In the propaganda war currently being waged over the Supreme Court, standards are dropping dangerously low:
The private homes of justices are being targeted by protesters. Democratic leaders cheer those protesters on. And President Joe Biden’s White House abdicates any responsibility for urging the most radical to maintain at least a veneer of civility.
But when it comes to what’s become one of the left’s most blatant lies on Supreme Court Justice Amy Coney Barrett, not even the biased “fact-checkers” at The Associated Press could let it go.
Twitter has been buzzing over a quote allegedly taken from Justice Samuel Alito’s draft opinion that would overturn the 1973 Roe v. Wade Supreme Court decision legalizing abortion.
In the liberal telling, the quote is attributed to Barrett and suggests that one reason the outspoken justice has given for her pro-life beliefs is to maintain the “domestic supply of infants.”
A few examples:
I can’t get Amy Coney Barrett’s phrase out of my head…….”domestic supply of infants.”
A lifetime judge on the Supreme Court.
— Mark Stern (@mfstern) May 8, 2022
BREAKING: In a brief re abortion, Supreme court Justices Amy Coney Barrett/Alito’s Draft, said US needs a “domestic supply of infants” to meet needs of parents seeking to adopt — that those who would otherwise abort must be made to carry to term — giving children up for adoption.
— Dr. Jack Brown (@DrGJackBrown) May 7, 2022
The problem here — and it’s a big one for the left– is that the phrase in Alito’s opinion doesn’t come from Barrett at all.
It doesn’t even come from a Supreme Court justice.
Instead, it comes as a footnote on page 34 of Alito’s draft with an unmistakeable attribution to a Centers for Disease Control and Prevention report from 2008: “[N]early 1 million women were seeking to adopt children in 2002 (i.e., they were in demand for a child), whereas the domestic supply of infants relinquished at birth or within the first month of life and available to be adopted had become virtually nonexistent.”
According to the AP’s “fact check,” some social media users are attributing the quote correctly, but many of the most virulent posts “conflated” the footnote with comments Barrett made during oral arguments in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health, the case that’s the subject of Alito’s draft.
During the December arguments (transcript here), Barrett asked why “safe haven laws,” which allow women to give up infants soon after their birth with no questions asked, are not enough to relieve women who don’t want to be mothers from the responsibility of child-rearing.
Granted, that’s a far, far cry from talking about a “domestic infant supply,” but first, credit should go where it’s due:
The AP long ago surrendered even the pretense of being an objective news gathering organization in favor of pushing liberal causes. During the first Obama administration, it introduced something called “accountability journalism,” which amounted to opinion writing by supposed news reporters. (Even the left-leaning Politico could see where that was headed.)
So, even a modicum of fairness in its “fact-checking” should be appreciated.
But it’s safe to say there’s not a whole lot of passion behind the AP’s defense.
First, the piece is headlined “Posts misattribute CDC quote in Supreme Court draft on abortion.” Which makes it sound like the harm is done to some CDC bureaucrat not getting the proper credit for pushing another dry round of statistics out of his hole in the Beltway warren.
The reality is that it’s a lie providing fodder for SCOTUS attackers in an increasingly vicious environment.
Second, the AP doesn’t really explain how an anodyne — and fairly logical — question about “safe haven laws” could have been innocently transmuted into a cold-blooded description of “domestic human supply,” which makes it sound like the pro-life Barrett is interested solely in human beings as a commodity.
Are you surprised the AP corrected a smear directed at Amy Coney Barrett?
The reason for that is that the most likely explanation is not one that an outfit like the AP is likely to propagate.
What’s most likely happening here is another version of the Big Lie. The stories the left tells so often they become part of the cultural fabric – such as Sarah Palin’s alleged “I can see Russia from my house” quote, which was actually said by “Saturday Night Live” actress Tina Fey. (Even the lefties at Snopes acknowledge that.)
This is the kind of distortion of reality pushed by an establishment media and Democratic Party that had no problem pretending Ronald Reagan was senile but refuse to acknowledge President Joe Biden’s painfully obvious cognitive failures.
It’s a political party and establishment media that condone “mostly peaceful” riots that kill Americans and destroy American cities but claim to see an “insurrection” in the Capitol incursion of Jan. 6, 2021.
It’s a cultural movement that sees immutable identity traits in the superficial characteristics of skin color but treats literally innate sexuality as a matter of personal choice — no matter how ludicrous the context is.
Is it any surprise a baseless Twitter smear has been born targeting a Supreme Court justice who’s not only pro-life but a woman to boot?
The Associated Press has been just as much a part of that propaganda war as every other mainstream media outlet – if not more so.
But on this Amy Coney Barrett smear, anyway, not even the AP could let slide.
