These last two DOJ indictments -- first of Hillary's lawyer, then of Christopher Steele's main source -- show that the Clinton campaign funded and fed to the FBI a gigantic batch of lies in the 2016 election, which the vast bulk of the media spent 3 years ratifying and spreading:
The employees of these media corporations know, deep down, what they did. They did the worst thing you can possibly do while calling yourself a "journalist": they drowned US politics for years in a fake conspiracy theory funded and concocted by criminals for partisan gain.
But we have heard so little about these indictments from these media figures. Why? Because they know that as long as they stay united in silence, the only people who will point out what they did are those they have frozen out of their circle and trained their audience not to hear
The NYT, the WPost, CNN, NBC and the digital liberal outlets are all vastly more guilty of what they have spent years claiming Trump and the GOP are: they basically ran a dangerous disinformation campaign, full of lies, in conjunction with CIA/FBI, and now won't own up to it.
From the start, Russiagate -- which drowned US politics and dangerously ratcheted up tensions with a major nuclear-armed power -- was concocted from whole cloth by serial liars paid for by the Clinton campaign and spread by their media servants: David Corn, Isikoff, Frank Foer.
They all made gigantic profit from this set of lies: all of them. Their ratings skyrocketed by scaring liberals about Kremlin control of the US. They wrote best-selling books and gave themselves Pulitzers based on this massive fraud. FBI lied to the FISA court. CIA fueled it all.
In 2019, @mtaibbi called Russiagate "this generation's WMDs."That was before these indictments. But from a media credibility perspective, this is worse. With WMD, they engaged in self-critique. With this, they never will: the media model doesn't allow it.
Instead of owning up to what they did, look at what they're doing instead. Adam Schiff just wrote a book claiming Robert Muller is SENILE (to explain why he didn't find the fake conspiracy). They ignore these indictments and what they mean except for meek admissions like this:
The indictments "cast new uncertainty on some past reporting on the dossier by news organizations, including The Washington Post?" LOL The dossier wasn't just paid for by the Clinton campaign - which they lied about for a year - but the info in it came from a Clinton operative.
What Rachel Maddow in particular did makes her one of the most disgraceful and unhinged media figures ever to work for a major media corporation. Her derangement and lies were off the charts. Yet the liberal networks are bidding for her: because DNC disinformation is their model!
Anyway, for all of those who lied to the public for years -- the NYT and WPost reporters, the rich and insulated CNN and NBC hosts, the countless charlatans and politicians like Adam Schiff & John Brennan who wrote bestselling books -- none of this will matter. Lies are rewarded.
Polarization of media means virtually every major media corporation -- CNN, NBC, NYT, WPost, NPR -- have an exclusively Dem audience. These Dems don't want to hear that they were lied to and, even if they knew, they'd be fine with it: for the right cause. So zero consequences.
But if you are someone who hates these media outlets and the liars who work for them to your core, know that your hatred is valid, justified and righteous. They are a toxic force in US political life. They don't lie, smear and propagandize on occasion: it's their core function.
Do you see what CNN's model is from this? It has nothing to do with journalism: zero. Journalism is the marketing disguise for the actual business they're in. How else to explain this?
As I've noted before, most corporate journalists adamantly refuse even to recognize let alone atone for all the evidence that has emerged showing how much of what they said is false. @Isikoff was one of the earliest but has admitted much of it was false:
Here was @Isikoff on MSNBC in 2019 telling @chrislhayes and @DavidCornDC what they very obviously did not want to hear: much of the media, including MSNBC, spread falsehoods for years. Almost nobody else did this:
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Left-liberal Twitch streamers and YouTube shows knew that to attract a pre-election audience (money), they had to tell their viewers Kamala was *clearly* winning.
So they randomly anointed a random Twitter user, @Ettingermentumv, into a data guru, who assured them all of it.
For months -- including just a couple weeks before the election -- this fraudulent partisan data guru kept saying the polls were wrong, the polling experts were wrong, the secret numbers he saw made clear that Kamala wasn't just ahead but ahead by a good distance.
This is as much a problem with partisan independent media as partisan corporate shows: they have to validate their viewers' desire to believe things even if untrue.
So after all the profit and Substack subscriptions were sold by this fraud, he wrote his "I-was-wrong" confession:
The belief that Joe Rogan and those like him are just an updated Fox News -- a non-stop messaging of right-wing ideology -- is beyond stupid.
Those podcasts grew organically: in part because they're not ideological or partisan. They're normal conversations: how humans speak.
Depicting Rogan as a far-right ideologue is something only those who never heard his show would say. AOC separated from Bernie's campaign after Bernie touted Rogan's endorsement.
He is a vehement defender of same-sex marriage. He believes in full freedom for adults' personal lives. He frequently argues that corporate power is suffocating the lives of ordinary people, etc. etc.
The most consequential - yet overlooked - Trump era change is many debates are no longer shaped by old left/right divisions, but instead by who loves, respects, and is loyal to institutions of authority (Dems) and who believes they're fundamentally corrupted (Trump supporters).
Today's NYT column by @ezraklein notes obvious exceptions (abortion, gun control), yet argues the key difference between Kamala and Trump voters is how much one likes US ruling institutions.
Hence, Dems love CIA, FBI, DHS, corporate media. Even views of corporate power changed.
@ezraklein Think about key debates. Which is right or left?
- Trust in large media corporations.
- Opposition to BigTech/state internet censorship.
- Opposition to funding endless wars (Ukraine).
- Eagerness to remain tied to NATO and EU-based institutions.
While many people in the West believe that Russia/Putin are "isolated" - because their media tells them that -- 2 dozen world leaders are in Russia now for a 3-day BRICS conference.
BRICS itself includes the 2 most-populous countries and 4 of the top 10 most populous.
Beyond the founding 5 (Brazil, Russia, India, China, South Africa), it expanded to 5 more (including key US "partners" Egypt, UAE and maybe Saudi).
They "account for 45% of the global population" and 28% of global economy.
Key goal: a financial system independent of US dollar.
There's Western skepticism and even mockery that this huge confederation of countries -- united over perceived abuses of US/EU sanctions -- could create a non-dollar system. @TheEconomist takes it seriously.
Inacreditável que Alexandre de Moraes esteja constantemente concentrando em si próprio a figura de suposta vítima, investigador policial, promotor e o juiz - em seus próprios interesses.
Não há democracia onde uma pessoa pode investigar criminalmente o jornalismo que a reporta.
@lf_ponde @folha Aqui também: um ótimo artigo de @lygia_maria sobre a visão perturbada e perigosa de Moraes, a marca registrada de uma mentalidade tirana:
Que qualquer crítica ou questionamento feita ele é em si "um ataque à democracia" e, portanto, um crime.