Ingraham3 bak 323

SEE FOUR 2 25

4/20 sparked by covid pharma

field error bak 3 23

vxr fail body count, jrnl fail

see bad trinity, but 820 she's the worst liar? (tho parrot trump admin?)

SEE CLARENCE CLERK MAFIA

(paleo-?) catholic

see climate lockdown tyranny fear

i keep seeing screen shot of fox idiots being interview by blonde, pretty sure it's laura i

furies pending on covid denial

milloy lie PM

big on woke

html endit

6 22 bak

---

bad trinity busted hard lying in dominion discovery

cf cruz ~ Gigi

---

mma see pardon trump anno 2 25

Right-wing media figures rushed to defend President Donald Trump’s decision to issue pardons or commutations to over 1,500 people who participated in the January 6 insurrection at the United States Capitol — including those convicted of violence against police.

They offered a number of arguments to support their defense: They baselessly claimed legal efforts to hold participants accountable were “show trials” or unfair compared to legal repercussions for the 2020 Black Lives Matter protests, said the pardons are justified because of former President Joe Biden’s pardons, and diminished the violence on January 6 by recasting those criminally charged as “ordinary patriots.”

Other right-wing figures defended the clemency by noting that Trump had campaigned on the issue, declaring, “Promises made, promises kept."

Right-wing media figures spent years urging pardons for January 6 participants, which Trump granted on the first day of his second term

- Trump issued pardons or commutations on the first day of his second term to over 1,500 participants in the January 6, 2021, insurrection at the U.S. Capitol, including those convicted of violent offenses against law enforcement officers. Trump had stated ahead of his presidency that he intended to issue pardons to some January 6 participants “in the first hour” of his second term. The Associated Press, [1/21/25; The Guardian, 1/6/25]
- Right-wing media figures have spent years creating a revisionist history of January 6, claiming that Trump supporters were “set up” and casting attempts to hold participants accountable as politically motivated. Right-wing media figures, initially led by former Fox News host Tucker Carlson, sought to downplay the extent of the day’s violence and substitute a revisionist counternarrative that declared January 6 participants as the victims of a false-flag operation perpetuated by the federal government. When participants were charged with crimes, right-wing figures suggested the prosecutions were evidence that “the major critics of the left have been targeted by lawfare” and referred to defendants as “political prisoners.” Media Matters, [5/21/24, 2/24/21, 1/3/24; The Associated Press, 1/4/24]
- Right-wing media also specifically pushed for pardons for January 6 participants for years. Right-wing media figures have been defending January 6 participants since at least February 2022, suggesting that Trump should “pardon every January 6ther," or at least “pardon those people who were nonviolent on January 6.” Media Matters, [1/20/25, 1/10/25]
- Prior to Trump’s issuance of the pardons, right-wing media lashed out against now-Vice President JD Vance, who told Fox News that violent January 6 defendants “obviously” should not be pardoned. Following Vance’s January 12 interview, where he suggested the pardons would be selective, right-wing media figures urged the president to “pardon everybody,” recycling claims that the Capitol riot was a “setup” by law enforcement. Media Matters, [1/28/25, 1/22/25]
## Right-wing media justified January 6 pardons by claiming that the government “showed mercy” or “nothing happened” to Black Lives Matter protestors in 2020
Right-wing media figures have continued to baselessly claim that Black Lives Matter protesters were treated with leniency compared to January 6 participants even though news outlets have debunked the claim and reported that over 17,000 arrests were made in the first two weeks of the BLM protests. Additionally, a reportfrom the City University of New York Law School’s Creating Law Enforcement Accountability & Responsibility Clinic determined that the Trump administration engaged in an “aggressive assertion of federal jurisdiction” over the protests and that many of the federal penalties were “clearly harsher” than applicable state law.

- Right-wing host Dan Bongino claimed that “the process used to target [J6ers] was clearly political,” arguing that “absolutely nothing happened” when BLM protestors allegedly attacked police at the White House. Bongino stated: “But there is zero doubt that when the White House was attacked by BLM and antifa and Secret Service agents and uniformed division officers I know personally were hurt and wounded, that absolutely nothing happened to these people at all. So you can have two simultaneous thoughts at the same time, and I want you to pay attention to this. You can and should say, ‘I am absolutely, resolutely against attacks on law enforcement for doing their job,’ period there. But I am also against a greater danger, which is a weaponized Justice Department that picks and chooses when they take this stuff seriously and targets political opponents for it. And that’s what happened here.” Rumble, *The Dan Bongino Show*, [1/22/25]
- Fox News host Laura Ingraham complained about outrage over January 6 pardons, saying, “Where was their demand for jail time and their outrage when the George Floyd rioters burned down American cities?” Fox News, *The Ingraham Angle*, [1/21/25]

- Defending the pardons, Fox host Sean Hannity falsely claimed that the government “never prosecuted” Black Lives Matter protestors for the 2020 protests. Hannity lamented that there were “574 riots in the summer of 2020, we had dozens of dead Americans, thousands of injured cops, billions in property damage, we have videotape evidence — they never prosecuted these people.” Premiere Radio Networks, *The Sean Hannity Show*, [1/22/25]
- Right-wing pundit Larry Elder claimed that “absolutely nothing happened” to BLM protesters who attacked cops. Elder: “In the summer of 2020, you got people who were battering police officers and absolutely nothing happened to them.” Newsmax, *Rob Schmitt Tonight*, [1/21/25]
- Fox host Jesse Watters praised the January 6 pardons while claiming that Democrats “showed mercy to BLM after they ransacked and firebombed cities.” Fox News, *Jesse Watters Primetime*, [1/22/25]
- Fox & Friendsco-host Lawrence Jones claimed that “there were no charges” for the BLM protests. Jones added: “So, I don't want anybody targeting cops. But I think what ended up happening, according to some of the reports, and I can pretty much confirm it, is when there was some debate going on who to pardon and they kept going back and forth and he said, just pardon them all. I'm not going to do this. If this is your effort to delay me getting the J6ers pardoned, the people that were overcharged, which a lot of legal scholars agree, then I'm just going to pardon them all.” Fox News, *Fox & Friends*, [1/23/25]
## Right-wing media justified the pardons by claiming that the January 6 trials were politically motivated and unfair and that the sentences were excessive
- Watters praised Trump for issuing a pardon for a man who received 20 years for “punching a cop at a rally that got out of control,” adding, “These guys got squeezed into pleas.”He said: “We don't think you should be able to punch a cop in the face and get away with it, but 20 years is a long time for punching a cop in the face. And these guys got squeezed into pleas.” Fox News, *Jesse Watters Primetime*, [1/22/25]
- Fox host Will Cain claimed that investigations into January 6 participants were “an attempt to cook the books within the DOJ and the FBI to suggest that domestic terrorism was on the rise.” He also stated that, “Real people had their lives ruined. Real people sat and rotted in jail. And Donald Trump, today, for those real people, brought justice.” Fox News, *The Will Cain Show*, [1/21/25]
- During Fox News’ inauguration coverage, Ingraham defended the pardons by claiming “these people were never had the real chance to put on a proper defense” and “documents were destroyed.” Ingraham noted Trump had granted “1,600 pardons for J6ers who were arrested,” adding, “And a lot of them were sentenced to two, three, four, five years in jail. His point is, documents were destroyed, which they were, and these people were never had the real chance to put on a proper defense. That was really big.” Mediaite, [1/20/25]

- Ingraham also justified Trump pardoning participants because “a lot of them served years in jail already.” She added, “We know sex assaults of convicts are, you know, go to jail all across this country for a couple of years. Some of these people have been in jail for already four years.” Fox News, *The Ingraham Angle*, [1/22/25]

- Former GOP congresswoman Michelle Bachmann said onFlashPointthat January 6 “was like a prayer meeting” and complained that there were “1,500 people who've been in jail serving time is far in excess of what murderers and rapists have to serve in jail.” Bachmann added, “People were preaching the gospel on the streets. It was like a family reunion. The happiest people you would ever see. There was no discontent on the Capitol Hill that day.” Victory Channel, *FlashPoint*, [1/21/25]
- Right-wing conspiracy theorist Mike Cernovich wrote, “Not one J6’er got a real trial so Trump had to release them all.” He added, “Anyone who has a problem with this can talk to the judges and prosecutors who did Stalin era show trials.” Twitter/X, [1/21/25; Media Matters, 8/21/18]
- Right-wing figure Dinesh D’Souza, who has pushed election denial conspiracy theories, called the pardons in an X post “a just outcome” because the trials were “show trials.” He also claimed that “when the process is thoroughly corrupted, everyone is presumed innocent after the fact.” Twitter/X, [1/21/25; Media Matters, 5/4/22]
- Former Fox host Bill O’Reilly claimed that “there was prosecutorial misconduct directed at some people who got into this fracas and got punished far beyond their crime.” Premiere Radio Networks, *The Sean Hannity Show*, [1/24/25]
## Right-wing media figures compared Trump’s pardons to Biden’s preemptive pardons for potential targets of the Trump administration
Prior to exiting the White House, then-President Joe Biden issued pardons for Dr. Anthony Fauci, retired Gen. Mark Milley, members of the House January 6 committee, and several of his family members in an attempt to protect them against potential reprisals by the incoming Trump administration. Following Trump’s January 6 pardons, right-wing media figures have equated the pardons issued by Biden and Trump, ignoring that the Trump administration had publicly telegraphed its intent to target many of those pardoned by Biden.

- OnFox Noticias, co-host Julie Banderas questioned why the media is “so focused on the Jan. 6 pardons and not the criminal pardons granted by Joe Biden.” Fox Deportes, *Fox Noticias*, [1/22/25]
- Discussing the potential political fallout of Trump pardoning January 6 participants convicted of violence, Newsweek deputy opinion editor Batya Ungar-Sargon invoked Biden’s preemptive pardons. She said that “what Biden did in terms of pardoning was so utterly egregious and is going to become a massive albatross around the neck of his party in a way that these really aren't for Donald Trump.” The Free Press, *Honestly with Bari Weiss*, [1/24/25]
- Fox anchor Bret Baier likened Biden's preemptive pardons of his family to Trump's pardon of January 6 participants, saying, “What about that, the pardon back and forth between the two presidents?” Fox News, *Special Report with Bret Baier*, [1/21/25]
## Right-wing media figures glossed over violent offenses by January 6 participants, saying Trump pardoned nonviolent “ordinary patriots” who were set up by law enforcement
Right-wing media figures have justified Trump’s blanket January 6 pardons by glossing over pardons for those convicted of seditious conspiracy or violent crimes. Approximately 140 police officers were injured that day, and several armed individuals and extremist groups were present.

- Newsmax’s Greg Kelly excused the pardons as “Donald Trump pardon[ing] vulnerable, not very powerful, regular, ordinary patriots” and claimed that “to the extent he [Enrique Tarrio] did anything wrong, it was a setup, a total and complete setup.” Kelly claimed that Trump pardoned the vulnerable and powerless. He also argued that Tarrio — the leader of the Proud Boys who was convicted of seditious conspiracy — was “just a guy who was being a guy, exercising his constitutional rights.” Newsmax, *Greg Kelly Reports*, [1/20/25; NBC News, 1/22/25]
- Lawrence Jones suggested Trump pardoned people who “didn’t attack officers" or engage in “any actual violence,” failing to mention that several of the pardons went to those who did attack officers. While discussing Trump’s January 6 pardons, Jones alluded to the fact that both Trump and Vance previously implied the pardons would be for people who “didn’t attack officers, if there wasn’t any actual violence.” Fox News, *Fox & Friends First*, [1/21/25]
- Fox News legal editor Kerri Urbahn failed to note that violent offenders were also pardoned when she emphasized “incredibly harsh sentences and penalties for mostly, for most of them, relatively minor offenses." Instead, she highlighted what she implied was over sentencing of “relatively minor offenses like trespassing, misdemeanors, and the like” and called the pardons “great.” Fox News, *Fox & Friends*, [1/21/25]
- Lara Logan, who has pushed conspiracy theories, responded to a post about Stewart Rhodes, leader of the Oath Keepers militia, receiving a pardon and wrote that he was “set-up” and “it was complete BS.” Twitter/X, [1/21/25; CBS News, 1/22/25; Media Matters, 3/28/22, 10/21/22]
## Right-wing media figures defended the clemency as a campaign promise Trump fulfilled: “Promises made, promises kept”
- Rumble host Donald Trump Jr. shared a video of Trump signing the pardons, commenting, “Promises Made, Promises Kept… And we are only just starting.”He also posted, “President Trump has just signed an executive order granting full pardons to about 1,500 J6 prisoners!” Twitter/X, [1/20/25]
- Pro-Trump troll Laura Loomer posted, “God bless the J6 patriots and President Trump for pardoning them! Promises made, promises kept!” Twitter/X, [1/20/25]
- OnOutnumbered, Fox News contributor Steve Hilton said, “The Trump pardon, whatever you think of them, it's the delivery of an election promise.” He added, “He said he would do this in pretty much every rally. He’s doing what he said. Biden said he would never do anything like this. It's the exact opposite. Trump is doing what he said. Biden is doing the opposite of what he said.” Fox News, *Outnumbered*, [1/21/25]
- Lawrence Jones celebrated the clemency: “Promises made, promises kept on day 1.” He said of Trump: “I think he made pretty clear and JD Vance kind of doubled down on it, if you didn't attack officers, if there wasn't actual violence, and you were caught up within the system, you were overcharged, you’ve done enough time, and he — promises made, promises kept on day 1.” Fox News, *Fox & Friends*, [1/21/25]

===

mma

Laura Ingraham says Joe Biden should be impeached for “fundamentally” changing America through immigration

09/27/24

---

mma 9 24

Fox News is helping Republicans spin fracking as a major election issue

The network mentioned fracking 544 times in the lead-up to Kamala Harris’ CNN interview

Special ProgramsClimate & Energy

Written by Allison Fisher

Research contributions from Ilana Berger

Published 09/05/24

Fox News is helping the right elevate fracking as a supposedly major election issue by continuing to litigate Kamala Harris’ position even after she and her campaign have stated that she no longer supports a ban on the natural gas extraction procedure. By keeping the focus on Harris’ position, Fox is distracting from important context about the controversial technique and its relevance to voters.

According to Axios, shortly after Harris announced her bid for the presidency, Republicans started “circulating Harris' endorsement of a fracking ban during her short-lived 2019 White House run — even though she walked it back after becoming President Biden's running mate.”

Then, during the August 29 joint CNN interview with Harris and running mate Tim Walz, one of the first questions from Dana Bash was about her position on fracking, with the CNN anchor describing it as “a pretty big issue, particularly in your must-win state of Pennsylvania.”

An analysis by Media Matters found that from July 27, when Kamala Harris’ campaign stated that she does not support a ban on fracking, to the August 29 interview, Fox News mentioned fracking 544 times, compared to CNN’s 201 mentions and MSNBC’s 30.

Because Fox is driving the discussion around fracking, it has often focused on whether Harris supports the practice and how her position would affect her electability in Pennsylvania.

News networks would better serve their audiences by explaining the climate impacts or local environmental threats associated with fossil fuel extraction, how local voters actually feel about fracking, how energy both clean and fossil fuel-based has fared under the Biden-Harris administration, and even whether a presidential candidate could actually ban fracking.

## Fox News shows no sign of stopping its attacks on Harris’ fracking position even as both she and her campaign have stated she doesn’t support a ban
Fox News has suggested that Harris will be hostile to the oil and gas industry regardless of her stated position.

On the August 15 edition of Fox & Friends, co-host Ainsley Earhardt said, “She wanted to ban fracking, her entire career. Now all of a sudden she’s saying I’m not gonna ban fracking. … She wants to get into the White House on January 20 … and then not change anything. She wants to go so liberal. So just don’t get caught up in her flip-flops, because she does not believe this in her heart. She is — look at her voting record.”

On The Ingraham Angle, Fox host Jeanine Pirro suggested that Harris has not changed her fracking position from 2019, saying: “That was just five years ago. Kamala's agenda was clear as day. Radical and progressive. But suddenly she doesn't believe in any of that anymore,” listing positions including fracking. “Will the real Kamala Harris please stand up? … How can the Trump campaign ensure that voters see the real Harris?”

Pirro’s guest, former Speaker of the House Kevin McCarthy added: “So it doesn’t matter if she changes her words. We know what her actions are.”

After Fox & Friends aired a clip of Harris talking about fracking, guest Andre Beliveau of the Commonwealth Foundation said, “She can backtrack or flip-flop all she wants. The record of the Biden-Harris administration the last four years is quite clear and that record has included — I mean, it's been Green New Deal-ism. It has been a pause on LNG exports.”

After Harris’ CNN interview, some Fox News figures said her position on fracking can’t be trusted.

While the interview was still airing, Pirro and Fox contributor Joe Concha attacked the vice president’s response on Hannity, with Concha claiming that “she's lying” about her position on fracking. The following day,Fox & Friends co-host Lawrence Jones questioned whether she was just going along with Biden’s position and would ultimately revert back to her 2019 stance.

The network also helped spread misinformation aboutBiden’s position on fracking in 2020, and it dominated the conversation then too.

During the week leading up to that election, the network also pushed the false narrative that Pennsylvania would likely be won or lost depending on how voters interpreted the candidates’ stance on fracking. And during the 2022 midterms elections, Fox attacked Pennsylvania Democratic Senate candidate John Fetterman for his stance on fracking,conflating his previous support for a fracking moratorium — a temporary prohibition — with an outright, permanent ban.

Even though the playbook has been exposed, Fox News continues to use it to shape the national media coverage of the issue.

## Rather than obsessing about her position, networks could provide valuable context about fracking

* Presidents cannot ban fracking on private and state land, where the vast majority – 90% – of fracked-gas production is done. “While there are several ways Harris, if elected president, could halt fracking on federal lands using executive power, she wouldn’t be able to unilaterally ban it on private land,” Bloomberg explains. “Under a 2005 law, the Environmental Protection Agency has almost no regulatory power over fracking. Changing that would require an act of Congress.” Bloomberg, [7/27/24; PolitiFact, 9/1/20]

Under the Biden-Harris administration, U.S. oil and gas production is at an all-time high – including in Pennsylvania — and its policies are supporting major energy projects in the state. As reported by Axios, the state is “part of the multibillion-dollar hydrogen ‘hubs’ program under the 2021 bipartisan infrastructure law,” and the “EPA announced nearly $400 million in grants for climate projects there under the Inflation Reduction Act.” Reuters, [3/28/24; U.S. Energy Information Administration, accessed 8/2/24; Axios, 7/23/24]

Public support for fracking in Pennsylvania is not a given. After Harris’ recent CNN interview Pennsylvania-based journalist Nick Field wrote, “I can not emphasize enough that - unless they happen to work in the fracking industry - Pennsylvanians don't care about fracking.” A 2020 survey conducted by YouGov found support for fracking in the state was evenly split, though Pennsylvanians who live in rural areas or identify as Republican were more likely to back it. Twitter/X, [8/29/24; YouGov, 10/19/20]

Real issues with fracking are almost entirely ignored in election horse race coverage. In the final week of the 2020 election cycle, cable news coverage failed to meaningfully cover the well-documented environmental and climate issues associated with fracking. This cycle, the media can add to the list of issues the fact that the industry has not delivered the wealth promised to many communities burdened with fracking wells. Media Matters, [11/19/20; Environmental Health News, 2/12/21]

## Methodology...

---

an ah may

Democratic incumbent President Joe Biden and presumptive 2024 Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump have agreed to two debates: the first hosted by CNN in Atlanta on June 27, the second by ABC News on September 10.

June 27 is early for a presidential debate, as the Republican National Convention won't be held until July 15-18 in Milwaukee — and its Democratic counterpart isn't until August 19-22 in Chicago. Biden's supporters view the June 27 debate as a golden opportunity for the president, as it will give him a chance to hammer Trump issue by issue and, they hope, improve his poll numbers. Many polls released in May have showed Biden narrowly trailing Trump by single digits in key swing states.

But some far-right pundits at Fox News are furious about the debates, including Laura Ingraham, Sean Hannity and Jesse Watters.

Ingraham complained that Biden needs a "game changer" performance and is hoping to get it "with the help of" CNN hosts Dana Bash and Jake Tapper.

Watters sarcastically commented, "Both moderators say Trump's Hitler, so the debate will be fair and balanced. Is Tapper going to cut the cameras away from Trump to fact-check him? We'll have to see."

Watters also attacked ABC News' George Stephanopoulos, saying that he "praised the deep state and said Trump's a threat to democracy" and adding, "I’m sure they'll be calling balls and strikes.”

READ MORE:[Biden campaign hammers Trump over infamous COVID comment

Hannity slammed Tapper as a "radical left-wing partisan talk show host" who is "masquerading as a journalist" and claimed that CNN "is filled with left-wing hacks who we know hate" Trump.

The Daily Beast's William Vaillancourt observes, "It didn’t take long at all for some of Fox News' most-watched hosts to frame next month's debate between President Joe Biden and Donald Trump, which was announced Wednesday morning, as unfair to the presumptive GOP nominee."

Although Fox News hosts have been attacking CNN and ABC News as too biased to be hosting the debates, they haven't had a lot to say about the controversy that surrounded the right-wing cable news channel's coverage of the last U.S. presidential election.

Fox News was sued by Dominion Voting Systems and its competitor Smartmatic after promoting the false, thoroughly debunked claim that their equipment was used to help Biden steal the 2020 presidential election from Trump. In 2023, Fox News agreed to a $787.5 million settlement with Dominion, although Smartmatic's $2.7 billion lawsuit against Fox News is ongoing.

READ MORE:[How Fox News' Trump trial coverage became an exercise in 'unintended hilarity': columnist

In an op-ed published on May 16, the Daily Beast's David Rothkopf doesn't agree with far-right claims that CNN and ABC News are too biased to be hosting the presidential debates. But he does argue that the debates could be a golden opportunity for Biden, as Trump is "out of practice" when it comes to debating as well as "bad at it."

Moreover, Rothkopf argues, the debates give Biden a chance to hammer Trump on issue after issue.

"In the view of those close to Biden," Rothkopf writes, "Trump's got a serious problem on the issues. He's on the wrong side of the American public on many of the policy questions most important to them. For example, Trump keeps proclaiming he is the one responsible for the repeal of Roe v. Wade. "

Rothkopf adds, "Almost two-thirds of all women and over six out of ten men support legal abortion according to a recent Pew report.… (Trump) loves Vladimir Putin, for example. In a Pew poll last year, 91 percent of Americans indicated they have an unfavorable view of Russia, with 62 percent having views that are very unfavorable."

Trump still knows how to fire up his hardcore supporters at MAGA rallies. But Rothkopf stresses that the debate format is problematic for Trump given his lack of self-discipline.

"Trump's defective character is so clear, and the danger he presents is so great, that the current president will have a hard time looking worse in comparison," Rothkopf writes. "The contrasts between the two men and their beliefs could not be starker."

*Read the Daily Beast's full Fox News coverage at this link and David Rothkoph's Daily Beast op-ed here (subscription required).

---

mma

Clay Travis: “We’re in a real war. Legal warfare is afoot and it’s time to return fire.”

:{05/31/24

### Laura Ingraham says Democrats could use reaction to Trump conviction to “maybe even declare martial law”

05/31/24 7:45 PM EDT

### Jesse Watters predicts “there will be a revolution” if Donald Trump receives jail time

05/31/24 6:10 PM EDT

### Sean Hannity calls Judge Merchan “the most corrupt judge I've ever seen in my lifetime”

05/31/24 4:09 PM EDT

### Jack Posobiec endorses “reciprocity” after Trump's 34 guilty verdicts: “Get the message across by any means necessary”

05/31/24 3:17 PM EDT

### Project 2025 plans to dismantle the federal agency that tracks hurricanes

05/31/24 3:07 PM EDT

### Matt Walsh: “Donald Trump should immediately create and publish a list of 10 high-ranking Democrat criminals who he will have arrested when he takes office”

05/31/24 2:21 PM EDT

### CNN and MSNBC fact-checked Trump's complaints about his guilty verdicts. Fox News repeated them.

05/31/24 1:01 PM EDT

### MAGA figure Mike Davis fantasizes about a Trump DOJ prosecuting Biden, Garland, and legal figures in Trump's trials: “There is absolutely gonna be retribution”

05/31/24 12:42 PM EDT

### Steve Bannon attacks House Republicans, calls for a “vast investigation” into Trump's 34 guilty verdicts

05/31/24

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border is basically the only gop issue for 2024?

Laura Ingraham says details of immigration compromise “do not matter,” she will personally work towards defeating any Republican that votes for it | Media Matters for America

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omg

https://www.alternet.org/laura-ingraham-renewables-maui-wildfire/

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Giddy with ignorance, Fox's Laura Ingraham enjoyed a deep belly cackle at what she thought was President Biden's expense, mocking him for referring to the Webb telescope as, uh, the Webb telescope. (As in the powerful James Webb Space Telescope that can offer details not captured by other telescopes.)

"Did he call it the web telescope? Isn't it the Hubble? Is he thinking of web Hubble? I don't understand!" the confused faux news host said, bursting into such a fit of laughter, she had to wipe away the tears. (See video below, posted by Andrew Lawrence.)

Guest Raymond Arroyo joined in the merriment, nodding and laughing as he agreed with the outrageousness of somebody calling the Webb telescope the Webb telescope. "Yes, yes, who knows?"

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// https://www.mediamatters.org/fox-news/jesse-watters-dismisses-donald-trumps-fake-electors-scheme-politics

https://www.mediamatters.org/laura-ingraham**/laura-ingraham**-says-special-counsel-jack-smith-more-dangerous-any-group-capitol

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gt replace?

https://www.mediamatters.org/fox-news/fox-news-laura-ingraham-claims-democrats-are-using-immigration-usher-new-america

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OMG

https://www.mediamatters.org/climate-deniers/15-nonsensical-comments-made-right-wing-media-during-2023s-summer-climate-fueled

15 nonsensical comments made by right-wing media during 2023’s summer of climate-fueled extreme weather events

Special PROGRAMS

CLIMATE & ENERGY

WRITTEN BY ALLISON FISHER

PUBLISHED 08/07/23

July 2023 was the earth’s hottest month on record, punctuated by record-shattering extreme heat events, catastrophic floods, and historic wildfires. While major media outlets sounded the alarm on the climate crisis, climate denial and downplay reached a fever pitch among right-wing media outlets and influencers.

Many in the right-wing media have downplayed the record heat — suggesting that it’s normal summer weather, despite clear evidence that the intensity of this summer’s heat waves would not have been possible without climate change — or dismissed its lethal impact by arguing that more people die of cold than heat. Others have said those linking July’s extreme weather to climate change are weaponizing these events to push a radical climate agenda or call for climate lockdowns.

Here are 15 other examples that illustrate the lengths to which right-wing media are going — often deploying nonsensical arguments or outright lies that attempt to ignore the fact that there is scientific consensus that carbon emissions are heating our planet— to maintain climate denial in the face of climate-fueled catastrophes:

1 in

response to extreme weather that grounded planes in the Northeast, Fox host Rachel Campos-Duffy said the left is “trying to control the weather” and “trying to be God.” Fox News, Fox & Friends, [7/3/23]
Responding to calls for climate action, Newsmax host Eric Bolling denied that human activity is responsible for warming: “Real scientists, meaning those not purchased by the kings of propaganda, well, they’ll tell you there is actually no such thing as climate change.” Newsmax, Eric Bolling The Balance, [7/11/23]
Fossil fuel shill Steve Milloy on Newsmax’s Rob Schmitt Tonight: “The Earth is greener than ever before. Have we affected the planet and wildlife? Yeah, sure. But you know, in the end, it's been, I think, positive. The Earth is carrying more life now than ever before thanks to warming, thanks to CO2, thanks to fossil fuel use.” Newsmax, Rob Schmitt Tonight, [7/11/23]
Newsmax host Greg Kelly said that “LGBTQ+IA whatever has been kind of pushed so relentlessly. … I think climate change and the whole phony debate about it has something to do with it,” suggesting the goal is to decrease population in order to reduce climate impacts. Newsmax, Greg Kelly Reports, [7/11/23]
Fox host Jesse Watters suggested that U.S. special presidential envoy for climateJohn Kerry made it “impossible” to believe in climate change because according to Watters he lied about using a private plane. Fox News, Jesse Watters Primetime, [7/13/23]
Conservative radio and Fox News host Mark Levin on his radioshow said climate change is a religion not based on science: “This is a religion. This is an ideology. This isn’t science. ...Don't you see how hot it is in Nevada? In the middle of the damn summer?It's what we have air conditioning for.”Westwood One, The Mark Levin Show, [7/13/23]
Far-right media host Steven Crowder claims that carbon dioxide is not pollution because plants use it: “Is carbon dioxide the — basically, you know, the neurotoxin atmospheric poison that people make it out to be? Because you just pointed out plants thrive on it.” Rumble, Louder with Crowder, [7/15/23]
Fox host Greg Gutfeld attempted to downplay the record-breaking heat with bizarre logic: “The problem with using weather — like saying, ‘This place broke records’ — how many states,how many countries didn't break records? Nobody ever provides you the context. They’re going, ‘Three countries had record-breaking heat waves.’ It’s like, well, how many countries are there?” Fox News, The Five, [7/17/23]
The Daily Wire’s Matt Walsh claimed that the record heat is not a result of human activity but the sun: “The sun … that’s what calls the shots on Earth. It determines the temperature. It determines everything in terms of weather. … And until you can figure out a way to literally control the sun, there is basically nothing we can do to intentionally and significantly raise, lower, or otherwise affect the temperature on Earth.” The Daily Wire, The Matt Walsh Show, [7/18/23]
The Daily Wire’s Ben Shapiro: “Thank God we have this thing called air conditioning. … You know what’s a great cure for being super-duper hot outside? Being a first world country.” The Daily Wire, The Ben Shapiro Show, [7/20/23]
Fox Business host Larry Kudlow on America Reports: “This is not an overly hot July. ... Hot weather happens in some places; cooler weather happens in other places. We do not have a climate catastrophe.” Fox News, America Reports, [7/21/23]
:{Turning Point USA founder Charlie Kirk on climate science and why carbon dioxide is not pollution: “The science is not solid. The science is debated. They look at science as if it is religious, irrefutable dogma.” Kirk added, “The built-in premise of the climate hoax is carbon is bad. OK, well, carbon is life, actually. …:{ Don’t plants thrive on carbon dioxide?}:” :{Real America’s Voice:(style="background-color:#ffff66ff"):}:, The Charlie Kirk Show, [7/24/23]}:
On The Ingraham Angle, American Majority founder Ned Ryun called climate change a “hoax”: “It is nothing more than an attempt to manipulate people into a state of fear to have them give more control over to a ruling elitewho would take this hoax and enforce it through a whole host of means:{.” Fox News, The Ingraham Angle, :(style="background-color:#ffffffff"):}:[7/27/23:{]}:
:{:{On America’s Newsroom, fossil fuel shill Daniel Turner deliberately conflated weather with climate}:: “And if you look at the weather forecast for this great city, where I’m born and raised, next Friday is mid-70s. So we are in what's called a heat wave.” :{Fox News, America’s Newsroom:(style="background-color:#6633ffff"):}:, [7/28/23]}:
Climate denier Marc Morano on Jesse Watters Primetime blamed global wildfires on arsonists, dismissing the role of climate change: “This is a global problem of people starting this. Now, is it climate change? Well, this would be the equivalent of blowing up a dam or sabotaging a dam and allowing a valley to flood and then saying, oh, look, climate change is causing more floods.” Fox News, Jesse Watters Primetime, [7/28/23]

…

Related

Right-wing media deny climate change in face of deadly and record-breaking extreme weather event

07/20/23

Right-wing media downplay the hottest day in modern history with the help of Twitter’s community notes feature

07/11/23

Only 5% of national TV news segments on the record-shattering heat wave that scorched Texas mentioned climate change

07/03/23

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SEEMS EMBELATIC, IMMUNE TO FACT/ REALITY

Right-wing media deny climate change in face of deadly and record-breaking extreme ...

https://www.mediamatters.org/climate-deniers/right-wing-media-deny-climate-change-face-deadly-and-record-breaking-extreme

Media Matters for America

Fox Business host Stuart Varney indulged climate change denier Marc Morano and said climate change is “a good debate.” When discussing extreme ...

as the climate crisis becomes more evident and destructive,even exceeding climate scientists’ earlier predictions, Fox News and other influential right-wing outlets and figures are downplaying the severity of climate-fueled events and pushing dangerous climate denial.

This summer has been marked by a series of record-breaking extreme weather events, illustrative of the rapidly intensifying effects of global warming. Unprecedented heat waves, wildfires, and floods have wreaked havoc across North America. Meanwhile, global sea surface temperatures have reached alarming levels, and the world just experienced its hottest day on record — four days in a row. These events align with scientists' warnings, but the acceleration of warming and the intensity of this summer’s extreme heat suggest that the climate crisis is unfolding faster than expected.

Last month, when smoke from hundreds of wildfires raging across Canada polluted the air over major population centers in the U.S., Fox News dismissed the link between the fires and climate change; meanwhile conspiracy theories seeking alternative explanations for Canada’s record-breaking wildfire season flourished online. In response to news that Earth had reached its hottest temperatures ever recorded, bad actors attempted to distract from the unsettling milestone by focusing on CNN’s use of the phrase “hottest day ever.” As deadly heat continues to scorch parts of the U.S., Asia, and Europe with no end in sight, and with a 1,000-year flood event having left parts of Vermont and New York state underwater, right-wing media cling to talking points that deny climate science.

By flooding the zone with climate denial right when the climate crisis is most evident, right-wing media run cover for Republican decision-makers who are actively obstructing climate action, ward off accountability for the fossil fuel industry, and pollute information systems for those attempting to understand the link between extreme weather and our dependence on fossil fuels. This tactic, like the extreme heat, has no end in sight.

Right-wing media responded to deadly climate change-fueled heat and flooding with denial and delay

Fox Business host Stuart Varney indulged climate change denier Marc Morano and said climate change is “a good debate.” When discussing extreme heat in Phoenix, Arizona, Morano said, “This is not outside the normal bounds of hot summer weather,” and claimed that CNN, The New York Times, and others are “weaponizing hot summer heat waves to turn it into some kind of climate action.” Varney asked Morano whether “that is not the result of CO2 emissions'' and said, “It's a good debate. This is a very good debate.” Fox Business, *Varney & Co*., [7/19/23]

Far-right radio host Steven Crowder hosted climate contrarian Bjorn Lomborg, who downplayed the climate crisis by arguing that more people die from cold than heat: “We are not talking about a world where most people die from heat. No, most people die from cold. Cold is fantastically more dangerous for a lot of different reasons.”:{ Rumble, :(style="background-color:#ffffffff"):}:*Louder with Crowder*:{, :(style="background-color:#ffffffff"):}:[7/19/23:{]}:

:{The Daily Wire’s Matt Walsh suggests that the extreme heat is normal for summer: “:{Well it’s summertime and that means it's hot outside … This is when the media, as it does every year, claims that the hot weather is a sign of our impending planetary doom.” The Daily Wire, :(style="background-color:#ffff66ff"):}:*The Matt Walsh Show*, [7/18/23]}:

Far-right pundit James Lindsay: “Climate struggle sessions ramping up. They're going to try and fail to make that transition again. The propaganda isn't going to work this time either, though.” Twitter, [7/18/23]

Fox News host Laura Ingraham, in response to an Axios article about extreme weather: “I'm not taking@Axios seriously until they start crusading against coal burning in China — anyone who claims to worry about carbon emissions should start there or button it. Even the ‘best states for climate change’ get hit with extreme weather” Twitter, [7/18/23]

COVID-19 conspiracy theorist Dr. Naomi Wolf: “Oh! Conclusions: this will happen more and more often because climate change so: stay indoors, do remote work, ‘mask’. Back where we were again.” Twitter, [7/18/23]

Right-wing Irish political activist and conspiracy theorist Ben Gilroy: “Today media continue to propagandise weather showing high temperatures in Death Valley USA — yet the park rangers wear jackets and gloves? The elites UN climate scam is really about securing a world government plutocracy, depopulation, and severely cutting your quality of life.” Twitter, [7/18/23]

Fox host Jesse Watters downplayed the extreme heat as simply “summer”: “It's been a hot July. Some call it ‘global warming,’ some call it ‘summer.’ But what's the best way to beat the heat? Ice cream.” Fox News, *Jesse Watters Primetime*, [7/17/23]

Lindsay mocked conditions in the southern U.S. that were so humid they had the potential to interfere with humans’ ability to sweat, pushing the limits of survivability. Twitter, [7/17/23]

Longtime fossil fuel shill Steve Milloy: “@AP: 'Around the world, millions feel the heat of an unrelenting summer.' Two points: 1. It is summer. It gets hot. 2. There 8 billion in the world. If only 'millions' are experiencing extreme heat, that doesn't sound much like 'climate change.'” Twitter, [7/17/23]

Misogynist influencer and alleged sex trafficker Tristan Tate: “They’re naming heatwaves like they used to name new ‘Covid variants’. Can somebody in the government give me the job of whoever makes the names up? I’ll do it for free. Watch out! The ‘lovely warm summer’ heatwave has just hit Europe.” Twitter, [7/15/23]

COVID-19 conspiracy theorist and anti-vaccine influencer Dr. Eli David: “When the weather is a bit warmer than usual: Experts™: IT'S PROOF OF GLOBAL WARMING!!!!! When the weather is colder than usual: Experts™: WEATHER AND CLIMATE ARE TWO DIFFERENT THINGS YOU MORONS!!!!!” Twitter, [7/17/23]

Newsmax host Chris Salcedo mocked concern over the record heat:“Newsflash folks, it gets hot in the summer.” He continued, “After a few particularly hot days on the Fourth of July weekend, the left — they went into full fearmongering mode.” Salcedo then interviewed Milloy, who warned that climate activists would call for climate lockdowns. Newsmax, *The Chris Salcedo Show*, [7/17/23]

On The Five, Jesse Watters attacked “the left” for connecting climate change to heat waves across the globe and mocked climate activists:“The left rushing to blame global warming for that dangerous heat wave gripping the nation and the world right now. But I think the heat's getting to their heads. Climate change-obsessed liberals are actually acting crazier than usual, with eco-extremists in Germany literally gluing their hands to airport runways as a way to sound thealarm on how the planet's cooked.” Fox News, *The Five*, [7/17/23]

Fox host Greg Gutfeld also attempted to downplay the record-breaking heat with bizarre logic: “The problem with using weather — like saying, ‘This place broke records’ — how many states, how many countries didn't break records? Nobody ever provides you the context. They’re going, ‘Three countries had record breaking heat waves.’ It’s like, well, ‘How many countries are there?’” Fox News, *The Five*, [7/17/23]

On America’s Newsroom, Lomborg suggested that more air conditioning is the way to address extreme heat: “The way to fix this, of course, is to make sure that people get lots of air conditioningand that they can actually afford the energy that they will run their air conditioning on. That’s one. The second one is to remember that, yes, there are many people dying from heat, but many, many more people dying from cold.:{” Fox News, :(style="background-color:#ffffffff"):}:*America’s Newsroom*:{, :(style="background-color:#ffffffff"):}:[7/17/23:{]}:

Climate change denier and former University of Alabama professor Matthew Wielicki: “We used to call this summer. Now we call this a climate crisis.” Twitter, [7/15/23]

Milloy: “India's monsoon season is not affected by emissions. Indians have died in monsoon flooding since there have been Indians and monsoons. It is really dishonest and disgusting to surf tragic deaths for climate.” Twitter, [7/14/23]

Right-wing British pundit Brendan O’Neill, who has been praised by anti-renewable energy activist Michael Shellenberger,:{ wrote that “global warming could be good for humankind.” Citing Lomborg, O’Neill wrote that “the truth is that global warming could be good for humankind” because more people die from the cold than heat. “It’s pissing down in Britain,” he continued, “Where’s our global warming? Even the name of the heatwave is designed to conjure up visions of hellfire and torment.” Spiked, :(style="background-color:#ffffffff"):}:[7/14/23:{]}:

On Fox News at Night, Carl Demaio, a political operative and conservative radio host, called a California campaign to warn residents about climate-driven extreme heat “wasteful spending” and “fear porn.” Fox News, *Fox News at Night*, [7/12/23]

Newsmax host Eric Bolling, in response to calls for climate action after flooding in the Northeast, denied that human activity is responsible for warming: “It's raining, so we all must change our behavior. Unprecedented weather events — look flooding’s terrible, loss of property is a disaster, and our hearts go out to those affected. But just imagine, for one moment, the ridiculousness and the pompousness to think that: one, our behavior has any real impact on weather and the Earth, and two, even if that were true — which it’s not — that we could do anything about it without making things worse.” Newsmax, *Eric Bolling The Balance*, [7/11/23]

Fox host Laura Ingraham also mocked the extreme heat and calls to action, suggesting that climate change is a made-up crisis: “It's hot, hot, hot all right. After all, we're in the middle of a season called ‘summer.’” Ingraham later played a clip from a previous show, arguing that “COVID lockdowns set the predicate for more to come.” She said, “Their so-called public health expertswere wrong on everything from lockdowns to masks to social distancing. And yet now we see the usual suspects lining up to exploit another hyped crisis: of course, I’m talking about climate change.”:{ Fox News, :(style="background-color:#ffffffff"):}:*The Ingraham Angle*:{, :(style="background-color:#ffffffff"):}:[7/11/23:{]}:

Right-wing journalist and author Alex Berenson: As climate change hysteria reaches a new level of screeching (1-in-1000 this, world's hottest that), remember that weather-related deaths have PLUNGED since 1970. The wealthier the world becomes, the easier managing climate change will be. And wealth requires energy. Period. Twitter, [7/10/23]

On Jesse Watters Primetime, guest host Pete Hegseth mocked reports of record-breaking heat and blamed media for “hyping climate insanity”: If there is one thing the mindless left loves to magically discover every year, it’s that summer is hot. Hegseth continued, “It was hotter in New York in April.And it’s not even the hottest June we’ve ever had. The data shows that the 80s and 90s … were a lot hotter.” Fox News, Jesse Watters Primetime, [7/7/23]

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// deep state

https://www.mediamatters.org/fox-news/fox-news-laura-ingraham-says-we-need-defund-federal-law-enforcement

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https://www.mediamatters.org/laura-ingraham/laura-ingraham-attacks-supreme-court-independent-state-legislature-ruling

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https://www.mediamatters.org/fox-news/laura-ingraham-defends-samuel-alito-receiving-and-not-disclosing-luxury-vacation

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https://www.mediamatters.org/fox-news/ten-months-rights-apocalyptic-rants-about-trump-documents-case

mma 6 23

no lnx vid twt

ten months of the right’s apocalyptic rants about the Trump documents case

WRITTEN BY MATT GERTZ

PUBLISHED 06/13/23

The federal criminal indictment against former President Donald Trump functions as a crushing repudiation of the apocalyptic rhetoric his right-wing media allies have deployed since August, when the FBI discovered a trove of highly classified documents while serving a search warrant at his Mar-a-Lago residence and resort. Their doomsaying and demagoguery, replete with warnings that the United States has become a lawless banana republic, has stoked the fury of an increasingly violent right-wing movement — and there’s little sign they plan to stop.

Fox News hosts cheered when Trump picked Bill Barr to become attorney general in December 2018 because they believed he could turn their conspiracy theories into federal investigations while protecting Trump and his allies from the law. In office he fulfilled that promise, shielding Trump from special counsel Robert Mueller’s probe, launching an inquiry into the origins of that investigation, and forestalling legal accountability for the then-president’s cronies.

But even Barr isn’t willing to make excuses for Trump’s conduct after Friday’s unsealing of the 37-count indictment. Prosecutors led by special counsel Jack Smith allege in the indictment that Trump had personally overseen the removal of government documents from the White House; knowingly retained highly classified documents, including ones containing information “regarding defense and weapons capabilities of both the United States and foreign countries” and about “United States nuclear programs”; kept boxes of such documents stored at times in unsecured locations including Mar-a-Lago’s ballroom and a bathroom; and conspired to prevent their return to government custody. Trump will be arraigned on Tuesday in a Miami, Florida, courtroom.

“I was shocked by the degree of sensitivity of these documents and how many there were, frankly,” Barr said on Fox News Sunday two days after the indictment's unsealing. “And so, the government's agenda was to get those -- protect those documents and get them out. And I think it was perfectly appropriate to do that. It was the right thing to do, and I think the counts under the Espionage Act that he willfully retained those documents are solid counts.”

Barr added of the indictment, “If even half of it is true, then he's toast. I mean, it's a pretty -- it's a very detailed indictment, and it's very, very damming. And this idea of presenting Trump as a victim here -- a victim of a witch hunt is ridiculous.”

“Witch hunt” would actually qualify as a fairly mild critique of the Trump documents investigation on the network where Barr offered his comments.

Fox propagandists, the carnival of Trump lackeys and lickspittles they’ve trotted out to comment, and the motley competitors angling for the network’s market share have spent the last 10 months bombarding their audience with unhinged attacks on the Trump documents probe. They’ve described the FBI and Justice Department as fascist shock troops targeting Trump at the whim of a tyrannical President Joe Biden, and warned that the legal action against the former president is merely the first step in terminating the American republic — and coming after his supporters.

After Mar-a-Lago search, Trumpists denounced the Justice Department and FBI …

Newt Gingrich, Fox contributor: “The FBI has been totally corrupted. Now, it could actually be called the American Stasi because its behavior is more like the German secret police than like the traditional FBI.” [Real America’s Voice, The Charlie Kirk Show, 8/9/22]

Laura Ingraham, Fox host: “We all see the Justice Department's leadership now for what it is. It's not the image of Lady Justice operating with a blindfold, but this is a Praetorian Guard that shields all of those who hold the real power in this town.” [Fox News, The Ingraham Angle, 8/8/22]

:{:{}:

Victor David Hanson, conservative pundit: “This is something like the East German Stasi in the Cold War. It really is. It's an ideological investigative group that is hired out by the left for particular retrieval services.” [Fox News, The Ingraham Angle, 8/8/22]

Sean Davis, The Federalist co-founder: “After you impeach and remove [Attorney General Merrick] Garland, you need to eliminate the FBI in its entirety, root and branch, and salt the earth where it stood. It is a corrupt, criminal enterprise that exists to terrorize anyone and everyone deemed a political enemy of the current regime.” [Media Matters for America, 8/9/22]

Steve Bannon, right-wing streamer: “The FBI right now is the Gestapo.” [Fox News, Tucker Carlson Tonight, 8/8/22]

Bannon: “I do not think it's beyond this administrative state and their deep state apparatus to actually try to work on the assassination of President Trump. … I wouldn't put it past him to have planted stuff – that – this is a criminal. The FBI and the DOJ are essentially lawless criminal organizations.” [Infowars, The Alex Jones Show, 8/9/22]

Buck Sexton, talk radio host:“This is undermining our faith in the not only the peaceful transfer of power, but in the executive arm of the government under an opposition party. Not to act like the Stasi, not to act like the secret police that we've seen in totalitarian regimes.” [Fox News, Jesse Watters Primetime, 8/8/22]

… called the probe an attack on America that is destructive to the rule of law …

Sean Hannity, Fox host: “A dark day for our republic, the Department of Justice, the rule of law, what looks to be potentially a shocking overreach — we'll find out in due time — that will have serious ramifications potentially for many, many years to come. … DOJ is now being used as a weapon against Biden’s top political rival. That’s the former president of the United States of America, Donald Trump.” [Fox News, Hannity, 8/8/22]

Mark Levin, Fox News host: “This is the worst attack on this republic in modern history, period.” [Fox News, Hannity, 8/8/22]

Dan Bongino, then-Fox host: “This is some Third World bullshit right here. Let me say it again: Third World bullshit.” [Fox News, Jesse Watters Primetime, 8/8/22]

Sexton: “[I]t almost feels like a preemptive coup. We've heard so much about the insurrection and the coup, but this is preventing this is meant to prevent Donald Trump from being able to run again. ... This is the Rubicon being crossed. This is something we've never seen before.” [Fox News, Jesse Watters Primetime, 8/8/22]

Gingrich: “You really are now seeing the ugly face of a tyranny. And the left is so desperate, so frightened.” [Real America’s Voice, The Charlie Kirk Show, 8/9/22]

… warned that Trump’s supporters are next …

Tucker Carlson, then-Fox host:“These are acts of aggression and hostility aimed at Americans. No American president has ever done this. No American president has ever explicitly declared war on his own population. … And just in case you missed the theme here, they're hiring another 87,000 armed IRS agents just to make sure that you obey. Got it?” [Fox News, Tucker Carlson Tonight, 8/15/22]

Ingraham:“The real target of this investigation isn't Trump. The real target of this investigation is you or anyone who dares to call out and take on the rank corruption of the D.C. establishment.” [Fox News, The Ingraham Angle, 8/8/22]

Sexton: “They're sending a message now to President Trump and his supporters that they'll come for you if you stand against the machine.” [Fox News, Jesse Watters Primetime, 8/8/22]

Levin: “It's not just an attack on Donald Trump. It's an attack on everybody who supports him. It's an attack on anybody who dares to raise serious questions about Washington, D.C., and the establishment in both parties.” [Fox News, Hannity, 8/8/22]

Lara Trump, then-Fox contributor: “If this is what they're able to do to the former president of the United States, think about what they could do to you, to anybody in America.” [Fox News, Tucker Carlson Tonight, 8/8/22]

Gingrich: “If they can, if the FBI can send 30 agents to the home of a former president, they can do it to you, to me, to everybody listening to us today. This is a direct threat to freedom.” [Real America’s Voice, The Charlie Kirk Show, 8/9/22]

… and demanded action — sometimes even violence — in response.

Jesse Watters,Fox host: “I think there is going to be some more action you are going to see out on the streets from the base after they see this break tonight. ... There are just a lot of honest Americans that've had it with what this corrupt government and what the FBI has done.” [Fox News, Jesse Watters Primetime, 8/8/22]

Will Cain, Fox host: “A day after the FBI’s raid on former president Donald Trump we are starting to see what a permanent national split looks like. A divorce. Nobody wants to say it out loud, but it’s true. And this is not simply a break between Democrats and Republicans. No, that’s too simple. What we are seeing is a divide between people who are willing to use the power of the state to silence their opponent and those who are unwilling.” [Fox News, Tucker Carlson Tonight, 8/9/22]

Pete Santilli, radio host: “We will have to arm up and surround Mar-a-Lago to protect it, to protect life, liberty, and property if the governor fails and refuses to do that.” [The Pete Santilli Show, 8/9/22]

Fox News screengrabs

Screengrabs from Fox News coverage following the FBI's search of Mar-a-Lago.

The Trump indictment news brought more fever dreams of the end of U.S. democracy.

Hannity: “It is a dark day in America. … There is no equal justice. There is no equal application of our laws. … Our system of justice has now been weaponized beyond belief and this country is in serious trouble." [Fox News, Hannity, 6/8/23]

Stephen Miller, former Trump aide: “History will record today as the day that we ceased to be a democratic republic and we became a people ruled by an unelected government bureaucracy.” [Fox News, Fox News Tonight, 6/8/23]

Tim Pool, streamer: “The federal indictment by the Biden DOJ is direct election interference. It is subversion of the United States election. … I don’t see how the United States stands and continues to function when you’ve got the sitting president filing an indictment against his chief rival.” [Timcast, 6/8/23]

Matt Whitaker, former acting attorney general for Trump: “It's really a sad day … and it's the stuff of banana republics, quite frankly.” [Fox News, Fox News Tonight, 6/8/23]

Levin: “Let me say this. Today — what is today's date? June 8? June 8 is the day of insurrection, not January 6. … We have never seen anything like this in the United States. We saw it under Stalin. We have seen it in other autocracies, Marxist regimes, fascist regimes. The Third World. … You have crossed the Rubicon twice, which has never been done. And we will never forgive you. Never, ever!” [Fox News, Hannity, 6/8/23]

Bongino: “We live in the police state, Rob. The police state’s here. …The idea that you live in a constitutional republic — take it, wipe your rump with it, and flush it down the toilet bowl, cause that’s gone.” [NewsmaxTV, Rob Schmitt Tonight, 6/8/23]

Joe diGenova, Trumpist lawyer: “Think Panama, think banana republic. You are looking at a thug. He is not the president of the United States. He is a thug and Merrick Garland and Christopher Wray are complicit in the thuggery that led to this indictment today. This indictment today is an embarrassment to the rule of law in the United States, and I hope that the American people understand clearly and unequivocally that what happened today is an assault on the Constitution of the United States.” [NewsmaxTV, Rob Schmitt Tonight, 6/8/23]

Matt Walsh, Daily Wire podcaster: “I'm not sure where we go from there because that really is truly a collapse of the republic kind of situation. It just is. For all the talk of the attacks on our democracy, this would be an attack unlike anything we've seen yet. An actual attack on our democracy. And it's an attack on our democracy because it's an attempt to circumvent and subvert the will of the people heading into an election.” [The Daily Wire, The Matt Walsh Show, 6/8/23]

Trump’s March indictment by a New York grand jury over his alleged role in paying off an adult film actor to boost his 2016 presidential campaign and his subsequent arraignment brought a similar frenzy, with right-wing pundits warning that “there’s no coming back from this moment,” offering comparisons to authoritarian states, and calling for retribution. Indictments from the ongoing federal and Georgia probes related to Trump’s role in the January 6 insurrection would surely lead to more of the same.

The extreme rhetoric on Fox and other right-wing media bastions to the Trump documents probe is part of a violent, radical response that has law enforcement and experts on the far-right sounding the alarm and recalling the 2021 attack on the U.S. Capitol.

The New York Times reports:

The federal indictment of former President Donald J. Trump has unleashed a wave of calls by his supporters for violence and an uprising to defend him, disturbing observers and raising concerns of a dangerous atmosphere ahead of his court appearance in Miami on Tuesday.

…

The calls to action and threats have been amplified on right-wing media sites and have been met by supportive responses from social media users and cheers from crowds, who have become conditioned over several years by Mr. Trump and his allies to see any efforts to hold him accountable as assaults against him.

Experts on political violence warn that attacks against people or institutions become more likely when elected officials or prominent media figures are able to issue threats or calls for violence with impunity. The pro-Trump mob that attacked the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, was drawn to Washington in part by a post on Twitter from Mr. Trump weeks earlier, promising that it would be “wild.”

The Washington Post adds:

Federal and local authorities on Sunday ramped up security preparations ahead of Donald Trump’s first appearance in federal court on criminal charges here, monitoring online threats and potential gatherings of far-right extremists while marshaling more police officers to be on duty.

Escalating violent rhetoric in online forums, coupled with defiant statements from the former president and his political allies, have put law enforcement officials on alert for potential disruptions ahead of Trump’s court appearance.

…

Authorities were monitoring plans for pro-Trump rallies in Miami, including one outside the federal courthouse on Tuesday purportedly organized by a local chapter of the Proud Boys, a far-right extremist group, some leaders of which were found guilty of seditious conspiracy in the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol.

There’s little indication that the Trumpist right will change course, even after the release of the damning indictment. Fox hosts are still rallying behind the former president, while his congressional allies plot to use their offices to aid his legal defense. They’ve all spent years defending Trump’s indefensible actions and training their supporters to reflexively ignore them.

Their efforts make it harder for Trump’s Republican opponents to dethrone him from his position at the head of the party and more difficult to walk the GOP — and the country — back from the abyss.

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https://www.mediamatters.org/fox-news/fox-news-role-spreading-conspiracy-theories-one-january-6-defendant-using-his-trial

mma 7 23

january 6 defendant Alan Hostetter will reportedly rely on three conspiracy theories at his trial, each of which he could have seen repeatedly on Fox News.

Hostetter, a former police chief, was initially charged alongside four other January 6 defendants who the government has accused of being Three Percenters — an extremist, anti-government ideology. The judge severed his case, however, “in a nod to the unusual nature of Mr. Hostetter’s proposed defense,” according to the New York Times.

The Times further reports:

Acting as his own lawyer, Mr. Hostetter has said that he intends tofight charges of conspiracy and obstruction based on what he calls“three fundamental pillars”: that the 2020 election was stolen from President Donald J. Trump; that he and other rioters had no desire to disrupt the challenges to the vote results that were taking place inside the Capitol on Jan. 6; and that, therefore, the assault on the building had to have been staged by “federal law enforcement and intelligence agencies.”

Fox News embraced Hostetter’s first false claim — that the 2020 election was stolen — across nearly the entire network.Fox cast doubt on the election results almost 800 times in the two weeks after it called the race for President Joe Biden, and falsely claimed machines run by Dominion Voting Systems and Smartmatic were unreliable or had been hacked to change vote totals. Dominion sued Fox for defamation, forcing a massive settlement on the day the trial was set to open. Smartmatic also filed a defamation lawsuit against Fox, which is ongoing.

Fox News also pushed Hostetter’s second inaccurate claim,that the rioters were simply tourists or otherwise not looking to disrupt the transfer of power. As recently as this March, prime-time host Laura Ingraham argued the insurrectionists were “old ladies walking through the halls of Congress taking selfies.” In January, her guest Miranda Devine, a Fox News contributor, claimed “most of the people that they've been rounding up are just guilty of trespassing. A lot of them were confused.” Fox’s Mark Levin said the rioters were simply “parading on public lands,” and compared them to “people in the civil rights movement.” On the day after the riot, Fox & Friends insisted the insurrectionists were at the Capitol to “voice their concerns” and to “defend our Republic.” That type of language was a fixture of Fox’s coverage, with on-air talent and guests calling the rioters “nonviolent” and “political prisoners." [twt]

hostetter’s final claim, that the insurrection was an inside job orchestrated and manufactured by federal law enforcement, was also a mainstay on Fox News. Like much of the network’s January 6 revisionism, this particular myth was largely, but not exclusively, driven by former marquee star Tucker Carlson. He filled his prime-time show and a documentary-style series called Patriot Purge with unsupported allegations that the riot was driven by FBI agents or informants, a claim that doesn’t stand up to even the mildest scrutiny.

Carlson promoted the series on Fox & Friends, during which co-host Brian Kilmeade asked, “Do you think maybe, perhaps and maybe you don't want to give away your series, you find indications that the FBI was actually pushing for this invasion?”

Hostetter recently criticized the network’s decision to fire Carlson in a rambling, incoherent defense motion that also referenced the JFK assassination and The Wizard of Oz. Prior to his ouster, Carlson had defended Hostetter as a victim of deep state persecution.

But Carlson wasn’t alone in spreading the conspiracy theory that the federal government was behind the attempted insurrection. Ingraham devoted a segment in October 2021 to the conspiracy theory that a man named Ray Epps was an FBI informant who had surreptitiously provoked the riot. She suggested in March of this year that FBI informants were “working the crowd either before they entered the Capitol or while they were in the Capitol.” Her guest in that segment was American Greatness’ Julie Kelly, a leading January 6 conspiracy theorist, who frequently pushed the same line on Carlson’s program as well.Levin interviewed Kelly in November 2021, asking, “Was this attack on the Capitol building instigated by the Federal Bureau of Investigation on January 6?” And a guest on the radio program of Fox’s Sean Hannity recently suggested that then-Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi “planned and conjured up” the riot to add drama to her daughter’s documentary film.

As the Times reports, prosecutors in Hostetter’s case are worried about the trial devolving to a “circuslike atmosphere.” If it does, Fox News will have played no small role in providing the elements for Hostetter’s spectacle.

---

note attack on lrgit press, elite

https://www.mediamatters.org/fox-news/response-wildfire-smoke-choking-new-york-city-fox-news-trots-out-tired-climate-denial

June 7, as smoke from hundreds of wildfires raging across Canada turned New York City into a dystopian climate change movie, MSNBC host Chris Hayes tweeted: “I always thought there would be *some* kind of climate reckoning when it got bad enough but Covid has taught me that, no, people will just step on the gas and happily mow people down so they never have to admit taking a wrong turn."

Too little TV news coverage connected the code red air quality in New York and other impacted U.S. cities to climate change, but Fox News and other right-wing media figures retreated even further from a reckoning, stepping on the climate denial pedal by dismissing the link between global warming and wildfires, attacking those that did, and insisting on alternative explanations for why Canada is having its worst-ever wildfire season.

In fact, at 2 hours and 41 minutes of coverage, Fox News covered the wildfire story more than either CNN (2 hours and 19 minutes) or MSNBC (41 minutes) on June 7 and mentioned climate change (to deny it) more times in its coverage than its counterparts.

Fox News dismisses the link between wildfires and climate change, mocks those that do make the connection

Scientists say wildfires are becoming more severe as “forests around the world increasingly dry out amid the warming climate”, a fact even observed by Rupert Murdoch’s Wall Street Journal. Experts further note that Canada’s wildfire season is a “harbinger of our climate future” with the United Nations warning that by 2090, “global wildfires are expected to increase in intensity by up to 57% thanks to climate change.” But no amount of evidence, either experiential or academic, changes the tone of the reporting at Fox News when it comes to extreme weather and climate-fueled events.

Fox & Friends co-host Brian Kilmeade mocks AOC, climate change czar John Kerry, and White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre for connecting the dangerous air quality to climate change: “Every time it’s real hot, climate change. Every time it’s real cold, climate change. When it rains a lot it’s because of climate change. And you guessed it, Canada, with burning forests, 400 separate fires, it’s because of climate change. AOC said it. Of course climate change czar John Kerry said it, and [Karine Jean-Pierre] KJP has one note, listen.” Fox News, Fox & Friends, [6/8/23]

Fox News host Laura Ingraham suggests that coverage of the event is overblown and mocks those reporting the air quality from a climate angle: “Is this really a novel occurrence for our country or is it getting the coverage of the type it’s getting because it's happening along the East Coast where all the elites live?” Ingraham continued: “The apocalyptic coverage in the New York Times today was just absolutely knee-slappingly hilarious. … CNN's Bill Weir, no stranger to hyperbole himself, used the event to call for action to electrify every car in the United States for humanity’s sake." Fox News, The Ingraham Angle, [6/7/23]

Fox News host Sean Hannity accuses Democrats, including AOC, of politicizing the crisis to push their climate agenda: “Tonight, smoke from the Canadian wildfires, they blanketed the entire East Coast of the U.S. creating a scary martian-like scene in New York City especially. And as usual, Democrats, they wasted no time. They went right to politicizing the crisis, AOC using the wildfire and heat wave in Puerto Rico to once again push her radical Green New Deal or the climate alarmist religious cult agenda.” Fox News, Hannity, [6/7/23]

On Jesse Watters Primetime, climate denier and frequent Fox guest Mark Morano dismissed climate change and accused those making the connection of weaponizing the weather while smoking a cigar:“This is exactly what you would expect to happen. This is Canadian natural disaster mismanagement and now they are trying to blame global warming which makes it, what? Our fault. It's our SUVs. It's our gas stoves which, by the way, didn't New York ban them? Shouldn't we have -- shouldn't wildfires be a thing of the past? I thought they were banning them.” Fox News, Jesse Watters Primetime, [6/7/23]

On The Five, Jeanine Pirro accuses AOC and Democrats of “pumping up climate hysteria”: “While Americans choke on the smoke, the far left smells an opportunity. AOC thinks this is a great time to push her Green New Deal. She says that we must, ”Adapt our food systems, energy grids, infrastructure and healthcare to prepare for what's to come". Other Democrats are pumping up climate hysteria and bringing back, you guessed it, mask insanity.” Fox News, The Five, [6/7/23]

On Outnumbered,the panel mocks AOC for connecting the crisis to climate change while Fox contributor Kennedy suggests that because wildfires existed before “we started talking about the climate crisis” then the science is not settled: “There are a lot of reasons for wildfires. Wildfires have been happening for a long time. Before we started talking about the climate crisis. So, I want to make sure that the science is settled before we completely turf our economy and flush any innovation we have down the toilet because of a tweet from AOC.” Fox News, Outnumbered, [6/7/23]

Fox turns to its go-to explanation for catastrophic wildfires: It’s poor forest management. And it’s environmentalists’ fault.

Forest management has played some role in the unprecedented wildfire season in Canada — while the role of climate change is also evident and clear. But from watching Fox’s coverage of the fires, you would probably come away with the idea that it’s been Canada’s forest management policies alone driving the worsening fires.

Fox’s jump to shift blame to poor forest management as a tactic to downplay climate change goes back to at least 2018 when Trump first blamed California’s forestry policies while touring the aftermath of the deadly Camp Fire that destroyed the town of Paradise. Fox revived the tactic in full force during California’s apocalyptic 2020 wildfires.

Helping drive the swift move to blame forest management and environmentalists this time around is News Corps darling, Fox News contributor, and New York Post columnist Miranda Devine who wrote a June 7 column, “Smoky New York isn’t climate change — it’s bad forest management,” which has been cited by Fox News personalities and amplified by right-wing media figures online.

Fox News host Rachel Campos-Duffy on Outnumbered: “The real blame is on the climate cult. … They are an anti-human group and they want to shut our forests and close them off to humans and to industry who know how to manage it. And that's what's happening right now.” Fox News, Outnumbered, [6/8/23]

On the Faulkner Focus, Fox News contributor Jason Chaffetz insists that poor forest management is liberals' fault: I hate to tell it you folks but there have been big forest fires for eons probably since the beginning of time. It's ironic to me because the same people who claim they want the Green New Deal, they fight us every single time on the mitigation efforts to manage the forests, clear out the underbrush, clear out the dead trees and clear out the fuel that makes these things so ignite in such big fashion. They will not do that as Democrats and these left-leaning liberals. Fox News, Faulkner Focus, [6/8/23]

Fox & Friends co-host Steve Doocy dismissed climate change and redirected the blame to “bad forest management”: “Climate change does not start a fire. It can create dry conditions, and they have really bad dry conditions up in Canada right now. In Canada they are blaming bad forest management because of a very dry winter and they did not get a lot of snow. … Apparently behind the scenes they have not been doing the controlled burns that they should have been doing. And back in 2024 environmentalists wrote a paper and said not enough is being done to fund this kind of forest management and there is going to be hell to pay.” Fox News, Fox & Friends, [6/8/23]

Sean Hannity also suggested that forest management is the main culprit:“Here's what nobody talks about. There is a science. You can get an advanced college degree in forestry. There's something called the controlled burns that climate alarmist cult members are all dead set against. And you see, if you have a controlled burn that prevents the bigger fires like the one they're experiencing in little Justin's neighborhood in Canada that's now making it smoke all the way down here.” Fox News, Hannity, [6/7/23]

Host Jesse Watters claims that there are fewer wildfires now than 100 years ago to dismiss the role of climate change and prop up the forest management argument: “You might be surprised to find out over the last 100 years, there have been less wildfires, not more. The Wall Street Journal says in the early 1900s about 4% of land worldwide burned every year by 2021 that was down to 2.5%. So instead of obsessing over climate change they should take a look at forest management.” Fox News, Jesse Watters Primetime, [6/7/23]

On The Five co-host Dana Perino blames wildfires on forest management and liberal policies: “Canada is experiencing really bad wildfires on their public lands. We have a similar problem, and it has to do with forest management. The Biden administration has policies that are in direct conflict with one another. … Wildfires can occur naturally of course, but if you are actively managing your forest, then you can prevent some of these things. The left has never wanted to do that.” Fox News, The Five, [6/7/23]

Pirro suggests that since only half of Americans believe in climate change that Democrats shouldn’t be linking it to wildfires: Agreeing that poor forest management is the main cause of severe wildfires, Pirro questions why climate change is even part of the discussion: “We’re at a point when I think 49% of Americans believe climate change is caused mostly by human actions, the lowest reported apparently in many years.So why are Democrats, why do they keep pushing climate change over something that could’ve been prevented?" Fox News, The Five, [6/7/23] HUH?!

National TV news chokes out the climate angle in coverage of Canadian wildfires

06/08/23 2:57 PM EDT

With Canadian wildfires, Fox News follows its COVID playbook

06/08/23

Fox News host Jesse Watters says it’s “normal” for the Northeastern United States to be engulfed in smoke from Canadian wildfires

06/08/23

---

dems will use 2024

https://www.mediamatters.org/fox-news/fox-news-laura-ingraham-calls-coverage-allen-texas-shooting-bloody-electoral-strategy

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https://www.mediamatters.org/fox-news/canadian-wildfires-fox-news-follows-its-covid-playbook

no lnx twit vid

With Canadian wildfires, Fox News follows its COVID playbook

Fox guest on hazardous smoke: “There's no health risk. … Particulate matter is very fine soot. It's just carbon particles — they're innocuous.”

Special PROGRAMS

CLIMATE & ENERGY

WRITTEN BY MATT GERTZ

PUBLISHED 06/08/23

Fox News hosts and guests and other right-wing media figures are minimizing the public health risk of the cloud of particulate matter from Canadian forest fires that descended on much of the United States this week and mocking people for taking steps to protect themselves.

:{:{}:

The coverage is reminiscent of Fox’s disastrous handling of the COVID-19 pandemic, particularly its early days, when the network downplayed the potential danger posed by the virus.

Smoke from wildfires in Ontario and Quebec inundated the Midwest and East Coast on Wednesday. Major metropolises were under hazardous air quality warnings, and a reddish-orange haze choked New York City, which at one point had the lowest air quality of any major city in the world. On Thursday, the smoke-filled air is expected to spread further into the Midwest and South even as conditions improve in the Northeast.

Scientists say such wildfires are becoming larger and more frequent as “forests around the world increasingly dry out amid the warming climate,” a fact calmly observed by Rupert Murdoch’s Wall Street Journal but furiously derided by his Fox employees.

Many major news outlets published reports noting that experts recommend people in affected areas wear high-quality masks to prevent health problems caused by the smoke. Those can include “trouble breathing, burning eyes, dizziness, headache or nausea,” particularly among high-risk populations including children, seniors, and people with respiratory problems including asthma. As Fox medical correspondent Dr. Janette Nesheiwat put it during a Wednesday appearance on Fox News Tonight, “If you do have to go outside, an N-95 can help protect you from that large particulate matter.”

Nesheiwat has a lot of work to do within Fox’s own building if she hopes that message will sink in for its audience. Hosts elsewhere on the network treated the idea of wearing masks in response to the wildfire smoke as a punch line.

On Wednesday afternoon, Jeanine Pirro presented the notion as a left-wing conspiracy, saying, “Democrats are pumping upclimate hysteriaand bringing back, you guessed it, mask insanity.” That night, Sean Hannity mocked “young, healthy people” for putting on masks, Jesse Watters lashed out at government officials for recommending their use, and Laura Ingraham claimed they “seem a little giddy to be back in the masks” and arepromoting “panic porn.”

In fact, Fox’s influential hosts repeatedly downplayed the idea that the wildfire smoke poses any health risk at all.

:{:{}:

“I keep reading and hearing reports and people being interviewed — 'I had a hard time breathing' — and I'm like, I'm walking in the same place you're walking in and I don't feel a thing, and I'm trying to understand, and my -- I work out regularly, so I think I'm relatively in tune with my body,” Hannity said. “I think if it was difficult -- if I was having difficulty breathing, I would notice. But these are young people saying this. Are they all snowflakes?”

“Yes,” OutKick host Charly Arnolt replied. “I think people just like to make a big deal out of nothing.”

“Everybody is saying stay inside, but I didn't listen,” Watters said at the top of his show over the chyron “Jesse Braves ‘Hazardous’ Air Quality.”

“Why? Because I love you,” he continued. “I came into the city for you tonight. I braved the smoke so you could watch your favorite show. The air quality is hazardous. ‘Worse than 9/11.’ But, I said, I don't care. The show must go on.”

Ingraham decided that the perspective her viewers needed to hear about the potential health impacts of smoke on the respiratory system was that of Steve Milloy, a notorious climate denier and former cigarette and coal lobbyist who told them they had nothing to fear.

“Steve, no one's denying it is unpleasant. My eyes are pretty itchy and watery, yesterday and a little bit today, and it might go on for a couple more days,” Ingraham said after introducing her guest. “But is this wholly out of the ordinary?”

“No. This happens anytime there's a wildfire in the West. I mean, it's unusual in the East. Look, the air is ugly, it's unpleasant to breathe, and for a lot of people, they getanxietyover it. But the reality is there's no health risk,” Milloy replied. “We have this kind of air in India and China all the time — no public health emergency.” (Both countries reportedly see more than 1 million premature deaths a year from air pollution.)

“This doesn't kill anybody, this doesn't make anybody cough, this is not a health event,” he further explained.

:{:{}:

“Particulate matter is very fine soot. It's just carbon particles — they’re innocuous,” Milloy later added. “There's nothing in them. They have no effect.”

Video

CitationFrom the June 7, 2023, edition of Fox News' The Ingraham Angle

Meanwhile, at Fox’s cable news competitor Newsmax, host Greg Kelly highlighted the upside of the hazardous levels of smoke blanketing New York City. “I'll tell you, it actually smells like wood smoke. It's not an unpleasant odor, to be honest,” he said. “It is pretty, it actually is pretty. It's a beautiful, interesting aura the city has right now.”

The modern right-wing media ecosystem is defined less by its ideology than its grievances. Popular figures within that milieu,for reasons financial and partisan, despise Democrats, liberals, experts, and the mainstream press, which they consider one and the same, and reflexively oppose whatever those hated entities support.

That reflexive opposition became lethal when COVID-19 spread across the United States. Fox News hosts initially told their viewers, incorrectly, that the virus was no more deadly than the flu and urged them to treat it as a Democratic hoax to damage President Donald Trump. Later, they endorsed untested and ineffective COVID-19 “cures” while downplaying the effectiveness of masks, social distancing, and vaccines.

This irresponsible coverage assuredly led to the deaths of Fox viewers. But virtually no one at the network was held accountable for their actions during a public health crisis, so now they are following the same playbook.

THE LATEST

With Canadian wildfires, Fox News follows its COVID playbook

06/08/23 12:19 PM EDT

Ben Shapiro says Trump mishandled classified documents “not for any nefarious purpose, but because Trump likes things and so he takes them”

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06/08/23 11:00 AM EDT

Linda Yaccarino just started as Twitter’s new CEO, but Elon Musk already destroyed the platform for advertisers

06/08/23 9:27 AM EDT

200+ things that Fox News has labeled “woke”

06/08/23

Sean Hannity mocks New Yorkers for wearing masks to protect themselves from wildfire smoke

06/07/23

Fox News host Jeanine Pirro calls it “insanity” to wear a mask to protect yourself from wildfire smoke

06/07/23

Fox News' Jesse Watters attacks government officials for suggesting masking to protect against wildfire smoke

06/07/23

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https://www.alternet.org/2022/07/laura-ingraham-madness-public-schools

an 4 23

no lnx vid?

Laura Ingraham attacks the ‘madness’ of public schools in call to ‘defund government education’

David Badash and The New Civil Rights Movement July 08, 2022

Laura Ingraham is the latest on the far right to attack a bedrock institution of American society: public schools. The Fox News propagandist on Thursday called to “defund government education” and wrongly implied the National Education Association, a labor union, was responsible for establishing education standards and curricula, which is the responsibility of government agencies.

Ingraham hosted Terry Stoops of the right-wing think tank The John Locke Foundation, which Accountable.US has said “repeatedly alleged Democrats conspired to allow widespread voter fraud.”

Stoops complained that Twitter took action against him after he posted what allegedly were proposed agenda items from the National Education Association’s annual meeting. Ingraham showed excerpts saying the NEA will support the right to abortion, LGBTQ rights, and other mainstream positions, which Ingraham attacked as “whackpot declarations.”

READ MORE: 'They're projecting': Fox News sparks outrage after calling teachers union the 'KKK with summers off'

Reading some of the proposed items, Ingraham mocked them, saying, “Reading, writing, and abortion.”

Stoops berated the NEA’s discussion of critical issues facing America, suggesting the group, America’s largest labor union and not a think tank or government education agency, was advancing an “insane agenda.”

Ingraham jumped in, calling for an end to public schools, and saying taxpayer funds should be diverted to private education.

As Media Matters reports, Ingraham said the NEA’s annual meeting “is more like a political rally for the far left.”

READ MORE: How can community schools rescue a ‘troubled’ district?

“I mean, it’s kind of a combination of Human Rights Campaign, BLM, you know, Earth Justice League, whatever it is,” Ingraham continued, conflating a union agenda with a government agency’s work.

“But what it’s not about is education and this is why I think, Terry, a lot of people are saying it’s time to defund government education or at least defund it bygiving vouchers to parents so they can say, ‘No, we’re not doing this anymore.’ And I think that just has to happen. We have to stop funding this madness.”

Since colonial times in America public schools, supported by taxes, have existed. In the mid-1800s states began to make public education mandatory. But as the religious right has grown in power, conservatives have tried to steer tax dollars away from public schools and into private and religious schools.

Watch below or at this link:

READ MORE: GOP governor launches investigation into public schools over one critical race theory complaint

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What is a 15-minute city?

In a nutshell, the concept of the 15-minute city is that life’s necessities such as schools and grocery stores should be just a short walk or bike ride away. According to Carlos Moreno, an urban planning professor who helped lay out the plan in Paris, cities should be “designed so that we can live, work and thrive in them without having to constantly commute elsewhere.” The goal is to foster healthier habits and stronger social relationships between neighbors by prioritizing green space, accessibility, and safety for human bodies, bikes, and public transportation, rather than cars.

The City of Oxford is implementing a separate strategy, Local Plan 2040, to help achieve these goals. But that’s not what has drawn so much attention in the media.

The traffic plan approved by the Oxford County Council which triggered backlash is meant to reduce commuting time and greenhouse gas emissions from excess traffic. According to a fact check from the Associated Press: “Oxfordshire has approved a plan to put ‘traffic filters’ on some main roads, restricting drivers’ access during daytime hours and freeing up space for buses, cyclists and pedestrians. But car owners can apply for daylong permits to bypass the new rules, and many other vehicles are exempt. All parts of the county will remain accessible by car, officials said.”

Right-wing opposition to the 15-minute city has been firmly rooted in COVID conspiracy theories

Despite what is actually happening in Oxford, right-wing influencers have painted the plan as a thin veneer for controlling every aspect of residents’ movement with the goal of preventing them from owning cars or leaving town at all. According to DeSmog, in 2022 in England, COVID-19 conspiracy theorist David Fleming, along with figures tied to climate denial think tank Global Warming Policy Foundation, created a group to oppose the plan and spread false claims via leaflets to Oxford residents. One founding signatory was Del Bigtree, a U.S. filmmaker and founder of the Informed Consent Action Network, an anti-vaccine group.

The seeds for the conspiracy theory to take root in the U.S. were planted back in April 2020. Frequent Fox News guest and climate change denierSteve Milloy warned of an impending “climate lockdown”and the idea proliferated, with figures like Laura Ingraham and Alex Jones claiming in 2021 that COVID-19 lockdowns were conditioning the public for even more stringent mandates in the name of climate change.

15-minute city fearmongering comes to the US

The ideas driving the 15-minute city are not new. New urbanism and public transit enthusiasts have been gaining traction on social media as Gen Zers and millennials lament their childhood confinement to suburbs that felt unnavigable and isolating. For years, but especially post-pandemic, cities across the globe have prioritized walkability and mixed-use development.

Right-wing media are working hard to maintain the status quo in part through elaborate conspiracy theories about 15-minute cities or anything seemingly related. Right-wing media figures including Australian anti-lockdown campaigner Bernie Spofforth, Turning Point USA contributor Drew Hernandez, and Swedish climate change denier Peter Imanuelsen have insisted they are being spearheaded by The World Economic Forum. In truth, theWEF has mixed things to say about the concept.

Right-wing culture warrior James Lindsay, said in a March 7 segment on One America News’ Morning News with Stephanie Myers that 15-minute cities are a means of “more social control.” He went on to say that they would lead to “new kinds of car non-ownership subscription borrowed models, kind of like Uber, but with no owner. All these things going, so that you don't have freedom of movement” before falsely claiming that in Oxford, “you can only leave your zone so many days a year” and “absolutely no vehicle that emits any kind of ah, you know, I guess CO2 or whatever was allowed to drive during certain hours.”

In the same segment, host Stephanie Myers again suggested that residents of 15-minute cities would be allocated 100 passes per year permitting them to leave their designated zones. In reality, Oxford drivers will always be able to get wherever they want using alternate routes, as only some roads will have traffic filters. Both Myers and Lindsay are misleadingly referencing the fact that local residents will have to apply for 100 day-long permits per year, where they can use any road at any time of the day free of charge.

On an April 6 segment of OAN’s Tipping Point with Kara McKinney, Jeffrey Tucker, former editorial director for the Koch-funded Foundation for Economic Education, blamed Dr. Anthony Fauci for 15-minute cities. Tucker said Fauci, who served as chief medical adviser to President Joe Biden and was a lead member of the White House COVID-19 Task Force under Trump, wanted people “imprisoned in our local communities and condemned to forage and eat bugs” and that he and the ruling oligarchy would insist on “no football games, no concerts, no amusement parks, certainly no church. They want us doomed to a kind of a pre-medieval existence with them in charge.”

In the interview, Tucker also used the familiar trope of Democrats supposedly being soft on crime, but he claimed it was intentional. “They really want to dismantle our cities. There’s no better way to do that than through crime,” he said. And the fact that cities like New York, Chicago and San Francisco are “collapsing in a miasma of blood and weed” would supposedly give them an excuse, he said.

Climate change denier Marc Moranospoke about 15-minute cities on an April 10 segment of OAN’s In Focus. Morano told OAN contributor Alison Steinberg that 15-minute cities are “conjuring up a little place called … East Germany, where you literally had to apply to the government in order to go from place to place. … All of this again is so that we will stay at home. That's actually the goal. They loved COVID lockdowns.” Steinberg asked of “radical leftists”: “Do you think they really realize — hey, you're not going to be able to drive to go get your little soy crackers that you like eating every night while you’re watching and playing your video games?”

In an April 11 segment of Fox News' The Ingraham Angle,Laura Ingraham spoke with U.K. professor Norman Fenton, who claimed 15-minute cities are “absolutely catastrophic” and that “the idea is essentially to stop you — yeah, it’s to stop you going out of the zone, stop you traveling wherever you want. … But in practice, people will have to go out of the zone to get to work, to take their kids to school and stuff like that.”

Fenton is a memberof HART (Health Advisory and Recovery Team), described by The Daily Dot as “a group of prominent proponents of an anti-vaccination, anti-lockdown, anti-mask strategy.” He has inaccurately suggested that the spike in second-wave COVID-19 deaths in 2021 may have been caused by vaccines.

Before turning his attention to 15-minute cities, Fenton also railed against the UK government's net-zero emissions target, misleadingly conflating it with a report on absolute zero emissions, which is not a current policy goal. He suggests that the government might prohibit airplane travel and shipping in the U.K. by 2050. This is not happening.

Online, one American anti-vaccine group seems particularly concerned about Oxford. Children’s Health Defense, Robert F. Kennedy Jr.'s anti-vax group, promoted a video of a young girl making a speech at a protest in Oxford calling 15-minute cities a “dystopian reality” on Telegram and on Twitter. One article on the group’s news site gives credence to the idea that 15-minute cities could in fact lead to “climate lockdowns.” The group also promoted a February protest against 15-minute cities in Oxford. Kennedy recently announced his bid for the presidency.

Infowarspromoted a video that compares a hen house to a 15-minute city because “it’s a spot-on illustration of how they view the people as vassals, or serfs – who only exist to produce eggs to be harvested.” The Telegram channel for the anti-vax group The Truth About Cancer wrote that 15-minute cities are proof that “we are under attack” from the “globalist ghouls.”

For online conspiracy theory networks, anti-15-minute city propaganda has been a gateway to climate change denial

On social media, an infamous COVID-19 conspiracy theory network has also signaled a shift to climate change denial, with the 15-minute city as a catalyst.

A channel that has been promoted by White Rose, an international disinformation group that operates on a network of Telegram channels, is among those promoting conspiracy theories about the 15-minute city, in addition to climate change denial.

The channel, Wide Awake Media, has 26k subscribers on its Telegram channel and has recently been gaining traction on Twitter. It has occasionally featured posts about climate change but started posting more often on the topic in January 2023 when the topic of 15-minute cities was becoming popular in right-wing media. This topic has provoked violent responses suggesting that leaders who support green policies should be killed.

On March 31, Wide Awake noted on both Twitter and Telegram that it had turned its attention to climate change, calling it a scam and comparing it to the COVID-19 pandemic.

[twit]

members of White Rose, which made headlines for distributing anti-vax stickers, posters, and leaflets, have also discussed the group’s shift to 15-minute cities. The group has repeatedly promoted Wide Awake, which primarily sells merchandise promoting conspiracy theories, in its channel.

The continued popularity of 15-minute city conspiracy theories proves that climate change denial is the perfect place for anti-vax and anti-mask enthusiasm to thrive as COVID-19 becomes less prominent in the news cycle but their need to prove they are “wide awake” persists. We have also seen that it can be easily adapted for U.S. audiences with their specific villains, such as Fauci, and framed as an affront to American values, such as our obsession with cars.

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mma 4 23

INGRAHAM (HOST): It seems like a real run up by the media to push for either more members of the court, more court packing or just changing the subject from the absolutely desperate shape the US economy is in and the desperate numbers, definitely bad numbers for Joe Biden.

...This is total bull, okay? And I put this in the same category as Alvin Bragg's indictment against President Trump.

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https://www.mediamatters.org/charlie-kirk/charlie-kirks-conspiratorial-fearmongering-and-retaliatory-fantasies-reach-dangerous

no lnx many vids

Charlie Kirk's conspiratorial fearmongering and retaliatory fantasies reach a dangerous new level

Kirk: "We are living in an enemy-occupied country. They have taken over the government and we have to think as dissidents.”

WRITTEN BY SOPHIE LAWTON & JACK WHEATLEY

PUBLISHED 04/03/23

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In late March, Turning Point USA’s Charlie Kirk repeatedly told his audience that they must take action against a demonic and tyrannical force that is targeting them for their conservative political views. While Kirk is no stranger to extreme rhetoric, his noticeably more incendiary and alarmist rhetoric is primarily in response to three news stories from the past week — the March 27 school shooting in Nashville, Tennessee; recent reports that the IRS visited the home of journalist Matt Taibbi; and the March 30 indictment of former President Donald Trump by a New York grand jury.

Trump indictment

As reports of Trump’s indictment in New York emerged on March 30, Kirk held a special livestream to speculate about the news and reasoning behind the sealed charges. Kirk claimed that the indictment is a distraction from the shooting in Nashville and is actually a “designed campaign” to goad conservatives into violence. Kirk stated, “They would love nothing more than for people to act uncharacteristic. They need to try to incite you to right-wing violence to justify their mass takeover of the country.”

Kirk also called for retribution against his political opponents, who he claimed are “acting like Stalinists,” and said “we must make them pay a price and a penalty” by indicting Democrats. “They crossed the Rubicon,” Kirk claimed. “They have declared quote-unquote the Roman Civil War.”

Video

CitationFrom the March 30, 2023, edition of Real America's Voice's The Charlie Kirk Show

As a guest on Thursday night’s edition ofThe Ingraham Angleon Fox News, Kirk took to spreading more conspiracy theories following the news of Trump’s indictment. Kirk again insinuated that the left and the “national security state” are “almost trying to incite the American conservative community to act uncharacteristic” and carry out right-wing violence which, in turn, would be used to presuppose the creation of “a Patriot Act 2.0, and that could then further justify their power grab across the country.”

Later on in the segment, Kirk claimed that Trump’s indictment was an act of revenge by those still upset over his election in 2016, saying that “it seems as if there is this bloodthirsty appetite and desire at the highest level of the Democrat eliteto quote-unquote get Trump.” Kirk went on to claim there’s a “kind ofStalinization of the American criminal justice system” that he hopes independent and moderate voters will recognize before the upcoming presidential race. Fox host Laura Ingraham agreed and added, “It’s like Stalin’s purges, right? That’s what we’re seeing.”

Addressing his audience the day following Trump’s indictment, Kirk said the only way to “bring the country together” and “heal” is for conservatives “to win,” then told his listeners that winning will include “a lot of our side going to jail, a lot of their side going to jail.” Kirk reminded his audience to stay peaceful though quickly reverted to inflammatory rhetoric, saying, “The country we grew up in has ended, a new country is born. Who’s going to control it? If we want it, we can win.”

In the same March 31 episode, while introducing an interview withDonald Trump Jr., Kirk told his listeners, “You should be angry today. And this is a time for action, and this a time to realize that the country we love has slipped away and we have to get it back.”

Video From the March 31, 2023, edition of The Charlie Kirk Show

Nashville school shooting

In the wake of the tragic school shooting in Nashville on March 27, Kirk unleashed vile attacks on the LGBTQ community following police reports that the shooter was transgender.

On his March 28 show, Kirk claimed that activists are becoming “trans jihadists” in the name of “this lie of a quote-unquote trans genocide” adding that “people think they’re on kind of a holy crusade.” He said that “there’s a lot of violent fantasies, unfortunately, among the trans radicals,” and went on to specifically blame the transgender community for the tragic attack in Nashville, claiming that they have “a violent undercurrent that tragically manifested in three dead kids and three dead teachers yesterday.” (Labeling all transgender people as violent is a common anti-trans trope.)

In his Tuesday episode with guest and Pizzagate conspiracy theorist Jack Posobiec, Kirk read a statement from a group called the Trans Resistance Network referencing the shooting in Nashville and claimed the group “is blaming us, is blaming Michael Knowles, blaming Matt Walsh, blaming Jack Posobiec, blaming all of us for the massacre of children.”

After discussing the Nashville shooting again on his March 29 podcast, Kirk told his audience, “The trans movement is almost on a jihad.They have been told that people like us want them deadand I’m afraid they’re on some sort of unholy crusade,” adding, “We have to stop it immediately.”

Supposed IRS targeting

IRS agents reportedly made a recent house call to Substack journalist Matt Taibbi, according to a statement from Rep. Jim Jordan (R-OH) and Republicans on the House Select Subcommittee on the Weaponization of the Federal Government based on Taibbi’s own claims. Kirk told his audience that the supposed IRS visit to Taibbi was just the beginning of a “targeted campaign to chill speech” and that the government will be visiting “Real America’s Voice listeners and viewers, grassroots conservatives” first. Kirk called the visit “Stalinistic, Maoist behavior from the Biden regime.”

After once again referring to the IRS visiting Taibbi as “theStalinization of America”during his March 29 show, Kirk called it “full outright Gestapo behavior.” He then told his audience that “we are living in an enemy-occupied country. They have taken over the government and we have to think as dissidents.”

Video From the March 29, 2023, edition of The Charlie Kirk Show

Kirk’s fearmongering about the government targeting “political enemies,” specifically conservatives, included claiming that “the IRS is one of the most dangerous” and “powerful government agencies that is able to ruin your life,” telling his audience that “political force” will be used to “try and crush you.”

Kirk also suggested the government planned the IRS visit to scare Taibbi out of testifying against “the liberal quote-unquote street gang,” claiming, “If you want out, they beat you up, they kill you.” Kirk questioned, “You have to wonder did somebody plan the IRS visit so Matt Taibbi would reveal his sources? Did they do the house call to his front door the day he was going to testify for the purpose that he would break? Was it the equivalent of waking up with a horse’s head in your bed, how the mob used to operate?”

Other extremist comments

On his March 29 podcast with guest Rep. Lauren Boebert (R-CO), Kirk defended the Second Amendment by claiming someday Americans may need guns to fight against a “tyrannical, usurpatious government.” Kirk claimed that “the last 100 years shows 150 million people slaughtered because they were disarmed.”

At a Turning Point Faith event that same day, Kirk suggested that conservatives know evil is happening but are afraid to act on it because “the cost is being called something they wish they would not be called. Racist, bigot.” Kirk then said that “racism and bigotry mostly comes from the left,” saying. “We are such a decent, not racist country, that the incentive structure is to fake your own hate crime.”

At the same Turning Point event, Kirk compared the existence of transgender people to “homeless encampments” and said, “We should not have tolerance for public degeneracy or depravity of our streets.”

During an earlier live event on March 28, Kirk went on a rant about how the “woke mind virus” is a product of Satan sent to “destroy the greatest nation ever to exist in the history of the world.”He encouraged American pastors “excommunicate … the demons of the woke,” stating, “Evil should not be tolerated in the American church.”

Video From the March 28, 2023, Turning Point Faith event, livestreamed on YouTube

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At the March 28 Turning Point Faith event, Kirk also attacked universities and academics, claiming their actions are “rooted in anti-whiteness” and that “I think they’re trying to start a race war in this country.” Throughout his seemingly endless stream of extreme comments, Kirk also issued calls to action to his listeners.

At the same event, when asked about critical race theory, Kirk called the educational theory a “tumor” in our schools that happened because “good people have allowed evil to spread.” Kirk then called on the audience to be part of stopping such “evil,” claiming it will ”require good people with courage and boldness to stand up against what seems to be an overwhelming force and to say stop.”

“CRT has spread, andnow it’s time for us to remove the tumor,” Kirk concluded.

Video From a March 28, 2023, Turning Point Faith event streamed live on YouTube

Kirk used the “tumor” metaphor again when discussing a recent Wall Street Journal poll showing a decline in patriotism in America. Kirk claimed this generation of Americans are “the most depressed, most suicidal, most alcohol-addicted, most drug-addicted generation in history.” He then told his listeners, “Sometimes you need to get harsh, honest news and then have a battle plan, a plan of attack to remove the tumor” — implying the need to remove unpatriotic people from the country.

vid From the March 27, 2023, edition of The Charlie Kirk Show

Kirk has not specified what he means when he tells his audience to “stop” transgender people or critical race theory, but he’s also promoted preparing for future events by investing in gold and “buying a lot of bullets.”

Video From a March 28, 2023, Turning Point Faith event livestreamed on YouTube

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https://www.mediamatters.org/fox-news/laura-ingraham-says-joe-biden-will-do-more-damage-democracy-january-6-rioters

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rubber inverse bizarro: remember when the libs made us feel bad for killing whales, well it turns out that...

via rww

https://www.huffpost.com/entry/offshore-wind-moratorium-whale-deaths_n_642599d9e4b02a8d518d12f0

no pix lnx twt

federal officials have repeatedly stressed that there is no evidence linking offshore wind development along the East Coast to a recent string of whale deaths.

Regardless, GOP lawmakers are citing those deaths in an effort to ban offshore wind — the latest in a growing, misinformation-rich campaign to stymie a ballooning renewable energy sector that stands to compete with America’s powerful oil and gas industry.

“The current system in place has allowed offshore wind to move forward too quickly & too recklessly in an attempt to solidify the legacies of green new deal advocates,” Rep. Jeff Van Drew (R-N.J.) wrote in a Twitter thread last week. “They hurt the environment, raise energy prices, & will destroy existing industry.”

Van Drew is part of a group of Republicans who introduced a resolution this month that calls for an immediate federal moratorium on offshore wind leasing and construction activity pending the outcome of an investigation to “determine the true impacts” of this development.

The resolution specifically notes that 23 dead whales have washed up along the East Coast since December and accuses regulatory agencies of having “an unclear process for determining all contributing causes of death of whales through necropsies.”

Along with Van Drew, the measure currently has five other GOP co-sponsors: Reps. Marjorie Taylor Green (Ga.), Andy Harris (Md.), Chris Smith (N.J.), Scott Perry (Pa.) and Anthony D’Esposito (N.Y.).

[ pix Offshore wind energy opponents gather during a "Save the Whales" rally on Feb. 19 in Point Pleasant, New Jersey.]

To be clear, there are a lot of unknowns about how offshore wind will impact wildlife and marine ecosystems in the short and long term. Like all other offshore industries, wind development has the potential to disrupt and harm whales and otherwise negatively impact the ocean environment.

But the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and independent scientists have for months been pushing back against sweeping claims that offshore wind activities, including sonar surveys, are to blame for recent whale deaths. Such misinformation has featured prominently on Fox News and other conservative media in recent months.

“When you think about this obsession with green energy — the argument is always like ‘oil and gas is so bad for the environment,’” Fox News host Laura Ingraham said on her show March 10. “How ironic that what they are doing is almost certainly killing large swaths of the whale population.”

Greene, one of Congress’ proudest conspiracy theorists, has peddled similar nonsense. In an interview with Fox News host Sean Hannity in February, she claimed — again, without evidence — that whales are washing up because of “wind farms that are being placed all over the ocean.”

“People are calling the alarms over how [wind farms] are not only killing unknown thousands of bird species but also causing whales to beach themselves at record numbers,” Greene said.

There are only two small wind farms in operation in U.S waters, one off the coast of Rhode Island and another off Virginia. Together, they have just seven turbines and a capacity of 42 megawatts.

More than a dozen other large-scale projects are in various stages of permitting and development, but none are currently under construction — a reality that makes the conservative narrative particularly deceitful.

As part of a broader climate agenda, the Biden administration set a goal of securing 30 gigawatts of offshore wind energy by 2030, enough to power 10 million homes for a year and cut 78 million metric tons of carbon dioxide emissions. So far, it has granted final approval to two major offshore wind projects: the long-stalled Vineyard Wind project off the coast of Massachusetts, and South Fork Wind project off Rhode Island.

The recent whale strandings are part of what federal authorities have classified as an “unusual mortality event” that dates back to 2016.

“At this point, there is no evidence that noise resulting from wind development-related site characterization surveys could potentially cause mortality of whales, and no specific links between recent large whale mortalities and currently ongoing surveys,” reads an FAQ on the NOAA’s website.

Rather, officials have pointed to vessel strikes and entanglement in fishing gear — the two biggest human threats to whales, including humpbacks and the critically endangered North Atlantic right whale. At least 190 humpback whales have died along the East Coast since 2016. Forty percent of the animals that underwent necropsies showed signs of being struck by a boat or an entanglement.

“Since December 1, 2022, injuries consistent with vessel strike were identified in many of the animals necropsied,” Lauren Gaches, spokesperson for NOAA Fisheries, told Inside Climate News this month.

Conservative lawmakers and media outlets are following the lead of fossil fuel-allied groups in exploiting whales to fight offshore wind. As HuffPost reported in November, anti-offshore wind groups, including some of the nation’s most hard-line climate change denial outfits, have branded themselves guardians of the endangered right whale as they threaten legal action against newly approved offshore wind projects.

Meanwhile, these same groups have advocated for increased offshore drilling while remaining silent about the documented threats to whales posed by oil and gas development. The NOAA estimates that 22% of the population of the endangered Rice’s whale in the Gulf of Mexico was lost as a result of the 2010 Deepwater Horizon oil spill.

[The Block Island Wind Farm off Rhode Island is the first commercial offshore wind farm in the United States.

Those groups include the Heartland Institute and the Committee for a Constructive Tomorrow, better known as CFACT, both of which have long histories of peddling climate change disinformation and cheerleading for the fossil fuel industry. In one of the more ironic and laughable moves of this anti-wind crusade, Peter Murphy, a senior fellow at CFACT, labeled the Biden administration “deniers” on par with the tobacco industry.

“As with the tabacco [sic] companies of yesteryear that disputed their product caused cancer, the Biden NOAA and climate-change cohorts are deniers, claiming there is ‘no evidence’ off-shore wind sites are harming whales,” Murphy wrote in a March 18 post to CFACT’s website, without presenting evidence to the contrary. “Rather, the agency attributes some of whale fatalities to ‘pre-mortem vessel strike,’ while conceding ‘more research is needed.’”

It is no secret that the tobacco and fossil fuel industries have a shared playbook for downplaying and dismissing the harm they have caused. In fact, a trove of documents compiled in 2016 by the Washington-based Center for International Environmental Law, or CIEL, showed that tobacco and oil giants have worked collaboratively for over half a century, sharing marketing and advertising strategies, research institutes, PR firms and even scientists.

CFACT is a member of the Cooler Heads Coalition, a group of conservative charities and nonprofits “focused on dispelling the myths of global warming,” according to its website. Between 1997 and 2007, CFACT received nearly $600,000 from oil giant ExxonMobil.

Few if any oil companies have done more to sow doubt about human-caused climate change than ExxonMobil.

In this July 31, 2010, file photo, a dolphin swims through an oil sheen from the Deepwater Horizon oil spill off East Grand Terre Island, where the Gulf of Mexico meets Barataria Bay, on the Louisiana coast.

In his post, Murphy concluded that “at the very least, there needs to be a moratorium on construction of off-shore wind turbines, which from a climate perspective alone are ineffective and a colossal waste, and now hazardous to the largest mammals on the planet.”

Three days later, Republicans introduced their resolution for an offshore wind moratorium.

Among other things, the resolution declares that “Atlantic coast offshore wind leases represent a transformative industrialization of vital environmental and maritime resources of the United States.”

There is no question wind farms will industrialize large swaths of U.S. waters. But one of the biggest threats to global ocean health is the burning of planet-warming fossil fuels. Oceans have absorbed an estimated 93% of the excess heat from human-caused climate change. This ocean warming has come with devastating impacts, from mass bleaching of coral reefs to the collapse of fisheries.

The NOAA notes on its website that whales, including the endangered right whale, are particularly vulnerable to climate change, as warming ocean temperatures impact the availability of zooplankton and other prey.

Without a herculean global effort to shift away from fossil fuels and halt planetary warming, scientists warn the impacts to the ocean and marine life will continue to mount.

“The percentage of animal species exposed to potentially dangerous conditions increases significantly the faster the world warms,” climate scientist Katharine Hayhoe tweeted this month, summarizing a finding of the latest United Nations climate report. “In general, ocean species like coral and tropical species are most at risk.”

Offshore wind could ultimately help rein in fossil fuel emissions and combat the global crisis — if disinformation doesn’t get in the way.

Media Matters, a media watchdog group, published a report last week that found that of the 288 Facebook posts from right-wing media in January and February that mentioned wind energy, a whopping 84% included unsubstantiated claims that offshore wind farms impact whale populations. The most popular post was a clip from Fox News’ Jesse Watters titled “Wind Surveying is KILLING our Whales.”

Republican Party

renewable energy

Whales

wind power

Climate Deniers Exploit Endangered Whales In Bid To Kill Offshore Wind

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in the March 9 edition of the Los Angeles Times weekly newsletter Boiling Point, reporter Sammy Roth wrote about a recent peer-reviewed study which found that minority communities in Los Angeles face higher levels of vehicular pollution than their white counterparts. The study’s abstract sums up the findings as follows:

Commuters from majority-White tracts disproportionately drive through non-White tracts, compared to the inverse. Decades of racially-motivated freeway infrastructure planning and residential segregation shape today’s disparities in who produces vehicular air pollution and who is exposed to it.

These findings are entirely uncontroversial. For example, studies looking at vehicular pollution in other cities have found similar results. There is a vast body of research showing that lower-income and minority communities in the U.S. face disproportionately higher levels of pollution than whiter and more affluent communities. There is also a well-documented history of racism in urban planning, with highways purposefully built through minority communities.

The study received little fanfare when it was published in February. A March 7 LA Times write-up of the study also received “normal levels of engagement,” per the author of the study. It wasn’t until March 9, when Roth offered some of his personal feelings about the topics of the study — noting that he “benefited from the region’s sordid history” and that he contributed “to the inequitable air pollution that Boeing’s study describes” — that Fox launched its attack on both Roth and the paper.

The following day, Fox News devoted at least 5 segments to attacking Roth and the LA Times

In the early morning hours of March 10, Foxnews.com published an article titled “LA Times writer says ‘White’ drivers are ‘polluting the air’ breathed by LA’s ‘people of color.’” The article listed some of Roth’s claims, gave a brief overview of the study, and then linked to some tweets by right-wing media personalities lambasting the article (none of which actually addressed any data or evidence presented in the study).

The Fox News TV segments on March 10 followed similar framing — making Roth or the LA Times the main targets of their vitriol and acting outraged over the mere notion of environmental racism.

On Outnumbered, co-host Emily Compagno began the segment by claiming that “if you are white and a driver in Los Angeles, then the liberal media thinks that you are racist.” A chyron mentioned the L.A. Times and an image included Roth’s name. Fox News’ liberal political commentator Marie Harf mentioned the study and broadly defended some of the points it made, including the fact that city highways are often built in lower-income areas and that many members of these communities don’t have cars and rely on public transport, though she said she “wouldn’t use the r-word; I wouldn’t use the ‘racist’ word about white people driving on highways.” Harf’s points about the study were generally dismissed by other guests, who instead focused on attacking the idea of environmental racism. For example, Jason Chaffetz scoffed at the idea that “driving on a freeway is somehow a racist act.”

Later that evening on The Five, co-host Brian Kilmeade called the L.A. Times piece “ridiculous,” mocking the idea that “driving can be racist.” A chyron and image again mentioned the L.A. Times and Roth by name, and the study was mentioned only in passing. Co-host Dana Perino tried to reframe the issue, stating that if she was ”in a minority community,” she “would say why are you giving subsidies to rich white people for electric vehicles.” Co-host Jesse Watters then dismissed the idea of racism in this story after saying that “the Chinese are the ones polluting everybody. They are the most racist, statistically.”

On Tucker Carlson Tonight, Carlson went into a tirade over the L.A. Times piece and mocked Roth’s own background. Carlson did not mention that Roth was reporting on a study. Carlson took an absurd position on the piece, insinuating that Roth wrote “that just by breathing, white people are hurting others.” Carlson also claimed that white people are victims of “Rwanda-style race hatred” pushed by the media.

on The Ingraham Angle, Laura Ingraham did mention the study, but her opening monologue centered on attacking both Roth and the L.A. Times. She downplayed the very idea of environmental racism in general, saying, “Making people live near landfills? We're making people live next to polluting facilities? Well, that's obviously ridiculous.” She also dismissed the well-established fact that highways were purposefully built through low-income and minority communities, stating that “what this is really all about is control.” A chyron read “This is all about eliminating your freedoms.”

In the very next segment, guest Chris Bedford stated that the money going toward environmental justice initiatives is useless and that it’s a “completely insane thing” to call carbon a pollutant anyway. Meanwhile, guest Vincent Edward Ellison called Democrats “the evilest people that have ever walked the face of this earth,” adding that “they don't care that these people are suffering.”

On Fox News at Night (airing during the midnight hour of March 11), Trace Gallagher began a segment by stating, “Driving is racist. Says so right in the LA Times, which ran a headline reading, quoting, ‘How white and affluent drivers are polluting the air breathed by L.A.’s people of color.’” He also dismissed the idea of the disproportionate impacts of minority pollution, claiming, “The study says air quality is worse a few blocks from a freeway and common sense says, it's L.A. Almost everyone lives a few blocks from the freeway.”

For his part in writing about a study and simply expressing his own feelings on racist highway practices, Roth was barraged with right-wing and antisemitic hate mail.

Fox News has a history of attacking environmental justice issues

In the aftermath of 2022’s Hurricane Ian, Vice President Kamala Harris correctly pointed out that it’s typically lower-income communities and communities of color that suffer the most from extreme weather events. Fox News personalities lambasted her over this claim, acting outraged that race was brought up at all. Some also falsely accused the administration of planning to deny hurricane aid to white communities. More recently, Fox attacked environmental justice initiatives and pushed racial grievance narratives in the wake of the Ohio train derailment.

In addition to mocking environmental justice initiatives, right-wing media will also downright ignore them, as they did when covering the Jackson, Mississippi, water crisis in 2022.

In addition to these examples, Fox also worked up a storm over environmental justice initiatives in the 2021 version of Biden’s Build Back Better bill, crying foul over modest attempts to rectify decades of racist building practices. At the time, Media Matters wrote that “Fox’s coverage of these programs has not attempted to describe what they entail or what they would accomplish for hundreds of communities. Rather, they have been used as punchlines or set up for cheap shots that reflect Fox’s racist ethos and climate denial.”

This exactly sums up Fox’s coverage of the vehicular pollution study and the resulting L.A. Times report on it. The network downplayed the facts and data surrounding disproportionate minority pollution, and instead loudly complained that it’s all a hoax or that it's actually white people who are being unfairly treated. Boeing, the author of the study, made the same point: Responding on Twitter to the right-wing anger toward his work, he stated that there wasn’t much for him to comment on because “there was no critical engagement with our data or statistical analysis whatsoever, all of which was peer reviewed.”

Promoting climate denial, protecting the wealthy fossil fuel industry, and downplaying the U.S.’ long and sordid history of racism are key themes of Fox News’ right-wing programming. Inconvenient facts like those pointed out in the study — that decades of racist urban planning have contributed to minority populations breathing in more polluted and dangerous air coming from vehicles driven by more affluent people living in other communities — would run up against Fox’s pro-fossil fuel and racial grievance agenda. It thus works for the network to aggressively deny environmental justice issues and reframe the discussion by attacking and manufacturing a backlash in an attempt to intimidate those who even dare to report on them. In this case, the intimidation did not succeed: Roth’s story ended up appearing in the March 13 print edition of the L.A. Times.

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2x? 2 23 vaxr

https://www.mediamatters.org/laura-ingraham/laura-ingrahams-anti-covid-vaccine-campaign-reaches-new-low-should-it-even-be

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Ingraham gets torched on social media for for comparing Trump’s work ethic to Biden’s

https://www.alternet.org/laura-ingraham-2659497821/

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https://www.mediamatters.org/laura-ingraham/foxs-laura-ingraham-participated-ron-desantis-donor-event-ahead-his-expected

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aha trump cato libtard GOP say dereg will revive rural blue collar economy but // EJ, poor white ppl hurt; poor white and POC endangered in covid, corps given immunity, and public health officials not allowed to report rates

see working class heroes

palestine OH neglected

ingraham

https://www.mediamatters.org/fox-news/fox-news-host-blames-diversity-initiatives-ohio-train-derailment

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palestine OH neglected

how much BS is deflection from trump incomp deregulation corruption free mkt libtard BS /grievance victim conspiracy

IF YOU WANT TO KNOW WHAT GOP DID OR WILL DO, CHECK THEIR ACCUSATIONS/ PROJECTION:

projection rubber glue retaliation

vs trump dereg vs chris christie bridge shutdown

https://www.mediamatters.org/charlie-kirk/charlie-kirk-suggests-residents-east-palestine-are-being-punished-voting-republican

https://www.mediamatters.org/cable-news/study-national-television-coverage-east-palestine-train-derailment-ignored-industry

https://www.mediamatters.org/diversity-discrimination/right-wing-media-weaponize-east-palestine-train-derailment-claim-white-0

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Donald Trump Junior conjured up a new conspiracy theory over the weekend regarding train derailments. His hypothesis is that hackers working on behalf of the Russian government were responsible for the February 3rd East Palestine, Ohio Norfolk Southern disaster as well as, perhaps, other incidents involving railcars disconnecting from their tracks.

Shortly after the crash that spilled toxic substances like vinyl chloride and forced thousands of residents to evacuate, many began to recall that Junior's father, former President Donald Trump, loosened regulations on braking mechanisms and safety features during his term.

But that is not the narrative that Junior was presenting.

READ MORE: 'This is why God made pipelines': GOP senator gives nonsensical explanation of Ohio train derailment

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aha? antifa blm merge

https://www.mediamatters.org/tucker-carlson/fox-news-and-right-wing-media-circulate-seemingly-inauthentic-antifa-poster

pix of poster bring rocks ...

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protests emerged around the country following the release of police body camera footage of officers fatally beating Tyre Nichols, Fox News and other right-wing media sources promoted an “antifa poster” whose authenticity has not been proved. The poster supposedly called for protesters to “burn it all down” and bring rocks and heavy objects to riots in New York City.

The image was initially shared in a Daily Mail article, which called it “a shocking poster,” and on Twitter by user Rob O’Donnell, per disinformation researcher Caroline Orr.

On January 27, Fox News’ Jesse Watters hosted O’Donnell, who said he knows the poster was “put out by antifa” and it’s “calling for protests and riots at all police precincts across the city, to bring rocks, to bring pipes, to bring box cutters,” saying it’s “circulating in the underground of New York City.”

Video

In the next hour, Fox host Tucker Carlson showed the poster, using it to suggest there is “an organized militia encouraging organized violence across the United States of America.”

Carlson’s guest during the segment, former Detroit Police Chief James Craig, told Carlson the police should have “zero tolerance” for antifa protesters and chastised “Biden’s DOJ” for doing “absolutely nothing” about antifa, who he said are “threatening cities across this country.”

Carlson also suggested the poster was evidence of a “criminal conspiracy” by antifa.

Carlson’s commentary was circulated by right-wing blogs The Daily Caller and The Gateway Pundit, and FoxNews.com promoted his segment with Craig.

Video 1 27

With the poster on screen, Fox correspondent Christina Coleman said on The Ingraham Angle that “antifa put out this bulletin, calling for violence, even though Tyre's own family has called for peace.”

The poster was also picked up by other right-wing outlets.

On Newsmax, host Lidia Curanaj said “a police source” sent her “a flyer that showed that antifa was organizing throughout the country” but did not show it on screen. She speculated that “a lot of times these horrible incidents, like what happened to Tyre Nichols, are amplified and used by other organizations in order to achieve their political agenda.” Later on the network, Curanaj repeated that the protests must have been planned ahead of time, accused the protests of having “professional agitators,” and called on the media to “do their due diligence and actually investigate” the situation.

The poster also appeared on far-right website The Post Millennial, in an article titled “Antifa vows to 'burn it all down' in NYC following death of Tyre Nichols,” which cites the Daily Mail as having obtained the poster. Neo-Nazi collaborator and Twitter personality Jack Posobiec shared the article on Twitter.

Right-wing commentary site Townhall shared O’Donnell’s tweet, including the image in a Friday night piece warning about “potential riots” in Memphis.

Newsmax’s Justine Brooke Murray shared the poster on Twitter, writing, “ANTIFA terrorists plan to burn down New York tonight. They’re blasting THIS out.”

Right-wing radio host David Webb on Twitter claimed the image showed that “violence is not a solution but it is a possibility.”

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https://www.mediamatters.org/fox-news/ron-desantis-and-triumph-anti-vax-right

no lnx vid

fox News founder Rupert Murdoch became one of the first people on Earth to be vaccinated against COVID-19 when he received his first jab in December 2020. He thanked “the amazing scientists who have made this vaccine possible,” in a statement at the time, adding, “I strongly encourage people around the world to get the vaccine as it becomes available.”

Two years later, such unqualified gratitude and support for the miraculous medicines are scarce among American conservatives, even as a new study found that COVID-19 vaccines have saved the lives of more than 3.2 million Americans and prevented more than 18.5 million hospitalizations. Instead, thanks in no small part to the paranoid rants of Murdoch’s employees, Republican anti-vaccine sentiment has spiraled to the point that former President Donald Trump’s role in their development may hurt his chances of gaining the party’s nomination in 2024.

Florida Governor Ron DeSantis was on Murdoch’s Fox on Tuesday night talking up his call for the state’s supreme court to impanel a grand jury to investigate “any and all wrongdoing” related to the vaccines and “bring legal accountability to those who committed misconduct.” It’s unclear precisely what such a grand jury would target or the impact it might have. As a signaling effort, however, DeSantis’ announcement put him squarely on the side of the anti-vax kooks at Fox and the faction of the GOP they influence.

DeSantis fielded softball questions from primetime host Laura Ingraham, who praised him for having “fought relentlessly against [the] medical cartel’s silencing campaign.” As the governor spoke, on-screen text touted him as “still leading on COVID” and drawing mainstream press outrage for “challenging Covidians.”

Video

CitationFrom the December 13, 2022, edition of Fox News' The Ingraham Angle.

DeSantis is likely to challenge Trump for the GOP presidential nomination. He enjoys broad support in recent primary polls and across the right-wing media spectrum, from Fox primetime hosts to anti-anti-Trumpers at publications like National Review to, reportedly, Murdoch himself. And it is clear to everyone – including Trump’s advisers – that in preparation for that run, he is staking out ground as the vaccine-skeptical candidate.

DeSantis is following the path blazed by Fox hosts like Ingraham and Tucker Carlson. Anti-vaccine sentiment would likely have become a problem for the vaccination campaign under any circumstances. But it took the network’s patented ability to manufacture grievances to turn it into a compelling primary issue for Republican politicians.

Fox spent the last two years sabotaging the U.S. vaccination effort. The network had a unique moral responsibility to try to convince their viewers to get vaccinated. Instead, its most prominent and trusted figures waged a nightly battle against the shots, stoking fears that they were useless or dangerous and that their distribution was part of a sinister plot to control Americans. The discourse was “great for ratings” – but deadly for Republicans, who were vaccinated against COVID-19 at lower rates and died from it at higher ones.

Some right-wing commentators, even at Fox, tried to push back against that narrative and encourage vaccination. But ultimately, they lost the argument within the movement.

DeSantis followed the shift in right-wing public opinion, choosing to preserve his political viability rather than the lives of his constituents. DeSantis once touted his own efforts to distribute the vaccines, which he credited with “saving lives.” But once he saw which way the wind was blowing on the right, he started trying to appeal to the anti-vaccine right. Meanwhile, Trump himself has been flummoxed, getting booed by a crowd for saying he got his booster and eschewing the word “vaccine” on the stump.

It is a testament to the power of Fox’s propaganda that the network was able to turn life-saving drugs into a poisoned chalice for Trump – and that perhaps his greatest rival adjusted his views on them to appeal to its viewers.

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gay marr end nuke fam

https://www.alternet.org/laura-ingraham-2658963361/

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https://www.alternet.org/laura-ingraham-2658858450/

Fox News' Laura Ingraham is not pleased with the latest setback Republicans face in wake of Herschel Walker's defeat in the Georgia Senate runoff.

On Tuesday, December 7, the former NFL player, who was backed by former President Donald Trump, ended up losing the election to Sen. Raphael Warnock (D-Ga.). During Ingraham's latest segment of "The Ingraham Angle," Fox News called the race for the Democratic incumbent.

Speaking to Fox News guest Mollie Hemingway, Ingraham expressed concern and frustration about the outcome of the election as she acknowledged that she was aware Walker was facing an uphill battle.

READ MORE: Time to 'turn the page': Fox News’ Laura Ingraham admits 'exhausted' Americans may finally be done with Trump

“We felt this coming,” Ingraham told Hemingway. “To me, it never felt like the Senate Republicans wanted this guy in office. He was a Trump pick and they didn’t like that.”

Ingraham went on to offer a critical assessment of Republican National Committee (RNC) Chair Ronna McDaniel who was in charge of overseeing the political party's voter turnout for the midterm election.

“We don’t change anything,” Ingraham continued. “We have the same people in place in leadership, same people in place apparently at the RNC, perhaps that’s not changing. But we just keep doing the same thing over and over again. I’m pissed tonight, frankly. I’m mad.”

Hemingway also offered a similar perspective describing the situation as "offensive."

“It’s really offensive for Republican voters, for Republican donors,” Hemingway said. “I mean, you look at what happened since the midterm elections where you had a Senate that basically responded to those disappointing midterm losses by doing nothing other than sabotaging their own base."

READ MORE: Fox News’ Laura Ingraham loses it when guest mentions ‘Sharpiegate’ during coronavirus discussion

She added, "What is the case for voting Republican for the Senate after these midterms? I don’t think one was even attempted to be made. And yet, nothing seems to be changing.”

READ MORE: Laura Ingraham attacks the ‘madness’ of public schools in call to ‘defund government education’

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mma 11 22

House Republicans appear set on spending the next two years firmly ensconced within the right-wing media bubble, focusing on creating content for its Fox News stars after garnering a slim majority in the midterm elections.

On Thursday morning, just hours after news outlets had projected that Republicans would take control of the lower chamber, Reps. James Comer (R-KY) and Jim Jordan (R-OH) held a news conference detailing what will apparently be the party’s top priority. Their announcement had nothing to do with the issues voters said they cared the most about when they went to the polls, like inflation or abortion rights. Instead, the incoming chairs of the House Oversight and Judiciary Committees, with the apparent approval of likely Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-CA), promised to be laser-focused on business deals President Joe Biden’s son Hunter was involved in years ago.

As they spoke, the caucus’ official Twitter account was tweeting catchphrases that are incomprehensible to anyone who doesn’t spend a significant amount of time in the right-wing information ecosystem [twt]

fox News hosts and their fellow travelers have been trying to use Hunter Biden’s business dealings as a cudgel against his father since before he launched his run for president. That fixation ultimately triggered Fox’s obsession and then-President Donald Trump’s first impeachment for corruptly using his power to try to force Ukraine to launch a spurious investigation into the Bidens. The story returned to the fore in the closing weeks of the 2020 presidential election as part of a last-ditch effort by Rupert Murdoch’s outlets to use revelations from the alleged “Hunter Biden laptop” to keep Trump in office. And as Election Day 2022 approached, right-wing outlets were rife with demands for Republicans to use the power they might gain to scrutinize what they term the “Biden Crime Family.”

Indeed, Thursday’s event seemed made-to-order for the right-wing press, which rewarded the House Republican leaders with fawning coverage and airtime.

Fox prime time host Sean Hannity opened his program that night by crowing that “Republicans now have control of the House and soon, for the first time in two years, this administration will finally get their feet held to the fire” before spending several segments purporting to explain how “the big guy himself, Joe Biden” had “ended up using his crack-addicted son as a bag man.” He aired clips from Comer and Jordan speaking at the news conference, then rewarded Comer with an interview, which he concluded by thanking the congressman “for your hard work and your willingness to take on a hard topic.” During the next hour, host Laura Ingraham also touted the event and aired clips before bringing on Jordan.

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an 10 22 no lnx

Army general investigated for defending female soldiers against Tucker Carlson’s insults

Daniel Villarreal and The New Civil Rights Movement October 10, 2022

An Army investigation criticized the Army’s top enlisted leader for using Twitter to defend female soldiers after Fox News host Tucker Carlson said they were weakening the military.

The investigation’s outcome has at least one Army general worried that “The Army has gone full MAGA,” a reference to former President Donald Trump’s campaign slogan, Make America Great Again.

In March 2021, Maj. Gen. Patrick Donahoe defended female soldiers after Carlson criticized new military policies providing maternity uniforms, “making it easier for women to pump breast milk on duty, and relaxing grooming standards to allow them to have ponytails and braids,” Insider reported.

In a segment that month, Carlson said, “While China’s military becomes more masculine as it assembles the world’s largest Navy, our military needs to become, as Joe Biden says, more feminine — whatever feminine means anymore, since men and women no longer exist.”

The statement likely referred to comments that President Joe Biden said referencing women in key military positions. Biden never said the military need to become “more feminine.”

In response to Carlson’s comment, Donahoe published a video on Twitter of him honoring a female officer. Donahoe wrote, “just as a reminder that Tucker Carlson couldn’t be more wrong.”

Donahoe’s response received “national media coverage” from Fox News personalities like Carlson and Laura Ingraham, as well as RepublicWorld.com and OpIndia.com, two right-wing Indian news outlets, Task and Purpose reported.

“While potentially admirable,” the Inspector General report said of Donahoe’s response to Carlson, “his post brought a measurable amount of negative publicity to the Army, enough that [the Office of the Chief of Public Affairs] warned [the Secretary of the Army] of the fallout…. [His tweets] exhibited poor judgment… [and the] subsequent media coverage drew national attention … and it cast the Army in a negative light.”

An Army general who anonymously spoke to Military.com to avoid retaliation said, “Why would any women want to serve now? The Army gave a hunting permit to radical partisans. … The Army has gone full MAGA.”

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Climate denial abounds on Fox as Hurricane Ian devastates Florida

On back-to-back nights during Florida’s Hurricane Ian nightmare, Fox hosts Tucker Carlson, Sean Hannity, and Laura Ingraham cast doubt on climate science

Special PROGRAMS

CLIMATE & ENERGY

WRITTEN BY ILANA BERGER

PUBLISHED 09/30/22

In response to Hurricane Ian, Fox News primetime shows sought to mislead viewers about how climate change is affecting hurricanes, using bad faith and often-repeated climate denier talking points.

More than 2.6 million people were without power across the state on Thursday morning, as extreme flooding left many residents trapped in their homes and on top of cars. At a press briefing, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis called Ian a “500-year flooding event” and added, “The impacts of this storm are historic and the damage that has been done is historic. … We've never seen a flood event like this, we've never seen a storm surge of this magnitude.” There were at least 21 confirmed deaths as of Friday morning, but that number is expected to rise as recovery efforts continue.

Fox primetime shows recycle debunked or irrelevant talking points on climate

Meanwhile, Fox personalities attempted to gaslight viewers into complacency by describing any hurricane coverage that mentioned climate change as “alarmist.” Fox also cherry-picked information about the relationship between climate change and hurricanes to imply that the two are not related. Climate scientists and media outlets have acknowledged that there is not enough evidence to support the theory that climate change will increase the frequency of hurricanes. However, there is evidence suggesting that higher ocean and air temperatures are causing hurricanes and storms to intensify more rapidly instead of weakening as they approach landfall, as happened with Ian. Hurricanes are also absorbing more moisture and dumping more rain on affected areas. Fox ignored this crucial connection or refuted it all together.

On September 27, Tucker Carlson called severity warnings leading up to the storm a “scam” on Tucker Carlson Tonight. But the next day, he called Hurricane Ian “a catastrophe” and a “national disaster,” adding, “People will certainly be killed.” Carlson then tried to use an exchange between CNN’s Don Lemon and Jamie Rhome, the deputy director of the National Hurricane Center, to push his agenda. Carlson used Rhome’s reluctance to link climate change to specific events to suggest that for political reasons, the media is more concerned about climate change than actual climate scientists are. However, Rhome clearly agreed that climate change is having an impact on storms, which is consistent with mainstream reporting on the issue. In fact, on September 28, CNN meteorologist Tom Sater reiterated Rhome’s point and added, “Since 1950 there have been seven landfall hurricanes in Florida that were a category 4 or 5 … the first 4 were each in a different decade. The last three — all in the last 5 years.”

On September 29, Carlson devoted a good chunk of his show to ranting about climate change as well. He was obsessively focused on hurricane frequency, arguing that somehow, a decrease in the numbers of storms would cancel out the plethora of other evidence indicating that the storm events themselves are intensifying. After citing a NOAA research overview highlighting that hurricanes are predicted to become more intense, Carlson went on to insist that “the claim is never proven,” and that “there’s no science behind these claims.” Later in the segment, he implied that humans cannot influence weather events because “they’re called natural disasters. … they’re products of nature, God is in charge.”

He then discussed Hurricane Ian with Candace Owens, who has a long history of climate change denial. Owens reiterated that climate change does not exist because “if there was no human beings that walked the face of the planet, there would continue to be hurricanes, like there would continue to be blizzards, and like there would continue to be tornadoes.” She also used several other environmental concerns such as the hole in the ozone layer, which has diminished because of the Montreal Protocol, and ocean acidification, which remains a concern due to climate change, to try and argue that “they’ve been wrong over and over and over again.”

Video

CitationFrom the September 29, 2022, edition of Fox News' Tucker Carlson Tonight

On September 28 edition of The Ingraham Angle, frequent Fox News guest and climate contrarian Michael Shellenberger and host Laura Ingraham told viewers that their personal experiences with extreme weather were untrustworthy and invalid. Ingraham implied that concerns about climate change only exist because people “feel that the ocean is warmer … but a feeling is not fact.” Shellenberger falsely claimed that hurricanes are “not intensifying right now, so any perception that hurricanes are more intense is just a perception fed by that relentless alarmist media.” Guest Mollie Hemmingway, editor-in-chief of The Federalist, later claimed that “the left” is pushing a “conspiracy theory” that “man-made climate change is the cause of hurricanes. … There’s just no evidence for this theory that people keep holding.” Hemmingway said this despite the fact that no one is claiming that climate change is the primary cause of hurricanes, rather it is one factor making them more dangerous.

Video file

Video CitationFrom the September 28, 2022, edition of Fox News' The Ingraham Angle

Hemmingway and Shellenberger also latched onto the idea that hurricane frequency is apparently the only metric that should concern the public, glossing over the very real dangers of threats like higher rainfall rates, which is the main factor that drives deaths and damage during a hurricane. They were fixated on the number of hurricanes that have occurred over different periods of time, using various irrelevant data points to unsuccessfully support their climate denial. They also downplayed damage caused by storms by saying that nowadays more people live in the areas most affected by hurricanes. Shellenberger first said that damage caused by hurricanes “has not increased at all” but then claimed that the increase in damage is due to the fact that “there’s more wealth in harm’s way,” going on to claim that the extreme weather events of the last several decades represent “an incredible success story for America,” because, in his telling, they could have been worse.

Before Ian made landfall, Sean Hannity hosted his favorite climate denier Joe Bastardi to emphasize that hurricane frequency in Florida has not increased. On September 28, Hannity said that the media should not discuss climate change because “this is hurricane season and during hurricane season, you usually have hurricanes like we did a hundred years ago.” Fox News contributor Lara Trump insisted that the Democrats' “marketing arm, the mainstream media” is “now trying to claim that one of the quietest hurricane seasons in 30 years is somehow due to climate change.” Finally, former governor of Arkansas Mike Huckabee, who was a guest on the show, said that people should reject the established science of climate change and instead of “worshipping that which is created rather than the creator … get back to the simple things of science and real faith and trust in God.”

The public is beginning to increasingly understand the dangers of climate change and the need for actions that not only reduce climate-causing emissions, but make our communities less vulnerable to the climate impacts that are already happening. But as the public and more media outlets are starting to connect extreme weather to the need for climate action, Fox News coverage seeks to break those links.

THE LATEST...

Fox News host: “Americans are going to have to start strapping up and exercising their Second Amendment rights”

09/30/22 5:30 PM EDT

Climate denial abounds on Fox as Hurricane Ian devastates Florida

09/30/22 2:52 PM EDT

Pagination

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IN THIS ARTICLE

Climate deniers

Climate denial and near climate silence has marred national TV news coverage of Hurricane Ian

09/30/22 1:48 PM EDT

Right-wing media manufacture outrage over CNN host Don Lemon discussing relationship between climate change and strengthened hurricanes

09/29/22 1:53 PM EDT

As Hurricane Ian hits Florida, Fox News undermines climate change

09/27/22 11:15 PM EDT

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guess she got the memo:

LAURA INGRAHAM (HOST): The entire ESG scheme is a complete fraud and the result will be the destruction of our energy independence, radical changes they're planning to our food supply and the creation of what ultimately will be something akin to a racial and ethnic caste system. The free enterprise system, that made us the most powerful nation on Earth, was based on objective merit and a strong work ethic. Well this helps smash all of that.

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mma 9 22

Then-President Donald Trump ordered Alex Azar, then his health and human services secretary, to immediately approve the anti-malarial drug hydroxychloroquine as a coronavirus treatment because Fox News host Laura Ingraham had said it was effective, according to a new book.

Trump, an avid Fox viewer who regularly turned the network’s programming into White House policy, became transfixed by the drug after his trusted Fox hosts started talking it up in mid-March of 2020, as the novel coronavirus swept across the country. If hydroxychloroquine had worked as the COVID-19 miracle cure Fox claimed, it would have allowed Americans to swiftly return to normal life without fear of becoming seriously ill from the virus. Unfortunately, hydroxychloroquine is not an effective coronavirus treatment, according to numerous studies as well as U.S. and international health agencies.

Peter Baker and Susan Glasser shed new light on the role Fox played in convincing Trump that hydroxychloroquine would be a COVID-19 “game changer” in their new book, The Divider: Trump in the White House, 2017-2021.

They chronicle a phone call between Trump and Azar that took place on March 18, 2020, two days after Ingraham had praised the hydroxychloroquine’s potential during an interview with the Long Island lawyer Gregory Rigano, who championed the drug.

“Laura says hydroxychloroquine works. It’s perfectly safe, so just approve it,” they write that Trump told Azar during the phone call.

When Azar protested, the then-president told him, “Laura takes it. It’s safe,” Baker and Glasser report.

“I want it approved today. That’s an order,” he ultimately demanded, according to the book.

After Trump publicly touted hydroxychloroquine at a press briefing the day after his call with Azar, the Fox-Trump feedback loop went into full swing: Fox ran hundreds of segments talking up the drug’s benefits; Trump tweeted praise of the drug in response to the coverage and successfully pressured health officials to issue guidance supporting the use of the drug as a coronavirus treatment; and Ingraham visited the White House with two members of her “medicine cabinet” to meet with Trump and FDA Commissioner Stephen Hahn and push for additional support for the treatment.

The federal government ultimately amassed a stockpile of 66 million doses of a drug that is not effective in treating COVID-19 because Fox hosts told Trump that it worked and he believed them. Meanwhile, the network moved on to peddling ivermectin, another drug studies show is ineffective in treating COVID-19, while slandering the actually effective COVID-19 vaccines. The results for Fox’s viewers have been devastating.

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mma 9 22

While children’s hospitals were facing a deluge of violent threats in August from an online campaign of intimidation and misinformation fueled by anti-LGBTQ trolls, Fox News repeatedly provided a platform for the individuals responsible for the harassment to amplify their attacks. Over the course of two weeks, Fox News — the most-watched cable network in the country — spent more time and ran more segments targeting three different children’s hospitals over false claims about gender-affirming care than CNN or MSNBC combined spent discussing the attacks.

Led by conservative social media figures including Chaya Raichik and Matt Walsh, an online campaign began by targeting Boston Children’s Hospital and Children’s National Hospital in Washington, D.C., with false claims that they were providing hysterectomies for trans youth. The unsubstantiated claims were debunked by independent fact-checking websites and refuted by the hospitals, which did not stop right-wing media figures from taking up the attacks to malign all gender-affirming care for trans youth as “mutilation.”

In reality, these hospitals do not provide genital surgery to trans youth. Rather, they follow the standards of care established by national medical organizations, offering medically necessary care that is supported by every major medical organization in America.

Fox News amplified the architects of the harassment campaign that resulted in threats of violence against at least three different children’s hospitals

Amid the influx of threats against children’s hospitals, Fox News adopted the attacks as part of its ongoing effort to demonize trans health care for political points and at the expense of trans children.

Between August 18, when the network’s first segment attacking Boston Children’s Hospital aired, and August 31, when Fox aired its most recent segment, attacking Chicago’s Lurie Children’s Hospital, the network aired 7 segments and spent more than 20 minutes vilifying the hospitals. Notably, three of the Fox prime-time shows featuring the attacks are in the top 10 most-watched cable news programs in the country — Tucker Carlson Tonight, The Ingraham Angle, and Jesse Watters Primetime.

And while other Fox News prime-time shows similarly repeated anti-trans attacks on the children’s hospitals, Tucker Carlson’s program has been the most responsible for amplifying the misinformation campaign and the figures behind it.

On August 18, the day after Vice News reported that far-right extremists were threatening to execute doctors at Boston Children’s Hospital over lies told about their gender-affirming care program, Carlson invited Chris Elston onto his show. Elston, a Canadian anti-trans extremist whose tweet kicked off the attacks on Boston Children’s Hospital, erroneously claimed gender-affirming care was “the biggest child abuse scandal in modern medicine history,” while Carlson called the care “sexual mutilation of children."

[vid]

a week later, Fox News ran 5 segments attacking D.C.’s Children’s National Hospital after it was targeted with a similar smear campaign prompted by Raichik, whose Twitter account “Libs of TikTok” has been instrumental in fueling Fox News’ anti-LGBTQ messaging. After the hospital reported its staff had received threats of violence, Carlson invited Raichik onto the August 30 edition of his show.

During the segment, Carlson falsely claimed Children’s National Hospital was “castrating young people, minors for no legitimate purpose whatsoever” and asserted that Raichik was “committing actual journalism."

[vid]

the night Carlson’s interview with Raichik aired, Boston Children’s Hospital was targeted with a bomb threat.

The next night, propagandist Chris Rufo earned a spot on Carlson’s show after falsely claiming that Lurie Children’s Hospital was promoting “‘trans-friendly’ sex toys for children” based on a resource document provided exclusively to teachers.

Carlson opened the segment by saying, “Most people trust children's hospitals implicitly. They just didn't know the details — but thanks to the internet, we now do.” He went on to claim that “some of these hospitals are performing horrifying experiments on children,” including “things you think would be crimes but that apparently aren't and that are going on in children's hospitals in the United States." [vid]

fox News’ attacks on children’s hospitals have outpaced mainstream cable network’s coverage of the threats

Coverage of the targeted harassment and threats against multiple major children’s hospitals from CNN and MSNBC lagged behind Fox News’ attacks against the same facilities. Not only did Fox spend more time (over 20 minutes) attacking and spreading misinformation on children’s hospitals over gender-affirming care than the other two networks spent covering the attacks (less than 19 minutes), but no show on either mainstream network has aired more than one segment on the attacks. Meanwhile, Tucker Carlson Tonight alone has aired 3 segments attacking the hospitals. In fact, Carlson’s show spent more time (just under 12 minutes) attacking children’s hospitals than CNN spent discussing the attacks across all programming (just over 5 minutes). MSNBC spent just over 13 minutes discussing the story.

While Carlson repeatedly hosted guests pushing anti-trans misinformation against gender-affirming care, only one show segment on either CNN or MSNBC interviewed a medical professional. The August 18 edition of MSNBC’s The 11th Hour With Stephanie Ruhle spoke with a doctor about the struggle of providing essential health care for trans youth while facing a barrage of threats.

Methodology

...

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women for thomas --> IWF (funded by old white MEN]

...The IWF’s Elizabeth Larson, in the organization’s Women’s Quarterly magazine, called sexual harassment an issue drummed up by “a growing number of women, many spurred on by Anita Hill’s example … [who] find it more profitable to litigate than to work.” After the 1994 passage of the Violence Against Women Act—spearheaded by then-Sen. Joe Biden in what was widely seen as atonement for his mishandling of the Thomas hearings—the IWF argued that the legislation should be repealed or receive zero funding; IWF spokeswoman (and ’90s right-wing It Girl) Laura Ingraham referred to VAWA as feminist “pork” with a “tear-jerker” title. The group also took on affirmative action, headlining a Women’s Quarterly article on the topic “That’s No White Male, That’s My Husband”—a phrase that revealed a lot about IWF constituents’ racial identities and loyalties. (“You can’t have white guys saying you don’t need affirmative action,” Ledeen told the Washington Post when asked why the anti-feminist IWF had organized as women in the first place.)....

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mma 7 22

When the House select committee investigating the January 6 insurrection subpoenaed Pat Cipollone, Donald Trump’s White House counsel, in late June, Fox News host Laura Ingraham scoffed. In trying to force the testimony of her “close friend,” Ingraham told her viewers, the “desperate” committee was attempting a “Hail Mary” that would ultimately produce nothing of interest.

It didn’t turn out that way. The committee produced clips from Cipollone’s eight-hour deposition during Tuesday’s meeting in which he described an Oval Office meeting where Trump contemplated a plan to have the Defense Department seize voting machines to substantiate his false claims that the 2020 presidential election had been stolen from him — revelations that one Fox legal commentator described as “breathtaking” and “very disturbing.”

But responding on her show that night, Ingraham mentioned Cipollone only to quip about a committee member mispronouncing his name. The Fox host presented the hearing as a “snoozefest” during which “we learned … basically nothing substantial that we didn't know 18 months ago.” She offered a series of snide comments about the committee’s members and witnesses while carefully hiding any of the hearing’s insights from her viewers

[jan 6 snooze fest vid]

ingraham’s yawning rebuttal is in line with her right-wing network’s broader handling of Tuesday’s hearing. Fox hosts have previously tried to counterprogram the committee’s doings, poke holes in its witnesses, defend its targets, and complain about its processes. On Tuesday night, the network largely responded with silence — Jesse Watters Primetime, Tucker Carlson Tonight, and Hannity all completely ignored the hearing. On Wednesday morning, Fox & Friends’ coverage was limited to a single news brief.

Fox, by shielding its viewers from the information the committee details, is continuing its complicity in Trump’s effort to subvert the election and the resulting mob attack on the U.S. Capitol.

The December 18, 2020, White House meeting discussed during Tuesday’s hearing appears to be a key pivot point for Trump that opened the door for the violence of January 6. During the meeting — held four days after the Electoral College voted to officially make Joe Biden the president-elect — Trump contemplated having the Defense Department seize voting machines and examine them for evidence of fraud and appointing the pro-Trump conspiracy theorist Sidney Powell as a special counsel to investigate purported election crimes.

Over six hours of debate before the president, marked by screaming and participants nearly coming to blows, Trump outside advisers Powell, Michael Flynn, and Patrick Byrne faced off with Cipollone and two other White House aides.

Cipollone, in clips from his testimony the committee played on Tuesday, said he was alarmed that Powell and her allies kept saying that there was evidence of widespread voter fraud that they would not produce, and described the Defense Department plan as “a terrible idea for the country” for which Trump lacked legal authority.

Trump ultimately decided against going forward with the plan. But shortly after the meeting concluded, he sent a tweet summoning his supporters to Washington, D.C. for a protest on January 6, when Congress would convene at the U.S. Capitol to approve the Electoral College vote.

While news outlets had previously reported on the meeting, the hearing provided new details produced by witnesses who served in Trump’s own White House who were testifying under oath.

The hearing provided a plethora of other revelations as well, including:

Key pro-Trump influencers and extremist elements recognized Trump’s tweet as a call to action and began planning for January 6 protests.

Two days after Trump sent the tweet, 10 Republican members of Congress met with Trump to discuss Trump lawyer John Eastman’s plot to have Vice President Mike Pence overturn the election results during the January 6 joint session of Congress.

Documents produced by the committee show Trump had planned to encourage supporters rallying on January 6 to march on the U.S. Capitol, and that insurrectionist leaders were aware of that plan beforehand.

Trump spoke to his former White House adviser Steve Bannon twice on January 5. Minutes after the first call, Bannon told his podcast listeners, “All hell is going to break loose tomorrow,” adding: “It’s all converging. And now we’re on, as they say, the point of attack. Right. The point of attack tomorrow.”

After Trump spoke with Pence on January 6 and Pence told him he would not aid the plot to overturn the election, Trump ordered his speechwriters to reinsert lines attacking his own vice president in the speech he planned to give to protestors later that day.

Maybe Ingraham, as a close friend of Cipollone and the person who reportedly introduced him to Trump in the first place, actually has known all of this for 18 months. But it’s certainly not information Fox regularly provides to its viewers. And that’s par for the course for Ingraham and her colleagues.

While Cipollone says he was confronting Trump’s conspiracy theorists about their lack of evidence of widespread voter fraud, Ingraham and her fellow Fox hosts were promoting Trump’s stolen election lies. When rioters stormed the U.S. Capitol on January 6, Ingraham texted White House chief of staff Mark Meadows and urged him to get Trump to make them stop — but on her Fox show, she suggested antifa was behind the violence. And now she and her fellow Fox hosts are alternately ignoring and attacking the committee’s findings.

It’s difficult to escape the conclusion that Fox is covering up revelations of Trump’s coup attempt because they regret that it failed and want to ensure future such efforts succeed.

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an 8 22

Fox News host Laura Ingraham, a substantial supporter of former President Donald Trump, recently suggested that Americans might be prepared to move on as she argued a fresh Republican presidential candidate may fair better in 2024.

The television anchor made her remarks during a recent discussion with podcaster Lisa Boothe. When she appeared on Boothe's show, she admitted that she believes it may be time “to turn the page.”

“People conflate Trump with people’s overall sense of happiness in the country. Donald Trump’s been a friend of mine for 25 years, and I’m always very open about this on my show. But, you know we’ll see whether that’s what the country wants,” Ingraham said during an appearance on Boothe’s podcast.

READ MORE: 'Monster' Laura Ingraham peddles bigoted LGBTQ 'grooming' lie

“The country I think is so exhausted," she added. "They’re exhausted by the battle, the constant battle, that they may believe that, well, maybe it’s time to turn the page if we can get someone who has all Trump’s policies, who’s not Trump.”

According to Ingraham, Trump's play on populism in previous years may not be as appealing among voters in 2024. “The other problem is that it’s really not about Trump, right, this is about the views that Trump now brought to the floor for the Republican Party,” Ingraham said.

“They don’t like his views, they don’t like the fact that he called out the military for their failures, that he wanted us to pull out of Iraq and Afghanistan," she added. "That he wanted to treat China and our trade relationship with China in a much — it was smarter, but much different way than the globalists preferred. And they certainly didn’t like the fact that he sent all those illegal immigrants back to Mexico with that Remain in Mexico.”

Ingraham's remarks come soon after Trump's Mar-a-Lago property was searched by the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI).

READ MORE: Laura Ingraham attacks the ‘madness’ of public schools in call to ‘defund government education’

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8 22 gone for a yr?

https://www.mediamatters.org/fox-news/after-temporary-banishment-rep-matt-gaetz-once-again-fox-news-star-despite-his-situation

within the first three months of 2021, according to Media Matters’ internal database, Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-FL) made 37 weekday appearances on Fox News daytime and prime-time programming. At the time, Gaetz and Fox News enjoyed a symbiotic relationship: Gaetz would appear weekly to biweekly to lend his firebrand personality and shameless distortion of the truth to whatever culture or message war the network was pushing, and in turn, the network elevated his stardom and status as one of former President Donald Trump’s top henchmen.

On March 30, 2021, the relationship between the Trump loyalist and the network dramatically shifted when The New York Times reported that Gaetz was facing a Justice Department inquiry over allegedly engaging in a sexual relationship with an underage girl. Fox’s leading face, Tucker Carlson, responded to the bombshell report by hosting Gaetz for a softball interview in which the congressman professed his innocence and claimed the Times was “smearing” him based on a financial extortion plot against Gaetz and his family. (While a Florida businessman eventually pleaded guilty to wire fraud against the Gaetz family, the investigation into Gaetz’ relationship with underage women was separate, and The Daily Beast outlined the numerous falsehoods Gaetz made in the interview.)

Gaetz also attempted to implicate Carlson by comparing his situation to false allegations against Carlson and suggesting Carlson had met a “friend” involved in the plot, leading the host to call it “one of the weirdest” interviews he’s ever done. This exchange landed Gaetz an informal excommunication from the network, forcing him off Fox airwaves until Carlson hosted him again, an exact year later, on March 30, 2022, to plead his innocence. Within the two last months, Carlson’s other prime-time colleagues Jesse Watters, Sean Hannity, and Laura Ingraham have all followed suit, hosting Gaetz with no mention of the scandal.

The Justice Department investigation is still ongoing, yet Fox has welcomed its former star back with open arms. As Gaetz’s scandals have deepened, it’s unclear what changed in the network’s calculation of the lawmaker’s suitability for its airwaves. At best, Gaetz’s increased appearances on Fox are another tool to fuel bad-faith Republican arguments, especially amid their desperate attempts to distract from the January 6 hearings. At worst, the network’s embrace of Gaetz represents a callous disregard for serious allegations, made particularly ironic given Fox’s recent homophobic campaign against the LGBTQ+ community under the pretense of protecting children from supposed groomers.

---

https://www.mediamatters.org/fox-news/laura-ingraham-says-her-fox-show-will-target-any-republican-who-supports-vaccines-mandates

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new fox target?

Ingraham hosted Terry Stoops of the right-wing think tank The John Locke Foundation, which Accountable.US has said “repeatedly alleged Democrats conspired to allow widespread voter fraud.”

READ MORE: 'They're projecting': Fox News sparks outrage after calling teachers union the 'KKK with summers off'

Reading some of the proposed items, Ingraham mocked them, saying, “Reading, writing, and abortion.”

Ingraham jumped in, calling for an end to public schools, and saying taxpayer funds should be diverted to private education.

As Media Matters reports, Ingraham said the NEA’s annual meeting “is more like a political rally for the far left.”

READ MORE: How can community schools rescue a ‘troubled’ district?

“But what it’s not about is education and this is why I think, Terry, a lot of people are saying it’s time to defund government education or at least defund it by giving vouchers to parents so they can say, ‘No, we’re not doing this anymore.’ And I think that just has to happen. We have to stop funding this madness.”

Watch below or at this link:

---

ingram also pot --> psychosis?

strict fr vs

https://www.alternet.org/2022/07/watch-tucker-carlson-finds-a-way-to-blamewomen-and-marijuana-for-the-most-recent-mass-shooting/

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5 22 ideol vs provocateur?

https://www.mediamatters.org/fox-news/foxs-laura-ingraham-calls-aid-ukraine-complete-outrage

https://www.mediamatters.org/steve-bannon/steve-bannon-claims-ukrainian-border-ill-defined

---

anne applebaum

https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2020/07/laura-ingrahams-descent-into-despair/614245/

no lnx

it was cocktail hour on the opening day of the new, Republican-dominated Congress, and the long, chandelier-lighted parlor of David Brock’s town house in Georgetown was filling up with exuberant young conservatives fresh from events on the Hill.”

That was the opening sentence, in 1995, of a New York Times Magazine cover story called “The Counter Counterculture.” The author was the late James Atlas, and one by one, he introduced a series of characters. There was young David Brooks, then of The Wall Street Journal’s editorial page. There was Brock himself, best known at the time for his vicious investigations into the personal affairs of President Bill Clinton. There was David Frum—now a writer for The Atlantic—and his wife, Danielle Crittenden, with whom, years later, I co-wrote a Polish cookbook.

There are amusing details—expensive Georgetown restaurants where educated conservative elites pour scorn upon educated liberal elites—but the tone of the article was not negative. It included a parade of other names and short profiles: Bill Kristol, John Podhoretz, Roger Kimball, Dinesh D’Souza. I knew most of them at the time the article appeared. I was then working in London for The Spectator, a conservative political magazine, and my relationship to this group was that of a foreign cousin who visited from time to time and inspired mild interest, but never quite made it to the inner circle. I wrote occasionally for The Weekly Standard, edited by Kristol; for The New Criterion, edited by Kimball; and once for the Independent Women’s Quarterly, then edited by, among others, Crittenden.

I also knew, slightly, a woman whose appearance, in a leopard-skin miniskirt, was the most notable thing about the magazine’s cover photograph: Laura Ingraham, who had been a clerk to Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas and was then an attorney at a tony law firm. In the penultimate paragraph Atlas finds himself, near midnight, “careering through the streets of downtown Washington with Brock in Ingraham’s military-green Land Rover at 60 miles an hour looking for an open bar while the music of Buckwheat Zydeco blasted over the stereo.”

As the Fox News presenter whose career is most closely tied to President Donald Trump, Ingraham is now far more famous than she was back then. She spoke for Trump at the Republican convention, in 2016; during the coronavirus pandemic, she has risen to prominence once again, not just supporting him but pushing him to “reopen” the country with maniacal fervor, accusing those who urge caution of having a political bias.

[Read: Trump’s favorite TV network is post-parody

Nevertheless, she still occasionally reconfirms, on her television programs or in public speeches, the main thing I associated her with in the 1990s: a devotion to Ronald Reagan and Reaganism, the same devotion that would have been shared, back then, by all of those people at Brock’s cocktail party. Or perhaps devotion to Reagan is a bit too specific. What really held that group together—and what drew me to it as well—was a kind of post–Cold War optimism, a belief that “we had won,” that the democratic revolution would now continue, that more good things would follow the collapse of the Soviet Union. This wasn’t the nostalgic conservatism of the English, or the hard-right nationalism found elsewhere in Europe; this was something more buoyant, more American—an optimistic conservatism that wasn’t backward-looking at all. Although there were darker versions, at its best it was energetic, reformist, and generous, predicated on faith in the United States, a belief in the greatness of American democracy, and an ambition to share that democracy with the rest of the world.

[This post is adapted from Applebaum’s recent book.]

But that moment turned out to be very brief; as soon as it started, it was almost over. For instead of harmony among American conservatives, the end of the Cold War produced deep divisions and unresolvable quarrels.

And no wonder: Before 1989, American anti-Communists—ranging from centrist Democrats all the way to the outer edges of the Republican Party—had been tied together by their determination to oppose the Soviet Union. But the group was not monolithic. Some were Cold Warriors because, as realpolitik diplomats or thinkers, they feared the traditional Russian aggression lurking beneath Soviet propaganda, they worried about nuclear war, and they cared about American influence around the world. Others—and I include myself in this category—thought that we were fighting against totalitarianism and dictatorship, and for political freedom and human rights. Still others, it turns out, fought the Soviet Union because Soviet ideology was explicitly atheist and because they believed that America stood on the side of God. When the Soviet Union fell apart, the links that had held these different anti-Communists together broke as well.

This tectonic shift took time. Its scope and scale were not immediately obvious. The events of 9/11 probably held the group together for far longer than would have otherwise been the case. Nevertheless, the cracks were already visible even as long ago as the Clinton administration. Only two years after the 1995 party, Brock himself, in an article entitled “Confessions of a Right-Wing Hit Man,” recanted, accusing the right of “intellectual intolerance and smug groupthink.” Brooks slowly drifted to the center and became a New York Times columnist and Atlantic contributor who writes books about how to live a meaningful life. Frum became a speechwriter for George W. Bush, then became disillusioned with the party’s xenophobic and conspiratorial fringe, then broke away completely after the election of Donald Trump. Kristol followed the same trajectory, a little bit later. Others—D’Souza, Kimball—went in precisely the opposite direction.

[Peter Beinart: In right-wing media, the pivot didn’t happen

My own break came in 2008, thanks to the ascent of Sarah Palin, a proto-Trump politician, and the Bush administration’s use of torture in Iraq. I even wrote an article, “Why I Can’t Vote for John McCain,” explaining how I thought the party had changed. (On rereading, I find this article mostly dedicated to praising McCain. Still, McCain, who had made a wonderful speech at the Washington launch of my book Gulag: A History, never spoke to me again.) But it was not until Donald Trump became the party’s candidate that I learned how different my understanding of the world had become from that of some of my former acquaintances, and none more so than Laura Ingraham.

[Ingraham addresses the Republican National Convention in 2016. (Michael Robinson-Chavez / The Washington Post / Getty)]

Not that we had much in common by 2016: Since the 1990s, we had gone in radically different directions. She had left the law, drifted into the world of conservative media, and tried for a long time to get her own television show. Though these early attempts all failed, she eventually had a popular talk-radio program. I was a guest on the program a couple of times, once after the Russian invasion of the nation of Georgia, in 2008. Listening again to the conversation—the magic of the internet ensures that no sound bite is ever lost—I was struck by how consistent it was with the optimistic conservatism of the ’90s. Ingraham was still talking about America’s power to do good, America’s ability to push back against the Russian threat. But she was already groping for something else. During our conversation, she quoted from an article by Pat Buchanan, one of her mentors, who had repeatedly railed against the pointlessness of any American relationship with Georgia, an aspiring democracy, and lauded Russia, a country he imagined to be more “Christian” than his own.

The reference was a hint at other changes. At some point in the intervening years, her Reaganite optimism slowly hardened into something better described as a form of apocalyptic pessimism. This can be found in much of what she says and writes nowadays: America is doomed, Europe is doomed, Western civilization is doomed—and immigration, political correctness, transgenderism, the culture, the establishment, the left, and the “Dems” are responsible. Some of what she sees is real. The so-called cancel culture on the internet, the extremism that sometimes flares up on university campuses and newsrooms, and the exaggerated claims of those who practice identity politics are a political and cultural problem that will require real bravery to fight. But it is no longer clear that she thinks these forms of left-wing extremism can be fought using normal democratic politics. In 2019, she had Buchanan himself on her show and put the point to him directly: “Is Western civilization, as we understood it, actually hanging in the balance? I think you could actually make a very strong argument that it is tipping over the cliff.” Like Buchanan, she has also become doubtful about whether America could or should play any role in the world. And no wonder: If America is not exceptional but degenerate, why would you expect it to achieve anything outside its borders?

[Anne Applebaum: History will judge the complicit

The same sense of doom colors her views of immigration. For many years now, Ingraham has, like so many others in the Fox universe, depicted undocumented immigrants as thieves and murderers, despite overwhelming evidence that immigrants commit fewer crimes overall than native-born Americans. Nor is hers a familiar, reasonable call for more restrictions at the border. She has also urged President Trump to end not just illegal immigration but also legal immigration, referring more than once to the “massive demographic changes” in America, “changes that none of us ever voted for, and most of us don’t like.” In some parts of the country, she said, “it does seem like the America that we know and love doesn’t exist anymore.” She finished by addressing what Trump must do:

This is a national emergency, and he must demand that Congress act now. There is something slipping away in this country, and it’s not about race or ethnicity. It’s what was once a common understanding by both parties that American citizenship is a privilege, and one that at a minimum requires respect for the rule of law and loyalty to our Constitution.

And if the real America, the true America, is disappearing, then extreme measures might be required to save it. In 2019, Ingraham nodded along on her Fox News show when one of her guests, the conservative lawyer Joseph diGenova, began to speak of the coming cultural conflict in America: “The suggestion that there’s ever going to be civil discourse in this country for the foreseeable future is over . . . it’s going to be total war,” he said. “I do two things; I vote and I buy guns.”

That dark pessimism, with its echoes of the most alarmist, the most radical left- and right-wing movements in American political history, helps explain how Ingraham became, long before many others, a convinced supporter of Donald Trump. She has known Trump since the ’90s; they once went on a date, though apparently that didn’t go well—she found him pompous. (“He needs two separate cars, one for himself and one for his hair,” she told some mutual friends.) Nevertheless, she was an early supporter of his involvement in politics, even allowing him to rant about birtherism on her show. She has had special access to him throughout his presidency and is one of several people at Fox who speak with him regularly.

[Adam Serwer: Birtherism of a nation

Her belief in him profoundly shaped Ingraham’s coverage of the coronavirus pandemic in the spring of 2020. Like her fellow Fox News broadcasters, she at first downplayed the story, blaming Democrats for hyping the virus, calling it “a new pathway for hitting President Trump.” Later, she engaged in active disinformation, ignoring medical experts and heavily promoting the drug hydroxychloroquine before it had been tested; she mentioned it three days before Trump began to promote it himself. In April, she joined the president’s strange campaign against his administration’s own lockdown policies, encouraging “rebels” to rise up against the quarantine. One of her tweets gave away some of her deeper views: “How many of those who urged our govt to help liberate the Iraqis, Syrians, Kurds, Afghanis, etc., are as committed now to liberating Virginia, Minnesota, California, etc?” Her use of the word liberation, the direct equivalence drawn between Saddam Hussein, a man who carried out mass murders, and democratically elected American governors who were trying to keep their citizens safe from an epidemic—these were not the thoughts of someone who has faith in American democracy.

[Trump gives Ingraham a kiss after inviting her on stage during the Turning Point USA Student Action Summit in 2019 (Luis M. Alvarez / AP)]

A few elements of ingraham’s trajectory remain mysterious. One is her frequent invocation of moral values, Christian values, personal values. During a 2007 speech, she told a group in Dallas that “without virtue there is no America. Without virtue we will be ruled by tyrants.” She then listed those virtues: “honor, courage, selflessness, sacrifice, hard work, personal responsibility, respect for elders, respect for the vulnerable.” None of these virtues can be ascribed to Donald Trump. More complicated is her participation in the opprobrium that the president heaps on all immigrants, and her own fears that legal immigration has undermined “the America we know and love.” Ingraham herself has three adopted children—all immigrants.

[Conor Friedersdorf: Laura Ingraham doesn’t love her country anymore

I don’t know how she explains these contradictions to herself, because Ingraham wouldn’t speak with me when I tried to ask. She answered one email and then went silent. But there are clues. Some mutual friends point out that she is a convert to Catholicism, and a breast-cancer survivor who is deeply religious: She told one of them that “the only man who never disappointed me was Jesus.” The willpower required to survive in the cutthroat world of right-wing media—especially at Fox News, where female stars were often pressured to sleep with their bosses—should not be underestimated. This combination of personal experiences gives a messianic edge to some of her public remarks. In that same 2007 speech, she spoke about her religious conversion. If it weren’t for her faith, she said, “I wouldn’t be here . . . I probably wouldn’t be alive.” That was why, she said, she fought to save America from the godless: “If we lose faith in God, as a country—we lose our country.”

Professional ambition, the oldest excuse in the world, is part of the story too. Partly thanks to Trump, and her connection to Trump, Ingraham finally got her own prime-time Fox television show, with a salary to match. She has secured interviews with him at key moments, during which she poses only flattering questions. (“By the way, congratulations on your polling numbers,” she told him while interviewing him on the anniversary of D-Day.) But I don’t think, for someone as intelligent as Ingraham, that this is the full explanation. She ran a radio show throughout the many years in which Fox didn’t give her a television program, and I believe she will go back to running a radio show if it ever cancels her program. As in the case of so many biographies, picking apart the personal and the political is a fool’s game.

There are some clues to her thinking from other times and other places. The Polish writer Jacek Trznadel has described what it felt like, in Stalinist Poland, to be a loud advocate for the regime and to doubt it at the same time. “I was shouting from a tribune at some university meeting in Wrocław, and simultaneously felt panicked at the thought of myself shouting . . . I told myself I was trying to convince [the crowd] by shouting, but in reality I was trying to convince myself.” For some people, loud advocacy of Trump helps to cover up the deep doubt and even shame they feel about their support for Trump. It’s not enough to express tepid approval of a president who is corrupting the White House and destroying America’s alliances and inflicting economic catastrophe on the country: You have to shout if you want to convince yourself as well as others. You have to exaggerate your feelings if you are to make them believable.

[Anne Applebaum: The rest of the world is laughing at Trump

But the answer may also lie, simply, in the depth of Ingraham’s despair. The America of the present, as she sees it, is a dark, nightmarish place where God speaks to only a tiny number of people; where idealism is dead; where civil war and violence are approaching; where democratically elected politicians are no better than foreign dictators and mass murderers; where the “elite” is wallowing in decadence, disarray, death. The America of the present, as she sees it, and as so many others see it, is a place where universities teach people to hate their country, where victims are more celebrated than heroes, where old values have been discarded.

Any price should be paid, any crime should be forgiven, any outrage should be ignored if that’s what it takes to get the real America, the old America, back.

This post is adapted from Applebaum’s recent book, Twilight of Democracy: The Seductive Lure of Authoritarianism.

---

Though they deplored Babbitt's death shortly after the event, few among Republican Members of Congress and conservative media initially claimed any wrongdoing from law enforcement, or suggested that it warranted a backlash.

Gradually, though, efforts were made to suggest that Babbitt was a martyr, or at least a patriot who was unjustly killed.[72] Fox News hosts Tucker Carlson, Laura Ingraham and Mark Levin were sympathetic to Babbitt, with Levin understating Babbitt's actions and claiming that she had been just "walking around with the rest". Republican representative Paul Gosar claimed that she had been "executed", later doubling down on that comment and adding that the police officer had been "lying in wait" and demanding to know his name. This drew a rebuke from representative Liz Cheney, who accused Gosar of "[smearing] the men and women who defended us". Fringe conservative figures[72] and far-right extremists[73] have also cast Babbitt as a martyr or a "freedom fighter".[73] Democratic strategist Mark Burns said that this was a "dangerous development for a Republican Party with members [27] increasingly comfortable pressing for and defending political violence".[74] Both he and David Frum in The Atlantic compared these efforts to the Nazi glorification of Horst Wessel.[75]

Some QAnon supporters, including Lin Wood, have claimed instead that Babbitt is still alive and that her apparent death was a "false flag" operation.[27][76]

In October 2021, Trump recorded a video message arguing that "There was no reason Ashli should've lost her life that day. We must all demand justice for Ashli and her family".[77][78][79] Russian President Vladimir Putin condemned the shooting of Babbitt, describing it as an "assassination".[80]

---

pink pill hype fear conspiracy qanon

https://www.mediamatters.org/laura-ingraham/fox-news-chyron-liberals-are-sexually-grooming-elementary-students

3 22

fox News propagandist Laura Ingraham has been called a “monster” by her own brother, who is gay.

“Our father was a Nazi sympathizer, racist, anti-Semite and homophobe,” Curtis Ingraham wrote, as NBC News reported in 2018. “Like father like daughter?”

Last year the highest-ranking Republican elected official in North Carolina came under fire for declaring LGBTQ people are “filth.” Not only was it vile and anti-American, but it was also done by dredging up an old trope, a disgusting lie, suggesting that gay people are pedophiles.

Lt. Governor Mark Robinson, a Christian nationalist, said: “there’s no reason anybody anywhere in America should be telling any child about transgenderism, homosexuality, any of that filth.”

Last week the taxpayer-paid press secretary to Florida Republican Governor Ron DeSantis went all-in on the pedophilia lie, defending the anti-LGBTQ legislation her boss is expected to soon sign.

“The bill that liberals inaccurately call ‘Don’t Say Gay’ would be more accurately described as an Anti-Grooming Bill,” Christina Pushaw announced. “If you’re against the Anti-Grooming Bill, you are probably a groomer or at least you don’t denounce the grooming of four eight-year-old children. Silence is complicity. This is how it works, Democrats, and I didn’t make the rules.”

The anti-LGBTQ and anti-left lies are back, being promulgated now by some of the most powerful propagandists in the country. Things are getting dangerously worse for LGBTQ people across America.

Freedom for All Americans, a “bipartisan campaign to secure full nondiscrimination protections for LGBTQ people nationwide,” lists dozens of anti-LGBTQ bills currently in state legislatures across the country. Their passage becomes increasingly assured when propagandists like Laura Ingraham promote vile, hateful tropes about LGBTQ people, even when they mask them by extending it to “liberals.”

Wednesday night Ingraham once again proved her brother right.

“LIBERALS ARE SEXUALLY GROOMING ELEMENTARY STUDENTS” read the chyron on an “Ingraham Angle” segment.

Watch:

Ingraham began by airing clips of two people who viewers likely were expected to believe are school teachers, even though they apparently aren’t. One is just someone on a streaming service who never says she’s a teacher. The other says she’s “in pre-school,” so not a public elementary school teacher.

Those facts don’t matter to propagandists, like Ingraham, who ran those clips then immediately says:

“When did our public schools, any schools, become what are essentially grooming centers for gender identity radicals?” Ingraham asks (video below), as Media Matters reports. “As a mom, I think it’s appalling, it’s frightening, it’s disgusting, it’s despicable. Florida just passed a bill to keep this type of sexual brainwashing out of schools. Democrats, though, claim the bill is bigoted, branding it as the ‘Don’t Say Gay Bill.’ Well, nice try. The real controversy, though, isn’t this bill. It’s that schools are peddling gender ideology when our international rankings in math, science, and reading are down across the board.”

As she introduces her guest, the chyron changes to read: “DEMS HAPPY TO RUN ON PRO-GROOMING PLATFORM.”

No facts, nothing to back up those claims, just outrageous, dangerous defamation.

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at some pt i need to do some analysis; is she the worst of bad trinity? tells worse lies 1st/ cling to longer/ ever a retraction/correction? we may have winner on herd immunity/nurse grift conspir

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top 12 climate BS mma for // agenda 21 un control BS fear phobia alarm // covid lockdown

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https://www.mediamatters.org/fox-news/laura-ingraham-defends-russian-oligarchs-asset-seizures

LAURA INGRAHAM (HOST): As you see things quickly spiral in Ukraine, the Biden administration wants you to believe that they are engaged and taking strong actions to pressure Putin by creating a DOJ task force with a really cool name. By the way, it's complete with sophisticated asset tracking and lots of sexy video.

[...]

Now, of course these moves are about as effective as cloth masks on a cross-country flight. Now, we just got finished with COVID response theater. And now they are starting up with Ukraine response theater. Now, these are all choreographed moves to make it appear as though the government is working hard to keep you safe and the people of Ukraine safe but it's all a ruse for masking a hidden agenda [note this does not need to be explained?!].

Now, a few points to keep in mind. First, the freezing of assets is nothing new. The department of justice has always had the power to deny international criminals and fraudsters access to their own wealth, including any ill-begotten gains. When not abused by out-of-control prosecutors, asset forfeiture laws are powerful tools against crime and corruption. But as we side with Ukrainian people against Russia's barbaric, hideous invasion, shouldn't we expect our own government to act under established and fair legal criteria?

---

https://www.alternet.org/2022/03/tucker-carlson-2656827634/

no lnx vid

Tucker Carlson tries to gaslight his way out of having pushed Putin’s anti-Ukraine propaganda for a month

David Neiwert and Daily Kos March 02, 2022

Tucker Carlson is utterly baffled that people would think he is rooting for Vladimir Putin and Russia in its war on Ukraine. “You know, it’s such an awful thing to say,” he said on his Fox News show Monday, after playing a clip of Congressman Eric Swalwell saying he and other Republicans were on Putin’s side. “We hesitated to play that, even—it’s very common, you hear it every day. The question is: Why are they saying that? It doesn’t make any sense.”

Gaslighting, of course, has become Carlson’s specialty. In reality, Carlson spent most of the month prior to the invasion praising Putin and echoing Russian propaganda: running down Ukraine, deriding it as a “State Department client state”—not a democracy, but “a tyranny”—and claiming that Russia just wants to keep its borders secure, everything the fault of Joe Biden. So much so that he became the hero of Russian state television, where his rants were translated and replayed, and he was praised as an astute American.

Now that the horror is hitting home, Carlson suddenly has realized that he backed the wrong horse and is scurrying hard to dig his way out. The first step in that, of course, is gaslighting his audience about what he had been saying just the week before, and blaming the war on Putin now—yet somehow it’s still all Joe Biden’s fault. Those clips have yet to appear on Russian TV.

The major tone shift occurred Friday, a day after the invasion: “It’s a tragedy, because war always is a tragedy, and the closer you get to it, the more horrifying it seems,” he said. He also squarely put the onus on Russia and Putin: “He is to blame for what we’re seeing tonight in Ukraine.”

“Vladimir Putin started this war, so whatever the context of the decision that he made, he did it,” [CYA?] he said. “He fired the first shots.”

It’s a sharp and complete reversal of his previous arguments. On Feb. 17, he spouted Russian propaganda in claiming that Ukraine is not a legitimate nation. He also attacked U.S. officials who provided military aid to Ukraine.

“These people are so ghoulish,” Carlson said. “Of course they’re promoting war, not to maintain the democracy that is Ukraine. Ukraine is not a democracy. It has never been a democracy in its history, and it’s not now. It’s a client state of the Biden administration.”

This narrative became a staple of Carlson’s defense of Russia’s war. On his Feb. 22 show, he again spouted Putin’s propaganda: “The point here is to defend democracy. Not that Ukraine is a democracy. It’s not a democracy. Ukraine’s president has arrested his main political opponent, he has shut down newspapers and television stations that have dared to criticize him. So in American terms, you would call Ukraine a tyranny. But Joe Biden likes Ukraine, so Putin bad, war good.”

The next day, he again dismissed Ukraine as “a State Department client state,” claiming that Democrats wanted Americans to “wholeheartedly support jumping with both feet into a highly complicated conflict in a part of Eastern Europe where we have no national interests.”

The most noteworthy part of that Feb. 22 episode, however, was how Carlson defended Putin against his “haters” by comparing him to American liberals, who he clearly saw as far more nefarious:

It might be worth asking yourself, since it is getting pretty serious, ‘What is this really about? Why do I hate Putin so much? Has Putin ever called me a racist? Has he threatened to get me fired for disagreeing with him? Has he shipped every middle class job in my town to Russia? Did he manufacture a worldwide pandemic that wrecked my business and kept me indoors for two years? Is he teaching my kids to embrace racial discrimination? Is he making fentanyl? Is he trying to snuff out Christianity? Does he eat dogs?’ These are fair questions, and the answer to all of them is no. Vladimir Putin didn’t do any of that. So do why does permanent Washington hate him so much?

The day after the invasion began, on Feb. 24, it was more of the same. The invasion, he claimed, demonstrated that Biden was a foreign-policy failure who had promised he would keep it from happening, making Putin’s war a “humiliating defeat for Joe Biden.”

Russian state media promptly began re-airing Carlson’s rants with translated subtitles, particularly the Putin-didn’t-call-me-a-racist episode. His attacks on Ukraine’s legitimacy also received heavy play. They also replayed Carlson’s Feb. 24 interview with ex-Congresswoman Tulsi Gabbard, who told him: "Sanctions don't work. This is the whole problem with the Biden administration: They are so focused on how do we punish Putin."

The clips became the topic of Russian TV news talk shows, where Carlson was uniformly praised. “Excellent performance,” the editor of a Russian national defense journal commented. “We can only have solidarity with this view.”

Of course, Carlson is hardly alone in spreading pro-Russian propaganda on Fox News. On Feb. 24, just before bombs began falling on Ukraine, host Laura Ingraham interviewed ex-president Donald Trump by phone, who praised Putin—“I do know him very well. We’ve had many, uh, times together. I got along with him fantastically”—and ranted at length that the invasion was Biden’s fault, and the war never would have happened if the election hadn’t been stolen from him.

Near the end of the interview, Ingraham asked Trump about the speech given earlier that day by Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, describing it as “a kind of really pathetic display” and described Ukraine’s United Nations ambassador as “looking like a defeated man.”

And despite the seeming change in tone, Carlson’s “pivot” still found him ardently defending Russian propaganda, and serving as its useful tool. Angry that authorities and platform owners in the U.S., Canada, and in Europe are taking action against the Kremlin-owned American news outlet Russia Today and other agitprop producers like Sputnik—both of whom also heavily replayed his pro-Russia rants—Carlson fumed that it all constituted “moral blackmail,” gaslighting away his previous remarks: “No one in America takes pride at the sight, feels anything but revulsion at the sight, of Russian troops within Ukraine.”

Sure enough, RT promptly retweeted Carlson’s clip: “Tucker Carlson defends media freedom as Senators use their power to shut down free speech on social media—especially so-called ‘Russian propaganda.’”

As Lis Wahl, a former anchor at Russia Today, explained to The Daily Beast, the distinction between a propaganda operation like RT and what’s aired on Fox News has essentially vanished:

While the American voices Russian media uses to influence Western audiences hail from the far-left and the far-right, the poison of disinformation asymmetrically originates on the ideological right. Research has demonstrated that followers of the former president stick to hyper-partisan and conspiracy-laden sources such as Breitbart, Info Wars, and Fox News. During Trump’s election and throughout his presidency, the rightwing ecosystem grew more conspiratorial, extreme, and anti-democratic. It is during this time that Russian media and right-wing media became indistinguishable.

Today, the chief purveyors of pro-Russian disinformation in the U.S. are now on Fox News. I have warned that quite often the pro-Putin claims on Fox and RT essentially mimic each other. But much of the American public, and even many in the mainstream media, fail to realize the extent to which this disinformation has become part of the fabric of the new media landscape, and therefore, American political discourse.

---

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mma 10 21

Joe Biden’s Build Back Better agenda, which is largely represented in the Democrat’s $3.5 trillion reconciliation bill, would materially benefit millions of Americans through unprecedented investments in our social safety net and efforts to combat climate change. Polling suggests that the spending bill is popular among the American people. Expectedly, Fox News has characterized the package as a “socialist wish list” and picked off a litany of minor ticket items to rally outrage and opposition on the right.

Former Trump aide Stephen Miller’s description of the bill on the October 16 edition of the Fox News show Watters’ World is representative of how the network is using its tried-and-true dog whistles to poison and stoke fear about the bill:

STEPHEN MILLER (GUEST): It's basically the Green New Deal, combined with critical race theory, combined with massive amnesty and open borders, combined with the complete destruction of the American economy.

Among the provisions Fox has characterized as the Green New Deal and mocked or grossly misrepresented are: the Civilian Climate Corps; an initiative referred to as Tree Equity; and a program intended to redress historic inequities and environmental injustices associated with zoning decisions and highway placement, which Fox has referred to as fixing “racists roads.”

Fox’s coverage of these programs has not attempted to describe what they entail or what they would accomplish for hundreds of communities. Rather, they have been used as punchlines or set up for cheap shots that reflect Fox’s racist ethos and climate denial — all under the guise of informing Fox’s audience about the policies contained in the reconciliation package.

Fox has grossly misrepresented the Civilian Climate Corps -- “climate cops” is not a thing KOCH FORK 4]

The reconciliation bill includes $8 billion earmarked for the Civilian Climate Corps -- modeled after the depression-era Civilian Conservation Corps -- which would establish a government jobs program that would put Americans to “work conserving our public lands and waters, bolstering community resilience, and advancing environmental justice.” The current funding for this program represents .4% of the $3.5 trillion spending in the bill.

On October 12, the Republican Study Committee chaired by Rep. Jim Banks (R-IN) released a memo on policies contained in the reconciliation package, claiming that while the bill is polling favorably, support would tank if the American people understood what was in it. It lists among the “policies to wreck America” the Climate Civilian Corps, which the memo characterizes as “a cabal of federally funded climate police … who will conduct progressive activism on taxpayers’ dime.”

There isn’t even a grain of truth in how the committee characterized the program: “Climate police” is to the reconciliation bill what “cow farts” was to the Green New Deal. But that won’t stop conservative media from running with it.

The Republican Study Committee wasn’t the first to characterize the program this way -- during the early stages of drafting the bill, climate denier Marc Morano suggested on Fox & Friends First that participants could resemble “climate cops” -- but the memo certainly reinvigorated the idea on Fox.

On the October 12 edition of The Ingraham Angle, Banks said the bill would “create a climate police department. This was a wacky idea that AOC came out with a couple of years ago. We all laughed at it because we thought it would never happen and now it’s on the brink of happening.” The following day, at least four programs described the program this way. On October 14, Banks appeared on both Kudlow on the Fox Business Network and Fox News' Faulkner Focus, claiming that the bill contains billions to create a “climate police department or a militia to go out and enforce Green New Deal policies."

[vid

October 14, 2021, episode of Fox News' Faulkner Focus]

Fox mocked and belittled provisions to address environmental injustices

Notably, during the Faulkner Focus segment Banks also referred to a program to fix “racist roads.” In fact, what he’s referring to is a $4 billion fund intended to address historic inequities and environmental injustices associated with zoning decisions and highway placement, which in some cases have divided once-thriving communities of color. The fund represents about .1% of the spending in the reconciliation bill.

Biden’s original infrastructure plan called for a $20 billion fund to “reconnect” neighborhoods cut off by old transportation projects. This would benefit communities like one in New Orleans whose residents have lived under the Claiborne Expressway for decades and remember how vibrant their community was before “The Monster” was built. After construction began on the highway in the 1960s, the once-thriving Tremé community, a center of Black cultural and commercial life, was divided and diminished. When the program was first introduced as part of the infrastructure plan, Fox’s Tucker Carlson suggested, in a blatantly racist rant, that the program was a form of reparations. This plan was cut in the bipartisan infrastructure bill negotiations, and a drastically reduced version is funded by the proposed $3.5 trillion reconciliation bill. Also among the litany of “controversial” items in the bill, often cited by Fox News hosts and anchors, is an initiative to plant trees, particularly in urban areas with less canopy cover to reduce the effects of extreme heat.

For example, during the October 13 edition of The Ingraham Angle, host Laura Ingraham fearmongered that the bill will “bankrupt the next generation, steal the next generation” before listing the “priorities” embedded in the legislation:

Eight billion bucks for a Civilian Climate Corps. It’s going to act basically as a taxpayer-funded leftist police force. $4 billion for equity — I love that word — in electric vehicle charging and tree planting. $643 million would go toward procuring culturally appropriate foods — I kid you not — for school lunches. Forget chicken tenders and Friday pizza, I guess. Free community college for illegals, of course. They’ll be eligible for child tax credits as well. My personal favorite, though — this is a drop in the bucket for the federal government. $15 million for national resource centers focused on providing services for older individuals who are underserved due to their sexual orientation or gender identity.

The tree equity initiative Ingraham refers to is a commonsense solution to addressing the heat island effect, which disproportionately impacts Black and brown communities across the US. Communities without sufficient canopy cover can reach temperatures up to 10 degrees higher than those that do, and one proven solution is to plant more trees in those neighborhoods.

On September 27, the day the reconciliation package was revealed, America’s Newsroom included the tree equity plan as one of the “doozies” that was buried in the bill while the Faulkner Focus also referred to it as one of the bill’s “hidden goodies” and mocked that there was “$3 billion for tree planting and so-called tree equity. Important that the trees feel equal to one another.”

In fact, there has been no shortage of “equity” jokes -- Greg Gutfeld on the September 29 edition of his late-night show Gutfeld! suggested that the program was meant to address “foilage privilege” (he meant “foliage”). And on the October 2 edition of Fox & Friends Saturday, in response to the program, Pete Hegseth quipped, “The oak trees feel like they have been too dominant for too long.” But for all the punchlines, there has been little attempt to understand what the program is or explain the issue it is proven to address.

Predictably, Fox has not scratched the surface of what the reconciliation bill means for climate mitigation

While the climate and environmental justice provisions that Fox has featured in its reconciliation bill coverage represent just a fraction of its spending, they are not an insignificant part of the Biden administration’s larger climate agenda, of which addressing environmental injustices and creating green union jobs are core pillars. They should be reported on. But Fox has framed the reconciliation bill as a radical-socialist wish list of trivial programs -- in fact, it represents, from a climate perspective, possibly the last chance to enact meaningful U.S. policies for the foreseeable future, which could make or break the global response to the climate crisis. But as long as Fox keeps its viewers revved up over “cow farts” and “climate cops” its base will never see the burning forest for the equitable trees.

---

https://www.mediamatters.org/fox-news/fox-news-laura-ingraham-attacks-small-minded-control-freaks-implementing-vaccine-mandates

---

an ah 1021

former White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows is among the Republicans who has been subpoenaed to testify before House Speaker Nancy Pelosi's select committee on the January 6 insurrection, but former President Donald Trump has urged him to refuse. Meadows discussed the committee Tuesday night during an interview with Fox News host Laura Ingraham, and liberal Washington Post columnist Greg Sargent slammed his comments as exemplifying the anti-democracy mindset that is so common in today's Republican Party.

Sargent, this week in his column, explains, "Meadows…. dismissed the January 6 committee's core mission…. Republicans have broadly renounced any obligation of any kind to hold actors on their side accountable for the effort to overturn U.S. democracy, first through corrupt and possibly illegal procedural means and then through mob violence."

During the interview, Sargent notes, Meadows and Ingraham "sneered at" the idea that extremists on the far right pose a "threat to democracy."

"Just look at that sneering at the very idea that Trumpists would undermine faith in our elections," Sargent observes. "How preposterous! Except just this weekend, Trump reiterated his stolen election lie, and the No. 2 House Republican [scalise?] refused to say the 2020 outcome was legitimate."

Sargent adds, "We just learned that a Trump lawyer authored a coup memo urging Vice President Mike Pence to ignore federal law to throw the election to Trump, and that Pence actually did entertain that scheme. Yet for Meadows, none of this is worth learning more about."

The fact that Meadows doesn't see the need for Pelosi's committee on January 6, Sargent stresses, shows how little Republicans care about the wellbeing of democracy in the United States.

"Meadows, apparently, doesn't want us to learn more about the full insurrectionist intentions of Trump and other co-conspirators — which likely include Republican lawmakers — or about the degree to which Meadows himself might have been one of those co-conspirators," Sargent writes. "Needless to say, a party this deeply committed to the absolute exoneration of Trump by definition does not see this effort to overthrow U.S. democracy as worthy of any national reckoning."

He concluded: "Meadows inadvertently captured an essential truth: The notion that a sustained effort to overthrow U.S. democracy requires a real reckoning and response has indeed become exclusively the Democratic Party position. But what does that say about the GOP?"

---

https://www.mediamatters.org/laura-ingraham/fox-news-laura-ingraham-attacks-vaccine-mandates-if-they-really-wanted-return-normal

---

gt replacement and covid BS hosp not full mma 921

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afghan, ALSO ROVE AND COOCH

https://www.mediamatters.org/fox-news/laura-ingraham-denigrates-immigrants-and-afghan-refugees-mass-humanity-who-will-grow

---

// tucker

https://www.mediamatters.org/fox-news/wake-hurricane-ida-fox-doubling-down-climate-denial-order-attack-bidens-infrastructure

Fox News is using Hurricane Ida to downplay the seriousness of climate change and attack President Joe Biden’s climate agenda, including the infrastructure bill which contains measures to make us more resilient in the face of extreme weather.

The fingerprints of climate change on the recent Hurricane Ida, which caused extensive damage from the Southeast to the Northeast U.S., were clear. One was its rapid intensification over very warm Gulf waters before pummeling Louisiana. Another was the amount of heavy rainfall that the storm brought in the Northeast that broke records in New Jersey, New York, and Pennsylvania, and caused major flash flooding. Beyond clearly showing that climate change is happening now, Ida’s devastating impacts, particularly in the Northeast, exposed how ill-prepared we are for it. And much of the coverage of Hurricane Ida was permeated with the theme that “the infrastructure in place today was built for a climate that no longer exists.”

In fact, with increased media coverage of events such as Ida, the public is beginning to increasingly understand the dangers of climate change and the need for actions that not only reduce climate-causing emissions, but make our communities less vulnerable to the climate impacts that are already happening. But as the public and more media outlets are starting to connect extreme weather to the need for climate action, Fox News coverage seeks to break those links.

Fox networks downplayed climate change and accused Biden of politicizing Hurricane Ida to push a climate agenda

Since September 2, the day after Ida’s remnants ravaged the Northeast, Fox News and Fox Business have aired at least a dozen segments, combined, that claimed that the Democrats are using Ida as a pretext to implement a massive climate agenda including through the infrastructure bill [W/ CORP Tax increase]. These attacks, coupled with instances of climate denial, show the network’s ultimate goal is to stop the implementation of Biden’s climate agenda by all means necessary.

Fox’s favorite new climate contrarian Michael Shellenberger appeared on two Fox programs to downplay climate’s impact on Ida and to argue that the climate crisis is actually overblown, first on the September 2 edition of Tucker Carlson Tonight, and later on the September 7 edition of The Ingraham Angle. In both segments, Shellenberger accused Democrats of using climate change only as a cover to make the economy more dependent on renewable energy sources like solar power, which he has a history of attacking. (Shellenberger is useful for Fox News because he doesn’t outright deny that climate change is happening; he only -- and falsely -- suggests that it’s not a major problem. In this sense, he provides the perfect cover for the fossil fuel industry to keep polluting the planet.)

Perhaps one of the more egregious examples came during a discussion of Biden’s response to Hurricane Ida during the September 3 edition of Fox Business’ Mornings With Maria. Guest Patrice Lee Onwuka of the Koch-funded Independent Women's Forum accused Biden of using the “fallacy” of climate change to get his agenda passed:

[vid]

paTRICE LEE ONWUKA (INDEPENDENT WOMEN’S FORUM): I think President Biden is absolutely looking out for what kind of a legacy he wants to leave behind, and he will try his best to get his agenda passed, using whatever fallacy that he can find. I mean, it’s remarkable that we're talking about, you know, a hurricane, and people who’ve lost livelihoods, some who’ve lost their lives, and we’re still pivoting to this idea that it’s all driven by climate change, when frankly, the facts dispute that. So it is unfortunate that the American people are subjected to this every single day, but this is going to continue.

There is no “fallacy” here and she is wrong on the facts -- climate scientists know that climate change has an impact on hurricanes, from things like rainfall to intensity level to how slow they move, and these impacts will only get worse in the future unless carbon emissions are rapidly cut.

There were many other examples that attacked Democrats for politicizing extreme weather events and threw cold water on the infrastructure bill. On the September 3 edition of Fox News’ Your World With Neil Cavuto, correspondent Chad Pergam began a segment on the infrastructure bill by stating, “Democrats are using the storm to justify their push for the infrastructure bill and the $3.5 trillion bill. It's loaded with environmental provisions.”[which are obviously inherently bad?!]

During the September 4 edition of Bongino Unfiltered, host Dan Bongino began a segment on Ida by also claiming, “Democrats wasted no time demanding action against climate change.” The segment which displayed chyrons like “Democrats’ Climate Power Play” and “Dems Push Climate Alarmism After Deadly Storms” also featured a Democratic strategist squaring off against longtime climate denier Marc Morano. Morano used his time to argue that the climate crisis is overblown. Although climate “both-sides” debates should be a relic of the past as they were promoted solely by polluting interests wanting to advance the narrative that climate change is “debatable,” Fox had no qualms in reviving it here despite overwhelming evidence of climate’s impact on Ida.

In addition, Fox invited climate-denying meteorologist Joe Bastardi on the September 8 edition of Tucker Carlson Tonight. The segment began with guest host Brian Kilmeade claiming that Joe Biden is “using these disasters for political purposes” in order to pass the infrastructure bill. Bastardi then backed up Kilmeade’s claim by dismissing the climate impacts of Ida, simply noting that other bad storms have happened in the past. He also falsely claimed, “The sun, the oceans, the events, the very design of the system, always try to fight back, and at the very least you can't tell what CO2 is doing.”

During an interview with U.S. Rep. Nicole Malliotakis (R-NY) on the September 4 edition of Fox News Live, co-anchor Anita Vogel referenced Biden’s and Sen. Chuck Schumer’s (D-NY) comments on Ida and climate change, and asked Malliotakis if “it's appropriate to blame this on climate change. … Should he be bringing politics into this when people are suffering?” Malliotakis responded, “We all need to do our part to be more environmentally friendly and reduce our footprint, but at the end of the day, you know, they're using this to push their radical-left agenda to try to pass a $3.5 trillion socialist wish list.”

Some Fox hosts also made similar comments in the wake of Ida. On the September 2 edition of Fox News’ Hannity, host Sean Hannity began a segment that ultimately downplayed the climate impacts of Ida by stating, “The left is blaming climate change for the heavy rainfall, severe weather and using it as another pretext to push their Green New Deal socialist agenda.” On the September 5 edition of Fox News’ The Next Revolution With Steve Hilton, host Steve Hilton did a short segment on Democrats using Ida to implement the Green New Deal.

Although the infrastructure bill is not the Green New Deal, that hasn’t stopped congressional Republicans, Fox News, and other right-wing media outlets from trying to compare the two. Fox is utterly obsessed with the Green New Deal and is using it to undermine basically every climate action that is proposed, however modest. This time, it’s the infrastructure bill the costs of which would pale in comparison to what unchecked climate change would do to the global economy.

Ida hit the U.S. against the backdrop of the recent report from U.N.’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change that conclusively linked climate change “to an increased frequency and/or intensity of some weather and climate extremes since pre-industrial times.” It also followed a summer of harrowing extreme weather events that also had climate fingerprints all over them, including Western U.S. wildfires and drought, and a brutal Pacific Northwest heat wave. The fact that, despite all these events, Fox continued to diminish climate’s impact on Ida and argued for continued delayed action on climate change shows how much of a dangerous threat the network is to the discourse on climate change.

---

BAD TRINITY

https://www.alternet.org/2021/08/fox-news-media/

i am sorry to report I've had more than one conversation with progressives who, despite being savvy and well-read, are under the mistaken impression that Fox News has seen the light and has started to promote the COVID-19 vaccine. I've even witnessed speculation that Rupert Murdoch, who is himself vaccinated, had a come-to-Jesus meeting with the Fox News brass about the wisdom of encouraging their own audience to contract a dangerous disease. And while I always enjoy a cheeky opportunity to tell folks they should be reading my work more, overall, it's distressing to see that people are buying into the myth that Fox News has "pivoted" to being pro-vaccine.

But can you blame folks for believing this? Someone who prides themselves on a responsible, fact-based diet of mainstream media sources like CNN, NBC News and NPR likely got exposed in mid-to-late July to misleading stories hyping an out-of-context clip of Fox News host Sean Hannity saying, "I believe in the science of vaccination" and urging viewers to "take COVID seriously." The clip also got shared widely on social media.

Everyone likes a "scared straight" story, and it just felt good to believe conservatives were on the verge of giving up this anti-vaccination nonsense. Unforutantely, the story was B.S.

As I and reporters who cover right wing media for Media Matters and Vox pointed out at the time, Hannity's show that night was not only bookmarked by two other shows — Laura Ingraham's and Tucker Carlson's — that openly discouraged vaccination, but his supposedly "pro-vaccine" comments came in the middle of a segment that overall portrayed vaccines as dangerous and a threat to freedom. Even in the edited clip, Hannity instructed his viewers to "research like crazy," which is a common anti-vaxx rhetorical trick. As with creationists claiming they want to "teach the controversy," it's a way to seem reasonable while slyly directing people to engage conspiracy theories and suggesting those conspiracy theories are on equal footing, credibility-wise, as scientific fact. As Michael Hiltzik of the Los Angeles Times wrote, Hannity was basically "encouraging listeners to expose themselves to the wide variety of anti-vax conspiracy mongering accessible on social media via 'research.'"

But in case there was any doubt, a perusal of Hannity's programming in the weeks since his supposed conversion shows that, actually, Hannity is still largely focused on stoking confusion, spreading misinformation, and portraying vaccination efforts as a liberal conspiracy against his audience. As Media Matters documented on Tuesday, Hannity gave an entire hour of his radio show over to two anti-vaccine conspiracy theorists — men who use phrases like "the demon needle" and "poisonous jabs." Hannity presented them falsely as medical experts to people calling in looking for advice. He also sneered at Dr. Anthony Fauci, President Joe Biden's chief medical advisor, calling him "flip-flop Fauci" and declaring that his anti-vaccine conspiracy theorists were better experts. The conspiracy theorists discouraged vaccines for young people, implied that dangerous and unproven drugs are superior prevention to the vaccine, and lied about the breakthrough infection rate, implying it's high when it is not.

This in in line with the general approach to the vaccine question on Hannity's show. From the moment that his misleading "pro-vaccine" clip went viral, Hannity has aggressively downplayed the claim that he's promoting the vaccine, declaring two days after the initial clip that, "I'm not urging people to get the COVID-19 vaccine" and "I have never told anyone to get a vaccine." In the past few weeks, he's attacked vaccine passport programs, portrayed vaccine advocacy as "threats coming from Democrats," exaggerated the risks of breakthrough infections, and even claimed that vaccine passport programs are racist against Black people. (In reality, Black people are at a higher risk of dying of COVID-19, which is one reason why aggressive public health measures are necessary.)

A visit to Hannity's Facebook page is more of the same. It features a post mocking New York City mayor Bill De Blasio for supposedly playing doctor by instituting a vaccine passport system, Blames undocumented immigrants for the COVID-19 spread when the medical establishment is quite clear that the problem is willfully unvaccinated people, and celebrates Florida's Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis, who is selling merchandise mocking vaccine advocates and whose state is paying the price for his idiocy with some of the highest rates of COVID-19 in the country.

Overall, Hannity viewers get a strong message that vaccines are ineffective, dangerous, and getting one is just giving into those damn Democrats. And his firehose of anti-vaccination demagoguery is in line with the rest of Fox News, which continues to take the stance that vaccines are "a menace", ineffective, and that refusing vaccination is a good way to prove one's right wing bona fides.

And yet, this notion that the network has changed its tune has become received wisdom in much of the mainstream media.

Googling "Hannity vaccines" turns up a darkly funny mix of Fox News headlines demonizing vaccination and mainstream media headlines praising Fox News for being pro-vaccination. One of those more recent ones, from Morning Consult, even announces, "Fox News Personalities Started to Promote COVID-19 Vaccines. Viewers Have Taken Notice." The article declares that "some conservative media personalities have gone all in on vaccines," falsely citing Hannity as an example. It credits this supposed shift in messaging for the fact that vaccine "reluctance fell to an all-time low this week among adults who watch Fox News: 27 percent of viewers now say they probably or definitely won't get vaccinated, down from 30 percent the week before and a high of 37 percent in mid-March." That's certainly an improvement, but hard to say if Fox News is really the cause, since their much-ballyhooed "shift" is an illusion propped up to bamboozle the mainstream media and not actually representative of the vaccine-negative messaging their audience actually gets. The comments from his fans on Facebook make quite clear what message they're getting, and it's definitely not that vaccination is good and that unvaccinated people are the cause of the current surge. Instead, it's fear-mongering about the shots, blaming immigrants and not the unvaccinated, and comparing vaccine passports and mandates to Nazi Germany.

As the New York Times reports, fears of the delta variant are also driving a lot of red state Americans to get the shot, clearly deciding that sticking it to the liberals isn't worth getting sick over. The article also points out that "employers and universities have started requiring the shots to return to work and class." Even the phrase "pandemic of the unvaccinated," which is being heavily (and accurately) promoted by the White House and the Centers for Disease Control, likely deserves credit for underscoring to the unvaccinated that it's they, not hated liberals, who are paying the price for listening to Fox News.

So this is probably not a matter of one pro-vaccine Hannity clip in a sea of anti-vaccine messaging changing minds. It's just that even the most devout death cults eventually have some members who start to question the wisdom of sacrificing themselves for some dumb ideology. Let's hope that the number of Fox News fans deciding they have their limits only continues to rise.

---

https://www.alternet.org/2021/07/fox-news-vaccines/

Fox News is moving even further toward being fully anti-vaxx.

Tuesday night on the conservative channel's "Ingraham Angle" host Laura Ingraham booked Dr. Peter McCullough, who falsely told America, "There's no reason right now, no clinical reason to go get vaccinated."

That's just plain false, according to the CDC and credible medical professionals.

"Virtually all Covid-19 hospitalizations and deaths in United States are now occurring among unvaccinated individuals," White House coronavirus response coordinator Jeff Zients said last week. Almost no fully vaccinated patients have been admitted to hospitals.

Ingraham herself wrongly claimed – or creatively framed – her response.

"Deaths and hospitalizations in almost everywhere is down. Way down."

That too is just plain false – hospitalizations are up.

Just look at these headlines over the past 24 hours:

Spike in hospitalizations due to Delta variant underscores need for COVID-19 vaccination, experts say

Young, unvaccinated people are being hospitalized with Covid-19 as delta variant spreads, officials warn

Covid-19 cases are surging in 46 states. In one hot spot, hospitalized patients are younger than ever, doctor says

Notice she left out the rise in coronavirus cases. The daily average of coronavirus cases has more than doubled over the past two weeks, and hospitalizations are also on the rise.

Dr. McCullough on Wednesday wrongly claimed, "the Delta variant really is not responsive at all, or protected by the vaccines."

That is a curious construction. Vaccines protect people, not viruses. And vaccine manufacturers have said the current slate of US vaccines do protect against the Delta variant.

McCullough is a cardiologist and an affiliate professor at Texas A&M College of Medicine.

He also claims "42% of 90,000 Delta cases in the UK have been vaccinated."

NCRM could find nothing that accurately substantiates that claim.

The vaccine is well over 90% effective in preventing infection, but for those who are infected after being fully inoculated, symptoms are almost always mild and do not require hospitalization. The number of fully vaccinated Americans who have died from coronavirus is infinitesimally small.

The Associated Press late last month reported "only about 150 of the more than 18,000 COVID-19 deaths in May were in fully vaccinated people. That translates to about 0.8%, or five deaths per day on average."

Dr. McCullough acknowledges to Fox News viewers there will be a "mild rise" in coronavirus Delta variant cases for vaccinated people, says those cases are "easily treatable in high risk patients," but then says, falsely: "There's no reason right now, no clinical reason to go get vaccinated."

NCRM has reached out to Dr. McCullough but did not immediately receive a response.

Watch: [TWT VID]

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---

https://www.mediamatters.org/fox-news/2021-fox-news-still-spreading-dangerous-climate-denial

no vids

on a near-daily basis, Fox News hosts, anchors, and guests spew misinformation and false narratives aimed at tanking efforts to address the climate crisis. These tactics to delay climate action or downplay the seriousness of our warming planet have often been referred to as the new climate denial -- since the actual denial of the scientific consensus that climate change is happening has mostly been pushed to the fringes of both politics and the traditional media landscape.

Fox deploys the new denial so often, it’s easy to forget that the network is one of the few highly influential media outlets that still promote one of the most dangerous lies of our time: Human activity is not overheating our climate.

This lie has existed for over five decades and for five decades has been repeatedly debunked. Its origins and merchants have been exposed; those who have continued to perpetuate it have been discredited; and our own experience during each unprecedented storm, historical heat wave, and apocalyptic wildfire has proven again and again what science has told us to expect from a warming world.

But in 2021, you can turn on Fox News and watch prime-time host Tucker Carlson quip that “not even climate experts understand the climate” or watch Fox contributor Dagen MacDowell suggest that climate change is a hoax because it is cold in April.

And in 2021, there is still no federal response to the climate crisis on the books, despite decades of warnings from scientists and with mounting support for climate action even among the largest companies and businesses in the U.S.

Fox is still fueling the lie that our planet is not warming

From insisting the science on climate change is not settled to deliberately misconstruing weather with climate, Fox News is still pushing the idea that human-made climate change is not real, despite overwhelming evidence and consensus in the scientific community.

In a segment on the April 28 edition of Tucker Carlson Tonight, host Tucker Carlson and Fox News contributor Sean Duffy discussed how the “critical environmental movement has infiltrated” schools and colleges, is scaring children about the climate crisis, and is convincing them to not have children. At the end of the segment, Duffy claimed that climate change is a “political movement, not a scientific movement” and that it is wrong to assume “the science is settled in climate”.

the segment aired just a week after Carlson and ultra-conservative political commentator and Fox contributor Mark Steyn mocked comments made by Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) linking climate change and racism. (For the record, experts say the two are “inexorably” linked.) Steyn, not satisfied with mocking the relationship between climate and racism, went on to attack the scientific consensus that warming is human-made, by invoking a defamation suit filed against him by climate scientist Michael Mann:

MARK STEYN (GUEST): This is supposed to be science. I've been in a 10-year lawsuit in Washington, D.C., up against the guy who invented the climate change hockey stick, and he is a scientist and his position is that in the last millennium -- nothing happened for nine centuries and then you, Tucker, got into your SUV and fried the planet. And that is a completely idiotic theory. But at least he's not trying to sell the world on the idea that somehow climate change correlates to racism.

[vid]

not to be outdone, the following night, prime-time host Laura Ingraham focused her April 22 monologue on “the big climate con.” Ingraham’s “climate con” list included misleading arguments against the benefits of climate action like job creation; attempts to discredit the role of -- and the need for -- global cooperation in dealing with the crisis; and false claims that the scientific warnings on climate are not sound or well understood. For good measure, Ingraham closed her monologue by mocking and attacking young climate activists.

in back-to-back shows on April 29 and April 30, Ingraham suggested that the climate crisis along with other pressing issues have been manufactured to “justify the left’s brazen efforts to take more of our money and more of our liberty” and they “only exist in the minds of leftists ideologues who hate America anyway.”

Denial paired with fear-mongering about the “left’s radical agenda” exemplifies the brand of climate denial Fox has peddled for years, and some network figures disingenuously equate weather with climate to push that narrative.

On the April 21 edition of The Five, Fox News contributor Dagen McDowell ended a rant against the Paris Climate Agreement by suggesting that abnormally cold April weather from Texas to the Great Lakes somehow disproves that global warming is occurring.

DAGEN MCDOWELL (CO-HOST): Here is your forecast today and why they stopped calling it global warming. April 21, 2021: Freeze warnings from Texas to the Great Lakes. Record low temperatures engulfing the heartland. Oh, and Indians/White Sox game in Cleveland had to be postponed for snow and cold.

This bit by MacDowell is both painfully stupid and reminiscent of a body of tweets by then-President Donald Trump, who conflated weather with global warming while suggesting that the term “climate change” was adopted by scientists and advocates to hide the incongruity between major winter storms and the idea of warming.

Interestingly, the term “climate change” was promoted by the Republican strategist Frank Luntz as part of the infamous 2002 memo advising the GOP on how to cast doubt on the scientific consensus that human activity was warming the planet.

Fox Nation host Lara Logan made the same inane claim on the February 19 edition of Outnumbered, in a segment about the winter storm that caused the deadly power failure in Texas:

“It's time for us to have an honest conversation about renewable energy and about global warming, climate change, whatever you want to call it,” said Logan. “This is the first time in Texas’ history that it has had a winter storm warning. So this is — this means that it is not getting warmer and warmer and warmer, simply.”

Fox has long been a platform for climate deniers

Fox News hosts and contributors not only push climate denial but regularly feature discredited deniers on their programs. Notorious climate denier Marc Morano -- who has no scientific background -- and Bjorn Lomborg -- whose spiel is dangerously claiming that climate change is happening, but not a big deal -- have both appeared on Fox for more than a decade. Just this year, both have appeared across Fox programming at least six times from January through April. Notably, Fox hosted both the day after President Joe Biden took office to attack his agenda on climate change.

Larry Kudlow, a long-time climate denier who formerly served as economic adviser to Trump and now hosts a show on Fox Business, has also been one of Fox’s go-to commentators on policies related to climate change across both the network’s so-called “news” and “opinion” programs.

But Morano, Lomborg, and Kudlow are far from the only climate deniers and contrarians on Fox’s roster. Over the past several years Rush Limbaugh, Joe Bastardi, Steve Milloy, and Patrick Moore all appeared regularly on Fox to push climate denial and misinformation. (In 2019, Moore said on Fox & Friends that “the climate crisis ... is not only fake news, it’s fake science”, and the line was picked up by Trump and tweeted to his millions of followers.)

Importantly, like Morano and Lomborg, none of these commentators are climate scientists, many have strong financial ties to the fossil fuel industry, and all have made a living out of obstructing efforts to address the climate crisis. With the exception of the late Rush Limbaugh, none would have had a megaphone to spread their lies absent Fox News.

Supported by advertisers, Fox runs cover for climate inaction

Climate scientists have repeatedly warned that if immediate and bold actions are not taken, then we will face dire climate disruption -- ever-increasing extreme and abnormal weather that threatens our homes, our food, our livelihoods, our economy, and our lives.

The stakes could not be higher.

The purpose of Fox hosts’ and contributors’ climate denial is to maintain an air of doubt about the existence and reality of our dangerously changing climate to provide cover for Republicans, who actively work to do nothing to stop the climate crisis, and the Big Polluters that bankroll their campaigns. This climate denial is also the foundation of the network’s persistent attacks -- across “opinion” and “straight news” programming -- on any proposed actions to reduce our carbon emissions and transition to a clean-energy economy. By extension, companies that advertise on Fox are party to climate inaction.

Publicly, many of these companies that run ads on Fox, including big insurers Allstate and Liberty Mutual have acknowledged the severe threat of the climate crisis. While others like General Motors, which is also among the network’s biggest advertisers, are actively calling for significant reduction in climate pollution. On the same day Dagen McDowell mocked global warming because it was cold in Texas, General Motors, along with 407 other corporations and businesses, issued a press release for an open letter to Biden supporting his goal of reducing carbon emissions by 50% by 2030. By continuing to sponsor Fox, these brands expose the cavern between their words and actions and associate themselves with a dangerous hostility to facts and science.

To be sure, Fox News is an accomplice to the impending climate emergency we face as a country and as part of the global community -- and so are those that support its programming with ads.

mma

How broadcast TV news covered environmental justice over the past four years

05/06/21 11:10 AM EDT

Buoyed by Biden’s climate summit, broadcast and cable TV networks provided strong Earth Day coverage

04/28/21 12:24 PM EDT

How broadcast TV networks covered climate change in 2020

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context

https://www.mediamatters.org/climate-deniers/right-wing-media-are-having-field-day-physicist-steve-koonins-new-book-climate

on May 6, theoretical physicist and former Obama administration energy official Steve Koonin appeared on two Fox programs to discuss his recently released book Unsettled: What Climate Science Tells Us, What It Doesn’t, and Why It Matters.

In a nearly 13-minute appearance on Fox Business’ Kudlow, Koonin pushed a number of claims from his book that contradict the established scientific consensus on climate change. Among other things, he stated that “we've seen hardly any change in most severe weather events”; that “in the U.S., the highest temperatures haven't gone up in 60 years and are the same as they were in 1900”; and that there’s been “no detectable human influences on hurricanes over the last many decades.” He also questioned why “somehow people don’t want to use” fracking and said the current situation around climate change is “misleading panic.”

Later that evening on Fox News’ Tucker Carlson Tonight, Koonin repeated the same statement on humans and hurricanes, and on hotter temperatures, he stated that “the incidence of heat waves across the 48 states is no greater now than it was in 1900, and the highest temperatures haven’t gone up in 60 years.” He also called climate models uncertain and claimed that climate science has become “immoral,” as “it's being used as a tool to scare young people, create depression.”

Koonin, who is not a climate scientist, has a controversial history within the scientific and political climate change community. He formerly served as chief scientist for BP (a company that has played an outsized role in both worsening climate change and delaying climate action). In 2017, he advocated for a “red team-blue team” approach to climate science, which would “put the ‘consensus’ to a test” and illuminate “differing perceptions of climate science.” This idea apparently caught the attention of then-EPA Administrator (and notorious climate change denier) Scott Pruitt. And in 2019, he reportedly tried to help former President Donald Trump create a “climate contrarians” panel with longtime climate denier Will Happer.

Given the content of his new book, it’s no surprise that Koonin appeared on Fox to discuss its key points. While those points are wrong and easily debunkable, they have been spreading across the vast right-wing media ecosystem.

Real climate scientists and experts have lambasted Koonin’s book

Some of the major claims Koonin made in his May 6 Fox appearances came directly from his book, which was reviewed in an April 25 Wall Street Journal piece that repeated a number of its claims. Climate Feedback, a website featuring climate scientists who review dubious climate pieces in the media, reviewed the article and estimated “its overall scientific credibility to be very low.”

Regarding Koonin’s misleading statement on human impacts on hurricanes, MIT atmospheric scientist Kerry Emanuel said the “most up-to-date research published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences demonstrates an increase in the proportion of hurricanes that become major hurricanes (Category 3-5) globally, supporting theoretical predictions that date back to 1987.” University of California, Los Angeles climate scientist Daniel Swain echoed this point, noting that “the most intense tropical cyclones are indeed becoming stronger in terms of maximum wind speeds and minimum central pressure and are producing more extreme rainfall.”

In his Kudlow interview, Koonin also downplayed the threat of melting ice and rising sea levels, stating that “people worry about the melting of the ice sheets, but that’s gonna take hundreds of years, if it happens.” This statement is remarkably wrong. Twila Moon of the University of Colorado stated that “over the last 20 years, ice loss has been rapid and large, creating measurable sea level rise.” Postdoctoral researcher Thomas Frederikse agreed, saying that “tide-gauge observations show that sea levels are persistently accelerating since the 1960s, and overall, the observed sea-level rise during the 20th century is higher than during any other century over the last 3000 years.”

Koonin’s claims downplaying the effectiveness of climate models are also wrong. Climate scientist Zeke Hausfather states that Koonin’s criticism “ignores the fact that climate models published since the 1970s were quite accurate in projecting the warming that actually occurred in the years after they were published, as we discuss in our recent paper.” (In fact, climate models have been so correct that even fossil-fuel giant Exxon’s own scientists accurately predicted the rate of global warming in the 1980s.)

The Climate Feedback piece also addressed other misleading claims from Koonin’s book that he did not repeat in his Fox interviews, including misleading statements on global wildfires, the severity of droughts, global crop yields, and the economic impact of climate change. Overall, says Twila Moon, “many conclusions highlighted in this article are examples of cherry-picking information and failing to provide the context of change. In other instances, statements are fully wrong and unsupported by scientific research.”

Marianna Lavelle of Inside Climate News also addressed some of the claims Koonin made in his new book, including rebutting the statement he made on his Fox appearances about hot temperatures and heat waves in the U.S.:

The average annual temperature in the contiguous U.S. has increased from 0.7 degrees to 1.0 degrees Celsius (1.2 to 1.8 degrees Fahrenheit) since the start of the 20th century. The year 2020 was the fifth-warmest year in the 126-year record for the contiguous U.S. And the five warmest years on record have occurred since 2012, NOAA reports. There is a more marked increase in nighttime lows than in daytime highs (the “warmest” temperatures) because of factors like the cooling effect of daytime aerosol pollution and soil moisture evaporation.

She also countered his claim about a future minimal economic impact of climate change by noting 2019 research that found that “global warming has very likely exacerbated global economic inequality, including ∼25% increase in population-weighted between-country inequality over the past half century.” Multiple scientific studies have showed that the cost of climate inaction far outweighs the cost of climate action. Indeed, one analysis finds that climate change could cost nearly $70 trillion by 2100.

In the past several weeks, Koonin has been featured in numerous right-wing media outlets

In addition to his May 6 appearances on Kudlow and Tucker Carlson Tonight, Koonin has made a number of other television appearances, written op-eds, and given interviews promoting his book. The vast majority of these have been with right-wing media outlets, including sources that are climate deniers.

He appeared on Bill O’Reilly’s The First on May 6, Andrew Bolt’s show on Australia’s Sky News on May 5, CNBC’s Squawk Box on May 4, and Kudlow on March 19. O’Reilly, Bolt, Kudlow, and Squawk Box’s Joe Kernan are all climate deniers. He also appeared on the Outsiders program on Sky News Australia on May 8. Here, he claimed that “modest” global warming will be beneficial for the planet, without noting that the negative impacts of climate change will far outweigh any positive ones. Sky News Australia, which is owned by Rupert Murdoch, has a history of climate denial.

He has written pieces promoting his book for The National Review and the New York Post, given a print interview to The Wall Street Journal’s Holman Jenkins (who has a history of being wrong about climate issues), given interviews to conservative radio personalities John Gormley and Ross Kaminsky, and spoken to fossil fuel industry shill Alex Epstein, climate misinformer Rich Lowry of The National Review, and conservative Daily Beast writer Matt Lewis. His book and its climate misinformation have also been the basis of articles in Townhall and The Federalist. And along the way, he’s been promoted by notorious climate deniers Marc Morano and Steve Milloy.

Right-wing media propping up books that are skeptical of climate change is an all-too-familiar occurrence

If this all sounds familiar, that’s because it is -- this sort of thing happened just last summer, when climate contrarians Bjorn Lomborg and Michael Shellenberger both released books downplaying the seriousness of climate change within a month of each other. Like Koonin, they both appeared across the right-wing media ecosystem to promote their books. There are other similarities between these individuals as well -- all are highly controversial within the climate science community, while their major works have been fact-checked and discredited by actual climate scientists and experts. Additionally, none of them are climate scientists.

As the realities of worsening climate change become more and more apparent, it’s become more difficult for right-wing media outlets to continue unequivocally denying that climate change is even happening. This new type of climate denial espoused by people like Koonin -- who say climate change is happening but it’s not that big of a problem -- provides perfect cover for right-wing media outlets to act like they care about the issue while they continue helping polluting companies kick climate action down the road.

Koonin’s misinformation-filled book won’t be the last one to downplay the threat of climate change, but it’s becoming easier to spot books like these when right-wing media take an exclusive interest in promoting their false claims.

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earth day

Laura Ingraham mocks young climate activists

On the April 22 edition of The Ingraham Angle, host Laura Ingraham focused her monologue on “the big climate con.” Ingraham’s “con” list included misleading arguments against the benefits of climate action like job creation; attempts to discredit the role of -- and the need for -- global cooperation in dealing with the crisis; and false claims that the scientific warnings on climate are not sound or well understood. Her final point was targeted at young activists who are calling for urgent and bold action -- and she took specific aim at Greta Thunberg and a Mexican climate justice activist named Xiye Bastida.

Ingraham suggested that today’s youths are being “indoctrinated into critical climate theory just like critical race theory.” Not to be outdone by Carlson, Ingraham introduced the clip of Bastida talking about the role of justice in developing climate solutions like this: “What happens when you mix open-borders madness, critical race theory, and climate paranoia all together in one big bowl? You get this." vid]

ingraham’s callous attacks on climate and youth activists are not new. She received significant blowback in 2019 for comments she made about Thunberg and in 2018 for mocking Parkland shooting survivor David Hogg.

The biggest problem with Fox’s “War on Earth Day'' is that it is not limited to once a year. Daily Fox assaults erode public acceptance of climate science and the need for urgent and bold action on climate change. Far from being a news outlet, the outlet is a key cog in the right-wing disinformation machine and climate obstruction is one of its main goals. mma 521

The presidential election was several months ago, but old habits are hard to break for former President Donald Trump.

On Thursday, March 25, Fox News host Laura Ingraham asked Trump about the Biden administration's efforts to expand voting rights and the former president quickly spiraled into a tirade riddled with false claims about the 2020 election and insurrection on the U.S. Capitol. Although most Americans witnessed the disturbing and deadly civil unrest that erupted at the U.S. Capitol, Trump attempted to downplay the insurrection yet again.

"If you look at the last election, it was disgraceful. It was a third-world election. It was a disgrace. Legislatures didn't approve much of what happened," Trump told Ingraham as he sidestepped her actual question.

In reference to the insurrection, although Trump admitted some rioters should be held accountable for their actions, he also claimed, "It was zero threat, right from the start, it was zero threat."

"The Supreme Court didn't have the courage to do what they had to do" -- Laura Ingraham lets Trump push the big lie… https://t.co/qDimESCSp6

— Aaron Rupar (@Aaron Rupar)

Despite the U.S. Supreme Court's repeated rejection of the Trump campaign's attempts to invalidate election results in multiple key battleground states across the country, Trump is still pushing the big election conspiracy.

Trump added, "And if you look at the numbers, the numbers were vastly in favor of us in the presidential election. It was disgraceful that they were able to get away with it. The Supreme Court didn't have the courage to do what they had to do."

At that point, Ingraham interjected saying, "Speaking as a lawyer, we're not going to relitigate the past."

When Trump attempted to steer the conversation back toward his criticism of the Supreme Court, Ingraham pushed back reminding the former president that "There's a lot of Republicans on that Supreme Court."

FROM YOUR SITE ARTICLES

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think piece SOLUTIONS REPAIR COMMONS

https://www.alternet.org/2021/02/gop-history/

...A few minutes later, President and First Lady Biden arrived at the rotunda to pay their respects. MSNBC and CNN were there. On Fox, Laura Ingraham briefly acknowledged the Bidens' presence but spent most of her airtime not honoring the slain policeman but trashing Dr. Anthony Fauci and beginning a story about homicides in Chicago with the phrase, "The BLM-fueled crime wave…" Black Lives Matter, you see, is just one more manifestation of the imaginary socialist plot to take over America. No wonder their viewers think the world's aflame, a cynical awful place where progressives plotting evil lurk at every corner pizzeria.

By the way, Officer Sicknick, a 12-year veteran of the force, was a Trump voter in 2016, although The Washington Post reports, "Those who encountered Sicknick said his political views did not align neatly with one political party." He was against impeachment but supported gun control.

There hasn't been an official explanation yet as to exactly how Sicknick died but he was attacked and killed while resisting the crazed crowd brainwashed by Trump

...Meanwhile, the rest of us are supposed to buy into the GOP's big con because, you know, unity. Every time truths are spoken that Republicans don't like, they claim that it's for sure dividing the country further.

So brazen are the attempts at manipulation of truth whether present or past, that in the last months of his term, President Trump and his sycophantic crew appointed a Presidential Advisory 1776 Committee, charged with creating "a definitive chronicle of the American founding." The report partly was a response to The New York Times' award-winning 1619 Project, charting the history of slavery in the United States and our continuing record of racial discrimination.

With little regard for the facts and not a single professional historian on the panel (but with plenty of conservative activists and educators), and with time quickly running out for the Trump White House, it was decided to release their findings on the Martin Luther King, Jr., holiday, months before the report was supposed to be completed and just two days before the Biden inauguration—timing that was either a stroke of haste, pure ignorance or malign spite—you make the call.

In any case, much of what the commission had to say was lost in the shuffle of last-minute Trump pardons and inauguration news but as per Sarah Ruiz-Grossman at The Huffington Post:

The 45-page report reads in places like a right-wing manifesto: It makes excuses for slavery and the Three-fifths Compromise that declared slaves counted as less than full humans. It decries socialism and "identity politics," celebrates the right to bear arms and calls the anti-abortion movement one of the nation's "great reforms…"

"The Trump commission's report also rails against socialism as leading people down a "dangerous path" of wealth redistribution and cites '"anti-Communism" and "the Pro-Life Movement"— or anti-abortion movement — as some of the "great reforms" of the country's history."

The report compares progressivism to fascism, seeking to "centralize power under the management of so-called experts." There are twice as many references to Christianity as of racism, no footnotes or citations, and not a single mention of Indigenous people, especially not the notion that upon our arrival, ninety percent of them quickly were wiped out by disease, murder, forced relocation, and other assorted territorial encroachments.

Many wondered what President Biden would do with the report. It didn't take long to find out. Within minutes of his swearing-in, an executive order wiped out the 1776 Committee. And shortly after, all evidence of its existence, including the panel's preposterous report, was removed from the White House website.

Via his Department of Education, the new president should lead an effort figuring out how to restore civics classes and revive the history curriculum that once taught young Americans how to be thoughtful, participating citizens by learning their past. This also should help them develop the kind of critical thinking that, when presented with the facts, responds with skepticism and debate but not in the belief of every crackpot version of reality that beckons to them from their televisions, radios and laptops. As we've seen, such an alternative truth—the real fake news as it were—can only lead to the violent end of American democracy.

For a party that used to preach responsibility and reason, the Republicans have devolved into an asylum for the proponents and hangers on of screwball revisionism fraudulent theories and the vicious overthrow of government. Don't know much about history but I do know that if the GOP have their way there will be little room for rational solutions that can help us...

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https://www.mediamatters.org/laura-ingraham/laura-ingraham-says-elementary-school-demonizing-all-people-who-are-non-minority

https://www.mediamatters.org/fox-news/laura-ingraham-criticizes-national-guard-presence-following-deadly-insurrection-obscene

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https://www.alternet.org/2021/01/right-wing-media-2649880889

...Media Matters has a good round-up of the various strategies being employed by right wing media to spin Wednesday's events as something less serious than an attempted coup spurred on by Trump himself.

Fox News' Tucker Carlson is reframing the insurrectionists as the real victims, subject to imaginary liberal incursions on vaguely defined "freedom." Laura Ingraham is working the "both sides do it" angle, falsely equating random and disorganized acts of vandalism during Black Lives Matter protests with the Trump crowd's direct attempt to overthrow the U.S. government and likely murder congressional leaders.

Sean Hannity is still working the "antifa did it!" lie, even after the FBI announced no evidence linking anti-fascist activists to the Trump-motivated mob. And Rush Limbaugh is denying that the insurrection was violent, saying it was simply people taking "selfies," ignoring the fact that five people died, including a Capitol police officer who was beat to death by someone wielding a fire extinguisher. These tactics of deflection also ignore that the mob clearly intended more mayhem— rioters weren't carrying weapons and wearing armor for their health — and it was only a matter of luck that things didn't get worse.

Unfortunately, such right-wing media pressure campaigns have worked, going back at least to the 1990s, when a campaign by figures like Rush Limbaugh to downplay Timothy McVeigh's 1995 terrorist attack on a federal building in Oklahoma City effectively shut down needed discourse about the role that extremist rhetoric on the right played in the attack.

Similarly, feigned outrage on the right over an FBI report in 2009 over the threat of domestic terrorism from returning veterans caused the Obama administration to buckle, withdrawing the report. Since then, there's been an air of heightened skepticism in mainstream media towards efforts by progressive activists to highlight the growing threat of domestic terrorism. Mainstream journalists have tended, all too often, to treat those warnings as hysterical, even in the face of terrorist attacks in El Paso and Pittsburgh.

Right-wing efforts to minimize right-wing violence can work, so Democrats need to act swiftly to take control of the narrative. Republicans must not be allowed to rewrite history to minimize the seriousness of this situation. And the best possible tool that Democrats have right now to evade right-wing gaslighting is impeachment.

The good news is that Democrats seem to understand this. After giving Vice President Mike Pence the whole weekend to invoke the 25th Amendment and remove Trump from office, House Democrats announced that they would be introducing an article of impeachment on Monday, accusing Trump of "incitement of insurrection." Still, there still seems to be some desire on the part of House Democrats to give Pence another 24 hours, leading to a confusing timeline where the impeachment is likely not to be brought to the floor until Tuesday....

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i really don't get her and covid, 330K KIA?!

A truly wild story: A former police captain was arrested and charged with assaulting an air conditioner repairman who he falsely thought was carrying 750,000 fraudulent ballots in his truck. The organization allegedly paying the former cop to prove supposed election fraud is led by a QAnon conspiracy theorist, and its Facebook page is filled with conspiracy theories and violent rhetoric.

A viral 4chan hoax about Chief Justice John Roberts tricked a presidential elector and pro-Trump media.

Right-wing media personality and major Fox News advertiser Mike Lindell, of MyPillow, called for Trump to impose martial law.

Invoking the infamous Dred Scott decision, Mark Levin screamed at the Supreme Court over Trump's election loss.

Laura Ingraham encouraged viewers to gather for the holidays. She is still lying about how lethal COVID-19 is, and also claimed this week that vaccinations may not be necessary in the Dakotas because of how many people have already been infected.

Tucker Carlson claimed vaccine distribution is “eugenics” against white people.

Fox News villainized Rep. Eric Swalwell (D-CA) for the massive hack (allegedly by Russia) that happened on Trump's watch.

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week on The Ingraham Angle, Laura Ingraham played a series of cable news clips that showed medical experts or TV news figures allegedly criticizing President Donald Trump for “promising to deliver a vaccine to the American people by the end of the year.” However, all but one of Ingraham’s clips were taken out of context to suggest arguments that were not actually made.

In one instance utilized a CNN clip of immunologist Dr. Rick Bright saying, “The reality is it’s irresponsible and reckless for the president of the United States to drive the evaluation of something as critical as a vaccine.” But Ingraham cut out Bright’s next five words: “to meet an election timeline.” Bright’s comment was about Trump trying to “move that vaccine to meet that target date” of the election. Other remarks were similarly about the election.

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reboot of agenda 21, plademic, the memes are mating /remix smoothie

https://theintercept.com/2020/12/08/great-reset-conspiracy/

...

The Great Reset is an attempt to create a plausible impression that the huge winners in this system are on the verge of voluntarily setting greed aside to get serious about solving the raging crises that are radically destabilizing our world.

So no, the Great Reset is not just another name for the Green New Deal, as many a right-winger with a digital chalkboard and an unhealthy AOC obsession is absurdly claiming. It is, first and foremost, about blocking a real Green New Deal, which most assuredly would not have the support of BP, Mastercard, the Prince of Wales, and all of the other Great Reset partners.

And yet, in recent weeks, a slew of right-wing commentators on Fox News, as well as Brazil’s minister of foreign affairs and prominent opposition politicians in Australia and Canada, have claimed to be confused about this and are suddenly giving oxygen to what was, until recently, a marginal conspiracy. Laura Ingraham, Tucker Carlson, and Ben Shapiro have all been terrifying their huge audiences with claims that green socialism is about to be forced down their throats via Schwab’s Great Reset, which, they explain, is the very same thing as President-elect Joe Biden’s “Build Back Better” plan, which is itself a thin cover for Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez’s Green New Deal. (Like an early fan of an indie punk band, Glenn Beck has been using his perch at The Blaze to point out that he was ranting about the Great Reset when it was just a gleam in Schwab’s eye.)

Do these people honestly think that Schwab is in cahoots with AOC and using the pandemic to put BP out of business — with the full cooperation of BP? Of course not. But President Donald Trump is on his way out, and the Green New Deal is popular — precisely because it is as far away from Davos as it could be, grounded in a polluter-pays ethos and in programs like a jobs guarantee and universal health care that enjoy broad working-class support. For right-wing politicians and the oil companies that back them, the more climate action can be conflated with an organization known for its traffic jams of private jets and its Bond villain founder, the easier it will be to resist any climate plan at all. That’s why the earliest alarmism about the Great Reset came from the Heartland Institute, ground zero of the climate change denial machine.

[Jason Kenney, leader of the United Conservative Party, speaks during a news conference in Calgary, Alberta, Canada, on Friday, April 5, 2019. Kenney said he would create a C$1 billion ($750 million) crown corporation to support Indigenous resource projects including pipelines if he's elected to lead Alberta's government this month, according to an emailed statement. Photographer: Todd Korol/Bloomberg via Getty ImagesJason Kenney, leader of the United Conservative Party, speaks during a news conference in Calgary, Canada, on April 5, 2019. Photo: Todd Korol/Bloomberg/Getty Images

This messaging is gaining traction not because people are suckers but because they are mad — and they have every right to be. Lockdown policies have demanded months of individual sacrifice for the collective good without providing the most basic collective protections to keep families from slipping into starvation and homelessness, or to keep small businesses afloat. Meanwhile, trillions have been spent to backstop markets and bail out multinationals, and pandemic profiteering is rampant. Is it any wonder that so many find it entirely plausible that the same elites who expect them to swallow all the coronavirus-related sacrifices while they party in the Hamptons and on private islands would also be willing to exaggerate the risks of the disease to get them to the accept more bitter “green” medicine, for the common good? As that first Davos theme made clear, trust between the people and the mountaintop has been broken — and it most certainly has not been rebuilt.

For a glimpse of how all of this fits together, take a look at what is going on in Alberta, Canada, under its truly reprehensible premier, one Jason Kenney. Kenney came to power pledging to serve as a shameless valet for the Alberta oil patch, specifically its extra-fast-planet-cooking tar sands. He promised to ram through all pipelines, no matter the opposition, and create a “war room” to surveil all opponents....

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wtf? 3k/day BEFORE thxgiving surge?!

mma

hosting Scott Atlas, Laura Ingraham mocks the COVID-19 fatality rate even as thousands die a day

12/11/20 11:16 PM EST

As the pandemic death toll soars, Laura Ingraham declares the virus “a lot less lethal than previously thought”

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bad trin on stop the steal

Laura Ingraham: In the days after the election, the Fox News host brought on House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) to spread conspiracy theories and sow doubts about the election result. She then blamed the outcome, in part, on “huge amounts of money from Mark Zuckerberg and George Soros” and told him that Republicans had “better remember who helped expand this party. … It was Donald Trump. And they better stand and fight for him.”

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https://www.mediamatters.org/fox-news/laura-ingraham-increasing-immigration-will-lead-more-dangerous-america

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https://www.mediamatters.org/laura-ingraham/laura-ingraham-blames-huge-amounts-money-mark-zuckerberg-and-george-soros-local

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https://www.alternet.org/2020/11/trumps-limp-coup-is-falling-apart-but-right-wing-media-and-certain-gop-politicians-dont-know-when-to-cut-bait/

amanda

Most still-rational Americans, watching Donald Trump's atrocity of a press conference on Thursday night, had two simultaneous reactions: Wow, that man really is the worst living American, and also, yeah, this is all over except for the paperwork.

It was an odd mix of emotions. There was the disgust of watching the actual president of the actual United States demand that legal votes be thrown out insinuating that millions of American voters were somehow fakes. But there was also the relief of seeing Trump's facade of bravado collapsing, exposing the loser that was always hiding behind that wall of bluster. Even many Trump voters knew, at that moment, that it was over. Trump's attempted coup is collapsing under the weight of his own incompetence and laziness.

We are now at the portion of the right-wing cycle of failure where the supporters of the corrupt and failed Republican president slink away and pretend that they were never that into him in the first place. (See: Nixon, Richard M., and Bush, George W.) But for whatever reason, a decent number of rats are clinging fiercely to the side of the sinking ship, insisting, as the water starts lapping against their skinny tails, that Captain Bleach-Injector can still somehow save himself.

Thursday night, a frantic Sean Hannity was on Fox News, baselessly claiming that Philadelphia election officials counting Pennsylvania ballots are "violating the law" and suggesting, apparently not as a joke, "a do-over in that state." On his radio show, Hannity begged for state-appointed electors who'll vote for Trump, defying the actual voters of Pennsylvania. (State GOP leaders have declined.)

House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy appeared on Laura Ingraham's Fox News show and falsely claimed that "Trump won this election," demanding, "Everyone who's listening, do not be quiet." He then tweeted out the video clip, in case there was any doubt he was trying to rile up Republican voters with these lies. Twitter put a content warning on the video.

Ingraham went along with McCarthy's antics, demanding that other Republican politicians "better stand and fight" for Trump and claiming that "we have huge amounts of money from Mark Zuckerberg and George Soros and others flooding" into "canvassing, you know, states like Pennsylvania." This claim is not only untrue but also nonsensical: The apparent implication is that, while Republicans are allowed to canvass and organize, Democrats have no such right.

Tucker Carlson was relatively limp, trying to boost Trump's conspiracy theories and complaining about "the media" calling the election. The latter is a particularly shameless play, as Trump's entire coup plot — which he has laid out in great detail over the past couple of months — was to seize on the appearance that he was ahead in early media reports on Tuesday night as evidence he had "won," even though all votes hadn't counted.

On Hannity's show, South Carolina's Republican Sen. Lindsey Graham let loose with baseless accusations, which carried a strong whiff of racism, that Philadelphia's elections are "crooked as a snake" while Arizona's are to be trusted. (News flash: Trump will probably lose that state too.)

Even former football coach Tommy Tuberville, having defeated Democratic Sen. Doug Jones in Alabama, decided that one of his first acts as a senator-elect was to declare that "the game is over" but "the referees are suddenly adding touchdowns to the other team's side of the scoreboard." It's a false analogy that elides the fact that votes are always counted after the polls close.

Salon's Sophia Tesfaye has an astounding list of other examples from GOP politicians, so readers can get the full scale of how bad this is.

Right-wing media whining has already drifted toward violent fantasies. Newt Gingrich, after letting loose with a racist rant about the "Philadelphia machine," the "Atlanta machine" and the "machine in Detroit," demanded on Fox News that Attorney General Bill Barr arrest election workers and menacingly declared that "federal agents can carry guns in the pursuit of people who are breaking the law."

While interviewing Rudy Giuliani on his radio show, Trumpian pseudo-fascist crackpot Sebastian Gorka declared that "we should just force our way in" to voting centers to keep votes from being counted. This was a bridge too far even for Giuliani, who suggested "that would require a fistfight, which I guess our people don't want to get involved in."

After falsely announcing that "Trump won an overwhelming victory" and was already "in his second term" in a Fox Business interview, disgraced former Trump adviser Steve Bannon went on his own radio show and fantasized about killing Dr. Anthony Fauci and FBI Director Christopher Wray.

"I'd put the heads on pikes," Bannon said, "as a warning to federal bureaucrats."

All of this, it should go without saying, is deeply evil. These people aren't just undermining democracy and telling outragous lies, they're often trying to incite violence against their fellow Americans. But evil is, sadly, to be expected. That's what has become of the Republican Party after decades of dehumanizing propaganda and five years of Trumpism.

But what's more puzzling is how irrational this behavior is. All these pundits and politicians are out there, flailing around and lying for Trump, and for what? He's a dead man walking, and they know it. The lawsuits Trump's team are filing are unbelievably feeble, so much so that it's clear they're less meant as a serious effort to rescue Trump from electoral defeat than to bolster his delusions that he's being unfairly victimized.

There's no point in defending Trump now, especially not in the stick-your-neck-out way we're seeing from Fox News hosts and politicians like Graham or McCarthy. It's certainly not going to make it more likely there's some miracle where Trump pulls himself out of a nosedive.

The only purpose of all this nonsense is to soothe Trump's injured ego with pretty lies about how he should have won and it's all rigged and he's the real winner here and not the massive loser he looks like to the whole world right now.

And I have to ask: To what end? It's one thing to flatter Trump when he's the president — it's gross and cynical, but entirely rational, to want the power of having a president on your side. It's another thing entirely to keep at it when he's on his way out. It's especially weird to demonstrate loyalty to Trump, a man who will never return it and would sell out all his bootlickers to black-market organ salesmen if he thought that might save his sorry ass.

I'm forced to conclude that these people merely stunned and falling back on bad habits. After four years of relentless lying and toadying to this reality-TV villain who sleazed his way into the Oval Office, the Trump apologists don't know how to quit him. Even as the building collapses around them, they're carrying on as if Trump will somehow find a way to survive this, because that's what they've been conditioned to believe.

The saddest part? Their audiences and supporters will forget all this when Trump finally leaves office. That's when the right will move seamlessly into Phase II: Forget This Ever Happened.

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mma1120

fox is behind Trump’s conspiracy theory about the coronavirus death count

Over the final weeks of his campaign, President Donald Trump has begun casually accusing doctors and hospitals caring for COVID-19 patients of deliberately inflating the death toll to make more money. His baseless conspiracy theory appears to originate with one of his favorite Fox News shows.

Fact-checkers have traced viral misinformation about hospital payments and the COVID-19 death count back to an April 8 appearance on Fox News’ The Ingraham Angle by Dr. Scott Jensen , a Republican state senator from Minnesota and family physician. Another Ingraham guest repeated the claim in July.

The fact of the matter is that no evidence has emerged suggesting that medical personnel are fabricating COVID-19 cases. As a result of limited test capacity, such official tolls are a significant undercount of the actual number of deaths, as estimated from the number of excess deaths during the pandemic compared to a typical year.

Fact check failure: Chuck Todd aired Trump's conspiracy theory without debunking it.

Also: Right-wing media have been spreading lies and conspiracy theories about the COVID-19 death count all year long.

Finally: Texas Republicans have petitioned a federal court to potentially throw out more than 100,000 ballots cast in drive-thru voting in Harris County, Texas. One of the plaintiffs is right-wing commentator Steven Hotze, a QAnon conspiracy theorist who has said that the coronavirus is “much ado about nothing” and speculated that the “deep state could have been the ones that orchestrated this whole viral problem with the virus.”

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at same time admin push herd immunity:

Ingraham attacks Dr. Fauci: “I'm shocked that he's still heading the coronavirus task force”

10/16/20 10:58 PM EDT

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mma1120

In an effort to “work the refs”, right-wing media and conservative politicians have long claimed that social media and tech companies are biased against them and censor their content, despite copious data proving otherwise. This week, we released a nine-month study which found that right-leaning Facebook pages outperformed left-leaning pages or performed similarly to them. Right-leaning pages consistently earned more average weekly interactions than left-leaning pages, while both types of pages earned similar engagement rates -- a measure of performance that accounts for interactions as well as numbers of page likes and posts.

[graf]

In an NBC News op-ed, Media Matters president Angelo Carusone examined the role of Facebook's right-wing executive Joel Kaplan : "While conservatives claim censorship is rampant on the platform, the hard truth is that Facebook has an active Republican operative — vice president of public policy Joel Kaplan — at the center of these stories who repeatedly sided with right-wing misinformation peddlers. It was Kaplan who set up the 2016 meeting between Zuckerberg and prominent right-wing media personalities like Tucker Carlson and Laura Ingraham in order to assuage their concerns about anti-conservative bias in Facebook’s trending topics. ... Kaplan continues to shape Facebook’s policies into advocacy tools for right-wing chicanery and partisan interests. Kaplan made an effort to “protect” Breitbart's account from being downsized in the news feed despite its distribution of harmful misinformation. Kaplan reportedly defended keeping up a network of fake news pages because removing them would “disproportionately affect conservatives.” Kaplan also reportedly defended basing Facebook’s algorithm on “super-sharers” — who are mostly extremely partisan — instead of regular Facebook users. And Kaplan shut down efforts to address polarization and extremism on the platform. In his spare time, Kaplan remains a Republican operative; most infamously, he helped shepherd through Brett Kavanaugh’s Supreme Court nomination through the Senate."

Finally: A blockbuster new Washington Post story details Facebook's "kid-glove treatment" of right-wing lies on the platform. Amazingly, Facebook's public policy team even "floated a proposal ensuring that a new system to escalate harmful posts do so evenly along ideological lines, the person said, so that 50 percent of the escalated material would be conservative and 50 percent would be liberal, even if the material was not equivalent in potential risk." The article details how repeat right-wing offenders of Facebook's misinformation policy are let off the hook.

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bizzarro: trump empathetic and transparent

https://www.mediamatters.org/fox-news/laura-ingraham-says-militia-planned-kidnap-gov-gretchen-whitmer-look-theyre-anarchists-and

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INCUBATOR BABY, W/ THIEL AND STEPHEN MILLER

https://www.urban.org/sites/default/files/2019/06/27/conservative_philanthropy_in_higher_education.pdf

...

CASE V: UNDERGRADUATE STUDENT GROUPS

Although the Federalist Society and conservative domination of the legal system represent conservative philanthropy’s most consequential achievements, other kinds of higher education philanthropy have contributed to right-wing political success. Conservative activists and philanthropists have underwritten right-wing undergraduate student activism that advocates free market ideology on college campuses. One of the earliest organized efforts was Young Americans for Freedom, founded by a group of some 90 young activists at conservative publisher William F. Buckley Jr.’s Connecticut estate in September 1960.55 (Young Americans for Freedom is not to be confused with Young America’s Foundation, discussed below. For clarity, I refer to both organizations by their full names).

Typically portrayed in the literature as a right-wing analogue of Students for a Democratic Society (SDS), Young Americans for Freedom was in fact largely reliant on existing power centers within the nascent American conservative movement for organizational and financial support.56

Although Young Americans for Freedom predated the rise of dedicated conservative philanthropic giving by nearly a decade, it provided an important blueprint for the success of subsequent generations of conservative student activism. Young Americans for Freedom was a conservative mass-membership organization that owed its successes to its closeness to existing conservative organizations, institutions, and funders, in particular the National Review, William F. Buckley Jr., and Martin Liebman, a public relations luminary and direct mail pioneer. These older conservatives cultivated Young Americans for Freedom’s founding members to serve as movement leaders. Douglas Caddy, for instance, an early Young Americans for Freedom activist, wrote for conservative publications while an undergraduate at Georgetown and later took a position at Liebman’s public relations firm, where he worked as a full-time organizer for Young Americans for Freedom. Although not as substantial as later organized philanthropic efforts, support for Young Americans for Freedom established a blueprint for future conservative student activism, above all the importance of a pipeline for conservative student leadership to move through.57

In fact, Young Americans for Freedom’s eventual inability to provide such a career pipeline under the Nixon administration limited its influence.58 Large-scale philanthropic support for conservative student organizations on campus accelerated in the 1970s alongside the proliferation of available funding for conservative institution-building writ large. Compared with the scholarship on Young Americans for Freedom, there is a considerable gap in the scholarly literature on post-1970s conservative student groups and their funders. One of the few exceptions is the work of sociologists Amy J. Binder and Kate Wood, Becoming Right: How Campuses Shape Young Conservatives, which provides a good introduction to several major conservative student activist groups in the 2000s, including Young America’s Foundation, the Leadership Institute, and the Intercollegiate Studies Institute (ISI). 59

Binder and Wood distinguish between the “populist” Leadership Institute and Young America’s Foundation, which focus mainly on cultivating firebrand conservative activists, and more “refined” and elitist organizations like ISI, although functionally these distinctions can be blurred. Most of the detail from Wood and Binder’s book comes from college students, organizers for conservative groups, and senior officials, all of whom emphasize the importance of financing. Groups like Young America’s Foundation and the Leadership Institute essentially function as conduits for conservative foundation money to be distributed to campus activists. In 2014 alone Young America’s Foundation controlled more than $59 million in assets and distributed nearly $23 million in funds.60

Its major donors include the Richard and Helen DeVos Foundation (Richard’s daughter-in-law, Betsy, is the current secretary of education in the Trump administration), Charles and David Koch, the Bradley Foundation, and the Olin family (distinct from the Olin Foundation, which closed its doors in 2005).61

Young America’s Foundation often supports campus activists by underwriting the speaking fees, transport, and hotel costs of conservative and/or pro–free market speakerson campus, and by subsidizing conferences and networking opportunities for conservative campus activists.62

The Leadership Institute has a similar mission and similar funding sources, and actively seeks to support conservative campus-based groups and, above all, campus publications. Alumni of conservative campus newspapers who have gone on to prominent positions in conservative and mainstream media include New York Times opinion columnist Ross Douthat (Harvard Salient), National Review writers Rich Lowry

(Virginia Advocate), Jay Nordlinger (Harvard Salient), and Ramesh Ponnuru (Princeton Tory), syndicated columnist and far-right political figure Ann Coulter (Cornell Review), talk show host Laura Ingraham (Dartmouth Review), Washington Free Beacon editor-in-chief Matthew Continetti (Columbia Daily Spectator), QVC network president Michael George (Northwestern Review), and Silicon Valley tycoon Peter Thiel (Stanford Review).63

Binder and Wood quote a pseudonymous student at a satellite campus of a land-grant university in the western United States, who told them that “[Leadership Institute] contacted him out of the blue [and] immediately offered him $750 for use on his newspaper.”64 It should also be noted that Young America’s Foundation and Leadership Institute alumni have gone on to prominent positions in the American Right in the 2010s, including White House advisor and architect of the Trump administration’s draconian immigration policy Stephen Miller (Young America’s Foundation) and media provocateur James O’Keefe (Leadership Institute). 65

This poses another counterfactual: would a similar conservative leadership cadre have developed absent support from organizations like Young America’s Foundation and the Leadership Institute? Ultimately, it seems unlikely that conservative organizations operating independently on college campuses without any kind of overarching political and financial coordination would have developed such a wide-ranging and politically disciplined leadership class. For instance, the broad support that conservative philanthropy has provided to conservative firebrand Dinesh D’Souza, now a bestselling author, suggests that a vibrant conservative ecosystem, both on and off campus, is crucial for cultivating conservative leaders. The Olin Foundation and the Institute for Educational Affairs first supported D’Souza through his right-wing campus newspaper, Dartmouth Review, in the early 1980s. After graduating from Dartmouth, D’Souza secured a John M. Olin Fellowship at the American Enterprise Institute, where he helped popularize the phrase “political correctness” to decry early 1990s campus culture. It seems fair to say that D’Souza owes much of his success to Olin, which can likely be said for many lesser-known conservative thinkers and writers who have reliably promoted free enterprise and pro-capitalist views.66

notes: 54Maxine Joselow, “Is George Mason the New Trump U?” E&E News, July 17, 2018, https://www.eenews.net/stories/1060089361; “Tracking Deregulation in the Trump Era,” Brookings Institution, January 16, 2019, https://www.brookings.edu/interactives/tracking-deregulation-in-the-trumpera/. 55 There are three scholarly treatments of Young Americans for Freedom by historians. These are Gregory L. Schneider’s Cadres for Conservatism: Young Americans for Freedom and the Rise of the Contemporary Right (New York: New York University Press, 1999), John A. Andrew’s The Other Side of the Sixties: Young Americans for Freedom and the Rise of Conservative Politics (New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press, 1997), and sociologist Rebecca E. Klatch’s A Generation Divided: The New Left, the New Right, and the 1960s (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1999). There are also a handful of accounts from conservative pundits involved in Young Americans for Freedom, notably William F. Buckley Jr.’s Flying High: Remembering Barry Goldwater (New York: Basic Books, 2008) and Wayne J. Thorburn’s (former executive director of Young Americans for Freedom) A Generation Awakes: Young Americans for Freedom and the Creation of the Conservative Movement (Ottawa, IL: Jameson Books, 2010). ]]

It should also be noted that Young America’s Foundation and Leadership Institute alumni have gone on to prominent positions in the American Right in the 2010s, including White House advisor and architect of the Trump administration’s draconian immigration policy Stephen Miller (Young America’s Foundation) and media provocateur James O’Keefe (Leadership Institute). 65

CONCLUSIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS

A survey of the literature on conservative philanthropy in higher education yields the following key themes: The importance of dense networks to achieve immediate and long-term goals. Michael Joyce, a senior official at the Olin Foundation and later the head of the Bradley Foundation, called this the “wine collection” effect; I refer to it as the career pipeline. This pipeline is a way for foundations to invest in conservative figures when they are students or scholars, who mature and eventually contribute to rightwing politics off campus.67

This was the Olin Foundation’s stated goal when it supported writers and activists like Dinesh D’Souza. But it was also a goal of institution-building on college campuses. Multiple foundations funded overlapping efforts at colleges and universities across the United States to establish centers for right-wing thought, and those efforts operated cumulatively over time. The creation of a center of conservative economic thought at the University of Chicago allowed for future successes; even failed attempts like Manne’s entrepreneurship at Rochester and Emory reaped results under different circumstances at George Mason.

The establishment of conservative student groups, from the Federalist Society to undergraduate conservative newspapers, provided a pipeline of talent to these institutions and, in the case of the Federalist Society, eventually provided financial support. Identifying faculty organizational entrepreneurs and sympathetic administrators. From an operational standpoint, this was a critical component of the eventual establishment of conservative centers on campus. When any of the three ingredients (dense networks of donors, dedicated organizational entrepreneurs among faculty, and a sympathetic administration) were lacking—as at the University of Rochester in the 1960s and Emory University in the 1980s—the institution-building efforts failed.

When those three ingredients were present, as they were at Harvard in the late 1980s and George Mason University since the 1970s, the transformations could be profound. The Koch network at George Mason would never have been as successful as it has been without the collaboration of faculty and administrators. A corollary to this is the importance of overcoming institutional resistance. There has been tremendous resistance in the academy to right-wing philanthropy. Three of the right-wing efforts discussed in this review—at the University of Chicago in the 1940s, the University of Rochester in the 1960s, and Emory University in the 1980s—were unsuccessful because of faculty or administration resistance; the successes were possible when support from faculty and, above all, administration was forthcoming.

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an 920

CNN’s John King slams Fox News as ‘state TV’ after Laura Ingraham calls ABC Trump townhall an ‘ambush’

Alex Henderson September 16, 2020

After President Donald Trump answered questions from U.S. voters and moderator George Stephanopoulos at an ABC News townhall event in Philadelphia on Tuesday night, September 15, Trump supporters were quick…

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https://www.alternet.org/2020/09/chaos-at-fox-news-as-some-refuse-to-believe-the-networks-own-reporting-on-trumps-contempt-for-troops/

ALL TWEETS not here

Bob Brigham / Raw Story September 5, 2020

On Friday, Fox News confirmed much of the reporting by The Atlantic on President Donald Trump disparaging American service members.

The network followed the Associated Press and The Washington Post in largely confirming the reporting.

But even after Fox News reporters matched the reporting, Fox News personality Greg Gutfield falsely claimed on-air that the story had been “debunked.”

twt: As Fox's own reporters confirm parts of the Atlantic story, Greg Gutfeld refers to it on air as a "hoax" and a "scam"

The split continued throughout the day.

“Fox contributor knocks Fox reporter for noting Fox has now confirmed key details of The Atlantic’s reporting,” CNN senior media reporter Oliver Darcy noted.

Fox contributor knocks Fox reporter for noting Fox has now confirmed key details of The Atlantic's reporting.

Darcy also noted a bizarre headline on the Fox News website following the network’s confirmation of the reporting. This was noticed by his CNN colleague Jon Passantino, who used to manage the webpage for Fox News,

and suggested the editorial choice was “extraordinary and unusual.”

[I used to manage the Fox News dot com homepage. This would be an extraordinary and unusual decision to run this denial as the top story despite having confirmed key details of the reporting

Oliver Darcy

@oliverdarcy

Replying to @oliverdarcy @JenGriffinFNC and @BretBaier

Just remarkable that after Fox's own reporter *CONFIRMS* key details of The Atlantic's report, this is the headline on the network's website.]

But Fox News personality Laura Ingraham seemed to be bashing her colleagues for a “fake” story on Friday evening.

[IngrahamAngle

It would save a lot of time if the Media would just tell us what fake stories they will be announcing over the next six weeks, and when each story will be released]

The uncomfortable position the network is in was hilariously driven home by Pete Buttigieg on Friday evening.

[PeteButtigieg

Even if you don't believe the multiple news organizations—including @FoxNews—that have confirmed these reports, believe your own eyes.

These comments are part of Donald Trump's pattern of disrespect for the military since he faked an injury to get out of serving in Vietnam.]

Chaos at Fox News as analysts refuse to believe the network’s reporting — because makes Trump look awful

Here is the Fox News reporting:...[twt]

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https://www.mediamatters.org/national-rifle-association/after-ny-state-ag-files-anti-fraud-lawsuit-against-nra-conservatives

After New York Attorney General Letitia James initiated a lawsuit against the National Rifle Association that asks a court to dissolve the group, some right-wing media figures called her “partisan” and dismissed the move as “trying to score political points” in an election year. Others called for GOP attorneys general to retaliate against liberal groups in kind.

New York attorney general alleges the National Rifle Association engaged in years of financial mismanagement and fraud

New York attorney general filed suit to “dissolve” the NRA following an 18-month investigation into “fraud and abuse.” New York Attorney General Letitia James filed a lawsuit on August 6 that looks to “dissolve the NRA in its entirety” and calls on organization leaders, including Executive Vice President Wayne LaPierre, to “pay back unlawful profits.” According to the 169-page lawsuit, LaPierre “spent millions of dollars of the NRA’s charitable assets for private plane trips for himself and his family.”

He also “repeatedly directed private aircraft to make additional stops” to pick up or drop off family members, “expensed over a hundred thousand dollars” on golf club membership fees, and attempted to purchase a $6.5 million mansion in Dallas, all allegedly funded by NRA donations. The lawsuit describes how the mismanagement went beyond LaPierre, alleging, “Directors or members in control of the NRA have looted or wasted the corporate assets, have perpetuated the corporation solely for their personal benefit, or have otherwise acted in an illegal, oppressive or fraudulent manner.” [NPR, 8/6/20; People of the State of New York v. The National Rifle Association of America, 8/6/20]

NBC’s Tom Winter: LaPierre and other NRA officials “have used this as a personal piggy bank, according to the attorney general.” During the August 6 edition of MSNBC’s MSNBC Live, NBC national security and justice correspondent Tom Winter explained that the complaint has “nothing to do with the NRA’s lobbying efforts.” Winter went on to describe how nonprofit organizations have to file expenses and operate in accordance with certain laws, and that the lawsuit alleges the NRA “failed their fiduciary responsibilities here, according to the attorney general, … and as a result, this organization cannot be run as a nonprofit organization anymore and it has to be dissolved.” [MSNBC, MSNBC Live, 8/6/20]

Some in right-wing media rushed to dismiss the lawsuit as a political move in an election year

Fox News contributor Ari Fleischer calls James “one of the most partisan figures” who made “one of the dumbest, biggest mistakes” she can make in an election year. During the August 6 edition of Fox News’ Outnumbered, guest Ari Fleischer called James “one of the most partisan figures” who ran for attorney general “on an anti-Trump platform, an anti-Republican/conservative platform,” before calling the lawsuit “one of the dumbest, biggest mistakes” she could have made in an election year. [Fox News, Outnumbered, 8/6/20]

Fox News host Laura Ingraham: James is “a complete and utter goofball socialist” who will “still have her security detail, I assume. The rest of you, you’re on your own.”

The Daily Wire’s Ben Shapiro: “This sounds…somewhat political.”

The Daily Caller: James is “trying to score political points.”

Newsbusters’ Tim Graham: “NY AG James sounds exactly like the NY Daily News with that NRA-is-a-terrorist-organization slime.”

Fox News host Sean Hannity: “It’s obvious this is political, we’re 89 days out of a presidential election. The timing to me, my read, is intentional.” During the August 6 edition of Fox News’ Outnumbered Overtime, Hannity called the timing of the charge “political” and “intentional.” Hannity went on to say he doesn’t “know anything about [the NRA’s] finances, but the timing of this stinks to high heaven to me and reeks of a political agenda.” [Fox News, Outnumbered Overtime, 8/6/20]

Rush Limbaugh: “Gun sales are a record high right now ... here comes Letitia James.” During the August 6 edition of Premiere Radio Networks’ The Rush Limbaugh Show, host Rush Limbaugh played a clip of James announcing the lawsuit before saying “gun sales are a record high right now, and it makes perfectly understandable sense with all of the rioting and the lawlessness and the Democrats talking about defunding the police, here comes Letitia James and now a lawsuit against the NRA in New York state.” [Premiere Radio Networks, The Rush Limbaugh Show, 8/6/20]

Fox News correspondent: “Not a coincidence that the lawsuit was filed today, just a few months before the election.” During the August 6 edition of Fox News’ The Story with Martha MacCallum, correspondent David Spunt reported on the lawsuit, and said it was “a major political fight after this was announced today, especially just under three months away from a presidential election.” Spunt went on to say that it is “not a coincidence that this lawsuit was filed today, just a few months before the election. Incredibly political.” [Fox News, The Story with Martha MacCallum, 8/6/20]

Fox News host Tucker Carlson: “If you wanted to short circuit Republicans in November’s election, you’d go after the NRA.” During the August 6 edition of Fox News’ Tucker Carlson Tonight, Carlson said it’s “hard to overstate how third world this lawsuit is” and compared James to Russian dictator Joseph Stalin. He went on to say the NRA will now have to spend its money pegged for “helping Republicans” in the 2020 election cycle on legal fees and called the lawsuit a way to “short circuit Republicans” this November. [Fox News, Tucker Carlson Tonight, 8/6/20]

Sean Hannity: This is a “bizarre, 170 paged, oddly timed” lawsuit. Fox News host Sean Hannity introduced the lawsuit as “bizarre” and “oddly timed” during the August 6 edition of Fox News’ Hannity. He questioned why James would file a lawsuit now when the city is also dealing with the coronavirus pandemic and rising crime and called it a “political attack.” [Fox News, Hannity, 8/6/20]

Fox’s Laura Ingraham: The lawsuit is “political hit job and a warning shot to others who dare question the leftist authority.” During an interview with Rudy Giuliani, Ingraham called the lawsuit a “political hit job” and an attempt to “crush an influential conservative organization in an election year.” Giuliani agreed, calling James “a poor excuse for a lawyer” and the lawsuit “silly.” [Fox News, The Ingraham Angle, 8/6/20]

Several conservative media figures suggested Republican attorneys general go after liberal groups in retaliation

Stephen Miller: “Planned Parenthood, you’re on the clock.”

One America News Networks’ Liz Wheeler: “Imagine going after the NRA but refusing to touch the Clinton Foundation.”

Conservative podcast host Derek Hunter suggested New York could now dissolve the Clinton Foundation.

TheBlaze’s Leon Wolf suggested Republican attorneys general can now dissolve Planned Parenthood.

---

// rush?

https://www.mediamatters.org/fox-news/laura-ingraham-stop-calling-them-protesters-theyre-violent-revolutionaries-trying

[bkgd: "riot and ruin party"]

INGRAHAM (HOST): Stop calling them protesters, they're violent revolutionaries trying to overthrow our government [= COMMIE?]and in the interim-- interim, they are basically trying to intimidate you, the voters, to support Biden or else.

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https://www.mediamatters.org/black-lives-matter/yes-trump-had-protesters-tear-gassed-much-fox-news-and-other-right-wing-media

Maj. Adam DeMarco, an Iraq veteran now serving with the D.C. National Guard, has become a whistleblower against the Trump administration’s denials that it had used tear gas — and specifically, chemical agent varieties — against Black Lives Matters protesters in Lafayette Square in a now-infamous episode on June 1.

The Washington Post reports:

DeMarco is scheduled to testify Tuesday before the House Natural Resources Committee, which is investigating the government’s actions in clearing protesters away from Lafayette Square with projectiles, gas, smoke and mounted police, including an apparent assault on Australian journalists by two Park Police officers. His statement was posted Monday on the committee’s website.

…

As the federal and local police waded into the protesters, DeMarco said he saw smoke being used and that he was told by a Park Police officer it was “stage smoke,” not tear gas. But DeMarco said, “I could feel irritation in my eyes and nose, and based on my previous exposure to tear gas in my training at West Point and later in my Army training, I recognized that irritation as effects consistent with CS or ‘tear gas.’" He said he found spent tear gas canisters on the street later.

The local CBS affiliate in Washington also found spent tear gas canisters at the scene, further giving the lie to the government’s claims.

CNN reported that Trump decided to tear-gas the crowd and stage the photo-op at St. John’s Episcopal Church because he was upset by earlier press coverage that he had been rushed into the White House’s underground bunker during earlier protests.

However, right-wing media personalities seized on early denials by the U.S. Park Police to insist that tear gas was never used at all. Such people included Fox News contributor Byron York, Fox News senior political analyst Brit Hume, and Fox prime-time host Laura Ingraham. On her show, Ingraham called it a “lie” that tear gas was used, claiming that “not only did law enforcement not use tear gas, the supposedly ‘peaceful’ crowd may not have been.”

Trump himself tweeted an article by right-wing outlet The Federalist on June 2, carrying the denial that tear gas was used.

The Trump campaign also demanded a retraction from various outlets (even including Media Matters) of the claim that tear gas was used, hinging on a narrow parsing of words to argue that solid pepper balls — which, when combined with the smoke bombs also present, form a tear-inducing gas — did not constitute “tear gas.” (In fact, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention includes pepper spray in the definition of “tear gas.”)

Fox News also waged an all-out propaganda campaign, keeping in sync with the Trump administration even as the party line kept shifting. While Fox’s early coverage glorified the use of tear gas and Trump’s walk to the church — calling it an “iconic moment” — within a day the network was parroting the administration’s denial that tear gas had been used, hinging on that supposed distinction of pepper agents.

Fox’s then-anchor Ed Henry even denied that “pepper spray and whatnot was used” at all, to which fellow news anchor Dana Perino responded: “Well, and I also think that when you're explaining ‘pepper balls’ versus ‘pepper spray,’ I mean, it's not necessarily a good one to have to do.”

And even that level of verbal quibbling was pointless because as the overwhelming mountain of evidence shows, chemical tear gas was used on top of the pepper agents — no matter how much right-wing media may try to deny it.

---

Social media platforms elevated a video featuring disinformation about COVID-19. Right-wing media figures embraced it.

On July 27, a video making false claims about COVID-19 began circulating on Facebook, and soon other social media platforms. Within a day, Facebook, YouTube, and Twitter committed to taking it down, but copies are still spreading -- and even worse, mainstream right-wing media figures are embracing the video , even as we learn about the deranged figures behind it.

First promoted by the Tea Party Patriots and Breitbart, the video featured members of a group called “America’s Frontline Doctors” holding a press conference in front of the Supreme Court. One of the speakers, Dr. Stella Immanuel , falsely claimed that “you don't need masks” to prevent the spread of COVID-19; she also falsely claimed hydroxychloroquine was a cure for the disease. It's not, and the fact is that trusted studies have repeatedly shown no effect.

Within hours, Donald Trump had retweeted claims from the video.

The Daily Beast found that Immanuel has made some truly bizarre claims, including that alien DNA can be used in medical treatments, and that some medical problems are caused by sex with demons. Eric Hananoki found that Immanuel had a long track record of anti-LGBTQ remarks, including calling homosexuality "the agenda of the Devil." The rest of the "Frontline Doctors" are hardly any better.

Facebook and Twitter removed the original video, with a Facebook spokesperson saying the reason was it shared “false information about cures and treatments for COVID-19,” and a Twitter spokesperson saying, “We're taking action in line with our Covid misinfo policy.” However, Media Matters found multiple instances of the video being re-uploaded on Facebook and Twitter following the platform’s statements.

Fox News and right-wing media did a full-throated defense of the video and the doctors, despite the lies and the extremist personalities. Rush Limbaugh extensively defended Immanuel, claiming the Daily Beast ran a "hit piece" on her. Tucker Carlson complained about the video being removed while also attacked the Daily Beast's reporting. Immanuel herself said that the Daily Beast's reporting did "a great job summarizing our deliverance ministry and exposing incubus and succubus.”

Sean Hannity and Laura Ingraham also complained about the video being removed. Ingraham hosted one of the "Frontline Doctors," who repeated the false claim that hydroxychloroquine was a "cure."

The entire right-wing ecosystem is built upon and thrives upon conspiracy theories. While conspiracy theories once took weeks or months to reach millions (for example, conspiracy theories about Barack Obama's birth certificate), the process now happens in a matter of minutes -- and this time, the misinformation puts public health on the line. Even worse, platforms like Facebook and Twitter are either unwilling or unable to stop it.

---

https://www.alternet.org/2020/07/there-is-something-to-learn-from-texas-but-its-not-what-fox-news-wants-you-to-believe/

no graphs key

here is something to learn from Texas — but it’s not what Fox News wants you to believe

Laura Ingraham speaking with attendees at the 2018 Student Action Summit hosted by Turning Point USA at the Palm Beach County Convention Center in West Palm Beach, Florida. // Gage Skidmore [she is wearing a cross]

Written by Mark Sumner / Daily Kos July 30, 2020

On Wednesday evening, Fox News person Laura Ingraham issued a tweet bragging that Texas was “looking pretty good” and sneering that this is “Bad news for the ‘Shut it all Down’ Democrats.” And then, with perfect timing, Texas announced another 9,200 new cases of COVID-19 and a record-shattering 313 deaths. Which isn’t exactly evidence that it’s time to throw a party in Texas.

Still … there’s actually a kernel of truth behind Ingraham’s post. It’s not that Texas is doing “good,” and the still-rising numbers of recorded deaths is a gut-punch. However, the rate of growth has slowed in Texas. It’s just that it’s slowed for a reason that Ingraham, Fox, or Trump are not going to mention—for a name that Democrats fully support.

Here’s Ingraham’s original tweet, which shows just how ridiculous the “looking good” comment really is.

But here’s the same data with something else in the picture.

[graf]

What can be seen in this image is something that happened on July 2. That’s when Governor Greg Abbott, facing a rising tide of cases, abruptly reversed himself and issued a mask mandate for the majority of Texas counties. That action didn’t have immediate effect, because the virus takes some time to be transmitted from person to person, and days more for symptoms to appear. However, just ten days after that order went into effect, the 7-day trend line of cases in Texas leveled off. Two weeks after that order went into effect, the number of new cases began to drop.

There are definitely problems with enforcement in some counties, and Abbott’s order could be simpler and less easily waved away with “exceptions,” but Texas appears to demonstrate, once again, that masks work.

What’s the evidence that masks have something to do with what’s happening in Texas and not some mystical effect of hitting a magic percentage of the population? Florida. That’s the evidence. Until the mask order went into place, the trends in the two southern states was remarkably similar.

On the day that Abbott issued the mask mandate, the difference in the total number of cases in Florida and Texas was less than 7000. For the next week, the two states went up in tandem. Then … Florida began to edge ahead. From a 4,000 case gap on July 11, Florida moved ahead by over 47,000 cases on July 28. Florida, where Governor Ron DeSantis has stubbornly refused to take any definitive action, is paying a price in tens of thousands of cases. Those cases will turn into hundreds of deaths.

If Abbott continues the mask mandate, and counties step up enforcement, it’s likely that in another month things in Texas will look better. Not “good” as Ingraham would have it, but better. Better as in a sharp reduction in new cases, an ease in overcrowded hospitals, and a drop in the indicator that always lags behind the others — deaths.

In the meantime, Florida’s numbers are about to start looking a whole lot better without a mask mandate. Because the state testing authority has announced that, with the tropical storm about to strike the state, testing is going to be suspended for at least five days.

Just enough time for DeSantis to run a quick victory lap.

Thursday, Jul 30, 2020 · 9:08:43 AM Eastern Daylight Time · Mark Sumner

One addition note: It’s now clear that Texas, like Florida, has been under reporting COVID-19 deaths. The scheme in both states appears to involve overlooking the rulings made by county officials and failing to incorporate deaths into the state-wide reporting. How Texas will handle these previously unreported deaths is not yet clear.

Lomborg regularly publishes op-eds in the conservative Wall Street Journal and New York Post. As noted above, he generally downplays the seriousness of climate change, avoids calling for a reduction in carbon emissions, and argues in favor of focusing on milquetoast approaches like increasing clean energy research and development spending.

He’s also appeared on Fox News three times in 2019 -- twice on Tucker Carlson Tonight and once on The Ingraham Angle. In all of these appearances, he’s downplayed the risks of climate change. For example, in an April appearance on Tucker Carlson Tonight, he stated, “They’re telling us global warming is a problem. But it’s also a moderate one.”

7/19/20

https://www.alternet.org/2020/07/fox-news-peddled-misinformation-about-the-coronavirus-253-times-in-five-days-study/

A new study finds that Fox News peddled misinformation about the coronavirus pandemic 253 times in only five days. The documented instances included claims which undermined science and faith in experts, as well as demands that schools and businesses reopen at the risk of public health.

Primetime host Laura Ingraham, who has no medical or scientific background whatsoever, led the pack with about a quarter of the claims — 63 total, or just more than 12 per show. Additionally, the network’s “straight news” programs contributed about 35% of the misinformation.

The study, published Thursday by media watchdog Media Matters for America, was conducted from July 6 to 10 — the week after a Yahoo News report proclaimed that Fox’s coronavirus coverage had taken a “remarkable turn” for the better:

However haltingly and incompletely, the president’s favorite news outlet has started to acknowledge, across various programs and its news site, that the coronavirus is a far graver threat than even [President Donald] Trump himself will acknowledge.

That report cited two articles on the network’s website and two instances of Fox News personalities Sean Hannity and Steve Doocy making remarks about masks that, while stopping short of endorsements, did not mock them outright.

The article also pointed out that Fox News requires its employees to wear masks at work most of the time. Additionally, the network appears to have canceled a Fox Nation show about the pandemic hosted by coronavirus conspiracy theorist Alex Berenson, though extant episodes remain available.

new study finds that Fox News peddled misinformation about the coronavirus pandemic 253 times in only five days. The documented instances included claims which undermined science and faith in experts, as well as demands that schools and businesses reopen at the risk of public health.

The data in the Media Matters study flatly contradicts the isolated examples from the Yahoo report. Here is a quick breakdown:

About half the incidents — 115 claims — challenged scientific consensus and undermined official government recommendations, such as social distancing and masking guidelines.

“The Ingraham Angle” was the clear leader of the pack, pushing misinformation 63 times, more than half of which came from Ingraham herself, who undermined science a staggering 21 times in five days.

“Fox & Friends” took second place with 45 instances; “Hannity” and “Tucker Carlson Tonight” finished in a dead heat for third, clocking 21 and 20 instances, respectively.

Straight news programs delivered more than a third of the misinformation, led by Martha MacCallum’s “The Story” with 20 claims.

Eight claims defended or endorsed unproven remedies such as hydroxychloroquine, days after the FDA told people not to take it outside of hospitals or clinical trials.

The network politicized the pandemic 63 times, including 51 claims that regulations requiring masks and closing businesses were rooted in politics and 10 false claims linking recent racial justice protests to a surge in new infections.

Hosts advocated 34 times to disregard public health concerns in favor of reopening the country’s more than 100,000 K-12 schools.

The misinformation and the seeming coordination with official White House talking points has raised alarm among experts.

For instance, in a “Hannity” interview July 10, the last day covered in the study, Trump responded to a question about the nation’s top infectious disease expert, Dr. Anthony Fauci, by saying “he’s made a lot of mistakes.”

That interview fed an ongoing White House effort to discredit Fauci, who pushed back by calling such efforts “bizarre.”

“Ultimately, it hurts the president,” he said.

Then there is the matter of schools. The network and the administration, including Trump and Secretary of Education Betsy DeVos, for weeks trumpeted an American Academy of Pediatrics statement advising a measured reopening of schools.

The misinformation’s momentum eventually compelled the academy — together with with the two largest educators’ unions in the country and the School Superintendents Association — to clarify its statement. It now says that reopening “will clearly require substantial new investments in our schools and campuses,” and calls on Congress and the administration “to provide the federal resources needed” to safely educate and care for students.

In an earlier Media Matters audit of the cable network, Fox News posted a 20% decline in its coronavirus coverage between March and May.

But this unrelenting misinformation campaign comes amid a massive surge in COVID-19 infections, which has ravaged healthcare resources in Sun Belt states such as Arizona, California, Florida and Texas. In recent weeks, the U.S. has set seven records for daily new cases, topping 68,000 on July 10, the same day which Trump, who said on numerous occasions that the virus would “miraculously” disappear in April, told Hannity that Fauci had “made a lot of mistakes.”

Now, many states are walking back reopening measures. California closed restaurants, movie theaters and bars. Arizona also shuttered movie theaters and bars, plus gyms and water parks.

On July 13, Fox Business host Lou Dobbs wondered “what in hell is going on” as closures increased. Dr. Marc Siegel, a Fox medical expert, criticized the policies as “not consistent,” “punitive” and “draconian.”

However, there are some fractures within the network. A study from April showed that viewers of Hannity were more likely to die of COVID-19 than Carlson’s viewers. Now, the two seem neck-and-neck in misinformation.

Carlson, who in June broke Hannity’s all-time ratings record, recently claimed there was “no evidence” that masks help constrain the pandemic, in contradiction of guidance from the World Health Organization and the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Hannity, meanwhile, took the opposite view.

“I went to my grocery store every week. Guess what?” the host recently asked. “They wore masks. Nobody at my grocery store, thank God, got coronavirus.”

“I think they work,” he added.

July 9 edition of her prime-time show, Fox’s Laura Ingraham claimed without evidence that the U.S. is “closer to herd immunity.” Ingraham also mocked experts like Dr. Anthony Fauci for suggesting stay-at-home orders may be needed to stem the spread of the novel coronavirus, saying such measures amount to “a war against our way of life.”

---

aha 5/10 is she the omega, vuln of trinity?! cg gates BS

---

In early April, another QAnon-backed conspiracy theory got a boost from Fox News. AfterQAnon supporters aggressively pushed the baseless claim that Microsoft founder Bill Gates — who is helping to fund COVID-19 vaccine development efforts — will somehow implant people with microchips for tracking and depopulation purposes, Fox’s Laura Ingraham quote-tweeted a post about Gates and vaccines, writing: “Digitally tracking Americans’ every move has been a dream of the globalists for years. This health crisis is the perfect vehicle for them to push this.”

Later that month, QAnon found an even greater megaphone in the president of the United States. Throughout the crisis, QAnon backers including Tesoriero have been calling on Trump to replace leading infectious-diseases specialist Dr. Anthony Fauci with Shiva Ayyadurai, a Senate GOP candidate and scientist who is staunchly opposed to vaccines, and who has promoted QAnon in the past. As the government had to enhance Fauci’s security detail in response to far-right harassment, an April 10 YouTube video of Ayyadurai accusing Fauci of being “embedded in the deep state” racked up millions of views. Two days later, the trending hashtag #FireFauci was retweeted by Trump himself.

---

mma 620 ingraham

NIGER INNIS: I'm so pleased that President Trump, Attorney General Barr has labeled antifa a terrorist organization. What they need to do is follow the money. How is it that bricks and bats and two by fours end up in these communities from Kansas to Los Angeles to New York and given out to these violent anarchists?

Follow the money and I suspect you're going to find Open Society Foundation and George Soros' fingerprints. That man should have been deported several decades ago. He is the destruction to our civilization and a clear and present danger to our country.

https://www.mediamatters.org/coronavirus-covid-19/bill-gates-coronavirus-conspiracy-theory-spread-social-media-and-then-fox-news

Conspiracy theorists, anti-vaxxers, white nationalists, and QAnon supporters spread the false claim online

WRITTEN BY ALEX KAPLAN

PUBLISHED 04/08/20

A conspiracy theory about Microsoft founder Bill Gates and a potential vaccine for the novel coronavirus has been circulating for weeks on social media platforms, getting high engagement numbers, and has since been pushed by both Fox News host Laura Ingraham and a Newsmax correspondent.

As the coronavirus pandemic has spread throughout the United States, Gates, who runs an organization that focuses on public health worldwide and has warned of the threat of epidemics for years, has been leading efforts to and spoken out about finding a vaccine. That has included spending billions of dollars to find a cure via his foundation and doing interviews on shows including Fox News Sunday and The Daily Show about the need for a vaccine.

Gates on March 18 also participated in a Reddit “AMA” (“Ask me anything”) Q&A, where he encouraged a “national tracking system” for the coronavirus and “some digital certificates to show who has recovered or been tested recently or when we have a vaccine who has received it.” Scientific American reported in December that Gates had been funding efforts to create an invisible ink that could go into people’s skin to see who has been vaccinated. A Massachusetts Institute of Technology bioengineer said the ink could provide data that is useful in fighting disease around the world, noting, “If we don’t have good data, it’s really difficult to eradicate disease” (though the outlet also quoted a bioengineering professor admitting it could raise privacy concerns).

During this time, conspiracy theorists, anti-vaxxers, white nationalists, and supporters of the QAnon conspiracy theory have spread a baseless conspiracy theory on multiple social media platforms, far-right sites, and message boards claiming that Gates’ effort to help develop a vaccine is some kind of nefarious attempt to control, follow, or even depopulate the world’s population via a “microchip” of some sort (the “depopulation” claim is based on a major misreading of Gates’ past remarks).

A review by Media Matters found that the conspiracy theory first seemed to gain traction around March 17, when a YouTube video about the virus mischaracterized Gates’ work to develop trackable vaccine data as “implanting everybody with a global ID” and compared it to tattoos on Holocaust victims. The video received more than 120,000 views. On that same day, conspiracy theory outlet Infowars published a piece and video of an Infowars host suggesting Gates was using the situation to “reduce the world’s population,” citing the invisible ink, and tied it to claiming the government would give out a “color-coded wristband that will be used for traveling Americans during an impending COVID-19 lockdown.” The Infowars article subsequently spread in Facebook groups and showed up as a meme on Instagram....[pix]

...Following Gates’ AMA and his “digital certificates” comment, the conspiracy theory spread on March 18, moving to message boards including 4chan’s “/pol/” and the conspiracy subreddit on Reddit, where a user called Gates’ Reddit posts “pretext for introduction of certificate of movement” and a plan to be “fully enslaved by the Deep State.” On Telegram that evening, white nationalist Faith Goldy wrote that Gates’ posts were “underreported” and that a “microchip implant ID” would be harmful to “nationalists.”[fiath g twt?]

...

The following day, as the conspiracy theory continued to circulate on 4chan, it was picked up by NewsPunch, a disinformation site formerly known as YourNewsWire, which accused Gates of pushing for technology that will be “adopted for its ‘convenience and safety’ and then overnight will become mandatory for you and your family – or else.” That piece, too, circulated on social media and as a meme, along with other memes accusing Gates of using a vaccine to work with “globalists” for a “new world order.”

[pix]

On March 21, another YouTube video was uploaded saying Gates wants to implant microchips in people and calling them a “mark of Satan” that could be used for “identifying us to the United Nations.” The video has received nearly 1.8 million views and at least 1.2 million Facebook engagements, according to the tracking tool BuzzSumo. That includes shares in QAnon Facebook groups and on a major anti-vaxx Facebook page.[pix w/ pyr eye]

throughout the rest of March, more videos popped up on YouTube (despite the platform’s pledge to crack down on coronavirus misinformation) accusing Gates of wanting “eugenics” and “population control” and claiming he is the antichrist and that he essentially supports genocide; they racked up another 1.6 million views combined. The videos included a clip from anti-Semitic conspiracy theory outlet TruNews and a video whose title called the virus a “hoax” (those videos received hundreds of thousands of Facebook engagements combined)....[rw talk?]

Videos on social media platform TikTok pushing the conspiracy theory in late March and early April also racked up many views (despite the platform’s anti-misinformation policy). One video that received more than 230,000 views included in the caption “#fvaccines” and accused Gates of pushing for everyone on the planet to have a “digital ID … by combining mandatory vaccines with implantable microchips.” (Media Matters removes identifying information from videos created by or featuring minors to protect their identity.) Another video that received tens of thousands of views claimed Gates was “evil” and connected him to a plan to “get everybody microchipped” via vaccines.

...[pix]

The conspiracy theory continued to spread following news in early April of Gates’ spending for a coronavirus cure. Another major white nationalist Telegram account shared a post saying Gates wants the population “extinguished,” and multiple accounts on Facebook and Instagram, including QAnon and anti-vaxx accounts, shared a meme urging people to take “no vaccine from some shady ass nerd that wants to depopulate the planet.” Ben Garrison, a far-right and pro-Trump cartoonist, drew a cartoon pushing the conspiracy theory that portrays Gates as a Nazi, which was also posted on the backup site of the pro-Trump subreddit “r/The_Donald.”[pix meme blk kid]

...By April 6, bigger QAnon accounts on social media had spread the conspiracy theory, such as Dylan Wheeler, who accused Gates of using “microchip[s]” in order to be “the face of the New World Order.”

That afternoon, Emerald Robinson, Newsmax’s White House correspondent, tweeted a thread accusing Gates of “control[ling] global health policy” and saying that his “plan” was to use “vaccines to track people.”

On the morning of April 7, Fox host Laura Ingraham, while quote-tweeting an anti-vaxx musician's post about Gates’ AMA, said “globalists” see the pandemic as a “perfect vehicle” for their “dream” of “digitally tracking Americans’ every move.”

The spread of the conspiracy theory comes as multiple other conspiracy theories about the coronavirus have circulated on social media, including others about Gates and the virus.

ref

NOOOO---ooooo---ooooo!

https://www.irishpost.com/news/jim-corr-corrs-comes-support-anti-vaxx-movement-168537

Jim Corr from The Corrs comes out in support of the anti-vaxx movement

BY: Jack Beresford

June 28, 2019

IRISH MUSICIAN Jim Corr of The Corrs has seemingly come out in support of the anti-vaxx movement in a move that has seen him come in for brutal criticism online.

Corr took to Twitter to voice his support for the anti-vaccination movement, which is led by a growing group of parents and individuals who are refusing to immunise their children against a raft of illnesses.

While vaccines have been known to have adverse reactions in a small group of people, scientists have always stressed the benefits far outweigh the risks in this regard.

Despite this, the number of people vaccinated against measles has been falling in countries like the US, which recently reported its first measles death in 12 years.

With measles infections are their highest since the diseasd was first eradicated, Corr took to Twitter to offer his view on the subject, writing:

“What if we were actually meant to get mild childhood illnesses like Measles so as to help prime our immune systems into fighting much greater diseases in later life?”

Jim Corr

@Jimcorrsays

What if we were actually meant to get mild childhood illnesses like Measles so as to help prime our immune systems into fighting much greater diseases in later life? ??

1,440

2:49 AM - Jun 25, 2019

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3,355 people are talking about this

It’s fair to say the tweet didn’t go down too well among his followers.

“Measles is not mild” one wrote. “Oh Jim. No. No no no,” another added.

“I ALMOST DIED at the age of 5 from Rubella measles & pneumonia,” a third tweeted.

Jim Corr

@Jimcorrsays

People are waking up to the dangerous Russian Roulette aspect of Vaccination. We're told repeatedly they're safe (in truth they're lucrative) while the US Gov has paid out 4 Billion in damages for vaccine injury. https://twitter.com/HighWireTalk/status/1143295006666579973 …

The HighWire

@HighWireTalk

We're #winning, they're panicking. "Just half of people in eastern #Europe think vaccines are safe, compared with 79% worldwide" MT Survey shows #vaccination crisis of confidence in parts of #Europe#YearOfTheBravehttps://www.tGUK.com/society/2019/jun/19/survey-shows-crisis-of-confidence-in-vaccines-in-parts-of-europe?CMP=share_btn_tw …

2:40 AM - Jun 25, 2019

Twitter Ads info and privacy

34 people are talking about this

“It added to my genetic bundle of autoimmune problems that have given me chronic pain my whole life. Measles will destroy your immune system & if you survive, you pay an enormous price. VACCINATE.”

Corr was having none of it though.

“#Google has also been censoring the vaccine debate,” he wrote in one follow-up tweet.

Jim Corr

@Jimcorrsays

#Google has also been censoring the vaccine debate. https://twitter.com/JeffereyJaxen/status/1144241505655230464 …

Jefferey Jaxen

@JeffereyJaxen

#Google is also censoring the vaccine debate in an attempt to influence, in favor of its pharmaceutical company partners, the record legislative activity happening across America https://www.breitbart.com/tech/2019/06/26/second-source-confirms-project-veritas-report-on-youtube-meddling-in-irish-abortion-referendum-searches/ … @congbillposey @realDonaldTrump @RepDLesko @RandPaul #Ireland

12:44 PM - Jun 27, 2019

Twitter Ads info and privacy

46 people are talking about this

The musician then took things a little further with a tweet condemning the use of…suncream.

“Most sunscreens are toxic. One must look carefully at the ingredients. Our skin is a living breathing organ that can absorb what is put on it especially if it's hot,” he tweeted.[vitamin d]

---

https://techcrunch.com/2020/05/07/plandemic-video-judy-mikovits/

no lnx twt

a video about the coronavirus featuring a well-known vaccine conspiracist is spreading like wildfire on social media this week, even as platforms talk tough about misinformation in the midst of the pandemic.

In the professionally-produced video, a solemn interviewer named Mikki Willis interviews Judy Mikovits, a figure best known for her anti-vaccine activism in recent years. The video touches on a number of topics favored among online conspiracists at the moment, filtering most of them through the lens that vaccines are a money-making enterprise that causes medical harm....

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https://www.mediamatters.org/coronavirus-covid-19/laura-ingrahams-coronavirus-coverage-has-been-cesspool-misinformation-and

no lnx many

Laura Ingraham's coronavirus coverage has been a cesspool of misinformation — and a danger to public health

WRITTEN BY ERIC KLEEFELD

RESEARCH CONTRIBUTIONS FROM JASON CAMPBELL & NOOR AL-SIBAI

PUBLISHED 05/08/20 7:08 AM EDT

While many Fox News personalities who have had a pernicious influence in the network’s ongoing coverage of the coronavirus pandemic, Laura Ingraham's coronavirus pandemic coverage has been a particular cesspool of dangerous medical misinformation, xenophobia, conspiracy theories, lies, and a denial of the crisis along with a hero-worship of President Donald Trump’s handling of that very crisis.

On just the April 28 edition of her show, Ingraham delivered a lengthy opening monologue alleging that coronavirus-related death counts have been inflated — then claimed that reporters were allowing the inflated death counts in order to “keep this thing shut down” and hurt President Donald Trump. She then interviewed a doctor from a fringe right-wing group to protest restrictions that Arizona’s Republican governor had imposed on prescribing the antimalarial drug hydroxychloroquine for its unproven treatment of COVID-19.

Along with Fox colleague Sean Hannity, Ingraham has spread a variety of misinformation, both on her prime-time TV show and on her Twitter account. And she has sometimes enjoyed a direct line to Trump himself, while also hosting Republican members of Congress and other important political advisers.

According to Media Matters’ internal database, Ingraham first mentioned the virus in reporting on the spread in early January. She has gone on to have over 329 segments since then discussing the virus.

Meanwhile, Ingraham’s coverage has swung from one extreme to another — all of them bad. She first denied that there was even a crisis at all — then, as she acknowledged the problem, she lashed out at immigrants, while insisting on Trump’s continued greatness. She has promoted dangerous, unproven treatments for the illness while opposing the shelter-in-place orders across the country and even encouraging defiance of them. She has further spoken against congressional relief and economic stimulus measures while claiming that Democrats are conspiring to enact a “socialist” agenda over the country.

Here’s a look at the kinds of COVID-19 misinformation that Ingraham has peddled.

Laura Ingraham’s coronavirus coverage

Choose a Topic

Ingraham downplays coronavirus and attacks media: It’s just a scare campaign

On February 26, Ingraham said that as scary as the virus seemed, with images of hazmat suits in China and mass quarantines in Italy, “more unsettling is something happening right here in the United States — and it's not medical, it's political. Democrats and their media cronies have decided to weaponize fear and also weaponize suffering to improve their chances against Trump in November.”

On the same broadcast, Ingraham hosted House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-CA), to assure viewers that the Republicans and Trump were very well prepared to deal with this pandemic no matter what Democrats said. “They’re one of those teachers you had that only wants to put a red mark on your paper, instead of telling you whether you’re doing it right,” McCarthy said. “And the president has been preparing for this.”

On the February 28 edition of her show, Ingraham praised Trump’s comments at a campaign rally that politicizing the coronavirus was a media and Democratic hoax, saying Trump sees right through the media’s ulterior motives. Her guest Dinesh D’Souza said that the media are “feeding a panic” that had damaged the stock market and that “the Democrats are now relying on a flu virus” to help defeat Trump.

During a March 2 interview with Secretary of Health and Human Services Alex Azar on her show, Ingraham brushed off the number of coronavirus deaths had occurred so far by comparing them to deaths during the flu season and accused the media of using the pandemic “to smear the administration in a number of ways.” She also hosted TV personality Dr. Drew Pinsky and asked him how much “damage” media were causing with their coverage. In response, Pinsky complained about the “panic” and “hysteria” around the pandemic, saying, “It’s here, it’s mild, and the press needs to shut up.”

On the March 9 edition of her show, Ingraham claimed the media were “panic pushers” against Trump — really just “a perfect storm — with a lot of bluster and hot air.” She also accused the media of “using the virus to attack the president’s health,” after Trump had been in contact with individuals who were potentially exposed to the virus at the annual Conservative Political Action Conference event. During the same show, she interviewed CPAC head Matt Schlapp — who was self-isolating after his own possible exposure — who said that “this virus is very hard to contract.”

On March 12, Ingraham hosted Mollie Hemingway of The Federalist and Tom Bevan of RealClearPolitics, who alleged that this was just another media campaign against Trump. “I think to the extent that they have any credibility, which is diminished clearly,” Ingraham said, “but to the extent they have any credibility, it doesn't add to anything except more panic, and more concern, and more upset.”

Ingraham claimed on March 27 that the media is upset that the coronavirus pandemic isn’t worse. “You get the sense that the media, ... some of them don't want things to go back to normal in the United States,” Ingraham said, claiming, “As the news comes in that might be slightly better than we thought — they're angrier and grumpier than they should be. It's odd.

Ingraham has also pushed the right-wing talking point that coronavirus death counts have been inflated. “Do we count someone who tests positive for the virus but died of pneumonia as a COVID death?” Ingraham said on April 3. “But what about someone who dies with symptoms of the disease, but was actually never tested? It's actually crucial information.” And then later on May 3, Ingraham tweeted the false claim that the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention had revised the number of actual coronavirus deaths in half.

Ingraham has also been a major proponent of the push to reopen the economy, using the projected deaths that have been revised downward because of the strong social distancing measures to say it means the projections were wrong in the first place. “And shouldn't this experience make us less willing to rely on the same experts to help determine when and how we should reopen our economy?” she said on April 7.

Ingraham again claimed on April 8 that the models projecting coronavirus-related deaths were wrong: “The projections here were not off by 10%, 15%, 20%. They were off by a factor of 33 from 2.2 million projected COVID deaths at the top, which was terrifying to a little bit more than 60,000 deaths projected today.” (As of May 6, total coronavirus-related deaths are now over 70,000.)

On April 16, Ingraham interviewed Dr. Anthony Fauci and asked him why there was an intense focus on developing a COVID-19 vaccine when there wasn’t one for HIV or SARS. Fauci explained to her why COVID-19 was a different public health threat, to which Ingraham responded, “But we don't know; this could disappear.”

On April 23, Ingraham was still insisting that COVID-19 was really just like the flu. “We were told the virus was far more lethal than the flu,” she said. “That was terrifying. Now we know it's likely to be closer to maybe a really aggressive flu season.”

Then on April 29, after Vice President Mike Pence was publicly shamed for not wearing a protective mask during his visit to the Mayo Clinic, Ingraham attacked the whole idea of mask-wearing as being itself just a scare campaign: “But the masks, well they're kind of a constant reminder. You see the mask and you think, you are not safe. You are not back to normal. Not even close.”

Ingraham resorts to xenophobia

Ingraham also reverted to her own signature brand of xenophobia during her show and hosted guests who spouted similar xenophobic talking points.

During a segment on March 17 about ongoing legal disputes over Trump’s immigration and border policies, Ingraham warned, “It's not beyond conception that literally thousands will rush into Mexico and then try to get into the United States seeking medical care in the wake of this pandemic — and of course free medical care, because when they come here, they get free care.” She later said, “This could put the health of our Border Patrol agents in jeopardy and further work toward a collapse of our health care system.”

During a March 20 interview with Mark Morgan, acting commissioner of Customs and Border Patrol, the Fox host and her guest extolled Trump’s efforts to shut down the southern border. “And this has to be a lesson for going forward. We don't need T.B. coming into the country,” Ingraham said. “These people ... are losing their jobs all over the country, we don't need a flood of new workers into America.”

On March 26, Ingraham said, “A lot of you are wondering why was Italy so hard hit by the coronavirus outbreak. It’s weird, right? Well, did you know 310,000 Chinese people now live in Italy, mainly in the north.” Ingraham hosted American Spectator writer Robert Stacy McCain said that “The key is that over the past 10 years, multiple media outlets have reported on the facts that Chinese workers and the Chinese-owned firms “have substantially taken over the fashion industry in northern Italy.”

D’Souza appeared on Ingraham’s show again on April 7, declaring: “The issue here is that as a country we owe debts and obligations to our fellow citizens, but not to others. And I think it's remarkable here that in a time of — that should be a time of national unity, we have this kind of attempt now to turn the tables, racialize the controversy, make the virus in effect racist, and then call for racially tailored solutions.”

Then on April 30, Ingraham retweeted an article by the white nationalist group VDare blaming workers from refugee communities for coronavirus hotspots in meatpacking plants, thus scapegoating particular groups of workers for the serious dangers within the plants themselves.

Ingraham and her guests insist on Trump’s greatness

On February 26, Ingraham hosted Sen. Tom Cotton (R-AR) who praised Trump for having imposed restrictions on travel to China as a preventative measure — even though it had very little in the way of decisive impact.

On March 2, Ingraham hosted Secretary of Health and Human Services Alex Azar, who proclaimed that Trump had taken “very aggressive actions, historically unprecedented actions, to protect the American people.”

On March 9, Ingraham hit back at Trump critics by declaring: “Let me just remind everybody that Donald Trump left a very successful company to go through the hell that he has had to go through of the last three years of investigations. But now he is selfish?”

On March 10, Ingraham delivered a meandering monologue in which she invoked the 2012 attack on American diplomats in Benghazi, Libya, building up to this flowery praise of Trump’s leadership:

LAURA INGRAHAM (HOST): In times of crisis, it helps to have a president who makes his own decisions, who marshals the right resources, and surrounds himself with the most competent people to do the job. He doesn't give in to the bureaucracy, he bends it to be more nimble. He pushes obstacles out of the way and solves problems. He has a take-charge, hands-on approach to the coronavirus and every other problem he faces. He’ll work with Democrats on a legislative package to help working families. He’ll do for our emergency response system what he's done for our economy, make it stronger and better, day by day.

On the March 19 edition of her show, Ingraham bemoaned: “You know the pressure people are under to say, ‘OK, we got to all come together, we just got to work together, we have to do something.’ So it's always the people who are asking the questions are always vilified. If you ask a question about a lockdown, or write an editorial as they did in The [Wall Street] Journal today, basically saying, ‘Rethinking the Coronavirus Shutdown,’ I mean, you are vilified.”

On April 2, she said that the economic lockdown to fight coronavirus might “kill the patient, which is America.” Later in the same broadcast, she explained: “And every life is precious, we want to keep everybody safe and we — of course, that's a given. But we also have to understand the cost of American lives on the other side of this.”

On April 7, she hosted Trump economic adviser Stephen Moore, who said that “the American economy, our $20 trillion economic engine, is in the intensive care unit right now.” Ingraham herself added: “We’ve got to protect lives but … these are all lives, I mean, there are lives on both sides here.”

Also on April 8, Ingraham tweeted a call for Trump to overrule his top medical experts, and have the country reopen on May 1:

laura-ingraham-tweet-trump-tell-fauci-birx-reopen-04-08-2020.png

On March 10, Ingraham ridiculed the “deep panic” of people who were criticizing Trump for not getting tested.

On March 16, Ingraham claimed that some in the media were supposedly “enjoying this moment that has brought great inconvenience, disruption, and suffering to American workers and families, … because some people think it’s Trump’s downfall, and they’re cheering that on.” She continued, “Testing snags notwithstanding, Trump has mobilized an aggressive effort to tackle this.”

Ingraham hypes hydroxychloroquine

Ingraham has been a prominent voice on Fox News for the untested usage of hydroxychloroquine, a drug normally used as an antimalarial, to treat coronavirus. In doing so, she became part of a chorus that influenced Trump’s own statements and actions on the matter.

Furthermore, two out of the top three guests that Ingraham has featured to discuss coronavirus are promoters of the drug for the pandemic, Dr. Ramin Oskoui and Dr. Stephen Smith, who have appeared 13 times and ten times respectively. In early April, Ingraham reportedly met with Trump, along with Oskoui and Smith, to continue pushing the drug.

From March 23 to May 6, Ingraham has discussed hydroxychloroquine in at least 51 segments on her show according to Media Matters’ internal database, often hosting guests to talk up its supposed therapeutic breakthroughs. But her claims never really matched up with the facts on the ground.

On March 19, Ingraham hyped that a patient had a “Lazarus” effect from use of hydroxychloroquine, after interviewing a doctor who had, in fact, inflated his own credentials. She also tweeted that a hospital in New York was regularly using the drug, and some doctors from that very hospital publicly denied that they were doing so. Twitter eventually took down her tweet for spreading misinformation.

On March 20, Ingraham praised Trump for pushing for hydroxychloroquine despite skepticism on the part of experts: “The president, as usual, has sharp instincts. He sees things that sometimes the intellectuals and the academics, they might get lost in some of the details, but he has sharp instincts about things. And he's pushing to get millions of doses now into the United States.”

On the March 30 edition of her show, Ingraham denounced “people who are still saying that drugs that are working right now — they don’t work on everybody, especially super, super-advanced people, but they’re working now — are still throwing cold water on therapies that seem like they could be really promising.”

On April 3, Ingraham asked Oskoui if all patients should be put on hydroxychloroquine under their doctor’s supervision. (Oskoui’s answer was yes.)

Then on April 9, Ingraham publicly suggested that the head of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Robert Redfield, should be fired for not strongly recommending the use of antimalarials for the coronavirus treatment.

When a Veterans Affairs study emerged showing hydroxychloroquine to have no beneficial effect — or possibly even causing more deaths — Ingraham responded on April 22 by attacking the study.

On April 29, Ingraham did a segment accusing Fauci and the National Institutes of Health of corruption and conflicts of interest for discussing preliminary study data showing beneficial treatment results from another drug, Remdesivir, after Fauci had declined to promote hydroxychloroquine.

On May 6, Ingraham called for Trump to overrule the warnings that have been issued against the use of hydroxychloroquine: “Time for the FDA, the president himself, to pull back on the misguided and unnecessary warning that was issued a few weeks ago.”

Ingraham opposes the lockdowns, incites resistance to them

Ingraham has also been a staunch opponent of the mass lockdowns and economic disruptions from social distancing policies to fight the pandemic, calling in late February for basic hygiene instead and insisting on March 9 that quarantines won’t work in the United States.

On the March 10 edition of her show, Fox News medical correspondent Dr. Marc Siegel denounced the “paranoia” about the spread of coronavirus: “We don't need this fear of going outdoors. It's agoraphobia — they have a diagnosis for that.”

On March 11, Ingraham delivered a lengthy opening monologue against the new lockdowns, warning at the end:

LAURA INGRAHAM (HOST): Maybe closing all these schools, colleges, universities, weddings — I guess a honeymoon could still go on maybe. Maybe that's all warranted. Maybe canceling all these events, entire seasons of sports, all of it, maybe that's the prudent thing to do. And I suppose it also means no graduations, no weddings even for healthy people.

But let's say things do calm down by the end of April. Yet the virus pops up again in the fall. Will this new precedent — again, thinking longer term — the new precedent require that we start canceling everything all anew.

And that means no more campaign events like rallies, no more town halls, no more interacting with the voters. Our constitution requires that our political process continue. This crisis must not be used to help candidates of either party escape the questions and accountability from the voters.

Nor must it be used to guilt candidates into canceling events for healthy people. At some point, people are going to begin pushing back against mass hysteria.

Also on April 8, Ingraham tweeted a call for Trump to overrule his top medical experts, and have the country reopen on May 1:

laura-ingraham-tweet-trump-tell-fauci-birx-reopen-04-08-2020.png

On the April 13 edition of her show, in a discussion with Reps. Jim Jordan (R-OH) and Lee Zeldin (R-NY), Ingraham compared the expert recommendations that the country needs 6-7 million coronavirus tests per week, compared to the reality of only about 200,000 right now — as a point against the experts’ goals. “But we have to set metrics for reopening the country that are realistic,” Ingraham said, “not continuing to move the goalposts on when Americans can actually exercise their civil liberties and make a decent darn living.”

On April 16, Ingraham hosted TV personality Dr. Phil McGraw — who relinquished his license to practice psychology in 2006 — to dismiss the need for lockdowns during the pandemic by arguing that the country doesn’t shut down over automobile-, cigarette-, or swimming-related deaths.

By April 23, Ingraham was denouncing the guidance of an actual medical expert: “If we wait for Dr. Fauci's seal of approval to reopen America, we may not have an America to reopen. At least not one we recognize.”

And on May 4, Ingraham said that there had been “no real scientific basis for believing” that social distancing was necessary or even useful in combatting the spread of the pandemic. “Viruses spread, that's what they do,” she added. “They often weaken as they go, and if it's like SARS, we hope it is, it'll eventually burn out as SARS did.”

Ingraham opposes relief measures

On the March 11 edition of her show, Ingraham said to Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-FL): “So, this is what Americans need to understand tonight, what the Democrats are floating, Congressman Gaetz, is a permanent series of government controls on American business as we're going to need to climb out of this chasm at some point. That's just what business is going to need, on its back — another anvil — trying to climb out of this hole that it's now in because of this virus.”

On the March 12 edition of her show, Ingraham said that the coronavirus aid package showed that Democrats were “more comfortable with socialism than they're letting on,” claiming that “in the end, the average person is always asked to cough up more money. In return, they get less freedom. It's socialism by crisis, and there's no hiding it.”

On the March 19 episode of her show, Ingraham hosted conservative economist Stephen Moore to blast the proposals for expanded unemployment benefits or universal stimulus checks during the pandemic, saying he had discussed it with his stepsons. “And the first one said, ‘Why would anybody work if the government is going to give you free money?’” Moore continued: “If a seventh and eighth grader can figure that out, why can't members of Congress? … Economics is not complicated.”

Ingraham spins conspiracy theories about Democrats

Ingraham has long said the entire crisis is really a Democratic plot to not only sink Trump, but to enact a wider left-wing agenda.

On February 25, she shot back at Trump critics saying he needed to work more effectively with other countries, using a key right-wing buzzword: “Now, does anyone actually think that more globalism is going to help this crisis? … Now, this may end up being a global epidemic, but his first responsibility is to the American people.”

Attacking Democrats on the February 26 broadcast, Ingraham said: “All they know how to do though is stoke panic. What else do they really have at this point? I guess they have Bernie's laundry list of freebies: free health care, free pre-K, free college, free medical care, free housing. It's all a fraud. No one takes any of this seriously.”

On the March 25 edition of her show, Ingraham warned of cities releasing criminals from jails during the pandemic, calling it a “get out of jail free card” — during which she was joined by former New York City Police Commissioner Bernie Kerik, himself recently pardoned by Trump for a corruption conviction stemming from his period as head of the U.S.-led occupation government in Iraq. (No mention was made that Kerik had himself served three years in prison.)

On her March 27 show, Ingraham covered a lot of ground during just one segment of denouncing the aid packages going through Congress. “If you thought spending $2.1 trillion would make Democrats happy, come on,” she said. “The tin cup is out, many on the radical left complaining that this so-called stimulus bill didn't include all of the socialist goodies they wanted.” She also tied into the ongoing right-wing misinformation campaigns against Planned Parenthood, saying to Rep. Lee Zeldin (R-NY): “Congressman, this is where the Democrats always go. Always has to go to the culture of death, as we are supposedly fighting death and destruction of this virus. We have got to keep funding death on the other side, of abortion.”

And on March 10, she denounced calls by then-Democratic presidential candidate Bernie Sanders for an eventual coronavirus vaccine to be made freely available to all, with Ingraham attempting to spin Sanders’ remarks to mean that the United States would pay for everyone around the world to get it:

LAURA INGRAHAM (HOST): And after your tax dollars are used to develop a vaccine, a Sanders administration would have wanted you to cover the costs for everyone — OK, but also for everyone across the globe.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SEN. BERNIE SANDERS (I-VT): When that vaccine is developed, obviously it should be made free to every person in this country and in fact every person in the world.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

INGRAHAM: Yes. Why not? And never content to let a good crisis go to waste, the left would use this health emergency to spend money on stupid programs. Any excuse to grow our already bloated government.

When Democratic New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo said that America would have to get to a “new normal,” Ingraham shot back conspiratorially on the April 1 edition of her show: “But if the ‘new normal’ that Cuomo's talking about means abandoning living the life we loved before the coronavirus or using this crisis, as some seem to be doing, as a vehicle for advancing a left-wing, freedom-killing agenda? Well, count us out.”

On April 2, she said of the push to expand voting by mail during the pandemic: “But of all the scams perpetrated through the COVID nightmare, the effort to change voting — we told you like two weeks ago this was going to happen — is perhaps the worst. Anything to create more opportunities for ballot harvesting or even voter fraud.”

On the April 9 edition of her show, Ingraham accused congressional Democrats of purposely working to hurt seniors, small businesses, and other vulnerable groups: “I know this is harsh to say, but it seems like Democrats in Congress almost want as many Americans out of work on Election Day as possible.”

On the April 13 edition of Ingraham’s show, guest Rep. Lee Zeldin (R-NY) said that in the debate over extending funding for the paycheck protection programs, Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) “looks at this as leverage to be able to get unrelated priority items — as she tried last time with phase three, the Green New Deal, ballot harvesting, and other items.” In turn, Ingraham said that both Pelosi and Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden “acknowledge the crisis, but they see a political opportunity — which has to be exposed every step of the way.”

On April 13, Ingraham attacked former first lady Michelle Obama’s advocacy for voting by mail, invoking her own mother who she said worked and raised four children — but always got to the polls in person. “And now, nobody can get to the polls,” Ingraham said. “Apparently, nobody can get to the polls anymore. I’ve never seen anything like this.”

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amanda

https://www.alternet.org/2020/05/theres-an-insidious-agenda-behind-the-anti-lockdown-protests

On Sunday, Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer, a Democrat, appeared on CNN and declared that the protests against stay-at-home orders that plagued her state capital, as well as numerous others, “depicted some of the worst racism and awful parts of our history in this country,” pointing to the regular appearance of swastikas, nooses, Nazi slogans and the American swastika, also known as the Confederate battle flag. (We can safely assume that the usual excuse of “Southern pride” used to defend the Rebel flag doesn’t apply in Michigan or Ohio or Illinois, states where thousands of young men fought and died for the Union.)

Conservatives cried foul at Whitmer’s words, of course, but there’s little point in denying it. We all have eyes and ears, and no one is mistaking the protesters for people who would flinch if they heard a friend casually use the n-word in conversation.

The question isn’t whether white identity politics and racism are fueling the protests. The real question is why. Racism isn’t some kind of magical force that shields your body from the coronavirus. Even Donald “Inject Bleach” Trump hasn’t been fool enough to suggest you can defeat the virus by wrapping yourself in the Confederate flag. Yet there’s no denying that there’s a direct correlation between racist attitudes and the belief that the coronavirus is an overblown hoax and the lockdowns are the result of a widespread leftist conspiracy.

That isn’t just true of the protesters, either. The most prominent voices in media and politics who are egging them on and denouncing stay-at-home orders also happen to be the people who are doing their utmost to mainstream white nationalist ideology.

Trump, of course, is the most prominent example of this. He has been eagerly cheering on the protesters, starting with his “LIBERATE” tweets last month that encouraged protesters who were defying social distancing recommendations.

This past weekend, Trump continued to publicly support the far-right protesters, who stormed the Michigan state capitol with guns in a clear bid to intimidate and threaten state politicians out of voting to continue the restrictions on commerce and movement that are meant to keep the coronavirus from spreading. Trump even called them “very good people,” an eerie echo of the words — “very fine people” — he used to praise the neo-Nazis who rioted in Charlottesville in 2017.

In the media, two of the biggest lockdown opponents are also two of the loudest voices seeking to bring white nationalism into the mainstream of American politics.

Over the weekend, Laura Ingraham of Fox News retweeted propaganda from a notorious white nationalist group, VDare. The tweet blamed immigrants of color for spreading the coronavirus at a meatpacking plant, in a blatant bid to racialize a virus that experts believe was primarily introduced in the U.S. by visitors from Europe, not by immigrants from Africa, Asia or Latin America.

Ingraham has been at the forefront of coronavirus conspiracy theory, denouncing everything from mask-wearing to scientific studies that debunk supposed miracle cures as part of a massive conspiracy to hype the threat of the disease. She even hosted a segment denouncing CNN anchors for reporting on their own experiences with COVID-19, clearly threatened by the way such reports make the disease seem both relatable and terrifying.

Ingraham is a major conduit of white nationalist ideology from the fringes to the mainstream, as documented by this 2018 Media Matters report that shows how she uses her perch at Fox News to stoke the belief that “demographic changes” — unsubtle code for growing communities of color — constitute a national emergency.

Same story with Tucker Carlson, whose white nationalist leanings have been thoroughly documented for years. Carlson initially took the coronavirus seriously, in distinction to many other Fox News hosts. But after stay-at-home orders became widespread, he took a hard right turn into denialism, doing segment after segment portraying the social distancing measures as an illegitimate power grab and implying that fears of the virus are being deliberately exaggerated to justify the shutdowns.

With this kind of prompting from Trump and major media figures, it’s no surprise that white nationalists and other far-right groups fueled by white identity politics have led the protests.

As the Southern Poverty Law Center explained in a recent report, while the anti-lockdown protests were organized and funded by wealthy right-wing donors, far-right groups like the Proud Boys “quickly realized” the value of the protests to amplify their proto-fascist views, recruit new members and further ingratiate themselves with Republican politicians.

Neil MacFarquhar of the New York Times expanded on this in a piece on Sunday, reporting that the far right sees the crisis as “a potent recruiting tool” its various groups can exploit “to bolster their white supremacist, anti-government agenda”.

David Neiwert, a journalist who has covered the far right for decades, wrote at Daily Kos that far-right groups are seizing on the crisis, hoping they can use it to kick-start “the long-sought ‘second civil war’ they believe is on the verge of erupting in the United States.” This partly illuminates the significance of Confederate flags at the protests, displayed by those who clearly hope the forces of racism and reactionary politics will win the second time around.

To a large degree, then, the marriage of racist politics to the anti-lockdown agenda is opportunistic. Trump himself has clearly indicated he thinks both that his re-election prospects hinge more on the economy than on the number of people dead from COVID-19 (partly because he still thinks he can cover up the latter) and that the economy will come roaring back to life if the lockdowns are ended. (This is doubtful!) Trump’s biggest champions, who share his racist agenda, are backing his play in the hopes that he’s right and that the combination of reopening the economy while minimizing or obscuring the body count will get him re-elected.

But as with so much of the horror show that is unfolding in the era of Trump, the rot runs deeper than political expediency. There’s obviously something deeply compelling to white identity ideologues about the idea that this virus is a hoax concocted by the “deep state,” beyond their desire to defend Trump.

The far right has grown increasingly hostile to the government in the face of social programs — most recently Obamacare — that they view as redistributing money from “deserving” white people to people of color. All the bellyaching about “tyranny” and patriotic cosplay is about creating a moral justification for anti-government views that are rooted in racist resentment and xenophobia. The lockdown protests are about further enshrining their hatred of Democrats, and their reluctance to pay taxes or share public goods with nonwhite people, as resistance to “tyranny.”

There’s no doubt in my mind, either, that the protests are fueled by the fact that the coronavirus pandemic is disproportionately affecting people of color and ravaging urban areas that have long been demonized by right wing media and Trump. While no one has stupid enough to suggest that white skin somehow shields you from the virus (at least not so far), a lot of rural and suburban white people who oppose the shutdowns are viewing it through a racialized lens. This is gently being referred to as the “urban-rural divide” on the issue, but should be understood as white conservatives who resenting having to give up their haircuts and dinners out at Chili’s to protect the health of people living in racially diverse cities.

Of course, what’s really happening is pretty much the opposite: The lockdowns are likely keeping the virus from spreading further into rural and suburban America (though the numbers in those areas are noticeably beginning to rise, despite the media’s focus on New York and other large cities). With Republican governors in many states beginning to ease restrictions to demonstrate their fealty to Trump, there’s a not-small chance that the relative safety that white people living in less dense areas currently experience will evaporate.

But if that happens, don’t expect right-wingers who oppose the lockdowns to apologize for not taking this seriously. They’ll just pivot to blaming cities and people of color for “spreading” the virus, even though those are the people and places who have most firmly supported the measures meant to contain the virus in the first place. The American right, like their feckless orange-skinned leader, will never accept blame for their failures, even as the corpses pile up.

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This week, Trump clashed with state governors, including those in his own party, over who has the ultimate authority to reopen states and when. Meanwhile, protests have erupted in some conservative and rural counties demanding an end to stay-at-home measures. Fox News's Laura Ingraham was among those heaping praise on protesters, tweeting that it was "time to get your freedom back".

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https://www.mediamatters.org/coronavirus-covid-19/these-pharmaceutical-companies-are-funding-spread-covid-misinformation-fox

04/10/20 4:07 PM EDT

Many pharmaceutical companies that are conducting ongoing research into COVID-19 therapeutics and vaccines are among the top sponsors of the Fox News Channel, a cesspool of medical misinformation, racist fearmongering, and reckless speculation that put vulnerable populations in harm’s way. These companies, many of which are spending millions to research therapies and donate specialized resources that might alleviate the toll of the virus, are undermining their own work by advertising on Fox News, whose coverage of the pandemic has been described as a “genuine public health threat.”

Here’s a list of these pharmaceutical companies. You can let them know they must stop sponsoring the spread of deadly misinformation during a global pandemic.

GlaxoSmithKline (GSK)

GlaxoSmithKline is a U.K.-based global pharmaceutical and vaccine manufacturer and a leading Fox News advertiser. It has invested hundreds of millions of dollars into researching COVID-19 therapeutics and has partnered with the British government and AstraZeneca to set up a testing facility at the University of Cambridge.

The company has run over 3,000 ads on Fox News since January 2019 and recently advertised on shows that have misinformed viewers about COVID-19, including Fox & Friends and The Next Revolution with Steve Hilton.

Pfizer Inc.

Pfizer is an American biopharmaceutical company and a top Fox News advertiser. The company has spent hundreds of millions of dollars to scale up its manufacturing capacity to fight COVID-19 and is running multiple studies into potential therapeutics.

Pfizer has run over 2,600 ads on Fox News since January 2019.

Novartis

Novartis is a Swiss pharmaceutical manufacturer and a Fox News advertiser. The company makes hydroxychloroquine and has promised to donate its entire inventory “not already allocated to existing orders and customers” to combat COVID-19. It also recently established the COVID-19 Response Fund, pledging “$20 million in grants to support public health initiatives.”

The company has run nearly 1,900 ads on Fox News since January 2019. In 2020, it has advertised on shows hosted by COVID misinformers such as Maria Bartiromo and Laura Ingraham.

Sanofi

Sanofi is a multinational pharmaceutical company, a manufacturer of hydroxychloroquine, and a top advertiser on COVID misinformer Sean Hannity’s prime-time show.

In collaboration with Regeneron Pharmaceuticals, Sanofi is currently testing a prescription medication designed to treat rheumatoid arthritis among COVID patients in New York with the hope that the drug can alleviate fevers and aid patients with oxygen intake.

Since January 2019, Sanofi-owned brands have advertised on Fox News over 1,700 times. Besides being a top advertiser on Hannity, Sanofi has paid for programming on shows that have advocated for the premature end to social distancing guidelines, including The Ingraham Angle and Fox & Friends. Previously, Sanofi dropped Bill O’Reilly’s now-defunct prime-time show when he was accused of sexual harassment by multiple women. It remains to be seen if the company will do the same when even more is at stake.

Vanda Pharmaceuticals

Vanda Pharmaceuticals is a therapeutics manufacturer based in Washington, D.C. It is currently running a clinical study of potential COVID treatments. The company has run 269 advertisements on Fox News since January 2019, including following Sean Hannity’s interview with President Donald Trump in which Trump touted “potential cures” for coronavirus that might benefit Prime Minister Boris Johnson.

Bayer

Bayer is a multinational pharmaceutical manufacturer that also manufactures chloroquine phosphate, and it is a top advertiser on Hannity and Fox News overall. The company has made multiple pledges to donate resources to fight COVID-19 in the U.S. and Spain. It is also paying for the spread of medical misinformation by advertising on Fox News: the company has run over 3,900 ads since January 2019, including 493 since the beginning of 2020. Brands owned by Bayer that run advertisements on the network include Bayer Aspirin, Aleve, Claritin, Dr. Scholl’s and Alka-Seltzer, among many others.

Gilead Sciences

Gilead Sciences is a California-based pharmaceutical research and development company that has a forthcoming study of its drug Remdesivir and whether it has therapeutic properties to treat COVID-19. It has run 269 advertisements on Fox since January 2019. This year, the company advertised on shows hosted by coronavirus misinformers, including Sean Hannity and Jeanine Pirro.

AstraZeneca

AstraZeneca is a multinational biopharmaceutical company that frequently advertises on Fox News. The company is currently researching potential treatments for coronavirus using antibody therapeutics. It has also publicly committed to donating 9 million face masks to health care workers across the world. The company is also a major sponsor of programs spreading COVID-19 misinformation; since January 2019 it has run over 700 advertisements on Fox News, including on Fox & Friends, and The Five.

Takeda

Takeda is a global pharmaceutical company and a Fox News advertiser that recently announced it is partnering with plasma companies to develop an antibody therapeutic to treat complications associated with COVID-19. It has advertised on Fox 563 times since January 2019 and recently ran ads on The Next Revolution with Steve Hilton, a show that has promoted an approach to COVID-19 that runs afoul of guidance from public health experts.

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