Selective demagoguery

The media and political left (pardon the redundancy) could never let go of the meme that the Tea Party was made up of nothing more than white, racist, violent thugs. Whether it was false accusations of Tea Partiers shouting racial slurs at the Congressional Black Caucus or implying that a single Tea Party member may have been responsible for the movie theater shooting in Aurora, CO, leftists and the media (again, PTR) have been relentless in the their slander.

With many Tea Party members now becoming actively involved in political campaigns, there aren't nearly as many rallies for the media to focus upon. With that in mind, the leftists are now targeting a new boogeyman in the form of Second Amendment advocates.

The latest entry in the slander files has to do with a Connecticut legislative hearing which took place Monday. Neil Heslin, whose son Jesse Lewis was one of 20 youngsters killed in the December 14 Newtown, CT shooting, testified before the Connecticut legislature in regards to gun control as well as more stringent testing for mental health. The meme MSNBC host Martin Bashir attempted to push was that Mr. Heslin was heckled by a bunch of heartless gun nuts.

Here is the clip which aired on Bashir's program:

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Given what is shown in the first 22 seconds of that video, one could easily ascertain that some unruly attendees were shouting down this grieving father while he was giving his testimony. Don't think for one second that Bashir's viewers getting that impression wasn't his ultimate goal.

Since MSNBC has a history of selectively editing video/audio footage to make the political right wing look bad, the folks at Twitchy did their own investigation. What do you suppose they turned up?

(Start the clip at 15:11)




As you saw/heard with the unedited video, Mr. Heslin made his full inquiry, which was assumed to be a rhetorical question. But when he followed up his inquiry with the statement "Not one person can answer that question", it was only then the crowd responded. So the notion that the crowd was interrupting the testimony of Mr. Heslin was at best overly sensationalized and at worst patently false.

Not to be outdone, CNN host Anderson Cooper piled on when previewing his Tuesday night TV show.

Why was the father of a #SandyHook victim shouted down during a public hearing? Details @AC360 8p, 10p

Cooper then deleted the tweet when he undoubtedly realized the false nature of his claim. I guess it's too much to ask of a journalist to actually verify the integrity of a story before throwing out a teaser. But think about it from Cooper's perspective. A bunch of gun nuts heckling a grieving father who lost his young son to gun violence? That's the veritable perfect storm for an elitist media member. It's too good not to just grab it and run with it.

To be fair, Cooper then clarified his previous tweet, but only after Twitchy's Michelle Malkin called him out.

.@andersoncooper So dishonest of you to delete your tweet without acknowledging the truth. But I guess that's how #realjournalists roll.
— Michelle Malkin (@michellemalkin) January 30, 2013

#SandyHook parent wasn't "shouted down" as I said in previous tweet. He asked for response and audiences members gave it and were admonished
— Anderson Cooper (@andersoncooper) January 30, 2013

Some other outlets who also ran with the false claim came out from the proverbial bunker with egg on their collective faces.

Couldn't have happened to a bunch of nicer folks.

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