Whiny NBC upset with Trump video

The people who gave us the Insurrection and Russiagate laughably cry fake news

In 2002, photographer Kenneth Adelman took photos to show the erosion along California’s coast. One photo showed the Malibu mansion of Barbra Streisand. He posted it online. Malibu Barbra sued for $50 million in an attempt to have it taken down. This backfired as the court quickly rejected her DEMAND and the lawsuit drew attention to the photo.

Mike Masnick, CEO and founder of Techdirt, dubbed it the Streisand Effect.

He wrote in 2005, “How long is it going to take before lawyers realize that the simple act of trying to repress something they don’t like online is likely to make it so that something that most people would never, ever see (like a photo of a urinal in some random beach resort) is now seen by many more people? Let’s call it the Streisand Effect.”

The answer is longer than he thought 18 years ago because NBC still hasn’t learned.

The New York Post reported, “NBC News has called on a top Trump campaign official to take down a deep fake video purporting to show one of the network’s reporters breaking down last month’s third Republican primary debate.

“Senior Trump 2024 adviser Chris LaCivita posted the video on Nov. 8 of Garrett Haake seemingly trash-talking Trump’s rivals ahead of the Miami debate, which NBC News co-hosted with the Republican National Committee.

“The video, which was still on X as of Monday afternoon, started off as a normal Meet the Press-style report.

“But it cut to footage of the candidates, with Haake’s voice berating each of the presidential hopefuls as they appeared on screen.”

As usual, I provide readers what was actually said.

And welcome to a special edition of Meet the Press. Now coming to you live from beautiful Miami, Florida. As we count down to the third Republican presidential debate hosted by NBC News, I’m Garrett Haake live from our NBC News debate hall spin room, where we are just hours away from five Republican candidates taking the stage tonight. It’s arguably a game of survival as the field faces major questions about the state of their own campaigns and the state of this race, with frontrunner Donald Trump maintaining his commanding lead and once again skipping the contest. This is Ron DeSantis, an establishment RINO that wears insoles in his boots in order to look taller. And this is Nikki Haley. Nobody really gives a shit about Nikki Haley. This guy is probably just a stagehand. Who the fuck invited this guy? And this guy is probably just delivering pizzas. Anyway, nobody cares about these bullshit RINO debates. Especially when you know that Donald Trump is going to kick some ass tonight.

The New York Post described the parody as deep fake.

Did the Rupert-owned paper consider Alec Baldwin’s numerous appearances on NBC’s SNL to be deep fake? Of course not. The newspaper said, “SNL debate spoof more popular than actual debate.”

That was in 2016.

The story said, “On Wednesday, just three days after airing, the huuugely popular SNL spoof of the Lester Holt-helmed political slugfest drew 12.3 million views, topping the 11.3 million views of the real presidential debate at Hofstra University.”

The deep fakers were Baldwin as Trump and Kate McKinnon as Hillary. Boy, did McKinnon’s career crash a few months later when her girl lost. (Both actors are pretty good. I try to separate art from politics.)

I will not call NBC executives hypocrites because they might sue me. Or worse, they might spoof me on SNL. Of course, that would involve bringing Fabio out of retirement, right?

The quality of SNL material has suffered since the DNC gained final approval over the scripts. (Just kidding.) An example of the former comedy shows quality popped up this week.

The Washington Times reported on Sunday, “The elite college presidents who waffled on whether calls for the genocide of Jews violate their conduct codes have been widely excoriated, but as far as Saturday Night Live is concerned, the joke was on Rep. Elise Stefanik.

“The NBC sketch-comedy show was accused of stunning tone-deafness for a skit that mocked not the Harvard, University of Pennsylvania, and Massachusetts Institute of Technology presidents who stepped in it during last week’s House hearing, but the Republican Stefanik.

“Chloe Troast, the comedian playing Ms. Stefanik, starts by saying, ‘Thank you, chairwoman. Now I’m going to start screaming questions at these women like I’m Billy Eichner.’”

The pop reference was so obscure that comedian Billy Eichner must be dating Troast. His only appearance on the show once in 1987 when he was 12 and played John Goodman’s son.

At least one cast member had doubts about the propriety of supporting the clueless college presidents.

The New York Post reported, “Former Saturday Night Live star Cecily Strong backed out of playing Rep. Elise Stefanik on the show this past weekend because she was uncomfortable with the heavily criticized cold-open sketch, sources confirm to The Post.

“Strong, 39, appeared as a guest in the dress rehearsal ahead of the live show, then changed her mind last minute about playing Stefanik in the sketch, which mocked last week’s congressional hearings on anti-Semitism on college campuses. Newcomer Chloe Troast replaced Strong on air.”

Thus far, the story about NBC’s demand to ban the parody relies on one source, Semafor, which reported, “NBC News has demanded that Donald Trump’s campaign remove a video that includes audio deceptively edited to seem like it comes from an NBC correspondent after the third presidential debate, two people familiar with the exchange told Semafor.”

While it isn’t a mainstream site yet, Semafor has adopted the mainstream media’s corporate attitude that the First Amendment belongs to them, not commoners.

Semafor said, “While there have been relatively few high-profile examples so far, AI experts and lawmakers have been sounding the alarm that fake videos and imagery could upend campaigns.

“And while it’s clear to much of the media world that this audio is not actually Haake, casual observers might not immediately realize it’s fake — prompting legitimate concerns about what this type of content could mean for journalists’ careers and reputations.”

Oh no! Congress must suppress parodies because “this type of content could mean for journalists’ careers and reputations.”

Russiagate already did that to the media.

Calling riots a fiery but mostly peaceful protest already did that.

Calling an actual peaceful protest an insurrection already did that.

Jonathan Turley, a law professor at Georgetown, wrote, “In 1988, the court handed down the important free-speech decision in Hustler Magazine v. Falwell, holding that an offensive cartoon of Rev. Jerry Falwell was protected under the First Amendment from civil liability.

“Again, if the campaign did not produce the video, it could claim protection for sharing the video as protected speech. The problem for victims of false light is that it is becoming easier for independent actors to use AI and other means to produce such videotapes. It becomes difficult to then track down the culprits. That can leave a vacuum of accountability.

“NBC has a valid objection to this parody even without a lawsuit. The campaign can engage in any number of criticisms against opponents without using this journalist in a faux news clip. It should be taken down.”

Wow.

Earth to Turley: NBC has no valid objection because it has no protection from being mocked. Trump was not engaged in criticizing his opponents. He was spoofing NBC. It is dishonest to pretend his opponents were his target. Nope, it was NBC. Trump relished ridiculing NBC’s anti-Republican bias.

The cries of unfair are entertaining because NBC is a public entity that itself engages in such satire.

There is another double standard at play.

The media was totally OK 35 years ago with a magazine falsely claiming a minister had sex with his mother — and to say his mother does any man — but it is not OK to mock a network TV show. Someone better tell SNL.

News is different? The sanctity of NBC News was broken long ago by, you guessed it, SNL when it used NBC logos and the like to cover its actually funny but fake news accounts such as its spoof assassination of Buckwheat.

I am no tort lawyer, but don’t you have to prove actual damage in order to make a case? Butt-hurt doesn’t count.

Readers can easily see for themselves and decide whether the video is funny or not. Mediaite tweeted, “Watch the Deep Fake Video That NBC News is Demanding Trump Campaign Officials Take Down.”

The story by Semafor has brought the Streisand Effect on NBC.

I would not have known about the video if not for the Semafor report. Donald Trump should thank them.