First up, the Times’ “editorial on NRA convention as accurate as you’d expect,” Ed Morrissey writes at Hot Air:
One can imagine that the New York Times editorial board had practically leaped with delight when they thought they’d found hypocrisy and irony in the NRA convention show. Their op-ed for today practically cackles with glee as they excoriate the premier gun-rights group for barring working weapons from their annual gathering. The problems with it start in the lead paragraph — indeed, in the very first sentence (via Instapundit):
Seventy-thousand people are expected to attend the National Rifle Association’s convention opening on Friday in Tennessee, and not one of them will be allowed to come armed with guns that can actually shoot. After all the N.R.A. propaganda about how “good guys with guns” are needed to be on guard across American life, from elementary schools to workplaces, the weekend’s gathering of disarmed conventioneers seems the ultimate in hypocrisy.
Wow! Sick burn, dudes. Except, er, that it’s not at all true, as the Tennessean explained … three days ago:
The National Rifle Association and the Music City Center have confirmed that gun owners with the proper carry permits can bring their guns with them into the center during the association’s convention, which will be held there this weekend.
A spokeswoman for the center said its policy is to follow state law and to allow the organizations holding events inside the facility to decide whether they wish for people to carry their guns inside.
Music City Center spokeswoman Mary Brette Clippard confirmed to The Tennessean on Tuesday afternoon that the NRA had no problem with gun owners with the proper gun permits bringing their weapons inside.
So the entire first paragraph was entirely ignorant of the NRA’s actual position and the reality of gun ownership. Well, that won’t come as a surprise to anyone who’s read the New York Times on the issue of gun rights, or several other topics, for that matter. But hey, maybe the editorial board just got off to a bad start.
No, it’s gets worse, as Ed writes. Meanwhile, the Times’ crosstown center-left rivals make the same mistake:
First sentence in this NYDN report on NRA convention refuted by … um … fourth and fifth sentences. By @dfriedman33 pic.twitter.com/JKD1YjYaS2
— Mollie (@MZHemingway) April 10, 2015
As Charles C.W. Cooke writes in a post titled, “New York Times Kicks off NRA Convention Coverage with Massive Lie:”
I noted when the New York Daily News peddled this same falsehood earlier in the week, the only guns that will have their firing pins removed are those that are presented for examination within the convention’s attendant trade show. This is standard practice. Why? Well, because the trade show guns are not for sale; they are not there to be fired; and they cannot be removed from their display cases. They exist only to demonstrate to attendees what each company has on offer.
To their credit, NBC’s low-rent discount cable access network did issue a correction after repeating the same falsehoods:
These MSNBC corrections are glorious. Next, it’ll be the @nytimes’s turn, right @Sulliview. http://t.co/2BVnr7LcGS pic.twitter.com/BFSxTGsshX
— Charles C. W. Cooke (@charlescwcooke) April 10, 2015
When will the Times?
NYT editorial page editor @andyrNYT has a very long history of deliberately printing lies http://t.co/hqNZGDjpch
— Sean Davis (@seanmdav) April 10, 2015
Hi, @andyrNYT and @sulliview: when do you plan to retract today’s blatantly false op-ed about NRA convention guns? http://t.co/hqNZGDjpch
— Sean Davis (@seanmdav) April 10, 2015
As Ed Morrissey writes, “If this is the quality of the New York Times’ editors, it doesn’t leave much confidence in the newspaper’s reporting.”
Is there anyone left who has confidence in the Times’ reporting?
Join the conversation as a VIP Member