It’s been a busy year at Grabien News. Chroniciling the major media’s bias, mistakes, and attempts at narrative-setting required near round-the-clock fact-checking and record-correcting. Much of this work took the form of our (world-renowned!) montages, which aim to both inform and entertain.
As today’s the last day of 2019, we wanted to revisit the montages you all — our readers — appreciated the most. So herewith is our list of our 12 greatest montages of the year, as tabulated by views/traffic.
20 — Since writer E. Jean Carroll claimed in June President Trump in the 1990s sexually assaulted her in a Bergdof Goodman's dressing room, the national media ran wild with her "rape" claim.
While Carroll stops short of describing the alleged attack as rape, many in the media are more than happy to do it for her. CNN's Alisyn Camerota, for example, used most of a lengthy interview with the author trying to get her to agree she had been raped. "That's what it was," Camerota told her. Between CNN and MSNBC, the term "rape" has been used in reference to President Trump more than 300 times since Friday, when an excerpt of Carroll's latest book — where the allegation first surfaced — was published in New York Magazine.
These same reporters have also taken to asking why the story isn’t getting even more coverage and and attacking outlets — such as Fox News — for not giving the allegation more airtime. MSNBC's Joy Ann Reid criticized The New York Times for placing its article about the alleged assault in their books section. The New York Times' executive editor, Dean Baquet, subsequently apologized and said the paper was "overly cautious" and should have made a bigger deal of the allegation despite not having independently corroborated the allegation.
But perhaps Baquet's earlier caution was indeed the correct approach. As Carroll has gone on a recent publicity tour for the book, "What Do We Need Men For? A Modest Proposal," she's revealed herself as a rather bizarre individual, with many online wondering if she's suffering from mental illness.
19 — If Sen. Warren’s 2020 presidential bid is going to get off the launchpad, she first needs to cut loose some extra baggage — namely the decades she spent portraying herself as a racial minority.
Last October she thought she’d hatched the perfect scheme for doing exactly this: A DNA test purporting to show distant Native American ancestry, but which — upon closer examination — proved she was less Native American than the average American.
But in those intervening hours between Warren’s DNA announcement and people getting around to reading the fine print, many in the media uncritically accepted her claim.
18 — The much anticipated DoJ Inspector General report on the FBI’s surveillance of the Trump campaign finally landed this month, and the biggest loser was … the so-called Trump Dossier.
That dossier, created by the political mercenary firm Fusion GPS via funds from the DNC and the Clinton campaign, compiled anti-Trump gossip, much of it sourced from Kremlin officials. The most salacious item involved Trump staying in a Moscow hotel room while watching Russian prostitutes pee on each other.
The resulting compilation of uncorroborated rumors wound up in the FBI’s hands, which, perplexingly, used it as the basis for launching a surveillance campaign against the Trump campaign’s Carter Page. The DoJ’s IG, Michael Horowitz, was emphatic that the dossier was “essential” to the FBI’s FISA application.
Echoing the Rep. Devin Nunes’ memo on FBI’s FISA misconduct, Horowitz’s report stated: “We determined that the Crossfire Hurricane team’s receipt of Steele’s election reporting on September 19, 2016 played a central and essential role in the FBI’s and Department’s decision to seek the FISA order.”
And Horowitz noted that the dossier itself was unverified and unreliable.
Despite the problematic nature of the Trump Dossier, the major media reliably informed Americans over the last three years that it was “corroborated.” CNN was one of the dossier’s biggest boosters. The network’s morning anchor, Alisyn Camerota, regularly told viewers that the Trump dossier was the God’s honest.
17 — Wherever you come down on the debate over the global climate, we should all agree on a compromise:
Leave the kids out of it.
Over the last few months, the American media has helped turn the 16-year-old Swedish climate activist Greta Thunberg into a teen celebrity and role model. Students are being encouraged to participate in her weekly “Climate Strike,” which calls for skipping school until global action is taken on global warming.
Greta spoke at the United Nation’s Climate Action Summit, and parents worldwide got a clearer picture of the movement sweeping schools by ... storm.
Far from offering a compelling summation of the science animating her passion for the issue, Greta resembled the kind of apocalyptic prophesier scientists usually detest. Speaking with great certainty, but expressing no curiosity about the underlying science, Greta, instead invested her energy in emotionally connecting with climate change; she’s an evangelist for what happens to be a very dark worldview.
Greta believes free-market capitalism is polluting the world to such an extent that humanity’s continued existence is at best uncertain. Students participating in her climate strike almost universally believe that barring the birth of a new eco-centric world order, the world will end in less than 12 years. See the montage below for more.
16 — Joe Biden entered CNN’s Democratic debate in October needing to reclaim ground lost to Sen. Elizabeth Warren, who in some recent polls leap-frogged him as the 2020 front-runner.
Unfortunately for the former vice president, his mouth often moved faster than his brain, and the candidate repeatedly found himself tongue tied.
At other times, he lost his train of thought entirely.
15 — This was obvious to anyone who's been paying attention.
West Point recently announced it's concluded an investigation into cadets who were seen flashing "OK" symbols during the most recent Army-Navy game.
Why was there even an investigation into such a mundane matter?
Because activists on Twitter began claiming the Cadets, in making the gesture, were actually expressing white nationalist sympathies.
But as many West Point graduates were quick to point out, there's a popular game among cadets called "the circle game," where someone flashes an "OK" sign, and then when someone sees that symbol, another is free to punch him/her in the arm.
The media, however, was only too happy to embrace the theory being pushed online — that these cadets were actually expressing white power sympathies.
14 — The DoJ/FBI may have toyed with using the 25th Amendment to overthrow President Trump, but only because their top agents were super stressed.
That’s the explanation coming from Andrew McCabe, the former deputy director of the FBI, who was ousted after the Department of Justice’s inspector general said he lied repeatedly in a bid to coverup abusing his office.
McCabe went on a publicity tour for his new book, “The Threat: How the FBI Protect America in the Age of Terror and Trump,” and was asked repeatedly about a salacious New York Times report from last September in which it was reported that after President Trump fired FBI director James Comey, the deputy attorney general, Rod Rosenstein, and senior FBI leadership discussed using the 25th Amendment to remove Trump from office.
13 — Whatever the opposite of “a game” is what Kamala Harris brought to her interview on Jimmy Fallon’s “Tonight Show.”
From the outset, the 2020 Democratic presidential candidate hemmed, hawed, stammered, and otherwise struggled speaking fluidly. The rocky appearance followed another uneven performance at the last Democtatic debate, during which she occasionally sounded tipsy.
Over the course of last night’s interview, Harris said “you know” 22 times, “um” 12 times, and other filler word virtually nonstop.
Fallon treated Harris to a series of seemingly rehearsed softball questions, yet the candidate was often still at a loss for words. Asked at the outset what she was like in college, Harris had to think for a moment, before offering up an anodyne anecdote about hitchhiking to her own graduation.
12 — After a Nevada lawmaker came forward with an accusation of unwanted sexual touching from former Vice President Joe Biden, the rumored 2020 Democratic presidential candidate released a statement.
"In my many years on the campaign trail and in public life, I have offered countless handshakes, hugs, expressions of affection, support and comfort," Biden said. "And not once — never — did I believe I acted inappropriately. If it is suggested I did so, I will listen respectfully. But it was never my intention."
Almost immediately thereafter, many in the major media came to his defense, adopting defense that he was simply showing “affection.”
Of course, many of these same media personalities had a different view of unwanted sexual touching when the accused was not Biden, but Brett Kavanaugh.
11 — The speaker of the House could use some brushing up on her speaking.
Appearing at the NAACP’s 110th anniversary convention, the Democratic leader repeatedly struggled to read her prepared remarks.
On at least 24 occasions, the San Francisco Democrat stumbled over her lines, often having to pause and restart. Her comments were only 15 minutes, meaning she averaged 1.6 stumbles per minute.
Pelosi particularly struggled saying “NAACP,” instead referring to the storied civil rights organization as “NAACT.”
“Imagine the honor to get the N-double-A-C-T-cent — the N-double-A-C-T centennial anniversary,” she stumbled early on. At another points she referred to the organization as “the N-double-A-C.”
10 — Democrats appearing at CNN's marathon 7-hour global warming forum had a plan to solve a changing climate: Ban everything!
Over the course of the television extravaganza, Democrats' leading 2020 presidential candidates floated a variety of proposals to cut Americans' energy use and, ostensibly, to stop the climate from changing.
Among them: Bans on plastic straws, red meat, incandescent lightbulbs, gas-powered cars, nuclear energy, off-shore drilling, fracking, natural gas exports, coal plants, and even "carbon" itself.
9 — President Obama visited Germany in April, ostensibly to speak about “community leadership and civic engagement” on behalf of his eponymous Obama Foundation, but Berliners soon discovered his main topic of interest was ... Barack Obama.
Obama talking about himself in an almost obsessive manner is no new phenomenon, but today he shattered his own records. Over the course of a 90 minute townhall with "emerging leaders," Obama mentioned himself an eye-popping 392 times.
Here's the breakdown of his personal pronoun use (based on a rush transcript of the event):
"I" — 312
"Me" — 33
"My" — 43
"I’d" — 9
"I’m" — 61
"Myself" — 9
8 — Whatever Rachel Maddow’s merits, enlisting her to moderate a presidential debate is no different than enlisting Sean Hannity or Rush Limbaugh.
So it was no surprise that much of Wednesday night’s MSNBC debate featured the primetime host baiting Democrats’ already left-wing 2020 presidential candidates even further to the left.
Maddow opened up the evening asking how Democrats will convince their Republican colleagues to impeach Trump. And that was just the beginning.
7 — Mere moments after BuzzFeed published a report — elements of which were soon called “false” by Special Council Robert Mueller’s office — the media had already begun invoking Trump’s imminent impeachment.
CBS News’s Paula Reid said: "If this 'BuzzFeed' news report is true, that the special counsel has evidence beyond just Michael Cohen's testimony, that the president directed his former personal attorney to lie to Congress, then we are likely on our way to possible impeachment proceedings. Because this, this is black and white.”
And that was just the beginning. Check out the below supercut for more. Much more.
6 — Over the last two years talking heads in the major media developed high hopes that Special Counsel Robert Mueller's probe would crescendo with dramatic flare.
Viewers likely started to imagine that the only possible outcome would be the Trump family being frog-walked out of the White House in handcuffs.
On Friday, Mueller's probe officially concluded. No further indictments will be filed, and no one in the Trump family will be indicted. The two-year investigation never charged anyone with conspiracy related to the Trump campaign and Russia.
The disappointment was evident on many of the news programs that served as the Mueller probe's biggest boosters. MSNBC's Rachel Maddow appeared to get emotional. Chris Matthews angrily asked why Mueller "let Trump off the hook?"
5 — Former Special Counsel Robert Mueller frequently appeared confused during his much-anticipated Capitol Hill testimony Wednesday.
Mueller, who is often celebrated in the media for laser-like thinking, had to ask lawmakers to regularly repeat their questions, seemingly struggling to pay attention.
At other points, Mueller got confused about whether the members of Congress were asking him questions or if they were reading from his own report.
In just the first 90 minutes of the hearing, Mueller needed help understanding questions more than 10 times.
4 — Hillary Clinton’s occasional southern accent made a well-timed return in Selma, Ala., where she spoke at an anniversary event of the 1965 “Bloody Sunday” march from Selma to Montgomery.
Clinton — who is known for lapsing into a southern drawl when speaking before southern audiences — occasionally affected a rhetorical tone resembling many of the preachers in attendance.
Speaking to one, she said, “Reverend Green, when those bones get up, and when that spirit is breathed into them, and they start climbing out of that valley, the first place they go is to register to vote!”
3 — New York’s freshman congressman, Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez has, like, a lot to say, lol.
Over the course of a wide-ranging 80-minute interview at South by Southwest on Saturday, the 29-year-old left-wing lightning rod let loose a litany of “likes,” “you knows,” and “whatevers.”
In between calling America “garbage,” capitalism “irredeemable,” and President Reagan racist, AOC said “like” no fewer than 71 times, “you know” at least 34 times, and “whatever” five times.
2 — When TMZ first reported that actor Jussie Smollett was the victim of a vicious hate crime, it sounded almost impossible to believe.
Upon leaving a Chicago Subway sandwich shop circa 2 AM one sub-zero night in late January, two masked men recognized him as the openly gay black actor starring in Fox’s ‘Empire,’ hurled racist and homophobic slurs at him, beat him to the point of breaking his ribs, doused him with bleach, tied a noose around his neck, before pronouncing “This is MAGA Country!” and fleeing.
Making such astonishing claims, the national media owed it to their viewers to give this story the circumspect coverage responsible journalism demands.
If only.
Instead the major media used their platform to uncritically parrot TMZ’s original report, even adding new details along the way (such as that the attackers wore “Make America Great Again” hats). This vicious hate crime, they said, painted a disturbing picture of America in 2019.
1 — At 76, Joe Biden is one the oldest people to ever mount a presidential campaign, and in his first speech as a presidential candidate in April, it showed.
The Pennsylvania native and former vice president — who just announced his third attempt at a run for the White House — repeatedly stumbled and slurred his way through his brief, 27-minute remarks in Pittsburgh Monday. His almost every sentence was peppered with verbal stumbles.