Nicholas Fondacaro
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With the murderous Iranian regime back in the headlines and the liberal media doing everything they could to make them look like victims of the United States (even after they shot down a passenger plane carrying 176 souls onboard), it’s worth taking a look at recent history and how the broadcast networks (ABC, CBS, and NBC) have set up a smokescreen to hide Iran’s diabolical behavior. Here is a look back at NewsBusters reporting of the networks omitting new damaging to Iran.
Just last week, ABC’s World News Tonight ran a report telling viewers all about how the United States military was wrong to the say Iran wanted to kill U.S. troops when it fired missiles that hit two bases in Iraq, and pushed the unfounded conspiracy theory that Iran had intentionally missed. Then, on Monday, the military gave the press access to areas of Al Asad Air Base destroyed by the missiles, which included the living quarters for roughly 39 service members. ABC’s World News Tonight didn’t show any of the damage while they again bemoaned the anti-regime protests in Iran.
In a Sunday report about how MSNBC failed in their duty to report facts to their viewers in the midst of Iran’s missile attack on U.S. bases in Iraq last week, Fox News Channel media reporter and host of MediaBuzz, Howard Kurtz unloaded on the liberal cable news outlet for pushing Iran’s state-media propaganda and scaring the families of service members.
During a sit-down interview with NBC political director Chuck Todd on Sunday’s Meet the Press, President Trump’s national security adviser, Ambassador Robert O’Brien embarrassed his host by repeatedly schooling him on how much of threat Iranian General Soleimani was. On top of that, he called out the liberal media for taking a pro-Iran stance with their refusal to cover the regime’s massacre of civilian protesters.
Overnight, students of Iran’s polytechnic university in Tehran put their lives on the line by taking to the streets to call for an end to the radical regime ruling the country. It was a massive blow to the liberal media’s false narrative that the U.S. killing of General Qasem Soleimani somehow “united” Iranians. To further prove their initials stood for Ayatollah Broadcasting Company, the Sunday edition of ABC’s Good Morning America downplayed the protests as just the wild emotional throws of a people, even spending more time on frivolous nonsense such as British royal family and the Oscars.
In a Thursday night article titled “An Iranian general dies in a U.S. attack, and Canada suffers,” the Associated Press made it abundantly clear who they blamed for the deaths of 176 people in the skies over Tehran. (Hint, it wasn’t the country that shot two surface-to-air missiles at a passenger jet.)
Despite the fact Iran had killed a U.S. contractor in Iraq, staged an assault on the U.S. Embassy there, and launched a missile attack on U.S. forces, House Democrats were so overcome with their hatred for President Trump that they voted Thursday to restrict his powers to react to hostilities from the regime. Of course, that meant the liberal media had something else to rally behind seeing as their buddies in Iran had just killed nearly 176 innocent people by blowing a passenger jet out the sky.
In his address to the nation on Wednesday regarding Iran’s missile attack on U.S. bases in Iraq, President Trump made reference to the fact that the Obama administration handed over roughly $1.7 billion to Iran as a ransom for American hostages and said it helped Iran fund the attack. Well, that triggered the liberal media who sprinted to the former President’s defense. CBS White House correspondent Weijia Jiang actually suggested it was “unfounded” for Trump to make the connection. And NBC ran to Obama-era liar Susan Rice for backup.
In 24-hours, ABC News went from touting Iran’s missile attack because they “kept [their] promise,” to insisting the U.S. military was wrong to say Iran was trying to kill U.S. troops. Seemingly working for the Ayatollah Broadcasting Company, World News Tonight anchor David Muir’s opening tease included a conspiracy theory that Iran was trying to be nice. “Iran launching missiles targeting two bases housing the U.S. military in Iraq. Did Iran intentionally miss U.S. troops,” he rhetorically asked viewers.
In the aftermath of the Iranian missile attack against two U.S. bases in Iraq Tuesday evening, it appeared as though there were no U.S. casualties (as of this post's publication) and both President Trump and Iranian officials were ready to deescalate the situation. But CNN was not having it. During an appearance on CNN Tonight, chief White House correspondent Jim Acosta insisted that Trump was backed into a corner, and could do nothing but push the United States closer to a major conflict with Iran. He even suggested Trump was gambling with the lives of U.S. troops.
As ABC’s evening newscast was coming on the air Tuesday, Americans were just getting word that Iran was firing ballistic missiles at U.S. troops stationed in Iraq. In an irreverent announcement about the attempt to kill Americans from World News Tonight anchor David Muir, the network touted that the murderous Iranian regime had “kept its promise” to attack U.S. troops again. It was a comment Muir made more than once.
“Don’t believe Iranian propaganda about the mourning for [General Qasem] Soleimani.” That’s the message or plea from Iranian journalist and activist Masih Alinejad published by The Washington Post on Monday. Unfortunately, as NewsBusters reporting on the liberal media’s reaction to Soleimani’s demise shows, they were not heeding her warning and were willingly becoming mouthpieces for the murderous regime.
The United States or Iran? CBS News flaunted whose side they were taking during Monday’s Evening News. In her report on the gatherings in Iran, foreign correspondent Elizabeth Palmer peddled Iranian propaganda, hyped the crowds in Tehran mourning the loss of a terrorist, and boosted a message of death against President Trump.
ABC News kicked off Sunday’s Good Morning America by marveling at the sea of mourners in the streets of Iran and hyping the Iranian politicians who gathered on the floor of their legislature to chant “death to America;” in the wake of the U.S. airstrike that killed Iranian general, Qasem Soleimani on Thursday.
As NewsBusters executive editor Tim Graham recently reported, CNN’s Erin Burnett conducted a sit-down interview with Iranian ambassador to the U.N., Majid Takht Ravanchi on Friday where she treated him to some slow-pitch softball questions. The network took a complete 180 on Sunday when State of the Union host Jake Tapper unloaded on Secretary of State Mike Pompeo by grilling him on the airstrike that killed Iran’s General Qasem Soleimani, and acting skeptical about the need to take out the terrorist.
Three days after President Trump ordered the killing of Iranian General Qasem Soleimani, the liberal media were still tripping over themselves as they continued to clamor about the President supposedly starting a war (while downplaying the Iranian-backed attack on the U.S. Embassy in Iraq). But during NBC’s Sunday Today they took it another step, declaring Trump had started a “religious war” and insinuated it was a tactic to distract from his impeachment.
As news broke that President Trump had ordered a targeted strike against Qasem Soleimani, the head of the Quds Forces of Iran, while he was in Iraq, the liberal media where aghast Trump would take action against a killer of American troops and innocence. During the primetime pearl-clutching on MSNBC’s The Last Word, a panel of journalists and former Obama administration officials were busy suggesting there was no plan and “if” Soleimani deserved what he got, Trump was the “wrong” president to dish it out.
In their Thursday report on the state of the Democratic primary at the start of the election year, ABC’s World News Tonight took the opportunity to boast about how well their candidates were doing terms of fundraising. But, they were the only broadcast network to omit how President Trump’s fundraising numbers were blowing them out of the water, $46 million for the fourth quarter of 2019 alone.
Thursday was the U.S. stock market’s first day of trading for the 2020 election year and as Fox News Channel anchor Bret Baier said on Special Report, “stock markets picked up the new year where they left off in 2019” by setting new record highs, yet again. It was a great way to kick off the new year but as they’ve done with much of the positive economic news since President Trump took office, the broadcast networks (ABC, CBS, and NBC) completely ignored it during their evening newscasts.
Shortly after the United States started to ring in 2020 on Wednesday (and more than a few drinks), CNN Tonight host Don Lemon announced he had a major New Year’s resolution for the upcoming election year that he wanted people to know about: “lean in harder” and “fight.” Essentially, he was vowing to be more biased in his reporting.