When confronted with a sex scandal involving a conservative, the Media Research Center’s default mode is to go into Clinton whataboutism mode. And as the MRC continues to insist that the likes of Paula Jones and Juanita Broaddrick must be believed because they accused a Clinton, they also believe that all accusers of conservatives must be discredited.
The MRC continues its quarter-century-long quest to bash Anita Hill for committing the offense of accusing conservative darling and Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas of sexual harassment in a July 31 post by Isaac Cross complaining that HBO’s John Oliver interviewed Hill, calling her an “old liberal hero” who achieve notoriety because “Thomas is a strong conservative and one of the media’s favorite targets.” Cross sneered:
Oliver painted Hill as a victim of “character assassination.” (Clarence Thomas called himself the victim of a “high-tech lynching,” for what it’s worth). The interview quickly turned into an Anita Hill pity party as Oliver listened to her talk about her misfortunes.
[…]Other than helping Hill claim victimization, Oliver asked questions about how to address sexual harassment and even had time to talk about his previous inaction and failings regarding assault. This last part the newsite Salon gawked over as an “extraordinary … moment of self-reflection.”
Oliver’s show was a big hit across the media as Vanity Fair called the interview “a must watch”, and USA Today headlined a piece “John Oliver tackles sexual harassment, Les Moonves with help from Anita Hill.” The interview also got hits on sites like Rolling Stone, Huffington Post, and Time magazine, among others.
The media simply fell over themselves trying to give voice to their fallen hero, Anita. Who knows? Maybe with the #MeToo movement, Hill will be able to tople that terrible conservative Clarence Thomas after all.
As for Stormy Daniels, who has credibly accused Trump of paying her hush money to conceal an affair with her, the MRC is even more dismissive. It has tagged articles about her as “pornography” (because she was a porn star, you see, which should raise questions about Trump instead of her), and its “news” division CNSNews.com had trouble speaking Daniels’ name. The MRC has launched several attacks on her just the past month alone.
On Aug. 1, Gabriel Hays huffed that Daniels had been invited to take part in a satirical awards show designed to mock sexism created by comedian Lizz Winstead:
Ms. Stormy appeared grateful for the invitation. She claimed that she was “surprised and honored when I was invited to be a presenter at this year’s Golden Probe Awards and I’m very much looking forward to the exciting evening.”
And in case you were hoping a porn actress would show more class than Winstead, you were wrong. “With reproductive rights under assault in Washington, there’s never been a more important time to shine a light on the assholes trying to take our rights away.”
Hays weirdly didn’t mention Trump at all in his piece, let alone that Trump is credibly accused of paying hush money to Daniels.
In an Aug. 28 post, Tim Graham describes Daniels as a “porn star” and “liberal stripper” as well as a “#Resistance mascot and plasticized container of impeachment fantasies– again, no mention of the hush money, and again, no mention of how this reflects on Trump rather than his critics — as he whines about Vogue magazine “trying to glamorize” Daniels.
Graham was also triggered by Daniels’ lawyer, Michael Avenatti, complaining that he’s quoted in the Vogue article as saying that “Stormy is ‘really f—ing smart’ three times…like it’s a porn version of Beetlejuice.“
The same day, Curtis Houck was similarly triggered by the appearance of the “liberal journalist” who wrote the Daniels profile for Vogue appearing on TV calling Daniels the “perfect adversary” to Trump. Houck also complained that the writer “passed her off as just [a] ‘working mom’ with ‘a family to support'” even though “Daniels doesn’t have full-time custody of her child and makes money that most Americans could only dream of making.”
The MRC would never treat Broaddrick like this, even though she’s a documented liar.