I'd be lying if I said I didn't spend last week wondering how to undo any damage to the #TwitterFiles caused by my interview with MSNBC’s Mehdi Hasan. Short of jumping in a DeLorean and time-flying back to cancel, few ideas presented themselves. I knew from the start the Twitter project would be a high-wire act, and I don’t get to blame anyone else for slipping.
Sadly, the aftermath of the segment took on a life of its own. I’ll have to weigh in at some point for obvious reasons, but in the meantime: remind me never to upset Lee Fang:
Update: I reached Anna Mulrine Grobe, co-author of the “pro-spanking” article Hasan is accused of plagiarizing. “I haven’t had any chats or contact with Mr. Hasan, including request for permission," she said. She added, “I’d forgotten all about the article (I have young children now and definitely don’t spank them).”
Also, in response to requests for clarification, here goes...
Post-segment, Hasan took the incredibly serious step of accusing me of lying to congress. Talk about “press as police”: that’s a felony charge, and Hasan has been insisting to everyone who’ll listen that I’m guilty of it. Hasan's claim is based on the idea that I was “suggesting a nonprofit was an intel agency to try & prove government collusion/censorship.”
This was a reference to my conflating the Center for Internet Security (CIS) and the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) in a #TwitterFiles tweet. One letter in an acronym may not sound like much, but it would have been a serious mistake indeed, if I’d implied an “intel agency” like CISA was partnered with Twitter and Stanford’s Election Integrity Project, if it was not.
But CISA absolutely was a partner to the EIP, as was the CIS. Hasan appeared not to have been aware of this, which may be why (apart from my bumbling demeanor) he seemed to think this was such a gotcha moment on air.
CISA, CIS, and EIP openly partnered through the 2020 election process, as TwitterFiles emailsdocuments as well as publicly available information repeatedly demonstrate. I even tweeted months ago, in TwitterFiles #6, that the two agencies were easily confused, as both were partners to Stanford’s election initiative. Neither CISA, the CIS, Twitter, nor the EIP has ever claimed CISA wasn’t a partner to the EIP project. It would be an impossible thing to assert: there are too many public announcements describing the CISA-EIP partnership. From the EIP’s own website:
Hasan said claiming CISA involvement with the EIP was “key to my thesis,” and since this “thesis” wasn’t true, House Judiciary chief and Weaponization of Government Subcommittee chair Jim Jordan needed to correct the record. (He doesn’t). Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, whose MO these days seems to involve loudly planting a flag in every online wedge controversy with any chance of trending, chimed in to claim the “entire Oversight hearing and investigation” was “based on these errors,” and therefore the GOP had wasted “tons of public time and dollars” on the Files material.
To say that all of this has been infuriating is a massive understatement. I have three little kids and these people are accusing me of a serious crime for which I could go to jail, yet they themselves are the ones making the mistake. The sheer viciousness of the ploy is mind-blowing.
Oh, and when Lee Fang responded point-by-point to Mehdi’s accusation, the matter plunged straight to the sewer, as Lee describes:
Mehdi… accused me of lying, of attempting to win access to the Twitter Files by “sucking up to Musk” — apparently unaware that I already had access to Twitter’s internal files and had published investigations using the documents — of careerism, and most viciously and absurdly, of being an Islamophobic bigot.
I’ve been angry in media spats before, but the level of withering hatred and dishonesty that’s come out over the Twitter Files is something new in my experience. I’m not surprised by it anymore, but I’ll never quite understand it. Thank God for Lee.
These days being a member of the "press" simply means telling lies that benefit the uniparty in general and the democrats in particular. The better/more you lie for the establishment, the more you are rewarded.
I couldn’t help think as I read this that Matt couldn’t have done much damage to his reputation because the interview was MSNBC. They lie constantly. The only people that actually watch MSNBC are talking heads and paid activists. Hasan is more of a member of the so-called press than the actual press. No sane person would ever assume anyone working for MSNBC cared about, much less reported, actual facts..........
Yes, and Obama got the Nobel Prize for Peace . . . right before he bombed Libya, but nobody asked for it back. Those "prizes" are as fake as the people they give them to.
"Many analysts say Mr. Obama's selection came as a complete surprise, since he has been in office less than a year. They also say it seems contradictory to give the coveted peace prize to a U.S. president who is sending an additional 30,000 troops to Afghanistan and is fighting a second war in Iraq."
The Nobel Peace Prize is a joke (and always has been). Henry Kissinger and Le Doc Thou 'won' the prize back in 1973. Le Doc Thou had the decency to turn the prize down. All that having been said, I also believe that Norman Borlaug deserved his Nobel Peace Prize.
I Googled his name. The references were entirely positive. Of course, he died a few years ago (2009) before PC took off. My guess is that in 2050 or 2075, references will be very positive. His contributions to world agriculture will remain. PC will have been long forgotten.
Obama must be the first (and only??) person to ever be awarded the Nobel Peace Prize before he had done anything at all! He should have been embarrassed about it
And starting in the 30's for covering up Russian crimes (Walter Duranty). Reporters doing the bidding of their ideological masters has a long and checkered history.
Now, now, now, NCmom . My 70 year old husband watches MSNBC all day every day. Of course, he has advanced Alzheimer's and has absolutely no idea of what he's watching.
Who knows. He's rapidly declining now. Last month, he sneaked out of the house, hitched a ride on a truck, and told the driver he was heading to California (we live in the Southeast). Fortunately, the driver drove him to a police station, and we got him back safe and sound.
I’m so sorry. It takes a lot of love, patience, and dedication to do what you’re doing. Especially when it includes listening to MSNBC for extensive periods of time!
Maybe he’s getting too much MSNBC! 😂 God be with you NC - I used to visit with dementia elders in assisted living once a week. It’s tough. Hang in there 🙏🏻
I am so torn on making the joke as it's such a horrible thing to go through, and I understand it, and sadly likely will be the same if I live out another 20 years, but his condition is likely similar to everybody else that watches Rachel Maddow so... does it matter?
Correct. At best, one million people watch MSNBC. And Medhis show? Maybe half that. So about one tenth of one percent of Americans watched that shit show.
The bubble is thick but even saying a few million us rather generous. Less than two million watch MSNBC on any given day. Granted cable news is basically ignored. Compare the numbers below to the over 10-million that listen to the average joe Rogan podcast.
Hasan is a shameless little weasel so he fits in perfectly with his coworkers.
It is disturbing that Matt would be accused of a breach that could be prosecuted as a felony. It seems to me that using the laws against “designated enemies” is becoming more aggressive and reckless.
It is a hard interview to watch, but Hasan came off like a bully, and you seemed like a soft-spoken person under attack. To see it a different way is to see it through a partisan lens.
Remember the early days of Fox News, where they'd have the macho conservative bully screaming over the soft-spoken liberal, who couldn't get a word in? It was that, but with Hasan recast as the arch-conservative bully, and honestly, that's what he is.
(But god bless Lee Fang for being the aggressor, so you don't have to be. And he seems such a mild-mannered type himself!)
Yes really. Matt seemed like he was (delusionally) hoping to have an actual discussion, and Hasan had a bunch of prepared - and crowdsourced on Twitter! - gotchas that almost all turned out not to be true, and threw them at Matt without really understanding what he was saying, and just berated, bullied and obnoxiously talked over Matt in general. It was gross and dishonest and a 100% pure suck-up-to-the-boss performance, not journalism. There was no “interview” that took place.
Matt’s seemingly not very good at the “change the subject from the substance and attack, attack, attack” game, which is fine, and I’m mostly glad he didn’t stoop to that low level, even if his loudly “owning/shutting up” Hasan would have been satisfying. (I could nitpick a million things, like “don’t allow yourself to be fact-checked in real time” or “have your own set of questionable gotchas to loudly throw out on the offensive when needed” or “be aware of all of the easily debunked false smears about your work circulating on Twitter before appearing on the worst media network in history” but then Matt wouldn’t be Matt, and I’d rather he be the thoughtful writer who likes to carefully choose his words than a televised mega-schmuck like Hasan.)
I understand why Matt felt like he needed to do the interview, but the fake lefties/pure partisans at MSNBC will only be more hostile than the evil governmental morons like Debbie Wasserman Schultz. In that congressional hearing, Matt acquitted himself nicely, because he actually mostly got to speak and respond to the idiocy as there was a second group there that made sure he could. That said group was the House Republicans is truly wild. The only lesson learned from the Hasan imbroglio was “don’t go on or watch or trust MSNBC ever,” and that’s too bad.
Matt assumed the same "deer in the headlights" posture during his testimony before Congress ... unprepared for the shit-throwing spider monkey attacks now common on the Left.
Gee. Funny how there are so many on the left who have followed Matt for years and still do. How to explain? Maybe the “shit-throwing spider monkeys” don’t speak for the left because they’re neocons.
Of course, you're right. The Uniparty embraces both. Swarming shit-throwing spider-monkey attacks are more commonly a signature of the Left, though. As Thomas Jefferson remarked, "Let the eye of vigilance never be closed."
Worst media network in history just settled a 7 hundred million libel lawsuit. Fox News lied about a stolen election and democracy has paid the price. I agree that both Fox & MSNBC both preach to the converted, but spin is different than lying.
Yes, Fox News is also really, really bad and pure partisan spin — and mostly created the evil "politics as professional wrestling" game afflicting all media now — but I'm sure that if someone had full discovery of emails and texts within the pool of subhuman MSNBC hosts and executives, you'd find that same thing that we found out about Fox News: many of the people within the organization don't buy the bullshit they're selling.
I personally think the whole lawsuit was worrisome: does every host of every media network need to fact check/intervene on every wild claim made by a guest at all times? That's a bad, unworkable precedent, because let's face it: these people aren't smart, or ethical, and they're just trying to keep the material going all the time. I also think Fox settled mostly because they didn't think they'd get a fair, non-partisan trial, which is also troublesome. None of this is meant excuse Fox News.
Why I'd argue that MSNBC is still worse is because of the Russiagate thing. They went crazy — along with others, but nobody as bad as MSNBC — and created a deep, still-thriving vortex of norm-and-peace-destroying bullshit with Russian collusion lies. A single episode of Rachel Maddow was ranking near a billion on the Pinnochio scale daily. And there has been no comeuppance, no admittance of fucking up, nothing. This was a massive lie that rewired all of western society, maybe all of the world's society. Many people still think it's all true.
The Trump voter fraud thing was indeed dumb, but there was a 0% chance that our election was going to be overturned, and nobody believed that unless they're 90% or more on the spectrum of either the QAnon or BlueAnon scale (which is honestly the same thing/same people). That said, there's a 98% chance that fear-mongering about "the enemies among us" via #resistance dipshits is maybe fucking everything for good. A day or so after the dumb Jan. 6th riots, Hillary Clinton had Nancy Pelosi on her podcast where both stated with certainty that Trump was talking to Putin during the "insurrection" and that Putin "was pulling the strings." That was way crazier and stupider than anything I heard come out of Trump's mouth that day; two of the most powerful women in our government's recent history, calmly lying.
I say all of this as someone on whatever remains of the "old left," but also treasures civil liberties and basic pragmatism and especially truth and justice: believing, or especially repeating, any of the 24-hour news network bullshit talking points on any topic is making people deluded. And dangerous.
So if “they don’t buy what they’re selling,” are they hypocrites? Or just terrible actors? Because it’s crystal clear the “news industry” in this country has ceased to exist...replaced by a de facto propaganda arm of the US government.
I always think of an old David Cross line (before he went full-on #resistance) about a disclaimer for entertainment news: "Entertainment News is neither entertainment nor news."
We can certainly say the same about whatever is left of most news and entertainment media. It's neither news nor entertaining. Maybe it's best described as "Rage-Inducing Hate Your Neighbor and Don't Pay Attention to Our Constant Crimes and Lying Propaganda"?
Yes in general but here, specifically, in this case:
1) they fired Lou Dobbs the week after the lawsuit drops, despite him having highest rated show on Fox Business, 2) during the proceedings when Dominion gave its examples the judge said "so this is actually just a Lou Dobbs probelm, then" since his were the real examples and 3) Murdoch said in his deposition Dobbs went over a line.
So watch Dobbs and see if you think that was over the line. I watched Bartiromo and didnt think she was. Carlson was never really implicated at all, he actually was saying directly on his show that Sidney Powell was full of it.
I'll pass on watching actually Dobbs! I've yet to read any real deep impartial reporting on this story — just some smaller pieces from people I find trustworthy — but this all sounds likely. I'll do some reading this weekend.
I keep hearing it presented by the least trustworthy out there as "Tucker Carlson knew the election wasn't stolen and didn't say it over and over — only sometimes! — and he had people on his show that believed it on his show and didn't scream over them so now we get to take Carlson off the air and send him to Guantanamo now, right?"
Your comment brought into mind something I have been pushing back against. Getting this out of the way, I don't have any faith in the electronic voting machines as now construed. Faith is all that gives them legitamacy. There are plenty of stories about the failures of these machines and why they fail.
My sense is, for the most part, they do work - somehow - eventually--and the results are correct (In my City of Richmond, we had a city council vote determined, in the end, by 5 votes. One of the initial vote counts was a tie and the method of selection called for by the city charter literally amounts to drawing straws. The looser of the chance drawing, petitioned to have all the votes manually recounted, again. That manual recount found the 5 vote error, which was in favor of the candidate who had one the chance drawing.
One of our county supervisors pointed out that we have had a number of very, very close elections, in our region.
I am a Leftist. Period. In the way that used to mean Leftist when I was a kid.
The real point I want to get too, was that all this 'noise' about cheating in the election, had the effect of disparaging the thousands of our neighbors who donate their time and there facilities, like their garage, for the rest of us to vote. People who take their bit part in the election process completely seriously.
I am a daily listener to The Duran, the 2 hosts are European social conservatives. As conservatives in the social sense, they are anti-war and anti-imperialist. They saw and see Trump as a relative lesser evil than any of the UniParty candidates.
I have to ruefully acknowledge they may be right. I have heard Alexander Mercouris gone on at some length that Trump is a realy despicable as a candidate. But the selections the UniParty offers up are so awful, Trump seems reasonable--somewhat.
They have also drunk the Kool-Aide to a larger extent on environmentalism. They acknowledge that there have been terrible events, such as the near apocalytic fires in Australia. They are appalled at the East Palestine chemical disaster and the will fully unaddressed Flint Michigan city water sytem lead contamination fiascoe. But they either deny that humanity has set in motion a series of inter locking processes, which if allowed to run their course without mitigation, amount to species suicide. Alternatives are that there is nothing that needs to be done or doing something about it, may be worse than whatever develops, anyway.
It seems to me, that denying what many of us see as obvious, has become a tennant of conservative faith. I am on the board of directors of a small, grass roots environmental group, founded to create a string of shoreline parks on the east side of the SF Bay. The founders, now both deceased, were life long Republicans.
One of the founders of Citizens For East Shore Parks, Sylvia McLaughlin, for whom East Shore Park is now named in the honor of, is also the iconic founder of Save The Bay.
The faux environmentalism of the 'Globalists' disgusts them as much as it disgusts people who are trully trying to mount a challenge. "We should I change anything. John Kerry rides around in 100 foot plus yarhct and flies on private jet airplanes."
And, of course, this cynicism is toxic to the human spirit and to the environment.
The Duran hosts' geo-political analysis is excellent across a wide spectrum and they will talk with, dialog with and learn from anyone who is being forthright. I hold them (The Duran theduran.com ) in high regard, as do other people, I might be a bit more in tune with. But it really grated on me that, because of the 'noise' around elections, that there was license to disparage my neighbors who took the process seriously, as I described.
We can play around at the margins of many local level entities, in small and mid-sized towns, boards of directors that are elected and change the course of policy a bit through elections. On the State and on the Federal level, big money rules.
The annoinment of a Walking Death Rattle (as Jimmy Dore derided Biden) as President of US Imperialism Inc, strikes me as the process has so devolved or so matured in an Orwellian sense, that a card board cut out that was carried from place to place, with a pre-recorded spiels to be played at each apperance of the cut-out, makes about as much sense as "electing" Biden.
That election really lived up to the old Lefty dismissal: There maybe a dimes worth of difference between the 2 candidates, but there is a never dimes worth of power at stake in these elections.
LOL. Here's what supreme boomer asshole Marc Cooper wrote about the Twitter Files:
"All you have to do is read the replies to Taibbi’s threads to see the orgasmic embrace given this crap by literal hordes of explicit alt-right, election denying, anti-vax, racist, fascist adjacent loons, kooks, and screwballs who constitute the cheering section of the Twitter Files. "
[...]
"As I slogged thru the Taibbi-written Twitter threads, I was unimpressed from the get-go. The material was incomplete and the conclusions were wildly exaggerated as he attempted to prove that a cabal of liberal Twitter employees aided by shadowy figures from three letter state agencies unfairly discriminated against conservative users and blocked or downplayed their posts and in many cases suspended their accounts. Needless to say, most of those “discriminated” against were insurrectionists, hate-mongers, racists, neo-nazis, peddlers of quack information about vaccines, and ultimately, former President Trump whose account was shut down two days after he incited the violent siege of the Capitol (and veritably all of whom have been gleefully reinstated by Musk)."
As one of the listees (I'm gonna go with 'adjacent loon'), I've been keeping up with the high school clique known on youtube as the Majority Report. I'd watched them a few times before the first TF release - never again.
Their "coverage" consists of pointing and giggling, accusations of "getting paid", cowardice and emotional issues, and repeated use of the the words Biden penis. They cheered on Hasan and the ramenghoul in congress. When Mehdi's "investigations" were corrected - crickets. All of this is of course reflected back at them in the comments threads. It's like these people have never had an original thought in their lives and only hang out in the one place.
I thank our kind host for inadvertently exposing these worthless people as the suck-ups and hacks that they are.
"...As to the once reliable Taibbi, he has shredded his credibility and is either experiencing temporary insanity or has become a cynical grifter, chalking up thousands of new pro-Trump paying subscribers to his substack (I lean toward the latter)."
Like Cooper, I lean toward the latter. How 'bout you, Steve?
It only makes coop look worse. There was so much chicken shit there i couldn't copy it all. But to answer your question, the coop was projecting because it's obvious with his pieces he was trying to ride the wave of media attention Matt was getting - so yes, the latter for Cooper seems right.
Many readers recognize the historic act of writing these pieces. It’s not a surprise that Mr. Fang has stepped in with corrective action. You are not alone in seeking the truth and many are equipped to help handle the heat. This piece is bigger than just you. So buckle up because you sure did start something. And we all know you’re feeling the heat of the spotlight. You’re not alone.
100% on this. Need a great, dedicated team working together to keep this going, and get the message out. Can’t do much better than Fang and Aaron Mate, but there are more great journos who are in your corner.
It doesn't matter. Lee Fang could get a signed videotaped confession from Mehdi Hasan that he in fact regularly molests zoo animals in violation of pretty much every law of God and man, and the MSM will ignore this to focus on how the Twitter Files are made up because Matt Taibbi once ripped the tag off his mattress. When he was eleven.
Mehdi: "Dude......some of those those baboons do things that I thought that only animals in magazines would do......and then there was, like, this bear. Dude....."
The interview was doomed from the start. The goal was to prevent you from completing a sentence even when asked to answer a question. Had you kept talking through his constant interruptions he would have only raised his voice to drown you out. He wore the smug dick persona as well as any of his cohorts at the digital manure spreading network that employs him.
I would have loved to see Matt pull out his phone and start scrolling Instagram while Hassan was popping off...and be like, “oh, Mehdi, forgot you were there...just like the rest of the world - according to your ratings...did you say something?”
"Short of jumping in a DeLorean and time-flying back to cancel, few ideas presented themselves. "
You did what you were supposed to. You corrected any actual factual errors immediately and transparently and defended things that were originally correct.
If an accidental acronym swap was the best that they could come up with, then the reporting was pretty solid.
I do think it's unfortunate that the situation with Twitter and Substack turned into a "Taibbi vs Musk" story, but your piece about it explained it pretty clearly from your side and that's just how the MSM was going to cover anything like that to help drive clicks and deflect from the content of the Twitter files.
It really is enjoyable these days to watch independent journalists easily call out the hacks at dying legacy media for being useful tools of state propaganda. Hassan is a hack that's always been clear, but now we know he's a plagiaristic hack, who grovels to be a lapdog to whoever will pay him, and cries wolf when anyone calls him out for being full of bs.
I only have about 1000 followers on Twitter but I tweeted this:
Mehdi Hasan Plagiarized Pro-Spanking Column from Lynn Rosellini and Anna Mulrine in their news article on the topic for U.S. News and World Report--April 13,1998 @usnews @mehdirhasan
The article is not online but it is in libraries and reprinted by @lhfang at his Substack newletter.
Matt knew exactly what he was facing, but Matt is a great writer and thinker....not a dueling fast spewing tv head who uses interruptions and false asides to ambush the narrative. Don’t bother with these jackasses. There’s zero to feel bad about. Class always wins. Love Lee Fangs beat down and am considering subscription.
I must admit that I haven't followed much of the news lately (outside Substack). But Lee Fangs rapid-fire unraveling of Hasans repeated plagiarism (and outright lying) over the years was a fun to read!
Frankly, I don't see how that lying hack can keep a job in journalism after reading this...
You're right Matt - Lee Fang is someone you sure don't want to piss off!
Matt, IMO you give Hasan too much credit. There are those who were never going to believe. Now you know that next time you should be on your home turf. In the meantime, please stop letting Hasan live rent free in your head. That real estate is too valuable to waste.
The people who were dunking because of Mehdi's interview were looking for any excuse to dunk, which is why they latched on to that weak sauce. If it hadn't been Mehdi, it would have been someone else or some Democrat in the congressional hearings. They don't want to admit that the emperors have no clothes.
Can't imagine the fucking frustration and flat-out rage that would be coursing thru me if I were you...
Breathe, kiss the wife, hug the kids, and know, really bone-deep know that you are on the right side of history. Many, many, many Americans are grateful for your work and your backbone.
BTW Your line the other day about "...enough rage to start a car..." is now part of regular conversations with so many of my friends and peers. We're all there.
If your agreement allows it, good next steps are to re-write and re-publish the older twitter files as written prose. The twitter stream format is hard to read and much less effective. Then continue digging and finding stories.
I ran into Mehdi Hasan for the first time on Twitter last summer, and he reminded me of the type of characters that Mr. Pickwick referred to as "pettifogging rogues and rascals" in one of his inimitable streams of invective in "The Pickwick Papers." He was referring to the morally bereft attorneys Messrs. Dodson and Fogg, but certain types endlessly recur throughout history, repackaged by The Prince of Lies himself, to fit more comfortably into the era in which they have been thrown.
Lee Fang doing journalism. Well done sir, well done. Hasan has proven again and again that he is a grifter of the elites and he will say and do anything to get in their favour
This was a joy to read. Not only for being a well organized, well researched, thoroughly lucid take down of someone totally deserving of being shamed for his phony, arrogant journalism, but because it is so VERY well written. Smooth sailing to the destination, from start to finish.
See also the reaction to you from Gladwell in the Monk debate, which again was won by the largest margin in the history of the debates. Everyone knows what's really going on with legacy media. As it gets worse, they will lash out more and more.
It does not take much emotional intelligence to recognize that Hasan is scum. But this paints a picture of Hasan being even worse.
We should not be too surprised as this is the standard for the left media. My guess is that a similar profile could be done on most of the CNN and MSNBC talking heads. Low capability and lazy charlatans that brown nose their way to the top.
Isn’t Maddow the exemplar of how to brown nose your way to the top? It remains astonishing to me that a, or so I’m told, highly intelligent woman could blatantly lie to the public for four years, get rich doing so, remain in her job, and all without ever apologising to the people she lied to. My personal favourite “gotcha” moment was the report that a server in Trump tower was talking to a server at Alfa bank headquarters in Moscow. Of course, this never happened but no consequences whatsoever for Maddow. Perhaps the tears helped.
Maddow's rise coincided with the changes in the media for pledging fealty to the ideological cult of the left overclass. To them, she is still a hero. And of course, she checks identity boxes.
The most hilarious of examples though is Don Lemon. Pledged fealty and checked the identity boxes... but uttered the wrong thoughts and had to be sent to reprogramming.
Yep, poor Don, didn’t quite work out as he must have imagined. I did have the pleasure of seeing that narcissistic aresehole Cuomo on a very minor channel a couple of weeks ago.
There is something so morally grotesque about all these upper-caste Brahmins coming to the West, scoring fantastic jobs and sinecures, living and thriving here, and then whining about the phantasm called White Supremacy and screaming Racist! every time they're cornered in an argument.
I can't speak for Britain, but here in America we have a very painful history based on the racist oppression of Black people, an entire body of Civil Rights law and other structures set up to counter this, and for shameless opportunists to cry Racist! for clicks and tenure is just pure Stolen Valor from African-Americans, a desperate sweaty attempt to play Oppressed because that's the latest fast track to exalted status.
Every time someone like Hasan belabors the bigotry accusation, takes away more of its sting and turns it into just another weapon in the culture war, he makes it less likely that someone who faces actual discrimination is heeded, and takes the serious issue of racism against American blacks and trivializes it.
I may just be getting old and cynical, but I'm starting to think that those who pose as "defenders of the oppressed" use their supposed morality and compassion as another shameless way to gain money and status.
Good thinking. Someone ought also to suggest to Mehdi Hasan to never, again, upset Lee Fang. Hasan's name meant nothing to me when I read comments about your interview with him, but having read Fang's description of what an opportunist Hasan is. and has been, I won't be foregetting it.
My teacher (a teller of truths) once joked the best approach is to tell the truth and then quickly leave town. My hope for you and the other truth tellers is you will become stronger and better from the experience because you are fortified with integrity.
Y'all been punk'd by the narrative and the evil cabal behind it that pulls all the strings. Hang tough brother! We're all with you. We see, admire, and support the courage you continue to bring to the mission that serves us all!!
You did an excellent job with the Twitter files. You should be proud of yourself. What ever anyone tries to criticize you or fines fault is to be expected. This is a world of criticism and jealousy. Just try, hard as it may be, to not become “them”. Hate and anger is not the answer. Mr Musk gave you a job and you excepted it. Good for both of you.
Hi Matt--I've noticed you suffer some from my ailment--I'm much better with the pen than I am a speaker. The words flow through my fingers, not directly out of my mouth. And these appearances are unbelievably stressful. I can see at times these people are intimidating you when you are twice as smart as they are. It's hard to remedy this other than once you really believe how smart you really are, you are quicker on your feet.
You also fight fair--you stick to debating issues--,afford everyone respect-- instead of dealing in ad hominem attacks. I think Lee Fang is justified to respond to this guy as he did because of his behavior. And because he's defending YOU.
But that has never been your way. I think people understand that.
So you need to hang in there and don't let these assholes get to you--easier said than done.
I had no idea what a Mehdi Hasan was until you posted your debate(?) so I can't say that his opinion carries much weight.
And while I understand that The Twitter Files was an important story that generated mostly smears and dismissals please don't fall into the Lenny Bruce trap where you come on stage & just read the transcripts of your trials & tribulations over & over.
What happened to you is happening to everyone who points out that, not only does the emperor have no clothes, he's also incontinent and has a dribble of liquid shit running down his leg.
Seymour Hersh's story about an embezzling Zelensk who is buying cut rate oil from the Russians also included info about how his cronies are falling all over themselves setting up shell companies so they can sell those lovely western weapons on the black market. I think Hersh's estimate was that 30% of the weapons make the battlefield while 70% are resold.
From what I can tell that story also generated complete silence from the MSM.
Maybe, from this point on, you should just admit that you're not going to guilt or debate any of these MSM journalists into admitting they're corporate hacks & shit journalists. I'm pretty sure that they know that they're shoveling manure, they just don't care. And why should they? Mainstream media manure shoveling appears to a very lucrative career move. And if their audience hasn't caught on by now that they're being lied to on a regular basis they never will.
I once claimed it as my favorite online news source, but came to realize I only liked Glen's reporting on Snowden stuff, Lee's stuff on all the digital espionage and Jeremy's podcast. It fell off my radar at some point and...well, whattayaknow...the gang's all here. #substackisthefuture
If anyone accuses someone of lying under oath, they better be able to right there prove it! Otherwise they are just rotten wantonly-lying individuals, due no respect. Who will of course, lie again.
After watching how you were treated by the Dems at the Congressional hearing it should be obvious to all that the gloves are off. There is no respect, fond recollections or camaraderie. There is only a perceived threat to the power structure goal.
Fang delivers a spanking. Hasan does not the meet minimum requirements of rational discussion and debate. In his version of 'debate' he is just a crude pettifogger whose engagement with political facts and arguments is so shallow and brittle that he is forced to disrupt his opponent's speech to avoid confrontation with fully fledged positions. There is a chapter in his book called 'Beware the Gish Galloper,' which is sad and ironic.
I am thinking that people like Hasan think pre-Internet backfiles of journals not online are to be harvested for plagiarism. I would watch him in any library...everything isn't online and maybe he thinks he's struck gold and no one else knows this..but librarians know.
In high school we had to write a short story. I and another girl had the 2 chosen to be read out loud to the class. The others girl’s was pretty good. A few years later I was digging in the back dusty old book shelves at my beloved Carnegie Library building and pulled out an old book of short stories. I read a few then came up with a start. Here was the exact story that was read to the class that day along with mine. Yes, I am also a retired librarian.
Mehdi's a hack. Of course, the Left ate it up, as if a typo and an acronym mistake invalidated months work of journalistic effort. But the seeds are planted. More and more people will red pill.
On a different note, Matt - please don't leave Twitter! I feel like my parents are fighting! Don't get a divorce...what did we do wrong? We won't do it again, we promise!
I wouldn't be too angry, besides the initial outrage. Mehdi Hasan is a mass media talking tool. I thought Bill Maher's ambush of Matt a while back was more objectionable. The underlying grievance, or point of the attack, was aimed at Independent Journalism, which people like Hasan are incapable of, thus professionally jealous. If Mehdi were remotely honest, he would have led off with the Modi stuff, which means geopolitics, a conversation that would have quickly exposed his own Right-Wing hack stripes. MSNBC, make no mistake, is a Neo-Con network..."War! War! War!"
Matt, if you haven't seen it yet you should check out this short video compilation by Turncoat Don, taken from your interview with Mehdi. By deleting all the garbage spewed by Mehdi, Don highlights your strongest, pithiest points, with each of them landing as literal punches at Mehdi:
Fang delivers a spanking. Hasan does not the meet minimum requirements of rational discussion and debate. In his version of 'debate' he is just a crude pettifogger whose engagement with political facts and arguments is so shallow and brittle that he is forced to disrupt his opponents speech to avoid confrontation with fully fledged positions. There is a chapter in his book called 'Beware the Gish Galloper,' which is sad and ironic.
New paying Sub here at the $5 a month level, in Thanks for taking on AND exposing the extents that MSNBC is a government sponsored operation, 1984 on steroids of Bigotry we could not have imagined even 3 years ago. Hasan's Epstein-cabal handlers NEED us to look away from their Constitutional violations and illegal activities in child sex-trafficking and money laundering. We the People stand WITH you Matt, they SHALL NOT get another journo like you or Assange into a cell. Go on their shows and show them the teeth and knives, we're with you 110%
These days being a member of the "press" simply means telling lies that benefit the uniparty in general and the democrats in particular. The better/more you lie for the establishment, the more you are rewarded.
Hasan is (yet another) perfect example.
I couldn’t help think as I read this that Matt couldn’t have done much damage to his reputation because the interview was MSNBC. They lie constantly. The only people that actually watch MSNBC are talking heads and paid activists. Hasan is more of a member of the so-called press than the actual press. No sane person would ever assume anyone working for MSNBC cared about, much less reported, actual facts..........
Just remember Pulitzer Prizes given out for fake Russia collusion stories…
Yes, and Obama got the Nobel Prize for Peace . . . right before he bombed Libya, but nobody asked for it back. Those "prizes" are as fake as the people they give them to.
"Many analysts say Mr. Obama's selection came as a complete surprise, since he has been in office less than a year. They also say it seems contradictory to give the coveted peace prize to a U.S. president who is sending an additional 30,000 troops to Afghanistan and is fighting a second war in Iraq."
In short, Obama got the peace prize because he wasn't Bush and he was the US's first black president. As I said, fake.
just like this doddering imbecile got elected because he wasn't Trump
The Nobel Peace Prize is a joke (and always has been). Henry Kissinger and Le Doc Thou 'won' the prize back in 1973. Le Doc Thou had the decency to turn the prize down. All that having been said, I also believe that Norman Borlaug deserved his Nobel Peace Prize.
I'd say it's been a joke since 1929 when Frank Kellogg won it for outlawing war.
The irony is that Norman Borlaug is in bad odor these days among The People Who Matter.
Exactly.
I Googled his name. The references were entirely positive. Of course, he died a few years ago (2009) before PC took off. My guess is that in 2050 or 2075, references will be very positive. His contributions to world agriculture will remain. PC will have been long forgotten.
Obama must be the first (and only??) person to ever be awarded the Nobel Peace Prize before he had done anything at all! He should have been embarrassed about it
That he wasn't should tell you everything you need to know about him.
And Congress gave Bush junior a shiny new bauble to celebrate his war crimes. I’m sure that this shiny new toy kept Bush amused for hours, every day.
We (The US, its politicians and the people) went along with the program. Now everyone acting like Capitaine Renault at Rick's Cafe.
Which only goes to show pts yet another captured institution........... there is a permanent stain on the organization
The People need their own "Pulitzer Prize" of sorts. A decentralized one instead of a corrupted one.
Barry Obama got one for being half white. a dam shame. then he went on a killing spree that is still playing out in Ethiopia Syria and Ukraine.
And starting in the 30's for covering up Russian crimes (Walter Duranty). Reporters doing the bidding of their ideological masters has a long and checkered history.
Read Levin, he nails the crimes by so-called "reporters" , they killed millions, many tens of millions.
Now, now, now, NCmom . My 70 year old husband watches MSNBC all day every day. Of course, he has advanced Alzheimer's and has absolutely no idea of what he's watching.
Prayers and Love for you and your husband.
Thank you, NC, for your kind words.
I’m sorry he is not well. I’m curious...was his condition improved or worsened by the soothing sounds of Rachel Madow?
Who knows. He's rapidly declining now. Last month, he sneaked out of the house, hitched a ride on a truck, and told the driver he was heading to California (we live in the Southeast). Fortunately, the driver drove him to a police station, and we got him back safe and sound.
I’m so sorry. It takes a lot of love, patience, and dedication to do what you’re doing. Especially when it includes listening to MSNBC for extensive periods of time!
Terrible disease. My neighbor was confined to a memory care facility; to see the decline was heartbreaking. I hope you find peace despite everything.
Thank you.
Maybe he’s getting too much MSNBC! 😂 God be with you NC - I used to visit with dementia elders in assisted living once a week. It’s tough. Hang in there 🙏🏻
I am so torn on making the joke as it's such a horrible thing to go through, and I understand it, and sadly likely will be the same if I live out another 20 years, but his condition is likely similar to everybody else that watches Rachel Maddow so... does it matter?
I hope you got him some earphones so you don't have to listen to such drivel.
I have to say you started a hell of a thread here, well done.
Correct. At best, one million people watch MSNBC. And Medhis show? Maybe half that. So about one tenth of one percent of Americans watched that shit show.
yet sadly at least a few million of our fellow citizens think this is objective reporting.
the bubble is so much thicker than we think. identity's a helluva drug.
The bubble is thick but even saying a few million us rather generous. Less than two million watch MSNBC on any given day. Granted cable news is basically ignored. Compare the numbers below to the over 10-million that listen to the average joe Rogan podcast.
https://www.adweek.com/tvnewser/here-are-fox-news-msnbc-and-cnn-ratings-for-february-2023/524861/
true, but lots of people who do not watch still think this way. they're hard to avoid sometimes.
True
that's racist lol
I love your moniker.
Mr. Bland
thx!
Hasan is a shameless little weasel so he fits in perfectly with his coworkers.
It is disturbing that Matt would be accused of a breach that could be prosecuted as a felony. It seems to me that using the laws against “designated enemies” is becoming more aggressive and reckless.
It is a hard interview to watch, but Hasan came off like a bully, and you seemed like a soft-spoken person under attack. To see it a different way is to see it through a partisan lens.
Remember the early days of Fox News, where they'd have the macho conservative bully screaming over the soft-spoken liberal, who couldn't get a word in? It was that, but with Hasan recast as the arch-conservative bully, and honestly, that's what he is.
(But god bless Lee Fang for being the aggressor, so you don't have to be. And he seems such a mild-mannered type himself!)
Wasn't Matt's mike full of static? I suspect that is a strategy of the network to muffle his responses. Conspiracy theory?
Get 'em Manhunter.
Really? I thought Hasan came off as a well prepared interviewed and Matt came off like a deer in the heasdlights/
Yes really. Matt seemed like he was (delusionally) hoping to have an actual discussion, and Hasan had a bunch of prepared - and crowdsourced on Twitter! - gotchas that almost all turned out not to be true, and threw them at Matt without really understanding what he was saying, and just berated, bullied and obnoxiously talked over Matt in general. It was gross and dishonest and a 100% pure suck-up-to-the-boss performance, not journalism. There was no “interview” that took place.
Matt’s seemingly not very good at the “change the subject from the substance and attack, attack, attack” game, which is fine, and I’m mostly glad he didn’t stoop to that low level, even if his loudly “owning/shutting up” Hasan would have been satisfying. (I could nitpick a million things, like “don’t allow yourself to be fact-checked in real time” or “have your own set of questionable gotchas to loudly throw out on the offensive when needed” or “be aware of all of the easily debunked false smears about your work circulating on Twitter before appearing on the worst media network in history” but then Matt wouldn’t be Matt, and I’d rather he be the thoughtful writer who likes to carefully choose his words than a televised mega-schmuck like Hasan.)
I understand why Matt felt like he needed to do the interview, but the fake lefties/pure partisans at MSNBC will only be more hostile than the evil governmental morons like Debbie Wasserman Schultz. In that congressional hearing, Matt acquitted himself nicely, because he actually mostly got to speak and respond to the idiocy as there was a second group there that made sure he could. That said group was the House Republicans is truly wild. The only lesson learned from the Hasan imbroglio was “don’t go on or watch or trust MSNBC ever,” and that’s too bad.
Matt assumed the same "deer in the headlights" posture during his testimony before Congress ... unprepared for the shit-throwing spider monkey attacks now common on the Left.
Gee. Funny how there are so many on the left who have followed Matt for years and still do. How to explain? Maybe the “shit-throwing spider monkeys” don’t speak for the left because they’re neocons.
Of course, you're right. The Uniparty embraces both. Swarming shit-throwing spider-monkey attacks are more commonly a signature of the Left, though. As Thomas Jefferson remarked, "Let the eye of vigilance never be closed."
Ugh! They are not the left! The left hates liberals as much as anyone. When you lump us together, you are cancelling the left.
Worst media network in history just settled a 7 hundred million libel lawsuit. Fox News lied about a stolen election and democracy has paid the price. I agree that both Fox & MSNBC both preach to the converted, but spin is different than lying.
Yes, Fox News is also really, really bad and pure partisan spin — and mostly created the evil "politics as professional wrestling" game afflicting all media now — but I'm sure that if someone had full discovery of emails and texts within the pool of subhuman MSNBC hosts and executives, you'd find that same thing that we found out about Fox News: many of the people within the organization don't buy the bullshit they're selling.
I personally think the whole lawsuit was worrisome: does every host of every media network need to fact check/intervene on every wild claim made by a guest at all times? That's a bad, unworkable precedent, because let's face it: these people aren't smart, or ethical, and they're just trying to keep the material going all the time. I also think Fox settled mostly because they didn't think they'd get a fair, non-partisan trial, which is also troublesome. None of this is meant excuse Fox News.
Why I'd argue that MSNBC is still worse is because of the Russiagate thing. They went crazy — along with others, but nobody as bad as MSNBC — and created a deep, still-thriving vortex of norm-and-peace-destroying bullshit with Russian collusion lies. A single episode of Rachel Maddow was ranking near a billion on the Pinnochio scale daily. And there has been no comeuppance, no admittance of fucking up, nothing. This was a massive lie that rewired all of western society, maybe all of the world's society. Many people still think it's all true.
The Trump voter fraud thing was indeed dumb, but there was a 0% chance that our election was going to be overturned, and nobody believed that unless they're 90% or more on the spectrum of either the QAnon or BlueAnon scale (which is honestly the same thing/same people). That said, there's a 98% chance that fear-mongering about "the enemies among us" via #resistance dipshits is maybe fucking everything for good. A day or so after the dumb Jan. 6th riots, Hillary Clinton had Nancy Pelosi on her podcast where both stated with certainty that Trump was talking to Putin during the "insurrection" and that Putin "was pulling the strings." That was way crazier and stupider than anything I heard come out of Trump's mouth that day; two of the most powerful women in our government's recent history, calmly lying.
I say all of this as someone on whatever remains of the "old left," but also treasures civil liberties and basic pragmatism and especially truth and justice: believing, or especially repeating, any of the 24-hour news network bullshit talking points on any topic is making people deluded. And dangerous.
So if “they don’t buy what they’re selling,” are they hypocrites? Or just terrible actors? Because it’s crystal clear the “news industry” in this country has ceased to exist...replaced by a de facto propaganda arm of the US government.
I always think of an old David Cross line (before he went full-on #resistance) about a disclaimer for entertainment news: "Entertainment News is neither entertainment nor news."
We can certainly say the same about whatever is left of most news and entertainment media. It's neither news nor entertaining. Maybe it's best described as "Rage-Inducing Hate Your Neighbor and Don't Pay Attention to Our Constant Crimes and Lying Propaganda"?
Yes in general but here, specifically, in this case:
1) they fired Lou Dobbs the week after the lawsuit drops, despite him having highest rated show on Fox Business, 2) during the proceedings when Dominion gave its examples the judge said "so this is actually just a Lou Dobbs probelm, then" since his were the real examples and 3) Murdoch said in his deposition Dobbs went over a line.
So watch Dobbs and see if you think that was over the line. I watched Bartiromo and didnt think she was. Carlson was never really implicated at all, he actually was saying directly on his show that Sidney Powell was full of it.
I'll pass on watching actually Dobbs! I've yet to read any real deep impartial reporting on this story — just some smaller pieces from people I find trustworthy — but this all sounds likely. I'll do some reading this weekend.
I keep hearing it presented by the least trustworthy out there as "Tucker Carlson knew the election wasn't stolen and didn't say it over and over — only sometimes! — and he had people on his show that believed it on his show and didn't scream over them so now we get to take Carlson off the air and send him to Guantanamo now, right?"
Your comment brought into mind something I have been pushing back against. Getting this out of the way, I don't have any faith in the electronic voting machines as now construed. Faith is all that gives them legitamacy. There are plenty of stories about the failures of these machines and why they fail.
My sense is, for the most part, they do work - somehow - eventually--and the results are correct (In my City of Richmond, we had a city council vote determined, in the end, by 5 votes. One of the initial vote counts was a tie and the method of selection called for by the city charter literally amounts to drawing straws. The looser of the chance drawing, petitioned to have all the votes manually recounted, again. That manual recount found the 5 vote error, which was in favor of the candidate who had one the chance drawing.
One of our county supervisors pointed out that we have had a number of very, very close elections, in our region.
I am a Leftist. Period. In the way that used to mean Leftist when I was a kid.
The real point I want to get too, was that all this 'noise' about cheating in the election, had the effect of disparaging the thousands of our neighbors who donate their time and there facilities, like their garage, for the rest of us to vote. People who take their bit part in the election process completely seriously.
I am a daily listener to The Duran, the 2 hosts are European social conservatives. As conservatives in the social sense, they are anti-war and anti-imperialist. They saw and see Trump as a relative lesser evil than any of the UniParty candidates.
I have to ruefully acknowledge they may be right. I have heard Alexander Mercouris gone on at some length that Trump is a realy despicable as a candidate. But the selections the UniParty offers up are so awful, Trump seems reasonable--somewhat.
They have also drunk the Kool-Aide to a larger extent on environmentalism. They acknowledge that there have been terrible events, such as the near apocalytic fires in Australia. They are appalled at the East Palestine chemical disaster and the will fully unaddressed Flint Michigan city water sytem lead contamination fiascoe. But they either deny that humanity has set in motion a series of inter locking processes, which if allowed to run their course without mitigation, amount to species suicide. Alternatives are that there is nothing that needs to be done or doing something about it, may be worse than whatever develops, anyway.
It seems to me, that denying what many of us see as obvious, has become a tennant of conservative faith. I am on the board of directors of a small, grass roots environmental group, founded to create a string of shoreline parks on the east side of the SF Bay. The founders, now both deceased, were life long Republicans.
One of the founders of Citizens For East Shore Parks, Sylvia McLaughlin, for whom East Shore Park is now named in the honor of, is also the iconic founder of Save The Bay.
The faux environmentalism of the 'Globalists' disgusts them as much as it disgusts people who are trully trying to mount a challenge. "We should I change anything. John Kerry rides around in 100 foot plus yarhct and flies on private jet airplanes."
And, of course, this cynicism is toxic to the human spirit and to the environment.
The Duran hosts' geo-political analysis is excellent across a wide spectrum and they will talk with, dialog with and learn from anyone who is being forthright. I hold them (The Duran theduran.com ) in high regard, as do other people, I might be a bit more in tune with. But it really grated on me that, because of the 'noise' around elections, that there was license to disparage my neighbors who took the process seriously, as I described.
We can play around at the margins of many local level entities, in small and mid-sized towns, boards of directors that are elected and change the course of policy a bit through elections. On the State and on the Federal level, big money rules.
The annoinment of a Walking Death Rattle (as Jimmy Dore derided Biden) as President of US Imperialism Inc, strikes me as the process has so devolved or so matured in an Orwellian sense, that a card board cut out that was carried from place to place, with a pre-recorded spiels to be played at each apperance of the cut-out, makes about as much sense as "electing" Biden.
That election really lived up to the old Lefty dismissal: There maybe a dimes worth of difference between the 2 candidates, but there is a never dimes worth of power at stake in these elections.
Gee, imagine that from someone who wrote a ridiculous piece entitled:
"How Elon Musk and Matt Taibbi Are Inventing a New Conspiracy Theory"
The jealousy among your peers, Matt, is breathtaking. And so petty.
Depends on whether you would like interviews to be informative or bloody minded point scoring. Hasan does. the latter.
Partisanship is the mind killer.
Partisans see what they NEED to see, not what is.
Hope this helps.
LOL. Here's what supreme boomer asshole Marc Cooper wrote about the Twitter Files:
"All you have to do is read the replies to Taibbi’s threads to see the orgasmic embrace given this crap by literal hordes of explicit alt-right, election denying, anti-vax, racist, fascist adjacent loons, kooks, and screwballs who constitute the cheering section of the Twitter Files. "
[...]
"As I slogged thru the Taibbi-written Twitter threads, I was unimpressed from the get-go. The material was incomplete and the conclusions were wildly exaggerated as he attempted to prove that a cabal of liberal Twitter employees aided by shadowy figures from three letter state agencies unfairly discriminated against conservative users and blocked or downplayed their posts and in many cases suspended their accounts. Needless to say, most of those “discriminated” against were insurrectionists, hate-mongers, racists, neo-nazis, peddlers of quack information about vaccines, and ultimately, former President Trump whose account was shut down two days after he incited the violent siege of the Capitol (and veritably all of whom have been gleefully reinstated by Musk)."
As one of the listees (I'm gonna go with 'adjacent loon'), I've been keeping up with the high school clique known on youtube as the Majority Report. I'd watched them a few times before the first TF release - never again.
Their "coverage" consists of pointing and giggling, accusations of "getting paid", cowardice and emotional issues, and repeated use of the the words Biden penis. They cheered on Hasan and the ramenghoul in congress. When Mehdi's "investigations" were corrected - crickets. All of this is of course reflected back at them in the comments threads. It's like these people have never had an original thought in their lives and only hang out in the one place.
I thank our kind host for inadvertently exposing these worthless people as the suck-ups and hacks that they are.
You forgot this:
"...As to the once reliable Taibbi, he has shredded his credibility and is either experiencing temporary insanity or has become a cynical grifter, chalking up thousands of new pro-Trump paying subscribers to his substack (I lean toward the latter)."
Like Cooper, I lean toward the latter. How 'bout you, Steve?
It only makes coop look worse. There was so much chicken shit there i couldn't copy it all. But to answer your question, the coop was projecting because it's obvious with his pieces he was trying to ride the wave of media attention Matt was getting - so yes, the latter for Cooper seems right.
Partisan, journalist AND a professor?
No wonder your thinking is so disordered.
I understand now.
Many readers recognize the historic act of writing these pieces. It’s not a surprise that Mr. Fang has stepped in with corrective action. You are not alone in seeking the truth and many are equipped to help handle the heat. This piece is bigger than just you. So buckle up because you sure did start something. And we all know you’re feeling the heat of the spotlight. You’re not alone.
100% on this. Need a great, dedicated team working together to keep this going, and get the message out. Can’t do much better than Fang and Aaron Mate, but there are more great journos who are in your corner.
Glenn Greenwald, for sure.
"I knew from the start the Twitter project would be a high-wire act, and I don’t get to blame anyone else for slipping."
This is the kind of attitude that sets you apart from the MSM grifters like Mehdi Hasan and will keep me subscribed to you for a long time to come.
Right between the eyes. Well done, Lee Fang.
It doesn't matter. Lee Fang could get a signed videotaped confession from Mehdi Hasan that he in fact regularly molests zoo animals in violation of pretty much every law of God and man, and the MSM will ignore this to focus on how the Twitter Files are made up because Matt Taibbi once ripped the tag off his mattress. When he was eleven.
>ripped the tag off his mattress
Which is legal to do after you buy the mattress!!! Accused, injustly of yet another crime!!!!! For shame! Shaaaaaame!
https://money.howstuffworks.com/removed-mattress-tag.htm
If that is all they have, then the heinous criminal Matt Taibbi will be accused of a non-crime.
I think they will and are accusing him of future crime.
Going against narrative is what, democracide?
That image is gonna be in my head all night. Thanks a lot!!
Mehdi: "Dude......some of those those baboons do things that I thought that only animals in magazines would do......and then there was, like, this bear. Dude....."
thanks - I will need several drinks to sleep tonight.
Best response ever. Epic.
Matt, you are a fantastic journalist. Hassan is a plagiaristic hack. I went out to Twitter to pop off at Hassan and found Lee Fang already there.
Racket 1, MSNBC 0. And it wasn’t even close.
Also, I may subscribe to Fang’s Substack just to stay on his good side...LOL. Seriously, I am a paying subscriber to support his reporting.
Spanked that Hassan butt really good!
Ha! As soon as I read Lee Fang's take-down of Hassan, I subscribed.
Ugh. Racket news is doing a great job, which just means more of Hack News networks like MSNBC will be trying to cancel you.
The interview was doomed from the start. The goal was to prevent you from completing a sentence even when asked to answer a question. Had you kept talking through his constant interruptions he would have only raised his voice to drown you out. He wore the smug dick persona as well as any of his cohorts at the digital manure spreading network that employs him.
I would have loved to see Matt pull out his phone and start scrolling Instagram while Hassan was popping off...and be like, “oh, Mehdi, forgot you were there...just like the rest of the world - according to your ratings...did you say something?”
"Short of jumping in a DeLorean and time-flying back to cancel, few ideas presented themselves. "
You did what you were supposed to. You corrected any actual factual errors immediately and transparently and defended things that were originally correct.
If an accidental acronym swap was the best that they could come up with, then the reporting was pretty solid.
I do think it's unfortunate that the situation with Twitter and Substack turned into a "Taibbi vs Musk" story, but your piece about it explained it pretty clearly from your side and that's just how the MSM was going to cover anything like that to help drive clicks and deflect from the content of the Twitter files.
Hate, Inc. indeed.
It really is enjoyable these days to watch independent journalists easily call out the hacks at dying legacy media for being useful tools of state propaganda. Hassan is a hack that's always been clear, but now we know he's a plagiaristic hack, who grovels to be a lapdog to whoever will pay him, and cries wolf when anyone calls him out for being full of bs.
I only have about 1000 followers on Twitter but I tweeted this:
Mehdi Hasan Plagiarized Pro-Spanking Column from Lynn Rosellini and Anna Mulrine in their news article on the topic for U.S. News and World Report--April 13,1998 @usnews @mehdirhasan
The article is not online but it is in libraries and reprinted by @lhfang at his Substack newletter.
Lee took down Hasan like someone scraping shit off his boot. Exquisite.
Pure poetry
Matt knew exactly what he was facing, but Matt is a great writer and thinker....not a dueling fast spewing tv head who uses interruptions and false asides to ambush the narrative. Don’t bother with these jackasses. There’s zero to feel bad about. Class always wins. Love Lee Fangs beat down and am considering subscription.
Oh, he’s worth it!
Big amplification----Megyn Kelly has 2.7 followers on Twitter and just tweeted Lee Fang's Tweet about Hasan. https://twitter.com/megynkelly
I like imagining what the 0.7 follower looks like.
The .5 kid in the 2.5 family average? I immediately get a Far Side image.
#hasanspank #stopthesteal #noharminplagiarising
#stopthespank and subscribe to Lee Fang!
freakin Lee rocked hard! Thanks Lee!
Matt - the central question to Mehdi Hasan (which wasn’t asked) is:
Do you have any concerns about our “government” exercising total control over what people know?
HO-LEE SHIT!
I must admit that I haven't followed much of the news lately (outside Substack). But Lee Fangs rapid-fire unraveling of Hasans repeated plagiarism (and outright lying) over the years was a fun to read!
Frankly, I don't see how that lying hack can keep a job in journalism after reading this...
You're right Matt - Lee Fang is someone you sure don't want to piss off!
Matt, IMO you give Hasan too much credit. There are those who were never going to believe. Now you know that next time you should be on your home turf. In the meantime, please stop letting Hasan live rent free in your head. That real estate is too valuable to waste.
The people who were dunking because of Mehdi's interview were looking for any excuse to dunk, which is why they latched on to that weak sauce. If it hadn't been Mehdi, it would have been someone else or some Democrat in the congressional hearings. They don't want to admit that the emperors have no clothes.
Can't imagine the fucking frustration and flat-out rage that would be coursing thru me if I were you...
Breathe, kiss the wife, hug the kids, and know, really bone-deep know that you are on the right side of history. Many, many, many Americans are grateful for your work and your backbone.
BTW Your line the other day about "...enough rage to start a car..." is now part of regular conversations with so many of my friends and peers. We're all there.
Keep giving 'em Hell.
They deserve it.
Never upset Lee Fang but definitely subscribe to his Substack.
If your agreement allows it, good next steps are to re-write and re-publish the older twitter files as written prose. The twitter stream format is hard to read and much less effective. Then continue digging and finding stories.
Yes. Please.
I ran into Mehdi Hasan for the first time on Twitter last summer, and he reminded me of the type of characters that Mr. Pickwick referred to as "pettifogging rogues and rascals" in one of his inimitable streams of invective in "The Pickwick Papers." He was referring to the morally bereft attorneys Messrs. Dodson and Fogg, but certain types endlessly recur throughout history, repackaged by The Prince of Lies himself, to fit more comfortably into the era in which they have been thrown.
George Orwell LOVED the Pickwick Papers.
Love the comparison to Pickwick Papers and the wonderfully named Dodson and Fogg.
Lee Fang doing journalism. Well done sir, well done. Hasan has proven again and again that he is a grifter of the elites and he will say and do anything to get in their favour
This was a joy to read. Not only for being a well organized, well researched, thoroughly lucid take down of someone totally deserving of being shamed for his phony, arrogant journalism, but because it is so VERY well written. Smooth sailing to the destination, from start to finish.
Yes! I’ve shared far and wide, with similar comments. Brilliant.
I suspect you've seen this already, but Freddie deBoer summed up the Hasan's of the world pretty clearly in this piece:
"It's All Just Displacement
Blue checkmarks are mourning bad careers in a broken industry
Freddie deBoer
Mar 22, 2021"
https://freddiedeboer.substack.com/p/its-all-just-displacement
See also the reaction to you from Gladwell in the Monk debate, which again was won by the largest margin in the history of the debates. Everyone knows what's really going on with legacy media. As it gets worse, they will lash out more and more.
Wow. Lee has real fangs!
It does not take much emotional intelligence to recognize that Hasan is scum. But this paints a picture of Hasan being even worse.
We should not be too surprised as this is the standard for the left media. My guess is that a similar profile could be done on most of the CNN and MSNBC talking heads. Low capability and lazy charlatans that brown nose their way to the top.
Isn’t Maddow the exemplar of how to brown nose your way to the top? It remains astonishing to me that a, or so I’m told, highly intelligent woman could blatantly lie to the public for four years, get rich doing so, remain in her job, and all without ever apologising to the people she lied to. My personal favourite “gotcha” moment was the report that a server in Trump tower was talking to a server at Alfa bank headquarters in Moscow. Of course, this never happened but no consequences whatsoever for Maddow. Perhaps the tears helped.
Maddow's rise coincided with the changes in the media for pledging fealty to the ideological cult of the left overclass. To them, she is still a hero. And of course, she checks identity boxes.
The most hilarious of examples though is Don Lemon. Pledged fealty and checked the identity boxes... but uttered the wrong thoughts and had to be sent to reprogramming.
Yep, poor Don, didn’t quite work out as he must have imagined. I did have the pleasure of seeing that narcissistic aresehole Cuomo on a very minor channel a couple of weeks ago.
Hasan is insufferable
I like this Lee guy. Wow! I'm inspired when I see people fight back.
Thanks for getting him to join us. He's beyond worthwhile.
Now that was a takedown! Bravo Lee Fang! Wow!
There is something so morally grotesque about all these upper-caste Brahmins coming to the West, scoring fantastic jobs and sinecures, living and thriving here, and then whining about the phantasm called White Supremacy and screaming Racist! every time they're cornered in an argument.
I can't speak for Britain, but here in America we have a very painful history based on the racist oppression of Black people, an entire body of Civil Rights law and other structures set up to counter this, and for shameless opportunists to cry Racist! for clicks and tenure is just pure Stolen Valor from African-Americans, a desperate sweaty attempt to play Oppressed because that's the latest fast track to exalted status.
Every time someone like Hasan belabors the bigotry accusation, takes away more of its sting and turns it into just another weapon in the culture war, he makes it less likely that someone who faces actual discrimination is heeded, and takes the serious issue of racism against American blacks and trivializes it.
I may just be getting old and cynical, but I'm starting to think that those who pose as "defenders of the oppressed" use their supposed morality and compassion as another shameless way to gain money and status.
Good thinking. Someone ought also to suggest to Mehdi Hasan to never, again, upset Lee Fang. Hasan's name meant nothing to me when I read comments about your interview with him, but having read Fang's description of what an opportunist Hasan is. and has been, I won't be foregetting it.
My teacher (a teller of truths) once joked the best approach is to tell the truth and then quickly leave town. My hope for you and the other truth tellers is you will become stronger and better from the experience because you are fortified with integrity.
Y'all been punk'd by the narrative and the evil cabal behind it that pulls all the strings. Hang tough brother! We're all with you. We see, admire, and support the courage you continue to bring to the mission that serves us all!!
peace love
You did an excellent job with the Twitter files. You should be proud of yourself. What ever anyone tries to criticize you or fines fault is to be expected. This is a world of criticism and jealousy. Just try, hard as it may be, to not become “them”. Hate and anger is not the answer. Mr Musk gave you a job and you excepted it. Good for both of you.
Hi Matt--I've noticed you suffer some from my ailment--I'm much better with the pen than I am a speaker. The words flow through my fingers, not directly out of my mouth. And these appearances are unbelievably stressful. I can see at times these people are intimidating you when you are twice as smart as they are. It's hard to remedy this other than once you really believe how smart you really are, you are quicker on your feet.
You also fight fair--you stick to debating issues--,afford everyone respect-- instead of dealing in ad hominem attacks. I think Lee Fang is justified to respond to this guy as he did because of his behavior. And because he's defending YOU.
But that has never been your way. I think people understand that.
So you need to hang in there and don't let these assholes get to you--easier said than done.
I had no idea what a Mehdi Hasan was until you posted your debate(?) so I can't say that his opinion carries much weight.
And while I understand that The Twitter Files was an important story that generated mostly smears and dismissals please don't fall into the Lenny Bruce trap where you come on stage & just read the transcripts of your trials & tribulations over & over.
What happened to you is happening to everyone who points out that, not only does the emperor have no clothes, he's also incontinent and has a dribble of liquid shit running down his leg.
Seymour Hersh's story about an embezzling Zelensk who is buying cut rate oil from the Russians also included info about how his cronies are falling all over themselves setting up shell companies so they can sell those lovely western weapons on the black market. I think Hersh's estimate was that 30% of the weapons make the battlefield while 70% are resold.
From what I can tell that story also generated complete silence from the MSM.
Maybe, from this point on, you should just admit that you're not going to guilt or debate any of these MSM journalists into admitting they're corporate hacks & shit journalists. I'm pretty sure that they know that they're shoveling manure, they just don't care. And why should they? Mainstream media manure shoveling appears to a very lucrative career move. And if their audience hasn't caught on by now that they're being lied to on a regular basis they never will.
"I think Hersh's estimate was that 30% of the weapons make the battlefield while 70% are resold."
That was also NBC's estimate a few months ago before they retracted their story when the Deep State flipped out.
Thanks, didn't know that. My NBC watching days are long over.
Is anyone left at The Intercept? Jeremy Scahil?
I once claimed it as my favorite online news source, but came to realize I only liked Glen's reporting on Snowden stuff, Lee's stuff on all the digital espionage and Jeremy's podcast. It fell off my radar at some point and...well, whattayaknow...the gang's all here. #substackisthefuture
So, to put it bluntly, according to Fang's evidence, Medhi is a whore. Or, to be thorough, a non white Muslim, whore.
Seems to pay well. Where did I go wrong.
When I read Fang's latest, all I could hear was: Kaaaaa BOOOM!
If anyone accuses someone of lying under oath, they better be able to right there prove it! Otherwise they are just rotten wantonly-lying individuals, due no respect. Who will of course, lie again.
After watching how you were treated by the Dems at the Congressional hearing it should be obvious to all that the gloves are off. There is no respect, fond recollections or camaraderie. There is only a perceived threat to the power structure goal.
Glad he's on our team ("our" being seekers of truth)! Kudos to him and to you. We need you to fight against these lies.
Fang delivers a spanking. Hasan does not the meet minimum requirements of rational discussion and debate. In his version of 'debate' he is just a crude pettifogger whose engagement with political facts and arguments is so shallow and brittle that he is forced to disrupt his opponent's speech to avoid confrontation with fully fledged positions. There is a chapter in his book called 'Beware the Gish Galloper,' which is sad and ironic.
I am thinking that people like Hasan think pre-Internet backfiles of journals not online are to be harvested for plagiarism. I would watch him in any library...everything isn't online and maybe he thinks he's struck gold and no one else knows this..but librarians know.
In high school we had to write a short story. I and another girl had the 2 chosen to be read out loud to the class. The others girl’s was pretty good. A few years later I was digging in the back dusty old book shelves at my beloved Carnegie Library building and pulled out an old book of short stories. I read a few then came up with a start. Here was the exact story that was read to the class that day along with mine. Yes, I am also a retired librarian.
Librarians will out!
They sure do! Thanks, dear one!
Mehdi's a hack. Of course, the Left ate it up, as if a typo and an acronym mistake invalidated months work of journalistic effort. But the seeds are planted. More and more people will red pill.
On a different note, Matt - please don't leave Twitter! I feel like my parents are fighting! Don't get a divorce...what did we do wrong? We won't do it again, we promise!
Matt tweeted today!
https://twitter.com/mtaibbi/status/1648466182037733381
Yay, Matt!!!!!!
I wouldn't be too angry, besides the initial outrage. Mehdi Hasan is a mass media talking tool. I thought Bill Maher's ambush of Matt a while back was more objectionable. The underlying grievance, or point of the attack, was aimed at Independent Journalism, which people like Hasan are incapable of, thus professionally jealous. If Mehdi were remotely honest, he would have led off with the Modi stuff, which means geopolitics, a conversation that would have quickly exposed his own Right-Wing hack stripes. MSNBC, make no mistake, is a Neo-Con network..."War! War! War!"
Henceforth, this hack shall be known as 'the plagiarist Mehdi Hasan.' When challenged, simply share Lee Fang's article.
Matt, if you haven't seen it yet you should check out this short video compilation by Turncoat Don, taken from your interview with Mehdi. By deleting all the garbage spewed by Mehdi, Don highlights your strongest, pithiest points, with each of them landing as literal punches at Mehdi:
https://twitter.com/TurncoatD/status/1644795611760451584?s=20
That's how I saw it too. .. except Mehdi kept talking over everybody just hear his own head rattle.
*idk why Matt is feeling bad about it.
Fang delivers a spanking. Hasan does not the meet minimum requirements of rational discussion and debate. In his version of 'debate' he is just a crude pettifogger whose engagement with political facts and arguments is so shallow and brittle that he is forced to disrupt his opponents speech to avoid confrontation with fully fledged positions. There is a chapter in his book called 'Beware the Gish Galloper,' which is sad and ironic.
He f’ing owned the POS in his article. Nailed it.
“remind me never to upset Lee Fang” ...word
New paying Sub here at the $5 a month level, in Thanks for taking on AND exposing the extents that MSNBC is a government sponsored operation, 1984 on steroids of Bigotry we could not have imagined even 3 years ago. Hasan's Epstein-cabal handlers NEED us to look away from their Constitutional violations and illegal activities in child sex-trafficking and money laundering. We the People stand WITH you Matt, they SHALL NOT get another journo like you or Assange into a cell. Go on their shows and show them the teeth and knives, we're with you 110%