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The Babylon Bee Sees a Victory for Genuine Fake News

Brad Slager
Brad Slager  |  Jun 14, 2021
The opinions expressed by columnists are their own and do not necessarily represent the views of Townhall.com.

This is Townhall's daily VIP feature, where we will focus coverage on the deeply flawed aspects of journalism in the nation. We'll look to bring accountability to the mishaps, misdeeds, manipulations, malpractice, and manufactured narratives in the mainstream media.

06.14.21 (Update)

Gilded Reframe – THE NEW YORK TIMES

For months now, there has been an ongoing battle between the undependable New York Times and the dependably hilarious satire site The Babylon Bee. The Times fell into a trap of their own making in attempting to reclassify The Bee as a source of misinformation, claiming they cloak their mission to mislead the public by claiming to be a satire site. This essentially exposes the methods seen at Snopes and the USA Today fact-checkers who routinely have run disclaiming pieces allegedly busting entries from The Bee as being falsehoods; they have been fact-checking jokes, in other words.

Recently, The Babylon Bee sent legal notices to The Times to have them retract their claim or run the risk of legal action, and today, Seth Dillion, founder of the site, disclosed that The Times backed down and ran a correction on their piece where it had slandered the satire site.

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Stealth Story Evolution – ABC News / Nightline

As the press continues to drape themselves in more layers of clownery by not correctly correcting the record when they screw up, the examples become even more hilarious. In a lengthy piece exploring the issue – something they could not be bothered with doing one year ago – Terry Moran from "Nightline" does an exhaustive report looking into the matter...finally. But in the course of rooting out the details and opening up the possibility of this becoming a story of a true leak from the Chinese virology lab, he absolutely had to take time and pass off the responsibility of the sloth seen from him and the broader journalism community. 

That damned Donald Trump was the reason.

"President Trump weaponized this subject and made the very questioning of the origins of the virus radioactive for a lot of people."

DNC PR Firm – ABC NEWS 

  • Not a good weekend for Terry Moran.

As an immediate follow-up to that strained attempt, Terry Moran decided he would continue to ignore the flop sweat he was creating for himself and weigh in on the filibuster matter in completely neutral and unbiased terms. 

Oh, Terry...it is never a good look to reveal you have a blindspot with extremely current events. McConnell just a few months ago finished years of being the Senate Majority leader without taking such action – and Donald Trump had in fact lobbied him to remove the filibuster. 

Pounce of Prevention – ASSOCIATED PRESS

In a wire report that sounds like an op-ed penned by a county party official, The AP details a number of GOP politicians highlighting the message of Democrats favoring anti-police measures. The lengthy piece makes it seem outlandish that anyone, let alone a politician, would utter something like this. 

Evidence be damned, it seems. It was noted in Minnesota, New York Mayor Bill de Blasio was a fervent supporter, and Democrats in Florida, following poor performance across the state, said the defund message hurt them tremendously. Oh, and there was this guy who was campaigning last year who thought redirecting money for police was a grand idea.

Matching Media Memorandum – NBC NEWS

Joining in with the nonsensical devotion to Rebekah Jones, the disgraced whistleblower from Florida, is NBC News. They have gleefully reported on the prospect that Jones has given voice to running against Matt Gaetz for his representative seat.

Despite the fact that Jones has become as dependable a source as a stick of dynamite had been for Wile E. Coyote, NBC touts her as a new candidate. Just a few small problems can be seen with their "report," however.

06.14.21 (Original)

Low Octane Gas Lighting – CNN

These two segments bear study for some time, as they typify all that has been wrong with the media over the course of their entire pandemic coverage. The pick-and-choose method of protection and attack regarding the players in the Covid response is encapsulated perfectly in a few brief minutes. Stelter opens things on "Reliable Sources" with coverage of what he deems to be excessive, obsessive negative coverage of Dr. Anthony Fauci in the past few weeks. "In one America," Stelter begins, "Dr. Anthony Fauci is trusted and even immortalized. In the other America, he is tarnished and distrusted."

Brian runs a series of clips from Fox News where Fauci is lambasted heavily on camera, for good reason, considering the trove of evidence that has come out showing Fauci misled on a number of topics. He is even shown to have possibly perjured himself in his recent testimony to Congress, as the exchanges he had with Sen. Rand Paul now appear deeply significant in showing he was untruthful. To Stelter, this is barely a concern. He dubs the released documents as "routine emails, portrayed as scandalous." No, Brian – they were repeated evidence of his contradictions and misleading information. 

Next, he appeared in the afternoon on his CNN cohort Jim Acosta's show to lend more clarifying misinformation to the discussion, and it would be considered an embarrassment of bias were either of them capable of such an emotion. In defense of Fauci, all of the double standards are in play; he is to be excused as he is exalted, and Trump is to be blamed as he is demonized for the similar reactions.

"Fauci was trying his best," said Stelter. "He made mistakes. So did a lot of other people. I think there is this attempt sometimes to only focus on the biggest mistakes or the worst moments someone like Fauci has had in order to cast him as a villain."

Just note that this sweeping excusal is never provided for Trump. He was supposed to be comprehensive and omniscient in his decisions, even though Fauci is the actual doctor. Then Acosta does his bumbling best to spout out all of his prepared talking points, showing how he is incapable of pragmatic analysis and also willing to dispense falsehoods.

"I don't recall Fauci telling people to inject themselves with disinfectants," said Acosta, once again turning to a long disproven claim made about the president in the press. Stelter, let's not forget, absolutely abhors when the newsmakers resort to misinformation – if they are at Fox News.

Then with a complete lack of self-awareness, his next scripted soundbite was, "This sounds like Fauci Derangement Syndrome." This, from the man so afflicted that he still invokes Trump on the regular during his eroding weekend show. Then he resorted to just plain ignorance to attempt making a point.

"He was downplaying the virus, saying it was going to go away. I mean, to put that record up against Dr. Fauci, there is no competition when it comes to the performance between these two individuals during that period."

Oh, Jim…

It was still in late February 2020 when Fauci was downplaying the virus. It was March when Anderson Cooper and Dr. Sanjay Gupta declared Covid to be no worse than the flu. But Gupta and Fauci are medical experts, and as we see, they are permitted to be incorrect on the way to being lionized. The non-medically trained Trump is expected to be flawless in his execution of duties. 

Pulitzer Prize...Winner – Associated Press

The Pulitzer Prizes were recently dispensed, and The AP was honored for their photojournalist work last year during all of the social upheavals that erupted across the country. While they should be rightfully proud of winning and touting their accomplishment, it looks both odd and oblivious when the news syndicate misrepresents not only the record but turns a blind eye to its own imagery. 

In crowing over the award, The AP declares that in their provided image of a private business engulfed in flames, we are looking at a "protest" – not a riot, mind you. Considering we are looking at an act of arson against a wine and liquor store, the assumption is then they are protesting in favor of bringing back the Temperance Movement. 

Presentation Paradox – THE NEW YORK TIMES

The Times gives us a deep examination of a controversy that erupted at a southern high school where families expressed outrage and opposition to the tabulation of the valedictorian and salutatorian awards. The two initial winners were POC students, and the families objecting to the results were white. When they challenged the school district that the standards of measurement had been ignored, it naturally became a case of racism. 

- "After two white families claimed a grade calculation error, a Mississippi school added their children as co-valedictorian and co-salutatorian, reviving questions about race and equity."

Two details have to be downplayed in order to sell this strife. The first is that it was determined that the calculation method used at the school was, in fact, incorrect. The second is that the paper has to inject race into the early sections of the article before getting around to this detail, nearly two dozen paragraphs deep. This was involving the parents speaking to Burnell McDonald, the superintendent of the schools of this area.

- "After talking with the white parents, Mr. McDonald, who is Black, concluded that the handbook and tradition backed them up: In the school system, class rank has been calculated by unweighted grade point average, not Q.P.A., which would have made the two white students the honorees."

Prose And Contradiction – MSNBC

It has been the cause of the year for Joy Reid, as she desperately and nightly pushes her support of Critical Race Theory. Her premise of deflection, to try describing opposition to CRT by coining the phrase "Confederate Race Theory," is daft enough (this is Joy Reid, after all). But she attempts to sell the concept that schools are currently refusing to even acknowledge that slavery existed.

We have a hard time figuring out what is the harder concept to absorb, that kids make it to college without knowing about this, or that it is even possible to teach about Abraham Lincoln and the Civil War while denying slavery existed.

Stealth Story Evolution – AUSTIN AMERICAN-STATESMAN

Early Saturday morning, there was a mass shooting that occurred in Austin, Texas, with 14 people shot. By Sunday, one victim perished. One local paper tried to cover the story and their standing in the social community by not detailing crucial information regarding the event.

Of note here, the  "vague" description from authorities was released to the public. It was decidedly not vague. "It is unknown if there is one, or multiple suspects involved. There is one suspect described as a black male, with dreadlocks, wearing a black shirt and a skinny build." Another detail is that at the time of the report, where the newspaper was unwilling to provide details to the public, the shooters were still at large. So with a pair of violent killers loose, the American-Statesman showed where their priority rested.

- "The Austin American-Statesman is not including the description as it is too vague at this time to be useful in identifying the shooter and such publication could be harmful in perpetuating stereotypes."

Reporting on the Mirror – NATIONAL PUBLIC RADIO

Well, if the audience will not be distracted away from his flubs and malaprops, at least the journalists can be distracted properly.