(ANTIMEDIA) United States — Irate voters across the U.S. joined in a collective scream of condemnation unceasing since Monday night, after the Associated Press crowned Hillary Clinton the presumptive Democratic nominee before California even opened polls for today’s primary. But this abrupt declaration by one of the world’s most powerful mainstream outlets simply marks the logical conclusion of an unfaltering campaign by establishment Democrats — and their corporate, lapdog press — to install Clinton back in her previous address at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue.
Considering the heft of telling evidence throughout the election season, the AP’s announcement — infuriating though it may be to Sanders’ supporters — cannot reasonably be called surprising on any level.
Indeed, if anyone in America still required proof corporate media couldn’t tell the truth from a hole in the wall, this devoid-of-all-journalistic-integrity reporting should handily suffice. Well after 8pm on the East Coast, the AP claimed:
“Hillary Clinton has commitments from the number of delegates needed to become the Democratic Party’s presumptive nominee for President, and will be the first woman to top the ticket of a major U.S. political party.”
The irresponsibility didn’t end with a simple announcement, however, as the outlet further cited an undisclosed survey of unnamed superdelegates — neither of which could possibly be verified — which inexplicably but decisively found support for Clinton sufficient to declare she’d captured the nomination. In perfect lockstep, a waterfall of additional mainstream outlets blindly parroted Hillary’s all-but-official nomination.
Interestingly enough, just prior to publishing this article, journalist Shaun King posted an image to Facebook of an email from AP Washington Bureau reporter, Alan Fram, which King claims was passed to him by an unnamed congressional staffer. Its partially redacted subject line reads, “presidential preference.” Though recipients have also been redacted, the document states, simply:
“[REDACTED] you reachable briefly re above? We’re rounding up superdelegates.”
In perfect lockstep, a waterfall of additional mainstream outlets blindly parroted Hillary’s all-but-official nomination.
Of course, throughout the entire season of primaries and caucuses, corporate so-called news outlets have repeatedly included superdelegate counts when declaring Clinton’s various wins — despite the fact superdelegates aren’t beholden to any candidate until the Democratic National Convention in July. This allowed a running narrative downplaying not only Sanders’ victories, but the remarkable level of support he managed to accrue.
Most notably, that blatant disregard for the true outcome of a primary surrounded events in Wyoming, where in spite of Sanders’ win by a 12 percent margin, Hillary declared victory via press reporting of her support from superdelegates.
Major outlets — including the AP, New York Times, and others — have staff known to be large donors to Clinton’s campaign, making enormously establishment-biased reporting not only commonplace, but de rigueur.
Whatever degree corporate media may be to blame for its unrelenting gushing over Clinton, an arguably more forceful vehicle commands a share of responsibility: Google.
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“Google is directly engaged with Hillary Clinton’s campaign,” whistleblower Julian Assange reportedly asserted. And while verifying Assange’s exact words might be a difficult task without video, a second report showing what appears to be evidence the search engine has been doing precisely that, could act as relative proof.
On Saturday, a report by Search Engine Land produced evidence inputting the search term “crooked Hillary” requires a remarkable effort. Google’s autocomplete function allows users to input just part of a specific word before an algorithm ostensibly offers suggestions for what might be the subject of that search. But attempting to search for the aforementioned, a user not only must write out the entire phrase, but Google’s autocomplete arbitrarily adds “bernie” on the end.
Anyone attempting to investigate numerous allegations against Hillary Clinton by entering “crooked hillary,” in other words, must jump through, albeit minimal, hoops to do so — whereas a search just for the AP’s presumptive nominee’s name, alone, will immediately be completed by the feature. Google shrugged off Search Engine Land’s suspicions by attributing the lack of completion to lack of user searches, but considering Assange’s damning statement, the doubts appear warranted.
But even with everything noted here so far, what Hillary Clinton’s media shills might have actually accomplished with their vociferous support and equally bold announcement of her presumptive nomination is the ultimate decimation of the party putatively held so dear.
A furious backlash over the AP’s announcement inflamed an already growing conflagration of resentment and division. In fact, such haughty loyalty by corporate media and establishment politicians drove an enormous wedge in so deep in the Democratic Party, the declaration of Clinton as the presumptive nominee for all intents and purposes killed any hopes they harbored of aligning Sanders’ supporters behind her at the DNC.
By consistently, egoistically ignoring vast swaths of voters who have unwaveringly supported the senator from Vermont, the corporate media’s keystone outlet probably — ultimately — just destroyed any shred of unity left.
Though such an article would ordinarily conclude with a generic ‘Guess we’ll have to see what happens at the convention,’ the Associated Press would rather tell you, itself — Democrats, meet your 2016 Presidential nominee, Hillary Clinton.
This article (Read This If the Media’s Sudden Crowning of Clinton Surprised You) is free and open source. You have permission to republish this article under a Creative Commons license with attribution to Claire Bernish and theAntiMedia.org. Anti-Media Radio airs weeknights at 11pm Eastern/8pm Pacific. If you spot a typo, email edits@theantimedia.org.