24: A Day’s Worth of Insanity At Huffington Post
For eight years, Jack Bauer and his elite team of agents fought against terrorists, a drug cartel and would-be assassins. Bauer overcame each crisis in just a 24-hour period.
Now, he has returned to face the real-time challenges of stopping a terrorist attack in “24: Live Another Day.”
But how would Bauer handle some of the worst denizens of the Internet? Where would he start to combat the collection of lies, disinformation, hype and propaganda?
Why, The Huffington Post, of course.
HuffPost, as it calls itself, has eclipsed traditional liberal outlets like The New York Times and become the most influential left-wing website. It is the envy of other news organizations with more than 300 editors, writers and columnists just in its U.S. operation. The site is filled with bloggers and columnists that reads like a Who’s Who list. On any day readers can encounter Hollywood celebs like Jamie Lee Curtis and John Cusack to liberal figures like Education Secretary Arne Duncan and former Labor Secretary Robert Reich.
But to generate the traffic, HuffPo, as its detractors call it, uses all the tricks the Internet has from linkbait to sex to celebrity pictures.
To give a better sense of what Huffington Post is really like, the Media Research Center’s Business and Media Institute analyzed the site for 24 straight hours -- from Thursday May 1, at 8 a.m. to Friday, May 2, at 8 a.m.
Even Jack Bauer might not be that brave.
What we found ranged from liberal propaganda, sex, attacks on Christians on the National Day of Prayer, more sex, sympathy for executed murderer/rapist Clayton Lockett, attacks on Republicans, still more sex and, of course, the gay agenda. All in all, a typical day at the left’s signature site:
8:15 a.m. There’s One Thing Missing From the Plan to Prosecute Big Banks
The left has almost exclusively blamed banks, bankers and Wall Street for the financial crisis of 2008 since it happened. It shouldn’t shock anyone to see The Huffington Post’s Mark Gongloff arguing for prosecution.
However, Gongloff a chief financial writer for HuffPo is disappointed with federal prosecutors’ plans to file criminal charges against banks because “unless some actual human beings are frog-marched out of those or other banks in handcuffs, criminal charges probably won’t do much to deter more crimes or make the public feel like justice is really being served.”
8:28 a.m. ‘CRUEL AND UNUSUAL’ BACK IN THE SPOTLIGHT
HuffPo spotlighted an AP story about Clayton Lockett, a convicted killer and Oklahoman inmate, who died of a heart attack following a lethal injection on April 29. The story took up the huge top spot on the home page from 8:28 a.m. until 12:07 p.m. The article said his “botched execution” was “certain to fire up the debate over what constitutes cruel and unusual punishment.”
The article focused on a number of execution attempts, but didn’t detail the horrific crimes prisoners like Lockett were found guilty of. On HuffPo, normal citizens don’t matter.
9:00 a.m. 1.2 MILLION REASONS TO BE ANGRY AT SENATE REPUBLICANS
That headline screamed in purple all caps from the top of HuffPo’s Business section. It’s part of a constant theme on the site to attack the GOP and always with hyperbolic headlines.
Jillian Berman of The Huffington Post supplied another attack on the GOP, lashing out at Senate Republicans for blocking a proposal to raise the federal minimum wage to $10.10 an hour. Her 1.2 million reasons “to be angry” at them? “That’s the number of women in the U.S. who have children three years old or younger and are working at jobs that pay $10.10 an hour or less,” Berman wrote -- citing data from the National Women’s Law Center.
She noted that half of those women “don’t have a second income,” which also means that half of them do. Berman also complained that $10.10 an hour cannot support a single mother and child, but she didn’t say how many of the 1.2 million women are actually single mothers.
9:04 a.m. 93% Of Straight Men In This Study Admitted to Doing This In Bed Together
HuffPo doesn’t just push the gay agenda. It helps manufacture it. In the Gay Voices section, the article made it sound like nearly all straight men have been doing more in bed with other men than is actually the case. The headline, with an accompanying photo of James Franco cuddling with another man, made the British studies’ findings sound more gay than they were.
Emily Thomas began the article by saying, “Yes, straight men sleep together.” She went on to detail a British study that found 98 percent of the participants “have shared a bed with another guy.” While, 93 percent said they had “spooned or cuddled” with another man.
However, the bromance study only looked at 40 young male athletes, in contrast the headline which made it sound like the majority of all straight guys are getting their cuddle on with other dudes. Perhaps only at HuffPo.
9:25 a.m. Upgrading From Prayer to Reason
The front page did mention that the National Day of Prayer was May 1, but in a disparaging way. HuffPo likes its religion either left-wing, non-traditional or not at all.
A featured blog post from Roy Speckhardt, Executive Director of the American Humanist Association, called it a “peculiar day” “set aside for government to intrude in their private religious practices.” The story appeared on the “featured blog posts” section of the home page and was cross-posted in the politics section.
Speckhardt argued that the existence of a National Day of Prayer as well as “under God” in the Pledge of Allegiance “reduce our freedom.” He called them “egregious violations of the First Amendment principle of church-state separation” and claimed they “run afoul of the Fourteenth Amendment guarantee that all citizens deserve equal protection under the law.”
9:35 a.m. EXCEPTIONAL, The U.S. Is Even More Unequal Than You Realized
The business section loudly warned of the “exceptional” inequality of the U.S. as the liberal media frenzy over French economist Thomas Piketty continues to reign. Stoking class envy is just part of a typical day at HuffPo.
The blaring headline at the top of the section was complete with a bar graph of multiple countries, taking from the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD). It showed income gains from 1975 to 2007 that the site’s Maxwell Strachan said showed that “nowhere did the rich benefit as much as in America.” The story had been posted at 8:28 a.m., but wasn’t promoted to the top section until about an hour later.
The chart Strachan used made Denmark look good, because as he noted “the vast majority of income gains went to the bottom 90 percent” in that country. He failed to point out that the average household’s net-adjusted disposable income in Denmark was far lower than that of the United States: $25,172 Denmark, $39,531 U.S., according to the OECD. Denmark also has a top income tax bracket of 60.2 percent in 2013 that kicks in on incomes above $55,000, CNN Money reported.
10:03 a.m. The Magical World of Tarot
What’s a National Day of Prayer without tarot cards? Rather than focusing on Christians gathering to pray for the U.S., HuffPo dabbled in the occult on its religion page. The top headline in the religion section was “The Magical World of Tarot.” It remained there almost until noon when it was replaced by a story about Beltane 2014, a pagan May 1 festival. Who cares about those pesky Christians?
The article, by Antonia Blumberg, focused on seven tarot readers “shaping Brooklyn’s alternative spiritual community” including a professional drag performer, a BDSM educator (if you don’t know, don’t ask), and a tarot reader whose mission is to “bring [these] magical practices to the mainstream.”
One of the featured readers was Damon, who in spite of his Catholic upbringing, was “always fascinated by divination.” Blumberg didn’t point out that the Bible condemns divination in Deuteronomy chapter 18.
“His own spirituality encompasses and witchcraft,” according to Huffington Post. “I self identify very strongly as a witch, and I see my practice as a card reader as an extension of witchcraft,” Damon said. Another of the tarot readers, Bruno also came from a Catholic family. “To me it would be beautiful if everyone could learn tarot,” said Bruno, who identifies as “new age.”
10:26 a.m. LOOK: Early 20th Century Gay Life Reveals in These Incredible Photos
HuffPo is blatantly pro-gay. Sometimes it seems like every section is hyping homosexuality. This time, the site promoted a new book, “The Invisibles: Vintage Portraits of Love and Pride,” by Sebastien Lifshitz that “seeks to provide a different perspective about gay culture during what is historically considered a harshly closeted era: the early to mid-20th century.”
The Gay Voices section included James Nichols’ interview with Lifshitz about the photographs he’d collected from several countries. Lifshitz conceded that he doesn’t know any of the people and “can’t really even say that each person photographed in the book is gay, except when it’s obvious.” Apparently, HuffPo even has historical gaydar.
11:00 a.m. You Can Now Sext In More Ways Than Ever Thanks To New Snapchat Features
Ever wonder what HuffPo staffers do all day? Now we might have a clue. The article only hints at the naughtiness of chat, “we'll just let you use your imagination as to how these can be employed when you know your words or video are going to disappear.”
11:48 a.m. In God (and Winnie the Pooh) I Trust
In the featured blog posts of the Christianity section of Huffington Post, journalist Greg Barrett compared Christian beliefs in God to his own “devout belief in Winnie the Pooh.”
No, we aren’t kidding.
Writing of UFC heavyweight champion Jon Jones, who thanked Jesus Christ after winning a fight, Barrett said, “without his belief in a personal connection to a higher and omnipotent power, Jones, as well as other superstar athletes who say they are anointed with God’s blessing, would not perform in ways that appear otherworldly.”
But, Barrett continued, “the same might be said of my devout belief in Winnie the Pooh. I was born the same year (1961) that the rights to Winnie the Pooh were licensed to Walt Disney Productions and, in no time, Disney had worked its magic. I became a believer.”
Ultimately, he argued that “when I truly believe that the power of the universe resides within me ... I act in such a way that I am able to tap it,” regardless of deity “Jesus or the Buddha or Winnie the Pooh ...” Again, this was on the National Day of Prayer. Next up: Tigger the Apostle.
11:50 a.m. HuffPost Live: #WorldBrief Focuses on Russian Leader’s Criticism of ‘Obvious Transvestite’
HuffPost Live is one of the magically entertaining parts of HuffPo. Like the rest of the site, it’s never far from pushing a gay agenda. In this case, Russian politician Vitaly Milonov wrote a critical letter to Eurovision over a music competition saying, “Even just broadcasting the competition in Russian could insult millions of Russians ...The participation of the obvious transvestite and hermaphrodite Conchita Wurst on the same stage as Russian singers on live television is blatant propaganda of homosexuality and spiritual decay.”
HuffPo Live anchor said that Milanov was referring to Wurst, an Austrian contestant who is a drag queen who “wears makeup, tight dresses and a full beard.” They showed part of a music video from Wurst.
Following that explanation, HuffPo turned to tweets on the subject including one from Vincent who said, “I’m going to watch every last minute of Eurovision this year, just to spite Russia’s homophobic politician Vitaly Milonov.”
11:59 a.m. Beltane 2014: Facts, History and Traditions
The Beltane celebration was posted at 11:10 a.m. and updated at 11:59 a.m. which is when it became the front page story on the religion section.
Paganism got front page treatment from the Huffington Post’s religious section complete with a photograph of a woman dancing with fire.
Beltane is a Celtic and neopagan festival held on May 1. Antonia Blumberg wrote, “As spring is underway and summer approaches, many neopagans and Wiccans around the world celebrate Beltane.” It is possible some of those Brooklyn tarot card readers Blumberg already wrote about were among the celebrants? Or perhaps just HuffPo staffers?
12:39 p.m. Why It Took So Long for An Economist to Expose the Flaw In Capitalism
The far-left French economist who thinks the U.S. should adopt a top income tax of 80 percent and advocates for a global wealth tax to curb inherited wealth was promoted by HuffPo’s Business section. It interviewed economist Thomas Piketty, who argued the “cold war prevented a true debate about inequality & capitalism.”
Naturally, HuffPo failed to point out his radical tax proposals in the article.
12:51 p.m. Congratulations Graduates*
Liberals have complained for years about equal pay, claiming women are disadvantaged and there is a wage gap between genders. HuffPo paraded it again as a top story for the Business section announced, “Congratulations Graduates*” and then beneath the image of college grads the words, “*Equal Pay Is Already Out of Your Reach.” Because it’s not really graduation unless you get the gift of propaganda.
Jillian Berman’s article focused on a new study from Economic Policy Institute, a liberal think tank. Berman didn’t label EPI as liberal, instead she just called it a “think tank focused on low-wage workers.” Apparently, honesty is already out of their reach.
12:59 p.m. “100 Reasons Not to Have Kids (That I Discovered After I Had One)”
Hating on the traditional family is one of the tenets of loony liberalism. This blog was written by Anjali Joshi, who is a mother and a blogger at TheAdventuresOfaNewMom.com. Apparently she isn’t too happy about her new-found family. The 100 list includes: “You dislike children. You like to sleep. You like to have sex. You like to have money. You like your freedom.” Yes, her response is a picture of her family, complete with child, but it seems forced.
1:20 p.m. Can An Affair Help Your Marriage
Three letters keep HuffPo stocked with readers: S-E-X. Even when stories aren’t salacious, headline writers do their best to pretend. HuffPost Live’s Alyona Minkovski (who got her big start at the Russian propaganda outlet RT) talked to four guests about the subject “When Infidelity Make The Heart Grow Fonder.”
Of course, she included a couple who say their marriage became stronger as a result of infidelity. “That’s right, for some couples a moment of infidelity can actually save the relationship,” Minkovski said to begin the segment.
Guest Ron Anderson wrote an article called, “My wife’s affair shattered and saved our marriage.” He told Minkovski it was a “wake up call.”
“Conventional wisdom” is that the one who strayed is the “bad actor,” Minkovski said as she asked Ron’s wife Nancy why she had an affair. She said it was because she was “selfish” and “bored” at a time in their marriage when they were fighting and not communicating well. Yes, cheating being bad is only “conventional wisdom.” There are no moral absolutes at HuffPo.
Guest Anne Bercht made sure to caution that she would never advise people to have an affair “to improve their marriage.” But that was buried by the rationalizations.
2:00 p.m. HuffPost Live: Living Wage
People shouldn’t just earn a decent living, they should earn a decent life. HuffPo hammers that point again and again. “Minimum is such a terrible, terrible word for this.” Linda Tirado, said, “people in general don’t like to look at hard facts.” “The difference between the middle class and the working poor is that the middle class has credit cards and they’ll be OK for next week if they need to be. The working poor, we don’t have that. there’s not a cushion, not a great safety net, and there’s the problem.”
Much like “24,” only government can help at HuffPo.
2:27 p.m. Huff Post Live: Luther Campbell interviewed for comments on Donald Sterling
Luther Campbell of 2 Live Crew was the expert HuffPost called in to talk about Donald Sterling (sexism vs racism?). Because when you need an expert, you go to the man famous for the song, “Me So Horny.” Campbell rambled fairly incoherently (and even seemed to have a vaguely rational view of the topic), but he was introduced by host Marc Lamont Hill as “a man who knows the 1st Amendment very, very well.”
Hill went on to ask Campbell “Do you feel any discomfort with what you went through with the 1st Amendment 20 years ago, and people trying to ban you and silence you. Do you worry about the fact that Adam Silver didn’t base his comments on the long history of racism that Donald Sterling has … he based it on what was on that tape.” Like the rest of lefty media, the Sterling case gave it a chance to use racism as a club against opponents.
2:43 p.m. Kids of Gay Parents Teach Us That Family is Family, Love is Love
A bunch of little kids being interviewed about their gay families. Each child was asked to talk about his or her house, and what they wanted to be when they grew up. Then they were asked to talk about their “two moms.” The video is part of a campaign which argues that there is no such thing as a “normal” family.
3:44 p.m. Stephen Colbert Not Happy About Lesbian 'Throuple'
HuffPo makes regular use of liberal comedians like Colbert, Jon Stewart and others. The short article ended with “Good for you, ladies!” It was published at 3:32, but got moved underneath the main story on HuffPost Gay Voices at 3:44.
Colbert had mockingly called this lesbian “wedding” a “slippery slope,” saying that "Sodomy leads to gay marriage, which leads to throupling, which inevitably leads to threestiality and whatever word they come up with for one dude and 10 snakes in a box. I'm gonna say, hissy fit?" Liberals, who have long denied polygamy was an issue, now laugh it off.
4:01 p.m. Small Town Mistakes Unity Sculpture for Giant Blue Orgy
The second story from the top in the Gay Voices section highlighted a bizarre sculpture. According to the story, “Unfortunately, some people missed the ‘relying on each other’ forest for ‘orgy’ trees.” HuffPo said that the sculptor, Mark Chatterley, “was confused by the sexual reading of his piece; he said it hadn’t crossed his mind and the accusation showed you ‘what people are really thinking about.’” According to the sculptor, the statue, called “Blue Human Condition,” “represents the idea that ‘living today we can’t do it alone -- we rely on other people … to try to survive.’” Now click the link and look at the picture and realize “orgy” is pretty accurate.
4:14 p.m. Extreme Rainfall Events like Pensacola, Florida Storm on the Rise (posted at 12:45, but moved to main page after 4 p.m.)
This became the top story on HuffPo Green, but it was originally published by Climate Central. The story claimed storms in Florida and Mobile Alabama recently were caused by climate change. The article quoted Kenneth Kunkel, a climate scientist with the National Climatic Data Center, who told Climate Central that, “There’s no place for the U.S. where the models aren’t, on average, showing an increase in extreme precipitation.” One thing is certain, if it’s extreme, HuffPo pushes it -- whether it’s environmental or social policy.
4:18 p.m. Courtney Stodden Is Literally Busting Out Of Her Bikini
It’s not HuffPo’s classic side boob story (side boobs have their own page on HuffPo), but anything involving sex and link bait gets the site’s editors excited.
5:09 p.m. HuffPost Live: Kshama Sawant, Seattle City Councilwoman: McDonald's Doesn't Need Time To Phase In $15 Minimum Wage
Hyping wage increases, remarkably similar to Democrat positions (Hmmmm) figure prominently on HuffPo and HuffPost Live. In this case, “outspoken socialist” Kshama Sawant has backed a move to make big business pay $15-an-hour to workers in Seattle. The real goal is bigger, it’s that workers everywhere will see what’s happening in Seattle and try to do their own things in their own cities. Host Alyona Minkovski finished the segment by saying that it was “nice to see how much could be accomplished in so little time.”
“Now I think that probably, it would be easy to say that there aren’t too many people who would be very sympathetic to McDonalds or other major corporations like that. They have the profit to be able to cover the additional costs here,” Minkovski said, before acknowledging that small business owners are afraid that they will have to fire workers in order to meet the higher minimum wage requirements. This might have been a good point to mention the lawsuit that unpaid bloggers hit HuffPo with.
The article that went with this story never once mentioned any opposition to the new minimum wage laws, and neither the article nor the interview addressed Sawant’s political leanings, beyond introducing her as an “outspoken socialist.”
Hard left policy positions are popular at HuffPo. This article became the top story on the Huffington Post main page around 6:30 pm.
5:24 p.m. HuffPost Live: Don’t Mock Rob Ford: Treat him as if he has cancer
As long as you don’t have an R after your name, expect the HuffPo staff to be nice. Even Toronto Mayor Rob Ford got gentle treatment. The two guests, Jeff Kreisler and Dr. Howard Samuels, a recovering addict who works with addicts, both argued that the fascination with Rob Ford was harmful. Kreisler argued that the attention was fueling Ford’s addiction, because he craved more attention, while Samuels said that he wanted “people to treat this issue like they’d treat someone who has cancer. When someone has cancer, they’re not being made fun of.”
5:42 p.m. AP Survey on Faith and Science Reveals That Science is Often Trumped by Religious Belief
As usual, HuffPo hyped a conflict between religion and science. According to the article, an AP survey, 51 percent of U.S. adults and 77 percent of people claiming to be born-again or evangelical, “have little or no confidence that ‘the universe began 13.8 billion years ago with a big bang.’” The article went on to say that “Nobel Prize-winning scientists expressed dismay at the findings.” It then quoted Duke University Biochemist and 2012 Nobel Prize winner Robert Lefkowitz as saying that “when you are putting up facts against faith, facts can’t argue against faith.”
5:51 p.m. HuffPost Live: The Catholic Church is “hung up on sex”
It’s the National Day of Prayer, so of course it is time to bash Catholics. Guest John Hooper, the Southern Europe editor for The Guardian, suggested that the Catholic church was hung up on sex by continually discussing things such as celibacy for priests, marriage and abortion.
HuffPost Live Host Caroline Modarressy-Tehrani decided to express her own distaste for the church. Modarressy-Tehrani, who by her own admission is a “lapsed Catholic,” stopped Father Thomas Loya, a Byzantine Catholic Priest who was responding to Hooper. She then interjected, “Sorry to interrupt you, but just this idea that the church hasn’t been hung up on sex, I think that the perception particularly among the laity, particularly among people who have been following the news in the past couple of decades is the the church really is hung up on sex. But hung up on sex in not just a very unhealthy way, but in a very problematic way, particularly on the issue of the sex abuse, and sex abuse scandal. Because, you know, really, when people think of ‘sex’ and ‘the Catholic church,’ the first thing that comes to mind isn’t a healthy intimacy. it really is kind of a pretty grim picture of sex abuse, unfortunately. Don’t you think?” she asked with a disgusted look on her face.
Hooper also claimed that part of the reason that the church was holding out on allowing priests to marry was that it didn’t want to pay for their families, since “once you start to have priests wives, you have to have widow’s pensions. Once you have priest’s children, you have to provide in some cases for orphan’s pensions. And, in any case, you are going to be paying for the upkeep of two people and not one. And that is very rarely referred to in the debate over celibacy, but, when you talk to people in the Vatican, they’ll say that this is a major consideration.”
Also noteworthy was that, although the topic of discussion was Father Stefan Hartmann, who petitioned Pope Francis to wave his vow of celibacy in order to “raise” a daughter he fathered in 1987, neither of the two guests was Roman Catholic.
6:29 p.m. GET OVER IT: Pelosi Mocks GOP Benghazi Fixation (main story, Politics)
Time again to attack those folks with Rs after their names. HuffPo highlighted House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi’s comments calling the latest round of Benghazi hearings “subterfuge.”
According to the article, “‘[w]hat I will say is, again, diversion, subterfuge,’ Pelosi declared when asked at her weekly news conference about the emergence this week of emails related to the deadly attacks against a U.S. compound on Sept. 11, 2012. ‘Benghazi, Benghazi, Benghazi. Why aren't we talking about something else?’”
The article claimed that the new documents were pointless, and that all information contained in them had been released before. It added that, “Pelosi contended that there was no obstruction because House Oversight Committee Chairman Darrell Issa (R-Calif.) hadn’t asked for those communications.” With complete contempt for the GOP congressman, Pelosi added that “[t]he scope of the subpoena that whatever his name is, Issa, was putting forth did not include that email.”
Sometimes all HuffPo does is parrot Democrat talking points. This was one of those times.
7:18 p.m. HELLO, I LOVE YOU. LET ME JUMP IN YOUR GAME
Nothing says we’re all a bunch of aging hippies like a headline that references ’60s rock. HuffPo’s tech page channeled its inner flower child. The headline: HELLO, I LOVE YOU. LET ME JUMP IN YOUR GAME. Using a 1968 Doors song to draw attention to a story nearly 50 years later shows the Boomer influence of the HuffPo staff.
7:23 p.m. Kerry as Churchill
Sometimes HuffPo doesn’t realize how ridiculous it really is. This author argued that “if there is a Winston Churchill of modern times who issues warnings and offers solutions, it is Secretary of State John Kerry.” He even went so far as to argue that, not just despite, but because of Kerry’s apartheid comments from April 30, “[s]ince the founding of Israel in 1948, Israel has had no better friend than John Kerry.” This was posted at 3:59 p.m., but was then moved to the top of the climate change section later.
Churchill stood up to the Nazis, who murdered 6 million Jews. Kerry stands up to Israel, the home for the survivors.
8:00 p.m. What Drives Credit Card Debt?
HuffPo loves the theme of income inequality. Even a piece on why people fall into credit card debt quickly strays from analysis to hawk liberal policies. The author argued that credit card debt correlates strongly with lack of health insurance, touting how Obamacare will help get people out of debt. The study concluded that companies shouldn’t pay attention to credit when deciding whether or not to hire an employee or to give them insurance.
The piece ended by essentially decrying financial responsibility. “In terms of public policy, efforts to increase health care coverage, boost the creation of high-quality jobs, and shore up the public safety net so that households without assets have more of a financial cushion are likely to make a greater impact on our level of credit card debt than attempts to teach households to be fiscally responsible.” Arianna Huffington never expected people to be fiscally responsible, especially those she refused to pay.
8:51 p.m. HuffPost Live Rerun: Supreme Court Upholds EPA Rule on Air Pollution
Even on HuffPost Live, energy logic seeps through the cracks: EPA regulations do burden industry and raise power prices for consumers. Former EPA administrator, Jeffrey Holmstead claimed that the EPA is hurting places like Texas.
In terms of future regulations, Holmstead contended that, “Texas really is overburdened by these regulations” and that “a combination of EPA regulations is causing a number of plants to shut down.” Holmstead then focused on the regulation’s impact on power prices. He said “power prices have gone up and will continue to go up” and emphasized the direct “increase of the power bills.”
Maybe that’s another reason that HuffPo doesn’t expect people to be fiscally responsible. They can’t when government keeps raising prices.
9:01 p.m. Is This Warren Buffet or Thomas Piketty?
Author Guy Rolnik compared the “American capitalist,” with “French Socialists.” Rolnik compared Obama supporter and liberal donor Warren Buffett as the “American capitalist” with ultra-liberal French economist Thomas Piketty. He accepted that America is an oligarchy because of capitalism, based on Buffett’s and Piketty’s statements, and claimed that American capitalists and French socialists are basically the same.
Because actual conservative capitalists don’t exist, despite constant liberal squawking about rich conservative businessmen and billionaires.
10:10 p.m. HuffPost Live Rerun. Tennessee Chooses Jail Over Treatment for New Moms
HuffPost Live discussed “personhood” laws which attempt to recognize the individual lives of unborn babies. In this discussion of pregnancy, the value of the baby was largely ignored, with Tennessee ACLU Director even calling babies “embryos.”
This segment showed HuffPo as part of the left’s permanent pro-abortion lobby. To liberals, all lives matter, even a convicted murderer -- except the unborn. While host Alyona Minkovski and her guests discussed the law’s impact on pregnant women, their babies were left out of the discussion almost entirely.
11:26 p.m. HuffPost Live Rerun “The Laws Holding Back Our Happiness”
Even in a rather tame interview with an author, HuffPo betrayed its liberal agenda. Caroline Modarressy-Tehrani interviewed Philip K. Howard, author of “The Rule of Nobody.” His book looked at how bureaucratic decisions instead of common sense ones are preventing people from being happy.
“Instead of creating legal structures that support our values, Americans are abandoning our values in deference to the bureaucratic structures,” Howard said in his book. In the interview, he called Washington “dysfunctional,” yet claimed over-regulation isn’t the real problem. “We need most of the oversight we have,” Howard said.
But Modarressy-Tehrani pressed multiple left-wing pet issues with him including income inequality (citing Maxwell Strachan’s Huffington Post article), minimum wage increases, the happiness of people in Denmark (without noting their HIGH tax rates), and the left’s current favorite economist: Thomas Piketty.
12:21 a.m. HuffPost Live Rerun: Interview with HuffPost editor
Marc Lamont Hill and editor Paige Lavender played a clip of “fundamentalist” Sen. James Inhofe, R-Okla., and literally laughed at him and mocked him for decrying the decline of traditional values.
Inhofe called out the Obama administration’s “suppression of Judeo-Christian values” and emphasized the need to “submit to God’s authority” and foster objective morals.
Lavender responded by laughing sarcastically and saying, “God forbid we change,” while the two proceeded to mock Inhofe and other Christian conservatives.
1:24 a.m. Big Tech Fights Back
In the wee hours of the morning, Huffington Post used a Washington Post article as its front-page headline. Ironically, the headline praised big businesses for working against government surveillance.
HuffPo regularly attacks corporations, so is this sudden praise because they happen to oppose government surveillance? Or is it just that tech companies like Google are major Obama supporters? Regardless, the story was moved down the page by the morning, before anybody could see HuffPo actually praising business.
2:01 a.m. Tweet: The only time it's acceptable to sleep with someone other than your spouse
In the wee hours of the morning, HuffPo’s Twitter feed turns to sex to get late-night readers’ attention. This classic HuffPo headline mixed the prospect of sex and Rick-rolled readers into a piece that showed owners who get replaced by pets as soon as they get out of bed. Hardly salacious.
2:00 a.m. Rapist Gets Light Sentence Because Judge Says 14-Year-Old 'Wasn't The Victim She Claimed To Be'
Irony alert. HuffPo is justifiably upset that a rapist gets a light sentence. Of course, this happened in Texas, so that probably explains the anger. Yet in the next hour, their true colors show -- sympathy for the murderer/rapist. Not for the victim.
HuffPo has been a big supporter of the push to give ex-felons voting rights, too. HuffPo editors see every criminal as a victim. The actual victims rarely get this attention.
3:24 a.m. Clayton Lockett Botched Execution: Killer's Collapsed Vein Wasn't Noticed For 21 Minutes
There is nothing the left loves more, it seems, than murderers. Even though Lockett was also a rapist, his death is still bemoaned by the site. The HuffPo feeding frenzy on the Lockett execution is just a hint at the national crusade against the death penalty. So every Lockett story was injected with hyped headlines and large photos. Unsurprisingly, the site showed little concern for the victims and their families.
4:32 a.m. Tweet: Is this the sexiest workout EVER?
Never let it be said that The Huffington Post isn’t willing to exploit women for clicks. The site promoted videos for “Brukwine,” “the Dancehall-inspirired (sic) workout is a body-moving, sweat-inducing, twerk-filled class and after watching nearly every video on the company's Instagram account (@brukwineaddiction), we can't wait to try.”
The videos included dancing, jiggling, thrusting scantily clad women -- almost all in high heels. Again, HuffPo late-night has taken on a Cinemax feel.
5:01 a.m. Tweet: James Franco says Lindsay Lohan is "delusional" if she thinks they ever had sex together
It’s late at night, and though there are a few signs of life at HuffPo, the Twitter feed is still dwelling on sex. One wonders if they have some metrics for how many sex stories the site needs to have at different times of the day. Throw in a few celebs and this non-story is classic.
Actor James Franco denied having sex with Lindsay Lohan. Hopefully, for Lindsay’s sake, it’s true.
6:20 a.m. What Kind Of 'Game Of Thrones' Fan Are You?
Time for HuffPo to juggle the front page, so why not a rape quiz? The “Quick Poll” included two separate “Game of Thrones” rape questions: “Did Jaime rape Cersei in ‘Breaker of Chains’?” and “What do you think about the writers changing the rape scene from the book?” Imagine HuffPo’s reaction to conservatives debating whether a rape actually happened or not. But liberal sites don’t need to be consistent.
6:30 a.m. The Great Headline Switch
In the middle of the night, Eastern Standard Time, Ukraine launched attacks at separatists in the eastern part of its nation. Someone at HuffPo moved that story to the story just under the main article. That only lasted a short while. It was switched back to highlight a piece attacking President Bush, of course. The story, “Bush-Era Controversy Back In The Spotlight,” focused on who has responsibility “for abuses of immigration detainees in the immediate aftermath of the Sept. 11 attacks.” Hardly breaking news -- you know, like a war. Even HuffPo called the other story, “First Major Assault Against Pro-Russian Forces.” The assault returned to its spot about an hour later as the Bush story moved down the page.
6:54 a.m. Fox Hosts Freak Out After Editor Exposes Big Secret
Life is never complete at Huffington Post without an attack on Fox News. This story moved to the front page early in the morning as the site promoted a war of words between Fox hosts and a climate change alarmist who had actually been on Fox. That wasn’t enough for him apparently. After his appearance, he complained about the subjects discussed, Tweeting out several nasty comments. HuffPo’s “Freak Out” meant that Fox hosts actually responded to the attack.
7:46 a.m. Tweet: Gender-bending nudes show a different side of the human body (NSFW)
What an unsurprising way for HuffPo to start the morning, promoting gender-bending nude photos. HuffPo wrote: “Polish photographer Maciek Jasik reveals that a clear image doesn't automatically equal a true image, especially in a world where so much is never certain.” Gender bending is just one of the many lefty, um, positions promoted at the site.
And it’s an ideal one to end 24 hours with HuffPo.
Julia A. Seymour, Mike Ciandella and Sean Long contributed to this report.
