NEW ARTICLE -- Out There, Exhibit 86: Standing Athwart Modern Art Topic: Newsmax
Columnists for WorldNetDaily and Newsmax complain about art being to abstract and non-representational, with one arguing that art is only "good" if it advances "Western heritage." Read more >>
MRC Helps Musk Attack Group For Exposing Hate On Twitter Topic: Media Research Center
The Media Research Cener made sure to ignore evem more bad news about Elon Musk and Twitter. For instance:
Twitter reinstated the account of right-wing influencer Dom Lucre after he was banned for posting a video of a toddler being tortured.
Twitter also reinstated the account of Kanye West, also know as Ye, months after it was banned for postin an image of a swastika inside a Star of David.
Musk knew he had to change the narrative, so it was right-wing red-meat time. And the MRC's Luis Cornelio eagerly lapped it up in an Aug.1 post:
An anti-free speech group had a meltdown after Elon Musk took legal action against the group’s research targeting X, formerly known as Twitter.
Imran Ahmed, the CEO of the infamous Center for Countering Digital Hate, and its Democrat allies have hysterically responded to a legal threat from Musk, the owner of X. Ahmed lamented that Musk is pushing back against the CCDH’s efforts to destroy the platform after Musk pledged to stand up for free speech. Disgraced Rep. Adam Schiff (D-CA) chimed in, whining that mass censorship is no longer reining on Twitter.
In a fiery letter, Musk’s attorneys issued an ultimatum to the CCDH, slamming the far-left organization’s research against the X platform. Musk argued that the CCDH is falsely accusing X of allowing so-called hate speech on its platform. The letter, as reported by The New York Times, called the research “false, misleading or both.” Similarly, in a blog post dated July 31, X blasted the CCDH for “actively working to”: “assert false and misleading claims encouraging advertisers to pause investment,” “prevent public dialogue” and “prevent free expression” by targeting individuals it doesn’t agree with.
Once again, Cornelio is dishonestly framing content moderation to address lies and misinformation as "censorship" while refusing to explain why lies and misinformation must be allowed to spread unchecked (if they further right-wing narratives, at least). Also, at no point does Cornelio cite Twitter or Musk providing any evidence that proves false anything CCDH has reported. Instead, he complained that Ahmed is responding to Musk by pointing out that he's effectively demanding that CCDH be censored:
Ahmed wrote an opinion article for MSNBC, whining that Musk is bullying him.“[Musk] is trying to silence the independent researchers at CCDH who are shining a light on the situation,” Ahmed further bellyached, referring to his group’s dubious research that hate speech is on the rise on X. “Musk and his legal team have engaged in an aggressive campaign to intimidate, bully and silence CCDH.”
In a brazen bout of hypocrisy, Ahmed further accused Musk of censoring CCDH, the exact sort of punishment CCDH seeks when accusing those it disagrees with of having spread so-called hate speech. Specifically, Ahmed claimed, “X’s legal threat is a brazen attempt to silence honest criticism and independent research, perhaps in a desperate hope that it can stem the tide of negative stories and rebuild the company's relationship with advertisers.”
Cornelio offered no proof that any bit of CCDH research about Twitter is "dubious," nor did he respond to anything else Ahmed said. He then admitted that his employer's attacks on CCDH are personal: "Just what has CCDH done in the past? In 2022, CCDH classified the Media Research Center, among others, as one of the 'Toxic Ten' of alleged climate 'misinformation.'" As we documented at the time, the MRC never rebutted anything in the CCDH report, instead merely demonstrating just how thin-skinned it is about criticism, smearing CCDH as "digital brownshirts."
Catherine Salgado touted a Republican attack on CCDH in an Aug. 7 post:
Rep. Jim Jordan (R-OH) is requesting information from an anti-free speech nonprofit over potential censorship collusion with the federal government.
X (formerly known as Twitter) accused the UK- and U.S.-based Center for Countering Digital Hate (CCDH) of hurting Twitter’s advertising through false claims of rising hate speech in a lawsuit last week. Now Jordan is asking for information on “the interactions between the Center for Countering Digital Hate (CCDH) and the federal government in particular, as well as between CCDH and social media companies.”
Dated August 3, the letter called out leftist CCDH CEO Imran Ahmed and his group for “appear[ing] to have played a role” in President Joe Biden’s “censorship regime by advising the government and social media companies on so-called ‘misinformation’ and other types of content— sometimes with direct or indirect support or approval from the federal government.”
The letter argued that anti-free speech efforts in coordination with the government, whether “directly or indirectly,” is “a grave threat to the First Amendment.” Jordan specifically zeroed in on CCDH’s COVID-19-era report on “The Disinformation Dozen,” which led to censorship of users like Robert F. Kennedy Jr. that CCDH labeled as prominent “anti-vaxxers.”
Salgado, like Cornelio, failed to explain why lies and misinformation -- especially about an important health issue like COVID -- must never be countered. Nor did she explain that Kennedy is very much an anti-vaxxer, and he has indisputably spread lies and misinformation about vaccines. Salgado also showed no curiosity about why Jordan is working to weaponize government against a critic at the apparent request of a wealhy man like Musk.
And like Cornelio, Salgado whined that "CCDH included Media Research Center in its November 2021 'Toxic Ten' report of the top spreaders of supposed 'climate change denial'" without mentioning that her employer didn't dispute anything CCDH said about it. She also made sure to note that her boss, Brent Bozell, "previously called CCDH 'digital brownshirts.'" Gotta make sure to smear a critic while cheering how the government is targeting it.
WND's Brown Ramps Up Anti-Transgender Hate Topic: WorldNetDaily
As part of his campaign of anti-LGBTQ hate, Michael Brown unsurprisingly supported the Supreme Court ruling that allowed a Christian website designer to refuse to offer her services, trying to parse the ruling in his July 3 column:
That's why some of the Christians who have come under attack in recent years had served LGBTQ+ customers for years. Some of them even had LGBTQ+ employees. But when it came to creating artistic content that violated their beliefs (such as creating a wedding cake or designing a floral arrangement for a same-sex ceremony), they declined. And for that, they were dragged into court, with their lives turned upside down.
[...]
That's why the Supreme Court's decision should have been 9-0 and applauded by people from all backgrounds. The fact that it was 6-3, with many Americans outraged over the ruling, reminds us of just how confused our nation has become.
May truth and sanity prevail.
Brown was back to cheering a British TV personality's anti-transgender hate in his July 12 column:
Do you remember when Ann Coulter was laughed to scorn on Bill Maher's TV show when she stated that, out of the announced Republican candidates in 2015, Donald Trump was the most likely to become president? "Trump? No way! You're crazy!" Who knew she would be so accurate in her prediction?
Now, what if I told you several years ago that Piers Morgan, well-known as a strong ally of the gay community, would become one of the loudest, most persistent voices against trans-activism? I imagine I would have been laughed to scorn, just as Coulter was.
The difference is that I did not make any such prediction.
That's because Morgan was known as a very strong ally of the LGBT community, not to mention a good friend of Elton John. If anything, I would have predicted that Morgan would also take up the trans cause, just as he had taken up the gay cause.
To my knowledge, he had not been on the record for separating the T from the LGB, nor, to my knowledge did he affirm the reality of gay identity while taking issue with the idea of trans identity.
[...]
To this moment, Morgan remains a passionate defender of same-sex relationships and, in his opinion, doesn't think most people really care to debate this anymore. Yet on broadcast after broadcast, he is challenging the madness of trans activism. (As always, when I speak of this "madness," I am not attacking individuals who truly and deeply struggle with gender dysphoria. I'm speaking about the societal madness of arguing that you are whatever sex and gender you perceive yourself to be. That idea is nothing less than madness.)
Ah, yes, the ol' "I'm not attacking people" claim he loves to take refuge in. But, again, he's framing a refusal to not not hate transgender people as "societal madness" demonstrates that he really is attacking people. Brown closed by cheering Morgan's hate: "You're on the right path, sir, step by step. We'll be waiting to greet you when you make it all the way home."
In his July 14 column, Brown cheered "influential gay blogger Andrew Sullivan" for complaining that LGBT activists tried to "reprogram children" into not hating LGBT people:
He hit the nail on the head. That is exactly what the "queers" did.
But where he was wrong was in saying that "we gays" never targeted children. That is patently false.
Who, then, were these "queers"? They were part and parcel of the larger gay-activist leadership, not least, in the realm of children's education. (And remember one of the best-known cries of early gay activists: "We're here, we're queer, get used to it.")
That's why, for well over a decade, this has been the official policy found in the Los Angeles Unified School District Reference Guide: "'Gender identity' refers to one's understanding, interests, outlook, and feelings about whether one is female or male, or both, or neither, regardless of one's biological sex."
This was not peripheral to the larger gay-activist agenda. It was right in the center of it, part of the radical war against heterosexual normativity and the hated gender binary.
[...]
Please don't tell me today that this was not part of the gay activist agenda from early on and that it was somehow hijacked by queer activists. All of this was mixed and mingled together. In fact, the pro-gay and pro-trans narratives were inextricably intertwined.
That's why, in my sarcastic poem, "Here At School the Slant Is Gay," I included these lines: "GLSEN will fill in for Granny and help kids find their inner-trannie."
Yes, Brown wrote an anti-LGBTQ poem. That's how much he hates these people.
Brown cocluded by touting how "my colleague at Focus on the Family, Jeff Johnston, has done the heavy lifting when it comes to documenting the gay indoctrination of children," then ranting: "It is now incumbent on us as parents, educators, ministry leaders, social media influences and activists to undo the damage that has been done and restore innocence and sanity to the kids of this world. It's the least that we can do." According to Brown, it's "innocence and santiy" to make sure chilren hate LGBT people and "indoctrination" to teach them not to.
MRC Still Censoring That Swalwell Was Cleared In Chinese Spy Investigation Topic: Media Research Center
We've documented the Media Research Center's weird obsession with Democratic Rep. Eric Swalwell and his alleged relationship with a woman who turned out to be a Chinese spy -- and its refusal to tell readers that a Republican-led House ethics investigation found no wrongdoing on Swalwell's part. The MRC was at it again in a July 10 post by Curtis Houck immaturely headlined "Fang Fang, Bang Bang":
Former Washington Examiner Justice reporter Jerry Dunleavy revealed Sunday in a series of lengthy tweets that, per a source, senior FBI leadership meddled in and shuttered investigations into Fang Fang, the rumored ex-lover of Congressman Eric Swalwell (D-CA) as well as Russell Lowe, a Chinese-American who had been working for Senator Dianne Feinstein (D-CA).
But most notable was something long the subject of speculation and giggles on Twitter, which was, as Dunleavy confirmed, “that there had been a sexual relationship between Swalwell & Fang.” Naturally, none of this was of interest to the “big three” of ABC, CBS, and NBC on their flagship Sunday night and Monday morning newscasts.
[...]
Turning to Fang Fang, Dunleavy dropped the bomb after referring to a 2020 story in Axios:
One thing that was actually not in the Axios story but which my source has confirmed — the FBI firmly believed based on the evidence they collected on Fang that there had been a sexual relationship between Swalwell & Fang.
He added that said official told him“the FBI had FISA surveillance up & running on Fang...and so many of her actions & communications were being intercepted & monitored.” This also drew in the CIA and the NSA.
Houck censored the fact that a bipartisan House committee found no wrongdoing on Swalwell's part, even as he complained that non-right-wing media covered other stories. It's as if the MRC is averse to doing "media research" that might not mesh with its preconceived partisan notions.
WND Columnist Has Homophobic Language Meltdown Topic: WorldNetDaily
Cambridge Dictionary lists the primary definition of "gay" as "sexually or romantically attracted to people of the same gender and not to people of a different gender." The traditional meaning of happy, fun, carefree, is listed only as a secondary meaning. In the late 1900s, homosexuals began referring to themselves as "gay," to describe their sexual orientation. It is important to understand that this didn't just spontaneously happen. The homosexuals knew that "homosexual" had a stigma and that to gain wide societal acceptance of their twisted lifestyle, they had to get the country to stop saying homosexual when referring to them or thinking about them. They needed to exchange the negatively charged 'homosexual' for a word with positive association in people's minds. Clever folks that they were, they understood the power of language and carefully selected the word "gay" with its sense of happiness and good feeling, as the new descriptor of choice for their perversion.
They sent out the memo to all sodomites and their sympathizers "never use 'homosexual' to refer to ourselves; say 'gay'" – and say it they did: gay, gay, gay, gay, gay, until with enough time and repetition the original meaning of the word was buried under the relentless barrage of weaponized rhetoric. It was a spectacular victory. So much so that if you ask anyone under 40 what "gay" means, they will probably say "homosexual." Paris, the capital of France, was traditionally referred to as "gay Paris." No more as people self-censor to avoid appearing to be calling "the city of light" the city of sodomites. Their success in changing America's speech led to changing America's moral values.
Ask the average person on the street if homosexuality is morally wrong and you'll probably hear something like, "Well, it's OK if that's what they want to do, as long as it isn't hurting anyone."
Ah, but it IS hurting people. The hijacking of "gay" was just the camel's nose under the flap of the tent. It opened the door to the pronoun tyranny and speech control of today. Professors are getting fired, their careers ended for insisting they have the right to decline to call a man a woman. Students are being kicked out of schools, destroying their education. Parents are investigated and harassed by the FBI for saying they don't agree with critical race theory at school board meetings. Those disobeying the speech police are physically swarmed and attacked in universities, those former bastions of free speech and thought. These Americans thought they still have freedom of speech in America. They are rapidly finding out otherwise. They didn't realize their freedom of speech was taken from them while the church slept.
In a way, you have to admire these indefatigable warriors of debauchery, these ambassadors of degeneracy for their intense, unflagging public relations campaign to change America's moral values.
[...]
Never use the word "gay" to refer to homosexuals. If using it out of habit, break the habit. The push-back has to start somewhere, and refusing to say "gay" is a good starting point. Anyone can do it. Use the scientifically accurate and traditional words "homosexual" and "sodomite," rather than the wildly inaccurate "gay." Suicide rates among homosexuals are significantly higher than the general population. These people are anything but gay, and we only contribute to their sickness by going along with their speech-control program.
MRC Flip-Flops On Simon Ateba To Rehash Old Grievances About Jim Acosta Topic: Media Research Center
We've documented how the Media Research Center loves Simon Ateba, an obscure right-wing reporter for his own Africa-baesd media outlet, becuase he's their kind of jerk -- he loves to make a spectacle of himself during White House press briefings under Biden -- and even trying to liken him to CNN reporter Jim Acosta, whom the MRC repeatedly attacked for his attempts to get answers from the Trump White House. This happened again in Tim Graham's July 28 podcast:
The New York Times and The Washington Post really demonstrated a double standard this month on confrontational White House reporters. CNN's screaming Jim Acosta was a heroic screamer in the briefing room, while screaming African reporter Simon Ateba should sit down and shut up.
Managing editor Curtis Houck -- our chronicler and video-tweeter of the White House Briefing -- joins the show to talk about press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre and the White House Correspondents Assocation taking a very hostile pose toward Ateba.
Graham and guest Curtis Houck, the MRC's designated hater of White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre, cited examples of non-right-wing media praise for Acosta and compared them against criticism of Ateba. But then they oddly distance themselves from Ateba. Graham insisted that "he's not a hero to us," while Houck added:
You notice in a lot of these stories, the conservative media worships him and all these -- and they provide examples. NewsBusters is not included because, I mean -- you can go ahead and boo us, you can ratio us, but I think I've been pretty consistent on Twitter and you have as well in your columns that Simon Ateba is a gadfly, he's a carnival barker, like, you don't even know what Today News Africa is. It's like a complete ripoff of New York Post. There's nothing about how or where his site is funded, so there's a lot of questions about, you know, his site, like, what is the point of it? ... But the point is, though, that he did actual reporting in Africa, so that's admirable [crosstalk] But in terms of his U.S. career, I feel very strongly that -- you know, people are saying, well, he's being ignored, he's the only one who's punching back. We'll talk about this more as the show goes on, but that's not the way you go about this.
Houck went on to tout how right-wing reporters like Fox News' Peter Doocy (whose political affiliations he did not acknowlege) are allegedly able to "prosecute" the press secretary "without the snark and the condescension." He then insisted that "we should be consistent, we should be honest about this" -- despite the fact that Houck's criticism of Ateba had never made it into a NewsBusters post until now.
Throughout all this, though, neither Graham nor Houck cited any examples of Acosta that are directly parallel to anything Ateba has done -- they simply rehashed their old grievances that Acosta asked questions the Trump White House didn't like, and they certainly didn't accuse right-wing reporterslike Doocy, Steven Nelson and Philip Wegmann of having any sort of polical bias they the way they accused Acosta of being; instead, Graham praised them for their questions being "politely stated."
The complainets continued. Graham and Houck grumbled that some Trump-era reporters that the MRC hated went on to other things -- "everybody screaming like Acosta got a gig," Graham huffed -- but don't expect them to comment negatively (if they comment at all) should Doocy or Wegmann get, say, their own Fox News show as a reward for their anti-Biden reporting.
As Newsmax Bashes Ramaswamy (Who Didn't Buy Airtime On Newsmax), Newsmax Hypes Perry Johnson (Who Did) Topic: Newsmax
In contrast to its negative treatment of Vivek Ramaswamy after he revealed an alleged pay-for-play demand for better coverage, Newsmax has given much more positive coverage to Perry Johnson, a Republican presidential candidate who's doing worse in polling than Ramaswamy. John Gizzi hyped Johnson in a May 23 article:
With Donald Trump and Ron DeSantis presently sucking the wind out of the Republican presidential sweepstakes, it is difficult, and sometimes impossible, to distinguish others further back in the GOP field.
There's South Carolina Sen. Tim Scott, who drew swatches of publicity with his announcement for president on Monday. Former U.N. Ambassador Nikki Haley has been on the hustings for months. And entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy has been a fixture on Sunday talk shows of late.
Then there's another entrepreneur, who may break out of the pack. Widely known in Michigan as the "quality guru," Perry Johnson has blitzed Iowa and New Hampshire in recent weeks, and he has signed on a campaign team that includes operatives in both of those states that are so crucial to nomination.
Todd Cheewing, former political director of the New Hampshire Republican Party, is Johnson's top agent in the Granite State. And, in what is almost a nod to Trump and his decade-plus hosting "The Celebrity Apprentice," Johnson has begun the filming of his own reality show for cable TV as he commences on the campaign trail.
Gizzi didn't mention that Johnson is paying Newsmax for airtime to broadcast his reality show.
After Johnson finished a distant second behind Trump in a straw poll at a conference of the far right Turning Point USA, Eric Mack wrote a July 17 resume-hyping article under the headline "Perry Johnson Is 2nd to Trump, but Who Is He?":
Johnson, 75, is a Michigan multimillionaire who self-styles himself a "quality guru."
The Republican presidential candidate boasts he helped save the auto manufacturing industry in the U.S. by "writing the book on the quality controls."
Johnson seems to click with grassroots conservatives, having placed third in a CPAC straw poll earlier this year.
Johnson is running on his "Two Cents to Save America" plan, which he outlined in a book that has become his campaign mantle.
"Two Cents" also bears a foreword from Art Laffer, the famed Reagan-era economist who is the father of supply-side tax cuts.
Unlike Gizzi, Mack did disclose the financial link between Johnson and Newsmax (though he turned it into a promotion):
In the presidential campaign, Johnson has been reaching out to younger voters in a Ross Perot-like campaign — albeit this one in the Republican Party. That strategy appears to be paying off with the strong support at the youth-oriented Turning Point.
Johnson positions himself as a businessman with a reality TV show following his campaign bus tours in early primary states Iowa and New Hampshire.
The reality show airs on social media and he has purchased air time for it on Newsmax, typically broadcasting on Sundays at 9 p.m. EST.
Over the following month or so, Newsmax has published numerous positive articles promoting Johnson, largely focused on his claims of being eligible for the first Republican candidate debate:
WND's Lively Impresses Russian Media With Misinfo About Religious Conflict in Ukraine Topic: WorldNetDaily
How much of a Putin stooge is Scott Lively? So much so that he's willing to appear in Russian media to do so. He began his April 7 column this way:
In is no secret to those who get their news outside the U.S./U.K. media propaganda bubble that the government of Ukraine has become a highly repressive military dictatorship under cultural Marxist President Zelensky, in which both opposition political parties and independent media are banned. But the very worst repression is being seen today in the grotesque holy week persecution of Orthodox monks and believers as showcased in this aptly titled article: "U.S./NATO-funded proxy war in Ukraine fueling hatred, persecution of ancient Christian community: Priests arrested, praying Christians mocked in public by ultra-nationalists and Satanists as standoff continues at holy site." Pay special attention to the accompanying photo.
In just that one paragraph, Lively managed to be even more dishonest about what was going on than fellow WND columnist Hanne Nabintu Herland. As we explained then, the issue here -- involving the expelling of the Ukranian Orthodox Church from a monastery -- is that the Ukranian Orthodox Church continues to have ties to the Russian Orthodox Church, which is headed by a staunch Putin ally, Patriarch Kirill, who has expressed enthusiastic support for Russia's war in Ukraine. (One Russian Orthodox priest appeared on Russian TV calling to "burn Ukrainians like pagans.") A breakaway sect, the Orthodox Church of Ukraine, has formed independent of Moscow, which Lively presumably doesn't like. That "aptly titled article" Lively is referring to was written by Leo Hohmann, a former WND reporter who has a history of writing articles so filled with false claims and fearmongering that WND had to stealth-correct months after the fact to presumably avoid getting sued.
Lively then wrote:
This week I gave an online interview on this topic to a Moscow-based Russian media outlet that featured me a few years ago as the primary English-speaking authority in the internationally popular documentary film "Sodom." I offer their questions and my preliminary answers here by way of educating my fellow American conservatives on this topic.
Yes, Lively is doing interviews with Russian media -- and you can bet he's not criticizing Russia's role in instigating the war during them. Indeed, his first answer is wildly divergent from reality in telling Russians what they want to hear:
Question. What provoked the religious conflict in Ukraine?
Answer. There is a worldwide assault on Christianity because it is the strongest force standing against the globalist plot for one-world government. The global elites intend to create this one-world government on a Utopian Cultural Marxist theme – which sets its highest priority on what they call "sexual freedom" but which is really sexual anarchy. The most powerful drivers of this agenda are the LGBTs, who now control the governments of the West, including the NATO alliance. Zelensky is their willing friend and ally in that goal. He is pretending that the current suppression of the church is about nationalistic patriotism, but it is really an effort to purge the church from the culture to make way for Marxism and the "great reset."
Lively continued to deceive as he willingly help his Russian media person (and, thus, Putin) advance bogus anti-Ukraine narratives:
Q. Criminal cases are initiated against clergy in Ukraine, some priests are deprived of Ukrainian citizenship, parishes are seized by schismatics – what will this lead to?
A. On my third trip to Russia in 2013, I toured Moscow and the Kremlin with a delegation from the World Congress of Families, which intended to hold an international conference defending biblical marriage and the natural family there in 2014 (which was canceled due to the outbreak of civil war in Ukraine). Part of that tour featured an overview of what the Soviet Communists did to the church during their control of Russia, which included tearing down beautiful churches and cathedrals, and turning others into storage warehouses for trucks and heavy equipment. That is always what Marxists do when they come to power, and I expect to see more of the same defilement of church properties in Ukraine and insults to the dignity of the believers, the stronger the Marxist powers grow.
For all the talk about religious schisms in the interview, there was no mention of the fact that this particular schism is driven by the fact that Orthodox Ukrainians would like to attend a church not affiliated with the government that's bombing their country and murdering thousands of its citizens. Instead, Lively continued to suck up to his Russian interviewer and the pro-Putin church:
Q. What can be the solution of the religious conflict in Ukraine?
A. I think the only solution to the religious conflict in Ukraine is for strong Christian believers with political skills to infiltrate the government and reform it from within, while Christian-influenced world governments and NGOs apply pressure from without to restore God's standards of ethics, morality and public service to the regime. I also think the Orthodox Church should directly appeal to the conservative Benjamin Netanyahu government in Israel for intervention, because it is experiencing the same Marxist vs. Religious power struggle in its country as is happening in Ukraine, and it also has a powerful role regarding U.S. policy.
Q. What role does the Russian Orthodox Church play in the world?
A. At the present time, the Russian Orthodox Church is the world's strongest defender of biblical marriage and the natural family, without which civilization itself will disintegrate. It's essential leadership in this matter is an encouragement to true Christian believers of every confession around the world, and even to those of other faiths who share the universal truths about normal sexuality and family. Preserving and unifying the people of the world around these foundational truths is, in my opinion, the only way to defeat godless globalism, and I urge the Russian Orthodox Church to be more assertive in its promotion of family-based unity around the world, using its resources to actively campaign for such unity internationally.
Note that Lively did not urge the Russian Orthodox Church to denounce the war or disassociate itself from Putin.
NEW ARTICLE: 30 Years (And Counting) Of Hating Anita Hill Topic: Media Research Center
The Media Research Center has never stopped hating Hill for her testimony against Clarence Thomas, continuing to baselessly smear her as a liar or claiming she did it for money. Read more >>
MRC Tried To Baselessly Link White House Cocaine To Hunter Biden Topic: Media Research Center
It was a bit of a slow time for news around the Independence Day holiday, so when news of a small amount of cocaine being discovered in the White House was reported, the Media Research Center latched onto it like, well, an addict on a bender and -- as a manifestation of its HunterBidenDerangementSyndrome -- it rushed to blame Hunter for it despite having absolutely no evidence to support such a claim. Curtis Houck kicked off the madness in a July 5 post:
Believe it or not, but the “big three” networks of ABC, CBS, and NBC each covered on Tuesday night and Wednesday morning the disturbing discovery of cocaine inside the West Wing of the White House with a news brief, partial segment, or full report. But despite the six minutes and 25 seconds of coverage and even a few jokes, there hasn’t been a mention of Hunter Biden.
CBS and NBC, however, have dutifully accepted the spin of the Biden regime put out in the press, which is the implication that the cocaine had to have been left by a tourist on a trip around the White House and not, say, the First Family, a staffer, or even — gasp — a journalist. If this happened under a Republican president, there’s no doubt this would be covered differently.
Later in the day, Ana Schau complained that CNN didn't treat the story with the gravity she insisted it deserved (and wouldn't rush to blame Hunter):
CNN News Central’s Wednesday morning coverage of the cocaine found at the White House over the weekend was short, but telling of their opinion of the matter. After anchor John Berman discussed selective aspects of the matter with White House correspondent Priscilla Alvarez, anchors Sara Sidner and Kate Bolduan joked about the matter and made light of it, saying that it’s not “too soon” for them to poke fun about it.
The segment began with Berman breaking the news of the lab confirmation that the white powdery substance discovered in the White House was, in fact, cocaine. He was quick to note, however, that President Biden was not present at the White House when it had been discovered, seeming to dismiss any relation between Biden and his family and the cocaine.
[...]
Considering that Hunter Biden, a known and self-acknowledged drug addict, had recently spent time at the White House before these drugs had been found, it seemed like it shouldn’t be too difficult to speculate where they may have come from. Something like this likely would have been their first guess if Donald Trump was still president.
Despite the fact that the White House is probably the most intensely video-surveilled building on the planet, an official with the investigation wants us to believe that the public shouldn't expect the discovery of the culprit who left cocaine there just this past weekend. At least that is what the utterly skepticism-free Politico reporter Daniel Lippman is relaying to his readers on Wednesday in "White House cocaine culprit unlikely to be found: Law enforcement official."
While Gladnick didn't actually reference Hunter by name, his post was illustrated with a photo of Hunter and received a "Hunter Biden" tag.
Kevin Tober served up his own demand for a rush to judgment on Hunter:
After predictably ignoring Hunter’s possible role in the appearance of a small bag of cocaine found inside the West Wing of the White House, the “big three” evening newscasts of ABC, CBS, and NBC kept up their silence on Hunter Biden. Failing to mention his name once during each of their reports Wednesday evening. This was despite the fact that the son of the President was a well-known user of cocaine and was reported to be at the White House approximately 48 hours prior to the discovery. Despite the refusal to broach the subject of Biden’s crackhead son, there was plenty of water carrying for the Biden regime’s various explanations and speculation about how cocaine was brought into the White House.
Despite a new update Thursday in the ongoing "cocainegate" scandal in which a small bag of cocaine was left inside with West Wing of the White House in a different location than was originally reported, ABC's World News Tonight and CBS Evening News both lost interest in the story, while NBC Nightly News only managed to dedicate 41 seconds during their evening newscast. The three networks often have a habit of moving on quickly from any scandals involving Democrats. You can be certain if Donald Trump Jr. was a well-known crackhead and a bag of cocaine was found in the Trump White House, this story would still be leading the three evening newscasts.
Nicholas Fondacaro somehow managed to avoid referencing Hunter in a July 7 post:
The White House is one of the most secure and surveilled facilities in America but apparently, the Secret Service may be unable to determine who left a baggie of cocaine in the West Wing. Being unable to determine who was responsible was an insane proposition that left CNN This Morning unfazed Friday as co-anchor Poppy Harlow and White House correspondent Priscilla Alvarez primed their viewers to not expect someone to be held accountable.
Needless to say, none of these writers provided a scintilla of evidence linking Hunter to the cocaine. That's irresponsible partisan activism, not "media research."
After Alleged Pay-For-Play Exposed, Newsmax Attacks Ramaswamy Topic: Newsmax
Over the weekend, Semafor reported that Newsmax told the campaign of Republican presidential candidate Vivek Ramaswamy that if it wanted better coverage of the canddiate, it should buy more ads on the channel. (Newsmax has denied this.) Semafor, and later Media Matters, cited the case of Perry Johnson, who is running well behind Ramaswamy in polls (he didn't even qualify for the first Republican debate) yet gets loads of favorable coverage on Newsmax. It presumably helps that Johnson pays Newsmax to run a reality-style show about his campaign.
While Newsmax has not addressed the Ramaswamy allegations on its website, it has ramped up its negative coverage of him. Around the time Semafor's story was posted, Newsmax posted a column by Dick Morris attacking Ramaswamy over his stance of cutting U.S. aid to Israel:
Whenever an inexperienced neophyte runs for president and ventures into foreign policy, he almost always puts his foot in his mouth due to ignorance and lack of preparation.
Now Vivek Ramaswamy, an interesting candidate, has made a big blunder by calling for a cut in U.S. aid to Israel.
He even wants its hostile Arab neighbors to get U.S. aid equal to what Israel gets.
[...]
He dangerously argues that Israel should not get any more U.S. aid than neighboring Muslim countries.
On what basis is that fair? Israel's aid package should be determined by what we give terrorist state Syria?
This being Morris, he then turned his attack into yet another endorsement of Donald Trump: "there is no reason to bet on an amateur when we have a seasoned 'pro' like Donald Trump."
That was followed by an Aug. 21 article by the apparently unironically named Charlie McCarthy claiming that Ramaswamy "is doubling down on his criticism of U.S. aid to Israel, now arguing that all military support should be cut off by 2028," adding tha t"Ramaswamy’s stance regarding Israel has drawn criticism" and citing Morris' column. That was followed by more attacks over his israel stance:
An Aug. 22 article credited only to "Newsmax Wires" launched a different attack on Ramaswamy:
Vivek Ramaswamy didn't tell the truth about the real reason he took money from the family of George Soros.
After criticism for receiving a $90,000 grant from the Paul & Daisy Soros Fellowship to attend Yale Law School, Ramaswamy claimed that he did so only because he "didn't have the money" pay for it.
But in 2011, the same year he started Yale, Ramaswamy reported he made $2.2 million in income, according to his tax returns reviewed by Fox News.
His returns also show for the the three years before 2011 he made over $1.1 million income working as a hedge fund analyst.
Ramaswamy's connection with Paul Soros, the brother of the controversial George Soros, has raised eyebrows in Republican circles.
An Aug. 23 article by Charles Kim noted that Ramaswamy "called CNN host Kaitlan Collins a 'petulant teenager' in a social media post Tuesday following a contentious interview on the network" over his apparent conspiracy theories about the 9/11 terrorist attacks, but pointed out that "Collins, however, kept her question narrow to the point that he said federal agents were on the planes on 9/11."
Following the Aug. 23 Republican presidential debate, Newsmax published an article on an exchange between Ramaswamy and Ron DeSantis, followed by two articles featuring attacks on Ramaswamy by other candidates:
At The MRC, The Bashing Of Anita Hill Never Ends Topic: Media Research Center
It's been more than 30 years since she made claims of sexual harassment against Clarence Thomas, but the Media Research Center justcan'tstopobsessing over Anita Hill. Clay Waters served up yet another complaint that she exists in a June 23 post:
On Monday’s edition of the tax-supported Amanpour & Co., airing on PBS and CNN International, host Christiane Amanpour interviewed Anita Hill, a professor and of course the woman who accused now-Justice Clarence Thomas of sexual harassment.
Hill has been hailed in the liberal media since her nationally televised 1991 confrontation with the U.S Senate and Thomas, and Amanpour shoehorned her into her show, ostensibly to talk about the African-American emancipation holiday Juneteenth, but really to bash the Supreme Court and claim affirmative action was a civil right.
First, Amanpour furthered the lie that black history wasn’t being taught in some schools because of conservative backlash to Critical Race Theory.
Actually, in the quote Waters provides to back this up, Amanpour said only that "an honest appraisal of black history is impossible in many school districts in the country today" and did not mention critical race theory. But back to complaining about Hill:
After Hill said she had tried to put herself in her enslaved ancestor’s mindset, thinking about voting rights and education and sexual harassment, a list of issues that gave Amanpour a convenient lead-in to bring up the alleged “assault on voting rights, the reversal of women’s rights” happening today as if there was any comparison to the slavery era and 2023.
Waters sneered that "Hill conflated preferential racial treatment under affirmative action to a 'protected right,'" then complained that "Amanpour asked Hill about Justice Clarence Thomas’s current “ethics questions,” as if Hill could possibly provide an objective viewpoint on Thomas." Yet Waters seems to want us to believe that he's offering an objective viewpoint on Hill despite his employment with a right-wing activist organization.
A July 1 "flashback" post by Geoffrey Dickens rehashed right-wing grievances about Hill:
Conservatives certainly remember the awful treatment Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas faced at his 1991 confirmation hearings, including the endless media coverage granted to utterly unproved charges of sexual harassment by a former employee, Anita Hill. At the time, Thomas referred to the televised hearings as a “ high tech lynching” perpetrated by those who would torpedo the conservative jurist’s nomination.
[...]
Given the media mindset of the moment, it was no surprise news organizations leaped to elevate Anita Hill’s harassment allegations, which appeared only after the confirmation hearings had officially ended and Thomas’s nomination had been sent to the Senate floor for what seemed like certain approval. Joe Biden’s Judiciary Committee quickly scheduled new hearings — a last gasp for liberals to try and torpedo the nomination.
And so it goes. The MRC needs to hate Hill in order because right-wingers must have enemies -- and because she criticized an ideologue it loves, Hill is a designated enemy.
WND Continued To Fret Over Tucker Carlson's Firing Topic: WorldNetDaily
WorldNetDaily continued tohave a sad over Fox News' firing of Tucker Carlson well into June. Regular Tucker-fluffer Ilana Mercer kept it up in a June 1 column:
Your columnist's April 25, live, "HARD TRUTH" podcast, recorded a day after Tucker Carlson's dismissal, got it right. Tucker, like Trump, we contended, is transformational. Fox was finished (we chuckled). This forecast was echoed in a column whose lead said it all, "Fix News is finished, having just fired their only attraction, Tucker Carlson!" Clearly, if not "finished," Fox News is sorely diminished. Joy!
I mean, who, pray tell, wants to watch Bret Baier's "Common Ground" sanctimony – where the neoconservative anchor gloms Democrats and Republicans together? What treacle! MAGA men and women – we're a "minority," said Asa (Who?) Hutchinson to CNN's Erin Burnett, on May 30 – will only ever reach across the aisle if it is to grab a member of the Treason Class by the scruff.
"Sacking Tucker Carlson has put a dent in Fox News's ratings," The Economist finally admitted, on May 16, when the truth could no longer be withheld. The consensus is that, "Fox News is currently down by more than a million viewers per show per night."
King Tuck clearly carried the network and its nits.
[...]
Tucker Carlson is planning to launch a new show on Twitter in the service of unfettered speech and a search for truth. That announcement on Twitter has been viewed 133.1 million times to date.
Rupert Murdoch will be remembered as the Money Man who fired Tucker Carlson and, by so doing, sank his network.
Actually, that viewing metric is all but meaningless as an accurate way to know who actually viewed the announcement.
In addition to linking to pretty much every new video Carlson posted on Twitter, more "news" articles followed throughout the month, by both WND writers and those republished from other sources like the right-wing Western Journal:
Editor Joseph Farah -- who urged Carlson to move to the fringe-right channel Real America's Voice in the immediate wake of his firing -- touted the channel again in his June 23 column as a stopgap fix for those missing Tucker:
I love Tucker Carlson so much I am going batty without him. When is he going to have a real nightly show again?
In the meantime, I have a sterling recommendation for you. Are you ready?
Grant Stinchfield at 7 p.m. Eastern on Real America's Voice, if you're lucky enough to get it or have Dish Network, on Channel 219. The network's content also streams live on its website. Real America's Voice also carries Steve Bannon and lots of other programs, including Gina Loudon, John Solomon and Bill Henry.
You might remember Loudon as the former WND columnist to tried to capitalize on her teenage daughter dating a 57-year-old man. WND helpfully deleted that column a few years later, presumably at her request as she sought credibility in Trumpworld.
Farah went on to insist that the folks at Real America's Voice are "real journalists" -- never mind the fact that actual media monitors find it wildly biased and barely credible. Farah's dubious judgment here should make people wonder how he runs WND.
How Is The MRC Hating Transgender People (And Those Who Won't Hate Them) These Days? Topic: Media Research Center
It's not enough for the Media Research Center to hate transgender people -- it must also hate anyone who doesn't hate them as much as it does. Thus, we have a May 4 post by Curtis Houck raging at the Kansas City Star newspaper -- which he laughably and hypocritically called "hate-filled" in his headline -- for correctly identifying a right-wing group as "anti-trans":
On Tuesday, the far-left Kansas City Star uncorked a 1,800-word-plus tome of punditry masquerading as a news story melting down over the Kansas legislature’s passage of a bill that seemed unnecessary five or ten years ago in ensuring everyone’s clear on what is a man and a woman.
Worse yet, they oversimplified the mission of the Independent Women’s Forum (IWF) (a member of the MRC’s Free Speech Alliance) and smeared them as simply an “anti-trans” organization, never quoted them, and, as NewsBusters can report, spiked a column in support of the bill.
In “Kansas will legally define gender as sex at birth. What that means for transgender rights,” activist reporters Kynala Phillips and Katie Bernard touted six opponents of basic biology over ten quotes (and 11 indirect quotes) but none in support of the measure except that label of IWF.
It came in paragraph three: “The national anti-trans group Independent Women’s Forum has been pushing for this law and similar variations across the country. They say the law is meant to prevent judges from interfering with existing single-sex public spaces.”
Houck failed to explain why the Star must be labeled "far-left" simply by not viciously hating transgender people the way he does. And for all his complaining that the paper "oversimplified the mission" of the IWF, he didn't dispute that it is, in fact, "anti-trans."
Houck went on to huff that a Star article on the bill was "teeming with disdain" -- then displayed his own disdain by sneering that an article from a transgender college student was written by "a woman pretending to be man."
A May 5 post by chief transphobe Tierin-Rose Mandelburg complained about criticism of a anti-transgender bill in Florida, so she stuck to approved right-wing talking points and narratives in describing it:
Since the left is only going to present its side of what the bill does, here are the actual details.
Broadly, the bill prohibits minors from receiving “gender-affirming care.” That’s in quotes because when a child is chemically or surgically castrated, their body endures unnecessary and sometimes permanent damages, and that isn’t and shouldn’t ever be referred to as care. Now, the so-called “kidnapping” aspect comes in as the bill would allow a court to temporarily remove a child from his or her home if it's found that they've been provided with these damaging procedures.
[...]
The bill also affirmed that a child's biological sex on his or her birth certificate cannot be modified to affirm a “perception” that a child’s gender is inconsistent with their actual, biological sex.
The bill was set to keep kids safe from parents who allow their children to live a dangerous delusion. But, as mentioned, the left has touted it as the “kidnapping bill.”
The next day, Clay Waters whined that NPR did a story on states passing biologial definition laws that didn't buy into anti-transgender narratives:
Wednesday’s edition of All Things Considered on National Public Radio showcased the latest in a long line of stories from tax-funded NPR trying hard to blur obvious biological lines, to further the cause of transgender activism.
The online version of the report -- under the odd headline “These states are narrowly defining who is 'female' and 'male' in law” -- began with a laughable sentence, especially given NPR’s self-image as educated science believers, that implied common biological terms were some kind of bizarre, made-up jargon:
Lawmakers in Montana, Tennessee and Kansas have voted in the past few weeks to narrowly define who is "female" and who is "male" in state law using such terms as "gametes," "ova," "sex chromosomes,"
Ah yes, those obscure terms that define the actual building blocks of life!
Waters returned for a May 13 post effectively complaining that PBS won't hate transgender people enough:
Tax-supported PBS has attracted heat of late for indoctrinating children on “queer,” transgender, and related issues, including through its PBS LearningMedia brand used in schools, under the rubric “Understanding LGBTQ+ Identity: A Toolkit for Educators.”
Oklahoma Gov. Kevin Stitt vetoed funding for the state’s PBS station for “indoctrination and over-sexualization” of children. Citizens Defending Freedom also called on PBS to be defunded for promoting an LGBT ‘toolkit’ for schools, and cited videos included in the package, including “All Oppression is Connected,” one of many examples of left-wing “intersectionality” propaganda in the education toolkit, which was initially created by the NYC Department of Education.
[...]
Such radical tax-funded PBS content supports the argument that public broadcasting is pushing gender agendas onto children.
Waters didn't explain why it's "indoctrination" and an "agenda" to not hate transgender people.
A May 16 post by Waters mocked NPR for pointing out how Florida is creating a hostile atmosphere for transgender people:
More taxpayer-supported “gender-affirming” propaganda, full of cringy sentimentality, came courtesy of National Public Radio’s misnamed All Things Considered news program Thursday: “As conservative states target trans rights, a Florida teen flees for a better life” The hagiographic tale under the guise of news was told by Stephanie Colombini, a health reporter for Tampa Bay’s NPR-member station WUSF.
(Colombini, naturally, has pronouns in her Twitter bio. She took the photo that accompanies the story.)
The rearranged print edition of the radio story captured the melodramatic tale of Josie, a teenager forced to “flee” the burgeoning authoritarian regime of….Florida, to start a new life in the free state of Rhode Island.
[...]
NPR even provided two trans-related phone numbers “for support.” Now close your eyes and imagine an alternate universe where NPR provides phone numbers for a pro-life rescue ministry, and realize how far-out the publicly funded radio network has gone out on the limb of "gender affirmation."
Waters didn't explain why it's "propaganda?" to not hate trangender people, while his clear and vicioius hatred apparently is not.
Alex Christy used a May 18 post to attack a parent for understanding her child's transgender identity:
As Texas moves to ban “gender-affirming care” for minors, MSNBC’s Jose Diaz-Balart asked a parent, simply known as Rachel, on Thursday if Republicans were being hypocrites. Naturally, Rachel agreed and claimed that they were and that her daughter (son) knew she (he) was a girl before reaching the age of five.
With some bad moral relativism, Diaz-Balart wondered, “So what parental rights do you think -- are there any limits to parental rights and I'm just wondering because you do -- there are inconsistencies, right in what people define as parental rights.”
[...]
While Rachel did not intend to argue for medical treatment for 5-year olds, she did advocate for “social transition,” claiming “So, the vast majority of transition is social. It is allowing children to be able to show the rest of the world who they are on the inside, and for my daughter, that meant growing her hair out, wearing dresses, and changing her name. So, it’s—there’s really not any kind of medical intervention until puberty and, you know, puberty blockers are totally reversible.”
That assertion is contentious, at best, but parental rights wasn’t the only issue Rachel alleged Republicans were being hypocrites on, “These are used for a variety of different healthcare reasons, not just for transgender youth and that's how we know this is a deeply discriminatory bill, because it is only banning the same healthcare that is accessible to non-transgender children and only, only targets trans kids.”
Yeah, because Johnny thinking he’s Susie is not the same thing as treating someone for precocious puberty or idiopathic short stature.
Christy didn't explain how he -- who, as far as we know, is neither a medical expert nor a parent -- could possibly know better than this mother about her child, or why that attitude doesn't conflict with the usual right-wing posturing that parents always know best when it comes to their children.
Waters spent a May 19 post complaining that the New York Times pointed out how right-wing activists are exploiting a handful of people who detransitioned from being transgender as a tool for anti-transgender activism:
A front-page story in Wednesday’s New York Times fiercely defended trans rights, reducing concerns that activists are leading children to make irrevocable surgical decisions, because they were “born in the wrong body,” to political cynicism: “G.O.P. Focuses On Testimonies Of Trans Regret.” (An earlier version really pressed the editorial thumb to the scale: “G.O.P. Focuses On Rare Stories Of Trans Regret.”)
This “news” attack on those who choose to detransition -- to stop identifying or to stop taking actions towards being transgender -- was reported by Maggie Astor, who stands out even among the paper’s woke staff for her devotion to the transgender cause. Previously she blamed Donald Trump for violence against transgenders, a story which opened with almost a parody of wokeness that had to be corrected later: “Transgender women of color led the uprising at the Stonewall Inn…”
[...]
Astor criticized Chloe Cole, a girl who lived as a transgender male and tragically got a double mastectomy at the age of 15, before detransitioning. Astor defined Cole’s detransition as “returning to her female identity,” not as returning to “biological reality.”
Waters also huffed that "Astor heaped skepticism on the detransitioner 'minority,' something she doesn’t do for people who are convinced they were born in the wrong body."
Newsmax Again Invokes Trump For Dishonest Promotion Of Newsmax-Published Book Topic: Newsmax
Newsmax is not shy about merging a little self-promotion into its Trump-fluffing. During Donald Trump's first indictment, it hyped Trump referencing a "final battle" and turned it into a promotion for a book by that same title by David Horowitz -- though it didn't disclose that Horowitz's book was published by Newsmax's book division, Humanix. Eric Mack performed that synergystic promotion again in a July 3 article:
A new campaign ad for former President Donald Trump warns of the 2024 presidential election as the "Final Battle" and vows to "liberate America" from "villains" in the country.
"This is the final battle," the ad begins with Trump's lines from a past campaign rally, referencing the David Horowitz book "Final Battle: The Next Election Could Be the Last."
"With you at my side, we will demolish the deep state," Trump's voice-over continues with the stern-faced former president walking down the hall toward the camera. "We will expel the warmongers from our government. We will drive out the globalists. We will cast out the communists, Marxists, and fascists.
"We will throw off the sick political class that hates our country.
"We will rout the fake news media, and we will liberate America from these villains once and for all."
[...]
Horowitz's "Final Battle" has been frequently mentioned by Trump in campaign rallies, including in a campaign statement on his flight to New York before he was arrested by Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg this spring.
As before, Mack failed to disclose the conflict of interest of Horowitz's book being published by Newsmax.
The Media Research Cener made sure to ignore evem more bad news about Elon Musk and Twitter. For instance:
As part of his 
We've documented
Cambridge Dictionary lists the primary definition of "gay" as "sexually or romantically attracted to people of the same gender and not to people of a different gender." The traditional meaning of happy, fun, carefree, is listed only as a secondary meaning. In the late 1900s, homosexuals began referring to themselves as "gay," to describe their sexual orientation. It is important to understand that this didn't just spontaneously happen. The homosexuals knew that "homosexual" had a stigma and that to gain wide societal acceptance of their twisted lifestyle, they had to get the country to stop saying homosexual when referring to them or thinking about them. They needed to exchange the negatively charged 'homosexual' for a word with positive association in people's minds. Clever folks that they were, they understood the power of language and carefully selected the word "gay" with its sense of happiness and good feeling, as the new descriptor of choice for their perversion.
We've 
In contrast to its 
How much of a 
It was a bit of a slow time for news around the Independence Day holiday, so when news of a small amount of cocaine being discovered in the White House was reported, the Media Research Center latched onto it like, well, an addict on a bender and -- as a manifestation of its 
Over the weekend, Semafor 
It's been more than 30 years since she made claims of sexual harassment against Clarence Thomas, but the Media Research Center 
WorldNetDaily 
It's not enough for the Media Research Center to 
Newsmax is not shy about merging a little self-promotion into its Trump-fluffing. During Donald Trump's first indictment, it 