James O’Keefe Allegedly Plotted To Incite Violence Against Police, Blame Protesters

Posted by on March 17, 2015 at 2:18 pm. 5 Comments :

Following reports about the Ferguson, Missouri police officers who were wounded by gunfire last week, Fox News and other conservative media outlets immediately began demanding accountability for the assault from the criminal perpetrators, whom they identified as President Barack Obama and Attorney General Eric Holder. They described Ferguson protesters as “government-sanctioned mobs” with a bloodlust against cops, and charged that Obama and Holder were “Chief among those [to] blame for fomenting an environment like this.”

Setting aside the deranged attempt to link the White House with a crime in a St. Louis suburb, the allegators™ at Fox had no evidence that the shooter was even associated with the protesters. The lawyer for the suspect, now in custody, says that his client had been involved in a dispute unrelated to the protests and was not aiming at the officers when he fired. The fact that he was shooting a pistol more than 120 yards from the police line gives credence to that claim. Will Fox News apologize to the President for their unwarranted accusations?

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An article in the New York Post today may shed some light on the assertions that citizens peacefully protesting discrimination are covertly engaging in anti-cop violence. The article reveals an alleged plot by right-wing activist James O’Keefe to frame protesters for inciting violence. The article’s source is a top O’Keefe staffer who was fired for refusing to participate in the unethical scheme. From the Post:

“[Richard] Valdes said [O’Keefe’s organization, Project] Veritas assigned a Muslim undercover agent pretending to be anti-cop to attend protest meetings and utter the following statement: ‘Sometimes, I wish I could just kill some of these cops. Don’t you just wish we could have one of the cops right here in the middle of our group?'”

When the prospective mole refused to go along, O’Keefe fired Valdez for “being unwilling to strong-arm the guy to do his dirty work.”

This incident brings into question previous allegations of anti-cop sentiments among the protesters. A few weeks ago Fox News heavily promoted a video that allegedly showed a splinter group of protesters in New York chanting that they wanted “dead cops.” There was never any attempt to identify those people or establish their connection to the main group of protesters. Might they have been a parade of O’Keefe flunkies trying to create a false narrative?

O’Keefe is no stranger to fabricating events that advance his dishonest and partisan agenda. His prior exploits have resulted in his arrest and conviction for unlawful acts in the office of a U.S. senator, a $100,000 judgement against him for defaming a former ACORN lawyer, and a sleazy plot to seduce a CNN reporter aboard his “Love Boat.”

This new gambit is particularly repulsive as it seeks to inflame emotions and incite actual violence. While it is unlikely that any committed activists for police reform and equal treatment will be persuaded to assault police officers, there are hostile elements on the conservative side that may hear about O’Keefe’s endeavors and decide that they can push the effort forward themselves by acting out in public with the hope of protesters getting the blame.

O’Keefe continually demonstrates that he is a despicable human being whose only goal is to hurt innocent people. This example of dangerous and dishonest behavior is only the latest proof that he has no credibility or integrity. And the same is true for any media organization that provides a platform for his vile antics.

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Bibi-lievers Beware: Fox News Is Already Making Excuses For Possible Netanyahu Loss

Posted by on March 15, 2015 at 6:55 pm. 5 Comments :

In the commotion surrounding Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s address before Congress, Fox News and their partners in rightist propaganda insisted that anyone who did not support his appearance and hawkish agenda were anti-Israel and even anti-Semitic. However, that view is not shared by most Americans or most Israelis.

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Subsequent to the speech, Netanhayu’s popularity has dropped in the U.S. to 38% favorable. Clearly the speech was not well received by Americans. That decline puts Netanyahu’s rating more than ten points lower than President Obama. And if you think that’s bad, his host, GOP Speaker John Boehner, is now more than ten points lower than Netanyahu.

Critics of the speech warned that it was inappropriate for Congress to provide a platform for a foreign official who was currently engaged in a political campaign. Those warnings were borne out when shortly after Netanyahu returned to Israel to resume his reelection effort he released an ad featuring video of the U.S. Congress applauding him. So Boehner was successfully suckered by Netanyahu into helping him produce campaign materials.

Despite this international assistance, Netanyahu’s reelection bid is struggling. He has fallen further behind his main opponent, Labor Party leader Isaac Herzog. And now, with the prospect of Netanyahu losing, Fox News and Republicans in Congress are laying the groundwork for an explanation for the failure of their hero. They are promoting an allegation that the Obama administration is interfering with Israeli elections in order to defeat Netanyahu. Of course they are. Like everything else – Netanyahu losing would be Obama’s fault.

The conspiracy revolves around their discovery that a former Obama campaign operative is working for a group that opposes Netanyahu’s reelection. That is an entirely routine activity. It is precisely what campaign consultants of both parties do for a living. But that didn’t stop Fox News from reporting in multiple segments an alleged effort by the administration to oust Netanyahu. The allegations are so important to Fox that on Sunday morning anchor Uma Pemmaraju interrupted a segment about Hillary Clinton’s email to ask about the Israeli election and a rumored Senate inquiry:

“There is a Senate probe apparently, that is launched, a bipartisan probe, to investigate concerns about a non-profit agency taking government funds to try and be involved in interfering with Israeli elections set for Tuesday. […] This particular group, apparently, has ties to the White House, no direct link has been determined at this point about whether the White House has been sending operatives into Israel to be involved with interfering in upcoming elections set for Tuesday. But the fact that if this group is found to have used government grants, up to $350,000 from the State Department, that would be a real violation of ethics and raise some big concerns.”

Twice in that “question” Pemmaraju used the loaded phrase “interfering with Israeli elections,” even though she also admitted that there was “no direct link” to Obama. Media Matters documented efforts to advance this smear a month ago by rightist fringe groups. Now it has percolated up to Fox News and senate investigators. Media Matters showed that political consultants from both sides frequently do work in other countries (like good capitalists). They also showed that former Obama operatives have worked in support of Netanyahu. And the allegations of federal funding were shown to have no merit as the funds were not used in conjunction with any campaign because the elections had not even been announced at the time.

So the facts show that there is no effort on the part of the White House to interfere with the Israeli elections. However, Speaker Boehner and Republicans in congress did interfere with Israeli elections by providing candidate Netanyahu with a platform and campaign material. They also permitted Netanyahu to interfere with American politics by trying to sway foreign policy in opposition to diplomacy with Iran.

And after this brazenly partisan, factless, regurgitation of an unsupported wingnut conspiracy theory, Fox News returned to their regular anti-Obama programming with Pemmaraju employing this subtle segue: “Turning now to the Select Committee investigating Benghazi…” Of course. What else?

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Government Sanctioned Mobs: Is Fox News Bigot Talking About Cops Or Protesters?

Posted by on March 14, 2015 at 4:31 pm. 6 Comments :

Todd Starnes has a unique role at Fox News as the protector of the heritage of white Christians. Most of his “dispatches” are about some imagined discrimination against this powerless majority. However, they are also mostly bogus fantasies that are later debunked by real journalists. In one case, Starnes hyped a fake story that was planted by the publisher of his new book.

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In his latest harangue, Starnes is aghast that President Obama didn’t clear his busy schedule to visit the two injured police officers in Ferguson, Missouri. His brief sermonette titled “Gov’t-Sanctioned Mobs Lay Siege to Ferguson While Obama Jets Off to Hollywood,” is crammed with viciousness and vituperative insults. The best way to demonstrate the idiocy and ignorance of this screed is to let it speak for itself. So here is every word of it with commentary:

Starnes: Whether they admit it or not, the protesters in Ferguson, Missouri got what they wanted this week. Two police officers ambushed.

This overtly racist opening line is evidence of a severe mental impairment. Starnes’ unsupported assertion that peaceful protesters wanted officers to get shot is the sort of bigotry that is generally seen in dispatches from the Ku Klux Klan.

Starnes: Blue Blood spilled on the streets, the latest casualties in a government-sanctioned war on law enforcement.

How dramatic. You have to wonder if Starnes is aware that “blue blood” usually refers to the upper-class elites that police are often shown to be protecting to the exclusion of every other citizen. And the “government-sanctioned” quip is utterly delusional. He doesn’t bother to identify the agency that is sanctioning this imaginary war on law enforcement.

Starnes: At some point you have to wonder when the police are just going say, “You know what folks? Just patrol your own blasted streets.”

Of course. Because that’s what all good police officers say who have encountered the risks associated with their jobs. What Starnes fails to grasp is that cops have been targets of criminal types since the beginning of policing. It’s a good thing that most officers have more dedication and integrity than cowards like Starnes.

Starnes: For months now, the White House has used Ferguson to advance a false narrative about racism in America. “Hands Up, Don’t Shoot” — a lie. A bald-faced lie.

Actually, the White House has never uttered the words “Hands Up, Don’t Shoot” much less advanced any narrative associated with it. Starnes is apparently unaware that it was the Obama Justice Department that found insufficient evidence to press charges against officer Darrel Wilson. But Starnes is equally unaware that the narrative of racism in America is not “false.” That fact was also in the Justice Department’s report, along with documented proof.

Starnes: Instead jetting off to Ferguson on Air Force One to console the officers and deliver a pro-law enforcement speech, President Obama flew right over Ferguson on his way to Hollywood, where he made a case for moral equivalency on “Jimmy Kimmel Live!”

Actually, Obama made a case for the rule of law and respect for law enforcement when he said that “there was no excuse for criminal acts.” He called for the arrest of the perpetrators and the marginalization of “people who resort to violence.” And by doing it with Jimmy Kimmel he reached a much larger audience with that message.

Starnes: He also tweeted: “Violence against police is unacceptable. Our prayers are with the officers in MO. Path to justice is one all of us must travel together. – bo” With all due respect, Mr. President – that’s a bunch of BS.

This is a perfect example of how Obama cannot win with blockhead partisans like Starnes. Even when he makes exactly the sort of statement that is appropriate for the circumstances, they will simply dismiss it and resume insulting him.

Starnes: There’s a war on cops – government-sanctioned mobs out to satisfy their bloodlust. And that’s all you’ve got? A hundred forty characters and a late-night punchline?

First of all, that aint all he’s got, it’s just all you heard. Starnes conveniently filters out anything that doesn’t fit his hateful biases. Secondly, Starnes should be more careful with his rhetoric. Parsing his closing sentence would suggest that he is defining cops as “government-sanctioned mobs.” Ironically, that’s just how some people in minority communities see them when they are discriminated against and mistreated as numerous studies have shown occurs with unfortunate frequency.

The saddest part of this is that it is just another chapter in the ongoing parade of bigoted commentaries from Fox News and other rightist media. They have an obsession with castigating minorities, denying racism, and lecturing the victims of their hate as to how they should respond when mistreated (aka “whitesplaining”). And by pretending that problems don’t exist, and lying to their audience, Fox News et al are only making the problems worse.

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Glenn Beck Threatens To Quit NRA Due To Infiltration By Muslim Jihadists

Posted by on March 13, 2015 at 12:20 pm. 4 Comments :

The nightmare of Armageddon is becoming more real every day as the signs continue to reveal that we are inhabiting the End Times forecast by the Biblical prophets of talk radio. Death and destruction are looming just over the horizon according to God’s messenger on the InterTubes, the Reverend Glenn Beck. Just this week he delivered a sermon predicting the start of World War III that will bring the darkness to all mankind.

And if that’s not bad enough, now the National Rifle Association is in danger of being overrun by radical Islamists bent on destroying America from within. The evidence of this peril was brought into the light by Beck yesterday (video below) during an interview with renowned Islamophobe and conspiracy kook Frank Gaffney who pulled aside the burka of anti-tax crusader Grover Norquist to expose him as the secret engineer of “influence operations on behalf of enemies of this country.”

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For those unfamiliar with Norquist, he is the president of Americans for Tax Reform, a rightist organization that opposes all tax increases and pressures weak politicians to sign his “no tax pledge.” Norquist has been a conservative staple for decades and is closely associated with the Republican Party. He is currently seeking reelection to the board of directors of the NRA.

So obviously he is a subversive agent of the Muslim Brotherhood as charged by Gaffney and Beck. These charges are based on incontrovertible evidence of his fraternization with our terrorist foes. Specifically, there are two facts from which he cannot hide. First, he is married to Muslim woman, which only a terrorist would do. And second, he has a beard.

If you think that facial hair is a foolish indicator of terrorist sympathies, note that it has been previously cited by the former chair of the Texas Republican Party as proof of a conversion to Islam. Similarly, the father of a captured American soldier was accused of the same thing when he abstained from shaving while his son was in captivity. However, the Duck Dynasty Klan has somehow managed to avoid being linked to Al Qaeda despite their hairy mugs.

Fox News Bergdahl Beard

As for Beck, he proudly states that he is a lifetime member of the NRA. He has spoken at their annual conferences where he once featured a picture of Michael Bloomberg, a gun safety advocate and the Jewish Mayor of New York City, giving a Nazi salute. But now Beck’s consternation about Norquist’s treasonous ambitions has boiled over as he declared that any organization that countenanced such a turncoat could not count on Beck’s support. He said that…

“I am not an expert on Grover Norquist by any stretch of the imagination, but I have heard enough that makes me concerned enough that – and, I hope the leadership of the NRA hears this, and every member of the NRA hears this – that if this man is elected, or re-elected and confirmed on the board of the NRA, I may drop my membership in the NRA. I am that concerned that he is a very bad influence and a very bad man, that if this is who the NRA decides to put on their board of directors, I don’t think I can be associated with them.”

Indeed. How can anyone of good conscience align themselves with bearded spouses of Muslim vixens? The NRA has an obligation to only form relationships with upstanding citizens like board member Ted Nugent, whose only shortcomings are his hateful bigotry and overtly hostile threats to his political foes, including that sub-human mongrel (Nugent’s words), President Obama. Subsequent to his rant, Beck says that the NRA has promised him that they will “get to the bottom of this once and for all” by conducting a thorough ethics investigation into Norquist. It’s about time.

Norquist’s wife is every bit as frightening as Hilary Clinton’s long-time aide Huma Abedin, who has also been fingered by wingnuts as a covert agent of our enemies. The prospect of Clinton assuming the presidency and Norquist’s infiltration of the NRA should be cause for all Americans to rise up. The danger is metastasizing throughout our government. Nearly all of the Republicans in Congress have signed Norquist’s pledge, including House Speaker John Boehner, Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell, and all of the GOP senators currently exploring presidential campaigns (Rand Paul, Ted Cruz, Lindsey Graham, and Marco Rubio). Exactly what does that obligate them to do on behalf of the worldwide radical Muslim movement?

Clearly Norquist’s influence is growing. Patriots need to establish what that means for our future as a free republic. And Beck is once again leading the way by refusing to accept the NRA’s tolerance for terrorist board members. Beck, as he likes to remind us, has been right about everything he has ever said. For instance, the stock market has crashed, oil prices have skyrocketed, ObamaCare destroyed the economy and left millions sick or dead, the dollar is worthless while gold is soaring, and Obama’s support for the worldwide Caliphate has achieved its goal.

Oh, wait a minute. None of those things are true. But if you close your mind to reality you can imagine that Beck’s prophesies have all come to pass and live in the dystopian paradise that he has fabricated in his demented, cartoon brain. Guns will be abundant, corporations will be free to poison our environment and elections, and no one will suffer from the pain of having health insurance. Wouldn’t that be Heavenly?

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Obama Did It: Fox News Blames Cop Shooting In #Ferguson On President And Attorney General

Posted by on March 12, 2015 at 1:48 pm. 4 Comments :

Affirming the predictability of the Fox News brand of hack journalism, the network moved quickly to make sure that their viewers were misinformed about a tragic incident in Ferguson, Missouri last night.

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As a gathering of protesters was winding down in Ferguson, shots rang out that resulted in injuries to two police officers. By morning the officers were released from the hospital and are expected to make full recoveries. Also by morning, Fox News aired multiple reports of the incident placing responsibility for the assaults squarely on the perpetrators whom Fox identified as President Obama and Attorney General Eric Holder.

Setting aside all of the known facts, Fox News sought to disparage the usual objects of their animus. It didn’t matter to them that the authorities in Ferguson had not tied the shootings to the protesters at all. Fox News made the leap from the protesters to the administration in record time. Their slanders were in direct contradiction to public statements by the chief of the St. Louis County Police, Jon Belmar, who the Washington Post reported as saying that…

“[T]hree or four shots were fired from across the street from where about 75 protesters and 40 police officers were gathered. He said that the shots did not come from the group of protesters who were gathered near the police station.”

Nevertheless, Fox twisted their coverage to point the blame toward government officials hundreds of miles away. The defamation began with the all-white Kurvy Kouch Potatoes at Fox & Friends as the story was still unfolding.

Elisabeth Hasselbeck: He [Holder] chose to grandstand. And now – fuel on the fire – less than a week later, we are seeing the dots connecting here.
Fox News legal analyst Bob Massi: When you say that you’re going to dismantle a police department if they don’t fix it, it incites race relations — it incites riots.

Hasselbeck’s delusional dot-connecting exercise aims to associate the shootings with the Department of Justice report finding that the Ferguson police department had engaged in a pattern and practice of discrimination against African-Americans. She, along with the rest of the right-wing media choir, would prefer that this racist and unconstitutional behavior was merely ignored and swept under the rug. But the notion that avoiding honest appraisals of police conduct would serve any positive purpose is one that only racist enablers and sympathizers could accept. In the real world, such avoidance would be recognized as a prelude to civil unrest.

Likewise, Massi utterly mangles logic by asserting that promises to take corrective action would incite riots. It is the complete opposite of reality. When officials undertake initiatives that address the complaints of the people, the people are generally satisfied and far less likely to erupt in violence. Massi’s conclusion is so absurd it defies comprehension.

Which takes us to Fox’s Outnumbered, where guest Lou Dobbs joined the program’s regulars to continue the condemnation of leaders in Washington:

Dobbs: I think that, plainly, there are so many forces at work here. So many people who deserve considerable blame for fomenting an environment like this in which this could occur. Chief among those, in my opinion, are the President of the United States and the Attorney General.
Tantaros: They intervened and they flamed the racial tensions. And Eric Holder has proven time again he is an Attorney General for the criminal, by the criminal, and of the criminals in the United States of America. […] You think it’s a coinicidence that two cops got shot last night? This was inflamed because of what this administration did. This specific incident.

Republicans used to define themselves as the party of responsibility. However, when they have the opportunity to hold wrongdoers accountable, they decline and instead shift blame to their ideological enemies, letting the real perpetrators off the hook. In the process they viciously malign people who had no role in the incident in question. It is a pathological compulsion to vilify those they perceive as their foes. That’s the only way they can justify accusing Obama and Holder of being chiefly responsible for assaults on police in Ferguson. It’s the only way that they can defend alleging that the Attorney General is collaborating with criminals and is a criminal himself.

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The conservative media effort to persuade America that racism doesn’t exist requires that they deny any evidence of it, particularly by institutional agencies such as police departments. It is a sort of self-inflicted blindness that turns the world into an Eden where there is only harmony and brotherhood in their deranged vision.

However, they make an exception for those who try to point out that prejudice is still very much with us, and who sincerely work to eliminate it. Those are the real racists, according to Fox News and the right, for having the gall to call out bigots. If only they would keep their mouths shut no one would have any problem with racism. Certainly the white, male, Christians wouldn’t have any problems. And that’s the American way, isn’t it?


About The GOP’s #47Traitors Letter To Iran…It Was All A Joke

Posted by on March 11, 2015 at 12:59 pm. 10 Comments :

While much of the media is obsessing over emails sent by former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton while she was serving the country, another letter has stirred up some controversy over whether Republicans in Congress have engaged in treason.

Clinton Email / Iran GOP Letter

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Freshman senator and Tea Party crush Tom Cotton of Arkansas managed to get forty-seven of his senate colleagues and a couple of GOP presidential hopefuls to sign a letter warning Iran not to take President Obama seriously with regard to negotiations on Iran’s nuclear ambitions. The letter took a decidedly condescending tone that presumed its recipients were unfamiliar with international diplomacy. Cotton offered to school them saying that…

“It has come to our attention while observing your nuclear negotiations with our government that you may not fully understand our constitutional system. […] We will consider any agreement regarding your nuclear-weapons program that is not approved by Congress as nothing more than an executive agreement between President Obama and Ayatollah Khamenei. The next president could revoke such an executive agreement with the stroke of a pen and future Congresses could modify the terms of the agreement at any time.”

Unfortunately for Cotton and his co-signers, Iran’s foreign minister was better prepared on these subjects than they were. Their misguided attempt to wedge their way into the negotiations was inappropriate, foolish, and possibly illegal. And worse, it probably had the opposite effect of what they were aiming for. Rather than undercutting Obama’s credibility, the letter served to more broadly discredit Congress and the nation. Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif scolded Cotton & Co. saying “In truth, it told us that we cannot trust the United States.” He went on to say that the letter’s signatories…

“…not only do not understand international law, but are not fully cognizant of the nuances of their own Constitution when it comes to presidential powers in the conduct of foreign policy. […] I should bring one important point to the attention of the authors and that is, the world is not the United States, and the conduct of inter-state relations is governed by international law, and not by US domestic law. The authors may not fully understand that in international law, governments represent the entirety of their respective states, are responsible for the conduct of foreign affairs, are required to fulfill the obligations they undertake with other states and may not invoke their internal law as justification for failure to perform their international obligations.”

Zarif also pointed out that any attempt by a future Congress or President to renege on an agreement of this sort would be a violation of international law. However, compliance with the law may not be uppermost in the minds of this letter’s authors. By writing and sending the letter they may have violated a domestic law known as the Logan Act that forbids unauthorized citizens from negotiating with foreign governments.

Subsequent to the letter’s publication, the Republicans associated with it have been pilloried for their both their ignorance of international diplomacy and their Constitutional role in negotiating inter-state agreements. Some in the GOP are already distancing themselves from the embarrassing letter, including Sen. Bob Corker, the chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. But the most peculiar response came from some unnamed GOP aides who are now trying to characterize the whole affair as a joke. Daily Beast reports that…

“Republican aides were taken aback by the response to what what they thought was a lighthearted attempt to signal to Iran and the public that Congress should have a role in the ongoing nuclear discussions. Two GOP aides separately described their letter as a ‘cheeky’ reminder of the congressional branch’s prerogatives.

‘The administration has no sense of humor when it comes to how weakly they have been handling these negotiations,’ said a top GOP Senate aide.”

Lighthearted? Cheeky? Someone is going to have to explain the punch line in this to me because writing to Iran’s leaders to inform that they cannot trust the President of the United States hardly seems like comedy or even playful banter. What’s more, the suggestion that the President has no sense of humor is puzzling. Do they think that the prospect of a nuclear-armed Iran is something that Obama should be joking about? Is their assertion that he is handling these negotiations weakly a laughing matter?

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The truth is that if Obama were to have injected humor into this situation in even the smallest way, the GOP would be renewing their calls for impeachment. [Actually, Laura Ingraham has already done so on Fox News Tuesday night with Greta Van Sustern] This shift to portraying the letter as a joke is just a lame attempt to get out from under the bad publicity it has created for the imbeciles who signed it. But it also reveals that Republicans are not averse to endangering sensitive negotiations, and the security of the nation and the world, in order to satisfy their psychotic hatred of our President. And that is what they regard as patriotism.

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Racists On Fox News Can’t Decide Whether Racism Is Over Or Not

Posted by on March 10, 2015 at 3:46 pm. 9 Comments :

For several year now the mantra that has been chanted on Fox News and other right-wing media is that racism is a thing of the past. America’s shameful legacy of prejudice was allegedly buried sometime between Rosa Parks’ refusal to give up her seat on a bus and Barack Obama’s election to the presidency. Never mind the continued instances of discrimination in hiring, housing, and education, or the horrific violence and intimidation that persists, or the many chapters of the KKK and other congregations of bigots that flourish in many parts of the country.

Fox News Racism

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For some people the fact that a little more than half of America’s voters chose an African-American president is evidence that the old hatreds have disappeared. But anyone who believes that just needs to ask themselves “What about the other half.” The presence of racism is visible to anyone with eyes and ears and a mind uncluttered by political partisans trying to eliminate a thorny campaign issue. You need look no further than the video that popped up this week showing members of the Sigma Alpha Epsilon fraternity at the University of Oklahoma to understand the depth of the problem that still persists.

The evidence notwithstanding, there are still deniers that either refuse to acknowledge the existence of racism, or excuse it as a trivial matter that doesn’t really interfere with anyone’s pursuit of the American Dream. And last night on Megyn Kelly’s program on Fox News she managed to dismiss the obvious occurrences of institutional racism in Ferguson, Missouri, that were outlined in a report by the Justice Department. Reacting to a portion of the report that addressed racist emails by Ferguson police officers, Kelly said that…

“There are very few companies in America [where] you won’t find racist emails.”

That was her defense of the Ferguson PD? First of all, a police department isn’t a “company.” And while there is no justification for Brewski Barn employees to be exchanging racist emails, law enforcement officers must be held to a higher standard. The inherent power that comes with the badge, not to mention the Constitution, requires unambiguous fairness and equal treatment. The fact that Kelly can wave off racist emails by the police is disturbing all by itself.

However, Kelly’s remarks have another component that must not be ignored. She is flatly asserting that most American companies are harboring racist employees. But didn’t Fox News declare that racism is over? What about these declarations of America’s racial harmony:

  • Eric Bolling: I don’t think there’s racism.
  • Bill O’Reilly: We are not a racist nation. […] Fair-minded Americans should be deeply offended, deeply offended that their country is being smeared with the bigotry brush.
  • Steve Doocy: I don’t know that Barack Obama could have been elected president if he was living in a racist nation.
  • Ann Coulter: Unfortunately for liberals, there is no more racism in America.
  • Republican National Committee: Today we remember Rosa Parks’ bold stance and her role in ending racism.

There you have it, racism is kaput. And yet Kelly explicitly states that racist emails can be found at all but a few of American companies. So which is it? Has America solved its race problem and embraced its rich heritage of diversity? Or are there legions of bigots firing off offensive messages on business computer networks seemingly free of any shame or concern about being caught?

Either way, Kelly’s points are utterly absurd. If she’s right about the racism at most American companies, how does that excuse the racism at the Ferguson Police Department? Although it was her intent to refute the Justice Department’s report, she has only succeeded in affirming the need to better scrutinize the behavior of local police departments. And for good measure she has opened the door to more reflection on the overarching problem of racism across the nation at all of these companies she has just called out.

Sadly, Kelly’s objective was to dispel all criticism of racism, whether it be imposed by cops or accountants. Her argument is that since racism is so prevalent at workplaces across the nation, why should anyone bother about it by police officers? The idiocy of that argument is self-apparent. And it’s almost as stupid as her colleagues at Fox who say that racism doesn’t exist anymore.

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Loving And (Mostly) Hating Fox News: Bill O’Reilly’s Desperation Is Showing

Posted by on March 9, 2015 at 10:40 pm. 4 Comments :

Not since the days of Keith Olbermann’s reign at MSNBC has Bill O’Reilly resorted to such relentless attacks on the network. His perceived victimization by a media cabal that he says is simultaneously impotent and omnipotent is reaching psychotic levels. And all of this is due to the fountain of lies that he has been spewing for decades and for which he is now being called upon to answer.

O’Reilly’s latest retaliatory harangue (video below) came at the opening of Monday’s Factor where he set out to claim once again that everything he does is sanctified by God because he has high ratings (First Church of Nielsen the Redeemer). His Talking Points Memo, titled “Hating Fox News,” heralded a new Quinnipiac poll that O’Reilly bragged “shows that Americans trust Fox News more than any other TV news agency by a substantial margin.”

Fox News

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As anyone familiar with O’Reilly’s aversion to the truth would know, he did not tell the whole story. The same poll shows that Fox News is also the network that is least trusted by Americans. Now why do you suppose he left that out? The fact that Fox received a vote of confidence from 29% of the poll’s respondents means that 71% trusted another network more. That is not exactly something of which to be proud. What’s more if you add up the two categories of positive responses for trusted networks (a great deal + somewhat), Fox News is second to the last. It beats only MSNBC by a mere 3%.

If anyone is “Hating Fox News” it is the majority of the American people who reject its frothing hostility, fear mongering, and perversion of the facts. But no one should mistake O’Reilly’s tirade for a reasoned commentary on the popularity of the media. This rant is a thinly veiled assault on those who are demanding that he come clean about the frequent lies he has told to portray himself as an intrepid reporter risking life and limb to bring truth to the people. But rather than taking on his critics forthrightly, he takes a more cowardly approach by pretending to be a victim of powerful enemies seeking the destruction of his employer. He’s attacking a broader, ambiguous foe because he’s afraid to face his critics head on. And of course that foe is, in his mind, a humongous titan of evil, even though he also insists that it is a weakling that has no support and can’t compare to the superhuman powers of Fox News.

Somehow all of this makes sense in O’Reilly’s cartoon brain. However, his campaign against his critics consists entirely of bluster, distractions, and outright threats. That’s why in Monday’s program he never once addressed the growing number of documented falsehoods he has been caught telling. He just continued boasting about his ample audience and the prominent role that Fox News plays in shaping the American media.

On that note, O’Reilly pulled back the curtain on the journalistic fraud that is Fox News. The facade of fairness and balance is just another one of the lies that are baked into the Fox mission. In this one episode O’Reilly repeatedly confessed to the unethical biases of Fox. For instance, he said that…

“Our primetime programs set the political agenda.”

“The fact is that Fox News is now a deep threat to the progressive movement and the far left despises us so they are in full attack mode desperately trying to marginalize FNC.”

“There are just two national news agencies that challenge the progressive agenda with authority: the Wall Street Journal editorial page and the Fox News Channel.”

“If FNC did not exist, America would be a far different place and the far left ideology would have a far easier time. But we do exist and now dominate the primetime news cycle. Not good news for progressive politicians, the liberal media, and crazed zealots on both sides.”

How are any of those overtly partisan statements consistent with the practice of professional journalism? O’Reilly is admitting that Fox is a political advocate of the right. This is why most media observers regard Fox as nothing more than the PR division of the Republican Party. Additionally, O’Reilly’s analysis that Fox’s very existence is bad news for progressives flies in the face of reality. Someone should inform him that President Obama was elected twice despite the existence of Fox which fought so hard against him.

There is one thing, however, that O’Reilly got right. America would be a far different place without Fox. There would be far less wingnut propaganda and conspiracy theories masquerading as news. We wouldn’t have to deal with wild goose chases for presidential birth certificates or claims that snowballs disprove the scientific evidence of Climate Change. Mentions of Sarah Palin and Donald Trump would produce confused looks and replies of “Who?” And the Tea Party would still be a gathering of folks who appreciate brewed herbs and pastries.

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Fox Nation vs. Reality: The Fox News Cult of Ignorance.
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Civil Whites March: Fox News Whines That Liberal Media Cut Bush Out Of Selma Ceremony

Posted by on March 9, 2015 at 12:39 pm. 4 Comments :

This past weekend marked the 50th anniversary of one of the most iconic events in America’s history. In 1965 hundreds of protesters organized a march from Selma to Montgomery, Alabama to demand an end to the institutional racism that kept African Americans from exercising their right to vote. The marchers were met on the Edmund Pettus Bridge by state troopers who beat them with nightsticks, trampled them horses, assaulted them with water cannons, and left many of the peaceful marchers severely injured.

John Lewis, now a U.S. congressman, was among those who suffered at the hands of the segregationist southern establishment. The televised images of the brutality directed at the marchers played a significant role in elevating the civil rights crisis to a national priority.

So how did Fox News choose to cover this historic commemorative occasion? This morning on Fox & Friends the Kurvy Kouch Potatoes devoted the whole of their Selma segment to complaining about a photo that appeared in the New York Times. Later, the ladies of “Outnumbered” did the same thing. The photo in question was of President Obama walking arm-in-arm with some of the figures who participated in the original march fifty years ago, including Rep. Lewis. But the Fox crew completely ignored the cultural importance of the event in order to play out their obsession with being victims of the “liberal” media.

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Dispensing with any discussion of the state of civil rights in the intervening years, Fox focused on their allegation that former president George W. Bush had been deliberately cropped out of the photo that appeared in the New York Times. To them this was further evidence of how the liberal media distorts the news and robs conservatives of their rightful place as champions of civil rights.

There are two small problems with that characterization. First, the Times did not crop the photo at all. They printed the entire photo that had been supplied to them. The photographer had quite reasonably framed the photo to put President Obama in the center, thus missing Bush who was far off to the side. Other photos were taken of the event that show Bush, however, in order to reveal the whole front line of the march, the picture would have either consumed the entire width of the paper or been reduced so that no one could have been recognized.

The second problem is that the notion that Bush is an indispensable component of any photo of a civil rights march is ludicrous. In his eight years as president, Bush attended only one of the annual meetings of the NAACP. His Justice Department investigated the organization with an aim to remove its tax-exempt status. He opposed affirmative action and other legislative remedies to racism. And he appointed Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts who wrote the majority opinion striking down provisions of the Voting Rights Act of 1965 that was a direct result of the original march in Selma.

Why the Fox regulars regard Bush as being entitled to a place of honor at this march is a mystery. But even worse is the fact that they would feature this phony assertion of liberal media bias to the exclusion of any substantive reporting on the issues that led to the march in 1965 and the importance of its 50th anniversary this weekend.

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Fox Nation vs. Reality: The Fox News Cult of Ignorance.
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This is typical of Fox’s perverse editorial stance on civil rights issues. On their Fox News Sunday program they hosted Kimberly Strassel of the Wall Street Journal (another brick in Rupert Murdoch’s media empire) who complained that Obama called for renewal of the Voting Rights Act. Just to be clear, she was against talking about voting rights in a speech commemorating an historic march for voting rights. Also notable is that Fox News failed to mention that not a single member of the current leadership in Congress attended the anniversary event in Selma.

And yet, Fox found time on multiple programs to gripe about a non-story concerning the cropping of a photo that never happened. That’s what Fox regards as newsworthy. And everybody knows that civil rights begin with exalting white Republicans who never did a damn thing to advance them.


Former Fox News Watch Host: The People Who Watch Fox News Are Cultish

Posted by on March 8, 2015 at 2:51 pm. 4 Comments :

This morning on CNN’s “Reliable Sources” host Brian Stelter interviewed the former host of the Fox News program “News Watch.” That program was canceled in 2008 and its host, Eric Burns, was fired. It’s replacement, “MediaBuzz,” is now led by a more reliable hack, Howard Kurtz, who isn’t troubled by having to peddle the partisan garbage that Fox spews.

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On Reliable Sources, Stelter raised the ever-expanding controversy over Bill O’Reilly’s diuretic flow of lies about his past adventures as a news superhero. Stelter opened with with statements from the order of nuns who lost four of their members to death squads in El Salvador. They were disturbed by O’Reilly’s false assertion that he had personally witnessed the executions. O’Reilly later admitted that he had only seen photographs, but failed to apologize or even acknowledge that his prior claims were false.

At the top of the interview segment, Burns told Stelter that he had experienced the extraordinary effect of the audience loyalty at Fox News, saying that “The people who watch Fox News are cultish.” [a condition that News Corpse documented a few months ago] and that “O’Reilly, as the head of the cult, is not held to the same standards as Brian Williams. Burns went on to give credit to MSNBC’s Keith Olbermann who had frequently pointed out O’Reilly’s predilection for lying, with evidence proving it. Then Stelter asked Burns to comment on the shift by Fox News to ever more right-wing slanted programming. Burns said that…

“I thought that as Fox got more and more popular that Roger Ailes, who runs the network, would say ‘Well, the right has nowhere else to go, so if I move a little more to the center I can get a bigger audience and not lose my core audience.’ He did just the opposite. He went more to the right.”

It’s important to note that Burns hosted a program that was already severely slanted to the right. He had four panelists that included a single “liberal,” pretty much setting the model for every other panel on Fox (i.e. MediaBuzz, The Five, Special Report, Cashin In, Fox News Sunday, etc.). So Burns is no progressive mole. However, he was astute enough to recognize the downside of being associated with Fox News and replied to inquiries after his departure by expressing relief that…

“I do not have to face the ethical problem of sharing an employer with Glenn Beck.”

On Fox’s MediaBuzz this morning, host Kurtz completely ignored the O’Reilly affair, choosing instead to focus on negative stories about Hillary Clinton’s email, Obama’s speech in Selma, AL, and Netanyahu’s speech before Congress. Throw in a suck-up profile of Rand Paul and all of the criticisms expressed by Burns begin to be obvious. But don’t tell that to the cult members who watch Fox. They threaten to throw another Tea Party.

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