Faux News Just Can't Help Being Faux News

[LFC]

Faux News has gone completely off the rails over so-called "critical race theory." Their version is just CWT: Conservative Whining Theory. Snowflakes gotta' snow!

Fox News' campaign against critical race theory shows no signs of abetting, as the network mentioned it more than 100 different times in less than a day on Tuesday.

According to The Daily Beast's Justin Baragona, Fox on Tuesday mentioned critical race theory a whopping 123 times on Tuesday as of 2 p.m. ET.

"Fox News is really going over the top with critical race theory outrage today, largely due to a teachers union saying it will push back against groups targeting teachers with anti-CRT rhetoric," Baragona comments.

[LFC]

Tuckums is at it again, taking a non-story on vote miscounting in Georgia and dialing it up to 111. Cue the ominous music!

In the long history of jarringly ironic comments made by on-air talent at Fox News, a pronouncement from Tucker Carlson on Wednesday night immediately vaulted into the upper echelon.

“You can’t have a democracy if the public doesn’t believe election results,” Carlson said. “Increasingly, many people in this country don’t believe them. The solution to that problem, and it’s a significant problem, is not to scream at these people, call them lunatics or throw them in jail. The solution is to tell the truth about what happened.”

It is absolutely true that the best way for the decline in confidence in elections to be combated is for trusted voices to tell the truth about the election. And then Carlson, a trusted voice to millions on the political right, proceeded to dump in their laps an array of unproven, irrelevant or obviously incorrect claims about the presidential election.

So apparently some mail-in ballots were rescanned more than once. "AAAAHHHH!!! THE SMOKING GUN!!!!" Just one problem with that lie. The error was apparently caught and never became part of the official total as confirmed by 3 separate, matching counts.

One claim was that absentee ballots had been scanned more than once, a claim Carlson accompanied by footage of a poll worker running a set of ballots through a scanner more than once on security video. It’s very useful here to point out this analysis itself undercuts Carlson’s extremely vague hints about that warehouse: Voter GA had access to scanned images of all of the ballots provided by the county. (You can download them yourself, if you wish, via the Atlanta Journal-Constitution.) But it’s also useful to point out that this doesn’t actually mean much.

For one thing, all of the ballots in Georgia were rescanned after the election. If these ballots were scanned twice and erroneously included in the vote total — an important and unproven addendum — they would then need to have been counted twice in the hand recount that was ordered by the secretary of state. And they would need to have been counted twice in the second machine count of the results in December. But all three of those counts (original, hand, machine) resulted in essentially the same number of ballots cast in Fulton County, as Fowler points out.

[goldenvalley]

Jul 15, 2021 19:33:38 GMT LFC said:

So apparently some mail-in ballots were rescanned more than once. "AAAAHHHH!!! THE SMOKING GUN!!!!" Just one problem with that lie. The error was apparently caught and never became part of the official total as confirmed by 3 separate, matching counts.

One claim was that absentee ballots had been scanned more than once, a claim Carlson accompanied by footage of a poll worker running a set of ballots through a scanner more than once on security video. It’s very useful here to point out this analysis itself undercuts Carlson’s extremely vague hints about that warehouse: Voter GA had access to scanned images of all of the ballots provided by the county. (You can download them yourself, if you wish, via the Atlanta Journal-Constitution.) But it’s also useful to point out that this doesn’t actually mean much.

For one thing, all of the ballots in Georgia were rescanned after the election. If these ballots were scanned twice and erroneously included in the vote total — an important and unproven addendum — they would then need to have been counted twice in the hand recount that was ordered by the secretary of state. And they would need to have been counted twice in the second machine count of the results in December. But all three of those counts (original, hand, machine) resulted in essentially the same number of ballots cast in Fulton County, as Fowler points out.

I understand that people don't know, nor did they care, how ballots are counted, what safeguards there are. Why on earth do they so quickly jump to the conclusion that election workers do whatever they please in the process of counting ballots with no quality control measures?

[Bact PhD]

Jul 15, 2021 20:00:50 GMT goldenvalley said:

Jul 15, 2021 19:33:38 GMT LFC said:

So apparently some mail-in ballots were rescanned more than once. "AAAAHHHH!!! THE SMOKING GUN!!!!" Just one problem with that lie. The error was apparently caught and never became part of the official total as confirmed by 3 separate, matching counts.

I understand that people don't know, nor did they care, how ballots are counted, what safeguards there are. Why on earth do they so quickly jump to the conclusion that election workers do whatever they please in the process of counting ballots with no quality control measures?

It supports the trope about government employees being lazy and grossly incompetent.

[pnwguy]

Jul 15, 2021 20:14:05 GMT Bact PhD said:

Jul 15, 2021 20:00:50 GMT goldenvalley said:

I understand that people don't know, nor did they care, how ballots are counted, what safeguards there are. Why on earth do they so quickly jump to the conclusion that election workers do whatever they please in the process of counting ballots with no quality control measures?

It supports the trope about government employees being lazy and grossly incompetent.

"And they only have those guvmit jobs because of affirmative action!"

[LFC]

How Tucker Carlson Became the Voice of White Grievance

This is an example of why I think he's slipping and sipping his own Kool-Aid. He probably now believes this crazy story of victimhood.

He attended the elite La Jolla Country Day School, where a woman entered his life whom he grew to detest. It was his first-grade teacher, whom he referred to in his book as Mrs. Raymond. He caricatured her as “a parody of earth-mother liberalism” who “wore long Indian-print skirts. . . . She had little interest in conventional academic topics, like reading and penmanship.” He recalled her sobbing theatrically at her desk, saying, “The world is so unfair! You don’t know that yet. But you’ll find out!”

Carlson said he just wanted liberals to “stop blubbering and teach us to read. . . . Mrs. Raymond never did teach us; my father had to hire a tutor to get me through phonics.” Thus, Carlson says, he began his sojourn as a conservative thinker, questioning the liberals who he said were all around him, exemplified by his first-grade teacher.

Which is all rather shocking to Marianna Raymond, 77, who remembers Carlson as “very precious and very, very polite and sweet,” and said she had no idea, until contacted recently by a Washington Post reporter, that her former student had ridiculed her as a key to understanding him.

Raymond said in an interview that she never sobbed at her desk, didn’t wear an Indian skirt and didn’t advocate her political views. She said that not only did she teach Carlson reading at La Jolla Country Day School — with a student body that was “very affluent and White” — but that she also was then hired to tutor him at his home.

“Oh my God,” she said, when informed of Carlson’s attack against her. “That is the most embellished, crazy thing I ever heard.”

If you can't get into WaPo here's a link using the Internet Archive Wayback Machine.

[goldenvalley]

Jul 16, 2021 15:08:55 GMT LFC said:

How Tucker Carlson Became the Voice of White Grievance

This is an example of why I think he's slipping and sipping his own Kool-Aid. He probably now believes this crazy story of victimhood.

If you can't get into WaPo here's a link using the Internet Archive Wayback Machine.

He just repeated every trope he could remember.  He's just mad he had to have a tutor for reading.  

[LFC]

Tuckums keeps bringing in people to spread vaccine misinformation a.k.a. bald-faced lies.

On Fox News Friday, Tucker Carlson played host to Alex Berenson, a COVID-19 truther who has consistently pushed falsehoods and wrong predictions about the pandemic. During the segment, Berenson falsely cast doubt on the effectiveness of the vaccines at protecting people from the virus.

"Masks are useless for their wearers, we have known that for at least a year," said Berenson. "What I've grown to conclude over the last 12 months is that masks are very simply symbolic, all that they are is a sign you are in a dangerous time and you need to listen to us. You know, if I don't see people wearing masks, I forget to be scared." He added that "Our vaccines, unfortunately, appear to be declining in effectiveness very quickly."

While studies have shown that the vaccines are somewhat less effective against the Delta variant at preventing infection, they are still extremely effective at preventing serious illness. Even with the Delta variant driving new infections, 98 to 99 percent of current COVID deaths are among the unvaccinated.

Berenson has been labeled "The Pandemic's Wrongest Man" by The Atlantic.

MSNBC's Chris Hayes blasted the segment as "evil."

[LFC]

You can take the girl out of Faux News but you can't take Faux News out of the girl. She attempted to be legit and crashed and burned, though picked up a sweet paycheck to leave. Now she's back to what she knows and that's peddling lies and outrage for money.

Rep. Ted Lieu (D-Calif.) fired back at Megyn Kelly after she waved off the severity and detriment of the deadly Capitol riots. On Monday, July 12, the former Fox News anchor discussed the Capitol riots during a segment of her podcast, "The Megyn Kelly Show."

According to Kelly, what transpired at the Capitol building on Jan. 6 "wasn't an insurrection." During the segment, Kelly claimed, "There is no question the media represented it as so much worse than it actually was," reports Newsweek.

After the segment, Lieu took to Twitter with a message leveled at Kelly. "Dear Megyn Kelly: I reviewed a lot of videos and evidence for the second impeachment trial," he tweeted on Tuesday. "The most accurate way I can say this is that you have no idea what you are talking about. 140 police officers were injured, some critically. People died. Why are you downplaying Jan 6?"

Hours later, the California lawmaker tagged Kelly in a statement to Rep. Andrew Clyde (R-Ga.) who has also made remarks downplaying the Capitol insurrection. He previously made headlines for describing the chaos at the Capitol as a "normal tourist visit."

With a clip of the latest footage released of the Capitol riots, Lieu included a letter to Clyde that read: "Dear @rep_Clyde: Can you take 34 seconds of your time to watch insurrectionists brutally assault police, and the cheering by the mob on Jan 6? This was not, as you say, a "normal tourist visit." Will you apologize to police for your disparaging comments?"

Lieu also leveled a challenge at Clyde asking, "Will you apologize to police for your disparaging comments?"

Kelly responded to Lieu's open post telling him to "grow up." She wrote, "Hey @tedlieu - I realize you get more attention by using my name since most ppl have no clue who you are, but try to get this: saying it was awful but the media overplayed it is not that controversial. Grow up."

Lieu offered a simple response to her message tweeting, "Thank you @megynkelly for following me on Twitter."

[LFC]

An actual expert on the military had a few things to say about Tuckums.

Whenever I watch Fox News personality Tucker Carlson attempt to explain how the U.S. military works, I am reminded of retired Army Gen. Norman Schwarzkopf’s famous description of Saddam Hussein: “He is neither a strategist, nor is he schooled in the operational arts, nor is he a tactician, nor is he a general, nor is he a soldier.”

Carlson is a professional demagogue. That does not mean he is dumb. He didn’t become the brightest star in the universe of misinformation by being dimwitted. He is an expert in trafficking falsehoods masquerading as facts. Even Fox News’ own attorneys have argued he should not be taken seriously.

U.S. District Judge Mary Kay Vyskocil agreed with Fox News. When she dismissed a lawsuit against Carlson in 2020, Vyskocil ruled that the general tenor of Carlson’s show should make clear to viewers that what he says is “exaggeration” and “non-literal commentary” and that Carlson is “not ‘stating actual facts’ about the topics he discusses.”

“Fox persuasively argues, see [Citation], that given Mr. Carlson’s reputation, any reasonable viewer ‘arrive(s) with an appropriate amount of skepticism’ about the statements he makes,” Vyskocil wrote in her opinion.

Still, millions of Americans believe that Carlson is the Messiah of Candor, even though your average seventh grader knows more about civil-military relations than he does, as evidenced by what he passes off as insight on his nightly airing of grievances.

On Thursday’s episode of his show, Carlson became livid when discussing a Washington Post commentary that argues Milley’s reported fears that Trump would use the military to illegally remain in power should lead to reforms in the election process. Carlson noted the Post also reported that Milley told former First Lady Michelle Obama at President Joe Biden’s inauguration, “No one has a bigger smile today than I do.”

“So, the question is: Why is Mark Milley still in command of the U.S. military?” Carlson said. “This is not a small question.”

Well, let me stop you right there, Tucker. Milley isn’t actually in command of the military. In fact, he’s not in command of anything.

I know this can be confusing, especially when Trump erroneously claimed that Milley was in charge of the Defense Department’s response to unrest during last summer’s protests against police brutality.

Milley’s actual role is to serve as the president’s military adviser, not as a commander of combatant forces. There is ample legislation that explains what the Joint Chiefs of Staff do.

OK, that’s an easy goof. I know it’s hard to get the details right ALL of the time. For example, you recently accused the Pentagon of secretly transporting illegal aliens from an Air Force base in Texas. A defense official told Task & Purpose that the Air Force has allowed U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement to use one of its airstrips but the military has no control about who is on those flights.

Moving on: Carlson continued to show his ignorance about the military during Thursday’s episode by alleging that the Pentagon had tried to “kill” an agreement to leave Afghanistan by “unilaterally” launching drone strikes and special operations raids against the Taliban.

"Dumb as a brick or a great professional liar? We broadcast, you decide." --Faux News

[LFC]

Another ex-Faux Newser is still full-on Faux.

Former President Donald Trump is struggling to sell tickets to his upcoming interview tour with conservative pundit Bill O'Reilly, according to a Politico report that prompted the former Fox News host to threaten a lawsuit threat.

Trump and O'Reilly last month announced that they would join forces for something called "The History Tour," which will feature interviews that "provide a never-before-heard inside view of his administration — which will be historical in and of itself." Trump vowed that the interviews would be "hard-hitting sessions" but also "fun, fun, fun, for everyone who attends."

Tickets for the tour, which will start with four cities in Florida and Texas, have been on sale for a month and range from $100 to $3000, though the pair is also selling a "VIP Meet & Greet Package" that includes a 45-minute reception before the show and backstage photos with Trump and O'Reilly. That will cost you $8,500.

But despite both men repeatedly promoting the tour, ticket sales have reportedly been struggling.

[goldenvalley]

Jul 17, 2021 23:59:34 GMT LFC said:

You can take the girl out of Faux News but you can't take Faux News out of the girl. She attempted to be legit and crashed and burned, though picked up a sweet paycheck to leave. Now she's back to what she knows and that's peddling lies and outrage for money.

Rep. Ted Lieu (D-Calif.) fired back at Megyn Kelly after she waved off the severity and detriment of the deadly Capitol riots. On Monday, July 12, the former Fox News anchor discussed the Capitol riots during a segment of her podcast, "The Megyn Kelly Show."

According to Kelly, what transpired at the Capitol building on Jan. 6 "wasn't an insurrection." During the segment, Kelly claimed, "There is no question the media represented it as so much worse than it actually was," reports Newsweek.

After the segment, Lieu took to Twitter with a message leveled at Kelly. "Dear Megyn Kelly: I reviewed a lot of videos and evidence for the second impeachment trial," he tweeted on Tuesday. "The most accurate way I can say this is that you have no idea what you are talking about. 140 police officers were injured, some critically. People died. Why are you downplaying Jan 6?"

Hours later, the California lawmaker tagged Kelly in a statement to Rep. Andrew Clyde (R-Ga.) who has also made remarks downplaying the Capitol insurrection. He previously made headlines for describing the chaos at the Capitol as a "normal tourist visit."

With a clip of the latest footage released of the Capitol riots, Lieu included a letter to Clyde that read: "Dear @rep_Clyde: Can you take 34 seconds of your time to watch insurrectionists brutally assault police, and the cheering by the mob on Jan 6? This was not, as you say, a "normal tourist visit." Will you apologize to police for your disparaging comments?"

Lieu also leveled a challenge at Clyde asking, "Will you apologize to police for your disparaging comments?"

Kelly responded to Lieu's open post telling him to "grow up." She wrote, "Hey @tedlieu - I realize you get more attention by using my name since most ppl have no clue who you are, but try to get this: saying it was awful but the media overplayed it is not that controversial. Grow up."

Lieu offered a simple response to her message tweeting, "Thank you @megynkelly for following me on Twitter."

Kelly got a lot of credit for her walk down to the Fox experts that night, but basically she's an opportunist who learned that being blonde, smart, and on the side of the right would get her attention and money that she would get nowhere else.  She and the other blonde firebrands of Fox are all of a piece not matter what she said about Ailes and sexual harassment.

[LFC]

Tuckums is, of course, not the only one at Faux News and in right-wingnut media to be screeching that Biden's fight against COVID vaccine lies are an attack on democracy. These people are demented.

The comments incensed right-wing media, which exploded Friday with claims both pointed and, at times, disingenuous. Take for instance, Fox News reporter Peter Doocy, who asked during Friday's press conference: "How long has the administration been spying on people's Facebook profiles looking for vaccine misinformation," seemingly suggesting that reading public figures' public posts amounted to "spying."

"This is how Communism starts," wrote freshman Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, R-GA, in a falsehood-filled Facebook post that would later become the most-interacted-with vaccine post in Facebook's U.S. market, according to data available through the company's publicly available analytics tool, Crowdtangle. "The White House is working with Facebook to censor your post which is violating your free speech because people want to discuss (on FB) a NON-FDA approved vaccine that the Biden admin wants to force you to take."

"This is a lie," complained Fox News contributor Ben Domenech on Friday. "I want him to find one example, one person in this country who has died because of the misinformation." As a study by left-leaning media watchdog group Media Matters found, Fox News has "undermined vaccination efforts in nearly 60% of all vaccination segments in the last two weeks."

[LFC]

Well, well, well. Look what news organization propaganda outlet just settled yet another sexual harassment case.

Britt McHenry’s lawsuit against Fox News, alleging sexual harassment and retaliation by her one-time Fox Nation co-host Tyrus, has been voluntarily dismissed by her legal team.

According to two sources familiar with the matter, McHenry has settled with Fox News—likely with a nondisclosure agreement and undisclosed cash settlement—and will leave the network.

[goldenvalley]

From LGM  Looks like Rupert Murdoch has decided that too much COVID is bad for business.  Apparently Hannity last night and Doocy yesterday morning told people the vaccine can save lives.  Remember, Fox reversed itself on Dominion after the lawsuit was filed.  I wonder what prompted this reversal.

[LFC]

Faux News has created their own vaccine "passport" system for coming back to the office.

Tucker Carlson has called the idea of vaccine passports the medical equivalent of "Jim Crow" laws. And other Fox News personalities have spent months both trafficking in anti-vaccine rhetoric and assailing the concept of showing proof of vaccination status.

But Fox Corporation, the right-wing talk channel's parent company, has quietly implemented the concept of a vaccine passport as workers slowly return back to the company's offices.

Fox employees, including those who work at Fox News, received an email, obtained by CNN Business, from the company's Human Resources department in early June that said Fox had "developed a secure, voluntary way for employees to self-attest their vaccination status."

The system allows for employees to self-report to Fox the dates their shots were administered and which vaccines were used.

The company has encouraged employees to report their status, telling them that "providing this information to FOX will assist the company with space planning and contact tracing."

Employees who report their status are allowed to bypass the otherwise required daily health screening, according to a follow-up email those who reported their vaccination status received.

"Thank you for providing FOX with your vaccination information," the email said. "You no longer are required to complete your daily health screening through WorkCare/WorkMatters."

The concept, which was first reported Monday by Ryan Grim on The Hill's morning streaming show, is known internally as "FOX Clear Pass."

While the "Fox Clear Pass" is voluntary for employees, and other companies have similar tools, it is still remarkable, given how vocal Fox's top talent has been in criticizing the concept of vaccine passports.

Fox News has spent months portraying the notion that people might be asked to show vaccination status as dangerous to personal freedom and anti-American.

Fox has also hyped the rejection of vaccine passports by Republican elected officials like Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis.

While there's been a little easing apparently Tuckums is still on the anti-vax train. (I'm sorry. The vaccine "skeptical" train.)

[LFC]

Jul 20, 2021 15:10:57 GMT goldenvalley said:

From LGM  Looks like Rupert Murdoch has decided that too much COVID is bad for business.  Apparently Hannity last night and Doocy yesterday morning told people the vaccine can save lives.  Remember, Fox reversed itself on Dominion after the lawsuit was filed.  I wonder what prompted this reversal.

Looks like it wasn't much of a reversal. In full due to paywall.

It started with “Fox and Friends” host Steve Doocy on Monday morning, urging viewers to get the COVID-19 vaccine because it will “save your life” — all while his co-host Brian Kilmeade hedged that “we’re not doctors” and said the network anchors aren’t going to “go there and give you other medical advice.” (FWIW, Doocy has been a encouraging viewers to get the shot for some time now, unlike some of his co-hosts.)

Then a few hours later, Fox host and anchor Bill Hemmer opened the door for one of the network’s top medical contributors, Marc Siegel, to hype the efficacy of the vaccine.

“The vaccine works, right? We haven’t budged on that, have we, doc?” Hemmer asked.

“The vaccine works extremely well even against the delta variant, preventing infection in 90 percent of cases,” Siegel said.

By the time Fox News’ Sean Hannity’s popular show hit the airwaves Monday evening, news had broke of a health screening measure that Fox News requests of its employees as the company returns to office work. CNN obtained an email from Fox’s Human Resources department alerting employees about how to voluntarily report their vaccination status to the company. The email encouraged employees to self-report and said those who do are allowed to bypass otherwise mandated daily health screenings, according to CNN. News of this plan, which some in the media have framed as amounting to a “vaccine passport” — a curse word in right-wing circles — was first reported by The Hill on Monday.

During his show last night, Hannity followed his colleagues’ lead … sort of. Hannity told viewers that he believes in vaccine science and urged viewers to “take COVID seriously.”

“I can’t say it enough. Enough people have died,” he said, before encouraging viewers to talk to their doctor about whether to get vaccinated. “It absolutely makes sense for many Americans to get vaccinated. I believe in science, I believe in vaccine science.”

As a Reuters reporter pointed it, this is all good and well, but Hannity also made these remarks in between peddling his same old, tired vaccine skepticism rhetoric.

Jan Wolfe
@jannwolfe
Before this clip, Hannity criticized a university for mandating vaccines.

After this clip, Hannity interviewed a young woman who lost feeling in her legs for a month in 2019 after getting a different type of vaccine.

(Fox’s Tucker Carlson — who has called the concept of vaccine passports similar to “Jim Crow” laws — didn’t jump on the bandwagon, using his usual primetime hour to promote anti-vaccine commentary.)

This morning, conservative commentator Ben Shapiro — who has raged against public health restrictions throughout the pandemic — seemed to take a cue from Fox and joined the club, sort of. Like Hannity, the warning was sandwiched among asides, including a Twitter tangent comparing the lethality of COVID-19 to other diseases killing Americans and complaints that lockdowns are a “power grab.”

Fox News has gotten a lot of heat in recent weeks over its anti-vax and vaccine skeptical rhetoric perpetuated by popular network hosts as the divide between the vaccinated and the unvaccinated grows in the U.S. — a public health issue made doubly concerning by the spread of the more contagious and more deadly Delta variant.

[LFC]

Tuckums came out and said he wasn't anti-vax. Glad that's cleared up now.

Tucker Carlson, the most popular TV host on Fox News, insisted on his program Monday night that he’s not against vaccines. In fact, Carlson said he’s never attacked vaccines on his program. The only problem, of course, is that Carlson is a very vocal anti-vaxxer and there’s hours of tape from his show during the past six months to prove it.

“They don’t trust you anymore and they don’t trust the drugs that you say they must take. And that’s a shame. We’re not attacking the vaccine. Never have,” Carlson said Monday in what can only be described as a bald-faced lie.

Carlson made his assertion that he wasn’t anti-vaccine while discussing Rep. Adam Kinzinger of Illinois, a Republican and prominent supporter of vaccines. Kinzinger thinks that his fellow Republicans have been playing a dangerous game during the covid-19 pandemic but Carlson attacked Kinzinger as a simpleton who lacks the proper skepticism of the medical establishment.

“What is the harm rate from the vaccine? Why can’t we ask? What’s the answer when you attack people rather than answer their questions?” Carlson said Monday night while referring to Kinzinger.

You don’t even need to quote Carlson’s words directly to know the game he’s playing. Just look at the chyrons and graphics that were appearing next to Carlson during last night’s show:

• Medicine Should Never be Forced on Anyone
• Dems Are Turning Vaccines Into a Political Test
• Vaccine Coercion
• Dems: Bring on the Vaccine Mandates
• No Vaccine, No Entry
• Vaccine Coercion by the Govt is About Power
• There is Almost No Resistance to What is Happening
• Army Now Forcing Vaccine on Soldiers

And that’s all just one episode of Carlson’s show. He’s been doing this for months and he’s drilling it into the heads of his viewers that there’s something nefarious afoot with the global covid-19 vaccine rollout.

It’s no coincidence that Tucker Carlson is attempting such an obvious tactic—claiming doesn’t hold a particular view, only to spout the talking points of that worldview merely seconds later. Carlson does this all the time with white nationalist talking points.

[LFC]

Colbert ripped into Brian Kilmeade's vaccination rantings.

With the Delta variant spreading like wildfire across the least vaccinated areas of the United States, Stephen Colbert pointed out that “all the anti-vax propaganda on Fox News is not helping.”

“Well, it’s no surprise,” the Late Show host joked in his monologue Tuesday night. “It’s right there in Fox News’ slogan: ‘We report. You just died.’”

Nothing exemplified this disturbing trend like a Monday morning Fox & Friends segment in which Brian Kilmeade—or “contestant on Jeopardy realizing he spelled his own name wrong,” as Colbert called him, declared that it’s not the government’s “job to protect anybody” from anything.

A furious Kilmeade argued against government mandates by telling viewers, “If you didn’t get a vaccination, that’s your choice,” adding, “And if you want to go cliff diving this weekend, you don’t have to check with me!”

When his co-host Steve Doocy pushed back by explaining that 99 percent of the people dying from COVID are unvaccinated, Kilmeade shouted, “That’s their choice!”

“So the brown-haired guy believes that being unvaccinated and maskless is the same as being a thrill-seeker who jumps off cliffs,” a baffled Colbert replied. “Well, that analogy does work if you first strap that cliff jumper to a group of old people.”

[LFC]

Carlson disrespects law enforcement again because they protected Congress against his audience. In this case he's being pure Tuckums by going after the black guy without using the n-word.

Fox News host Tucker Carlson spent part of his Wednesday night show delegitimizing a Black Capitol Police officer who defended the building from the pro-Trump mob on January 6.

The officer in question, Harry Dunn, is slated to testify before the first hearing of the January 6 committee next week. He gained national attention for sharing his experience of the insurrection, during which he said he was called the n-word more than a dozen times.

“Dunn will pretend to speak for the country’s law enforcement community, but it turns out Dunn has very little in common with your average cop,” Carlson said. “Dunn is an angry left-wing political activist.”

Dunn’s lawyers, Mark Zaid and David Laufman, blasted the comments in a Thursday statement.

“Our client has served 13 years in law enforcement and on January 6, 2021, fought against an insurrectionist violent crowd – no doubt many of them Carlson’s supporters – to protect the lives of our elected officials, including Vice President Mike Pence,” they wrote.

Of Dunn’s upcoming testimony, they added that “the last thing Carlson wants is for the truth to emerge of what happened that day and why.”

[goldenvalley]

Carlson would be one of the insurrectionists yelling at the cops to let them through. "You're supposed to be on our side!" And let me guess...Officer Dunn is black? Can't find anything that mentions it.

[LFC]

Jul 22, 2021 18:04:43 GMT goldenvalley said:

Carlson would be one of the insurrectionists yelling at the cops to let them through. "You're supposed to be on our side!" And let me guess...Officer Dunn is black? Can't find anything that mentions it.

Yes, he's black. It's right there in the first sentence I quoted though oddly the source capitalized "Black."

[LFC]

Tuckums is still on his warpath against vaccination. Here he's talking to a complete crank and whining that nobody with any mouthpiece has the right to talk about stupid people who won't get vaccinated. You know. Like Tuckums's audience. Notice how he plays the concern troll to "balance" out the charlatan.

Amid his own network’s noticeable shift in urging viewers to get vaccinated, Fox News host Tucker Carlson smiled and laughed Wednesday night as Turning Point USA founder Charlie Kirk criticized the sudden influx of “virtue signaling” conservatives who are encouraging people to get their shots.

Prior to appearing on Carlson’s show, Kirk—who has a long history of peddling COVID-19 misinformation and vaccine skepticism—insanely speculated on his podcast that twice as many people have died after getting the COVID-19 vaccine than have died from the disease itself. Citing numbers in the CDC’s VAERS system, a database on vaccine adverse events that has become a breeding ground for anti-vax misinformation, Kirk took the number of deaths currently listed in the system and inexplicably claimed they may only account for 1 percent of total vaccine deaths, coming to a total of 1.2 million.

“I’m not saying that’s true,” he noted. “I’m saying that according to how we calculate VAERS by the independent study that was administered, this could be true.” The CDC itself states that reports of death to VAERS “do not necessarily mean that a vaccine caused a health problem.” Furthermore, the CDC has also said they’ve only confirmed three deaths have so far been linked to a COVID-19 vaccine, all from the Johnson & Johnson shot.

Carlson, who has also used VAERS to misleadingly allege that vaccines are causing thousands of deaths, brought on Kirk to talk about an internal email he accidentally received from a CNN executive that bemoaned the stagnating vaccination rates in the country. “As a channel, CNN should not have a position on whether you should take medicine or not, because it’s a news channel. It’s not a health station,” Carlson added.

(Interestingly, as Carlson criticizes CNN executives for thinking vaccination requirements may be necessary for businesses and schools, his own network has recently implemented a vaccine passport system for its employees.)

“Is it CNN’s position now that if someone decides to refuse to get the vaccine, like I have, that I’m going to come under some sort of punishment? What does that mean? What does the stick look like in CNN’s world?” Kirk wondered aloud, referring to a “carrot vs. stick” reference in the CNN exec’s email.

Carlson, meanwhile, grumbled that “a lot of” news channels are “speaking with this moral authority” about getting vaccinated. At the same time, he asked Kirk: “When did this become their role to do stuff like this?”

Kirk took that opportunity to blast his fellow conservatives for suddenly advocating for vaccines during a surge in COVID-19 hospitalizations among the unvaccinated.

“The other question is why all of a sudden in the last 48 hours has there been this almost coordinated effort of people on the establishment center-right kind of virtue signaling and telling every single person to get vaccinated,” he exclaimed as Carlson nodded and laughed.

Kirk went on to claim that he thinks there’s a “mission creep of certain institutions that think they are supposed to do things that they really aren’t,” stating that the email shows a “very disturbing” inside look into CNN.

“Yeah. It is disturbing,” Carlson agreed, adding: “Coordination, yeah. I’m suspecting maybe you are right.”

[goldenvalley]

Jul 22, 2021 19:12:50 GMT LFC said:

Jul 22, 2021 18:04:43 GMT goldenvalley said:

Carlson would be one of the insurrectionists yelling at the cops to let them through. "You're supposed to be on our side!" And let me guess...Officer Dunn is black? Can't find anything that mentions it.

Yes, he's black. It's right there in the first sentence I quoted though oddly the source capitalized "Black."

Point taken.  Must. read. more. slowly.

[LFC]

Jul 22, 2021 19:51:59 GMT goldenvalley said:

Point taken.  Must. read. more. slowly.

I really think it was the capitalization of "Black" right before the name. I skipped over it the first time myself because it looks like part of the proper name. It's sloppy writing if you ask me. A good editor should have caught that.