Matt Taibbi goes after MSM Tulsi/Sanders smear campaign

We’ve Hit a New Low in Campaign Hit Pieces Recent efforts to sandbag Bernie Sanders and Tulsi Gabbard are crude repeats of behaviors that helped elect Trump in 2016

MSM loses the Rolling Stone? HT Tulsi campaign

Last week, the Daily Beast ran this headline: “Tulsi Gabbard’s Campaign Is Being Boosted by Putin Apologists”

That was followed by the sub headline: “The Hawaii congresswoman is quickly becoming the top candidate for Democrats who think the Russian leader is misunderstood.”

The Gabbard campaign has received 75,000 individual donations. This crazy Beast article is based on (maybe) three of them.

The three names are professor Stephen Cohen, activist Sharon Tennison and someone using the name “Goofy Grapes,” who may or may not have once worked for comedian Lee Camp, currently employed by Russia Today.

This vicious little article might have died a quiet death, except ABC’s George Stephanopoulos regurgitated it in an interview with Gabbard days later. The This Week host put up the Beast headline in a question about whether or not Gabbard was “softer” on Putin than other candidates.

Gabbard responded: “It’s unfortunate that you’re citing that article, George, because it’s a whole lot of fake news.”

snip

“They smear anyone who is against regime change wars,” says Gabbard.

snip

Reporters refuse to see it, but the national media now lives on the unpopularity spectrum somewhere between botulism and congress. While some of that is undeserved, some of it isn’t. Voters especially resent being told who is and isn’t an acceptable choice, by a press corps increasingly seen as part of a corrupt and condescending political establishment.

Stories like “Tulsi Gabbard Is the Top Candidate of Traitors” represent exactly the kind of thing people hate about the commercial press as an institution. This scarlet lettering backfired badly in 2016, but we’re doing more of it this time around, not less. Don’t be surprised if it ends badly again.

I, for one, am shocked that George et al are defending the campaigns of Dem Corporatists.

Suggest you read this article in full.

(I'll forgo posting the "I'm Shocked" video from Casablanca)

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Comments

detroitmechworks's picture

Try this one...

[video:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YnoW-Yk2Spw]

But hey, if you didn't expect the guys dressed up in full body makeup and team colors to be rooting for a particular team, I applaud your open mindedness and question your sanity. Smile

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I do not pretend I know what I do not know.

EdMass's picture

@detroitmechworks

"When the going gets weird, the Weird get tough"

Wink

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Prof: Nancy! I’m going to Greece!
Nancy: And swim the English Channel?
Prof: No. No. To ancient Greece where burning Sapho stood beside the wine dark sea. Wa de do da! Nancy, I’ve invented a time machine!

Firesign Theater

Stop the War!

@EdMass
"When the going gets weird, the weird turn pro."

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The earth is a multibillion-year-old sphere.
The Nazis killed millions of Jews.
On 9/11/01 a Boeing 757 (AA77) flew into the Pentagon.
AGCC is happening.
If you cannot accept these facts, I cannot fake an interest in any of your opinions.

@UntimelyRippd

...Huge Hunter Thompson fan here. (See below! '-)

It's been my experience that, somewhat often, people do (slightly) misquote him.

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"Freedom is something that dies unless it's used." --Hunter S. Thompson

EdMass's picture

@UntimelyRippd

I realized my mistake at about 3 AM last night...

Sigh

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Prof: Nancy! I’m going to Greece!
Nancy: And swim the English Channel?
Prof: No. No. To ancient Greece where burning Sapho stood beside the wine dark sea. Wa de do da! Nancy, I’ve invented a time machine!

Firesign Theater

Stop the War!

from Casablanca. Among many other things, it shows that Hollywood had nailed how utterly phony government is by at least as early as 1940. (Limited release was in 1942; I'm just adding in some time for reducing the idea to a screenplay and then for convincing someone to make a film from the script. The play was earlier, but I don't know if the Vichy official was the same in the play.)

Besides, any film so well acted deserves every mention it gets. It has to be among the best 100 "talkies" the US film industry ever made.

Most importantly, of course, (-; I like it.

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EdMass's picture

@HenryAWallace

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Prof: Nancy! I’m going to Greece!
Nancy: And swim the English Channel?
Prof: No. No. To ancient Greece where burning Sapho stood beside the wine dark sea. Wa de do da! Nancy, I’ve invented a time machine!

Firesign Theater

Stop the War!

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https://youtu.be/I_LuvWHqW_Q
Except for a misstep on HRC in 2016 (I canceled my RS subscription), Matt Taibbi has been very good

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chuck utzman

TULSI 2020

gulfgal98's picture

@chuckutzman to talk about a potential war with Iran. Unlike other MSM networks, Fox allowed Tulsi to talk without interruption.

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Do I hear the sound of guillotines being constructed?

“Those who make peaceful revolution impossible will make violent revolution inevitable." ~ President John F. Kennedy

snoopydawg's picture

but it could have been written for this election cycle. This is a good read.

How Bernie is being Hillaryied by the democrats

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Which AIPAC/MIC/pharma/bank bought politician are you going to vote for? Don’t be surprised when nothing changes.