Joseph A. Wulfsohn
@JosephWulfsohn
UPDATE: Gannett spox issued a statement:

"We regret the oversight in updating the Stacey Abrams column. As soon as we recognized there was no editor’s note, we added it to the page to reflect her changes. We have reviewed our procedures to ensure this does not occur again." //

What they did not answer, however, was the key question from Fox News on whether they had any regrets for “allowing revisions to Abrams’ op-ed instead of preserving it as it was originally written,” which pretty much tells you that they do not regret it.

That’s really the key issue here, and the fact that they didn’t address it speaks volumes about them. If Abrams wanted to update the piece, what the paper should have done was to have her write a new one with a new headline and everything. But they allowed her to make changes to the original piece after the MLB pulled the game that made it sound like she was even more opposed to boycotts than she originally sounded. //

The lies Abrams, President Biden, Sen. Raphael Warnock, and other Democrats told about the law laid the groundwork for boycotts to be announced and MLB to pull the game. Matters were made worse once Warnock’s staff admitted after the fact that his comments about the law were made based on an early version of the bill that did not make the final cut. Then Abrams revised her piece post-MLB announcement, and the USA Today didn’t even bother to point it out until they got called out nearly three weeks later.

When you can convince people racism is rampant, you ignite a flame of division and destruction that can only end with bodies on the ground and cities leveled. //

These erroneous stories aren’t flukes. Recent history shows repeatedly that corrupt media and politicians aren’t surprised or embarrassed when body cam footage or crucial details emerge that debunk their initial “reporting.”

That’s because they don’t so much report as create. They don’t get clicks and clout by uncovering and reporting what actually happened, but by feeding people and politicians’ pre-existing narratives. That’s why every lede and headline seems to be some variation of Black Lives Matter talking points.

Corrections, if issued at all, are usually stealthy and get buried instantly, and there’s no room for nuance on a protester’s poster board or in a presidential press release. Thus the narrative is set before any details emerge, and narratives are more powerful than facts in ginning up emotional responses and revolutions.

The media know this. The ruling class knows this. If they can convince enough people that America is systemically racist, they can infiltrate government schools with critical race theory — and they have.

If they can make people believe police officers are irredeemably evil, they can nationalize local law enforcement and funnel more money toward their pet social programs. If they can convince corporations that performative “antiracism” is more important than profits, they can blackmail state lawmakers into passing legislation that gives them more power — and they are. //

Make no mistake: The ruling class is absolutely inciting violence. The same crowd that insisted President Donald Trump “incited an insurrection” is the one that outrageously lies to demonstrators claiming white cops go on search-and-destroy missions against innocent black Americans. These are the people who gaslight Americans with buzzwords like “peaceful protests” while they watch their cities light up in flames.

The way to bring revolution is to provoke unrest, and the best means to do that is to convince the public that isolated instances of evil represent endemic institutional problems through inflammatory rhetoric and disproportionate attention. It’s a strategy, and it works. //

They said, “Destroying property … is not violence.” They said protests don’t need to be peaceful and called riots a “proportionate response.” They denied evidence of anarchy. They said violence works. They condemned the term “riot” as “loaded,” instead calling it “democracy.” They released a documentary claiming “Riots Built America.” And they flat-out pretended cities weren’t being ravaged, with Gov. Jay Inslee saying “That’s news to me!” when asked about the so-called Capitol Hill Autonomous Zone, and Rep. Jerry Nadler calling Antifa a “myth.”

It isn’t just sins of commission either. The media transgress with omission as well. That’s why you’ll hear Ma’Khia Bryant’s name infinitely more than you’ll hear Mohammad Anwar’s. His life was stolen by two black teens when they violently carjacked him in broad daylight in D.C. last month. One story can be spun to further the narrative that foments riots. One cannot.

Back in January, left-wingers in the media, on Twitter, and in the halls of Congress breathlessly reported that Trump had incited in insurrection. He was a seditionist and a fascist, they said, and he posed such a grave threat to public safety that his social media accounts were nuked from orbit, and Democrats immediately drafted articles of impeachment again. When he urged rioters at the Capitol to go home, calling for “NO violence, NO lawbreaking and NO vandalism of any kind,” a ban on his Twitter prevented the message from going out.

Although the events of that day were awful, the ruling class lied about and amplified them to the point of repeated falsehoods, with The New York Times peddling a false story that rioters bludgeoned a Capitol Police officer to death with a fire extinguisher, and Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez claiming Sen. Ted Cruz tried to have her murdered. //

The biggest lie is that the entire United States of America — with its white people, police officers, institutions, and norms — is irredeemably racist and evil to its core. The race-baiters who peddle this lie have incited more violence than Trump ever did. When you can convince people racism is rampant, and that silence about it is violence while actual physical vigilante violence is justice, you ignite a flame of division and destruction that can only end with bodies on the ground and cities leveled. //

As Shelby Steele says, “America’s original sin is not slavery. It is simply the use of race as a means to power.” While the ruling classes exploit tragedy to accrue more and more power, Americans become increasingly powerless as pawns in the race war, many paying with their sanity, others with their livelihoods, and even some with their lives.

Nicholas Fondacaro
@NickFondacaro
In their report on the officer-involved shooting in Columbus, Ohio, NBC Nightly News deceptively edited the 911 call to leave out the part where the caller says a girl was "trying to stab us." They also don't show viewers the knife in the attacker's hand just before the shots. //

Geoffrey Ingersoll
@GPIngersoll
Is this not to the level of actual malice at this point? The police officer is not a public person. The report leaves out key evidence in such a way as to imply deliberate deception. //

Stephen L. Miller
@redsteeze
Lester Holt gave a speech about facts and truth two weeks ago. //

Lester Holt’s speech is ironic, but it’s also a window into his problematic understanding of journalism and what his role is in reporting.

From Fox:

“[I]t’s become clear that fairness is overrated,” and [he] added that “the idea that we should always give two sides equal weight and merit does not reflect the world we find ourselves in.”

“That the sun sets in the west is a fact. Any contrary view does not deserve our time or attention,” Holt said. “Decisions to not give unsupported arguments equal time are not a dereliction of journalistic responsibility or some kind of agenda. In fact, it’s just the opposite. Providing an open platform for misinformation, for anyone to come say whatever they want, especially when issues of public health and safety are at stake, can be quite dangerous. Our duty is to be fair to the truth.”

Remember that Russian bounties story with which the media absolutely flayed President Donald Trump?

The fake story claimed that, per U.S. intelligence agencies, supposedly, Russia had offered bounties for killing American forces in Afghanistan. Democrats went crazy, using the story to suggest that somehow Trump, who they painted as a Putin puppet, was not doing anything about this and endangering American troops.

Now that just got officially walked back by U.S. intel.

But on Thursday, the Biden administration announced that U.S. intelligence only had “low to moderate” confidence in the story after all. Translated from the jargon of spyworld, that means the intelligence agencies have found the story is, at best, unproven—and possibly untrue.

According to the emails obtained by Fox News, Beatrice then requested Zill de Granados and Gordon interview Moskowitz, who she said was available that day and Friday to do an interview either in a studio or by Skype.

The "60 Minutes" producer replied that they had requested an on-the-record interview with Moskowitz "repeatedly" since February and claimed that he had not responded to messages since mid-March.

DeSantis' office stressed that it was "important" for CBS News to interview Moskowitz and Palm Beach County Mayor David Kerner, who Zill de Granados said was not responsive to inquiries.

"Thank you for your input. Unfortunately, the deadline has passed," Zill de Granados told Beatrice on Thursday afternoon. "As you may know, the Covid pandemic makes our interview protocol much more complicated and time-consuming due to new distancing and testing requirements for correspondents and camera crews." //

However, that standard appeared not to apply to Florida State Rep. Omari Hardy, a DeSantis critic who "60 Minutes" correspondent Sharyn Alfonsi interviewed remotely.

"Luckily, we have already spoken to Director Moskowitz several times," Zill de Granados continued. "We appreciate his perspective on the roll out in Florida. We have included the information he provided on background as it pertains to this story". Zill de Granados also noted that Moskowitz had been asked to do on-camera interviews on Feb. 28 and March 12.

When asked by Fox News if he thought "60 Minutes" "appreciated his perspective" on the vaccine rollout, Moskowitz replied, "Did you see the perspective that the person in charge of the Covid response told them how Publix was selected in their agency and that the contribution story was garbage?

"They ran with pay to play, when I told them it was done by my agency and why and how. Did you see that perspective?" Moskowitz added.

But the Democrat Division of Emergency Management Director Jared Moskowitz was having none of this, pointing out, yet again how he told 60 Minutes the Publix story was untrue, but they didn’t care. //

'60 Minutes' Doubles Down on Its Outrageous Attack on Ron DeSantis, They Get Busted Again by Dems
By Nick Arama | Apr 07, 2021 1:00 AM ET

AP Photo/Chris O'Meara
As we previously reported, CBS News’ “60 Minutes” deceptively edited a video clip of Florida Governor Ron DeSantis responding to an accusation of a pay for play deal with Publix over the vaccine rollout. DeSantis explained why that was nonsense, but the show then ran a clip eliminating almost his entire explanation as well as running other false insinuations.

Publix and even Democrats called out the ’60 Minutes’ fake narrative.

Ron DeSantis completely shredded them on Tucker Carlson’s show and in another statement yesterday.

DeSantis made it clear that they weren’t going to get away with it, “I’m punching back.”

At this point, ’60 Minutes’ should have just apologized and slunk away. But it seems that they have no morals, so they’re doubling down.

Apparently it’s everyone else in this story including the Democrats who are wrong, according to 60 Minutes.

But the Democrat Division of Emergency Management Director Jared Moskowitz was having none of this, pointing out, yet again how he told 60 Minutes the Publix story was untrue, but they didn’t care.

Moskowitz had previously explained that they reached out to all the pharmacies but that Publix was the only one who could execute on the mission at that point. He also explained that Publix was not recommended by the Governor’s office.

Moskowitz reiterated that that CBS failed to include that it was a decision made by his office, according to Fox.

When asked by Fox News if he thought “60 Minutes” “appreciated his perspective” on the vaccine rollout, Moskowitz replied, “Did you see the perspective that the person in charge of the Covid response told them how Publix was selected in their agency and that the contribution story was garbage?

“They ran with pay to play, when I told them it was done by my agency and why and how. Did you see that perspective?” Moskowitz added.

Democratic Palm Beach Mayor David Kerner had also flamed the 60 Minutes piece calling it intentionally false.

60 Minutes
@60Minutes
Campaign finance reports obtained by 60 Minutes show that weeks before Florida Governor Ron DeSantis announced a partnership with Publix grocery stores to distribute the vaccine in its pharmacies, Publix donated $100,000 to his PAC. https://cbsn.ws/3rYmnHj //

The Partyman
@PartymanRandy
·
Apr 4, 2021
I don’t understand what the scandal is supposed to be. Publix wasn’t the only store distributing vaccines. No one is alleging that they pocketed the money or even that they did a bad job. The program was very successful.

It’s 100% trying to manufacture a scandal by implication. //

The Partyman
@PartymanRandy
It should also be pointed out that @60minutes got caught deceptively editing the exchange between DeSantis and their reporter.

They cut out a big part of his answer where he explained the process and made the reporter look like an idiot. //

Jared MASKowitz 😷
@JaredEMoskowitz
@60Minutes I said this before and I’ll say it again. @Publix was recommended by @FLSERT and @HealthyFla as the other pharmacies were not ready to start. Period! Full Stop! No one from the Governors office suggested Publix. It’s just absolute malarkey. https://twitter.com/jaredemoskowit //

Charles C. W. Cooke
@charlescwcooke
This is Jared Moskowitz, director of the Florida Division of Emergency Management. He’s a Democrat, served as one in the state legislature until 2019, and campaigned for Gore and Obama. He’s not falling for this absolute garbage, and neither should you.

This is clearly declaring that the distribution of food or water cannot be made with the intent of delivering influence and/or an attempt to sway voters. The law does have language stating that water stations can certainly be provided on-site from poll officers. This shows Biden’s assessment was in truth inaccurate, but here is the first sign of trouble from the Truth Detectors; neither one bothered to fact-check the President’s statement.

The New York Times
@nytimes
Mike Pompeo is emerging as the most outspoken critic of President Biden among former top Trump officials, ignoring, much as he did in office, the custom that current and former secretaries of state avoid the appearance of political partisanship. https://nyti.ms/3ruQB49 //

🇺🇸 Mike Davis 🇺🇸
@mrddmia
Dear @nytimes:

Secretary of State @HillaryClinton ran for President after leaving office.

After her stunning defeat to a political novice (Trump), she’s been an outspoken critic for 4 years (and counting).

And former Secretary @JohnKerry hasn’t shut up.

But besides them ... //

Matt Whitlock
@mattdizwhitlock
Replying to @nytimes
What former Secretaries of State have avoided political partisanship?! Hillary Clinton? John Kerry? Colin Powell who has endorsed every Dem for 20 years? Albright called Trump a fascist.

Only recent Secretary of State to respect this “custom” is Condi Rice. //

Plus, we should note that six past secretaries of state – Thomas Jefferson, James Madison, James Monroe, John Quincy Adams, Martin Van Buren, and James Buchanan – all went on to be elected president and multiple others ran for president. But let’s not tell the “presidential historian” about all that.

But nice try, New York Times. Maybe make the naked partisanship of your own a little less obvious the next time.

But now the pictures are out and you can decide. Let’s first look at the pictures that show he had the faces and description of each reporter, what outlet they were with, with some circled with the numbers on them (order in which they were supposed to be called on?).

Brick Suit
@Brick_Suit
·
Mar 25, 2021
Joe Biden had a cheat sheet of all the reporters with numbered circles by the ones he was supposed to call on.
#Scripted

Successful libel actions are good for the press. They help keep it free of censorship, by enabling the public to trust that the press has respect for the truth and does not knowingly or negligently spread lies. Allowing blatant falsehoods to circulate unchecked turns the public against the press.

Accordingly, trust in the media has been declining steadily since the Sullivan decision and is now at an all-time low. The latest Gallup survey found 60 percent of the U.S. public has little or no trust in the media, with self-identified Republicans’ trust dropping from 32 percent in 2015 to 10 percent in December 2020.

To help restore at least some of that lost credibility, the Supreme Court should heed Thomas and Silberman and revisit the arrogant, unjustified, and immensely destructive Sullivan decision.

Becket Adams wrote a piece that illustrates a part of what I’m talking about. He noted how so many newsrooms claimed to have “verified” the fake Trump quotes while they ran to repeat them.

The natural question is how you can verify something that is objectively false. The obvious answer is that you can’t. That means that NBC News, ABC News, CNN, and others who hid behind fake verification claims so they could repeat this false report did so knowing that they had no proof for what they were actually putting out there. They simply made it up, or they all got duped by the same source.

On that note, let me say this. If the Post and all these other outlets aren’t going to reveal who the lying source was, then I have no choice but to assume their “source” simply doesn’t exist and that they all made it up as a partisan political attack. There is no ethical reason to protect a source that provides false information. In fact, it’s unethical to print a false story and then refuse to even reveal how you came into the possession of that false story. I say that to mean when media flacks try to claim that the Post was lied to but that they didn’t lie by repeating it, you owe them zero benefits of the doubt. If they were lied to, then they should tell us who lied. If they won’t, then it’s logical to conclude that source doesn’t actually exist. //

Regardless, ask yourself this. How many times has this been done in the past? Yes, the Post got caught this time just like CNN got caught when they printed false claims about James Comey’s then-future. The Atlantic’s “suckers and losers” story also comes to mind. But for every time these outlets get caught, you have to assume they’ve gotten away with it hundreds of times. After all, how exactly can you disprove an anonymous source who doesn’t actually provide evidence of anything? You typically can’t. This latest case was an exception because audio happened to exist to directly contradict the account.

tsar becket adams
@BecketAdams
you all are missing the real story re: WaPo's correction of its Trump/Ga. investigations chief "scoop."

the real scandal is that a bunch of newsrooms claimed at the time they “confirmed” the details of the "scoop" with their own anon sourcing.
Audio shows the media got the Trump-Georgia story all wrong
washingtonexaminer.com //

That’s incredibly significant, and not just from a media malfeasance perspective (but that’s, of course, part of it). Here’s why: it was reported in January that Georgia State officials didn’t think a recording of the call existed, which is presumably why WaPo took bad quotes from a source they wouldn’t name but who was familiar with the conversation. They wanted the story and didn’t have the recording, so they reported what they were told. Not particularly impressive journalism.

That was readily apparent after the Wall Street Journal got their hands on the recording and published it last week, proving that the anonymous source essentially made up quotes and attributed them to the former president. And where was this recording discovered? In the trash folder on a device belonging to the lead investigator in the Secretary of State’s office, the very person Trump called.

When journalists defend the removal of art you know we are plunging down the cultural waterslide… //

Some, like Philip Bump, go so far as to say if you defend these ‘’racist’’ books it is because you want to defend racism. Defending a person’s right to speak is not defending their actual speech. He knows this, or at the very least he should. But for him, and the others, preserving their right to expression is less important than virtue signaling, and then using the call for free expression as a tool to injure political opposition.

It is a shallow and craven mindset. This is echoed in the belief that every person has a right to vote, but if a racist votes for a certain candidate then everyone who voted for said candidate is a racist. It is the thinking that justifies targeted silencing and approves of making an entire movement a pariah. That our members of the press are pushing this is beyond disturbing.

“I’m sure there are other journalists out there who feel the same way. I found myself reading news copy that I didn’t believe was fully truthful, or only told part of the story. And I began to feel that I was contributing to the fear and division in this country by continuing on in this profession.” //

Lake told Arizona Daily Independent that the COVID pandemic was her breaking point.

“It really got difficult for me when Covid hit. I felt the stories I was reading were not fully truthful. The cancel mob’s insistence that certain Covid-related stories not be told or even whispered, while others were told over-and-over made me feel as if I was not giving a balanced view of the situation to viewers.”

The news media fluffed Biden in unimaginable ways, making the bed they now have to lie in. You see, when you give a politician a pass on everything, do no investigative reporting on him, and essentially worship at his feet to defeat the orange man, that politician will not respect you when the time comes to press him on an issue. Biden feels completely comfortable snubbing the press, and they have no one to blame but themselves. //

Philip Melanchthon Wegmann
@PhilipWegmann
I asked @PressSec why the White House hasn't released virtual visitor logs. Isn't that important for transparency? Wouldn't it be easy?

@PressSec: "He's meeting with members of the Senate virtually today. There, I've released it for you. What else would you like to know?"

Anita Kumar
@anitakumar01
There are no citizen petitions or schedules for the president and vice president posted online. The White House comment line is shut down. The White House won't release virtual visitor logs. Biden has yet to hold a news conference of his own. https://

As bitter partisans and Democrat Party sycophants, the White House press corps is a joke – and has been for years. The legacy media commentators and contributors on network news are perhaps even worse. We have watched over four years of attacks and slander on a political outsider president. We have watched them cover the lies and perfidy of the political class and Deep State while throwing ridiculous, misleading, and misinformed questions at President Trump at every turn. Interviews with Democrats are filled with inanities and softball questions; no difficult questions are ever asked of these people – whether Democrats, RINOs, or members of the Deep State. Can’t ask anything that might embarrass them, don’t ya know?

This is the vacant, hollow, bereft-of-content scandal the left and the media are attempting to cook up on Florida’s governor. If you are someone in the media looking at the elderly receiving vaccine access as some sort of problem then you are engaging in the two things the very same media have been demonizing; those politicizing the pandemic, and those ignoring the science and the advice of healthcare professionals.

This faux scandal proves that both of those realities are in play right now.

Love him or hate him, Limbaugh’s legacy cannot be discounted. He paved the way for many right-leaning Americans to have a voice and helped to transform the conservative movement that, for all its faults, has stood as a bulwark against those who wish to steer our nation further towards Marxism. If the so-called progressive left were being honest, they would acknowledge that this is the reason they detested Rush Limbaugh, nothing more, nothing less.

When all is said and done, though, the media will look back on the past four years as the straw that broke the camel’s back. It was a time when their hucksterism, their raw, naked partisanship, their willingness to tell whatever lie it took to press their political agenda was laid bare for the world to see. There is no coming back from this. All that remains is deciding when to lock the doors and turn out the lights.