It’s so cute to watch the Media Research Center pass judgment on media ethics.
This week, the MRC has been freaking out about how, as NewsBusters’ P.J. Gladnick put it, “Telemundo believes it is perfectly alright to stage events and film them as authentic.” So what did this “staging” actually consisted of? A Telemundo cameraman telling a protester holding a Mexican flag upside down to turn it around.
So, yeah, not exactly rigging crash results, but generally frowned upon in the news business. The fact that Telemundo did not even use the purportedly “staged” footage on the air did not stop the MRC outrage machine, as Brent Bozell quickly blundered in:
Telemundo should be commended for not using the clip, but this doesn’t change the fact that there is evidence of a deliberate attempt to stage the news — a clear case of advocacy replacing journalism on the campaign trail. Telemundo must immediately apologize to Donald Trump, fire the cameraman and anyone else involved in order to retain their viewers’ trust and confidence. No one trusts any supposedly fair media outlet that chooses one side or one candidate over another.
Funny we don’t recall Bozell offering an immediate apology — or an apology of any kind — or his resignation after it was revealed he staged his own fake twice-weekly news event for more than a decade: perpetuating the fiction that he wrote his own syndicated column.
Address the issue of your own honesty first, Brent. Then you might have a little moral authority to pass judgment on Telemundo.
UPDATE: Bozell appeared on Fox Business (of course) to talk about Telemundo and actually said, “I don’t understand how the press simply cannot make itself apologize when it does something wrong.” You first, Brent.