Topic: Newsmax
Between anti-vaxxers, deadbeat dads and credibly accused sexual harassers, Newsmax has hired a rogue's gallery of on-air talent and commentators. Read more >>
Friday, April 1, 2022
NEW ARTICLE: The Newsmax Personnel Merry-Go-Round
Topic: Newsmax Between anti-vaxxers, deadbeat dads and credibly accused sexual harassers, Newsmax has hired a rogue's gallery of on-air talent and commentators. Read more >>
Posted by Terry K.
at 6:12 PM EDT
CNS Turns To Oil Industry Lobbyists To Rebut Biden Over Oil, Gas Leases
Topic: CNSNews.com CNSNews.com's parent, the Media Research Center, has taken money from fossil fuel interests in the past, so it's no surprise that it would rely on the industry to rebut Biden administration claims about oil and gas leases on federal land. Melane Arter seemed annoyed in a March 4 article:
Three days later, Craig Bannister cranked up the spin machine to try and shut down the claim:
Bannister went on to quote the right-wing website the National File as evidence. He followed up for a March 8 article by going straight to the oil industry's lobbying group:
But Neither Bannister nor O'Scannlain explained where, exactly, in the regulatory process all those 9,000 leases are and when they can be put online. Bannister mislead his readers by hyping that the Biden administration suspended the issuance of new leases when Biden took office but not reporting that the moratorium has since been lifted, and the Biden administration has issued more drilling permits on federal lands than Trump did. Bannister also misleadingly claimed:
In fact, most of the products from Keystone XL oil would likely have been exported. But when you put serving talking points ahead of reporting facts, these kind of things happen. Bannister went to industry lobbyists again for a March 22 article:
Actually, the Dallas Federal Reserve office recently surveyed 139 oil and gas companies about trends in the industry, and one of the questions asked, "Which of the following is the primary reason that publicly traded oil producers are restraining growth despite high oil prices?" Nearly 60 percent responded, "Investor pressure to maintain capital discipline"-- i.e., investors want prices high so they can make money.Less than 10 percent cietd "government regulations" as the reason. Instead of noting that, Bannister let the lobbyists complain that "Language and facts matter." Of course, if they mattered, Bannister would have reported the full truth instead of being a stenographer for industry lobbyists.
Posted by Terry K.
at 1:08 AM EDT
Updated: Friday, April 1, 2022 1:21 AM EDT
Thursday, March 31, 2022
MRC Right-Wing Echo Chamber Mad At Being Called Out for Hyping Bad Biden Poll Numbers
Topic: Media Research Center The Media Research Center's Drennen complained in a March 1 post:
Drennen didn't dispute the existence of a "right-wing echo chamber" that lives to hype Biden's poll numbers -- presumably because he knows he can't. Indeed, the MRC is a proud member of that right-wing echo chamber; it has aggressively pushed polls with the numbers it prefers -- however dubious and biased -- to attack the Biden administration (flip-flopping from its fact-free 2020 narrative that polls showing Biden winning the election were made up). Here are the poll-hyping posts the MRC has published since the beginning of the year:
The MRC did not similarly obsess over Donald Trump's perennially low approval ratings during his presidency, nor did it chastise its fellow right-wing echo chamber residents for largely ignoring them. The MRC needs to be honest with itself and admit it's not about "media research" but is nothing more than a right-wing echo chamber.
Posted by Terry K.
at 10:05 PM EDT
WND Repeats More Election Fraud Misinfo From Arizona
Topic: WorldNetDaily Though its COVID misinformation campaign has been driving it recently, WorldNetDailiy seems to want you to know that its election fraud misinformation game is trying to be strong too. Bob Unruh wrote in a Feb. 28 article:
The name Shiva Ayyadurai should raise a red flag. He was hired last year by Arizona to conduct a biased audit of the 2020 election, and as we noted, he got things so wrong that fact-checkers wondered ifhe even understood how mail-in voting procedures even worked. He's playing games here too; he analyzed only 499 ballots, and the error rate he claims he found was then extrapolated to more than 200,000 purportedly fraudlent ballots. But has Maricopa County Board of Supervisors chairman Bill Gates pointed out, Ayyadurai's work ere is just as slipshod:
Ayyadurai is also an anti-vaccine activist who thinks Anthony Fauci is a deep-state plant and who has also dubiously claimed that he invented email and demands to be credited for doing so. In other words, just another WND-friendly crackpot.
Posted by Terry K.
at 6:47 PM EDT
Updated: Thursday, March 31, 2022 6:48 PM EDT
MRC's Graham Otherizes SCOTUS Nominee By Using Just Her (Non-Mainstream) First Name
Topic: Media Research Center A Feb. 26 post by Media Research Center executive Tim Graham sought to reinforce the right-wing narrative of Supreme Court nominee Ketanji Brown Jackson as a wild radical:
Interestingly, the headline of Graham's post simply referred to Jackson as "Ketanji," as if went by one name (she doesn't) and -- more importantly -- as if conservatives were trying to emphasize her out-of-the-mainstream first name as a way of "othering" her the way it tried do to Barack Obama. Oddly, Graham appears to be a little sensitive to being accused of that. He defensively wrote in a Twitter post the next day:
The MRC is a bit sensitive about this sort of thing, since it was very much fixated on Obama's middle name when it suited its right-wing agenda to do so -- but not so much when Obama himself used his middle name.Let's take a look back, shall we? In 2008, the MRC rushed to the defense of right-wing radio host Bill Cunningham, who made a point of emphasizing "Hussein" in campaign appearances for then-GOP presidential candidate John McCain. Matthew Sheffield gave Cunningham space to laughably deny he was being Islamophobic by screeching "Hussein" at every opportunithy: ""I have nothing but respect for my Muslim brothers and sisters."And Brent Baker whined:
Brent Bozell mocked in a 2008 column how some people "flail with outrage when a conservative uses his full name, Barack Hussein Obama. It’s not a lie. It’s not a distortion. It’s his name." grumbled in another 2008 column: "If you want an angry media mob, you need merely spit out "Barack Hussein Obama" at a McCain rally and watch the Guardians of Social Taste bring out the torches and pitchforks." Scott Whitlock complained in 2009 that a reporter in Dubai "seemed interested in eliciting praise from the students about Barack Obama's middle name." Whitlock huffed in another 2009 post: Mike Bates obsessed a lot in 2009 over a clip of schoolchildren singing about Obama, writing in one post, "Last month it was school children merrily singing the praises of Barack Hussein Obama. Mmm. Mmm. Mm! huffed in a another post: "It appears that at CBS News, as in much of the mainstream media, a conservative is anyone to the right of Barack Hussein Obama. Mmm. Mmm. Mm!" In 2010, Brad Wilmouth complained about a TV panel that debated whether "electing a President whose middle name was 'Hussein' had 'opened a door to better relations with the Arab and Islamic world. Or has it opened a door to more xenophobic American negativity?'" Dan Gainor wrote in a 2011 post: "When Barack Hussein Obama was born, the United States budget was a bit more than $94 billion and ran only a $3 billion deficit that year. Ah the good ol' days." In anbother 2011 post, Noel Sheppard noted "what Senator Barack Hussein Obama said five years ago." Graham played whataboutism over right-wingers who insisted on using Obama's full name in a 2012 post: "what about liberals who make fun of the name 'Willard Mitt Romney'?" Yes, Graham may be trying to "get some attention" by emphasizing Jackson's name, but is it the kind of attention he really wants, given that it's tghe same playbook he and his fellow right-wingers used against Obama a decade ago? Apparently so, because he used "Ketanji" as a stand-alone name in more posts:
Certainly, nobody can accuse Graham of having empathy for anyone he hates (well, is paid to hate) for not being a right-winger like he is.
Posted by Terry K.
at 3:31 PM EDT
CNS Sneers At Biden During State of the Union Address
Topic: CNSNews.com Cherry-picking quotes to portray President Biden as senile was only one part of CNSNews.com's coverage of his State of the Union address -- it was highly critical and largely dismissive all around. That tone started in a March 1 preview of the address, in which Susan Jones dismissively wrote: "In his State of the Union address tonight, President Joe Biden 'will absolutely use the word 'inflation,'' White House spokeswoman Jen Psaki told reporters on Monday." Another preview article by Jones started by quoting a Democrat saying nice things, then quickly pivoted to spouting Republican talking points:
And that was just the start of the pre-emptive attacks on an address that had not yet been given:
CNS began its coverage of the actual address with surprisingly straight reporting on what Biden said:
Then it was time to put out more Repuiblican talking points, as demonstrated by Jones:
Jones followed that with an article devoted to one Republican's attacks on the address as "devoid of all reality of what is happening in the United States." Managing editor Michael W. Chapman, on the other hand, found a liberal columnist who complained that Biden didn't mention black people in his speech. There were no articles praising Biden. Then there was a raft of anonymously written article cherry-picking varioius statements Biden made -- even though a comprehensive article that a CNS reporter would have been willing to put a byline on would have been more journalistically sound -- designed to fixate onthings right-wingers could exploit:
Speaking of that last item, abortion-obsessed editor Terry Jeffrey made sure to put his own slant on a post-address article:"After delivering a State of the Union Address on Tuesday in which he advocated for “a woman’s right to choose” to abort her unborn child, President Joe Biden attended Mass on Sunday at St. Joseph on the Brandywine Catholic Church in Greenville, Del." Jeffrey likes to lord his supposedly superior Catholicism over Biden.
Posted by Terry K.
at 1:49 AM EDT
Wednesday, March 30, 2022
MRC Cheers Death Of RT -- But Won't Mention Conservatives Who Had Shows There
Topic: Media Research Center We've noted how Russian aggression in Ukraine abruptly awakened the Media Research Center's interest in the Russia Today channel -- though it studiously ignored the fact that notable conservatives like Dennis Miller and Steve Malzberg had shows on the channel. As the Russian war in Ukraine escalated, so did the MRC's attacks on RT. Nicholas Fondacaro served up some backhanded praise of non-right-wing channels in bashing RT in a Feb. 28 post: "You may have thought CNN and MSNBC spewed outright lies and falsehoods, but with Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, they don’t hold a candle to state-controlled RT (Russia Today)." Actually, the Fox News model is much closer to the RT model when it comes to spreading falsehoods, especially when Republicans control the government. The same day, Catherine Salgado imposed another shopworn MRC narrative on RT and other Russian-controlled media: Russia state-affiliated accounts on Twitter, Facebook and YouTube are still allowed to influence their approximately 38.7 million followers even as Russia attacks Ukraine. ... These are the same platforms that banned former U.S. President Donald Trump in January, 2021." Salgado then played dumb on what Trump did: "Facebook, YouTube and Twitter banned then-President Donald Trump in 2021 for supposedly encouraging violence." Wait, what? "Supposedly"? The record is pretty clear on Trump playing a major role in instigating the Capitol riot. In a case of reality overtaking a political narrative, Salgado had to update her post to note that, yes, social media sites were taking aim at Russian state-media accounts. A March 1 post by Scott Whitlock cheered that "DirectTV was FINALLY dropping Russian propaganda outfit RT" and compiled "five of the most offensive, idiotic, ridiculous falsehoods" if found on RT -- an exercise the MRC will never do on Fox News. Salgado returned to lament that "DirecTV absurdly refused to renew One America News Network earlier this year while RT’s programming was only suspended after Russia invaded Ukraine." Curtis Houck marked the "final moments of Putin's stoogefest" as DirecTV pulled the plug. Tierin-Rose Mandelburg also played the Trump equivocation in a March 2 post: "It took a full-fledged war for Big Tech to take action against Russia state-affiliated accounts like Sputnik and RT, Russia Today. President Donald Trump was censored 625 times before being permanently banned." The correct way to say that is that Trump violated social media terms of service 625 times, which led to him being permanently banned (plus the whole inciting-a-Capitol-riot thing). When RT announced it would cease production after ghetting deplatformed, fondacaro cheered in a March 3 post:
None of these posts mentioned the conservatives who had shows on RT -- not even to denounce them for working witih Russian state media. Maybe the MRC doesn't want to be reminded that it too held warm thoughts about Putin because he mouthed conservative-friendly talking points. It's part of the MRC giving conservatives a pass for being Putin-curious.
Posted by Terry K.
at 11:17 PM EDT
NEW ARTICLE: Doing It For Durham
Topic: Media Research Center The Media Research Center aggressively hyped claims by right-leaning special counsel John Durham that suggested the Hillary Clinton campaign was spying on Donald Trump -- then got mad that the hype was fact-checked and found to be factually lacking. Read more >>
Posted by Terry K.
at 2:30 PM EDT
WND COVID Fake News Watch, DNA Edition
Topic: WorldNetDaily It seems that just about every wild claim WorldNetDaily has published about COVID vaccines has proven to be highly misleading or entirely wrong, and that record unsurprisingly continues. Chief COVID misleader Art Moore wrote in a Feb. 24 article:
But as the medical fact-checker website Health Feedback reported, there are actually numerous instances of that DNA occuring naturally:
Health Feedback also pointed out that there is little actual evidence that noting that COVID-19 originated in a lab in China, among other things, "there isn’t a known coronavirus that is genetically similar enough to SARS-CoV-2 to be a plausible candidate for genetic modification. But Moore wasn't done spreading DNA-related COVID misinformation. He wrote in a March 1 article:
Health Feedback blew up this claim as well:
Nevertheless, Moore quoted one of his favorite COVID misinformers, Peter McCullough, claiiming that the findings have "enormous implications of permanent chromosomal change" that could drive a "whole new genre of chronic disease." Both of Moore's articles remain live and uncorrected at WND.
Posted by Terry K.
at 12:23 AM EDT
Tuesday, March 29, 2022
MRC Targets RT -- But Is Silent On Its Conservative Shows
Topic: Media Research Center The Media Research Center tended to leave Russia Today -- the Russian government-operated channel in the U.S. -- to its own devices ... unless it served a right-wing narrative to do so. It showed some interest in the channel when Ed Schultz and Larry King had shows there circa 2015-16, but had done little since. In fact, after its last Schultz-related post in May 2016, it had published only two posts related to the channel in the following five and a half years (ones that were tagged with the "Russia Today" category, anyway). Then came Russian aggression toward Ukraine, and suddenly the MRC cared about RT again. Catherine Salgado served up a familiar Trump-centric lament in a Jan. 25 post: "Twitter and Facebook allow Russian state-controlled media to maintain verified accounts even as Russia prepares to invade Ukraine. Both sites ban organizations involved in violence. Meanwhile, former President Donald Trump remains banned from the social media platforms for allegedly encouraging violence." She added:
Salgado didn't mention that Trump instigated "the events of Jan. 6, 2021" -- better known as the Capitol insurrection -- and didn't tweet his call for peace until hours after the riot started. He also told the rioters, "We love you. You're very special," and falsely claimed that "We had an election that was stolen from us." Salgado also didn't mention the conservatives who had shows on RT at the time. There were at least three of them:
The MRC didn't get around to addressing RT again until Feb. 28, when Curtis Houck touted his new favorite channel NewsNation (you know, the one filled with ex-Fox News staffers) focusing on RT:
Like Salgado, Houck didn't mention the conservatives who had shows on RT. He did, however, mention in passing a segment with a former RT anchor that he complained "went off the rails as she fixated on how Fox News was part and parcel with RT" but made no effort to refute the claim or even bother to identify who the interviewee was. But the MRC wasn't done bashing RT -- or hiding the fact that conservatives had shows on the channel. More soon.
Posted by Terry K.
at 9:43 PM EDT
Updated: Tuesday, March 29, 2022 9:53 PM EDT
Yes, We're Still Monitoring Ilana Mercer's White Nationalism
Topic: WorldNetDaily We're not monitoring it as much as we should -- we've been distracted by all the COVID misinformation put out by her publisher as well as its imminent demise -- but WorldNetDaily columnist Ilana Mercer continues to dabble in white nationalism. In her Nov. 18 column (also published at CNSNews.com), Mercer complained that Republicans like black people too much:
Mercer went on to complain that a Fox News talking head said that Democrats "only care when a white person takes a black life. If a black person takes a black life, they don't even care at all," prompting her to rebut:
Mercer kept up her Colin Flaherty-esque obsession with black-on-white crime in her Nov. 25 column: A knee-capping of a different kind was delivered to an exceedingly vulnerable Caucasian America by influencer Candace Owens. To wit, Darrell Brooks is the black supremacist who used his vehicle to mow down and murder white grannies and grandkids parading in Waukesha, Wisconsin. But if you had dared to consider the race of Brooks in a hate crime manifestly motivated by race – you were boorishly berated by Owens as "brainwashed": "Darrell Brooks is a scumbag murderer – his race is irrelevant. … Disagree? You're brainwashed!" America is now systemically and institutionally anti-white. Black-on-white hate crime is rife, but it's invariably not reported, underreported, or if reported, masked as something other than what it really is, precisely as Owens has done – and now orders you to do. Ignore her ilk – Republicans who are always boasting about their color-blindness and their blindness to white suffering. Your life and the lives of those you love, very plainly, depend on it. Mercer hyped her Dec. 9 column-slash-conversation with the British racist David Vance by asserting:
She also noted that "David and I also delve controversially – naturally – into the assault on speech by Jewish organizations (e.g., Anti-Defamation League) and activists, who seem intent on stymieing styles of speech, such as the use of hyperbole and the deployment of the reductio ad absurdum argument to drive home a point." In short: We're still watching Mercer.
Posted by Terry K.
at 6:07 PM EDT
Updated: Tuesday, March 29, 2022 6:16 PM EDT
Trump's Pollster Accuses Biden Of Trying To Wag The Dog On Russia
Topic: Newsmax McLaughlin & Associates was Donald Trump's pollster for the 2020 campaign, so it's no surprise it cranks out alleged polls that are designed to make the guy who beat Trump look bad. In their Feb. 25 Newsmax column, John and Jim McLaughlin accused Biden of trying to wag the dog over Russia:
Needless to say, the McLaughlins believe this is very good news for their former employer:
It appears that the McLaughlins have never polled voters about Trump's remarks praising Vladimir Putin as "savvy" and a "genius" -- that would have made him look bad. Instead, for their March 28 column, the McLaughlins served up more anti-Biden polling that, of course, was good news for Trump:
It seems that the McLaughlin might be using their polls to audition for another job in a future Trump campaign.
Posted by Terry K.
at 1:20 PM EDT
CNS Took More Shots At Biden As Russia Invasion Began
Topic: CNSNews.com We've shown how CNSNews.com acted in an anti-American manner before Russia's invastion of Ukraine by touting Vladimir Putin as a strong leader compared with President Biden's purported weakness. AFter the invasion, CNS continued to attack Biden for allegedly not moving quick enough on sanctions. IN a Feb. 24 article, Patrick Goodenough admitted that the initial round of sanctions after the invasion were "sweeping," yet he complained that they weren't sweeping enough since they didn't target Putin himself:
The next day, Susan Jones complained that Biden didn't immediately cut off U.S. imports of Russian oil, while also rehashing right-wing narratives about Biden's energy policies:
In fact, U.S. oil production has been on an overall upward trajectory since bottoming out because of the pandemic, and Jones did not explain how, exactly, the cancallation of the KeystoneXL pipeline (most of the oil from which would have been exported) or the pause in oil and gas leases on federal land (which have not only resumed but have outpaced Trump's record) directly harmed the U.S oil industry.
Posted by Terry K.
at 1:15 AM EDT
Monday, March 28, 2022
MRC Defends Credibility Of Newsmax, OAN To Own NewsGuard
Topic: Media Research Center The Media Research Center's war on NewsGuard has been continuing with a variation on a theme of attempting to portray right-wing news outlets as accurate and truthful. Catherine Salgado launched this particularly lame salvo in a Feb. 2 post:
As before, during its complaint that NewsGuard rated right-wing websites lower than liberal-leaning ones, Salgado makes sure not to mention the ugly details of the "false content" published by those right-wing sites she's defending. We've already noted Newsmax's accuracy issues and the fact that it's currently being sued by voting-tech companies Dominion and Smartmatic for spreading false claims, as well as as the fact that LifeNews has been busted for spreading false information about President Biden's views on abortion and about Planned Parenthood. OAN, meanwhile, is in a category all its own. It too is being sued by Smartmatic and Dominion for spreading lies about the companies to boost Donald Trump's bogus claims of election fraud. It's also being sued by two Georgia poll workers for spreading lies about them, and management ordered on-air personnel not to call the Capitol riot a "riot." Salgado went on to huff that "NewsGuard’s ratings of outlets that AllSides rates “right” or “lean right” and at least one pro-life outlet versus some Chinese state-run media sites would seem to ignore the utter lack of journalistic credibility of the latter." But she made no effort to prove thatNewsmax, OAN or LifeNews have any journalistic credibility. Givenn that Newsmax and OAN were effectively pro-Trump state media during the Trump presidency -- and LifeNews has more than proven itself to be an unreliable source -- Salgado not only makes herself look silly trying to defend them as supposedly not as bad as Chinese state media, she proves that she and the MRC has a weird vendetta against NewsGuard because it doesn't adhere to right-wing media narratives.
Posted by Terry K.
at 7:52 PM EDT
Root Peddles Conspiracy Theories In Interview With Trump
Topic: WorldNetDaily Wayne Allyn Root can't stop sucking up to Donald Trump -- presumably because Trump won't do interviews with him if he doesn't -- and he did it again in his Feb. 14 column:
This gushing led up to Root touting "my third interview with Trump in the past nine months," in which the sucking up continued:
Root also found a new conspiracy theory to commiserate with Trump about:
This conspiracy theory is based on an unproven claim that the Bureau of Labor Statistics changed the way it computed how it counts jobs created. Like the Media Research Center before him, Root offers no evidence to back up his claim. Surprisingly, there was none of Root's gentle hectoring of Trump over COVID vaccines beyond a shared desire to get rid of vaccine mandates. Instead, he served up even more conspiracy theories, like his (similarly unproven) suggestion that the Biden administration overpaid for COVID tests from China by $800 million "so that Biden or his family could receive a $100 million bribe/kickback deposited into an offshore account." That's the highly unreliable Root we all know.
Posted by Terry K.
at 5:51 PM EDT
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