The objective of Media Matters For America (MMFA) is to tell half-truths, spin, distort and well … let’s face it, they will do anything except deal with the facts in order to try and discredit anyone who disagrees with the Progressive agenda as outlined by their favorite rich guy, George Soros, the “Dude” of “Spooky.” But you have to hand it to them, sometimes they are so creative in their methods.
Take their homepage from the other day:
Looking at the screen shot, one would think that they would present proof that Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity and Andrew Breitbart are being disingenuous about their “birther” positions. But when you open up to the items inside it becomes reminiscent of that old song from Sesame Street,
One of these things is not like the others,
One of these things just doesn’t belong,
Can you tell which thing is not like the others
By the time I finish my song?
In the article teased by the cover story Hannity is mentioned 18x, Limbaugh is mentioned 20x and Andrew Breitbart is mentioned….wait let me count…ah zero times. Breitbart is showcased in the picture, right there over headline, but he isn’t part of the story about flip-flopping about the “birther” issue.
Giving MMFA the benefit of the doubt (something they don’t practice) I considered the possibility that the author of the article forgot to put in the Breitbart quotes, leading me to check Breitbart’s websites for “birther” content.
Doing a search of Brietbart’s “Big” sites you don’t see the word “birther,” used often. There is not one mention of it in an article written by the “Big’s” cheese. Where the term is used by other writers, it’s used to cast adherents of the theory in a bad light, to criticize progressives for falsely accusing others of being “birthers,” or to explain why “birthers” are not necessarily racists. In the interests of full disclosure six of the stories that mention “birthers” were written by me.
MMFA put the picture of Breitbart on its home page for one reason only, an attempted smear of the internet entrepreneur as being less than truthful. Obviously some of the stories he has been running have upset their benefactor Mr. Soros but they had no real facts to disprove them (either that or they are angry about not being included in the forward of his new book; after all they gave him so much content).
Breitbart was smeared without using any of his words to back up their charges, Hannity and Limbaugh had the “joy” of having their words used.
Take a look at the “quotes they used for Hannity”
- On March 24, Hannity asked: “What’s the deal? Produce the birth certificate, it’s over, done with.” During the segment, he also said that Obama “did talk in his book about how he went and prayers and he went to a Muslim school, and he did talk about all this. And he studied the Quran, and prayers at sunset were some of the most beautiful things he saw in life. So he spent a lot of years of his youth in Indonesia … And show the birth certificate.” [Fox News, Hannity, 3/24/11]
- On March 23, Hannity asked, “What do you think about this birth certificate issue? I mean, it has not been my main issue, but it kind of does get a little odd here after a while. Can’t they just produce it and we move on?” [Fox News, Hannity, 3/23/11]
- On March 25, Hannity stated, “Donald Trump brought up the issue of the birth certificate, and it’s getting huge buzz around the country,” and later asked, “Why can’t they just release the birth certificate, you know, and just move on?” [Fox News, Hannity, 3/25/11]
- Later on the March 25 show, Hannity stated: “Do I think he was [born in America]? Yes. Do I think this is odd that they won’t produce the birth certificate? It’s beginning to get odd to me.” Hannity later stated that it’s “not true” that Obama has shown his birth certificate. [Fox News, Hannity, 3/25/11]
- On April 5, Hannity said that Obama was born in the United States but demanded that he “show the stupid birth certificate and move on.” [Fox News, Hannity, 4/5/11]
Not once did Hannity say he believed Obama was born outside the U.S. What he was calling for is for Obama to show the long form birth certificate to shut up the “birthers.” In three of the five quotes used, Hannity calls for Obama to show the birth certificate and move on. Like many on the conservative side, Hannity realized that Obama was holding back on the “long form” because it was a winning issue for him, or rather it was a losing one for his opposition (at least until Trump came along.) It destroyed the credibility of anyone who talked about it.
As far as the Limbaugh quotes, it is impossible to evaluate them out of context, which undoubtedly is the reason they presented them that way. Anybody who listens to Rush all the time (and MMFA has at least one person assigned to that task) knows that half of what he says is satire or sarcasm. Without listening to him make those comments, there is no way to tell what he means.
Truth and context do not really matter when MMFA is making charges against a conservative. That is simply the modus operandi of the Soros machine and the progressive movement. Just look at what they said about the Paul Ryan budget plan, it was if they were trying to tell the public that conservatives only want to put old people out on to the streets and eat babies. In the case of Media Matters for America, they try to confer slanders through photographic association, ignore context, or just plain pull a false charge out of their collective arses in their attempt to avoid discussing substantive issues by libeling people with whom they disagree.
Crossposted From NewsRealBlog