Can't anybody do conservative media criticism? Or, please stop whining about ACORN coverage
September 16, 2009 8:50 am ET by Eric Boehlert
Can't anybody on the right play this game. Just once we'd actually love to read a coherent, fact-based critique of the press from the right. We'd actually welcome it. Instead, we're stuck with lame attempts like this one by Media Research Center's Dan Gainor.
He's hitting the same notes all the other far-right pundits are: The media's ignoring the (supposedly) blockbuster ACORN story:
The small scandal showing an embarrassing video of Baltimore ACORN staffers looking like they were giving tax advice on how to set up a brothel, is now national news. -- This story has everything you could ever want – corruption, sleazy actions at tax-funded organizations, firings, government ties, sex, hookers. It is a network news director’s dream. Imagine the ratings!
Only almost no one is covering it.
Really? According to Nexis/Lexis, these are mainstream media outlets that, prior to the publication of Gainor's piece, had covered the ACORN story out of Baltimore in the last week: Baltimore Sun, New York Post, Fort Worth Star-Telegram, Grand Rapids Press, Kansas City Star, Newsday, Newark Star-Ledger, Washington Post, Washington Times, CNN.com, Washingtonpost.com.
But aside from that, almost nobody is covering it.
Later, Gainor focuses on the network news coverage of the ACORN story, or the lack of [emphasis added]:
And yet. And yet it’s still been ignored by the network news. Nothing on ABC, CBS or NBC. The only thing any one of the three broadcast networks has done appeared in a blog post by ABC’s Jake Tapper. It's hardly worth noting except to show that the networks know about what’s going on. They just don’t care to report it. Only FOX News has bothered to report on the controversy.
See the obvious apples-to-oranges connection? Gainor claims the Big Three nets didn't' cover ACORN; only Fox News did. Of course, Fox News isn't a network and Fox News has about 21 more hours of news programming to fill each day because it's a 24/7 cable news outlet. Yet for some reason Gainor ignores what other 24/7 cable news outlets have done regarding the ACORN story. Why does Gainor play dumb? Because if he reveals the truth, his silly critique collapses.
For the record, here are the days from within the last week, and prior to Gainor's piece, when CNN covered the ACORN story. (I repeated the days on which CNN offered up multiple reports):
Sept. 10, 10, 11, 11, 11, 11, 11, 11, 12, 13, and 14.
Yeah, everybody's just totally ignoring the ACORN story.
ACORN is not a criminal organization. Some members got caught giving criminal advice (supposedly, though we don't have the full film, and the film makers, laughably incompetent, won't release them). Though, even then the films won't hold up in court because the sting is clearly entrapment.
At any rate, ACORN is no more a criminal organization then Cheney is a rapist.
Second, it is only entrapment when done by an agent of the state, ie the police.
Third, they have to talk you into, or get you to commit a crime you would not have committed. An example....they ask you to buy drugs from a local drug dealer, so they can build a case against him. You do, and they arrest you for buying drugs. This case is simply no where near what is needed for entrapment.
Since the entire conversation was based on a farce, there is no crime.
Or the Christian Church for the actions of Ted Haggard...
Or AM Talk Radio for employing convicted felon G. Gordon Liddy...
Or the Republicans for the actions of Richard Nixon. (Or any of these creepy side-show clowns!)
It's amazing that these fools try to play the "guilt by association" when they're made up of corporate raiders, polluters, felons, war criminals, closeted homosexuals and child molestors.
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Always projecting, huh?
So, if that is the case, Dick Cheney is a rapist.
1) The Right possesses neither reason, nor shame.
2) The 'liberal media' (barf) will never run the story.
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I hate these souless bastards
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WHAT Liberal Media?!
How does 3 low-level staffers equate to widespread and up the ladder? Are you really this dense or is this an act?
The 4th staffer knew it was a joke and played the teabaggers like a fiddle. pwned.
You might want to look at the video on MMFA on the left corner of the home page. The film makers got punk'd and look really stupid, which questions the other films, as well.
Rule # 3,674 of the right wing crackpot lunatic handbook
"The other networks aren't covering it" = "The other networks aren't telling the story 24/7/365"
But it's not, because the underlying justification just isn't there! There's ACORN that handles voter registation who keeps getting accused of officially-sanctioned and directed voter fraud when the leadership is doing nothing of the sort. Then there's the false claim that they have been 'given' federal stimulus funds arranged by the Obama Administration. They haven't been doing that, though. ACORN has no plans to apply for those funds. Then there's the separate group that handles housing for low-income US citizens that had a few low-level employees entrapped, and when those employees did wrong, they were fired.
They want ACORN to be a big deal, but it's not, and so all they can do is whine.
Whenever there's this level of false outrage, racism HAS to be large part of the equation.
Shorter - I think it's a combo of anti-black and anti-poor and it's sometimes hard to tell them apart.
Oh, it's much worse than that... ACORN were the VICTIMS of that voter-registration fraud crime!
Ahfter all, it was THERE MONEY, intended to increase Democratic votes, that was WASTED by people who filled out fraudulent forms that would NOT result in any actual votes!
And, like ANY good victim of a crime - ACORN NOTIFIED TO AUTHORITIES!!!
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WHAT Liberal Media?!
Look not only at how often they disparage other outlets, but how they follow it by making themselves out to be noble, yet humble heroes.
Those liberal media people, just have no idea what's important, do they? That's why they keep getting the story wrong. But that's OK, because I will tell you the real truth, the truth that the liberal media dare not touch! Forget the facts, we have TRUTHINESS!
What Acorn coverage?
You can dance around this issue as much as you want, but the facts are clear. People are no longer listening to news media that don't cover the news.
Glenn Beck is now getting more than 3 million views, compared to 600K for MSNBC in that time slot. That means that 83% of viewers, when deciding between the two channels, go to Fox.
Becks audience is small when compared to total population
Fox news is irrelevant
Ratings for radio talk show hosts are overblown.
The 9-12 protest had 60,000 so there irrelevant.
Everything the right does s supposedly irrelevant because there is no real support it all fake.
Yet the left has multiple sites, shows, devoted to trying to destroy Beck, Rush, Hanity ect. Why waste your time on something so irrelevant.
The right track is that it's bad for the country when such highly-rated shows lie repeatedly about important policy.
You weren't saying that the ratings show they aren't lying, were you? Because that would be really stupid.
But since you're looking only for acorn bashing, not acorn news stories, you're just going to have to shove off.
It's a reality vs. fantasy thing, mr/mrs grunt. Make a note of it.
I don't know what reality you are living in. Apparently, your fantasy life doesn't allow you to do simple searches.
If you happen to disagree with that, then your call for an independent prosecutor for a few dozen Bush administration crimes is noted.
It's not only Glenn Beck, it's also O'reilly and Shannity, and others. Constant harping how the other networks are not following their lead. But the bleating is not so much that they are scooping the other networks, as much as they are pleading that the other networks also do what they, FOX, are doing to ACORN.
It's odd isn't it? Why is it important to FOX, that ABC, NBC, CNN, CBS, NYTIMES, WASH POST, ET. AL, do as they, FOX, report the ACORN story? Why does it matter to FOX, if the other networks don't report on ACORN, 133 times, or some such number, as FOX did? Why are they so obsessed that the other networks and print media are not following their lead?