hypocrisy

The NRA Wants to Keep Gun Records Secret From Everyone Except the NRA

Sergio Hernandez · 02/27/13 02:00PM

Legislators and gun rights advocates get really angry whenever nosy reporters try to use public records laws to find out who's packing heat. When the Westchester Journal News published an online map of local residents with handgun licenses last year, the paper was excoriated by the NRA and its allies; it eventually took the map down. When Gawker published a similar list—without addresses—of New York City handgun permit-holders last month, we were attacked by Fox News and received multiple death threats. And when the editor of the North Carolina Cherokee Scout dared to request—not publish, but merely request—similar data from his local sheriff, he was forced to apologize and resign; he plans to leave the state entirely.

Daughter of Newsman Brian Williams Has Flack Censor Softball Interview Question

Hamilton Nolan · 02/11/13 02:28PM

Allison Williams, co-star of the HBO hit Girls, is the daughter of NBC News anchor Brian Williams, a man who makes his living by asking the tough questions. A cynic might even allege that Allison Williams would not be a famous TV star now were it not for her famous newsman dad. It would seem ironic, then, for Allison Williams to be instructing her PR soldiers to CENSOR even the gentlest of puff interviews.

You're Only a Hero Until You Tell the Truth

Hamilton Nolan · 09/18/12 12:02PM

When news broke that Osama bin Laden had been killed by a team of Navy SEALS, the first thought of everyone in the media business, and of many curious Americans was: when can we get one of these heroes to tell his story? Well, now we have. And a lot of people want the government to crush him for it.

White House Didn't Ask New York Times Not to Publish Classified Information

John Cook · 06/01/12 03:47PM

When the New York Times published a detailed story by chief Washington correspondent David Sanger today confirming the U.S. as the co-author of the Stuxnet virus and outlining Barack Obama's role in directing a highly classified digital monkeywrenching program against Iranian nuclear facilities, many observers noted that the story couldn't have been written without White House support. Which is odd, considering how much energy the White House has been putting into prosecuting leaks it doesn't like.

Nick Kristof's Itty-Bitty Prostitution Hypocrisy Issue

Hamilton Nolan · 04/19/12 03:45PM

Consummate do-gooder NYT columnist Nick Kristof is waging a campaign against Backpage.com, the online hooker-ad compendium, and its corporate parents, Village Voice Media and (until Kristof gave them bad PR) Goldman Sachs. Is there a note of hypocrisy to be found in all this? Perhaps, a little!

So Ron Paul Likes Buying Fancy Airplane Seats, What Do You Care?

Jim Newell · 01/16/12 05:17PM

There are so many excellent ways that the Associated Press could investigate Ron Paul, given his long congressional record and status as a competitive major party presidential candidate with views radically outside the mainstream, something you don't see too often. He's a character, a real life political character. But what the AP has chosen to go with today is a report about how he frequently flies first-class between Washington and his Texas district, making him the worst sort of hypocrite who has no values and loves Big Government deficits, secretly.

Don't Act Like You Just Found Out Pat Buchanan Is Racist, You Hypocrites

Hamilton Nolan · 01/11/12 10:00AM

Former Nixonite and coonskin cap-wearing sometime presidential candidate Pat Buchanan has always been a racist relic who appealed mostly to those caveman-like Americans anxious for a return to the Andrew Jackson era. Always. There has never been a time, during his long career as a smiley pundit, in which he was not a racist. So. Although it's kind of nice that he's been suspended by MSNBC, it's the media equivalent of giving all the homeless people in your city a one-way bus ticket just as long as the Olympics are in town.