Political connections—not skill—got these mainstream news icons their jobs.
By Donald Jeffries
Considering how many Americans pay high tuition costs every year for college degrees in journalism, or go to expensive broadcasting schools, it is instructive to look at the backgrounds of those at the highest levels of the media.
On CNN alone, Anderson Cooper is the son of One Percenter Gloria Vanderbilt and was a CIA college recruit for good measure.
Chris Cuomo is the son of former politician Mario Cuomo and brother of current New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo.
Among the network’s “senior advisors” are former Barack Obama aide David Axelrod and former White House Fellow under Hillary Clinton Dr. Sanjay Gupta.
Chief Washington correspondent Jake Tapper started out as press secretary for Democratic congressional candidate Marjorie Margolies-Mezvinsky, and worked for a public relations firm run by Jimmy Carter’s press secretary, Jody Powell, as well as Handgun Control Inc.
Several among CNN’s on-air “talent” sit on the boards of big corporations, an all-too-common practice this author exposed in the book Survival of the Richest. Not only do these positions provide lucrative “part-time” income, they represent a clear conflict of interest.
MSNBC’s “Morning Joe” program is hosted by former Republican Rep. Joe Scarborough, in whose office a dead young female aide was found shortly before his political career ended, an incident which has never been investigated and rarely reported on. His co-host is Mika Brzezinski, daughter of globalist extraordinaire Zbigniew Brzezinski. Former Bill Clinton advisor George Stephanopoulos is a “reporter” for ABC News. Former Bush aide Karl Rove works for Fox News. Former Clinton aide James Carville has worked for both CNN and Fox News.
The pipeline goes both ways.
Donald Trump hired Fox News’s Larry Kudlow, and according to The Hill, during Obama’s first term alone, 25 former reporters joined his administration. The staffs of politicians like Sen. John Kerry have long been littered with ex-journalists.
Chris Matthews got his start working for former Democratic Speaker of the House Tip O’Neill.
Regardless of their backgrounds, most mainstream “journalists” have proven to be not only devoid of any true investigative zeal, but utterly capable of smearing and destroying innocent lives.
Richard Jewell was lambasted in the press as the Atlanta Olympics bomber, when in fact he was a genuine hero. His early death was undoubtedly at least partially triggered by the nonstop negative press coverage.
Recently, the Des Moines Register dredged up some texts from young cancer fundraiser Carson King, when he was just 16, and demonized him for “the public good.” Predictably, these texts were deemed “racist,” and Anheuser-Busch, which had been matching contributions to his cause, immediately severed ties with King. The paper initially stood behind their reprehensible actions, but then it came out that reporter Aaron Colvin, who penned the article, had written far worse things on his own social media accounts. Colvin was eventually fired, but he blamed “right-wing ideologues,” and claimed he was being oppressed like “women and journalists of color.”
Former ESPN reporter turned Fox Nation contributor Britt McHenry, who had an embarrassing video of her own go viral a few years back, in which she shamefully bullied a low-paid woman, expressed her outrage that a white male would dare to compare himself to officially designated “oppressed” groups, tweeting eloquently, “Wait, hold the [expletive deleted] up. He dares to compare himself to receiving the vitriol women or people of color get on here?”
During the first Gulf War, CNN was caught staging fake missile attacks. Nothing happened to any of those involved.
Katie Couric was shown to have creatively edited responses during a special on gun control, and again her reputation didn’t suffer in the least. MSNBC disgracefully edited a conversation between George Zimmerman and a police dispatcher, in an effort to portray Zimmerman as a racist.
Recently, ABC News was caught airing unrelated footage in an attempt to show that any proposed withdrawal of troops from Syria, as proposed by President Donald Trump, would be devastating. Few Americans remember Pulitzer Prize-winning reporter Janet Cooke, who won the award for a Washington Post story that was subsequently discovered to have been entirely fabricated. Her academic credentials were later discovered to have been bogus. Jayson Blair made up stories for The New York Times.
Sabrina Erdely invented a nonexistent rape at the University of Virginia for Rolling Stone magazine. There are many other examples, including the case of NBC’s Brian Williams, who fabricated a bogus tale about his experiences in Iraq and got caught—after telling it to thousands of viewers.
The same “journalists,” who worked for the politicians they cover for, enjoy hefty salaries for attending a few board meetings for companies they cover, hold an antipathy for any questioning of our corrupt authorities, which they instantly brand “conspiracy theories.” But they will camp out on an average person’s doorstep and badger their families in an effort to “expose” the truth about some mundane matter. They are gutless, well-connected, and state-controlled.
Donald Jeffries is a highly respected author and researcher whose work on the JFK, RFK and MLK assassinations and other high crimes of the Deep State has been read by millions of people across the world. Jeffries is also the author of three books currently being sold by the AFP Online Store.
