Scandalous

Fox News Wants Lincoln Project to ‘Shut Down’ for the Same Offenses as – Fox News!

Posted by on February 25, 2021 at 1:52 pm. 2 Comments :

The Olympic-grade hypocrisy of Fox News continues to lap the field of ultra-rightist media hacks.
There is literally no limit to how flagrantly they will attack others for the crimes they are so conspicuously guilty of.

Fox News, Censorship

In recent weeks the anti-Trump Republican group, the Lincoln Project, has been embroiled in a controversy over the alleged misbehavior of one of their principles, John Weaver. He has been accused of sexual harassment and subsequently resigned from the organization. The scandal was immediately leapt upon by conservatives and Trump supporters, not because they care about sexual harassment, but as an opportunity to dispose of an effective group of Trump critics with solid Republican credentials.

One of the things that distinguishes liberals and Democrats from conservatives and Republicans is how they respond to misconduct in their ranks. The left acknowledges their failings and holds their own accountable. The right, on the other hand, defends their scoundrels, denies any wrongdoing, and embraces them even more tightly.

On Thursday Fox News joined the opportunistic rabble on the right that has been going after the Lincoln Project. They published an article on their website that called for the group to be shut down, advocating for…

“…the dissolution of the Lincoln Project, the anti-Trump political action committee that has imploded in the past month from accusations of a sexual harassment cover-up, financial skulduggery, and a toxic work environment.”

Fine. That’s not a particularly unreasonable position. And it’s one that is shared by many liberals who are appalled by the revelations of Weaver’s behavior. In fact, Fox’s article references John F. Harris’ piece on Politico as its source.

The problem is that Fox News was never so outraged by similar – and worse – behavior by their own personalities and executives. Fox’s founder, Roger Ailes, was accused by numerous women of sexual harassment and assault. So was Bill O’Reilly, Fox’s top host until he was fired in the wake of several multimillion dollar lawsuits. Fox News president Bill Shine was forced out for having covered for O’Reilly. Several Foxies (Pete Hegseth, Jessie Watters, Ed Henry) were caught in inappropriate, extramarital affairs with much younger coworkers. And Kimberly Guilfoyle, Don Trump Jr’s current girlfriend, was fired for sending her colleagues dick-pics.

Speaking of Donnie Junior, who left his wife and five children for Guilfoyle, he couldn’t resist the temptation to pile on New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo with this tweet:

Once again, Donnie is wrong. Democrats have not been shy about criticizing Cuomo, some even calling for him to resign. But Donnie fails to mention the dozens of credible accusations of both harassment and assault against his father. Now that he is a civilian, those cases are going to start coming to court.

There is no excuse for the behavior that is alleged to have been engaged in by Weaver or Cuomo or Daddy Trump. But the remedy, according to Fox News, is questionable. The Lincoln Project doesn’t need to be shut down over conduct that was limited to one person. But if that’s the argument that Fox wants to make, then Fox News should be shut down for the conduct of multiple persons and their protectors.

And, of course, Trump should be figuratively shut down as a candidate or public figure for the remainder of his heinous life. But then, there are lots of other reasons for that besides his sexual predation. For instance, financial corruption, charity theft, academic fraud, presidential lying, enriching himself with taxpayer funds, and treason against America. If there were ever good reasons for “canceling” someone, Trump has exceeded the limit.

NOTE: Twitter recently suspended the News Corpse account after 11 years without giving a reason. So if anyone wants to tweet articles from my website, please feel free to do so often and repeatedly. Also, Be sure to visit and follow News Corpse on Instagram. Thanks for your support.

How Fox News Deceives and Controls Their Flock:
Fox Nation vs. Reality: The Fox News Cult of Ignorance.
Available now at Amazon.

Eric Trump Is Right For Once: ‘The MAGA Movement Is Going Nowhere’

Posted by on January 6, 2021 at 11:55 am. 2 Comments :

The morning after Democrats succeeded in gaining the majority in the Senate with the election of Raphael Warnock and Jon Ossoff, Donald Trump showed up at the grossly misnamed “Save America” rally in Washington, D.C. He proceeded to deliver the same tedious speech he has been disgorging for months, with a few more examples of the flagrantly false allegations of election fraud.

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Donald Trump

Fox News, of course, aired the whole speech live and uninterrupted. It was an hour plus of whining, lying, and infantile insulting. And there was no shortage of ranting about paranoid delusions of a “Deep State” cabal aligned against him that now even includes Mike Pence.

Trump’s despondence over the defeat he was dealt by President-Elect Joe Biden was apparent in his seething tirade. He simply can’t acknowledge the reality that America has thoroughly rejected him and his crime family. Speaking of which, Trump’s spawn Eric visited with Sean Hannity on Fox News Tuesday night to expound upon the Trump tribulations. And, surprisingly, Eric actually said something that was not only true, but which could unite Democrats and Republicans going forward:

“I can tell you, Sean, any senator or any congressmen – meaning on this side – that does not fight tomorrow – I’m telling you, their political career is over, because the MAGA movement is going nowhere. My father’s created the greatest political movement in American history and, I’m telling you, they will get primaried the next time around. And they will lose.”

Indeed! “The MAGA movement is going nowhere.” It’s been going nowhere for four years now. And the American people have soundly repudiated the dishonesty, division, hostility, and incompetence, that have been the hallmarks of MAGA madness in the Trump Era. So going forward the bowel “movement” created by Daddy Trump will descend to even deeper depths of irrelevancy. The political careers of those associated with it will fade into well-deserved obscurity. And the new Democratic majority in the Senate, made possible by the victories of two Democrats in the formerly deep red state of Georgia, is the first sign of the tectonic political shift that’s in progress.

What’s more, Eric’s determination to primary any Republican that he and his father deem insufficiently worshipful of Dear Leader is a political promise that Americans of every political stripe can support. The nation is more than ready for the GOP (Greedy One Percent) to be swept from power, and any help that the Trumps want to provide, however inadvertent, is welcome. Although, it’s hard to imagine that they could be more helpful than they have been to date via their repulsive policies and behaviors.

For his part, Donald Trump is fully on board with Eric’s strategy of political suicide. During his address to Wednesday’s MAGA rally, Trump said that “We have to get our people to fight. And if they don’t fight we have to primary the hell out of them.”

Unfortunately, Trump’s incitement to “fight” has been taken literally by his cult disciples, who are now storming the Capitol as members of Congress are gathered to certify the Electoral College vote. Ironically, they are disrupting their own Republican members who are objecting to the certification. And Trump’s seditious lawyer, Rudy Giuliani, joined the rush of traitors to whip up even more hostility in the crowd, saying “Let’s have trial by combat.”

The inflammatory rhetoric of Trump and his cronies, along with the unlawful breach of the Capitol, are further evidence of the treasonous intentions of Trump and his faithless brigades. They are battling with the police officers they have pretended to support. They are harassing the press (including Fox News). And they are employing violence in order to obstruct the business of the people and to advance their traitorous objectives.

This is not going to end well in the short term. But longer term it is going to cement the demise of the violent, unpatriotic, MAGA movement, just as Eric predicted. And Donald Trump must ultimately be held accountable as its leader and primary agitator.

NOTE: Twitter recently suspended the News Corpse account after 11 years without giving a reason. So if anyone wants to tweet articles from my website, please feel free to do so often and repeatedly. Thanks for your support.

How Fox News Deceives and Controls Their Flock:
Fox Nation vs. Reality: The Fox News Cult of Ignorance.
Available now at Amazon.

LISTEN: Trump Threatens Georgia Officials For Not Helping Him Subvert the Election

Posted by on January 3, 2021 at 2:02 pm. 8 Comments :

If anyone is still looking for a smoking gun to implicate Donald Trump in a criminal act, Trump himself just fired it. Shooting off his big mouth again, Trump openly pressured Georgia’s Secretary of State to alter the the election results in order to make Trump the victor. And it’s all been captured on tape.

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Donald Trump, Impeach

The Washington Post broke this story with the release of excerpts from an hour long phone call between Trump and Georgia’s Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger. Trump is heard explicitly pressuring Raffensperger and even threatening to charge him with criminal acts if he doesn’t comply with Trump’s flagrantly unlawful demands:

“You know what they did and you’re not reporting it. That’s a criminal offense. And you can’t let that happen. That’s a big risk to you and to Ryan [Germany], your lawyer. That’s a big risk.

“They are shredding ballots in my opinion, based on what I’ve heard. And they are removing machinery, and they’re moving it as fast as they can. Both of which are criminal finds. And you can’t let it happen, and you are letting it happen. You know, I’m notifying you that you’re letting it happen.”

So Trump was officially giving notice to these Georgia officials that he intends to hold them criminally liable for the fake offenses he is accusing them of. That notice was clearly meant to scare them into submission. And by his own admission, his demands to overturn the election were based entirely on “rumors” and “what I’ve heard.” He still has no actual evidence, which is why he already lost about 60 lawsuits alleging election fraud.

It’s a desperate act by a desperate man who knows that when he leaves the White House he will be the one liable for an array of criminal and civil violations of the law. It’s literally driving Trump crazy (or crazier) than he’s ever been. And it exposes him to even more legal peril than he was in prior to this bizarre incident.

But that’s not the only act of desperation by Trump this weekend. On Saturday he dispatched his loyal but incompetent trade advisor, Peter Navarro, to Fox News to assert a blatantly unconstitutional “right” to delay Joe Biden’s inauguration. And Fox’s “Judge” Jeanine Pirro happily embraced the ludicrous notion.

The Trump tape (full hour and transcript here) also contained a familiar tactic used by Trump to twist the arms of his victims. He told Raffensperger that “All I want to do is this. I just want to find 11,780 votes, which is one more than we have. Because we won the state.” That’s the preamble to his “quid pro quo” that culminated with the threats above.

That’s exactly the same thing he tried on President Zelensky of Ukraine, which got him impeached. And it isn’t too late to impeach him again. Even if he’s out of office when the impeachment is conducted, It’s useful to establish the illegality of his behavior and to prohibit him from holding office in the future. It is also necessary as an attempt to deter him from committing more crimes in the few weeks he is still president. Lord knows what he’s capable of at this point, and in this deranged state of mind.

NOTE: Twitter recently suspended the News Corpse account after 11 years without giving a reason. So if anyone wants to tweet articles from my website, please feel free to do so often and repeatedly. Thanks for your support.

How Fox News Deceives and Controls Their Flock:
Fox Nation vs. Reality: The Fox News Cult of Ignorance.
Available now at Amazon.

WTF? Trump Pardons Russia for Hacking U.S., Blames China

Posted by on December 19, 2020 at 9:34 am. 5 Comments :

After days of conspicuous silence, Donald Trump has finally addressed the report that Russia hacked into several U.S. government agencies including the Pentagon, the Treasury Department, and Homeland Security. It was a cyber attack that officials described as “significant and alarming.”

Be sure to visit and follow News Corpse on Instagram.

Donald Trump, Vladimir Putin

Trump’s appalling negligence and dereliction of duty is emblematic of his weakness as a “leader,” as well his servile relationship with Vladimir Putin. And as if to reinforce his dangerous deficiencies and suspect loyalties, Trump took to his Twitter machine to post this on Saturday morning…

Trump is, once again, contradicting his own administration to arrive at these ludicrous conclusions. Secretary of State, Mike Pompeo said that “This was a very significant effort, and I think it’s the case that now we can say pretty clearly that it was the Russians that engaged in this activity.”

What’s more, it wasn’t sufficient for Trump to absolve Russia of its obvious guilt. Nope, he was compelled to cast blame on China with absolutely zero evidence. And he also lashed out at the media for reporting the truth as supplied by his own intelligence agencies. And even found a way to connect this to his fantastical delusions that he won the election. But at least he got it right that this is all an “embarrassment for the USA,” although he fails to realize that he’s the reason.

It’s hard to elaborate on this blatant abdication of duty, patriotism, and trust. Trump has literally given up on pretending that he is the least bit interested in the welfare of America or it’s people. He has demonstrated that previously by presiding over an utterly incompetent management of the deadly coronavirus pandemic that has taken the lives of more than 320,000 Americans.

And now Trump is sucking up again to his BFF Putin who he has never once been able to criticize. Whether it was Russia’s interference in the 2016 election, or his placing bounties on the heads of American soldiers in Afghanistan, Trump has reliably come to Putin’s defense. So it leaves us with one pressing question: Whose side is Trump on?

NOTE: Twitter recently suspended the News Corpse account after 11 years without giving a reason. So if anyone wants to tweet articles from my website, please feel free to do so often and repeatedly. Thanks for your support.

How Fox News Deceives and Controls Their Flock:
Fox Nation vs. Reality: The Fox News Cult of Ignorance.
Available now at Amazon.

Trump is Aiding and Abetting Russian Propaganda to Smear the Biden Family

Posted by on October 19, 2020 at 1:17 pm. 5 Comments :

There is a new “scandal” brewing in Trump World as they desperately search for a way dig Donald Trump out of his political abyss. The recent rash of feigned outrage stems from an interview by Senior Fox News Trump-fluffer, Maria Bartiromo. She gifted her platform to the Director of National Intelligence, John Ratcliffe, a Trump appointee who has no experience in intelligence. And the the result was a made-for-State-TV segment intended to rescue a floundering campaign.

Donald Trump Vladimir Putin

The gist of the so-called scandal concerns a mysterious laptop computer that allegedly belonged to Hunter Biden, the son of Joe Biden. The New York Post reported that it was left with a computer repair shop in Delaware where the owner claims to have found “incriminating” e-mails that he passed on to Rudy Giuliani and the FBI.

The whole story was rife with contradictions, unverifiable claims, and outright falsehoods. It was so bad that when Giuliani first brought it to Fox News, they declined to air it with sources saying that…

“…the lack of authentication of Hunter Biden’s alleged laptop, combined with established concerns about Giuliani as a reliable source and his desire for unvetted publication, led the network’s news division to pass.”

Fox anchor Bret Baier called the story “sketchy,” and Chris Wallace said it was “suspicious.” Nevertheless, the primetime Ministers of Trump Propaganda (Sean Hannity, et al) were more than happy to jump feet first into the bogus hit piece.

During the Bartiromo interview, Ratcliffe sought to rebut the debunking that threatened to defuse the budding scandal. He insisted that there was no evidence that the information about the laptop, and the data supposedly found on it, were the product of Russian disinformation. He blamed the allegation of Russian involvement on Rep. Adam Schiff, but in fact, it came from the FBI that is currently run by Trump appointee Chris Wray:

“Federal authorities are investigating whether a Russian influence operation was behind the disclosure of emails purporting to document the Ukrainian and Chinese business dealings of Hunter Biden, the son of Democratic nominee Joe Biden, a person briefed on the matter said Friday.

“The FBI’s examination is tied to the New York Post’s reporting this week on the contents of a computer hard drive it obtained from President Donald Trump’s personal lawyer, Rudy Giuliani.”

What’s more, the associates who Giuliani relied on for his smear campaign have been positively identified as Russian intelligence operatives by Trump’s Treasury Department:

“Treasury secretary, Steve Mnuchin, declared, ‘[Andriy ] Derkach and other Russian agents employ manipulation and deceit to attempt to influence elections in the United States and elsewhere around the world.’ Previously, the Office of the Director of National Intelligence told Congress that Derkach is ‘spreading claims about corruption’ as part of the Kremlin’s effort to undermine Biden’s campaign. And he worked with Guliani to do so.”

The New York Post’s story has been the talk of the Trump Cult. Trump himself has tweeted about it repeatedly since its publication. He called it the “smoking gun” proof that Biden is “a corrupt politician,” and that it’s “the second biggest political scandal in our history!” But the actual reporters were less convinced by the material they had assembled themselves. They wouldn’t even allow the Post to attach their names to the story:

“On Sunday night, the New York Times reported that the New York Post had a difficult time finding a reporter to put their byline on the story amidst internal concerns about its dubious sourcing. The Times reported that the staff writer who mostly wrote the story, Bruce Golding, refused put his name on the report because he doubted its credibility.” […]

“The story’s bylines eventually went to Emma-Jo Morris, a former associate producer on Fox News show Hannity, who joined the Post as an editor this year and had yet to publish a story with her byline, and Gabrielle Fonrouge, a Post reporter since 2014. According to the Times, Fonrouge only learned her name was on the story after it was published.”

So this story is so untrustworthy that its own authors don’t believe it. It is filled with contradictions and implausible allegations that were sourced to Russian intelligence operatives. And this is what Trump and Fox News and the rest of the Confederacy of Deplorables thinks will bring about the end of Joe Biden. But it isn’t quite working out that way. In fact, they’re about to learn something about how the boomerang effect works.

How Fox News Deceives and Controls Their Flock:
Fox Nation vs. Reality: The Fox News Cult of Ignorance.
Available now at Amazon.

Fox News Boss Rupert Murdoch Predicts Biden Will Beat Trump in a Landslide

Posted by on October 15, 2020 at 12:55 pm. 5 Comments :

In the closing weeks of the 2020 presidential election, the bad news for Donald Trump just keeps piling up. Every new poll that is published shows him falling farther behind Joe Biden, including those that are devotedly biased toward Trump. He’s losing in most of the critical battleground states. His crazed rhetoric keeps descending into an abyss of dementia. He’s even threatening to go to war against aliens (from Mars, not Mexico).

Rupert Murdoch Donald Trump

Now the chairman of Fox News, Rupert Murdoch, is predicting that Trump is going to lose to Biden in a landslide. This is an election year defection that should rattle the rafters of Trump’s campaign operation. Murdoch has been a reliable supporter of Trump for years (even if that support has been reciprocated). And his cable network is Trump’s de facto Ministry of Propaganda. According to the Daily Beast (via Talking Points Memo)…

“Media magnate Rupert Murdoch has predicted privately that Democratic nominee Joe Biden will defeat President Donald Trump in the presidential election in a landslide victory, the Daily Beast reported Thursday.

“The Australian-born billionaire who has been an influential supporter of the President in the past has remarked to close associates that Trump is his own worst enemy, according to the Daily Beast. Murdoch suggested to at least three Daily Beast sources that Trump has handled the COVID-19 pandemic poorly and ignored advice on how to better manage it, which has created a never-ending crisis for his administration.”

The suggestion that Trump has “handled the COVID-19 pandemic poorly” is a gross understatement. The deaths of more than 216,000 Americans, along with 7.5 million infected, many of whom will have permanent disabilities, is better described as mass murder. And it is Trump’s negligence, incompetence, and even deliberate malfeasance, that is directly responsible. And Trump’s newly adopted position on “herd immunity” would guarantee more than two million fatalities according to epidemiology experts.

Murdoch’s opinion on the likely outcome of the presidential race does not immunize him from criticism for his years of disseminating lies aimed at Democrats. He is not endorsing Biden. He is merely expressing his analysis of the direction of the campaign. But the harm that Fox News has done to the nation under his direction is immeasurable.

That’s especially true with regard to the coronavirus pandemic that Murdoch is suddenly so worried about. Fox News has been relentlessly supporting and advancing Trump’s tragically misguided view that COVID-19 is nothing to be concerned about. They say that it’s no worse than the flu and will disappear like magic (never mind that thousands are still dying every week). And they continue to air, and positively comment on, Trump’s Coronavirus Super Spreader Rallies wherein he recklessly repeats these lies that will undoubtedly bring more suffering and grieving.

What’s more, instead of reporting on the health crisis, Fox News is deflecting to ludicrous conspiracy theories about Biden and his family. Most recently they are obsessing over a baseless story in Murdoch’s New York Post that purportedly connects Biden to some sort of chicanery in Ukraine. Let’s set aside for the moment the fact that the story has no evidence of any wrongdoing, or even that what they allege is unlawful. The Post’s story has been documented to be aligned with Russian propaganda aimed at disrupting the U.S. election. So Murdoch, Fox News, and Trump (who has been tweeting about this and raising it during his cult rallies) are now actively abetting Russia’s efforts to interfere with our election. As reported by David Corn in Mother Jones:

“The key point of the article was predicated on false information that [Rudy] Giuliani has been spreading for a long time—and that appears to be linked to a Russian disinformation operation that the Post neglected to note in its article. That is, the Post piece, based on an unproven smear, is in sync with Moscow’s ongoing effort to influence the 2020 election to help President Donald Trump retain power.”

Corn poignantly notes that “The New York Post has provided all reporters a wonderful tutorial on how to be a useful idiot for Russia.” And the same goes for Fox News since they are plastering this story all over their air. Which makes Murdoch’s lament about Trump’s floundering reelection campaign utterly meaningless. It doesn’t immunize him from the guilt of having helped Trump to spread lies along with a deadly virus. He is as responsible for the tragic consequences as Trump, because he’s been right by his side as Trump led America down a deadly path. And if Trump does lose in a landslide, Murdoch can take at least half the credit for it. As well as the blame for all the harm that Trump’s has caused in the past four years.

How Fox News Deceives and Controls Their Flock:
Fox Nation vs. Reality: The Fox News Cult of Ignorance.
Available now at Amazon.

Trump is Inciting His Deplorables to Commit Violence Against Journalists

Posted by on September 20, 2020 at 12:55 pm. 2 Comments :

No president in America’s history has been more hostile to the press than Donald Trump. He repeatedly refers to them in Stalinist terms as the “the enemy of the people.” That openly aggressive posturing is an unambiguous assault on the constitution’s First Amendment. And Trump’s vicious rhetoric has been cited as endangering the work – and lives – of journalists, not just in the United States, but around the world.

Trump Charlotsville

On Saturday Trump took another leap crossing over the line of decency and free speech during his latest Coronavirus Super Spreader event in Minnesota. Reading from his teleprompter, Trump told a story about a reporter covering Black Lives Matter protests in the state several weeks ago:

“I remember this guy Welshi. He got hit on the knee with a canister of tear gas and he went down. He was down. […] After we take all that crap – for weeks and weeks they would take that crap – and then you finally see men get up there and go right through… Wasn’t it really a beautiful sight? It’s called law and order.”

Like virtually every story that Trump tells, almost none of this one was truthful. To begin with, the reporter’s name was Ali Velshi, not Welshi. Perhaps Trump was using the Russian pronunciation. Secondly, Velshi was hit by a rubber bullet, not a tear gas canister. But those are relatively trivial misstatements by Trump who is rarely able to express himself coherently (which has not gone unnoticed by the American people).

More troubling was Trump’s celebration of this assault on a journalist by government goons as “a beautiful sight.” How any American “leader” can describe such an attack in those favorable terms is unthinkable. Trump is affirming his long held reputation as a fascist wannabe who aligns himself with the noxious philosophies of the authoritarian dictators he so admires (i.e. Vladimir Putin, Kim Jong Un, Xi Jinping, etc.). These are people who brazenly violate press freedoms and even torture and murder critical journalists. And Trump is moving more in that direction every day.

Trump elaborated on his praise for federal agents physically assaulting reporters in another speech later in the day in North Carolina. In that tirade Trump got Velshi’s network wrong, saying he was with CNN, rather than MSNBC. He also lied that Velshi was reporting from a “war zone” when the truth was that he was covering a peaceful demonstration. Well, except for the feds. The video of Velshi’s reporting proves that.

Velshi himself addressed Trump’s remarks about the incident when he was shot, and asks a relevant question that Trump will surely fail to answer:

Make no mistake, this was not an off the cuff commentary by a rambling lunatic. Yes, Trump is a rambling lunatic, but this wasn’t off the cuff. He was reading from a teleprompter. And he was deliberately sending a message to his glassy-eyed disciples that assaulting journalists is something that will earn his appreciation. Trump is overtly soliciting his cult followers to commit what can only be described as terrorism. And he is promising to reward them with compliments and praise for what a “beautiful” thing they’ve done.

These remarks by Trump pretty much guarantee that more reporters will be attacked just for doing their jobs. The assailants will feel justified because the president has given his approval in advance. And if there is any justice in this world, Trump will be charged criminally and civilly for any harm that comes to journalists due to his reckless ranting.

How Fox News Deceives and Controls Their Flock:
Fox Nation vs. Reality: The Fox News Cult of Ignorance.
Available now at Amazon.

RAGE: Bob Woodward Book Reveals that Trump Deliberately Lied About the Coronavirus

Posted by on September 9, 2020 at 11:46 am. 3 Comments :

For months after the coronavirus was known to spreading throughout the United States, Donald Trump was pretending that it wasn’t anything to be concerned about. He claimed it was no more dangerous than the common flu. He insisted that that he had it under control. Now, after more than 190,000 Americans have died, we have some evidence of just how dishonest Trump was with the American people.

Donald Trump, Coronavirus

A new book is being released next week. And RAGE, by Bob Woodward is already creating a tsunami that pulls the veil from Trump’s lies. Excerpts are beginning to be reported by the media. And they are nothing less than shocking. For instance, as reported by Robert Costa of the Washington Post…

“‘This will be the biggest national security threat you face in your presidency,’ national security adviser Robert O’Brien told Trump, according to a new book by Washington Post associate editor Bob Woodward. ‘This is going to be the roughest thing you face.'”

“Ten days later, Trump called Woodward and revealed that he thought the situation was far more dire than what he had been saying publicly. ‘You just breathe the air and that’s how it’s passed,’ Trump said in a Feb. 7 call. ‘And so that’s a very tricky one. That’s a very delicate one. It’s also more deadly than even your strenuous flu.'”

“At that time, Trump was telling the nation that the virus was no worse than a seasonal flu, predicting it would soon disappear, and insisting that the U.S. government had it totally under control.”

“Trump admitted to Woodward on March 19 that he deliberately minimized the danger. ‘I wanted to always play it down,’ the president said.”

“Fauci at one point tells others that the president ‘is on a separate channel’ and unfocused in meetings, with ‘rudderless’ leadership, according to Woodward. ‘His attention span is like a minus number,’ Fauci said, according to Woodward. ‘His sole purpose is to get reelected.'”

Most of this has been known to those who have been paying attention for the past six months. It was easy to conclude from Trump’s behavior and public comments that he was lying to advance his political interests. But for the first time we have Trump himself confessing to this outrageous and deadly dishonesty. And to make matters worse, there are tapes (see below).

This is an abhorrent betrayal of the American people by a president who clearly couldn’t care less about who gets hurt. And he’s still doing it. He’s still playing it down with demands that schools reopen, that professional sports and other large public events resume, and that the country returns to a pre-virus lifestyle before it is safe to do so. And it’s still “his sole purpose…to get reelected.” Anyone still not convinced that Trump is a narcissistic sociopath is just a devoted cult follower who wants to be be deceived.

How Fox News Deceives and Controls Their Flock:
Fox Nation vs. Reality: The Fox News Cult of Ignorance.
Available now at Amazon.

WTF? Bill Barr Told Rupert Murdoch to ‘Muzzle’ a Fox News Trump Critic

Posted by on August 22, 2020 at 2:48 pm. 4 Comments :

The creeping fascism of the Donald Trump regime continues to unfurl as the criminal accomplices in his cabinet carry out his nefarious agenda. Chief among them is Attorney Genuflect, Bill Barr, who doesn’t even bother anymore to disguise his desecration of the Justice Department into a pseudo-legal cabal that works solely as Trump’s personal defense team.

Donald Trump, Bill Barr

A new book by CNN’s media correspondent, Brian Stelter, is set to be released next week, and excerpts are starting to make the rounds. “Hoax: Donald Trump, Fox News, and the Dangerous Distortion of Truth“, has already created quite a stir with revelations about how insiders at Fox News privately admit that they think Trump is “crazy,” even while they exalt him worshipfully on the air.

The toxic, codependent relationship between Trump and Fox News has been the source of incalculable damage to American media and democracy. It is an unprecedented political/press partnership that benefits both. Fox News gets an audience with cult-like devotion that they can brainwash with blatant scare tactics and the darkly unifying force of racism. While Trump gets an aggressive assault team to attack his critics and political opponents, and a constant defense for his unending stream of unsavory conduct and outright crimes. It’s a marriage whose foundation rests on lies and ignorance.

Another excerpt from the book was just published by The Guardian. This one describes a meeting that took place last October between Barr and Fox News Overlord, Rupert Murdoch. News Corpse speculated at the time that the meeting resulted in the resignation of Fox host Shepard Smith, which was announced the next day. But Stelter’s book reports that there was another topic of discussion on their agenda:

“The attorney general, William Barr, told Rupert Murdoch to ‘muzzle’ Andrew Napolitano, a prominent Fox News personality who became a critic of Donald Trump, according to a new book about the rightwing TV network. […] Trump ‘was so incensed by the judge’s TV broadcasts that he had implored Barr to send Rupert a message in person … about ‘muzzling the judge’. [Trump] wanted the nation’s top law enforcement official to convey just how atrocious Napolitano’s legal analysis had been.'”

Just to be clear, intimidating and manipulating the media is not a part of the Attorney General’s job. In fact, it isn’t a part of any government official’s job. It is a totalitarian tactic to control speech and clampdown on the free press. And this sort of suppression of the constitutional rights of journalists is part and parcel of the Trump Doctrine that has designated the media in Stalinist terms as “the enemy of the people.”

Napolitano, the Senior Legal Analyst at Fox News, has been known to criticize Trump. And for that heresy he was entirely excluded from Fox’s coverage of Trump’s impeachment. A few notable examples of his well-reasoned critiques include…

Napolitano has a right to his opinions, and quite often he agrees with Trump. But none of that is relevant here. It was grossly inappropriate for Trump to seek to censor a legal news commentator. And it only makes matters worse that Trump recruited his attorney general to deliver that message. And Barr, of course, should never have agreed to take the assignment. It’s not only improper, and a violation of the Constitution, it has absolutely nothing to with his duties at the Department of Justice.

It is, however, consistent with Trump’s flagrant disrespect for the law, his relentless abuse of power, and his frighteningly obvious tyrannical aspirations. And it’s further proof that neither Trump nor Barr are fit to serve in any position of government authority. They have both proven that they are utterly untrustworthy and the sooner they are deposed, the better for America.

How Fox News Deceives and Controls Their Flock:
Fox Nation vs. Reality: The Fox News Cult of Ignorance.
Available now at Amazon.

Joe Biden Brilliantly Nails Trump’s Descent Into Corruption and Tyranny

Posted by on May 16, 2020 at 11:24 am. 14 Comments :

From day one of his accidental presidency, Donald Trump has exhibited clear signs of his aspirations to emulate the brutal dictators that he so admires (Xi Jinping, Kim Jong Un, Vladimir Putin). His reverence for the trappings of totalitarianism has been thinly disguised as he openly exchanged love letters with his autocratic heroes and behaved in a manner that mimicked their oppressive methods of governing.

Donald Trump, Joe Biden

On Friday evening Trump committed yet another act of obvious abuse of power. Hoping to avoid media scrutiny, he quietly sent a letter to Congress indicating his intention to fire Steve Linick, the State Department’s Inspector General. Linick just happened to been investigating misconduct by Trump’s Secretary of State, Mike Pompeo.

The Inspector General’s position is supposed to be an independent watchdog post to protect the integrity of government agencies. That’s why Trump could not fire Linick outright, but had to give Congress a 30 day notice. Unfortunately, due to Senate majority leader Mitch McConnell’s blind obedience to Trump, it is still likely that nothing will be done about this, at least from McConnell’s perch.

This negligence on the part of Republicans in Congress is all the worse considering that this isn’t the first time that Trump has fired an IG who was investigating his administration. Nor is it the second time. Or the the third. Linick’s dismissal follows that of Inspectors General Christi Grimm (Health and Human Services), Glenn Fine (Defense Department), and Michael Atkinson (Intelligence Community). Each of these people were non-partisan career professionals who served administrations of both parties. Each of them were probing misconduct in the Trump administration. And all of this took place within a six week period.

Trump has been executing a slow-motion version of a Saturday Night Massacre, wherein he’s terminating honorable public servants who were doing their jobs on behalf of the American people. His brazen lawlessness seems to be growing unchecked ever since the Senate failed in their duty to remove him from office after his impeachment.

Trump is becoming ever more desperate in recent days as the coronavirus death toll for Americans approaches 90,000. Which is another even more tragic consequence of the GOP’s acquiescence to Dear Leader. Lately Trump has been fixated on a thoroughly imaginary “scandal” that he has been calling “ObamaGate.” There is no rational explanation for what he’s alleging, and given the opportunity, even he couldn’t define it. But he has been tweeting up a storm with links to rabid Obama haters making bizarre and unsupported accusations.

On Saturday morning Trump embarked on a raging Twitter-palooza that included one tweet saying that “Scandal has defined the Obama Administration.” Which is peculiar considering there is not even a hint of any untoward activity by President Obama over the eight years of his presidency. However, there is nothing but scandal and corruption engulfing Trump and his confederacy of criminals, many of whom have already been indicted and convicted.

So Trump’s current obsessive acting out against IGs is just his way of trying to put a lid on the discovery of his raging malfeasance in office. He is writhing in fear of losing in November and being held accountable for his presidential crime spree. He knows that his approval ratings are plummeting and most polls show Joe Biden beating him nationally, as well as in many of the crucial swing states. So it is especially sweet to see Biden excoriating Trump in a succinct yet effective tweet of his own:

Indeed. While there are many former Trump staffers who have left his employ under a cloud, the only person Trump ever fired for wrongdoing was his disgraced National Security Advisor, Michael Flynn, who got the ax for lying to both the administration and the FBI. But now Trump is praising Flynn after having had his Attorney General, Bill Barr, drop all charges against him. Never mind that Flynn had confessed and pleaded guilty twice.

Trump keeps demonstrating that he will cozy up to those who swear their unflinching allegiance to his White House mob family. Loyalty to him always takes precedence over loyalty to the United States or its Constitution. And he will continue to poison the waters of justice in order to avoid being held accountable for his innumerable crimes. You have to wonder if there is any breach of law or ethics that will provoke Republicans to act with integrity and dignity and patriotism. but don’t hold your breath.

How Fox News Deceives and Controls Their Flock:
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