood comedian who keeps being "censored" because he's a conservative and not for all those nasty homophobic attacks he likes to make. Well, Crowder got himself into trouble again, and Nick Kangadis was on hand to play dumb in a May 13 post:
Note that Kangadis does not document what Crowder actually said so we could judge for ourselves, even though he went on to write that "Yours truly watched that episode the day it aired, and while the Crowder crew likes to have fun and make joke — whether you agree with them or not, at no point did they 'revel' in the death of Bryant." As a more honest and responsible media watchdog did document, Crowder and his co-host were mocking the dead Bryant in general and her weight in particular, claiming she moves like "an old [George] Foreman" and claiming her "fifth DoorDash" was arriving. So, yeah, they were very much reveling in and mocking a dead woman. But Kangadis want to gaslight you, parroting the old MRC narrative that "This seems like it’s just being used as an excuse to come one step closer to eliminating the most popular conservative channel on YouTube." If this is "the most popular conservative channel on YouTube," alleged censorship is the least of conservatives' problems. Kangadis continued to gaslight in a May 21 post:
Again, Kangadis refused to tell readers exactly what Crowder said. If it was not offensive, why hide that since it would presumably boost Crowder's defense? Then, on June 3, Casey Ryan kept up the gaslighting on Crowder in a monthly roundup of what the MRC thinks is the month's "WORST censorship":
Like Kangadis, Ryan also refused to offer a transcript of what Crowder said.
Posted by Terry K.
at 10:18 PM EDT
CNS Omits Facts About GOP Congressmen's Letter On Oil, Gas Taxes
Topic: CNSNews.com Craig Bannister intoned in a May 13 CNSNews.com article:
Bannister failed to report that, as Greenpeace noted, all but three of the letter's56 signatories have received political donations from the oil and gas industry, a total of more than $14 million over their collective political careers -- likely the main motivation for the letter. Bannister went on to dutifully write:
Bannister uncritically uncritically repeated the letter's portrayal of a tax write-off as a "tax increase." As the Natural Resources Defense Council reported, the intangible drilling cost write-off is more than a century old and could certainly stand to be reviewed, and ending the write-off would bring in $9 billion in tax revenue over 10 years. As another analyst pointed out, technological advances in the oil drilling industry mean that dry wells, the main impetus behind the writeoff, are less of an issue these days. The letter -- and, thus Bannister -- never explained how the intangible drilling cost write-off was exactly the same as other business expense write-offs. Uncritically repeating one side of a story while hiding the apparent motivations driving that argument is not reporting -- it's stenography. Fortunately for Bannister, stenography is what CNS pays him to do.
Posted by Terry K.
at 2:20 PM EDT
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