Media Matters' Dishonest Misrepresentation of Pigford Presser – UPDATED

When I say that Media Matters For America is posting some very dishonest stuff about the Pigford press conference that I was part of yesterday, it probably won’t shock most of the readers here one bit. That’s okay, because it saves me time.

But since I’m apparently the token liberal around here, I will take a second to make it clear that Media Matters IS taken seriously on the left. Stop snickering, it’s true. MMFA is considered a very reliable and well researched source that sets the record straight and exposes the lies on right. If you’re a Big reader, I know YOU don’t believe this but just understand that liberals do and that would include me, until recently.

But now that I’m seeing firsthand just exactly how deceptive Media Matters is being about the Pigford press conference, I’m going to set the record straight and expose their lies.

Take this story about the presser that claims Andrew Breitbart doesn’t understand Pigford. They run a section of video where AB, speaking off the cuff, makes a minor gaffe discussing the difference between Track A and Track B claims in Pigford. The two tracks are a topic Andrew has discussed many, many times and it’s in the Pigford report. Andrew obviously knows the difference between Track A and B claims and in his short introduction, he was focusing on how these tracks effected the real, bona fide farmers like Eddie Slaughter, who is sitting about 5 feet away from him in the video clip Media Matters put up.

But Media Matters only shows a short section of the press conference. Their ‘heavily edited’ video doesn’t show any of the other speakers, including Mr. Slaughter, Rep. Michelle Bachman, Rep. Steve King or me. Nor does Media Matters make ANY reference to the point of the press conference — the release of hard evidence of how simple it is to commit fraud in Pigford.

When I saw the Media Matters piece, I immediately left two comments to respond to their charges. Those comments haven’t been posted on Media Matters’s website but other comments, posted AFTER I left mine are visible on the site.

Here’s one comment I responded to…

Breitbart should have had the “journalists” that did the “investigation” at the press conference. The problem with this course of action, is that Breitbart is neither a journalist, nor does he employ any. The other problem was there was no investigation performed, unless you consider group of wackos coming up with talking points, an investigation.

This commenter doesn’t know that I was there at the press conference presenting material and discussing the two months that I’ve been on the road exclusively working on the Pigford story. He doesn’t know that Breitbart was introducing me, one of the journalists doing investigation.

Why doesn’t the commenter know? Because Media Matters posted a ‘heavily edited’ video that deliberately left out this key information. It’s exactly what Media Matters accuses their enemies of, and they won’t even publish my comments to clarify.

*UPDATE: This next morning, after a private email to MMFA’s Eric Boehlert, my comments are showing up. Feel free to leave your own comments, as well.