LF: The Engineered Ignorance of Fox News

You probably saw this story yesterday about a failed GOP congressional candidate from Tennessee who was arrested and charged with conspiring to lead a militia attack - using the assistance of an existing 'militia' which goes by the initials OAF - on a Muslim community in Hancock, New York. "We shall be Warriors who will inflict horrible numbers of casualties upon the enemies of our Nation and World Peace,” he wrote in a Facebook post. And in a call intercepted by federal investigators, he told one woman “When we meet with this state, the people that we will seek will know who we are. We will be cruel to them. And we will burn down their buildings."

But there's one element of this story buried in the piece. The supporting role of Fox News. Not long after the terror attacks in Paris at the beginning of the year, Fox News went on a tear about no-go zones in Paris, Birmingham and other places - a run of fabrications so extreme that the station was compelled to issue one of the only retractions and apologies the network has ever issued.

One of the guests who was part of this was Ryan Mauro, head of the 'Clarion Project', an anti-Muslim group best known for producing lurid anti-jihadist movies which are distributed to voters in the run-ups to US elections. Mauro told Fox that the FBI considered the Muslims of America community in Hancock to be a threat and he had videos of them "engaging in guerrilla warfare training."

It's a reminder of the study I mentioned over the weekend on various studies about the engineered ignorance of viewers of Fox News.

The Muslims of America is lead by a Pakistani born Sufi named Sheik Mubarak Shah Jilani. But the group is predominantly African-American. Nor is it new or a stranger to controversy. This 1994 article in Newsweek said federal officials suspected the group of connections to a number of intra-Islamic bombings and stabbings. The questions surrounding the group seem largely tied to whether it is an fact a shadowy group called al Fuqra. At a minimum the group was big on the sort of 'anti-zionist' rantings one associates with the heterodox Nation of Islam. They were written up again in the Times just after 9/11 when federal prosecutors again got interested in just what the MoA was up to on their isolated rural hamlets.

However that may be, local law enforcement and the broader community - both in 1994 and today - have never viewed the community as a threat. And federal officials now do not seem to think the MoA village is much of an issue. But based on the Fox segment Doggart got the idea that the MoAs in Hancock were plotting a domestic terrorist attack and began planning his own attack on the MoA's hamlet, nicknamed 'Islamberg', with "a small group of gunmen with assault rifles, some Molotov cocktails or a demolitions expert and, just in case, a machete."

Alas, Doggart's plan was foiled and he is in house arrest, awaiting sentencing on various federal charges.

Notice that this article doesn't even fully name the suspect, calling him only "Doggart". That is so people won't realize how ridiculous this article is or be able to quickly look up the facts with a search engine. This is no accident.

U.S. Rep. Scott DesJarlais, ranked as one of the most conservative lawmakers in Congress, breezed to a third term on Tuesday, downing Democratic challenger Lenda Sherrell after months of contentious campaigning.

With 64 percent of precincts reporting, DesJarlais was leading with 59 percent of the vote to 35 percent for Sherrell. Independent candidate Robert Rankin Doggart had 6 percent.

It turns out this Doggart was a gadfly candidate that had no impact on the race at all.

And Doggart was not a GOP candidate at all. He was an independent. The writer went to some lengths to avoid mentioning the facts and tried to paint a picture that was wholly inaccurate, just so they could libel the GOP and Fox News.

Talk about yellow journalism, Willie. This article is yellow (and libelous) in spades.

I don't know if it's ignorance, it's just that the viewers have a skewed sense of reality and guzzle down the pro-war kool-aid doled out by FOX.

Add to that the rabid cheerleading for the police state - O'Reilly and Hannity are especially repulsive in that respect.

Americans who have no experience with, or knowledge of, tyranny believe that only terrorists will experience the unchecked power of the state. They will believe this until it happens to them, or their children, or their friends.

Unlike the MSM which makes up stories based on anonymous sources, Fox News interviewed terrorism analyst Steve Emerson who was the person who made these comments.

His interview left the impression with the viewers that these no-go zones were sanctioned by the countries involved. The "retraction" from Fox was:

“To be clear, there is no formal designation of these zones in either country and no credible information to support the assertion there are specific areas in these countries that exclude individuals based solely on their religion.”

Now, where are all the retractions from the MSM for the interviews they did with people who said Michal Brown had his hands up and was saying "Don't shoot"? THAT shoddy reporting led to riots in Ferguson where property was destroyed.

Is anyone surprised tha Jon Stewart is the "journalist" of choice for the gathering of news for the under 40 crowd? Undoubtedly he is the most fair, balanced and informed newscaster of all time. He has no axe to grind or political philosophy to push. He's just a plain down the middle non- political "reporter", as is his emploey...er....what's the name again........er......oh yeah, COMEDY CENTRAL.

“Truth is treason in the empire of lies.” - Ron Paul

Americans who have no experience with, or knowledge of, tyranny believe that only terrorists will experience the unchecked power of the state. They will believe this until it happens to them, or their children, or their friends.