Turning Point USA’s Candace Owens spoke to The Daily Signal’s Rob Bluey about why conservative policies are better for the African-American community. Owens appeared at the White House’s Generation Next forum for millennials Thursday. An edited transcript of her Daily Signal interview is below.
Rob Bluey: How did you become a conservative?
Candace Owens: I think for most people, watching Donald Trump run in 2016, something had to wake up inside of you. This is a man who was celebrated by the media. They could not get enough of Trump. You’re listening to rap and hip-hop music, they glorified him. Everyone wanted to end up at Mar-a-Lago. They said they were acting like Trump.
And then the second he won, he became a racist instantly. In that moment, I understood that racism was being used as a theme and a mechanism to control black Americans, and that the black community needed new leaders to sort of see them through that complete lie.
Bluey: You’ve made the case that Trump and his policies are better for the black community. Why is that?
Owens: Of course, our conservative policies are better for a black community. If you think of everything that we’ve gone through historically, it is because of Democratic policies that we are worse off today than we were 60 years ago.
For sure, no one would be foolish enough to say that America is a more racist country today than it was 60 years ago. So what happened? LBJ happened, the Great Society happened. Government dependency happened, welfare happened. All of this happened and came from the Democratic Party.
Bluey: When you’re talking to young people at Turning Point USA, what is your message to them?
Owens: My message to them is just that the time is now. President Trump represents the first opportunity for black Americans to get off of, what I refer to as, the ideological slave ship, to step outside of this line—this myth and this illusion—and to understand that we’ve had our power essentially stripped from us.
We continue to allow that by being afraid of racism, which is no longer an actual threat in this society for black Americans.
Bluey: You’re somebody who isn’t afraid to engage on Twitter or in the media. What gives you that courage to stand firm on these principles?
Owens: Honestly, I was born aggressive. I think I came out shouting orders at everyone.
I’ve been really strong-minded from the time I was a little girl, and I hate being told what to think. So propaganda just doesn’t really work on me. I’m not afraid. It takes fearlessness.
You can’t be afraid to be referred to as a “coon” or an “Uncle Tom,” which, by the way, Uncle Tom, for people that actually read the book, was the hero of the novel. That term does not work.
It’s going to take people with some courage to step up and say, “You can call me whatever you want, this movement is happening. You can get on board or you can watch it.”
Bluey: We’re approaching in the next couple of weeks the 50th anniversary of Martin Luther King Jr.’s assassination. How did MLK influence your life?
Owens: The most important thing to understand is that what he wanted was a society where people would not be judged by the color of their skin. Everything that the Democrats are advocating for is for us to only be judged by the color of our skin, by our sex, me as a black woman, they want me to constantly remember that.
You are black, you are a woman, and you cannot exist outside of that. So we need to understand that in many ways, we’ve gone backward from the themes that he was teaching when he gave his “I Have a Dream” speech.
His dream is being realized, but it’s not being realized by the Democratic Party right now.
Rob Bluey is editor-in-chief of The Daily Signal, the multimedia news organization of The Heritage Foundation. Send an email to Rob. Twitter: @RobertBluey.
Dear Readers:
With the recent conservative victories related to tax cuts, the Supreme Court, and other major issues, it is easy to become complacent.
However, the liberal Left is not backing down. They are rallying supporters to advance their agenda, moving this nation further from the vision of our founding fathers.
If we are to continue to bring this nation back to our founding principles of limited government and fiscal conservatism, we need to come together as a group of likeminded conservatives.
This is the mission of The Heritage Foundation. We want to continue to develop and present conservative solutions to the nation’s toughest problems. And we cannot do this alone.
We are looking for a select few conservatives to become a Heritage Foundation member. With your membership, you’ll qualify for all associated benefits and you’ll help keep our nation great for future generations.
In May 2018, The United West, along with Judge Jeanine Pirro and 100 pro-American, pro-Israel activists with be in the Holy Land at one of the most historic moments in the life of Israel.
Our national security mission is designed to study and experience the wonder of Israel and the challenges Israel face living in a land surrounded by many enemies.
As we travel from the north to the south, at the borders of Lebanon, Syria, Gaza and in East Jerusalem we will confront significant enemy obstacles for peace. Lessons learned help our group of significant leaders be better equipped to promote and defend pro-Israel policies of the United States government.
While we are in Jerusalem massive geopolitical events will occur and the intrepid United West film team will be reporting LIVE, from the middle of the action!
Saturday May 12…..Deadline for President Trump to decide on the Iran, JCPOA
Sunday May 13……51st Jerusalem Day, celebrating victory of the Arabs in 1967
Sunday May 14……..70th Anniversary of the “Rebirth” of Israel, May 14, 1948
Monday May 14….Historic move of the US Embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem
Tuesday May 15…..“Nakba Day” (catastrophe) Arabs protesting the 1948 decision
As you can see, May in Israel is HISTORIC but you can rely on The United West to be in the middle of the action and telling you the complete, unfiltered story!
Stay tuned for an exciting and educational time.
https://drrichswier.com/wp-content/uploads/Flag-70-Heb-e1524428452530.jpg379640Defend The Borderhttp://drrich.wpengine.com/wp-content/uploads/logo_264x69.pngDefend The Border2018-04-22 16:21:392018-04-22 16:22:11VIDEO: Amazing Israel at 70 — Defying All Odds!
In this episode of “Inside Judicial Watch,” host Jerry Dunleavy joins JW Senior Attorney Ramona Cotca to compare and contrast the Clinton email investigation & the ongoing Mueller special counsel investigation into alleged collusion between then-presidential candidate Donald Trump and Russia during the 2016 election.
https://drrichswier.com/wp-content/uploads/clinton-mueller.jpg360640Judicial Watchhttp://drrich.wpengine.com/wp-content/uploads/logo_264x69.pngJudicial Watch2018-04-20 05:34:582018-04-20 05:34:58VIDEO: Clinton & Mueller – A Tale of Two Investigations
I had the pleasure of being on PIJN News to discuss how Facebook censors those that do not fit its mold.
During the first two segments I discussed with Dr. Chaps how Facebook uses its algorithms to censor. The last segment is a comparison of two films “Paul – Apostle of Christ” and “Chappaquiddick.”
CIA Director Mike Pompeo is the president’s choice to be the next secretary of state. Nile Gardiner, director of The Heritage Foundation’s Margaret Thatcher Freedom Center, sits down with us to discuss what Pompeo would mean for U.S. foreign policy and how he differs from his predecessor. We also discuss the international response to Syria’s chemical weapons attack. Plus: The House speaker’s race is full speed ahead, Missouri’s governor is accused of sexual misconduct, and a billionaire activist seeks to break up California.
With the recent conservative victories related to tax cuts, the Supreme Court, and other major issues, it is easy to become complacent.
However, the liberal Left is not backing down. They are rallying supporters to advance their agenda, moving this nation further from the vision of our founding fathers.
If we are to continue to bring this nation back to our founding principles of limited government and fiscal conservatism, we need to come together as a group of likeminded conservatives.
This is the mission of The Heritage Foundation. We want to continue to develop and present conservative solutions to the nation’s toughest problems. And we cannot do this alone.
We are looking for a select few conservatives to become a Heritage Foundation member. With your membership, you’ll qualify for all associated benefits and you’ll help keep our nation great for future generations.
EDITORS NOTE: The featured image is of CIA Director Mike Pompeo testifying on his nomination to be secretary of state before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. (Photo: Ron Sachs – CNP / Mega / Newscom)
https://drrichswier.com/wp-content/uploads/MikePompeoHearing-1250x650-e1523702645973.jpg378640The Daily Signalhttp://drrich.wpengine.com/wp-content/uploads/logo_264x69.pngThe Daily Signal2018-04-14 06:44:142018-04-14 06:44:14PODCAST: Mike Pompeo as Secretary of State
https://drrichswier.com/wp-content/uploads/trump-45-1-e1514677411774.jpg360640Bill Finlayhttp://drrich.wpengine.com/wp-content/uploads/logo_264x69.pngBill Finlay2018-04-13 05:12:392018-04-13 05:34:31Time for Republicans to Defend The President
The hugely popular Netflix series, 13 Reasons Why, has become a lightning rod for critics who say it glorifies suicide and might even make it an attractive option for teenagers who are enduring difficult times in their lives.
Watch the heartbreaking video about Anna Bright, a 14-year-old who committed suicide after binge-watching 13 Reasons Why.
Anna’s parents contacted the American Family Association, asking us to help get the word out about the dangers of 13 Reasons Why. They shared their story with our film division.
On March 25, I sent a private letter to Netflix CEO Reed Hastings, respectfully asking for a short meeting to discuss our concerns. The letter was ignored.
Season 1 was hugely popular. While it was airing last year, the web site for Teen Vogue said the series was Netflix’s most popular show on social media. Netflix plans to release a second season soon.
Even the mainstream media has publicized the potential dangers of 13 Reasons Why, and some schools here in America and abroad have sent home letters to warn parents about the series.
Those dangers are very real. The American Academy of Pediatrics says that suicide has risen to become the second-leading cause of death among teenagers.
Asking Netflix to drop this dangerous television series is the right thing to do. Please sign this petition, then share it as a way to warn other friends, family, and church members about the dangers of 13 Reasons Why.
Sign the petition demanding that Netflix pull Season 1 of the series and cancel plans to air Season 2.
https://drrichswier.com/wp-content/uploads/13-reasons-why.png368640American Family Associationhttp://drrich.wpengine.com/wp-content/uploads/logo_264x69.pngAmerican Family Association2018-04-10 05:57:372018-04-10 05:57:37VIDEO: Did Netflix show kill Anna Bright?
Kelly Clemente found out she was pregnant when she was 18. She had just finished her first semester of college, and up until then, described herself as your typical “all-American girl.”
She got good grades, was a member of a sorority, and ran on the track team.
When she saw that pregnancy test, “My life is over,” she thought.
“I was like, it doesn’t even matter. Nothing matters anymore,” Kelly told The Daily Signal.
Kelly, unlike most girls her age, was familiar with the implications of an unplanned pregnancy. In high school, she volunteered at HOPE in Northern Virginia, a nonprofit that creates gift baskets for mothers faced with an unplanned pregnancy.
Although she shared compassion for them, Kelly had bought into the stigmas about birth moms. “I’ll never be one of those women,” she thought.
But she was wrong. At 18, Kelly became an unplanned pregnancy statistic. “I was no better than these women that I was creating baskets for,” she said.
After crying and feeling nothing but noise and chaos, Kelly thought of her little sister, who her parents had adopted into their family from Central America.
“I thought of the joy she brought into our family, and for the first moment after hours of crying, I felt calm, and I felt peaceful,” Kelly said. “I knew that I needed to make the decision that my sister’s birth mom had made.”
Kelly would carry her baby to term, and place him—or her—for adoption.
But first, she’d have to tell her parents.
‘Parents’ Worst Nightmare’
Within days upon learning she was pregnant, Kelly had to figure out how to come clean with her parents. “I expected them to be angry,” she said. “Parents’ worst nightmare, right?”
First, she called her mom from school to say she wasn’t feeling well.
“I was concerned enough to go to school to see firsthand what was going on,” Susan Clemente, Kelly’s mom, said.
The two went grocery shopping together, but Kelly avoided sharing the news. Sensing something was wrong, her mom invited Kelly to come back home.
“That entire ride home, I never once told you that I was pregnant,” Kelly said, speaking to her mom about that day. “You told me later that you just knew.”
“I did,” Kelly’s mom replied.
When they got home, they sat on the living room couch and talked so intently that the sun went down without anyone noticing. When her dad, Mark, arrived home from work, he asked, “Why are you all sitting in the dark?”
At that moment, Kelly had to confront one of her biggest fears—telling her dad she was pregnant.
“I could tell something was going on,” he said of the two sitting in the dark.
Almost in the same breath, Kelly broke the news that she was pregnant—and going to place the child for adoption.
Instead of responding with anger or disappointment, Mark told The Daily Signal, “I just remember being so grateful and proud.”
“We’d hoped that we had raised you that way,” her dad said, speaking to Kelly. “So the fact that you didn’t even entertain that thought [abortion], to be honest, it was a very proud moment.”
After that, Kelly moved back in with her parents and set up an appointment with Bethany Christian Services, an organization that facilitates private, faith-based adoptions.
‘Little Treasure’
Walking into Bethany Christian Services, Kelly was expecting “the wrath of God” to be on her.
“I’m going to an adoption agency, and I’m going to be judged,” she said. But when she walked in there, “I never experienced any of that,” she said.
“They showed me what it was like to walk with someone through the hardest time of their life when they are feeling so down on themselves and so alone, they were there.”
Shawn and Dave Hansen were the second couple Kelly and her mom met with in the adoption process.
“It was so obvious that these were the people that would have her little treasure,” her mom told The Daily Signal.
But finding them was the easy part. Kelly was 18, in college, and still pregnant.
‘Where’s My Choice?’
“Being pregnant and being in college is never really a great thing,” Kelly said. “I found out very quickly who my true friends were.”
At one point, she told a friend on her track team that she was pregnant and placing her child for adoption. His response was less than supportive.
“If you don’t get an abortion, I will lose all respect for you,” Kelly remembered him saying.
“I was horrified,” Kelly said. “You call yourself pro-choice, but where’s my choice? It’s my choice to choose adoption.”
Then, two weeks before the birth, Kelly got a phone call from the baby’s father’s best friend informing her the father—Kelly’s boyfriend at the time—wasn’t being faithful.
“I was devastated,” Kelly said. “This is someone I knew for eight years, this is someone I trusted. I’m having his baby. We had conversations about getting married.”
Hearing that news was the second hardest news to take over those nine months, Kelly said. Her entire identity had already been shattered, and her relationship now was, too.
At a low point, Kelly walked out to her parents’ driveway in the middle of the night. She laid down on the road, in the dark, and prayed that a car would come run her over.
“I want to die,” Kelly remembered thinking. “I can’t handle this. This is too much for me.”
At that moment, Kelly said she heard a voice from God telling her to get up. So she did.
“I got up, and I said, ‘OK, I know that this sweet baby did nothing wrong, so I don’t want him to get hurt, so I’m going to have this baby and then I’m going to take my life.’ Because I was so broken, I didn’t think there was any meaning left.”
But then the voice came back and said, “No, I’m not done with you yet.”
“At that moment, I knew that I was loved by a really big God who had a really big heart, that didn’t judge me by my pregnancy and still loved me so much,” Kelly said.
A few weeks later, her water broke, and Kelly gave birth to a healthy baby boy.
‘An Answer to My Prayers’
“Those three days I spent in the hospital, he was mine,” Kelly said of her birth son, Alex. But after those three days, it was time to place Alex with his adoptive parents, Shawn and Dave Hansen.
“I don’t sugarcoat that because it’s real life and I loved this child so much, but I couldn’t give him a father, I couldn’t give him brothers and sisters for a long time, I couldn’t provide him with what felt like anything he deserved.”
She then walked to the hospital chapel, said a prayer for everything to be OK, and at that moment, Dave and Shawn walked in.
“I was like, wow,” Kelly said. “They truly are an answer to my prayers.”
Handing her baby to another family wasn’t going to be easy, even though the family was the living embodiment of her prayers.
“I thought the hardest day of my life would be finding out that I was pregnant,” Kelly said. “It wasn’t.”
“The hardest day of my life was driving away from that hospital without a baby. I had never felt more empty in my life. I was physically empty, and I felt so alone.”
Kelly made a decision that in today’s society, few women do.
In 2014, the latest data available, 18,329 women in the U.S. chose to place their children for adoption. That same year, more than 900,000 women chose abortion. According to the National Council for Adoption, a nonpartisan group that advocates adoption, for every 1,000 abortions and births to unmarried women, there were only 6.9 adoptions.
‘It’s Over Now’
Kelly gave birth in September 2008, and returned to college in January. Much like the pregnancy, the transition back wasn’t easy.
“I remember everybody just telling me over and over again, ‘It’s over now. It’s over. Aren’t you so glad that this is over?’” Kelly said.
But she felt differently.
“I was fine without drinking, I was fine without sleeping around. I had lived a life I was proud of while I was pregnant, and I wanted that to continue but I was feeling so much pressure to just be that fun sorority party girl that I was before my entire life changed. No one seemed to wrap their head around the fact that my entire worldview had been shifted.”
Today, Kelly is 28 years old. She graduated from college and went back to receive a master’s degree in school counseling.
“My heart is for children,” Kelly said. For now, she’s teaching preschool and hopes one day to be either a school counselor or a voice for teen moms and teen birth moms.
“I want them to know that they have value and their life isn’t over. They have their whole life ahead of them.”
She also wants birth moms to know that children placed with adoptive families “are not lacking in love.”
Her son, Kelly said, “not only receives love from his adoptive parents. He receives love from me, he receives love from my parents, there’s so much love to go around.”
Kelly chose to have an open adoption with Alex and his parents, and sees him a couple times every year.
After enjoying time together, Kelly said, “You would think that it would be this emotional thing where I’m so upset that my birth son is going back with his adoptive parents.”
“It’s not,” she said. “It’s this beautiful thing where he’s happy that he’s seen me, I’m happy that I’ve seen him. He knows who is parents are. He knows that I’m not mom. One day I hope to be a mom, but I’m not his mom. I get to be birth mommy. And that’s OK with me.”
With the recent conservative victories related to tax cuts, the Supreme Court, and other major issues, it is easy to become complacent.
However, the liberal Left is not backing down. They are rallying supporters to advance their agenda, moving this nation further from the vision of our founding fathers.
If we are to continue to bring this nation back to our founding principles of limited government and fiscal conservatism, we need to come together as a group of likeminded conservatives.
This is the mission of The Heritage Foundation. We want to continue to develop and present conservative solutions to the nation’s toughest problems. And we cannot do this alone.
We are looking for a select few conservatives to become a Heritage Foundation member. With your membership, you’ll qualify for all associated benefits and you’ll help keep our nation great for future generations.
https://drrichswier.com/wp-content/uploads/kelly-clemente.jpg312600The Daily Signalhttp://drrich.wpengine.com/wp-content/uploads/logo_264x69.pngThe Daily Signal2018-04-09 06:35:482018-07-10 06:16:05VIDEO: She Got Pregnant at 18 and Did Something That Today, Few Teens Do
New reports have emerged that dozens of House Democrats waived the background checks on the Awan Brothers — the House I.T. aides handling their cybersecurity and with access to their email systems. Judicial Watch President Tom Fitton went to Capitol Hill last year to help shine a spotlight on the ongoing Awan Brothers I.T. scandal in the House of Representatives that the mainstream media — and, sadly, even our Justice Department and much of Congress — are all ignoring.
This is a story that involves political corruption, alleged cybersecurity breaches, the potential sharing of private constituent info, possible large-scale fraud, cover-ups, and threats to our national security.
https://drrichswier.com/wp-content/uploads/AWAN-BROTHERS-01.jpg360640Judicial Watchhttp://drrich.wpengine.com/wp-content/uploads/logo_264x69.pngJudicial Watch2018-04-08 08:01:222018-04-08 08:01:22VIDEO: The Awan Brothers/Democrat I.T. Scandal
What do you get when one side will not accept the results of a free election?
https://drrichswier.com/wp-content/uploads/unhinged-democrats-e1523141210877.jpg361640Bill Finlayhttp://drrich.wpengine.com/wp-content/uploads/logo_264x69.pngBill Finlay2018-04-07 18:46:592018-04-07 18:46:59Civil War: What you get when one side doesn’t accept the results of a free election
Not content to let the gun control and hardcore anti-Donald Trump communities’ hateful rhetoric be relegated to the internet, print media, television, and protests, prominent Texas Moms Demand Action President Kellye Burke decided she would take direct action against her political adversaries – by allegedly berating some teenage girls in a bakery. Burke is also a city council member in West University Park Place, Texas.
Kelly Burke
According to a report from Houston’s KPRC, a group of teenage girls were waiting in line at Tiny’s Milk and Cookies to buy some baked goods for their church when Burke happened upon them. Apparently disturbed that one of the teens had decided to exercise her First Amendment right by wearing a “Trump: Make America Great Again” shirt, Burke allegedly began to shout an expletive for a part of the female anatomy at the young girls.
The father of one of the girls told KPRC that the group initially ignored Burke’s aberrant conduct. However, Burke allegedly continued to harass the girls, reportedly shaking her fist and mockingly shouting “MAGA! MAGA! MAGA!”
Demonstrating a level of maturity not present in the council member, the girls reportedly left the bakery without engaging Burke. According to the father, “They were absolutely scared. My little girl essentially wanted to know if this woman was going to hurt her.”
The bizarre encounter was captured on video, which allowed Burke to be identified.
Due to Burke’s position as a city council member, the case is being handled by the Harris County Constable’s Office, who, according to the Fort Worth Star Telegram, cited Burke for disorderly conduct on Thursday.
The mother of one of Burke’s alleged victims didn’t appreciate Burke’s sardonic response, stating, “Clearly her ‘apology’ was an attempt to placate very angry parents as opposed to a genuine apology.” Offering Burke some friendly advice, the mother went on to note, “if a t-shirt triggers such strong emotions, one should seek therapy.”
We do not know about how, quote responsible [concealed handgun license] holders are because that dataset is not available and is completely locked down. Any statements about how quote responsible and law-abiding CHL’s are is completely anecdotal and therefore conjecture.
In fact, the Texas Department of Public Safety makes detailed statistics concerning conviction rates among CHL holders available to the public, as well as a variety of demographic data that includes CHL revocations.
Burke’s erroneous testimony failed to sway the committee. The State Affairs Committee approved the legislation by a vote of 7 to 2 and campus Right-to-Carry became law on June 13, 2015.
According to an interview with the radical left-wing publication Mother Jones, Burke was driven to support gun control by what she called the “sickness and the callousness” of NRA. Most Americans, and probably an even larger portion of Texans, do not share Burke’s view. A March 2018 Reuter/Ipsos poll found that a majority of Americans hold a favorable view of NRA. The same cannot be said for Moms Demand Action’s preferred presidential candidate.
Look for the top-down Michael Bloomberg gun control machine to distance itself from Burke following her alleged attempt to dictate the attire and political beliefs of those around her. Then again, why should they? Controlling the legitimate behavior of others is what gun control is all about.
RELATED VIDEO: “If you are a #MAGA, I don’t care if you live or die” – One America News:
https://drrichswier.com/wp-content/uploads/maga-tshirt.jpg360640NRA Institute for Legislative Actionhttp://drrich.wpengine.com/wp-content/uploads/logo_264x69.pngNRA Institute for Legislative Action2018-04-07 06:18:052018-04-07 07:21:18Texas Moms Demand Action President Charged for Accosting Teen Girls
A vast right-wing conspiracy is taking over America’s newsrooms.
That’s the narrative that has taken off with the release of a video by the popular news site Deadspin, which shows news anchors on multiple local stations reciting the exact same lines.
Those local stations are all owned by Sinclair Broadcast Group, a media group that is generally considered conservative or right-leaning. According to the Washington Examiner, Sinclair owns “193 TV stations spanning over 614 channels in 89 U.S. markets.”
A number of media pundits and politicians wildly overreacted to the recitation of fairly innocuous lines—that have been used in CNN ads—by calling Sinclair’s editorial practices a threat to democracy and an omen of coming authoritarianism.
On Wednesday, Sen. Dick Durbin, D-Ill., sent Sinclair a letter, according to Talking Points Memo, asking it to explain why it is telling local affiliates what to say and demanding that it reveal its editorial practices.
Amy McGrath, who is running for office in Kentucky, decided to pull ads from a local Sinclair affiliate, saying the multiple video broadcasts posed “an extreme danger to our democracy” and that they mimic “the propaganda efforts that authoritarian regimes often use to control the media in their own country.”
Is it not ironic that in response to Sinclair’s alleged signs of “authoritarianism,” government officials are now prying into the editorial decisions of a private company?
As one might expect, media figures pounced on the video and lashed out at Sinclair.
John Oliver, the comedian and host of “Last Week Tonight,” said the montage made the journalists look like “a brainwashed cult.”
Liberal late night host Jimmy Kimmel said on Twitter that Sinclair’s editorial practices were “dangerous to our democracy.” This nearly exact phrase, ironically, was used in the Sinclair promo that he found so dangerous.
MSNBC’s “Morning Joe” co-host Mika Brzezinski said, “This looks like something we would mock the Russians for doing during the days of Pravda.”
Perhaps the most absurd criticism of Sinclair—and that’s a high bar—came from disgraced CBS anchor Dan Rather.
Rather, who lost his job in 2004 when he ran a false story about President George W. Bush on the eve of an election, chimed to castigate news hosts for reading scripts and peddling fake news.
“News anchors looking into the camera and reading a script handed down by a corporate overlord—a script meant to obscure the truth, not elucidate it—is not journalism,” he said. “It is propaganda. It is Orwellian. It is on a slippery slope toward some of history’s most destructive forces.”
But Sinclair’s senior vice president of news, Scott Livingston, begs to differ. He said these reactions wildly exaggerate what news anchors actually said in their repeated scripts.
“If you read the script, it’s not propaganda, it’s a statement of our commitment,” Livingston told The Daily Signal. “To say that this is comparable to state-controlled television. That’s crazy.”
While playing all of the identical broadcasts together in a synchronized fashion certainly makes them sound creepy, what they actually said is fairly innocuous.
“[W]e’re concerned about the troubling trend of irresponsible, one-sided news stories plaguing our country,” the news anchor script reads. “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.”
You can read the rest of the script here. It is hardly a call to authoritarianism, and at most it is marginally political.
President Donald Trump even jumped into the controversy, praising Sinclair on Twitter.
Sinclair’s politics certainly lean to the right. But that doesn’t mean it is intentionally misleading its audiences.
Would the repeated script be so controversial if it had been spoken by left-leaning journalists at CNN?
That’s not too hard to imagine—“fake news” has been a favorite target of left-leaning media outlets since the 2016 election. It was The New York Times, after all, that first sounded the alarm about the spread of “fake news” on social media.
The Washington Post soon joined the chorus:
“Fake news is dangerous mischief and takes advantage of the fact that social media generally rely on rapid-fire algorithms and not deliberate human editing,” The Washington Post editorial board wrote in 2016. “The internet has become a vital forum for democratic debate; it is essential that that interchange not be warped by propaganda and lies.”
These concerns over authoritarianism and journalistic integrity sound awfully similar to the concerns voiced by Sinclair-owned outlets.
Like most other media groups, Sinclair wants to be known as an honest and trusted source of information.
Saying that this is what differentiates it from its media competition is hardly unique—other news outlets often say similar things.
This is hardly a new and novel practice.
Of course, media outlets may not exactly have disinterested reasons for suddenly chastising Sinclair.
Sinclair is currently attempting a merger with Tribune Media—another large local media provider—and will have to get approval from the Federal Communications Commission to do so.
Some have called for blocking the merger, including some conservatives. It makes sense that in a contentious media market, news outlets would try to gain the upper hand on one another.
“We’re all competing for eyeballs. And we’re competitors,” Livingston said.
“They see we are doing great things across the country,” he continued. “ … You see that and you can see why we are a threat.”
As ridiculous as the video looked, with all the anchors delivering the same lines verbatim, using identical lines on multiple shows isn’t exactly an uncommon media practice.
Late night host Conan O’Brien has actually been making fun of this practice for years, as conservative commentator Stephen Miller pointed out.
All this is to say that, regardless of potential bias or skewing of the news, the cries of “authoritarianism” levied against Sinclair are completely unfounded. Government is not forcing anyone to watch any particular news station. America offers media companies on both the right and left a mostly free marketplace to thrive.
The legacy media’s missteps and perceived bias have opened up opportunities for other outlets to capture their audiences.
That’s a good thing.
But some voices are, of course, unhappy with the outcome of the free market.
If tyranny is in fact lurking around the corner, it will most likely come from government following the advice of this New York Times editorial:
We must rediscover the term ‘public good,’ holding entities like Sinclair and Fox News to account for disseminating outlandish propaganda. Yes, we treasure our First Amendment, but we also treasure our democracy.
Maybe it’s time to bring back the Fairness Doctrine. Certainly it is time to force the FCC to follow the law and fulfill its mandate under our laws to promote diversity of access to the public airwaves. In the end, we must all rededicate ourselves to democracy. Allowing our media to become the province of a few ideological extremists bent on ownership of our airwaves is not just bad for the republic. It could be its end.
Yes, we like the First Amendment, but we’d rather gut it to save our vision of “democracy.”
As David Harsanyi wrote in The Federalist, “As long as we have a media market and inhibit government meddling in speech … the idea that we are powerless to turn away from ‘propaganda’ is nothing but alarmism.”
If viewers don’t like the programming of Sinclair, or The Washington Post, or CNN, it’s very easy to tune out and find something else.
Moreover, recent deregulation by the FCC—such as allowing newspapers to go into the broadcasting business—makes it even easier for companies to enter that market than was possible in the mid-20th century.
James Gattuso, a regulatory and telecommunications expert at The Heritage Foundation, wrote, “The power over information that the FCC’s rules were meant to control simply is no more. In today’s marketplace, the old media is threatened rather than threatening.”
The legacy media’s missteps and perceived bias have opened up opportunities for other outlets to capture their audiences. That’s a good thing. But some voices are, of course, unhappy with the outcome of the free market.
It is that desire to shut down alternative media, not the editorial slant of private media companies, that would put our institutions and liberty at risk.
Trust in the mainstream media is at a historic low—and rightfully so given the behavior of many journalists in Washington, D.C.
Ever since Donald Trump was elected president, it is painfully clear that the mainstream media covers liberals glowingly and conservatives critically.
Now journalists spread false, negative rumors about President Trump before any evidence is even produced.
Americans need an alternative to the mainstream media. That’s why The Daily Signal exists.
The Daily Signal’s mission is to give Americans the real, unvarnished truth about what is happening in Washington and what must be done to save our country.
Our dedicated team of more than 100 journalists and policy experts rely on the financial support of patriots like you.
Your donation helps us fight for access to our nation’s leaders and report the facts.
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EDITORS NOTE: The featured image is by John Greim John Greim Photography /Newscom.
https://drrichswier.com/wp-content/uploads/180405_SInclairedit-1250x650-e1523011348481.jpg361640The Daily Signalhttp://drrich.wpengine.com/wp-content/uploads/logo_264x69.pngThe Daily Signal2018-04-06 06:56:412018-07-22 06:46:30VIDEO: The Sinclair Controversy Is About the Legacy Media’s Fear of Losing Control
A slew of news articles flooded the print, broadcast, and internet media this week about two new studies published in Monday’s online issue of JAMA Internal Medicine.
One study found that states with medical marijuana laws are associated with reductions in Medicare Part D opioid prescriptions, compared to states that do not have such laws. The other found a similar association in states with both medical and recreational marijuana laws in the Medicaid population.
Lead author of the first study is David Bradford, PhD, at the School of Public and International Affairs of the University of Georgia. UGA sent out a press release promoting Dr. Bradford’s study with this title: “SPIA Professor Pens New Study: Legalized Medical Cannabis Lowers Opioid Use.”
Not quite.
Dr. Bradford’s study finds a correlation between states with medical marijuana laws and a reduction in opioid prescriptions, not use. And only in the Medicare Part D population, not the whole population. Dr. Bradford himself notes this when citing the study’s limitations in his journal article. Yet many of the news stories picked up his university’s headline.
And he pushed this misinformation along in interviews he gave to the press, telling the Cox Media Group, “’There are substantial reductions in opiate use’ in states that have initiated dispensaries for medical marijuana,” when in fact there are significant reductions in opioid prescriptions rather than use.
Dr. Bradford also tells his interviewers that the 2017 National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine (NAS) review of the marijuana literature found “conclusive evidence that there are benefits to cannabis for chronic pain in adults, for nausea associated with chemotherapy, and for spasticity and seizures.” He doesn’t understand that all of the evidence for the last three conditions and most of it for chronic pain came from randomized controlled trials of purified cannabinoids rather the kinds of marijuana states have legalized for medical use.
He tells AP reporter Malcolm Ritter that the NAS report presents evidence that is “hard to ignore” and therefore federal laws should be changed to allow doctors to prescribe marijuana for pain treatment.
An accompanying editorial in the journal by two physicians not affiliated with these studies notes that other studies find legal marijuana increases opioid use. They warn than marijuana policy has gotten far ahead of marijuana science and we must remedy this quickly.
Perhaps people with chronic pain will get more relief from purified cannabinoids than opioids, but we won’t know that until randomized, controlled trials are conducted to find out if that’s true. At best, ecological studies like the two published this week can push us towards research, but certainly not policy.
Read “Association Between US State Medical Cannabis Laws and Opioid Prescribing in the Medicare Part D Population” here.
Read “Association of Medical and Adult-Use Marijuana Laws With Opioid Prescribing for Medicaid Enrollees” here.
Read “The Role of Cannabis Legalization in the Opioid Crisis” here.
Marijuana May Lead Nonsmokers to Cigarettes
A study from Columbia University Mailman School of Public Health finds that while cigarette smoking has been on the decline for many years, marijuana use is on the rise—and may end that decline.
The study found that marijuana use may
Increase the initiation of smoking cigarettes among nonsmokers.
Make it harder for smokers who also use marijuana to stop smoking cigarettes, and
Make former smokers who use marijuana more likely to relapse to cigarette smoking.
These findings came from an analysis of data from the National Epidemiologic Survey on Alcohol and Related Conditions in 2001-2002 and 2004-2005 via responses from 36,639 individuals asked about marijuana use and smoking. The effects occurred among all marijuana users, not just those with marijuana use disorders.
New Film on YouTube Shows Effects of Marijuana Legalization in Colorado
Curious about what marijuana legalization looks like in Colorado? View Marijuana Xhere. Filmmaker Michael De Leon has put his director’s cut on YouTube so that you can watch this movie free of charge.
https://drrichswier.com/wp-content/uploads/marijuana-2.png360611National Families in Actionhttp://drrich.wpengine.com/wp-content/uploads/logo_264x69.pngNational Families in Action2018-04-05 05:32:352018-04-05 05:34:51Calling BS on Marijuana Research + Video on Effects of Marijuana Legalization in Colorado
