Newsmax's beef? "Media Matters quoted, but de-emphasized, much of the fuller context of Beck's remarks"
Quoting from an October 23 Media Matters for America press release on radio host Glenn Beck's statement that "I think there is a handful of people who hate America. Unfortunately for them, a lot of them are losing their homes in [the Southern California] forest fire today," an October 25 Newsmax.com article claimed that Media Matters "implie[d]" that Beck "somehow approved of the burning of certain Southern California residents' homes." The article went on to claim that "a plain reading of his words in context reflects no such approval," and claimed that Media Matters "quoted, but de-emphasized, much of the fuller context" of Beck's remarks. In fact, Media Matters never "implie[d]" that Beck "approved of the burning of certain Southern California residents' homes," and Newsmax offered no explanation as to how Media Matters "de-emphasized" the "fuller context" of Beck's remarks -- indeed, it acknowledged that Media Matters quoted "the fuller context."
From the October 25 Newsmax.com article:
Critics, including MSNBC's Keith Olbermann, focused on two sentences in a segment about California politics in which Beck said: "I think there is a handful of people who hate America. Unfortunately for them, a lot of them are losing their homes in a forest fire today."
For his remarks, Olbermann awarded Beck third place in his daily Worst Person in the World contest. Meanwhile, self-described "progressive" media watchdog group Media Matters for America on Tuesday issued a statement saying "CNN should distance itself" from Beck's "inappropriate remarks."
Such criticism implies that Beck had somehow approved of the burning of certain Southern California residents' homes.
But a plain reading of his words in context reflects no such approval.
Beck's original remark was made while explaining his differences with California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger.
According to the show's transcript, Beck said: "We need to come together and we need to get back to the center...We all love America. We just disagree on how we should function, what we should do, big government, small government. It doesn't mean you hate America. I think there's a handful of people who hate America. Unfortunately for them, a lot of them are losing their homes in a forest fire today."
"There are a few people that hate America," Beck continued. "But I don't think the Democrats are those. I think there are those posing as Democrats that are like that. But you don't come to the [political] center."
In response to the flurry of criticism, Beck referred Newsmax to the statements he made Tuesday, in which he said: "I clearly do not want anyone's house to be burned down. Now, some people may want to interpret what they think I mean, but that's what I mean."
Beck, who grew up in the forested Pacific Northwest, added that "wildfires are deeply personal to me" and explained to listeners the fear he feels at the red glow of an approaching forest fire over a hill.
Both Olbermann and Media Matters quoted, but de-emphasized, much of the fuller context of Beck's remarks. Oh well, who care [sic] about the facts?
Both the October 23 press release -- headlined "CNN's Glenn Beck: Some Victims of Calif. Wildfires 'Hate America' " -- and Media Matters' original item documenting Beck's comments provided the full context of his remarks.
When you issue a statement urging CNN to distance themselves from Beck's remarks, you are most definitely implying your distaste of his remarks.
And when part of the text is bold, the parts that are not are "de-emphasized".
Own it.
Oh noes! Tommy is angry is because MMFA is pointing out the "what about all good things Hitler did?" approach Newsmax took to Beck's remarks? Poor Tommy.
It's pretty sad when the right's approach to this kind of idiocy is not recognizing it for what it is, but instead demanding that MMFA use more or less bolding. Christ. The only thing that would be nearly as pathetic would be demanding that each right-winged bobble head featured here have a list of all the attaboys they've completed since high school.
The only one that needs to 'own' anything is Glenn Beck. He's pulling the same trash that Rush did so I guess that means we are in store for another month of whining from his hateful mouth.
The original post had nothing to do with MM suggesting Beck was happy with the houses burning down, or at least that interpretation never crossed my mind. The complaint by MM had to do with the fact that Beck said it was happening to people who "hate America," which is the stupid comment.
Again, nobody noted that the homes were lost in hugely Republican parts of the state. I mean hugely.
You are WRONG in both instances. Implied distaste for the statement is not SAYING he approved of houses burning down. Only that the statement itself was distasteful as it is. AND NO, bolding one part is EMPHASISING that part, nothing you are quoting is being de-emphasized unless they put it in microscopic print.
What nitpicking idiocy. When you emphasize something, you automatically de-emphasize the other parts. It's not rocket science.
And stop acting naive, you know exactly what MMFA was referring to when they urged CNN to distance themselves. You can play word parsing games, like what the meaning of "is" "is".......but it changes nothing.
MMFA had a problem with the "Hate America" bullsh*t the far right likes to propagate.
I don't diagree with the original criticims of Beck's comments, they were disgraceful.....but that isn't the topic of this thread. It is MMFA saying Newsmax is mischaracterizing MMFA's activism, which they are not.
NO QUESTION they ARE. Nowhere was there ANY suggestion that MMFA was saying or implying that Beck was HAPPY about houses burning down, that is ludicrous and flat OUT misinformation and I NO they did not DE-EMPHASIZE anything. They didnt PUT IT IN FINE PRINT. You are not being rational on this one. Either cough up something specific MMFA said that would infer he was being criticised for being glad houses were burning and tell us the action MMFA took to De-emphasize the context or give it up.
What Newsmax is doing is engaging in what's called a red-herring argument: making culpable something that is clearly not so. O'Reilly does it all the time, etc. etc.-- it's a classic right-wing tactic.
You are absolutely correct Tommy. I don't how you argue with these people day in and day out but I appreciate it. Always makes for a fun read.
No he isnt there is no question Newsmax is misrepresenting MMFA. No possible way can it be established that MMFA was implying in ANY way that Beck was glad peoples houses were burning down. Is there NO limit to how ludicrous an argument you will accept as long as it appologizes for rightwing BS?
Tommy can't you get attention somewhere else, I'm tired of reading your crying everyday in faux outrage over MMFA. Everyday its the same stuff from you. You are just trying to tick people off enough so they will talk to you. Just f*ck off...or take a vacation from posting...
Wrong again BOTH TIMES. First I never took it anything LIKE Beck was glad houses were burning down but more hate America BS from moronic Beck. Second NO YOU DONT. You EMPHASIZE certain things that leaves the rest all the same to. It leaves the context. De-emphasizing is a word that declares an action taken. If I say President BUSH is a moron it is emphasizing his identity in order to define him from other presidents it doesnt de emphasize the fact he is president or that I think he is a moron.
Exactly, the action taked was not to emphasize the entire contextual quote.....but to choose, or act, to emphasize only the most damning parts. That is exactly what Newsmax said.
To parse and pick apart words in some microscopic fashion does nothing to bolster your argument, when the overall meaning is unchanged. But if you must to provoke an argument or defend MMFA at all costs, then go for it.
taken, not taked.
NO, its not correct to say that emphasizing the part that they are talking about de-emphasizes the rest. That is silly. The word de-emphasis describes an affirmative action. By this logic there is NO WAY to give context at ALL if you highlight the part you find particularly offensive. Its ludicrous. Newmax didnt say they emphasized the truly offensive part and gave context which is what happened they said they DE-EMPHASIZED the context. Emphasizing the one part is NOT he same as de-emphasizing the other. Besides there isnt any WAY to argue that Newmax is NOT misinforming when they say MMFA implied Beck was glad houses were burning down. It IS misinformation they didnt even TRY to show how that was done. It WASNT done.
I think whenever Media Matters quotes a nonliberal they should have to quote everything he/she has ever said and not emphasize any part of it. anything else will be unfair.
When I look at your post all I see is "not only" because you've de-emphasized the rest. What exactly do you mean by "not only"?
I think I agree with you clams, but since nothing was in BOLD I your entire post was de-emphasized.
I would say they "de-emphasised" the other 2 hours and 59 minutes of the broadcast that did not have to do with Beck's moronic statements about the victims of the fire.
I usually think Tommy's parsing of MMFA's articles is just being extremely diligent, but this looks like a vindictive play.
You should catch his comments on the "O'Reilly again ignored CNN and MSNBC coverage...". "Diligent" is definitely not the word for it.
Tommy, I'm not sure what you thinking MMFA is failing to "own" here. But it strikes me that when Beck makes tasteless half-jokes about Californians hating America and losing their houses in fires, don't you think it's important for CNN, Beck, and Beck's supporters to "own it", too?
Yeah, who cares about the facts -- the fact that he said it and needs someone else to explain how the messengers are the villains.
MEDIA MATTERS KEEP DOING YOUR THING. Everytime one of these commentators or publications mentions your name, they are saying to the world "these guys over here are challenging our "traditional", borderline bigot/racist way of doing things and we don't like it. We want Beck, Coulter, Hannity and the rest of the Stupor Villains to be able to say whatever disgusting things they want to say on our airwaves." Good job keeping these folks in line!
De-emphasized? This is genuinely absurd!
First there was the claim, "They're not quoting me in context!" (even though they were, in all those O'Reilly and Limbaugh scuff-ups!). Now it's, "They're quoting me in context, but I really wish they'd just ignore that offensive part!" WHAT?!?!
Do they want the entire quote in the headline or summary? Then it really wouldn't be a "HEADLINE" or a "SUMMARY," though, would it?!
If Olbermann read everything at exactly the same pace, he would run out of time on his show. Since he said the words (albeit quickly), one has the means to go look them up if one doubts their intent.
If we're talking about the most offensive two sentences, it makes sense to emphasize those sentences, or how could anyone follow what you're saying?!
"But a plain reading of his words in context reveals no such approval." WHAT? How are you deciding that?
I can tell you one thing, a plain LISTENING of his words in context reveals PLENTY of approval! My goodness, there was so much venom in his voice throughout that entire speech!
That is so true, when the offending comments are taken out of context is when they are the least vile. Taken in the context of months or years of lies, half truths etc etc; you know what I'm talking about, the comments can be interpreted as the speaker meant in their dark little heart.
Beck is a moron and CNN should get rid of him because he is just irrelevant , but the thought police scares me. Should MSNBC condemm Keith Olbermann for these things? I do not think so, let people speak and let the market decide. Thankfully that is what happened to Imus last spring.
http://www.adl.org/media_watch/tv/20060728-MSNBC.htm
http://hotair.com/archives/2007/09/10/worst-person-in-the-world-fox-news-is-worse-than-al-qaeda/
I love it when MMFA is quoted out of context in an article cmplaining that MMFA quoted someone out of context. (Ouch! My head hurts!) I try to get my conservative friends to read MMFA, not to change their position (it would be nice, but it's not likely to happen) but just so they'd realize how much these O'Rielly, Beck and Limbaugh types just outright LIE to them, especially when they call MMFA a "smear site."
WIth the exception of the editorial columns (cleary marked as such), there's no opinion stated here at all. Just the quote (alnog with the enitre transcipt), an ID of the distortion and references/links to the correct info. You can have any position you want on an issue, but at least TRY to make a reasobale argument, based on accurate info and facts. All [the irght] has is strawmen. A whole army of them. (If they only had a brain....)
Wait? Didn't Glenn say it was a joke?
Oh, well, why not use all the excuses at the same time?
what exactly are the facts whose absence Newsmax laments?
Before the conservative assualt begins (well, it sort of started already with Tommy):
(1) Own what? of course MMFA placed certain of Beck's remarks in bold type--the OFFENDING REMARKS. So what? What wouldv'e been the point of emphasizing Beck's thought that we all get along? That's an unremarkable statement. The fact that he would then go on to say that those who hate America are losing their homes IS NOTABLE.
(2) and MOST IMPORTANTLY. Here's my question for everyone: Does the inclusion of the full context make Beck's comments any LESS OFFENSIVE? Does it actually CHANGE their meaning? I would say obviously NOT but would love to hear an alternative explanation.
NEWSMAX: "Critics, including MSNBC's Keith Olbermann, focused on two sentences in a segment about California politics in which Beck said: 'I think there is a handful of people who hate America. Unfortunately for them, a lot of them are losing their homes in a forest fire today.'"
Critics of Keith Olbermann, including Newsmax, focused on two sentences from the Worst Person segment, conveniently leaving out the additional 5 sentences that Olbermann had included in his quote:
OLBERMANN: That's ahead, but first, time for Countdown's "Worst Persons in the World."The bronze: CNN's Glenn Beck. He says, quote, "We're all one America. Just because I disagree with you doesn't mean you hate America, and I love America. We all love America. We just disagree on how we should function, what we should do, big government, small government. It doesn't mean you hate America." Next sentence: "I think there's a handful of people who hate America. Unfortunately for them, a lot of them are losing their homes in a forest fire today."
Nice. Make fun of the California wildfires. How would you like to have to defend this guy at a sanity hearing?
Oh well, who cares about the facts?
So it's ok to say something really stupid or offensive as long as you say something nice before and/or after it to provide "context"
LOL @ Newswhacks
Speaking of owning things...Beck, Limbaugh, Hannity, Coulter and the other Troglodyte Flying Monkey Liars on the Right often accuse Liberals of "hating America". It's bullsh*t, of course, but that's all they've got. They OWN that phrase, even though they scurry away from it like cockroaches when someone calls them on it.
Beck is a hack Republican liar, despite his "aw-shucks" regular guy affectations.
The difference between Newsmax and MMFA:
MMFA's article links to the Newsmax article.
The Newsmax article contains no links whatsoever. (We can't have any of the faithful going to the source for the truth now, can we?)
MMFA provides a forum within the posting where all are welcome to comment, discuss and debate.
The Newsmax article contains no discussion or comment forum and does not link to one. (We can't have any detractors posting a dose of reality for all the faithful to see, can we?)
MMFA has the initials of the staff member who wrote the article clearly indicated, which can be looked up in the staff listing.
The Newsmax article, unless it was mentioned somewhere inconspicuously, has an anonymous author. (Responsibility, reshmonsibility.)
Newsmax is an amateur hack outfit.
One look at their site or one look at the article MMFA linked to proves that.
right on Pete. You nailed it.
Newsmax has developed that right-wing disease called Ameriphobia, which is the fear of anyone but their kind being Americans. It is a terrible disease which affects narrow minded people. Symptoms include, lack of reading comprehension, twisted hearing and lack of discussion with dissenters. It attacks people who have the lesser known disease, Patriophobia...Hannity has that one.
It's funny...Archie Bunker, for those old enough to remember him...was a loveable buffoon. He was a conservative caricature and most of us laughed at him, because his opinions were so obviously based on ignorance and bigotry. The personality traits that made him the butt of jokes are now considered virtues by a large segment of the Republican party. This is the real legacy of Rush Limbaugh and his acolytes.
"Newsmax has developed that right-wing disease called Ameriphobia... It attacks people who have the lesser known disease, Patriophobia...".- princeofwheels
I'm giving a second oinion, POW. I see symptoms of de-emphysema.
How do you de-emphasize something?
Print it in invisible ink maybe?
Is de-emphasize the new "out of context" excuse?
(D) emphaize
This is ridiculous.
It's bold or italic or caps for emphasis.
The fact that you use bold or italic or caps doesn't de-emphasize anything.
The part of Beck's quotes that aren't emphasized are as important as they always were.
There's no way to de-emphasize something unless you leave it out.
What a bunch of dopes.
They certainly do need some editors at Newsmax.
Nice deflection. The offensive part of Beck's remark was that he accused some victims of the fire of "Hating America." That was the focus of the press release and the MMFA item, not any implication that Beck wished the fire upon them.
How does Glenn Beck know that any of the people "losing their homes in a forest fire" hate America? That's a pretty bold statement to make. Then he tried to say he was making a joke? About what, Glenn? People losing their homes in a forest fire? Nice. Anyone who tries to defend this is a moron. Why won't the right ever just apologize when they say stupid stuff? If they did, it would all just go away. But, i guess they like the contraversy because it sells books and gets high ratings with their fans...
It's hard sometimes, but one of my rulz 2 live by is:
"Never attribute to malice that which is explained by stupidity."
Limbaugh, O'Rielly - not dumb. Manipulative bastards with a lot of gullible listeners, but they are street-smart men who KNOW DAMN WELL what they're doing. (And credit where it's due: THEY DO IT WELL! That's why we need MMFA, Keith Olbermann, etc...)
BECK on the other hand... I think his picture should go next my quote above. He's an idiot. No other way to say it. In fact ["He's an idiot"] is a pretty good caption for just about every picture I've ever seen of the man.
They are only angry because Media Matters is keeping track of their lies. I posted in another comment but do not know if it showed up in another thread here they are scared. For years they got away with lies and now they aren't. These right-wing places just can not stand that the lies are being caught keep up the good work.
I'm going to disagree with some on this thread. From the original statement Beck made, it was crystal clear that Beck was glad that there are celebrity liberals that lost their homes in the Malibu fire. Newsmax and Beck pointing out that wildfire threats are deeply personal to Beck does not change the fact that he has no compassion for what happened to celebrity liberals.
Beck gave a specific context to his original comments. He states the lie that the liberal celebrities are not part of the majority that loves America and then rubs in the fact many are losing their homes. Am I supposed to believe that he has compassion when bad things happen to America-haters? No.
C'mon, skip! Beck is clearly buying up all the cheap homebuilder stocks he can, due to the market catastrophe they have undergone. This fire will hopefully generate lots of new building, and, perhaps, help him become fabulously wealthy. How could he not root for prosperity, even - no, especially - when it comes (in his mind) from visitation of God's wrath upon the unholy.
To de-emphasize text would be to print it in a smaller font size or to display it in an area that is not easily accessible, like on a different page. For example, the terms and conditions you get when you receive a new credit card are 'de-emphasized'. The fine print you see on a tv screen when you watch a car dealer's commercial is 'de-emphasized'. Printing text at the top of a web page in 12pt font size with a link to the original source is not de-emphasizing text
First off, a couple of things...
Media Matters doesn't really emphesize, or de-emphesize anything by bolding it. They bold the quote to show the reader where they got it from when they quote him in the main article.
It goes...
Article (with quotes from text).
Transcript (with bolded quotes contained in text). Bolding isn't here to provide an emphesis. It's just to show easily where they took the quote from the article from. Check it out...
"I think there is a handful of people who hate America. Unfortunately for them, a lot of them are losing their homes in a forest fire today."
Really, really hard to spin that one away...
The question about emphasis or deemphasis is a stupid one that simply distracts from the real issues. MM printed a quote and printed that quote in its context. So that you could see the portion attention was called to it was printed in bold. So what? How do you who complain expect someone to do this? 1) Not put the context in or 2) not emphasize the part the writer wanted to point out. I suppose with the right's ideas about a fair debate, it would be 2) to not emphasize the part you want to point out. the right can then complain that you are not pointing out where the offending statement is so it can be readily reviewed by a reader. Face it for the right the only fair way for a liberal to debate is to be silent.