Conservatives : Reinventing History One Site At A Time

Back in May I wrote about the Conservative YouTube called QubeTV, today I bring you Conservapedia.

We all know about Townhall.Com and other "mainstream" Conservative publications and their blatant attempts to insert bigotry into our national dialogue and we know about their shameless and false reconstruction of history and current events.

We already knew that Conservatives couldn't cut it at YouTube, and now we also know they can't hang at Wikipedia either.

Conservapedia, what an interesting concept... Do we need a Leftapedia now so we can keep up with the constant flow of disinformation streaming out of Conservapedia?

Let's look at Conservapedia's entry on George W. Bush.

Economy :

"Though the liberal media continues to disparage Bush's handling of the economy, they often neglect to report the many aspects of the economy that Bush has improved. For example, during his term Exxon Mobil has posted the largest profit of any company in a single year, and executive salaries have greatly increased as well." Emphasis is mine.

If you read between the lines you can see the Plutocrat that lies deep within all Conservatives.

These Conservatives are failing to see that to the majority of the country witnessing Exxon Mobile making huge profits while we suffer at the gas pump is not a good thing, it is something we view as very, very bad.

The majority of the American people who are just hard working people with families do not see CEO's getting 300 million dollar bonuses while we pay record high gas prices as something positive!

Furthermore we are even more disgusted that these high oil prices are blamed on a lack of refineries which the oil companies refuse to build, instead giving their executives outrageous bonuses.

Sorry Conservapedia, we do not see getting raped at the pump as a positive improvement and this so called entry about the economy shows how out of touch the Conservatives are with the American public.

So how accurate is Conservapedia?

Let's look at the "Family" section for GW Bush :

"George W. Bush is the son of George H. W. Bush, who served as vice-president from 1981 to 1989 and as president from 1989 to 1993.

George W. Bush is a member of the United Methodist Church, and many people feel that George W. Bush's faith is sincere and profound. The Faith of George W. Bush, a non-political book by author Stephen Strang, made the New York Times best-sellers list."

So Conservapedia doesn't even bother to mention Bush's daughters or his wife in the "Family" section? Is this supposed to be some sort of ultimate proof that Conservatives view woman as worthless?

If sexism is not the reason the President's daughters and wife are not mentioned in the "Family" section of the George W. Bush entry in Conservapedia then sloppiness and disregard for accuracy must be the answer. Quite a slapdash entry considering that you are writing a small bio for the current President of the United States...

Instead of mentioning the President's daughters and wife in his "Family" section Conservapedia finds it more important to discuss how "profound" Bush's faith is, according to some guy who is trying to sell a book.

Conservapedia also claims that "the anti-War movement was defeated" because Democrats were unable to pass a bill that included a withdrawal date.

What Conservapedia fails to mention is that President Bush vetoed two bills presented by Democrats that included timetables. Conservapedia also fails to observe that the antiwar movement has not been defeated, in reality public disapproval with it is at an all time high.

Comparing Conservapedia to Wikipedia is a joke.

Conservapedia's entry for the President is only 7 paragraphs long and offers zero insight into the life or career of George W. Bush.

Wikipedia's entry for the President on the other hand is at least 65 paragraphs long and offers information from his early life including controversies and it doesn't fail to mention his wife and daughters by name.

The bigger point of my post is that Conservatives are desperately and actively seeking to present an alternative to the truth (right wing domination of the radio, QubeTV, Conservapedia) that they are shameless in disseminating.

This brand of Conservatives disregard the facts that they find inconvenient to their narrative. It started with FOX and the right wing radio shows that dominate the air, now they are developing web platform which we need to be constantly aware of.

Conservatives always claim to set up these enterprises only in order to counter the "Liberal bias" that they see in everything imaginable- but the only thing I can really find "Liberal" about YouTube or Wikipedia is the fact that they are free and everyone is allowed to come in and only a rowdy few get kicked out.

When examining Conservapedia I am astounded at the lack of factual information. Only 7 paragraphs are offered on the current President and torture isn't even mentioned once. Warrantless wiretapping? Nope. Alberto Gonzales? Yeah, right...

But wait - Conservapedia's entry for Bill Clinton is 28 paragraphs long. Conservapedia offers some insight on their enemies, it's just their hero's they don't want you to know anything about.

But compare Conservapedia's 28 papragraphs to Wikipedia's 80 paragraphs for Bill Clinton and we can see that Conservapedia is light on the facts compared to Wikipedia, no matter what the subject is.

For Conservapedia and other Conservative media it is not about preserving the facts and the truth of the subject matter, it is about spinning the truth until it becomes favorable to Conservatives, no matter how many facts it omits and how many pretzel like contortions it has to make in order to do so.