ABC Slams Breitbart?s Tantrum Over Not Being Allowed To Go On TV, Disinvites Him From Participating At All
Posted in Main Blog (All Posts) on November 3rd, 2010 4:38 am by HL
ABC Slams Breitbart?s Tantrum Over Not Being Allowed To Go On TV, Disinvites Him From Participating At All
Last week, right-wing media tycoon Andrew Breitbart announced that he would be “bringing analysis live” on air for ABC News’ “election night coverage.” Media watchdogs were rightly outraged by ABC’s decision to host the smear merchant, and the attorney for Shirley Sherrod — who was ousted from her job at the USDA by a duplicitously […]
Last week, right-wing media tycoon Andrew Breitbart announced that he would be “bringing analysis live” on air for ABC News’ “election night coverage.” Media watchdogs were rightly outraged by ABC’s decision to host the smear merchant, and the attorney for Shirley Sherrod — who was ousted from her job at the USDA by a duplicitously edited Breitbart video — slammed the network, saying hosting Breitbart was “like rewarding a Klansman.”
However, ABC quickly clarified and distanced themselves from Breitbart, saying they had never asked him to appear on air, and had only asked him to participate in “an online-only discussion and debate.” This snub was too much for Breitbart, and in recent days he has directed a considerable portion of his formidable smear machine at ABC News for supposedly lying to him about his participation in the network’s coverage.
This afternoon, ABC News released a letter it sent to Breitbart disinviting him from any participation with the network’s election coverage, saying his immature reaction to not be allowed to go on TV made them “feel it best for you not to participate“:
We have spent the past several days trying to make clear to you your limited role as a participant in our digital town hall to be streamed on ABCNews.com and Facebook. The post on your blog last Friday created a widespread impression that you would be analyzing the election on ABC News. We made it as clear as possible as quickly as possible that you had been invited along with numerous others to participate in our digital town hall. Instead of clarifying your role, you posted a blog on Sunday evening in which you continued to claim a bigger role in our coverage. As we are still unable to agree on your role, we feel it best for you not to participate.
While it seems clear now that Breitbart greatly exaggerated what ABC had asked him to do, and then threw a tantrum and used is his vast media empire to concoct outlandish conspiracy theories to defend his shameless self-promotion, ABC probably should have steered clear of Breitbart in the first place. As the American Prospect’s Adam Serwer has explained, Breitbart “has contributed in very direct ways to the racialization of the conservative argument against Obama, and has helped amplify that argument” through his dishonest faux journalism, and ABC turning to him would only help “rehabilitate” the smear merchant.
Right-Wing Agitprop Illegally Uses Photos Of Young ?Socialist? Obama
The National Republican Trust PAC’s race-baiting agitprop “Breaking Point” uses photographs, without permission, of President Barack Obama as a young man in order to portray him as a grinning, smoking “socialist” who wants to “confiscate” money from white families. The photographs, taken by college friend Lisa Jack, now a psychology professor at Augsberg College, appear […]
The National Republican Trust PAC’s race-baiting agitprop “Breaking Point” uses photographs, without permission, of President Barack Obama as a young man in order to portray him as a grinning, smoking “socialist” who wants to “confiscate” money from white families. The photographs, taken by college friend Lisa Jack, now a psychology professor at Augsberg College, appear in a montage which implies that Obama plans to “confiscate” money from working white families and give it to young black men like he once was:
| Whose wealth is to be . . . |  |
. . . spread around? And who would be the beneficiaries of the money . . . | . . . Obama planned to confiscate? | It wasn’t the only time Obama displayed tendencies that some labeled ‘socialist.’ |
| Obama images ? Lisa Jack |
ThinkProgress research has found that stations were paid to run “Breaking Point” in Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, North Carolina, Iowa, and Kentucky. According to the organization’s head, Scott Wheeler, the smear program has also run in Delaware, Alaska, and Florida — all within the last week.
With the Supreme Court’s Citizens United decision — which “Breaking Point” argues is a key victory for free speech — organizations with no disclosure or limits on funding could illegally use intellectual property such as Dr. Jack’s with impunity in October 2012.
The legal department of Getty Images, the company which handles the licensing for Dr. Jack’s photographs of President Obama, is now investigating.
