People walk outside CNN Center, Wednesday, Oct. 24, 2018, in Atlanta. CNN is now screening all people who enter after a suspicious package was delivered to CNN in New York. NYPD’s chief of counterterrorism says the explosive device sent to CNN’s headquarters in New York appeared to be sent by the same person who mailed pipe bombs to George Soros, Hillary Clinton and former President Barack Obama. (AP Photo/Ron Harris)
I’m not against biased commentary. Hell, I make my living off of it. I don’t even mind biased commentary off of cable news networks. Many people tune into Fox News, MSNBC, and CNN specifically for that reason. In fact, they make their biased commentary programs their primetime shows.
What I can’t tolerate is when these clearly biased networks attempt to paint themselves as centrists here to report the news to you with pure, unfiltered fact. Almost every mainstream news network on the planet is guilty of this, and none more so than CNN.
As my colleague, Sister Toldja, wrote earlier today, the right-leaning news network OANN has fallen under attack by CNN in the same way a stereotypical rich boy socialite from the movies looks down on the new kid:
One America News Network has been covering the daily White House Coronavirus Task Force press briefings since the briefings first began, and the network has already come under fire from so-called “respectable” journalists after asking President Trump if it “alarmed” him that so many in the mainstream media appeared to be teaming up with China’s government in their propaganda offensive against Trump’s use of the term “Chinese virus” to describe the Wuhan coronavirus.
OANN was there for the Sunday press briefing, and CNN once again was not pleased.
I recommend reading Toldja’s article to get the full rundown of what CNN said, but the primary idea is that it revolves around their thinking that OANN is a “fringe outlet.”
CNN’s @JDiamond1 attacks OAN reporter @JennPellegrino by calling her a “propagandist” from a “fringe outlet.” https://t.co/IcsGJAiBpF
— Alex Salvi (@alexsalvinews) March 30, 2020
To summarize: Amid a global pandemic killing thousands of Americans, Trump disparaged CNN, NYT, and PBS at his press conference, while saving his praise for a fringe cable channel that peddles right-wing conspiracy theories.
— Oliver Darcy (@oliverdarcy) March 29, 2020
What gives CNN the right to refer to OANN as a “fringe” news network?
Absolutely nothing.
CNN is currently drawing this conclusion, perhaps unknowingly, for a few reasons. For one, they see themselves as the establishment of news organizations. CNN has a long history of delivering cable news to the point where they’ve become a household name while OANN is the new kid on the block in relativity.
What’s more, CNN believes that its ideological positions are the norm, and in the world of the mainstream media, they are perfectly correct. Leftist positions and Democrat voters are about as common as sand on a beach in the mainstream news community. This leads them to believe that their positions, including their horrifically advanced case of Trump Derangement Syndrome, is a perfectly standard position to take. Maybe even the decent one.
OANN, however, is a network with right-leaning people and it makes no qualms about showing that. I’ve been on OANN quite a few times as a guest of Liz Wheeler’s and even hosted her show a couple of times. I was never once asked to keep my right-leaning opinions to myself. In fact, that’s one of the reasons they have me on. I don’t buy what the mainstream media is trying to sell and I report the news for what it is with a clear prejudice against leftist narratives.
For CNN, a network that is soaked in leftism, anything to the right of them would likely seem frightening, extreme, and “fringe.” This is rich coming from the network that hosted Michael Avennati over 50 times, had a host that referred to white Trump voters as terrorists, and spent the pandemic trying to find a way to paint Trump as a villain while making China look like heroes to the globe. Let’s not forget that they spent years trying to find a way to impeach the president and touting every event as the thing that finally sinks Orange Man.
But an important thing must be pointed out here. CNN called OANN “fringe” for their opinions, but it’s clear that OANN exists as it does because many people agree with the network’s opinions on any given subject. In fact, its opinions are relevant enough that President Donald Trump himself — a man the people voted into office and plan on voting for again — has acknowledged and gives the floor to.
There’s clearly a large part of America, at least half, whose views and opinions fall in line with those expressed by the hosts at OANN. If that’s the case then CNN is referring to half the country as “fringe” simply for holding a different opinion than them.
CNN constantly places third in the cable news race. If that’s their opinion, then they belong in last place behind the number one rated cable news channel, Fox News, who also carries primarily right-leaning hosts in their prime time lineup. Hopefully soon, it’ll also place below OANN.
