Funny, that is not what you said last time....

Kellyanne Conway is currently the Counselor to President Trump.  I find it hard to cry too much for her lately.  She is decrying the media as being biased, liers and out to get the President.  Hmmmm.

In his first appearance before the press, Sean Spicer criticized the "media" for reporting that the bust of Martin Luther King had been removed from the Oval Office.  He used this as proof that the "media" was out to get him.  Here are the facts:

7:21 Zeke Miller tweets that the Churchill bust is back in the Oval Office
7:33 another reporter tweets that the MLK bust is gone, sourced from another reporter - not Miller (there seems to be no "Tweets" from Miller, but he might have said that in a press pool report.)
8:14 Miller tweets that the MLK bust is still there
8:41 Miller tweets that he has confirmed with White house aide that the MLK bust is in the Oval Office.

Now Miller claimed the bust was obscured by a door and a secret service agent.  I did not believe that until I saw this:

Can you see either? 

MLK bust is on the left - Churchill is on the right.  (actually, this might have been taken earlier and the bust on the right might be Lincoln.  The picture above MLK sometimes shows the Statue of Liberty.)

Now this is sloppy reporting if they noticed that the  Churchill bust was there and did not ask the aide if the MLK bust had been replaced.  But if Miller thought he saw it with his own eyes, then he would not have asked.  So let's assume he was looking for a gotcha moment and screwed up, then apologized.

Let's compare this to:

On Wednesday November 2, 2016, FOX News anchor Bret Baier announced that according to unnamed sources, the FBI was investigating Hillary Clinton which “will continue to likely an indictment.”

This was picked up by then Candidate Trump and blasted out over many conservative websites.

This was amplified on November 3, even while other news outlets were debunking the claim.  Even Baier himself walked back the claim on Thursday but that did not stop people on Friday from repeating the claim, 48 hours later.

Baier even apologized. - even though he did not fully back down.

How does this relate to Ms Conway?

“The damage is done to Hillary Clinton,” Trump campaign manager Kellyanne Conway told MSNBC’s Brian Williams on Friday.  (11/3)

Funny, this was 24 hours, not 2 before a correction was made.  There was no apology to Ms Clinton by Brett Baier as was demanded by Sean Spicer from Zeke Miller to Donald Trump.  In fact Ms Conway doubled down and stood by the report even after it had been walked back.  There was no backing down by candidate Trump, he doubled down also.

For President Trump, Ms Conway or Sean Spicer, to express outrage at bad reporting is the ultimate in hypocrisy, seeing as "Alternative Facts" such as the FOX News report, helped him win the election - but they saw nothing wrong with it.

1/30/2017


Sources:
http://www.snopes.com/mlk-bust-oval-office/
http://morninganswerchicago.com/2017/01/21/reporters-jump-chance-report-fake-news-mlk-bust-removed-oval-office/
http://mediamatters.org/blog/2016/11/03/bret-baier-serving-mouthpiece-unknown-sources-fbi-stories/214269
http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/trumps-claims-evidence-fbis-clinton-foundation-probe-impressive/story?id=43282736
http://nymag.com/daily/intelligencer/2016/11/conway-on-fox-clinton-indictment-story-the-damage-is-done.html
http://www.msnbc.com/11th-hour-with-Brian-Williams (