Tag: liar

Posted on

Anderson Cooper Slaps Back At Pam Bondi’s Complaints Of “Edited” Interview

After Florida Attorney General Pam Bondi called into a friend’s radio to complain about being “ambushed” in a CNN interview with Anderson Cooper, Anderson Cooper took to the airwaves to set the record straight.

I love that Anderson presents the pre-interview notes on the air.

Truth be told, it doesn’t take an Anderson Cooper to make Florida Attorney General Pam Bondi look bad. She’s been doing that all on her own for a long time.

For years Bondi worked fervently to keep equal rights, like marriage equality, from “the gays.” So, when she spends her time on national TV these past few days (in an effort to bolster her political career) pretending she’s some great ally of the LGBT community, this is exactly what happens.

Here’s how Anderson responded to Bondi’s claims that her interview was unfair, and that it was “edited.”

“She’s either mistaken or she’s not telling the truth,” the CNN host said on his show, Anderson Cooper 360. “Let’s be real here. Ms. Bondi’s big complaint seems to be that I asked in the wake of a massacre of gay and lesbian citizens about her new statements about the gay community and about her old ones.”

“For the record, my interview was not filled with any anger. I was respectful before the interview, I was respectful during the interview and I was respectful after the interview. I don’t know Pam Bondi personally, she seems like a nice person actually. I don’t think she has hate in her heart. But what I think doesn’t matter, its my job to hold people accountable. If on Sunday a politician was talking love and embracing quote ‘our LGBT community’ I don’t think it’s unfair to look at their record and see if they have actually ever spoken that way publicly before which I never heard her say.

“The fact is, Attorney General Bondi signed off on a 2014 federal court brief that claimed married gay people would pose ‘significant public harm’. Harm. She spent hundreds of thousands of dollars in taxpayer money. Gay and straight taxpayers money, trying to keep gays and lesbians from getting the right to marry. Now look, good people can and do disagree on that issue. everyone has a right to their own opinion thank goodness. But Ms. Bondi is championing right now her efforts to help survivors but the very right which allows gay spouses to bury their dead loved ones – that’s a right that would not exist if Ms Bondi had had her way. I think it’s fair to ask her about that. There is an irony in that.”

And for the record, here is the entire interview segment that began this whole debate:

Posted on

Pastor Who Claimed Whole Foods Wrote Homophobic Slur On Cake Stands Down

Texas pastor Jordan Brown claimed Whole Foods wrote anti-gay slur on his cake

A local Texas pastor, Jordan Brown, had recently filed a lawsuit against a bakery department associate at Whole Foods claiming the associate wrote an anti-gay slur on a cake he purchased. According to the suit, he asked employees in the bakery department to write “Love Wins” on a blank, pre-frosted cake.

Brown told the media at the time that the employee wrote “Love Wins FAG” on the cake.

Now, Brown has changed his tune, issuing the following statement:

“Today I am dismissing my lawsuit against Whole Foods Market. The company did nothing wrong. I was wrong to pursue this matter and use the media to perpetuate this story.

“I want to apologize to Whole Foods and its team members for questioning the company’s commitment to its values, and especially the bakery associate who I understand was put in a terrible position because of my actions.

“I apologize to the LGBT community for diverting attention from real issues. I also want to apologize to my partner, my family, my church family, and my attorney.”
-Jordan Brown

Whole Foods Market, responds to the local pastor dismissing his lawsuit:

“We’re very pleased that the truth has come to light. Given Mr. Brown’s apology and public admission that his story was a complete fabrication, we see no reason to move forward with our counter suit to defend the integrity of our brand and team members.”

Posted on

Donald Trump’s Fake Steaks

Earlier this week, Donald Trump attempted to quash the idea that any of his business ventures have been failures.

The idea has been trotted out by GOP opponent Sen. Marco Rubio on the campaign trail the last couple of weeks.

At a celebration/press event Tuesday night, the Trumpster showed off many of his “products.” Among them were several “Trump Steaks” – even though the public was under the impression the venture closed up shop years ago.

It turns out the trademark for Trump Steaks lapsed over a year ago.

From NBC:

The trademark the Republican presidential front-runner took on Trump Steaks in August 2006 was canceled eight years later, in December 2014, according to the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office.

The supposed Trump Steaks that the GOP front runner trotted out Tuesday after notching primary victories in Mississippi and Michigan are actually from Bush Brothers Provisions, a longtime West Palm Beach meat purveyor, according to the company. (It’s not connected to Trump’s ousted rival Jeb Bush.)

It is not unusual for meat to be purchased wholesale and rebranded, but that did not appear to be the case with the meat presented Tuesday. In fact, some of the meat on the butcher board was still wrapped in Bush Brothers packaging. None of the meat appeared to be in Trump Steaks packaging.

“We do supply his properties in Palm Beach County with beef,” a company spokesman told NBC News, referring to Trump. “He’s a customer.”

So, basically, Trump is attempting some double-talk here. In a sense, he does sell steaks – in his restaurants of his hotels for diners to enjoy.

BUT – the business named “Trump Steaks” does not sell any product and is out of business.

Do we really want a president who’s ego is so fragile that he has to parse things so minutely so as to not admit a failure?

Posted on

Pulitzer Prize Winning Website Politifact Names Donald Trump “Lie Of The Year’

Pulitzer Prize winning fact check web site Politifact honors GOP White House hopeful Donald Trump as the collective “Lie Of The Year.”

PolitiFact has been documenting Trump’s statements on our Truth-O-Meter, where we’ve rated 76 percent of them Mostly False, False or Pants on Fire, out of 77 statements checked. No other politician has as many statements rated so far down on the dial.

In considering our annual Lie of the Year, we found our only real contenders were Trump’s — his various statements also led our Readers’ Poll. But it was hard to single one out from the others. So we have rolled them into one big trophy.

To the candidate who says he’s all about winning, PolitiFact designates the many campaign misstatements of Donald Trump as our 2015 Lie of the Year.

When it comes to inaccurate statements, the Donald was on fire:

• “I watched when the World Trade Center came tumbling down,” he said at a Nov. 21 rally in Birmingham, Ala. “And I watched in Jersey City, N.J., where thousands and thousands of people were cheering as that building was coming down. Thousands of people were cheering.” Pants on Fire. There is no video of thousands of people in Jersey City cheering. Weeks later, Trump continues to stand by his claim but has not been able to point to evidence to back it up. Public safety officials on the ground in New Jersey say it never happened.

• “The Mexican government … they send the bad ones over.” Pants on Fire. There’s no evidence to show the Mexican government encourages criminals to cross the border. Most illegal immigration comes from people seeking work. Recent estimates show illegal immigration from Mexico dropped off dramatically during the recession and has remained low.

• “Whites killed by whites — 16%. Whites killed by blacks — 81%,” said an image he shared on Twitter. Pants on Fire. Most people are killed by someone they know, and someone of the same race. The correct number for whites killed by whites was 82 percent in 2014, while the number of whites killed by blacks was 15 percent.

Posted on

PolitiFact Rates Donald Trump “Thousands Cheered In New Jersey” Statement – PANTS ON FIRE

It comes as no surprise that the Pulitzer Prize winning website PolitiFact has researched Donald Trump’s now infamous claim that “thousands and thousands” cheered in New Jersey when the World Trade Center was attacked on 9/11.

Trump said he “watched in Jersey City, N.J., where thousands and thousands of people were cheering” as the World Trade Center collapsed.

This defies basic logic. If thousands and thousands of people were celebrating the 9/11 attacks on American soil, many people beyond Trump would remember it. And in the 21st century, there would be video or visual evidence.

Instead, all we found were a couple of news articles that described rumors of celebrations that were either debunked or unproven.

Trump’s recollection of events in New Jersey in the hours after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks flies in the face of all the evidence we could find.

We rate this statement Pants on Fire.

Bolding is mine.

If you go to the link, you can read the extensive digging the folks at PolitiFact did to try and give Trump even a smidgen of leeway. But there was none to be found.

Trump even admitted to Bill O’Reilly on last night’s “O’Reilly Factor” that he doesn’t bother to check facts before he tweets or retweets things.

Posted on

Donald Trump Implies Hillary Clinton Laughed During Benghazi Attack

Donald Trump posted a video today that implies that former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton “laughed” as the attacks on American diplomats were under attack in Benghazi.

From Talking Points Memo:

Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump posted a video to Instagram Monday that mocked Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton’s laugh, superimposing video of her chuckling over newspaper headlines about her emails and fiery images from the Benghazi attacks.

At one point, Trump’s video showed Clinton laughing during her recent 11-hour testimony before the House Benghazi committee over footage of the burning diplomatic compound. Trump captioned the video with, “Hillary, there is nothing to laugh about.”

Trump captioned the video “Hillary, there’s nothing to worry about.”

Posted on

Mat Staver: A Host Of THE VIEW Called For Kim Davis To Be Murdered

Anti-gay Liberty Counsel’s Mat Staver, who has been representing Kentucky County Clerk Kim Davis, asserted in a recent appearance on the “Faith and Freedom” radio show that a host of the ABC show THE VIEW called for someone “to go kill her.”

“I would encourage you to pray for Kim Davis, pray for her family, pray for those that work with her, pray for Liberty Counsel,” Staver said. “Kim has received just horrible death threats, even from ‘The View,’ amazingly. They called her a monster on national television, one of them said that someone ought to go kill her. This is on a major network. That was on ‘The View’ on ABC. I mean, that was astounding, that kind of language was happening on a major TV network.”

While the “monster” label was used on THE VIEW, no one can seem to find any instance of anyone on THE VIEW calling for Davis’ murder.

Lawsuit anyone?

Posted on

Another Lie Perpetrated By Tony Perkins

Hate group leader Tony Perkins can’t help but twist and turn the facts regarding the “Ark Encounter” which recently was informed it would lose state funding in Kentucky (to the tune of $18 million) because those building the project required folks to be Christian in order to be hired.

Via email:

“At a new Kentucky theme park, Christians are the ones getting taken for a ride. Construction is already underway in Williamstown for a one-of-a-kind tourist attraction by our friends at Answers in Genesis (AiG).

“The organization behind the Creation Museum is working on a built-to-scale Ark Encounter — but so far, all they’ve encountered is intolerance. The state had given AiG the thumbs up on its application last fall, which triggered some outcry from anti-faith groups.

“Almost immediately, they swooped into Kentucky and started making noise about the rebate, demanding that it be retracted. Why? Because AiG dares to hire people who share their beliefs on creation. And as a religious organization, that’s entirely within both state and federal law.

“Do we force animal rights groups to hire hunters? No. Or Muslim groceries to hire pig farmers? Of course not.

So why is Ham’s group being targeted? Constitutional questions aside, with as many as 700,000 people expected at the Ark each year, the benefits for Kentucky far outweigh any perceived slights in hiring policy.”

Now to the facts: The “Ark Encounter” lost it’s state funding because folks applying for jobs were expected to sign affidavits swearing they were Christian. You cannot demand that employees be Christian (or any other religion) when you receive tax-payers dollars. There can be NO religious litmus test. That’s what “Ark Encounter” did.

In a statement by Kentucky Gov. Steve Beshear in December:

“We expect any entity that accepts state incentives not to discriminate on any basis in hiring. While the leaders of Ark Encounter had previously agreed not to discriminate in hiring based on religion, they now refuse to make that commitment and it has become apparent that they do intend to use religious beliefs as a litmus test for hiring decisions. For that reason, we cannot proceed with the tourism incentive application for the Ark Encounter project.

The project didn’t lose funding because people dared to be Christian. It lost funding because the project REQUIRED employees to be Christian.

So two important things here:

1. Tony Perkins lies. All the folks who listen to him and nod in agreement should know that you are listening to lies. His email posted above makes that abundantly clear.

2. Even if you are Christian and would like the rest of the world to be, the laws of the land dictate that tax dollars can’t be used to discriminate in hiring. Whether you support or oppose the Ark Encounter project, employment discrimination can’t be a part of the equation regarding religious beliefs.

Get it right, Tony. Get the facts straight and stop twisting the truth.