Full Court Press

Media's too busy praising Harris to bother with journalism

(Note: This is one of those articles that’s too long for some email servers — check the webpage to ensure you get the full story!)

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In basketball, a full court press is a strategy in which the defense pressures the offense the full length of the court. Typically employed late in a game by a losing team or to attack a specific aspect of an opponent, one of the drawbacks of a full court press is the massive amount of energy it takes to employ. Additionally, it only takes a small mistake from a single player to render the strategy worthless — meaning all that energy and effort is wasted.

Although this isn’t a perfect analogy to the 2024 presidential election, it reminds me of the current mainstream media attitude surrounding the race. Everywhere you turn, the insane levels of propaganda and gaslighting are right in your face.

“Kamala Harris has raw political talent” is a line so detached from reality it’s a wonder Mr. White didn’t commit seppuku to restore his family’s honor. This pair of paragraphs, in particular, jumped out at me:

Harris had “an impressive” rollout to her 2019 campaign, but quit before a single vote was cast. Why? Because the more voters got to know Kalama Harris, the less they liked her. Early in the campaign, Harris polled at 13% — months later her support had cratered to 5%.

Put another way, from July 2019 to September 2019 — as voters started paying attention to the election — Kamala Harris lost 62% of her supporters. That’s anything but ‘raw talent’.

White sort of handwaves his way around Kamala’s actual accomplishments while Vice President and instead focuses on how she attacked the Supreme Court, which “gave her confidence.” Later in the article, the author notes that JFK and Ronald Reagan weren’t always good politicians, either — they had to grow into it.

See? Kamala is like a cross between JFK and Reagan! Are convinced yet, America?

What if we toss around another big political name?

In case you’re (justifiably) boycotting anything Molly Jong-Fast, here’s the absolute howler highlight:

“People really like her. She’s gotten to be a really gifted, Obama-level orator.”

Kamala Harris actually speaking:

The only “Obama-level” aspects of the Harris campaign are the Obama-level media fawning and coordination of talking points:

Tim Walz is a down-the-middle, folksy, happy warrior! Not like that WEIRD JD Vance!

(The people calling you weird:)

Monica Hesse is a columnist for the Washington Post. Honest.

It’s like the entire Harris campaign is trying to turn America into a high school lunch room — while paying off ‘influencers’ and musicians to help spread the campaign’s propaganda. You (finally) have a chance to sit at the cool kids’ table! You don’t want to sit over there with that WEIRDO who admitted he had sex with couches, do you?

OK, maybe JD Vance didn’t exactly admit he had sex with a couch — but he’s totally the type of person who would have sex with a couch, right? WHAT A WEIRDO!

OK, the entire thing is a total lie, but it’s not like anybody ACTUALLY BELIEVED JD Vance had sex with a couch — you just don’t GET IT.

See — we know he didn’t do it, and here’s exactly how he didn’t.

We find ourselves in this ridiculous situation because the mainstream media is no longer interested in doing the job of journalism. Instead, they see it as their mission to ensure the election of Swamp Creatures, so everything they do and everything they say is in furtherance of that goal.

As I mentioned before, we saw this stuff during the Obama years — but no matter what else you think about Obama, you must admit he was a gifted speaker who could effectively talk for hours. If you got Obama in front of a camera, the hard part was already done — he’d handle the rest.

This stands in stark contrast to Kamala Harris — head chef of the word salad — who has yet to answer tough questions or even speak off-script. And the mainstream press continues to cover for her instead of doing their jobs and demanding answers. (If even for their own sake!)

In some ways, this development shouldn’t be a surprise. In 2013, then-President Obama signed the “Smith-Mundt Modernization Act” — which really should have been named the “Smith-Mundt Nullification Act”, as it removed WWII-era barriers preventing the US government from broadcasting propaganda to its citizens. (Around that time you may have noticed a huge uptick in former military members — and maybe current Raytheon board members — showing up on TV telling us why it was so important to bomb this or that country.)

Once it was legal for the government to serve us propaganda on the news, getting served government propaganda on the news was a certainty. Here’s how the Libertarian Institute describes the future of censorship:

….with the Smith-Mundt Modernization Act already in place, there are only two short steps to the complete squelching of dissent.

First, the government controls the media through injecting many pro-government texts into the marketplace of ideas. This is obviously already being done, and has been unabashedly pursued since the ratification of the Act. (To dispel any doubts that this is happening, it suffices to turn on the mainstream network news.)

Second, among the government-promoted ideas will now be the claim that the newly established Disinformation Governance Board does not violate the Constitution of the United States. Once lawmakers have been persuaded to believe this, then the DGB will have the power to eliminate what they themselves have identified as disinformation, including the very claim that the DGB is illegitimate.

After that will follow the censorship of the texts of anyone who disagrees with the government and, ultimately, the criminalization of those who “persist” in promulgating ideas deemed “threatening” by the powers that be. The danger of all of this to free people is very real, as the plight of whistleblowers in recent years has already revealed.’

(This sounds nearly exactly like what’s happening in the UK, doesn’t it?)

So ultimately we end up in this full court press — much like we did during covid. With one voice, the entire mainstream media apparatus is working toward a single goal, with terrifying results (once again much like covid).

But it’s important to note the entire gambit relies on having COMPLETE control over the narrative. As in our basketball full court press, a single ‘leak’ can torpedo the whole ship. We know from covid and ensuing censorship topics that the mainstream media is all on board — the ‘threat’ comes from those people who refuse to play ball.

Here’s how Matt Taibbi described the current situation in a recent interview with Tucker Carlson: (The whole thing is well worth watching!)

“The thing that you need most of all in journalism to be good at it, is you need to have some bravery.”

And — as we saw during covid — that removes most people from consideration immediately. When Pfizer is buying the advertisements running during the commercial breaks, newsrooms are hesitant to tell the truth about Pfizer. When ‘access’ is the most important thing to media members, they will be hesitant to tell the truth about the people granting them that access. People who can be truthful because they’re free of these influences are few and far between. (Though it seems like most of them are here on Substack!)

Thus, we have an entire media that does little but lie at the behest of powerful government or corporate entities. And when it comes to the 2024 election, those entities are determined to prevent Trump from winning back the White House. They say this is because Trump is a danger to American democracy and will be a dictator — and if I thought they actually believed that, I might cut them some slack.

After all, I believe it’s my duty as an American to protect the things that make America what it is — namely the Constitution and the ideas enshrined in it. Government cannot stop you from speaking. Government cannot stop you from defending yourself and your family. All the way down the list. In summary, the PEOPLE are in charge, and the government is there to do the bidding of the people — not the other way around.

So if I see somebody who threatens the idea of America, I DO feel like I have some sort of duty to speak out against them — even as a journalist. Joe Biden’s White House agreed:

So when a member of a presidential ticket attacks freedom of speech, it should be universally condemned, right?

Fact-check:

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.

Nothing there about ‘misinformation’ or ‘hate speech’.

(I have a sneaking suspicion that if we went back in time and explained this issue to the founders, they would make it clear that Americans can say whatever the fuck they want about the government. Oh wait, they did.)

Where is the media outrage that Tim Walz is attacking the ‘sacrosanct’ Constitution? Why are they not calling for the dismantling of the massive censorship apparatus aimed at Americans expressing legal speech — specially if “Super Hitler” is only months away from taking office? If we’re worried about Trump ending democracy, where’s the call for restriction on executive orders? (Reminder — covid vaccine mandates were executive orders. Hard to imagine something less American and more dictatorial!)

That’s how you know the media isn’t acting in good faith. The things they claim to worry about under Trump are already happening under Biden — to deafening silence from the MSM.

Let’s start with the biggest charge — Trump will ignore the rules of the system and illegally remain in power. Nothing could harm American democracy more than ignoring the rules and just remaining in power, right Democratic Representative Jamie Raskin?

Uh……..did he just say that Congress would disqualify Trump on January 6th, 2025 — after he’s won the election? If you’re concerned about American democracy, shouldn’t this be setting off huge alarm bells? (Maybe the media uses silent alarms?)

The media tells us that another bad aspect of Trump is his yearning for POLITICAL REVENGE!

I mean — can you even IMAGINE a sitting president using the justice system to attack rivals and critics, including members of the media?

Trump would also purge federal agencies to get rid of people who won’t do his bidding! CAN YOU EVEN IMAGINE WHAT THAT MIGHT LOOK LIKE?

Why, that kind of thing would be the end of American democracy as we know it! Luckily, that will never ever happen as long as we can kick all the non-democrats off the ballot.

Then we can make sure everybody ends up in the same place!

I’m actually president on Friday! Equity!

The truth is that Donald Trump has already been president for four years — during that time he had unquestioned authority over numerous aspects of the US government, including the military.

This is what ACTUALLY happened during that time:

I don’t throw the word ‘treason’ around lightly, but I’m pretty sure that lying to the Commander-in-chief about movement of military assets might qualify. The military doesn’t work if people are free to simply disobey lawful orders.

In the same vein, when Trump issued orders to declassify Crossfire Hurricane documents before he left office — something completely under his control as President — the Swamp simply ignored him. When Trump wanted to shut down flights from China, he was attacked relentlessly. When Trump wanted to open schools, he was attacked relentlessly. When Trump [insert literally anything here], he was attacked relentlessly.

Imagine Donald Trump trying to mandate the covid vaccine to these people:

So you’ll have to pardon me if I’m a little bit skeptical that I should be worried about how Donald Trump will single-handedly lead to the downfall of American democracy. In fact, I’m MUCH MUCH MUCH MUCH MUCH MUCH MUCH MUCH more worried about the entrenched censorship machine being used against the American people RIGHT NOW.

Many of you have already been caught up by that machine, and know through experience that you have little recourse against this completely ‘legal’ system of government-led censorship that watches everything and ‘reports’ you if you say the wrong thing.

When the media starts reporting about THAT, I’ll believe that they’re actually worried about preserving American ideals. The entire point of journalism is to hold powerful people accountable for their misdeeds — not enable them. Until the MSM remembers that, it’s up to those of us who don’t mind losing a few friends to keep Screaming the truth.

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PS — If I’m wrong and Trump does turn into a dictator, I promise to be first over the wall.