Bad Reporting Is One Of The Things That

Today The Gateway Pundit posted an article that illustrates how misquoting a person can create a totally false impression of the person and of what was said. The thing to keep in mind here is that the mainstream media attacks those who it considers to be a future threat to their narrative and their hold on power.

The article reports:

The far left media is making up completely fraudulent quotes now to smear the Republicans.

The Hill reported on Saturday that South Dakota Governor Kristi Noem called the removal of Confederate statues was an effort to “discredit” our Founding Fathers.

This would be quite a quote if it was true.
But it’s not true.
It was completely made up to make the popular Republican governor and the Republican party look racist and stupid.

The tweet is still up over 24 hours later.

The article posts the actual quote:

Here are Governor Noem’s actual words:

“Across America these last several weeks, we have been witnessing a very troubling situation unfold. In real time, we are watching an organized, coordinated campaign to remove and eliminate all references to our nation’s founding and many other points in our history. The approach focuses exclusively on our forefathers’ flaws, but it fails to capitalize on the opportunity to learn from their virtues. Make no mistake, this is being done deliberately to discredit America’s founding principles by discrediting the individuals who formed them so that America can be remade into a different political image.”

As you can see, there is no reference to the Confederacy or the statues. This is a blatant attempt to stop the forward political progress of a woman who has served her state well, both in Congress and as Governor. This is the sort of reporting that divides rather than informs.

A Voice Of Reason From The Political Left

On Tuesday Alan Dershowitz commented on the recent activism by the political left. Professor Dershowitz’s comments were posted in a Washington Times article posted on Tuesday.

Some of Professor Dershowitz’s comments:

…the movement sweeping the country to take down Confederate-era statues that some find offensive is setting a dangerous precedent.

“Do not glorify the violent people who are now tearing down the statues,” he said. “Many of these people, not all of them, many of these people are trying to tear down America.

 Antifa is a radical anti-American, anti-free market, communist, socialist, hard, hard left censorial organization that tries to stop speakers on campuses from speaking,” Mr. Dershowitz said. “They use violence. And just because they’re opposed to fascism and to some of these monuments shouldn’t make them heroes of the liberals.”

“I’m a liberal, and I think it’s the obligation of liberals to speak out against the hard left radicals just like it’s the obligation of conservatives to speak out against the extremism of the hard right,” he added.

…“We have to use this as an educational moment,” he said. “We have to take some of the statues that were put up more recently, for example, during the Civil Rights Movement and perhaps move them to museums where they can be used to teach young students about how statues are intended sometimes for bad purposes, to glorify negatives and to hold back positive developments.”

“But the idea of willy-nilly going through and doing what Stalin did — just erasing history and re-writing it to serve current purposes — does pose a danger, and it poses a danger of educational malpractice, of missing opportunities to educate people, and of going too far,” he said.

Mr. Dershowitz argued that the movement against Confederate-era statues ignores other discriminated groups in America, like Jews, women, and the Japanese.

“Once you start rewriting history of African Americans in this country, you have to start rewriting history of discrimination against many, many other groups,” he said. “Look, we’re both a nation of immigrants and a nation of discrimination against immigrants. That’s an important history for us to remember.”

Wouldn’t it be wonderful if our political leaders currently following the crowd on the rewriting of history would listen to the words of Professor Dershowitz.