Institutional Catholic corruption in some media claims?

Let's start examining evidence, like detectives in my police-beat days

A lesson here for writers and others involved in producing for media. And for those who consume media when “fake news” can rule the day if the powerful decide so.

Even 17 years ago, the president of a small southern California college noted to me in an interview how the media landscape had changed. His students learned filmmaking and running the business enterprises that would support them. No longer did they have to knock at the doors of big studios in Hollywood in hopes of getting some attention, he said. They’d produce entertainment on their own at the school then put it on the Internet to go around the world instantly. Maybe they’d score.

In pretty much the same way, people involved in the news business a few decades ago knew that “The Seven” could make or break a story nationally — The New York Times, The Washington Post, Time and Newsweek, ABC, CBS, NBC. But no longer. They’re not irrelevant today, but they’re no longer the gatekeepers in the age of general Internet access.

Substack allows writers to go right before the public. Which can be vital when some gatekeeper stands in the way of us lesser mortals.

With this article, I’m beginning an examination that I hope benefits other writers, and also readers, dependent on navigating the publishing world. The shocks began nearly five full years ago, in late April 2017. Months turned into years. In late 2021 I gained a confidential legal settlement, so when I use the word “defamation” against me, it’s not an accusation, it’s the conclusion in a settlement.

Let’s begin with the evidence, then we’ll look into what followed. Be like detectives arriving on the scene, who start taking measurements and interviewing witnesses behind their yellow tape. I once worked a bit as a weekend police reporter and recall, for instance, arriving at a liquor store after 1 a.m. where the clerk had been shot through the drive-up window, or when an unfortunate nighttime pedestrian lay under a blanket in the street.

As a writer, I web-search my name regularly to see where I may pop up. In late April 2017 I was surprised to see a comment online that I had likened U.S. Sen. John McCain to “a mad scientist.” I managed to see a few other false claims, too. What was this? A blog? An ebook? It turned out to be an actual hardcopy book first published in late 2016 by Missouri’s James Hitchcock, Ph.D., a well-known 20th century Catholic university historian. As a young writer, I had admired him back in the 1970s and was happy when he began a column at the National Catholic Register, where I also wrote. I was pleased when he made a favorable reference about my own writing back then. However, he continued writing as he aged, deeper into the 21st century.

I literally got a chill down my spine in May 2017 as I read his numerous inexplicable falsehoods against me in his book Abortion, Religious Freedom, and Catholic Politics. It was first published by Transaction Publishers, in New Jersey, a firm soon acquired by the international, London-based publisher Taylor & Francis. Hitchcock had published a supposed historical work without checking with me about accuracy, yet here it was, already being distributed to institutions literally around the world with its defamation. (See WorldCat.org.)

This wasn’t a situation where Hitchcock decided to write hearsay, rumors or gossip by a third party. Instead he only took published articles I had done for the national weekly Catholic newspaper The Wanderer, founded back in 1867, but he misrepresented them and made repeated outright false claims. My published words were right before his eyes, but sometimes it was as if he barely could understand the English language. How could this happen? In nearly five years, Hitchcock has never explained this to me — or even admitted making a single error.

His manipulations all point one way, toward making me the bad guy. His errors don’t put me in a more positive light. If these were honest errors, the law of averages should have given me a better break. Experienced historian Hitchcock is determined to make me friendly toward permissive abortion even though I’m a longtime opponent of it. Did he even write this book himself? Did he farm out some or all of it to some unqualified assistant? He hasn’t provided the slightest explanation.

Before long others had been drawn into promoting the book, including “global Catholic network” EWTN, which even sold it through its own store.

Below is a shortened list of errors, which are so numerous that I repeatedly was urged to trim them down for attorneys. The index lists me on 20 pages of a book a little over 200 pages. Even Planned Parenthood is on only 10 pages. Did Hitchcock see me as even a bigger threat? I bring this evidence forward now so it can be the basis of discussion in subsequent articles.

p. 57: Hitchcock: “A regular Wanderer author named Dexter Duggan identified Governor Mike Huckabee of Arkansas as being pro-life (Dec. 13, 2007), but Huckabee was the only mainstream Republican candidate about whom that fact was acknowledged, and it was not repeated.”

In fact, that very same Wanderer story also noted candidate Mitt Romney’s evolving pro-life stand, and John McCain as having “a generally pro-life voting record.” And “not repeated”? In the immediately succeeding months, my Wanderer stories about the pro-life issue and major GOP presidential candidates included Feb. 14, 2008; Feb. 21, 2008, March 6, 2008, and April 10, 2008. Huckabee dropped out of the presidential race in early March.

p. 62: “In 2013 (Sept. 19), Duggan said ‘McCain is like a mad scientist …. The best that can be said for McCain is that he is unstable, irrational, and incredibly vindictive’.”

In fact, this is a portion of a direct quotation by plainly identified Arizona conservative activist Rob Haney, not me, way down in the 30th paragraph of an article, so Hitchcock had to be well aware of the context by the time he read this far (if, indeed, he read it on his own instead of maybe using someone else’s inaccurate notes).

Directly before Haney’s quotation is a quotation by a conservative activist defending McCain’s motivations that Hitchcock ignores because this wouldn’t support Hitchcock’s position that The Wanderer is one-sidedly against McCain. (P. 57, Hitchcock: “…The Wanderer also did all in its power to discredit the Republican Party in general and Senator John McCain in particular.”)

p. 67: Duggan was among those who “favored drastically curtailing Hispanic immigration.” No citation.

The actual topic was massive illegal immigration, not ethnicity-based immigration. In my previous, 16-page list of Hitchcock’s numerous serious errors that I was asked to shorten, I identified nine sample articles of mine that showed the topic was illegal immigration. To recall two: “Arizonans Near Border – Tell How Illegal Immigration Changed Their Lives” (July 3, 2008), and “Priest-Author With International View – Cites Church Stand Against Illegal Immigration” (April 22, 2010).

p. 68: “Duggan regretted (July 24, 2008) that McCain had been endorsed by Arizona Right to Life and claimed that McCain had a record of opposing Arizona political conservatives.”

Instead of an opinion article just giving my thoughts, I factually reported on the internal debate by Arizona Right to Life PAC officials themselves about whether they would endorse McCain. As for Hitchcock’s verb saying I “claimed” McCain had a record of opposing Arizona political conservatives, I reported actual instances of this in the same story, but Hitchcock ignores them.

p. 68: “In 2009 (Aug. 6) Duggan placed his hopes in either conservative Democrats, a possible third party, or Sarah Palin.”

This completely garbles an article where I quote from a Washington Times report about Palin’s own plans, not about whom I’m placing my hopes in. Although Palin explicitly is reported to be eager to campaign for Republicans, independents, and even Democrats who share her values, Hitchcock omits the reference to helping Republicans. Hitchcock is manipulating the evidence to suit his claim, noted above, that The Wanderer is biased against Republicans.

p. 68: “Duggan (June 5 [2008]) asked whether, if McCain picked a pro-life running mate, it would only [emphasis added] be ‘to lure conservative voters to elect an administration dedicated to undermining their cause’.”

In fact, I am reporting a range of observers’ speculations. I also note, in the very same sentence, speculation that “a dedicated conservative activist and pro-lifer like [Bobby] Jindal could enhance the ticket by influencing McCain to the right.” Hitchcock craftily omits the portion of the sentence that disproves his assertion.

p. 69: In a barrage of truly baseless falsehoods, Hitchcock alleges that I am a “Paleoconservative” who worried over Reagan Democrats “precisely because they made abortion their primary issue and were oblivious to ‘true conservatism’.” Others and I allegedly “decried” the betrayal of conservative principles that the Reagan Democrats’ presence in Republican ranks facilitated. I “scarcely acknowledged … embarrassing facts” about U.S. Sen. Barry Goldwater and Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O’Connor, whom Goldwater supported. We Paleoconservatives wanted “to persuade pro-lifers to transcend their narrow outlook and support a wider agenda.” I “seemed to regard immigration as the most important issue of the campaign” and I “considered the pro-abortion Goldwater worthy of unqualified support.” On the same page, Hitchcock describes Goldwater as “fanatically pro-abortion.”

For a practicing Catholic such as myself to treat a “fanatically pro-abortion” politician as “worthy of unqualified support” would be a grave sin. Hitchcock had taught both at a Catholic university and a Catholic seminary. Did he not understand the gravity of his defamatory accusation published in a supposedly scholarly book? Yet he tossed the falsehood around while offering no proof.

Both Hitchcock and I had been contributing editors at the National Catholic Register in the early 1980s and he was well aware of my pro-life advocacy, yet he completely ignores that fact in this book. Do we see the record being rewritten maliciously?

p. 154: “Duggan reported (Jan. 27 [2010]) that Tea Partiers and other true conservatives in Arizona were ecstatic over newly elected Senator Scott Brown of Massachusetts.” Hitchcock immediately adds, “(Brown was pro-abortion.)”

I covered no such gathering of pro-abortion Arizona “true conservatives,” so there was no “ecstatic” reaction of theirs to report. Also, there was no Jan. 27 hardcopy issue of The Wanderer in 2010. I did cover an official Republican Party meeting for the Jan. 28, 2010, Wanderer where a Democratic pro-abortionist was criticized, but Hitchcock omits this.

p. 154: “Duggan quoted a Tea Party member who was pro-life, but he also reported a Tea Party rally in which opposition to socialism seemed to be the main issue (Jan. 28, 2010).”

I did not report on a Tea Party rally in the Jan. 28, 2010, Wanderer. Furthermore, can Hitchcock not allow a Tea Partier to oppose abortion and also socialism at the same time?

p. 157: “Duggan (March 29, April 12, 2012) raised further doubts about [2012 presidential candidate Mitt] Romney, especially because he had been endorsed by McCain.”

Hitchcock completely ignores a serious Arizona political controversy that I reported on these dates (as well as on April 5 and May 24, 2012) about McCain undercutting an Arizona legislative bill to protect religious conscience that was sponsored by Arizona House GOP Majority Whip Debbie Lesko. My stories quoted various figures including Rep. Lesko on the controversy that Hitchcock ignored because it didn’t serve his slant.

p. 161: “Looking to the 2014 election, Dexter Duggan, as he had done in 2012, at first enthusiastically proposed Santorum for president (Wanderer, Oct. 31, 2013) but only a week later (Nov. 7) could see no acceptable Republican candidate.”

There was no presidential election in 2014, so I could not have been anticipating Rick Santorum – or anyone else – in such a race.

My Oct. 31, 2013, story had absolutely no statement that I was “enthusiastically propos[ing] Santorum for president.” Instead, the story was about the release of a Christmas movie from Santorum’s Texas entertainment company and was headlined, “’Tis The Season -- Rick Santorum Rings Out Word Of Christmas Movie.”

The Nov. 7 story didn’t say that I “could see no acceptable Republican candidate,” but instead concluded by quoting a GOP political strategist saying, “Let’s be hopeful for our potential heroes, but wait until they’ve proven themselves a few times first before conferring full hero status on them.” This story also said that “new, proudly conservative Sen. Ted Cruz (R., Texas) basically hasn’t disappointed traditionalist voters in any important way so far.” So Hitchcock’s assertion is disproved that there’s no acceptable Republican candidate mentioned here.

pp. 163-64: Hitchcock mentions the series of videos by the Center for Medical Progress (CMP) in 2015 documenting abortionists selling babies’ body parts.

Although I did weekly front-page articles as the shocking video revelations continued, Hitchcock entirely ignored them. Instead, he immediately devoted six paragraphs to others’ reactions to the videos, including defenders of Planned Parenthood. Hitchcock already alleged my uninterest or adversary view toward the pro-life movement (p. 69 being an example), so it behooves him to present evidence in my favor here. But he completely fails to do so.

To demonstrate examples, here are just four of the headlines on my CMP articles on Page One: “Planned Parenthood’s War On The World – As Tragedy Deepens, Can Elitists Awake From Their Nightmare?” (July 30, 2015); “Crunchy PP Creates Its Own 9-11 – Newest Video Shows So Much Horror As Morality Is Crushed” (Aug. 6, 2015); “As Groups Fight to Suppress Videos – Abortion Shocker Shows ‘Good Germans’ Now ‘Good Democrats’” (Aug. 13, 2015), “Seventh Planned Parenthood Video – Removing Live Baby Brain Made Procurement Worker Quit” (Aug. 27, 2015).

p. 170: “At the very moment the [U.S.] House was passing the bill [to defund Planned Parenthood and repeal provisions of Obamacare], Duggan (Jan. 7 [2016]) denounced [U.S. House Speaker Paul] Ryan for not having done so….”

Hitchcock is so confused. My article was about the Omnibus spending bill passed by Congress before Christmas 2015, not legislation in January 2016. It was headlined, “Elite’s Bipartisan Festivity: Ryan And Pelosi Celebrate Christmas With Herodian Budget Deal.” I wrote this story on Dec. 27, 2015, so I couldn’t have written it “at the very moment” the House voted on a different bill in the new year, on Jan. 6, 2016.

p. 170: “Duggan (Wanderer, Nov. 19 [2015]) considered [Paul] Ryan too compromising on the immigration issue...."

Plainly identified former California GOP Congressman Robert Dornan, not I, is commenting on various political topics including Ryan’s attitude toward illegal immigration. Dornan says he is hopeful Ryan will change his stand.

p. 170: “Duggan recalled the power of the Tea Party (June 25 [2015]) and predicted its resurgence….”

My story (“Obamatrade’s Conga Line – Have Elite Party Leaders Finally Misstepped Too Far?”) made no predictions about a Tea Party “resurgence.”

p. 170: “Near the end of the year (Dec. 3), Duggan briefly wondered if the Tea Party still had an impact, and two weeks later reported that it was still strong in Arizona.”

The Dec. 3, 2015, story, about 1,500 words long (that’s “briefly”?), reported a discussion by Tea Party members themselves, not me. “Two weeks later” would be the Wanderer of Dec. 17, 2015. There was no article by me reporting that the Tea Party “was still strong in Arizona.”

Why Hitchcock’s adverse interest in the Tea Party? Because he doesn’t regard it as a group that prioritizes the pro-life cause, so my reporting on it shows my minimizing pro-lifers (see p. 69), in his eyes.

p. 170: “He [Duggan] predicted (Dec. 24 [2015]) that McCain would be defeated for renomination by discontented conservatives.”

In fact, the prediction was not by me but by two plainly identified young political strategists speaking in Phoenix in December 2015 about disgust with the established political system.

pp. 170-71: “As Duggan was giving Trump his qualified endorsement, Trump expressed his newly discovered opposition to abortion but at the same time reaffirmed his overall support of Planned Parenthood.”

Hitchcock fails to provide any citation here that I gave my endorsement, much less if Trump still expressed overall support for Planned Parenthood. Like many other pro-lifers, I had had questions about the sincerity of Trump’s profession of pro-life beliefs during his run for the 2016 nomination, although favorable signs were to emerge.

p. 172: Hitchcock says the name of passionately pro-life presidential candidate Rick Santorum “went unmentioned” in 2015 in The Wanderer, “except in one last-page article by an unfamiliar writer (June 11).”

A quick online search in Wanderer archives reveals that Santorum was mentioned in eight articles in 2015, usually briefly, but also including a prominent three-column-wide story I wrote on p. A3 in the Oct. 15, 2015, issue, with Santorum’s name in the “kicker” part of the headline (“Santorum Urges Making Difference”). Hitchcock omits my story.

As for the June 11 Santorum story by “an unfamiliar writer” supposedly on the “last page,” that article was written by Ben Johnson, of the well-known LifeSiteNews.com, that stretched across the top half of the back page (p. A8) of the first section of a two-section newspaper. It wasn’t a half-hidden article on the final page.

p. 172: Hitchcock said that in a May 21, 2015, article, “Duggan … appeared to agree” with columnist Pat Buchanan on foreign policy, particularly with Buchanan’s opposing continued Republican support of Israel. Hitchcock said I praised U.S. Sen. Rand Paul’s anti-interventionism.

My article said nothing whatever about opposing support of Israel. I covered a speech by Rand Paul at Arizona State University in which he said, “I am a Reagan Republican, through and through… Reagan believed in peace through strength. Reagan didn’t believe intervention was always the answer.” As is often the case, Hitchcock inexplicably thinks that if I cover someone else’s talk, report a statement, or do an interview, I am thereby praising or favoring that person or even just simply stating my own thoughts.

p. 172: “At first (Apr. 16 [2015]) Duggan seemed to favor Cruz for president, but by the late summer (Aug. 13), he thought the idea of a third-party candidate (presumably Trump) was appealing.”

My April 16 story (“Political Researcher Offers Idea For Winning Team in 2016”) is about a talk given by New Zealand conservative activist Trevor Loudon. Deep within the story I reported that Loudon was impressed by U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz. At no point in this story did I write of my own preferences for candidates. As for a supposed Aug. 13 story where I thought the idea of a third-party candidate appealing, there was no such story.

p. 172: “Blacks too, Duggan said (Dec. 17 [2015]), were opposed to immigration and would flock to Trump’s banner.”

In fact, black activist Ted Hayes was making a speech on the 14th Amendment to the Constitution. Aside from putting Hayes’ words in my mouth, Hitchcock didn’t even quote this 27th paragraph of my story accurately. It said, “U.S. blacks ‘are moving toward Donald Trump’ because they recognize ‘he’s speaking more to our interests’ on the 14th Amendment, Hayes said.” (Moving, not flocking.) Also, Hitchcock misrepresented Hayes’ reference to illegal immigration as being only about “immigration.” Hitchcock had to read all the way down to the 27th paragraph to find this particular remark, so he should have been perfectly aware of the actual context. The story is so plainly about Hayes’ speech, not my thoughts, that one wonders: Is Hitchcock capable of reading English?

p. 172: “…Duggan (Jan. 7 [2016]) thought conservative Republicans were so outraged at party leaders that they might even vote Democratic.”

In fact, Arizona GOP conservative activist Rob Haney was quoted here, not I — in the 46th paragraph of a 48-paragraph story about Congress’ Omnibus spending bill. Once again Hitchcock has read deeply into a story to find a quotation that he proceeds to misattribute. He didn’t just grab the first words he saw at the top of the story.

p. 180: “During the bitter Republican primary battles of the spring of 2016, The Wanderer consistently supported Trump (Feb. 18-March 3, March 10, March 17, 2016).”

I was one of the major writers of political stories in The Wanderer, and I wasn’t at odds with other writers’ developing perception of the Manhattan billionaire. Starting with the Feb. 18 date that Hitchcock himself provides, we see my political story beginning on Page One recognized that at that point, many pro-life figures doubted Trump’s reliability. I commented that “pro-lifers may be right to be concerned about the depth of Trump’s pro-life knowledge or convictions,” and I said that “aside from his words, is Trump really much different from the New York donor class he seems to resemble in other ways?”

In the March 3, 2016, Wanderer (also a date that Hitchcock himself specifies), I wrote that Trump was making progress on the pro-life front by treating pro-lifers like winners, but I wrote: “This article isn’t intended to be an endorsement in any way as the Republican primaries and caucuses get into full swing. It’s only pointing out that even the man known for rushing into the room and overturning all the tables, and all the expectations, apparently is persuaded to take the pro-life stand.”

On another date that Hitchcock himself specifies as showing The Wanderer “consistently” supporting Trump, March 10, I wrote: “Maybe Trump could do a great job in the White House. But the classic warning against ‘jumping out of the frying pan into the fire’ is a reminder that voter desperation can lead to foolish decisions. Better kick the tires of Trump’s limousine before letting him take you for a ride.”

Noting Trump’s ambivalence about Planned Parenthood – although he rejected its doing abortions – I concluded: “Maybe voters are happier with a candidate who scatters insults than with a president who craftily lies with every breath like Obama. But might there be a better choice than Mr. Frying Pan or Mr. Fire?”

I concluded the March 17, 2016, story – again, a date Hitchcock himself provided as showing The Wanderer’s alleged consistent support for Trump -- by noting a letter by prominent Catholics including Princeton University scholar Robert George and author George Weigel saying that “Trump speaks about ‘issues of legitimate and genuine concern,’ but there are better Republican candidates to address them.”

And what did Hitchcock, his publisher, and “global Catholic network” EWTN do when his major errors were called to their attention? Watch for the next installment as we start reviewing these powerful folks’ record.