Newsmax, OAN, Others When Faux Just Isn't Crazy Enough

[pnwguy]

May 5, 2022 14:18:15 GMT LFC said:

Newsmax knows who leaked the SCOTUS opinion; Ketanji Brown Jackson, who is not yet actually on the court!

He left out the obvious suspect.  But then if you are referring to Democrats, it's all one and the same.

[goldenvalley]

It's always Satan, but what tool did Satan use this time???

[pnwguy]

May 5, 2022 15:29:43 GMT goldenvalley said:

It's always Satan, but what tool did Satan use this time???

Pedophiles.  Ketanji Brown Jackson sent young kids to sneak in the Supreme Court building and pilfer those copies.  And to reward the children, afterwards, she drank their blood.

[andydp]

Bet this wasn't the answer they wanted...


Zelenskyy shuts down Newsmax interviewer who tried to get him to say there would be no war if Trump were president


Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy shut down a Newsmax interviewer who prompted him to say that there would be no war in Ukraine if former President Donald Trump were still US president.  Zelenskyy was interviewed by Newsmax anchor Rob Schmitt in Kyiv, Ukraine's capital, on Tuesday about Russia's invasion of Ukraine.  Schmitt asked Zelenskyy: "Do you think that different American leadership, do you think that different Western leadership, may have prevented this aggression?

"There are many Americans that believe that if somebody like Donald Trump was still in the White House that this invasion would not have happened. What is your position?"

<SNIP>

I am sorry if I'll be saying something that you don't like but for us as the country in war, it doesn't matter whether its Democrats or Republicans. It's the people of the United States that support us," he said.

Zelenskyy later added: "I don't know what would happen if the president, if Donald Trump would be the president of the United States for this situation, so I cannot predict what would happen."

news.yahoo.com/zelenskyy-shuts-down-newsmax-interviewer-084435054.html?_guc_consent_skip=1654076011

[pnwguy]

Jun 1, 2022 12:36:11 GMT andydp said:

Bet this wasn't the answer they wanted...


Zelenskyy shuts down Newsmax interviewer who tried to get him to say there would be no war if Trump were president

In fairness, I don't think Putin would have invaded Ukraine in 2022, if Dumpster was president. He would have waited a year until the Dumpster had pulled out of NATO, withdrew military aid to Zelenskky, retreated US troops out of European bases, and destroyed most diplomacy with western democracies while shifting aid to autocracies like Hungary, Belarus, and Turkey.  So Putin might have needed to wait until 2023. 

[LFC]

The Washington Examiner, a long-standing right-wing propaganda rag, finally hit their breaking point. The MAGAts are furious that they told the truth for once.

When a conservative news outlet published a scathing editorial on Wednesday calling former President Donald Trump “unfit” to ever hold political power again, they surely expected to face some MAGA blowback.

But few would have expected the degree to which the Washington Examiner, a longstanding go-to conservative Beltway publication, was ripped apart by fellow conservatives, who branded the outlet as “controlled opposition” and “RINO-funded.”

“Cassidy Hutchinson’s Tuesday testimony ought to ring the death knell for former President Donald Trump’s political career,” the paper’s editorial board wrote of the former Trump aide who presented bombshell revelations to the Jan 6 committee earlier in the week. “Trump is unfit to be anywhere near power ever again.”

After publication, the Examiner’s executive editor Seth Mandel tweeted out the story, only for his post to become fodder for a pile-on from fellow conservatives.

“Just heresay [sic] for the ratio,” former Trump legal advisor Jenna Ellis fired back as the angry replies rolled into Mandel’s feed. The Examiner editor did not return The Daily Beast’s request for comment on Thursday.

Jan. 6 truther and American Greatness writer Julie Kelly also jumped into the fold, declaring: “Takes from 2015, 2016, 2017, 2018, 2019, 2020, 2022,” referencing the publication being wary of Trump in the past. “At least you guys are consistent!”

“One of the most obvious goals of Pelosi’s J6 committee was to relaunch the NeverTrump movement, to demoralize Republicans voters, and to criminalize any opposition to the regime’s policies,” wrote Mollie Hemingway, a Fox News contributor and editor-in-chief of The Federalist, taking direct aim at the Examiner. “By that measure, as editorials like this show, Pelosi’s been successful.”

From there, the right-wing outrage session only continued.

At least Newsmax know who butters their bread.

Former President Donald Trump on Thursday ran to the loving arms of Newsmax to react to his former aide Cassidy Hutchinson’s bombshell Jan. 6 testimony.

And while he predictably railed against Hutchinson throughout the interview, he also made sure to complain that Newsmax would likely cut out his complaints about the “stolen and rigged election.”

Newsmax anchor Rob Finnerty, however, obsequiously reassured the disgraced ex-president that he would “not allow that” to happen.

Not content with merely raging about Hutchinson’s testimony on his Truth Social account, Trump spent much of his Newsmax interview attacking Hutchinson as a “whack job” that he “hardly knew.” Additionally, he took shots at Fox News for “latching” onto the shocking revelations from Tuesday’s hearing, which detailed Trump’s willful attempt to orchestrate an armed coup.

“I heard Bret Baier say that which is obviously, sigh, strange. You know, I love Bret Baier,” grumbled the former president and voracious cable-news consumer.

Eventually, though, the conversation veered to Trump’s obsession over losing the 2020 election to Joe Biden and his bogus claims that widespread voter fraud was responsible for his defeat. In his opinion, the “Big Lie” should be the sole focus of the Jan. 6 committee.

“They don’t talk about any of the things that refute Jan. 6. They don’t talk about the election numbers. They don’t analyze the election,” Trump fumed. “The people were there because the election was rigged and stolen. They don’t want to do that. In fact, they don’t even want to hear that.”

He then turned his attention to Fox and Newsmax, who he believes are steering clear of election denialism due to the billion-dollar defamation lawsuits they both face from voting software firms Dominion and Smartmatic.

“And Fox doesn’t put it on and, by the way, you people don’t put it on either. You’re afraid of being sued or something,” Trump groused.

[LFC]

Newmax goes full metal self-parody.

A Newsmax host on Thursday celebrated the end of Pride Month, declaring anti-LGBTQ attacks, marginalization, discrimination, and bullying in the past, claiming Americans were required to display the LGBTQ Pride flag or risk getting "in trouble," while lamenting the concept of "pride" as exclusionary and "a negative thing."

"It's June 30. I gotta say, I'm glad that June is over. The flag, pride, whatever. What was it, Gay Pride Month, right? I mean, it was, it was too much," said Greg Kelly, a host on the far-right-wing network.

"It was just too much, everywhere. If you had a business, if you had a building, if you had a house, if you had a dog house, you had to put a flag, a gay pride flag up, or else you could be in trouble," he said falsely.

Kelly then denounced the "relentless programming," and the "celebration."

"You see, this has gotten so big, that those of us who happen to be heterosexual feel excluded, feel marginalized," Kelly insisted.

"Now, I don't want anybody to feel that way. And I do know that gay people were persecuted unfairly, they could be targeted and canceled. But that's not America anymore. That's long ago," he claimed, literally days after the U.S. Supreme Court struck down a civil right to privacy, with one Justice warning specifically that the constitutional right of same-sex couples to engage in intimate contact and to marry should be reviewed and the "error" corrected.

[LFC]

OAN is gasping for air as it's just about to lose another distributor. Maybe some right-wing fascist billionaire can bail them out and give OAN away for free to the distributors. Or not.

One America News Network is about to lose its last major TV distributor. After being removed from DirecTV in early April, the right-wing network was still aired on Verizon Fios. But with a channel-carriage contract expiring at the end of July, Verizon confirmed that the sides won't reach a deal.

"Our negotiation with OAN has been a typical, business-as-usual carriage negotiation like those that routinely happen between content distributors and content providers. These negotiations were focused on economics, as they always are, but OAN failed to agree to fair terms," Verizon said in a statement provided to Ars last night. "Since we were unable to reach an agreement, effective July 31, 2022, we will no longer have the rights to provide our customers with this programming, and it will be removed from the Fios TV lineup."

Verizon also confirmed the July 31 removal in an update posted to its website, which notes that "sometimes broadcasters and cable networks demand unacceptable price increases" that can increase customers' monthly TV bills. We contacted OAN about its removal from Verizon last night and will update this article if we get a response.

[andydp]

Today's laugh a minute:

Newsmax host praises Trump as our most athletic president.


www.facebook.com/watch/?v=1260140807858367&aggr_v_ids[0]=1260140807858367&notif_id=1659699019303147&notif_t=watch_follower_video&ref=notif

[LFC]

Aug 5, 2022 12:55:35 GMT andydp said:

Today's laugh a minute:

Newsmax host praises Trump as our most athletic president.


www.facebook.com/watch/?v=1260140807858367&aggr_v_ids[0]=1260140807858367&notif_id=1659699019303147&notif_t=watch_follower_video&ref=notif

Reminds me of the old line, "I'm in shape. Round is a shape."

[LFC]

It should come as no shock that Putin is funding this kind of stuff or that he's picked somebody in the craziest wing of the Republican Party.

Russia's state-backed media apparatus is financing four new TV programs produced by a U.S. conspiracy theorist and aimed in large part at undercutting America's image and interests in the developing world, records show.

Driving the news: American journalist Ben Swann is producing four news-style TV shows for state-backed Russian media organ TV Novosti and two other entities, the Russian firm Kart LLC and an Armenian company called Stark Industries LLC.

• Themes of the shows will include "the United States and NATO continuing to spread war around the world," "the economic warfare waged by the United States and its allies," and "transgender issues in the United States," according to foreign agent filings.

• Swann previously anchored a nightly news broadcast for CBS' Atlanta affiliate, where he aired a segment promoting the false "Pizzagate" conspiracy theory.

• He has also promoted conspiracy theories surrounding the 9/11 attacks and the Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting.

• Swann did not respond to inquiries about his new Russian-backed shows.

The filings also reveal that Swann acted as a cutout for payments to ex-employees of Russian propaganda network RT America, which also received funding from TV Novosti and shut down after Russia's invasion of Ukraine.

• Swann reported receiving more than $600,000 this year to "pay employees of [RT America production company] T&R productions who were laid off when the company suddenly closed."

[LFC]

OAN isn't dead yet as it continues to peddle lies.

OAN Brags About Airing Debunked Election Conspiracy Movie

Trump’s arguably most devoted propaganda machine proudly announced yesterday that it had secured the “television premiere” of “2000 Mules,” a fake documentary about non-existent voter fraud in the 2020 election. The movie, which is the brainchild of far-right crank Dinesh D’Souza, has been debunked over and over and over and over and over*.

I, for one, am looking forward to seeing if we’ll be treated to this helpful and legally thorough disclaimer again:

*And over and over and over.

Every "over" quoted links to another debunking. If you're interested in those go to the link provided and scroll to the bottom of TPM's Morning Memo.

[LFC]

At this point OAN is a parody of a parody.

M&M's recently added a new character to their "spokescandy" lineup (see second video below), and it happens to be purple. Mind you, every other color of the rainbow is already represented by M&M's characters (not only does their cast already include red, orange, yellow, green and blue, but brown as well), so the company's inclusion of purple is a natural.

But conservative OAN host Dan Ball was highly displeased with the color, reducing himself to a schoolyard bully as he resorted to what he thought was a low-blow by calling the candy "transgender."

"M&M's, you know, the candy we all grew up eating? Well they released their brand new character in over a decade, and the brand new character is PURPLE M&M!" he shouted scornfully. "Which is supposed to represent inclusivity and acceptance." Oh, the dread of it all.

"I think it's a female character, but I'm pretty sure they haven't said," he continued. And then in a whisper, "Maybe it's transgender." Yeah, could be. Or maybe it's just a purple peanut and chocolate M&M.

[goldenvalley]

Oct 5, 2022 22:39:24 GMT LFC said:

At this point OAN is a parody of a parody.

M&M's recently added a new character to their "spokescandy" lineup (see second video below), and it happens to be purple. Mind you, every other color of the rainbow is already represented by M&M's characters (not only does their cast already include red, orange, yellow, green and blue, but brown as well), so the company's inclusion of purple is a natural.

But conservative OAN host Dan Ball was highly displeased with the color, reducing himself to a schoolyard bully as he resorted to what he thought was a low-blow by calling the candy "transgender."

"M&M's, you know, the candy we all grew up eating? Well they released their brand new character in over a decade, and the brand new character is PURPLE M&M!" he shouted scornfully. "Which is supposed to represent inclusivity and acceptance." Oh, the dread of it all.

"I think it's a female character, but I'm pretty sure they haven't said," he continued. And then in a whisper, "Maybe it's transgender." Yeah, could be. Or maybe it's just a purple peanut and chocolate M&M.

LOL. LOL. LOL. Ridiculously stupid.

[LFC]

Typical right-wing grifter or did her tether to reality just snapped? We report, you decide.

Nearly a year after she was kicked to the curb by Fox News for essentially calling Dr. Anthony Fauci a Nazi, Lara Logan was on Newsmax’s primetime airwaves pushing QAnon tropes, invoking blood libel, and fear-mongering about a “global cabal” planning to “dilute the pool of patriots” in the United States with “100 million illegal immigrants.”

Logan, a one-time award-winning reporter for CBS News, has embraced baseless conspiracy theories in an apparent effort to remake herself as a far-right pundit. Her increasingly unhinged rhetoric, though, eventually resulted in Fox News distancing itself from her and the loss of her series on the network’s streaming service.

In recent weeks, however, Newsmax has showcased the former 60 Minutes correspondent, featuring her prominently on ex-Fox News host Eric Bolling’s primetime program. He once again welcomed her on as his lead guest Wednesday night, this time to discuss New York City’s handling of migrants who’ve been bussed in from Texas and other red states.

Logan, who once called migrants “a virus bomb” on America, immediately kicked off the segment by casually accusing the White House of importing immigrants in an effort to “incite” violence from the right.

“It’s really interesting because we live in a moment where you can see all over the place that this administration is desperate to incite some kind of event,” she declared. “Incite people to act that will prove the lie of white terrorism and white supremacy in America today and give them an excuse to crack down. They need a Reichstag fire.”

After invoking the Nazis' rise to power and agreeing with Bolling that asylum-seeking migrants are being treated better than American citizens, Logan then insisted that she had proof that there was a worldwide plot to fully implement the “Great Replacement” theory in the United States. (The racist notion, which has now made its way to mainstream conservatives and Republicans, asserts that liberals are trying to “replace” white voters in Western countries with compliant non-white immigrants.)

“Meanwhile, these people are coming in freeloading, so you divide the population, and then you conquer them,” Bolling exclaimed, invoking the theory. “Then you get them to agree, get your side to agree, to give these people voting rights. Then you never, ever, see a conservative holding office again.”

Logan, of course, took it several steps further, repeating an unhinged claim she made on Newsmax’s far-right competitor One America News last month.

“And you’re 100 percent right, Eric, but you know what? It’s even bigger than that,” she replied. “Because I spoke to a man who was actually holding the documents in his hand. He told me about it, right? He said he infiltrated the global cabal at the U.N. level, right? And one of the things that he was able to tell me about, from his own personal experience, what he witnessed himself was these documents that showed the time there is a plan, and this was several years ago.”

Logan continued: “The plan was to infiltrate 100 million illegal immigrants, and at that point, there were already 40 million, and these people would dilute what they called the pool of patriots. Their words, right? And they would not be taught that America is a great country and trained to sing the national anthem with pride, and so on and so on. They would be taught all the negative things that we’re told about the U.S. today that our own children are taught.”

But the former Fox Nation host wasn’t done—not by a long shot.

[LFC]

Dafuq? Has Newsmax decided that it's not worth riding this particular mythical pony anymore?

During his Newsmax appearance on Wednesday night, D-list actor turned far-right pundit Kevin Sorbo was asked to react to The View’s Joy Behar mocking former President Donald Trump’s recent 2024 presidential campaign announcement. Behar, a vocal Trump critic, said Trump looked “defeated” while comparing him to Mussolini.

“I was there last night. I was at Mar-a-Lago,” Sorbo replied. “I was fourth-row center and I tell you what—that was the most presidential speech he’s given. I mean, seriously. I thought that this was awesome. I’m not surprised he’s coming back.”

While the former Hercules star had nothing but gushing praise for the speech, some of Trump’s own family didn’t even bother to show up at Mar-a-Lago on Tuesday night. Many in attendance tried to head for the exits before the ex-president even wrapped up his remarks.

Additionally, only one GOP lawmaker was in attendance—and that congressman will soon be out of office. Trump’s announcement was also met with resistance from a number of Republican officials and right-wing media outlets. Heck, even one-time White House shadow chief of staff Sean Hannity cut away from Trump’s speech.

Sorbo, echoing the twice-impeached former president, then asserted that both the 2020 presidential election and this year’s midterm results were fraudulent.

“I am a voter denial. There was definitely fraud in this election, as there was two years ago,” Sorbo flatly stated.

Newsmax fill-in host Lidia Curanaj, however, interjected and quickly changed the subject. “Well, we don’t have any proof of that,” she exclaimed. “And we’re going to look forward. We’re going to look forward and focus on the policies and the positivity of America.”

[LFC]

OAN's lawsuit against DirectTV isn't going so well. Funny how a champion of "FREEDUMB!" thinks it's OK to force a private company to pay them for their content even if that company has decided they don't want it.

One America News Network's owner lost a key ruling in a lawsuit against DirecTV over the TV provider's decision to drop OAN from its channel lineup. OAN-owner Herring Networks had sued DirecTV and its owner AT&T in March 2022, claiming breach of contract.

The lawsuit always seemed like an uphill battle for Herring Networks because DirecTV didn't take OAN off the air while they still had a carriage agreement. Instead, DirecTV waited until the carriage agreement expired and chose not to renew it.

Most of OAN's claims were thrown out in a ruling issued last week by Judge John Meyer of California Superior Court in San Diego County. DirecTV had filed an anti-SLAPP (strategic lawsuits against public participation) motion to strike the Herring Networks complaint; DirecTV's motion was granted in part and denied in part.

"As to the breach of the implied covenant claim, to the extent it is based on the non-renewal of the Affiliation Agreement, the claim fails because the agreement contains a fixed expiration date and no provision entitling Herring to a renewal," the ruling said.

[LFC]

Newsmax is also being dumped by DirectTV. They went full metal victim and, of course, lied. And Congressional Republicans have, of course, parroted those lies. So much for belief in the free market. Maybe Sinclair can dig into their own pockets and pick up some of their programming.

In the span of days, Newsmax has successfully turned a standard fee dispute with a pay-TV provider into a political football, convincing Congress to threaten DirecTV with hearings for dropping the pro-Trump network.

Since the satellite carrier pulled Newsmax from its lineup last week, the channel has flooded its airwaves with anti-DirecTV rants accusing the company and its corporate partner AT&T of “political discrimination” against conservatives while urging viewers to cancel the companies’ products.

At the same time, Newsmax has relentlessly aired a series of spurious claims about the remaining content on DirecTV’s lineup, repeatedly insisting that the provider is paying “22 liberal news channels” while refusing to offer any license fees to Newsmax. Asserting that it’s the “fourth highest-rated cable news network” in America, the channel has also groused that its viewership dwarfs “most” of these nearly two dozen left-leaning stations—yet DirecTV will not fairly compensate the right-wing news channel.

Much of what’s been said by Newsmax about the failed DirecTV deal, which has been parroted by Republicans on Capitol Hill, ranges from misleading to outright false.

The full-court press has worked with the GOP, who had already promised to hold investigations into anti-conservative bias in media and Big Tech even before winning a slim majority in the House last year. Days after House Republicans pressured DirecTV to pay Newsmax “fair and equitable” fees while accusing the company of “colluding” with Democrats to censor conservative speech, their colleagues in the Senate followed suit.

“The silencing of conservative speech at the request of government officials is a direct assault on free speech and a threat to democracy,” the letter, written by Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) and three other senators, reads.

Additionally, the lawmakers’ warnings to DirecTV have echoed many of the same claims Newsmax and its CEO Chris Ruddy have made over and over again.

[LFC]

Nice embrace of white supremacy on Newsmax. Gee, I wonder why DirectTV doesn't want to pay for them.

Newsmax host and serial plagiarist Benny Johnson was so mad that “Lift Every Voice and Sing” was performed at this year’s Super Bowl that he demanded the hymn—often referred to as the Black national anthem—be made “illegal.”

The right-wing edgelord was grateful, however, that other conservatives were just as upset as he was about the “woke culture” on display at the big game, specifically praising GOP gubernatorial loser Kari Lake for refusing to stand when the song was played.

Johnson, who also serves as chief creative officer for MAGA student group Turning Point USA, devoted a good portion of his Monday podcast to railing against the NFL’s decision to play the song, which was performed by actress Sheryl Lee Ralph. (Her performance preceded both “America the Beautiful” and “The Star-Spangled Banner,” which was sung by country star Chris Stapleton.)

“Sports is woke culture, and it's really repugnant to me, and so I don't follow sports super closely,” Johnson exclaimed on The Benny Show, as first flagged by liberal media monitoring group Media Matters. “That being said, I do watch the Super Bowl for cultural moments like the Black national anthem being sung. How the hell is this even a thing?!”

He continued: “What a repugnant, degenerate thing to do, to split up a national anthem by race. That is antithetical, of course, to America. It should, quite frankly, be illegal. You shouldn't be able to do that. Is there a white national anthem? I'm not sure anyone would be very happy with that being sung.”

The right-wing culture warrior, meanwhile, brought up Lake performatively sitting down at State Farm Stadium while Ralph sang. “Kari Lake was in the event last night in the stadium. She refused to stand for the Black national anthem; good for her,” he proclaimed about the election-denying provocateur.

“Nobody should stand for the Black national—,” Johnson added before catching himself. “There shouldn't be a Black national anthem because America is a country that is founded upon all of us being created equal, regardless of the melanin amount in your skin or where your ancestors were raised.”

[pnwguy]

Feb 14, 2023 17:19:42 GMT LFC said:

Nice embrace of white supremacy on Newsmax. Gee, I wonder why DirectTV doesn't want to pay for them.

 “There shouldn't be a Black national anthem because America is a country that is founded upon all of us being created equal, regardless of the melanin amount in your skin or where your ancestors were raised.”

Indeed!  But those founders thought an excess of melanin should be discounted by 40 percent for population purposes.

[goldenvalley]

[LFC]

This just amuses me.

[goldenvalley]

Mar 9, 2023 20:42:43 GMT LFC said:

This just amuses me.

It's funny but is it smart?  Just so they can say but our reporters, pundits, and management really like Trump...even as they settled their case with Dominion by admitting the stuff they aired was untrue? 

[LFC]

Mar 9, 2023 21:32:32 GMT goldenvalley said:

It's funny but is it smart?  Just so they can say but our reporters, pundits, and management really like Trump...even as they settled their case with Dominion by admitting the stuff they aired was untrue? 

MAGAts are the demographic they're competing for and they love Trump. This is catnip. Things that require thought and knowledge, like the lawsuit being settled, go down the memory hole if Faux is caught trashing Lord God Mangoman.

[LFC]

DirectTV is putting Newsmax back on. Too bad. Of course they always said it was about the money Newsmax was demanding, not the toxic content they spewed out.

Two months after dumping Newsmax instead of paying a new fee, DirecTV has reached a deal to put the conservative news network back in the satellite provider's channel lineup.

Newsmax had waged an aggressive public relations campaign against DirecTV. "This is a blatant act of political discrimination and censorship against Newsmax," Newsmax CEO Christopher Ruddy said on January 25 in an article on the network's website.

Newsmax changed its tune today when announcing the deal that will put Newsmax back on DirecTV starting tomorrow. "While we raised the issue of censorship relating to our removal, we now believe in DirecTV's commitment to distributing diverse viewpoints, including conservative ones," Newsmax said in a statement provided to Ars.

Ruddy provided a statement for DirecTV's press release today, saying that "Newsmax recognizes and appreciates that DirecTV clearly supports diverse voices, including conservative ones."

DirecTV said in an announcement today that "Newsmax will be available on DirecTV, DirecTV Stream, and U-verse at no additional cost to customers." This seems to suggest that if DirecTV is paying Newsmax anything under the new deal, it's a much smaller amount than Newsmax requested.