Greg Sargent imagines “how the both-sides media would cover a successful Trump coup.”
Ted Cruz Apologizes for Calling Capitol Rioters ‘Terrorists’
Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) went on Tucker Carlon’s show to say it had been a “mistake” for him to call the Jan. 6 attack at the Capitol a “terrorist attack” after he received pushback from supporters of former President Trump.
Said Cruz: “As a result of my sloppy phrasing, it’s caused a lot of people to misunderstand what I meant. What I was referring to was the limited number of people who engaged in violent attacks against police officers.”
Jonathan Chait: “Cruz thought the sweet spot for him was to position himself as a champion of Trump’s non-violent efforts to discard the election results while strongly condemning its violent aspects. Not for the first time, and probably not for the last, he misjudged the political market.”
Aaron Blake: “It did not go quite so well. But it did at least provide an extremely apt picture of the current state of the post-Jan. 6 GOP — on the evening of Jan. 6 itself, no less.”
Another Anti-Vax Host Dies of Covid
“Far-right podcast host Douglas Kuzma—who was an outspoken critic of the COVID-19 vaccine—has died while battling the coronavirus, which he contracted after attending a QAnon-friendly gathering in Texas that right-wingers baselessly claimed was the victim of an anthrax attack,” the Daily Beast reports.
Podcasts Helped Spread the Big Lie
New York Times: “Researchers at the Brookings Institution reviewed transcripts of nearly 1,500 episodes from 20 of the most popular political podcasts. Among episodes released between the election and the Jan. 6 riot, about half contained election misinformation, according to the analysis.”
“In some weeks, 60 percent of episodes mentioned the election fraud conspiracy theories tracked by Brookings. Those included false claims that software glitches interfered with the count, that fake ballots were used, and that voting machines run by Dominion Voting Systems were rigged to help Democrats.”
Thoughts On Our Political Exhaustion
Charlie Sykes: “The world is too much with us, of course, but the real problem it is that it so dumb, so infused with mind-numbing bad faith, and a grinding sense of futility that anything will matter or change.”
“This exhaustion is not to be confused with boredom, because, if anything we have been been over-stimulated for too long. On social media and cable television, the emotional level has been set somewhere between alarm and emotional meltdown for years now. We’ve experienced endless assaults on the public mind, with the ever-escalating goal of inciting, inflaming, and grifting. We’ve been saturated, pummeled, and battered by it for the last five years.”
“Over and over and over.”
How Fox News Distorts the Reality of January 6
A new Washington Post/University of Maryland poll finds that Republicans who watch Fox News are 15 points more likely to say the January 6 rioters at the U.S. Capitol were “mostly peaceful,” while Republicans who don’t watch Fox News were 16 points more likely to say the rioters were “mostly violent.”
The Media Must Help Save American Democracy
Margaret Sullivan: “In the year since the Jan. 6 insurrection, mainstream journalists have done a lot of things right. They’ve published major investigations, pointed out politicians’ lies and, in many cases, finally learned how to clearly communicate the facts of what happened leading up to that horrendous riot at the U.S. Capitol — and what is happening now as pro-Trump Republicans steadily chip away at the very checks and balances that saved American democracy last year.”
“Much of this work has been impressive. And yet, something crucial is missing. For the most part, news organizations are not making democracy-under-siege a central focus of the work they present to the public.”
Fox News’ Worst Lies About the Pandemic In 2021
Gizmodo takes a look at the worst lies Fox News told its audience about the Covid-19 pandemic during 2021.
Alex Jones Threatens to Dish ‘Dirt’ on Donald Trump
Alex Jones threatened to “dish all the dirt” on Donald Trump to get back at the former president for his embrace of the Covid-19 vaccines by saying they save lives, the Daily Beast reports.
Said Jones: “It’s not to hurt Trump, it’s so people can know how pathetic he is when you think he is playing 4D chess, going to save you and he’s not!”
MAGA Radio Host Calls for Trump Intervention
Conservative radio host Wayne Allyn Root wants to stage an “intervention” with Donald Trump over the former president’s support for the Covid-19 vaccine, the Daily Beast reports.
Said Root: “He’s been right on everything except this issue. He’s so horribly wrong on this issue, and the best way to put it, ironically, is that he’s dead wrong, because people are dying!”
He added: “When everyone I know dies, you are getting the blame, President Trump!”
France to Block Five Porn Sites
“The French government will block five widely watched pornography websites unless they introduce measures to verify that users are aged over 18,“ the Times of London reports.
“The move brings France into line with Germany in taking action against sites that fail to prevent children from accessing adult content.”
“The two countries have some of the strictest rules in the developed world for tackling the issue.”
Fauci Says Fox News Host Should Be Fired
Dr. Anthony Fauci called on Fox News to fire host Jesse Watters for targeting him with violent rhetoric at a conservative conference, Politico reports.
Said Fauci: “I mean, that’s crazy. The guy should be fired on the spot.”
Jason Miller’s ‘Free Speech’ Site Boots White Nationalist
Jason Miller’s right-wing “free speech” social media alternative Gettr “suspended” the account of white nationalist Nicholas Fuentes, the Daily Beast reports.
Fox Won’t Let Employees Test Out of Vaccine Mandate
“Fox Corporation, the owner of Fox News, told employees on Friday that those working in New York City would have to show proof they’d had at least one dose of the Covid vaccine by Dec. 27, removing the option to get tested weekly instead,” the New York Times reports.
Dominion Defamation Suit Against Fox News Can Proceed
Bloomberg: “Fox News probably had enough information after the 2020 presidential election to know a conspiracy theory claiming Dominion Voting Systems Inc. rigged the contest was false, a judge said in denying the network’s request to dismiss a defamation lawsuit.”
Does Punchbowl News Play by the Rules?
American Prospect: “On Sunday afternoon, the Washington Football Team lost to the Dallas Cowboys, and Punchbowl News was there to see it. The D.C.-based scoop shop, a newsletter-based online publication, partnered with the scandal-plagued and still nameless sports franchise to secure a luxury skybox from which to watch the game. And they invited some friends—in their own words, an ‘exclusive group of D.C. decision makers.'”
“On its face, the event looks like a flagrant violation of journalistic ethics. Basically every single lobbyist listed represents a firm that has lobbied legislators on the text of the Build Back Better, bipartisan infrastructure, and American Rescue Plan acts over the last ten months…”
“Over that same ten-month period, which makes up the entirety of Punchbowl’s existence, the publication has covered those pieces of legislation breathlessly. Build Back Better, in particular, has been the object of an overwhelming percentage of the outlet’s journalistic output. For the publication to then host the very same lobbyists who were attempting, and often succeeding, to take down multiple provisions in that bill as special guests at a free skybox event raises serious questions about whether Punchbowl has been doing journalism or simply laundering industry talking points.”
The Public vs. Private Comments of Fox News Hosts
Listen to what Fox News hosts said privately vs. publicly about the January 6 insurrection at the Capitol.
Aaron Rupar: “It took Fox News almost a full day to come up with a way to spin revelations that prominent anchors texted Mark Meadows on January 6 and pleaded with him to persuade then-President Trump to do something about the attack on the Capitol — only to go on the air that day and try and shift blame to anyone but Trump.”
The Go-To Way to Influence Biden
“Interest groups trying to influence the president of the United States will often fork over millions of dollars in order to do so. During the Biden era, however, an old media-centric, less splashy technique has been deployed,” Politico reports.
“A handful of organizations with legislative interests before the government have taken to running print ads in Delaware’s The News Journal in an effort to get their message in front of the world’s most powerful individual, one who is likely the paper’s most famous reader. A review of the paper found that 17 ads have been run by these groups between September and mid-November alone.”
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