Tag Archive for: media

Mainstream Pollsters Are ‘Mouthpieces for the Government’ and Corporate Oligarchy: Pollster

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A series of inaccurate polls that consistently favored Kamala Harris and liberal issues in the 2024 election shows that mainstream pollsters are “mouthpieces for the government” and for the corporate behemoths who own their networks, a pollster who accurately predicted the election’s outcome has said.

Polls from the legacy media consistently presented the Harris-Walz campaign as surging and possibly poised to win the White House on Tuesday. In reality, Donald Trump won 31 states and bested Harris in the popular vote — a first for a Republican presidential candidate in two decades. Yet NBC News and ABC News reported a three-point lead for Kamala Harris going into election day, 49% to 46%. CBS News polls showed the 2024 presidential race tied. On the other hand, Rasmussen Reports forecast a 2.4% lead for Donald Trump. What explains such disparate poll results?

“Polling is content. And when your pollsters all report up to organizations that are owned by massive corporations that have vested interests in making sure that the corporate oligarchy status quo in D.C. maintains its control, that’s what happens. They are literally mouthpieces for the government, and I’ve proven that they shill for Democrats,” Mark Mitchell, chief pollster of Rasmussen Reports, told “Washington Watch with Tony Perkins” on Wednesday. “We caught them. They absolutely cooked the internals of the polls, because the exit polling is showing that who turned out to vote is nothing like what was in ABC polls, NBC polls, Reuters, Ipsos — not at all.”

ABC News reported that the most important issue to voters in 2024 was protecting democracy from incipient fascism. That was followed by the economy, keeping abortion legal, and granting amnesty to millions of illegal immigrants, the network stated.

“The state of democracy narrowly prevailed as the most important issue to voters out of five tested in the exit polls,” claimed ABC News, citing its own exit polls on election night. “Thirty-five percent of voters ranked it as their top issue, followed by 31% who said the economy, 14% who said abortion, 11% who said immigration and 4% who said foreign policy.”

“Legal abortion wins majority backing in all seven swing states from 60% to 69%,” ABC News asserted. It also claimed 57% of 2024 voters said illegal immigrants should not be deported but instead “should be offered a chance to apply for legal status,” despite polls showing nearly that exact number (54%) of Americans support mass deportations.

That did not ring true with Mitchell. “I’ve never seen that” constellation of issues rise to the top of the 2024 election, Mitchell told Perkins. “The number one issue has always been the economy in our polling, and the exit polling is confirming that. And then number two is the border — but it doesn’t really capture the pain that people are feeling just talking about the border.”

Voters feel that “America is in a much, much worse place after the Biden administration,” said Mitchell. “Only 37% of voters said they’re better off than they were four years ago. Only 27% of voters in the swing states say they’re safer than there were four years ago.” And only about one in five voters said that “today’s children will be better off than their parents.”

“That’s absolutely horrible,” said Mitchell. “So, when they talk about the border and the economy, they’re telling you: Stop the invasion; bring back the middle class. Because the Democrats, in my opinion, killed it.”

ABC News buried news of the voters’ economic anguish. “The economy remains a key irritant. Voters say it’s in bad shape by 67%-32%. And 45% say their own financial situation is worse now than four years ago, versus 30% the same, with just 24% doing better. The ‘worse off’ number exceeds its 2008 level, then 42%, and far outpaces its shares in 2020 (20%) and 2016 (28%),” said its exit polling.

“With a different hand of cards, [Harris] might actually have won this thing,” said Mitchell. “But she is the status quo candidate, and people hate the status quo.”

Yet pollster Ann Seltzer had a last-minute poll supposedly showing Kamala Harris winning the reliably Republican state of Iowa.

That was “probably the most ridiculous thing that ever happened in the industry,” said Mitchell. Selzer “can definitely poll Iowa, because she’s been doing it cycle after cycle. And she even polled it in July and had Trump up 18. Trump finished at 14, but she put up a Harris plus-three result right on the weekend before election day, just to satiate the Democrat need for some kind of good news.”

“She burned her credibility,” said Mitchell.

“The legacy media and their pollsters should not have a shred of credibility,” said Family Research Council President Tony Perkins.

Mitchell touted the work of Rasmussen pollsters, with one exception. His firm “underestimated the massive Republican turnout” in Texas. “If you take that one out, our error goes down to 0.2% in the states. Eleven out of the 14 states we hit within the margin of error.”

In all, he agreed the political landscape had realigned in 2024, with a multiracial working-class supporting Trump and suburban social liberals shifting to the Democratic Party.

The 2024 election showed middle-class “people fleeing the Democrat Party,” he noted. “There are some offsets. There are the upper-class suburban women and the Boomer men who watch MSNBC. Those people are breaking more towards Harris.”

Meanwhile, “the Republicans, the Donald Trump movement, are really starting to become the core of the counterculture.”

But the realignment of the United States is “all predicated on the Republican Party reforming around the MAGA agenda. Because voters overwhelmingly think the Republican Party is the party of Trump and the MAGA movement.”

“The MAGA tenets are very popular,” said Mitchell. But since “Trump can’t run again,” the persistence of an America First agenda in the GOP “has yet to be seen.”

AUTHOR

Ben Johnson

Ben Johnson is senior reporter and editor at The Washington Stand.

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EDITORS NOTE: This Washington Stand column is republished with permission. All rights reserved. ©2024 Family Research Council.

The Washington Stand is Family Research Council’s outlet for news and commentary from a biblical worldview. The Washington Stand is based in Washington, D.C. and is published by FRC, whose mission is to advance faith, family, and freedom in public policy and the culture from a biblical worldview. We invite you to stand with us by partnering with FRC.

Truth Breeds Trust, Deceit Breeds Destruction

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Americans’ trust in mass media has stumbled to 31%, the lowest measurement since Gallup first asked the question in 1972, while those with absolutely no trust in the media has climbed to 36%. Trust in the media is higher among Democrats (54%) than Republicans (12%) and among senior citizens (43%) than those aged 18-29 (26%), but the media is now the least trusted of all civic and political institutions included in the survey.

How could this happen? If you’re reading The Washington Stand, you likely already know. Mass media, as an institution, lost Americans’ trust by behaving less like the neutral arbiters of objective information they claimed to be and more like partisan organs dedicated to getting candidates who shared their ideology elected.

In other words, they lied — or at least significantly misrepresented themselves. If the media were open about their biases and allowed consumers to reach they own conclusions, they might enjoy greater public trust than they do today.

In fact, the media’s problem with accurate reporting was “highlighted this week,” noted Family Research Council Action President Jody Hice on “Washington Watch,” in a “CBS news interview with [Vice President] Kamala Harris and … an interview with [House] Speaker [Mike] Johnson.” On one hand, CBS News faced accusations of selectively editing Harris’ answers, as well as giving her multiple chances to respond to the same question when her first attempt was unsatisfactory. On the other hand, Johnson accused CBS News of selectively cutting out the most persuasive parts of his interview.

While the media may be the worst offender, Americans’ distrust of institutions is not confined to the evening paper. “Trust in our institutions is eroding” more broadly, warned David Closson, director of Family Research Council’s Center for Biblical Worldview, “whether it’s the courts, whether it’s our school system, even the military.”

“Why is that?” Closson asked. “It’s because of decisions that our leaders have made.”

“Thinking of the military,” he continued, “why are recruitment levels so low? Well, think of the woke ideology that’s been introduced into our service branches.” The military is not supposed to be a partisan or ideological entity. Yet servicemembers were subjected to critical race theory trainings, celebration of transgenderism, and DEI performance objectives. Not only was the military drifting away from its critical mission, it was also becoming unmoored from objective reality and truth.

Or, “think about the thousands of service members that were discharged because they didn’t want to get the COVID-19 shot,” Closson added. In fact, public officials in many arenas squandered trust profligately during the COVID pandemic. “Think of all of us that were told to wear masks, and how none of that was actually based on science,” recalled Closson.

Indeed, the brazen lies and arbitrary orders issuing from public institutions during COVID created a “run” on public trust that went beyond just the issues at hand. Backed by the media and powerful government agencies, public health officials demanded that citizens comply with draconian mandates, including stay-at-home orders, mask mandates, vaccine passports, and social distancing farces. These officials traded on their scientific reputation as public health experts, when in fact few to none of the recommendations they issued were based on science.

As a result, Americans jaded by their COVID-era interactions with government are more willing to question the government on unrelated points. If public health officials were willing to lie about the efficacy of the COVID jabs, for example, then why should they be trusted on the rest of the recommended vaccine regimen? This, combined with a wide-open southern border — another example of gaslighting — has led to the resurgence of diseases once on the verge of eradication. Drug companies are now paying for advertisements that aren’t selling new products, but which are simply begging Americans not to turn their backs on longstanding vaccine recommendations. Building trust takes much longer than destroying it.

The collapse of public trust in America holds lessons for Christians to take to heart. “As Christians, we believe in an objective order, right and wrong,” concluded Closson. “And we believe in speaking the truth in love. And, too often, people in positions of power are abusing their authority, and that is eroding trust we have. And that’s not sustainable for any society in the long term.”

Three thousand years ago, David lamented that “Everyone utters lies to his neighbor; with flattering lips and a double heart they speak” (Psalms 12:2). But, rather than giving in to despair, David placed his trust in the Lord. “The words of the Lord are pure words, like silver refined in a furnace on the ground, purified seven times” (Psalm 12:6).

Because God speaks the truth, his children should also be known for their truthfulness. Paul describes how God has given the church pastors and teachers to “equip the saints for the work of ministry, for building up the body of Christ,” so that we may not be misled “by every wind of doctrine, by human cunning, by craftiness in deceitful schemes. Rather, speaking the truth in love, we are to grow up in every way into him who is the head, into Christ” (Ephesians 4:12, 14-15).

The goal is unity and mutual edification (Ephesians 4:16), but the means are truth and love. Truth fosters trust, but deceit leads to destruction. This holds as true for the church as it does for the society at large. So, rather than be discouraged and disillusioned by the maelstrom of brazen lies swirling through our public discourse, Christians should consider in what ways they are walking in the truth, and how that can contribute to building up the body of Christ.

AUTHOR

Joshua Arnold

Joshua Arnold is a senior writer at The Washington Stand.

EDITORS NOTE: This Washington Stand column is republished with permission. All rights reserved. ©2024 Family Research Council.

The Washington Stand is Family Research Council’s outlet for news and commentary from a biblical worldview. The Washington Stand is based in Washington, D.C. and is published by FRC, whose mission is to advance faith, family, and freedom in public policy and the culture from a biblical worldview. We invite you to stand with us by partnering with FRC.

‘What Are You Talking About?’: Harris Confuses, Shouts Down Host during Fox News Interview

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Vice President Kamala Harris tried to cram a stream of anti-Trump allegations into her Fox News interview with Bret Baier, frequently talking over him before concluding the interview in a litany of shouted claims about how former President Donald Trump presented an existential threat to democracy. Meanwhile, she dodged questions about taxpayer-funded transgender surgeries for prison inmates and illegal immigrants, amnesty for potentially tens of millions of illegal immigrants, how she would differ from Joe Biden, and whether her open borders policies contributed to the deaths of numerous young American women.

Harris attempted to brush off Baier’s efforts to receive an answer to his questions by implying that he secretly knew she was right, at one point leading the top-rated news anchor to reply, “What are you talking about?”

News consumers hoping to get a concrete idea of what a President Harris would do in office were sorely disappointed on issue after issue. “Are you still in support of using taxpayer dollars to help prison inmates or detained illegal aliens to transition to another gender?” asked Baier at one point.

“I will follow the law,” she replied — an answer she gave to numerous policy questions, ignoring the fact that presidents pass, interpret, and enforce the law.

She later claimed the controversial policy of inflicting transgender procedures on federal prisoners is “a law that Donald Trump actually followed.” The Trump administration actually watered down the Obama-Biden administration’s interpretation of federal law which called transgender “transitions” for prisoners “necessary.” The first transgender surgery carried out in federal prisons took place in 2022, during the Biden-Harris administration.

“Kamala Harris has forcefully advocated for transgender inmates to be able to get transition surgeries, President Trump never has,” clarified Brian Hughes, a senior adviser to the Trump campaign.

In fact, candidate Harris bragged to a transgender pressure group that, as California attorney general, “I pushed for that policy” to assure inmates had “access to the medical care that they desired,” adding she may have been the “first in the country” to do so.

On Wednesday, the vice president brushed aside the Trump campaign’s attempts to distance itself from the prison procedures.

“Well, you know what? You got to take responsible [sic] for what happened in your administration,” declared Harris.

Observers predicted the line would come back to haunt the incumbent vice president, who has presided over 40-year-high inflation rates, long periods of wage deterioration, historically unprecedented numbers of illegal border crossings, the invasion of U.S. apartment buildings by transnational criminal gangs, and record-breaking numbers of American deaths from drug overdoses.

Harris’s eyes darted back-and-forth when asked, “When did you first notice Joe Biden’s mental faculties were diminished?”

“He has the judgment and the experience to do exactly what he has done,” Harris replied.

“Joe Biden is not on the ballot,” she added. At one point, Harris responded, “Let me be very clear: My presidency will not be a continuation of Joe Biden’s presidency.” But she failed to specify a single policy she would change or to list any mistake of the hyphenated Biden-Harris administration.

The two also clashed over the open border policies enacted during Harris’s tenure in office, which kicked off with more than 90 executive actions undoing Trump administration border security policies. An unprecedented wave of more than 10 million illegal border crossings followed, in addition to new amnesty and “parole” programs, such as the one that placed tens of thousands of Haitians in Springfield, Ohio.

“Looking back, do you regret the decision to terminate Remain in Mexico at the beginning of your administration?” asked Baier.

Harris referenced two pieces of legislation that bookend the Biden-Harris administration, without any mention of the years in between. In an answer that nearly mirrored a response she gave to Charlemagne Tha God earlier in the week, Harris noted that among her administration’s first actions was the introduction of a mass amnesty bill. The administration supported the U.S. Citizenship Act of 2021, which would have granted amnesty to at least 11 million illegal immigrants over eight years. Despite Democratic control of the White House and both chambers of Congress, the bill never came up for a vote.

She also alleged that Donald Trump bears responsibility for the border situation for opposing a bill negotiated by Senator James Lankford (R-Okla.), which would have allowed 1.8 million illegal immigrants into the country each year, among other proposals that border hawks disliked.

Baier repeatedly attempted to turn the interview back to Harris, her record, and her policies. He noted that among the six million or more illegal immigrants released into the U.S. homeland by the Biden-Harris administration were those who assaulted and killed U.S. citizens Jocelyn Gary, Rachel Moran, and Laken Riley. When Baier asked if Harris owed their families an apology, she replied she felt “sorry for their loss.”

During a Fox News town hall with Harris Faulkner, Trump laid down a radically different immigration plan. “We’re going to end all sanctuary cities in the United States, and we’re going to go back to normalcy, and we’re going to have law and order,” he said, to massive cheers. The former president has also promised a mass deportation of illegal immigrants, a policy supported by the majority of Americans.

Baier kept up the pressure, citing a recent poll which found that 79% of Americans believe the nation is on the wrong track, and “that track follows three and a half years of you being vice president,” said Baier. “If you’re turning the page, you’ve been in office for three and a half years.”

“And Trump has been running for office,” replied Harris, echoing her response that she had “never been to Europe” during her disastrous interview with NBC News host Lester Holt.

When Baier pushed Harris over her responsibility for her actions, she replied, “You and I both know what I’m talking about. You and I both know what I’m talking about.”

“I actually don’t. What are you talking about?” replied an inquisitive Baier.

He later asked Harris about the eight out of 10 Americans who believe Biden-Harris administration policies have sapped American strength. “Are they misguided? Are they stupid?” asked Baier.

“No, God, I would never say that,” replied Harris, apparently taking the Lord’s Name in vain.

Harris then accused Donald Trump of “suggesting he would turn the American military on the American people.” Harris Faulkner asked Trump about that allegation earlier in the day. “I’m not threatening anybody,” he replied, noting that he has “been investigated more than Alphonse Capone. It’s called weaponization of government.”

As the interview came to a conclusion, Harris began yelling, waving her hands, and screaming at Baier while insisting it is Donald Trump who is “misguided,” “unstable,” and “mentally not stable.” Harris filibustered Baier, refusing to yield as he tried to redirect her to the original topic. “I have a lot more to say” about Donald Trump, Harris complained.

Baier expressed his regret that the interview lacked substance, to which Harris replied “I invite everyone to go” to her campaign website.

“I tried to redirect numerous times without interrupting too much,” said Baier after the interview. He also noted the Harris campaign tried to shorten the interview significantly.

“We were supposed to start at 5 p.m. This was the time they gave us. Originally, we were going to do 25 or 30 minutes. They came in and said, ‘Well, maybe 20,’ so it was already getting whittled down. And then the vice president showed up about 5:15. We were pushing the envelope to be able to turn it around for the top of the 6 o’clock” hour. “I had a lot of other questions,” Baier added.

Baier also revealed that Harris’s campaign aides pushed him hard to “wrap,” or end the interview early. “I’m talking, like four people, waving their hands like, ‘It’s gotta stop!’” he said.

The interview went so poorly that shortly after its conclusion Republican vice presidential candidate J.D. Vance advised his “Democratic friends: maybe you should consider swapping Kamala Harris for Joe Biden.” The Trump War Room retweeted the entire interview with the message, “Our newest ad just dropped.”

“Kamala’s not used to real interviews. It shows,” said Senator Mike Lee (R-Utah). “She is melting under the spotlight,” said Stephen Miller, a senior adviser to President Donald Trump and founder of America First Legal.

Democrats and members of the liberal media tried to defend Harris’s performance. Harris campaign senior adviser and former adviser to Barack Obama David Plouffe called the exchange “an ambush.” MSNBC hostess Mika Brzezinski posted on X that “@KamalaHarris did a great job” during “a rude and misleading interview.” Brzezinski also accused Baier of “performing for an audience of one,” implying Baier tailored his questions to please Trump — although MSNBC hosts have reported receiving texts from Democratic White House officials live on the air.

CNN’s Brian Stelter predicted, “A lot of viewers are going to come away saying, ‘Wow, she’s willing to do that. That’s a sign of toughness and strength.’” The host of “The Situation Room,” Wolf Blitzer, agreed with Stelter that Harris’s performance was “impressive indeed.”

Media headlines repeatedly referred to the interview as “testy.”

“It was a little tense,” Baier told Sean Hannity, adding the video — which showed Harris pausing, stuttering, and looking around frantically at times — was unedited. “I think she had a mission,” said Baier. She wanted to have a viral moment … and I think she might have gotten that.”

Harris, who has attempted to pitch her candidacy to the relatively narrow slither of Never Trump Republicans who lined up behind former South Carolina Governor Nikki Haley in the primaries, has also discussed interviewing on Joe Rogan’s podcast.

“Maybe she’ll come back,” said Baier. “I don’t know whether she will or not, but I hope she does.”

“I think I understand why they don’t want tough interviews, and this will probably be the last one,” replied Hannity.

AUTHOR

Ben Johnson

Ben Johnson is senior reporter and editor at The Washington Stand.

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EDITORS NOTE: This Washington Stand column is republished with permission. All rights reserved. ©2024 Family Research Council.

The Washington Stand is Family Research Council’s outlet for news and commentary from a biblical worldview. The Washington Stand is based in Washington, D.C. and is published by FRC, whose mission is to advance faith, family, and freedom in public policy and the culture from a biblical worldview. We invite you to stand with us by partnering with FRC.

The Leftist Institutional Machine behind the Trump Assassination Attempts

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Former President Donald Trump plays a lot of golf, and by all accounts is skilled at it. But the game of golf has a long history among U.S. presidents. William McKinley is believed to have been the first to play, starting in 1897, but the 350-pound William Howard Taft was the first president to take the game seriously, having taken up golf in 1894 with his brother Henry. Woodrow Wilson played over 1,000 rounds of golf while in office and even painted his golf balls black during the winter so that he could play in the snow.

Warren G. Harding trained his dog to go and fetch his golf balls. Calvin Coolidge was not particularly skilled at golf and eventually left his golf bag behind in the White House when his presidency ended. Before contracting polio, Franklin D. Roosevelt was a golf club champion. Dwight D. Eisenhower installed the first presidential putting green on the White House grounds and often played with his friend Arnold Palmer. John F. Kennedy played on the Harvard golf team and managed a single-digit handicap, although he shied away from the game as president, believing it to be an indication of a privileged lifestyle. Not one of the game’s greats, Lyndon B. Johnson found that inviting senators to join him for a game of golf would give him three or four hours to argue for legislation he favored. Richard Nixon was a fairly gifted golfer but removed the White House putting green and refused to play while in office, focusing his time and energy on his political ambitions. After Gerald Ford pardoned Nixon, the first thing he did was play golf.

Ronald Reagan was recognized as a decent player, but not an avid one. George H.W. Bush holds the presidential record for fastest game ever played, clocking in at just under two hours for a full 18 holes. Bill Clinton was known for re-taking shots he wasn’t pleased with but loved the game so much that he would even play alone in the rain. Like his father, George W. Bush was a golf lover, but gave up playing in office after the September 11 attacks of 2001. Barack Obama had custom golf balls made, and his frequent tee times even made national headlines during his White House tenure.

Until Sunday, the golf course was a sort of safe escape, a sportsman’s retreat, for presidents — both in office and afterward. At least 17 U.S. presidents have been golfers, to varying degrees, and some of them played golf during the most fraught, contentious times in modern history, including World War I. But never before, as far as history recollects, had anyone attempted to assassinate a U.S. president on the golf course — not until Ryan Routh poked the muzzle of an automatic rifle through the chain link fence surrounding a West Palm Beach golf course and tried to find Donald Trump in his sights.

This is not to say, of course, that the golf course is some sacred, inviolate place; it is not. Nor are Sunday’s events merely indicative of the volatile lows that political discourse has reached in the Western world in the 21st century — after all, conservatives firmly believe that the political Left is a threat to essential rights, such as freedom of speech and freedom of religion, and its machinations are responsible for the slaughter of tens of millions of unborn innocents on the horrifying altar of abortion. Yet Vice President Kamala Harris has not been shot in the side of the head, nobody has poked a rifle through the fence to take aim at President Joe Biden while he golfs — or, what is more likely, while he naps on the beach.

Some have said that Thomas Crooks and Ryan Routh — the two men who have, thus far, attempted to assassinate Donald Trump — have been “radicalized.” This is most certainly true, but it is a far deeper, more complicated, and more sinister affair than political pundits and keyboard commentators may suggest. A 20-year-old student and a 58-year-old construction worker are not convinced to attempt murder because they read or hear or watch a few frightening news reports centered on a politician over a period of weeks, months, or even a few years. Were that the case, everyone who watches Alex Jones or Tucker Carlson would be hunting Washington’s elite, believing them to be brainwashed by demons. No, the foundation was laid years — even generations — prior to motivate everyday civilians to take a shot at the president.

There are three chief institutions which come into play in this ploy, and one which plays a supporting role: the education system, the media, the family, and the government. Over the past 60 years or more, the education system has been responsible for drilling into every child’s head the conclusion that Adolf Hitler was the most evil and inhuman creature to ever roam the face of the planet. Of course, Hitler was evil, and he wreaked war and atrocities upon the world, but he may not even be the most vile, despotic genocidal maniac of his day.

His one-time ally Joseph Stalin, leader of the Soviet Union, is crediting with tens of millions of deaths. Whether in gulags or from famine or in unceremonious mass executions or even massacres in the streets during his many purges, Stalin racked up a body count roughly quadruple that of Adolf Hitler’s. Communist China’s Chairman Mao Zedong topped both Hitler and Stalin, the latter by almost 20 million deaths. Yet generation after generation has been taught, by an institution that they are practically forced to respect, that Adolf Hitler was the most evil man to ever walk the face of the earth.

The media’s role, which is rightly noted as incessantly labeling Donald Trump as “Adolf Hitler” and his allies and supporters as “Nazis,” cannot be fulfilled unless the education system first fulfills its own role. In his apocalyptic novel “That Hideous Strength,” C.S. Lewis made the following observation regarding those who read newspapers:

“Why you fool, it’s the educated reader who CAN be gulled. All our difficulty comes with the others. When did you meet a workman who believes the papers? He takes it for granted that they’re all propaganda and skips the leading articles. He buys his paper for the football results and the little paragraphs about girls falling out of windows and corpses found in Mayfair flats. He is our problem. We have to recondition him. But the educated public, the people who read the high-brow weeklies, don’t need reconditioning. They’re all right already. They’ll believe anything.”

Thus, the education system not only teaches children which historical figure to consider the most depraved, the most evil, and the least human. The education system is also tasked with doing away with the “common man.” The sort of man who believes almost nothing written in the newspapers or reported on cable or network news programs, who “takes it for granted that they’re all propaganda,” must be “reconditioned.” His critical thinking skills, instead of being honed and sharpened, are dulled and allowed to atrophy. Subjects are taught to him by rote, his academic and intellectual value is judged on the basis of what he can remember and how closely it resembles the words of his textbook, not by his capacity for innovation or ingenuity. He is not taught to analyze subjects but to identify which analyses (conducted by others) are acceptable for him to read and regurgitate. He is taught the theory of “accreditation,” and learns to fear and abhor sources which are deemed un-credible.

Now, this process should be prevented and remedied by the third institution in our ensemble: the family. It ought to be the mother and father who, upon realizing that their child is especially dull and seemingly incapable of critical thinking, pull that child from the local school and either find a private, classical-based alternative or else just homeschool the child, seeing to his intellectual development and cultivation themselves. Thus, the family must be fractured. Feminism, pornography, and economic strife join forces to achieve this outcome, breaking up marriages and both encouraging and pressuring both mother and father to go out into the workforce, leaving them little time to recognize that their child is languishing intellectually and even less time to devote to rectifying that ill.

Christianity, which offers the antidote to the enemies of marriage, is shunned, mocked, and ridiculed in the public square, leaving fewer and fewer couples with any awareness that there even is an antidote to their marital struggles, much less what that antidote might be or where to find it.

Enter the media: Donald Trump is painted with a Hitler mustache on magazine covers, he is repeatedly compared to the German autocrat over a period of four, now eight, now 12 years, and every rhetorical stretch is employed, every argumentative gymnastic move put to use, to liken his policies and agenda to those of the Third Reich. Never mind that Donald Trump never rounded people up, tossed them in camps, and killed them. Never mind that Donald Trump has ended wars and conflicts, instead of beginning them. Never mind that Donald Trump’s political career did not begin with a failed and violent coup attempt. Never mind that Donald Trump never wrote a book detailing his racial ideology. Never mind that Donald Trump didn’t dissolve Congress upon taking office and declare himself the supreme leader of the country.

Donald Trump is further labeled a “threat to democracy,” a phrase repeated online by Routh, just a few months prior to pointing an AK-47 at the 45th president. This claim has been amplified and repeated ad infinitum by the left-wing political establishment in government and media. Again, never mind that Donald Trump left office in January 2021, even amidst credible claims of election fraud. Never mind that his policies in office included upholding and respecting the separation of powers, instead of packing or discrediting constitutional courts. Never mind that he was democratically elected in 2016 and not only ran for office again but earned even more votes in 2020. No, he’s literally Hitler, you have to believe us.

And the media is believed, because the media is “accredited,” it’s an acceptable source, and there are no critical thinking skills left to refute the overwhelming weight of that “accreditation.” This is only bolstered when those in the government, in the sitting presidential administration, condemn Donald Trump as Hitler and those who appreciate his policies and his patriotism as Nazis. These politicians are seen, by the likes of Thomas Crooks and Ryan Routh, as Winston Churchill, boldly facing down the madman threatening the world, when in fact, ironically, they are more like Joseph Goebbels, pushing dehumanizing propaganda at every turn.

Ultimately, that’s what is behind the assassination attempts against Donald Trump: dehumanization. This machine consisting of the education system, the media, and the government operates on the principle that those who oppose its agenda — even those who simply do not accept it — are unfit to be called human. Again, ironically, this is alarmingly similar to Hitler’s own ideology, to his mythological Aryan ideal: all those who do not fit in are simply declared sub-human and eliminated. The radicalization of would-be assassins — not to mention the unprecedented lawfare campaign targeting Donald Trump — would also seem to fall under the purview of threatening democracy.

Donald Trump not only opposes the ideology of the diabolical elites — unlimited immigration from the third world, the destruction of America’s heritage and history, the economic oppression of every American family working hard to make a home — but is an existential threat to it. He must, therefore, be eliminated. After all, the elites will argue, he’s less than human. He’s a threat to democracy, he’s literally Hitler.

AUTHOR

S.A. McCarthy

S.A. McCarthy serves as a news writer at The Washington Stand.

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EDITORS NOTE: This Washington Stand column is republished with permission. All rights reserved. ©2024 Family Research Council.

The Washington Stand is Family Research Council’s outlet for news and commentary from a biblical worldview. The Washington Stand is based in Washington, D.C. and is published by FRC, whose mission is to advance faith, family, and freedom in public policy and the culture from a biblical worldview. We invite you to stand with us by partnering with FRC.

‘Witness Protection’: Media-Friendly Tim Walz Has Disappeared From Airwaves Since Joining Harris Ticket

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Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz rose to prominence by making the rounds in mainstream media interviews, but since being named Kamala Harris’s running mate, the “folksy”, “midwestern dad” has been missing from the airwaves.

From July 22 to Aug. 6, about two weeks before he was added to the ticket, Walz appeared on MSNBC, PBS, CNN and Fox News a total of ten times, an analysis by Newsbusters’ Curtis Houck, shared with the Daily Caller, showed. Since Harris chose Walz as her running mate on Aug. 6, the governor has not appeared on the networks he flocked to during the vetting process, according to Houck’s analysis.

“It’s no surprise that Tim Walz has gone into the witness protection program first started by the Biden-Harris 2020 campaign after blanketing the liberal cable networks during the vetting process to show Kamala Harris his loyalty to her,” Houck told the Caller.

“Between July 23 and August 6, he appeared on CNN and MSNBC at least seven times, with an additional hit on taxpayer-funded PBS. Morning and evening, Walz made sure Harris and her team saw him at all hours of the day. Importantly, none came after July 30 as the vetting intensified and Harris conducted final round interviews,” he continued.

The shift is a jarring departure from Walz’s pre-nomination media blitz, which skyrocketed him into liberal stardom and separated him from the other contenders in the VP sweepstakes.

Walz has done one tv appearance since being named Harris’ running mate; his joint interview on CNN alongside the vice president. Over the first month of her presidential campaign, Harris faced scrutiny for a lack of unscripted moments. The pressure forced Harris to commit to setting up an interview by the end of August, though rather than doing a one-on-one sit-down, she brought Walz along.

Neither Harris nor Walz have held a press conference since beginning their run, only taking a few questions from reporters in gaggles when on the road.

While Harris and Walz have done one media appearance together, Senator J.D. Vance has done 94 interviews, press conferences and gaggles with the media since Trump named him his running mate on July 15, according to Axios. In the month of August, Vance did all five major Sunday shows, the outlet reported.

“Tim Walz is in hiding, just like Kamala Harris, because Harris is a San Francisco liberal desperately pretending not to be one, and no one trusts Walz to remember every part of the fictional record the campaign staff has created for both of them. They are both radical leftists, whose policies would only send the American economy into a deeper and faster spiral, and the last thing they want anyone to do is answer questions about anything,” Tim Murtaugh, senior adviser to the Trump campaign, told the Caller.

“Walz has lied about so much that they have no idea what piece of his embellished life story he’ll roll out next. Next thing you know he’ll claim to have quarterbacked the Minnesota Vikings to the Super Bowl while simultaneously serving in Afghanistan,” he added.

Before Walz was shielded from mainstream media appearances, the governor was going viral for his line of attack on Republicans. During his July 23 hit with MSNBC, Walz deemed Vance, Trump and other Republicans “weird,” a message that would prove to be a bit troublesome for Vance as he started to hit the campaign trail.

“Walz sat with incredibly friendly liberal journalists who saw no problem in helping Walz advance his case, including his astroturfed insult against former President Trump, Senator Vance and the Republican ticket as being ‘weird.’ The moniker kept Walz in the minds of liberal journalists like star-crossed lovers being unable to think of anything else after laying eyes on each other. Why? He said exactly how they feel about conservatives,” Houck told the Caller.

Scott Jennings, a longtime GOP adviser in Kentucky and veteran of numerous campaigns, told the Caller that the Harris campaign must have judged Walz as a risk to the operation and chose to sideline him as a result.

“They’ve obviously judged him to be a huge risk. His limited engagement on the CNN sit-down was ridiculously bad,” Jennings told the Caller.

After Harris named Walz her running mate, the Minnesota governor has been caught in several lies, including some about his service record.

The Harris campaign unknowingly began the unraveling of Walz’s military story after unearthing a 2018 video of the governor pushing for gun control, saying that “those weapons of war, that I carried in war” should stay only in combat. Social media users were quick to point out despite Walz’s statement, he never saw war.

Veterans in Walz’s unit previously accused him during his run for office in 2018 of retiring from the National Guard to run for Congress once it was revealed that he would be deployed to Iraq. Vance has lobbed attacks at Walz on the campaign trail, questioning why Americans should trust a guy who lied about his military record.

Veteran who knew Walz unloads on him on the @MegynKellyShow: “He’s not brave, I call him a coward because he is” pic.twitter.com/efGKk1fHjm

The Minnesota Governor is also the subject of a congressional investigation relating to his ties to the Chinese government. House Oversight Committee Chairman James Comer wrote a letter to FBI Director Christopher Wray to request all documents relating to any Chinese entities that the now-governor may have interacted with while on his dozens of trips to China.

Lies aside, Jennings told the Caller that another reason for sidelining Walz could be because he would be pressed about a policy platform Harris is yet to define. More than a month into her campaign, Harris has only unveiled her economic policy and has yet to put a platform on her website. The Trump campaign, by contrast, features the Republican National Committee’s platform as its own.

“In his defense, she has no idea what her positions are so how could he be expected to know anything?” Jennings said.

AUTHOR

Reagan Reese

White House reporter. Follow Reagan on Twitter.

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EDITORS NOTE: This Daily Caller column is republished with permission. ©All rights reserved.

‘The History of Kamala Harris’ by Geoffrey B. Higginbotham, Major General, USMC (Ret.)

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Many of our readers sent us a link to a column written by Geoffrey B. Higginbotham, Major General, USMC (Ret.) on the history of the Harris family and of Kamala and her husband Doug Emhoff.

It was published on March 13, 2021 in Government in Exile.

Here are Marine General Higginbotham’s words.

The History of Kamala Harris

For your knowledge and interest about the Biden VP.  Here is a timely editorial that exposes the hidden background of Kamala Harris from the Combat Veterans for Congress Political Action Committee that is posted here with permission of the author. CVFC PAC supports the election of US military combat veterans to the US Senate and House of Representatives. The editorial begins:

Kamala Harris’ father was an avowed Marxist professor in the Economics Department at Stanford University in Palo Alto, CA. Both of Harris’ parents were active in the Berkeley based Afro-American Association; Fidel Castro and Che Guevara were the heroes of the Afro-American Association.

The group’s leader, Donald Warden (aka Khalid al-Mansour), mentored two young Afro-American Association members, Huey Newton and Bobby Seale; they created the Maoist inspired Black Panther Party which gained strong support from Communist China; the Black Panther Party served as the model for creation of the Black Lives Matter Marxist organization Khalid al-Mansour subsequently went on to arrange financing and facilitated for Barack Hussein Obama to be accepted as a
student to matriculate at Harvard Law School.

Following her graduation from college, Harris returned to California and subsequently became the mistress of the 60-year-old married Speaker of the California Assembly, Willie Brown, Jr. Brown’s political campaigns were supported and funded by Dr. Carlton Goodlett, the owner of The Sun Reporter and several other pro-Communist newspapers.

Brown was elected as Mayor of San Francisco, and strongly endorsed Harris’ Marxist political philosophy; he guided Harris’ political rise in California politics, leading to her election as California’s Attorney General. Willie Brown, Jr. was a well-known long-time Communist sympathizer. Willie Brown, Jr. was initially elected to public office with the substantial help of the Communist Party USA.

Today, Willie Brown is widely regarded as one of the Chinese Communist Party’s best friends in the San Francisco Bay Area.

While serving as San Francisco District Attorney, Kamala Harris mentored a young San Francisco Radical Maoist activist, Lateefah Simon, who was a member of the STORM Revolutionary Movement; Simon currently chairs the Bay Area Rapid Transit (BART) Board. Simon has always been close friends with the founder of Black Lives Matter Marxist Domestic Terrorists, Alicia Garza, as well as STORM member and avowed Communist, Van Jones. Harris has been openly and aggressively supporting Black Lives Matter Marxists; Kamala Harris is still closely associated with Maoist Lateefah Simon and Marxist Alicia Garza.

Kamala Harris’s sister Maya Harris was a student activist at Stanford University. She was a closely associated with Steve Phillips, one of the leading Marxist-Leninists on campus and a long-time affiliate with the League of Revolutionary Struggle, a pro-Chinese Communist group.

Phillips came out of the Left, and in college he studied Marx, Mao, and Lenin, and maintained close associations with fellow Communists. Phillips married into the multi billion dollar Sandler family of the Golden West Savings and Loan fortune. He funded many leftist political campaigns, and the voter registration drives in the Southern and South Western states in order to help his friend, Barack Hussein Obama, defeat Hillary Clinton. Phillips has been a major financial sponsor for Kamala Harris’s political campaigns for various California elective offices.

Harris’ husband, Doug Emhoff works for the law firm DLA Piper, which “boasts nearly 30 years of experience in Communist China with over 140 lawyers dedicated to its ‘Communist China  investment Services’ branch. He was just appointed to Professor at Yale to school future lawyers in the fine points of Communism. When she was elected to the US Senate, Kamala Harris appointed a Pro-Communist Senate Chief of Staff, Karine Jean-Pierre. Jean-Pierre was active with the New York-based Haiti Support Network. The organization worked closely with the pro-Communist China/Communist North Korea Workers World Party and supported Jean-Bertrand Aristide, the far-left Communist former president of Haiti and the radical Lavalas movement.

Fortunately for Harris, but potentially disastrous for the Republic, elected office holders are not subject to the security clearance process. If the FBI did a Background Investigation on Kamala Harris, she never would have passed, because of her 40-year close ties with Marxists, Communists, Maoists, and Communist China. Harris would never have been approved for acceptance to any of the 5 Military Service Academies, been appointed to a US Government Sub-Cabinet position, or would have been approved to fill a sensitive position for a high security defense contractor. Yet, since Joe Biden was elected, Harris could be a heartbeat away from being President.

The US constitutional Republic is being threatened by the People’s Republic of Communist China (PPC) externally, and by their very active espionage operations within the United States. The People’s Republic of Communist China (PPC), with 1.4 billion people, is governed by the 90 million member Chinese Communist Party (CCP), that has been working with Russia to destroy the US Constitutional Republic for over 70 years.

If the American voters read the background information (in Trevor Loudon’s article) on Kamala Harris, they would never support her election as Vice President of the United States. Joe Biden is suffering from the early onset of dementia and will continue to decline in cerebral awareness; he will never be able to fill out a four-year term of office. Since Biden was elected, the Socialists, Marxists, and Communist who control Kamala Harris, are planning to enact provisions of the 25th Amendment, in order to remove Joe Biden from office, so Harris can become the first Communist President of the United States.

Since Biden was elected, because Biden would not be up to it, Kamala Harris would lead the effort to appoint very dangerous anti-American Leftist, Communist, Socialists, and Marxists to fill highly sensitive positions in the Washington Deep State Bureaucracy. She would fill all appointive positions in the US Intelligence Agencies, in the Department of Homeland Security, in the Department of Defense, in The Justice Department, the Department of State, the FBI, the CIA, most cabinet positions, the National Security Council, and in the White House Staff.

American voters must alert their fellow Americans that Kamala Harris is a very serious National Security threat to the very survival of the US Constitutional Republic; she has been a fellow traveler of Marxists, Communists, Maoists, Socialists, Progressives, and Chinese Communists for over 35 years. President Trump had much more background information on Kamala Harris than we presented here, and he was correct, when he accused Kamala Harris of being a Communist subverter.

Geoffrey B. Higginbotham
Major General, USMC (Ret.)

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EDITORS NOTE: This Government in Exile column is republished with permission. ©All rights reserved.

Media Rewrites Kamala’s Record

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Which senator had the most liberal voting record in 2019? According to GovTrack.us in January 2020, it was then-Senator Kamala Harris (D-Calif.). Today, that same webpage can no longer be found, nor can the page for Harris’s 2019 report card. The internet Wayback Machine first noticed the pages missing on Monday. Coinciding with this disappearance was only one relevant change: last weekend President Joe Biden announced via X that he would not seek reelection and endorsed Harris as his replacement.

Is the media scrubbing the web of Harris’s past liberal record?

According to GovTrack.us in July 2024, there was a perfectly innocent-sounding explanation for the sudden scrubbing of a five-year-old webpage. That page “was based on a single calendar year. Several years ago we discontinued creating new single-calendar-year ‘report cards’ because a single year of data is “not sufficient to create a reliable portrait of the activity of legislators.”

It is true that more years of data provide a fuller picture. However, having only served in the Senate for four years, Harris didn’t develop a large legislative record there. In 2017 (also archived), GovTrack.us ranked Harris as the 8th-most liberal senator by voting record. In 2018 (live), she ranked as the 4th-most liberal. Harris was the most liberal in 2019, and in 2020 (also live) she ranked as the 2nd-most liberal senator. In 2021, she became vice president.

But arguing that “a reliable portrait” of a legislator’s activity required information from multiple years is not an explanation for deleting pages from certain years and not others. Indeed, deleting any record of voting scores seems beneath an organization described as a non-partisan “government transparency site.”

Their poor excuse for deleting the 2019 report card (and a 2019 page ranking all senators ideologically), combined with the suggestive timing of the move, only stoked suspicions that GovTrack.us deleted the pages to obscure Harris’s voting record, which was the most liberal of the year. What made GovTrack’s coverup even more embarrassing is that their patchwork deletions did not even effectively obscure Harris’s consistently liberal voting record.

When CBS news anchor Norah O’Donnell asked Harris about the “most-liberal” ranking in an interview for “60 Minutes,” Harris first deflected, then characteristically laughed it off. “You supported the Green New Deal, you supported Medicare for all, you’ve supported legalizing marijuana. Joe Biden doesn’t support those things,” O’Donnell pressed.

Harris did not deny that statement. Instead, she responded, “What I will do — and I promise you this, and this is what Joe wants me to do, this was part of our deal — I will always share with him my lived experience as it relates to any issue that we confront. And I promised Joe that I will give him that perspective and always be honest with him.”

Two things seem to be true at the same time. On one hand, Kamala Harris is on the far-left flank of the American political spectrum, or at least she wants the support of that constituency. On the other hand, Harris also has national political ambitions and enough political instincts to recognize that being “the most liberal senator” doesn’t play well in most places outside of California.

The best explanation to be offered so far for GovTrack.us deleting Harris’s record from their site is that they, too, recognize the political liability of being “the most liberal senator,” and they removed the page as an intangible contribution to Harris’s campaign for president. If they wish to dispute this, let them offer a better explanation to convince us. The American people know when we are being gaslighted.

Border Czar?

GovTrack.us is not the only organization to be exposed for polishing up Harris’s record by, well, denying what they had previously said about it. “In the past few days,” Axios claimed Wednesday, “the Trump campaign and Republicans have tagged Harris repeatedly with the ‘border czar’ title — which she never actually had.”

Again, the urge to exonerate Harris of any responsibility for the border serves the short-term, political goal of separating her from the unpopular border policies of the Biden-Harris administration.

Yet this critique would surprise Axios writers from five years ago, when they unironically called Harris the “border czar.” The very same writer who is now denouncing Republicans’ use of the label “border czar,” Stef Kight, wrote an article on March 24, 2021 titled, “Biden puts Harris in charge of border crisis.” As with all American applications of the word “czar,” the “border czar” refers colloquially to the person in charge of an issue, not to that person’s technical title.

Even worse, this shifts the focus of history revisionism from Harris’s Senate career to her record as vice president. In other words, it memory-holes Harris’s actions not from a role she held five years ago, but from a role she holds right now. In other words, to identify Axios’s infinitesimal distinction, their readers would not only have to rewrite their memory of their recent past but also override their current political knowledge about the present.

Axios knows better, and their readers do too. But they went ahead and published this ridiculous argument for cheap political points, hoping no one would notice that they had drawn a distinction without a difference. After getting called out in a community note on X, Axios doubled-down on their recent resolve to split hairs. At the bottom of their most recent article, an editor’s note now declares that “Axios was among the news outlets that incorrectly labeled Harris a ‘border czar’ in 2021.”

“There’s some kind of oligarchy there that’s running the country,” declared Rep. Andy Biggs (R-Ariz.) on “Washington Watch” Thursday. “You’ve got the massive cover up and cleaning up of the image of Kamala Harris, who has bungled everything that she’s been put in charge of, like the border.”

“She was the border czar,” Biggs added. “Everybody calls her that. And if you don’t like border czar, she was appointed to lead the border effort. She was the manager. She was the director, whatever you want to call it. The bottom line is still the same. She failed, and Joe Biden, stuck with her.”

Rioter Bailouts

Yet another attempt to rehabilitate Kamala Harris’s political image came Thursday, when CBS News claimed, “Trump falsely accuses Harris of donating to Minnesota Freedom Fund, bailing out ‘dangerous criminals.’”

The Minnesota Freedom Fund was a Democrat-organized fundraiser to bail out violent activists who were arrested for attacking police, torching businesses, and terrorizing neighborhoods during the height of the George Floyd riots in the summer of 2020. Again, it’s obvious why Harris and her supporters would want to distance themselves from such a politically unpopular policy.

CBS News got tagged by a community note informing their readers that Harris publicly promoted the Minnesota Freedom Fund in a June 1, 2020 tweet that is still live, “If you’re able to, chip in now to the @MNFreedomFund to help post bail for those protesting on the ground in Minnesota.”

CBS has since updated its headline to read, “Despite Trump claim and 2020 tweet showing support, Harris never donated to Minnesota Freedom Fund.” In other words, to salvage the “news” story, CBS twisted it into a story about something a politician didn’t do four years ago. Do these people ever listen to themselves?

Even if they hadn’t descended into absurdity, it’s hard to see that Harris appears in a better light after CBS’s amended story. Perhaps she didn’t personally donate to the rioter bail fund. But she promoted it and encouraged others to donate to it. If the point was to distance the presumptive Democratic nominee from a radical, unpopular stance she took four years ago, the mission was most definitely not accomplished.

In late 2023, The New York Times Magazine ran a lengthy profile of Harris that described how she “is still struggling to make the case for herself — and feels she shouldn’t have to.” The bottom line is that many Americans have never been very enamored with the radical, leftward-pressing fringe of the Democratic Party that Harris so often represents. Until recently, it was okay for the media to say so. But, with Biden bowing out of the race, and no other Democrat stepping forward to challenge Trump, refurbishing Harris’s rusty image has become the prime objective.

In unburdening Harris from what has been, it seems the media is not above rewriting the past.

AUTHOR

Joshua Arnold

Joshua Arnold is a senior writer at The Washington Stand.

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EDITORS NOTE: This Washington Stand column is republished with permission. All rights reserved. ©2024 Family Research Council.

The Washington Stand is Family Research Council’s outlet for news and commentary from a biblical worldview. The Washington Stand is based in Washington, D.C. and is published by FRC, whose mission is to advance faith, family, and freedom in public policy and the culture from a biblical worldview. We invite you to stand with us by partnering with FRC.

Three Top Tactics Used by Media to Distort Israeli Hostage Rescue, Serve Hamas Interests

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Effective tactics are used by media outlets employed to distort the narrative surrounding Israel’s recent hostage rescue. 

Media outlets went out of their way on Saturday (June 8) to make Israel’s heroic rescue of four Gaza hostages look tainted or even immoral, with a reframing that served Hamas’ strategy.

Instead of simply reporting the news — that Israeli hostages Noa Argamani, Almog Meir Jan, Andrey Kozlov, and Shlomi Ziv had been rescued in a rare and complex operation in the heart of Gaza — media outlets chose to label it as one of the “bloodiest” raids of the war.

They used three tactics to achieve that goal, which effectively turned justice into injustice:

  • Minimizing the achievement by using the term “freed” instead of “rescued” to describe the hostages
  • Emphasizing the Palestinian death toll based on Hamas figures
  • Whitewashing the terrorists’ use of civilians as human shields

The Washington Post, for example, committed two of these journalistic crimes:

Its headline led with the number of Palestinian casualties (without questioning how many of them were terrorists), its sub-header called the operation “brazen” and the lead paragraph labeled the operation “one of the bloodiest raids of the war.”

The fact that the hostages were rescued alive is mentioned only in the second paragraph. And the word “Blitz” is casually thrown into the fifth paragraph, evoking comparisons to Nazi warfare.

But what’s hidden in plain sight is the complete whitewashing of Hamas’ strategy of using civilians as human shields. The article simply mentions that the hostages had been held in “buildings,” omitting the fact that they were kept in families’ homes in the crowded multi-story structures, amid the civilian population.

NPR‘s coverage has similar faults: The Palestinian death toll is used to frame the hostage rescue with descriptions like “the streets were…covered in blood,” and the sites of the hostage captivity are called “locations in Nuseirat in central Gaza” — which could mean anything from tunnels to military compounds.

Did the Washington Post or NPR journalists independently verify whether the blood in the streets belonged to terrorists or innocent civilians? Or is blood used here — as in ancient times — to demonize Jews?

Either way, their coverage whitewashes the terrorists.

Selective Terminology

Reuters, which also called the operation “one of the single bloodiest Israeli assaults of the eight-month-old war,” used another tactic while focusing on the Palestinian casualties.

One of its headlines used the vague term “freed,” which can be attributed to the goodwill of the terrorists, instead of the value-laden word “rescued” that may paint Hamas as bad:

BBC did the same, while obscuring the identity of Hamas terrorists and IDF rescuers:

Cognitive Dissonance

But some media outlets didn’t just change words. They descended into a total cognitive dissonance in their attempt to put the onus on Palestinian victimhood.

AP, for example, shamelessly quoted casualty data from the Palestinian health ministry whose reliability had been questioned by the wire service only a day earlier.

And a BBC anchorwoman expected the IDF to warn Gazans ahead of such a dangerous rescue operation:

Similarly, a Sky News anchorwoman gave a platform to Palestinian politician Mustafa Barghouti, and failed to correct him when he called Israeli hostages “prisoners.” She also didn’t remind him about starvation and sexual assault when he suggested that those released in the past had been well treated by Hamas:

And the same network’s Alex Crawford didn’t even bother waiting for more details of the operation to emerge before she labeled it “a massacre”:

The underlying premise of such biased coverage is that Israelis should not fight for their lives because it comes at a cost. They should just sit back and let terrorists slaughter and kidnap their brethren because they run and hide among innocent people.

But media should stop ignoring the increasing evidence of Gazan civilian complicity with Hamas, as well as the fact that Hamas bears responsibility for putting the entire Gazan population in danger since its October 7th attack on the Jewish state.

On Saturday, Israeli special forces undertook a mission in an area that became a legitimate target by virtue of the presence of hostages. As Noa, Almog, Andrey, and Shlomi were rescued after eight months in captivity, Hamas terrorists fired RPGs at them from within the Nuseirat market area. IDF troops responded to save their lives and bring them home.

Any other way to frame it serves the terrorists.

EDITORS NOTE: This Honest Reporting column is republished with permission. ©All rights reserved.

A Week in and ‘Biden’s Border Move Has Already Failed’: Media

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So much for a Biden border crackdown. Already, people on the ground are calling the president’s “fix” a joke, pointing to the 10,000 migrants in custody from last Thursday — four times the phony limit set by the White House. “And the inflows keep coming,” The New York Post editorial board wrote in collective disgust. Barely a week in and “Biden’s BS border move has already failed,” they argue.

The supposed “crackdown” is “a total fake,” the editors insist — and the last few days seem to prove it. In the southwest, Border Patrol announced an apprehension rate of 2,600 in just three sectors (San Diego, Tucson, and Del Rio). Look, Texas Governor Greg Abbott (R) told reporters, we all know this order is a joke. “This executive order will do nothing but further an invasion into our country, inviting thousands of unvetted illegal immigrants to cross the border every single day — the exact opposite of shutting down the border.”

Worse, he points out, the policy “essentially legalizes the millions of illegal immigrants already in our country and allows thousands more to illegally cross our southern border daily.”

Even the president’s media cheerleaders are panning the administration’s insincere response. On ABC’s “This Week,” host Martha Raddatz was openly incredulous with Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas, insisting that it was “very hard” to call President Biden’s actions at the border a “success” when 6.5 million illegal immigrants have been caught on the southern border.

And if Democrats think this lawlessness is helping them with their base, they’re mistaken. A CBS/YouGov poll from this past week showed that 62% of voters support “a new national program to deport all undocumented immigrants currently living in the U.S. illegally” — including a majority of Hispanics (53%) and almost 40% of the president’s party. Former President Donald Trump played to that strength during a campaign stop in Phoenix on Thursday. “Biden wants an invasion,” Trump said, “I want deportation.”

As far as House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) is concerned, this issue could very well be the president’s undoing. It was “interesting,” he told Family Research Council President Tony Perkins on Saturday’s edition of “This Week on the Hill,” that Biden had spent the last several months “assur[ing] the American people there was nothing he could do.” And yet, “On many occasions I met with the president,” the speaker explained. “I read him the legal authorities [he has]. I handed him a summary of all the executive action that he could take under the existing federal statutes to solve the crisis that he himself created. Remember,” he pointed out, “we documented 64 specific executive actions that Joe Biden and Secretary Mayorkas took … to open the border wide. They did it intentionally,” Johnson argued. “And for him to now feign as though he’s concerned about [it] … that he wants to fix it is just pure politics.”

How do we know that? Because, as Johnson and others point out, what Biden did won’t solve the problem. In fact, the speaker insists, “it might actually make it worse … because he’s now sent the signal that if you’re among the first 2,500 illegals every day, you get a free pass. … The whole policy is crazy.” It does not, as he highlighted, end the catch-and-release program or reinstate Trump’s hugely effective Remain in Mexico policy. “It has created a catastrophe for the country that we are going to be dealing with for decades. [And] now, just a few weeks before the first debate and on the eve of the election … he wants to be able to go out and tell people that, ‘Oh, gosh, I tried to do something.’” And yet, Johnson went on, “he won’t ever acknowledge that he is the one that created the catastrophe.”

Now his party is divided, the speaker warned, because they’ve effectively created an “open borders caucus.” Worse, his campaign is dealing with the political fallout of openly defying federal law. “He has a real problem,” Johnson said of Biden. “This past week I was in Ohio, Michigan, Illinois, Wisconsin doing events. [The crowds] are not [just] normal Republican voters. They’re new people,” the Louisiana leader explained. It’s all part of the “demographic shift going on in the country” that’s pulling Hispanics, African-American voters, and the Jewish community into the GOP camp.

“[T]they see no alternative,” Johnson pointed out. “They understand that Joe Biden has wrecked the country and turned his back on their interest and their security and their ability to put groceries on the table. All these things are going to have a huge effect in November. And I think … the Republican Party is going to have a great election year.”

AUTHOR

Suzanne Bowdey

Suzanne Bowdey serves as editorial director and senior writer at The Washington Stand.

EDITORS NOTE: This Washington Stand column is republished with permission. All rights reserved. ©2024 Family Research Council.

The Washington Stand is Family Research Council’s outlet for news and commentary from a biblical worldview. The Washington Stand is based in Washington, D.C. and is published by FRC, whose mission is to advance faith, family, and freedom in public policy and the culture from a biblical worldview. We invite you to stand with us by partnering with FRC.

4 Biblical Ways to ‘Counter the Deception’ Rampant in Modern Media

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“Even the AP is acknowledging that there is deception” in modern media, said Family Research Council President Tony Perkins, host of “Washington Watch,” on Wednesday. Perkins referenced an Associated Press headline published on January 31, which read, “Grave peril of digital conspiracy theories: ‘What happens when no one believes anything anymore?’” That’s “a very profound question,” said Perkins, but he added that the AP failed to “get to the real problem and the source or the solution.”

The nearly 3,000-word article “focused on bloggers and others using the internet” to spread or adopt conspiracy theories, said Perkins. With a predictable skew toward right-fringe conspiracy theories, the article featured everything from QAnon and 2020 election claims, to government complicity in the Maui wildfires and the Sandy Hook school shooting.

On one hand, technology is a tool that cuts both ways, Perkins acknowledged. “Today’s technology … has benefits such as allowing you to watch or listen to ‘Washington Watch’ on a device you carry in your pocket. It also allows the false prophets to amplify their message with what today we might call conspiracy theories or fake news,” he said. David Closson, director of FRC’s Center for Biblical Worldview concurred. “Someone can fire something off on social media and it can make it around the world … before there’s even a chance to do a fact check.”

On the other hand, “the legacy media is a part of this problem,” Perkins argued. “The reason [people are] susceptible” to conspiracy theories is “because [the legacy media] were the first ones that rejected truth and therefore set the stage for these conspiracy theories to prosper.” As the media becomes less trustworthy, they are shocked to find a corresponding decrease in people trusting the media.

“The media and journalists of all stripes really have had such a casual relationship with the truth,” agreed Closson, “or worse, … even suppressed legitimate news.” On some networks like CNN, he said he can’t even trust “the premise of some of their arguments when [in] the previous segment, you know, they’re using preferred pronouns.” At The New York Times, staffers complained internally that an article on detransitioners created “a hostile work environment for the queer people who work here.” Readers will surely recall their own encounters with mainstream media outlets choosing narrative over news.

People eschewing the legacy media for alternate sources of information represents an existential crisis to those outlets, and they have responded accordingly. Last month, a Washington Post analyst known for favoring false narratives over true ones concluded that ordinary Americans shouldn’t do their own research. Ironically, the study he relied upon actually demonstrated that the cottage industry of fact-checking has become so subjective that fact-checkers agree on what is disinformation less than half the time.

The AP article, which extended a multi-part series on the rising threat of conspiracy theories, noted with alarm that the increase in conspiracy theories corresponds to a decrease in authority, institutions, and the mainstream media. “And even when they fail to convince people,” they wrote, “the conspiracy theories embraced by these groups contribute to mounting distrust of authorities and democratic institutions, causing people to reject reliable sources of information while encouraging division and suspicion.”

“When you have a breakdown in authority … especially in media, … you sow the seeds on fertile ground for these conspiracy theories to thrive,” Closson warned. He pointed to a 2023 Gallup poll which, for 11 out of 16 public institutions they asked about, found “the lowest level of confidence that [the public has] had in 40 years.”

“We live in a time when people simply don’t trust institutions,” said Closson. “Nor should they, given where we are,” Perkins argued. “When you have people denying the revealed truth that is so fundamental — male and female, the institution of marriage … these people are not worthy to be trusted or followed.”

Closson pointed out that conspiracy theories and misinformation have been around for a long time, “really since the beginning of time,” beginning with the serpent in the garden. “Did God actually say, ‘You shall not eat of any tree in the garden’?” the serpent said to Eve (Genesis 3:1). There, the serpent challenged the truth of God’s Word, “sowing doubt, sowing confusion,” said Closson, and Adam and Eve swallowed the lie. “Ever since then, we’ve lived in some sort of a post-truth world.”

However, Closson added, conspiracy theories seem to be gaining more traction now because of America’s culture-wide rejection of truth. “Even in our churches, we’re not immune from these things,” he lamented. He cited research FRC commissioned in 2023 that found “48% of regular church goers say that they don’t believe in absolute moral truth, … a basic tenet of a biblical worldview.”

“Deception comes when we depart from truth,” Perkins responded. He cited Paul’s warning to the Thessalonians about the age of lawlessness, which would bring “all wicked deception for those who are perishing, because they refused to love the truth and so be saved. Therefore God sends them a strong delusion, so that they may believe what is false, in order that all may be condemned who did not believe the truth but had pleasure in unrighteousness” (2 Thessalonians 2:9-12). “We should take that as an indication that these latter days are going to be filled with deception,” said Perkins.

Perkins and Closson identified four ways that Christians should respond to the epidemic of deception poisoning America’s media, public discourse, and even the church. In a refreshing contrast to America’s prevailing buffet of lies, they served up courses of hearty, wholesome truth — all of which were grounded in God’s infallible Word.

1. Don’t Be Led Astray

The Olivet Discourse (Matthew 24-25) opened with Jesus’s disciples asking him to teach them about “the sign of your coming and of the end of the age” (Matthew 24:3). Jesus answered, “See that no one leads you astray. For many will come in my name, saying, ‘I am the Christ,’ and they will lead many astray” (Matthew 24:4-5). Paul, having learned from Jesus, later issued similar instructions to the Thessalonians, “Let no one deceive you in any way” (2 Thessalonians 2:3). In other words, the latter times would feature many anti-Christ deceivers peddling counterfeit gospels, and Jesus wanted his followers to be on their guard.

These instructions from our Lord were the “first words out of his mouth,” Perkins noted, after quoting the passage. “You see, Jesus warns his followers to be on guard against deception and those who will peddle deception. … So, repeatedly he says, ‘Don’t be deceived.’”

Jesus had already warned his followers against deception. “Beware of false prophets, who come to you in sheep’s clothing but inwardly are ravenous wolves,” said Jesus in the Sermon on the Mount (Matthew 7:15). Closson quoted these words and added that Jesus gave “a litmus test” by which to recognize false teachers: “You will recognize them by their fruits” (Matthew 7:16). He endorsed applying this litmus test to “the people reporting the news. Let’s recognize them by their fruit.”

In a culture of confusion and lies, Christian, don’t be led astray by false teachers.

2. Don’t Be Alarmed

Jesus proceeded to instruct his disciples, “See that you are not alarmed” (Matthew 24:6). Jesus foretold wars, calamities, persecutions — intense trials that could throw Christians off-balance. Nevertheless, Jesus instructed his followers that these things must happen, preparing them beforehand to remember that God is sovereign over all things.

Paul repeated this instruction, too. “Now concerning the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ and our being gathered together to him, we ask you, brothers, not to be quickly shaken in mind or alarmed, either by a spirit or a spoken word, or a letter seeming to be from us, to the effect that the day of the Lord has come” (2 Thessalonians 2:1-2).

“We should not be surprised,” said Perkins, who quoted from Matthew 24. “Jesus warned us over and over … that this was going to occur.”

3. Return to the Truth

Christians must also “go back to the truth,” as an antidote to the epidemic of deception, said Closson. “We need to stand on God’s word …, which is our ultimate source of truth” (see John 17:17). “All Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, that the man of God may be complete, equipped for every good work” (2 Timothy 3:16-17).

“We should put our confidence in that which does not change,” Perkins agreed. He added, “Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today, and forever [Hebrews 13:8]. The Word of God does not change.” Jesus also said this on the Mount of Olives, “Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will not pass away.”

Perkins applied this truth to the moments in which we’re tempted to believe a lie, especially one that questions God’s Word (“Did God really say?”). Our response, he said, should be, “‘Well, wait a minute. Let me check. Let me go back to the source.’ … You go back to the source. That’s how you counter the deception.”

Perkins argued that American Christians should use their access to the source of truth to counter the deception of the evil one in the public square. “We have the ability, here in the United States, to use the freedoms that we still have to advocate for others. We have the ability to expose these things that are occurring in the end times that Jesus warned about,” he said. “He said they were coming, I think, to prepare us so that we could stand against the evil.” Invoking Matthew 24:12, “Because lawlessness will be increased, the love of many will grow cold,” Perkins urged, “We have to act on legitimate information we have, so that we can be the salt and light that allows the gospel to go forth.”

4. Use Discernment

Countering error with truth is not always simple, which is “why we need discernment,” said Closson, “today more than we have ever needed it.” When Jesus first sent his disciples out into the world, he told them to “be wise as serpents and innocent as doves” (Matthew 10:16), he quoted. Additionally, Jesus quoted the greatest commandment in the law, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind” (Matthew 22:37).

Using discernment is easier said than done, but Perkins and Closson discussed several helpful tips for evaluating the news:

A. Pause and Pray

“The first step that I would take when I see something on the social media or the news, is just take a pause,” said Closson. “There’s the impulse that we like to know everything at once. In a social media age, we’re used to getting our news instantaneously. And so I think we need to slow down. We need to pray.”

“You don’t have to be the first one to pass [a news article] on,” Perkins concurred. Because here’s what happens when you do that. Most of these [conspiracy theories] are exposed within time. If you’re associated with that, you lose credibility among your friends.”

So, counseled Perkins, “Resist this temptation to forward it on or to post it or embrace it. … Pray over it. Just have discernment.”

B. Read Critically

Second, “Don’t believe anything you see just because you see it in print,” said Closson. Perkins put the same concept in different words, “Be careful what you read online. Be careful about just forwarding something on” without considering first if it’s true.

As part of this step, Christians should compare what they read in the news to what the Bible says, Perkins advised.

In the same discourse, Jesus predicted, “For nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom, and there will be famines and earthquakes in various places. … Then they will deliver you up to tribulation and put you to death, and you will be hated by all nations for my name’s sake. … And many false prophets will arise and lead many astray” (Matthew 24:7, 9, 11).

“When you hear those things happening,” we know that “the Scripture says, ‘Yeah, those things are going to happen,’” said Perkins. “So, we can say, ‘Well, all right, this lines up with what Jesus said was going to be happening. Let’s go the next step and validate and verify the source.’”

C. Corroborate Information

“It’s always good to corroborate. If you see something on social media, don’t just assume it’s true,” Closson said. “Don’t forward the email to a friend. Don’t forward the post, but corroborate it. Go to some valid news organizations.”

Closson recommended Family Research Council’s own news organization, The Washington Stand, noting that it has “a whole team of reporters” dedicated to “coming at [the news] from a biblical worldview.” This means that they are “trying to connect it to Scripture, trying to connect it to facts, objective truth, things that are reportable, things that can be verified.”

Perkins suggested a “rule of thumb” that “anything you see that is detached from a specific, reliable news or organizational site like The Washington Stand, … don’t trust it if it’s not connected to a site that it can be verified.”

One way to find reliable news is to “get as close to the source as you can,” said Perkins. “That’s why we bring you the actual news makers. We go right to the source. We’re not, you know, reporting on what someone else said.” That’s one reason why social media is an unreliable place to peruse the news; it’s far removed from the source.

D. Be Honest

Everyone is liable to make mistakes. This is even easier in a rapidly changing news environment, where first reports often turn out to be wrong, misleading, or at least lacking critical information. The question is, how do we respond when we make mistakes?

Perkins exhorted “Washington Watch” listeners to be honest. “I do my very best to make sure that everything we say here is validated and it’s true,” he said. “And, if we do get something wrong, I’m going to take ownership of that, and I’m going to correct it when we find out.”

“So,” Closson summarized, “prayer, discernment, corroborating objectivity — all of these things, I think, ought to mark a Christian as they take in, read, understand, and share the news.” Christians should speak the truth in love, which means we should not be led astray or alarmed, but stand firm on the Word of God, the only infallible source of truth. To accurately handle the Word of truth amid a culture of deception, Christians must navigate with all discernment, never losing sight of him who is “the way, and the truth, and the life” (John 14:6).

AUTHOR

Joshua Arnold

Joshua Arnold is a senior writer at The Washington Stand.

EDITORS NOTE: This Washington Stand column is republished with permission. All rights reserved. ©2024 Family Research Council.

The Washington Stand is Family Research Council’s outlet for news and commentary from a biblical worldview. The Washington Stand is based in Washington, D.C. and is published by FRC, whose mission is to advance faith, family, and freedom in public policy and the culture from a biblical worldview. We invite you to stand with us by partnering with FRC.

‘Deplatforming Works’: Left Learns Wrong Lesson from Week of Media Firings

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Far-left Democrat Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (N.Y.) raised eyebrows — not to mention blood pressures — with her response to Tucker Carlson’s abrupt departure from Fox News. Her most offensive comment was not the mean-spirited joke, “couldn’t have happened to a better guy,” nor the possibly libelous claim that Carlson was “arguably responsible for driving some of the most amounts of death threats, violent threats, not just to my office but to plenty of people across the country,” but the political conclusion she drew, “deplatforming works, and it is important, and there you go.”

By “deplatforming,” Ocasio-Cortez means more than just someone losing a platform (in the abstract, modern sense of “platform” that includes all digital-age equivalents for mounting a literal platform to deliver a speech). For her and other leftists, “deplatforming” describes a particular form of censorship achieved by disallowing those who express undesirable views from using the media by which they reach their intended audience. She also seems to have in mind not only the act of removing someone from a platform, but the activism and pressure campaigns that lead to that result — in two words, cancel culture.

This is emphatically the wrong conclusion to draw.

For starters, Ocasio-Cortez completely overlooks the context of Carlson’s firing. Unless you’ve been reading the news about “the news” — which, let’s be honest, you probably shouldn’t — you’re probably unaware that Carlson’s departure from Fox is only one item in a string of high-profile firings across cable and network television. In just the past week, CNN booted left-wing gadfly Don Lemon, Comcast (which owns NBC) parted ways with NBC Universal CEO Jeff Shell, Disney-owned ABC (which owns election data site FiveThirtyEight) did not renew a contract with FiveThirtyEight founder Nate Silver, and Fox fired commentator Dan Bongino in addition to Carlson. With all this sacking, it’s a wonder the price of burlap hasn’t gone through the roof.

Surprisingly, these clustered separations seem to be unrelated to one another. Lemon got the hammer after engaging in a racially charged tirade against Republican presidential candidate Vivek Ramaswamy, of Indian heritage. Shell was pushed out at NBC over an inappropriate sexual relationship. Silver got swept up by Disney-wide layoffs (apparently subsidizing the rainbow renders other colors unaffordable).

Meanwhile, Fox has given no public reason for the firings, but they might be related to the company’s legal problems. The pair of firings came days after settling a defamation lawsuit in which Carlson was mentioned frequently with voting machine manufacturer Dominion for a stunning $787 million; the company still faces a defamation lawsuit from another voting machine company, Smartmatic, and a hostile work environment lawsuit from a former booker for Carlson’s show, Abby Grossberg. Another possible reason for at least Lemon’s and Carlson’s ousters is that the CEO or owner disliked them and was actively looking for an opportunity to show them the door.

These details indicate that there are many possible reasons why a network might terminate a relationship with an anchor — reasons which might be totally unrelated to a cancellation campaign against them. Without knowing the reason why a host lost his show, it’s impossible to prove that “deplatforming works” in the strategic sense Ocasio-Cortez means.

Left-wingers tried to cancel Carlson on numerous occasions. In 2021, the Anti-Defamation League called for an advertising boycott, but that failed to drive audiences away. On former White House press secretary Jen Psaki’s MSNBC show, Ocasio-Cortez herself on Sunday endorsed government action to end his show, calling for “federal regulation, in terms of what’s allowed on air and what isn’t. And when you look at [what] Tucker Carlson and some of these other folks on Fox do, it is very, very clearly incitement of violence. Very clearly incitement of violence. And that is the line that I think we have to be willing to contend with.” But what Ocasio-Cortez called for did not happen.

In fact, the coincidental cancellation campaign may have had no more effect on Carlson’s firing than a child attempting to use “the Force” on a supermarket’s automatic doors.

A separate issue from the factual accuracy of Ocasio-Cortez’s position — and a more important one — is whether the “deplatforming” she envisions is acceptable in a free society. Ocasio-Cortez explicitly called for government suppression of the distribution of opinions with which she disagrees. The policy outcome flies so obviously in the face of the First Amendment’s protection of free speech and a free press that Ocasio-Cortez felt the need to justify herself by claiming the speech that offended her was “very clearly incitement of violence.” If that case could be proven in court, surely someone would have sued Fox News over that by now.

A giant chasm yawns between what actually happened to Tucker Carlson and what Ocasio-Cortez wanted to happen to him. Opinions will differ about whether Rupert Murdoch (owner of Fox’s parent company News Corp) made the right decision or for the right reasons. But at root, Carlson’s employer no longer wanted to employ him, so he terminated his employment. One bedrock principle of a free market is that no one is forced to do business with anyone they don’t want to do business with. Ocasio-Cortez wants the government to dictate to broadcasters who they can put on air.

The Left seems not to recognize or understand this difference, as Ocasio-Cortez’s recent “deplatforming works” claim underscores. Left-wing cancellation efforts target not only Fox News, but virtually every right-wing news outlet you can think of. Ironically, the self-proclaimed opponents of fascism have ripped a page right out of the fascist playbook (and every other dictator in history) in agitating to shut down dissenting media outlets.

This trend has increased in recent years. Pew Research Center found that the percentage of Democrat or Democrat-leaning U.S. adults who agree that “the U.S. government should take steps to restrict false information online, even if it limits freedom of information,” increased from 40% in 2018 to 65% in 2021. Even more (76% of Democrat or Democrat-leaning adults) believed in 2021 that “tech companies should take steps to restrict false information online, even if it limits freedom of information.”

This notion is dangerous to America. But rather than censor it, proponents of free speech must defeat it through persuasion, which is far more challenging.

If Ocasio-Cortez and other leftists have taken the “wrong” — both incorrect and totalitarian — lesson from Carlson’s departure from Fox News, what is the right lesson? Combined with other recent media departures, it’s clear that the American news media — for all of its problems — remains capable of self-adjustment. Different outlets continue to represent different points of view, cycle between spokespersons, and remain accountable both to the public and to the legal system. The media landscape continues to remain open to independent new players, such as The Washington Stand or (possibly soon) the Tucker Carlson Network. No one has a monopoly on the facts, the right opinions, or the press. That’s how things are supposed to work in a rambunctious popular government.

There is, and will always be, a fundamental difference between government regulators taking a popular program off the air and that program’s broadcast cutting that program from its lineup. The difference is freedom.

AUTHOR

Joshua Arnold

Joshua Arnold is a staff writer at The Washington Stand.

EDITORS NOTE: This Washington Stand column is republished with permission. All rights reserved. ©2023 Family Research Council.

The Washington Stand is Family Research Council’s outlet for news and commentary from a biblical worldview. The Washington Stand is based in Washington, D.C. and is published by FRC, whose mission is to advance faith, family, and freedom in public policy and the culture from a biblical worldview. We invite you to stand with us by partnering with FRC.

Tucker Carlson Out at Fox News Days After Asking Americans to Wage Spiritual Warfare, Pray for Our Country

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Fox News Channel announced it cut ties with the top-rated host in cable news, Tucker Carlson, on Monday, just days after he gave a widely praised speech imploring leaders to pray that God will preserve America from the progressive movement’s “evil” agenda.

Promoting transgender surgeries for minors and describing abortion as a good thing are “manifestations of some larger force” exerting its nefarious influence over us, he said over the weekend. Fox’s announcement, which removed Carlson’s reliably populist-conservative voice from the increasingly moderate network’s schedule, caused the corporation’s stock to tank by more than half-a-billion dollars.

“FOX News Media and Tucker Carlson have agreed to part ways. We thank him for his service to the network as a host and prior to that as a contributor,” said a press release from Fox News Channel. Neither the network nor Carlson disclosed the reason for the abrupt contract cancellation. The host did not get to give his audience a farewell broadcast. “Mr. Carlson’s last program was Friday April 21st,” said the release. Carlson’s Friday episode discussed the Nashville shooter’s still-unreleased manifesto, the longstanding Obama-Biden plan to establish permanent Democratic power by moving low-income people into suburbia, America’s uncontrolled border with Mexico, and the mysterious meaning of the “plus” in “LGBTQIA+.” Carlson closed the show by eating pizza with local hero Tyler Morrell, a delivery man who tripped a criminal suspect eluding police.

“Tucker Carlson Tonight” ended its six-and-a-half-year run as the highest-rated show in all cable news with an average of 3.39 million viewers. Even in his departure, Carlson outperformed his competitors, as his exit from Fox News drew far more headlines than CNN’s decision to fire low-rated 17-year host Don Lemon the same day.

Carlson’s eponymous primetime show has featured exclusive footage of the January 6 Capitol riot, reports from a Chinese whistleblower that COVID-19 originated inside China’s Wuhan Institute of Virology, and proof that prisons released hundreds of violent criminals thanks to the First Step Act. He also invited guests who did not agree with his conservative views to discuss the transgender movement’s grooming of children, oppose current or potential wars, and expose Deep State censorship.

Carlson and frequent guest Jason Whitlock increasingly analyzed political problems through a spiritual lens. Earlier this month, Carlson said, “Transgenderism is this country’s fastest growing religion.” Transgender ideologues “believe that they themselves are God with the power to control nature” by changing their gender by taking careful thought.

Tucker Carlson’s analysis turned especially prophetic shortly after his last show Friday night, when he gave the keynote address at the Heritage Foundation’s 50th anniversary gala. The political debate had shifted radically since 1991, when he got his first job as the copy editor of Heritage’s quarterly publication, Policy Review, for $14,000 a year. At that time, think tanks engaged in fact-based debates over mutually shared goals: for instance, whether Keynesian or Austrian economics created maximum prosperity. “I don’t think we’re watching a debate over how to get to the best outcome,” he said.

Today, the progressive political movement promotes laws allowing surgeons to “sexually mutilate children … I don’t think anyone could defend that as a positive outcome, but the weight of the government and a lot of corporate interests are behind that,” he said.

Similarly, in the Clinton era, Democrats portrayed abortion as a necessary evil. “But if you’re telling me abortion is a positive good, what are you saying? Well, you’re arguing for child sacrifice, obviously,” he said. “That’s like an Aztec principle.”

“None of this makes sense in conventional political terms,” he said. When political leaders embrace “destruction for its own sake … what you’re watching is not a political movement; it’s evil.”

“Those ideas won’t produce outcomes that any rational person would want under any circumstances. Those are manifestations of some larger force acting upon us,” Carlson said.

Carlson noted his spiritual insight is hampered by his background in the liberal Episcopal Church USA. “I’m an Episcopalian, so don’t take any theological advice from me, because I don’t have any. I grew up in the shallowest faith tradition ever invented,” Carlson said. “It’s not even a Christian religion at this point, I say with shame.” Yet his views derive equally from the Christian tradition and classical Athenian notions of the good, the true, and the beautiful. “Good is characterized by order, calmness, tranquility, peace … lack of conflict, cleanliness.” Evil “is characterized by their opposites: violence, hate, disorder, division, disorganization, and filth.”

“If you are all in on the things that produce the latter basket of outcomes, what you’re really advocating for is evil,” Carlson said. “I’m not calling for a religious war, far from it. I’m merely calling for an acknowledgement of what we’re watching.”

Carlson described the spiritual power that emanates from following God’s commandments. “The truth is contagious,” and “the second you decide to tell the truth about something, you are filled with this power from somewhere else,” he said. “The more you tell the truth, the stronger you become.” Entertaining lies, and “Drug and alcohol use are the same way: They make you weak and afraid.”

Carlson then hailed those who would not engage in the pageantry of sharing their pronouns for faith-based reasons. “I’m not doing that. It’s a betrayal of what I think is true. It’s a betrayal of my conscience, of my faith, of my sense of myself, of my dignity as a human being, of my autonomy.”

“I am not a slave. I am a free citizen, and I’m not doing that,” Carlson said, likening their steadfast obedience to the Apostle “Paul on trial.”

In a heartfelt moment, Carlson shared how he “was overcome a little bit with emotion” during a prayer offered by Fr. Paul Scalia, the son of late Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia, which convicted him of an oversight in his patriotic duties. “I don’t pray enough for the country, and I should,” Carlson said. “We all should be.”

He closed his speech by exhorting his audience to set aside a substantial block of time to pray for the United States. “Maybe we should all take like 10 minutes a day to say a prayer about” America’s future. “I’m saying that to you not as some kind of an evangelist. I’m literally saying that to you as an Episcopalian. … and even I have concluded it might be worth taking just 10 minutes out of your busy schedule to say a prayer for the future, and I hope you will,” he concluded.

Before the news of Carlson’s departure from Fox broke, Christians hailed the spiritual content of Carlson’s Heritage speech. “He is so spot on! God bless him for his clarity and his courage,” said Christian talk show host Janet Parshall. “He understood we are in a war between good and evil — and dared to say so,” noted evangelical Christian author and talk show host Eric Metaxas.

During a question-and-answer session immediately after the speech, Heritage Foundation President Kevin Roberts told Carlson, “If things go South at Fox News, there’s always a job for you at Heritage.”

It is not known whether Carlson’s call to spiritual warfare preceded or followed his departure from the network, or whether it influenced the Monday morning announcement. FNC renamed Carlson’s show “Fox News Tonight,” which will be filled by a rotating series of guest hosts until the network names a permanent anchor — a decision that drew international condemnation.

“Tucker Carlson is irreplaceable. This will hurt Fox News,” predicted UK politician and Brexit leader Nigel Farage.

The stock market soon confirmed his words. Within hours of the announcement, Fox Corp. stock tumbled by 5.4%, trimming approximately $1 billion from the company’s value, before leveling out to 2.9%, for a $507 million loss. The plunge reportedly reduced 92-year-old executive chairman Rupert Murdoch’s net worth by $182 million.

But it cheered the hearts of Carlson’s more implacable foes, including numerous Democratic elected officials who had called for the network, or the government, to suppress Carlson. Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) said “our democracy depends on” Murdoch deciding to “stop Tucker Carlson from going on” his network. Over the weekend his colleague, Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.), called for harsher “federal regulation in terms of what’s allowed on air and what isn’t,” accusing “Tucker Carlson and some of these other folks on Fox” of unspecified “incitement of violence.”

Fox News’s rift with Tucker Carlson came four days after the network announced it had also parted ways with Dan Bongino — the latest in a number of lurches the network has made to the left since the ascension of Rupert Murdoch’s son, Lachlan Murdoch, and especially after former Speaker of the House Paul Ryan (who once voted for the anti-conscience Employment Non-Discrimination Act) joined Fox News’s board of directors in 2019. The network has since platformed such social liberals as former Democratic campaign strategist Donna Brazile, UK presenter Piers Morgan, and former men’s Olympic decathlon gold medalist Bruce Jenner, who now identifies as female and changed his name to Caitlin Jenner.

The drift evidenced itself in Fox’s news coverage, as well. As part of Fox News’s celebration of Pride Month last June, “America’s Newsroom” anchor Dana Perino introduced a story on celebrating parents who began presenting their five-year-old daughter in public as a boy. The Whittington family showed “extraordinary courage” in transitioning their preschooler based on their “conservative faith,” said reporter Bryan Llenas, adding, “People are afraid of what they do not understand.” Fox News has also parroted pro-abortion rhetoric in its news coverage of late-term abortion.

“For a while Fox News has been moving to become establishment media, and Tucker Carlson’s removal is a big milestone in that effort,” said rival Newsmax CEO Chris Ruddy.

Senators and members of Congress weighed in on the latest programming shake-up. “Could a new network emerge featuring (among others) @TuckerCarlson & @dbongino?” asked Senator Mike Lee (R-Utah) on his personal Twitter account. Rep. Andy Biggs (R-Ariz.) praised both men as “true trailblazers amid a period where American corporate media controls speech.”

Carlson has yet to speak publicly on the matter or announce his next steps. Glenn Beck, himself a former Fox News host, offered to pay Carlson “a bucketful of money” to take a job at The Blaze. “You won’t miss a beat, and together, the two of us will tear it up,” he promised.

Carlson recently shared his increasingly critical view of the mainstream news media, which he said intentionally denied Americans access to the information necessary to become effective citizens.

“The media are part of the control apparatus,” Carlson told the “Full Send” podcast. “Their job is not to inform you. They are working for the small group of people who actually run the world. They’re their servants and their Pretorian Guard, and we should treat them with maximum contempt, because they have earned it.”

Carlson’s supporters hope he will return to another platform soon — and that Americans will take up his charge to pray for our country in the meantime. “We need to turn to God as a nation, in every way that we can, with everything in us,” Metaxas added. “It is genuinely our only hope.”

Jonathan Cahn, the author of “The Return of the Gods,” did not immediately return this reporter’s request for comment.

AUTHOR:

Ben Johnson

Ben Johnson is senior reporter and editor at The Washington Stand.

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EDITORS NOTE: This Washington Stand column is republished with permission. All rights reserved. ©2023 Family Research Council.

The Washington Stand is Family Research Council’s outlet for news and commentary from a biblical worldview. The Washington Stand is based in Washington, D.C. and is published by FRC, whose mission is to advance faith, family, and freedom in public policy and the culture from a biblical worldview. We invite you to stand with us by partnering with FRC.

U.S. Media Outlet Has Extensive Partnerships, Financial Dealings With Orgs Tied To Chinese Communist Party Influence Operations

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  • Approximately 20 organizations that may be headed by members of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) or members of alleged Chinese influence operations have sponsored or partnered with The China Project (TCP), a China-focused New York media outlet, the Daily Caller News Foundation determined.
  • TCP recently denied working for or with the CCP after a former employee sent an Oct. 21 declaration to the Department of Justice and Congress accusing the outlet of harboring a pro-CCP bias. 
  • “We must help defend our fellow citizens and lawful permanent residents from pressure — and in many cases, transnational repression up to and including assassination attempts — by the Chinese Communist Party,” New Jersey Republican Rep. Chris Smith told the DCNF.

The China Project (TCP), a New York-based media outlet renowned for its China reporting, has had professional and financial ties with organizations that may have been headed by members of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) or members of alleged Chinese influence operations, a Daily Caller News Foundation investigation found.

Over 20 organizations that may have been led by such individuals have apparently partnered with or financially sponsored TCP, including the China-United States Exchange Foundation (CUSEF) and the Confucius Institute, the DCNF found. Both groups apparently began professional relationships with TCP after the U.S.-China Economic and Security Review Commission (USCC) identified them as CCP influence operations in 2018. Furthermore, the DCNF found that TCP’s “board director,” Clarence Kwan, may have been simultaneously serving as a director of an alleged CCP front group at the time he joined TCP’s board and provided initial equity in the company.

Kwan did not respond to the DCNF’s request for comment.

These revelations come over a month after journalist Shannon Van Sant, a former TCP business editor, delivered a sworn declaration to Congress and the Department of Justice (DOJ) on Oct. 21, alleging TCP fired her in June 2020 for being out of “alignment” with the organization’s alleged pro-CCP bias.

Van Sant’s declaration also stated that after being fired she “conducted open source research and found links between the organization and China’s Communist Party,” however, Van Sant’s declaration did not provide any documentation to substantiate her claim.

“It is important to me to provide transparency and shed light on my experiences,” Van Sant’s declaration stated. “That is why I am doing this disclosure.”

Florida Republican Sen. Marco Rubio and New Jersey Republican Rep. Chris Smith — both of whom sit on the Congressional-Executive Commission on China — recently told Semafor that TCP “should be forced to register” under the Foreign Agents Registration Act (FARA), which requires the disclosure of service to foreign entities.

In response, TCP’s attorneys at Boies Schiller Flexner sent a 12-page letter to Semafor on Oct. 31, demanding Semafor retract their piece on Van Sant’s allegations. TCP’s attorneys allege Van Sant had been fired for “poor work performance” and had “an axe to grind.”

“Nothing in Ms. Van Sant’s ‘sworn declaration’ comes close to providing evidence, direct or circumstantial, that TCP is working for or has worked for the Chinese government,” Boies Schiller Flexner wrote to Semafor.

Neither TCP nor their attorneys at Boies Schiller Flexner responded to multiple requests for comment from the DCNF. Van Sant declined the DCNF’s request for comment through her representatives at Whistleblower Aid.

‘A Jewel In The Crown Of China Reporting’

TCP — which until September was known as “SupChina” — is a multimedia group that claims to reach “more than two million people per month” through a variety of platforms including news articles and podcasts. Former Ambassador to China Max Baucus — who recently came under fire for Nov. 11 and 12 meetings with alleged Chinese influence operatives — called TCP “a jewel in the crown of China reporting,” according to the outlet’s website.

The multimedia outlet also runs a nonprofit arm, Serica, which seeks “to educate and cultivate empathy around the issues of Sinophobia and anti-Asian hate,” according to its website. TCP also maintains a “United States Sinophobia Tracker” that’s collected numerous articles on CCP espionage allegations, such as a 2020 NBC News piece about the growing number of FBI counterintelligence cases, which TCP tags on its website as “paranoid rhetoric.”

TCP has also published articles and podcasts critical of the DOJ’s China Initiative — an anti-espionage program launched during the Trump administration which was ultimately terminated in February 2022 after the “civil rights community” expressed concern that the program had “fueled a narrative of intolerance and bias,” Assistant Attorney General Matthew Olsen said at the time.

China’s United Front

In her declaration to the federal government, Van Sant claims to have discovered links between TCP and the China Overseas Exchange Association (COEA), an organization which billed itself as an “important platform and bridge for people-to-people exchanges,” according to an archived version of COEA’s website.

China intelligence analyst and former senior analyst at the Canberra-based Australian Strategic Policy Institute Alex Joske identified COEA as a “key” United Front Work Department (UFWD) front group that merged with the China Overseas Friendship Association (COFA) in 2019 — an organization which USCC also identified as a UFWD front group.

Joske is the author of “Spies and Lies: How China’s Greatest Covert Operations Fooled the World” published in October 2022, which was well-received by the international press.

The UFWD is a Chinese government agency, which oversees CCP influence operations and reports directly to the CCP’s Central Committee, according to USCC. General Secretary Xi Jinping has repeatedly emphasized the importance of the UFWD. He even described the agency as the CCP’s “magic weapon” for “realizing the great rejuvenation of the Chinese nation” in a 2015 speech.

“The UFWD is essentially an intelligence agency of the CCP tasked with infiltrating different communities and organizations, co-opting and influencing them,” Salih Hudayar, Uyghur prime minister of the East Turkistan Government in Exile, told the DCNF.

While TCP’s attorneys conceded in their October letter to Semafor that Kwan formerly served as a COEA “director,” they claim his involvement with the group “was limited to participating in two trips to China in 2013 and 2014.” TCP’s attorneys also claimed Kwan’s COEA tenure preceded his joining TCP’s board and his providing nearly 2% of the outlet’s initial equity.

Yet, the DCNF discovered that archived versions of COEA’s website — which was deleted after the organization merged with COFA around 2019 — list Kwan as a “director” for two consecutive four-year terms running from 2013-2017 and 2017-2021. This appears to indicate that Kwan’s time at COEA overlapped with his $150,000 purchase of SupChina First Notes in September 2016, according to Security and Exchange Commission filings. Likewise, this indicates Kwan may have been serving as COEA’s director when he assumed the role of “director” of SupChina — now called TCP — in May 2017.

Kwan is currently listed as an “advisory board member” on TCP’s website.

Additionally, Kwan appears to have also held leadership positions in several companies that have financially sponsored TCP, including KCY Family Office, East West Bank and Piermont Bank, the DCNF found.

The Committee Of 100

TCP also appears to have partnered with, and donated $25,000 to, a New York-based organization called the Committee of 100 (C100) — a nonprofit that claims to seek “constructive dialogue and relationships between the peoples of the United States and Greater China.”

Yet, C100 members appear to have included Chinese government advisers and 10 COEA directors, including Kwan, who, based on the committee’s website, may have served as C100’s chairman while simultaneously serving as COEA’s director.

Moreover, in addition to TCP’s founder, Anla Cheng — a hedge fund manager by trade, who apparently is also a trustee and former C100 director — seven of TCP’s 23 advisory board members appear to belong to C100, including John Long, S. Alice Mong, Frank Wu, Li Cheng, Ted Wang, Janet Yang and Lesley Ma.

TCP’s attorneys accused Semafor’s article of relying on “racial profiling and stereotypes” by citing a C100 report which claimed “Asian defendants are more than twice as likely to be falsely accused of espionage” without acknowledging any financial or personnel ties between the two organizations.

C100 did not respond to multiple requests for comment.

‘CCP Agents Often Target The Chinese Diaspora’

Van Sant also claims in her 11-page declaration that the China Association for Science and Technology (CAST) told TCP’s founder, Cheng, in June 2020 about a Chinese scientist whom the U.S. government had charged with espionage, prompting Cheng to direct staff to “protect him.”

CAST is a unit of the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC), which oversees the UFWD, according to USCC. The CPPCC “operates as a way for the CCP to falsely claim that it represents the full breadth of Chinese society,” according to a 2020 report written by Joske, the intel analyst.

“In practice, those organizations are controlled by the CCP,” Joske wrote. “Their leaders are often party members, and, historically, some have been manipulated through inducement and coercion, including blackmail.”

Although TCP’s attorneys did not deny Van Sant’s allegation in their letter to Semafor, they claimed that “protecting a ‘wrongly investigated’ Chinese scientist” did not amount to “evidence of espionage.”

Yet, TCP listed CAST as a “partner organization” on flyers from a 2022 “Women’s Conference,” the DCNF found.

Furthermore, TCP appears to have partnered with around 10 organizations that may be led by members of the CCP or alleged UFWD fronts, the DCNF found. For example, the “About Us” tab on CAST’s website includes a section on “Leading Party Members” and features CAST’s Party Secretary Zhang Yuzhuo and five other Communist Party members.

Likewise, TCP partnered with another organization called NYO China for its 2019 “Women’s Conference.” NYO China appears to be headed by He Mei, vice chairman of the Center for China and Globalization (CCG), which was identified by USCC as a UFWD front back in 2018.

The year before the State Department designated the Confucius Institute as a UFWD “foreign mission” in 2020, TCP also partnered with the Chinese government-run propaganda center to host an event on “China’s Food Revolution.” Li Changchun, former CCP propaganda chief, once called Confucius Institutes “an important part of China’s overseas propaganda setup,” according to the State Department.

“Confucius Institutes are the United Front’s most well-known overseas outreach program,” Helen Raleigh, author of “Backlash: How China’s Aggression Has Backfired,” told the DCNF.

“Confucius Institutes have been noted to present students with only the CCP-sanctioned version of Chinese history, which omits the CCP’s human rights violations, and Chinese teachers at Confucius Institutes are all thoroughly vetted by Beijing,” Raleigh said.

In total, about 10 organizations that appear to have been headed by CCP members or alleged UFWD front members financially sponsored TCP, the DCNF determined. These organizations paid as much as $50,000 to sponsor events hosted by the multimedia outlet, according to various flyers.

Youhe Invest — whose website identifies its chairman Su Jie as a member of the CCP and CPPCC — is listed on TCP’s website as a sponsor of past events. Likewise, the China-United States Exchange Foundation (CUSEF) sponsored a TCP screening of a documentary on “the history and evolution of Afro-Chinese relations in America” in 2021.

CUSEF is a Hong Kong-based nonprofit registered under the Foreign Agents Registration Act that is involved in UFWD “influence operations,” according to USCC.

Several companies run by individuals from CUSEF’s leadership have also sponsored TCP, such as Wisdom Valley — whose founding director, Victor Fung, is listed as CUSEF’s vice chairman — and Value Partners — whose co-chairman, Cheah Cheng Hye, is one of CUSEF’s “counsellors.”

Rep. Smith told the DCNF that once Republicans take control of the House it will become a priority to investigate Chinese influence operations.

“Beyond national security concerns, we know that CCP agents often target the Chinese diaspora in the United States,” Smith said. “We must help defend our fellow citizens and lawful permanent residents from pressure — and in many cases, transnational repression up to and including assassination attempts — by the Chinese Communist Party.”

AUTHOR

PHILIP LENCZYCKI

Investigative reporter.

RELATED ARTICLE: EXCLUSIVE: CIA Director’s Former Think Tank Hired Experts From Nonprofits Controlled By Chinese Spy Agencies

EDITORS NOTE: This Daily Caller column is republished with permission. ©All rights reserved. All content created by the Daily Caller News Foundation, an independent and nonpartisan newswire service, is available without charge to any legitimate news publisher that can provide a large audience. All republished articles must include our logo, our reporter’s byline and their DCNF affiliation. For any questions about our guidelines or partnering with us, please contact licensing@dailycallernewsfoundation.org.

‘My Son Hunter’: An imperfect but necessary indictment of media’s corruption

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This satirical film reveals a disturbing truth about modern mainstream journalistic standards.

We all love the literary motif of the unwilling prostitute who, at the end of the story, does virtuous deeds to save herself and others. In Crime and Punishment, Sonya is instrumental in Raskolnikov’s redemption. Director Robert Davi uses the same formula to tell the story of President’s Biden son in My Son Hunter.

Grace struggles to pay for her college tuition, so she is a favourite escort of powerful men. As she encounters Hunter Biden in a world of cocaine, wild sex, and rampant corruption, she offers him a path to redemption — and of course, he rejects it.

Now, Davi is no Dostoevsky — nor does he intend to be. My Son Hunter is first and foremost political satire, all-too-frequently engaging in cheap shots. But it does take a stab at Dostoevskyan psychological profundity, and in that endeavour, it partly succeeds.

The shadow of successful Beau Biden — Hunter’s deceased brother — looms large over Hunter, who struggles to find meaning in life. Very much as Raskolnikov, he comes across as a pathological narcissist who engages in criminal activity as a way to prove to himself that he is so great so as to be above the law.

Overblown

Unfortunately, My Son Hunter often goes overboard and loses effectiveness. I lost count of the number of times Joe Biden sniffs the hair of women in the film. Is that necessary? That portrayal runs the risk of playing into the left-wing narrative that criticisms of the Bidens focus on petty things that can be easily dismissed.

The stakes are high, so a more focused and incisive portrayal was needed. Say what you want about Oliver Stone’s leftist politics and penchant for conspiracy theories, but he surely can strike an opponent in his films — Richard Nixon and George W. Bush being the most notorious cases.

The story of Hunter Biden lends itself to Stone’s sober cinematographic style, but My Son Hunter misses an opportunity, to the extent that it aims for low-hanging fruit. Yes, the Bidens are corrupt, but one is left wondering: can they be that corrupt? While the dialogues between Joe and Hunter are clever and amusing, the perversity defies credibility. Perhaps Davi was deliberately aiming more for Saturday Night Live’s lampooning style all along. If so, the film works at some level, but never entirely.

I would have personally enjoyed a more sober style because there is a far darker theme in the film. My Son Hunter is not about the moral failings of a privileged, corrupt drug addict. It is not even about crony capitalism and globalist elites. The real central theme is the media’s rot.

Media manipulation

Two scenes are particularly frightening. At the beginning of the film, Grace is at a Black Lives Matter protest, and records some of her comrades engaging in violent deeds. A fellow activist says: “You can’t post that video… it will make the protest look bad… Those people are too ignorant to understand complex moral issues. You have to withhold things for their own good. We choose truth over facts.” Grace acquiesces.

Towards the end of the film, Grace summons a journalist to expose Hunter’s corruption. The man tells her: “Even if what you are saying is true, it’s not news. We have the chance to take down a fascist dictator [Trump]… I’m sorry Grace, this one is not for me.” We now know that Twitter and Facebook — with their disturbing algorithms — were not the only ones trying to bury Hunter’s laptop under the sand.

As Mark Zuckerberg recently acknowledged, the FBI itself pressured him to do so, because they did not want the bad Orange Man to win the election — all with the excuse that the whole story was Russian disinformation. Later on, both the Washington Post and the New York Times had to reverse their stance and admit that, in fact, the laptop does contain compromising emails.

Plato infamously recommended telling people the Noble Lie. Very much as the Black Lives Matter activist in this film, Plato believed such lies were for people’s own good, as they were too stupid to understand things. In his seminal study of totalitarianism, Karl Popper persuasively argued that Plato’s plan became a central tenet of totalitarian regimes. That is the real fascism.

While being far from a perfect film, My Son Hunter provides meaningful insight on this issue, and hopefully it might become an important step towards much-needed media accountability in this woke age.

For the time being, we need to be realistic. Don’t hold your breath waiting for Hollywood to make an Oliver Stone-like blockbuster about the corruption and hypocrisy of the Left.

Rather, keep an eye out for low-budget productions like My Son Hunter that are bypassing the Hollywood production and distribution system. These include Uncle Tom I and II, various Christian films, such as Run, Hide, Fight.

They will not be great works of art, but at least they will be something. And from there, the quality of such films may gradually improve, until we again see mainstream studios portraying corrupt politicians from both sides of the political spectrum.

AUTHOR

Gabriel Andrade is a university professor originally from Venezuela. He writes about politics, philosophy, history, religion and psychology. More by Gabriel Andrade

EDITORS NOTE: This MercatorNet column is republished with permission. ©All rights reserved.

Still No Deaths From Omicron: Americans Are Getting On With Their Lives Despite Unhinged Media Frenzy

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The pandemic was a hoax. The American people have had it.

WATCH: Biden laughs and walks away when asked about his “responsibility” for COVID deaths.

Still No Deaths From Omicron, And Americans Are Getting On With Their Lives

By Jordan Boyd The Federalist, December 14, 2021:

Americans are returning to normal despite the media’s attempts to drum up alarm over the supposedly ‘highly transmissible’ Omicron variant of COVID-19.

Americans are returning to normal despite the corporate media’s attempts to drum up alarm over the supposedly “highly transmissible” Omicron variant of COVID-19.

While corporate media outlets panicked and revived permanent pandemic narratives and talk of more lockdowns, a new poll from CBS News and YouGov found that of 1,731 people surveyed, 81 percent said they have not rearranged plans because of the Omicron variant or the hype surrounding it. In fact, a majority said they still plan to keep their normal holiday traditions and routines. Sixty-eight percent still plan to “gather with friends and family,” 64 percent said they will do their Christmas shopping in person, and 52 percent said they will eat in a restaurant.

Only 17 percent of those surveyed said they were “very concerned about Omicron,” while about 42 percent said they were not concerned at all about Omicron despite the initial media and bureaucracy-induced panic about it.

These Americans’ thoughts on Omicron are validated by the data. As it turns out, not one single COVID-19-related death in the U.S. from Dec. 1-8 was found to be caused by the Omicron variant. As of Friday, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention found that of the 43 people infected with the Omicron strain of COVID, most cases manifested only mild symptoms such as “a cough, fatigue, and congestion or a runny nose.”

The CDC report also found that “one individual, who was vaccinated, required a brief hospital stay” and that a majority of cases, 79 percent, were in fully vaccinated individuals.

The European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control’s measures of Omicron produced similar results in a report released Sunday.

“There have been no Omicron-related deaths reported thus far,” the European health agency claimed, noting that most cases of Omicron-related COVID presented as “either asymptomatic or mild.”

Read the rest at the Federalist.

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EDITORS NOTE: This Geller Report is republished with permission. ©All rights reserved.

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