A Tuesday report from CNN Business is a real piece of work. It’s probably the most egregious example of media bias I’ve seen this year.
The report is blatant following of ze orders by a Left-wing news outlet even as it openly reveals that it is following ze orders. This goes way beyond your basic self-awareness fail to land somewhere between dereliction of journalistic duty and utter immorality in the pursuit of partisan service.
A CNN headline that read, “White House to send letter to news execs urging outlets to ‘ramp up’ scrutiny of GOP’s Biden impeachment inquiry ‘based on lies’” surprised me this morning. I was ready to grudgingly give the left-wing rag some credit for speaking truth to power for once. But a quick read through the article shattered my dreams of CNN actually committing an act of journalism.
The gist of the story is that, on Tuesday, CNN obtained an advance draft of a media directive from the White House that it would have received on Wednesday anyway. The newsworthy part is that the directive is absolutely shocking for a White House to send to the allegedly free media. And the first two paragraphs of the CNN piece almost read like a real news item (emphasis is added throughout all quotes):
The White House plans to send a letter to top US news executives on Wednesday, urging them to intensify their scrutiny of House Republicans after Speaker Kevin McCarthy launched an impeachment inquiry into President Joe Biden, despite having found no evidence of a crime. [Okay, so they slipped up and plunked a biased lie right in the first sentence.]
“It’s time for the media to ramp up its scrutiny of House Republicans for opening an impeachment inquiry based on lies [oops! Another talking point slipped in],” Ian Sams, a spokesperson for the White House Counsel’s Office, wrote in the letter, according to a draft copy obtained by CNN.
If CNN had stopped right there, it would have done what journalists are supposed to do: expose the political party in power for abusing its authority to collude with the media to cover up for its leader’s corruption. And holy cow — that’s a big story! Corruption heaped upon corruption — the American people absolutely should be informed of this sort of malfeasance among its public officials and news media.
But CNN did not stop there. It soon became obvious that, rather than breaking an incredible news story, the outlet was actually rushing to start cranking out the White House talking points to neutralize damage from the announcement of the Biden impeachment inquiry.
PJ Media readers, of course, know that the White House and CNN are lying when they say there is “no supporting evidence” for the impeachment inquiry. From Hunter Biden’s laptop full of texts, videos, recordings, and emails to sworn eyewitness statements from actual participants in Biden family corruption to bank records of graft distribution to IRS whistleblowers to FBI memos, the evidence is overwhelming.
Related: Reporter Gets Destroyed After Claiming ‘No Evidence’ for Biden Impeachment
Here are a few of the instances in which the pretend reporter simply regurgitated what his masters told him to say (emphasis added):
The letter, which said an impeachment inquiry with no supporting evidence should “set off alarm bells for news organizations,” will be sent to executives helming the nation’s largest news organizations, including CNN, The New York Times, Fox News, the Associated Press, CBS News, and others, a White House official familiar with the matter said.
The correspondence comes one day after McCarthy announced that he had directed three House committees to begin an impeachment inquiry into Biden. House Republicans, most of whom have denied that disgraced former President Donald Trump committed any wrongdoing, have long sought to baselessly portray Biden as a corrupt, crime-ridden politician engaged in sinister activities. […]
Here’s a tremendous laugh line:
“Covering impeachment as a process story – Republicans say X, but the White House says Y – is a disservice to the American public who relies on the independent press to hold those in power accountable,” Sams wrote.
And here’s the part where the White House puts media outlets on notice that those who don’t follow ze orders will be considered agents of disinformation (likely subject to the same demonetization and throttling that conservative news outlets suffer daily):
“And in the modern media environment, where every day liars and hucksters peddle disinformation and lies everywhere from Facebook to Fox, process stories that fail to unpack the illegitimacy of the claims on which House Republicans are basing all their actions only serve to generate confusion, put false premises in people’s feeds, and obscure the truth,” Sams added.
CNN’s White House talking points transcriber then whined that “McCarthy launched the impeachment inquiry Tuesday without a formal House vote.” While it’s true that traditionally, the full house voted to proceed with an impeachment inquiry, Democrats stampeded right past that norm the second time they impeached President Trump. Now we have just another one of the Democrats’ New Rules that we get to use, too.
But get this: just when I thought CNN was the sole repulsive operative in this episode, I realized that a phrase in their “coverage” was nagging at me. Take another look at the third paragraph: “The letter, which said an impeachment inquiry with no supporting evidence should ‘set off alarm bells for news organizations,’ will be sent to executives helming the nation’s largest news organizations, including CNN, The New York Times, Fox News, the Associated Press, CBS News, and others, a White House official familiar with the matter said.”
In other words, the White House itself leaked the draft of its pending directive to its trustworthy pet propaganda outfit, CNN, so it could begin countering House Speaker Kevin McCarthy’s announcement of Biden’s impeachment immediately. Which, of course, CNN did.
The White House and the media — working hand-in-hand to keep us in the dark and force their will on us. Layer upon layer of collusion and corruption. Not even a fleeting pretense at ethics or integrity.
Disgusting.
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