Derek Hunter has a new book called Outrage Inc.: How the Liberal Mob Ruined Science, Journalism, and Hollywood. He came to our studio in Reston, Virginia for a NewsBusters interview to discuss the book and the latest media developments. His thesis is that the media are generating outrage and emotion that overwhelms facts...which are not "first."
In his book, he concludes "The American people have never been more misinformed by the media, but they've also never had more access to information. The house of cards that is the mainstream media will either fall or be forced to change completely. Until that happens, it's up to you to not only be informed, but inform others."
I mentioned to Derek that people ask us where they should go for reliable and unbiased information, and how one needs a mix of news sources, and if possible get to the original source, like raw video. I had mentioned Time’s Trump-bashing “prank cover” that improperly exploited a Getty Images photo of a child that wasn’t separated from her mother. That's where he really made a jarring prediction, or warning on the current direction:
DEREK HUNTER: You really have to go out and hunt for it. You should read conservative sites. You should read liberal sites, and find the truth in there. If something is repeated on both sides, that’s generally what happened.
In respect to Time magazine, that cover is ridiculous. Ten years ago, somebody would have been fired over it. But we’re now approaching the point that newspapers will no longer have a Corrections section. They’ll have a Justifications section. Because Time magazine didn’t say ‘Wow, we dropped the ball, we got fooled by this.’ They justified the use of a fraudulent picture, that was already Photoshopped to have the president staring at that kid. But they justified it! This is not – The Luce family would be rolling over in their grave at what has become of what they started!
The author complained about how our media conflate and confuse legal and illegal immigration, and that opposing illegal immigration is portrayed as idential to opposing all immigration.
DEREK HUNTER: It’s more degrading of what journalism is supposed to be. It's agenda-driven, they are of a hive mind. They don’t need to be told – there was the JournoList, which was exposed a few years ago by the Daily Caller, where they were talking about ‘this is how you should message and how you should report on things.’ They don’t even need that any more. They just see somebody do it, and they know immediately to jump on it.
In 2000, during the election, remember – Dick Cheney – the second he was announced as [George W. Bush's pick for] vice president, the word “gravitas” came out of everybody’s mouth. “He’s adding gravitas, much-needed gravitas,” blah blah blah. It’s that, every single day. That was an anomaly back then. Now it’s every single day, every single hour.
It’s sad because the American people need information. I love journalism. I love real journalism because I want to be informed and I want as many people to be informed as possible, but it’s getting more and more difficult to find it.
The book is available at Amazon and elsewhere. It's a fun read -- if you can handle learning about liberal outrages. If you read NewsBusters, you should really enjoy this.
Our entire interview is now posted on YouTube, and we get into fractured fact-checkers, how Bill Nye and Neil deGrasse Tyson are NOT climate scientists, and how Taylor Swift MUST be political:
