All day long Thursday, as reported extensively by NewsBusters, the big three evening news broadcasts were beside themselves with glee over the third arraignment of President Joe Biden's political opponent Donald Trump. Between the motorcade chases broadcasted live, and breathless coverage of every detail large and small, it's clear this was seen by the networks as a ratings-grabbing television production rather than the federal government prosecuting the leading challenger to the Biden regime's power in the upcoming elections. The show continued during the big-three evening newscasts, where each network's anchor relayed the day's events to anyone who wasn't already watching.
All in all, the networks were so obsessed that their total coverage of the Trump indictment was now up to 132.5 minutes (2 hours, 12 minutes, and 28 seconds). 20 minutes and 31 seconds of that total occurred on Thursday alone.
Curtis Houck got mad that it was pointed out how Republicans failed to do their job in refusing to convict Trump in an impeachment trial for helping to incite the Capitol riot:
Amid the O.J. Simpson Bronco chase-like idiocy on the broadcast and cable networks Thursday afternoon surrounding former President Trump’s third criminal arraignment, NBC’s Meet the Press moderator Chuck Todd suffered a near-emotional, weapons-grade meltdown seething at the Republican Party for putting America on the precipice of collapse because the GOP “refused to do” what was right and remove Trump from office in 2021 so he can never run again.
Worse yet, he claimed that, by not listening to “the Founders” who “created a process” to do right, Republicans (and not Democrats running urban hellscapes) are the reason there could be an irreparable “erosion of the rule of law”.
[...]
Sounding like he was near tears, the former Senate Democratic staffer blasted the GOP as having made “the wrong call for the Republican Party,” “the American public,” and< “the justice system.”
Houck didn't rebut anything Todd said -- he simply complained that it was said at all.
Houck served up yet more Biden whataboutism in an Aug. 4 post, though he did concede that a former president being repeatedly indicted is "a huge story":
Through four days and three installments each of the flagship morning and evening news shows on the major broadcast networks, ABC, CBS, and NBC have eagerly doled out astounding 162 minutes and 16 seconds through Friday morning salivating over the third criminal indictment of former President Trumpthat has the potential to either land him in prison or propel him to the White House in 2024.
These numbers represent a network tally that is 19 times larger than what these same networks gave (eight minutes and 32 seconds) to Monday’s closed-door House Oversight Committee hearing featuring Hunter Biden’s former business partner, Devin Archer.
The indictment of a former President is undoubtedly a huge story, but scant attention for a person heavily involved in Hunter Biden’s life of ruin amid allegations of bribery involving Burisma, where both Archer and Hunter were on the board? Of course, the networks don’t have any time for the bribery claim.
Houck and Nicholas Fondacaro regurgitated these complaints in the MRC's Aug. 4 podcast: "As they flood the zone with coverage, they also fill the airwaves with flaming hot takes proclaiming their anticipation of Trump behind bars or even exiled."
Jeffrey Lord went back in time in his Aug. 5 column to serve up some good ol' Clinton equivocation:
The media love fest for the Trump-investigating Jack Smith was curiously absent when the name of the prosecutor was - Ken Starr. That would be the Special Counsel assigned to investigate Democrat President Bill Clinton. Somewhere along the way I crossed paths with him at a conservative event. A nicer, more decent and smarter guy it would be hard to find. Not that you would have learned that from the media that covered his most famous case in the mid 1990’s.
Lord went back even further to criticize special counsels for Ronald Reagan and Richard Nixon before returning to present-day complaints:
In short, as is frequently the case with the liberal media, the more things change the more they stay the same.
Special Counsel Jack Smith is now on his way into the liberal media hall of fame.
Shocking.
Not.
Tim Graham spent an Aug. 6 post having a fit that the contrast between our current president and our previous one, under the headline "As Trump went to court, Biden went for a bike ride," was pointed out. Graham lashed out at the reporter who made the observation, declaring that he is "one of the most flagrant Biden publicists in the White House press corps" and huffing: 'In the Trump years, White House reporters competed to see which could be more bombastically anti-Trump. Under Biden, they compete to see which one can sound the most like a White House press secretary."
Clay Waters huffed that some people see Trump's criminality more harshly than he does in an Aug. 7 post:
What's Amanpour & Co’s idea of a balanced segment on the news of former President Donald Trump’s third indictment for “conspiring to defraud” the United States for contesting his loss in 2020? Hosting a sitting liberal Democrat, Representative Joe Neguse (CO), and the ex-Republican (in all senses) Representative Joe Walsh, who ran against Trump in the 2020 primary and remained fiercely opposed.
Amanpour’s Tuesday (August 1,2023) evening show promised both sides, which turned out to be one sitting and one former congressman, both adamantly unsympathetic to Trump. From host Christiane Amanpour's show introduction: Then, how Republicans are reacting to the newswith former GOP congressman and presidential candidate Joe Walsh….”
Neguse was positively placid in comparison to former congressman Walsh’s theatrically rabid attack on Trump.
Picking Walsh of all people to deliver the Republican opinion on Trump was just more evidence that Amanpour & Co. was more concerned about piling on the former President than any sense of journalistic balance.
[...]
Amanpour showed no feel for counter-arguments about an indictment that some have called an example of a two-tiered justice system, one for Republicans, and a more lenient one for Democrats like Hunter Biden.
We don't recall Waters ever demanding that Fox News show concern about having "any sense of journalistic balance."
NEW ARTICLE: Dragphobia Is (Still) All The Rage At The MRC Topic: Media Research Center
The Media Research Center wants you to hate and fear drag queens as much as it does, and its attacks on them at the start of this year continued that narrative (but Milton Berle and "Bosom Buddies" have been deemed exempt from criticism). Read more >>
MRC Complains That Trump's (Third) Indictment Is Considered News Topic: Media Research Center
As it had before with previousindictments, the Media Research Center rushed to defend Donald Trump after his third indictment with the usual distractions and whataboutism. An Aug. 1 post by Kevin Tober whining that that the non-right-wing media covered additional charges under a previous indictment:
Late Tuesday afternoon, Biden DOJ-appointed special prosecutor Jack Smith announced yet another indictment against former President Donald Trump on four separate counts. This time related to his alleged actions in the run-up to the January 6 riots at the United States Capitol. In stark contrast to their dismissive coverage of Hunter Biden’s criminal activity, the three networks spent a combined 24 minutes and 36 seconds on the third indictment of Trump.
ABC’s World News Tonight was the worst offender when it comes to the obsessive network coverage. In total, the network spent 11 minutes and 56 seconds harping on the news. Their total airtime dedicated to reporting the news (minus teases and commercials) was 19 minutes flat, which meant over 60 percent (62.8%) was about Trump.
Tober didn't explain why a former president getting indicted yet again wasn't newsworthy. An Aug. 2 post by Alex Christy similarly complained about newsworthiness:
If CNN has a line on hyperbolic rhetoric about former President Donald Trump, law enforcement analyst and former D.C. police officer Michael Fanone almost crossed it on Tuesday’s CNN Tonight when he compared Trump’s new indictment related to the aftermath of the 2020 Election to the death of Osama bin Laden. Even liberal host Laura Coates was shocked by the comparison.
After Coates asked Fanone his thoughts, he recalled that, “When I first learned about the indictment, I had a long conversation with a friend of mine, Ryan Reilly, and I told him how proud I felt to be an American at that moment. Much in the way that I did when I learned that our military had killed Osama bin Laden. I just felt incredibly proud.”
Amid some crosstalk, a confused Coates sought clarification, “These two seem comfortable to you?... I'm sorry, I don't want to cut you off, but why that comparison in particular?... In what way?”
Doubling down, Fanone declared, “Osama bin Laden was a terrorist who committed a horrific act against American people and against our republic. And I believe that Donald Trump is a terrorist who committed horrific acts against the American people.”
With Tuesday’s third indictment of former President Trump, the “big three” networks of ABC, CBS, and NBC had their ticket out of having to acknowledge the scandals surrounding the Biden family, including reasons to continue skipping Burisma bribery claims and no longer probe Monday’s testimony from Hunter Biden’s former business partner, Devon Archer.
Between their flagship Tuesday evening (24:36) and Wednesday morning news shows (46:05), they’ve spent a whopping 70 minutes and 41 seconds obsessing over the charges filed against Trump relating to January 6 riot and claims about the 2020 election.
All three networks were within two minutes of each other with NBC at 22 minutes and 17 seconds, CBS at 23 minutes and 28 seconds, and then ABC on top at 24 minutes and 56 seconds. Each of these networks far exceeded what all three put up for post-Archer hearing coverage, which was only eight minutes and 32 seconds.
Mark Finkelstein groused about another Osama bin Liden reference to Trump's indictment:
On Wednesday's Morning Joe, liberal historian Michael Beschloss said that the indictment of former President Trump "fits perfectly into the American story" because there has been a history of "monsters" seeking to destroy American democracy. Beschloss cited the Confederacy, the attack on Pearl Harbor, and Osama Bin Laden.
In the context of commenting on the new indictment of Trump relating to January 6th, an apparently panicked Beschloss [see screencap] described Trump as a "monster" like Bin Laden. And in a bit of unhinged scare-mongering, Beschloss warned that if elected, Trump will institute a "presidential dictatorship" and "take away our democracy."
"9/11/2001, Osama bin Laden and other terrorists hated our democracy, tried to destroy it. You see where I'm going," he proclaimed.
Finkelstein was giddy at the prospect that his fellow normally law-and-order right-wingers won't accept their their favorite presidential candidate is a criminal:
Beschloss didn't offer any evidence in support of his claim that Trump has said that the would institute a "presidential dictatorship," or that he would "take our democracy away."
As for the indictment somehow saving America from Trump being elected: even a conviction would not legally bar Trump from running and serving, and Trump has indicated that would be his intention. Indeed, this indictment, which even the National Review has editorialized "shouldn't stand," could be the very thing that propels Trump back into the White House.
Be careful what you wish for, Michael Beschloss and the rest of the liberal establishment!
Houck took over the MRC's Aug. 2 podcast to rehash his complaint about "the astounding totals of coverage on ABC, CBS, and NBC" of the Trump indictment," again claiming that this "has given the networks the perfect excuse to wave goodbye to any and all Biden scandals for an indefinite period of time."
Houck whined again that Trump's indictment was treated as news, with added Biden whataboutism, in an Aug. 3 post:
On Wednesday afternoon, NewsBusters brought you the tally of broadcast network coverage of the third Trump indictment as having stood at roughly 70 minutes (70:41) on the flagship morning and evening newscasts of ABC, CBS, and NBC. Unsurprisingly, the coverage ballooned ahead of Trump’s arraignment Thursday afternoon on charges relating to his conduct on and prior to January 6. The total this time? Roughly 112 minutes (111:57).
Another pattern held serve as, thanks to this third Trump indictment and the liberal media’s obsession with all things Trump (including elevating his 2024 candidacy), the networks again had nothing on Wednesday night and Thursday morning about any of the scandals pertaining to the Biden presidency, Hunter Biden’s life of ruin, or allegations of corruption against President Joe Biden.
The three remained in close touch on the stop watch with ABC still in first place with 38 minutes and 48 seconds.
Houck didn't explain why he apparenty thinks Trump's indictment should be censored.
Nicholas Fondacaro melted down over the ladies of "The View" -- whom he once again smeared as a "cackling coven" -- had an opinion on Trump's latest indictment:
With 2024 on the horizon, the Cackling Coven of ABC’s The View really wanted former President Trump out of the picture. So much so that co-host Sara Haines was flabbergasted on Thursday by the notion that he would get a fair trial and not have any potential jury pool poisoned by the Justice Department releasing information pre-trial. They also fantasized about what his imprisonment situation would be like with Joy Behar saying she would settle for him being exiled somewhere, anywhere.
Referencing an interview Trump Attorney General Bill Barr gave to CNN the previous night, Haines couldn’t wrap her mind around why Trump deserved to have a fair trial, admitting it “blew my mind”:
Tober returned to rant that someone said nice things about Smith:
During CBS’s live coverage of former President Donald Trump’s arraignment on charges related to the January 6 riots at the United States Capitol and his alleged attempt to “overturn” the results of the 2020 presidential election, anchor Norah O’Donnell and correspondent Robert Costa heaped sycophantic praise for the corrupt anti-Trump prosecutor Jack Smith. O’Donnell took a break from analyzing the multiple indictments Trump was facing as they were speaking to Beclown herself by swooning over Smith and his so-called “grit” and “determination.”
“Also in the courtroom is a special counsel, Jack Smith,” O’Donnell observed. “He is essentially who Donald Trump is up against in multiple of these indictments,” she said referring to Smith. “The two of course the classified documents and the January 6 one. And they're sitting across from each other inside this courtroom.”
Tober offered no evidence to back up has assertion that Smith is "corrupt," unless he's arguing that merely indicting a Republican is evidence of "corruption." Instead, he closed by huffing: "The media is enjoying this saga way too much. They can’t be trusted to report on these indictments and trials objectively. It’s all a game to them." But that falsely suggests that Fox News is somehow not part of "the media" -- Tober didn't tell us how Fox News is covering the indictment -- and it ignores that Tober and the rest of the MRC can't be trusted to report on Trump's indictments objectively because its anti-media agenda is nothing but a game to them.
Posted by Terry K.
at 8:24 PM EDT
Updated: Thursday, September 21, 2023 11:23 PM EDT
MRC Annoyed That It's Pointed Out How Trump Acts Like A Mobster Topic: Media Research Center
The Media Research Center has aggressively defended Donald Trump against the many indictment he faces, but before it could get around to defending him against his third indictment, it felt the need to complaing that people were likening him to a mob boss. Peter Kotara groused in a July 26 post:
On Wednesday’s Morning Joe, race-baiting Reverend Al Sharpton came up with an excessively belligerent and hateful reason for why Democrat prosecutions of former President Donald Trump were not affecting his support among voters in the Republican primary.
Sharpton argued that the reason why all these indictments brought by Trump’s political enemies right before the election, was in fact because Trump appealed to the Republican electorate who just hated blacks, women, and gays, and wanted to oppress them.
[...]
He added that Trump was a “crime boss.” Sharpton argued that “It was Trump that had a crime attorney, Roy Cohen [sic], who represented outright mafia chiefs. That was Donald Trump's lawyer. I mean if anyone was a crime boss and is a crime boss, it would be Donald Trump. And if you think it's an overstatement, get the calendar of court dates he has coming up the rest of the year.”
It should be noted that none of the Trump indictments were about mafia activities or organized crime, and hiring a very well-known attorney that happened to represent mafia members in the past does not prove that Trump was a mafia member.
Yes, Kotara is reduced to insisting that Trump can't possibly be a mob boss because he hasn't been specifically charged with being one. And doesn't the hiring of a mob attorney like Roy Cohn say volumes about the company you keep, whether or not you're actually involved in the mob?
Mark Finkelstein similarly complained in a July 28 post:
It's easy for the pro-Biden networks to promote Jack Smith's indictments with maximum drama. On Friday's Morning Joe, NBC News justice correspondent Ken Dilanian is bringing all the doom-and-gloom language he brought to the Mueller probe of Russian collusion with Trump.
Speaking of the new charges against Trump, that he attempted to have surveillance video at Mar-a-Lago deleted, Dilanian really built this up as a criminal conspiracy:
"These allegations rival anything that Richard Nixon was accused of. These are two additional counts of obstruction of justice. . . This indictment reads like a Mafia case."
As you'll see in the video, Dilanian appeared to be virtually at a loss for words as he declared the situation "mind-boggling."
Willie Geist, hosting today's show, agreed with Dilanian, saying:
"It really is astonishing, Jonathan Lemire. It has to be said, reading through this new indictment, it reads like something straight out of the Gambino crime family."
Finkelstein offered nothing but whataboutism in response:
Given his track record on the truth, Dilanian's declarations might be taken with a grain of salt. Back in 2020, NewsBusters caught Dilanian claiming that the Hunter Biden laptop story sounded "really fishy " He suggested that it was, in fact, a Russian "intelligence operation." Whoops!
PS: If Trump sounds like a Mafia boss, what does Joe '10% for the Big Guy' Biden sound like—Cosa Nostra Ken, complete with Dr. Jill Barbie?
Finkelstein didn't mention that, as we've previously noted, questions about Hunter's laptop were reasonable given that they came from the wildly biased pro-Trump right-wing rag that his the New York Post , and the Post could have avoided such questions had they provided independent verification of the laptop that would have address skepticism about it.
MRC Tried To Whitewash Alleged Shady Criminal Witness Against Hunter Biden Topic: Media Research Center
The Media Research Center was a big fan of Gal Luft in 2008, mainly because of his objection to importing oil.
A March 2008 post by Ariel Cohen approvingly stated: "As Gal Luft, Director of the Institute for Analysis of Global Security recently wrote, at current oil prices the United States sends $460 billion per year overseas to finance its daily purchase of 12 million barrels of imported oil. This amount of money is about the size of our defense budget and three times the size of the ''economic stimulus'' package recently passed by Congress. Dependence on imported oil threatens the U.S. with a long-term economic decline and loss of sovereignty, according to Luft."
A June 2008 post by Geoffrey Dickens included a quote of New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman stating that "we basically have an energy policy that Gal Luft has described, I think very accurately as the 'sum of all lobbies.'"
Julia Seymour devoted an entire July 2008 post to "energy security expert" Luft claiming that "The environmental movement stands to lose many supporters if it works against people's economic prosperity."
The next time Luft popped up at the MRC was in a February 2013 post by Brent Baker noting that an essay by Luft was among the contents of an issue of Foreign Policy that said too many nice things about Barack Obama.
Luft didn't get renewed attention at the MRC again until his entanglement as an alleged whistleblower against Hunter Biden. A March 31 post by Dickens doing a time count of coverage of "Biden family corruption" repeated a claim by the right-wing New York Post that "Israeli energy expoert" Luftwas claiming that "Hunter Biden had an FBI mole named “One-Eye” who tipped off his Chinese business partners that they were under investigation," also noting that Luft was "arrested in Cyprus last month on gunrunning charges" and made his claims after "being detained at a Cyprus airport as he prepared to board a plane to Israel." Dickens also included Luft ranting that he was the target of a "politically motivated extradition request by the U.S." and that the "DOJ is trying to bury me to protect Joe, Jim, and Hunter Biden."
But the MRC never told its readers that Luft kinda disappeared after that, as Republican Rep. James Comer seemed to confirm in a May appearance on Fox Business. That's not a good look for a would-be whistleblower, but the MRC doesn't care. When he surfaceed while in fugitive-from-justice mode, Dickens cheered the development in a July 6 post:
An eyewitness with stunning claims about the Biden family scandals has come forward on a video, yet so far ABC, CBS and NBC have yet to report on them.
Israeli professor and former Israeli army officer Dr. Gal Luft in a 14-minute long video (released by the New York Post on late Wednesday night) claimed he was about to testify to the House Oversight Committee on the Biden family receiving payments from Chinese officials but was arrested in Cyprus, before he could deliver that testimony.
Dickens quoted the Post noting that Luft is a "fugitive" whose video was "filmed in an undisclosed location while he’s on the run." The Post was evendismissive of Luft, calling him a "self-proclaimed fall guy." But Dickens made sure to reward Fox News for helping to push this anti-Hunter narrative: "While the broadcast networks have yet to utter a word on this amazing development, FNC’s Fox & Friends did jump on the story this morning."
Luft popped up one last time in a July 11 post by Curtis Houck, who was uncritically quoting a question at a White House press briefing by a New York Post reporter who noted that Luft hads been indicted "for violating the Foreign Agents Registration Act by working without registration for a company called CEFC China Energy. The President’s son and brother worked for the same firm without registration and the President was invoked in that infamous shakedown text message preceding the transfer of $5 million to the Biden family."
But there's a lot the MRC hasn;t told you about Luft. As Liz Dye at Wonkette pointed out, the original charging document against Luft was issued in November 2022 -- before there was a Republican House to obsess over Hunter -- meaning that it's arguably untrue that Luft is being charged to shut him up about Hunter. She further summarized: "Luft didn't get indicted because he tried to blow the whistle on Hunter Biden. He got indicted because he was wildly corrupt and because he made false statements about it to the FBI, including in March of 2019, during the very same interview in which Comer alleges that Luft blew the whistle on Hunter Biden."
Allof which makes it strange that Comer and the MRC are hanging their credibility hat on a guy who's clearly spining stories in order to save himself from jail -- in part for being a fugitive from justice -- rather than out of any interest in telling the truth. But then, there's a lot of HunterBidenDerangementSyndrome going on at the MRC these days.
NEW ARTICLE: The MRC Hating Transgender People, 2023 Edition Topic: Media Research Center
In the first few months of this year, the Media Research Center kept up its nasty campaign of hate against transgender people. Read more >>
MRC Floods The Zone To Promote RFK Jr.'s Victimhood (And Hide That He's An Anti-Semitic Wacko) Topic: Media Research Center
The Media Research Center had to work to clean up Robert Kennedy Jr.'s bizarre anti-Semetic remark that COVID was "ethnically targeted" to spare Jews because he was the star witness at a Republian-led congressional hearing where he was to play victim and repeat the MRC's "censorship" narrative. And when that day came on July 20, theMRC made sure to flood the zone. Luis Cornelio was first up on the RFK Jr. stenography beat:
Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. dropped the hammer on Big Tech, particularly YouTube, for censoring free speech about important issues.
In his opening statement, Kennedy agreed with ranking member Stacey Plaskett that “this body ought to be concerning itself with the issues that impact directly the American people.” But, he retorted, “we can’t do that without the First Amendment, without debate.” Kennedy has been in a seemingly never-ending fight against a barrage of censorship by Big Tech platforms who colluded with federal entities to silence online free speech. But today the tables have turned, and the presidential candidate has been given a platform before the House Select Subcommittee on the Weaponization of the Federal Government.
Kennedy came out swinging at the hearing, which covered the notable trend in collusion between the federal government and Big Tech to censor American speech, according to the House Judiciary Committee website.
To illustrate the importance of free speech, Kennedy referred to how his campaign announcement speech was censored. He said that, in the speech, he “talked about… all the issues that deeply concern” Plaskett. However, despite this, Kennedy said that “five minutes into my speech, when I was talking about Paul Revere, YouTube de-platformed me.”
“I didn’t talk about vaccines in that speech. I didn’t talk about anything that was a forbidden subject. I just was talking about my campaign and things that, conversation that we ought to be having with each other as Americans, and I was shut down,” Kennedy said. “And that is why the First Amendment is important.”
Indeed, Big Tech companies have already interfered in the 2024 presidential election and have censored Kennedy no fewer than 10 times between April and June 2023, according to MRC’s exclusive CensorTrack.org database. YouTube, in particular, has censored Kennedy most prolifically in comparison to other platforms. A 2022 MRC Free Speech America study found that Kennedy’s accounts were repeatedly targeted for alleged “ false COVID-19 vaccine claims ” and “vaccine misinformation.”
Cornelio didn't explain why he apparently believes false information about COVID vaccines should be allowed to spread unchecked.
Gabriela Pariseau followed by attacking Plaskett for pointing out that Kennedy is an anti-vaxxer conspiracy theorist and apparent anti-Semite:
House Ranking member Stacey Plaskett (D-VI) kicked off Thursday’s hearings by railing against her committee for giving Democratic presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr. a platform to share his experiences with Big Tech censorship.
In her remarks, Plaskett attempted to discredit Kennedy and the hearing entirely during a hearing before the Select Subcommittee on the Weaponization of the Federal Government. Her comments came after she joined over 100 Members who tried to remove Kennedy from the witness list prior to the hearing.
He recently came under fire for comments claiming that COVID-19 was an ethnically targeted bioweapon that does not affect certain Jewish and Chinese people. Kennedy has been in a seemingly never-ending fight against a barrage of censorship by Big Tech platforms. But today the tables have turned, and the presidential candidate has been given a platform before Congress.
In an attempt to discredit Kennedy, Plaskett asked why the committee was Kennedy a platform. She said mockingly, “many of my Republican colleagues will rush to cover that they have Mr. Kennedy here because they want to protect his free speech, that they do not believe in American censorship.”
She went on to show her true colors when she seemed to dismiss the idea of Kennedy having the freedom to speak at a hearing about free speech. “This is not the kind of free speech that I know of, the free speech that is protected by the constitution’s First Amendment,” she said. “[F]ree speech is not an absolute. The Supreme Court has stated that and other’s free speech that is allowed –hateful, abusive rhetoric– does not need to be promoted in the halls of the people’s house.”
Plaskett went on to try and defame the Republican conference and staffers who she claimed “have even questioned whether the Holocaust took place” and “openly follow white supremacy.” She followed up by saying “It’s a free country. You absolutely have a right to say what you believe,” she said. “But, you don’t have the right to a platform, public or private. We don’t have to give one of the largest platforms of our democracy, congress this hearing.” Of course, she glossed over the fact that Americans’ do have the right not to have their government pressure private companies to censor their viewpoints. [Emphasis added].
The congresswoman went on to claim that Kennedy’s views are “harmful” and “dangerous” and by having them at the hearing Republicans were not merely “supporting free speech” but “endorsing” or even “co-signing” his views.
Pariseau made no effort to disprove Plaskett's claim that Kennedy's anti-Semitism and continued lies about vaccines have effectively forfeited his right to unfettered frree speech. Instead, she whined that Kennedy's vaccine lies deserve free speech too:
Plasket [sic] additionally showed that she is out of touch with the concerns of many Americans. She noted questions that she has been asked like: “Why are you having this hearing? What does this have to do with inflation? What does this have to do with the cost of living? What does this have to do with the lives of everyday Americans?” There’s a simple answer. A right to free speech and a right to access relevant information about vaccines and elections deeply affects the everyday lives of Americans.
Catherine Salgado then did stenography for the Republican committee head insisting that Kennedy was telling the truth when he tweeted that baseball great Hank Aaron died of COVID vaccine:
Rep. Jim Jordan (R-OH) called out the anti-free speech efforts of the FBI and President Joe Biden’s administration during a Thursday Congressional hearing.
The House Select Subcommittee on the Weaponization of the Federal Government held a hearing July 20 at which two targets of government censorship efforts, Democrat presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and journalist Emma-Jo Morris, testified. The White House pounced on Kennedy just “pointing out facts,” the representative insisted. Jordan described the Biden administration efforts to silence Kennedy and FBI censorship priming that triggered censorship of Morris, who in 2020 broke the Hunter Biden laptop scandal for the New York Post.
A mere 37 hours into the Biden administration’s term in office, Jan. 23, 2021, Jordan explained, the White House emailed Twitter: “‘Wanted to flag the below tweet, and I am wondering if we can get moving on the process for having it removed ASAP.’” The tweet referred to was from Robert F. Kennedy Jr., which said, “‘Hank Aaron’s tragic death is part of a wave of suspicious deaths among elderly closely following administration of the vaccine. He received the vaccine on Jan. 5 to inspire other black Americans to get the vaccine.’”
Jordan emphasized the tweet did not contain any false claims, despite the White House email subject line of “Flagging Hank Aaron Misinformation.” Jordan said, “Misinformation is when you don’t have the facts right, you’re saying things that are not true.” Jordan said Kennedy was just “pointing out facts, and yet the White House … 37 hours into the administration, they were trying to censor Mr. Kennedy. I find that interesting. The irony here of trying to censor the guy who’s [now] actually their Democrat primary opponent.”
In fact, Kennedy was lying when he falsely blamed Aaron's death on a COVID vaccine -- a medical examiner found that Aaron died of natural causes, not from the vaccine. Salgado failed to mention that inconvenient fact.
Craig Bannister rehashed Kennedy's statement in an post republished from the right-wing blog that CNSNews.com has been reduced to:
YouTube deplatformed him five minutes into his announcement that he was a Democrat presidential candidate, Robert Kennedy, Jr. said Thursday, while defending himself from attacks by fellow Democrats during a House hearing.
A hearing, which was supposed to be about the weaponization of government through censorship, quickly detoured into vicious efforts to smear Kennedy and prevent him from testifying against censorship of viewpoints opposed by the Biden Administration.
[...]
“Big Tech and the media are desperately trying to censor @RobertKennedyJr to protect Biden. Stop interfering in our elections!” Media Research Center (MRC) President Brent Bozell tweeted, reacting to Kennedy’s testimony.
Bannister uncritically quoted Kennedy claiming that "I've never been anti-vaccine" while failing to mention all the facts that prove the exact opposite.
Tom Olohan squeezed yet another Kennedy-promoting item from this hearing for a July 21 post:
Rep. Thomas Massie (R-KY) and Ronald F. Kennedy Jr. (RFK Jr.) went after Big Tech platforms for censoring free speech on natural immunity during the pandemic.
On Thursday, July 20th, RFK Jr. was given a chance to speak to Congress and the American people. This provided Rep. Massie, another opponent of censorship, an opportunity to speak to RFK Jr. about how Big Tech had censored him and others who posted about natural immunity, even when the censored information was both scientifically accurate and promoted by a legacy media source. Massie said, “One of the immutable and undeniable uh tenants of immunology is natural immunity. But for two years it was denied. It wasn't even just denied. It was censored.”
Massie also noted to Louisiana Special Assistant Attorney General D. John Sauer, “I noticed in the court ruling — in the case that you worked on— that they said that the court said that Facebook reported to the White House that it labeled and demoted posts, suggesting natural immunity to a COVID-19 infection is superior to vaccine immunity,” before discussing how Twitter had specifically censored him on the issue.
In fact, there is little evidence that "natural immunity" -- catching a disease that might kill you in the hope of becoming immune from it -- is superior to vaccination, and there was little information earlyon in the COVID pandemic about whether "natural immunity" was a valid path given that, again, COVID was quite deadly early on.
As we've said before, this is a lot of time and energy for the MRC to spend on a candidate it supports only because he fits its victimhood narrative and he might be a spoiler to President Biden's re-election -- not be it would ever support him should he somehow win the Democratic nomination.
Posted by Terry K.
at 10:05 PM EDT
Updated: Wednesday, September 20, 2023 11:09 AM EDT
MRC Whines Networks Didn't Parrot Right-Wing Narrative On FBI Whistleblowers Topic: Media Research Center
The Media Research Center's Kevin Tober whined in a May 18 post:
On Thursday, the House Judiciary Committee held a hearing on the weaponization of the federal government against its citizens. A sad occurrence that has become more frequent as the government continues to grow out of control. During the hearing, numerous whistleblowers testified about being retaliated against by the FBI for coming forward to report either corruption or abuse of power by the government or its affiliated agencies.
Being members of the fourth estate that were supposed to report on government and its excesses, you would think the big three evening news broadcasts would jump at the opportunity to report on this hearing and the shocking accounts that were revealed. Sadly, like most stories of any consequence these days, the big three networks ignored it because they rightly believe coverage would hurt the Biden administration.
Instead, all three networks: ABC’s World News Tonight, CBS Evening News, and NBC Nightly News decided to keep their viewers in the dark and waste precious airtime on stories like a fire at a North Carolina construction site or a security scare at the Vatican.
But Tober gave a gold star to Fox News for dutifully embracing the narrative:
Meanwhile, Fox News Channel’s flagship newscast Special Report kicked off the broadcast with the news that was made from the congressional hearing.
“Witnesses told members of Congress stories of retaliation and intimidation because they questioned a prominent investigation,” correspondent David Spunt explained.
One of the whistleblowers who testified under oath was a former FBI agent named Marcus Allen who “was punished for questioning the official narrative of what happened at the U.S. Capitol on January 6, 2021.”
“He lost his security clearance two weeks ago, though it was suspended in January 2022,” Spunt noted.
Tober, complained, though, that Fox News reported a small piece of the other side of the story, which he immediately dismissed:
In an attempt at damage control, the FBI released a statement to Fox News that tried to smear Allen, reading: “Mr. Allen used his FBI email to send multiple colleagues, quote: Links to web sites and urged recipients to exercise extreme caution and discretion in pursuit of any investigative inquiries or leads pertaining to the events of January 6.”
Tim Graham similarly complained in a May 19 post that the Republican narrative wasn't uncritically presented and that questions were raised about the whistleblowers:
Last night, we reported that the nightly newscasts of ABC, CBS, and NBC completely skipped any mention of a House Judiciary Committee hearing on FBI whistleblowers. Since the hearing was organized by Republicans, it was somehow not news. Fox's Special Report had it. The PBS NewsHour and NPR's All Things Considered also failed to consider the hearing.
The trend continued on Friday's morning shows, with no FBI whistleblower coverage on ABC's Good Morning America,CBS Mornings, and NBC's Today. Even a "jam-packed Morning Joe" couldn't locate the story on MSNBC. NPR's Morning Edition also offered nothing. CNN This Morning did offer a brief piece, making it sound like a very messy hearing, as Democrats (like Del. Stacey Plaskett) insisted that these weren't real "whistleblowers" on the FBI, because the FBI insisted they were not.
Collins began "Meanwhile, in Washington, lawmakers on Capitol Hill got into a pretty explosive argument yesterday over whether or not those three self-proclaimed FBI whistleblowers are actually whistleblowers."
Collins at least aired soundbites from two whistleblowers, and then followed with the FBI line: "It is also important to note that before the hearing, the FBI actually sent a letter to Congressman Jordan's subcommittee. In it, the agency said that officials stripped two of those three men that you saw there who testified of their security clearances after multiple violations and security concerns. The agency says that both men also expressed alternate theories about the attack on the Capitol."
Graham further whined that non-right-wing outlets reported a fuller story about the whistleblowers:
That's not to say that Ken Dilanian missed the FBI whistleblower hearing. Online, Dilanian and Ryan Reilly wrote up a story larded with pro-FBI spin: "GOP witnesses undermined Jan. 6 cases with conspiracy theories, FBI says". You have to get about 15 paragraphs down before the pro-whistleblower side gets a quote or two.
[...]
The Washington Post actually covered the hearing on page A-4 under the headline "FBI agents who testified on alleged abuses had security clearance revoked."
This is how liberal media outlets play: any criticism of Democrats are described as "alleged abuses" from "self-proclaimed whistleblowers."
Graham didn't explain why the full story of the self-proclaimed whistleblowers should be censored, nor did he explain why FBI agents who refused to do their jobs should be trust. Graham didn't tell his readers that, according to the NBC News article he cited, the FBI stated that one of the agents, Steve Friend, "told his bureau management in Florida he would not work Jan. 6 cases and "refused to participate in the execution of a court authorized, search and arrest," and that Allen "'espoused alternative theories' about Jan. 6 to co-workers and also "'failed to provide relevant information' to an FBI special agent about a Jan. 6 suspect who was later discovered to have physically assaulted U.S. Capitol Police officers." Graham also failed to mention that Friend received money from Trump ally Kash Patel, who provided Friend with a job at a right-wing think tank after he was suspended by the FBI.
Rather than reveal the full truth about these whistleblowers, Graham continued to whine about this in his podcast the same day:
NBC is a national news network. So why would it skip House GOP hearings into whistleblowers being punished by the FBI, and obsess instead over small-town right-wing school board members pushing a "dangerous" curriculum? We call it "bias by story selection." They pick the narratives they want to enforce, and avoid the narratives that aren't helpful to Democrats.
Of course, Graham is engaging in his own bias by story selection by censoring the full story about the whistleblowers' misdeeds.
It will not surprise you to learn that the MRC does not treat all whistleblowers as sacrosanct truth-tellers who must always be believed. It repeatedly tried to discredit Frances Haugen for telling how Facebook did little to stop misinformation on its platform, attacking her as "a far-left activist and AOC donor" -- while failing to disclose the fact that it wasadhering to the talking points of Facebook management, who had reached out to conservative organizations to plant those attacks.
MRC's Imaginary 'Secondhand Censorship' Metric Ensnares Twitter Fact-Checkers Topic: Media Research Center
The Media Research Center now believes fact-checking is "censorship," as we learned in an Aug. 3 post by Heather Moon that includes Twitter's Community Notes crowdsourced fact-checkers in its made-up and meaningless "secondhand censorship" metric:
Big Tech’s continued censorship of free speech on platforms creates real-world harm, not just to the users being censored, but to anyone who should have seen the censored messages. Nowhere is that more clear than when Big Tech platforms either silence or place spin on posts by candidates in what is otherwise nothing short of election interference.
Since MRC Free Speech America began tracking secondhand censorship in the first quarter of 2022, we have counted a total of at least 881,700,573 times that users have been harmed through the tactics used by Big Tech platforms. MRC Free Speech America researchers recorded 231 documented cases of censorship in the second quarter (Q2) of 2023, down from 363 cases in the first quarter (Q1).
Beginning with Q2 we began tracking Twitter’s Community Notes feature as a form of< censorship much like fact checks. (Twitter was re-branded as X in July.) Community Notes represent Twitter’s efforts to influence the perception of certain tweets and stand as a gatekeeper between content creators and their followers. This feature was used heavily on tweets from accounts with millions of followers. Therefore, the total secondhand censorship for Q2 jumped up 489 percent from Q1, with Big Tech harming users 484,498,858 times during the second quarter of 2023. This number follows the 82,249,700 times that users were harmed through secondhand censorship in the first quarter.
Twitter’s rampant use of Community Notes touched heavily on issues related to the presidential campaigns. As a result, users following accounts that were censored over content related to campaign issues suffered the most in Q2. Transgenderism also continued to be one of the topics enduring the most harm from secondhand censorship in the second quarter of 2023, surpassing its first quarter numbers.
Moon acknowledged that Community Notes have been used on claims made by President Biden (which we presume was not made a part of the "secondhand censorship" metric), but she was much more upset that it was used on claims made by Republican presidential candidates, as it usually is:
Community Notes had the greatest impact on followers of President Joe Biden’s official accounts, several of which have more than 30 million followers. His followers made up the largest segment of users harmed through secondhand censorship in the second quarter. MRC Free Speech America documented nine tweets that were censored by Community Notes from just one of Biden’s accounts. This totaled 283,600,000 times Twitter harmed users through secondhand censorship.
Each Community Note begins by stating that “[r]eaders added context they thought people might want to know.” In one example, a tweet from @JoeBiden claimed, “I make no apologies for being the most pro-union president in American history.” The Community Note read, “On December 22, 2022, President Biden signed a bill to block the railroad union from striking.” In another example, the account tweeted, “12,700,000 jobs,” with an attached infographic that read “12,700,000 jobs added under President Biden.” The Community Note read, “While Biden’s claim of 12.7 million new jobs in his term is accurate, the large majority of these new jobs can be attributed to economic recovery after COVID-19.”
But Twitter has also applied Community Notes to other campaign accounts. The @TrumpWarRoom Twitter account tweeted, “Fake News @marcthiessen is spreading outright lies. President Trump won BIG in Iowa. And will win again in 2024.” The Community Note read, “Ted Cruz won the 2016 Iowa Caucus with 27.6%. Donald Trump finished second with 24.3%.” This note does not address Trump’s wins in the general elections of 2016 or 2020. The Trump War Room Twitter account suffered a total of 23,400,000 users harmed through secondhand censorship just from the 13 Community Notes documented at CensorTrack.org.
Moon also ranted that Robert Kennedy Jr. -- who's an MRCdarling for being a possible spoiler to Biden, not because it actually wants him to be president -- also faced "censorship" (by having his false claims moderated):
But Twitter is not the only Big Tech platform engaging in election interference. YouTube has deleted no fewer than seven videos that featured interviews with Democratic presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., while Instagram also temporarily banned a new account Kennedy create campaign ad that explained why Trump is the only candidate who can "make America great again" starting on day one. The YouTube “context” label discussed the results of the 2020 election, despite the ad not mentioning the 2020 election. LinkedIn also censored Republican presidential candidate Vivek Ramaswamy ’s account. The platform restricted his account, reportedly citing “misleading or inaccurate information” in several of his posts relating to climate change and President Joe Biden’s relationship with China. LinkedIn claimed this action was taken “in error” and reversed the censorship.
Moon also huffed that transphobic hate was "censored," which she dishonestly framed as merely "content critiquing so-called 'transgenderism':
MRC Free Speech America continues to monitor Big Tech’s ongoing war waged against users who post content that does not affirm the left’s so-called “transgender” ideology. Unfortunately, although this type of censorship has lessened on some platforms, it is unlikely to go away completely any time soon. Since we began tracking secondhand censorship, Big Tech harmed users on content critical of the left’s “transgender” narrative more than ever in Q2.
MRC Free Speech America tallied at least 36,830,787 times that Big Tech harmed users by hindering them from seeing content critiquing so-called “transgenderism” in the second quarter of 2023. This number is higher than the number of transgender-related secondhand censorship for Q1, which previously showed the highest numbers for that category. Q1 of 2023 saw 21,471,808 times users were harmed through secondhand censorship.
Censorship of posts critical of the "transgender" ideology exploded in Q1 as a result of the infamous "Trans Day of Vengeance," making the number of times Big Tech harmed users through secondhand censorship skyrocket. But in Q2, Big Tech harmed an even greater number of users who criticized “transgender” ideology. This would still be true even in the absence of the 12,900,000 users harmed through Twitter’s Community Notes feature censoring tweets related to “transgenderism.”
Moon did not explain why she insists on calling being transgender an "ideology" and an "ism." She concluded with defending thte bogus metric an drepeating herself on how fact-checking is somehow "censorship":
Secondhand censorship represents the domino effect of how Big Tech harms users with its efforts to silence or reframe messages shared by users. Big Tech censorship of campaigns, candidates and/or of important policies or cultural events is tantamount to election interference. Americans must be allowed the freedom to speak their minds and to do their own research and come to their own conclusions. When Big Tech places its thumb on the scales through the use of things like fact checks, Community Notes, content deletion or account suspensions, free speech — and by extension, American democracy — is under attack. All such suppression of constitutionally-protected speech and election interference must be called out and stopped.
MRC Free Speech America calls on Americans to push tech companies to end their efforts of election interference.
Moon did not explain how, exacrly, "American democracy" is "under attack" because people are being fact-checked, or how fact-checking is "election interference."
MRC Concerned About Dubious Musk Moves -- But More Bothered That Twitter Fact-Checked Him Topic: Media Research Center
The Media Research Center looks at Elon Musk and Twitter only through the lens of whether its fellow right-wingers are allowed to spout hate, misinformation and falsehoods without getting fact-checked or moderated (what it dishonestly calls "censorship"). As non-Musk Twitter executives realize that Twitter being filled with hate and lies is a bad thing, the MRC's Catherine Salgado went on an anti-"censorship" tantrum in an Aug. 10 post:
X (formerly Twitter) CEO Linda Yaccarino boasted August 10 of how her platform’s safety tools can censor content while supposedly allowing free speech.
Yaccarinotried to reassure the public that Twitter does in fact still censor so-called “hateful content” when asked about "brand safety" in a CNBC Squawk on the Streetinterview with Co-Anchor Sara Eisen. Yaccarino broadcasted the full interview in a Twitter
Space Thursday. “If it is lawful but it is awful, it’s extraordinarily difficult for you to see it,” Yaccarino bragged, explaining how X censors content and assures advertisers their ads will only appear with content they like. Yet Yaccarino also pretended loyalty to “free expression.”
“By all objective metrics, X is a much healthier and safer platform than it was a year ago,” Yaccarino claimed. “We have built brand safety and content moderation tools that have never existed before at this company.” She specifically cited the new policy that X owner Elon Musk and Yaccarino call “freedom of speech, not reach” as part of this content moderation (i.e. censorship).
The X CEO gleefully announced that big brands “are protected from the risk of being next to that content.” She didn’t seem worried about protecting users’ First Amendment right to free speech.
Salgado was too enraged that right-wing Twitter hate might get monitored under Musk that she didn't mention that Yaccarino is lying -- Twitter regularlyplacesads by major advertisers next to offensive and hateful content. Others also pointed out how detached from reality Yaccarino's answers were. But Salgado didn't care about those blatant falsehoods; rather, she continued to whine about Yaccarino claiming to act responsibly, and she also lashed out at the interviewer:
Yaccarino was particularly proud to report that, after a post is labeled, 30 percent of users “staggeringly” take it down themselves. “Reducing that hateful content from being seen is one of the best examples of how X is committed to encouraging healthy behavior online,” Yaccarino bragged of the censorship, claiming that “99.9 percent” of impressions on Twitter “are healthy.”
Eisen self-righteously lectured about “conspiracy theories” and hysterically cited Kanye West and Musk himself. Yaccarino then gave a hypocritical nod to free speech. “You might not agree with what everyone is saying,” she told Eisen. “Free expression at its core will really, really only survive when someone you don’t agree with says something you don’t agree with.”
[...]
Unfortunately, Yaccarino’s views are unsurprising since she came to Twitter from woke NBCUniversal and the anti-free speech World Economic Forum.
The MRC has already expressed its hatred of Yaccarino for caring more about making Twitter a sustainable and profitable business than right-wing culture wars.
Heather Moon was outraged that that a Musk-instituted Twitter changed was used to fact-check Musk in an Aug. 18 post, laughably headlined "Did Musk Just Get Censored on His Own Platform?":
In a bold twist, Twitter’s Community Notes censored Elon Musk and had the gall to tell him what he can and cannot do with his own platform.
Community Notes, the crowdsourced fact-checking system for X (formerly known as Twitter) that has been characterized as “censorship by a different name,” took aim at owner Musk’s announcement that he will soon remove X’s block feature. The Note attached to his post, however, claimed that he is forbidden from making such a change.
Proving that no one using X is immune from censorship, the platform applied a Community Note to one of Musk’s own posts.
In his announcement today Musk posted what immediately proved to be one of the most controversial moves he has made since taking over the company. “Block is going to be deleted as a ‘feature,’ except for DMs,” he posted.
The Community Notes team quickly came up with a Note rebuking the latest potential change that now appears below Musk’s post. The Note reads: “Elon Musk cannot do this. The feature to block someone on the site is REQUIRED as a social media app to be allowed on the App Store and the Google Play store.” It also provides links to the app guidelines for both the Apple App Store and the Google Playstore as proof.
Moon didn't mention Musk's complete hypocrisy on the issue; after getting into an argument with right-wing actor James Woods via Twitter over removing the block feature, Musk blocked Woods. The MRC thinks Community Notes are just fine when liberals are fact-checked but are tantamount to "censorship" when a conservative (or Musk) gets the same treatment. -- yes, the MRC thinks that fact-checking someone is "censorship." Moon remained committed to the fact-checking-is-censorship narrative by invoking the MRC's made-up and meaningless "secondhand censorship" metric:
Musk has made many changes to X since he purchased it. One of the more controversial changes was a global rollout of what is known as Community Notes in December of 2022. MRC Free Speech America’s CensorTrack recently reported that this new form of censorship caused Secondhand Censorship to soar in the second quarter of 2023.
Luis Cornelio was similarly outraged that Twitter would want to reduce hate and lies in an Aug. 21 post (note his placing of "disinformation" in scare quotes, as if there was no objective definition of it):
The so-called warriors of election “disinformation” could be back in town, just in time for the 2024 presidential election.
X (formerly known as Twitter) is allegedly eying a chief election manipulator to lead its Civic Integrity/Elections Team. Political commentator Kristen Ruby first caught the news, which ignited a wave of criticism aimed at X and its choice to use recruiter Aaron Rodericks. Rodericks apparently voiced support for the Department of Homeland Security’s CISA and the Biden administration’s defunct Disinformation Governance Board through a series of RTs and likes on X.
Rodericks announced the new role on August 11. The listing even alluded to the fact that new hires on the “Civic Integrity/Election Team” may influence election outcomes. “Are you passionate about building innovative products that connect people and enable conversations on a global scale?” X further asked before adding: “Do you want to be part of a dynamic team that influences how the world communicates?” As content moderators of specifically election-related content, how could “Civic Integrity/Election Team” not influence elections?
Does Cornelio not think that people who spread political falsehoods and misinformation are also trying to influence elections? Shouldn't elections be based on factual information and not falsehoods? As usual, Cornelio doesn't explain why hate, lies and misinformation should be allowed to spread unchecked.
Autumn Johnson expressed furter doubt about Twitter changes under Musk in an Aug. 23 post, referring to Musk as an "eccentric billionaire" and not in a good way):
Eccentric billionaire Elon Musk originally said he wanted to purchase Twitter to promote free speech, but times may be changing with the questionable changes he has made since acquiring the platform.
A new change under platform owner Musk’s direction will require users to manually add text to links that they share. Without the added text, the post will only include an image and an overlay of the URL, on “X,” formerly known as Twitter.
Musk acknowledged on Tuesday the seemingly random change by responding to a user’s post detailing the move. “This is coming from me directly,” Musk admitted on X. “Will greatly improve the esthetics.”
MRC Free Speech America has reported on Musk’s questionable changes to the platform since the contentious purchase, including choosing Linda Yaccarino, an anti-free speech former NBCUniversal executive, to be the CEO of the company.
Musk also pushed forward with Twitter Community Notes, a questionable crowdsourced form of fact-checking and censorship.
In November of last year, Musk described X’s speech policy as “freedom of speech, not reach,” indicating that users would be censored for certain views labeled as “hate speech.” Musk never clarified what he believes constitutes so-called “hate speech.”
Johnson didn't explain why she apparently thinks hate speech is subjective and something that is merely "labeled" as such.
MRC Cheers Actors, Writers Strikes For Stopping Non-Right-Wing 'Propaganda' On TV Topic: Media Research Center
The Media Research Center's Elise Ehrhard spent a July 28 post cheering that the strike by actors and writers will result in more reruns and unscripted reality-style entertainment for the time being, because it means she will be less likely to encounter non-right-wing points of view on TV:
So, for the first time in years, viewers won't be inundated with the latest pro-abortion rants from Shonda Rhimes' on Grey's Anatomy or Station 19. ABC comedies like The Connors won't be pushing toxic leftist narratives on a weekly basis.
CBS is also replacing much of its fall lineup with reality shows and bringing content from its Paramount+ streaming service to the linear channel. Its usual staple of network shows will be delayed. Gone will be September premieres of popular franchises such as the FBI shows that portray a perfect agency utterly devoid of any corruption. Audiences will have to wait for a new season of scripts about evil, racist white people on shows like The Equalizer. How will Americans know what they are supposed to think without such Hollywood fare?
Ehrhard wants the FBI to be portrayed as corrupt? We thought right-wingers supported law enforcememnt. Her whine continued:
Only NBC has a few scripted shows ready to go due to schedule completions prior to the strike, but many of their most well-known series have been pushed back with no premiere date in sight. Viewers will still be able to find a steady diet of propaganda on newer shows like Quantum Leap, which pushed both child transgenderism and anti-Christian attacks last spring. However, well-established franchises such as the Law and Order shows won't be available to push left-wing sacred cows for the foreseeable future.
Maybe this hiatus will be a time of reflection for network writers, and they'll return after the strike with less woke and formulaic content. More likely, this break will reinforce for dwindling network audiences that left-wing Hollywood entertainment was never really worth watching in the first place.
It's almost funny that Enrhard is dismissing any opinion she doesn't like as "propaganda," given that the MRC is paying her to be a propagandist for right-wing narrratives. Maybe Ehrhard should use the strikes as a time of reflection on why she is so eager to censor any point of view that doesn't mesh with the right-wing ieology she slavishly follows.
MRC's Jean-Pierre-Bashing, Doocy-Fluffing Watch, 'Return Of The King' Edition Topic: Media Research Center
It was a light month for Karine Jean-Pierre-bashing in August because there were fewer White House press briefings due to President Biden being on vacation. That didn't stop KJP from living rent-free in the collective heads of the MRC, of course. Tim Graham spent an Aug. 17 post whining that Snopes pointed out that a claim attributed to Jean-Pierre was coming from a satire website; Graham conceded that Snopes was correct but whined about purported "selection bias" anyway:
The "independent fact-checkers" have a knee-jerk pattern of rushing to the defense of Team Biden. They're not always wrong about the facts. But their selection bias is obvious. Jordan Liles had to decry a satire site that might convince some dullards in an article titled:
Did Karine Jean-Pierre 'Admit' Biden Won't Visit Maui After Fires Because 'It's Not a Swing State'?
That headline should be obvious. Any competent press secretary would never say such a thing out loud if that were the internal calculation. (Now insert the joke that Karine Jean-Pierre isn't one of those.)
[...]
The byline on this bogus piece is "Flagg Eagleton, Patriot," which ought to put your tongue in your cheek.Then they turn to their own fake White House correspondent, named "Tara Newhole." There's no video for evidence. As Snopes explained, there is no one at Telemundo named Joseph Barron. The Dunning-Kruger Times describes its content as containing "parody, satire, and tomfoolery."
So the fact check is accurate -- in Biden's defense.
But conservatives have raised the point that Biden has yet to live up to his pledge to visit East Palestine, Ohio after the toxic train derailment there.
But the Snopes fact-check did not mention East Palestine, so there's no reason for Graham to bring it up here other than to play whataboutism.
When the press briefings restarted later in the month, Curtis Houck was unable to hide his hero-worship for the return from paternity leave of his favorite biased right-wing reporter, under the embarassing headline "Return of the King," in his writeup of the Aug. 28 briefing:
Fox White House correspondent Peter Doocy finally made his return to the White House Briefing Room Monday after paternity leave and, given his long time away, he came out guns blazing on Biden family corruption and even the latest attempt by the federal bureaucracy to further encroach on the lives of ordinary Americans. On both counts, he made Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre look even more inept.
Following pleasantries between the two (with Jean-Pierre insisting, “I’ve missed you”), Doocy led with a question he predicted she “probably [was] not expecting”: “Does President Biden want to limit Americans to two beers a week?”
Jean-Pierre was exasperated: “I — I — where is this coming from? Maybe I did — maybe I didn’t miss you so much. Where is this — where is this coming from?”
Doocy then explained it came from “Dr. George Koob, who is the director of the National Institute of Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism,” who “says the U.S. may soon follow Canada and recommend just two beers a week.”
Asked how the administration “think[s] that’s going to go over,” Jean-Pierre ducked, saying “what I’m not going to get in involved in” is “that question right there” and instead she’d cede to “the experts.”
Doocy then pivoted to Hunter Biden and his life of ruin with two simple questions that, in classic Doocy fashion, led to a larger narrative. The first? “The Secret Service is paying $16,000 a month now to stage near Hunter Biden in Malibu. Who’s paying for that?”
Houck couldn't stop gushing further over Doocy -- adding his biased correspondent wife into the mix as well -- in his writeup of the Aug. 29 briefing:
After Monday’s smashing return to the White House Briefing Room, Fox’s Peter Doocy had a new topic to do battle with Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre over. Monday’s foray concerned Biden family corruption and another example of the expanding nanny state, but Tuesday focused on a captured ISIS sympathizer that had been working to smuggle people across the U.S.-Mexico border.
Prior to Doocy’s back-and-forth, Jean-Pierre was also under the gun from Doocy’s wife, Hillary Vaughn of the Fox Business Network, over transgenderism continuing to infect women’s sports. Vaughn started by wondering if Biden agreed with 2024 GOP presidential candidate Nikki Haley that transgenderism encroaching on girls sports “is the women’s issue of our time.”
Jean-Pierre wasn’t amused based on her answers. Lamenting “we’ve talked about this many times” and “[t]he Department of Education proposed a rule...that gives schools the flexibility to establish their own athletics policies” on a topic that’s “a complicated issue.”
Of course, it isn’t. And Vaughn made that clear: “The President has granddaughters. Does he care that girls are allowed to compete in sports without the fear of injury? Does he think it’s fair for girls to have to compete against biological males?”
Jean-Pierre stammered some before reiterating the cockamamie assertion that this “is a complicated issue” and “[t]here is no yes or no answer to this.”
Doocy closed the briefing with his exchange, starting with a simple question: “How is it possible that an ISIS sympathizer is sneaking people into this country?”
Houck slobbered over Doocy's bias even more in his writeup of the Aug. 30 briefing:
During Wednesday’s Doocy Time at the White House press briefing, one of the questions from Fox White House correspondent Peter Doocy drew looks of incredulousness and disgust from liberal journalists seated next to and behind him. Doocy’s crime? Asking White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre if the response to Hurricane Idalia was smoother vs. the Hawaii wildfires because President Biden wasn’t on vacation.
Doocy was blunt: “[I]t seems like the hurricane response so far is robust. Did you guys realize that the initial Hawaii wildfire response was not that good, or is it just easier for people to get help from the White House when the President is not on vacation?”
As he finished, NBC’s Peter Alexander closed his eyes and raised his eyebrows as if he couldn’t believe Doocy’s query and, behind them, liberal reporter Annie Linskey of The Wall Street Journal did the same before briefly squinting in Doocy’s direction.
Jean-Pierre, not surprisingly, was also taken aback and told him that she “disagr[eed]” with “the premise of your question and the way you pose the question.”
[...]
Spoiler alert: Of course Hawaii’s governor and two senators would sing Biden’s praises given they are, in fact, Democrats, and it’s what partisans do for each other.
And Graham wonders why Snopes needs to point out satire that can easily be treated as "news" in the right-wing bubble.
Note also that Houck made a point of identifying the Wall Street Journal correspondent as a "liberal reporter," but he has never explicitly labeled Doocy as "right-wing" or "conservative" reporter -- ironic given how much the MRC loves to lecture others about labeling bias.
UPDATE: The boys at the MRC are such Doocy stans that Kevin Tober wrote an overly excited Aug. 7 post ("HE"S BACK!") gushing that Doocy popped up on "Fox & Friends" during the midst of his paternity leave, where he "showed pictures of his daughter" and noted that she was wearing a presidential onesie ("Peter said he had gotten it from someone who works at the White House. Though he wouldn't say who exactly"). Tober closed by drooling: "From all of us here at NewsBusters, welcome back, Peter! And congratulations to you and Hillary on the new baby!" You can't make this stuff up, folks.
NEW ARTICLE: The MRC's Lingering Obama Derangement, Part 2 Topic: Media Research Center
Barack and Michelle Obama left the White House in 2017, but they continue to live rent-free in the collective heads of the Media Research Center -- even whining about Barack doing a podcast with Bruce Springsteen. Read more >>
MRC Tries To Clean Up After, Deflect From RFK Jr.'s Anti-Semitic Remark Topic: Media Research Center
The Media Research Center began its runup to Robert K. Kennedy Jr.'s appearance before Congress by trying to do some cleanup of an inflammatory comment he made. Ana Schau was stuck playing whataboutism in a July 18 post:
CNN This Morning host Phil Mattingly had Representative Elissa Slotkin (D-MI) on Tuesday morning’s program to discuss several different issues, notably the recent anti-Semitic statements from Representative Pramila Jayapal (D-WA). Together they lamented Republicans calling out Democrats and tried to tie the anti-Semitic comments from Robert F. Kennedy Jr. to House Republicans despite him running for president as a Democrat.
Mattingly introduced the subject by asking Slotkin about Jayapal and “the statement that she made about Israel being a racist nation.”
But Jayapal's statement is not "anti-Semitic" -- it's simply critical of Israel. Not all criticism of Israeli is anti-Semitic, and Schau made no effort to prove Jayapal's statement is. By contrast, Schau did not repeat the statement Kennedy made -- that the COVID virus was "ethnically targeted" not to infect Jews -- which is much more clearly anti-Semitic.
Also, it's quite easy to associate Kennedy with Republicans given that they are the only ones actively promotiing his candidacy -- and that includesthe MRC. Schau didn't mention that inconvenient fact, of course. (It's also a sign that he's serving Republican purposes that Fox News barely mentioned his Jewish conspiracy theory, which is not something he would ignore if he were a genuine Democratic candidate.) Instead, she labored to counterfactually distance Kennedy from Republicans, even though they ewere the ones who invicted him to the upcoming hearing:
Mattingly was the one who put the name to the person when he asked specifically about Kennedy’s invitation to testify from Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-CA), seeming to think that this invitation linked them together in an anti-Semitic ideology somehow.
He said that, despite McCarthy’s statement that he disagreed with Kennedy’s opinion on the matter, “there’s a difference between censoring somebody and inviting them to testify at a hearing,” and asked Slotkin if the Republicans were not as “uneasy” about Kennedy’s statement as they should have been.
The assumption that McCarthy and the other House Republicans agreed with Kennedy simply because they had invited him for a testimony in a case is an absurd assumption. It would be like assuming that Jack Smith or any other investigator for the January 6th hearings agreed with Trump simply because they had some of his supporters there to testify in the case.
If Kennedy is not serving Republican desires by running, why is Schau working so hard to distance his anti-Semitism from Republicans?
The next day, Gabriela Pariseau ramped up the MRC's victimhood narrative, whining that Kennedy had been "censored" -- then cheered McCarthy for not disinviting him from the hearing over his anti-Semitic remarks:
Big Tech has censored 2024 Democratic Party presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr. at least 10 times over a span of three months, but apparently, that is not enough for the left.
Kennedy is no stranger to censorship. Big Tech companies have already interfered in the 2024 presidential election and have censored Kennedy no fewer than 10 times between April and June 2023, according to MRC’s exclusive CensorTrack.org database. YouTube committed the majority of the censorship as it removed no fewer than eight videos from its platform for violating its “Community Guidelines.” In the videos, Kennedy repeatedly spoke on controversial topics like COVID-19 and claimed that the CIA killed his father. Twitter additionally added context or Community Notes to two of Kennedy’s posts.
Kennedy is set to testify at a House Judiciary hearing on censorship Thursday, but he has recently come under fire for comments claiming that COVID-19 was an ethnically targeted bioweapon that does not affect certain Jewish and Chinese people. As a result, Congressional Integrity Project Executive Director Kyle Herrig and over 100 members of Congress have all called for Kennedy to be uninvited from speaking to the committee, arguing that Kennedy has a history of making offensive claims. But House Speaker Kevin McCarthy, in the spirit of free speech, has not caved to the left’s pressure.
Pariseau also got mad that Twitter's Community Notes were used to call out a Kennedy lie:
Twitter has also posted Community Notes under a couple of Kennedy’s posts. In one case, Kennedy was actually drawing attention to the fact that ABC had censored portions of an interview he gave them. “47 USC 315 makes it illegal for TV networks to censor Presidential candidates but Thursday, ABC showed its contempt for the law, democracy, and its audience by cutting most of the content of my interview with host Linsey Davis leaving only cherry-picked snippets and a defamatory disclaimer,” Kennedy tweeted.
The Community Note, however, claimed that Kennedy misunderstood the statute he referred to. "47 USC 315’s censorship prohibition applies only when candidates 'use a broadcasting station'. The law explicitly exempts newscasts & news interviews, which are allowed to censor," the note read.
The MRC considers Community Notes to be "censorship" when used to correct falsehoods made by right-wingers (and Kennedy).
Alex Christy tried to do more cleanup via whataboutism of Kennedy's anti-Semitic remark, again invoking Jayapal's non-equivalent criticism of Israel, in a July 21 post:
A befuddled Scott Jennings was forced to correct Rolling Stone’s Jay Michaelson on Thursday’s CNN Tonightw hen the former claimed that he couldn’t recall someone with “such anti-Semitic ideas getting this kind of platform” when referring to Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s testimony in front of the House Judiciary Committee. Jennings politely reminded Michaelson that “It's platformed every day in the Democrat conference.”
Alluding to Rep. Pramila Jayapal’s remarks that Israel is a racist state, Michaelson, who is also a non-denominational rabbi, alleged, “But it's outrageous that there is, I think, perhaps a double standard that when somebody who spouts anti-Semitism is useful to a party in power, they get a platform. And when someone says something which may or may not, maybe sort of anti-Semitic, thinking, you know, the congresswoman from last week, you know, they get censured.”
Michaelson added, “So, this is a shocking display, I think, of -- I can't think of someone who has espoused-- someone-- such anti-Semitic ideas getting such this kind of a platform.”
There is no doubt that RFK Jr. is a kook and that his latest comments about COVID being “ethnically targeted” to protect Ashkenazi Jews and Chinese people is just the latest example of that, but host Sara Sidner noticed Jennings wasn’t buying the larger point, “Scott, you made a face and don't think I didn't notice it.”
If Kennedy is such a "kook," why is the MRC so desperate to defend him and deflect criticism from him? Christy didn't answer that question.
When Michaelson pointed out that Japayal's remarks were not, in fact, anti-Semitic like Kennedy's, Christy helped Jennings push his narrative:
Michaelson then tried to defend himself, claiming that Jayapal’s comments are not even close to as bad as Kennedy’s, “Scott, there is no comparison between a statement, which I think was out of line, saying Israel is a racist state. That is a political statement. It is not one that I agree with. I think it's extreme and I've said it again in the column for CNN why I think that's incorrect… But to compare a sort of extreme political statement with, again, a thousand-year-old claim that Jews somehow engineered plagues to kill non-Jews, that's a crazy false equivalence. They're totally different.”
Jennings shot back by informing Michaelson that he was moving the goal posts, “No, your statement was you had never heard of anti-Semitism being platformed like this in the U.S. Congress. It's platformed every day in the Democrat conference.”
Again, Michaelson tried to suggest Jayapal’s remarks were different, “That's only if you agree that a statement about Israel which, again, I'm not agreeing with that statement or endorsing it, is anti-Semitic. It's a political statement… And so, for this guy to get on, you know, to get a platform after saying that like the Jews are immune and that this was targeted and it's some sort of a bioweapon, I'm sorry, but to compare that to one statement saying Israel is a racist state, that's no comparison.”
It is not just Jayapal, as Jennings recalled, “It's not one statement. That corner of the party makes repeated statements, but sorry.”
Jennings is, of course, correct. Elected progressives say anti-Semitic things routinely under the guise of criticizing Israel and, unlike RFK Jr., they actually hold positions of power.
Christy did not explain how, exactly, Jayapal's remark was anti-Semitic, and he offered no examples to support hs contention that Jennings "is, of course, correct."
FLASHBACK: An Interlude Of Stelter Derangement Syndrome Topic: Media Research Center
As part of this flashback series, we'veshown how the Media Research Center worked hard to falsely smear a proposed anti-disinformation initiative in the Department of Homeland Security as a Orwellian "ministry of truth" -- while also smearing its leader, Nina Jankowicz -- then gleefully danced on its grave when officials caved to the nonsense and shut it down. And because this is the MRC, it also spent time lashing out at then-CNN host Brian Stelter, whom it irrationallyhates for interfering with its right-wing talking points, for telling the other side of the story. Kevin Tober chortled in a May 2022 post that served up stenography for an insult-fest:
On Monday night, Fox News host Tucker Carlson once again proved why he has the number one show on cable news when he did a brutal takedown of CNN’s Brian Stelter for his sadness over the demise of Biden’s Disinformation Governance Board (DGB) also known as the Ministry of Truth.
Carlson started off by expressing his amusement over the former head of the DGB, Nina Jankowicz. “So, by far the most entertaining person Joe Biden has appointed to anything was that Nina woman he put in charge of the Ministry of Truth. She was so ridiculous and provably so that she’s out,” Carlson said.
He then turned his attention to CNN and Brian Stelter: “but at CNN, they are sad. They wanted her there forever.”
[...]
Carlson surmised that “Brian Stelter is in fact, assuming he's a real person, basically lifted directly from the pages of 1984, the Orwell novel.”
Needless to say, Tober fact-checked nothing Carlson said. Iinstead, he embarrassingly gushed: "Ouch! Tucker Carlson does not miss."
When stelter had Jankowicz on his show to tell her side of the story -- which is apparently forbidden in the right-wing bubbile -- Tober lashed out anew in a July 10, 2022, post:
On Sunday's Reliable Sources on CNN, host Brian Stelter spent the opening monologue of his show in a tizzy over the amount of disinformation on the internet and in American politics in general. So naturally, Stelter decided to bring the former head of President Joe Biden's Ministry of Truth Nina Jankowicz to help her rehabilitate her image. Perhaps unsurprisingly, Jankowicz spread disinformation herself during the interview.
Predictably, Stelter opened the segment by sucking up to her and failed to correct her on any of her lies. "The sympathetic view, to you, is that the disinformation board was the victim of disinformation. Is that how you feel?"
Jankowicz responded that "it absolutely was the victim of disinformation. All of these narratives, that the disinformation governance board was going to be this Orwellian Ministry of Truth and all of the harassment and disinformation that was directed against me, was based on that falsehood. Based on that falsehood that was knowingly peddled by many people in the conservative media ecosystem and on Capitol Hill."
[...]
Stelter teed her up to play victim about all the personal attacks she allegedly had to endure: "These critics, there were many of them, they were incredibly loud. They say you are just a giant liberal, could never be appropriately hired for this job because you posted disinformation on Twitter yourself."
In response Jankowicz went through a laundry list of grievances many of which were false:
[...]
She purposefully lied about former President Trump's ties to the Russian Alfa Bank and that he had two secret email servers to communicate with the Russians. Both claims were and are flat-out false. Screenshots are forever, Nina! Of course, Stelter never confronted her about this either. Stelter is a fake journalist at a fake news network.
Tober offered no evidence Jankowicz "purposefully lied" about the Alfa Bank story; just because something later turns out not to be true doesn't mean it was a lie to report the original claim. By contrast, the MRC continuesto falselyclaim that an invfestigation into ties between Russia and Donald Trump was a "hoax" though most normal people -- even Republicans -- agree there was more than enough evidence to justify an investigation. Also note that Tober made no effort to defend the disonest attacks on the board and on Jankowicz, suggesting that he agrees that her criticism of those attacks are accurate.
Tim Graham served up one more bit of needless mockery in his podcast the next day:
The liberal media paint themselves as the forces of Truth, and the conservatives as an army of misinformation. On his Sunday show, CNN host Brian Stelter brought on former "Disinformation Governance Board" leader Nina Jankowicz and asked softball questions about her feelings, and sugggested she was wronged by the right-wingers. The only tough questions dwelled on how the Department of Homeland Security didn't fight the conservatives hard enough.
Graham is certainly not going to concede that Jankowicz is right and his side is wrong.
The Media Research Center distraction-and-whataboutism complaints about Donald Trump's third indictment continued in more whining from Kevin Tober in a Aug. 3 post:
As it had before with 
The Media Research Center has aggressively defended Donald Trump against the many indictment he faces, but before it could get around to defending him against his third indictment, it felt the need to complaing that people were likening him to a mob boss. Peter Kotara groused in a July 26 
The Media Research Center was a big fan of Gal Luft in 2008, mainly because of his objection to importing oil. 
The Media Research Center 
The Media Research Center's Kevin Tober whined in a May 18 
The Media Research Center now believes fact-checking is "censorship," as we learned in an Aug. 3 
The Media Research Center looks at Elon Musk and Twitter only through the lens of whether its fellow right-wingers are allowed to spout hate, misinformation and falsehoods without getting fact-checked or moderated (what it dishonestly calls "censorship"). As non-Musk Twitter executives realize that Twitter being filled with hate and lies is a bad thing, the MRC's Catherine Salgado went on an anti-"censorship" tantrum in an Aug. 10 
The Media Research Center's Elise Ehrhard spent a July 28 
It was a light month for Karine Jean-Pierre-bashing in August because there were fewer White House press briefings due to President Biden being on vacation. That didn't stop KJP from living rent-free in the collective heads of the MRC, of course. Tim Graham spent an Aug. 17 
The Media Research Center began its runup to Robert K. Kennedy Jr.'s appearance before Congress by trying to do some cleanup of an inflammatory comment he made. Ana Schau was stuck playing whataboutism in a July 18 
As part of this flashback series, 
