Friday, February 10, 2017

NewsBusters Blasts Sykes

Some respected conservative outlets are not pleased with the role former Milwaukee conservative talk radio host Charlie Sykes has chosen.

From Curtis Houck, NewsBusters:

In another hilarious case of irony, The 11th Hour host and serial liar Brian Williams teed up guest Charlie Sykes on Tuesday to lambaste conservative media (like the one you’re reading) for being why no one trusts mainstream media in the age of Trump and alternative facts.

Sykes and Williams offered no arguments or examples of how the establishment media have torpedoed their own credibility with false stories and a decidedly liberal slant. Instead, it was an exclusive attack on conservatives for supposedly enabling President Trump to offer misstatements without consequences.

...

Overall, the former conservative host stated that his “concern is not just that's [Trump’s] lying” but “[i]t's an attack on the concept of the truth itself — of credibility and my main concern is that you'll have millions of voters at some point who will basically say, ‘what is truth?’”

Failing to realize that he’s joined an echo-chamber in which Manhattan elites sit around reading The New York Times and The New Yorker while watching The Daily Show, Sykes knocked anyone supporting Trump as “pick[ing] the facts that confirm our bias, that support our guy and ignore the facts that don't support our guy.”

“[A]nd then we're in a very, very, you know, dangerous place for democracy,” he surmised.

Once again, the irony can’t be lost on how this is occurring on a Brian Williams-hosted program.

...

Continuing to parody the likes of [CNN's Brian] Stelter, Sykes compared the current United States to that of countries under the rule of authoritarism:

Now, this is something that, in authoritarian regimes, people are used to, which is that the leader will define what is the truth. And all criticism is delegitimized. By the way, criticism from federal judges, criticism from the media, criticism from the intelligence agencies, that all of those sources of independent information or checks are basically — well and they are — and they are discredited.

“So what is the source of truth? Well it, comes from the leader. This, again, familiar to authoritarian regimes, very alien to a democratic society,” he concluded.

The media has done plenty to undermine their cause. Aside from their boy who cried wolf fears about past Republican candidates, their false stories, slanted analyses, and failed predictions stand out.

...

As the Federalist’s Daniel Payne wrote, the news media have published at least 16 different fake or false stories in the scant number of days since Trump was inaugurated on January 20.

If Sykes wants to blame conservatives for simply pointing out the faults of the mainstream media, perhaps he should instead emphasize that legacy media should think twice before concocting untrue narratives or going forward with stories without sufficient fact-checking.
How can Brian Williams be part of any discussion regarding the loss of credibility of the mainstream media?

Williams certainly belongs on the All-Star Team of most notorious liars in the media.

Clearly, committed individuals at the Media Research Center and at NewsBusters have toiled for years, exposing the lies of the Leftist media. They have been an invaluable source of truth and have provided a tremendous service.

They deserve respect. They have earned it.

Understandably, they don't appear to appreciate being slurred by Sykes.

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