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The Hill
16-06-2025
- Politics
- The Hill
LA riot coverage shows the media's Biden ‘miss' wasn't a miss at all — they just lie
If you still need proof that the media never intended to tell you the truth about former President Joe Biden's physical and mental decline, look no further than their coverage of the riots in Los Angeles. These people have no problem lying right to your face — insisting that you doubt the evidence before your own eyes and instead believe their preferred version of events. There is plenty of photo and video evidence showcasing the violent unrest in Los Angeles — everything from cars set ablaze to rioters hurling chunks of concrete at law enforcement officers and their vehicles. An unlawful assembly was declared within hours of when the violence first broke out way back on June 6 — more than a week ago, when the rioters and arsonists initially clashed with federal officers. City law enforcement officials deployed tear gas and other crowd control methods that evening in an attempt to disperse the mob. Not long afterward, Los Angeles issued a citywide tactical alert, alerting the city's officers of an all-hands event. Note that all of this occurred before President Trump had called up the National Guard. In the early morning of June 8, after two days of escalation, the first National Guard troops arrived on the scene. Trump later called in the U.S. Marines to protect federal properties, which had already been attacked and vandalized. The city's comically inept mayor, Karen Bass, imposed a curfew and declared a local emergency on June 10. Despite the timeline, major media are going out of their way to downplay and dismiss the violence. They are trying to frame the narrative, maintaining simultaneously that the riots are 'largely peaceful' and that Trump somehow tricked the rioters into their violent and lawless behavior (notice the contradiction?) by sending in the troops days after they had started rioting. It hasn't even been a year since journalists tried to convince you that Biden was 'sharp and focused.' They are already back to lying — telling you to ignore the evidence before your eyes and accept some version of time-travel that allows their narrative to make sense, that Trump somehow provoked the rioters to riot days after they had started rioting. The Associated Press attempted to downplay the violence by highlighting a more violent historical example: 'LA protests far different from '92 Rodney King riots.' Well, yeah — and United Flight 93 wasn't as deadly as Flights 11 and 175. But that's not really the point, is it? 'Offline, in real-world Los Angeles, most Angelenos are having a perfectly normal day,' wrote self-appointed media ombudsman and CNN analyst Brian Stelter. 'But online, the fires and riots are still raging. Seeking clicks, clout and chaos, unvetted social media accounts are preying on fears about where last weekend's clashes will lead. … [T]he powerful algorithms that fuel social media platforms are feeding users days-old and sometimes completely fake content about the recent unrest in L.A., contributing to a sense of non-stop crisis.' Stelter complained elsewhere that people have been getting a false impression of the riots because of 'hours-old' video — one hell of a claim, considering how much mileage we got out of five-year-old footage of the January 2021 Capitol riot. On June 10, the day Bass imposed a curfew and declared a local emergency, PBS reported on the ground, '[T]he scene here has been pretty quiet, almost festival-like … Of course, we mentioned some looting, but, in general, last night was pretty nonviolent … Also keep in mind that this is happening in a very small slice of the city. It's only a few blocks of downtown L.A., and in the rest of the city, Angelenos are going about their lives as normal.' We might as well say that nearly all of Iran was not bombed the other day — it's just as true. At ABC News, there has been praise for the rioters' supposed self-control, with reporter Mary Bruce alleging, 'We've witnessed many of the protesters self-policing, keeping others in check.' On Wednesday, NBC News' Liz Kreutz attempted to extinguish the idea that L.A. was on fire. 'You could be in Santa Monica or another part of LA and not even feel the impact of these protests,' she said. 'They are very much concentrated [to] a very small pocket of downtown LA, around the federal building, around City Hall.' 'And we should say there are some agitators and people that have been really instigating things with police,' she added. 'But for the most part, especially during the day, many of the protesters gathering have been peaceful.' At the New Yorker, an editorial cartoon featured the caption, 'The protesters seem to be doing some sort of joyful synchronized dance. Is it time to call in the Marines?' The New York Times, meanwhile, took a more predictable line, publishing an article that opined the debate has been flooded with dis- and misinformation. This is true, but the Times gives the game away when it focuses exclusively on 'nutpicking' pro-Trump right-wingers while giving a pass to those who lie or misinform to downplay what has been happening. 'Fake Images and Conspiracy Theories Swirl Around L.A. Protests,' read the headline, its subhead adding, 'Disinformation spreading on social media platforms has stoked an already tense situation.' The article mentions actor James Woods. It quotes a university professor who alleges right-wingers are 'building up the riots in a performative way' to help support Trump's claims that Los Angeles had been taken over by 'violent, insurrectionist mobs.' The report mentions a viral photo of bricks, which was falsely cited as evidence that the riots are well-organized and funded. The article references Rep. Lauren Boebert (R-Colo.). It references anti-George Soros conspiracies. It quotes another university egghead who asserts that things such as the bogus bricks claim are 'catnip for right-wing agitators and grifters.' The article also suggests the Russians may be involved in spreading false narratives regarding the riots. Oddly missing from the report are mentions of Rep. Maxine Waters (D-Calif.), who risibly claimed on June 10 that there had been 'no violence' in Los Angeles before the National Guard was called up. The article fails to mention a June 7 viral video, which claims to showcase a Los Angeles school worker's 'frustration over parents having to leave their children's graduation ceremony because ICE raided an elementary school's graduation today.' That video was an outright lie, and it has garnered eight million views — far more than any falsehood cited in the Times's reporting. The Times article has not been updated to include ABC's Jimmy Kimmel telling his 1.5 million primetime viewers on June 11, during which a curfew was in place and an unlawful assembly declared, that 'There's no riot outside.' Nor does the Times article mention when the hosts of 'The View,' which is part of ABC's news division, falsely claimed, '[It has] been peaceful for days, and then suddenly these guys showed up and flipped everybody out,' and 'These protests were very, very orderly, they weren't violent, and they occurred in about a four-block radius.' The Times apparently couldn't be bothered to track these falsehoods. It is too busy publishing stories with headlines such as, 'Not Far From Tense Clashes, Life Goes on in L.A.,' and subheads such as, 'Trump officials have cast demonstrators waving the Mexican flag as insurrectionists, but for many protesters who are Mexican American, the flag represents pride in their heritage.' Amusingly, the Times has also been running overly defensive pieces, including one which falsely described the riots as 'largely peaceful' not once or twice, but three times. Perhaps most laughable of all is the Los Angeles-based ABC News reporter who said at the outset of the riots, 'It could turn very volatile if you move law enforcement in there in the wrong way, and turn what is just a bunch of people having fun watching cars burn into a massive confrontation and altercation between officers and demonstrators.' On June 9, an amateur videographer captured footage of protesters hurling cinder blocks from an overpass onto California Highway Patrol officers below. The footage shows one officer being struck directly in the skull, knocking his helmet off and splitting his head open. He is seen later surrounded by his colleagues, his face drenched in blood spurting from the fresh wound. The media have a serious problem. As far as the Biden story is concerned, and all the recent attempts to explain how they 'missed it' or were 'tricked' into believing the former president was sharp as a tack, it is all self-serving baloney. Their halfhearted defenses are pure theater. It is CYA mode of the highest order. These people have no problem lying right to your face, and they are showing it once again. They only care that they can get away with it. Becket Adams is program director of the National Journalism Center at the Young America's Foundation.
Yahoo
25-04-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
DOGE to end lease on Somerset Borough office used during Flight 93 memorial planning
SOMERSET, Pa. (WTAJ) — A small Somerset Borough office used in the early days of the Flight 93 National Memorial project will soon be vacated, as federal officials move to cut costs tied to its lease. According to our media partners at The Tribune-Democrat, the 2,300-square-foot space, leased by the National Park Service and located roughly 16 miles from the memorial site in Shanksville, is being cut by the Department of Government Efficiency. The decision is expected to save the federal government more than $86,700 in the coming years, according to DOGE. The office was originally used during the planning and development of the Flight 93 National Memorial, which opened in 2015. It has since been used occasionally for meetings and off-site educational programming by the Friends of Flight 93, a nonprofit partner of the National Park Service. Although the lease is ending, the nonprofit's efforts to educate the public about the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks and the passengers who fought back on United Flight 93 will continue. The group's programming, including its Teach to Remember initiative, will now rely more heavily on the memorial's on-site Learning Center for future meetings and events. Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
Yahoo
11-03-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
Former Yellowstone, Rushmore, Badlands superintendents say DOGE wiped out a generation of leaders
(Illustration by Joshua Haiar/South Dakota Searchlight) If Dan Wenk had been fired during his first year in a permanent job with the National Park Service, the agency would've lost his many later accomplishments. He would not have gone on to help lead a public-private partnership that raised $75 million to redevelop visitor facilities at Mount Rushmore National Memorial, or a $300 million negotiation to improve amenities at Yellowstone National Park with private funds, or the acquisition of the United Flight 93 crash site in Pennsylvania for a national memorial. Wenk worked on those and other momentous projects during a four-decade career that began with his first permanent job as a landscape architect at Yellowstone. Now he wonders how many potentially decades-long careers were extinguished on Feb. 14. That's when the Trump administration fired 1,000 park service employees — about 5% of the agency's workforce — who had yet to complete the probationary period for new hires. Another 700 employees reportedly accepted buyouts that were offered before the firings. 'The feeder groups are being devastated in terms of future leaders of an organization,' Wenk said. Wenk and fellow former park service superintendents Cheryl Schreier and Mike Pflaum recently visited South Dakota Searchlight to express their concerns about the Trump administration's mass firings and spending cuts, carried out largely by billionaire Elon Musk and his Department of Government Efficiency, known as DOGE. The actions have affected many federal agencies and programs, resulting in a reported 75,000 employee buyouts, 30,000 firings, and trillions of dollars in frozen or canceled federal grants, loans and foreign aid. Wenk, Pflaum and Schreier each retired in South Dakota's Black Hills after decades-long careers culminating in the leadership of major park service sites, including Mount Rushmore and Yellowstone for Wenk, Mount Rushmore for Schreier, and Badlands National Park for Pflaum. Wenk's other postings included a stint as acting director of the park service. Schreier is now the vice chair of The Coalition to Protect America's Parks, and Pflaum is the president-elect of the Association of National Park Rangers. All three started as seasonal park service employees, like some of the recently fired workers did. Wenk said starting as a seasonal worker is a common park service career path, and it's an important thing to know about the probationary workers who lost their jobs. 'They may have been in the park service for many, many years,' Wenk said, 'and had finally gotten a permanent position.' Schreier's first permanent job was working as a protection ranger, securing the Liberty Bell and other historical treasures at Independence National Historical Park in Philadelphia. Pflaum got his first permanent job at Yellowstone, where he worked as a telecommunications operator in the dispatch center. Recently fired employees in those types of positions might never get back on a career track that could have led to leadership. That includes Lydia Jones, who was fired from her first permanent park service job last month at Badlands National Park after working as a seasonal ranger in multiple parks for several years. 'I'm devastated,' Jones wrote on social media, adding 'my career is over.' Pflaum formerly worked with Jones at Badlands National Park. 'She was obviously a rising star,' Pflaum said. 'She was very good, very articulate, doing interpretive programs and managing the visitor center desk. And she got fired for 'poor performance,' which is absolutely untrue.' Pflaum said he's spoken with many current and retired park service employees in the past few weeks, and employees who were fired. 'There's absolutely an atmosphere of stress, anxiety and fear throughout the ranks,' he said. 'And that's not a good thing for mission accomplishment.' In the short term, mission accomplishment means hiring seasonal employees to staff many of the 433 park service sites that cover 133,000 square miles across the country. In South Dakota, park service locations include such well-known destinations as Mount Rushmore, the Badlands, Wind Cave National Park, Jewel Cave National Monument and Minuteman Missile National Historic Site. The Trump/DOGE cuts have introduced chaos into the typically predictable seasonal hiring process. Trump ordered a federal hiring freeze in January, reportedly resulting in rescinded job offers for some seasonal park service workers. After the mass firings on Feb. 14 and a public outcry, the Trump administration said it would hire back at least 50 of the park service jobs and authorize 5,000 seasonal positions, which would've been a reduction from recent years. Then the administration relented again and authorized 7,700 seasonal workers. Wenk, Pflaum and Schreier said the confusion and delays will make filling seasonal jobs difficult. They said many seasonal workers may have been scared away or taken other jobs by now. Those that are hired could end up behind schedule with background checks and training. And they might lack permanent employees to train them because of the mass firings. Wenk said visitors could suffer the consequences. Park service sites collectively receive more than 300 million visits per year. 'I think it is going to have an impact this summer,' Wenk said, 'especially as people start arriving in parks in the numbers that they traditionally do, and they expect the same kind of experience. It's not going to be there for them.' One of the experiences that could fall away is programming. At Mount Rushmore, summer programs include ranger talks, presidential reenactors and Native American dancers. The mountain carving receives more than 2 million visitors per year, and on some days, the crowds are overwhelming. Wenk said parks could be overwhelmed more often this summer due to staffing shortages. 'If it got crowded, we used to put a sign out — 'cut the programs' — because we've got to get people through here faster,' Wenk said. 'So there aren't going to be programs available for them to take advantage of.' Other problems could range from insufficiently cleaned bathrooms to inadequate emergency response times, the former superintendents said. Pflaum worries about safety. 'Lots of people, unfortunately, become ill or injured or lost or need rescue in our parks,' he said. 'I don't think those things will be non-existent, but will they be somehow delayed because of fewer rangers? Could lives hang in the balance? I don't know, but I think those are potential impacts.' Schreier said additional problems might be less visible and longer-term in nature, but ultimately devastating to the park service. They could include reductions in the scientific research that goes on behind the scenes in many parks, on topics ranging from geology and paleontology to invasive and endangered species. 'So if you don't have those individuals who are working on that, or the inventory and monitoring of those resources,' Schreier said, 'there may be years of data, and all of a sudden they're not collecting that data anymore.' The most serious danger is to the parks themselves, Wenk said, from having fewer people protecting the treasures they contain. 'A lot of the resources in the National Park Service are fragile, whether they be natural resources or cultural resources,' he said. 'And if you don't have the people to protect them, you could lose something forever.' South Dakota Searchlight is part of States Newsroom, a nonprofit news network supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. South Dakota Searchlight maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor Seth Tupper for questions: info@
Yahoo
10-03-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
Former Yellowstone, Rushmore, Badlands superintendents say DOGE wiped out a generation of leaders
(Illustration by Joshua Haiar/South Dakota Searchlight) If Dan Wenk had been fired during his first year in a permanent job with the National Park Service, the agency would've lost his many later accomplishments. He would not have gone on to help lead a public-private partnership that raised $75 million to redevelop visitor facilities at Mount Rushmore National Memorial, or a $300 million negotiation to improve amenities at Yellowstone National Park with private funds, or the acquisition of the United Flight 93 crash site in Pennsylvania for a national memorial. This is part of a series on the impact of mass federal firings, funding freezes and grant cancellations in South Dakota. For future and prior reporting, see Searchlight's DOGE in SD page. Wenk worked on those and other momentous projects during a four-decade career that began with his first permanent job as a landscape architect at Yellowstone. Now he wonders how many potentially decades-long careers were extinguished on Feb. 14. That's when the Trump administration fired 1,000 park service employees — about 5% of the agency's workforce — who had yet to complete the probationary period for new hires. Another 700 employees reportedly accepted buyouts that were offered before the firings. 'The feeder groups are being devastated in terms of future leaders of an organization,' Wenk said. Wenk and fellow former park service superintendents Cheryl Schreier and Mike Pflaum recently visited South Dakota Searchlight to express their concerns about the Trump administration's mass firings and spending cuts, carried out largely by billionaire Elon Musk and his Department of Government Efficiency, known as DOGE. The actions have affected many federal agencies and programs, resulting in a reported 75,000 employee buyouts, 30,000 firings, and trillions of dollars in frozen or canceled federal grants, loans and foreign aid. Wenk, Pflaum and Schreier each retired in South Dakota's Black Hills after decades-long careers culminating in the leadership of major park service sites, including Mount Rushmore and Yellowstone for Wenk, Mount Rushmore for Schreier, and Badlands National Park for Pflaum. Wenk's other postings included a stint as acting director of the park service. Schreier is now the vice chair of The Coalition to Protect America's Parks, and Pflaum is the president-elect of the Association of National Park Rangers. All three started as seasonal park service employees, like some of the recently fired workers did. Wenk said starting as a seasonal worker is a common park service career path, and it's an important thing to know about the probationary workers who lost their jobs. 'They may have been in the park service for many, many years,' Wenk said, 'and had finally gotten a permanent position.' Schreier's first permanent job was working as a protection ranger, securing the Liberty Bell and other historical treasures at Independence National Historical Park in Philadelphia. Pflaum got his first permanent job at Yellowstone, where he worked as a telecommunications operator in the dispatch center. Recently fired employees in those types of positions might never get back on a career track that could have led to leadership. That includes Lydia Jones, who was fired from her first permanent park service job last month at Badlands National Park after working as a seasonal ranger in multiple parks for several years. 'I'm devastated,' Jones wrote on social media, adding 'my career is over.' Pflaum formerly worked with Jones at Badlands National Park. 'She was obviously a rising star,' Pflaum said. 'She was very good, very articulate, doing interpretive programs and managing the visitor center desk. And she got fired for 'poor performance,' which is absolutely untrue.' Pflaum said he's spoken with many current and retired park service employees in the past few weeks, and employees who were fired. 'There's absolutely an atmosphere of stress, anxiety and fear throughout the ranks,' he said. 'And that's not a good thing for mission accomplishment.' In the short term, mission accomplishment means hiring seasonal employees to staff many of the 433 park service sites that cover 133,000 square miles across the country. In South Dakota, park service locations include such well-known destinations as Mount Rushmore, the Badlands, Wind Cave National Park, Jewel Cave National Monument and Minuteman Missile National Historic Site. The Trump/DOGE cuts have introduced chaos into the typically predictable seasonal hiring process. Trump ordered a federal hiring freeze in January, reportedly resulting in rescinded job offers for some seasonal park service workers. After the mass firings on Feb. 14 and a public outcry, the Trump administration said it would hire back at least 50 of the park service jobs and authorize 5,000 seasonal positions, which would've been a reduction from recent years. Then the administration relented again and authorized 7,700 seasonal workers. Wenk, Pflaum and Schreier said the confusion and delays will make filling seasonal jobs difficult. They said many seasonal workers may have been scared away or taken other jobs by now. Those that are hired could end up behind schedule with background checks and training. And they might lack permanent employees to train them because of the mass firings. Wenk said visitors could suffer the consequences. Park service sites collectively receive more than 300 million visits per year. 'I think it is going to have an impact this summer,' Wenk said, 'especially as people start arriving in parks in the numbers that they traditionally do, and they expect the same kind of experience. It's not going to be there for them.' One of the experiences that could fall away is programming. At Mount Rushmore, summer programs include ranger talks, presidential reenactors and Native American dancers. The mountain carving receives more than 2 million visitors per year, and on some days, the crowds are overwhelming. Wenk said parks could be overwhelmed more often this summer due to staffing shortages. 'If it got crowded, we used to put a sign out — 'cut the programs' — because we've got to get people through here faster,' Wenk said. 'So there aren't going to be programs available for them to take advantage of.' Other problems could range from insufficiently cleaned bathrooms to inadequate emergency response times, the former superintendents said. Pflaum worries about safety. 'Lots of people, unfortunately, become ill or injured or lost or need rescue in our parks,' he said. 'I don't think those things will be non-existent, but will they be somehow delayed because of fewer rangers? Could lives hang in the balance? I don't know, but I think those are potential impacts.' Schreier said additional problems might be less visible and longer-term in nature, but ultimately devastating to the park service. They could include reductions in the scientific research that goes on behind the scenes in many parks, on topics ranging from geology and paleontology to invasive and endangered species. 'So if you don't have those individuals who are working on that, or the inventory and monitoring of those resources,' Schreier said, 'there may be years of data, and all of a sudden they're not collecting that data anymore.' The most serious danger is to the parks themselves, Wenk said, from having fewer people protecting the treasures they contain. 'A lot of the resources in the National Park Service are fragile, whether they be natural resources or cultural resources,' he said. 'And if you don't have the people to protect them, you could lose something forever.' SUBSCRIBE: GET THE MORNING HEADLINES DELIVERED TO YOUR INBOX
