Guess who fell for a Code Pinko, Blackwater-bashing hoax?
MSM journalists have layers and layers and layers of editorial fact-checkers. They are trained professionals. You are untrained amateurs. They remind us of their place and our place every chance they can–and with maximum sanctiony.
So, how is it that The Professionals fell for a Code Pink, Blackwater-bashing hoax more obvious than a nosebleed on a white tissue?
All the ingredients were there:
Blackwater Derangement? Check.
Neocon quote? Check.
Anti-military undertone? Check.
Ben Johnson at Frontpage Magazine recounts how the Pinkos released a fake Blackwater press release announcing the creation of a “Department of Corporate Integrity.
The Associated Press (no surprise), CBS News (no surprise), and Politico.com all lapped it up.
Phony remarks were attributed to conservative author Max Boot, Blackwater CEO Eric Prince, and “Kitty Laver,” a pseudonym for Pinko leader Medea Benjamin. The B.S. detectors should have been set off by this text from the fake press release:
“Blackwater has become synonymous with mercenary, but the public doesn’t understand that mercenary has actually be a positive term throughout history,” said Max Boot of the Council of Foreign Affairs.
…Directing the new Department of Public Integrity is Kitty Laver, who has 20 years’ experience in public relations and corporate responsibility. “My job is to put the mercy back in mercenary,” says Laver.
If that doesn’t scream moonbat, nothing does.
Reports Johnson:
The hoax went off smoothly, without the annoyance of journalistic due diligence. One of the planners chortled, ”Code Pinkers stayed in character as Kitty Laver of Blackwater while our phones rang off the hook from Blackwater and the press…A television network called us to schedule Blackwater president Eric Prince for their morning talk show.”
Only later did they realize they had been fooled. (Code Pink conducted a “Blackwater press conference” Tuesday morning.)
Jim Hoft and Ethel Fenig have more.
But, hey, who are we? Gotta leave the fact-checking to The Professionals.
***
Here’s a blast from the past…another example of Code Pink trickery.
See what others have said
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Trackbacks
- MSM: It’s Hoaxalicious! : The Sundries Shack
- JammieWearingFool
- I’m A Pundit Too | Iraq Central 11-01-2007
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I better be careful, they may take one of my faux news alerts seriously.
Move along, now. Nothing to see here.
MM, is this a diversion or are you denying the main accusations against Blackwater? Do you deny that a Blackwater employee killed an Iraqi security guard inside the Green zone while drunk? Do you deny that Blackwater security guards cost the US more than twice as much per person as regular US soldiers. Do you deny that the government of Iraq has asked Blackwater to leave Iraq, which request would be followed if Iraq were a sovereign country?
Agenda-driven journalism at its best!…
Or, maybe there is a rather simple explanation. The fact-checkers were given the day off, there are no fact-checkers, etc…
LGM,you’re a diversion. Do you deny that we would have more military and not need firms like Blackwater if the Clinton Administration wouldn’t have slashed the military? Do you deny that the Shrill Hill wants to slash the military if even further if she’s elected? If you do deny these things, you must understand that if the Clinton machine hadn’t destroyed the military, there would be no need for firms like Blackwater to come in. Here’s a newsflash for you LGM fool, we’re still in Germany and that war ended in 1945.
“Preserve the narrative. Preserve the narrative,” the loon toon leftist moonbats chant.
Aj:
HA!
LGM:
Double HA!
Aj:
No disrespect, of course…didn’t mean to lump ya in.
Oh, for goodness sake, Halloween is over. Put the troll back under the bridge where it belongs.
none taken, your laughin with me, i know that.
Heres a reminder for us.
feeding
lgm, I do not believe that Michelle was denying anything. What she was doing was shining a light on the commmunist organizations (code pink)tactics and how the mainstream media is not intelligent enough to know they are being conned. Kind of like you. I am guessing that they did realize that it was fake but that has never stopped CBS. The AP is what it is. A tool of the left. They count on the kool-aid drinkers like yourself to defend them.
I just talked to Katie Couric and she assured me that Mike Rotch, Homer Sexual, Semour Butz, Bea O’Problem and Amanda Huggenkiss are all Blackwater employees.
#11 ajmontana
“Heres a reminder for us.”
“feeding”
Good link!
Thank you.
LOL AJ,
Don’t feed the trools!
Someone needs to photoshop that pic and add a pink shirt and tin foil hat!
Photoshop software, to much bucks and I’d have wayyyyyyyy to much fun.
It’s needed on another thread…
Quick to the bat mobile.
Almost two years ago, the DVD of “All The President’s Men” had in its extras a bunch of self-serving blather from various Treason Media players about how bloggers couldn’t match the skill and expertise of “real” news people. Reviewers fawned all over the movie again as a shining example of when the Treason Media “spoke truth to power” and bemoaned that there weren’t brave reporters taking down this “fascist Administration”. Blah-blah-woof-woof. You know the drill.
In the ensuing time, we’ve seen Dan Rather clean out his desk; the term “fauxtography” be coined as bloggers detected propaganda disseminated via al-Reuters and al-AP; Pulitzer Prizes awarded for committing treason during wartime; the New Republic’s self-destruction unremarked upon by the Treason Media; and countless shenanigans like this occur because the overwhelmingly biased (9:1 ratios in voting and contributions in favor of Dems) Treason Media sees the punishment of Dubya as their sole raison d’etre.
Just as “Top Gun” inspired kids to want to be fighter pilots, “All The President’s Men” inspired busybody liberals to go into the news business in order to crucify Republicans in the hopes that they’ll be played by George Clooney, Brad Pitt and Julia Roberts in the movie. What they overlook is that Woodward and Bernstein didn’t fabricate documents or go into the story with a pre-conceived notion of where it should end up. They simply followed the clues.
Today’s “journalists” have the downfall of Republicans as their primary goal. They believe that Dems are noble and pure (like them) and the GOP eats babies fried in Halliburton oil. They believe that only stupid, poor, minority, warmongers join the military. (Mark Steyn was absolutely right about how young people think war and soldiers are like they appeared in “Born on the Full Metal Deer Apocalypse Platoon in July Hunter Jacket Now”.) And their “reporting” is tailored to fit that notion. They don’t go and find out what happened; they seek specific examples to illustrate their theses. They have absorbed Michael Moore’s fraudulent methods and perverted journalism into something unrecognizable.
And LGM, do you deny that we haven’t lost a single State Department employee being guarded by Blackwater?
And do you deny that after the incident and Blackwater was “fired” they were brought back because they were the only company willing to do the work?
And do you deny that Michelle blogging with my morning coffee is the greatest thing since sliced bread?
On another note, thanks for bringing back the “preview” button Michelle.
I’m shocked, SHOCKED that the press would fall for this. Guess they don’t teach common sense at Columbia’s J-school anymore.
The grossly unprofessional main stream media (MSM) do nothing but waste our time, tear down our country and take sides with our sworn enemies. May God forgive them.
Professionalism, integrity, devotion to the truth, we know who exudes these qualities and who does not. You’re the best news and opinion person in world, bar none. That’s my 2¢ worth.
They should have gone the extra mile, and had an imposter stand in the interview as the black water C.E.O. The MSM still have egg on their face!!!!!!!
#19
Now tell us what you really think!
Great post
Can’t add much more to what DirkBelig said in #19 above.
When today’s “journalists” mistake their role as “The Fourth Estate” to mean that they’re players instead of reporters, one can argue persuasively that they’re no longer journalists but partisans.
In the 1980s, comedian Father Guido Sarducci had a routine where he said he’d start his own college: it’d take five minutes to get a degree, based on the idea that a few years after graduation, most college grads can only talk about what they learned for that length of time.
I propose a new J-School along the same lines: instead of two years of upper-division studies, just memorize the following catechisms and I’ll give you your “degree:”
1. Fake, but accurate!
2. It ‘might’ be true!
3. Too good to check!
Congratulations, here’s your sheepskin, now go forth and slay the Republican dragons!
Looks like the woman from the ‘fake Blackwater press release’ (tallest woman in the photo) is the same Code Pink protester who rushed Condoleezza Rice.
What’s this? No jail time for rushing up to the US Secretary of State with your hands painted red and threatening her? Why do they let these same people into the gallery every single time, and let them get away with this over and over and over again?
They offer no corrections or if they do issue a correction it will be buried some place inconspicuous.
The “name of the game” is to simply the get message out there; who cares if it is right or wrong, we have a presidential election to win…no holds barred.
Someone suggested, on a previous thread, that you would not be able to see the “impeach Bush” socks under these moonbats trousers. Looking at that photo, he was right.
fake Blackwater press release
No kidding Thomas, She should still be in Jail.
#26 & #29
Too bad they’re allowed to hide under the cloak of anonimity.
Anybody get the name of that ‘protestor’?
Standard msm template - of course they don’t question it. Why should they?
lgm,
Let’s see 4 years & how many successful missions & you can only find 1 talking point to promote your agenda against the ‘evil’ corporation - & it involoves an off-duty employee. Too bad your side doesn’t have the integrity to apply those same “fiscal” concerns towards healthcare, Social Security, education, etc. Your majority in Congress may have actually accomplished something since 2006, other than denying qualified judges their chance to be voted on that is. What exactly have been the costs of the constant investigations that have produced no wrong doings, other then to indict someone for forgetting a conversation about a crime that never happened. Strong. Tough.
Oh my goodness, how true! Newsflash: MM will not be writing anything to support your agenda, lgm. Why you think she would is beyond stupidity!
Those “news” organizations were not fooled they found the “story” they were looking for. These lying through their teeth MSM idiot’s have not caught on to the fact that NO ONE believes a word they say, period.
lgm has left the building. People like that don’t argue because they can’t ~ facts get in the way, so people like lgm just type something stupid and emotional then leave.
Agenda driven journalism at its best. It would be counter-productive to fact-check what they already know is bogus “news”.
I’m sure they are still sitting in their corner officers at all levels of the MSM scratching their head and wondering why their ratings, circulation, etc. are crashing through the floor, while outlets like Fox, the Blogosphere, etc. are skyrocketing.
The not-ready-for-prime-time Code Pink players should be rounded up, tried for treason and shot.
We are at war. It’s time to end the party.
Further, bar the commerical press from all theaters of war. So few are willing to go into killing zones anyway. Let the Yon’s and others who have proven themselves as *journalists*, and not as determinants of battlefield outcomes in the media, remain.
Tighten it up further by prosecuting Soros’ funding of MoveOn.org and seditious acts against the military. There are grounds for doing so and it should be done.
Try Nancy Pelosi, Harry Reid, and Jack Murtha for treasonous acts against the military.
If our Commander-in-Chief was not so busy selling the domestic side of our Nation down the river with *them* perhaps he would clean house against our domestic enemies.
Also, prosecute the Clintonista holdovers in the Department of Justice who prosecuted Rick Convertino for doing his job and putting al Qaeda bad guys in prison.
It’s time to end the partisanship that is selling out our Country.
Meanwhile, another faux-named Code Pink fool wrote in the Berkeley Daily Planet on this Monday past, how Code Pink didn’t deface the USMC Recruiting Office door because they used marker pens and duct tape, that they don’t harm the earth when they do their “work”.
They all speak like they are mentally ill and chemically unbalanced.
here’s the link to the Code Pink letter to Marine Captain Lund:
http://berkeleydailyplanet.com/article.cfm?issue=10-30-07&storyID=28321
Hey!!! Doesn’t Code Stink’s (mis)use of Blackwater’s name violate copyright law? Trying to sell a “bill of goods?”
I wonder if lgm is coming back to answer all your excellent rebuttals or if this was just another drive-by.
First, I am not defending LGM’s misplaced/misguided comments. I wholeheartedly agree that MM’s point was about the Media and their Modus Operandi rather than the various Blackwater events that have propelled that company into the MSM’s current meme. Obviously MM wasn’t denying anything - she wasn’t addressing those particular issues b/c they were tangential to her point. I don’t know if LGM is a moonbat, and I’ll assume innocence until sure proof of guilt is provided. However, LGM seems to exhibit all the symptoms of the “jump to conclusions” Left in that refuting bad behavior on one side automatically means that you are a stauch supporter of other bad behavior (most likely on the other side of the fence). A typical logical fallacy.
That being said, I think that we should be careful of support for Blackwater. There have been numerous incidents (that none of us would be proud of) commited/caused by them and companies like them. They have, in some cases, fallen outside of certian legal measures which have given individual actors a lattitude to act that is not neccessarily consonant with our message and objectives in Iraq, nor our broader national objectives.
These companies are not the Military - they are not in-country for selfless service, therefore they do not deserve our unqualified support. Because of the unique situation in Iraq, I can tell you by experience that the companies did not have the same legal and operational controls (such as stringently enforced ROE) for years. Under pressure and due to individual failures, the lack of these basic frameworks (is going to and did) lead to abuses and mistakes. Recognizing this, we should approach this issue with “reserved” support, find out the facts, support those of our fellow Americans who rightfully deserve support, and condemn/prosecute those few who have acted unlawfully, dishonestly, or contrary to our interests.
Semper Fi
PMain said (#32):
This is the discussion we should be having. Is Blackwater doing a good job or not? Should we keep them in Iraq or not? MM’s issues over a possibly inaccurate press report is a minor issue by comparison. Thanks to PMain for seeing that.
I think it’s time for Blackwater to leave Iraq. They are a far more expensive way to protect people than regular US soldiers. The Iraqi government has officially asked them to leave — keeping them shows the world that the Iraqi government is not sovereign. They have a reputation for excessive and unprovoked use of force that seems (from all reports but their own) to be well deserved. They protected an apparent murderer by illegally transporting him out of the country.
Spell check:
sanctimony
LGM #43,
I think your first two questions are valid, although MM’s post was not really meant to address that, so you can’t blame her or the other posters for not directly addressing this.
Second, whether Blackwater, et. al., is more important than the complete failure (again) of the MSM to uphold standards of objectivity, honesty and due diligence is merely your own subjective opinion based on your own evaluation of relative importance of each issue. Assertion and opinion do not equal fact. Support your assertions with facts and I think you’ll have more success generating the discussion you seem to want.
Third, as for your point about the relative cost of Blackwater v. military protection - I’m not sure that your information is correct. Mark Corallo writes about Blackwater from his perspective (http://article.nationalreview.com/?q=ZWY3OWUyNGU0OGNkMjc1MTU5OGI0ZDQ1YzJiYjQzNjM=). Although one could be excused for being skeptical of his facts, since he was a lawyer for Blackwater. However, this is not the first time that I’ve been presented with the information that Blackwater is actually the most cost effective way of providing security for the diplomats. At the very least, both sides should agree that the argument of the relative cost of Blackwater is not settled until more hard information is marshalled in support of its side.
In addition, irrespective of the relative cost issue, at the present moment the military lacks the capacity to provide additional forces in support of the security of dipolomats. In order to provide this additional security, the military would require an overall endstrength increase, with an attendant lag in deployment to theater (due recruiting and training), and with an even larger U.S. military presence in Iraq.
Also, the sovereignty of Iraq is a difficult and complex issue. Its really more of a case of “more or less” rather than a binary situation of “yes or no.” There are some spheres in which the Iraqi government has the capacity to excercise full sovereignty, and does so. There are other spheres, in terms of national security and law enforcement, in which the fledgling democratic Iraqi state has only limited capacity. In some cases that capacity is 100% but limited to certain localities. In other cases, it is less than 100% in a locality or a wider region. Because of this, a continued military presence in Iraq is essential to both our interests and the interests of the Iraqi state. Under the current arrangement, the Iraqi state gives up some of its sovereignty (in terms of being able to exert absolute control over foreign troops in Iraq) in order to gain de facto control of those regions/areas it would otherwise lack the capacity to exert direct control over. The current arrangement is built on the realities of the situation. We prevent state failure and deny sanctuary for violent transnational actors, while the Iraqi state transistions from a weak state to a fully normal nation (how long that will take would be a guess on my part).
What does this have to do with security contractors in Iraq? The security contractors are a unique subset of this soveriegnty issue: the Iraqi government asks for Blackwater to be removed, but at the current time neither we nor the Iraqis have adequate capacity to provide alternative means for the security of our diplomats. Hence, in order to satisfy the Iraqis we would be forced to uncovered and endanger our diplomats who would surely be (and have already been) targeted by the enemy. This is a perfect case that highlights the “more or less” nature of Iraqi sovereignty. As for world opinion and showing the world things… we should worry about achieving our stated objectives first rather than pandering to world opinion (by handing over too much, too soon - BTW, we’ve tried that and learned the hard way) at the potential cost of even more lives (both Iraqi and American).
Finally, as for the protection of the “apparent murderer:” you seem to presume guilt by using the term “apparent” rather than “alleged.” In any case, our system presumes innocence first. Since you are non-specific about whom you’re talking, I’m going to make an assumption that you’re talking about the Christmas shooting. From the hearsay, the incident sounds bad, but again we should let the courts establish the facts before we pass final judgement.
As for the procedures for extracting the Blackwater employee, this is pretty standard DOS procedure for Diplomats and Marine Security Guards in foreign countries who become involved in incidents overseas (whether guilty of some crime or not). The procedure is an excercise of diplomatic immunity and is meant to protect the sovereignty of a nation to exercise justice with respect to its diplomats. The military generally has Status of Forces Agreements (SOFA) with countries where we have bases. These agreements outline under what cicumstances a particular nation has jurisdiction and the ability to prosecute American military personnel. In this case (Blackwater), since Blackwater works for DOS, I’m assuming they are invoking diplomatic immunity and withdrawing compromised personnel from the country. I would not be surprised to learn that this was a negotiated contractual protection for Blackwater employees, although I don’t know… so I’m open to new information on this one.
Sorry for the length of the post…
Semper Fi
LGM, who care about your accusation? You claim you are scientific oriented, in fact you are no such thing. Do you really think that anyone here knows anything about what you are talking about? You need to check in with the home front.
#30 answered my own question:
“Desiré Farooz” was the lady’s name.
Verbal per BO’s show last night; confirmed via the web today @
article dated 25 OCT 07