Media Bias

Fox News’ Maria Bartiromo is Angling for Trump-Fluffer of the Year Award

Posted by on May 14, 2020 at 11:59 am. 9 Comments :

Donald Trump’s fear of being interviewed by anyone but Fox News is still driving his media schedule. On Thursday he got another tongue bath by Fox’s Maria Bartiromo, who has become one of the network’s most glassy-eyed disciples of the Trump Cult. Her questions were such sycophantic pablum that they would have embarrassed a North Korean State TV shill.

Fox News, Donald Trump, Maria Bartiromo

The entire interview was nothing but pure propaganda, as Bartiromo failed to challenge Trump on any issue, and her follow-ups mostly consisted of obediently nodding her head in agreement. But perhaps the most preposterous and troubling exchange occurred as she was wrapping up the interview and slipped into her best impersonation of a butt-kissing supplicant (video below):

Bartiromo: This is toward the end of your first term as president and this entire term has been dominated by resistance. You’ve gotten so much done: Tax legislation, international things, so much done. And yet the FBI take-down effort, pushback on all of your Supreme Judges, a complete drama around Brett Kavanaugh, the Democrats in Congress attacking your call with the Ukraine leader, then an impeachment trial.
Trump: Over nothing. Over absolutely nothing.
Bartiromo: And you keep…I’ve never seen anybody that can take a punch and get right back up and keep punching. Where does this resilience come from that you keep getting things done in the face of all of this?

Bartiromo makes groupies look respectable. She led off with a stream of unbridled praise for Trump’s alleged achievements, but could only list one, his tax cuts for the rich. Then she rattled off what she regarded as Trump’s obstacles, beginning with the inane conspiracy theory that Trump is calling “Obamagate.” Trump told Bartiromo that it was “the biggest political scandal of all time.” And Bartiromo giddily agreed. But when she asked Trump to explain what it is, he wandered off into an incoherent and unrelated rant about Peter Strzok and Lisa Page, never returning to actually answer the question. And Bartiromo failed to press him on it.

Following that, Bartiromo complained on Trump’s behalf about “pushback” he received on his Supreme Court nominations, as if that never happened to any other president. She didn’t bother to mention how Mitch McConnell single-handedly denied President Obama’s nominee, Merrick Garland, even the courtesy of a hearing. That was followed by Bartiromo’s insipid references to Trump’s impeachment, characterizing it as an annoyance and not the historic event that only two other presidents have been subject to.

Finally, Bartiromo mustered up all her courage, batted her eyes, and confessed her adoration for Dear Leader’s divine strength and endurance in the face of an onslaught of evil. In her eyes he is just so powerful and dreamy. She could hardly get all of her tributes out due to the drool flowing from her quivering, orange-stained lips.

And that was just from the last couple of minutes of the interview. The rest of this fawning romance video was equally as crammed with adulation and hero-worship. On Trump’s part, he predictably peppered the hour with his trademark bullying, boasting, and bullshit. For instance…

  • Trump lied about coronavirus fatality estimates, saying that 100,000 (which is up from his previous estimate of 60,000) should be regarded as a victory because it wasn’t 2,000,000.
  • Trump threatened to prosecute and jail President Obama and Joe Biden for crimes that he couldn’t name.
  • Trump tried to rewrite history by claiming that Putin wanted Hillary to win in 2016, even though Putin himself – and all of the U.S. intelligence community – said that Putin wanted Trump to win and helped him to do so.
  • Trump Lied about having built “new” wall along the southern border, which Bartiromo agreed with, despite the fact that not a single mile of new wall has been built.
  • Trump repeated his oft told lie that the U.S. was “taking in billions of dollars” in tariffs from China.

Trump closed by making a bizarre and callously insensitive comment about what he considered to be the positive side of a deadly pandemic. “The one thing about the Plague,” Trump bragged, “is that it said Trump was right.” WTHF is wrong with this so-called man? He is utterly devoid of any human-like attributes of sympathy. He is like the creature from Alien that is wholly focused on his own survival and will destroy anything that gets in his way. Except the movie is far more entertaining than watching Trump on Fox News. If you have the stomach for it, here’s the full tongue bathing …er… interview on Fox.

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

https://twitter.com/MollyJongFast/status/1260933694790922242

PITY PARTY? Trump Clown Show Mocks Americans Suffering in Coronavirus Depression

Posted by on May 11, 2020 at 1:17 pm. 3 Comments :

As if it weren’t enough that Donald Trump neglected to act for two months as COVID-19 (coronavirus) spread throughout the nation – or that he trivialized it’s impact as being “totally under control” and that cases were “going down to zero” very soon, or that he blamed Democrats, China, and anyone but himself for the tragedies resulting from his incompetence – it’s agonizing to watch him continue to put the lives of more Americans at risk because his ego won’t permit him to take responsibility and act responsibly. Even worse, he actually brags about his flagrant failures.

Donald Trump, Pennywise

Trump’s rush to send Americans back into a still dangerous workplace has the stench of hypocrisy. He can’t even keep the coronavirus out of the White House with daily testing, but he expects average folks to become the “warriors” in his battle to save corporations and the stock market. And they won’t have the testing, protective gear, or medical care that he and his comrades have.

In this environment of blatant privilege for the wealthy and the politically connected elite, Trump has proven that he just doesn’t care about the hardships of others. So he sent Peter Navarro, his advisor on trade and manufacturing, out to mingle with the Trump-fluffers at Fox News. Navarro’s visit with the “Curvy Couch” potatoes of Fox and Friends (video below) was jam-packed with the sort of happy-talk propaganda that totalitarian regimes are so fond of.

Navarro lead off with a callous characterization of the hard times that most Americans are struggling to cope with. He referred to the criticism of Trump’s dreadful mishandling of the deadly coronavirus pandemic with this tone-deaf phrasing: “That was a pity party yesterday on the Sunday shows.” Of course. Because what’s a more self-indulgent demonstration of whiners feeling sorry for themselves than a population ravaged by a fatal and infectious virus? Particularly one that has resulted in the deaths of more than 80,000 people, many of which were preventable had there been competent leadership. Navarro elaborated saying that…

“This is not the Great Depression. Anybody that thinks this is the Great Depression doesn’t understand either history or economics. […] Here’s what we have here. We have President Donald J. Trump who built up the strongest and most beautiful economy in three and half years. And then the Chinese communist party dropped a virus on the world that, within sixty days, has temporarily shut us down. And all we need to do here is focus on the mission, the original mission of Donald J. Trump […]

Now it’s gonna be a long process because of the structural adjustments that are gonna take place as we adapt to the virus socially, culturally, and economically. But this Great Depression pity party stuff I saw yesterday, this aint that..”

For an economic advisor, Navarro sure sounds a lot like a PR shill. He begins by failing to grasp that the economic decline, the collapse of markets in equities and bonds, and the 20+ million Americans who are now unemployed, actually fit the definition of a depression with painful precision. And he dresses up his fan fiction in tributes to Dear Leader Trump, who he believes has that divine gift of being able to do no wrong. Naturally, he adopts his master’s habit of shoveling any and all blame unto others, in this case China. And while China shares it’s measure of blame, it was Trump who praised President Xi saying that “I think he’s handled it really well,” and that his management of the budding pandemic was “strong, sharp and powerfully focused.” Trump effusively complimented Xi well into February.

Now, suddenly, it’s all China’s fault, Trump’s lazy and lethal disregard is being ignored, and the White House rhetoric is simultaneously insisting that our tribulations are both temporary and “a long process.” The confusion emanating from the Trump administration is indicative of their utter lack of any idea of what to do. They are paralyzed by ignorance and their desperation to avoid any political fallout, especially with regard to the presidential election in November, which currently has Joe Biden beating Trump nationally, as well as in many of the crucial swing states.

Nevertheless, Navarro thought it would be a good idea to go on Fox News and demean Trump’s critics – which includes the majority of American voters – as a pity party. It’s a pity that these cretins don’t have more sympathy for the sick and the scared and the families of the deceased. But then heartless narcissism has been the Trump brand from the very beginning of his occupation of the white House. And there’s no reason to expect that to change.

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

HUH? Fox News Implies Barr’s Absolution of Flynn Invalidates the 2018 Election

Posted by on May 7, 2020 at 2:26 pm. 2 Comments :

The criminal administration of Donald Trump is frantically trying to slip through as many political atrocities as it can before it is swept out office next year. And they aren’t shy about hiding behind the tragedies of the COVID-19 (coronavirus) pandemic in order to achieve their nefarious goals. In fact, it almost seems like they are deliberately making things worse by prematurely “reopening” the country economically in order to better cloak their activities.

Donald Trump, Bill Barr

On Thursday Trump’s Justice Department led by Attorney General, Bill Barr, announced that they were asking a federal judge to drop the charges against Michael Flynn, Trump’s disgraced former National Security Advisor. Flynn had pleaded guilty to an array of charges including lying to the FBI. He also promised to cooperate with federal prosecutors until he abruptly reneged and hired a new team of lawyers. The charges against him were pretty airtight, which is why he originally admitted his guilt. But more recently he concluded that by hanging tough he would be able to secure a presidential pardon or a dismissal, which is what has now occurred.

Flynn was the poster boy for the corruption that infects every cell of the Trump regime’s body. He had unsavory relations with the governments of Russia and Turkey. He was considered dirty even before Trump was inaugurated. President Obama fired him and warned Trump to steer clear. Naturally, that probably had the effect of endearing Flynn to Trump. Birds of a feather, and all that. Just last week Trump unleashed a tweetstorm of 27 tweets supporting Flynn.

The news that Barr was dropping the charges broke pretty quickly as every news network interrupted their programming with special coverage. However, the coverage on Fox News stood out for its predictably biased slant, including bizarre opinions by their “straight” news anchors, Bill Hemmer and Bret Baier. They joined to imply that Barr’s dismissal of Flynn’s charges somehow reflected on the validity of the 2018 election (video below):

Hemmer: It begs the question, what was Bob Mueller doing all this time? And were they out there looking for something that never existed? Were they trying to find a crime were they could not find one?
Baier: We’re in the middle of dealing with COVID and all of the health crisis and the economic crisis, but if you look back and you realize when Bob Mueller and his team knew that there was nothing there there, it was before the midterm election. And that raises its own questions about where that investigation went and how it proceeded.

WTF? If these guys don’t know what Mueller was doing at this point, they are either too stupid to be allowed to function outside of an asylum, or they are brazenly lying in support of their extreme right-wing agenda. Hemmer’s “questions” as to whether a crime occurred is deliberate disinformation. Mueller’s report explicitly stated that he was not able to exonerate Trump. It also enumerated several instances of felony perjury. Plus, there were several indictments and convictions in addition to Flynn’s guilty plea. All of this has been on the record for years now.

As for Baier, his preposterous speculations expose him as a bitterly partisan political hack. He asserts that Mueller at some point “knew that there was nothing there there.” That’s a flagrant lie. When Mueller testified before Congress he said that “Trump and his campaign welcomed and encouraged Russian interference,” and that they “lied about it to cover it up.” Does that sound like he knew there was no there there?

What’s more, the contention that Flynn being let off the hook now has some bearing on the 2018 election cannot be squared with reality. First of all, how can a decision to allow an admitted felon to go free by a dishonest and devotedly loyal Trump Attorney General have any such effect? Barr’s decision doesn’t make Flynn innocent and it doesn’t alter the voters’ choices to sweep corrupt Republicans out of office. Flynn’s get-out-of-jail-free card only serves as a further indictment of the corruption in Trump’s criminal syndicate. If anything, it validates what voters did in 2018.

More importantly, Barr’s Trumpist puppetry will likely spark a new level of outrage among the majority of Americans who already want Trump, and his GOP confederates, gone in November. If they think that coddling traitors is going to translate into Republican votes, they are dumber than Trump looks. Flynn’s freedom will remind every American voter that Republicans are on the side of those who betray our country. The likelihood of a Democratic tsunami at the polls in November became greater today.

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

Hannity Freaks Out Over Holding Trump Accountable for His Coronavirus Death Toll

Posted by on May 2, 2020 at 1:11 pm. 3 Comments :

Donald Trump is without question the most reckless, ignorant, and incompetent president in America’s short history. Nevertheless, he is renowned for failing to take responsibility for any of his calamitous failures. Trump will vainly shift blame to others, employ awkward deflections, and lie shamelessly to avoid being held accountable. With Trump, the buck is always handed off to an innocent political foe or some hapless flunky.

Donald Trump Sean Hannity

Fortunately for Trump, he has a cadre of glassy-eyed disciples in right-wing media who will cover for him no matter how ludicrous the circumstances. Most of them reside at State TV (aka Fox News), such as his shadow chief-of-staff-infection, Sean Hannity. Trump relies on Hannity as a defensive shield against uncomfortable facts, propaganda dissemination, and contorted political strategy. And on Saturday Hannity fulfilled all three of those roles in a brief blog post.

The headline on Hannity’s harrangue was “A NEW LOW: Schiff Says ’50,000 Americans Are Dead’ Because Trump Wasn’t Impeached and Removed.” He lashed out at Rep. Adam Schiff for what he said were “Schiff’s vicious comments.” Elaborating, Hannity charged that…

“Congressman Adam Schiff escalated his war-of-words with the Trump administration Saturday; saying “50,000 Americans are dead” because the President was not impeached and removed from the Oval Office.”

What Hannity was referencing was a portion of a Schiff interview on Friday with Chris Hayes on MSNBC (video below). Schiff accurately observed about Trump that “A man with no moral compass will never find his way, and this president certainly hasn’t.” The subject of the segment was Trump’s tragically negligent response to the COVID-19 (coronavirus) pandemic. Hayes asked Schiff about comments he made at the conclusion of Trump’s impeachment that speculated about the grave necessity of removing Trump from office to avert future catastrophes. Schiff’s response speculated about the degree of damage Trump would still be capable of if he remained:

“How much damage could he really do? We posed that question to the Senate and we answered it by saying that he could do an awful lot of damage. But frankly, Chris, I don’t think we had any idea how much damage he would go on to do in the months ahead.

There are 50,000 Americans now who are dead in significant part because of his incompetence. Because of his inability to think beyond himself and put the country first. I don’t think we would have ever anticipated that his brand of narcissism and his brand of incompetence, sometimes his brand of malevolence, would be so fatal to the American people.

To be clear, Hannity’s assertion that Schiff said 50,000 Americans are dead because Trump wasn’t removed from office is inaccurate. What Schiff is that the deaths were because of Trump’s incompetence. Of course, those deaths would not have occurred had he been removed, but neither would they have occurred had he not been incompetent. What’s more, the severity of the coronavirus casualties is being under reported. The death toll is now over 65,000 with more than 1,100,000 infected.

A month ago Trump said that he would consider a total of 65,000 deaths to be a “victory.” That was an estimate for August that we reached in April. A few days ago his son-in-law (and senior advisor), Jared Kushner, called it “a great success story.” But yesterday Trump was busy tearing down and reconstructing the goal posts at 100,000 fatalities. Expect those posts to be pushed back further in a few weeks.

As for Hannity, his concern about not holding Trump accountable for the death toll isn’t surprising. But he is also failing to hold himself accountable. He spent the past couple of months dismissing the coronavirus as an insignificant form of the flu. As a result, a recent study revealed that watching Hannity actually increased one’s likelihood of dying from the disease. So it would be wise to practice social distancing from Hannity as well as all other Fox News viewers and Trump supporters. You can’t be too careful these days.

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

Jared Kushner Tells Fox News that 60,000 Dead ‘Is a Great Success Story’

Posted by on April 29, 2020 at 1:34 pm. 6 Comments :

History will record the total absence of “leadership” provided by Donald Trump and his regime as a catastrophic failure. It is unimaginable how thoroughly negligent Trump has been as a deadly pandemic spread across the nation and the world.

Donald Trump, Jared Kushner

Trump’s first inclination was to ignore the coronavirus entirely. He failed to take heed of at least a dozen warnings in his Daily Presidential Briefings. Then he cavalierly dismissed the threat as trivial, saying that it was “totally under control,” that it would “disappear…like a miracle,” and that “you have 15 people, and the 15 within a couple of days is going to be down to close to zero.” It is now more than a million. And through it all he refused to take any responsibility for his negligence and incompetence as he wasted crucial months shifting blame to others.

At the same time, Trump hijacked the White House Coronavirus Task Force briefings to cast himself as the star of what became an egocentric reality TV show that functioned more as a Trump 2020 reelection campaign infomercial. Instead of focusing on public education, he disseminated lies, insulted reporters, and bragged about the ratings. It got to the point that even his political allies were grimacing at his bizarre behavior. So he announced that he would cease to attend the briefings. That didn’t last but a couple of days.

Which brings us to Wednesday morning when Trump’s son-in-law, Jared Kushner, made an appearance on Fox News for his regular propaganda and happy-talk segment (video below). And he didn’t disappoint his hosts, the “Curvy Couch” potatoes of Fox and Friends. He kept his remarks socially distant from reality by faithfully adhering to pre-established talking points such as his disparagement of health experts as “the eternal lockdown crowd.” Then he elaborated…

“We’re on the other side of the medical aspect of this, and I think that we’ve achieved all the different milestones that are needed. So the federal government rose to the challenge, and this is a great success story.”

Literally every line of that is flagrantly untrue. We are certainly not “on the other side of the medical aspect of this.” To the contrary, the number of infections and fatalities continue to rise. We have not “achieved all the different milestones.” Unless Kushner regards 60,000 deaths an administration milestone. What’s more, we are not even close to the number of Americans tested that experts say are necessary to “flatten the curve.”

Kushner’s assertion that “the federal government rose to the challenge” is not only false considering its tragically poor performance, it contradicts what Trump says is the federal government’s role. Trump has repeatedly insisted that the states have primary responsibility and the feds are are just a backup of last resort.

Finally, Kushner closed by calling the Trump administration’s handling of this crisis “a great success story.” That’s an assessment so preposterous it hardly deserves a response. With tens of thousands of dead Americans, and over a million more suffering, any characterization of this as successful can only come from deranged and callously insensitive mind.

However, Trump is desperate to sell this snake oil story. The American people are not buying his self-serving presentations of an allegedly flawless response to the COVID-19 pandemic, nor his utterly insufficient efforts to bring relief to a nation crippled physically, emotionally, and financially. And he has fallen behind Joe Biden in every national poll, as well as polling in many of the critical swing states. It is in that state of desperation that Trump is frantically struggling to survive politically and psychologically. But with each passing day he seems to be losing both battles.

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

Fox News Cultists – And Nearly No One Else – Believe Trump is Honest

Posted by on April 28, 2020 at 2:30 pm. 5 Comments :

The determination of Donald Trump to malign the credibility of the media has taken a toll. However, the impact has been felt mostly by his own devoted disciples. The American people by and large continue to have little respect for Trump as a trustworthy source of information.

Trump Lies

Trump’s problems are entirely of his own making. His frequent and shameless lying does not go unnoticed. He has been documented to have told more than 18,000 lies since his inauguration. And particularly with regard to the COVID-19 (coronavirus) pandemic, Trump has repeatedly disseminated easily verified falsehoods. As a result, the majority of the American people don’t believe what he says about pretty much anything. Even more painful from Trump’s perspective, and after years of vilification, they believe the media more.

A new poll by USA Today/Suffolk University affirms these views. When asked if they think Trump is honest and trustworthy, only 31% said that he is, while more than twice as many (64%) said that he is not. What’s more, when the responses were broken down by preferences for news sources, the ideological divide was starkly revealing:

“According to the Suffolk poll, of the 31% of Americans who believe Trump is honest and trustworthy, nearly two-thirds of them say Fox is their favorite news source. Among Fox-first viewers – who comprise about 25% of Americans in the survey – 78% say Trump is honest and trustworthy, while just 15% disagree.

The imbalance is even more striking when you look at people who don’t trust Fox the most. Among the three-fourths of the population who don’t list Fox as their No. 1, just 15% say Trump is honest and trustworthy, while nearly 80% say he is not.”

Let that sink in. The poll shows, firstly, that only 25% of the American people say they watch Fox News. The number is actually smaller than that as the Nielsen ratings show that only about 1% of TV viewers are actually tuning in the right-wing network. The poll respondents are likely just giving credit to the channel that reflects their political biases.

Of the 75% of Americans who are not Fox News viewers, a measly 15% of them regard Trump as honest and trustworthy. That compares to 78% of the Fox cultists who are only a quarter of the total respondents in the poll.

Consequently, Trump is suffering a huge trust deficit from which he is unlikely to recover in the few months remaining before the election. And his recovery is all the more difficult since there is no sign that he plans to be more truthful going forward, or that is even able to be. Trump’s commitment to spewing self-serving fiction has been a key component of his character (or lack thereof) for decades. And the more he puts himself in from of the people, the more he lies, and the more his credibility sinks into an abyss.

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

Reality TV Host Trump Appoints Another Fox News Regular to a High Profile Post

Posted by on April 23, 2020 at 1:53 pm. 7 Comments :

The gross negligence and incompetence of Donald Trump has been painfully evident in his tragic mishandling of the COVID-19 (coronavirus) crisis. This intrusion of his ignorance and ego (observable at his daily Coronavirus Task Force briefings that make even his allies cringe) could not have resulted in anything but tragedy and loss.

Donald Trump, Fox News, White House

Just as responsible for his personal failings is his reliance on a coterie of imbeciles and bootlickers, many recruited from his State TV propaganda operation, aka Fox News. On Thursday morning it was announced that yet another Fox News talking head has been elevated to a critical post in the Trump administration. Former general Anthony Tata has been a Fox News contributor for several years. His appearances are predictably slathered in adulation of Trump and blind loyalty to Trumpism. That’s been a sure-fire method of attaining employment in the administration of our reality TV game show host “president.” Politico reports that…

“Anthony Tata, a retired Army brigadier general, novelist and Fox News regular, will be tapped as the next Pentagon policy chief, according to three people with knowledge of the decision.

“If confirmed by the Senate, Tata would replace John Rood, who was forced out in February as part of President Donald Trump’s loyalty purge after two years in the job.”

Trump’s embrace of Fox News is an unprecedented merger of media and government. He routinely seeks the advice of Fox anchors who are bursting with shallow opinions, but have no relevant skills. Sean Hannity is Trump’s virtual chief of staff, despite lacking either education or experience. And the Fox News/White House revolving door has seen at least 21 people spinning through its portal. They include…

  • Senior advisor Hope Hicks
  • Former Fox president Bill Shine
  • State Department spokeswoman Heather Nauert
  • Former Deputy Assistant to the President Sebastian Gorka
  • Former National Security Advisor John Bolton
  • White House director of strategic communications Mercedes Schlapp
  • Housing and Urban Development Secretary Ben Carson
  • Acting Director of National Intelligence Richard Grenell
  • Deputy National Security Advisor K. T. McFarland

This is the sort of politicization of critical government roles that insures catastrophe. The White House utterly lacks any assembly of knowledge, experience, or historical memory. Consequently it suffers from a tunnel blind sameness of perspective that is wholly obedient to the Dear Leader responsible for doling out privilege and access to power.

As a recent example of this abysmal absence of leadership and devotion to unflinching personal loyalty, the Trump administration dismissed Dr. Richard Bright, the leading expert on viruses and vaccines at the Department of Health and Human Services. Bright subsequently spoke out about his “demotion” noting that, because he “resisted efforts to fund potentially dangerous drugs (i.e. hydroxychloroquine) promoted by those with political connections,” the administration retaliated against him with a punitive transfer. As it turns out, that drug, that was hyped repeatedly and recklessly by Trump and Fox News actually contributed to more deaths among a trial group of coronavirus patients, than those who did not receive it.

These efforts by Trump to pack his White House with ultra-partisan right-wingers that he finds at Fox News can only only lead to ever more incidents of bad judgment and potentially deadly mistakes, whether by misguided intent or flagrant ignorance. This is particularly dangerous during a time when the nation is engulfed in a pandemic that requires leadership driven by science, not politics. Unfortunately, Trump is incapable of governing that way. So we can expect to see more turmoil, suffering, and disastrous blunders until he is booted out of office. November cannot come too soon.

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

Study Shows Higher Rates of Coronavirus Deaths Linked to Watching Sean Hannity

Posted by on April 22, 2020 at 12:50 pm. 5 Comments :

Anyone who has observed how Donald Trump and Fox News have portrayed the emergence and spread of the coronavirus for the past few months cannot help but notice their trivialization of the pandemic threat. They have contradicted the health experts who have been issuing dire warnings all along. They have insisted, falsely, that it is less deadly than the common flu. They have accused Democrats of creating it as a hoax to bring down the President.

Fox News, Sean Hannity

More recently, the Fox/Trump cartel has been peddling the asinine exploits of astroturf protesters who seek to prematurely end the “stay-at-home” policies imposed by most state governors. These are measures that have been responsible for helping to mitigate the most tragic consequences of the pandemic. They seem to be operating a doomsday cult with a death wish for the nation in order to allow wealthy corporations to return to padding their bank accounts. And they’re too stupid to realize that the only way back to economic prosperity is to protect the health of all Americans by defeating the virus.

Not surprisingly, the field marshal for the COVID-19 militia is Sean Hannity of Fox News. And now his contributions to the success of the contagion have been affirmed by a study conducted by a trio of economists with the Becker Friedman Institute for Economics at the University of Chicago. The study compiled data related to the virus and matched it to television ratings for both Hannity, who routinely downplayed the virus, and Tucker Carlson, who, at least initially, reported on its potential for great harm. The key conclusions from their research reveal a distinct relationship between higher infection and death rates from the coronavirus and viewing of Hannity’s program:

“Using both a poll of Fox News viewers over age 55 and publicly available data on television-watching patterns, they calculate that Fox viewers who watched Hannity rather than Carlson were less likely to adhere to social distancing rules, and that areas where more people watched Hannity relative to Carlson had higher local rates of infection and death.”

While there are caveats to accepting these conclusions without some healthy skepticism (it is just one study and not yet peer reviewed), it satisfies a certain level of common sense. After all, any “trusted” source of information (as Fox News viewers consider Hannity) is likely to exert influence on the consumer of that information. So if Hannity tells his audience that there is nothing to worry about, they will behave in a dangerously cavalier manner that makes them more susceptible to virus transmission and acquisition. And that’s precisely the behavior that would produce the results seen in this study.

The study did not explore more broad associations involving Fox News as compared to other news networks. But it isn’t hard to imagine that the same factors would play out with similar results. In other words, if Fox News tells you it’s okay to go to work and ignore social distancing recommendations, you are probably going to be more at risk than viewers of CNN or MSNBC who are taking prudent precautions.

These conclusions are also aligned with rational logic. News Corpse speculated two months ago that Trump’s cult rallies were potential breeding grounds for the coronavirus due to their willingness to ignore the warnings. What’s more, a recent Gallup survey found that Fox News viewers and Republicans are more likely to buy Trump’s COVID-19 lies. Consequently, they too would have increased vulnerability. Which makes it impossible not to presume that it is far more dangerous to be in the company of reckless Republicans, Hannity viewers, and Trump supporters, than cautious Democrats. Proceed at your own risk.

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

Talk About Desperate: Trump Celebrates an OANN Poll that Doesn’t Exist

Posted by on April 16, 2020 at 12:54 pm. 4 Comments :

On Wednesday Donald Trump unleashed one of his most bizarrely unhinged performances at the Coronavirus Task Force briefing (aka Trump Campaign Rally). He produced a fictional list of corporate executives he said were members of a new economic task force. He reiterated his delusional view that he has “total authority” and threatened to shut down Congress. And of course, he bragged about imaginary achievements and yelled petulantly at reporters. Then he stomped out in huff when he didn’t like the questions.

Donald Trump Pacifier Fox

Trump’s presence at these briefings has been a waste of time from the start. He contributes nothing of substance, but distracts from the experts who actually have some relevant knowledge to impart to the public. Trump has proved that the only things he cares about are those things that advance his personal self-interest and assuaging his voracious ego. That was affirmed on Thursday as he took to Twitter with bitterly partisan posts and flagrant lies.

The first of Trump’s tweets was his celebration of a poll by the ultra right-wing Fox News wannabe One America News Network (OANN). This is the network that doesn’t have a big enough audience to be rated by Nielsen. It’s the network whose reporter was recently booted out of the White House briefings for violating social distancing guidelines, but who got a personal reprieve to stand in the back of the room by Trump’s press secretary (since fired), Stephanie Grisham. It’s a network that has even less credibility than viewers. But Trump promotes them because he can always count on them to kiss his – let’s say ring. He also uses them to needle Fox News when he doesn’t think they are being sufficiently flattering. So Trump tweeted this Thursday morning:

The first thing that makes this tweet significant is that no such OANN poll exists. This is another example of Trump mangling the facts to disseminate whatever “news” he believes will put him the best light, even if it’s fictional. It’s similar to his repeated – and false – claims that he has a 95% approval rating among Republicans. Trump often makes things up on the fly.

There does appear to be a poll that has numbers aligned to Trump’s tweet. It was conducted by the Civitas Institute, a conservative think tank in North Carolina. So even if Trump had gotten the reference correct, it is still not a reputable, non-partisan survey. The notoriously biased Rasmussen poll only has Trump with a 46% approval, 53% disapproval. What’s more, the Civitas results are hardly worth bragging about. The alleged seven point lead over Joe Biden still has Trump below 50% (49-42%). Nationally, Trump has taken a nosedive with the most recent Gallup poll showing a six point drop in approval and a nine point leap in disapproval.

To add another level of irrelevance, the poll was conducted from April 5-7, so it’s a week and a half old. A more recent poll of this North Carolina race by Public Policy Polling shows Biden with a small lead in the state (48-47%), and the Democratic candidate for the Senate, Cal Cunningham, well ahead of the GOP incumbent, Thom Tillis (47-40%).

Trump has also been obsessed with maligning his perceived foes, including, and especially, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi of whom he has a mortal fear. He posted two tweets piling on as many derogatory adjectives as he could think of. He called her “crazy,” “weak,” “a poor leader,” “incompetent,” “a pathetic puppet,” and “third-rate.” The first tweet quoted the insults of Sean Hannity of Fox News. The second tweet accused Pelosi of being “responsible for many deaths.” It also accused her of deleting a tweet that she never actually posted.

In other words, Trump was suffering a severe bout of psychological projection. Because those are all characteristics that have long defined Trump himself. Particularly the one concerning responsibility for tens of thousands of deaths that are directly attributable to Trump’s criminal negligence, and incompetence. And to make matters worse, Trump is still insisting that he wants to “reopen” the country, despite the fact that every health expert says it would be disastrous and deadly to do so at this time. Not that Trump or his GOP confederates care.

For the perfect example of how callous, insensitive, and greedy they are, take a look at this clip of Dr. Oz on Hannity Wednesday evening saying that schools should be reopened now because the deaths of 2 to 3% of American children from the coronavirus would be an acceptable “tradeoff” to get the economy back on track. No, really. He actually said that while Hannity nodded approvingly. This is the so-called “pro-life” right-wing:

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

COVID-1? How Stupid are the Trump-Fluffing Hacks on Fox News?

Posted by on April 15, 2020 at 12:10 pm. 7 Comments :

From the outset of the COVID-19 (coronavirus) pandemic, Donald Trump and his enablers at State TV (aka Fox News) have been producing an impressive amount of propaganda and outright lies. Trump spends the majority of his time at the Coronavirus Task Force briefings defending his abysmal record and yelling at reporters. He has, in fact, hijacked the briefings to transform them into campaign events for his reelection. And now Trump has ordered the Treasury Department to put his name on the stimulus checks that Congress allocated as relief for the severe economic hardship the nation is suffering.

Donald Trump, Stimulus Check

Never mind that it isn’t his money, it’s the American people’s money. Trump just wants to make sure that there is some acknowledgement that the checks are connected to him. He doesn’t need to worry about that. Most Americans already know that the only reason these checks had to be issued was due to Trump’s negligence and incompetence. Note also that some 80 million people will be getting these funds via direct deposit and will never see a paper check.

Meanwhile, Fox News continues to parrot whatever falsehoods and self-exalting disinformation flows from Trump and his regime. They recently ran a dangerously deceitful segment that actually asserted that the coronavirus “was not and is not a pandemic.” And their perversions of reality are having an impact, at least on those foolish enough to rely on Fox News.

The startling abundance of idiocy never ceases to amaze. Just this week Trump declared that as President he has “total authority” to force states to bend to his fascistic will (a position he didn’t really think through). He also announced that in the middle of a global pandemic he was halting funding to the World Health Organization (WHO), ostensibly because they were soft on China near the beginning of the crisis. But they weren’t nearly as soft as Trump:

As if that weren’t dumb enough, Trump’s senior White House counselor, Kellyanne Conway, visited the “Curvy Couch” potatoes of Fox and Friends for a little Trump-fluffing and cult sermonizing. Conway sought to defend Trump’s defunding of the WHO by accusing them of not adhering to the facts. Which makes her remarks ever more asinine:

“This is COVID-19, not COVID-1 folks, and so you would think the people in charge of the World Health Organization, facts and figures, would be on top of that.”

Is it possible that Conway actually believes that the pandemic was caused by the nineteenth iteration of the coronavirus and that there were eighteen prior strains that we should have learned from? For the record, COVID-19 was named for being the coronavirus disease of 2019. And yet, this is her argument for adhering to the facts?

Well, to be fair, it was Kellyanne Conway who originated the phrase “alternative facts.” So it’s kind of her brand. But no one at Fox News bothered to correct her. And, in the end, it serves to validate the studies that have long proved that watching Fox News makes people stupider.

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