Outrage over Handshakes, Lobsters and the Twitter Files Public Relations Stunt
A condensed overview of 15 hours of Fox News for the week ending 12/4/22
Fans of the network might think ‘The Twitter Files’ revealed on Friday evening were the smoking gun that proved that President Biden had committed impeachable offenses. Fox viewers might also believe Biden had banned Maine lobsters and that an excessively long handshake with French President Emmanuel Macron was a sign of Biden’s cognitive decline.
Anyone who got all of their news from Fox would have no idea that the jobs report for the month of November showed more signs of growth as the U.S. economy added 263,000 new jobs. They also wouldn’t know that former President Donald J. Trump had dinner at Mar-a-Lago with Nicholas J. Fuentes, a white nationalist and Holocaust denier or that jury deliberations began in the criminal case against the Trump Organization.
A typical Fox viewer would be enraged and outraged while remaining horribly uninformed.
Shows covered last week
Fox & Friends - 1st hour
The Five
Hannity
Fox New focused on a number of issues last week from the crisis at the Southern border, to anti-government protests in Iran and China, along with it’s usual slew of crime stories.
One story showed up at the end of the week and has since dominated the right -wing media landscape - The Twitter Files.
The Twitter Files Public Relations Stunt
On Friday evening Elon Musk hired journalist, Matt Taibbi, for a public relations stunt Musk tried to sell as massive unveiling of secrets buried deep within the hard drives of Twitter.
Taibbi acting within constraints he was given by Elon Musk himself, revealed documentation over the course a roughly 40 tweet thread that was supposed to finally prove that the social media company had worked as an arm of the Democrat Party to influence the last presidential election for President Biden.
What readers got was a slow meandering thread of mostly old information peppered with dick picks of Hunter Biden.
Luckily there were no visible images of genitalia on display but the mysterious lines of code all led back to amateur porn created by the Hunter Biden when he was in the throes of addiction.
It took Taibbi eight long and self-aggrandizing tweets to even start to post any documentation from Twitter.
The first clue that the emails and documents did not point to much of anything was the date on the top of the first series of tweets that were deleted at the request of the Biden presidential campaign.
On October 24, 2020 the president of the United States was Donald J. Trump, not Joe Biden. Trump would have had the power and influence to use any number of resources available to him to put pressure on Twitter. Biden was nothing more than a candidate for president.
No one wit the DNC could call up any law enforcement agency or yield any sort of sanction against Twitter. Twitter being a private company could decide what it would publish, delete, block or feature.
The second thing that gave me pause was the way Taibbi presented the tweets that were taken down by Twitter on behest of the Biden presidential campaign.
What did any of that code mean? What exactly was taken down? Why didn’t Taibbi indicate what type of content was removed?
Former Twitter employees swooped in to let everyone know that those lines of code were mostly pornographic images of Hunter Biden’s penis.
I would assume Taibbi and Musk both knew that list contained links that would have led to photographs of genitalia but neither one of them shared that information.
Photos of genitalia and sexually graphic images posted without the consent of the people featured in the videos or photographs goes against Twitter’s community standards.
Of course there is plenty of porn on Twitter but it’s posted by people who want others to see them naked or engaged in sexual activity.
With this next tweet Taibbi basically destroyed the premise that Twitter was acting as some sort of arm of the Democrat Party.
Taibbi’s attempt to mitigate the reveal that both Republicans and Democrats had asked Twitter to remove content was to post the political donations of Twitter employees for the past three years.
What would have been far more persuasive is if he actually showed correspondence and tweets where Republicans asked Twitter to remove content from the platform. Were there any Republicans begging Twitter to remove dick pics? Embarrassing sexual content is not exactly unique to one political party.
There was also no data that showed a ratio of the amount of requests made by Republicans versus Democrats. If anyone truly had gone through thousands of examples they could easily show a ratio with a simple spreadsheet.
What came after these first few tweets was mostly information that was already old news. The only new information were conversations between executives and security experts at Twitter who were clearly conflicted about how to deal with the Hunter Biden laptop story.
Had Taibbi posted something with heated language against the Republican Party or Donald J. Trump he might have had something but it was instead a bunch of different voices who genuinely seemed concerned about if they were doing the right thing.
At one point in the various conversations Democrat U.S. Representative Ro Khanna (D-CA) urged Vijaya Gadde, Twitter’s former head of legal affairs to publish the Hunter Biden story and material. Khanna was concerned that suppressing the content would actually elevate it and make the situation for all parties worse.
Taibbi even violated Twitter’s community standards himself when he neglected to obscure the personal email of Khanna which was clearly visible in two screenshots. There was also no attempt to hide the names of various Twitter employees which opened them up to harassment.
At the end of this underwhelming display of poorly thought out public relations disguised as journalism Fox News hosts tasted blood in the water and started their own feeding frenzy.
Jason Chaffetz was subbing for Hannity on Friday. He started it off with typical Fox News hyperbole.
“Now, make no mistake, the level of left wing bias and corruption at Twitter was extreme. This comes on the heels of new testimony from a federal agent who claims that the FBI held weekly meetings with major tech platforms ahead of the 2020 election,” said Chaffetz
Then radio host and sports commentator Clay Travis added,
“Just kind of contextualize this for everybody out there who's wondering about what exactly is going on in China. They have set up what they call the Great Wall of China for Internet blocking. So the government itself controls what you can and cannot see,” said Travis.
Travis was making an enormous leap comparing the United States to China, a country with draconian controls over every aspect of its citizens. If Twitter was the only source for news he might have had a point but it’s one of many platforms.
Throughout the rest of the various rants the terms “Biden administration and Biden campaign” became intertwined.
“Colluding with big tech to do effectively what government is not allowed to do by itself. They effectively deputized these big tech companies to undertake actions that they otherwise would not have been able to do without violating the First Amendment. As they said in these documents, that frankly was chilling. Sometimes it would happen for Republicans to be fair. But as the demonstration here is overwhelmingly it was in favor of the Democrat Party,” said Travis.
Even in his wording it’s clear that the “presentation” presented by Taibbi was inadequate. He could have easily shown readers actual numbers for the amount of requests from Republicans and Democrats, instead he cherry picked only requests from Democrats.
Radio host Tammy Bruce also used heightened language meant to enflame the rage of viewers.
“But effectively, in this case, Twitter. And now we know also in league, perhaps with Facebook and other conversations regarding the FBI and their conversations is that certain platforms and certainly now Twitter, we're acting as agents of the state,” said Bruce.
She continued.
“And this is what is remarkable, the thing the specific thing that sets this nation apart from all the totalitarian rat holes around the world that abuse their people and crush them and have fake elections or no elections is, in fact, our Bill of Rights,” said Bruce.
Some excellent articles about the Twitter files
A Twitter thread by The Sparrow Project, Dec. 2nd, 2022
PostingThroughtIt, “Matt Taibbi whiffs as he licks the boot,” Jared Holt, Dec. 3, 2022
Bulwark, “No, You Do Not Have a Constitutional Right to Post Hunter Biden’s Dick Pic on Twitter,” Tim Miller, Dec. 3rd, 2022
The Atlantic,“Elon Musk and Tucker Carlson Don’t Understand the First Amendment,” David French, Dec. 3rd, 2022
Lobstergate!
The term lobster was used 78 times last week. Fox tried to manufacture a scandal by falsely equating a two environmental groups and a supermarket chain with the federal government.
This is how it started. In the first segment on “Fox and Friends” on Friday Fox mentioned Biden’s first State dinner for French President Emmanuel Macron. Maine Lobster was on the menu.
Then Kevin Corke mentioned in a VoiceOver how the Marine Stewardship Council declared that Maine lobster unsustainable and the food retailer Whole Foods stopped selling it.
The Marine Stewardship Council is an environmental group based in London. It has no connection to the US government.
Kevin Corke continued,
“But that decision to serve lobster actually came after the Monterey Bay Aquarium. Seafood Watch and the Marine Stewardship Council declared lobster unsustainable, said Corke”
I looked into Monetary Bay Seafood Watch. It’s part of the nonprofit Monetary Aquarium in California. It’s also not affiliated with the federal government.
Whole Foods, of course, is a private company that is publicly traded and Whole Foods can sell whatever it wants. Now, there are plenty of other retailers that will sell Maine lobster. Whole Foods is one of many.
The segment included a Tweet by Sen. Susan Collins (R-ME)
“This delicious, sustainable Maine lobster is an excellent choice for the main course for the president's first state dinner. If Maine lobster is good enough for the White House to serve, it's good enough for every seafood retailer, including Whole Foods, to sell,” tweeted Collins.
It appeared her tweet was more of a dig at Whole Food than the President of the United States.
“The Five” also spent nearly 7 minutes on this story, they kept bringing up the environmental groups and Whole Foods and what they wanted Maine lobstermen to do about lobster fishing. They didn't bring up any specifics. The Biden administration is enforcing upon this industry.
Biden and the Longest Handshake
In this clip Biden shakes the hand of France’s President Emmanuel Macron. The handshake goes on for about 45 seconds or so, which is long for a handshake but it appeared that both men might have been lingering in their greeting so photographers could get a good shot of it.
This did not stop Fox News from making a simple gesture into a major incident.
TikTok Threw the Election to the Dems!
Fox continues to make excuses for why Republicans didn’t fare better in midterm election. On “The Five” Jesse Watters brought up the social media app TikTok again as some type of nefarious plot by the Chinese government to brainwash young American voters into voting for Democrats.
Watters didn’t offer any specific examples he just painted his fear mongering message in broad strokes.
“That comes as we get a disturbing new report on how China used TikTok in order to tip the scales in our midterms. Apparently accounts run by the propaganda arm of the Chinese government have accumulated millions of followers. They were bashing Republicans and praising Democrats without really clearly disclosing they were being posted by a foreign government,” said Watters.
The rest of the cast exploded into a cacophony of exclamations about the evils of the social media app, Chinese government interface and election meddling.
Stories Fox News Ignored
Every week I compare fifteen hours of Fox News coverage to five hours of the PBS NewsHour the following is a list of stories covered on PBS that Fox did not mention.
The 19-year-old white gunman, Payton Grendon, accused of targeting and killing 10 Black victims and injuring three others in a racially motivated attack at a Buffalo, NY grocery store pleaded guilty to state charges.
Trump had dinner with Ye West and Nicholas J. Fuentes, a white nationalist and Holocaust denier at his Mar-a-Lago estate.
The U.S. added 263,000 new jobs in November which is a sign of health in the economy.
The Democratic Party decided to start its presidential primary in the state of South Carolina instead of Iowa.
InfoWars broadcaster, Alex Jones, has filed for Chapter 11 personal bankruptcy after he was ordered by courts to pay over $1.5 billion in damages to the families of shooting victims at Sandy Hook elementary.
The European Union policing agency, Europol helped take down a large cocaine cartel that operated in six European countries.
Residents of Houston, Texas faced a boil water notice after a power outage at a water treatment plant.
In a major loss to Donald J. Trump’s legal team an appeals court halted the Special Masters review of documents seized at Mar-a-Lago.
European Union countries agreed to a $60 price cap on Russian oil as a means to harm Russia financially.
Lawyers for the Trump Organization rested their case in the criminal tax fraud trial in New York State.
Leader of Oath Keepers and an Oath Keepers member were found guilty of seditious conspiracy and other charges related to U.S. Capitol breach on January 6th, 2021.
The Supreme Court is deciding a case about federal immigration policy brought by Texas and Louisiana. The suit is over immigration enforcement guidelines issued by the Biden administration that deal with the arrest and detainment of undocumented immigrants.
In Arizona Republican gubernatorial candidate Kari Lake refuses to concede her loss to Katie Hobbs. Officials in Cochise County, a Republican dominated rural area, blew past the statutory deadline to certify its votes but eventually voted to certify them after a court order.
Sen. Sherrod Brown (D-OH) sent a letter to Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen urging her to help craft legislation that would add safeguards and regulations to the crypto currency market.
Pres. Biden pledged new commitments, respect for tribal nations at a two-day White House Tribal Nations Summit to representatives from hundreds of Native American tribes.
The United Nations launched a record $51 billion appeal for humanitarian aid. The U.N. expects 339 million people in 69 countries to need assistance due to internal conflicts, food insecurity and climate change.
The Islamic State jihadist group’s leader has been killed in battle in an operation carried out by rebels of the Free Syrian Army in Southern Syria. He is the third leader to meet a violent death.
Turkey launched attacks against Syrian Kurds, a United States ally, in the Northern border of Syria.
Five Palestinian men were killed by Israeli forces in West Bank violence.
According to the Pentagon China has plans to triple its nuclear arsenal by 2035.
Despite a peace deal signed last month violence erupted in the Northern Tigray region of Ethiopia. A joint committee of the Ethiopian government and Tigray forces has convened to outline disarmament plans.
COVID-19 disruptions have led to a decline in childhood vaccines globally. As many as 40 million children have missed doses of the measles vaccine.
Legendary baseball pitcher and two-time Cy Young winner, Gaylord Perry, dies at age 84.
The French baguette gets UNESCO recognition - an award through the United Nations which recognizes the bread’s cultural importance.
By the Numbers
The Twitter Files dominated last week’s coverage even though the story dropped on a Friday evening. Twitter and Elon Musk were discussed throughout the week.
The Twitter Files story dominated the week even though it dropped on Friday evening. I predict it will dominate most of this week’s coverage as well. Anti-government protests in Iran and China
Fox suddenly acknowledged the anti-government protests in Iran but anchors only mentioned in in passing in between segments. Even though the protests started in mid-September Fox News has still yet to dedicate a single segment to the crisis.
The network also focused on the anti-government protests in China which have largely been spurned on by brutally inhumane COVID-19 lockdowns. Fox used the rare civil unrest in the communist country as a way to criticize President Biden. Somehow President Biden wasn’t doing enough to support protesters in both Iran and China, two sovereign nations with strained relationships with the United States.
Fox News also kept tying Apple to the protests in China whereas PBS never mentioned the tech company once in its coverage of the civil unrest.
It was especially odd to see the anyone on Fox express outrage about the Iranian protests as the network has blatantly ignored the human rights catastrophe until it became a part of the Fox’s World Cup coverage when Iranian soccer players refused to sing their national anthem. .
PBS did not sugarcoat Nicholas J. Fuentes in the slightest. Although they didn’t call him a Nazi as I do in this chart they used the terms Holocaust denier and white nationalist.
Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) did NOT make the list this past week. This has only happened twice. She was usurped by Hakeem Jefferies.
Coming up…
I’ll be capturing “Fox & Friends,” “The Five,” and “Tucker Carlson Tonight,” this week.
Keep up the good work... get some backing and post an ad on the five.. haha