Deception & Misdirection
Reporting and Then “Reporting”: All the News That’s Fit to Spin
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This past weekend, Americans discovered the identity of the man who provided most of the information for the Steele dossier. This salacious, poorly sourced, and now discredited document—according to a report from U.S. Department of Justice Inspector General Michael Horowitz—provided the “central and essential role” in allowing the government to conduct electronic spying on a Trump campaign official and keep alive the debunked conspiracy theory that Donald Trump’s election campaign had colluded with the Russian government.
A pair of headlines show how two purportedly investigative news sources covered the revelation of important information that the American people deserved to know:
- “The F.B.I. Pledged to Keep a Source Anonymous. Trump Allies Aided His Unmasking.,” New York Times, July 25, 2020.
- “Meet the Steele Dossier’s ‘Primary Subsource’: Fabulist Russian From Democrat Think Tank Whose Boozy Past the FBI Ignored,” RealClearInvestigations, July 25, 2020.
Fun Quiz: Guess which one of these two shared a Pulitzer Prize with the Washington Post for its role in amplifying a lot of the now debunked rumors from the Trump-Russia hoax.