XPost: alt.politics.usa.constitution, alt.politics.guns, alt.california   
   XPost: sac.general   
   From: gp@dont-email.me   
      
   The past few months have left gun owners enraged about how   
   frequently and casually they’re villainized.   
   Dallas, Texas — A video shown twice before the main speeches at   
   the NRA’s annual meeting mocked CNN’s “this is an apple”   
   commercial.   
      
   “This is a lemon,” the announcer declared. (It is unlikely that   
   it is a coincidence that the choice of produce is the surname of   
   a CNN anchor.) “Yes, some people might try to tell you that this   
   is a journalist. They might even scream ‘journalist,’   
   ‘journalist,’ ‘journalist,’ over and over again. They might put   
   journalists in all-caps . . . but this is a lemon.” The joke   
   worked on three levels, and the gathered gun owners chuckled   
   throughout. In a subsequent video, NRATV host and former U.S.   
   Secret Service agent Dan Bongino silently made lemonade out of   
   some lemons, generating another round of laughter. “When they   
   give you lemons, we give you the truth,” the video promises.   
      
   It’s unsurprising that the national news media would be a   
   frequent and favorite target of the speakers at the NRA’s annual   
   meeting — particularly the regular critics of media such as   
   Chris Cox, Wayne LaPierre, and Donald Trump. But even the   
   comparatively buttoned-down Vice President Mike Pence spoke at   
   length about his objections to the mass media’s coverage of   
   firearms and those who own them.   
      
   “The media are working an agenda that is very different from   
   most of us in this room,” Pence said. “They won’t tell the whole   
   story of firearms in America. They focus on the tragedies and   
   heartbreak — and well they should — but many in the national   
   media ignore when well-trained, law-abiding gun owners save   
   lives. It’s the truth.” Pence spoke of armed citizens who   
   intervened and prevented tragedies at an Atlanta party, a   
   Philadelphia barber shop, and on a Chicago street.   
      
   “I’m calling on the national media to start telling the whole   
   story to the American people about firearms,” Pence said to   
   applause. “It’s time the national media gave as much attention   
   to our heroes as much as they give to our villains.”   
      
   Criticism of the media has always been a theme of the speeches   
   at the NRA’s gathering, but this year felt like it could easily   
   have been co-produced by L. Brent Bozell’s Media Research Center.   
      
   Even by the standards of the never-smooth relationship between   
   the NRA and the national media, the past few months have left   
   gun owners enraged about how frequently and casually they’re   
   villainized, and how openly gun-control advocates have been   
   exalted. Much of this change in the media’s coverage of gun   
   rights stemmed from the emergence of pro-gun-control students   
   who survived the Parkland shooting.   
      
   CNN was always a favorite target of speakers at NRA events, but   
   its recent coverage added fuel to the fire. The prime-time “town   
   hall meeting” CNN put on just days after the shooting   
   represented a particularly embarrassing hour for the network, in   
   which the furious demonization of NRATV Dana Loesch went   
   unchecked while Broward County Sheriff Scott Israel — whose   
   department handled the situation about as badly as is imaginable   
   — was given the stage to lecture Loesch: “You are not standing   
   up for [these students] until you say, ‘I want less weapons.’”   
   It was shameless and deft responsibility-shifting on the   
   sheriff’s part, and CNN let it go unchallenged. (After several   
   days, in perhaps the journalistic equivalent of a referee’s make-   
   up call, CNN subjected Israel to more critical coverage and much   
   tougher interviews.)   
      
   The emergence of the Parkland students provided the national   
   media with what was ostensibly an emotional human-interest story   
   — here’s a young student who’s endured a terrifying event,   
   listen to how that experience affected him — and it quickly   
   turned into an opportunity for scathing, often unfair criticisms   
   of gun owners and the NRA. David Hogg quickly became a go-to   
   source for comments that programs, magazines, and newspapers   
   would never print or broadcast in other contexts. In one   
   particularly angry interview, Hogg called the NRA, “pathetic   
   f***ers that want to keep killing our children,” and claimed GOP   
   lawmakers “could have blood from children splattered all over   
   their faces and they wouldn’t take action, because they all   
   still see these dollar signs.”   
      
   For better or worse, CNN’s media reporter, Brian Stelter,   
   admitted in a late March interview with S. E. Cupp that he   
   simply couldn’t bring himself to correct David Hogg when he   
   appeared on Stelter’s program.   
      
   “There were a few times I wanted to jump in and say, ‘Let’s   
   correct that fact.’ And at one of the times I did and other   
      
   [continued in next message]   
      
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