TheBlaze’s Dana Loesch Now Giving Fox News’ Megyn Kelly Story Ideas - Original version

Original headline and text for this post.

When Fox News’ Megyn Kelly moved to 9pm, she promised the same hard news sensibility that she had brought to her afternoon show, and liberal media watchdog Media Matters fretted that Kelly was “more dangerous than Bill O’Reilly” because her more journalistic style might lend credibility to “partisan and misleading” stories. On Friday night’s The Kelly File, The Blaze‘s Dana Loesch helped Kelly allay Media Matters‘ fears.

Kelly told her audience that “We are drilling deeper tonight on a new proposal that would make psychological evaluations mandatory for all public school students in the state of New York.”

Kelly brought in conservative media star Dana Loesch to discuss the measure, which Loesch mentions is currently in committee, and that deeper drilling consisted of Loesch promoting false and misleading conservative media paranoia, and Megyn Kelly thanking her for it.

The New York measure actually is a bad idea, but not for the reasons Kelly and Loesch identify. Loesch complains that the psychological exam would be required ” twice in the elementary grades, twice in the secondary grades as well,” which is true, but adds that “they have to make their entire, complete health history evaluation to the school district, any time the school district wants it, it’s completely at the school’s discretion,” which she describes as “unbelievable overreach.”

That requirement, for a health history and/or exam at the school’s discretion, is already the law. The only change this bill makes to the law is to require a mental heath certification, and when Kelly asserts that the evaluation will be performed by “who knows who,” she ignores the fact that the bill say who. It’s a terrible idea because no doctor is going to assume the liability of signing off on a student who later becomes a huge problem, so the result would be an extremely small number of kids attending public schools.

Loesch then explains that this New York measure, which has not received a single vote, is all part of a broader strategy that includes “an effort to require parents to report any firearm ownership to their respective school district, and we know that with Common Core, and with all the data mining, there’s been a lot of questions not only into the political beliefs of each student’s parents, but also their religious believes and their extracurricular activities, that all has to be reported as a result of Common Core.”

The “effort” that Loesch describes is a bill by a Democratic State Senator named Maria Chappelle-Nadal (D-MO), a bill that is stuck in committee in a state senate in which Republicans outnumber Democrats 24-9. This “effort” is roughly the equivalent of the push for the Mandatory Snowball Storage Act of 2013, as drafted and sponsored by Assemblyman Satan (R-Hell). Loesch’s claim that “political beliefs of each student’s parents, …their religious believes and their extracurricular activities” all have “to be reported as a result of Common Core” is a complete falsehood.

For a conservative media firecracker like Dana Loesch, of course, this is pretty normal, ginning up panic by drawing tenuous connections between dubious claims. In fact, this segment demonstrates the power and resilience of Dana Loesch. After a bitter separation from Breitbart.com and a quasi-blackball by CNN, she has more than landed on her feet. Loesch now has the run of Glenn Beck‘s website TheBlaze, and a much larger cable audience. As Kelly reveals in the final seconds of the segment, Loesch now also has a hand in influencing the editorial direction of a major hard news program.

“Dana, thanks for being here,” Kelly said, adding “Thanks for bringing it to our attention.”

Seconded.

Here’s the clip, from The Kelly File:

When Fox News’ Megyn Kelly moved to 9pm,she promised the same hard news sensibility that she had brought to her afternoon show, and liberal media watchdog Media Matters fretted that Kelly was “more dangerous than Bill O’Reilly” because her more journalistic style might lend credibility to “partisan and misleading” stories. On Friday night’s The Kelly File, The Blaze‘s Dana Loesch helped Kelly allay Media Matters‘ fears.

Kelly told her audience that “We are drilling deeper tonight on a new proposal that would make psychological evaluations mandatory for all public school students in the state of New York.”

Kelly brought in conservative media star Dana Loesch to discuss the measure, which Loesch mentions is currently in committee, and that deeper drilling consisted of Loesch promoting false and misleading conservative media paranoia, and Megyn Kelly thanking her for it.

The New York measure actually is a bad idea, but not for the reasons Kelly and Loesch identify. Loesch complains that the psychological exam would be required ” twice in the elementary grades, twice in the secondary grades as well,” which is true, but adds that “they have to make their entire, complete health history evaluation to the school district, any time the school district wants it, it’s completely at the school’s discretion,” which she describes as “unbelievable overreach.”

That requirement, for a health history and/or exam at the school’s discretion, is already the law. The only change this bill makes to the law is to require a mental heath certification, and when Kelly asserts that the evaluation will be performed by “who knows who,” she ignores the fact that the bill say who. It’s a terrible idea because no doctor is going to assume the liability of signing off on a student who later becomes a huge problem, so the result would be an extremely small number of kids attending public schools.

Loesch then explains that this New York measure, which has not received a single vote, is all part of a broader strategy that includes “an effort to require parents to report any firearm ownership to their respective school district, and we know that with Common Core, and with all the data mining, there’s been a lot of questions not only into the political beliefs of each student’s parents, but also their religious believes and their extracurricular activities, that all has to be reported as a result of Common Core.”

The “effort” that Loesch describes is a bill by a Democratic State Senator named Maria Chappelle-Nadal (D-MO), a bill that is stuck in committee in a state senate in which Republicans outnumberDemocrats 24-9. This “effort” is roughly the equivalent of the push for the Mandatory Snowball Storage Act of 2013, as drafted and sponsored by Assemblyman Satan (R-Hell). Loesch’s claim that “political beliefs of each student’s parents, …their religious believes and their extracurricular activities” all have “to be reported as a result of Common Core” is a complete falsehood.

For a conservative media firecracker like Dana Loesch, of course, this is pretty normal, ginning up panic by drawing tenuous connections between dubious claims. In fact, this segment demonstrates the power and resilience of Dana Loesch. After a bitter separation from Breitbart.com and a quasi-blackball by CNN, she has more than landed on her feet. Loesch now has the run of Glenn Beck‘s website TheBlaze, and a much larger cable audience. As Kelly reveals in the final seconds of the segment, Loesch now also has a hand in influencing the editorial direction of a major hard news program.

“Dana, thanks for being here,” Kelly said, adding “Thanks for bringing it to our attention.”

Seconded.

Here’s the clip, from The Kelly File:

Megyn Kelly Blames Her White Privilege On The Black Girl

Update 4pm Sunday: Sad news. After holding this piece for 30 hours, Andrew Kirell says it's too late in the cycle to publish it, so you can only read it here. Please share it.

This piece was submitted for publication this morning, but is awaiting approval/edits. Here's a sneak peak for Tommy Xtra readers.

On Fox News' The Kelly File Friday night, host Megyn Kelly tried to explain away her emphatic insistence that Santa Claus is emphatically, undeniable, and unchangeably white by explaining that she was just agreeing with Slate's Aisha Harris that our culture depicts Santa Claus as white. Kelly also claimed she was the victim of accusations of "racism," but then proceeded to play several clips of no one accusing her of that. Kelly's commentary was an outrageous example of white privilege, and so was her defiant response to the controversy.

In her response to the controversy last night, Kelly made several claims that just don't match up with reality. She claimed that "Kicking off the light-hearted segment, I offered a tongue in cheek message for any kids watching, saying that Santa, who I joked is a real person whose race is identifiable, is white, just as Harris claimed in her piece, but that we were debating whether that should somehow change."

That's simply not true. Joking or not, Kelly was not simply outlining the debate, she was making an emphatic ruling on it, repeatedly. She had already called the premise of Harris' piece "ridiculous," and later explicitly acknowledged that she had considered Harris' argument, and again offered Santa's immutable whiteness as rebuttal. "I have given her her due on where she was going with," Kelly said, adding "Just because it makes you feel uncomfortable doesn't mean it has to change.

"Jesus was a white man, too," Kelly continued. "He was a historical figure. That's a verifiable fact -- as is Santa. I want the kids to know that. How do you revise it in the middle of the legacy, of the story, and change Santa from white to black?"

Kelly seems to think she was mocked for thinking that Santa is a real person, but that's the entire point; Kelly's rigid insistence that Santa Claus just is white is only absurd because we all know he isn't a flesh-and-blood person. The debate is over the "reality" of Santa in the sense that Frank Church wrote about it, in his ability to "make glad the heart of childhood." Faced with someone whose heart is not made glad by white Santa, Kelly's response was: too bad, he just is white.

She also claimed to have been beset by charges of racism, and while that may have occurred in some other forum, none of the examples she provided included that charge, nor did anyone say her commentary was "motivated by racial fear or loathing," as Kelly also claimed. The criticism was of the commentary as an expression of white privilege.

White Privilege is not the same thing as racism, but rather, a product of racism that allows otherwise decent people to support a racist status quo by inoculating them from racism's effects, and blinding them to their own privileged immunity from them. Kelly's insistence that Santa Claus just is white is, as she pointed out in her response, the product of a dominant white culture that simply will not entertain the notion of a nonwhite Santa Claus, as Kelly herself would not.

But the ultimate expression of that white privilege is to go on television before your overwhelmingly white audience, and explain that when you told them that Santa Claus just is white, and that it was "ridiculous" to say otherwise, and that "Just because it makes you feel uncomfortable doesn't mean it has to change," you were really just agreeing with the black lady who wrote the original piece, and by the way, that black lady is a "race-baiter." Kelly used Aisha Harris as a brush in the whitewashing of her remarks.

Kelly has that privilege because there is zero risk in the proposition, and considerable reward. Fox News' audience doesn't include many people who will be alienated by any of this, and her well-promoted response will likely generate huge ratings. By doubling down, Kelly also provides fodder for more criticism, which will only draw more like-minded eyeballs to her program.

If there are people calling Megyn Kelly a racist over this, I disagree with them, but I also think Megyn Kelly ought to listen to them instead of bristling. Fox News nighttime demographics aside, Kelly ought to ask herself just which kids she was really talking to when she repeatedly assured them that Santa is white, and if she was talking to all of them, how that might have made some of them feel.

The Race War on Christmas: Megyn Kelly Declares ‘Santa Claus Just Is White’ and So Was Jesus

It's come to this. Of all the absurdity that has emerged from the War on Christmas™ narrative, there has been nothing so surreal as a hard news anchor weighing in, authoritatively, on the racial identity of a nonexistent person, which is what happened on Wednesday night's edition of The Kelly File. Discussing a Slate article that suggested a more inclusive Santa, host Megyn Kelly repeatedly informed "the kids" (a key Fox News primetime demo) that "Santa Claus just is white," and that "Jesus was a white man, too."

Slate's Aisha Harris wrote a thoughtful piece about the effects of cultural exclusion from such a dominant American symbol of childhood, and suggested that Santa Claus be transformed, not into a black man (good thinking, because Black Santa would get down exactly one chimney before getting shot in the face), but a penguin, "spare millions of nonwhite kids the insecurity and shame" that she remembers from childhood.

Of this thoughtful essay about inclusion, Kelly says "I kind of laughed and I said this is ridiculous. Yet another person claiming it's racist to have a white Santa."

Harris, it should be noted, did not say it was "racist to have a white Santa," but rather that the notion that Santa can only be white "helps perpetuate the whole 'white-as-default' notion endemic to American culture (and, of course, not just American culture)," i.e. it's messed up to say that you can't have a black Santa Claus, as well.

"For kids watching at home, Santa just is white," Kelly continues, "but this person is arguing we should have a black Santa."

Again, Harris actually isn't arguing that at all (not that there would be anything wrong with a black Santa, any more than there's a problem with an endless succession of white Jackson Five's). She wants him to be a penguin.

Some of the panel handles the subject with a surprising amount of nuance, but later on, Kelly answers their agreement by responding "Just because it makes you feel uncomfortable doesn't mean it has to change. Jesus was a white man, too. It's like we have, he's a historical figure, as is Santa."

There is, of course, considerable disagreement about Jesus' race and appearance, but her designation of Santa Claus as a "historical figure" dooms Kelly's argument.

After Monica Crowley sensibly observes that "a penguin would never work, because penguin cannot lug gifts around the world," unlike pre-diabetic fat men on flying sleds, she agrees with Kelly that "Santa Claus is based on St. Nicholas, a Greek bishop, who was a white man."

Kelly's main objection here seems to be changing Santa, because obviously, there are no differences between these two guys:




As Crowley points out, Santa is partially based on a historical figure, one with whom the current Santa Claus differs significantly. If we're going to be purists, then we should be decorating our trees with the pickled, severed heads of would-be sex slaves, and street-corner Santas should be railing against Arianism as they ring their bells. Of the millions of differences that there are between Santa Claus and Saint Nicholas, why is it that the one trait that must never, ever be changed is that he was white (assuming he was even all that white)?

Because it's just that important, apparently.

We had an expression in my family that went "You keep Christmas in your way, and I'll keep it in mine," and it worked pretty well, but if we're looking to roll out a new, dominant cultural symbol of Christmas, then Santa Claus should be a giant self-aware computer who delivers presents using an army of antlered (possibly red-nosed) drones. Now there's a War on Christmas I can get behind.

Here's the clip, from Fox News' The Kelly File:

(h/t MMFA)

GOP Strategist Rick Wilson Tweets About Sh*tting in Sarah Palin's 'Whore Mouth'

The ouster of MSNBC host Martin Bashir over commentary he delivered about former Alaska Governor Sarah Palin has sparked intense debate online, debate which included Republican strategist Rick Wilson tweeting something far more vulgar about Palin than anything Bashir said in his controversial commentary. Responding to a tweet berating liberals for failing to oppose Bashir's ouster, Wilson tweeted "Yeah, I mean it was just Sarah Palin right? Totes cool to talk about shitting HER whore mouth, amitrite? I mean, really." 

 By rights, anyone referring to Governor Palin's oral cavity as a "whore mouth," and calling her a "whore" by extension, should never expect to get a job in politics again. During our Twitter exchange, I asked if Wilson should expect a fate similar to Bashir's:

The fact is that context matters, and Rick Wilson clearly did not actually mean that Sarah Palin has a "whore mouth," or that he would like to hear more about it being defecated in. Rick Wilson was using satire (not parody) to make a point, which was that many Palin detractors view her with irrational, at times misogynistic, contempt, while also attempting to falsely recast Bashir's remarks as a gender-specific attack. It was vulgar and provocative, but was clearly intended to make a point, not to literally condone the filling of anyone's mouth, "whore" or otherwise, with fecal matter.

 The same could also be said of the commentary that resulted in Martin Bashir's ouster. It was vulgar and provocative, but was clearly intended to make a point, not to literally condone the filling of anyone's mouth with fecal matter. The purpose of Bashir’s commentary was to illustrate, mainly to Sarah Palin, the sick trivialization of her remarks about slavery. Bashir’s goal was worthy, and his means were legitimate, but that’s not the commentary or provocation that I would have used. Yes, it amplified the underlying message, but at the cost of obscuring it.

Palin deliberately referenced American slavery, as conservatives are wont to do, in order to make a trivial point about public debt, and Bashir's intent was to show just what it was she was comparing. Bashir described, at length, the barbaric punishments used on slaves, and in the long tradition of political satire, included a provocation that served to amplify that commentary. Just as Swift didn’t actually intend for people to eat babies, Bashir did not literally wish for Palin to be shat upon, or into.

 It's an important distinction to make, because Martin Bashir didn't lose his job for violating MSNBC language standards, or for offending the sensibilities of his audience, but for running afoul of people who already didn't like him, and who relentlessly sought to silence him. That MSNBC volunteered to capitulate is unfortunate, because they have introduced a chill to an essential form of political and social commentary, and it's an asymmetrical chill. Conservatives don't punish people for saying offensive things, they reward them.

 To be clear, Martin Bashir's commentary didn't get it right; the provocation that he punctuated it with was misguided and irresponsible, and he was right to apologize for it. MSNBC would even have been justified in suspending him for it, had they done so immediately. In forcing Bashir out under external pressure, MSNBC has drawn a target on the back of any liberal commentator who dares to be provocative. [photo via Wikimedia Commons]

Heritage Foundation 'Updates' Incorrect Obamascare Story That Fox News Parroted

This post has been submitted for publication at Mediaite, but is being published here first:

On Monday night's The Kelly File, Fox News' Trace Gallagher delivered a report on yet another Obamascare horror story that didn't quite check out, and which was based entirely on reporting from The Heritage Foundation blog. Since publication of a fact-check on that story, Heritage has "updated" their story several times to address the points raised in that critique, acknowledging some problems in their original report. That's to their credit, even if they couldn't bring themselves to call them corrections, but their updated post still doesn't check out.

 The Fox News report focused on the sacrifices that the family of Northern Californian Kate Joy will have to make in order to afford health insurance under Obamacare, which includes things like extra mortgage payments, manicures, and dinners out. “They live in northern California, and help support their 19- and 21-year-old sons who work part-time and go to college,” Gallagher reported. “Here’s the deal. Under the old plan they paid $499 a month. Of course it was cancelled, because it doesn’t qualify under the Affordable Care Act. Look at the number. $1,252 per month.”

 According to that Heritage post, the Joys “live off her husband’s retirement salary,” and that “the family does not qualify for any subsidies.” She told Heritage that the $750 increase was on-fifth of her husband's salary, which is $45,120 a year. According to Covered California, a family of four adults from Sonora, CA, at that income level, qualifies for subsidies that would make an Anthem Blue Cross Bronze plan available for $4 per month. That’s not a typo. Four bucks. For $172 /mo., such a family could get an enhanced Silver plan from Anthem with a $1,000 family deductible, $16,000 less than the Joys’ old plan. $507, what the Joys were paying before, gets an Anthem Gold plan with no deductible at all.

 This is where the "updates" come in, and I don't scare-quote that word just to be a jerk. Heritage's reporting was, at best, sloppy and incomplete, but they were also given incorrect information by their source, incorrect information that seems to be the result of honest confusion. They still should have checked, but in a series of tweets, they seem genuinely interested in sorting it out. Here are those updates:

UPDATE: Following publication of this story, Mediaite asserted on November 26 that Kate Joy’s family is eligible for subsidies that would make a Bronze 60 plan available at $4 per month. That is incorrect. 

Even though she has chosen not to disclose her husband’s retirement salary, Joy did confirm that it is higher than the $58,899 cut off for subsidies under Covered California. The Anthem option that is closest to the family’s current plan is $1,252 per month — money that Joy reiterated will cause unwanted cuts in other areas of the family budget: 

"As I tried to point out and I don’t think it came across, we are in a position to make discretionary spending cuts and we are truly blessed, but we still have a monthly budget and no one, I don’t care their income level, should have to deal with increases like we are seeing with Obamacare."

UPDATE II: In a series of tweets, Mediaite’s Tommy Christopher challenged Heritage’s update to this story. It appears that a poorly worded sentence on our part is causing confusion about whether Kate Joy’s family qualifies for a subsidy. 

The sentence originally read: “The 150 percent premium increase amounts to one-fifth of her husband’s retirement salary, and she said that they don’t want to devote that much money to health care.” 

In his story, Christopher was basing his calculations on the $753 per month increase in the family’s premium. Over the course of a year, that increase totals $9,036. That’s how Christopher calculated the $45,120 salary he included in his story. 

However, in a subsequent email exchange with Kate Joy, she explained the total cost of the premium—not the increase alone—amounts to one-fifth of the salary. She declined to reveal the actual salary, but told us it is more than $58,899 cutoff for a subsidy. Joy got the subsidy number by using the Covered California calculator. 

She acknowledged that a family of four could qualify for a Bronze 60 plan at $4 per month, as Christopher explained. Joy’s family, however, isn’t eligible because of her husband’s income. 

What does this mean for the Joy family? Kate can purchase the Bronze 60 plan for $1,136 per month from Covered California. Instead, she’s decided to stick with Anthem, at a cost of $1,252 per month, because the Bronze 60 plan has higher out-of-pocket costs in the event of a major medical event. In our earlier update, we inadvertently used the $1,136 figure instead of the $1,252 monthly cost. We regret the error.

As I explained to Heritage's Robert Bluey on Twitter, Joy's revised claim, that their income is five times the total premium amount, still only adds up to about $75,000, well within the cutoff for federal assistance. The cutoff figure that Kate Joy got from the Covered California calculator is for cost-sharing subsidies; the cutoff for premium assistance is $94,200. According to Covered California, based on a $75,000 a year income for a family of four, a PPO Bronze costs $171 /mo. after premium assistance.

 Ideological differences aside, this is confusing stuff, and even the best mainstream reporters have failed to thoroughly check these stories out. What's important is that everyone get the right information, and get health insurance if they can. Heritage has offered to help Mrs. Joy get in touch with me so we can sort this whole thing out. Whatever you want to call it, a correction, an update, or a clarification, Fox News should follow Heritage's lead, and give its viewers the correct story.

Here's the post after it was edited, and then still not published, by Mediaite:

Heritage Foundation Updates Incorrect Obamascare Story

On Monday night's The Kelly File, Fox News' Trace Gallagher delivered a report on yet another Obamascare horror story that didn't quite check out, and which was based entirely on reporting from The Heritage Foundation blog. Since publication of a fact-check on that story, Heritage has updated their story several times to address the points raised in that critique, acknowledging some problems in their original report. That's to their credit, even if they couldn't bring themselves to call them corrections, but their updated post still doesn't check out.

The Fox News report focused on the sacrifices that the family of Northern Californian Kate Joy will have to make in order to afford health insurance under Obamacare, which includes things like extra mortgage payments, manicures, and dinners out. “They live in northern California, and help support their 19- and 21-year-old sons who work part-time and go to college,” Gallagher reported. “Here’s the deal. Under the old plan they paid $499 a month. Of course it was cancelled, because it doesn’t qualify under the Affordable Care Act. Look at the number. $1,252 per month.”

According to that Heritage post, the Joys “live off her husband’s retirement salary,” and that “the family does not qualify for any subsidies.”

She told Heritage that the $750 increase was on-fifth of her husband's salary, which is $45,120 a year. According to Covered California, a family of four adults from Sonora, CA, at that income level, qualifies for subsidies that would make an Anthem Blue Cross Bronze plan available for $4 per month. That’s not a typo. Four bucks. For $172 /mo., such a family could get an enhanced Silver plan from Anthem with a $1,000 family deductible, $16,000 less than the Joys’ old plan. $507, what the Joys were paying before, gets an Anthem Gold plan with no deductible at all.

Heritage's reporting was, at best, sloppy and incomplete, but they were also given incorrect information by their source, incorrect information that seems to be the result of honest confusion. They still should have checked, but in a series of tweets, they seem genuinely interested in sorting it out. Here are those updates:

UPDATE: Following publication of this story, Mediaite asserted on November 26 that Kate Joy’s family is eligible for subsidies that would make a Bronze 60 plan available at $4 per month. That is incorrect.

Even though she has chosen not to disclose her husband’s retirement salary, Joy did confirm that it is higher than the $58,899 cut off for subsidies under Covered California.

The Anthem option that is closest to the family’s current plan is $1,252 per month — money that Joy reiterated will cause unwanted cuts in other areas of the family budget:

As I tried to point out and I don’t think it came across, we are in a position to make discretionary spending cuts and we are truly blessed, but we still have a monthly budget and no one, I don’t care their income level, should have to deal with increases like we are seeing with Obamacare.

UPDATE II: In a series of tweets, Mediaite’s Tommy Christopher challenged Heritage’s update to this story. It appears that a poorly worded sentence on our part is causing confusion about whether Kate Joy’s family qualifies for a subsidy.

The sentence originally read: “The 150 percent premium increase amounts to one-fifth of her husband’s retirement salary, and she said that they don’t want to devote that much money to health care.”

In his story, Christopher was basing his calculations on the $753 per month increase in the family’s premium. Over the course of a year, that increase totals $9,036. That’s how Christopher calculated the $45,120 salary he included in his story.

However, in a subsequent email exchange with Kate Joy, she explained the total cost of the premium—not the increase alone—amounts to one-fifth of the salary. She declined to reveal the actual salary, but told us it is more than $58,899 cutoff for a subsidy.

Joy got the subsidy number by using the Covered California calculator. She acknowledged that a family of four could qualify for a Bronze 60 plan at $4 per month, as Christopher explained. Joy’s family, however, isn’t eligible because of her husband’s income.

What does this mean for the Joy family? Kate can purchase the Bronze 60 plan for $1,136 per month from Covered California. Instead, she’s decided to stick with Anthem, at a cost of $1,252 per month, because the Bronze 60 plan has higher out-of-pocket costs in the event of a major medical event.

In our earlier update, we inadvertently used the $1,136 figure instead of the $1,252 monthly cost. We regret the error.

As I explained to Heritage's Robert Bluey on Twitter, Joy's revised claim, that their income is five times the total premium amount, still only adds up to about $75,000, well within the cutoff for federal assistance. The cutoff figure that Kate Joy got from the Covered California calculator is for cost-sharing subsidies; the cutoff for premium assistance is $94,200. According to Covered California, based on a $75,000 a year income for a family of four, a PPO Bronze costs $171 /mo. after premium assistance.

Ideological differences aside, this is confusing stuff, and even the best mainstream reporters have failed to thoroughly check these stories out. What's important is that everyone get the right information, and get health insurance if they can. Heritage has offered to help Mrs. Joy get in touch with me so we can sort this whole thing out.

Original Version: Fox Lifts Bogus Obamascare Story from Heritage Foundation Without Sourcing

This post was edited, several hours after publication by Mediaite, without my input or knowledge. This is the post as it was originally written and published, minus the annoying font colors that Blogger changed for no good reason: Fixed the formatting:

Even as CNN greatly improves its reporting on Obamacare, Fox News continues the mainstream media trend of bogus reporting on supposed Obamacare horror stories that don’t pan out. On Monday night’s The Kelly File, Megyn Kelly featured a report by Trace Gallagher that told the sad story of a family that might have to cut down on manicures and such, in order to afford their Obamacare plan, and while the story predictably doesn’t add up, it has the added twist of being lifted from The Heritage Foundation’s blog, without attribution.

 Gallagher’s report focused on Kate Joy, a California woman who, “despite her name, is not happy” about Obamacare. She and her husband “have an extensive Christmas list, and have checked it more than twice,” Gallagher reveals. “It’s a list of what they plan to give up to pay for the new healthcare plan.”

Obamacare burn! Nicely done.

“They live in northern California, and help support their 19- and 21-year-old sons who work part-time and go to college,” he continues. “Here’s the deal. Under the old plan they paid $499 a month. Of course it was cancelled, because it doesn’t qualify under the Affordable Care Act. Look at the number. $1,252 per month.”

This would be a good place for Gallagher to explain why the old plan didn’t qualify under the Affordable Care Act, but he doesn’t. The viewer, then, is free to assume that the old plan only covered non-complicated doctors’ visits on alternating Tuesdays.

“That’s actually more than my monthly mortgage on my home,” Joy says in an interview clip. “You can imagine that you have to start thinking about, you know, where is the extra money coming from to pay for the policy.”

“To make up for the increase, the Joys are cutting money they normally add to the mortgage every month,” Gallagher explains. “They are cutting the home phone, instead using cell phones. Charitable donations go down, along with the anniversary fund, and teeth cleanings will be just once a year. Add to that manicures, magazines and movies, and they should have the extra $750 they need. Despite her name, Kate Joy isn’t happy.”

“Fewer haircuts, not eating out as much, not going to the movies. That affects small businesses in our community,” Joy says.

On the latter point, people paying more under Obamacare are extreme outliers, so the millions more people who will be paying less ought to be able to pick up the slack for manicurists and dinners at The Olive Garden.

Stay tuned, though, because Kate Joy’s nails may yet be saved. “Remember, California rejected President Obama’s plan to extend those individual policies,” Gallagher reminds viewers, “so the Joys’ reality begins in 36 days.”

(Watch Video Here)

At face value, most people would probably agree that one set of marginally gnarlier nails is a fair price to pay so that millions of other people can no longer be denied health insurance, but it doesn’t even have to be that way.

Newshounds‘ Ellen Brodsky thought something sounded familiar, and smelled a little funky, about Gallagher’s reporting. She pointed out that the report is an almost rote regurgitation of a Heritage Foundation blog post, and that something had to be wrong.

The Heritage post makes the claim that the Joys don’t qualify for subsidies, a subject which Gallagher ignores: If this family is struggling to get by to the point that they have to give up dental treatments (as both reports stated), it’s hard to believe they wouldn’t qualify for any subsidies. Considering that the Kelly File has come up with many of Fox’s even more numerous bogus ObamaCare victims, there’s good reason to be skeptical.
It’s also suspect that Gallagher didn’t discuss it. After all, it’s a major component of the Affordable Care Act. 

According to that Heritage post, the Joys “live off her husband’s retirement salary,” which, according to what Kate Joy told them, is $45,120.00 a year, and that “the family does not qualify for any subsidies.”

But according to Covered California, both of those things cannot be true. A family of four adults from Sonora, CA, at that income level, qualifies for subsidies that would make an Anthem Blue Cross Bronze plan available for $4 per month. That’s not a typo. Four bucks. For $172 /mo., such a family could get an enhanced Silver plan from Anthem with a $1,000 family deductible, $16,000 less than the Joys’ old plan. $507, what the Joys were paying before, gets an Anthem Gold plan with no deductible at all. Heritage and Gallagher also fail to acknowledge the fact that without Obamacare, the Joys wouldn’t even have the option of covering their adult children.

Gallagher doesn’t credit Heritage for this story, but for Heritage, credit isn’t the point; slagging Obamacare with stories like this is the point. Given a choice, I’d much rather Gallagher and his staff had bothered to check Heritage‘s reporting than disclosed them as the source. It would also be nice if Kelly’s team would exercise some editorial judgment in the Obamacare stories she puts on the air.

Unedited version: Maddow Slams ‘Conservative Media Criticism Website’ Mediaite’s Coverage of Gettysburg Address Scandlet

This is the unedited version of this post, which was published at Mediaite.

As Mediaite's Andrew Kirell reported yesterday, the conservative media spun up its outrage warp drive over President Obama's supposed omission of the words "under God" from his recitation of the Gettysburg Address, only to later learn that the President had been asked to read a first draft of the speech that did not contain the phrase. It was with some delight, then, that I noted Mediaite fave Rachel Maddow cited our reporting on Tuesday night's episode of The Rachel Maddow Show.

 Rachel began the segment in trademark fashion, building a foundation of context for the story by ticking off several other deranged right-wing outrages from earlier in Barack Obama's presidency. This is one of the reasons people hang in until 9 pm to see TRMS, because even when she's covering a story you've already seen 18 times that day, Rachel Maddow will sweeten the pot with old video clips and history lessons, or in this case, histrionics lessons. She touched on a few perennial favorites, like the evergreen vacation outrage, but missed my personal favorites, the teleprompter story, the trips to Israel kerfuffle, and uppity King Obama's use of a food taster.

 Then, she went around the horn describing how various right-wing media outlets fairly convulsed with outrage over the President's "omission" of the phrase "under God," and Mediaite's writeup appeared onscreen. What a proud moment...(record-scratch noise).

 "The conservative media criticism website Mediaite covered it under the guise of covering the outrage about it," Maddow said.

 Wait, what? By "conservative media criticism website," does she mean a website that constantly criticizes the conservative media? Either interpretation is unfair, since this site has always featured writers with a diverse set of viewpoints, so while you can argue over where the balance tilts at any given time, or take issue with the merits of those varying points of view, we have always been defined by that diversity of views. When we're not a "conservative media criticism website," we're "primarily left-wing," to hear Bill O'Reilly tell it.

 On the issue of the merits, the accusation that Mediaite covered the Gettysburg kerfuffle under the "guise" of covering the outrage about it would be fair if we had suddenly, just for Barack Obama's recitation of the speech, created a whole new category of reporting on outrage just for the occasion. It's actually kind of our wheelhouse. It's only fair to note that, in covering the outrage, Andrew Kirell noted the following:

TheBlaze has reported extensively in the past on the controversy surrounding whether Lincoln actually said the words “under God” in his original speech. Lincoln’s original draft did not include the words “under God” and so, perhaps, Obama was reading from that iteration? We’ll likely soon find out.

If anything, the websites that ran with this story probably should have waited to find out, but they didn't. What we did do was provide that bit of context, and update our story immediately, crediting Media Matters for pointing out that the President was reading from the earliest draft of the Gettysburg Address, which did not include the words "under God," and that he was asked to do so by documentarian Ken Burns.

 It would have been even nicer if we had tracked down that notation on Burns' "Learn the Address" website, but as much as I hate to be the one to point this out (not really; nothing would please me more than to have the wingnut media further clown itself by shrieking about a "coverup"), it probably wasn't there when this ridiculous narrative got rolling. It's not in the Google cache version of the page from November 15, which means it was added some time after that. It also apparently wasn't there when CBS News' Major Garrett, as fastidious a reporter as there is, asked Jay Carney about it at Tuesday's White House briefing, long after we published our piece.

Aside from failing to turn up something that probably wasn't there when he began writing the post, Andrew Kirell got the story right.

 (h/t stand-up comic and Mediaite reader Andy Kindler)