"Riffed from the Headlines" is Townhall's daily VIP feature with coverage of the deeply flawed aspects of journalism in the nation. We'll look to bring accountability to the mishaps, malaprops, misdeeds, manipulations, malpractice, and manufactured narratives in mainstream media.
01.16.23
First Amendment Strike Force – AXIOS
On Martin Luther King Day, the gang at Axios has seen a potential for problematics. It turns out the last thing they want people to do on this holiday is to bring up what Dr. King himself had to say.
- "Words from Martin Luther King Jr.'s 1963 'I Have a Dream' speech about a colorblind nation are repeated every MLK Day. But civil rights advocates say the now-frequent cherry-picking of quotes distorts his views and masks today's systemic racism. 'What's really interesting about colorblindness is that it sounds perfect. In theory. But in reality, colorblindness is a way to obfuscate systemic inequality,' said Hajar Yazdiha, a USC sociologist."
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I don't know; it seems rather racist to suggest that Dr. King's own words somehow contribute to systemic racism.
Weaponizing MLK's words in a divided nation https://t.co/LOz2yoWfav by @RussContreras
— Dan Primack (@danprimack) January 16, 2023
News Avoidance Syndrome – VARIOUS OUTLETS
- More not-lies told from the Fable-Maker in Chief.
In a Sunday speech ahead of the MLK holiday, Jose Biden was speaking to a congregation, and in his time at the pulpit, he recanted a tale of his formative years being spent attending a black church regularly and listening to sermons from a favorite pastor.
BIDEN: "I used to go to 7:30 mass every morning in high school and then in college, before I went to the Black church. Not a joke."
— RNC Research (@RNCResearch) January 15, 2023
Congregants say they can't recall Biden ever attending. pic.twitter.com/4xcF6i0nFE
That rustling noise you hear is the fact-checkers fading into the hedgerows in an effort to avoid addressing this fraudulent claim by the president. One journo willing to look into this matter is Alana Goodman of the Washington Free Beacon, and look into she did. She not only speaks to longtime parishioners who have zero recollection of Biden attending but the pastor he raves about listening to had not been attached to the alluded to church when Biden claims to have allegedly been in attendance.
Biden again claimed yesterday he attended a black church in high school & college -- a claim congregants and employees told me is not true.https://t.co/CEd25NzZNA https://t.co/b8yO1pNCqQ
— Alana Goodman (@alanagoodman) January 16, 2023
Democrat Custodial Services – CNN
- You know what, Abilio? Biden might be better off without your "help."
This weekend, Jim Acosta got his chance to defend Jose Biden's honor by insinuating that Republicans are completely wrong in trying to accuse the president of being some type of criminal mastermind. Now, I am not aware of anyone calling Biden anything approaching this, but it is clear that Jimbo is using the contradiction of reality as a form of deflecting Biden from any responsibility.
Saying the president is not in the wrong over these documents because he clearly is not a mastermind is a remarkable way of supporting the man.
Jim @Acosta defends Joe Biden over the document discoveries by saying that the Republicans are completely wrong in calling Biden a "mastermind".
— Lie-Able Sources (@LieAbleSources) January 16, 2023
Soooooo, according to Jim, Biden is too stupid to be guilty of anything. Admittedly, this is a sterling defense. pic.twitter.com/3l1Ww7elD9
Gilded Reframe – VARIOUS OUTLETS
- It seems the president did not get the memo on the narrative used to defend his policy.
Last week, we covered how Glenn Kessler and Jake Tapper were consumed with defending the IRS from the proposal from the Republicans to pull the funding for hiring 87,000 new employees. One of the key talking points has been these are not primarily auditors to go after Americans but that they will mostly be support staff, IT workers, and customer service reps.
That script has now been shredded, as Biden gave his speech for Martin Luther King Day and spent much of the time not talking about Dr. King. In one segment, he addressed the IRS issue and spoke rhapsodically about all of the 87,000 agents he needed to hire in his proposal.
BIDEN: "All these new IRS agents we have, it's because they fired a lot of them, and a lot are retiring, and guess what? Who needs serious agents to know what they're doing and not doing? The billionaires!" pic.twitter.com/A4Otibqw3J
— Townhall.com (@townhallcom) January 16, 2023
Artisanally-Crafted Narratives – WORLD ECONOMIC FORUM
- Seems those who are determining what constitutes misinformation are rather uniform in their approach to the topic.
As the World Economic Forum fires up, the ominous feeling these gatherings generate is always a factor, but the WEF appears to want to entrench that impression even more so.
This year, it has formed a panel to discuss the matter of misinformation, and it is not a shock to learn the composition of the group shows to be figures selected all from a common position. The standout for us, among the names listed, is the deposed media guru from CNN, Brian Stelter. The seriousness of its wanting to address misinformation is more than slightly compromised by the appearance of the man dismissed from a major news outlet for his own predilection of spreading misinformation.
WEF's "disinformation" panel features: a fired CNN host, a media baron, an EU bureaucrat, the prez of a liberal dark money-funded non-profit and of course a Dem politician. pic.twitter.com/38T0RMHvgs
— Ailan Evans (@AilanHEvans) January 16, 2023
First Amendment Strike Force – USA TODAY
It must have been past an allotment of days without a manufactured cultural outrage, so USA Today has come out with a stunted lecture about appropriation…or some such nonsense. Now, you people who think it is quaint to use "Aloha" in interactions without being a Hawaiian are acting in an aggressive fashion.
-" 'It's a greeting or a farewell, but the meaning is deeper,' says Maile Arvin, the director of Pacific Islands Studies at the University of Utah. 'One of my Hawaiian language teachers taught it to me as 'Aloha means recognizing yourself in everyone and everything you meet.' If you're not Hawaiian and you say it, it could come off as mockery. And that's just one word to think about.'"
I was under the impression that Hawaiians were Americans, but now we have to treat them as a foreign culture in need of being segregated and off-limits to…other Americans. I guess the folks at USA Today do not consider all Americans part of the USA.
