Tuesday, June 28, 2011

Calling out excuse-mongering Jon Stewart and Media Matters on Gunwalker intent

Sorry, fellas—I realize I can’t match you for urbane snark or snotty punk judgmentalism, but that really seems to be the only hand you’re holding. So OK, smart guys, if finding U.S. civilian market weapons at Mexican crime scenes was NOT part of the objective—and then, once the joviality wore off, exploiting that information, then you tell us: How do you go from Phase 1, letting thousands of guns destined for Mexican cartels escape into the wild in the hands of straw purchasers, to Phase 3, bringing down “the big fish”?

How exactly does that work, smart guys? Explain it to us, oh wiser, more progressive ones.

What the HELL happens in Phase 2? [More]
Today's Gun Rights Examiner column accepts the call-out from media Underpants Gnomes.

2 comments:

Kevin Wilmeth said...

Stewart's followup was disappointing, sure, but not that surprising.

What I took from the Daily Show segment is that Fox News is simply a higher target on Stewart's own Maslowian hierarchy, than anything related to Gunwalker is. (Or, at least, it's a low-enough-hanging cash-cow fruit that any sort of conjectural opinion coming therefrom is reflexively suspect. Unfortunately Fox News has earned its share of this, so again: not much of a surprise.)

However, if the same story starts to come from other MSM sources (and we know it should, since it's actually got some substance), then it's no longer just Fox News offering the idea, and so can be taken more on its own terms. (Here's where it would be really nice and all, if MSM covering the story would actually, like, acknowledge the guys who broke it. What an idea!)

I'm not suggesting Stewart is a closeted Aaron Zelman (RIP) or anything, but I'll personally hold some judgment until he parrots the same line against a source that is not already his favorite skewer-toy.

In the meantime, just to be clear, it's entirely appropriate to make the point "uh, Jon? Even when it's yer mortal enemy who calls your wife a whore, the impartial bystander still first needs to know whether she is or not." Just because it was Fox News that offered the idea that Gunwalker was a political operation rather than a crimefighting one, doesn't mean it wasn't.

Chas said...

Markie Marxist sez: "Yeah! It's a baseless conspiracy theory, uh, because, uh, the AKs were really teddy bears! Yeah! And they weren't smuggled over the border; all the paperwork was in order for those bears! And they didn't go to criminals in drug cartels; they went to Mexican schoolchildren, the bears did. ATF just got mixed up in smuggling, I mean transporting, the bears by mistake, I mean, no, they did it just to be nice to the kids. On purpose. In Mexico. Because they're a nice agency.”
“Oooooooooooo! I don't think this is going to fly! I hope Melson can do better than this, but he does seem to be a bit angry. I hope he's not too upset about that ‘fall guy’ thing. We had his best interests at heart, really we did! If he rats on us, we're done for! What are we gonna do?!?!?!"