by Joseph P. Tartaro | Executive Editor
The battle to keep the American public in the dark about many government deliberations and activities is not just a recent development. The Obama administration’s battles with reporters it doesn’t like, such as Sharyl Attkisson, formerly of CBS, are not a new phenomenon. I have seen references to government officials striving to keep the news media from reporting on government activities and government officials that date back to the early 19th century, shortly after this republic was founded. Even two hundred years ago some government functionaries tried to muzzle the press in spite of their vote to enshrine freedom of the press in the First Amendment to the Constitution.
The Obama press strategy is really old hat. No surprise there.
What is relatively new is the establishment media focusing so much attention on “media stories,” like the one about former NBC news anchor Brian Williams’ lying.
Anyone who pays much attention to print and broadcast news is not very likely to be surprised by the revelation that Williams, or anyone else in the media lies, or only tells selected parts of true news stories. Gunowners are probably more aware of this pasteurized news policy because of the media slant on guns and self-defense. So when Williams admitted that he had lied about being aboard an Army helicopter that had come under fire in Iraq, we were not surprised. He didn’t admit to “lying” of course.
Williams’ admission has become news in itself. Again, no surprise!
And few of his news bosses are unlikely to be blamed for what they do to manage the news on a regular basis. Again, no surprise there.
But others will follow the story. Dylan Byers, a media columnist for Politico.com, already has. Byers wrote:
“The NBC News investigation into the veracity of Brian Williams’ personal stories is ongoing, but a list of examples is already starting to build. As these examples leak out, it’s important to keep in mind that not every inconsistency in Williams’ history qualifies as a lie….
“There are, however, three real examples that should raise red flags,” Byers continued, citing first Williams’ Jan. 30, 2015 NBC broadcast, in which Williams referred to “a terrible moment a dozen years back during the invasion of Iraq when the helicopter we were traveling in was forced down after being hit by an RPG.” Williams later said he was not in the helicopter that was hit by an RPG, but in a helicopter directly behind it. The pilots of Williams’ helicopter say their chopper was not directly behind the hit Chinook either, Byers noted.
Then Byers recalled that during his May 3, 2011 broadcast Williams said that he had “the great honor of flying into Baghdad with [SEAL Team 6] at the start of the war.” A Special Operations Command spokesman told Huffington Post: “We do not embed journalists with this or any other unit that conducts counter-terrorism missions.” Then another SEAL officer told CNN: “That early in the conflict, there were only missions taking place, not bouncing between outstations.”
“At a 2008 forum at the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library, Williams said that he ‘was at the Brandenburg Gate the night the [Berlin] wall came down,’ but appareently he wasn’t.
As CNN reports, “ ‘the night the wall came down’ Williams wasn’t there.
Enough about Williams! Now here’s another example of the establishment news media hiding the facts, and it comes from alternative Internet media.
TheDailyCaller.com reports that former New York City mayor Michael Bloomberg has successfully blocked video from a controversial talk he gave at the Aspen Institute recently from being posted online, saying “At the Institute’s Feb. 5 event, the pro-gun control multi-billionaire suggested keeping guns out of the hands of young, male minorities.”
Ninety-five percent of murders are attributed to the group, said Bloomberg, who has spent tens of millions of dollars on various gun control initiatives, including the group Everytown for Gun Safety, which has its own history of fudging the facts.
“These kids think they’re going to get killed anyway because all their friends are getting killed,” Bloomberg said at the summit. “They just don’t have any long-term focus or anything. It’s a joke to have a gun. It’s a joke to pull a trigger.”
“Various national media outlets jumped on the pointed comments, for both the pro-gun control sentiment and the racial aspect,” the Daily Caller said.
“Perhaps because of that response, Bloomberg, who founded the massive Bloomberg L.P. media empire, has asked both the Aspen Institute and GrassRoots TV, the company that filmed the event, to refrain from broadcasting footage of the talk, according to The Aspen Times, the Daily Caller reported.
Indeed, TGM first learned of Bloomberg’s racist comments through the Aspen Times website.
The Aspen Institute, which regularly hosts movers’ and shakers’ policy talks, accommodated Bloomberg’s request.
“We basically honor the wishes of our speakers and Mayor Bloomberg preferred that we not use the video for broadcast,” Jim Spiegelman, chief external affairs officer for the Aspen Institute told The Aspen Times, according to the Daily Caller.
During his talk, Bloomberg also discussed the discredited “stop-and-frisk,” a policing practice he advocated and expanded while he was mayor. Bloomberg said that one way to deal with the issue of gun proliferation among young, minority males is to “throw them up against the wall and frisk them.”
According to the Washington Times, New York State Rifle & Pistol Association president Tom King, said: “Mayor Bloomberg’s statement that black males should not be allowed to have guns echoes similar sentiments made by southern white supremacists in the 19th century….So-called ‘Black Codes’ were enacted by various southern states to discriminate against black Americans and maintain the system of white supremacy that made slavery possible. These included restrictions on firearms possession.”
“If a politician said this about anything other than guns, the mainstream media would be all over them,” King added.
Once again, no surprise.
