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CNN in a McCabe Shame Spiral

Brad Slager
Brad Slager  |  Jun 12, 2023
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06.12.23

Legalized Press-titution – CNN

  • The question becomes, who did you turn down to serve as your expert?!

While many are still digesting the sudden ouster of CNN boss Chris Licht, one thing painfully obvious is that he was not the cause of this network operating with near-zero credibility. One needs only look at the on-air product remaining unchanged over the years and delivering perpetual downward ratings trends. 

As the staff is clearly excited about the Trump documents indictment, the giddy coverage leads to impacted decisions. Why would a network wanting to be taken seriously use Andrew McCabe to suggest Hillary Clinton should have no legal ramifications, the man fired from the FBI for leaking and lying about the Clintons?

Democrat Custodial Services – ABC NEWS / GOOD MORNING AMERICA

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  • This is called "Insisting the Problem Away."

On GMA, host and former Clinton operative George Stephanopoulos had on former Trump attorney Jim Trusty to review the recent indictment over the documents scandal. George thought he had a biting, accusatory question for Trusty, except the lawyer was ready to combat the slanted approach:

Don’t you believe in the principle that no person is above the law? If the president committed the same crime as someone else did, shouldn’t he be charged?

George was not ready to have some cold facts thrown back at him:

No person is below the law, that’s really the issue here. You’ve got these investigations in Delaware that are 1,000 times more serious by a sitting president who has authorized his DOJ [Department of Justice] to try to sink the candidacy of his prime opposition while that guy has unsecured documents that he stole out of a skiff dozens of years ago.

This did not sit well with the host at all. After exclaiming, "What are you talking about?!" Steph attempted to completely brash away all of the known details about Biden's documents issues:

We will see how it plays out because I don’t think you have any evidence to back up any of the charges you just made.

Reporting on the Mirror – NATIONAL PRESS CLUB

  • All the proof this industry has zero interest in fixing things.

There is little mystery why the public perception of the press is in the septic tank when the journalist authorities themselves do not take things seriously. This past weekend, the National Press Club gave out a Walter Cronkite Award to none other than Ben Collins of NBC News, the laughably reliable media liar. Apart from his being suspended by his own network for his shoddy work, one of the items the NPC held up as laudable was one of Ben's biggest fiascos from last year:

It’s inspiring to watch Collins cover stories like…the anti-trans campaigns in the lead-up to the Club Q shooting, bearing witness to the extremism on the dark web and holding it accountable.

Collins spent days blaming the Club-Q shooting on right-wing media before being shown to be 100% incorrect. The killer was found to be non-binary, and Collins instantly began describing him as being victimized, then walking away from the story without any corrections – facts the journalists at the National Press Club had to be aware of. 

Blue-Anon – CNN

Just as Chris Licht cannot be looked at as the blame for current conditions at the network, one of the underlying stories has been how so many of the remaining entities inside CNN have been turning to former CEO Jeff Zucker over the past year. As it has been revealed he has still been pulling certain strings while in exile, there is all the more reason to get him as far away as possible. 

One of the biggest issues leading to his departure was the blatant journalism ethics involving having Governor Andrew Cuomo come on the air with his brother Chris. While it allowed him to deliver agitprop during Covid, Chris was also working behind the scenes to help his brother with a sex scandal, all while the network was pumping up the governor's actions as heroic. Now, another layer of shadiness has been revealed. 

Max Tani of Semafor has come across text messages from inside the network showing Zucker's in-house lover, Allison Gollust, had been lobbying Cuomo to open up movie theaters during the Covid shutdowns. This was done on behalf of parent company Warner Brothers, which was desperate to get movies back into theaters in order to recoup tens of millions in lost box office receipts. 

Bear in mind, too, at the time CNN, was pushing hard in favor of lockdowns and business closures – except when it came to their own business interests.

News Avoidance Syndrome – VARIOUS OUTLETS

  • Hmmm, it would almost appear the media complex is not swaying minds.

With all the lobbying and activist reporting from the journalist set over trans issues only getting more voluminous and louder, you would expect that any notable detail in public approval would be reported. Well…

A new Gallup poll has been released on the subject of trans women competing in sports as females, and the public mindset is seen to be shifting. The only problem for the press, people are moving away from what the news outlets have been pushing.

Today, 69% of respondents say that athletes should compete in divisions that match their birth gender, compared to 26% saying they favor them competing in their declared gender. What is notable in these figures is that it is not reflecting a shrinking majority. Over the past two years, the number has gone up by +7%, and that is not due to a one-sided influence.  

Among Democrats, there has also been that seven percentage point swing. Today it is essentially a split, 48/47%. 

Pre-Written Field Reports – TIME MAGAZINE

  • Maybe they should teach more geography in J-School and less Gender Studies. 

When the dam explosion took place in Ukraine, it became an environmental disaster and a humanitarian crisis. It sure felt like a natural comparison to make in likening this to a similar disaster, the Chernobyl nuclear crisis. Yet, there is a small issue in the details. 

Yes, they are dealing with the fallout of this dam flooding the region in Ukraine, much like the reactor catastrophe meant serious trouble for the people in…um, also Ukraine. 

"Riffed from the Headlines" is Townhall's daily VIP feature with coverage on the deeply flawed aspects of journalism in the nation, where Brad Slager looks to bring accountability to the mishaps, malaprops, misdeeds, manipulations, malpractice, and manufactured narratives in mainstream media.