Once again the mainstream media has had a very, very bad week, with the White House Correspondents' Dinner coming under fire from both sides of the political aisle for the nasty attacks on the women in the Trump administration, to the false claims that the "NRA was banning guns" at their annual conference, to "mishandling sexual harassment claims against Tom Brokaw," to inappropriately screaming questions about Stormy Daniels at the president during the National Day of Prayer, causing one attendee to actual take them to task by saying "shame on you," and castigating the reporter by telling him to have respect for the ceremony.
Topping off their bad week, multiple outlets, including NBC News and MSNBC, reported inaccurately that President Trump's personal attorney was "wiretapped," which then caused yet another round of corrections, retractions and apologies. (See: The Media’s No Good, Very Bad Week)
WHEN THE MEDIA BECOMES THE NEWS
Ever since the 2016 presidential election we have seen a massive uptick of mistakes, missteps, and outright fake news being pumped out by the mainstream media, with forced resignations (CNN), journalists being suspended (ABC News), false claims being completely rewritten, re-titled, corrected and updated (CNN), on more than one story throughout 2017, as just some of the examples among the dozens from 2017, which ultimately made the news more about "journalism," and those charged with reporting the news, than the news itself. The majority of the public, 77 percent, now sees the mainstream media as pushing fake news, with 31 percent saying they do it regularly, and 46 percent saying they do it occasionally.
But that is just one of the patterns that has become so prevelant since the 2016 presidential election.
The other pattern is far more disturbing as some media personalities are determined to distract from the actual blockbusting news of the day by trying to become the news, in an attempt to cry about how they are "victims" of attacks by President Trump and his administration.
Granted, President Trump has been highlighly critical of the mainstream media and their consistent, 91 percent average, of hostile coverage which began the very day he announced his candidacy with selectively edited versions of his initial commentary.
I cannot begin to tell you how many times I see the media lamenting on air, and on social media, that the President has been attacking them, without ever once acknowledging they started attacking first and are now screeching about being victims because he dares to fight back, to highlight every example of their false reporting, their lies, their "fake news."
While Acosta is a prime example of journalists acting like crying, whining social justice warrior snowflakes, he is not the only WH reporter that thinks the news should be all about them (See ANP piece on Narcissism's Role In The Fall Of America), rather than informing the public of the actual news, as the latest example is American Urban Radio Networks' WH correspondent and CNN commentator April Ryan, who after a sharply worded rebuke from White House press Secretary Sarah Huckabee-Sanders telling Ryan that she "didn't know much about her," ran to CNN and other "news" shows to complain, mischaracterize the exchange and accuse of Huckabee-Sanders of attacking her, speaking to a physical confrontation.
Forget the actual news, Ryan and CNN, who was interviewing her and others, want it to be all about them, the poor beleagured, embattled "victims."
Here is the segment and actual exchange between Ryan and Huckabee-Sanders, followed by her CNN interview where Ryan's claim that the term "you don't know me, in certain sectors of this nation, people understand, what 'you don't know me' means. It's very 'street' and it leads to a fight, a physical fight." Then she goes to claim that the last two press secretaries like to "point me out." Then as you will note in the clip below, when another commentator compliments Huckabee-Sanders, Ryan talks over him to the point where he actually asks her, "April, why are making this so personal." Ryan's astounding response is "because she attacked me."
Watch for yourself, decide for yourself.
In response to criticism, Ryan then took to social media, saying "Something is really wrong when people don’t understand a joke to take the temperature down from words a @PressSec said that in some cases ignite fights. A former mayor nor an esteemed journalist would never go that low to physically fight someone for ignorant street words."
(Note- She is speaking about tweets between her and an African American mayor talking about a "fist fight" regarding the Ryan/Huckabee-Sanders exchange.
She continued to lament the whole non-story, because of course Ryan, like Acosta, think the media IS the story: "The joke was in response to the words coming from that White House Podium. In some sectors of this country those words from the @PressSec start physical fights. I believe in non violence!! End of story!," Ryan continued.
Guess not the end of story, since she had more to say: "So their words incite death threats on me and others and then they say things that typically start street fights. And I am the one with the issue please!"
Some users had enough of her "buffoonery," and let her have it back, stating "Death threats are wrong, send all to appropriate authority. However your overall buffoonery makes you a legitimate target for mockery. "Its so street." What sort of imbecile even says something like that? '
See more reaction to Ryan's constant complaining and attempts to justify her behavior and claims, at Twitchy.
The barrage of inaccurate, and in some cases outright fake news, from the MSM, and the constant attention seeking of the journalists meant to cover the "news" but would rather it be all about them, is an attempt to distract from the real news.
Whether it is the record breaking unemployment numbers, or the chaos occuring right now in the ranks of the U.S. intelligence agencies, such as the FBI, where two FBI lawyers, Jim Baker, former FBI special counsel and Lisa Page, FBI lawyer engulfed in scandal over her text messages with FBI senior official Peter Strzok, have both just resigned, as the OIG report, expected to detail their misconduct is to be released this month.
Other "news" the MSM would rather distract from is the recent unclassified House Intel Committee's report, where shown side-by-side with the prior version with massive redactions, indicate the redactions by the FBI and DOJ, were not to protect national security, but were specifically protecting the FBI and DOJ themselves.
Co-Founder of the Federalist, Sean Davis, has done and outstanding job breaking this down, a job that should have been done by the MSM, but they too have been too busy with distractions in order to cover for the deep state antics.
Via Davis: "Compare the fully redacted version that came out last week to the mostly unredacted version that came out today. Do you see what DOJ/FBI tried to cover up? McCabe said they hadn't substantiated anything against Flynn, and the ambush of Flynn at the WH was directed by Comey."
(Click images to enlarge)
Comparing another two pages, Davis highlights what the FBI/DOJ was trying to hide, and it had nothing to do with national security.
Via Davis here and here: "Compare these two pages. The initial redacted version hid clear testimony that the FBI didn't think Flynn lied. McCabe: "The two people who interviewed [Flynn] didn't think he was lying[.]" And: "[N]ot [a] great beginning of a false statement case[.]"/ and "DOJ/FBI also tried to hide Comey's clear testimony that FBI agents didn't think Flynn lied. Here's what they covered up: "Comey testified to the Committee that 'the agents...discerned no physical indications of deception. They saw nothing that indicated...he was lying to them.'"
(Click images to enlarge)
His full explanation and analysis can be seen either at Twitchy, or at his Twitter thread, which lays out the implications and the truth of why the FBI/DOJ was trying to prevent this from going public.
Showing which outlets are trying to distract from what is truly a damning indictment against the FBI/DOJ to protect Mueller over what has been done to Michael Flynn, compared to outlets trying to report the news of what was revealed, here is a screen shot of the top results via Google search:
Notice the only outlet trying to distract from the news? CNN thinks Americans should focus on David Nunes, rather than more misconduct by the FBI/DOJ, while the "conservative" outlets the liberal media call the "fringe" are actually trying to get the news to the public.
At this rate, CNN should just focus on strippers/porn stars, prostitutes and sex coaches, and butthurt journalists like April Ryan, it seems to be all they care about focusing on anymore, certainly not "real news."
A search directly at the New York Times shows the last story they did about the House Intelligence report was April 27, 2018, nothing on the bombshell that dropped on Friday. Washington Post search shows the last story mentioning the House Intelligence report was on May 3, 2018, (That was about Clapper/Tapper) again, nothing since this latest news dump.
BOTTOM LINE
The media has done everything in their power, short of dancing naked on-air, to protect the deep state members of the intelligence community, from lying, publishing fake news stories with the intent of making them go viral to distract from the actual news, to throwing temper tantrums and trying to make the news all about "them" personally.
The bottom line here is the mainstream media has become the propaganda arm of not just Democrats, but of the deep state itself.
Or as Laura Ingraham describes them below, "They have proudly, many of them, become hostile adversaries in the vanguard of the resistance."
For those interested, Scott Johnson from PowerLine has uploaded the less-redacted version of the House Intelligence Committee report, and it is embedded below.
Exit Question: With all the redactions the U.S. intelligence agencies have still left within the report, are they about national security or are they still protecting the FBI/DOJ and Robert Mueller?
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