SRSLY? Breaking on Fox News: ‘Hillary Clinton is Toast’

For the past couple of years Fox News has refocused their standard Republican propaganda machine to more narrowly serve as Donald Trump’s personal PR and defense team. They have worked furiously to spin his innumerable gaffes and blunders as examples of some perverse brilliance. While at the same manufacturing distractions and phony news items intended to draw attention away from Trump’s idiocy, incompetence, and failure.

Hillary Clinton

One of the most frequently used tactics by Fox News is to toss out spurious allegations against Trump’s critics and political foes. At the top of the list for that ploy is, of course, Hillary Clinton. Trump can’t seem to suppress his fetish for the woman who got three million more votes than he did. And Fox News is just as obsessed by her refusal to crawl into a cave for her remaining days.

The latest manifestation of Fox’s fixation on Clinton came in the form of an opinion by contributor Liz Peek. Her story was headlined “Hillary is Toast: Scandals Finally Catch Up with Clintons.” Coming more than a year after the presidential election, it is quite a scoop for Fox News to herald the end of Clinton’s political career. They must be proud to have broken this news after only – everybody else on Planet Earth. And the profound insights in the story begin with this keen observation:

“Hillary Clinton is done, finished, kaput. Dogged by scandals old and new, out of step politically, her excess baggage has morphed into an entire baggage train, dragging her towards political oblivion.”

You have to wonder why both Trump and Fox News relentlessly harp on the question of Clinton’s relevance if they are truly convinced that she has none. The article, however, answers that question by noting that “While it is refreshing to consider the landscape unadorned by Clintons, Republicans will miss her.” And that’s precisely why Fox won’t stop blabbering about her whenever they need to shift attention away from another patented Trump Fuckup. In this case it has something to do with the President’s cowardly silence on the GOP’s pedophile candidate for the senate in Alabama, Roy Moore. Unable to conjure up a suitable response, they go deploy the Clinton deflection:

“As charges of sexual aggression swirl around prominent figures on the left and right, Bill Clinton’s gross and possibly criminal behavior is getting a second look. […] It is high time Bill Clinton’s misdeeds and Hillary’s defense of them received bipartisan condemnation.”

Getting a second look? You mean the first time around, when it was investigated for months and ended in an impeachment, wasn’t sufficient? And it’s fair to say that the condemnation was totally bipartisan when even Al Gore declined to embrace Clinton during his campaign to succeed him. These are just lame and baseless arguments intended to divert the American people from the harsh realities of Trump’s own sexual perversions and crimes. And if Republicans think that Trump is being treated unfairly because Bill Clinton got away with his misconduct, then let’s be sure Trump receives only the punishment that Clinton did and no more. That would, of course, be impeachment.

Trump Clinton

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

The rest of the article wound aimlessly between debunked GOP myths like the Uranium One deal and whining that Hillary has the audacity to embark on a book tour. It’s funny, you never hear any similar complaints when John McCain, Bernie Sanders, Mitt Romney, or any other defeated male candidate writes and promotes a post-campaign book. The truth is that Fox News and Trump and the rest of the Republican Party are addicted to the Clintons and are largely responsible for their continued prominence in the press. In fact, they may just be what Hillary is most thankful for during this Thanksgiving holiday.

Find us on Google+
Advertisement:

Rachel Maddow Grabs Another Weekly Win From Fox News and Floundering Sean Hannity

A few weeks ago Fox News had to realign their schedule due to all the sexual perverts being terminated. First they lost Bill O’Reilly, and then Eric Bolling. They also lost Megyn Kelly, who was a victim of the sexual abuse from both O’Reilly and Fox News CEO Roger Ailes. These scandals gutted most of the network’s primetime lineup. Today they are left with newcomers Tucker Carlson and Laura Ingraham.

Rachel Maddow

Sean Hannity is the lone holdover and he’s not not exactly holding his own. For one thing, his support for the pedophile Republican senate candidate in Alabama, Roy Moore, is costing him advertisers (see Stop Hannity). His fear and desperation resulting from that caused a major meltdown on Sunday as revealed in a series of hysterical tweets. But his problems don’t end there.

Last week Rachel Maddow pulled off another ratings victory over her new competition. Not that they are competing for the same viewers, but having a Nielsen win during your time period is an important factor in the television marketplace. Maddow’s strength in the ratings against the biggest draw on Fox News is a significant development and a dire dilemma for Hannity.

Maddow and Hannity actually split the week with each winning two nights (Maddow was preempted on Friday by a special program). However, the average over the four nights favored Maddow. That’s because her wins were with larger margins, and where she came in second it was close. All of this points to the weakness of Hannity’s program despite being the top rated show on Fox.

Maddow’s success has had a positive effect on the rest of MSNBC’s primetime. The Last Word with Lawrence O’Donnell took on Fox’s new Laura Ingraham show and beat her three out of four nights. The same was true for The Eleventh Hour with Brian Williams in it’s battle with another new entry for Fox, Fox News @ Night. The only weak spot for MSNBC is All In with Chris Hayes. But although it isn’t delivering big audience numbers, it has become a sort of Emmy magnet. Hopefully over time viewers will appreciate the high quality of the show and tune in more.

As for Fox, clearly their replacement programs are not performing particularly well. But the bigger problem is that the cornerstone of the schedule, Hannity, is not only failing to maintain the network’s long-time dominance, but it’s also less viable financially as its advertisers fall away. In their last quarterly report, Fox News disappointed stockholders with a seventeen percent drop in ad revenue.

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

Fox’s troubles are not going to go away anytime soon. Their audience shows signs of weariness with knee-jerk, right-wing propaganda. Some of them want to know what is actually happening in the world, not the Fox News manufactured version of it. And the glassy-eyed ultra-conservatives are starting to drift off to other news outlets like Breitbart that aim to out flank Fox from the right. Even the efforts of Donald Trump, who has been feverishly hyping Fox, have not helped. It’s likely that the fate of Fox News and Trump are going to be tightly bound together in a Titanic sinking. We just have to wait until the iceberg (Russia? Mueller? Sex crimes?) takes its inevitable toll.


Sean Hannity Unleashes His Inner-Trump In a Full-Psycho, All-Caps Twitter Rant

The surest sign that someone is becoming unmoored from what’s left of their sanity is an all-caps upchuck on Twitter. It signals the impending collapse of mental stability along with a sense of grave desperation. And that’s precisely the state of mind that must be burdening Sean Hannity of Fox News.

Donald Trump Sean Hannity

In the past few weeks Hannity has been the subject of an advertiser backlash due to his repugnant support for the pedophile Republican candidate for senate in Alabama, Roy Moore. His knee-jerk affinity for a man who has been accused of serious sexual misconduct by multiple women has proven too much for many of his commercial sponsors.

The campaign to inform advertisers of the risks of being associated with Hannity (Stop Hannity) is being advanced by Angelo Carusone, president of Media Matters for America. So Hannity has focused his outrage on Carusone in the most deranged manner he can: a series of aimless, insulting, dishonest outbursts on Twitter. In this online tantrum, Hannity baselessly accuses Carusone of being an anti-Semitic, homophobic, racist. For example:

https://twitter.com/seanhannity/status/932247467697102849

There is so much wrong with that tweet it’s hard to know where to begin. Let’s start with the fact that Carusone is gay and his husband is Jewish. So there goes the homophobic, anti-Semitic allegations. Hannity offers no proof whatsoever of any racism on Carusone’s part. Additionally, Hannity directs this tweet to CNN and its media correspondent, Brian Stelter, asking why they would support those heinous behaviors that don’t actually exist. And one has to wonder what made Hannity think that anyone at CNN would take his criticisms seriously considering his relentless bashing of the network as “Fake News.” Finally, Hannity ended his tweet with a link to fake account on Twitter pretending to be Carusone (here is his real account).

Exacerbating the lunacy of this tweet is the fact that Hannity posted it five times in five minutes. The exact same message (although he swapped in different photos), one after another. After he got that out of system he continued his tirade with a tweet asserting that Media Matters “is atrocious as they are the most anti free speech, pro censorship group in America.” Consistent with right-wing doctrine, Hannity regards free speech as a one-way principle. He can say whatever bullcrap he wants, but no one else can reply or disagree. If they do it’s an attack on his constitutional rights.

Sean Hannity has always been an ultra-rightist shill for the GOP (Greedy One Percent). But since the election of Donald Trump he has devolved into the Fox News version of Alex Jones. He’s become America’s preeminent conspiracy theorist and hate monger. His manic idolatry of all things Trump has made him a favorite of the President who, it’s reported, calls him almost daily. CNN’s Jeffrey Toobin has observed that their relationship has resulted in what he calls “the Sean Hannity Presidency.” “The only response Donald Trump has to any political event now,” Toobin notes, “is identical to that of Sean Hannity and Fox News.”

Indeed, it is impossible to distinguish any difference between Trump’s ignorant, unhinged rhetoric, and that of Hannity (or Tucker Carlson, or Laura Ingraham, or Jesse Watters, or the loonies on Fox and Friends). The only question is, is Trump the president Fox News created, or is Fox News the PR division of the Trump administration?

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

Angelo Carusone was interviewed Sunday on CNN’s Reliable Sources. Watch it here:
https://youtu.be/Vh0lKAoVL2M


Trump-Fluffing Fox News Host Actually Says ‘There Are No Allegations Against the President’

The Age of Alternative Facts is in full swing. Donald Trump’s administration has ushered in era that unabashedly traffics in verifiably false information and deliberate deceit. They are literally proud of their ability to disseminate lies and they do so even after the lie has been revealed.

Maria Bartiromo Fox

However, they could not do it alone. Fortunately for Trump et al, they have an alleged “news” network that is just as brazen in its embrace of falsehoods as Trump. Fox News recently fortified its already ultra-biased lineup with known Friends of Don who are happy to distort reality on his behalf. The network appears to be digging in as a response to the clouds of doom hovering over the White House in the shape of Russia.

Fox also has another propaganda spewing channel that serves the interests of the President. The Fox Business Network pretends to be a financial news outlet, but its programs are just as politically slanted as anything you’d see on the Fox News mothership. A crystal clear example of that came on Friday during a segment on Mornings with Maria featuring the “Money Honey” (her own promotional tag that she sought to trademark), Maria Bartiromo (video below). In this exchange with former Deputy Secretary of Labor, Christopher Lu, Bartiromo gives Trump absolution for his past sexual crimes and misdemeanors:

Lu: As your own network has reported there are now, I think, eight or nine women who have made allegations against Roy Moore. There is probably an equal number who have made allegations against the President. […]
Bartiromo: Just to be clear, there are no allegations against the President.
Lu: There are allegations against Donald Trump from an earlier time.
Bartiromo: He said during the campaign that wasn’t true. In fact, didn’t he say also that, you know, all of this will come to light and there will be a lawsuit? I mean… we’re talking about a situation where we have a picture with the guy’s hands on her breasts.

No allegations against the President? Has she been in a coma? There are at least sixteen women who have come forward with credible allegations of Trump’s sexual harassment and/or abuse. See this video that features many of them describing his misconduct in their own words. Even Trump’s press secretary acknowledged the allegations. Although she bizarrely claimed that they should not be investigated because he denied them. That’s a peculiar legal position that implies that once a suspect denies the charges, the matter should be dropped.

Bartiromo seems to be taking the same position with her remarks about Trump’s denials. And what point she is trying to make with her reference to Trump’s threatened lawsuits is a complete mystery. It certainly doesn’t prove innocence. Especially since Trump chickened out and never followed through on the threat. Also notable is Bartiromo’s assertion that there is a picture showing Sen. Al Franken’s hands on a woman’s breasts. However, the picture clearly shows that he is not touching her, but pretending to and mugging for the camera.

Bartiromo then literally stutters through an attempted justification of her ludicrous denial of documented events. She ends up awkwardly complaining that it’s an apples to oranges comparison. And she’s right. There is a single accuser against Franken, who has been a frequent guest on Sean Hannity’s Fox News show, and whose charges mainly describe bad attempts at humor. While there are at least sixteen accusers against Trump who all describe behavior that is abusive and probably illegal. Apples and oranges.

Bartiromo was once considered a credible financial journalist. But since her move from CNBC to the Fox family she has transformed into just another right-wing shill. Her recent interview of Trump was widely ridiculed as an embarrassing exercise in sucking up. And now she has taken her hackery to the next level with comments that totally contradict reality.

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


HUH? WH Press Sec Says Trump’s Sexual Abuse Shouldn’t Be Investigated Because He Denies It

The more Donald Trump and his flagrantly dishonest administration diverge from reality, the harder it is for them to maintain any semblance of coherence. Their lies just keep getting more absurd, which requires ever more ludicrous justifications and defenses. That state of affairs was perfectly illustrated Friday morning when Trump’s press secretary, Sarah Huckabee-Sanders, was asked to comment about the allegations against Sen. Al Franken.

Sarah Huckabee-Sanders

The question put to Huckabee-Sanders sought an explanation for why Trump’s history of sexual harassment and abuse should be dismissed while Franken is being subjected to harsh criticism from all sides. After all, There is just one accuser against Franken, but at least sixteen against Trump. [See all sixteen in this moving video that features Trump’s victims in their own words]. What’s more, the allegations against Franken are closer to bad humor and disrespect than to harassment. The incidents described occurred in public with witnesses and clear, but misguided, comedic intentions. Actual sexual abusers generally seek out privacy to commit their heinous acts.

Trump has been uncharacteristically silent with regard to the allegations against Republican senate candidate Roy Moore. The White House said that he doesn’t have time to respond to every news item. But that excuse didn’t seem to apply when it came to Franken. Trump managed to find the time to tweet this:

Let’s set aside Trump’s typically infantile name-calling, his misspelling of “Frankenstein,” and his baseless assumptions about additional photos. The fact that he could post this message despite his own repugnant record of gross, and potentially criminal, behavior, shows astonishing hypocrisy and self-deception. And that psychological impairment appears to be contagious. Take, for instance, this exchange during Friday’s White House press briefing (video below):

Reporter: If it’s fair to investigate Al Franken in the allegation made by his accuser, is it also fair to investigate this president and the allegations of sexual misconduct made against him by more than a dozen women?
Huckabee-Sanders: Look, I think that this was covered pretty extensively during the campaign. We addressed that then. The American people, I think, spoke very loud and clear when they elected this president.
Reporter: But how is this different?
Huckabee-Sanders: I think in one case specifically, Sen. Franken has admitted wrongdoing and the President hasn’t. I think that’s a very clear distinction.

Indeed, that’s a very clear distinction. But not in the way she thinks. The fact that Franken has admitted wrongdoing and apologized makes the need for an investigation less imperative. Why probe something that isn’t in dispute? Conversely, Trump’s stubborn denials and attacks on his accusers should make an investigation necessary to resolve the discrepancies between Trump’s version of events and those of the sixteen women he allegedly abused. In effect, Huckabee-Sanders just made the case for initiating an investigation of Trump. Thanks, Sarah.

And just for the record, the American people spoke very loud and clear when they gave Hillary Clinton three million more votes than Trump got. And his approval ratings from day one of his presidency have been historically low. Polls even show that a plurality of voters favor impeaching Trump. So there’s that.

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


And What About Trump, the Sexual-Predator-in-Chief: This Must-See Video Needs to Go Viral

For several weeks the issue of harassment and abuse of women has taken center stage. It is something that is long overdue. Women have had to suffer in silence and fear as more powerful associates took advantage of them. It’s a big step forward that they are being paid attention to now and that there are consequences for the perpetrators. Well, some of them.

Donald Trump

Harvey Weinstein has lost his job and his company. Kevin Spacey and Louis C.K. are now pariahs in their industry. GOP senate candidate Roy Moore, is still hanging on, but is being abandoned by more of his own supporters everyday. However, there is a notable omission among the ranks of sleazeballs who have grossly abused women who trusted them. Donald Trump appears to be getting away with his despicable and criminal behavior.

Trump’s abusive acts have been well known for some time. He even admitted to criminal sexual assault in the video from Access Hollywood. But he was elected president anyway by so-called “family values” voters who dismissed his contemptible conduct in favor of rank party politics. And he has the full support of Fox News, a network whose corporate culture virtually encourages sexual harassment. Now Brave New Films has produced a video that compiles sixteen of Trump’s accusers describing the acts committed against them. It’s a moving presentation that needs to be seen by as many people as possible:

Brave New Films has a website that hosts this video and makes the point that no one should be excused for such heinous behavior. It occurs by aberrant men in every walk of life, every industry, and every political party. And justice must be served on an equal basis without favoritism. As is pointed out on the website: “[O]ur current president isn’t immune to being held accountable.” That ought to mean that if other perpetrators lose their status and position, so too should Donald Trump.

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

Allowing Trump to remain in the White House sends a terrible message to all Americans, particularly women and girls. If Trump isn’t impeached for obstruction of justice, collusion with Russia, financial corruption, undermining the free press, or being a pathological liar and malignant narcissist, then his sexual depravity and criminality should be more than reason enough.

Find us on Google+
Advertisement:

Fox News Flack Donald Trump Tries to Save Sean Hannity’s Fast Sinking Program

Following an embarrassing “Make America Gag Again” tour of Asia, Donald Trump slinked back into the White House and immediately took up his Twitter machine to regale in his own wonderfulness. Having achieved nothing of significance, while kowtowing to foreign adversaries, the President needed to sing his own praises because no one else with any credibility was going to do it.

Trump Hannity

However, he has not neglected his primary role in public service since pretending to engage in it. As a candidate and an alleged president, Trump has spent more time promoting his PR department (aka Fox News) than any other “official” duty. Fox News has benefited greatly from this arrangement, scoring millions of dollars worth of free advertising. For example, for just one program, Fox and Friends, Trump has tweeted or retweeted 142 times since the beginning of his campaign. And the “Curvy Couch” potatoes were among his first tweets upon returning to the U.S. Note that most of Trump’s Twitter activity is to promote something he recently saw on Fox. This one is promoting something that has yet to air. Apparently they are sharing their programming schedule with him in advance of broadcast:

Trump also wanted his Twitter followers to know how much he suffered while travelling the world. The itinerary that he pitifully regarded as “almost physically impossible” had the added torture of having to watch something other than relentlessly fawning Fox News coverage (i.e. real news):

What’s more, Trump gave a bigly shout out to his most devoted cheerleader on Fox, Sean Hannity. He retweeted this celebration of Hannity’s ratings:

This is the clearest sign that Hannity is big trouble. He has been losing advertisers at a rapid clip since coming out in support of the pedophile Republican running for the senate in Alabama, Roy Moore. The seventeen percent ad revenue slump at Fox News is evidence of the disastrous impact Hannity is having on the network. Consequently, Trump was called in to help plug the leak. But there are some serious problems with the help he’s providing.

First of all, the positive ratings tweet that Trump retweeted is two weeks old. It doesn’t represent the whole picture of Hannity’s ratings performance. He has been frequently beaten by MSNBC’s Rachel Maddow. The most recent ratings for this past Monday show Maddow trouncing Hannity. No wonder Trump didn’t post something more timely.

Furthermore, the Twitter user Trump retweeted identifies himself as a media analyst, but his account was created less than three months ago and has only sixty-nine tweets. He follows only two Twitter accounts: Sean Hannity and Rachel Maddow. He’s also a writer for the ultra-rightist web rag, American Thinker. And somehow Trump found a rotting two week old tweet from this nobody and saw fit to relay it to his glassy-eyed disciples.

Hannity must be hanging by a thread. When Fox News fired Bill O’Reilly it wasn’t because of the tens of millions of dollars that they had to pay out to multiple women who O’Reilly harassed and/or abused. Fox was cool with that. It was because his advertisers had ditched the program and it was no longer financially viable. That’s what Hannity is facing now. That’s why Trump is contributing, in his lame way, to Hannity’s rescue. Even Hannity recognizes that he’s sinking fast. Tuesday night he did a double back flip to throw Roy Moore under the bus:

Trump’s post-Asia tweetstorm was typical self-promotion and lies. It conveyed nothing of value to the American people. As usual he is just consumed with himself and fails to do any of the hard work of governing. He complains about being forced (by whom?) to watch CNN and spews endless praises for his pals at Fox. Yet he insists that he doesn’t have time to watch TV (which he also did five months ago). And in all of that Tweeting he left out any updates to this tweet from two days ago:

He must have forgotten what his “major statement” was. Maybe he’s picked up whatever virus caused Jeff Sessions to forget so much of his recent past with Russians. Or Maybe Trump’s aging and distorted memory is just incapable of functioning anymore.

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


Pathetic: Trump is Relying on His Warped Imagination to Convince Himself That He’s Popular

The historically low approval ratings for Donald Trump are no longer news. It is a state of affairs that is cemented in the public zeitgeist as this President continues to flounder. The American people have made up their minds that he is an offensive blowhard whose policies reek of bigotry, ignorance, greed, and narcissism. That’s a recipe for catastrophe and given his obstinance and inability to learn or repent, there is little hope that anything will change.

As an illustration of just how blinded Trump is to reality, he just posted a tweet bragging about his approval ratings. That’s right, he’s managed to find something positive about being the worst president in history. However his tweet reveals signs of a mental collapse on several points:

Let’s break that down. First of all, Trump is praising Rasmussen Reports as “One of the most accurate polls.” Anyone with knowledge of Rasmussen knows that his reputation as a pollster is toxic. His results are notoriously over-weighted in favor of Republicans and conservatives. The experts at FiveThirtyEight give him a C+, which is generous. Rasmussen polls are conducted by robocalls, a methodology that is widely discredited amongst statisticians. The only reason for his survey company to exist is to provide biased data to wingnut “news” operations and pundits.

Secondly, Trump dismisses all other polls as “fake news.” It’s his typical way of avoiding any facts that don’t exalt him as the beloved Messiah he envisions himself to be. The fact that almost every poll taken by reputable survey organizations place Trump in the thirties is an affirmation of their accuracy. But Trump pulls his MAGA hat down over his eyes and plugs his fingers in his ears to prevent any exposure to the sad truth that he’s universally despised.

Thirdly, Trump drops one of his famous “some people” diversions into the mix. If there is any poll putting Trump’s favorability in the fifties he should be able to cite it. Not even the ultra-right Rasmussen goes there. The only voices articulating those numbers are in Trump’s head.

Finally, if Trump is so pleased with Rasmussen’s survey results he should probably make a more complete presentation of them. Then people would know that his forty-six percent approval rating has already dropped two points to forty-four. His disapproval is at fifty-four percent, hardly anything to boast about. Even worse, Rasmussen tracks his ‘Strongly Disapprove” rating which sits at forty-five percent. That compares to his “Strongly Approve” rating at a pitiful twenty-eight percent. According to Rasmussen, that gives him a negative seventeen percent approval index.

Donald Trump

These are the dismal numbers that got Trump so excited he had to get on the Twitter machine and rejoice. But the only thing these numbers reveal is the depths of his psychological impairment. And his celebration of how much America hates him is just another reason he needs to be removed from office and confined to a padded cell.

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


Desperation in Trump Land: AG Considering a Special Counsel to Investigate Hillary Clinton

There is now definitive proof that Donald Trump is stomping around the Oval Office in a white-hot panic. Whether it is Special Counsel Robert Mueller, a newly energized media, or pressure from his Kremlin handlers, Trump is clearly nervous that the truth is getting closer to daylight. Or at least that someone is getting closer to the truth that Trump wants to conceal.

Jeff Sessions Hillary Clinton

We know that Trump’s anxiety is at fever pitch because of the news just out about what’s going on at the Justice Department. His bootlicking attorney general, Jeff Sessions, has heard the call from his master and is giving consideration to a long sought objective of the President. Specifically the realization of the glassy-eyed rally chant “Lock Her Up.” According to reports:

“Attorney General Jeff Sessions is leaving open the possibility that a special counsel could be appointed to look into Hillary Clinton, Clinton Foundation dealings and a uranium deal during the Obama administration among other matters.”

In a letter to the House Judiciary Committee, a Justice Department official says Sessions has directed senior federal prosecutors to evaluate concerns raised by Republican lawmakers. The letter says the prosecutors will recommend whether an investigation is merited.”

The whole initiative is the manifestation of delusions harbored by right-wing scam mongers. There have already been numerous investigations into these matters that found no hint of wrongdoing. Despite years of baseless allegations, the Clinton Foundation remains a respected charity that has received the highest scores from philanthropic ratings organizations. The Uranium One matter has been repeatedly debunked by fact checkers.

Trump undoubtedly is buoyed by the ultra-conservatives that dominate the Republican Party and hunger for Clinton’s blood. Many have tried to push the DOJ and Trump to punish the former Secretary of State (and current grandma in Chappaqua). And of course Fox News is contributing to the lynch mob mentality. Sean Hannity has virtually given up his entire show to it. And he isn’t alone. Tucker Carlson, Laura Ingraham, and the “Curvy Couch” potatoes of Fox and Friends are all in. Fox’s Jeanine Pirro even met with Trump to urge him to proceed with a Clinton prosecution.

But there are other reasons that consideration of persecuting Clinton is ludicrous and brazenly dishonest. For one thing, if Sessions intends to direct his staff to recommend whether an investigation is merited, he will be violating his statement made under oath to Congress:

“Sessions said he had made comments during the ‘contentious’ campaign about Clinton’s use of the email server and her family’s charitable foundation that could place his objectivity in question.”

“‘I believe the proper thing for me to do would be to recuse myself from any questions involving those kind of investigations that involve Secretary Hillary Clinton,’ the Alabama Republican told senators on the Judiciary Committee.”

That’s an unambiguous promise by Sessions to recuse himself from any Clinton investigations. But his stated consideration of appointing a second special counsel overtly breaches that promise. In addition to Sessions’ prior statements, Trump also expressed his disinterest in pursuing any Clinton queries. this what he said last year on the subject:

However, like pretty much everything Trump says, it will eventually be contradicted by something else that Trump says. More recently he has frantically returned to his obsession with Clinton and has been behaving like the tin-horn dictator he aspires to be. Here he is openly and improperly beseeching his Justice Department to go after Clinton despite not feeling strongly about it.

Legal experts will note that Trump’s pressuring the Justice Department violates long-standing protocol to insure the independence of the department. He has no more business asking for investigations or special counsels than he does firing them. It is a blatant abuse of power and potentially impeachable obstruction of justice.

The fact that Sessions now appears to be caving to Trump’s demands to abuse his legal power and prosecute a former political rival speaks to the fear that must be enveloping the White House. He must feel the warm breath of justice on his neck. And he thinks it’s a proper response to attack his political adversaries with the full force of the government he so incompetently leads. That’s what happens in authoritarian regimes ruled by self-absorbed tyrants. The United States must not allow that to happen here. Donald Trump must be impeached before he’s allowed to inflict more harm on the nation – and the world.

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


Does Fox News Defense of a Pedophile Surprise You? It Shouldn’t, and Here’s Why

Under ordinary circumstance, the senate campaign in Alabama would never have been elevated into a national news story. But almost everything that has happened in the era of Donald Trump has been strikingly abnormal. That makes Alabama’s election to replace Trump’s Attorney General, Jeff Sessions, an unlikely media phenomenon.

Donald Trump

Republican candidate Roy Moore is engulfed in a sex scandal involving multiple women, including a girl just fourteen years old. He is denying all the charges, but his denials don’t come close to assuaging the graphic claims of his accusers. A generation ago this campaign would have been shut down in a hot minute. But what Moore has going for him is a well-heeled propaganda machine that masquerades as a news network: Fox News.

On first blush, it may seem beyond the pale that even a devoted practitioner of media bias would hesitate to defend a sexual predator and pedophile. However, we are talking about Fox News here. They have a history with sexual deviants who were shielded, and even promoted, within their own dysfunctional corporate family. With that record of toxic behavior, it’s no wonder that Fox News can so fiercely support someone like Moore. Take a look at who they built their reputation supporting:

  • CEO Roger Ailes
  • Star host Bill O’Reilly
  • President Bill Shine
  • Host Eric Bolling
  • Fox Business host Charles Payne
  • Fox Sports President Jamie Horowitz
  • Vice-President of Fox News Latino, Francisco Cortes

All of these people were powerful and prominent Fox News big shots who were touched by scandals involving sexual harassment and/or abuse. Most of them were terminated in disgrace, although even then some were rewarded by Fox with rich severance packages. And in addition to the loss of those sleazeballs, Fox News also said farewell to some of the female talent who resigned after being victimized. They include Gretchen Carlson, Megyn Kelly, Laurie Dhue, Andrea Tantaros, Rudi Bakhtiar, and Julie Roginsky.

And let’s not forget the most notorious Fox News pervert: Donald Trump. The President was himself a Fox News attraction before joining with Vladimir Putin to steal an election. Trump was featured in a regular segment of Fox and Friends called “Mondays with Trump.” Now he is the White House affiliate of the Fox News propaganda factory. And his past is fraught with credible allegations of sexual abuse that is equal to, or worse than, any of that committed by the offenders above. He should be driven from office on those grounds alone, never mind the evidence of treason. Yet he’s getting a free pass from Fox News as well as all the other news organizations.

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

As for Fox, with its abundant experience it is the perfect place to go for reputation rehabilitation if you’re caught soliciting minor girls. And shills like Sean Hannity have already had plenty of practice in this nauseating field of public relations. So it’s no surprise that Moore has burrowed into the protective arms of his Fox News protectors. And there he will reside until his sleazy past becomes impossible to escape. But even then Fox will be be frantically proclaiming his innocence and victimhood while blaming it all on Hillary Clinton or Barack Obama. It’s what they do.