In Case You Had Doubts

On Thursday, Newsbusters posted an article about a recent comment by CNN’s Don Lemon.

The article reports:

Recently, CNN’s New Day has been on a streak of providing fairly objective reporting. Alas, it was a streak that Don Lemon decided to end this Thursday morning, ambling over from his nightly slots for what seemed to be a monthly Festivus tradition of his: complaining that the media isn’t doing enough to attack Republicans. Essentially openly opposing new CNN boss Chris Licht’s reported desire to bring CNN back to journalism and away from Lemon’s brand of partisanship.

The reason Lemon graced the TV screens at such an early hour was apparently due to an interview on Wednesday evening, where former Proud Boys spokesperson Jason van Tatenhove expressed fears of political extremists rising to prominence in the Republican Party, and NYU History professor Ruth Ben-Ghiat said, “I don’t think a lot of people know that on the local and state level there’s a lot of intermingling and fusion between extremists and the GOP, and I really see the GOP as an extremist entity now.”

The following quote from Don Lemon should leave no doubt in your mind as to what the mainstream media is doing:

We sit around and we talk about these things and we — we want to give this false equivalence to Democrats and Republicans. That is not where we are right now. Republicans are doing something that is very dangerous to our society, and we have to acknowledge that. We have to acknowledge that as Americans, we must acknowledge that as journalists, because if we don’t we’re not doing our jobs

Actually, their job as journalists is to report the news as it is–not to inject their opinion and not to (according to them) try to save the country.

The article also mentions Don Lemon’s desire to hold Republicans responsible for overturning Roe vs. Wade. So he believes that the Republicans are dangerous to society because they want to prevent the killing of babies. It seems to me that a society that values life might be less dangerous than a society that supports the killing of unborn babies.

That Was Then, This Is Now

Yesterday The Conservative Treehouse posted an article about how the Biden administration is handing the illegal aliens crossing our southern border.

The article reports:

A remarkable contrast in manipulative media narrative engineering. President Trump built a migrant facility for unaccompanied alien children in 2019 and was lambasted by mainstream media for it. Today the Joe Biden administration activates the exact same facility and the media are swooning over the compassionate care facility.

The article includes an excerpt from The Washington Post:

CARRIZO SPRINGS, Tex. — Dozens of migrant teens boarded vans Monday for the trip down a dusty road to a former man camp for oil field workers here, the first migrant child facility opened under the Biden administration.

The emergency facility — a vestige of the Trump administration that was open for only a month in summer 2019 — is being reactivated to hold up to 700 children ages 13 to 17.

Government officials say the camp is needed because facilities for migrant children have had to cut capacity by nearly half because of the coronavirus pandemic. At the same time, the number of unaccompanied children crossing the border has been inching up, with January reporting the highest total — more than 5,700 apprehensions — for that month in recent years. 

The article also includes the classic picture of Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez crying over an empty parking lot. Good grief.

The media has not been helpful to our republic for quite some time. It would be nice if there were at least some semblance of unbiased reporting. Right now it really does take effort to be an informed voter, and Democrats are working hard to take down conservative or unbiased news sources. The Fourth Estate has become a Fifth Column.

Skewing The News Can Have Consequences

Bias in news reporting comes in a variety of ways. One way is to leave out critical parts of a story in order to give a totally misleading impression. Unfortunately the news media did that recently in a situation where someone died.

Townhall posted an article that illustrates how harmful and misleading media bias can be.

The article reports:

Media outlets and journalists on social media heavily pushed a story about a woman and her husband drinking fish tank cleaner because it contained chloroquine phosphate after President Trump had mentioned the medicinal version of chloroquine could be used to help treat COVID-19.

After drinking the cleaner, the couple began to feel sick and were rushed to the hospital, where her husband later died and she was put in intensive care. She told NBC News they drank it out of fear of contracting the coronavirus and had heard Trump talking about chloroquine to treat patients.

However, some of the reports and social media left out the fact the couple did not ingest the medicinal form of chloroquine that Trump had said could be used to help cure those infected with the Wuhan coronavirus.

Axios’ story about the incident completely left out the part about them ingesting fish tank cleaner. Their tweet for the original story has been deleted and an editor’s note was added to the story hours after it was first published.

…Journalists on Twitter often left out the part explaining the couple did not use the tablet form of chloroquine, racking up thousands of retweets and likes off of the false premise.

NBC News Correspondent Heidi Przybyla’s tweet about the story went viral, but she did not add the key detail until two hours later and at the very bottom of her thread, which has received far less attention.

The most blatant example of journalistic malpractice was found in a tweet by Axios and the response by Jennifer Rubin:

Understand as you read this that the political left would love to see President Trump’s daily coronavirus updates go away. Why? Because when the President talks to the people directly, Americans see a man handling the situation as well as could be expected. The media spin rooms try to spin what was said, but if people see it for themselves, the spin has less impact.

Please follow the link to the article at Townhall. It shows a number of tweets attempting to blame President Trump for the death of the man who drank fish tank cleaner. While the man’s death is a tragedy, no one told him to drink fish tank cleaner. It was a really dumb thing to do. However, the reporting of this tragedy is only one example of how irresponsible our mainstream media has become.

This Is What Desperation Looks Like

Mediaite posted an article this morning about the ongoing impeachment hearings. Before I continue, I need to share the following from a website called Media Bias/Fact Check:

True to form, this is the Mediaite headline, “Fox’s Bret Baier: Trump Gave Schiff a New ‘Article of Impeachment in Real Time’ With Twitter Attack on Yovanovitch.” I guess Harry Truman would not be able to be President in today’s politically correct world.

The article reports:

The dramatic moment during Friday’s House Impeachment hearing in which Rep. Adam Schiff (D-CA) read out President Donald Trump’s tweet blasting former ambassador to Ukraine Marie Yovanovitch in real time — with Yovanovitch saying she finds the tweet “very intimidating” — may have amounted to an on-the-spot article of impeachment, according to one Fox News anchor.

Weighing in immediately after the hearing went to recess, Fox anchor Bret Baier said that the president gave Schiff ammunition in real time on Friday morning with the attack.

“That enabled Schiff to then characterize that tweet as intimidating the witness, or tampering with the witness, which is a crime, adding essentially an article of impeachment in real-time as this hearing is going on,” Baier said.

If a tweet is grounds for impeachment, no elected official who disagrees with the ‘powers that be’ is safe. This is scary.

These are the tweets:

Draw your own opinion.

The Double Standard Is Alive And Well In The Media

Newsbusters posted an article yesterday that illustrates that media bias is not anything new.

The article reports:

It’s always big news when a former associate of a President goes on trial, right? Well actually no.

When Bill Clinton’s Whitewater business partners Jim and Susan McDougal and the former Arkansas Governor Jim Guy Tucker were tried (and convicted) for conspiracy and fraud charges the Big Three (ABC, CBS, NBC) evening news programs devoted (on average) just 36 seconds per night (March 3, 1996 – May 29, 1996) to the trial. This despite the fact that the then-sitting President offered video testimony during the court proceedings.   

In contrast, the trial of Donald Trump’s one-time campaign manager Paul Manafort – for charges in a tax fraud case that had nothing to do with President Trump or alleged Russian collusion –  averaged 2 minutes and 18 seconds per night (July 31 – August 21) on those same evening programs. This was at a rate almost 4x higher than network coverage of the 1996 trial. 

…In total ABC, CBS and NBC spent 51 minutes and 28 seconds in 87 days on the trial of Clinton’s business partners.

In contrast, ABC, CBS and NBC almost reached that total (50 minutes, 30 seconds) in just 22 days of coverage of the Manafort trial.

Let’s not forget the lack of reporting on President Obama’s close association with Reverend Wright, Bill Ayers, and Bernadette Dorn.

The thing to remember in dealing with the 24/7 coverage of anything detrimental to President Trump is that the heyday of the power of the American press was Watergate–when they drove President Nixon from office. The would love to repeat that performance. For whatever reason, the mainstream press is unaware that attempting to drive a duly-elected President from power does not help the republic.

Losing Touch

It is no surprise to anyone living outside the bubble of Washington, D.C., California, or the Northeast that the mainstream media has totally lost touch with average Americans. There are a few general traits of average Americans that the media has forgotten. America was originally founded by people who were fleeing persecution and looking for religious freedom. There are still a number of us who consider religion an important part of our lives. Generally speaking, members of the mainstream media do not fall into that category. Many of the original British settlers to America were the second sons of their family. Under British law, they would receive no inheritance, so they set out to start from scratch in a new land. They understood the risks, but were willing to settle the new land. Personal responsibility and the risks included in that were part of our growth as a nation. The other trait that permeates our culture is cheering on the underdog. When someone is under constant attack or being bullied, Americans seem to rally to their side. That is something the mainstream media has overlooked in their frenzied attacks on President Trump. A recent article in The Conservative Treehouse illustrates that point.

The article states:

If you were to review how CNN and corporate mainstream media talk politics, well, according to their echo-chambered versions of President Trump, each week that passes is the worst week ever in presidential history.  Seriously, no joke. President Trump has been in office for 30 weeks, and 20 of those weeks have been called “the worst” by media.

However, if you actually engage with people living their lives and not focused on who the media blame for the latest round of horrid offenses; well, then you might recognize the scope of how over-emphasized and out-of-touch the media perspective really is.

CBS and The Associated Press each found themselves picking their corporate media jaws off the floor when they actually did ask people.  You know, ordinary people.  Folks like you and me.  The media didn’t anticipate the power of common sense to see through their BS.

There is also the analogy of the boy who cried wolf. Twenty of the thirty weeks President Trump has been in office have been described by the mainstream media as “the worst.” The seems more than a little over the top.

I am sure that the comments made in the video included in the article were a bit of a shock to the media. Here is the video:

The video is from CBS News. I am somewhat amazed that they were willing to release it.

The Central Issue In The November Presidential Election

There are a lot of issues floating around the presidential election in November–globalism vs. nationalism, gun control vs. the Second Amendment, freedom of speech, religious freedom, etc., but there is one very subtle issue that really needs to be looked at carefully if you care about the future of America.

On Wednesday, the American Family Association (AFA) posted an article about a recent statement by Donald Trump about this election.

In August, The Washington Post reported:

Donald Trump, trailing narrowly in presidential polls, has issued a warning to worried Republican voters: The election will be “rigged” against him — and he could lose as a result.

Trump pointed to several court cases nationwide in which restrictive laws requiring voters to show identification have been thrown out. He said those decisions open the door to fraud in November.

“If the election is rigged, I would not be surprised,” he told The Washington Post in an interview Tuesday afternoon. “The voter ID situation has turned out to be a very unfair development. We may have people vote 10 times.”

The article was dismissive of the charges–not a surprise, considering the political bent of the newspaper, but we have seen clear evidence of voter fraud in the race between Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders, so the idea of voter fraud is not shocking.

The AFA article explains exactly how the system is rigged:

This makes two debates in the past week where the moderator’s biases have been clearly evident. The American people can’t even get a fair and balanced debate.  Why? Because the Left’s ideas don’t work and if there ever were to be a fair debate, this would become quite obvious.

We all remember the role Candy Crowley‘s misinformation played in the 2012 debate between Mitt Romney and President Obama. We can expect more of that sort of thing in the coming debates.

The AFA article further explains:

Over recent years, rogue federal judges have struck down voter I.D. laws in several key states. Laws aimed at preventing voter fraud have been partially or fully struck down in states like Texas, North Carolina, Ohio and Wisconsin to name a few. Many of the judges claimed that the voter I.D. laws would have caused a decrease in turnout for minority voters, specifically blacks.

This should be an offense to the entire black community. A federal judge makes the assumption that minorities aren’t responsible enough to acquire a government issued identification card. If individuals have to show their I.D. when buying tobacco or when going to see an R rated movie, then why is it unjust to apply the same standard to something as important as voting?

I would like to note that the majority of the judges ruling against voter ID were appointed by Democrats.

So what am I saying? The system is definitely slanted against Republicans. If Hillary is elected, that will continue and she will probably add to the problem. Unless you want America to become a banana republic where one party rules and is above the law, you need to vote for Trump. I really don’t care what the man does or what he is accused of, he is the alternative to losing our freedom. If you believe that the Clintons are pure as the wind-driven snow and have never spoken or acted crudely, then you are the result of the slanted media I have been talking about. There are some serious things on the line here–the Second Amendment and the First Amendment (including religious freedom) being two of them. Your vote counts.

R.I.P. American Journalism

This is a blog. I have never claimed to be objective. The name of the blog ought to be a clue as to my political leanings. I call things according to how I see them. You will notice that there are no ads on this blog. That is for two reasons–first of all, I don’t want to do the bookkeeping, but secondly, and more important, I don’t ever want to be conflicted about posting an article because someone is advertising on my blog. I have no problem with a reporter reporting on an event from a specific viewpoint as long as the reporter is willing to make his viewpoint known to the hearing audience. However, we have wondered away from that concept. As I write this, I am watching a supposedly objective news reporter change the subject every time a Trump supporter makes a valid point. We saw the mainstream media actually do damage to future American security with their lying about the Iran nuclear deal. Why are we surprised when they lie about the candidates for President?

The New York Post posted an article today about what has happened to journalism in the current election campaign.

The article reports:

The frenzy to bury Trump is not limited to the Clinton campaign and the Obama White House. They are working hand-in-hand with what was considered the cream of the nation’s news organizations.

The shameful display of naked partisanship by the elite media is unlike anything seen in modern America.

The largest broadcast networks — CBS, NBC and ABC — and major newspapers like The New York Times and Washington Post have jettisoned all pretense of fair play. Their fierce determination to keep Trump out of the Oval Office has no precedent.

Indeed, no foreign enemy, no terror group, no native criminal gang, suffers the daily beating that Trump does. The mad mullahs of Iran, who call America the Great Satan and vow to wipe Israel off the map, are treated gently by comparison.

By torching its remaining credibility in service of Clinton, the mainstream media’s reputations will likely never recover, nor will the standards. No future producer, editor, reporter or anchor can be expected to meet a test of fairness when that standard has been trashed in such willful and blatant fashion.

Most Americans are not stupid. I also believe that most Americans have a definite sense of fair play. The are noticing the media pile-on that has been aimed at Donald Trump.

The article further states:

The Times now is so out of the closet as a Clinton shill that it is giving itself permission to violate any semblance of evenhandedness in its news pages as well as its opinion pages.

A recent article by its media reporter, Jim Rutenberg, whom I know and like, began this way: “If you’re a working journalist and you believe that Donald J. Trump is a demagogue playing to the nation’s worst racist and nationalistic tendencies, that he cozies up to anti-American dictators and that he would be dangerous with control of the United States nuclear codes, how the heck are you supposed to cover him?”

If you are still getting your news from the mainstream media, you are not getting the whole story. It’s time to do some investigating on your own.

A Liberal I Can Respect

The political debate continues. The gap between both sides widens. However, every now and then someone accidentally bridges the gap and says something that most of us can agree on.

On Thursday, Newsbusters posted a portion of an interview of Camille Paglia by Salon.

The article reports:

Liberals think of themselves as very open-minded, but that’s simply not true!” she said. “Liberalism has sadly become a knee-jerk ideology, with people barricaded in their comfortable little cells. They think that their views are the only rational ones, and everyone else is not only evil but financed by the Koch brothers. It’s so simplistic!” Bring it, Camille!

Then, Paglia really got going. “Now let me give you a recent example of the persisting insularity of liberal thought in the media,” she said. “When the first secret Planned Parenthood video was released in mid-July, anyone who looks only at liberal media was kept totally in the dark about it, even after the second video was released.” 

“It was a huge and disturbing story,” she continued, “but there was total silence in the liberal media. That kind of censorship was shockingly unprofessional. The liberal major media were trying to bury the story by ignoring it.” 

“Now I am a former member of Planned Parenthood and a strong supporter of unconstrained reproductive rights. But I was horrified and disgusted by those videos and immediately felt there were serious breaches of medical ethics in the conduct of Planned Parenthood officials.”

“But here’s my point,” she concluded. “It is everyone’s obligation, whatever your political views, to look at both liberal and conservative news sources every single day. You need a full range of viewpoints to understand what is going on in the world. 

The videotapes about Planned Parenthood are disturbing. I attempted to bring them up in a discussion with a liberal friend on Facebook and got called a lot of things I won’t repeat. A discussion of the issue was not possible. The video tapes were false and men were trying to control women’s bodies. I don’t know if our culture has reached the point of no return, but if we haven’t, we are definitely close. Selling aborted baby body parts is evil. We should at least be able to agree on that.

 

What The News Said And What Actually Happened

Hot Air posted an article yesterday about some recent news stories about shootings at gun shows. The contrast between the headline and the actual facts is almost comical.

The article reports:

The headlines speak volumes without even digging into the nasty messages underneath. 5 People Shot at 3 Different Gun Shows on Gun Appreciation Day. Holy cow! Five people were gunned down? That’s awful! I’m sure you wouldn’t go and get all snarky about shooting victims though, would you?

Now let’s look at what actually happened. In an incident at a North Carolina gun show. The article reports:

A man identified as Gary Lynn Wilson, 36, of Wilmington, brought the 12-gauge shotgun to the show at the North Carolina State Fairgrounds and was attempting to remove it from its case when the weapon went off shortly after 1 p.m., police said.

Linwood Hester, 50, of Durham, was struck in the left hand by birdshot, according to Joel Keith, police chief with the state Department of Agriculture. The birdshot also struck a woman identified as Janet Hoover, 54, of Benson, and Jake Alderman, a retired sheriff’s deputy from Wake Forest who was working at the event.

The article also reports:

The second incident, in Indianapolis, concerned a guy who accidentally shot himself with his new gun after leaving the gun show. The final one was in the Buckeye state.

And in Ohio, a gun dealer in Medina was checking out a semi-automatic handgun he had bought when he accidentally pulled the trigger, injuring his friend, police said. The gun’s magazine had been removed from the firearm, but one round remained in the chamber, police said.

Admittedly, some of the people involved in these incidents were not acting responsibly, but there was no violent or criminal intent. The answer to these incidents would be to encourage all gun owners to follow safety procedures when participating in gun shows–not seeking laws that violate the U. S. Constitution to advance a political agenda.

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A New Low In Media Reporting

The Blaze posted two videos on Thursday of a Romney-Ryan rally in Ohio. The first video was played by MSNBC host Martin Bashir to illustrate his point that Paul Ryan was overshadowing Mitt Romney in the presidential campaign. A similar video had been played on “Morning Joe” the day before. I am not posting that video, if you would like to see it, follow the link to “The Blaze” above.

The unedited (untampered with) clip is at the bottom of the article at “The Blaze.” Here it is:

The article also provides an eyewitness account of the events. The eyewitness account and the unedited video clearly show that the crowd was not shouting “Ryan”–they were shouting “Romney,” and Mitt Romney encouraged them to change the shout to “Romney-Ryan.”  It is very discouraging to see videotape edited to fit the picture the mainstream media is trying to paint of this presidential campaign. This altered video clearly shows the reason we need the Internet as an alternative news source.

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Editorial Compliance Equals Access

The German newspaper called Deutsche Welle posted a story last Thursday about the American media. The headline of the story was “US journalists trade independence for access.” The article points out that in Germany it is not unusual to require authorization before interviews can be published, but that America is moving in that direction.

The article reports:

But in the United States, the balance of power between the journalist and the politician has increasingly shifted in favor of the latter. According to a July 15 report by Jeremy W. Peters of the New York Times, political journalists in Washington are increasingly trading their editorial independence for high-level access to members of the Obama administration.

Quotes gleaned from administration officials by a reporter are not just reviewed by the publication’s editor, they are often sent to the very same officials for approval – and even redaction – before going to print.

According to Stephen Ward, there is a growing and unhealthy “pressure on journalists and … on news organizations to get the story, to be first, to be the first tweet.”

“The officials who know this are quite aware that in this era of 24 hours news, access is king,” Ward, the director of the Center for Journalism Ethics at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, told DW. “This is just a game of access – it’s as old as journalism.”

Access may partially explain the leftward tilt of American journalism, but I think there is also another explanation. Since the 1960’s our colleges have shifted to the political left. They have reflected the political and social upheaval of that time. The professors of today are often the students of that era or were educated after the our college campuses turned left. The inmates are running the asylum.

The article concludes:

Ultimately, journalists must assume much of the responsibility for the weakening of their editorial independence, according to Ward. He argues that they have increasingly bought into a partisan political game that revels in scandal at the sake of context.

“We are never going to get rid of all the tweets and the 24-hour business – all the fast-food journalism that we are seeing,” Ward said. “But we can at the core of political discourse maintain certain sources of news and analysis that are informed and not breathless – (that are) thoughtful.”

Our republic depends on a honest mainstream media. It is distressing that at this time we have to turn to the alternative media for the truth.

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The Old Media Shows Why We Need The New Media

John Hinderaker at Power Line posted an article yesterday about the press coverage of Governor Romney’s trip to Europe. When he was interviewed by the British press, the Governor stated (in true CEO fashion) that he was concerned about some of the logistics issues surrounding the Olympics. He was soundly criticized by the British press for even implying that things might not be perfectly planned out. Although that statement has turned out to be accurate, there have been no apologies from the press or comments from the press stating that what he said turned out to be true.

The Governor then traveled to Israel where he was met with cheers (and raised $1 million from contributors). The press reported how upset the Palestinians were about his comments that the Israeli culture provides a fertile ground for economic prosperity.

The article at Power Line quotes an Associated Press (AP) report on Governor Romney’s trip:

It was all intended to demonstrate he was ready to handle foreign affairs smoothly and lead during dangerous times.

Instead, as he made his final stop of a three-nation tour in Poland late Monday, Republicans and Democrats alike were shaking their heads in the U.S. Though Republicans said they saw no lasting harm, Democrats raised questions about Romney’s ability to handle delicate topics with sensitivity on foreign soil, even under the friendliest conditions.

Any resemblance between what actually happened and what AP reported is purely coincidental. It really is a shame that the American press has forgotten that it is supposed to supply voters with accurate information–particularly during an election season.

 

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Why It Matters Where You Get Your News

Yesterday YouTube posted a video giving a general summary of Fast and Furious as it now stands. The video was produced and posted by the American Future Fund.

The video gives a short explanation of what Fast and Furious was and how the Obama Administration has successfully blocked (as of now) any serious inquiry into the origin and supervision of the program.

Meanwhile, Fox News posted a story remarking that NBC first reported on Operation Fast and Furious on Tuesday night. Brian Terry was killed in December of 2010 with a weapon traced to Fast and Furious. There have been questions about his death since then. Where has the major media been? The network slanted the story as a partisan battle between the Republicans and Attorney General Holder. This is not a political battle–it is a battle about a government agency out of control.

The article at Fox News reports:

Correspondent Kelly O’Donnell then took over, repeating the Williams theme that this was all about a Republican ax to grind. — And certainly never about an American border agent being killed by guns that Holder did everything but Fed-Ex to Mexican drug lords. — Williams and O’Donnell mentioned Republicans seven times and Democrats just twice because this was a “long simmering conflict between Republicans and Attorney General Eric Holder.”
 
It’s time the major media started reporting the news accurately and completely. The bias of the network is indicated not only in how they slant the story, but in the stories they cover. If American voters want to be informed, they are going to have to look past the major media.
 
 

 

 

 

 

 

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The Role Of Internet News Sites

 

English: Marco Rubio, U.S. Senator from Florid...

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The Weekly Standard posted an article yesterday about the role of an Internet blogger in bringing to light the errors in a very negative Reuters story about Florida Senator Marco Rubio. Matt Lewis, a blogger for the Daily Caller, pointed out the errors in the story, forcing Reuters to correct five of the items listed in the story. Reuters has admitted that the story is regrettable.

The article at The Weekly Standard reports:

It was so bad, in fact, that the editors and writer involved have been asked not to talk about it. (I reached out to editors David Lindsey and Eric Walsh, but have not heard back.)

The article, by David Adams, had intended to detail why Rubio was an unlikely pick for Vice President: “Rubio may not be as coveted as Gingrich or Romney would have it appear as they press for votes in Florida, where more than 450,000 Hispanics identify themselves as Republicans,” Reuters David Adams wrote. “Despite his reputation as a watchdog over federal spending, Rubio, 40, has had significant financial problems that could keep him from passing any vetting process as a potential vice presidential choice, Republican and Democratic strategists say.”

But after pressure from the Rubio staff, Reuters was forced to issue corrections that quickly became a larger talking point than the article itself.

Without the work of Matt Lewis, this story would have been allowed to go unchallenged, and a good man would have been smeared in the press. That is the reason why we need the Internet and Internet news sources!

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The Dangers Of A Biased Media

It really isn’t a secret that the media wants four more years of President Barack Obama (although I can’t understand why). Before you complain that I am biased, I would like to remind you of the name of this blog. I don’t have a problem with media being on one side or the other–I just want everyone to be honest about where they stand!

Big Journalism posted a story today that should enrage every American.

The story states (and includes a video):

Yesterday, on MSNBC, left-wing journalists Chris Hayes of The Nation and Ezra Klein of the Washington Postno strangers to Democrat-media collusion–revealed that they had been part of an off-the-record White House briefing in which it was made clear that President Barack Obama planned all along to let the temporary payroll tax holiday expire, and then blame Republicans.

The media bias impacted the negotiations–the Republicans also knew that the President was willing to let the tax cuts expire and then blame them. They also knew that because of the media bias, they would not be able to convince the American public that they were not responsible for the end of the payroll tax cut.

The article further reports:

According to Hayes, “everyone in Washington” knew that Obama wanted the payroll tax extension to fail–and yet the same journalists eagerly covered the subsequent payroll tax debate as if Republicans were the only obstacle to an extension. The result of the media’s collusion was a year-end political victory for Obama and the Democrats at the expense of House leaders, the Tea Party, and Republicans in general.

Shame on the media for not doing their job of objective reporting.

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Learning To Look Behind The Stories

John Hinderaker at Power Line posted an article yesterday about the efforts by some media outlets to begin the tearing down process of all Republican presidential contenders. I’m hoping that the electorate is too sophisticated to fall for this ploy.

Mr. Hinderaker states:

The election is still over a year away, and yet “news” stories intended to bring down leading Republican contenders are appearing on pretty much a daily basis. I’m not sure I will be able to stand it for another 12 months.

The Associated Press’s story of the day on Herman Cain relies on battlefield preparation that has been done over the last year by the far left: “Long ties to Koch brothers key to Cain’s campaign.” This is one of those wink-wink pieces; you wouldn’t really get the point unless you are aware of the left’s over-the-top campaign against Charles and David Koch, two of the very few seriously rich people who support conservative causes.

The story in the Associated Press goes on to list the various questionable associations between Herman Cain and the ‘evil’ Koch brothers. The Koch brothers are the force behind Americans for Prosperity, a group that supports conservative causes. Therefore the liberal media has painted a target on their backs. The media is also trying to link any Republican candidate they can to them–two birds with one stone.

The attack on Romney is more subtle. The article reports:

Try as it might, the Times (New York Times) is not able to put Romney in a particularly bad light. On the contrary, it appears clear that he was an unusually effective leader in this aspect of his life, as in all others. But the Times has a purpose: it wants to rally potential Obama voters who are appalled by the economic performance of the Obama administration, by letting them know that Romney is a man of deep religious conviction. This, to many readers of the NY Times, is weird. The Times hopes that the idea of Romney’s religious faith will horrify some voters even more than Obama’s policy failures. And, as to some liberal and atheist voters, it probably will.

The growth of the alternative media is not totally the result of brilliance on the part of those involved in it–it is the result of a mainstream media that has lost its way. I am hoping that the American voter is too smart to fall for the tricks the media will use to try to win a second term for President Obama. It’s a shame that the media cannot honestly report the accomplishments of President Obama and those candidates likely to run against him.

 

 

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Fact Checking The Associated Press

"The Honorable Rick Perry (front right), ...

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Rick Perry was in New Hampshire on Saturday. He spoke at an event at the home of Chuck Stephen co-hosted by John Stephen, the former Republican gubernatorial nominee. Human Events reported on Sunday that the coverage of the event by the Associated Press left out some significant information.

This is an excerpt from the Associated Press article:

Speaking to hundreds of Granite State voters at a private reception, the Texas governor was asked whether he supported a fence along the Mexican border. “No, I don’t support a fence on the border,” he said.

“The fact is, it’s 1,200 miles from Brownsville to El Paso. Two things: How long you think it would take to build that? And then if you build a 30-foot wall from El Paso to Brownsville, the 35-foot ladder business gets real good.”

The answer produced an angry shout from at least one audience member.

Channel 7 (WHIOTV) in Ohio did a slightly better job of reporting the speech:

“No, I don’t support a fence on the border,” he said, while referring to the long border in Texas alone. “The fact is, it’s 1,200 miles from Brownsville to El Paso. Two things: How long you think it would take to build that? And then if you build a 30-foot wall from El Paso to Brownsville, the 35-foot ladder business gets real good.”

Instead, Perry said he supported “strategic fencing” and National Guard troops to prevent illegal immigration and violence from Mexican drug cartels.

The answer produced an angry shout from at least one audience member. And it exposed an ongoing rift with some conservative voters over Perry’s immigration record.

That’s a little better. However, a website called Instapundit posted a first-hand account:

A BLOG REPORT FROM RICK PERRY’S SPEECH IN NEW HAMPSHIRE: “I attended that event, stood about 15 feet from where he delivered those remarks and never heard an ‘angry shout’. Either the AP is making it up or it wasn’t much of a shout. Perhaps they can supply the audio.”

Maybe it was a reporter in the back who was doing the shouting. But after the 2004 bogus-boos incident, I encourage bloggers and others attending these events to record audio and video. You never know what’ll happen — or what people will report happened, even if it didn’t.

This election season every voter will need to be careful when gathering news and deciding on candidates. Unfortunately much of the major media is no longer objective and is reporting things that didn’t happen or not reporting important facts. There are many places on the internet (hopefully this is one of them) where a voter can go to fact check and get the whole story. Be careful what you read, and stay informed. That is the only way to preserve our freedom.



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