In a July 21 Fox Business appearance, Media Research Center chief Brent Bozell “trashed the liberal media’s shameless overreliance on anonymous sources, noting that they have no interest in ‘journalism 101’ and ‘have nothing to do with the news.'” But as we’ve documented, Bozell’s a shameless hypocrite on this issue; the MRC will enthusiastically embrace anonymous sources as much as the “liberal media” it despises when doing so advances its right-wing agenda.
Indeed, the MRC did so exactly one week before Bozell’s appearance. Alexander Hall breathlessly wrote in a July 14 article:
A former Wikipedia editor blasted Wikipedia for not being neutral, and slammed the platform for a multi-year scorched-earth campaign against popular conservative talk radio host Mark Levin.
A massive exposé accusing Wikipedia of having biased editors was put out by Breitbart News. “Localemediamonitor” and “Snooganssnoogans,” according to Breitbart, have been allowed to run rampant on conservative Wikipedia entries. That included their jihad against Levin.
The banned Wikipedia editor wrote at Breitbart under the alias T.D. Adler.
That’s right — the author is anonymous. The Breitbart article claims that the writer is hiding behind a fake name because of “previous witch-hunts led by mainstream Wikipedians against their critics,” but no evidence is provided of this — and, more importantly, no evidence is provided that “Adler” is who he says he/she is, or that Breitbart did any sort of fact-checking to verify his/her identity or claims.
Funny how the MRC is treating “Adler” so credulously despite lacking proof the author’s veracity. It’s especially funny coming after it ranted so hard about the media failing to fact-check Mary Trump’s claims about her uncle, Donald Trump, despite the fact that she’s not hiding behind a fake name and she clearly lived much of what is in the book she wrote about it.
And, of course, Hall failed to disclose that the MRC has had — and perhaps still has — a cross-promotion deal with Levin, and that Levin is a close personal friend of Bozell, meaning that this post falls somewhere between a personal favor to Levin and a contractual business deal. That seems relevant to disclose, no?