CNSNews.com managing editor Michael W. Chapman used a blog post to tout how Newt Gingrich dismissed the “mainstream media” as the “propaganda media.”
But as was made clear during the election — what with its transcription-heavy “reporting” on the Trump campaign — the actual “propaganda media” is the website Chapman runs. And CNS is continuing to prove how it’s going to be a propagandist for the Trump presidency.
As evidence continues to emerge that Russia interfered with the election with the apparent goal of getting Trump elected, CNS has served as Trump’s PR shop in trying to change the subject.
Susan Jones uncritically relayed Trump dismissing “press reports” –no, Susan, it was the CIA — about Russian interference in the campaign, along with another article quoting outgoing RNC chairman Reince Priebus’ partisan attack that “The Russians didn’t tell Hillary Clinton to ignore Wisconsin and Michigan.”Jones also uncritically relayed Priebus’ denial that the RNC was hacked, despite reports dating from before the election about it.
Jones then followed with an attack on President Obama, rehashing the “FLASHBACK” about how “a live microphone picked up his whispered conversation with then-Russian President Dmitry Medvedev.” Jones went on to note that “While campaigning for Hillary Clinton in October, Obama criticized Republican Donald Trump’s ‘continued flattery of Mr. Putin and the degree to which he appears to model many of his policies and approaches’ after those of Putin.”
Jones cranked out another distraction attack, stating that the New YOrk Times wrote in 2012 that Putin “sauntered into American presidential politics…praising President Barack Obama as ‘a very honest man’ and chastising the Republican nominee, Mitt Romney, for describing Russia as ‘without question our No. 1 geopolitical foe.'”
Melanie Hunter joined in the biased fun, making sure to approvingly quote Republican Rand Paul sneering that Trump “got 70 percent in eastern Kentucky” and it had nothing to do with Russia.
Unusually, CNS did provide a couple token articles forwarding the other side of the story — that, you know, foreign interference in a U.S. election should probably be looked into. Jones actually cited a former U.S. ambassador to Russia saying that, and Hunter quoted Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell saying that “simply cannot be a partisan issue” (but then quoted McConnell making it just that by alleging that the Obama administration “sat back” while Russia “expanded its sphere of influence”).
Still, pro-Trump stenography is the order of the day at CNS. It seems all that Mercer money to CNS parent the Media Research Center speaks louder than words — or, in this case, unbiased reporting.
UPDATE: Jones has stayed in propaganda mode. She complained in one article that “The Obama White House on Wednesday went so far as to suggest that Republican Donald Trump had inside information about Russian hacking before administration officials notified Americans about it in October.” She baselessly asserted that Trump “joking suggested [sic]” that Russia should go after Hillary’s emails.
Jones followed that up by uncritically quoting Republican Rep. Peter King calling the CIA charges a “disinformation campaign.”