Conspiracy Theories

Thursday’s New York Times lead editorial, “A Certificate of Embarrassment,” dealt with President Obama authorizing the State of Hawaii to release his long-form birth certificate. The editorial writers commit the same error its media reporter Brian Stelter did, falsely stating the rumor “was originally promulgated by fringe figures of the radical right,” when in fact it was initially circulated…

President Obama chided the news media Wednesday for continuing to focus national attention on the non-issue of his American citizenship. "Fascinating how many of Obama's birther remarks…were aimed at the media for stoking this," tweeted Howard Kurtz shortly after the speech. The birth certificate issue was a distraction, Obama stated, and the White House decision to release his long-form…

Paul Krugman, economist turned left-wing folk hero. New York magazine’s Benjamin Wallace-Wells talked with the once respected-economist turned hack New York Times columnist about “What’s Left of the Left,” a title which at least positions Krugman accurately as a left-wing opinion leader who draws cool economics graphs that prove the perfidy of Republican policy (whether or not he once agreed…

Real estate mogul Donald Trump, acting like a presidential candidate, is garnering attention by latching on to the “birther” issue -- the discredited notion that President Obama was not born in Hawaii but in another country, thus making him ineligible for the presidency. The New York Times ran a poll April 22 that asked: “Do you think Barack Obama was born in the United States, or was he born…

In an interview with former Clinton Labor Secretary Robert Reich on Monday's CBS Early Show, co-host Erica Hill wondered if higher gas prices in the wake of Mideast unrest were the result of some sort of fraud: "We've seen prices skyrocket....Is the public right to feel taken advantage of in some ways here, or even scammed?" Even the liberal Reich didn't accept the premise: "Well look, a lot…

MSNBC anchors, such as Chris Matthews, often rail about a supposed failure by conservatives and Republicans to denounce birthers from their ranks. Yet, host Contessa Brewer interviewed 9/11 truther (and seller of birther merchandise) Alex Jones on Friday, allowing him to hype his conspiracy website three times. Jones appeared on MSNBC's News Live to recount his gossip-filled interview with…

MSNBC's Chris Jansing, referencing a report by the liberal Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) on "active U.S. hate groups," asked Wednesday if the rise of radical right-wing groups coincided with the motives behind Jared Loughner's assassination attempt on Rep. Gabrielle Giffords (D-Ariz.). When asked about the "hate groups" report, guest Mark Potok of the SPLC immediately pointed to the…

Every so often, MSNBC anchor Dylan Ratigan goes on a rhetorical bender that stupefies his guests and defies logic. On his eponymous program today, Ratigan latched onto conflicting reports concerning the treatment of Pfc. Bradley Manning, who was arrested under suspicion of illegally downloading classified military documents and funneling them to WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange, to assert…

MSNBC's Andrea Mitchell continued her crusade against Sarah Palin today, reiterating the fallacious contention that the former Alaska governor is at least partly responsible for the shooting rampage in Tucson, Arizona that left six dead and a congresswoman critically injured. On her eponymous afternoon program, Mitchell criticized Palin's "campaign tactics" in an interview with former…

With the founder of the Daily Kos deliberately trying to tie Sarah Palin's target list to yesterday's shooting in Tucson, perhaps it's time Markos Moulitsas took this opportunity to look at his own people in regards to using incendiary rhetoric.  Markos took the time to send a message to his followers yesterday tweeting, “Mission accomplished, Sarah Palin”.  But if target lists are considered…

Capitalizing on the shooting in Tucson this afternoon, CBS furthered the lunatic left rhetoric that Sarah Palin was somehow responsible for this heinous crime.  The theory being that the shooter was inspired by Palin’s midterm election map, which featured Gabrielle Giffords as a potential target.  “…critics of Sarah Palin have already drawn a link between the shooting and the fact that the…

Which is crazier: believing President Obama was not born in the United States or is actually a Muslim, or believing in total state control of the economy? If you answered the latter, you are probably not a journalist. The mainstream press went absolutely nuts over an August Pew poll showing that 18 percent of Americans believed that Obama was a Muslim. There was also considerable media…

Fox News apparently employs a pair of 9/11 "Truthers": Geraldo Rivera, host of FNC's "Geraldo at Large", and, we've recently discovered, Judge Andrew Napolitano, who hosts "Freedom Watch" on the Fox Business Network. Both Napolitano and Rivera have, er, raised questions about the "official" (read: commonsensical) explanation for the collapse of the WTC7 building on September 11, 2001. This…

Those Tea Partiers – is there anything in this nation they can’t spoil? They’ve already gummed up the president’s agenda with their rallies and signs and voting. Now, they’re trying to ruin “Dancing with the Stars!” So says the left and many in the media agree. Now that newly resurgent conservatives have handed them a crushing mid-term defeat, liberals are seeing nefarious Tea Party plots…