Posted on 01/20/2019 5:15:21 AM PST by Kaslin
Journalism is dead. It wasn’t murder, or old age, it was suicide. Journalism died after drinking a cocktail of contempt, arrogance, ignorance, and enough narrative to kill a whale. Its corpse rolls on, meeting deadlines, publishing stories, and forming cable news panels continuing to extol the virtues of the poisons that killed it. They deserve your skepticism and your contempt.
The latest nail in the media’s credibility coffin landed Friday night. It was a bombshell story that declared, “President Donald Trump directed his longtime attorney Michael Cohen to lie to Congress about negotiations to build a Trump Tower in Moscow, according to two federal law enforcement officials involved in an investigation of the matter.”
Subornation of perjury is a serious allegation for a “news” organization to make. At least it has become one in the years since Bill Clinton actually did it with Monica Lewinsky and Democrats didn’t care (it’s amazing what a difference party membership makes). If true, talking heads exclaimed, this would be grounds for impeachment of the President.
A second after Buzzfeed, the glorified blog known mostly for clickbait listicles and cat videos, published the allegations all presses were stopped. Newspapers and networks sent their reporters on a quest to verify the story, based on anonymous sources, for themselves. They couldn’t.
Normally, if journalism were still a profession with standards, this “bombshell” wouldn’t warrant more than a mention unless and until it was able to be corroborated by someone, even an anonymous someone, by the other organizations. You can’t report on someone else’s anonymous reporting if you can’t get anyone to back it up. But these aren’t normal times.
Every outlet ran the story, adding a casual mention of not having (yet) been able to “independently verify” it for themselves. A mere formality; it had to be true, after all, it was a story about Donald Trump, painting him as a criminal – the top item on Christmas lists in newsrooms from coast to coast.
All of Friday was consumed by this story and its implications.
Meanwhile, no one was able to verify any of it.
The two reporters who “broke” the story were immediately booked on cable news to be celebrated as conquering heroes. And they immediately contradicted each other on the crucial question of whether or not they’d actually seen documents proving their story with their own eyes.
When CNN asked if he’d seen the proof himself, one reporter named Anthony Cormier said, “No, I have not seen it personally. But the folks we have talked to -- two officials we have spoken to, are fully 100% read it, to that aspect of the special counsel’s investigation.”
The other reporters, named Jason Leopold, was asked on MSNBC about his partner’s admission and responded, “Over the course of a year we've reported pretty extensively on the Trump Moscow project, and we have been -- I'll just say that we've seen documents, we’ve been briefed on documents. We're very confident in our reporting.”
One said they hadn’t seen any proof themselves, the other said they did. It can’t be both.
No one took a knee when those flags were raised, they all saluted and continued an endless series of hypothetical discussions predicated on a story no one at any news organization could back up. I’d be shocked if several of the participants didn’t win Pulitzer Prizes.
Journalism went to Hell courtesy of what its practitioners view as its shining moment – Watergate – and it hasn’t looked back since.
As I wrote in my book, “Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein made an untold fortune, were played in a movie by Robert Redford and Dustin Hoffman, were showered with awards, and sent many journalists running down the path of fame rather than truth. And fame is the only thing heroin gets addicted to. The thing was, Woodward and Bernstein were real journalists. They reported a real story of corruption, worked sources, uncovered information, checked their facts, and got the story right. In other words, they earned their accolades. Today, too many journalists aren’t interested in doing the work, they just want the rewards.”
And there is a lifetime of rewards awaiting whoever claims the scalp under the golden coiffed locks resting atop Donald Trump’s head. Its pursuit has perverted the profession more than anything before it, and this time they thought they had it.
Late in the evening on Friday, in an extremely rare move, Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s office broke their long-standing silence to issue a statement on the story, a strong statement of denial. “BuzzFeed's description of specific statements to the Special Counsel's Office, and characterization of documents and testimony obtained by this office, regarding Michael Cohen's Congressional testimony are not accurate,” the statement read.
Mueller could have remained silent, could have let the story peter out the way so many others have, but he didn’t. He drove a stake through its heart, rendering the entire day’s news cycle yet another fake news fever dream.
How this whole Mueller investigation ultimately plays out is anyone’s guess, anyone telling you otherwise is selling something. But how it’s played out for the media is laid bare for the whole world to see. CNN’s Chris Cuomo put it perfectly when he said, “Mueller didn’t do the media any favors tonight, and he did do the president one, because…this allows them to say, ‘You can’t believe it. You can’t believe what you read, you can’t believe what you hear.”
NPR had Cormier on at 10:00 AM-————positively salivating over the news-——and we taxpayers pay for this garbage.
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The dishonest media fools never learn a thing. How many Trump slingshot hits do they need between their eyes before they realize never to mess with the biblical David of our times?
The lie was picked up and broadcast throughout the world. There were no retractions. This is what they do. They know danmed well that the deliberate lie will be believed, talked about, chiseled in concrete, and enshrined in history as absolute truth.
They accomplished what they set out to do.
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The old saying....A lie will travel around the world before the truth can get it’s pants on.
Remember Jerry, it’s not a lie if you believe it to be true.
George Costanza.
NPR and PBS should not receive taxpayer money.
I think this guy might still be alive. Somebody that looks exactly like him came to empty my septic tank a few weeks ago.
Remember when Romney proposed he would end public funding of PBS and NPR? And the liberal reaction was that he wanted to kill off Big Bird. And Romney came back grovelling saying he loved Big Bird.
Just an example of how issues get so distorted.
” I am now finishing a 36 year career as a CPA. We have a code of ethics and are a profession (doesn’t mean all CPAs are good or honest, but we have a way to enforce the code if we catch ‘em).”
Ostensibly so does the legal profession which also purports to be a self regulating “profession”. Yet very few attorneys are disbarred. I’ve noticed there has been no rush by the liberal bar association in New York to disbar Trump’s former attorney Michael Cohn, despite Cohen pleading guilty to multiple felonies and admitting he violated attorney-client privilege.
I once retained a “respected” and politically connected at the state level attorney, and paid a hefty retainer, to file a lawsuit. Weeks went by and there was no action, even though at the meeting where I paid the money the attorney promised he would file within days. He would not return telephone calls, written letters, nor would he make an appointment to see me. After doing some investigation on my own I discovered the attorney had done considerable work for a very close friend of the defendant.
Frustrated I went to see a senior attorney at a premier law firm in the same town. I specifically asked him about finding a complaint with the state bar association. The second attorney told me the apparent conflict of interest was real. He also told me not to expect any action or refund of retainer from the original attorney. If I filed a complaint with the state bar they would go through the motions of an “investigation” but my original attorney was so powerful in the state nothing would happen. Likely the original attorney would send me a letter stating he had used my entire retainer researching the law and had determined my case was not strong enough to take to trial. The original documents I provided him to support my case would be inadvertently “lost”. The bar association would dismiss my complaint.
After that experience, I determined there is no ethical “profession” in the United States of America.
Yep, between big bird and the dog on the car roof, romney showed his true character. He really needs a but whooping. Knock some of that wimp out of him.
Agreed.
Which reminds me, has anyone told Rudy to stay off TV?
I like the guy but he has turned into a walking Gaffe Machine.
Remember Jerry, its not a lie if you believe it to be true. George Costanza.TV characters said those words but the liberal Larry David wrote it for them to repeat as fact.
It was a Wag the Dog from the Deep State. They were stuck on a bus driving around in circles and needed a reset. Each and every member of the DSM (Deep State Media) is obviously expendable to the Deep. Picture this - Conan the Barbarian being given a Tour of the Snake Kings Capital. The Snake looks up at a DTM member and says, come to me my child. And then proclaims. That is real power. Lol. In other words - Progressives are a bunch of stupid toads.
the liberal reaction was that he wanted to kill off Big Bird. And Romney came back grovelling saying he loved Big Bird.It's not difficult to distort an issue when you have a willing accomplice like Romney.Just an example of how issues get so distorted.
Yeah, even back in the 70's there were an abundance of political hacks. Just not nearly EVERY urinalist like today.
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