In an interview with CNN's Anderson Cooper, Trump biographer Michael D'Antonio claims President Trump has been lying since he was a child, saying "he was named the ladies man at a high school that had no women at it ... he has been doing this forever."
Fact
Noun
1. something that actually exists; reality; truth:
Your fears have no basis in fact.
2. something is known to exist or to have happened:
Space travel is now a fact.
3. a truth is known by actual experience or observation; something is known to be true:
Scientists gather facts about plant growth.
Modern conservatives have been lying about taxes pretty much from the beginning of their movement. Made-up sob stories about family farms broken up to pay inheritance taxes, magical claims about self-financing tax cuts, and so on go all the way back to the 1970s. But the selling of tax cuts under Trump has taken things to a whole new level, both in terms of the brazenness of the lies and their sheer number. Both the depth and the breadth of the dishonesty make it hard even for those of us who do this for a living to keep track.
For liberals, it’s not exactly “breaking news” to find out that Fox News is mostly comprised of misinformation or flat-out lies. Anyone with even a shred of common sense can watch just a handful of their featured shows and see that the entire channel is nothing more than a propaganda mechanism for the Republican party.
Punditfact, a branch of Politifact, has put together profiles for CNN, MSNBC and Fox News detailing just how honest each of these networks are. And while it’s obviously not a completely comprehensive profile (it would be nearly impossible to fact check every single thing said on each network) it’s a decent measure of the honesty of each.
And what do you know, Pundifact found Fox News to have only told the truth 18 percent (15 of 83) of the time for the statements they checked. And even of that 18 percent, only 8 percent of what they said was completely “True.” The other 10 percent was rated as “Mostly True.”
A staggering 60 percent (50 of 83) comments were found to be either “Mostly False,” “False,” or “Pants on Fire.”
The other 22 percent were rated “Half True.”
Essentially well over half of what Punditfact has fact-checked on Fox News has been a lie and only 18 percent has been deemed factual.
To compare, CNN was found to have been honest about 60 percent of the time, while only having 18 percent of their comments found to be false. As for MSNBC, they were found to have been honest about 31 percent of the time, while 48 percent of the comments they had fact-checked were deemed untrue.
So while MSNBC’s numbers aren’t exactly worth bragging about, they’re still far better than the “fair and balanced” Fox News.
You know, because anything that’s not approved by Fox News or some other right-wing media source is clearly “liberally biased propaganda.”
Which is really a fantastic piece of rhetoric, isn’t it? Fox News, and other right-wing media sources can lie as much as they want. Then if any other source debunks the nonsense they’re spewing, the conservative media simply dismisses it as “lies perpetuated by the liberal media.”
It’s how conspiracy theorists manipulate their sheep. They perpetuate some kind of asinine conspiracy, then when it’s completely debunked, they claim the information debunking it is “all a part of the conspiracy.”
And that’s exactly what the right-wing media does.
Which is why tens of millions of conservatives believe that Fox News is a “fair and balanced” beacon of truth, despite the fact that Punditfact found only 18 percent of their comments to be factual among a fairly large sampling of 83 relatively important statements made on the network.
Sean Hannity is the typical bully. He seems like the kind of person who is making up for being beaten up a lot as a child. His debating skills are excellent. His success comes from his natural ability to win an argument regardless of which side he takes.
According to his bios posted on Fox’s website and his personal website, Sean has not attended any journalism classes, has no formal training in journalism and has not been a reporter. He was a talk show host on a college radio station and he made a very successful jump to AM radio.
Out of Context Quotes: This is one of Sean’s most common tools of deception. By using partial quotes, or quoting words without explaining the intended message of the person quoted, Sean basically commits slander on an hour by hour basis. For those of you who do not know what this is, I will try to site some examples in the future. Their never-ending list of examples but all you have to do to witness this is watch or listen to him for 10 minutes. It is amazing, once you realize he is doing this you will be stunned at how often he uses this method of deception.
Dismissing Facts: Whenever someone points out a fact or statistic that works against his point of view he dismisses it. He questions it’s validity regardless of the source. In other words, he disregards the truth.
Attack the Messenger: This might be the most often used tactic of the right wing since Nixon used it so successfully. Sean spends a great deal of energy searching for any controversial aspect of his interviewee or the whoever the target of the moment is, so as to discredit the messenger. In other words when he is scared of the message and he has no way of winning his argument he lashes out at the individual. Sometimes he uses this preemptively before any interview starts, he begins by making some accusation, distracting from the topic of discussion. An example of how this is so wrong to do might be if a convicted murderer saved someone's life, the fact that he had murdered in the past has no relevance to the fact that he just saved a life. The argument, as most of Sean’s arguments are, is irrelevant.To paint another picture of how wrong this to do when dealing with journalism you might think of it this way, regardless of Michael Jackson’s odd personal life you can not in any way question his musical talent. Sean would use Michael’s personal life to discredit his talent. It is wrong both technically and morally.
Cut Off and Redirect: Sean constantly stifles people for the purpose of bringing up another issue or to make an accusation, usually making use of his skill at presenting out of context information.
Factual Errors Relentlessly Posed as Truth: Sean’s flagrant disregard for honesty is simply stunning. He quotes facts that are simply wrong. It would be a full-time job for someone to keep track of his lies. One example might be the fact that he continually repeats the statement that Sadam gassed 1.5 million of his own people. Well Sean, wrong as usual. 1.5 million people may have died over the 10 years of war with Iran, but even the US did not sell him THAT much gas!
Why he is dangerous: Using his loud mouth, partial truths, and tactics (see above), he has become one of the most listened to radio hosts in America. Sadly, our less than intelligent American public has been suckered into following this Pied Piper of Pontification. much like the bad guys in professional wrestling gain a fan base.
A Message: Hey Sean, having an audience does not mean that you have anything meaningful to say. Case in point, Jerry Springer. Your claim to fame is a big mouth. Let’s have a little verbal one on one, without commercials, we’ll see how “right” you are. The only reason for your success is due to the fact that the people you interview, no matter how right they are, just don’t have your verbal skills. You are all show, and no substance.
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