During the first official day of the annual Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC), Media Research Center (MRC) founder and President Brent Bozell tore into the dishonest and corrupt media for the way they cover (or don’t cover) the news. Bozell declared that they are no longer liberal, they are full-blown Marxists.
Joined WMAL radio host Larry O’Connor, TownHall senior columnist Kurt Schlichter and Libs of TikTok founder Chaya Raichik, on a panel aptly titled “Don Lemon is past his primetime,” Bozell expertly tore apart the media and explained how their bias has gotten so much worse in the years since the MRC was founded in 1987.
Looking back to when the MRC was founded, O’Connor observed to Bozell that “back then it was a quaint notion of media bias. I think we’ve come a long way from just media bias haven't we?”
“When we started in 1987, we went after this thing called liberal media bias. It doesn't exist anymore,” Bozell explained. “We're not talking about a liberal media, you are talking about a media that could care less about the news. They don't report the news. They’re weaponized. They’re Marxist! Many of them are Marxist,” Bozell added.
He pointed out that if they want to do what they do as “opinion writers” then they can go ahead but from them “to say that they are CNN, that they are CBS News, NBC News, ABC News, that’s an insult to America to do this.”
“I do find them insulting. I also find them idiotic,” Bozell added.
Referencing the recent news that the Energy Department and FBI both admitted that the COVID-19 virus originated from a lab in Wuhan, China, Bozell mocked the media for their stunning hypocrisy:
There's a leak, something happens where a virus comes out and kills half of humanity or whatever and there's a lab in Wuhan and Donald Trump says well I think there was a leak in that lab, no you don't and that's racist.
“Come on, folks. It was so obvious all along where it came from,” Bozell said in amusement.
Later on in the panel discussion, Bozell explained how the media despises conservative media because they had the "audacity to challenge them."
Bozell noted that the media is "the most arrogant institution besides Hollywood, it’s the second most arrogant institution in America," and are extremely out of touch with real Americans:
These people who went from college, to J-school, and to a job at the networks, never really held a real job, have no real idea about the real world, have never visited Idaho, have never seen the world, never talk to any one of you because you guys are retreads, are intellectual retreads. But then along—You guys come and you speak up and you speak your mind. And it goes against their narrative. They despise you personally for it.
Turning to the namesake of the panel: Don Lemon, Bozell said that if any conservative uttered what Lemon did about Nikki Haley, or any other minority woman, "you wouldn’t have finished the sentence before you were fired."
Yet, Don Lemon got away with it because CNN is "scared to death of firing Don Lemon."
"If they believed in market economics, by the way they would fire everyone," Bozell added.
To read the full transcript of Brent Bozell’s appearance at CPAC, click “expand”:
CPAC’s Don Lemon Is Past His Prime Time Panel
3/2/2023
11:57:19 p.m. EasternLARRY O’CONNOR: So Brent, I mean you started Media Research Center in 1987. In a weird way, it was sort of what Chaya does now with Libs of TikTok all you did was—and you still do, brilliantly at Media Research Center is just make a record of everything that’s said in the media then repeat it so everybody can see what they’re saying so we see exactly what they’re doing. Back then it was a quaint notion of media bias. I think we’ve come a long way from just media bias haven't we?
[...]
BRENT BOZELL: Here’s the reality, when we started in 1987, we went after this thing called liberal media bias. It doesn't exist anymore. We're not talking about a liberal media, you are talking about a media that could care less about the news. They don't report the news. They’re weaponized. They’re Marxist! Many of them are Marxist.
They are projecting the far far left in America. Now, if you want to do that as an opinion writer, well, go ahead but for them then to say that they are CNN, that they are CBS News, NBC News, ABC News, that’s an insult to America to do this.
I do find them insulting. I also find them idiotic. Because look there's a leak, something happens where a virus comes out and kills half of humanity or whatever and there's a lab in Wuhan and Donald Trump says well I think there was a leak in that lab, no you don't and that's racist.
Come on, folks. It was so obvious all along where it came from. So now all of them are saying yeah I guess we should have reported on Hunter Biden. Yeah, I guess we should have covered 1,001 Biden scandals but no they don't want to do it.
O’CONNOR: Well, what you have done at Media Research Center in the last just five years is shift much of your focus on Big Tech. I mean thank God Elon Musk bought Twitter. Because he was able to expose to the world what we all saw in plain sight what was going on. The silicon valley media bias, the use of Big Tech as a weapon to silence and censor us, and yes we will get to you in a minute, it’s again 100 times worse than what it was—
BOZELL: Far more serious, far more serious because what you have, you’re going beyond the bias. What they are doing now is censoring speech not just in the United States, worldwide. Worldwide you’re being told, if you want to talk to 2 billion people on Facebook, you must talk this way. If you want to be on YouTube with a video, you must do it this way. If you can’t do it, we won’t allow you to communicate with your fellow man. In the history of man, we’ve never seen this. This is what happens to you, and to you, and to you. And the attacks that come on you and if you try to defend yourself, boom you’re taken off.
[...]
O’CONNOR: They are an adversary. They don’t have our interests certainly in mind. They want to win. They are a weapon, Mr. Bozell and they are used very effectively by the left because they know that the deck is stacked against us. How is conservative media doing right now?
BOZELL: Well I think it’s doing well. If you want to look at the power of the leftwing media, all you have to do is envision a world without them. What would be the world if the left wasn’t using the media? If the media were reporting the news objectively. Or attempting to report it objectively. Nothing that’s happening today in this country would be happening. Nothing would be happening. Do you think, do you think. In show of hands of anyone who thinks that CPAC is going to be reported fairly. We all know it’s not going to be. If it’s reported at all. This is the way of media today.
We are in the information age. What we have to be is storytellers. I tell every single one of you, don’t assume people know what you know. Look at the survey that we took after the election. We asked Democratic Biden voters in all the battleground states, did you know about the Hunter Biden laptop? Well, of course we all say. Well, of course they all knew. Did you know that 54 percent of Biden’s voters didn’t know about Hunter Biden? Then when we told them about it, when we asked would you have voted for Biden, 9.4 percent said they would not have. Put that across the board, Donald Trump would have won Nevada, Arizona, Georgia, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, Michigan, 317 electoral votes, a landslide!
Can I say the media caused it? So my answer to you is, we all have to be storytellers. We all have to tell our neighbors that which we know because our neighbor is not getting it if our neighbor is watching NBC News.
[...]
BOZELL: What they hate about you, and I know this from the experience that I’ve got from 36 years. What they hate about you, is you have the audacity to challenge them. This is the most arrogant institution besides Hollywood, it’s the second most arrogant institution in America. These people who went from college, to J-school, and to a job at the networks, never really held a real job, have no real idea about the real world, have never visited Idaho, have never seen the world, never talk to any one of you because you guys are retreads, are intellectual retreads. But then along—You guys come and you speak up and you speak your mind. And it goes against their narrative. They despise you personally for it.
[...]
BOZELL: If you were employed by CNN, God help us. But if you were, and you made that statement, you wouldn’t have finished the sentence before you were fired. Absolutely fact. It would have happened to any conservative. But Don Lemon, well I don’t know let's explain him, let's punish him a little bit. They’re scared to death of firing Don Lemon. If they believed in market economics, by the way they would fire everyone.
[...]
BOZELL: Several years ago, there was a President of CNN and I called him, and I knew him. And I said look I’m going to tell you how to become the number one network in America today. And I told him all you have to do is let Rush Limbaugh have a show. And he said, do you have any other ideas?
[...]
