Ever wonder why your Democrat acquaintances are so poorly informed? It's because the media they listen to, watch, and trust in, blatantly lies to them. Let me tell you about the most recent example, if only because it’s just so plain, so blatant.
Charles Cooke is a writer for National Review and participates in a weekly podcast called Mad Dogs and Englishmen with fellow NR writer Kevin Williamson. The podcast is owned by NR. Charles is a naturalized American out of Britain who lives in Florida, but not Tampa.
Kevin Williamson once wrote for the Atlantic, which fired him after a very brief sojourn there, for, of all things, being a conservative writer with a conservative viewpoint. What did they think they were getting when they hired him? Brian Stelter? Rachel Maddow in drag? Don Lemon in whiteface? Sheesh!
Mad Dogs and Englishmen is a British styled pub in Tampa, Florida. Just to make the point that this pub is British, this photo of Queen Elizabeth with one of her Corgis here:
is on their Facebook page. NO American restaurant has, has had or ever will have this photo, but it’s not at all uncommon on the other side of the pond (God save the Queen!).
So what’s the point? Last week, a slimy, lying bunch of lefties at a media organization called ProPublica started posting the following meme about Charles and Kevin:
Oh my, there’s Charles, very strongly condemning Biden’s student loan forgiveness in article after article, and he got over $150k in PPP loans forgiven.
THAT LYING, ROTTEN, HYPOCRITICAL BASTARD!
Amirite? I mean, am I right or what? How could Charles do this? People were demanding answers of him after seeing this garbage in PP. Garbage? Well, it seems that the editor at ProPublica was editing “by the knife”, as we used to say in the newspaper business. Here’s what that statement above really showed:
Looks just a little different now, doesn’t it? ProPublica cut off half the image, the half that clearly showed Mad Dogs and Englishman is a pub with 29 employees, not a two man podcast owned by a highly respected conservative publication.
ProPublica has been called out on this, and have not recanted on their lying. They have however changed the screenshot to show the complete one. Such lovely people.
But what’s that do for the tens of thousands of people, largely democrats, who saw only the first, inaccurate screenshot? Not a thing. Those deluded people are quite sure (PP presents itself as a responsible media source!) that noted NR writer Charles Cooke is a hypocrite.
Now were I Charles, I’d be off to court with a claim for defamation. What PP did is clearly malicious, which is the standard that has to be met because Charles is a public figure. Charles, however, has sharpened his pen and his wit even more than usual and is giving it to them in his newsletter. Well and good, but the damage is done, isn’t it?
This of course, is not the only example of how a lying left wing media deceives people and contributes to a badly fractured America. Somewhere around 40% of democrats continue to believe that President Trump colluded with Russia. This despite the Mueller investigation and subsequent findings that Hillary Clinton paid for the Steele dossier, and masterminded the entire collusion story as a way to detract attention from her email server issues.
This kind of lying by the media goes from such minor issues as Trump wrongly feeding koi fish (false), telling people to drink bleach (false), hiring prostitutes to pee on Obama’s bed in Russia (false), to the more harmful examples such as Russia collusion (really bloody damn false).
What can be done about this? How do you keep from being taken in by a dishonest media?
First of all, check your sources before you post anything. Be sure what you post is accurate. There’s rarely a day goes by that I’m not nearly caught by some pernicious lie. Don’t ever presume that what you see is the truth without checking it. The right is not immune to this sort of thing, it’s just that the media, being tilted so far to the left, we see much more of it from them.
Secondly - share the heck out of anything that points out the lying done by the media. Only by making others aware of what’s going on can we hope to contain the damage these lies do.
Today as an example of checking sources, I got an email from a friend with a media copy/paste about global warming, CO2 and volcanoes. It was interesting, so I took the time to research the claims in the article. I found out that the copy/paste may well be wrong, or highly inaccurate. There’s significant division amongst scientists about the issue. Thus, I didn’t post it and won’t forward it.
That’s the difference between being responsible in your use of the internet, and that of organizations such as Pro Publica. The PP types not only push out reckless innuendo, fake news, and wholesale lying (often by omission), they do it deliberately and with malice. They know that their readers are unlikely to check back for updates or corrections, (NOT that they are likely to publish updates or corrections/retractions), or to seek the truth in a right wing publication, so their editors feel completely free to lie to their readers.
And boy, do they ever lie. Thus, we end up with a society ever more fractured on political lines, with each side positive that they know the truth and that the other side is stupid, ignorant, misinformed…
You’re probably now asking yourself how I dare write this and risk the wrath of a lawsuit from ProPublica. Great question!
I’m not in the least worried. First, what I’ve written about them is accurate. They did what they did. Truth is always a defence to a defamation claim. I’ve twice walked out of a courtroom with a lawyer’s testicles in my pocket after they tried suing me for libel because I had the truth on my side. That’s why you’ll never, ever see a lie out of me in print. The truth protects me from lawyers who think they can go after me.
Secondly, PP won’t file for defamation because to do so would be to bring publicity to this blog, and they don’t want people to see the truth about what they have done. And, let’s be honest, my readership is so small that they’re quite unlikely to become aware of what I’ve said. They’d actually be doing me a favour because they’d significantly raise my profile by suing.
Let me finish tonight with an unabashed plug for Charles and Kevin, whom I admire but do not know. Charles is a superb writer, entertaining, with a sharp, desiccated, British wit. He’s an excellent read. You can sign up for his newsletter at Charles CW Cooke. You can also see his work at National Review.
And if you’d like another take on this issue, check out Kevin Williamson’s article at NR, Hypocrisy for Dummies. Kevin has an entertaining weekly post, The Tuesday, which NR members can sign up for.
Saturday Night’s Playlist - Right now, I’m listening to the Sanford-Townsend Band singing Smoke from a Distant Fire.
Next up - Brooklyn Bridge, the Worst that Could Happen, from the 60s.
Looks like a retro Saturday evening! Pour yourself a glass of something tasty and join me!
And it's easy for them to do in our 24/7 news saturation age. They rely on people getting distracted by the next shiny thing so the public forgets about it.
Good read Wally :)