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Worthless Media
WELCOME TO WORTHLESS MEDIA WHERE THE FAILURE OF REAL JOURNALISM IS
EXPOSED
apr 21, 2018
“The media serve, and propagandize on behalf of, the powerful societal interests that control and finance them. The representatives of these interests have important agendas and principles that they want to advance, and they are well positioned to shape and constrain media policy.”
–Chomsky
Media lo-lites
(source: politicus usa, raw story, alternet, newshounds)
*WATCH: Alex Jones flips out and claims Sandy Hook lawsuit is part of a globalist plot to assassinate him
*MSNBC’s Morning Joe throws a truthbomb: ‘Paul Ryan won’t tell the truth about Trump because he wants big, fat paycheck’
*Fox & Friends host drops hint to Trump that bombing Syria would be ‘a bigger story than Comey’s book’
*Fox News anchor Chris Wallace slaps Comey for getting ‘b*tchy’ about Trump’s personal appearance
*Hannity Tries To Make The Stormy Daniels Story About Bill Clinton
What does Sean Hannity do when the whole country is fixated on Stormy Daniels, a porn star who could bring down Donald Trump? Why, pretend to cover the story by making it about the media coverage of Bill Clinton’s sex scandals nearly 20 years ago.
*Fox & Friends Likes Charlottesville Neo-Nazi March Better Than March For Our Lives
As disturbing as it is to consider in 2018, Fox & Friends has been more sympathetic to the Neo-Nazis marching in Charlottesville last summer than to the young March for Our Lives activists who took to the streets across the country last weekend.
*Greg Gutfeld: Torture Is ‘An Asset To Be Treasured’
Fox News host Greg Gutfeld spent nearly six minutes singing the praises of torture – and smearing those who oppose it as unpatriotic. In between bits of Gutfeld’s idea of comedy.
Fox News’ Kremlin Ties Go Much Deeper Than Just Sean Hannity
By John R. Schindler - observer
04/19/18 3:38pm
A few days ago, I addressed the troubling issue of Sean Hannity, the Fox News star, and his hidden ties to the Trump administration. With the revelation that Hannity shares an attorney with the president—namely the disgraced Michael Cohen, who’s now a key player in the Department of Justice’s investigation of the White House and its secret Kremlin links—it’s high time to ask exactly what sort of “journalism” Hannity is pushing at Fox News.
Moreover, when coupled with my previous revelations of Hannity’s “reporting” of rancid disinformation scripted by Russian intelligence as “news,” plus his clandestine relationship with WikiLeaks—said by President Donald Trump’s own CIA director to be a Kremlin front—Fox News is making itself a player not just in the Trump administration, but a target of any fair and balanced investigation of it. As I stated:
With the revelation that Cohen has been Hannity’s attorney, in some fashion that neither of them wished to disclose, it is even more imperative that Fox News explain why it keeps a Kremlin propagandist without any semblance of professional ethics on the air. If they fail to do so, that network is exposing itself to counterintelligence scrutiny as well.
To the surprise of nobody who has observed that network in action, Fox News quickly decided that Hannity’s ethical missteps regarding Cohen were no big deal. Per its statement on the case: “We have reviewed the matter and spoken to Sean and he continues to have our full support.” Nevertheless, the network’s own media analyst explained that Hannity was clearly in the wrong, ethically speaking, by commenting many times on-air about Cohen, invariably favorably, without divulging his relationship with him.
Other reports are even less favorable to the network and its ethical standards, rather lack thereof. Vanity Fair this week quoted anonymous staffers at the network about what it termed the Hannity-induced “crisis”: “This is the most embarrassing thing I’ve ever seen,” stated one. Another added, “This is bad. It violates every rule of journalism.”
That said, it’s not difficult to divine why Hannity remains on the air. He’s a headliner, the network’s most prominent talker and nighttime draw for its pro-Trump viewers. Moreover, Hannity’s astonishingly close relationship with this White House, viewed negatively as almost a parody of “access journalism” by outsiders, seems to only bolster his position at Fox News. As The Washington Postreported this week, Hannity talks frequently with Trump, serving as a senior advisor to the Oval Office and playing a pivotal role in the administration’s media war against Trump’s enemies—above all Special Counsel Robert Mueller and his investigation of the president’s Kremlin ties. The Fox News star “basically has a desk” in the White House, explained one presidential adviser to the Post.
Normal journalism, this is not. Since I’ve castigated the mainstream media for its fawning over President Barack Obama, allowing his staff to play them like an instrument, particularly regarding foreign policy, let me add that the Hannity case outstrips even those low-points in terms of journalistic integrity. Clearly Fox News is happy to let its leading on-air personality act as a propagandist for Trump. It’s high time for the network to remove “news” from its title if Hannity is its idea of journalism.
Worse, Fox News seems untroubled by the fact that Hannity isn’t just a Trump superfan-cum-consigliere; he also has disturbing ties to the Kremlin and its agents. Since Hannity’s pushing of Russian-scripted disinformation on Americans has been reported for nearly a year, the network can’t say it didn’t know. Fox News therefore is making the unsettling—not to mention potentially politically hazardous—choice to serve as a witting cut-out for the Kremlin’s lie machine.
Perhaps there are no surprises here at all, however. This week, Latvian Public Broadcasting reported an astonishing story about how Fox News operates in their country. As unmasked by a local investigation, Russian-language versions of the network’s programming that are broadcast in Latvia aren’t merely translated; they’re edited for content in a pro-Kremlin direction. Per the report, which cites internal Fox News regulations:
Translators have to follow Russian subtitling guidelines requiring glossing over or ‘softening content’ concerning accidents, homosexual relationships, ‘anti-Russian propaganda,’ narcotics, extremist activities and suicides. For instance, the translators are instructed to ‘soften’ all negative language about the Russian military and space program, policies of the Russian president and government, while positive texts about same-sex relationships have to be made more generalized so they could be attributed to relationships of any kind.
Let’s be perfectly clear here: Fox News is requiring its content being broadcast in a country that is a member of both NATO and the European Union to be edited to be more pleasing to the regime of Vladimir Putin. This is no small matter in Latvia, a country of only two million people, more than one-quarter of whom are ethnic Russians. That minority is habitually exploited by Moscow in its propaganda aimed at NATO’s eastern frontier. For years, the Kremlin has waged an aggressive, full-spectrum information war against Latvia, attempting to foment divisions in that country by making its Russian minority feel alienated and more loyal to Moscow than to Riga. In extremis, many Latvians worry, this noxious disinformation campaign could be a precursor to an actual Russian invasion—an event that has happened several times in the small country’s history.
Fox News is unambiguously on the side of the Kremlin in this information struggle against little Latvia—and the entire Western world. It’s not just what Fox News is beaming into the Baltic states that merits scrutiny. The network’s reports on Latvia for Western audiences—for instance one last month pushed blatant Russian propaganda and cited the Centre for Research on Globalization, a notorious Kremlin disinformation front—likewise deserve investigation.
Above all, Americans should ask what Fox News’ relationship with Putin’s regime actually is. It’s one thing to allow known disinformateurs like Sean Hannity to push Russian-made lies on air; it’s even worse to give Moscow editorial control over its “reporting.” If Fox News is skewing the news in a pro-Kremlin direction for political effect in a free and democratic society like Latvia, they can do it anywhere.
Moreover, when coupled with my previous revelations of Hannity’s “reporting” of rancid disinformation scripted by Russian intelligence as “news,” plus his clandestine relationship with WikiLeaks—said by President Donald Trump’s own CIA director to be a Kremlin front—Fox News is making itself a player not just in the Trump administration, but a target of any fair and balanced investigation of it. As I stated:
With the revelation that Cohen has been Hannity’s attorney, in some fashion that neither of them wished to disclose, it is even more imperative that Fox News explain why it keeps a Kremlin propagandist without any semblance of professional ethics on the air. If they fail to do so, that network is exposing itself to counterintelligence scrutiny as well.
To the surprise of nobody who has observed that network in action, Fox News quickly decided that Hannity’s ethical missteps regarding Cohen were no big deal. Per its statement on the case: “We have reviewed the matter and spoken to Sean and he continues to have our full support.” Nevertheless, the network’s own media analyst explained that Hannity was clearly in the wrong, ethically speaking, by commenting many times on-air about Cohen, invariably favorably, without divulging his relationship with him.
Other reports are even less favorable to the network and its ethical standards, rather lack thereof. Vanity Fair this week quoted anonymous staffers at the network about what it termed the Hannity-induced “crisis”: “This is the most embarrassing thing I’ve ever seen,” stated one. Another added, “This is bad. It violates every rule of journalism.”
That said, it’s not difficult to divine why Hannity remains on the air. He’s a headliner, the network’s most prominent talker and nighttime draw for its pro-Trump viewers. Moreover, Hannity’s astonishingly close relationship with this White House, viewed negatively as almost a parody of “access journalism” by outsiders, seems to only bolster his position at Fox News. As The Washington Postreported this week, Hannity talks frequently with Trump, serving as a senior advisor to the Oval Office and playing a pivotal role in the administration’s media war against Trump’s enemies—above all Special Counsel Robert Mueller and his investigation of the president’s Kremlin ties. The Fox News star “basically has a desk” in the White House, explained one presidential adviser to the Post.
Normal journalism, this is not. Since I’ve castigated the mainstream media for its fawning over President Barack Obama, allowing his staff to play them like an instrument, particularly regarding foreign policy, let me add that the Hannity case outstrips even those low-points in terms of journalistic integrity. Clearly Fox News is happy to let its leading on-air personality act as a propagandist for Trump. It’s high time for the network to remove “news” from its title if Hannity is its idea of journalism.
Worse, Fox News seems untroubled by the fact that Hannity isn’t just a Trump superfan-cum-consigliere; he also has disturbing ties to the Kremlin and its agents. Since Hannity’s pushing of Russian-scripted disinformation on Americans has been reported for nearly a year, the network can’t say it didn’t know. Fox News therefore is making the unsettling—not to mention potentially politically hazardous—choice to serve as a witting cut-out for the Kremlin’s lie machine.
Perhaps there are no surprises here at all, however. This week, Latvian Public Broadcasting reported an astonishing story about how Fox News operates in their country. As unmasked by a local investigation, Russian-language versions of the network’s programming that are broadcast in Latvia aren’t merely translated; they’re edited for content in a pro-Kremlin direction. Per the report, which cites internal Fox News regulations:
Translators have to follow Russian subtitling guidelines requiring glossing over or ‘softening content’ concerning accidents, homosexual relationships, ‘anti-Russian propaganda,’ narcotics, extremist activities and suicides. For instance, the translators are instructed to ‘soften’ all negative language about the Russian military and space program, policies of the Russian president and government, while positive texts about same-sex relationships have to be made more generalized so they could be attributed to relationships of any kind.
Let’s be perfectly clear here: Fox News is requiring its content being broadcast in a country that is a member of both NATO and the European Union to be edited to be more pleasing to the regime of Vladimir Putin. This is no small matter in Latvia, a country of only two million people, more than one-quarter of whom are ethnic Russians. That minority is habitually exploited by Moscow in its propaganda aimed at NATO’s eastern frontier. For years, the Kremlin has waged an aggressive, full-spectrum information war against Latvia, attempting to foment divisions in that country by making its Russian minority feel alienated and more loyal to Moscow than to Riga. In extremis, many Latvians worry, this noxious disinformation campaign could be a precursor to an actual Russian invasion—an event that has happened several times in the small country’s history.
Fox News is unambiguously on the side of the Kremlin in this information struggle against little Latvia—and the entire Western world. It’s not just what Fox News is beaming into the Baltic states that merits scrutiny. The network’s reports on Latvia for Western audiences—for instance one last month pushed blatant Russian propaganda and cited the Centre for Research on Globalization, a notorious Kremlin disinformation front—likewise deserve investigation.
Above all, Americans should ask what Fox News’ relationship with Putin’s regime actually is. It’s one thing to allow known disinformateurs like Sean Hannity to push Russian-made lies on air; it’s even worse to give Moscow editorial control over its “reporting.” If Fox News is skewing the news in a pro-Kremlin direction for political effect in a free and democratic society like Latvia, they can do it anywhere.
Sean Hannity’s Ties to Two More Trump-Connected Lawyers
The Fox News host denies that Michael Cohen was ever his lawyer—but Hannity was represented by a pair of legal advisers who also have close links to the president.
ROSIE GRAY - the atlantic
2:57 PM ET
Sean Hannity has had no shortage of lawyers. In court on Monday, his name was disclosed as the third “mystery client” of Donald Trump’s personal lawyer Michael Cohen. Though Hannity says he was never actually Cohen’s client, he does appear to have used the legal services of other well-connected Trump-world lawyers in a different matter a year ago.
On May 25, 2017, KFAQ, a radio station based in Tulsa, Oklahoma, received a cease-and-desist letter signed by two lawyers for Hannity: Victoria Toensing and Jay Alan Sekulow. Toensing’s signature sits above her name and that of her husband Joseph E. diGenova, the members of diGenova and Toensing LLP, who are identified as “Counsel for Sean Hannity,” according to a copy of the letter obtained by The Atlantic. Sekulow is also identified in the letter page as a “Counsel for Sean Hannity.”
Sekulow is now the only known personal attorney for President Trump working full-time on the response to Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s inquiry. Sekulow recently announced that diGenova and Toensing had been hired to join him, before reversing course. The letter to the radio station was sent before Sekulow joined Trump’s team.
The letter was sent in response to accusations against Hannity made by the controversial conservative activist Debbie Schlussel. During an appearance on the Pat Campbell show on KFAQ last April, Schlussel said Hannity had been “creepy” towards her and had invited her to his hotel room.
Hannity responded at the time by calling the allegations “100 percent false and a complete fabrication,” and said that he had hired lawyers to plan a response. “This letter provides notice that Ms. Schlussel’s statements are false and defamatory,” the letter read. “Continued publication will result in further exposure to liability because of continued harm to Mr. Hannity’s impeccable reputation.”
On Monday, Schlussel said she remembered that the radio station where she made the remarks had received a legal letter afterwards, but she didn’t know who the lawyer was. Reached by phone on Tuesday, Toensing acknowledged that “at that time” she was acting as Hannity’s lawyer but wouldn’t comment on whether she still represents him.
“I’ve just learned in the press that anybody who is Sean Hannity’s lawyer is going to be blasted so I think this phone call is over,” Toensing said. “I’m wondering what attorney-client privilege means to anybody. I don’t say who my clients are, sometimes I do, and many times, most of the time, I do not.”
Sekulow, diGenova, and Toensing have frequently appeared on Hannity’s program; diGenova appeared on the show as recently as Monday night. Asked for comment, Hannity sent a text consisting of NewsBusters and Daily Caller links to stories about ethical misconduct in the mainstream media and declined to offer further comment. “I don’t have time for these silly questions,” he said.
Sekulow didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment. After publication of this story, a Fox News spokesperson sent an example of Hannity mentioning Sekulow as his lawyer. On May 23, 2017, two days before the letter was sent, he said on his show that Sekulow had “done legal work for me in the past.”
The addition of Toensing and diGenova to Trump’s legal team was recently announced, but then swiftly reversed. “The President is disappointed that conflicts prevent Joe diGenova and Victoria Toensing from joining the President’s Special Counsel legal team,” Sekulow said in a statement at the time. “However, those conflicts do not prevent them from assisting the President in other legal matters. The President looks forward to working with them.”
When the Cohen news came out, Hannity insisted that Cohen had not really been his lawyer and that he had only asked him for advice regarding real estate. “I never retained his services, I never received an invoice, I never paid Michael Cohen for legal fees,” Hannity said on his show on Monday night. “I did have occasional brief conversations with Michael Cohen—he’s a great attorney—about legal questions I had where I was looking for input and perspective. My discussions with Michael Cohen never rose to any level that I needed to tell anyone that I was asking him questions and to be absolutely clear, they never involved any matter, any—sorry to disappoint so many—matter between me, a third party, a third group, at all.”
On Monday night’s show, Hannity was criticized by the retired Harvard Law professor Alan Dershowitz, who told him he should have disclosed the relationship to his viewers when discussing Cohen-related matters. “I’m on his show from time to time and I just thought I had an obligation to tell him I think it would have been appropriate for him to disclose that …” Dershowitz told me. “When I’m on the show, I want to be on the show with someone who satisfies journalistic standards, and that would satisfy journalistic standards.”
But it’s unclear whether Fox News, which gives Hannity broad autonomy, cares about these conflicts. It’s already well-known that Hannity champions the president publicly and advises him privately, although the breadth of his relationships with attorneys linked to the president wasn’t known before this week. “I think he’s totally fine,” one Fox source who was not authorized to speak publicly said on Monday. “I take Sean at his word that nothing’s there” in the relationship with Cohen, a former Hannity employee who also spoke on the condition of anonymity said, adding that Hannity normally uses David Limbaugh as his lawyer and agent for “absolutely everything.”
“While Fox News was unaware of Sean Hannity’s informal relationship with Michael Cohen and was surprised by the announcement in court yesterday, we have reviewed the matter and spoken to Sean and he continues to have our full support,” the network said in a statement on Tuesday.
“I don’t want to get into it because I haven’t talked to Sean about whether he wants me to say anything publicly, as a lawyer I’d better not,” Limbaugh said, but added that he is “proud of my relationship with him.” Limbaugh said he had had nothing to do with anything related to the Schlussel matter.
A Fox News spokesperson didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment.
On May 25, 2017, KFAQ, a radio station based in Tulsa, Oklahoma, received a cease-and-desist letter signed by two lawyers for Hannity: Victoria Toensing and Jay Alan Sekulow. Toensing’s signature sits above her name and that of her husband Joseph E. diGenova, the members of diGenova and Toensing LLP, who are identified as “Counsel for Sean Hannity,” according to a copy of the letter obtained by The Atlantic. Sekulow is also identified in the letter page as a “Counsel for Sean Hannity.”
Sekulow is now the only known personal attorney for President Trump working full-time on the response to Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s inquiry. Sekulow recently announced that diGenova and Toensing had been hired to join him, before reversing course. The letter to the radio station was sent before Sekulow joined Trump’s team.
The letter was sent in response to accusations against Hannity made by the controversial conservative activist Debbie Schlussel. During an appearance on the Pat Campbell show on KFAQ last April, Schlussel said Hannity had been “creepy” towards her and had invited her to his hotel room.
Hannity responded at the time by calling the allegations “100 percent false and a complete fabrication,” and said that he had hired lawyers to plan a response. “This letter provides notice that Ms. Schlussel’s statements are false and defamatory,” the letter read. “Continued publication will result in further exposure to liability because of continued harm to Mr. Hannity’s impeccable reputation.”
On Monday, Schlussel said she remembered that the radio station where she made the remarks had received a legal letter afterwards, but she didn’t know who the lawyer was. Reached by phone on Tuesday, Toensing acknowledged that “at that time” she was acting as Hannity’s lawyer but wouldn’t comment on whether she still represents him.
“I’ve just learned in the press that anybody who is Sean Hannity’s lawyer is going to be blasted so I think this phone call is over,” Toensing said. “I’m wondering what attorney-client privilege means to anybody. I don’t say who my clients are, sometimes I do, and many times, most of the time, I do not.”
Sekulow, diGenova, and Toensing have frequently appeared on Hannity’s program; diGenova appeared on the show as recently as Monday night. Asked for comment, Hannity sent a text consisting of NewsBusters and Daily Caller links to stories about ethical misconduct in the mainstream media and declined to offer further comment. “I don’t have time for these silly questions,” he said.
Sekulow didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment. After publication of this story, a Fox News spokesperson sent an example of Hannity mentioning Sekulow as his lawyer. On May 23, 2017, two days before the letter was sent, he said on his show that Sekulow had “done legal work for me in the past.”
The addition of Toensing and diGenova to Trump’s legal team was recently announced, but then swiftly reversed. “The President is disappointed that conflicts prevent Joe diGenova and Victoria Toensing from joining the President’s Special Counsel legal team,” Sekulow said in a statement at the time. “However, those conflicts do not prevent them from assisting the President in other legal matters. The President looks forward to working with them.”
When the Cohen news came out, Hannity insisted that Cohen had not really been his lawyer and that he had only asked him for advice regarding real estate. “I never retained his services, I never received an invoice, I never paid Michael Cohen for legal fees,” Hannity said on his show on Monday night. “I did have occasional brief conversations with Michael Cohen—he’s a great attorney—about legal questions I had where I was looking for input and perspective. My discussions with Michael Cohen never rose to any level that I needed to tell anyone that I was asking him questions and to be absolutely clear, they never involved any matter, any—sorry to disappoint so many—matter between me, a third party, a third group, at all.”
On Monday night’s show, Hannity was criticized by the retired Harvard Law professor Alan Dershowitz, who told him he should have disclosed the relationship to his viewers when discussing Cohen-related matters. “I’m on his show from time to time and I just thought I had an obligation to tell him I think it would have been appropriate for him to disclose that …” Dershowitz told me. “When I’m on the show, I want to be on the show with someone who satisfies journalistic standards, and that would satisfy journalistic standards.”
But it’s unclear whether Fox News, which gives Hannity broad autonomy, cares about these conflicts. It’s already well-known that Hannity champions the president publicly and advises him privately, although the breadth of his relationships with attorneys linked to the president wasn’t known before this week. “I think he’s totally fine,” one Fox source who was not authorized to speak publicly said on Monday. “I take Sean at his word that nothing’s there” in the relationship with Cohen, a former Hannity employee who also spoke on the condition of anonymity said, adding that Hannity normally uses David Limbaugh as his lawyer and agent for “absolutely everything.”
“While Fox News was unaware of Sean Hannity’s informal relationship with Michael Cohen and was surprised by the announcement in court yesterday, we have reviewed the matter and spoken to Sean and he continues to have our full support,” the network said in a statement on Tuesday.
“I don’t want to get into it because I haven’t talked to Sean about whether he wants me to say anything publicly, as a lawyer I’d better not,” Limbaugh said, but added that he is “proud of my relationship with him.” Limbaugh said he had had nothing to do with anything related to the Schlussel matter.
A Fox News spokesperson didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment.
putin's bitch #2
Former NSA analyst connects the dots between Sean Hannity, Julian Assange and Russian spies
Travis Gettys - raw story
17 APR 2018 AT 10:17 ET
Sean Hannity finds himself in a professionally problematic situation after he was outed in federal court as the mystery third client of President Donald Trump’s personal attorney Michael Cohen — but he could potentially be in deeper trouble.
The Fox News broadcaster neglected to inform viewers of his personal ties to Cohen despite repeatedly discussing the attorney and the FBI raid on his home and office, which likely includes evidence related to Hannity’s discussions with him.
It’s not clear what evidence relating to Hannity could have been turned up by the search warrant, or whether those documents or recordings would be of any interest to investigators.
But former National Security analyst John Schindler and others have been warning for months that Hannity has helped the president spread Russian propaganda through his nightly Fox News broadcasts and daily syndicated radio program.
Schindler claims the Fox News broadcaster has been under counterintelligence investigation for his links to the Kremlin, which appear to run through WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange.
“We need to ask questions about Hannity’s relationship with the Kremlin, considering his track record of pushing rancid Russian disinformation on his Fox News program,” Schindler said. “Hannity is a propagandist, not a journalist, by his own admission, but if he has served as a witting conduit for lies crafted by Russian spies, Fox News needs to explain why they are airing Kremlin Active Measures aimed at the American public and calling it ‘news.'”
“Intelligence Community friends have told me that Sean Hannity has been under counterintelligence investigation for some time, based on his clandestine ties to Moscow,” he added. “Now we know why.”
Hannity played a key role in promoting a conspiracy theory about slain Democratic National Committee staffer Seth Rich, whose family has sued Fox News over a since-retracted May 2017 article posted on the network’s website.
Fox News Malia Zimmerman and frequent Fox News guest Ed Butowsky reported that Rich had leaked thousands of internal DNC emails that U.S. intelligence and law enforcement agencies believe were stolen by Russian hackers.
Schindler says the conspiracy theory originated just days after Rich’s murder on the shadowy conspiracy website Sorcha Faal — which claimed the 27-year-old was assassinated by a “hit team” linked to Hillary Clinton.
The website claimed its source was Russia’s Foreign Intelligence Service, or SVR, and Schindler noted this “classic Kremlin disinformation” campaign was quickly picked up by Trump allies such as Hannity, Assange and Republican activist Roger Stone.
The Rich family’s lawsuit claims Trump himself reviewed drafts of the Fox News story last year before it was broadcast and published online.
WikiLeaks, which dumped the stolen emails online during the 2016 campaign, offered a $20,000 reward for information leading to the conviction of Rich’s killer — and Assange reportedly has been in contact with Hannity, Stone and Donald Trump Jr.
Stone appeared on the InfoWars radio show — where host Alex Jones also promoted the Rich conspiracy — the same day he sent an email claiming to have dined with Assange, and predicted “devastating” disclosures against the Clinton Foundation.
No evidence has turned up yet that Hannity and Assange were in contact during the campaign, but the WikiLeaks founder reached out to a parody Twitter account for the Fox News broadcaster that suggests the two men may have been in contact before — and Hannity has invited Assange to host his radio program.
Texas writer Dell Gilliam set up the phony account in January after Hannity’s legitimate account was briefly deleted after cryptically tweeting the phrase “Form Submission 1649 | #Hannity.”
Assange contacted the account, apparently believing it was the broadcaster, and offered to set up a meeting over “other channels” to send “some news about Warner.”
About a week later, Fox News broke into its evening programming to report on text messages between Sen. Mark Warner (D-VA), the top Democrat on the Senate’s Russia investigation, and a lobbyist linked to a Russian oligarch.
The texts had been reviewed months earlier by Republicans, who saw nothing suspicious about them, and Ed Henry, the Fox News reporter who broke the story, insisted WikiLeaks and Hannity played no role in his reporting.
Hannity hyped the report on his radio program, hours before Henry’s report came out, and Trump tweeted an attack on Warner’s credibility hours after it aired.
“Wow! -Senator Mark Warner got caught having extensive contact with a lobbyist for a Russian oligarch. Warner did not want a ‘paper trail’ on a ‘private’ meeting (in London) he requested with Steele of fraudulent Dossier fame. All tied into Crooked Hillary,” he tweeted.
Hannity also played a leading role in hyping a misleading memo written by Rep. Devin Nunes (R-CA) intended to discredit the special counsel probe, which was also promoted by Russian bots on social media.
The Fox News broadcaster neglected to inform viewers of his personal ties to Cohen despite repeatedly discussing the attorney and the FBI raid on his home and office, which likely includes evidence related to Hannity’s discussions with him.
It’s not clear what evidence relating to Hannity could have been turned up by the search warrant, or whether those documents or recordings would be of any interest to investigators.
But former National Security analyst John Schindler and others have been warning for months that Hannity has helped the president spread Russian propaganda through his nightly Fox News broadcasts and daily syndicated radio program.
Schindler claims the Fox News broadcaster has been under counterintelligence investigation for his links to the Kremlin, which appear to run through WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange.
“We need to ask questions about Hannity’s relationship with the Kremlin, considering his track record of pushing rancid Russian disinformation on his Fox News program,” Schindler said. “Hannity is a propagandist, not a journalist, by his own admission, but if he has served as a witting conduit for lies crafted by Russian spies, Fox News needs to explain why they are airing Kremlin Active Measures aimed at the American public and calling it ‘news.'”
“Intelligence Community friends have told me that Sean Hannity has been under counterintelligence investigation for some time, based on his clandestine ties to Moscow,” he added. “Now we know why.”
Hannity played a key role in promoting a conspiracy theory about slain Democratic National Committee staffer Seth Rich, whose family has sued Fox News over a since-retracted May 2017 article posted on the network’s website.
Fox News Malia Zimmerman and frequent Fox News guest Ed Butowsky reported that Rich had leaked thousands of internal DNC emails that U.S. intelligence and law enforcement agencies believe were stolen by Russian hackers.
Schindler says the conspiracy theory originated just days after Rich’s murder on the shadowy conspiracy website Sorcha Faal — which claimed the 27-year-old was assassinated by a “hit team” linked to Hillary Clinton.
The website claimed its source was Russia’s Foreign Intelligence Service, or SVR, and Schindler noted this “classic Kremlin disinformation” campaign was quickly picked up by Trump allies such as Hannity, Assange and Republican activist Roger Stone.
The Rich family’s lawsuit claims Trump himself reviewed drafts of the Fox News story last year before it was broadcast and published online.
WikiLeaks, which dumped the stolen emails online during the 2016 campaign, offered a $20,000 reward for information leading to the conviction of Rich’s killer — and Assange reportedly has been in contact with Hannity, Stone and Donald Trump Jr.
Stone appeared on the InfoWars radio show — where host Alex Jones also promoted the Rich conspiracy — the same day he sent an email claiming to have dined with Assange, and predicted “devastating” disclosures against the Clinton Foundation.
No evidence has turned up yet that Hannity and Assange were in contact during the campaign, but the WikiLeaks founder reached out to a parody Twitter account for the Fox News broadcaster that suggests the two men may have been in contact before — and Hannity has invited Assange to host his radio program.
Texas writer Dell Gilliam set up the phony account in January after Hannity’s legitimate account was briefly deleted after cryptically tweeting the phrase “Form Submission 1649 | #Hannity.”
Assange contacted the account, apparently believing it was the broadcaster, and offered to set up a meeting over “other channels” to send “some news about Warner.”
About a week later, Fox News broke into its evening programming to report on text messages between Sen. Mark Warner (D-VA), the top Democrat on the Senate’s Russia investigation, and a lobbyist linked to a Russian oligarch.
The texts had been reviewed months earlier by Republicans, who saw nothing suspicious about them, and Ed Henry, the Fox News reporter who broke the story, insisted WikiLeaks and Hannity played no role in his reporting.
Hannity hyped the report on his radio program, hours before Henry’s report came out, and Trump tweeted an attack on Warner’s credibility hours after it aired.
“Wow! -Senator Mark Warner got caught having extensive contact with a lobbyist for a Russian oligarch. Warner did not want a ‘paper trail’ on a ‘private’ meeting (in London) he requested with Steele of fraudulent Dossier fame. All tied into Crooked Hillary,” he tweeted.
Hannity also played a leading role in hyping a misleading memo written by Rep. Devin Nunes (R-CA) intended to discredit the special counsel probe, which was also promoted by Russian bots on social media.
Facebook’s Tracking Of Non-Users Sparks Broader Privacy Concerns
Zuckerberg said that, for security reasons, the company collects “data of people who have not signed up for Facebook.”
David Ingram - huff post
04/15/2018 09:19 am ET
SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) - Concern about Facebook Inc’s respect for data privacy is widening to include the information it collects about non-users, after Chief Executive Mark Zuckerberg said the world’s largest social network tracks people whether they have accounts or not.
Privacy concerns have swamped Facebook since it acknowledged last month that information about millions of users wrongly ended up in the hands of political consultancy Cambridge Analytica, a firm that has counted U.S. President Donald Trump’s 2016 electoral campaign among its clients.
Zuckerberg said on Wednesday under questioning by U.S. Representative Ben Luján that, for security reasons, Facebook also collects “data of people who have not signed up for Facebook.”
Lawmakers and privacy advocates immediately protested the practice, with many saying Facebook needed to develop a way for non-users to find out what the company knows about them.
“We’ve got to fix that,” Representative Luján, a Democrat, told Zuckerberg, calling for such disclosure, a move that would have unclear effects on the company’s ability to target ads. Zuckerberg did not respond. On Friday Facebook said it had no plans to build such a tool.
Critics said that Zuckerberg has not said enough about the extent and use of the data. “It’s not clear what Facebook is doing with that information,” said Chris Calabrese, vice president for policy at the Center for Democracy & Technology, a Washington advocacy group.
COOKIES EVERYWHERE
Facebook gets some data on non-users from people on its network, such as when a user uploads email addresses of friends. Other information comes from “cookies,” small files stored via a browser and used by Facebook and others to track people on the internet, sometimes to target them with ads.
“This kind of data collection is fundamental to how the internet works,” Facebook said in a statement to Reuters.
Asked if people could opt out, Facebook added, “There are basic things you can do to limit the use of this information for advertising, like using browser or device settings to delete cookies. This would apply to other services beyond Facebook because, as mentioned, it is standard to how the internet works.”
Facebook often installs cookies on non-users’ browsers if they visit sites with Facebook”like” and “share” buttons, whether or not a person pushes a button. Facebook said it uses browsing data to create analytics reports, including about traffic to a site.
The company said it does not use the data to target ads, except those inviting people to join Facebook.
TARGETING FACEBOOK
Advocates and lawmakers say they are singling out Facebook because of its size, rivaled outside China only by Alphabet Inc’s Google, and because they allege Zuckerberg was not forthcoming about the extent and reasons for the tracking.
“He’s either deliberately misunderstanding some of the questions, or he’s not clear about what’s actually happening inside Facebook’s operation,” said Daniel Kahn Gillmor, a senior staff technologist at the American Civil Liberties Union.
Zuckerberg, for instance, said the collection was done for security purposes, without explaining further or saying whether it was also used for measurement or analytics, Gillmor said, adding that Facebook had a business incentive to use the non-user data to target ads.
Facebook declined to comment on why Zuckerberg referred to security only.
Gillmor said Facebook could build databases on non-users by combining web browsing history with uploaded contacts. Facebook said on Friday that it does not do so.
The ACLU is pushing U.S. lawmakers to enact broad privacy legislation including a requirement for consent prior to data collection.
The first regulatory challenge to Facebook’s practices for non-users may come next month when a new European Union law, known as the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), takes effect and requires notice and consent prior to data collection.
At a minimum, “Facebook is going to have to think about ways to structure their technology to give that proper notice,” said Woodrow Hartzog, a Northeastern University professor of law and computer science.
Facebook said in its statement on Friday, “Our products and services comply with applicable law and will comply with GDPR.”
The social network would be wise to recognize at least a right to know, said Michael Froomkin, a University of Miami law professor.
“If I’m not a Facebook user, I ought to have a right to know what data Facebook has about me,” Froomkin said.
Privacy concerns have swamped Facebook since it acknowledged last month that information about millions of users wrongly ended up in the hands of political consultancy Cambridge Analytica, a firm that has counted U.S. President Donald Trump’s 2016 electoral campaign among its clients.
Zuckerberg said on Wednesday under questioning by U.S. Representative Ben Luján that, for security reasons, Facebook also collects “data of people who have not signed up for Facebook.”
Lawmakers and privacy advocates immediately protested the practice, with many saying Facebook needed to develop a way for non-users to find out what the company knows about them.
“We’ve got to fix that,” Representative Luján, a Democrat, told Zuckerberg, calling for such disclosure, a move that would have unclear effects on the company’s ability to target ads. Zuckerberg did not respond. On Friday Facebook said it had no plans to build such a tool.
Critics said that Zuckerberg has not said enough about the extent and use of the data. “It’s not clear what Facebook is doing with that information,” said Chris Calabrese, vice president for policy at the Center for Democracy & Technology, a Washington advocacy group.
COOKIES EVERYWHERE
Facebook gets some data on non-users from people on its network, such as when a user uploads email addresses of friends. Other information comes from “cookies,” small files stored via a browser and used by Facebook and others to track people on the internet, sometimes to target them with ads.
“This kind of data collection is fundamental to how the internet works,” Facebook said in a statement to Reuters.
Asked if people could opt out, Facebook added, “There are basic things you can do to limit the use of this information for advertising, like using browser or device settings to delete cookies. This would apply to other services beyond Facebook because, as mentioned, it is standard to how the internet works.”
Facebook often installs cookies on non-users’ browsers if they visit sites with Facebook”like” and “share” buttons, whether or not a person pushes a button. Facebook said it uses browsing data to create analytics reports, including about traffic to a site.
The company said it does not use the data to target ads, except those inviting people to join Facebook.
TARGETING FACEBOOK
Advocates and lawmakers say they are singling out Facebook because of its size, rivaled outside China only by Alphabet Inc’s Google, and because they allege Zuckerberg was not forthcoming about the extent and reasons for the tracking.
“He’s either deliberately misunderstanding some of the questions, or he’s not clear about what’s actually happening inside Facebook’s operation,” said Daniel Kahn Gillmor, a senior staff technologist at the American Civil Liberties Union.
Zuckerberg, for instance, said the collection was done for security purposes, without explaining further or saying whether it was also used for measurement or analytics, Gillmor said, adding that Facebook had a business incentive to use the non-user data to target ads.
Facebook declined to comment on why Zuckerberg referred to security only.
Gillmor said Facebook could build databases on non-users by combining web browsing history with uploaded contacts. Facebook said on Friday that it does not do so.
The ACLU is pushing U.S. lawmakers to enact broad privacy legislation including a requirement for consent prior to data collection.
The first regulatory challenge to Facebook’s practices for non-users may come next month when a new European Union law, known as the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), takes effect and requires notice and consent prior to data collection.
At a minimum, “Facebook is going to have to think about ways to structure their technology to give that proper notice,” said Woodrow Hartzog, a Northeastern University professor of law and computer science.
Facebook said in its statement on Friday, “Our products and services comply with applicable law and will comply with GDPR.”
The social network would be wise to recognize at least a right to know, said Michael Froomkin, a University of Miami law professor.
“If I’m not a Facebook user, I ought to have a right to know what data Facebook has about me,” Froomkin said.
Showing They Learned Nothing From Iraq, Corporate Media Help Beat War Drums for Trump Attack on Syria
Thursday, April 12, 2018
By Jake Johnson, Common Dreams | Report - truthout
With the US's major corporate cable outlets -- particularly so-called liberal networks like MSNBC -- continuing to uncritically provide generals and lawmakers a massive platform to beat the drums of war as President Donald Trump inches closer to launching a military attack on Syria, critics have concluded that the US media has clearly learned nothing from the crucial role it played in cheerleading for the Bush administration's catastrophic invasion of Iraq in 2003.
"The push for escalation on TV is overwhelming," Cenk Uyger, host of The Young Turks, observed in a tweet on Wednesday, reacting to the numerous instances this week of television hosts opining on Trump's "military options" with the likes of Iraq War supporter and retired Gen. Barry McCaffrey while refusing to question the underlying rationale for or legality of unilateral military action.
"It's incredible how readily the cable news channels have politicians on pushing for war in Syria with almost no questions asked about how disastrous it might be or the so-called evidence," Uyger added. "They pretended to learn lessons from Iraq but have actually learned nothing."
As media critic Simon Maloy lamented in a column at Media Matters, the behavior of much of the corporate media "indicates how alarmingly comfortable much of the mainstream press is with the idea that the president can just up and decide to initiate military hostilities whenever, wherever, and for whatever reason -- even when there is no actual reason at all."
Almost entirely absent from the prevailing discussion of Syria on US cable networks in recent days -- which one journalist described as "a parade of one war hawk after another" -- has been any mention of the alternatives to military action.
Exemplifying this total exclusion of peaceful options was a segment on Wednesday by MSNBC's Ali Velshi, who provided his viewers with a quick rundown of the possible actions the president could take in Syria -- from "small strike" to "more damaging strikes" to "strikes on Russian and Iranian bases" -- without ever mentioning one major choice: no airstrikes at all.
Trevor Timm, executive director of the Freedom of the Press Foundation, argued on Twitter that the corporate media's relentless elevation of pro-war voices since the Assad regime was accused of carrying out a chemical attack on Sunday is "making John Bolton's wildest dreams come true."
As Common Dreams reported, Bolton officially took over as Trump's national security adviser on Monday as the White House weighed whether to strike Syria militarily.
"In his first week on the job, everyone is calling for a new war," Timm noted.
Trevor Timm✔
@trevortimm
Replying to @trevortimm
The cognitive dissonance in the media the last two weeks is really something to behold.
Last week: John Bolton is a maniac whose going to dangerously lead Trump to start a new war.
This week: The Trump admin *must* launch a new war in John Bolton’s first few days on the job.
10:05 PM - Apr 10, 2018
With outlets like CNN and MSNBC leaving a massive vacuum by refusing to raise even the most basic questions about the Trump administration's push for military action in Syria, Tucker Carlson of Fox News has been one of the few cable hosts to criticize the rationale for war and offer a platform to an anti-war voice.
In an appearance on Carlson's primetime show Tuesday night, The Intercept's Glenn Greenwald argued that it is the "standard tactic" of the corporate media to smear opponents of US wars in an effort to shut down legitimate questions about the rush toward military action.
"This climate arises that you're just supposed to cheer when it comes time to drop bombs on other countries, not ask whether there's evidence to justify it, not ask whether it will do any good, not ask whether it will kill any civilians," Greenwald said. "And if you do ask one of those questions it means you're on the side of America's enemies. It's an incredibly authoritarian tactic that gets used to suppress debate."
"The push for escalation on TV is overwhelming," Cenk Uyger, host of The Young Turks, observed in a tweet on Wednesday, reacting to the numerous instances this week of television hosts opining on Trump's "military options" with the likes of Iraq War supporter and retired Gen. Barry McCaffrey while refusing to question the underlying rationale for or legality of unilateral military action.
"It's incredible how readily the cable news channels have politicians on pushing for war in Syria with almost no questions asked about how disastrous it might be or the so-called evidence," Uyger added. "They pretended to learn lessons from Iraq but have actually learned nothing."
As media critic Simon Maloy lamented in a column at Media Matters, the behavior of much of the corporate media "indicates how alarmingly comfortable much of the mainstream press is with the idea that the president can just up and decide to initiate military hostilities whenever, wherever, and for whatever reason -- even when there is no actual reason at all."
Almost entirely absent from the prevailing discussion of Syria on US cable networks in recent days -- which one journalist described as "a parade of one war hawk after another" -- has been any mention of the alternatives to military action.
Exemplifying this total exclusion of peaceful options was a segment on Wednesday by MSNBC's Ali Velshi, who provided his viewers with a quick rundown of the possible actions the president could take in Syria -- from "small strike" to "more damaging strikes" to "strikes on Russian and Iranian bases" -- without ever mentioning one major choice: no airstrikes at all.
Trevor Timm, executive director of the Freedom of the Press Foundation, argued on Twitter that the corporate media's relentless elevation of pro-war voices since the Assad regime was accused of carrying out a chemical attack on Sunday is "making John Bolton's wildest dreams come true."
As Common Dreams reported, Bolton officially took over as Trump's national security adviser on Monday as the White House weighed whether to strike Syria militarily.
"In his first week on the job, everyone is calling for a new war," Timm noted.
Trevor Timm✔
@trevortimm
Replying to @trevortimm
The cognitive dissonance in the media the last two weeks is really something to behold.
Last week: John Bolton is a maniac whose going to dangerously lead Trump to start a new war.
This week: The Trump admin *must* launch a new war in John Bolton’s first few days on the job.
10:05 PM - Apr 10, 2018
With outlets like CNN and MSNBC leaving a massive vacuum by refusing to raise even the most basic questions about the Trump administration's push for military action in Syria, Tucker Carlson of Fox News has been one of the few cable hosts to criticize the rationale for war and offer a platform to an anti-war voice.
In an appearance on Carlson's primetime show Tuesday night, The Intercept's Glenn Greenwald argued that it is the "standard tactic" of the corporate media to smear opponents of US wars in an effort to shut down legitimate questions about the rush toward military action.
"This climate arises that you're just supposed to cheer when it comes time to drop bombs on other countries, not ask whether there's evidence to justify it, not ask whether it will do any good, not ask whether it will kill any civilians," Greenwald said. "And if you do ask one of those questions it means you're on the side of America's enemies. It's an incredibly authoritarian tactic that gets used to suppress debate."
Liberal blogger horrified to discover she was duped by Russian trolls on Tumblr to help Trump
Martin Cizmar - raw story
05 APR 2018 AT 08:44 ET
While Facebook and Twitter have been rightly bashed for providing fertile ground to Russian trolls seeking to influence the 2016 election, Tumblr has largely flown under the radar.
That’s despite the fact that the site now knows it was home to an large and active group of Russian trolls, mainly focused on impersonating black activists to stir long-simmering resentments. The trolls used accounts called things like 4mysquad, postingwhileblack and yanbig.
A woman who ran a popular pro-Hillary Tumblr is now speaking up about her realization for Salon.
“I’ve been doing digital strategy in politics and advocacy for more than 11 years, and what I saw online in 2016 didn’t make sense to me,” she wrote. “Spend more than 10 minutes on any online platform and you got the sense that every American voter thought Hillary Clinton was an evil criminal, something the election results (in which Clinton won the popular vote) didn’t bear out. Hillary Clinton might have been an unpopular candidate, but she wasn’t hated by everyone. It didn’t add up.”
Ryan points out that her posts were averaging 200,000 engagements a week, and she figures she may have reblogged divisive comments that were written by Russian trolls. She definitely had trolls in her comments.
“Essentially, I gave Russian propagandists an outlet,” she writes. “I unknowingly allowed them to use something I’d created online in their active measures campaign. I was duped.”
The most interesting thing about Tumblr, Ryan notes, is that because of the way reblogging works, it’s possible to trace exactly how the trolls operated. Unlike other tech companies that have tried to cover their tracks, Tumblr posted a list of all the accounts it identified and left the chains up intact so people can go back and see what happened and how.
“Tumblr waited too long to inform its users, but I appreciate the way the company did it, especially its decision to provide the list of account names and leaving the chains of reblogged content intact,” Ryan writes.
Of course that came after BuzzFeed revealed that trolls were “running wild” on the site in a story that the company refused to comment upon. In that story, a Brooklyn man who ran an account called alwaysbewoke said that he he was fooled by Russian trolls—and very surprised to learn as much.
“There was actually some nuance to the things they were posting. It wasn’t your run of the mill ‘white people are vile’ kind of stuff. It was far more nuanced than that,” said the man, who described himself as a 35-year-old living in Brooklyn.
That’s despite the fact that the site now knows it was home to an large and active group of Russian trolls, mainly focused on impersonating black activists to stir long-simmering resentments. The trolls used accounts called things like 4mysquad, postingwhileblack and yanbig.
A woman who ran a popular pro-Hillary Tumblr is now speaking up about her realization for Salon.
“I’ve been doing digital strategy in politics and advocacy for more than 11 years, and what I saw online in 2016 didn’t make sense to me,” she wrote. “Spend more than 10 minutes on any online platform and you got the sense that every American voter thought Hillary Clinton was an evil criminal, something the election results (in which Clinton won the popular vote) didn’t bear out. Hillary Clinton might have been an unpopular candidate, but she wasn’t hated by everyone. It didn’t add up.”
Ryan points out that her posts were averaging 200,000 engagements a week, and she figures she may have reblogged divisive comments that were written by Russian trolls. She definitely had trolls in her comments.
“Essentially, I gave Russian propagandists an outlet,” she writes. “I unknowingly allowed them to use something I’d created online in their active measures campaign. I was duped.”
The most interesting thing about Tumblr, Ryan notes, is that because of the way reblogging works, it’s possible to trace exactly how the trolls operated. Unlike other tech companies that have tried to cover their tracks, Tumblr posted a list of all the accounts it identified and left the chains up intact so people can go back and see what happened and how.
“Tumblr waited too long to inform its users, but I appreciate the way the company did it, especially its decision to provide the list of account names and leaving the chains of reblogged content intact,” Ryan writes.
Of course that came after BuzzFeed revealed that trolls were “running wild” on the site in a story that the company refused to comment upon. In that story, a Brooklyn man who ran an account called alwaysbewoke said that he he was fooled by Russian trolls—and very surprised to learn as much.
“There was actually some nuance to the things they were posting. It wasn’t your run of the mill ‘white people are vile’ kind of stuff. It was far more nuanced than that,” said the man, who described himself as a 35-year-old living in Brooklyn.
RIGHT-WING MEDIA LOOK AT PARKLAND STUDENT ACTIVISTS AND SEE A REASON TO GUT PUBLIC EDUCATION
Rachel M. Cohen - the intercept
April 4 2018, 4:00 a.m.
WITNESSING WITH HORROR a parade of articulate and smart teenagers speaking confidently about the role of intersectionality in the social movement they ignited, conservative leaders have seized on the explosion of activism launched by Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School students to make the case that so-called government schools — or traditional public schools — are a fundamental threat to their vision of the country. David Hogg and Emma González are all the evidence they need.
“The radical progressive agenda is now basic propaganda in our public school system,” said Mark Levin, a prominent right-wing radio host on his show in March. “These government schools have become propaganda mills. Whether it’s genitalia assignment, bathrooms, and gyms; whether it’s the school lunch program that’s even politicized … radical environmentalism is advanced, capitalism is trashed.”
Levin, who leaned hard into his message that “the purpose” of public education is to indoctrinate students, insisted that public schools have been taken over by liberals and their unions. “Whether it’s the school lunch in the cafeteria, the different plays and musicals that take place, history class, social studies, current events — they push the agenda of the progressives, of the Democratic Party,” he said.
Following the national student walkouts for gun control, United States Parents Involved in Education, a right-wing education activist group, released a statement also blaming the public school curriculum:
Government K-12 schools are teaching politically biased social justice values. Students are taught the faults of America, Christianity, Western Civilization and White Men. Sadly, children are not being taught accurate history of the United States and the reasons for American exceptionalism. They are not being taught the historic facts about hundreds of millions of unarmed people of all races murdered by their own governments in the 20th century. Lack of historical context leads students to believe the only way they can be safe in school is to further restrict and/or take guns away from law abiding Americans. Children deserve better.
Until policy makers implement proven school safety strategies, and until schools stop teaching politically-biased social justice values, the only way parents can raise children safely to be well educated American citizens is to teach at home or in good private schools.
Just days after the Parkland shooting, right-wing radio show host Rush Limbaugh went so far as to say that such tragedies only occur in public schools, not private or religious schools. “That is an inescapable observation,” he said. “It’s true.” A caller on his show offered this by way of explanation: “I mean, there’s almost no rules in the public schools.”
Ted Nugent, a National Rifle Association board member, said last week on the radio that schools and the media are brainwashing students. “The lies from these poor, mushy brained children who have been fed lies and parrot lies, I really feel sorry for them,” said Nugent. “It’s not only ignorant and dangerously stupid — it’s soulless. … I’m afraid to say and it hurts me to say this, but the evidence is irrefutable: They have no soul.”
The condemnation of public schools for their ability to create such dangerous figures as the Parkland students comes at a time when conservatives more broadly are gravitating toward increased support for charter schools, which undercut liberal teacher unions and give schools much more freedom over the curriculum.
The lines between church and state in charter schools are also more complicated — and in some cases blurrier — than in traditional schools. In a post published last month on the website for the Heartland Institute, a right-wing think tank, the author spoke favorably about religious schools and charters, writing, “it’s obvious that the traditional government school system is broken.”
Public opinion polling released over the past year reinforces this idea of a growing partisan divide for charter schools. Paul Peterson, the director of Harvard’s Program on Education Policy and Governance wrote recently, “As late as 2010, members of the two parties did not differ significantly in their opinions about charters. But by 2015, a 20-point gap had opened up, and now it has grown to 30 percentage points: 75 percent of Republicans, but only 45 percent of Democrats.”
A Gallup survey, released in August, found Democratic support for charter schools standing at 48 percent, down from 61 percent in 2012. Republican support, by contrast, held steady at 62 percent. A different nationally representative online survey, released last month by the University of Southern California, showed charter support jumping by 14 percentage points among self-identified Republicans, with no change in support from Democrats.
Far-right conservative attempts to weaken support for public education did not begin with the Parkland massacre. Many advocates for private and religious schools have long framed public schools as dangerous secular institutions. Even this past summer, a young listener called in to Rush Limbaugh’s show to ask why it seems like liberalism has taken over all aspects of public education. Limbaugh responded:
Whenever there is a communist invasion or revolution, the news outlets are the first things seized and then the schools and then health care. … So [leftists] make it an objective to control education, because that’s how they control minds, that’s how they control countries, that’s how they control populations.
But the Parkland students’ efforts have catalyzed a renewed sense of outrage among conservatives, who see students walking out from schools to protest guns, some without consequence, as irrefutable proof of public education’s liberal bias.
“As a former high school teacher, I am shocked at the scope of political indoctrination and partisan manipulation now taking place in middle and high school classrooms,” wrote Tom Tancredo, a former Republican Colorado Congressperson, following the walkouts. “But the breakdown in standards goes beyond the open partisanship of classroom teachers promoting walkouts. School administrators, too, participated in the charade. How else to explain the large number of school buses providing taxpayer-funded transportation to partisan rallies off the campus? How else to explain reports of students being punished for NOT walking out of class and teachers being disciplined for questioning the educational character of the event?”
“The radical progressive agenda is now basic propaganda in our public school system,” said Mark Levin, a prominent right-wing radio host on his show in March. “These government schools have become propaganda mills. Whether it’s genitalia assignment, bathrooms, and gyms; whether it’s the school lunch program that’s even politicized … radical environmentalism is advanced, capitalism is trashed.”
Levin, who leaned hard into his message that “the purpose” of public education is to indoctrinate students, insisted that public schools have been taken over by liberals and their unions. “Whether it’s the school lunch in the cafeteria, the different plays and musicals that take place, history class, social studies, current events — they push the agenda of the progressives, of the Democratic Party,” he said.
Following the national student walkouts for gun control, United States Parents Involved in Education, a right-wing education activist group, released a statement also blaming the public school curriculum:
Government K-12 schools are teaching politically biased social justice values. Students are taught the faults of America, Christianity, Western Civilization and White Men. Sadly, children are not being taught accurate history of the United States and the reasons for American exceptionalism. They are not being taught the historic facts about hundreds of millions of unarmed people of all races murdered by their own governments in the 20th century. Lack of historical context leads students to believe the only way they can be safe in school is to further restrict and/or take guns away from law abiding Americans. Children deserve better.
Until policy makers implement proven school safety strategies, and until schools stop teaching politically-biased social justice values, the only way parents can raise children safely to be well educated American citizens is to teach at home or in good private schools.
Just days after the Parkland shooting, right-wing radio show host Rush Limbaugh went so far as to say that such tragedies only occur in public schools, not private or religious schools. “That is an inescapable observation,” he said. “It’s true.” A caller on his show offered this by way of explanation: “I mean, there’s almost no rules in the public schools.”
Ted Nugent, a National Rifle Association board member, said last week on the radio that schools and the media are brainwashing students. “The lies from these poor, mushy brained children who have been fed lies and parrot lies, I really feel sorry for them,” said Nugent. “It’s not only ignorant and dangerously stupid — it’s soulless. … I’m afraid to say and it hurts me to say this, but the evidence is irrefutable: They have no soul.”
The condemnation of public schools for their ability to create such dangerous figures as the Parkland students comes at a time when conservatives more broadly are gravitating toward increased support for charter schools, which undercut liberal teacher unions and give schools much more freedom over the curriculum.
The lines between church and state in charter schools are also more complicated — and in some cases blurrier — than in traditional schools. In a post published last month on the website for the Heartland Institute, a right-wing think tank, the author spoke favorably about religious schools and charters, writing, “it’s obvious that the traditional government school system is broken.”
Public opinion polling released over the past year reinforces this idea of a growing partisan divide for charter schools. Paul Peterson, the director of Harvard’s Program on Education Policy and Governance wrote recently, “As late as 2010, members of the two parties did not differ significantly in their opinions about charters. But by 2015, a 20-point gap had opened up, and now it has grown to 30 percentage points: 75 percent of Republicans, but only 45 percent of Democrats.”
A Gallup survey, released in August, found Democratic support for charter schools standing at 48 percent, down from 61 percent in 2012. Republican support, by contrast, held steady at 62 percent. A different nationally representative online survey, released last month by the University of Southern California, showed charter support jumping by 14 percentage points among self-identified Republicans, with no change in support from Democrats.
Far-right conservative attempts to weaken support for public education did not begin with the Parkland massacre. Many advocates for private and religious schools have long framed public schools as dangerous secular institutions. Even this past summer, a young listener called in to Rush Limbaugh’s show to ask why it seems like liberalism has taken over all aspects of public education. Limbaugh responded:
Whenever there is a communist invasion or revolution, the news outlets are the first things seized and then the schools and then health care. … So [leftists] make it an objective to control education, because that’s how they control minds, that’s how they control countries, that’s how they control populations.
But the Parkland students’ efforts have catalyzed a renewed sense of outrage among conservatives, who see students walking out from schools to protest guns, some without consequence, as irrefutable proof of public education’s liberal bias.
“As a former high school teacher, I am shocked at the scope of political indoctrination and partisan manipulation now taking place in middle and high school classrooms,” wrote Tom Tancredo, a former Republican Colorado Congressperson, following the walkouts. “But the breakdown in standards goes beyond the open partisanship of classroom teachers promoting walkouts. School administrators, too, participated in the charade. How else to explain the large number of school buses providing taxpayer-funded transportation to partisan rallies off the campus? How else to explain reports of students being punished for NOT walking out of class and teachers being disciplined for questioning the educational character of the event?”
How Ajit Pai’s FCC enables Sinclair’s bad practices
Under Ajit Pai, right-leaning companies like Sinclair are slowly taking over local markets, to the detriment of the consumer.
LUKE BARNES - think progress
APR 3, 2018, 12:34 PM
News anchors being forced to denounce their competition as “fake news.” TV segments described as “must-run” that air a mix of misinformation and pro-government talking points. Contracts that penalize reporters if they quit.
This environment may sound like that of a propaganda outlet but they’re actually conditions gripping reporters and anchors at America’s largest owner of local news stations, Sinclair Broadcast Group. More troubling, that media company is being shielded by the Federal Communications Commission (FCC), under the leadership of conservative FCC Chairman Ajit Pai.
Last week, a promotional script for a must-run segment — shared by KOMO-TV and published by the Seattle Post-Intelligencer, and later reported by ThinkProgress and Deadspin — was leaked, demonstrating how Sinclair forced its news anchors to parrot pro-Trump messages. The revelation sparked renewed concerns about Sinclair’s power over local broadcasters.
Compounding the matter is that fact that Sinclair is actively expanding. The group currently owns 193 stations, and is in talks to acquire Tribune Media Company for $3.9 billion. If approved, it would mean that Sinclair would be able to broadcast into 72 percent of U.S. households — or 87.3 million homes.
Sinclair’s sudden ascendancy to pro-Trump media giant is worrying. But it was only made possible through actions taken by the Republican-controlled FCC under Chairman Pai, who has become conduit through which corporate advocates can fast-track deregulation efforts in telecom and media — often at the expense of the consumer.
Over the last year, Pai and the FCC aggressively pursued rule rollbacks and new policies extremely friendly to big businesses like Sinclair and major telecom providers. Last November, for instance, the FCC laid the groundwork for Sinclair’s merger by repealing a decades-old rule which prevented media companies from merging if it meant fewer than eight independently owned stations remained in a given local market. In October, the FCC also repealed the “main studio rule,” which requires broadcasters to have a studio in the area where they’re transmitting. In practice, this means that major national broadcasters could take over more local stations and beam in select messages from afar — instead of focusing on local news.
Pai defended the decisions, saying that doing so would “open the door to pro-competitive combinations that will strengthen local voices.” He did not mention that the changes would also benefit Sinclair, enabling it to carry out its multi-billion dollar merger with Tribune media unchecked.
In February, it was announced that the FCC’s internal watchdog was investigating whether the repeal had been timed to benefit Sinclair, whose lobbyists have repeatedly corresponded with Pai.
A similar scene played out in December, when the FCC voted along party lines to repeal net neutrality. Pai, a former lawyer for Verizon, said the repeal would restore “a favorable climate for network investment…spurring competition and innovation that benefits consumers.” In reality, the repeal gives huge and unpopular corporations like Verizon, AT&T, and Comcast increased power over what websites consumers can see and which websites are relegated to a lower tier of service.
When Pai was criticized by tech companies for allowing the repeal to take place, he turned on social media giant Twitter, accusing it of silencing conservatives and arguing that it and other social media companies “routinely block or discriminate against content they don’t like.” (It should be noted that Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey willingly tweeted a plea for outside advice in March, citing the platform’s nightmarish moderation policy.)
Over the years, Pai has endeared himself to conservatives so much that he received the NRA’s “Charlton Heston Courage Under Fire Award” at this year’s Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) — despite the net neutrality repeal being staggeringly unpopular among Republican voters.
This environment may sound like that of a propaganda outlet but they’re actually conditions gripping reporters and anchors at America’s largest owner of local news stations, Sinclair Broadcast Group. More troubling, that media company is being shielded by the Federal Communications Commission (FCC), under the leadership of conservative FCC Chairman Ajit Pai.
Last week, a promotional script for a must-run segment — shared by KOMO-TV and published by the Seattle Post-Intelligencer, and later reported by ThinkProgress and Deadspin — was leaked, demonstrating how Sinclair forced its news anchors to parrot pro-Trump messages. The revelation sparked renewed concerns about Sinclair’s power over local broadcasters.
Compounding the matter is that fact that Sinclair is actively expanding. The group currently owns 193 stations, and is in talks to acquire Tribune Media Company for $3.9 billion. If approved, it would mean that Sinclair would be able to broadcast into 72 percent of U.S. households — or 87.3 million homes.
Sinclair’s sudden ascendancy to pro-Trump media giant is worrying. But it was only made possible through actions taken by the Republican-controlled FCC under Chairman Pai, who has become conduit through which corporate advocates can fast-track deregulation efforts in telecom and media — often at the expense of the consumer.
Over the last year, Pai and the FCC aggressively pursued rule rollbacks and new policies extremely friendly to big businesses like Sinclair and major telecom providers. Last November, for instance, the FCC laid the groundwork for Sinclair’s merger by repealing a decades-old rule which prevented media companies from merging if it meant fewer than eight independently owned stations remained in a given local market. In October, the FCC also repealed the “main studio rule,” which requires broadcasters to have a studio in the area where they’re transmitting. In practice, this means that major national broadcasters could take over more local stations and beam in select messages from afar — instead of focusing on local news.
Pai defended the decisions, saying that doing so would “open the door to pro-competitive combinations that will strengthen local voices.” He did not mention that the changes would also benefit Sinclair, enabling it to carry out its multi-billion dollar merger with Tribune media unchecked.
In February, it was announced that the FCC’s internal watchdog was investigating whether the repeal had been timed to benefit Sinclair, whose lobbyists have repeatedly corresponded with Pai.
A similar scene played out in December, when the FCC voted along party lines to repeal net neutrality. Pai, a former lawyer for Verizon, said the repeal would restore “a favorable climate for network investment…spurring competition and innovation that benefits consumers.” In reality, the repeal gives huge and unpopular corporations like Verizon, AT&T, and Comcast increased power over what websites consumers can see and which websites are relegated to a lower tier of service.
When Pai was criticized by tech companies for allowing the repeal to take place, he turned on social media giant Twitter, accusing it of silencing conservatives and arguing that it and other social media companies “routinely block or discriminate against content they don’t like.” (It should be noted that Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey willingly tweeted a plea for outside advice in March, citing the platform’s nightmarish moderation policy.)
Over the years, Pai has endeared himself to conservatives so much that he received the NRA’s “Charlton Heston Courage Under Fire Award” at this year’s Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) — despite the net neutrality repeal being staggeringly unpopular among Republican voters.
Sinclair-owned station revolts, refuses to air ‘must-run’ segment written by pro-Trump ownership
Fox 47 Madison says it's staying true to its commitment to provide viewers with actual news.
MELANIE SCHMITZ - think progress
APR 3, 2018, 11:15 AM
A Sinclair-owned news station in Madison, Wisconsin pushed back against the conservative-leaning media company’s directives this week, saying it refused to air a recent “must-run” propaganda segment highlighting “false news” from competitor stations out of a commitment to its viewers.
“WMSN/FOX47 Madison did not air the Sinclair promotional announcement during our 9pm news this weekend,” a spokesperson for Fox 47 Madison said. “Rather, we stayed true to our commitment to provide our Madison area viewers local news, weather and sports of interest to them.”
In response to questions on Twitter, a Fox 47 spokesperson clarified that the station had not run the segment “at any time.”
Fox 47’s comments were in direct response to recent fallout over a script for a “must-run” segment that was sent to all Sinclair-owned stations last month, which claimed “false news” from competing outlets posed a danger to democracy.
“We’re concerned about the troubling trend of irresponsible, one-sided news stories plaguing our country. The sharing of biased and false news has become all too common on social media. More alarming, some media outlets publish these same fake stories… stories that just aren’t true, without checking facts first,” the script reads, in part. “Unfortunately, some members of the media use their platforms to push their own personal bias and agenda to control ‘exactly what people think’…This is extremely dangerous to a democracy.”
The script was first shared by Seattle’s KOMO-TV and published by the Seattle Post-Intelligencer on Thursday. CNN also detailed the must-run segments earlier in March.
Sinclair has made a practice of airing similar “must-run” segments on its stations over the years, forcing reporters and anchors to parrot misinformation and White House talking points under the guise of real news. Many segments feature former Trump advisers like Boris Epshtyn and Sebastian Gorka rattling off Trump-friendly statements on topics such as extremism, immigration, and free speech. One recent segment also featured propaganda about the so-called “Deep State,” a collection of un-elected government officials who conservative conspiracy theorists believe are somehow attempting to overthrow the administration from the inside.
In December, White House adviser Jared Kushner, the president’s son-in-law, also acknowledged that, during the 2016 election, the Trump campaign struck a deal with Sinclair to obtain favorable coverage in exchange for greater access to the campaign. When confronted about the move, Sinclair’s vice president of news, Scott Livingston, told Politico that the company had offered a similar deal to Trump’s rival, Hillary Clinton, but claimed Clinton had declined the opportunity.
Fox 47 isn’t the only station to be hesitant to run these kinds of canned, propaganda-like segments: on Monday, Fletcher Fischer, business manager and financial secretary of the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers Local 1228, spoke to The Providence Journal and said that the anchors and journalists at stations like local NBC-affiliate WJAR were unhappy with the mandatory scripts, but were afraid to speak out.
“No one in our bargaining unit is happy with the way Sinclair is forcing these must-runs,” Fischer said. “Every time, they get flooded with emails and calls from viewers who hate it. They are in the same boat that every anchor is with Sinclair: If they complain about something, they are gone.”
In Seattle, KOMO employees have also expressed a reluctance to follow orders from the top. “They’re certainly not happy about it,” one employee told the Post-Intelligencer. “It’s certainly a forced thing.”[...]
“WMSN/FOX47 Madison did not air the Sinclair promotional announcement during our 9pm news this weekend,” a spokesperson for Fox 47 Madison said. “Rather, we stayed true to our commitment to provide our Madison area viewers local news, weather and sports of interest to them.”
In response to questions on Twitter, a Fox 47 spokesperson clarified that the station had not run the segment “at any time.”
Fox 47’s comments were in direct response to recent fallout over a script for a “must-run” segment that was sent to all Sinclair-owned stations last month, which claimed “false news” from competing outlets posed a danger to democracy.
“We’re concerned about the troubling trend of irresponsible, one-sided news stories plaguing our country. The sharing of biased and false news has become all too common on social media. More alarming, some media outlets publish these same fake stories… stories that just aren’t true, without checking facts first,” the script reads, in part. “Unfortunately, some members of the media use their platforms to push their own personal bias and agenda to control ‘exactly what people think’…This is extremely dangerous to a democracy.”
The script was first shared by Seattle’s KOMO-TV and published by the Seattle Post-Intelligencer on Thursday. CNN also detailed the must-run segments earlier in March.
Sinclair has made a practice of airing similar “must-run” segments on its stations over the years, forcing reporters and anchors to parrot misinformation and White House talking points under the guise of real news. Many segments feature former Trump advisers like Boris Epshtyn and Sebastian Gorka rattling off Trump-friendly statements on topics such as extremism, immigration, and free speech. One recent segment also featured propaganda about the so-called “Deep State,” a collection of un-elected government officials who conservative conspiracy theorists believe are somehow attempting to overthrow the administration from the inside.
In December, White House adviser Jared Kushner, the president’s son-in-law, also acknowledged that, during the 2016 election, the Trump campaign struck a deal with Sinclair to obtain favorable coverage in exchange for greater access to the campaign. When confronted about the move, Sinclair’s vice president of news, Scott Livingston, told Politico that the company had offered a similar deal to Trump’s rival, Hillary Clinton, but claimed Clinton had declined the opportunity.
Fox 47 isn’t the only station to be hesitant to run these kinds of canned, propaganda-like segments: on Monday, Fletcher Fischer, business manager and financial secretary of the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers Local 1228, spoke to The Providence Journal and said that the anchors and journalists at stations like local NBC-affiliate WJAR were unhappy with the mandatory scripts, but were afraid to speak out.
“No one in our bargaining unit is happy with the way Sinclair is forcing these must-runs,” Fischer said. “Every time, they get flooded with emails and calls from viewers who hate it. They are in the same boat that every anchor is with Sinclair: If they complain about something, they are gone.”
In Seattle, KOMO employees have also expressed a reluctance to follow orders from the top. “They’re certainly not happy about it,” one employee told the Post-Intelligencer. “It’s certainly a forced thing.”[...]
The Empty Piety of the American Press
Chris Hedges - truthdig
3/12/18
The press, giddy with its newfound sense of mission and purpose, is carrying out a moral crusade against Donald Trump. The airwaves and print have shed their traditional claims of “impartiality” and “objectivity.” They fulminate against Trump, charging—falsely—that he was elected because of Russian interference and calling him a liar, ignorant and incompetent. They give airtime to his bitterest critics and bizarre associates, such as Omarosa Manigault-Newman, a onetime star of “The Apprentice” and now a fired White House aide, and Stormy Daniels, the porn actress who says she had a sexual relationship with Trump. It is great entertainment. It is great for ratings. It is great for profits. But it is not moral, and it is not journalism.
The empty piety is a mask for self-interest. It is accompanied by the veneration of the establishment politicians, generals, intelligence chiefs, corporate heads and hired apologists who carried out the corporate coup d’état that created our system of “inverted totalitarianism.” The corporate structures that have a stranglehold on the country and have overseen deindustrialization and the evisceration of democratic institutions, plunging over half the country into chronic poverty and misery, are unassailable. They are portrayed as forces of progress. The criminals on Wall Street, including the heads of financial firms such as Goldman Sachs, are treated with reverence. Free trade is equated with freedom. Democratic politicians such as Barack Obama—who assaulted civil liberties, transferred trillions of dollars upward to reigning oligarchs, expanded the drone wars to include targeted assassinations of American citizens, and used the Espionage Act to silence investigative journalism—are hailed as champions of democracy. Deference is paid to democratic processes, liberties, electoral politics and rights enshrined in our Constitution, from due process to privacy, that no longer exist. It is a vast game of deception under the cover of a vacuous morality.
Those cast aside by corporate capitalism—Noam Chomsky calls them “unpeople”—are rendered invisible and reviled at the same time. The “experts” whose opinions are amplified on every issue, from economics to empire and politics, are drawn from corporate-funded think tanks, such as the Heritage Foundation and the American Enterprise Institute, or are former military and intelligence officials or politicians who are responsible for the failure of our democracy and usually in the employ of corporations. Cable news also has the incestuous habit of interviewing its own news celebrities. Former CIA Director John Brennan, one of many former officials now on the airwaves, has morphed into a senior national security and intelligence analyst for NBC and MSNBC. Brennan was the architect of the disastrous attempt to spend hundreds of millions of dollars to arm “moderate” rebels in Syria, oversaw the huge expansion of our drone wars and instigated the canard that Russia stole the last U.S. presidential election. The most astute critics of empire, including Andrew Bacevich, are banished, as are critics of corporate power, including Ralph Nader and Chomsky. Those who decry the waste within the military, such as MIT Professor Emeritus Ted Postol, who has exposed the useless $13 billion anti-ballistic missile program, are unheard. Advocates of universal health care, such as Dr. Margaret Flowers, are locked out of national health care debates. There is a long list of the censored. The acceptable range of opinion is so narrow it is almost nonexistent.
Where is the flood of stories about families being evicted or losing their homes because of foreclosures and bank repossessions? Where are the stories about the banks and lending agencies that prey on recent college graduates burdened with crippling loans and unable to find work? Where are the stories about families going into bankruptcy because they cannot pay medical bills and the soaring premiums of for-profit health care? Where are the stories about the despair that drives middle-aged white men to suicide and millions of Americans into the deadly embrace of opioid addiction? Where are the stories on the cruelty of mass incarceration, the collapse of our court system and the reign of terror by police in marginal communities? Where are the investigative pieces on the fraud and the tax boycott that have been legalized for Wall Street, the poisoning of the ecosystem by the fossil fuel and animal agriculture industries? Why is climate change a forbidden subject, even as extreme weather devastates the nation and much of the rest of the planet? Why are the atrocities we commit or abet in Iraq, Afghanistan and Yemen ignored? Why are the war crimes carried out by Israel against the Palestinians erased from news coverage?
The relentless pillorying of Trump is news-as-reality-television. Trump fills in for Richard Hatch of the old “Survivor” show. Trump’s imbecility, dishonesty, narcissism and incompetence are at once revolting and riveting. The press, ostensibly seeking a more polished brand to improve the public presentation of empire and corporate capitalism, is in fact further empowering the lunatics who will dominate the political landscape.
“America is ceasing to be a nation,” reporter and author Matt Taibbi writes in his book “Insane Clown President: Dispatches From the 2016 Circus,” “and turning into a giant television show.”
The stunts pulled during the last presidential election—Kentucky Sen. Rand Paul wearing goggles as he chain-sawed the tax code in half, Trump inviting women who accused Bill Clinton of sexual assault to a presidential debate and Ben Carson having to defend himself against allegations he lied when he wrote that as a child he attempted to stab another boy—will become staples of political campaigning. Voters, stripped of all meaningful power or control over their own destiny, used only as stage props in rallies and at party conventions, are permitted to vote only for a system they hate. And the winners are those who can give the best and most entertaining expression of that hatred. “Trump found the flaw in the American Death Star,” Taibbi writes. “It doesn’t know how to turn the cameras off, even when it’s filming its own demise.”
If the press sided with citizens and exposed the corporate systems of power that hold them captive, its advertising income would dwindle and it would be treated as an enemy of the state. Since corporations own the airwaves and declining city newspapers, this will not happen. Journalism will remain burlesque. The Public Broadcasting System, along with National Public Radio dependent on corporate money, including the Koch brothers, is as loath to take on the corporate establishment as its for-profit competitors. Dissenters and critics exist only on the margins of the internet, and the abolition of net neutrality will see them silenced.
CNN’s Jake Tapper, one of the high priests in the Trump Inquisition, was quite open about the narrowness of the assault. Being interviewed on “The Axe Files” podcast, hosted by former Obama White House aide David Axelrod, Tapper addressed charges that he opposes Trump’s policies by saying, “Whenever anybody says that to me, I say, you can’t find any evidence about what I think about his tax plan or repealing Obamacare or DACA or immigration or trade or any of these issues—terrorism or ISIS or Syria. I’m agnostic on that. I want to have full and interesting and provocative debates and call balls and strikes. But I’m not putting out there an immigration proposal.”
The corporate airwaves have a depressing habit of taking political hacks like Axelrod or the former Clinton strategist George Stephanopoulos and transforming them into journalists. Even Chelsea Clinton got a shot at journalism, being paid $600,000 a year to do fluff pieces for NBC. The fusion of news and celebrity, with figures like Tapper appearing on late night talk shows, fits with the reality-television presidency the corporate press empowers.
The press, like the Democratic Party, is playing a very dangerous game. It is banking, as Hillary Clinton did, on Trump being so repugnant he and those who support him will be replaced with Democrats. It relies on polls to guide its tactics and strategy, forgetting that every national poll offered assurance that Trump would lose in 2016. This gamble may work. But it may not. Policy issues accounted for only 10 percent of the media coverage during the 2016 presidential race. News reports concentrated on the latest polls, scandals, publicity stunts, campaign tactics and strategy as well as Trump’s bombastic remarks, according to a report issued by the Shorenstein Center at Harvard University. In short, there was little substance to the coverage. This will only get worse. The gossip, trivia and invective masquerading as news are not only irrelevant to most of the electorate but reinforce the image of liberal elites being out of touch with the pain and rage rippling across the nation.
Corporations that own the press look at news as a revenue stream. The news division competes against other revenue streams. If news does not produce comparable profits, its managers are replaced and its content is altered and distorted to draw in more viewers. Journalism is irrelevant. The disease of celebrity and greed, which warps and deforms the personality of Trump, warps and deforms celebrities in the media. They share Trump’s most distasteful characteristics. The consequences are ominous. An ignored, impoverished and frustrated underclass will turn to increasingly bizarre politicians and more outlandish con artists and purveyors of hate. Trump is only the beginning. The grotesque mutations to come, ones that will make Trump look reasonable, are being spawned in newsrooms across the country.
The empty piety is a mask for self-interest. It is accompanied by the veneration of the establishment politicians, generals, intelligence chiefs, corporate heads and hired apologists who carried out the corporate coup d’état that created our system of “inverted totalitarianism.” The corporate structures that have a stranglehold on the country and have overseen deindustrialization and the evisceration of democratic institutions, plunging over half the country into chronic poverty and misery, are unassailable. They are portrayed as forces of progress. The criminals on Wall Street, including the heads of financial firms such as Goldman Sachs, are treated with reverence. Free trade is equated with freedom. Democratic politicians such as Barack Obama—who assaulted civil liberties, transferred trillions of dollars upward to reigning oligarchs, expanded the drone wars to include targeted assassinations of American citizens, and used the Espionage Act to silence investigative journalism—are hailed as champions of democracy. Deference is paid to democratic processes, liberties, electoral politics and rights enshrined in our Constitution, from due process to privacy, that no longer exist. It is a vast game of deception under the cover of a vacuous morality.
Those cast aside by corporate capitalism—Noam Chomsky calls them “unpeople”—are rendered invisible and reviled at the same time. The “experts” whose opinions are amplified on every issue, from economics to empire and politics, are drawn from corporate-funded think tanks, such as the Heritage Foundation and the American Enterprise Institute, or are former military and intelligence officials or politicians who are responsible for the failure of our democracy and usually in the employ of corporations. Cable news also has the incestuous habit of interviewing its own news celebrities. Former CIA Director John Brennan, one of many former officials now on the airwaves, has morphed into a senior national security and intelligence analyst for NBC and MSNBC. Brennan was the architect of the disastrous attempt to spend hundreds of millions of dollars to arm “moderate” rebels in Syria, oversaw the huge expansion of our drone wars and instigated the canard that Russia stole the last U.S. presidential election. The most astute critics of empire, including Andrew Bacevich, are banished, as are critics of corporate power, including Ralph Nader and Chomsky. Those who decry the waste within the military, such as MIT Professor Emeritus Ted Postol, who has exposed the useless $13 billion anti-ballistic missile program, are unheard. Advocates of universal health care, such as Dr. Margaret Flowers, are locked out of national health care debates. There is a long list of the censored. The acceptable range of opinion is so narrow it is almost nonexistent.
Where is the flood of stories about families being evicted or losing their homes because of foreclosures and bank repossessions? Where are the stories about the banks and lending agencies that prey on recent college graduates burdened with crippling loans and unable to find work? Where are the stories about families going into bankruptcy because they cannot pay medical bills and the soaring premiums of for-profit health care? Where are the stories about the despair that drives middle-aged white men to suicide and millions of Americans into the deadly embrace of opioid addiction? Where are the stories on the cruelty of mass incarceration, the collapse of our court system and the reign of terror by police in marginal communities? Where are the investigative pieces on the fraud and the tax boycott that have been legalized for Wall Street, the poisoning of the ecosystem by the fossil fuel and animal agriculture industries? Why is climate change a forbidden subject, even as extreme weather devastates the nation and much of the rest of the planet? Why are the atrocities we commit or abet in Iraq, Afghanistan and Yemen ignored? Why are the war crimes carried out by Israel against the Palestinians erased from news coverage?
The relentless pillorying of Trump is news-as-reality-television. Trump fills in for Richard Hatch of the old “Survivor” show. Trump’s imbecility, dishonesty, narcissism and incompetence are at once revolting and riveting. The press, ostensibly seeking a more polished brand to improve the public presentation of empire and corporate capitalism, is in fact further empowering the lunatics who will dominate the political landscape.
“America is ceasing to be a nation,” reporter and author Matt Taibbi writes in his book “Insane Clown President: Dispatches From the 2016 Circus,” “and turning into a giant television show.”
The stunts pulled during the last presidential election—Kentucky Sen. Rand Paul wearing goggles as he chain-sawed the tax code in half, Trump inviting women who accused Bill Clinton of sexual assault to a presidential debate and Ben Carson having to defend himself against allegations he lied when he wrote that as a child he attempted to stab another boy—will become staples of political campaigning. Voters, stripped of all meaningful power or control over their own destiny, used only as stage props in rallies and at party conventions, are permitted to vote only for a system they hate. And the winners are those who can give the best and most entertaining expression of that hatred. “Trump found the flaw in the American Death Star,” Taibbi writes. “It doesn’t know how to turn the cameras off, even when it’s filming its own demise.”
If the press sided with citizens and exposed the corporate systems of power that hold them captive, its advertising income would dwindle and it would be treated as an enemy of the state. Since corporations own the airwaves and declining city newspapers, this will not happen. Journalism will remain burlesque. The Public Broadcasting System, along with National Public Radio dependent on corporate money, including the Koch brothers, is as loath to take on the corporate establishment as its for-profit competitors. Dissenters and critics exist only on the margins of the internet, and the abolition of net neutrality will see them silenced.
CNN’s Jake Tapper, one of the high priests in the Trump Inquisition, was quite open about the narrowness of the assault. Being interviewed on “The Axe Files” podcast, hosted by former Obama White House aide David Axelrod, Tapper addressed charges that he opposes Trump’s policies by saying, “Whenever anybody says that to me, I say, you can’t find any evidence about what I think about his tax plan or repealing Obamacare or DACA or immigration or trade or any of these issues—terrorism or ISIS or Syria. I’m agnostic on that. I want to have full and interesting and provocative debates and call balls and strikes. But I’m not putting out there an immigration proposal.”
The corporate airwaves have a depressing habit of taking political hacks like Axelrod or the former Clinton strategist George Stephanopoulos and transforming them into journalists. Even Chelsea Clinton got a shot at journalism, being paid $600,000 a year to do fluff pieces for NBC. The fusion of news and celebrity, with figures like Tapper appearing on late night talk shows, fits with the reality-television presidency the corporate press empowers.
The press, like the Democratic Party, is playing a very dangerous game. It is banking, as Hillary Clinton did, on Trump being so repugnant he and those who support him will be replaced with Democrats. It relies on polls to guide its tactics and strategy, forgetting that every national poll offered assurance that Trump would lose in 2016. This gamble may work. But it may not. Policy issues accounted for only 10 percent of the media coverage during the 2016 presidential race. News reports concentrated on the latest polls, scandals, publicity stunts, campaign tactics and strategy as well as Trump’s bombastic remarks, according to a report issued by the Shorenstein Center at Harvard University. In short, there was little substance to the coverage. This will only get worse. The gossip, trivia and invective masquerading as news are not only irrelevant to most of the electorate but reinforce the image of liberal elites being out of touch with the pain and rage rippling across the nation.
Corporations that own the press look at news as a revenue stream. The news division competes against other revenue streams. If news does not produce comparable profits, its managers are replaced and its content is altered and distorted to draw in more viewers. Journalism is irrelevant. The disease of celebrity and greed, which warps and deforms the personality of Trump, warps and deforms celebrities in the media. They share Trump’s most distasteful characteristics. The consequences are ominous. An ignored, impoverished and frustrated underclass will turn to increasingly bizarre politicians and more outlandish con artists and purveyors of hate. Trump is only the beginning. The grotesque mutations to come, ones that will make Trump look reasonable, are being spawned in newsrooms across the country.
worthless media funnies
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https://teespring.com/fox-news-toilet-2#pid=369&cid=6513&sid=front
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