Less than week after fearmongering that if states stop participating in Secured Communities -- a federal deportation program begun under the Bush administration that may result in serial killers being on the loose -- Fox News was back at it, attacking states for not participating in the program.

On Fox News' America's Newsroom, Fox News correspondent William La Jeunesse claimed that states opting out of the Secure Communities program is "mutiny" and is "undermining" current federal policy "and the rule of law" at the behest of "the Latino lobby." La Jeunesse's report then got really muddled. While showing a graphic, he falsely asserted that immigrants identified by the Secured Communities program either "had existing criminal convictions" or were "typically arrested for misdemeanors."

LA JEUNESSE: Secured Communities -- the program is a cornerstone of the president's immigration policy, which says, for illegals here, you work hard, you keep your nose clean, you get to stay. You break the law, you go home. But now the Latino lobby is pushing back. And this mutiny by states like Illinois, New York, Massachusetts are undermining that policy and the rule of law.

Now under the program, a criminal's fingerprints are run, not just with the FBI, but also DHS. DHS ran about 8 million fingerprints. Some 500,000 of those were immigrants, mostly illegals. About 200,000 were scheduled to be deported. About three-quarters had existing criminal convictions from murder to shoplifting. The rest arrested for misdemeanors like driving without a license. Now it is this group, the final group that some are -- some states that is -- are refusing to turn over to the feds even though supporters say even non-felons can be dangerous.

In fact, as La Jeunesse himself acknowledged later in the report, 70 percent of undocumented immigrants processed through the Secure Communities program had been convicted of a crime -- whether a misdemeanor or a felony, meaning that 30 percent were not convicted of any crime.

Read the full entry ...

Yesterday, Jim Hoft put up a post on his Right Network blog announcing that he would be leaving the site to start a new "Gateway Pundit Blog" at thegatewaypundit.com. In typical Hoft fashion, he managed to botch the announcement:

It wouldn't appear to make sense for Right Network  to get rid of Hoft, since he seemingly has been a traffic boon for them. Still, Hoft's popularity remains an ongoing source of bewilderment. Despite regularly concocting phony stories and botching facts, Hoft remains a wildly popular and influential conservative blogger.

Similar to his time writing for FirstThings.com, Hoft's tenure at Right Network was marked by an almost remarkable capacity for failure. Here's a brief recap of three of his worst moments.

Read the full entry ...

Americans for Prosperity Foundation, a conservative advocacy group chaired by oil tycoon David Koch, has launched a media campaign to take advantage of high gasoline prices. Polls indicate that most Americans don't blame Barack Obama for the recent spike in gas prices and AFP wants to change that.

But journalists covering AFP's "Running on Empty" campaign, which pins current gas prices on Obama's drilling policies, should point out that AFP's claim is not based in reality, as numerous energy economists, including those who disagree with Obama's policies, have explained.

The global oil market is simply too large for small declines in U.S. production to have noticeably moved our gas prices. It's kind of like blaming your bankruptcy on the fact that grandma didn't give you the $25 birthday check this year.

A recent Ohio State University study concluded that reporters who shirk their duty to referee factual claims in political debates are doing their audiences a disservice. From an OSU press release on the study:

The study found that people are more likely to doubt their own ability to determine the truth in politics after reading an article that simply lists competing claims without offering any idea of which side is right.

Any media outlet that reports AFP's accusations without noting that they are widely rejected by energy experts is contributing to AFP's campaign and perpetuating the misconception that Americans could somehow escape the price volatility of the oil market if only the government would fast track drilling permits.

If it seems that news coverage of the government's decision to raise the debt ceiling this year goes far beyond previous coverage when the debt ceiling was raised, that’s because it has.  And if it seems that the conservative movement has been able to force the media to pay attention to precisely what they want them to (i.e. the debt ceiling), that’s because conservatives have.   

The fact is, the press is suffering from “debt” overload, and conservatives are likely quite pleased.

After all, it was the Tea Party that embraced the radical idea of the U.S. defaulting on its debt, and catapulted the once-obscure fiscal issue to media superstardom, with news outlets now drowning consumers with “debt ceiling” coverage. 

But here’s the thing: The government previously raised the debt ceiling in 2002, 2003, 2004, 2006, 2007, and twice in 2008. And in each of those years Beltway journalists covered the issue rather modestly. But in 2011, the topic has become one of the most-covered of the year. In 2011, the press is devoting nearly twenty times as time and attention to the issue than it did in previous years.

It’s true there’s more debate and political wrangling over the issue this time around, which means there’s more news to cover. But that still doesn’t explain the off-the-charts saturation the story has received in 2011.

Take a look.

Through just the first five months of 2011, there have been nearly 2,000 U.S. newspaper articles or columns that mention “debt ceiling,” while  on television, for example, CNN has aired 230 segments that have mentioned the topic. That, according to a "federal" “debt ceiling” search on Nexis. 

By comparison, for the entire year of 2008, there were only 136 newspaper mentions and just 22 CNN hits. And that’s how the issue, prior to this year, was generally covered:

-2008: 136 newspaper, 22 CNN

-2007: 91 newspaper, 4 CNN

-2006: 286 newspaper, 11 CNN

-2004: 276 newspaper, 21 CNN

-2003: 222 newspaper, 5 CNN

-2002: 309 newspaper, 15 CNN

Over the last decade, and during years when the debt ceiling was raised, the average number of newspaper mentions was 220, while CNN usually aired 13 reports on the topic.

Yet less than halfway through 2011, the newspaper total is already nine times that average, while the CNN count has increased nearly 20 fold. (If you were to extend the current rate of coverage through the end of the year, the newspaper and CNN increases would be even more substantial.)

As the debt ceiling coverage motors on, it's worth noting that the Beltway press has adopted an entirely new and aggressive standard for covering this story. And yes, it's a story conservatives very much want front and center. 

As the presidential primary race heats up, it's become increasingly clear that the road to the Republican nomination runs through Fox News.

Literally.

Last week, for example, On The Record's Greta Van Susteren hopped aboard Sarah Palin's bus as the former Alaskan governor visited historic American sites as part of her "One Nation" tour. Van Susteren, whose husband advises Palin, devoted the entire first half of her May 31 show to the interview, asking hard-hitting questions like, "So Governor, we're on the bus. Whose idea was this bus?"

In order to keep tabs on Fox's non-stop parade of declared and potential Republican presidential candidates (some of whom, like Palin, still have lucrative Fox contracts), Media Matters is launching a new regular feature. Each week, we'll watch the interviews, crunch the numbers, and tell you what Fox is up to in the presidential campaign.

Read the full entry ...

In a June 7 editorial, The Washington Times stated that Sarah Palin's recent comments about Paul Revere were "correct" and that the "left does not revere history." As Media Matters has noted, experts agree that Palin's account of Paul Revere's ride was "mostly inaccurate."

From the Times editorial, headlined, "The media ride of Sarah Palin; The left does not revere history":

It soon turned out, however, that Mrs. Palin's version of history was correct. While Revere warned the Americans that the British were coming, he also warned the British - not for their benefit - that the Americans were coming. When Revere was detained by British soldiers during his ride, he told them, in his own words, "that their troops had catched aground in passing the River, and that There would be 500 Americans there in a short time, for I had alarmed the Country all the way up." As for the bells and gunshots, David Hackett Fischer - in the 1994 book "Paul Revere's Ride" - quotes a townsman saying that on that night, "repeated gunshots, the beating of drums and the ringing of bells filled the air."

[...]

Tea Partyers and others who look to America's past for inspiration are appealing to the great national narrative that the left has rejected. In essence, we have become two peoples: one with a vision of America as an exceptional country with a heroic history, and another believing the country and its people are burdened by a multitude of original sins and populated by groups who are owed continuing and endless debts because of that corrupt past.

Previously:

Right-Wing Media Try, Fail To Declare Palin Was "Right" On Paul Revere Story

Among the insights found in tonight's Bloomberg Television presentation of "Game Changers," which profiles the billionaire Koch Brothers, is Bloomberg Washington, D.C. Executive Editor Al Hunt's views that Charles and David Koch are very influential, not forthcoming, and "more active than ever." According to Hunt, the Kochs' "philosophical, personal and political agenda" often overlaps with the "corporate agenda" of their "far-flung energy empire."

A sneak preview of highlights from the Bloomberg program, set for 9 p.m. EDT, includes Hunt stating:

At least 300 advertisers have reportedly dropped their ads from Glenn Beck's Fox News program since he called President Obama a "racist" who has a "deep-seated hatred for white people." Here are his June 7 sponsors, in the order they appeared:

• Goldline
• SelectQuote.com
• Lifestyle Lift
• News Corp. (Fox & Friends)
• PlatformBreathe.org
• Loan Modification Help Line
• American Petroleum Institute
• Lear Capital
• International Fellowship of Christians and Jews
• American Petroleum Institute
• News Corp. (The O'Reilly Factor)
• Merit Financial
• TaxMasters
• PCMatic.com
• Easy Water
• News Corp. (Hannity)
• DiscountGoldBrokers.com
• The Meyer Law Firm, P.C.
• Lifestyle Lift
• News Corp. (FX's Rescue Me)
• News Corp. (Hannity And On the Record)
• SelectQuote.com
• Tempur-Pedic
• Rosland Capital
• News Corp. (The Wall Street Journal)
• Legal Zoom
• NovoLog Flexpen
• MyLife.com

Following a series of increasingly hostile public exchanges, Glenn Beck's "transition" off of Fox News was announced back in April. Fox recently confirmed that Beck's final show will take place on June 30.

More than 300 advertisers excluded their ads from Glenn Beck's Fox News program since late July 2009 when he called President Obama a "racist" who has a "deep-seated hatred for white people." Subsequent to news of Beck's departure, The New York Times reported that Fox News saw "the refusal of hundreds Fox advertisers" to place ads on Beck as an issue.

This Friday, Fox News is preempting Beck's 5pm show to air a special focused on political sex scandals hosted by Greta Van Susteren. Deadline has more (emphasis added):

Today, Ann Coulter appeared on ABC's Good Morning America to promote her new book, Demonic. According to the Nexis database, Coulter was last interviewed on Good Morning America in 2009. And with her history of offensive and inflammatory rhetoric, it is disappointing to see that ABC chose to give her a platform to promote her book.

In 2007, Coulter's inflammatory commentary led CNN's Howard Kurtz, host of Reliable Sources, to question why news networks continue to host the conservative author. Kurtz stated: "[S]he can say whatever she wants, but there's no constitutional right to appear on a television show." At the time, Coulter had recently said: "we" Christians "just want Jews to be perfected, as they say."

• Just yesterday, Coulter described the Kent State massacre as "what you do with a mob." She also stated: "The whole country was embarrassed [about Kent State], well I'm not embarrassed."
• In February 2011, Coulter labeled current U.S. President Barack Obama "a crazy Muslim." 
• In February 2011, Coulter also attacked the "INS" for choosing "illiterate Pakistanis" rather than "Swiss scientists" for immigration "because we need more New York City valets." In the same episode of Hannity, Coulter also stated that "liberals have been using one special interest group after another" like "the gays" "for their attacks on the family."
• In November 2009, Coulter advocated for racial profiling stating: "The one thing we won't look at is who is doing this." She then added, terrorists "all look alike. They're all foreign-born...they're all Muslim."
• In October 2009, the conservative author compared Jennings writing the forward of a book to Polanski "anally raping a 13-year-old."
• In August 2009, Coulter stated: "Zeke Emanuel is on my death list."

Read the full entry ...

Judicial Watch president Tom Fitton has taken to the pages of Andrew Breitbart's BigGovernment.com to hype his organization's latest "bombshell" -- a series of mundane emails between FCC Commissioner Michael Copps and media reform organization Free Press regarding the placement of a pro-net neutrality op-ed. As Media Matters has demonstrated, the communications are nothing out of the ordinary. Government officials regularly communicate with outside interest groups and even make arrangements to work with them, like when FCC commissioner Robert M. McDowell gave a speech expressing his opposition to net neutrality at Americans For Prosperity's (AFP) Right Online conference in 2010.

Nevertheless, Fitton and others on the right seem to think they've uncovered a conspiracy of sorts. In his BigGovernment piece, Fitton goes overboard in describing the alleged perfidy his group has discovered, steadily escalating the infraction to something approaching supervillainy:

We recently uncovered documents from the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) that show officials at the FCC colluded with the radical leftist Free Press organization to publicly push a new plan to regulate the Internet under the FCC's so-called "net neutrality" program.

[...]

Judicial Watch uncovered internal correspondence showing unusual coordination by some officials at the FCC and Free Press in pushing the "net neutrality" agenda in the run-up to the controversial FCC vote in December:

[...]

So it should come as no surprise that an organization with socialist ties is driving the net neutrality agenda from inside the Obama administration.  The FCC is supposed to be an independent agency that follows the law.  The American people should be deeply troubled by the fact that the Obama administration, on issue after issue, seems to be run by shadowy leftist organizations. 

Mind you, all that Judicial Watch has "uncovered" are emails discussing the placement of an op-ed, and potential speakers for a FCC conference on net neutrality. From this, Fitton starts at "collusion," moves on to "unusual coordination," and then somehow ends up at the Obama administration being "run by shadowy leftist organizations." How he got there is anyone's guess.

Fox's supposedly "straight news" show, America's Newsroom, did a segment on the U.S. Supreme Court's decision not to hear a challenge to a California law that provides that students who attended California high school for at least three years and meet other requirements are eligible for in-state college tuition.

Anti-illegal immigration activists challenged the law in California courts, asserting that the statute conflicted with federal law because it did not have an exception barring illegal immigrants from receiving in-state tuition. The California Supreme Court upheld the law unanimously. The decision was written by Judge Ming W. Chin, who was appointed by former Republican Governor Pete Wilson (who was a strong supporter of the anti-illegal immigrant Proposition 187), and the opinion was joined by other Wilson appointees.

Anti-immigration activists were not satisfied, so they asked the U.S. Supreme Court to hear the case. The high court refused to hear the case without any justice publicly stating his or her disagreement with the court's action.

Although there is no way to know why the U.S. Supreme Court refused to hear the case, it would only take the votes of four justices (say Chief Justice John Roberts and Associate Justices Antonin Scalia, Clarence Thomas, and Samuel Alito) to hear the case.

Case closed, right?

Not if you're Fox News. America's Newsroom spent a five minute segment hosting Rep. Brian Bilbray (R-CA) to attack the law. In the middle of the segment, the guest co-host of this supposedly "straight news" program, Alisyn Camerota, said to Bilbray: "It seems as though this law is flawed in a few ways." A few minutes later, as the segment was drawing to a close: "Well look, you've obviously made a very compelling case for what is wrong with the law. So why did the Supreme Court then endorse it yesterday?"

Read the full entry ...

The conservative Eagle Publishing is offering advertisers the "unprecedented" chance to sponsor the newsletter of Republican presidential candidate Newt Gingrich.

In the May/June issue of its company brochure, Eagle Publishing writes that "On May 11, Newt Gingrich made his much-anticipated announcement that he will seek the Republican nomination for president. Beyond its political implications, this presents an unprecedented opportunity for advertisers looking to sponsor the Newt Gingrich Letter, the free e-letter published only by Human Events."

Eagle Publishing adds: "With the increased level of media attention Newt will now receive, the Newt Gingrich Letter will draw even more engaged conservatives looking to keep up with the candidates. Sponsorship of the Newt Gingrich Letter is the only opportunity in the conservative marketplace where you can directly align your brand with a presidential candidate. Get in on the action now before slots sell out!"

From the brochure:

Read the full entry ...

In an editorial assailing light bulb efficiency standards signed into law by George W. Bush, the Wall Street Journal claims that "we will all be required to buy compact fluorescent lights, or CFLs." The Journal adds:

The question an (allegedly) free society should ask is if CFL bulbs are so clearly superior, why does the government have to force people to buy them?

But just last week the Wall Street Journal's own Gwendolyn Bounds reported that, contrary to the editorial's claim, consumers will not be limited in their choices to CFLs:

Initially, consumers will find three main alternatives to incandescent bulbs on shelves: halogen-incandescent, compact fluorescent (CFL) and light-emitting diodes (LED). Many are designed similarly to the familiar pear-shaped "A-Line" bulb consumers know. Halogens behave most like existing bulbs, but have an inner capsule filled with halogen gas around a filament to make the bulb about 25% more efficient than a traditional incandescent. They're also the cheapest alternative at less than $2 each.

"It's essentially a souped-up incandescent bulb," says Peter Soares, director of marketing for consumer lighting at Philips Electronics North America.

The Journal's own reporting establishes that the editorial board needs to issue a correction for falsely telling readers that they will be able to purchase only CFL bulbs after the new standards take effect.

Read the full entry ...

On June 1, 2011, Fox News released its official iPad application. The application is free for download and is currently financially supported by a sole sponsor, ExxonMobil.

Mashable's Ben Parr, who spoke with Jeremy Steinberg, Fox News VP of digital media ad sales and business development, provides some additional information:

Users will also notice something else about the app: the prominent placement of ExxonMobil advertising throughout the app. Exxon is the exclusive launch partner for Fox News's iPad app. "We decided we wanted to work with one sponsor," Steinberg said, explaining that there are always question marks surrounding a launch, so Fox News wanted a partner comfortable with that. He said Exxon, which is in the midst of a new branding campaign, thought the app was a perfect platform for broadcasting its message.

Given Fox News' long history of deliberately propagating climate science misinformation, it's fitting that Exxon reportedly believes Fox's new app provides a perfect platform for disseminating its message.

Previously:

REPORT: Opponents of EPA Climate Action Dominate TV News Airwaves

When they're not busy taking up the fight against labor unions or healthy eating, one of Fox's favorite battles is its War on Education. Fox News, like the rest of the right-wing media, is relentless in pushing stories that openly bash teachers and schools; their favorites are phony stories about supposed "indoctrination" or "liberal bias" in public schools.

Today they took a slightly different approach, however, and attacked Texas teachers for asking for a "bailout." Fox & Friends co-host Steve Doocy teased the story this way on today's broadcast:

DOOCY: Coming up next on the rundown, teachers saying no fair over budget cuts. Now, the teachers are demanding a bailout of their own. Of course.

Co-host Brian Kilmeade reported the story by saying:

KILMEADE: Public teachers in Texas angry over budget cuts that could lead to layoffs and furloughs. Well, teachers unions chanted "shame" inside the Capitol rotunda. They want lawmakers to bail out the education budget with a rainy day fund, something GOP lawmakers are against. The Senate needs to slash nearly $4 billion from the budget.

Fox drove home their point with this text, which aired on screen while Kilmeade was speaking:

But teachers aren't asking for a "bailout" at all. What's actually happening is that the Texas state government is proposing cuts to education, and teachers are fighting the cuts, claiming the government already has the money it claims needs axing.

Read the full entry ...

The following on-screen graphic aired during the June 7 edition of Fox News' America's Newsroom:

Previously:

Why does Fox choose to use loaded term "illegals"?

Special Report's Bret Baier Uses Loaded Term "Illegals"

Special Report Segment Uses "Illegals" Slur

Fox Uses White House Meeting On Immigration Reform To Insult Undocumented Immigrants And Border Security

Glenn Beck doesn't just shape and propagate the GOP party line; now he's feeding talking points to Republican presidential candidates, too. After Beck distorted a speech by Obama, GOP Presidential candidate and former Fox News contributor Rick Santorum repeated Beck's falsehood.

The talking point began its life in an April 13 post on Beck's website, The Blaze, by Beck's co-host Stu Burguiere:

Obama: USA wasn't a great country until 1965.

Not an exact quote, but that's exactly what he's saying here...right?

[...]

So, we would not be a great country without Medicare, Social Security, unemployment, and Medicaid?  Well, we didn't have all of them until 1965. [The Blaze, 4/13/11]

Beck promoted the falsehood on his radio show -- on the same day that he interviewed Santorum over the phone:

The great thing about this president is I learn something new every day. Every single day I learn something about my country that I did not know: for instance, that America was not a great country up until about 1965. [Premiere Radio Networks, The Glenn Beck Program, 4/14/11]

And Santorum repeated the falsehood yesterday while announcing his candidacy for president. From The Associated Press:

SANTORUM: Obama recently discussed "Medicare, Medicaid and unemployment insurance. He said, 'The country is a better country with those programs. I will go one step further,' he said. 'America was not a great country until those programs.' America was a great country before 1965."

THE FACTS: Santorum misquoted Obama's April 13 speech, when the president said: "We contribute to programs like Medicare and Social Security, which guarantee us health care and a measure of basic income after a lifetime of hard work; unemployment insurance, which protects us against unexpected job loss, and Medicaid, which provides care for millions of seniors in nursing homes, poor children and those with disabilities. We are a better country because of these commitments. I'll go further -- we would not be a great country without those commitments."

Santorum neglected to note that Obama included Social Security, a popular program created in 1935. And Obama did not say America "was not a great country" before 1965, the year that ushered in Medicare and Medicaid. He implied the nation would not be great now had it failed to implement the safety-net programs when it did.

Let's see what other Beck-promoted fibs make their way into the race to be President of the United States.

The charge was negligent homicide. 

Incensed by a New York Post "exclusive" last winter about "arrogant" union sanitation workers who purposefully failed to plow local streets in the aftermath of a crippling blizzard in order to protest department budget cuts, some members of the GOP Noise Machine, having whipped themselves into a union-hating frenzy, suggested the worker were actually guilty of criminal misconduct. 

The Post's plow story, which was thoroughly debunked by a just-completed city investigation, and which the right-wing media now remain universally silent about, presents us with a depressing case study of how so-called "conservative journalism" often works today. (And especially how Rupert Murdoch-bankrolled journalism works.) 

As illustrated by the Post's hollow, union bashing "exclusive," as well as by the far-right press' feral hyping of the concocted story, conservative journalism is often nothing more than sloppy propaganda designed to deceive and to inflame partisan passions. It' a nasty brand of misinformation and operates outside any discernible ethical guidelines, which accounts for its fleeting interesting in truthful reporting, as well as its dedicated lack of accountability. 

In the wake of the Anthony Weiner scandal, members of the conservative media are demanding respect for getting the story right. But they're conveniently forgetting about a whole laundry list of previous smear campaigns they peddled and have never apologized for. 

This was the Post's outlandish claim: 

Selfish Sanitation Department bosses from the snow-slammed outer boroughs ordered their drivers to snarl the blizzard cleanup to protest budget cuts — a disastrous move that turned streets into a minefield for emergency-services vehicles, The Post has learned.

…

New York's Strongest used a variety of tactics to drag out the plowing process -- and pad overtime checks -- which included keeping plows slightly higher than the roadways and skipping over streets along their routes, the sources said.

Keep in mind that city investigators have now determined that virtually nothing in the Post’s breathless “exclusive” was accurate.  

In other words, it was a hoax.

Read the full entry ...

Writing today at the National Review Online's The Corner Kevin D. Williamson was critical of organizations, including Media Matters, for highlighting Al Qaeda spokesman Adam Gadahn's recent video instructions to purchase guns at gun shows to use in terror attacks against Americans. From Gadahn's statement:

America is absolutely awash with easily obtainable firearms. You can go down to a gun show at the local convention center and come away with a fully automatic assault rifle, without a background check, and most likely without having to show an identification card. So what are you waiting for?

Mirroring common gun lobby talking points Williamson notes that "fully automatic" guns are highly restricted and regulated. Williamson's account is in fact a highly misleading characterization of the accessibility of fully automatic weapons. The reality is that semi-automatic rifles, such as AK-47s or AR-15s, are widely available and sold at gun shows from private sellers that do not run background checks. Further conversion kits that make these rifles indistinguishable from machine guns are also widely available at gun shows.

Williamson's focus on the availability of fully automatics weapons distracts from the uncontested fact that terrorists could easily use gun shows to bypass background checks as they plot the next Mumbai style terrorist attack.

From Williamson's post:

In his latest statement, Mr. Gadahn repeated the myth that machineguns are widely available to American civilians, and he encouraged his fellow jihadis to hit the gun-show circuit and gear up for an intifada in the United States. When I read that statement, I was certain that it would be repeated as fact by the antigun ideologues and their enablers in the media. [....]

It is not easy for a U.S. civilian to legally possess a "fully automatic assault rifle," or any fully automatic firearm at all. If that civilian is not a federally licensed firearms dealer, owning a fully automatic weapon manufactured after 1986 is categorically illegal; fully automatic weapons that were legally owned and registered with the federal government before 1986 may be transferred to a qualified buyer with the approval of federal and local law-enforcement authorities, a rigorous background check, and, of course, a sign-off from the U.S. Treasury Department: there's a couple hundred bucks in fees and taxes involved. (You may examine the application here.) Selling a fully automatic weapon to an unlicensed party, at a gun show or anywhere else, is a very excellent way to land yourself in prison for a good long while. Mr. Gadahn, and the editors of the New York Daily News, are full of it.

Also writing at The Corner Clifford D. May noted the availability of conversion kits fact in a post responding to Williamson:

That's not correct [Gadhan's assertion regarding the availability of fully automatic weapons], as Kevin makes clear. A fully automatic assault rifle -- or any fully automatic firearm -- is very difficult to acquire due to serious restrictions already in place. But one can, I believe, buy a kit that will enable the conversion of an AK semi-automatic into a fully automatic weapon.

Read the full entry ...