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Going back to the earliest days of our unio, news organizations were used as tools to spread rumor and innuendo. Some of it would make Moore’s seem tame. Let’s face it, Rush and Sean do it daily.

Frankly, I consider that statement itself to be a smear. I listen to both, and would not be doing so if I believed that. And granted that everyone is vulnerable to self-deception, FR is IMHO a very good venue for seeing through cons.
The natural disposition is always to believe. It is acquired wisdom and experience only that teach incredulity, and they very seldom teach it enough. The wisest and most cautious of us all frequently gives credit to stories which he himself is afterwards both ashamed and astonished that he could possibly think of believing. The man whom we believe is necessarily, in the things concerning which we believe him, our leader and director, and we look up to him with a certain degree of esteem and respect. But as from admiring other people we come to wish to be admired ourselves; so from being led and directed by other people we learn to wish to become ourselves leaders and directors . . .
The desire of being believed, the desire of persuading, of leading and directing other people, seems to be one of the strongest of all our natural desires. - Adam Smith, Theory of Moral Sentiments (1759)
Here on FR we pool our (individually inadequate) “incredulity.” With the result that sometimes I read something which sounds sensible, but which is promptly skewered by the response of some astute fellow FReeper. Accordingly I have to respect the possibility that the same thing is about to happen here. But “do it daily” won’t do. I require examples. At least one example will do for starters.

the . . . lady hired by Project Veritas was exposed as a fraud.

Again, I need a link.