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May 28, 2022

Joaquin Castro and the bluechecks outclown one another for a Twitter hoaxster

By Monica Showalter

Joaquin Castro, keystone cop of wokester lefties who famously doxxed his own donors, got sucked into a hoax from a Twitter bozo claiming to be a member of a Uvalde massacre victim's family, who was followed home by members of Texas governor Greg Abbott's team and demanded that they pose in backdrop pictures on behalf of Abbott or they would be prosecuted.

I took a screen shot of the exchange when I saw it:

It was fake as heck and easily blown apart as a hoax by journalists Andy Ngo (who famously has exposed Antifa) and Yashir Ali (a lefty, but an honest one).

Turns out the asshat who put out the fake tweet was known to Ngo as a 43-year old white man based in Spokane, Washington, who habitually put out fake news takes after mass tragedies as some kind of victim or other, and then watched the flies gather to what flies gather to, again and again.  In various hoaxes, Jason R. Nauertz claimed to be black, a former prisoner of war, had a "nephew" shot by a sheriff, was a 9/11 first responder, and was a Purple Heart recipient.  According to Fox News, he "also boasted about shooting at cars with a Trump flag, among other anti-Trump posts."  This time, he was a Uvalde victim's "uncle," supposedly harassed by the dreadful political goons of Texas governor Greg Abbott.

Castro, who's a congressman representing San Antonio, Texas, was the first to swallow the bait — hook, line, and sinker — making a fool of himself yet again.  He's significant because he's an elected official and presumably could exert some kind of power based on that lie.  His tweet to the hoaxster drew 26,000 "likes."

But he was far from the only one.  Other lefties jumped aboard and spread the trash around, offering to be the heroes of the invented "narrative."  The hoax tweet got 74,000 "likes" and 31,000 retweets.

According to Ngo and Fox News, these included huge portions of the press, with Keith Olbermann the easiest easy mark. 

"The nightmare continues. The DOJ needs to prosecute the office of Texas Governor @GregAbbott_TX for malfeasance and intimidation. Read this thread. I'm speechless," Olbermann tweeted. 

After it was exposed as a hoax and Olbermann apologized, Fox News Digital asked him for comment, and "Olbermann responded with an obscenity for Fox's viewers and employees."

Fox reported that the Austin Chronicle's culture editor, Richard Whittaker, bought the hoax and tried to flag Joe Strauss, a former speaker of the Texas House of Representatives, trying to get some political action going.

Los Angeles Times columnist Patt Morrison, who's won multiple Pulitzer prizes, was drawn in, too, eventually deleting her tweet.  CBS46's Own Ron Burgundy news anchor, Shon Gables, jumped in, as did USAToday digital producer Brandon Gray.  So did Entertainment Weekly digital editor Yolando Machado, who tweeted that Abbott was "a murderer," and bubble-headed WFAA weekend anchor and senior reporter Teresa Woodard.  Katie Hall, who's chair of the Austin News Guild and who reports for the Austin American Statesman, jumped in, too.  Ngo pointed out that Amy Siskind, a sort of left-wing activist-journalist, was in, as was Eleanor Dearman of the Fort Worth Star-Telegram.  Bluecheck Chester M. Pitts II called the matter "abhorrent."

According to Fox, "Nearly every single tweet mentioned above has been deleted."

Yet Ngo and Ali are the supposedly marginal journalists, often disparaged by the bluechecks, while these journalists are squarely in the supposedly even-tempered mainstream.

Well.

Meanwhile, Hollywood denizens were there to cheerlead, too, such as actress Rosanna Arquette, who praised Nauertz for his "courage."

What it shows is that hate-filled Democrats are easy marks for charlatans who get their jollies in promoting phony news stories and who gladly spread these phony stories.

It's fun to laugh at these fools, but the problem is that phony stories are often believed by large portions of the public, particularly if they hear a supposedly credible news source or a congressman, promote them.  They never get to hear the correction and the sheepish tweet deletes that come afterward.  Yet they suffer no loss in credibility, none whatsoever.

All this serves the aims of the Democrats, so naturally, it continues.  Nauertz's Twitter site has apparently been suspended for embarrassing Democrats or perhaps shut down, but the other hoaxes were there, unimpeded, well before this episode.

And word of how easy Democrats are as marks has gotten around.  Ngo points out that other hoaxes have formed in the wake of Uvalde.  He exposed this one:

Nauretz is a clown.  But the bigger clowns are those who are most willing to believe him.  Why are they willing to believe?  To buy the story unquestioningly without so much as minimally checking even with a left-leaning source such as Ali?

It's because they are so malevolent to start with, so desperate to destroy Republicans or President Trump or Texas's governor, Greg Abbott.  The hoaxsters can see this, and, liking attention, they move on in.

A look through Castro's other tweets that have followed this farce show a mind that has remained rabidly focused on Getting Abbott, getting Republicans.  We have already seen how Democrats have fallen over themselves in a desperate bid to politicize the tragedy in Uvalde through speeches and congressional sessions — from Beto O'Rourke's shouting stunt to Joe Biden's yell for gun control.  Hoaxsters know that Democrats like to exploit tragedy for political gain and jump quickly to it.

It sure as heck doesn't stop Castro from jumping into every hoax and unverified story he can find to make political hay for himself.  Sure enough, he was the first into the pit.

Image: Twitter screen shot.

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