Faux News Just Can't Help Being Faux News

[goldenvalley]

Jun 27, 2022 15:37:53 GMT goldenvalley said:

Jun 27, 2022 15:21:00 GMT LFC said:

WTF? Have the Murdochs decided that Trump's expiration date is coming on fast?

Does anyone speak for the Murdochs? Or has Kilmeade decided he needs to separate himself from Trump like so many around Trump did back then, to tell himself that his hands were clean? He was taken in by a guy who suddenly went mad. News from the Select Committee and the book by former DoD head Esper that just came out may have penetrated Kilmeade's consciousness to the point where he realizes complete backing of all things Trump may make Kilmeade look bad (even to himself).

[LFC]

Just Faux being a bit of Faux.

Fox News host Harris Faulkner declined to correct Rep. Kat Cammack (R-FL) after she suggested that Joe Biden might not be the president of the United States.

Faulkner kicked off a Tuesday segment by slamming Biden for making a "gaffe" as he spoke about a recent mass shooting in Highland Park, Illinois. Biden said that authorities had not released the name of the alleged shooter but a person of interest had been named by the time he spoke.

"He also had to read off a card," Faulkner said, letting out a dramatic sigh. "We put so much on the shoulders of our leaders. And I don't think that's unfair. He wanted the job and he's got it now."

"Yes," Cammack agreed. "Think about this, Harris. They supposedly campaigned for this job, supposedly 81 million people voted and this is what we have, a bumbling, stumbling, so-called commander-in-chief."

Faulkner did not correct Cammack's suggestion that Biden might not be the legitimate president.

[LFC]

Two people on Faux News argued about who they should hate. It's so difficult to make sure you're hating all the right people.

During a roundtable discussion Tuesday on the Fox News show The Five, co-host Greg Gutfeld suggested that immigrants could replace “worthless white wokesters’—and Judge Jeanine Pirro was seriously triggered.

On the topic of immigration, primarily through the southern border, Gutfeld said the U.S. should not “be dissuading good, decent people from coming here.”

“True, it may just be for a paycheck, but that’s often just to start. We are talking about largely God-fearing, family-centric people who aren’t afraid of a day’s hard work,” he said. “They are, in short, the complete and utter opposite of what is dripping out of our campuses like coagulated pimple juice.”

“Would a guy or a girl from Guatemala burn an American flag when they come here? No, they’re happy to be here. Would a young Hispanic couple be OK with drag queens in kindergarten? Hell no,” Gutfeld claimed. “I say bring them in. Trade them for the worthless white wokesters that are destroying this country. That’s my replacement theory,” he concluded with a smile.

There were no smiles from Pirro, who called the situation at the border an “invasion,” just as leaders in a handful of Texas border counties did earlier in the day.

“The problem is not just what’s happening to them on the way here,” Pirro said, bringing to mind how more than 50 migrants died last month after being trapped in an abandoned tractor-trailer outside San Antonio. “The problem is what is going on once they get here.”

“The people who are coming here—and I won’t say they are good, bad or indifferent—I don’t know who they are. I want to know what their record is, I want to know who’s a drug dealer. I want to know who’s a pedophile… I want to know all this stuff.”

“And it’s not funny, Greg,” Pirro continued. “The truth is, they are destroying this country.”

[LFC]

Do they just make this shit up on the fly or is there a right-wing backroom shit factory that makes sure there's a steady supply? Or both?

Fox News host Emily Compagno, while downplaying criticism that women’s rights are under assault in the United States, claimed this week that pregnant Kenyan women are not only denied voting rights but are also prevented from physically leaving their homes.

It didn’t take long, though, for actual Kenyans to call out her comments as misleading and demand the host and network issue a correction.

Despite the backlash, however, Compagno isn’t backing down, instead citing an unsourced website to make her case.

I read it on the internet? Reeeaaalllyyy?

[LFC]

Still crazy after all these years. I love the projection. Dude, the KKK is YOUR base, not the liberals'.

Fox News’ The Five on Thursday took on the “woke insanity” of the largest teachers union in the country, the National Education Association (NEA), which co-host Greg Gutfeld labeled “the KKK with summers off.”

The conversation then shifted to the more general role the NEA plays in the lives of public school students, with Gutfeld criticizing the union for its stance on “school choice.”

“Anybody at this point who opposes school choice is protecting a destructive system that harms minorities who don’t have other options, and that makes them truly racist oppressors. The NEA is the KKK with summers off. It’s true. They’re racist,” claimed Gutfeld, who once scoffed at comparing the white supremacist hate group with Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE).

No mention that private charter schools, a big part of the supposed solution, statistically don't perform better than public schools despite being able to cherry pick their student body. Also no mention of the potential taxpayer costs when a charter or private school goes bankrupt (not uncommon) and the public school has to absorb those students back in.

[goldenvalley]

Jul 8, 2022 16:18:50 GMT LFC said:

Still crazy after all these years. I love the projection. Dude, the KKK is YOUR base, not the liberals'.

Fox News’ The Five on Thursday took on the “woke insanity” of the largest teachers union in the country, the National Education Association (NEA), which co-host Greg Gutfeld labeled “the KKK with summers off.”

The conversation then shifted to the more general role the NEA plays in the lives of public school students, with Gutfeld criticizing the union for its stance on “school choice.”

“Anybody at this point who opposes school choice is protecting a destructive system that harms minorities who don’t have other options, and that makes them truly racist oppressors. The NEA is the KKK with summers off. It’s true. They’re racist,” claimed Gutfeld, who once scoffed at comparing the white supremacist hate group with Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE).

No mention that private charter schools, a big part of the supposed solution, statistically don't perform better than public schools despite being able to cherry pick their student body. Also no mention of the potential taxpayer costs when a charter or private school goes bankrupt (not uncommon) and the public school has to absorb those students back in.

Don't let the facts get in the way of a good rant!

[LFC]

The jobs market remains strong. Faux News really, really hates that. Bonus points for side defense of Putin.

The United States economy continues to defy growing recession fears that have been sparked by record-high inflation and surging gas prices, adding a better-than-expected 372,000 jobs in June while the unemployment rate held steady at 3.6 percent.

Following the release of Friday’s strong jobs report, though, Fox News appeared taken aback by the growth before eventually spinning the plentiful number of job opportunities as “America’s employment crisis.”

Just ahead of Friday morning’s release of the monthly employment numbers, for example, the network prepped its viewers to expect more bad news for President Joe Biden.

“The White House is bracing for what’s expected to be an underwhelming jobs report in a little over two hours,” host Carley Shimkus stated on morning flagship show Fox & Friends. “The data is expected to show the weakest jobs growth since April 2021. But press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre trying to shift the narrative. She insists the Biden economy is the strongest in our nation’s history but confesses that gas prices are out of control despite putting the blame on Vladimir Putin.”

Two hours later, after Fox News anchor Julie Banderas told the network’s audience that the latest jobs report beat expectations, Trump-boosting Fox Business anchor Maria Bartiromo was brought on to provide analysis of the numbers. And in her opinion the report showed that America is dealing with the “tightest jobs market” in recent history.

“We’re talking about this concern from employers now for several months, the fact this is the tightest jobs market they’ve ever seen pushing wages up,” she told anchor Bill Hemmer on America’s Newsroom. “372,000 jobs much better than the expectation. So many people are questioning how it is possible that we can generate 372,000 jobs even in potentially a recession, which is where we are potentially right now.”

Bartiromo would go on to stoke concerns that both inflation and gas prices will continue to rise, even though she admitted that “commodities have come off the highs,” adding that we are in “an economy that’s slowing despite job growth.”

Hemmer, meanwhile, noted that there are currently around 11 million job openings and that “if you want to work in America, you can.” While making these remarks, the program aired a graphic that blared “America’s Employment Crisis” while contrasting the number of available jobs with the number of unemployed workers, which is estimated at 5.9 million.

Continuing to express pessimism that the job market will sustain this level of growth, Bartiromo concluded that “we’ll see if this is the last strong report that we see before evidence of a recession.” Hemmer, while praising Bartiromo’s “great analysis,” wondered aloud if “we’re dipping or dropping or going the other way.”

The following hour on Fox News’ The Faulkner Focus, another Fox Business anchor also poured cold water on the employment numbers, suggesting that they were indicative of increased inflation and a weakening economy on the verge of recession.

[LFC]

The coded white supremacy / nationalism at Faux has long since collapsed into the blatantly obvious. That stance is not just being displayed by Tuckums.

Fox News dedicated a segment on Sunday to complaining that Thomas Jefferson’s Monticello plantation makes visitors feel bad by educating them on true aspects of American history.

“Fox & Friends” weekend hosts Rachel Campos-Duffy and Pete Hegseth brought up an article published in the New York Post Saturday that accused the Charlottesville, Virginia, home of the Founding Father of “going woke” and offering visitors “a harangue on the horrors of slavery.”

Jefferson owned more than 600 people in his lifetime, including 400 who were enslaved at Monticello. The estate is owned by the nonprofit Thomas Jefferson Foundation, which works to preserve its history and educate people about the third American president.

According to Hegseth, Monticello is now all about “how terrible Thomas Jefferson was because he was a slave owner” and presents a “one-sided point of view that makes Thomas Jefferson a bad guy in his own home.”

Campos-Duffy complained that there is a sign in the museum that questions if Jefferson’s line in the Declaration of Independence that “all men are created equal” is being lived up to in the U.S. today.

She also took issue with an international bestselling anti-racism book for sale in the gift shop.

“All of these sort of books that are damning of America and suggesting that we’re still a racist country are for sale in the gift shop,” she added.

In another segment, Campos-Duffy argued that there were slaves throughout human history, but people shouldn’t be “ashamed” of leaders who owned them.

“I get that. It’s a terrible history we should talk about, but we should not feel guilty or ashamed of our leaders when we go and visit the people who brought us the Constitution, the Declaration of Independence. You leave feeling that way,” she said.

[LFC]

Update on that last post from TPM. The guy who Faux had on to complain about "wokeism" at Monticello? A full blown racist who has been on the front lines of spreading hate for decades. This isn't some crank who posts on Facebook or 8chan sometimes. He's the guy who wrote the racist crap for Ron Paul's newsletters.

[andydp]

With all the "pivoting" I'm surprised Fox people can stand up straight.

High gas prices: Biden's fault and bad for the economy.

Low gas prices: Biden's fault hurting mom and pop gas stations.

Fox News Pivots to Concern for Gas Stations as Prices Drop

Days after spinning June’s strong jobs report as “America’s employment crisis,” Fox News is now concerned that the month-long drop in sky-high fuel costs could potentially be a bad thing for “mom-and-pop gas stations.”

As gas prices surged during the first half of the year, Fox News relentlessly blamed the White House for the increased pain at the pump, claiming it was due to President Joe Biden deliberately harming the oil industry and his decision to shut down the uncompleted Keystone XL pipeline. (The actual reasons for the sharp increase were, of course, a bit more complicated.)

While the network was all over the price increases, it was slow to acknowledge the steady price drop at the pump over the past month. According to both GasBuddy and the American Automobile Association, the price average national price of a gallon of regular unleaded gas has dropped nearly 40 cents since hitting its peak of $5.02.


www.yahoo.com/news/fox-news-pivots-concern-gas-204808754.html

[goldenvalley]

Jul 13, 2022 12:29:02 GMT andydp said:

With all the "pivoting" I'm surprised Fox people can stand up straight.

Easy peasy. As long as you start with the premise that anything bad that happens is the fault of the president who claims the D designation, the copy just writes itself.  

[LFC]

Hannity whined that Biden got a less virulent strain of COVID than Trump and that he didn't mention that. Classic.

Sean Hannity took President Joe Biden to task on his show Wednesday, something that’s obviously not new. What did the Fox News personality get all bent out of shape about this time? Hannity is apparently upset that President Biden got a weaker variant of covid-19 than President Donald Trump, the big strong man who barely survived his bout with the disease in 2020, according to many reports.

“What Joe failed to mention is the current variant, which is BA.5, the dominant variant of the omicron is much, much weaker than the original strain that infected then-President Trump,” Hannity said on his show Wednesday night.

The comparison by Hannity, first spotted by Mediaite, was prompted by news Wednesday that Biden has recovered from covid-19 after five days of isolating with relatively mild symptoms. Biden, who contracted the BA.5 subvariant of omicron, is vaccinated and double boosted.

“What’s different now is our ability to protect ourselves from serious illness due to covid,” Biden said in an address that was livestreamed on YouTube.

“In fact, that’s radically different today than it was just a year ago. Covid isn’t gone, but even with cases climbing in this country, covid deaths are down nearly 90%,” Biden said.

The U.S. reported 227,253 new cases of covid-19 on Wednesday and 824 new deaths, according to the New York Times.

Biden had noted his vaccination status and the availability of the antiviral Paxlovid, which was also not available when Trump was in office in remarks earlier this week. Biden didn’t appear to necessarily be taking credit for the development of the vaccine or antivirals, he was just noting that these tools have brought the mortality rate for covid-19 way down and they’re important for all Americans to take seriously if they want to avoid serious symptoms and even death should they get the disease.

“When my predecessor got covid he had to get helicoptered to Walter Reed Medical Center. He was severely ill. Thankfully, he recovered. When I got covid, I worked from upstairs of the White House and the offices upstairs and for that five-day period,” said Biden.

[LFC]

Man, it must be tough to have to pre-suck Trump's dick when you're going to deliver an inconvenient fact. No wonder Faux News usually just avoids facts altogether.

“Fox and Friends” co-host Brian Kilmeade tried to preemptively shield his show from ex-President Donald Trump’s wrath in an extremely dignified display on Thursday morning.

“Fox and Friends” co-host Steve Doocy read aloud a new CNN poll showing that 55 percent of GOP/GOP-leaning voters wanted someone other than Trump to run in 2024, up six points from CNN’s previous poll on the issue at the beginning of the year.

And so, Kilmeade interjected to make sure it was well-understood by any certain, idk, ex-presidents who may be tuning in to the show that “Fox and Friends” is not, repeat not, responsible for those unhappy figures.

“If the former president’s watching, you should know, those are just the numbers you’re relaying,” Kilmeade told his co-host. “You didn’t come up with those numbers.”

An awkward Doocy said that it was an interesting poll regardless, and “that’s why we just talked about it.”

“And they are right as often as Halley’s Comet comes by,” Kilmeade snarked.

Doocy, visibly taken aback by the extent of the lickspittling going on on the other side of the couch, checked to make sure his co-host wasn’t trying to discredit their own show on air.

“So you’re just saying all we talked about for the last four minutes is not accurate?” Doocy asked.

“I’m just saying, Donald Trump is watching,” Kilmeade replied. “And if Donald Trump is watching, just let him know we didn’t come up with that number. That’s what the poll said.”

[LFC]

Should Democrats Even Bother Going on Fox News?

For Buttigieg, going on Fox News is “a no-brainer,” Lis Smith, author of Any Given Tuesday: A Political Love Story and senior adviser for Buttigieg’s 2020 presidential campaign, told Molly Jong-Fast on this week’s episode of The New Abnormal.

“On that campaign, going on Fox was an absolute no-brainer,” Smith explains. “First of all, there’s this idea that no Democrats watch Fox, which is completely, completely misguided. About a third of all Democrats get their news from Fox News. It’s the same across racial demographics: white Democrats, Latino Democrats, Black Democrats. And the Fox News audience, as we know, is monumentally larger than both CNN and MSNBC. You do reach a large number of Democrats.”

Smith said that when Buttigieg appeared on Fox News’ town hall in 2019, “there were 1.1 million viewers for the town hall, which was three or four times the audience that we had for any of his CNN or MSNBC town halls.

“He didn’t go on and spew Republican talking points. If anything, he gave really important counter-programming to the Fox News audience. And that’s why I believe Democrats should go on because while we know that some of their hosts might be acting in bad faith, a lot of their viewers aren’t, and that’s the only way that they get their news. And that’s the only way they’re ever gonna hear from Democrats.”

[LFC]

Faux News isn't interested in allowing Jon Stewart to appear and discuss the Senate Republicans' blocking of life saving veterans benefits that they previously supported simply because they're butthurt. I'm not shocked. There's no way that the Republicans come out looking good over this so they'll just hide as best they can.

Jon Stewart said in an interview Thursday night that Fox News “refused” to book him for an interview to comment on GOP senators late Wednesday voting down legislation expanding health care for veterans affected by toxins while serving. “There is an information silo. I was lucky enough to get a hold of Newsmax this morning and go on there. [That] might have been the first time those viewers have ever heard about it,” Stewart told MSNBC host Mehdi Hasan. “Fox News—they refused to put me on all day. We have been begging them to get on the air all day long so that we can finally bring along some possible accountability to these senators.” The former host of The Daily Show made his presence known on multiple fronts Thursday. Referring to Republicans while speaking outside the Senate, an irate Stewart asked, “How are these people human?” On Friday morning, a Fox News spokesperson emailed: “We have welcomed Jon Stewart on our programs many times to spotlight his critical work with veterans and 9/11 first responders and look forward to having him on America’s Newsroom today at 10:30 AM.”

[LFC]

There's no doubt that Manchin has pissed me off to no end for the past year and a half but I have to give him props for his interview on Faux News. He took no shit, calling out his interviewer Harris Faulkner for repeating a lie about the tax provisions in the Democrats' bill.

U.S. Senator Joe Manchin (D-WV) dismantled the false claims of a top Fox News host who claimed the Democrats' Inflation Reduction Act legislation will raise taxes on Americans making under $400,000 a year.

"That's a lie. That is a pure outright lie," the West Virginia Democratic Senator told Fox News' Harris Faulkner Tuesday when she claimed, "I'm saying Americans $400,000 and below now are going to be taxed."

That $400,000 number is critical to Fox News. It refers to a campaign promise President Joe Biden made before the election, stating his economic plan would not raise taxes on couples making $400,000 or less, ever.

Manchin turned the populist tables on her. Do you really want to defend some of the largest companies, with ultra-rich owners and major shareholders, not having to pay any taxes?

Faulkner quoted the Joint Committee on Taxation's claim that the Biden-Schumer legislation will raise taxes, a claim Fox News' Peter Doocy made on Monday. White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre told him the claim was "not correct." Manchin explained to Faulkner the Joint Committee's report was only written by Republicans.

"So that is unfair, so let's be accurate, what we're doing here. The bottom line is how in the world can you be 'raising taxes' when all we're saying is the wealthiest corporations in America, 55 of them pay zero to help this great country of ours to defend ourselves."

Faulkner, scrambling to maintain her false claim, challenged Manchin.

"Well how does this change that, because that's part of the corporate structuring?"

"It's a minimum of 15%," Manchin explained, stating that corporations instead of paying zero dollars in taxes would by law be required to pay at minimum 15%.

"The tax rate was at 35% before 2017," he continued, offering some history. "Then it went to 21%. That was a tremendous savings, but that's not good enough" for the corporations and the GOP, Manchin said. "All we're saying is at 15% minimum, everyone in West Virginia I know and most people around the country pay a 21% corporate or greater. So why can't the greatest billion dollars of revenue a year, why can't they pay at least 15% for this great country?"

Faulkner then suggested if corporations, like Archer Daniels Midland, Charter Communications, FedEx, and Nike which have a history of paying zero taxes, have to pay a 15% minimum tax, it could lead to higher unemployment – before going back to her false claim that the bill raises taxes on those making under $400,000 a year.

Then he put another one right between her beady little lying eyes.

"So their taxes are not going to go up?" she asked.

"Not at all," Manchin again stated. "And you know, one thing, how about the people that are going to be saving as far as on their Medicare $288 billion who were paying higher prices than they should?"

It doesn't sound like she wanted to touch Medicare recipients saving big bucks on their prescriptions.

And Manchin really dug the knife in here. Note the meaningless defenses she tossed out. Her father served? WTF does that have to do with anything? So did Michael Flynn and multiple Jan 6 insurrectionists, asshole.

At one point, Manchin questioned Faulkner about why she seemed so opposed to what he described as a moderate deal that didn't exclusively rely on green energy sources and that didn't raise taxes on anyone making under $400,000 a year.

"Harris, are you afraid we’re going to do something good that’ll help our country?" Manchin asked her.

Faulkner was immediately taken aback by this remark.

"Of course not, my father served!" she said indignantly. "Are you kidding? Service is in the Bible! That's what we do, we serve our fellow man and woman! Don't make this personal because it's not!"

[LFC]

Wow, this is some serious pretzel making.

The Labor Department dropped a surprising monthly jobs report for July on Friday showing that U.S. employers added a whopping 528,000 jobs last month while unemployment dropped to 3.5 percent, bringing employment back to its pre-pandemic level.

Now allow Fox News to explain how President Joe Biden and the White House screwed up here.

“America’s Newsroom” opened its segment on the report with a clip of White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre telling reporters on Thursday that the Biden administration expected that the incoming employment report would put the number of new jobs at 150,000.

Wrong! Job growth was actually way better than that! The White House was wrong!

“White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre yesterday predicting a cooler job report that might tame inflation, but number’s going in the opposite direction,” Fox News host Mike Emanuel said after the clip.

Underneath Emanuel was a chyron declaring “WH MISSES FORECAST ON LOWER JULY JOBS GROWTH.”

However, the White House hadn’t missed the forecast any more than Fox Business did on Thursday, when former Trump economics adviser Kevin Hassett, appearing as a guest on fellow ex-Trump adviser Larry Kudlow’s show, claimed the report would show employment “way on the downside” at only around 100,000 jobs.

If there's anything that screams "Bad Analysis Approaching!" it's Kevin Hasset on with Larry Kudlow. How's that Dow 36,000 comin', Kevin? It's only 13 years out and we've just kissed it a couple of times.

[LFC]

Hannity's Trump taint tonguing strategy seems to be failing as his ratings fall in favor of Tucker "The Kind, Gentler Face of White Christian Nationalism and Fascism" Carlson.

Oh, how the mighty have fallen.

During the Trump administration, Sean Hannity was on top of the world. With the ouster of his longtime Fox News colleague and nemesis Bill O’Reilly in April 2017 over sexual misconduct allegations, Hannity quickly rose from second fiddle to the most-watched host in cable news. And he stayed there for years.

Not only was the veteran Fox News host pulling in nearly four million viewers every night while cheerleading for Donald Trump, but he was also widely considered the then-president’s shadow chief of staff. When Trump wasn’t calling into his show for an “exclusive” interview, Hannity was ringing the president late at night and serving as an informal adviser.

But toward the end of Trump’s term, Tucker Carlson—who essentially replaced O’Reilly in primetime—supplanted Hannity as the top dog at Fox News. Conservative cable viewers seemed far more interested in Carlson’s brand of taking Trumpism’s far-right nationalism, fervent anti-immigrant rhetoric, and COVID trutherism and running with it over Hannity’s increasingly stale Trump boosterism (and insatiable Hillary Clinton obsession).

And the longer Hannity—now the longest-running cable news host in history—has traversed a post-Trump world, the further he’s tumbled down the ratings mountaintop.

“We are the envy of every other network in having to compete with ourselves after beating everything else in cable, but no other host in the industry has the longevity and staying power of Sean Hannity,” wrote a network spokesperson. “FOX News Media is beyond proud that his number one show at 9PM is an integral part of our primetime lineup and a pivotal part of our success for 26 years.”

Having already risen to a solid third place in Fox News viewership by the 2020 election, the late-afternoon panel show The Five—featuring popular Fox News veterans Greg Gutfeld and Jesse Watters—eventually passed Hannity for second place in August 2021, and hasn’t looked back since. In fact, the culture war-driven gabfest has even overtaken Tucker Carlson Tonight as the most-watched show in all of cable news. (Carlson’s show, however, regularly draws more viewers in the coveted 25-54 advertising demographic.)

[LFC]

Hannity throws a temper tantrum over the FBI not being Republican lackeys.

Fox News personality Sean Hannity suddenly thinks that the FBI sucks, actually, after the FBI executed a raid on ex-President Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago resort earlier this week.

During his program on Wednesday night, Hannity accused the FBI – which he apparently had previously “revered” for “decades” – of “blatantly targeting our fellow Americans for their political beliefs” and claimed that the bureau’s “reputation has been shattered.”

“If you listen to my radio show, watch this show, you know my love of law enforcement, it has now been pretty much utterly destroyed,” the Fox host declared.

Hannity’s newfound disillusionment with the FBI reflects the 180 supposed back-the-blue conservatives have spun in their outrage over the bombshell raid on Mar-a-Lago, where agents seized boxes of White House records that Trump had improperly squirreled away.

“DEFUND THE FBI” Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA) screeched via Twitter on Monday.

[LFC]

Jesse Waters proves himself to be just another sexually stunted and obsessed employee at Faux News. With the number of them who got booted and Tucker's clearly homoerotic obsession it's no surprise to just add another to the list. The people at Faux News are just SOOOOO f***ed up.

Jesse Watters Is Weirdly Horny About FBI Raid

Fox News host Jesse Watters won’t stop serving one very specific, very thirsty take on the FBI raiding Mar-a-Lago:

[goldenvalley]

That think about bugs in the bedroom is so Russian spying.  I remember reading an interview with an American journalist who lived with his family in Moscow for a number of years. He said he'd come home after he and his family were gone for the day to find some sort of porn in his bedroom.  This came up in the context of the "pee" tape and prompted him to say his experience made a pee tape sound plausible.

[LFC]

Dafuq? Is this nitwit actually realizing that he and his co-workers are going to get people killed? Has he found a shred of something resembling a conscience?

Fox & Friends co-host Steve Doocy flipped the script on Thursday morning, pushing back on House Minority Whip Steve Scalise’s wild suggestion that FBI agents went “rogue” in executing a court-approved search warrant at former President Donald Trump’s residence.

Doocy further took issue with the immediate “rush to judgment” made by Scalise and other conservatives, asking if they could at least “wait a week” before determining that the FBI is “crazy.”

Fox News has engaged in a full-scale meltdown since Trump’s Mar-a-Lago estate was raided by FBI agents on Monday, reportedly because investigators were tipped off that Trump was hiding classified documents on the property. The network—in effect, proving wrong the narrative that it was distancing itself from the ex-president—has since peddled baseless conspiracy theories and unhinged rhetoric to boost Trump’s claims that the Justice Department has been “weaponized” against him and conservatives.

In recent days, the irresponsible speculation and dangerous incitement on the network have ramped up to extreme levels. Several Fox hosts and guests, for instance, have pushed the fabricated allegation that the FBI “planted evidence” in materials they took from Trump’s home. Additionally, the channel’s stars have stoked outrage over the judge who signed the warrant, who has received threats on his life from far-right extremists.

While Doocy’s Fox & Friends colleagues have helped fuel the network’s round-the-clock rage-fest on the Trump raid, Doocy took a remarkably different tack on Thursday morning while interviewing Scalise.

After the Republican lawmaker said the DOJ must be held “accountable” because the department wants “to trample over the Constitution,” Doocy noted that field agents are now receiving death threats amid the over-the-top rhetoric coming from the right. He also pointed out that many Republicans have been calling for the dismantling and defunding of the FBI. (A talking point that has been picked up by Fox News.)

“I’m just curious whatever happened to the Republican Party backing the blue? And, in particular, the [35,000] members of law enforcement, federal law enforcement, at the FBI?” Doocy pressed the ultra-conservative congressman.

“Frankly, we are very strong supporters of law enforcement, and it concerns everybody if you see some agents go rogue,” Scalise responded. “If you see an agent that doesn’t have the right checks and balances at the top. This is coming from the top.”

Doocy firmly interjected: “Who went rogue, Steve? Who went rogue? They were following a search warrant!”

[goldenvalley]

Aug 11, 2022 19:28:46 GMT LFC said:

Dafuq? Is this nitwit actually realizing that he and his co-workers are going to get people killed? Has he found a shred of something resembling a conscience?

Doocy understands criminal procedure...a warrant dude!  No jack booted thugs storming the citadel.  Scalise and folks just listen to Trump's version of things.  I'm hoping word is coming down from Fox heads that the company needs to survive beyond the Trump cult's reign of terror.

[LFC]

They can always go lower.

In an escalation of the conservative media’s attacks on the judge who signed the search warrant for the FBI’s raid on ex-President Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago club, Fox News on Thursday aired a photoshopped image, claiming it showed the judge hanging out with child sex trafficker Ghislaine Maxwell.

Filling in as the host of “Tucker Carlson Tonight,” Fox News host Brian Kilmeade promised to present another “embarrassing photo” of the judge, Bruce Reinhart during the program. The night before, Kilmeade presented a photo during the program before showing Reinhart holding a bottle of whiskey and a package of Golden Oreos.

“We showed you that photo yesterday, but that isn’t the only embarrassing photo from Judge Bruce Reinhart,” Kilmeade said on Thursday night. “You won’t believe who he’s pictured getting cozy with. We’re gonna show you that next.”

[snip]

After the break, Kilmeade unveiled the new “embarrassing photo,” which purported to show Reinhart getting his foot rubbed by Maxwell on a plane as he holds a bottle of whiskey and Golden Oreos.

“So, a picture of Bruce Reinhart,” Kilmeade commented as the doctored image flashed across the screen. “This is the judge in charge of the, as you know, warrant. And we’ll see if he’s going to release it next.”

In reality, the image was a digitally altered photo of Maxwell rubbing (now-deceased) fellow sex trafficker Jeffrey Epstein’s foot, with Reinhart’s upper half photoshopped onto Epstein’s body.

It was too ridiculous even for Hannity.

In fact, the altered nature of the image went unacknowledged until fellow Fox host Sean Hannity, whose show comes after Kilmeade’s, pointed it out.

“I think that’s actually a picture of Jeffrey Epstein with somebody putting [Reinhart’s] head on there,” Hannity said – before hedging: “I’m guessing. I don’t know.”

But rather than admitting that the image was doctored, Kilmeade simply joked, “It might be his plane, who knows?”

“I’ll let you determine that in the morning,” Hannity said with a laugh before moving on to his own program.

[snip]

On Friday afternoon, Kilmeade finally clarified via Twitter that the photo was fake.

“Last night while subbing for Tucker Carlson, we showed you an image of Judge Bruce Reinhart w/ Ghislaine Maxwell that was sourced on screen to a meme pulled from Twitter & wasn’t real,” the Fox host tweeted. “This depiction never took place & we wanted to make clear that we were showing a meme in jest.”

Aaaaahhhhh! The old "it was a joke" defense! That's original.

[Bact PhD]

”It was a joke,” huh? Who does he think he is, David Letterman?