Not the Headlines Extra: MSNBC is lying to you

The Listening To presents Not the Headlines Extra. About a week ago, I was speaking to someone who said they didn't really have an issue with Trump's tariffs, but that they were surprised by them. I've heard other similar complaints from interview subjects at rallies and people on the street. It's surprising to me that there are so many people who didn't see what the media now calls a trade war coming. Donald Trump literally campaigned on it. He championed the idea of tariffs and even praised President McKinley for his tariff policies. He even renamed the former Mount McKinley, which had been renamed Denali, back to Mount McKinley, reverting back to the former name of the tallest mountain in North America to recognize a guy who was big on tariffs might also have been a good sign for what President Trump had in mind. So how could it be that there are people who are surprised by the Trump tariff plan? Well, if you get your news from MSNBC, it might interest you to know that they intentionally kept that information from you. It's not your fault. The news source you trusted betrayed you, not just in this case, but in many ways over many years. MSNBC is so worthless to viewers and its parent company NBC Universal that it's now part of a group of cable channels being spun off like excess water from a big umbrella. Don't believe me? The properties being auctioned off are literally being called SpinCo. MSNBC is currently looking for new offices and studios once they are officially no longer a part of NBC. They already got rid of Joy Reed and her staff, and those who still remain are wearing down their claws with the hope of surviving. Why they want to stay is a mystery to me. Reporting the news is a lot harder when you're being told there are things you can't report. I have personally run into this problem, usually as a reporter in the military, but not always. It was actually easier to report the things you weren't supposed to report in the military than in civilian life. In the military, I could always refer to regulations and mission statements to justify telling the truth. In civilian life, reporters are more likely to be coerced into towing the company line for financial reasons, plus they have no regulations to support them. I pissed off more than one general during my time as a military journalist, but there was absolutely nothing they could do about it. It's not the same in civilian life. If you're one of the lucky reporters who's allowed to be impartial, that's great. But be prepared to look for a new job more often than someone who aligns with the powers that be. So when MSNBC made the decision to not broadcast any of Donald Trump's campaign speeches, the rest of the staff also maintained radio silence when it came to what the candidate was telling audiences on the campaign trail. This deprived people of the information they could have used. It may not have changed their vote or their minds, but they would have known that tariffs were a significant part of his plan as president. MSNBC justified the choice to not air Donald Trump's speeches live by saying they couldn't confirm that everything he was going to say would be true. Try as I might, I can't think of an analogy to demonstrate all the ways in which that reasoning is absurd. One way it's absurd is that MSNBC doesn't think you're smart enough to figure out on your own what is true. MSNBC assumes that you'll believe whatever you hear, even if it's something Donald Trump said. MSNBC doesn't want to risk you having enough information to come to your own conclusion. MSNBC will determine what, if anything, Donald Trump said is worth repeating. It seems they may have skipped over a few things that might have been good to know earlier, like his tariff plan. But MSNBC didn't want you to see Donald Trump's speeches. They didn't want you to see the festival like atmosphere that followed the candidate everywhere he went. They didn't want you to see the throngs of people, the rows of vendors selling Trump merchandise. They didn't want you to see all of the American flags being flown, and didn't want you to hear the people cheering for the man they hoped would be president again. But most of all, MSNBC didn't want you to hear Donald Trump speak. MSNBC and the Parent Company were afraid that you too would become a fan of the man they kept telling you was a threat to democracy and a danger to the country. But that's only the most recent way MSNBC has been hiding the truth in an attempt to demonize Donald Trump. And this might be starting to sound like I'm here just to support Donald Trump. But this is only about Donald Trump because MSNBC made it about Trump. There was to be a trial this week to determine if MSNBC intentionally ruined the reputation of an immigrant doctor for the purpose of connecting him to Donald Trump. And what MSNBC did was in September of twenty twenty, less than two months before the election that Donald Trump lost. Three of MSNBC's talking heads and a correspondent were named in the lawsuit filed by doctor Mahendra Amin. The doctor was seeking thirty million dollars for what was said about him on several programs. What did they say? Well, if you're a steady viewer of MSNBC, you may recall the man nicknamed the Uterus Collector. That's doctor Amin, according to Rachel Maddow, Nicole Wallace, and Chris Hayes. They said he had performed mass hysterectomies on immigrants detained at a customs enforcement site in Georgia. They made it sound like dozens, if not hundreds, of women were being forced to have nonconsensual surgeries at the direction of the Trump administration, and doctor Amin was the guy doing the dirty work. And these allegations weren't just a quick quip among bigger stories. No, this was a block material, talked about on nearly two dozen segments. They claimed that a whistleblower alerted them to the horrific conditions and the evil doctor who dissects women without their permission. NBC was never able to verify the claims, but went with the story anyway. Here's some advice for NBC. You can't continue to call them a whistleblower if they lied to you. And the whistleblower did lie. NBC knew it. NBC knew that doctor Amin had performed only two hysterectomies while at the facility, both of them necessary and both of them agreed to by the patient. A lawyer for the doctor, Stacy Evans, is a self-described Democrat and regular viewer of MSNBC. She's also a state representative and ran in the Democratic primary for governor, losing to Stacy Abrams, who lost in the general election. She called out Rachel Maddow, especially, telling Fox News that Maddow's treatment of the doctor was preposterous and disappointing. Evans is quoted as saying, quote, it was Rachel Maddow who tried to tie Dr. Amin as the next chapter in the continuing saga, essentially, of mistreatment of immigrants by the Donald Trump administration. And she opened that block by talking about child separation policies and this former Trump administrator who had been tracking women's menstrual cycles, some really sick stuff, and then to say that Dr. Amin was the next chapter in this saga, it was preposterous the way she did it. All in the name of making Donald Trump look bad. I find it odd that the name of the so called whistleblower has never been revealed. NBC would like to continue to keep that a secret, I guess. Maybe that's why they decided to settle the lawsuit out of court. That's why no trial will begin this week. That's why we'll probably never hear the name of the whistleblower if there even is one. I doubt there is. NBC agreed to settle a thirty million dollar lawsuit, for exactly how much we don't know, instead of going to trial and having to perhaps reveal who made up the story about the good doctor. Plus there won't be an opportunity for any other news organization to make a big deal out of the trial. After all, news organizations aren't supposed to be the news. But on the listening tube, they often are, and it's because of the many ways the news is being used in an attempt to manipulate us. Now we know to what extent MSNBC will go. The Democrat lawyer who defended the doctor called MSNBC a default channel for Democrats. Perhaps some people need to change their default settings to something more responsible. Perhaps a supermarket tabloid would be a step in the right direction. Even the chairman of the Federal Communications Commission agrees. Brendan Carr recently called out Comcast, the parent company of NBC and its subsidiaries, for spreading false information disguised as news. Specifically in reference to the Salvadoran man who was captured in Maryland. Carr accused the Comcast television outlets of continuing to call the man a law-abiding U.S. citizen and a Maryland man after it was clear he was not. The FCC chairman wrote on X that, quote, Comcast knows that federal law requires its licensed operations to serve the public interest. News distortion doesn't cut it. Now, to be clear, cable TV channels have different rules to follow than the network channels, and that's why Carr is calling out the parent company to get its act together and not just a single entity like MSNBC. He's literally warning the parents of the unruly children to get their kids in line or get kicked out of the restaurant. And before you say he's just doing what Donald Trump tells him to do, well, that may be true, but it doesn't mean he's wrong. News organizations have a responsibility to serve the public interest, and if it can be shown that the responsibility is being ignored, then there has to be somebody to remind them of it. That would be the chairman of the FCC. And no, this isn't a free speech issue. This is a how are you serving the public interest issue. Get a lot more content from the listening tube with Bob Woodley Podcast.