Snow Job: When “Conservative Journalism” Is Just Purposeful Propaganda

http://mediamatters.org/blog/201106070017

The charge was negligent homicide.

Incensed by a New York Post "exclusive" last winter about "arrogant" union sanitation workers who purposefully failed to plow local streets in the aftermath of a crippling blizzard in order to protest department budget cuts, some members of the GOP Noise Machine, having whipped themselves into a union-hating frenzy, suggested the worker were actually guilty of criminal misconduct.

The Post's plow story, which was thoroughly debunked by a just-completed city investigation, and which the right-wing media now remain universally silent about, presents us with a depressing case study of how so-called "conservative journalism" often works today. (And especially how Rupert Murdoch-bankrolled journalism works.)

As illustrated by the Post's hollow, union bashing "exclusive," as well as by the far-right press' feral hyping of the concocted story, conservative journalism is often nothing more than sloppy propaganda designed to deceive and to inflame partisan passions. It' a nasty brand of misinformation and operates outside any discernible ethical guidelines, which accounts for its fleeting interesting in truthful reporting, as well as its dedicated lack of accountability.

More at the link --

we need to keep repeating that their so-called journalism is pure right wing propaganda.

I think we need to take this to court as a purely personal financial attack on that particular worker, ignoring any hypothetical political aspects of it. I can't see any reason to treat it any different than if I got my nose out of joint and attacked some state worker.

It's a crime. The criminals go to jail, and they DON'T get to use the court system for their own private megaphone.

I think we can do both though