Lazy and Stupid

An advisor to President Barack Obama once characterized the mainstream media as [paraphrasing] "a bunch of lazy and stupid 27-year olds who know little of the world." He could have also added that the vast majority of main stream media "journalists" are heavily biased (in favor of the Democrats), are more often than not dishonest in the way they report the news, and are incompetent in their ability to conduct thorough investigations of wrong-doing (if they choose to report the wrong-doing at all).

That reality won't change, regardless of the utter contempt that is leveled on the media and the lack of public trust that their "reporting" is accurate and unbiased. Therefore, it's very important to look for indicators that provide us with a better understanding of the media's motives as well as their level on honesty. Here are a few questions to ask when ever you encounter a media report:

• Was a news story timed to provide advantage to a particular politician or party? 
• Was an unnamed source(s) used to discredit or criticize a particular politician or party? 
• Was there an appeal to authority, quoting "experts" who have a specific bias, and have those experts been right or wrong in the past?
• Are claims by government agencies (usually leaked) being reported without reference to supporting hard facts and the granularity necessary to assess those facts?
• Was there an appeal to authority, quoting past government officials (e.g., past intelligence directors) who have an institutional bias to protect the deep state and are undoubtedly active players in the Washington swamp?
• When any media entity makes a "mistake," does the error in reporting always seem to benefit one political party and harm another?
• Have crucial facts been omitted or buried to ensure that a story promotes a specific narrative?
• When a politician is quoted, has an important part of his/her statement been omitted, leading to misinterpretation of meaning?
• Do reporters use loaded language when reporting on conservatives (e.g., "white supremacist" when describing someone who questions the motives of groups like BLM)? 
• Do reporters use softer language when reporting on left-wing groups (e.g., calling violent-leftist rioters much more benign terms like "activists" or protestors")?
• Do reporters ask questions that have a stated (and incorrect assumption) built into them (e.g., "What do you say to people who say that your management of the virus has failed?)?
• Are crucial facts been omitted or relegated to the 27th paragraph?
• Are statistics presented with enough granularity to allow the reader to understand their importance or have they been characterized in a way that is intended to promote a specific narrative?
• Is gaslighting initiated when obvious wrong-doing or corruption is uncovered and can't be avoided (e.g., falsely labeling the corruption story about Joe and Hunter Biden "Russian disinformation")?

If you ask those questions about every important mainstream news report or "bombshell" when GOP leaders are in office, you'll begin the question the veracity of the media's reports. BTW, I suspect we'll see a lot fewer "bombshells" that reflect badly on Joe Biden and the Dems, a lot fewer unnamed sources, and lot fewer leaks—not because there aren't any, but because the media chooses to ignore or bury them when the Dems are in power. 

So when the Democrats tell us that there were no election "irregularities" and are backed up by the mainstream media who call any legitimate report of actual irregularities or obvious statistical anomalies a "myth," it's not the least bit surprising that tens of millions of people don't believe them. If, in fact, all of it was a myth, the media could have and should have debunked each claim one-by-one, not with generalities or dismissal, but with hard facts. They chose not to do that. You have to ask, why?

The media has lied regularly and viciously over the past four years,. There's absolutely no reason to believe they're not lying about important stories right now. But as the party in power changes, the lies will also change—from unsupported and dishonest accusations of wrong-doing by the GOP to defensive stories that are intended to refute and bury any opposition to the Dems' policies or actions. 

James Freeman reports on a communication with a reader, who writes:

The Left needs to accept the fact that too many of the things they told us could not possibly be true turned out to be true—right up to calling [Trump] a liar for saying there would be a vaccine. And now they expect normal people, who don’t follow politics 24/7... to simply believe them that everything [the vote] is on the up and up. You know, just like the FISA investigation.

Everyday people are expected to be able to understand that, even though they see a bag of votes discovered here, and an irregularity there, that these are isolated incidents and don’t define the entire system. And journalists look down on these people and their cognitive biases. And then these same journalists see a George Floyd video and are ready to dismantle police departments!

It's one thing to spin debatable opinions or actions, but it's something else entirely to purposely ignore important stories, to omit or distort facts, and to gaslight with vigor to protect the preferred narrative. The mainstream media are propagandists in the truest sense of the term.They cannot and should not be trusted.