4/10/2015

23 Responses to “Media Matters Research Fellow Oliver Willis Falls for Hoax Story”

1. I Love How they call themselves “fellows.”

   Patterico (9c670f) — 4/10/2015 @ 11:44 pm

   
   

2. Media Matters Research Fellow Oliver Willis conduct some high-level research and media analysis on this phony story.

   So let me get this right, this guy gets paid to do research (google) I do my own for free (using the same tools, except I don’t believe everything I read) I have a brain, he has?
   It’s strange ’cause we both use the same tools, yet it’s like he is driving a beater 1995 Ford Taurus while I am in a brand new 2015 Z06.

   MSL (5f601f) — 4/11/2015 @ 12:00 am

   
   

3. NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO i want it to be true

   Pretty much Willis’ reaction to all stories bashing conservatives. This one hurts him because it’s completely phony rather than just being untrue.

   L.N. Smithee (291dc4) — 4/11/2015 @ 12:06 am

   
   

4. My favorite part of the whole episode was watching Ben Howe egg him on.

   Patterico (9c670f) — 4/11/2015 @ 12:16 am

   
   

5. From the craziest Dude on a bike & the internet

   So today, this happened: Bloomberg News fell for a fake news story originally posted at one of those awful sites that plays on confirmation bias to circulate seemingly genuine stories and generate clicks for them:

   Forgive me if I am wrong, but doesn’t that sum up the entirety of the website to which the above quote came from?
   Pot – Kettle….

   MSL (5f601f) — 4/11/2015 @ 12:29 am

   
   

6. People like Oliver Willis should be sentenced to spend the rest of their life in an area where just about everyone thinks and votes pretty much the same way they do: Detroit, Michigan. They need to see, feel and live the experience of mindless liberalism (“coming down from my high now”—ie, I love Hillary, etc!!) 24/7, 365 days of the year.

   BTW, if there is a conservative counterpart to the Detroits throughout America or, for that matter, any of the other left-leaning quagmires throughout the world, I’m willing to hear about them and, if it comes down to it, sentenced to them certainly instead of being exiled to liberal strongholds like Michigan’s largest city.

   Mark (4bad5a) — 4/11/2015 @ 6:37 am

   
   

7. As punishment, he should have his Twinkie ration reduced to 6 cases per week.

   JD (bccb81) — 4/11/2015 @ 6:44 am

   
   

8. Confirmation bias is what passes for thought on the left. I look at HuffPo every day to see what they are talking about. When the Iranians came out and said that Kerry and Obama were lying about the Iran deal, the story disappeared from HuffPo. Just disappeared. For the next week, it will be all Hillary ! all the time.

   Mike K (90dfdc) — 4/11/2015 @ 6:51 am

   
   

9. Look out, first, last and always, for any other people numerous enough to declare themselves an oppressed group – the minimum number is 3… or 1, if you’re Oliver Willis.

   Colonel Haiku (2601c0) — 4/11/2015 @ 6:53 am

   
   

10. Nancy Reagan blech

    she never added any value that one

    happyfeet (831175) — 4/11/2015 @ 7:17 am

    
    

11. Mark wrote:

    People like Oliver Willis should be sentenced to spend the rest of their life in an area where just about everyone thinks and votes pretty much the same way they do: Detroit, Michigan.

    Actually, he does: he lives in Silver Spring, Maryland. He’s just fortunate to make enough money so that he doesn’t have to live like the real beneficiaries of Democratic polices.

    The amused Dana (1b79fa) — 4/11/2015 @ 7:24 am

    
    

12. she never added any value that one

    I’m surprised you say that, happyfeet, since she reportedly socialized with more than her fair share of — and had various friends from — the GLBT in Hollywood. IOW, your kind of people.

    Mark (4bad5a) — 4/11/2015 @ 7:26 am

    
    

13. Actually, he does: he lives in Silver Spring, Maryland.

    But, Dana, is it full-volume, full-blown liberalism or leftism like it is in Detroit (et al), where over 90% of voters favor liberals/Democrats? Not over 70% or even 80%, but over 90%.

    Mark (4bad5a) — 4/11/2015 @ 7:31 am

    
    

14. Mark wrote:

    BTW, if there is a conservative counterpart to the Detroits throughout America or, for that matter, any of the other left-leaning quagmires throughout the world, I’m willing to hear about them and, if it comes down to it, sentenced to them certainly instead of being exiled to liberal strongholds like Michigan’s largest city.

    I think that it’s a real possibility that liberalism is an artifact of urbanization: when you have everybody living on top of each other, you have more dependence upon each other, while more rural dwellers have to do more for themselves. Add to that the fact that having so man people crammed in together, and you have a greater tendency for people to irritate each other, and fights escalate more quickly. Then you get people thinking, “if only they hadn’t been allowed to have guns,” and other silliness.

    Our retirement property — we’ll be moving there in four years — is almost 8 acres, with 500 feet of river frontage, with the nearest town having a population of 596 people. We are pleased.

    The rural Dana (1b79fa) — 4/11/2015 @ 7:32 am

    
    

15. He should be used to the disappointment by now.
    I think JD was on to something… Willis read the hoax, but somewhere in there he saw the subliminal message of Twinkies and Ho Ho’s and swallowed it whole

    steveg (794291) — 4/11/2015 @ 7:33 am

    
    

16. Mark asked:

    Actually, he does: he lives in Silver Spring, Maryland.

    But, Dana, is it full-volume, full-blown liberalism or leftism like it is in Detroit (et al), where over 90% of voters favor liberals/Democrats? Not over 70% or even 80%, but over 90%.

    No. Silver Spring is a bedroom community for Washington, DC, and experiences government wealth spreading throughout the area; the median income is higher than the national average. It’s heavily Democratic, because so man people work for the government in some way.

    American liberalism seems to miss the middle: it has a high percentage of government drones, and people who are better off than average, along with the welfare class. It’s the working class which is missing. For the government workers, liberalism is a good thing economically, because it provides them with a better income than their skills would command in the private sector, and the last thing that they want to see is Republicans cutting spending and the size of government. (Not that Republicans ever have, even if they’ve promised it.) This is why Virginia has transitioned from a red state to a blue one: too many federal workers living in northern Virginia.

    The Dana with all the answers (1b79fa) — 4/11/2015 @ 7:43 am

    
    

17. and fights escalate more quickly.

    What’s interesting is that crime and criminality seem to go hand-in-hand with liberalism or socialism, since liberal nirvanas like Venezuela, Argentina or Sweden (ie, its high level of cases of rape) — and notice how those places transcend issues of race and ethnicity—eg Argentina is less racially diverse, and has a populace more tilted towards that of European ancestry, than perhaps any other part of the Americas — all suffer from bouts of people hurting other people through crime.

    It apparently comes down to too much of a population (ie voters) and politicians ignorantly, blindly, foolishly and easily sympathizing with bad people, bad situations and not responding in kind to good people, good situations. It’s analogous to looking at a two-faced mess like Hillary and thinking, “wow, she has a big heart, she’s beautifully progressive, so, hell yea, she’d make a great president!”

    Mark (4bad5a) — 4/11/2015 @ 7:52 am

    
    

18. No. Silver Spring is a bedroom community for Washington, DC,

    But as ideologically bad as that place is, I’m guessing elections even there aren’t quite as ridiculously, absurdly one-sided or lopsided as they are in communities like Detroit. IOW, the Motor City, et al, truly is the epitome of liberalism run amok, bar none.

    I often muse about this question in general, but is there any truly crime-ridden, corruption-filled, economically dysfunctional place where over 90-plus percent of the people in such places always and mindlessly vote for conservative politicians, conservative policies? And mainstream conservatism too, or not some strange hybrid perhaps found in the Middle East or small enclaves of Africa or India.

    Mark (4bad5a) — 4/11/2015 @ 8:04 am

    
    

19. Willis, (what you talking about’) has proved himself a knave, that’s why he works at Media Matters, flinging poo, on a larger note:

    http://reason.com/blog/2015/04/10/at-umich-a-libertarian-muslim-student-un?utm_content=buffer9e9d5&utm_medium=social&utm_source=facebook.com&utm_campaign=buffer

    narciso (ee1f88) — 4/11/2015 @ 8:10 am

    
    

20. I don’t read anyone’s Twitter.

    98% of the stuff I read from Twitter, I read here, and every time I do, it reaffirms my decision not to read anyone’s Twitter.

    It’s like a medium invented to promote stupidity. Highly concentrated stupidity whose only redeeming feature is that each message is short. But as this post demonstrates, stupid slops over into multi-Tweeting.

    Beldar (fa637a) — 4/12/2015 @ 7:03 am

    
    

21. Mark,

    I think Dallas could be considered a conservative version of Detroit.

    DRJ (e80d46) — 4/12/2015 @ 9:01 am

    
    

22. We are kindred spirits on this, Beldar. Twitter sometimes does have genuine on the scene breaking news benefits to society, but in my view twitter (and instagram) is more about “look at meeeee” than anything else. No offense to our many community twitterers, but if Mr. IowaHawk held the sole license to tweet in 2015 America I’d be happy.

    elissa (a01764) — 4/12/2015 @ 9:02 am

    
    

23. I agree with Rural Dana. That sounds like an awesome retirement home, Dana.

    DRJ (e80d46) — 4/12/2015 @ 9:02 am