On Monday's "Tucker Carlson Tonight", Tucker and I mulled the latest accusation from MSNBC:
"Joy Reid has finally figured it out," Steyn remarked. "While the Democrats have been distracted investigating Trump for stealing the 2016 election, he's already stolen the 2024 election. That's how smart he is."
I also compared the left's charges of election-stealing to the ducking chair of long-ago witchfinders: the fact that Trump won the election is ipso facto proof he stole it. Click below to watch:
You can see the full show with Tucker here.
~In Tucker-related news, my fellow TCT regular Dan Bongino is suing The Daily Beast for $15 million after its "reporter" Lachlan Markay falsely and maliciously wrote that he had been fired by NRA-TV (characteristically inaccurate headline: "Bongi-No-More"; back in the real world, Dan is one of the hottest properties in conservative media).
I have some previous with Markay - he's the Daily Beast employee referenced in Paragraph Fifteen on page eight in the final verdict in my second triumphant stunning victory over the CRTV tosspots. So aspects of Dan's tightly written statement of claim rang very familiar to me, particularly with respect to Markay's modus operandi and the Beast's refusal to correct a story it knew to be untrue and misleading. (In my case, two judges, an arbitrator and five appellate judges have ruled that the truth is not as Markay reported, but the Beast has never updated its story.)
Markay is not a journalist but a biddable fellow who likes to be fed selective leaks by powerful men with a score to settle. (He recently moved on to Tucker.) The pithiest summation of him came from evidence in the CRTV vs Steyn cases: according to Gaston Mooney, President of CRTV's successor Blaze TV, "Lachlan is just a damn lazy reporter". Which is why Mooney regarded him as the perfect chap for a planted (and utterly false) hit piece essentially ghosted by him and Cary Katz. As the Second Arbitrator found and the New York Supreme Court confirmed:
The testimony in this proceeding (as in the prior arbitration) is replete with admissions of Messrs. Katz and Mooney regarding instigating and shaping the slant and content of the Daily Beast article. [emphasis added]
So it's res judicata that, at least in one not dissimilar instance, Lachlan Markay's pieces are "shaped" and "slanted" by others. That's how the "damn lazy reporter" likes it: Leak him some clickbait, and feel free to "shape" the "slant" of his story. In the CRTV hit-piece, Markay was leaked the "evidence" of convicted criminals, including a perjurer and fugitive from justice who (as Mooney testified at trial) remains in CRTV's employ. See the second CRTV vs Steyn final verdict (Statement 50 at page 25):
The persuasive evidence reflected 'substantial truth' in the notion of a group, some of whom had criminal records, being employed by CRTV in connection with the unwinding of the studio and relationship, in fact intimidated some female associates of Mr. Steyn, and successfully left the studio unusable...
There is a reference to the CRTV 'goon squad'. The connotation is that of 'thugs' hired to commit acts of intimidation in a dispute. See Rx-0561. Truth or substantial truth is a defense under New York law. See Newport, supra. While the record is unclear on why the individuals involved were hired, it is plain on the persuasive evidence how they behaved in certain instances ranging from placement of the Daily Beast "hit" piece to the treatment of female associates.
This goon squad of criminals who intimidate women were Markay's "sources": That's the company he keeps.
So the question with the Bongino/NRA story is: Who leaked the "damn lazy reporter" Markay his "slant and content" this time round? It's presumably not the NRA, who distanced themselves from Markay and confirmed Dan's version of events. Whatever you call this modus operandi, it isn't "journalism".
At any rate, I wish Dan Bongino all the best in this particular legal battle. Mooney was, even by Katz's standards, a disastrous witness for CRTV in this spring's trial, but he did, in the course of his testimony, shed a lot of useful light on just what sort of a "reporter" Lachlan Markay is. Dan is doing the world a public service in taking him on.
~If you prefer yours truly in non-visual formats, I'll be back in audio only this evening with the latest of our L M Montgomery Christmas Tales for Our Time - and tomorrow, Wednesday, I'll be keeping my midweek date with the great John Oakley on Toronto's Global News Radio 640.
On the other hand, if you're one of that small brave band who enjoy me on camera, don't miss The Mark Steyn Christmas Show with me and my special guests coming up right here this weekend.
The Mark Steyn Christmas Show is made with the support of members of The Mark Steyn Club. You can find more details about our Club here - and it also makes a great Christmas gift.
