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2022-04-05 Government Corruption
Corporate News Outlets Again 'Confirm' the Same False Story, While Many Refuse to Correct it
Posted from a comment yesterday by our own Unavinter Ulaitch.
[Glenn Greenwald - May 3, 2021]
One of the primary plagues of corporate journalism, which I have documented more times than I can count, just reared its ugly head again to deceive millions of people with fake news. When one large news outlet publishes a false story based on whispers from anonymous security state agents with the CIA or FBI, other news outlets quickly purport that they have "independently confirmed" the false story, in order to bolster its credibility (oh, it must be true since other outlets have also confirmed it).

This is an obvious scam — they have not "independently confirmed" anything but rather merely acted as servants to the same lying security state agents who planted the original false story — but they do it over and over, creating the deceitful perception that a fake story has been "confirmed" by multiple outlets, thus bolstering its credibility in the public mind. It was the favored tactic for spreading debunked Russiagate frauds and is still used. One of the most vivid examples occurred in December, 2017, when CNN falsely reported what it hyped as "a major bombshell": that Donald Trump, Jr. had advance access to the WikiLeaks archive. Within an hour, NBC News’ Ken Dilanian and CBS News both claimed they had "independently confirmed" this fairy tale. When it turned out that it was a complete lie, all based on a false date on an email to Trump Jr., these outlets embarrassingly corrected it hours later and then simply moved on as if it never happened, never explaining how multiple outlets could possibly have all "independently confirmed" the same blatant falsehood.

On Thursday night, The Washington Post, citing anonymous sources (of course), claimed that the FBI gave a "defensive briefing" to Rudy Giuliani in 2019, before he traveled to Ukraine, that he was being targeted by a Russian disinformation campaign to hurt Joe Biden's candidacy, yet he ignored the FBI's warnings and went anyway. The Post also claimed that the right-wing news outlet OANN was similarly briefed. The claim about Giuliani not only predictably ricocheted all over social media and cable news — where, as usual, it was uncritically treated as Truth — but it was shortly thereafter "independently confirmed" by both NBC News’ de facto CIA spokesman Ken Dilanian along with The New York Times.

What was the problem with this story? It was totally false. The FBI never briefed Giuliani on any such thing. As a result, The Washington Post had to append this "correction" — meaning a retraction — to the top of its viral story:
Posted by Besoeker 2022-04-05 00:00|| || Front Page|| [14 views ]  Top

#1 Ken Dilanian is a tool. Most of the "national security" reporting from D.C. consists of fables, spin, bullshit planted by anonymous "senior Pentagon officials" and "intelligence analysts."
Posted by Omineger Gleper8394 2022-04-05 00:43||   2022-04-05 00:43|| Front Page Top

#2 Uhhh.... the entire reason for a defensive briefing is so you CAN go. Go with a little warning of what you might face and how to...defend yourself from the threat. That and last time I checked, the USG cannot restrict the travel of private citizen barring a legal process/order.
Posted by Bangkok Billy 2022-04-05 04:55||   2022-04-05 04:55|| Front Page Top

07:31 Besoeker
07:28 Besoeker
07:28 Frank G
07:27 SteveS
07:26 Besoeker
07:23 Grom the Reflective
07:23 Huputle+Cherelet4131
07:20 Grom the Reflective
07:19 Huputle+Cherelet4131
07:15 SteveS
07:04 Procopius2k
06:58 Procopius2k
06:57 SteveS
06:56 Procopius2k
06:53 Procopius2k
06:43 Mullah Richard
06:02 Frank G
05:49 NN2N1
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02:25 badanov
02:22 Grom the Reflective
02:11 Grom the Reflective
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