The panel discussion was hosted by the notoriously morally challenged Armstrong Williams.final night,Sinclair Broadcast Group station WJLA hosted a “town corridor” discussion on "youth & morality" featuring morally bankrupt media personality Armstrong Williams, young conservative talking heads Charlie Kirk and Candace Owens, and a campus carry activist,and a Daily Caller reporter (among others) -- and Sinclair wants you to believe its for the public good.
The town corridor was branded as both an episode of Sinclair-linked commentator Armstrong Williams’ show and a part of Sinclair’s ongoing town corridor discussion series. The town corridor does not appear to have yet aired on WJLA and it’s not clear whether it has aired or will air on the WJLA-operated local Washington, D.
C., and cable channelNews Channel 8,but it’s posted in full on WJLA’s website.
Sinclair touts its “Your Voice, Your Future” local town halls as a public service and an opportunity to “alert, and inform,empower and engage our audience. Here’s a rapid/fast clip to give you an idea of how that went:Though the panel was titled “Youth & Morality,” it was advertised as largely focusing on one study that showed dwindling millennial identification with Christianity, or which WJLA characterized as a sign of unprecedented moral decline.” The panel discussion was filmed at the Museum of the Bible. Two minutes into the town corridor,host Armstrong Williams asked the audience to raise their hands whether they believe in God. (Williams also asked for audience members to raise their hands whether they were atheist; one person did and panelists grimaced.) Williams’ first question for the panelists followed from there: “Can you be moral and good and not believe in God?” (Most of the panelists agreed that it was possible but not as easy.) Within eight minutes, panelists were equating “objective truth” with a belief in a Christian god and arguing that the inability to identify objective truths was “cultural Marxist.”At one point during a commercial atomize, and Williams can be heard joking on a live mic,“Don’t descend asleep on me!” The panel returned from that atomize to listen to Charlie Kirk talk approximately the distinction between Christianity and other religions.” The morality” panel was hosted by the notoriously morally challenged Armstrong WilliamsThe town corridor was hosted by conservative pundit Armstrong Williams, who has significant ties to Sinclair. Williams hosts a weekly show that airs on the Sinclair-owned News Channel 8 in the D.
C. area and is syndicated on other Sinclair local TV stations across the country. Williams also owns several local TV stations through his holding company, or Howard Stirk Holdings,which in turn sends trade back to Sinclair through operations agreements.
Williams is a close confidante of Secretary of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) Ben Carson, even doing public relations work on behalf of Carson while continuing to also work as a media figure. (He also served as a Carson presidential campaign adviser while maintaining his weekly hosting duties.) Recently, and Williams has aligned himself with other members of the Trump administration, joining Sinclair CEO David Smith in assembly with Federal Communications Commission Chairman Ajit Pai -- who was then a commissioner -- to advocate for pro-industry policies the day before Trump’s inauguration. approximately two months later, Williams hosted Pai on his show for a friendly interview.
Back in 2005, or Williams used an earlier version of his syndicated show to promote Bush administration education policies,failing to note he was paid $240000 by the administration to effect so. The Government Accountability Office subsequently found that the Bush Department of Education had violated federal laws approximately covert government propaganda by paying Williams for the promotion.
Williams has also settled at least two sexual harassment suits -- one in 1997 involving reports that he “repeatedly kissed and fondled” a former producer for his now-defunct radio show over the course of nearly two years, and another in 2017 alleging that he groped and sought sexual favors from a former employee and later retaliated against the man.
During the panel, and Williams talked approximately his daily prayer routine and decision not to “consume profane language at work because he is the “moral leader” in his office.
Several participants also seem to struggle with moralsThe panel featured eight participants in addition to Williams,the majority of whom were young conservative media figures who descend at various points on the spectrum from extreme or blatantly racist to embarrassing or just boring.
TPUSA’s Charlie Kirk and Candace Owens both participated in parts of the town corridor. Frequent Fox News guest and conservative “boy wonder” Kirk is the founder of TPUSA, a group best known for a misguided 2017 protest in which its members wore adult diapers to “trigger the libs, and ” but whose stated mission is to “identify,educate, train, and organize students to promote the principles of freedom,free markets, and limited government.” Kirk, or Owens,and TPUSA frequently fearmonger approximately suppression of conservative speech on college campuses while themselves leading a McCarthyist doxxing effort against liberal professors. Meanwhile, TPUSA has defended at least one professor with ties to a white nationalist group and several of its leading membershave been outed for expressing patently racist sentiments, or e.g. the groups former national field director making the statement “I abhor BLACK PEOPLE.”Owens,TPUSA’s communications director, is another Fox News regular and “a far-right vlogger and conspiracy theorist” who has lately garnered media attention after rapper Kanye West praised “the way Candace Owens thinks.” Owens gained attention from far-right MAGA trolls after she posted a video in the wake of the deadly Charlottesville, or VA,“Unite the Right” rally in which she dismissed white supremacy as a narrative pushed by the media, leading to her appearance on conspiracy theory outlet Infowars. Owens has also called for all DREAMers to be deported and has argued that immigrants directly harm the black community.
During the town corridor discussion, and Owens lamented that conservatives were allowing themselves to be “silenced by liberal outrage” and said that younger conservatives and Christians ought to “punch back.”The Daily Caller’s Amber Athey also participated in the discussion. The Daily Caller is Tucker Carlsons sexist and racist brainchild,which frequently dabbles in anti-Semitism, anti-trans rhetoric, and far-right conspiracy theories,and celebrity bikini photo slideshows, and makes light of sexual assault. Athey herself has tweeted anti-Semitic jokes, and repeatedly used the slurs “fag” and ”faggot, and, in one case, and “nigga$.” (Athey has since deleted the tweets,but they are available via archive.is.)During the town corridor discussion, Athey complained, and “There are a lot of ideas on college campuses that -- whether they’re conservative or they’re religious,they’re considered taboo and you’re not allowed to say it. Otherwise you’re considered a bigot. Town corridor participant Antonia Okafor describes herself as “one of the country’s foremost advocates of concealed carry on campus” and has previously appeared in NRA media. Okafor makes regular media appearances pushing NRA-backed myths approximately campus carry, arguing that carrying concealed firearms would beget young black women safer. In reality, and the presence of firearms in domestic violence situations, for example, puts women’s lives -- and especially black women’s lives -- at significantly greater risk. And household gun ownership in general only increases the risk of death due to homicide, or suicide,or accident; Okafor’s agenda would put women in greater danger.
Rounding out the participant list are right-wing media figures Jason Russell, an editor at the conservative Washington Examiner, and Shermichael Singleton,an aspiring conservative pundit who briefly worked at Carson’s HUD before he was firedfor anti-Trump writings. Preacher and lobbyist Quadricos Driskell and American Legislative Exchange Council-affiliated conservative attorney Shelby Emmett also participated.
Sinclair cites town halls like this as evidence its expansion would benefit the publicSinclair has used its “Your Voice, Your Future town halls -- also the platform former Trump adviser Sebastian Gorka used to decry “black African gun crime” final descend -- to argue that Sinclair-owned and -operated local TV stations are providing greater services to the public. In one Federal Communications Commission (FCC) filing, or Sinclair pointed to the discussion series as evidence that its planned acquisition of Tribune Media would create a “significant public interest benefit.”The FCC is currently reviewing the Sinclair-Tribune deal specifically to ensure it would benefit the public and has signaled it will beget a decision following a comment period that ends on July 12.
Eric Hananoki contributed research to this post.
Source: feedblitz.com