Brian Stelter

We are three-plus years into this #FakeNews thing and our mainstream colleagues still don’t seem to understand the biggest issue the American electorate has with them.  The talking heads at places like CNN think that Trump won in 2016 because non-Democrat voters are “low-information” voters and those people just didn’t know any better. It’s precisely the opposite. Despite the contempt shown for fly-over states by the coastal media outlets, those voters are actually acutely aware of what they want and who they want to vote for. It isn’t stupidity that they acted upon in 2016…it was hypocrisy.

Voters and news consumers have grown tired of the hypocrisy of the media outlets they once trusted for objective reporting. As a member of the media class myself I can say that it has all certainly become quite tedious.

Case in point: CNN’s Brian Stelter and Oliver Darcy fired up the drama queen routine to a 10 when one of our reporters – who goes by the pseudonym Bonchie – wrote up a quick column on the curious case of Katie Hill consorting with correspondents at a convivial cocktail congress in New York City.

Yes, I will accept your applause for that amazing alliteration.

Bonchie figured it might be some kind of conflict of interest. At the very least it is distasteful given how self-righteous the CNN crew has been in the wake of Jennifer Van Laar breaking Hill’s story. While they accused our reporters of “revenge porn” and being unprofessional for exposing a sitting Congresswoman in violation of official House ethics, they have run cover for her without any sense of professional curiosity from day one. Not only that, now we know they socialize in the same circles as the accused.

NOT ONLY THAT…

During the most heated days of the Katie Hill story, Playboy reporter Alex Thomas reached out for comment to several Redstate editors including myself and Van Laar. Because of the nature of the accusations, legal ramifications and the glut of requests at the time, we did not respond. Thomas took it personally, insulted us on Twitter and proceeded to run interference for Katie Hill on social media as though he had some personal stake in the matter. It certainly wasn’t the timeline of an objective journalist curious to refute or verify an important political story.

Fast forward to March, 2020 and lo and behold…Thomas indeed has some personal stake in the matter. He’s apparently dating Katie Hill.

.@brianstelter @oliverdarcy – Please tell us more about partying with Katie Hill pic.twitter.com/r0jZgMlCAr

— Stephen L. Miller (@redsteeze) February 29, 2020

Are we starting to see the picture develop here?

oh this is rich, Brian. You of all people getting upset over this. You do this same thing every single day. I know for a fact you don't reach out for comment to all the ppl you skewer on a daily basis. Bonch did his job, don't get mad cuz you got caught fraternizing

— Kira (@RealKiraDavis) March 2, 2020

It is absolutely relevant that Darcy and Stelter – two huge offenders when it came to smearing our own reporter without cause or curiosity – would be at a New York City cocktail party alongside her. They may claim they didn’t even know she was there but at this point do we have any reason to believe them? Even so, they set the standard here. Our reporter was simply extending the same measure of professional consideration that they extended to Van Laar.

When it comes to left-wing journalists like Darcy and Stelter, if there weren’t such a thing as double standards they’d have no standards at all.

Nah. You don’t get whine about the semantics of partied vs. being at the same party. Especially after you falsely presented the Hill situation as a right wing smear and trashed good reporting by @jenvanlaar. Be less hypocritical.

— Bonchie (@bonchieredstate) March 2, 2020

Stelter wants to know why Bonchie just wouldn’t contact him or Darcy for comment. This is a mind-blowing comment coming from the pundit with a national tv show show who proudly ran cover for Katie Hill, inviting her on his show to make her case without once reaching out to the Redstate reporter who broke the story. Quite the opposite – Stelter went so far as to smear Van Laar and the rest of Redstate for publishing “revenge porn”, painting us and our reporter as amateur, right-wing agents of conspiracy.

Again, not one request went out to Van Laar or anyone else at Redstate for comment on the story of the year. Instead, their misreporting of the story and the woman who broke it fostered an atmosphere of contempt that led to Van Laar having her life threatened, her finances threatened, and her children threatened.

And Oliver Darcy has the nerve to complain about  Bonchie’s headline being “misleading”?

neither of us even saw her or knew she was at the party until after the fact! please make sure that's clear in your story. your headline is incredibly misleading

— Oliver Darcy (@oliverdarcy) March 2, 2020

As the face of Redstate it is important to me to stand up for my writers when I see they are being bullied for doing nothing but reporting on the truth and the hypocrisy that comes from left-wing media every day. I have to make sure this pathetic whining is addressed. Otherwise it emboldens people. I’ve learned that from raising two children – children who wouldn’t dare come to me with the immature complaints of the likes of Stelter and Darcy.

Bonchie is an anonymous writer. Why he is anonymous is not anyone’s business but ours. Darcy’s tragic attempt at doxxing Bonchie in that Twitter thread is all you need to know about why some conservative writers choose to remain cloaked. The story is all that ever needs to be responded to, but Darcy and his cohorts feel perfectly comfortable making it personal.

Poor Francesco.

Everyone on this thread: You got the wrong Bonchi. I think someone tagged or mentioned me by mistake! I keep receiving notifications but I have nothing to do with this. Actually I do not even understand what you’re discussing about. Thanks

— Francesco Bonchi (@FrancescoBonchi) March 2, 2020

Bonchie – who doesn’t have a national tv show or the force of the entire Democrat complex behind him – had the most mature view of the Twitter kerfuffle.

My piece was punditry, responding to a news report. The fact that they want to come out and complain almost two days after the piece published, after ignoring numerous calls from @redsteeze and others to respond about it, is just more intellectual dishonesty. I was responding with my opinion to a news report. That’s what I do.

Despite their whining about the wording of my piece, they still refuse to correct their false framing of the Katie Hill story. We did not make her resign. She resigned because she actually did something wrong and Jennifer Van Laar exposed it. Full stop.

 

He’s right. And the difference between Redstate and a place like CNN is that we are a news/opinion outlet. We are absolutely skewed to the right. It’s literally in the name. Stelter & Co. continue to pretend they have no agenda and are only interested in getting out the facts. That is far more dishonest. To whine about a single Redstate reporter giving his opinion on their hypocrisy is laughable and they should be embarrassed.

Redstate is very much looking forward to seeing Darcy and Stelter reaching out to us, Fox News, and every other conservative media outlet for comment every time they want to run an opinion story on us.

Good times!