My latest piece at @mmfa:

Fox
News keeps trying to justify GOP efforts to object to the Electoral College vote by pointing to the number of people who think the election was stolen (after spending 2 months telling their audiences that it was

This is Fox, basically: https://t.co/dkc0J8Dviw
Another comparison to the role Fox is playing here via one of my favorite Onion articles: https://t.co/7R5PsQ8xvT
Or maybe a human centipede, but with the front connected back to the end for a loop of shit-eating. Yeah, that's it. That's the role Fox is playing here.
But seriously, check out the *more than 2 months* of Fox-enabled conspiracy theories (a partial list): https://t.co/STD1vheqU4
https://t.co/ZfqbWncekD
https://t.co/haivFSEztO
https://t.co/51fYDdcxet
https://t.co/ZBGDh2IkZs
https://t.co/ElP1TxOl8j
https://t.co/F9BZrLL53m
https://t.co/0kppjxyPLs
https://t.co/C8ZdCa1RLQ
https://t.co/WRc4zEdfXT
https://t.co/tC1VgFTdnw
https://t.co/Lt5hwatqi3
https://t.co/MKTYbrFlIc
https://t.co/Lc819P581T
https://t.co/isMAsmSSi0
https://t.co/Q5PehkHPZj
https://t.co/tZN0CzH9sg
https://t.co/rru2ZBAP5M
https://t.co/QI1lHwM2AU
https://t.co/M70PxE141Q
https://t.co/B4euDlyeJN
Fox is the dad in the "I learned it by watching you!" anti-drug PSA https://t.co/4MML4lM056
But check out this example from last month:

* Fox promotes the false "Georgia suitcase" conspiracy theory

* Fox reports that it wasn't true...

* And then Fox promotes the story again https://t.co/IUs7shC9pA
It doesn't help their case or Trump's case that they have spent *years* scaremongering about widespread voter fraud that didn't exist. https://t.co/D4uYQWE9k2
And it certainly doesn't help their case that when Trump got angry that he didn't win the popular vote in 2016, he devoted government resources to create a "voting integrity commission" run by Trump toadies who couldn't find any evidence of fraud https://t.co/epGfcl2yuq
The problem with all of this has been that mainstream news organizations and tech companies are way, way, way too afraid of upsetting Trump or Republicans.
"But I FEEL like social media is biased against conservatives!" was enough of an argument to actually get Facebook to bend over backwards to specifically boost right wing content. Working the refs works.
And it's been Trump's go-to move throughout his presidency. "This is the greatest economy ever," he'd say when it objectively was not. "I built the wall!" he'd say when he didn't. "Mexico is paying for it," when we were paying for his goofy pet project.
For the most part, news organizations took him at his work and would just print what he said. Worst case scenario is that they'd run some sort of mealy mouthed "both sides" piece.
(This is exactly what Josh Hawley did when he *lied* about "antifa thugs" attacking his house or whatever... it's on tape! It didn't happen that way! Still, WaPo ran a story giving him the benefit of the doubt.)
So really, why *wouldn't* they try this? These clowns haven't come up with a single bit of evidence to support any of their insane claims. Look at how relatively chill mainstream media is about all of this, treating it like a totally normal thing to do.
Republicans face zero consequences for their actions. Zero. Chuck Todd still invites them on Meet the Press, lobs them softballs for a few minutes, and then *thanks them* for coming on the show.
So while this is a Fox News problem (and an OAN/Newsmax/etc. problem), it's also a CNN problem, an NBC problem, a CBS problem, an ABC problem, an AP problem, a New York Times problem.

It's the mainstream outlets that created the conditions for all of this.
And what have they taken away from this? Nothing. Absolutely nothing. So while we watch as more than 100 House Republicans try to overturn the election results tomorrow, let's all remember that it goes back beyond right-wing media.
And just like that... another headline that shows just how much mainstream media have failed. “Political calculus?” Give me a break.

More from Parker Molloy

2017 https://t.co/kiqQoWR57e


https://t.co/W18nqFlLru


The GOP got rid of the SCOTUS filibuster so they could jam through three fringy right-wing Alito clones, including one right before the election, but sure thing, bud.

“Uh, actually, they got rid of the SCOTUS filibuster because Harry Reid did it first for something totally different! I am very smart!”

No. Knock it off.

Here’s the thing about the “But Harry Reid...” excuse:

1. McConnell was holding up Obama nominees, some *for literal years* without a vote.

2. Had he *not* done that, Trump would have inherited *even more* vacant seats.
This is a good piece by @AaronBlake. I've been scratching my head over claims that there was something in this trove of emails that implicated Fauci in something bad because pretty much everything matched up with what was being said publicly at whatever time the emails were from.


One thing that's occurred to me over the past few years is that there's a sense that the mere *existence* of emails is seen as evidence of wrongdoing, which is obviously nonsense.

It played out that way when it came to the DNC and Podesta emails in 2016, the Hunter Biden e-mails in 2020, these e-mails in 2021. It wasn't that there was much that was damning in, say, the DNC emails that helped sink Clinton's candidacy, but just their existence ...

... gave off a sense of corruption/scandal/etc., that weighed more heavily on people's perception of them as the result of them taking the form of a leak/data dump.

And it's kind of similar with the Fauci e-mails (which weren't leaked, but were FOIAed).

Anyway, again, @AaronBlake's post is a good and methodical breakdown of some of the bizarre claims being thrown about. If there's anything we didn't already know contained in those e-mails, I haven't seen it.
When Biden talked about unity, he was very specific about what he meant, and the insistence of right-wing tools like @Kredo0 to try to frame stuff like this as “betraying his own ‘unity agenda’” (what is that even a quote from?) shows how pointless it is to try to work with Rs.


Guys like @Kredo0 want to a.) put the onus of unifying the country entirely on Biden and Dems, b.) pretend that “unity” is the same as capitulation, while c.) not giving an inch on their end.

No. No, no, no. Nice try.

Really, get all the way the fuck out of here with that take. “Biden didn’t keep Trump’s POLITICAL APPOINTEES in their position, therefore Biden isn’t unifying the country.” Fuuuuuuck off with that bullshit.

When Biden said “unity,” he was talking about trying to help ALL Americans, not just the ones who voted for him. This, sadly, needed to be said after the Trump administration repeatedly tried to screw over people who didn’t support him.

Remember when the Trump administration INTENTIONALLY let the virus rage out of control (really should have been a bigger scandal, but 🤷🏻‍♀️) because it was mostly hitting states that voted for Dems?
I told you they’d bring this up


I was wondering why that tweet had so many stupid replies. And now I see


Seriously, this was “the night before.” If you’re at the march where they’re changing “Jews will not replace us” and “Blood and soil,” you’re not a “very fine person.” Full stop.


There are 3 important moments in that transcript.

1.) When someone asked Trump about a statement *he had already made* about there being blame on “both sides,” he said the “fine people” line.


2. Trump does clarify! “I’m not talking about the neo-Nazis and white nationalists — because they should be condemned totally “

Okay!

Then adds that there were “many people in that group other than neo-Nazis and white nationalists.”
If you're curious what Trump's defense will look like, all you have to do is turn on Fox News. My latest at @mmfa

The tl;dr is that for years right-wing media have been excusing Trump's violent rhetoric by going, "Yes, but THE DEMOCRATS..." and then bending themselves into knots to pretend that Dems were calling for violence when they very, very clearly weren't.

And in fact, this predates Trump.

In 2008, Obama was talking about not backing down in the face of an ugly campaign. He said "If they bring a knife to the fight, we bring a gun."

https://t.co/i5YaQJsKop


That quote was from the movie The Untouchables. And there's no way anybody reading that quote in good faith could conclude that he was talking about actual guns and knives. But it became a big talking point on the

In 2018, Obama-era Attorney General Eric Holder was speaking to a group of Georgia Democrats about GOP voter suppression. He riffed on Michelle Obama's "When they go low, we go high" line from the 2016 DNC.

More from News

@CarmineSabia Here, let us help @mjs_DC with this thread of Democrats and their propaganda wing who endorsed violence what they dishonestly called "peaceful


@mjs_DC 2)


@mjs_DC


@mjs_DC


@mjs_DC 5)

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I hate when I learn something new (to me) & stunning about the Jeff Epstein network (h/t MoodyKnowsNada.)

Where to begin?

So our new Secretary of State Anthony Blinken's stepfather, Samuel Pisar, was "longtime lawyer and confidant of...Robert Maxwell," Ghislaine Maxwell's Dad.


"Pisar was one of the last people to speak to Maxwell, by phone, probably an hour before the chairman of Mirror Group Newspapers fell off his luxury yacht the Lady Ghislaine on 5 November, 1991."
https://t.co/DAEgchNyTP


OK, so that's just a coincidence. Moving on, Anthony Blinken "attended the prestigious Dalton School in New York City"...wait, what? https://t.co/DnE6AvHmJg

Dalton School...Dalton School...rings a

Oh that's right.

The dad of the U.S. Attorney General under both George W. Bush & Donald Trump, William Barr, was headmaster of the Dalton School.

Donald Barr was also quite a


I'm not going to even mention that Blinken's stepdad Sam Pisar's name was in Epstein's "black book."

Lots of names in that book. I mean, for example, Cuomo, Trump, Clinton, Prince Andrew, Bill Cosby, Woody Allen - all in that book, and their reputations are spotless.