By Douglas V. Gibbs
The media has always been tainted, or at least during my lifetime. Back when I was a kid the left had it contained on three major networks. Then, Rush Limbaugh broke radio wide upon for conservative thought, and the advent of cable television added more voices. But, even though the left permeated the ranks of radio and television journalists, they at least tried to look like the facts mattered back then. Now, journalism has become a game of “gotcha” instead of “get the facts”? A good example is the recent textbook case of the left-wing media complex trying to smear Tom Homan with a rumor so thin it couldn’t hold up a cocktail napkin.
You know Tom Homan. He’s pulls no punches. He’s the perfect Border Czar. Straight shooter. No-nonsense. The kind of guy who actually believes in enforcing the law. And because of that, the left hates him. So what do they do? They float a nasty, unsubstantiated rumor that he accepted a $50,000 bribe. The claim is it got handed to him by undercover FBI agents. No true evidence exists of this rumor. There are no charges. No indictment. No trial. Just hearsay and headlines.
And who’s pushing this garbage? The usual suspects. A big one has been George Stephanopoulos, the Clinton consigliere turned Sunday morning inquisitor. He tried to corner Vice President JD Vance on ABC’s This Week, asking about a so-called FBI tape that nobody’s seen, nobody’s authenticated, and nobody’s confirmed. Vance, to his credit, didn’t flinch. He called it what it was: a smear. A distraction. A reason why fewer and fewer Americans tune in to the mainstream media circus.
“You’re insinuating criminal wrongdoing against a guy who has done nothing wrong,” Vance said. “Let’s talk about the real issues.”
And this is the kind of shadow-chasing that is important to Stephanopoulos while the government is shut down. Troops aren’t getting paid as they should be. Low-income families are wondering where their next meal might be coming from (though I believe safety nets like welfare should be administered by the States, not the federal government – that’s just a constitutional authority thing, with me). But ABC wanted to talk about a bribe that didn’t happen.
And then, when Vance got going, the ABC team cut Vance off. Mid-sentence. Boom. Commercial break. Because when the truth doesn’t fit the narrative, the left hits the mute button.
Then, we get to Bill O’Reilly, the former FOX News personality. He confronted Homan directly, in front of a live audience, with no plan to cut him off like ABC did to Vance. No teleprompters. No spin. Just a question: “Did you take $50,000?”
Homan looked him dead in the eye and said: “I didn’t take $50,000 from anybody.”
Then he dropped the hammer:
“Day one I came back, I recused myself from any discussions, of any contact or any monetary decisions like that because I used to have a company that did consulting…I took a significant, huge pay cut to come back and serve my nation…I am not enriching myself doing this job.”
That’s what integrity looks like, folks. That’s what service looks like. And that’s why the left can’t stand him.
They can’t beat Trump or his people on policy. They can’t beat him on results. So they try to beat him with rumors. But here’s the thing: Tom Homan doesn’t care what they think. He said it himself:
“I don’t care what people think about me, I never have because I know who I am. I work for the greatest president in the history of this nation in my opinion. And we’re doing the right thing every day.”
Boom. Mic drop. That’s how you handle fake news.
It’s the same B.S. as usual; the media trying to sell you a scandal. I get asked these questions all the time about what I think about what the media says. I always respond: “Who said it, is it backed by facts, or is it just another leftist attempt to deceptively attack a patriot?”
In the end, truth wins. And Tom Homan? He’s still standing.
— Political Pistachio Conservative News and Commentary
