I think so, Brain … but not unless we have final control over the editing.
Are You Pondering What I’m Pondering?
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Tag Archives: Fake News
There’s Nothing New Under the Sun
Chuck Todd has been caught editing remarks by Attorney General William Barr to misrepresent what Mr. Barr really said.
Yawn.
There’s nothing novel about the Left’s crude attempts to edit Reality to their liking.
Neither Nikolai Yazhov nor Winston Smith were available for comment.
Purple Monkey Dishwasher
I’ve watched the White House briefings most evenings this week, and when I read the accounts published by many of the media outlets and repeated by the blue check crowd on Twitter, I’m reminded of how facts get twisted when they’re transmitted through non-reliable channels.
BTW, Truth is often an even more effective disinfectant than Lysol.
Team Kimberlin Post of the Day
This TKPOTD from seven years ago today shows that Bill Schmalfeldt knew exactly who he was involved with when he joined Team Kimberlin.
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From Twitter, 16 June, 2012:
Sat Jun 16 22:27:31 +0000 2012, liberalgrouch, 214122056504184832, @Prepostericity If your point is that Kimberlin is a scumbag, I’m way ahead of you on that. Said so in my blog weeks ago. I could do
Sat Jun 16 22:28:26 +0000 2012, liberalgrouch, 214122288910577664, @Prepostericity without the condescending bullshit from a fellow blogger, if you don’t mind. I am trying to find the truth and tell it as
Sat Jun 16 22:28:59 +0000 2012, liberalgrouch, 214122427435847682, @Prepostericity I see it. Do YOUR homework and read up on who you’re talking to before you make such assholish statements in the future.
Sat Jun 16 22:29:46 +0000 2012, liberalgrouch, 214122624475869184, @Prepostericity I know Kimberlin was a bomber. I also know Breitbart followers and their reputations. So spare me the eye rolling disbelief
Sat Jun 16 22:30:21 +0000 2012, liberalgrouch, 214122770508955648, @Prepostericity when someone who has been doing this since you were in diapers tends to side with liberals over proven right wing liars. OK?
You may choose to look the other way but you can never again say you did not know.
—William Wilberforce
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The “news” Bill Schmalfeldt “reported” when associated with such Team Kimberlin outlets as Breitbart Unmasked Bunny Bill Boy Unread was the sort of lies that would even embarrass … oh, never mind.
When Even Rolling Stone Calls It Fake News …
… it’s time to admit you’ve been pushing fake news.
Matt Tabbi has a review of the recently released DoJ IG report over at Rolling Stone.
Then, following a series of leaks, the news media essentially reported on the FBI’s wrong reporting of Steele’s wrong reporting.
The impact was greater than just securing a warrant to monitor Page. More significant were the years of headlines that grew out of this process, beginning with the leaking of the meeting with Trump about Steele’s blackmail allegations, the insertion of Steele’s conclusions in the Intelligence Assessment about Russian interference, and the leak of news about the approval of the Page FISA warrant.
As a result, a “well-developed conspiracy” theory based on a report that Comey described as “salacious and unverified material that a responsible journalist wouldn’t report without corroborating,” became the driving news story in a superpower nation for two years. Even the New York Times, which published a lot of these stories, is in the wake of the Horowitz report noting Steele’s role in “unleashing a flood of speculation in the news media about the new president’s relationship with Russia.”
No matter what people think the political meaning of the Horowitz report might be, reporters who read it will know: Anybody who touched this nonsense in print should be embarrassed.
They should be embarrassed because their behavior was unprofessional and immoral, but I suspect for most of our betters among the “journalists” the source of any embarrassment is frustration caused by being caught.
The Russian Collusion Conspiracy Theory is Kaput …
… and even The Nation gets it.
The real Russiagate scandal is the damage it has done to our democratic system and media.
For more than two years, leading US political and media voices promoted a narrative that Donald Trump conspired with or was compromised by the Kremlin, and that Special Counsel Robert Mueller would prove it. In the process, they overlooked countervailing evidence and diverted anti-Trump energies into fervent speculation and prolonged anticipation. So long as Mueller was on the case, it was possible to believe that “The Walls Are Closing In” on the traitor/puppet/asset in the White House.
And—
In the end, Mueller’s report shows that the Trump-Russia collusion narrative embraced and evangelized by the US political and media establishments to be a work of fiction. The American public was presented with a far different picture from what was expected, because leading pundits, outlets, and politicians ignored the countervailing facts and promoted maximalist interpretations of others. Anonymous officials also leaked explosive yet uncorroborated claims, leaving behind many stories that were subsequently discredited, retracted, or remain unconfirmed to this day.
It is too early to assess the damage that influential Russiagate promoters have done to their own reputations; to public confidence in our democratic system and media; and to the prospects of defeating Trump, who always stood to benefit if the all-consuming conspiracy theory ultimately collapsed. The scale of the wreckage, confirmed by Mueller’s report, may prove to be the ultimate Russiagate scandal.
Note to the Democrats and the Media (but I repeat myself): When you’ve lost The Nation, it’s time to pack it in.
Crime Story
There is crime in Chicago, plenty of it, so much that there’s no real need for fake crime for the cops to waste their time solving. However, that didn’t keep Jussie Smollet from his … what was it? … publicity stunt? … political theatre? I’ve stayed away from that story on the off-chance that it wasn’t a hoax, but it’s now fairly clear the only crime that may have been filing a false police report. Frankly, I’ve had more interesting things to deal with than yet another bit of poorly crafted fake news.
Other bloggers have written about it, and I recommend this piece by my podcast partner Stacy McCain and this one by Peter Ingemi.
Stacy goes through the facts of the story, beginning with the temperature in Chicago (-4 F) when the imaginary assault was supposed to have happened and noting how flimsy the tale was from the start.
Common-sense skepticism is our best defense against the myths created by what Trump likes to call the “fake news” media. Maybe next time, they’ll get away with it, but this latest debacle, coming on the heels of the Left’s debunked smear of the Covington Catholic boys, has only further eroded the credibility of the president’s enemies. It’s gonna be four below zero in Hell before we trust them again.
Peter makes the interesting observation that the Democrats’ racism appears to have become inverted over the last century. He compares Jussie Smollet’s claims and the Left’s reaction to them to those of Mayella Ewell and the reaction of the all-white jury in To Kill a Mocking Bird.
He knew his community, the solid Democrat liberal/Hollywood/Media left. He knew their prejudices and counted on him backing up his story because it fit everything they believed. … The adjectives might have changed in 70-100 years but the Democrat playbook remains exactly the same.
Read both of them all the way through.
Toxic Media
I saw that phase over at Instapundit while I was drinking my morning coffee, and, yeah, some of the reporting I’m seeing is downright poisonous. Meanwhile, my podcasting partner Stacy McCain has some thoughts posted about the importance of the Truth and getting things right in reporting.
The Truth is out there, but it’s getting harder to find.
To Pounce
After seeing several comments on the Interwebz about how the Right was “pouncing” on the errors made in the misreporting of the Covington Kids harassment story, I clicked on the Dictionary widget on my Mac and found this as part of the definition of pounce—
notice and take swift and eager advantage of a mistake, remark, or sign of weakness: reporters who are just as eager to pounce on a gaffe as on a significant news story.
Well, I suppose we are taking advantage of the Left’s mistake. Their whole pitch was based on lies. It was their drummer who invaded someone else’s space. It was their “elder” who tried to provoke children, and it was they who cyberabused the youngsters. And it was their “elder” who may not be a respectable veteran, but a liar who misrepresented a military service record that appears to include stateside AWOL rather than service overseas.
Yeah, we pounced on that, and in the process, turned the Left’s fake news gaffe into a significant real news story.
Accountability?
I hope Film Ladd is correct, at least about the firings. In the case of lawsuits, the process is the punishment, and it can punish both sides. It would be better for the media companies involved to offer generous settlements to the children they appear to have victimized and keep the matter out of court.
However, the individual Twitter thugs shouldn’t be left unaccountable for their cyberbullying. The question remains of how to make a public example of them sufficient to deter such acts in the future.
Public shaming? One massive lawsuit against hundreds or thousands of defendants alleging that they are jointly and severally liable for the incitement to violence?
Alea iacta est.
Are You Pondering What I’m Pondering?
I think so, Brain … but it’s like some reporters need to sit down and give their minds a rest. They clearly need it.
Fake News
And we have another bombshell that’s a dud. It’s seems that there is no evidence to support the BuzzFeed story about Donald Trump ordering Michael Cohen to lie to Congress. One of the bylined reports has admitted that he’s seen nothing. No one else has been able to confirm the story. Oh, and the Special Counsel’s operation has disputed the report.
Those reporters and the editor responsible would probably be better suited to an outlet such as Breitbart Unmasked Bunny Billy Boy Unread. I hear there may be one or more openings there.
Are You Pondering What I’m Pondering?
I think so, Brain … but I was misquoted.
Are You Pondering What I’m Pondering?
I think so, Brain … but if politicians tell lies to journalists, why do they believe what they read in the newspapers?
CNN’s Bottom 20 List
Actually, it’s a bottom 21. The Daily Caller has a list of 20 bungled stories carried by CNN plus the “we never lie” Michael Cohen/Lanny Davis/Robert Mueller story of the past week or so. Although CNN hasn’t doubled down on all of them like the Cohen’s-Gotta-Rat-Out-Trump fantasy, many have gone uncorrected.
It’s a long piece, but real the whole thing.
Is the reason they have CNN in the airports to make the TSA look good by contrast?
I’m So Old …
… that I remember when it was considered good environmental stewardship to cut down a dead or dying tree that was likely to fall and cause serious damage. Now, that is something so uncouth that it can be the basis of a lie about one’s political adversary (or his wife). In their coverage of the fake news surrounding Melania Trump and the Jackson Magnolia, Victory Girls note—.
First Ladies are traditionally the ones who make final decisions about landscaping, which means that Melania did indeed have to sign off of the tree’s removal – but did so after a report from the United States National Arboretum stating that the tree was no longer salvageable. And Chelsea Clinton even thanked Melania for her efforts.
Read the whole thing.
I’m Not Making This Up, You Know
The way fake news is flying around these days …
Oh, never mind.
