NEW ARTICLE -- New Press Secretary, Same MRC Hate: October-December 2022 Topic: Media Research Center
Curtis Houck and Co. seemed to be getting bored with spewing hate at Karine Jean-Pierre and fluffing right-wing journalists, so the frequency of the Media Research Center's press briefing write-ups diminished toward the end of the year. Read more >>
MRC Predictably Bashes Jan. 6 Committee (Again) As Its Mission Ends Topic: Media Research Center
The Media Research Center has constantlyattacked the House committee looking into the Capitol riot and its causes -- not that it ever offered any factual counterpoint to the testimony revealed by the committee -- so it's not a shock that as the committee concluded its business and prepared to issue its final report, the MRC simply couldn't stop the hate. Nicholas Fondacaro whined in a Dec. 19 post:
With the January 6 Committee having held their final hearing on Monday by sending criminal referrals against former President Trump and others to the Department of Justice (DOJ), the liberal broadcast networks swooned for their friends on the committee. ABC and NBC suggested the committee was better at conducting investigations than the DOJ. Meanwhile, CBS was itching to see soon-to-be former Republican Congresswoman and committee vice chair, Liz Cheney (WY) run for president against Trump.
Immediately following the proceedings, ABC chief anchor David Muir opined, “We have just witnessed an extraordinary moment in American history, the January 6 Select Committee with both Democrats and Republicans … Voting unanimously to send a criminal referral to the Department of Justice.”
ABC chief Washington correspondent Jon Karl joined him to blow smoke for the committee. According to him, the biased committee conducted the most thorough investigation in American history. “This committee conducted a thorough investigation … one of the most thorough we have seen of any single incident in American history,” he proclaimed.
Again, no factual counterpoint was offered -- Fondacaro was simply being paid to whine. Kevin Tober similarly complained with the additional whine that something historic was described as "historic":
On Monday, the hyper partisan January 6 congressional committee recommended criminal charges against former President Donald Trump. Due to this news, the “big three” evening newscasts brought out the confetti and each led with the story while hyping its “historic” nature, with one network going as far as to laughably claim that the committee was “bipartisan.”
During ABC’s World News Tonight, anchor David Muir hyped how the “January 6 committee making history today for the first time Congress has recommended criminal charges for a former President.”
Muir bragged that the committee voted “unanimously to recommend former President Trump be charged by the Justice Department for his actions leading up to and including January 6,” and reminded viewers how many seasons the Pelosi circus ran: “The committee's nearly 18-month investigation, ten public hearings, depositions from more than 1,000 witnesses.”
Meanwhile on CBS Evening News, anchor Norah O’Donnell began the program by proclaiming it a “historic day on capitol hill,” because “for the first time in American history, Congress has referred a former President to the Department of Justice for possible criminal prosecution, recommending four felony charges for his role in trying to overturn the 2020 presidential election.”
O’Donnell told viewers that “the statute for one of those charges, insurrection, says someone convicted shall be incapable of holding any office under the United States.”
Which of course, is the entire point of the committee.
Tober didn't explain why that was a bad thing.
Aiden Moorehouse cheered that "Former Acting FBI Director and current CNN analyst Andrew McCabe took a much more cautious tone than most media pundits, and accidentally hinted at how the blatantly partisan and theatrical presentation the Committee opted for ended up hurting it in the end," adding that "McCabe lent credence to one of the strongest accusations against the conduct of the January 6 Committee: that it was purposefully designed as a theatrical production intended to push a narrative more focused on short-term electoral gains in 2022 than any real long-term accountability." Never mind, of course, that Moorehouse's employer would have criticized the committee whatever it did because its beloved Donald Trump was being investigated.
Moorehouse's boss, Tim Graham -- who had previously complained that non-right-wing media was covering the final pre-election hearing from the committee isntead of the latest legal fiasco by right-wing prosecutor John Durham, which the MRC also ignored -- was in full whine mode for his Dec. 19 podcast: "Monday's rerun hearing of the House January 6 committee drew the usual supportive wave of live coverage -- and then led the evening newscasts of ABC, CBS, NBC, and PBS. Coming next are the massive 500-page copies of the committee's final report -- The New York Times, The New Yorker, and MSNBC's Ari Melber are all pushing versions of the report. The committee's own official report -- with commentary by Rep. Adam Schiff -- is coming out on the second anniversary of the January 6 riot." Graham followed up in his Dec. 21 column, with an added dose of Hunter Biden Derangement:
After the final hearing of the Pelosi-picked House January 6 panel, Time magazine sent out an email to its audience, under the headline "Trump should be prosecuted, Jan. 6 Committee declares in historic criminal referral”. To our leftist media elite, everything the Democrats do to promote themselves is “historic.”
Is it surprising to anyone that the House Democrats (and Cheney and Kinzinger) want Trump in an orange jumpsuit? Is it “historic” if the referrals are ignored by the Justice Department?
Obviously, the riot itself is historic, in the worst way. But Time and their media pals would never consider the heavy-handed Hunter Biden scandal censorship “historic,” as in an ever-more-obvious plot to prevent Donald Trump’s re-election. They cannot mentally connect Hunter censorship to January 6, even though that kind of rigging outraged Republican voters of all kinds. You get the sense that journalists get emotional and hyperbolic and imagine that anyone talking about Hunter’s laptop is an honorary rioter.
But Graham is serving up an implicit defense of Trump by not criticizing his actions leading up to the riot or during it, in which he spent three hours watching it on TV instead of trying to stop it. No, it's all about the evil Hunter Biden, and Trump is as pure as the driven snow.
The MRC also published a Dec. 29 syndicated column by Cal Thomas complaining that the committee had a "predictable outcome" and insisting that "One can oppose Donald Trump’s run for president in 2024, while still questioning the way the House committee conducted itself." But he too failed to dispute any of the evidence the committee uncovered.
WorldNetDaily managing editor David Kupelian penned a Dec. 15 article that was also sent out as a money beg to WND's mailing list:
Dear WND readers,
First, MERRY CHRISTMAS – I know I speak for everyone at WND in saying how much we truly appreciate your readership, loyalty and support.
I have an earnest request for you, and it is simply this: If you read and appreciate WND and would like to see us survive the never-ending and utterly insane attacks on us by Big Tech, one of the most important – and rewarding – ways you can pitch in is by becoming a subscriber to our monthly magazine, Whistleblower. Stay with me here.
If you haven’t read Whistleblower, honestly you have no idea what you’re missing.
Actually, we've read enough of WND's promos for it to know exactly what we're missing -- highlybiasedexaminations of issues designed to draw right-wing eyeballs, capped off with a screed from Kupelian himself.
Of course, that's not what Kupelian thinks -- Whistleblower is his baby, and he has to beg people to subscribe, so the sales pitch was on:
Each monthly issue is a totally unique deep dive into one single topic, a trip down to the hidden realm where politics, culture and the spiritual realm intersect – in other words, to REALITY.
[...]
Friends, for the sake of your family and loved ones who need the type of insight and encouragement found in Whistleblower, and for the sake of our country that's under total siege – and for the sake of helping WND during a time of extraordinary and literally never-ending challenges courtesy of Big Tech, please subscribe to Whistleblower today, or renew (or extend) your subscription. And also please generously give Whistleblower gift subscriptions this Christmas. For many years, Whistleblower – which is available in both PRINT and state-of-the-art DIGITAL versions – has been WND's single most popular GIFT choice.
Kupelian also plugged the current issue of Whistleblower, which, yes, is yet another highly biased rant against something he doesn't like:
To illustrate, consider the current Whistleblower issue, titled “HOLY WAR: Defeating the growing cult of leftism and its total war on Christianity.”
Whether it’s the “Climate Change Cult” or the “Anti-Racism Cult,” or the “Cult of Wokeness” or the “Transgender Cult” with its appalling sexualization and grooming of America’s children – or any of the other ever-expanding cults, like the “COVID Cult” and the “Cult of Globalism” and the various “TikTok Cults,” every month the list grows and grows. What on earth is going on?
Clearheaded, right-thinking Americans are starting to realize that the irrational, deranged – and often demonic – leftwing political and cultural movements currently capturing the minds of millions of Americans are nothing short of full-fledged religious cults.
This Whistleblower issue reveals how today’s leftwing cults are not only negatively transforming America, they also frequently instigate full-bore social contagion episodes. For example, there’s the hypnotic influence various TikTok personalities exert on adolescents, especially girls, persuading many to “identify” as transgender and undergo horrendous surgical amputation of healthy body parts. There are few limits to this social contagion phenomenon, which Western medicine refers to as “mass sociogenic illness.” And of course, the “Climate Change” and “Anti-Racism” cults and others are being deployed (to use Obama’s words) to “fundamentally transform the United States of America.”
Anyway, all this and much more is explored in a deeply insightful way I can guarantee you have not seen before, in the current Whistleblower issue, “HOLY WAR.”
Actually, the only thing Kupelian should be guaranteeing is that -- as his screed indicates, as taken from his essay -- there will be nothing at all deep or insightful about this issue. Meanwhile, Kupelian has little moral standing to make this argument -- he remains in the grip of the Trump cult, as well as the cult of far-right Christianity that will not accept any other interpretation or lifestyle and depicts anyone who disagrees with him as not just wrong but evil.
Not only is that not deep or insightful, it's also not good journalism. No wonder WND remains on the precipice on failure -- and that Kupelian has to beg for money to keep him employed.
Newsmax -- always a shill for all things Donald Trump -- pl;ayed along with yet another tease in a Dec. 14 article by the apparently unironically named Charlie McCarthy:
Former President Donald Trump said he will make a major announcement Thursday concerning America's need for a "superhero."
"America Needs a Superhero! I will be making a Major Announcement tomorrow. Thank you!" Trump posted in all-caps Wednesday morning on Truth Social.
Trump's post was accompanied by a video, which begins with him restating the country's need for a superhero.
The video then gives way to animation showing the former president, standing before Trump Tower, with a buttoned-down shirt torn open to reveal a Superman-like outfit with the symbol "T" on his chest. Light beams protrude from Trump's eyes.
The spot ends showing "Major announcement. Thursday, December 15th."
Trump's post gave no indication what the announcement would be about.
McCarthy did, interestingly, hint that this was a distraction from bad news, noting that the post "came on a day that The Wall Street Journal reported its new poll showed Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis holding a 52%-38% lead over Trump among Republican primary voters."
The next day did indeed bring that "major announcement" -- and, yes, McCarthy was there for that too, while seeming to concede it was a tad underwhelming:
Former President Donald Trump's self-proclaimed "MAJOR ANNOUNCEMENT" concerns a new digital trading card collection.
Trump on Wednesday teased that he would have a "MAJOR ANNOUNCEMENT on America's need for a "superhero." He followed through with a Thursday morning post on Truth Social.
"MAJOR ANNOUNCEMENT! My official Donald Trump Digital Trading Card collection is here!," Trump posted with an image of the former president standing Superman-like in a costume showing a "T" on his chest and an American flag cape.
"These limited edition cards feature amazing ART of my Life & Career! Collect all of your favorite Trump Digital Trading Cards, very much like a baseball card, but hopefully much more exciting. Go to collecttrumpcards.com/ & GET YOUR CARDS NOW! Only $99 each! Would make a great Christmas gift. Don’t Wait. They will be gone, I believe, very quickly!"
Trump last month officially kicked off his campaign for the 2024 Republican presidential nomination.
After Trump's Wednesday post, some wondered if the announcement would concern a running mate, or the former president's return to Twitter, Newsweek reported.
Newsmax didn't report on related issues with the cards, such as lauching them as the NFT market decllines (and the value of the Trump NFTs fell quickly), criticism of such a money-grubbing venture by even his allies, and using images into which Trump was photoshopped that may or may not have been stolen. Instead, a Dec. 16 article by Nicole Wells bragged about how the NFTs had sold out, with only a token noting of criticism:
The entire collection of former President Donald Trump's digital trading cards reportedly sold out within 12 hours of launching — raising millions in the process.
Trump teased a "major announcement" earlier this week on his social media platform Truth Social. While some people thought he could be announcing a running mate for the 2024 presidential election, the news that he was releasing a digital trading cardor nonfungible token (NFT) collection was criticized by both supporters and detractors.
Wells also included a very defensive statement from the marketer of the NFTs:
It was not immediately clear who receives the money and how it will be used.
NFT INT, which created the digital cards, said that money from their sale will not be used to fund Trump’s 2024 bid for the presidency, which he announced last month.
"These Digital Trading Cards are not political and have nothing to do with any political campaign," the company said on the cards’ website. "NFT INT LLC is not owned, managed or controlled by Donald J. Trump, The Trump Organization, CIC Digital LLC or any of their respective principals or affiliates. NFT INT LLC uses Donald J. Trump's name, likeness and image under paid license from CIC Digital LLC, which license may be terminated."
As it turns out, NFT INT has its headquarters in a mailbox at a UPS Store in Park City, Utah, and is owned by a different company run by a current Trump lawyer and a former Trump adviser, the mailing address for which is the Trump International Golf Club in Palm Beach.
In between all this, Luca Cacciatore cranked out a Dec. 15 stenography piece gushing over how "Trump unveiled a five-point plan to tackle censorship Thursday night, vowing to protect 'lawful speech' from being labeled as disinformation. Newsmax provided coverage of the strategy rollout." Cacciatore made no mention of the NFT imbroglio, even though that and not this five-point plan was what people would be talking about.
CNS Nitpicks Biden's Christmas Message For Not Ramming Religion Down Americans' Throats Topic: CNSNews.com
CNSNews.com's nitpickiness of President Biden even extends to his Christmas messages. In December 2020, CNS repeated Biden's Christmas message, though it saited until four days after Christmas to report on it and refused to identify him as president-elect -- not a surprise, since it was stillpromoting Donald Trump's election fraud conspiracies. CNS didn't even report on Biden's 2021 Christmas message.
But for the 2022 Christmas message, CNS decided to nitpick. A Dec.23 article by Susan Jones nitpicked how Biden delivered it:
Instead of an end-of-year press conference, where he might be asked a few difficult questions -- about the border chaos, for example -- President Joe Biden delivered a "Christmas Address to the Nation," as the White House described it.
His message: "Things are getting better." And: "Spread a little kindness."
The message was delivered at the White House, with no reporters present.
An article by Craig Bannister later that day nitpicked the words he used -- a running theme lately -- then compared him unfavorably to the last president:
This year, when President Joe Biden spoke at his second annual White House Christmas tree lighting ceremony, he neglected to mention either “Christ” or “Jesus,” just as he did last year.
Not until the last two sentences of his remarks, did he wish Americans a “Merry Christmas” and mention “God” (“God bless you.”)
At the 2021 Christmas tree lighting ceremony, on December 2, Biden did actually commemorate a birthday: that of his Interior Secretary, not that of Jesus Christ (“It is wonderful to join you here on your birthday, Madam Secretary. Happy birthday”).
In contrast, at his last Christmas tree lighting ceremony in 2019, President Donald Trump reminded Americans of the Christian heritage and beliefs that Christmas trees represent:
Bannister didn't not that there's no evidence that Trump lives the words he spoke, nor doid he explain why the president must shoehorn Christianity into a secular ceremony.
In an apparent attempt at partisan contrast, managing editor Michael W. Chapman cranked out two articles on the Christmas messages from more conservatively correct Republican presidents, Ronald Reagan and Donald Trump; Chapman made sure to put their references to Jesus by name in the headlines. For unexplained reasons, Chapman also reposted a 2019 article recounting how "As heavy clouds and torrential rain stalled the advance of the U.S. Third Army during the Battle of the Bulge in December 1944, Gen. George S. Patton ordered the Third Army chaplain to compose a prayer for good weather to kill Germans, to 'crush the oppression and wickedness of our enemies.'"
From there, the nitpicking duties went to CNS' new commentary editor, Georgiana Constantin-Parke,who began her Dec. 29 column with a bit of an apology (while also making sure to include her employer's senility narrative):
There already have been several articles about President Joe Biden’s 2022 Christmas message. And while some might see this type of scrutiny as nitpicking or quite a tedious hobby of the right wing or right-leaning individuals in general, it is essential that one is always aware and awake, as the reality of faith and the burden of freedom demand. Analyzing the actions and words of our leaders is vital to understanding our potential futures.
However, firstly, one must acknowledge that both he and his speech writer are human, and therefore cannot be expected to be free of flaws. On the other hand, they are also not expected to be all flaws.
Secondly, let us take into consideration that this is probably not an easy time for him, as the memory of the death of his first wife and one of his children many years ago around this time is not one which will ever go away. We should offer prayers for the souls of his departed loved ones and be understanding of this difficult time for him and his family.
Finally, whether he is in the (arguably) early stages of Alzheimer’s, or he lies habitually, or is no longer the Christian he claims to be, or perhaps he is doing the very work of those who would see the church dismantled around the world, makes no difference in one respect: he is, somehow, the President of the United States.
Tump lied habiltually, but we don't recall CNS ever being concerned about that.Constantin-Parke then moved to a partisan attack on Biden's message:
So what was his message?
At first glance, it was one that called people to unity, to remember the light for which we all stand, no matter our beliefs, and to be kind and empathetic to one another. In a nutshell, it was a classic example of ‘do as I say not as I do’ rhetoric -- his messages to the electorate have rarely been uniting or empathetic or ones to steer people toward the light of goodness.
Encouraging the mutilation of children through speedy so-called gender-affirming care, treating children in the womb as if they were parasites there to steal the mother’s independence, and calling for an end to patience with the unvaccinated, among other things, did anything but unite or inspire kindness in people.
Then the real nitpicking began, with Constantin-Parke being weirdly perturbed that Biden said "Son of God" instead of "Jesus Christ":
An important part of the speech revolved around, as some have noted, hinting to Christ rather than saying His name. This is true. But perhaps the more noteworthy concern was the way he talked about Christianity and the picture he painted of religion and faith in general.
To start off, the language used was one of an objective observer rather than a participant in faith. He stated that Christmas is about the birth of a child that “Christians believe to be the son of God.” It would perhaps have been more appropriate for a practicing Christian to have noted “ a child all of us Christians know as the Son of God, the Christ.”
By distancing himself from his declared faith, Catholicism, he made a clear statement. Perhaps they did not want him to seem overzealous or fanatical, but rather inclusive. But the problem with this approach is the message that it sends to everyone.
It wasn't until near the end of her column that Constantin-Parke acknowledged that Biden might be the president ofall Americans, not just the Christian ones, and that his message should be at least somewhat universal -- yet she still insisted on slamming his Christmas message anyway:
Of course, I could be wrong and he could truly have meant to speak of joy and unity and show himself as the president of all Americans, not just Christians. But even then, you cannot stand and defend peoples’ faiths while distancing yourself from your own. Not to say that he should be the most devout Christian, but if he just does not trust in Christ anymore, why lie about it? His actions speak quite clearly. And many would probably call him brave for stating his disbelief or change of creed.
Or perhaps he has not pondered nor does he care about the discrepancies between his words and actions. This is politics after all. But then again, even politicians have to tell some truths sometimes, otherwise there is no point to any political system. So, where are Biden’s truths?
The real issue is that he is diminishing the idea of religion and faith in general and shrouding it in a light of embarrassment and myth. This is a more diplomatic version of what the communists did in Socialist Romania. They ridiculed faith and church so that no “serious scientist” and “man of reason” would ever dare think of “such nonsense.”
This is the direction the Christmas message was heading. It was not the avoidance of the words Jesus Christ or the watered-down presentation of his own declared faith that were the most problematic, but the combination of what was blurred and what was made clear.
So inclusive Christmas messages are sending America down the road to communism? Constantin-Parke didn't explain why the president must force-feed Christianity to Americans who aren't Christian.
The MRC's Autumn of Hunter Biden Derangement Topic: Media Research Center
Elon Musk's selectively released "Twitter files" is not the only Hunter Biden-related narrative the Media Resarch Center pushed in the final few months of 2022 (while whining that it was not inaccurately made into a right-wing obsession with Hunter's genitals). Its Hunter Biden Derangement Syndrome continued to reign at the MRC since the last time we checked in, with lots of complaining that the non-right-wing media was ignoring whatever minor development was blowing up in their right-wing media bubble.
Here's some of what the MRC was obessing over (and whining about) in the last few months of 2022:
We've already noted how the MRC keeps blaming the media for not embracing the right-wing narrative on the then-unverified Hunter laptop story (and not criticizing the New York Post for providing any independent verification at the time that would have kept the story from being treated as anything other than a partisan October surprise), as well as how that the MRC smeared not only Hunter but her daughter on her wedding day, how it lashed out at media outlets who won't push the right-wing anti-Hunter narrative as "liberal rags." and how it complained that interview with Hunter's ex-wife didn't dish enough sleaze for the MRC's prurient satisfaction.
We've also noted how the MRC loves to run up the numbers on purported Hunter Biden scandals, and it tried to add to that list with an Oct. 13 piece by Geoffrey Dickens declaring, "Eight Brand New Hunter Biden Scandals the Nets Are CENSORING." That inflated the number of MRC-declared Hunter "scandals" to 35.
But if there's anything the MRC really doesn't like, it's normal media people pointing out that Hunter Biden is a thing only inside the right-wing media bubble. Kevin Tober complained in an Oct. 9 post:
On Sunday's Meet the Press on NBC former Biden White House press secretary Jen Psaki dismissed the newsworthiness of the FBI's announcement that they now have collected enough evidence to charge President Biden's crack delinquent crackhead son Hunter with tax and gun-related charges. Psaki claimed that she looked online at the front pages of local newspapers around the country and didn't see the story. Therefore, according to her, it's just an inside-the-Beltway Washington story.
[...]
Psaki is only making NewsBusters point that the media is covering for Joe and Hunter Biden by not covering this story. Just because a handful of leftwing newspapers aren't covering the Hunter Biden scandal doesn't mean it's not a big story.
Mark Finkelstein whined even more in a Nov. 18 post:
Hypothesis:
CNN's Don Lemon is a shameless pro-Democrat hack.
Proof:
Just before the presidential election, theNew York Post broke bombshell stories, derived from Hunter Biden's laptop, indicating that he was trading influence with his father for big paydays from companies in Ukraine and China. And that on at least one of the deals, 10% of the payments had been earmarked for "the big guy," which one of Hunter Biden's partners has said was a reference to Joe Biden.
The liberal media, including CNN, and Big Tech, including Facebook and Twitter, circled the wagons, dismissing the New York Post story as "Russian disinformation."
But—after the election—the Washington Post and the New York Times admitted that the information on Hunter's laptop was authentic—not Russian disinformation.
So . . . you'd think that Don Lemon would have the journalistic integrity to acknowledge that a congressional investigation into the matter is very much justified, and indeed, necessary.
But no. On today's CNN This Morning, CNN's Pamela Brown reported on her interview with Rep. James Comer, the Republican chairman of the House oversight committee, who will be leading the investigation. Comer indicated that although Joe Biden will not be subpoenaed, this will be an investigation of the president.
Lemon, expressing skepticism, asked Brown whether there is any "there, there" to the investigation. Lemon suggested that the investigation is nothing more than "retribution" for the Democrats' investigations of Donald Trump.
And Lemon concluded the segment by scoffing at the importance of the investigation:
"The American people are dealing with a lot of things. I'm not sure this is one of them."
Right. Because who cares if the sitting President of the United States had been profiting from his son's influence-peddling?
Never mind, of course, that the Hunter laptop story looked enough like Russian disinformation for numerous intelligence officials to initially dismiss the story, coupled with the New York Post's failure to provide any initial independent verification. But in Finkelstein's eyes, that's not the Post's fault, apparently.
This is how desperate the MRC wants to take down President Biden, that it feels it must destroy his son in order to make that happen.
CNS Doing Word Counts On Biden Now Topic: CNSNews.com
CNSNews.com loves to do word counts on Democrats (though never on Republicans) -- heck, it's stilldoing that to Barack Obama even though he hasn't been president for years. President Biden is the latest nitpickingtarget, and CNS is obsessing over how he repeats certain words in his speeches. Susan Jones complained in a Oct. 5 article:
President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris convened the second meeting of their reproductive rights taskforce on Tuesday, each giving introductory remarks and slamming pro-life views as "extremist."
Reading from a binder when his moment came, Biden used the word "extreme" or "extremist" six times in five minutes to describe abortion bans and the people who support such bans.
After citing each example and even putting it in boldface, Jones then went the gaslighting route (like its Media Research Center parent) to pretend that Democrats are the real extremists on abortion:
Some pro-life Americans, including Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, have said Democrats are the real extremists on abortion:
In a speech on the Senate floor in May, McConnell accused Democrats of supporting "an extreme and radical abortion policy."
“Our Democratic colleagues want to vote for abortion on demand through all nine months, until the moment before a baby is born," McConnell said.
"Democrats’ radical bill is as extreme as extreme gets. It ignores modern science. It is tone-deaf to public opinion. Nothing about their bill merely codifies the current case law on this issue. Their extreme proposal goes way, way beyond codifying the status quo. It would roll back many existing laws.
"Democrats’ bill would functionally allow elective abortion through all nine months. Abortion until the moment of birth.
Jones cited no example of an abortion taking place at "the moment of birth."
Craig Bannister did his own word count for a Nov. 30 article:
President Joe Biden repeatedly promised his audience that he was being truthful on Tuesday, when he addressed a South Korean-owned computer chip manufacturer in Bay City, Michigan.
On 29 occasions during his speech, Biden reassured those in attendance either that “I mean it,” it’s “not a joke,” it’s “a fact,” or he was “serious” about what he said.
Biden said 13 times that he meant what he said. Three of those times, Biden revealed that he “really” meant what he said, and another three times he explained that he “seriously” meant it.
Four of his comments were “not a joke,” Biden explained.
Nine times, Biden declared that he was providing a “fact,” including three times he doubled down on the claim.
Biden said that three of his comments were “serious.”
On multiple occasions, Biden used more than one of the reassurances in the same sentence, such as when he declared union workers to be the world’s most highly skilled and trained:
We cannot recall an instance in which CNS called out how many times Donald Trump used a certain word or phrase, even though there are many opportunities for it to do so -- for instance, his multiple claims that "big, strong" men keep coming up to him and crying.
WND Pushed Conspiracy Theories Against Kari Lake's Opponent Topic: WorldNetDaily
WorldNetDaily has embraced Kari Lake's election denierism, so it's not surprising that it would launch attacks on the woman who defeated her for Arizona governor, Katie Hobbs. An anonymously written Nov. 14 article tried to build a conspiracy theory out of the idea that because Hobbs was Arizona secretary of state, she would be signing off on her own election:
It is a conflict of interest?
Democrat Katie Hobbs, the party's candidate to be governor of Arizona, is holding a small lead in the race over Republican Kari Lake as the last few percentages of precincts are counted – a week after the fact of the election.
And as the state's elections chief as secretary of state, she could be in the position to certify her own election.
Which has raised objections from Lake, who suggested Hobbs should recuse, because of the apparent conflict.
In fact, the secretary of state's role in certifying elections is largely ceremonial and there was no real reason for Hobbs to recuse herself.
Art Moore pushed another Hobbs attack in a Nov. 29 article:
As Arizona Republican gubernatorial candidate Kari Lake challenges Maricopa County's certification of the 2022 election in court, the chairman of another county is declaring he voted to certify under duress.
"I found out today that I have no choice but to vote 'Aye' or I will be arrested and charged with a felony," said Ron Gould, chairman of the Mohave County Board of Supervisors.
Lake's opponent, Arizona Secretary of State Katie Hobbs, who is overseeing the election, has threatened felony charges for officials who don't certify the election.
Hobbs is suing Cochise County, which refused to certify by the Monday deadline.
But as a more responsible media outlet reported, there was a state-mandated Nov. 28 deadline for Arizona counties to certify the election , but county officials clung to a dubious claim that the county's voting machines weren't certified as an excuse to delay certification, adding that "County boards do not have the legal right to either change the results provided by their elections officials or refuse to certify them."
An anonymously written Dec. 2 article rehashed numerous pro-Lake, anti-Hobbs claims, including that "It was Secretary of State Katie Hobbs, who curiously 'won' that race, that sent an email to officials in Mohave County threatening to file felony charges against them."
Bob Unruh tried to manufacture a conspiracy theory in a Dec. 6 article:
Multiple people have called for an investigation into Katie Hobbs, the Democrat governor-elect of Arizona, after it was revealed that she colluded with Big Tech to censor information about the election in which she was on the ballot.
Republican attorney general nominee Abe Hamadeh's campaign issued a statement that, "The Secretary of State (Hobbs) was working with the federal government and Big Tech to silence free speech and political dissent in an election that she was on the ticket for. This needs to be fully investigated."
Also, firebrand U.S. Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, R-Ga., said, "The SOS of AZ and Gov candidate, Katie Hobbs, used the power of the AZ SOS to collude w/Twitter to unconstitutionally violate 1st Amendment rights of Americans for her own political gain. This is communism and Hobbs can not be governor. I'm calling for a Federal investigation."
It is a report at Just the News that explained Christinia Bobb, a lawyer for Donald Trump for President 2024, wondered, "What else did Katie Hobbs have removed? And how much censorship took place under her office?"
The report said Twitter removed several statements from the social media site after Hobbs' office contacted an organization called the Center for Internet Security, "which forwarded it to Twitter."
Unruh is lying. In fact, the Hobbs action in question did not try to "censor information about the election in which she was on the ballot" -- it was made on Jan. 7, 2021, months before Hobbs announced for governor, something even the dubious Just the News admits. The request specifically address the false claim made in those tweets that the state's voter registration system is controlled by foreigners. Unruh offered no proof otherwise, nor did he explain why lies should never be challenged or why it's "censorship" to remove verifiably false information.
Despite that, Andy Schlafly perpetuated this misinformation, delcaring in his Dec. 6 column that "In a story broken by The Gateway Pundit, Twitter censored tweets critical of Democratic gubernatorial candidate Katie Hobbs at her request" without mentioning important context like the untruth of the tweet being "censored."
NEW ARTICLE: The MRC Flips Over Elon Musk, Part 5 Topic: Media Research Center
The Media Research Center continued to embrace the chaos Musk unleashed when he took over Twitter -- and even defending him over statements by Musk that appeared anti-Semitic. Read more >>
MRC Ramps Up Musk Hero Worship Over 'Twitter Files' Release Topic: Media Research Center
As the selectively released "Twitter files" continued to roll out to Elon Musk's handpicked journalists, the Media Research Center kept cranking out the stenography, as well as the usual whining that non-right-wing media outlets weren't parroting Musk's narrative:
This happened as even Fox News host Trey Gowdy downplayed the importance of the selectively released files.
In between, however, P.J. Gladnick served up a little hero worship in a Dec.12 post:
At just two minutes before 6 AM Eastern Time on Sunday morning, Elon Musk drove the left and their media allies nuts with a short tweet: "My pronouns are Prosecute/Fauci."
This quickly resulted in a wall of fury to the extent that even media outlets that have been engaged in Censorship Denialism such as CBS News were forced into mentioning the Twitter Files.
Gladnick concluded by gushing over the prospect of Twitter releasing "COVID files": "The reaction to the Twitter Covid Files could be so extreme as to smoke out ABC and NBC News into joining CBS News by forcing them to also break out of their Censorship Denialism and mention the previously taboo topic of the Twitter Files."
Catherine Salgado cheered another Musk move in a Dec. 13 post:
New Twitter CEO Elon Musk has reportedly dissolved Twitter’s Trust and Safety Council, as the Twitter Files uncover details of Twitter’s previous biased censorship.
Forbes reported that the 100 “activists, academics and civic leaders” of the Trust and Safety Council were informed by email Monday of the council’s dissolution, hours before being set to meet with Twitter executives about supposed “recent issues” on the platform. The “About” link for the council on Twitter’s website now brings up the short message, “Nothing to see here.”
Reportedly, former Head of Trust and Safety Yoel Roth, who recently left Twitter, and former Twitter General Counsel Vijaya Gadde deliberately orchestrated the ban of then-President Donald Trump from Twitter in 2021, even though Trump broke no rules.
While the Trust and Safety Council was meant to advise Twitter about safety, Twitter’s censorship of conservatives while ignoring actual violent incitement indicates the council’s definition of safety might have been politically biased.
Of course, nobody imagined that the president of the United States would help to incite a violent insurrection, which is why there may not have been a prohibition against it. She also failed to mention that Musk disbanded the council about an hour before it was scheduled to meet with Musk and other Twitter officials, suggesting a bit of cowardice on his part.
Brian Bradley, meanwhile, complained that the crappy working conditions Musk is making Twitter employees work under was being exposed:
Instead of reporting honestly on the newsworthy revelations of the Twitter Files, The Washington Post continues to take personal shots at the platform’s new CEO Elon Musk.
On Dec. 9, Washington Post columnist Michelle Singletary released a “perspective” piece that hit Musk for such absurdities as requiring high work ethic from his employees and laying off workers to cut costs.
“Looking back at 2022 … Elon Musk emerged as the grand marshal of maniacal management,” Singletary wrote in a piece titled, “Here’s why Elon Musk is the worst kind of boss.”
Singletary continued: “Those who remained were told to commit, in writing, to a ‘hardcore’ workplace or quit. ‘This will mean working long hours at high intensity,’ Musk said in an email to employees. Hundreds chose unemployment, refusing to sign a pledge to perform at levels best reserved for robots.”
[...]
It appears that Singletary left a key part out of her commentary: There is a value in hard work, and bosses value it.
Bradley then whined about how the Post pointed out the right-wing leanings of the reporters Musk hand-picked for his "Twitter files" release:
Meanwhile, when The Post did write something of substance covering the Twitter Files, it attempted to smear the reporters breaking the story. The publication stealth-deleted a description of journalists Matt Taibbi and Bari Weiss – who have reported on the Twitter Files – as “conservative,” Fox News reported. Taibbi and Weiss have not identified themselves as conservative, and it appears that The Post had only included the reference initially to discredit the release of the damning Twitter Files.
Bradley offered no evidence to prove that Taibbi and Weiss are not conservative -- their denials mean nothing -- and the fat that he cited the decidedly right-wing Fox News to complain about this adds another level of irony.
NewsBusters has found liberal cable news networks CNN and MSNBC have almost completely ignored the first five installments of the Twitter Files, which revealed Twitter employees engaged in rampant censorship of conservatives. Since the first set of documents were published on the evening of December 2, less half of one percent of the coverage on either network has even bothered to mention the story.
MRC analysts examined all regular programming on both CNN and MSNBC between 7:00 p.m. Eastern on December 2 and 7:00 pm ET on December 13. Not including commercials, MSNBC aired approximately 133 hours of news during that period, of which only 0.26 percent (1,253 seconds) included any mention of the Twitter Files. Of the approximate 130 hours of non-commercial time on CNN during the same span, just 0.34 percent (1,574 seconds) dealt with this topic.
D'Agostino was silent on how much time Fox News spent on the story.
Alex Christy devoted a Dec. 15 post to lashing out at CNN for not adhering to the right-wing narrative on the files:
Thursday’s CNN This Morning had a peculiar take on the Twitter Files and revelations into what went into the decision to block the New York Post story on Hunter Biden’s laptop. Not only was it alleged that the Twitter Files actually made Twitter look good, but it was also claimed that it was Elon Musk that was violating the spirit of free speech.
Against a chyron headline that read, “Culture War Theater,” co-host Poppy Harlow began by asking senior media reporter Oliver Darcy, “the Hunter Biden laptop and the New York Post story that squashed weeks ahead of the election. What has come out of the Twitter Files on that?”
Darcy began by reporting, “that Jack Dorsey admitted that suppressing the New York Poststory was a mistake, so that he did, I think, last year.”
Beyond that, he also added that these things happen because of the nature of the business, “So, the Twitter Files, though, they really showed the-- I think the messy content moderation that was happening behind the scenes and I think we're seeing and it's probably no surprise but we're seeing that not everyone agrees, is on the same page when they're making these complex decisions.”
That conveniently ignores the mental gymnastics Twitter had to perform to justify the ban, but Darcy nevertheless continued, “I will say on this specific Twitter Files drop, I thought what was really noteworthy was Elon Musk’s handpicked reporter, Matt Tiabbi [sic], said that there was no evidence of government involvement in trying to suppress this story and that was a big claim that Elon Musk had made earlier when he was hyping these Twitter Files. I think that's very important to point out here.”
Christy further complained that CNN pointed out that Taibbi was Musk's "handpicked" journalist chosen to put out Musk's preferred narrative, huffing in response, "Even if Musk had given the materials to Darcy for a traditional news story, he would still be a 'handpicked' journalist, just one that CNN approves of."
CNS Keeps Up Hateful Biden-Is-Senile Narrative Topic: CNSNews.com
For the past three years, CNSNews.com hashighlighted gaffes and misstatements by President Biden for the partisan purpose of making him look senile -- something it refused to do to Donald Trump despite a similar record of gaffes. That malicious narrative continued in 2022. Susan Jones sounded quite conspiratorial in an April 6 article under the headline "Watch As Barack Obama Returns to White House, Stealing the Limelight From 'Vice President Biden'":
Was former President Barack Obama kidding when he referred to President Joe Biden as "vice president" at a White House event on Tuesday? Obama called it a "joke," but...
Why did Biden feel the need to explain his wife's absence from the event celebrating Obama's signature achievement -- the Affordable Care Act?
And why did everyone, including Obama, ignore Biden, leaving him to wander alone in a room now dominated by his former boss?
Those are the questions. Here's the video:
An anonymously written April 22 article was provocatively headlined "President Biden: “The Caption Underneath the Picture Was, ‘Biden Molests Another Child’” -- though the article was about Biden criticizing the picture, which was actually of him comforting a grandchild after the funeral for his son Beau. Talk about burying context.
The smears and deliberate out-of-context quotes continued:
Biden: 'Which Way Are We Going?' (in which Jones sneered: "As he frequently does, President Joe Biden needed someone to tell him which way he was supposed to go, right on the grounds of the White House.")
A Sept. 27 article by Peyton Holliday, meanwhile, hyped a poll claiming that 56% of respondents "say they 'have doubts' about the president’s mental fitness for office." There was also an implicitly snarky and anonymously written Oct. 31 article on Biden issuing a proclamation for National Alzheimer’s Disease Awareness Month, in which he "call[ed] on Americans 'to recognize their fellow citizens with Alzheimer’s Disease.'"
Concurrent with this was the occasional article about Republicans engaging in performative outrage over Biden's gaffes (again, despite the fact they never fretted over Trump's gaffes). For instance, Craig Bannister wrote in a March 30 article:
President Joe Biden’s constant gaffes, especially those regarding classified information, emboldens the Deep State to keep him in the dark and make important decisions without him, Rep. James Comer (R-KY) warned Wednesday.
Discussing how the administration has had to walk back Biden’s recent remarks, suggesting that Americans are training Ukrainian troops in Poland and that Russian President Vladimir Putin should be removed from office, Rep. Comer told Fox & Friends First that the gaffes endanger American citizens, not just U.S. troops:
[...]
The more public gaffes Pres. Biden makes, the more likely it is that the Deep State will cut him out of the loop and start making decisions without consulting him, Rep. Comer said:
None of that actually happened, of course; Comer was just saying what he thought would get him on Fox News.
Similarly, an Oct. 10 article by Jones reported that "President Joe Biden's comments last week about the world facing the 'prospect of Armageddon' were 'reckless' and dangerous, former (Trump) Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said on Sunday."
On the "opinion" side, Pat Buchanan (whose presidential campaigns CNS editor Terry Jeffrey worked for in the 1990s) has been the leader in pushing the narrative of Biden's purported senility:
President Joe Biden may be making trips to New Hampshire, but few believe he will be running again in 2024, as the manifestations of his cognitive decline appear more frequent and disturbing. -- April 26
Biden has himself become a drag on the party. His low poll numbers, verbal foot faults, visible frailty and perceived "cognitive decline" all handicap efforts to portray him as a strong, engaged and decisive leader. -- May 3
Does Biden, with his shuffling gait, regular gaffes, and physical and cognitive decline manifest that attribute of which Hamilton wrote ?-- May 24
It is not too much to infer from this stunning piece on the front page of the Times that America's newspaper of record, a citadel of liberalism, has decided it is now fair game to confront Biden on the age-and-infirmities issue. Nor is it too much to say that the Times is giving its own belated validation to claims made for many months by conservative media that Biden is neither physically nor cognitively capable of handling the duties of his office, let alone to serve a second term, which would end in 2029 with Biden at 86 years of age. -- July 12
But in a hilarious counterpoint to all of this, a Dec. 2 article by Jones quoted none other than Newt Gingrich conceding that Biden might not be so senile after all and criticizing his fellow Republicans because "We dislike Biden so much, we pettily focus on his speaking difficulties, sometimes strange behavior, clear lapses of memory, and other personal flaws. Our aversion to him and his policies makes us underestimate him and the Democrats":
"Republicans must learn to quit underestimating President Joe Biden," says former Republican House Speaker Newt Gingrich, who admits he's no fan of Biden or his policies
[...]
He credits Biden with waging war in Ukraine without any troops; and successfully "polarizing Americans against Donald Trump supporters," resulting in a strong midterm showing for Democrats, despite Americans' concerns about the economy, crime and the border.
Gingrich concludes:
"Today there is not nearly enough understanding (or acknowledgement) among leading Republicans that our system and approach failed. We need to rethink from the ground up how we are going to Defeat Big Government Socialism – including almost inevitable second-time Democrat Presidential Nominee Biden."
Is that a tacit admission that CNS' petty obsession with cherry-picking Biden statements to make him look senile has failed? Perhaps.
MRC's Graham Hypocritically (And Lazily) Bashes The 'Meathead Media' Topic: Media Research Center
For years, the Media Research Center hasrepeatedlyhurled the lazy "Meathead" insult at any statement made by actor and director Rob Reiner, even though "All In The Family" ended nearly 50 years ago -- as if the MRC cannot separate an actor from a role he hasn't played in literally decades. Tim Graham used his Nov. 4 column to lazily spread the "Meathead" description to all non-right-wing media in an pre-election attempt to deflect from the extremism of Republicans:
We don’t have a Mainstream Media. We have a Meathead Media.
Actor and director Rob Reiner captured the paranoid style of the press in summarizing the latest nationally televised Republican-smearing speech by our president.
[Embedded tweet from Reiner: "President Biden couldn’t have been clearer. These midterms will determine whether we want to preserve our 246 year Democratic experiment in self rule or surrender to the Tyranny of Fascism."]
This kind of deranged speech is treated as conventional wisdom. Everyone is supposed to understand that you should feel compelled to vote straight-ticket for the Democrat Party [sic], because the Republicans are the Tyranny Of Fascism Party.
“Democracy is on the ballot,” our president says, which heavily implies voting against his wishes is voting for the end of the American experiment. It would be a vote for autocracy, or monarchy. Democrats somehow cannot see that this carries the echoes of autocracy, or monarchy. They tell voters they don’t have actual choices on the ballot. It should be a one-party state, or democracy dies.
That's simply a rehash of ConWeb criticism of Biden for calling out MAGA extremism -- which Graham never actually rebuts but merely complains was said aloud. He then rehashed another right-wing grievance about the Capitol riot hearings:
They want to run our country exactly the way they have run the House January 6 Committee. There are two legitimate political parties, the Democrats, and the Cheney-Kinzinger Republicans. Both are deeply committed to the belief that the actual Republican Party should be dismantled.
The press has presented this argument in a very undemocratic way. No one questioning the committee’s hearings or rulings deserves to be heard. No one suggesting the committee is a partisan enterprise should be acknowledged -- even when it’s obvious to everyone that Democrats believe January 6 is somehow the best partisan argument they can make for themselves in these midterms.
Bu Graham never explains why MAGA Repubicans are more legitimate than the "Cheney-Kinzinger Republicans," or why there should be no accountability for anyone involved in instigating or participating in the insurrection. Instead, he did more grievance-hopping:
The Democrats and their repeaters in the press don’t actually want the Cheney-Kinzinger Republicans to succeed, either. See how Cheney and Kinzinger won’t be in the House in 2023, and how the Democrats cynically supported what Biden calls the “extreme MAGA Republicans” in primary contests against Republicans who voted to impeach Trump over January 6. Of ten Republicans vote to impeach, four retired and four were defeated in primaries. Only two are on the ballot.
One of them is Rep. David Valadao of California. Before his primary in June, Democrats spent $110,000 on ads criticizing his impeachment vote. Now a Democrat PAC called the Voter Protection Project has created a website, traitordavidvaladao.com, calling Mr. Valadao “A Traitor Who Turned His Back On President Trump To Serve His Own Interests.”
This project claims to be “holding Republicans accountable for their attacks on the ballot box.” But in reality, It’s not about accountability. It’s about putting each and every Republican in the Tyranny of Fascism box, regardless of their actual votes and beliefs. Any Republican who seeks the approval of the press should see the dead end.
As we've documented, Graham and his MRC repeatedly freaked out over cross-party primary meddling when Democrats did it, but had no problem with Rush Limbaugh's "Operation Chaos," which encouraged cross-party primary meddling by Republicans. He also forgot to mention that his MRC cheered Cheney's primary loss.
Graham went on to complain that "There was no 'fact-checking' and no opposing view" of Biden's speech -- but neglected to mention that he hates fact-checkers because they have a bad habit of exposing the falsehoods of Republcians, or that his employer's own "news" division, CNSNews.com, is not big on offering opposing views to statements made by Republicans.
Graham concluded by whining:
["Ex-Republican" Matthew Dowd] compared Republicans to a devastating hurricane, and the media are like a weather man saying “oh, by the way, a hurricane is gonna hit in three days. Good night, and [I'm] not telling you what damage it's gonna do, what you can do to prevent it."
That’s the deranged sound of the Meathead Media, slanting everything in favor of Biden’s vote-for-us-or-else “democracy.”
Graham is hypocritically criticizing the "meathead media" for doing exactly what the MRC does. Who's the real meathead here?
WND Still Whining About Election, Complaining That Voting Is Too Easy Topic: WorldNetDaily
The midterm elections may have taken place in November, but WorldNetDaily has continued to whine about the outcome -- and, of course, manufacture conspiracy theories about elections being stolen from Republicans. Brad Lyles -- who has pushed voter fraud conspiracies before -- did so again in his Dec. 2 column:
The obvious diagnosis is: Democrats cheat.
And if Democrats don't cheat, Democrats don't win. And since Democrats are so fantastically skilled at cheating, they win even when everyone hates them and hates everything they're doing.
Cheating wins.
Of course, as outlined earlier, multiple factors in addition to cheating played a significant role in neutralizing Republicans' Red Wave – but it is the cheating that is foundational. Because none of the multiple other factors pertinent to our defeat, or victory, have relevance as long as cheating remains. Cheating defeats them all. Cheating is the ultimate hole card; merely consider Maricopa County this very week.
Cheating will always defeat even the most aggressive efforts to win elections – even if every such effort is executed perfectly. Even if Mitch McConnell were really a Republican.
The most recent example of efforts – beyond those to prevent cheating – include Republicans' newfound awareness of Democratic success – legal success – at capitalizing on their assault upon election integrity in 2020. And it is clear that Republicans must achieve success in this new world as well, understanding that collecting ballots is more important than winning hearts and minds or having well-attended rallies. Winners now win with ballot harvesting, ballot boxes, focused canvassing, early voting, mass ballot mailing, etc. Mastery of these new election mechanics is crucial to any future Republican success.
However, even if Republicans achieve success in this new arena, their electoral victories will be short-lived, because no matter how many votes or ballots Republicans deliver, Democrats will always find more – because Democrats will manufacture more – because Democrats cheat, and they do it well.
The same day, Josh Hammer insisted that Donald Trump should still be an example for Republicans to follow, even though most of his candidates lost on Election Day and nobody really likes him:
Trump's manifold personal flaws and recent headline-grabbing self-inflicted wounds aside, there is still much to learn from his dominance of the 2016 Republican presidential primary field. Trump ran to the "right" of his median competitor on some issues, such as immigration, but he ran well to the "left" of his median competitor on other issues, such as trade, health care and entitlements. On foreign policy, he was the most critical of all candidates on the debate stage of the instinctive ultra-hawkishness that had become post-Cold War GOP orthodoxy.
While it is impossible to ignore the dominant halo effect of Trump's global celebrity status, GOP primary voters also rallied to Trump's nationalist, populist strand of conservatism. He broke through the Democrats' Rust Belt "blue wall" in the general election, upsetting Hillary Clinton in Pennsylvania, Michigan and Wisconsin (not coincidentally, all states that were disproportionate victims of globalization). He narrowly lost those same states in 2020, but all of them – along with Wisconsin's western neighbor, Minnesota – are now considerably closer each election cycle, in the age of this more nationalist and populist GOP, than they were during the "dead consensus"/"zombie Reaganism" years of the 1990s through the mid-2010s.
Joseph Farah spent his Dec. 5 column ranting that a push in some localities to lower the voting age to 16 is part of an evil democratic plot:
Beyond potentially gaining more votes by lowering the voting age, some observers see the Vote 16 push as part of Democrats' broader effort since the 2020 election cycle to change a host of voting rules, such as instituting universal mail-in voting.
Just last year, 125 House Democrats voted in favor of an amendment to the For the People Act, which included several Democrat-backed election rule changes, to add a provision to the legislation lowering the voting age for federal elections to 16.
It's coming. They're serious. They just never give up.
Andy Schlafly was still parroting Donald Trump's discredited election fraud narrative in his Dec. 6 column and ranting about early voting, basically arguing that Republicans can't win if more people are allowed to vote:
The unjustified suppression of free speech on social media and the exploitation of rampant early-voting ballots have severely tainted the last two elections. The sooner both problems can be rectified, the sooner election integrity will be restored.
Donald Trump's tweetstorm, not on Twitter but on his platform Truth Social, hit a nerve. Trump pointed out that "steps must be immediately taken to RIGHT THE WRONG. Only FOOLS would disagree with that and accept STOLEN ELECTIONS. MAGA!"
[...]
A record number of early ballots were cast in Georgia this year, more than during the pandemic in 2020, plus another 2 million early votes in the runoff. Some conservatives mistakenly think that the record early turnout in Georgia is the way of the future, when the real future for our nation is returning to one Election Day.
No wonder Republicans are losing Georgia. Republicans cannot win an election that has "record early voter turnout." As The Western Journal's Floyd Brown told Steve Bannon on "The War Room," there is no path for Republicans to win statewide elections in Arizona, Georgia and other must-win states without a return to in-person voting on Election Day.
Richard Blakley spent his Dec. 8 column similarly lashing out at early voting, effectively declaring that states who can't elect Republicans be kicked out of the union:
Florida's outcome, with its legal voting system, is in line with pre-election polling. But now, with the weeks of counting all the votes and the eyebrow raising "42 million" early votes, and stunning record-breaking numbers of absentee ballots being dropped off on Election Day, we are expected to believe that Republicans lost the U.S. Senate, and nearly failed to take the U.S. House, and many state legislatures and local elections flipped blue! That almost makes you think that someone counting Democratic ballots might have been messing with the figures, where if someone did a thorough check behind them they just might say, "Look, twins … again and again and again!"
Originally, to be a state in the union, there were a series of criterion, among which the petitioning territory had to show governance that prevented lawlessness, making it such that this territory had the capacity to interact lawfully with other states. If states cannot use their governance to insure legal voting, the most important aspect of being a part of a republic, then perhaps their statehood should be reexamined. Maybe it is time to drop some stars off the flag. At the very least, perhaps a probationary period needs to be instituted for states, whereby they can lose their statehood if they cannot get their act together and correct their lawlessness.
[...]
Maybe we can reconstruct some of the voting systems, by having strict voter ID requirements, strict laws against voter fraud, severe prison terms for anyone caught trying to commit voter fraud, no mail-in ballots sent to every voter, no ballot drop boxes, no ballet harvesting, no ballots accepted for days after Election Day and no counting relentlessly for days on end. This would be like putting the figures back where they need to be in a manger scene that has been dismantled. Perhaps by doing this, no one examining ballots in the future will have to say, "Look, twins."
Like Schlafly, Blakley is arguing that Republicans can't win if too many people are allowed to vote.
MRC Keeps Musk PR Machine Rolling To Promote 'Twitter Files' Topic: Media Research Center
Given how enthusiastically the Media Research Center promoted the first release of Elon Musk's "Twitter files" selectively released to hand-picked journalists, it was again more than willing to serve as Musk's servile stenographer to promote the second installment. Curtis Houck did the usual MRC thing of complaining that non-right-wing networks wouldn't take the bait while praising Fox News for falling into line:
On Thursday night, journalist Bari Weiss released the second batch of the Twitter Files that showed unequivocally that Twitter has not only blacklisted conservative and opposing views, but lied repeatedly to the world about shadowbanning. Not surprisingly, the major broadcast networks ABC, CBS, and NBC censored this story from their flagship Friday morning shows and continued to purposefully live in denial.
In turn, the tally for network coverage of the Twitter files remained at 26 seconds courtesy of Monday's CBS Mornings regarding first Twitter Files, which were releasedDecember 2 by Matt Taibbi.
The Fox News Channel’s Fox News @ Night provided an alternative approach by spending eight minutes and 53 seconds on Weiss’s reporting. Host Trace Gallagher shared in a tease on how they revealed “not only were conservative accounts blacklisted, but the highest levels of the company were involved in the censorship.”
Well, yes, "alternative approach" is one way to describe Fox's parroting right-wing talking points. Speaking of which, Joseph Vazquez served up exactly that:
Twitter owner Elon Musk dropped another batch of files exposing his predecessors for lying about the existence of the platform’s elusive shadowbanning operation.
Former New York Times editor Bari Weiss, who first reported on the second batch of Twitter files Dec. 8, noted that they show how Twitter employees “build blacklists, prevent disfavored tweets from trending, and actively limit the visibility of entire accounts or even trending topics—all in secret, without informing users.”
“Twitter executives have been lying to Congress and to the American public,” MRC Free Speech America Vice President Dan Schneider said. “This is an illegal fraud on all of us. DOJ, SEC, FTC and the FEC should immediately investigate for criminal and other violations of law.”
But as others have pointed out, there was nothing secret about any of this -- Twitter's terms of service specifically state that it may "limit the distribution or visibility" of any content on its site. And as others have also noted, this release actually shows how "Twitter spent years finding new and creative ways to keep large conservative and right-wing accounts on the site despite some pretty egregious behavior" -- something Houck and Vazquez will never admit.
Also note how Vazquez cites Weiss' former employment at the Times to boost her credibility. In fact, the MRC has been trying to promote her bid for victimhood after she made a show of quitting the Times because of criticism of her work, suggesting that she is very much a right-wing writer who is politically invested in the biased narrative Musk is pushing.
The MRC kept the PR campaign going while hiding reality:
Vazquez was back in PR mode for the third selective release of documents:
Twitter owner Elon Musk released through journalist Matt Taibbi yet another batch of documents revealing the sordid decision process by former executives to ban former President Donald Trump from the platform.
Taibbi, who reported on the new batch Dec. 9, said the documents reveal an “erosion of standards within the company in months before [the Capitol Hill riot], decisions by high-ranking executives to violate their own policies, and more, against the backdrop of ongoing, documented interaction with federal agencies.” The most damning was revealed when Taibbi noted that the “intellectual framework” behind banning and censoring Trump“was laid in the months preceding the Capitol riots.”
This was followed, of course, by the requisite whining that non-right-wing outlets weren't getting suckered into Musk's narrative. Alex Christy performed that duty:
The Saturday editions of the network morning shows concealed round three of The Twitter Files, where it was revealed that Twitter’s decision to ban former President Trump was the culmination a process that began well before January 6. Other things that ABC’s Good Morning America want to conceal include your face as prepare for your upcoming holiday festivities during flu season.
Christy didn't mention that Musk treating this release like a Friday news dump -- the time when bad news typically gets released because most journalists are done for the week and are slow to report on it -- pretty much guaranteed that coverage would be minimal. Yet the PR machine continued:
The MRC was also still complaining that people were pointing out that people really wanted to use the Hunter biden laptop story as an excuse to post pictures of Hunter Biden's penis. Jorge Bonilla was the designated whiner this time (also in Spanish):
Over two years have passed since Twitter censored the New York Post's story on Hunter Biden's "Laptop From Hell". We continue to learn about the internal processes behind the censorship, but CNN En Español insists on trying to avoid any substantive coverage of the story while gaslighting the public it claims to serve.
Whereas Univision and Telemundo simply avoided mention of the laptop and made their Twitter Files reporting all about Donald Trump, CNN En Español attempted to redirect the story by suggesting that the story was primarily about the sexually suggestive photos found in the laptop, as opposed to details about the peddling of influence while Joe Biden was Vice President of the United States.
[...]
[CNN En Español anchor Juan Carlos] Lopez' redirection is something to behold. Not only does he claim that there was nothing new in the first installment of the Twitter Files, but that the New York Post wasn't really censored, and that the decision to censor was about Hunter's skin pics.
Bonilla refused to acknowledge that people like right-wing actor James Woods were very much trying to post pictures of Hunter's schlong on Twitter, which does in fact violate policies against posting nude photos without the subject's consent.
CNS Calls On Right-Wing Jewish Group For Cleanup After Trump Leans Into Anti-Semitism Topic: CNSNews.com
CNSNews.com loves the right-wing Zionist Organization of America -- and, more specificially, ZOA's love of Donald Trump -- so much, it ran two separate articles on Trump receiving the exact same award from the group. So when CNS had to do cleanup after Trump leaned into anti-Semitism by claiming that American Jews aren't loyal enough to Israel at a ZOA event, managing editor Michael W. Chapman knew exactly who to call on to rebut the criticism in a Dec. 6 article:
The Zionist Organization of America (ZOA), an American Jewish organization that defends the interests of Israel and Jewish people, denounced a letter from 12 Democrats that called on GOP congressional leaders to condemn alleged “anti-Semitic remarks” by former President Donald Trump.
The ZOA also praised Trump’s comments stressing that “there are many American Jews who are not doing the right thing for Israel, and some of them are even serving in Congress.”
After noting that the letter -- led by Rep. Steve Cohen, who is Jewish -- stated that Trump furthered an "anti-Semitic trope" by portraying Jews as having dual loyalty to the U.S. and Israel (as well as Trump's whining that American Jews tend to support Democrats), let ZOA attack Cohen without actually rebutting the specific claim:
Commenting on the letter, ZOA Director of Government Relations Dan Pollack said, “It is inappropriate for Congressman Cohen to use antisemitism as a political weapon. The fight against anti-Semitism is too important, with real victims in the United States, to deploy it like a hammer whenever a political rival speaks.”
“The comments of former President Trump are true,” said Pollack, “there are many American Jews who are not doing the right thing for Israel, and some of them are even serving in Congress.”
“Most of the signers of this letter by Rep. Cohen are reliable opponents of everything Israel does and have also signed letters threatening to reduce our strategic cooperation with Israel unless they adopt the policies advocated by Israel's enemies,” he added.
From there, Chapman helped ZOA play whataboutism by spouting old talking points:
In relation to perceived anti-Semites in Congress, Mort Klein, the ZOA’s national president, said, “ZOA strongly applauds Leader Kevin McCarthy for sending a clear and powerful message that there will be negative consequences to Jew-hatred and unwarranted Israel-bashing which undermine America’s longstanding position of maintaining strong U.S.-Israel relations as a bulwark of our Mideast policy.”
“We urge Leader McCarthy to remove other bigots Rashida Tlaib, AOC, Jamal Bowman, Cori Bush and Betty McCollum from their committees as well,” added Klein.
ZOA Board Chairman David Schoen noted the “classic anti-Semitism espoused by Rep. Omar,” and said Rep. Cohen’s “time would be much better spent clearing out the bigotry among his colleagues than playing politics with such an important subject.”
Chapman did not allow Cohen or anyone else respond to ZOA's attacks.
Interestingly, Chapman and CNS did not call on ZOA for cleanup duty after Trump dined with anti-Semites Kanye West and Nick Fuentes. Then again, CNS has been trying to censor that story.
The Media Research Center has 
WorldNetDaily managing editor David Kupelian penned a Dec. 15 
Newsmax -- 
CNSNews.com's nitpickiness of President Biden even extends to his Christmas messages. In December 2020, CNS 
Elon Musk's 
CNSNews.com 
WorldNetDaily 
As the selectively released "Twitter files" continued to roll out to Elon Musk's handpicked journalists, the Media Research Center kept cranking out the stenography, as well as the usual whining that non-right-wing media outlets weren't parroting Musk's narrative:
For the past three years, CNSNews.com 
For years, the Media Research Center 
The midterm elections may have taken place in November, but WorldNetDaily has 
Given 
CNSNews.com loves the right-wing Zionist Organization of America -- and, more specificially, ZOA's love of Donald Trump -- so much, it ran 