Left Leaning Legacy Media Belatedly and Grudgingly Acknowledge that the Steele Dossier was Fraudulent

How does it feel to now know that left-leaning legacy news media duped you for years on Trump-Russia? Drew Holden offers chapter and verse below, and there are oh so many offenders, including Rachel Maddow, her "reporter" pals at CNN and many many others. This is merely one story of many where the two media teams (the Democrat team and the Republican team) tell you only what they want you to know (and withhold what they don't want you to know). There was plenty of reason to be suspicious about the Steele Dossier before this recent indictment. This widespread journalistic malpractice re Trump-Russia went on for years.

As Glenn Greenwald notes in a related tweet: "NYT & WashPost showered themselves with Pulitzers for their monomaniacal obsession with Russiagate. Even after Mueller admitted he could find no evidence to establish the conspiracy and indicted *nobody* for it, they persisted." But there is a bigger lesson here that pertains to all of us and our failing democracy: consumers of "news" are not getting what they think they are getting. Many of them, including many who will bristle as they read this post, have been as credulous as the CNN reporters.

[[Added Nov 7, 2021]

Greenwald is correct to hammer this story over and over. The media is the only industry specifically mentioned in the U.S. Constitution. Without accurate information our Democracy is a sham, an opportunity for tyrants and their sycophants to run the U.S. without regard to the needs and desires of the People. If we are happy with that dysfunction, then we should cancel the Fourth of July because the 1776 revolt from England would be then reduced to a mere exercise in power, not the beginning of an amazing real-life experiment in democracy. One last thing for now: I entirely agree with Greenwald that if the left-leaning legacy media had a conscience, if it were serving the higher purpose that it is pretending to serve, it would prominently acknowledge the false information it published and it would publicly explain the steps it is taking to make sure that this sort of thing does not ever occur again. The worst offending media outlets are refusing to do that in the case of the Steele Dossier, which is strong evidence that it will be business as usual as we approach the next round of elections. What follows is Greenwald's most recent thread on this topic. I wish I could argue with Greenwald on the facts he notes and his conclusions, because they constitute an strong indictment that our system of government/media has largely become manipulative theater, not the ingenious and innovative system for serving the People that many of us learned in civics classes decades ago.

One more excerpt worth repeating:

One key point I omitted: no discussion of the Russiagate fraud and the media's role is complete without highlighting their key partners in all of this: the security state services (CIA/FBI/NSA/DOJ). The most under-discussed media story of this decade is how they all but merged.

Continue ReadingLeft Leaning Legacy Media Belatedly and Grudgingly Acknowledge that the Steele Dossier was Fraudulent

Race Essentialism 101 at MSNBC, Compliments of Joy Ann Reid

It's very simple. If you are born with a certain color of skin, you are obligated to think and vote a certain way. Watch Joy Ann Reid smiling and nodding as she listens as this lesson in race essentialism unfolds for her audience. Those of us who have actually forced ourselves to read how the topic of "race relations" is now taught in many schools, corporations and government offices can easily see direct line causation from these principles to "news" shows of this sort.

Continue ReadingRace Essentialism 101 at MSNBC, Compliments of Joy Ann Reid

What Critical Race Theory Is Not.

Critical Race Theory is a cancer eating out Democrats from the inside out. The "carcinogen" at play is cowardice, unwillingness to speak up when faced with the absurdities offered by Wokeness. I follow Wilfred Reilly on Twitter.

The dozens of replies and links to his post, above, will be informative for all of you A) Who think that critical race theory is not being taught in K-12 schools, B) Who think that CRT is merely an attempt to teach honest American history, C) who think that you are well informed about CRT by getting most of your information from NYT/WP/NPR/CNN, D) who insist that only Republicans are concerned about CRT, E) Who consider CRT a productive method of improving race relations, F) Who consider CRT to be a natural evolution and enhancement of the civil rights movement, G) who believe that children won't be harmed by CRT, H) who don't appreciate that CRT excels at shutting down productive classroom conversation, H) who don't realize that huge segments of people who have voted Democrat their entire lives are finding themselves politically homeless based on the Democratic Party's uncritical embrace (or stunning silence) about CRT, I) who won't open their eyes to vast numbers of credible reports about the dangers of CRT by fired and suspended teachers and hundreds of whistle-blower produced documents, J) who refuse to acknowledge the problem because they hate Republicans, many of whom are also concerned about CRT, and K) who don't understand that CRT clashes with Enlightenment values that you treasure.

Here are dozens of additional examples from my own collection:

“But Where is Critical Race Theory Actually Being Taught?”

What is “Critical Race Theory”?

CRT thrives because it shuts down discussion of anything that challenges the prevailing narrative (e.g., the sorts of things mentioned by Wilfred Reilly in this NYP article), assisted by the intentional silence of left-leaning legacy media.  The answer is not to pivot to right-leaning media like FOX, which has its own massive dysfunction.  The challenge is to think for ourselves, downplay tribalism and speak up when falsehoods are uttered in your presence. These themes and others are prominent in John McWhorter's new book, Woke Racism.

Facts have consequences.  Here is an excerpt from Jesse Singal's most recent post springing from the Democrats' stunning loss in Virginia: "If Democrats Get Destroyed By The "Critical Race Theory" Backlash, It'll Be Their Own Fault":

What I’m saying is because many Democrats are obsessed with repeating, like actual robots, the catch phrases CRT isn’t being taught in K-12 schools and CRT is just acknowledging racism helped shaped America, when the former misses the point and the latter is basically a lie, they’ve left themselves completely vulnerable to what appears to be a successful and growing backlash. After my imaginary parent cleans the shards of silicon off herself, she’s likely headed straight for Christopher Rufo’s Twitter feed, because no one else will take her concerns seriously.

What a remarkable boon this is to the GOP! Think about it: Biden is off to a rough start, but with the shadow of Trump hanging over everything, the party is severely lacking in any sort of sustainable identity or momentum beyond “Fuck Joe Biden!”Now, they can present themselves as the party of Concerned Parents who just want a say in what their kids are being taught in school. And in the case of those crucial suburbs and exurbs that swung to Biden, they can do so while, when necessary, assiduously avoiding any mention of Orange Man altogether. Liberals, meanwhile, always looking for new and creative ways to lose winnable elections, have decided that in the wake of George Floyd’s murder, it is super important to stridently defend and to cast as racist anyone who citicizes… Robin DiAngelo and Tema Okun?

From David French on Bari Weiss' Substack:

Late last week, my friends Greg Lukianoff and Jonathan Haidt published an important piece in the online journal Persuasion that contained a startling statistic. Since 2015, there have been 471 separate efforts to fire university professors and scholars for their speech. More than 60 percent of those efforts have come from the left (though most of the physical threats have come from the right).

In light of the above, I can't help but conclude that the silence, cowardice and tribal instincts of most Democrats are making the Republicans look enlightened. That's not true because the Republicans are rife with dysfunction of their own, but Republicans have seen and seized an opportunity.  Even worse, the dysfunction of Democrats has energized Republicans, who now have a real issue.  The Democrats are now flat footed and sorely lacking in credibility because they have chosen tribalism based on absurdities rather than Enlightenment values. I have seen this all playing out for almost two years, based on dozens of articles I've posted on this website. Shame on all of us who have failed to speak up in the face of absurdities.  Our current political mess is the natural consequence of that conduct.

Continue ReadingWhat Critical Race Theory Is Not.

In Deleted Tweet, Ibram Kendi Claims Minority Status Paves the Way for Successful Admissions

Stunning admission:

This is the same man who talks in circles on the concept of "racism," a concept upon which all of his writings depend: At the Aspen Ideas Festival in 2019, when asked to define racism, Kendi earnestly answered: “[It is] a collection of racist policies that lead to racial inequity, that are substantiated by racist ideas.”

Continue ReadingIn Deleted Tweet, Ibram Kendi Claims Minority Status Paves the Way for Successful Admissions