{"id":7689,"date":"2019-02-03T22:21:59","date_gmt":"2019-02-04T05:21:59","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/myfutureamerica.org\/?p=7689"},"modified":"2019-02-03T22:22:08","modified_gmt":"2019-02-04T05:22:08","slug":"fake-news-is-poison-for-a-democracy-by-definition-beyond-buzzfeed-the-10-worst-most-embarrassing-u-s-media-failures-on-the-trump-russia-story","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/myfutureamerica.org\/?p=7689","title":{"rendered":"Fake News is poison for a democracy by definition. … Beyond BuzzFeed: The 10 Worst, Most Embarrassing U.S. Media Failures on the Trump-Russia Story"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

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Glenn Greenwald<\/a> January 20 2019, 3:39\u00a0p.m.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

BuzzFeed was once notorious for traffic-generating \u201clisticles,\u201d<\/a> but\n has since become an impressive outlet for deep investigative journalism\n under editor-in-chief Ben Smith. That outlet was prominently in the \nnews this week thanks to its \u201cbombshell\u201d story about President Trump and\n Michael Cohen: a story that, like so many others of its kind, blew up in its face<\/a>, this time when the typically mute Robert Mueller\u2019s office took the extremely rare step to label its key claims \u201cinaccurate.\u201d<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

But in homage to BuzzFeed\u2019s past viral glory, following are the top \nten worst media failures in two-plus-years of Trump\/Russia reporting. \nThey are listed in reverse order, as measured by the magnitude of the \nembarrassment, the hysteria they generated on social media and cable \nnews, the level of journalistic recklessness that produced them, and the\n amount of damage and danger they caused. This list was extremely \ndifficult to compile in part because news outlets (particularly CNN and \nMSNBC) often delete from the internet the video segments of their most \nembarrassing moments. Even more challenging was the fact that the number\n of worthy nominees is so large that highly meritorious entrees had to \nbe excluded, but are acknowledged at the end with (dis)honorable mention\n status.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Note that all of these \u201cerrors\u201d go only in one direction: namely, \nexaggerating the grave threat posed by Moscow and the Trump circle\u2019s \nconnection to it. It\u2019s inevitable that media outlets will make mistakes \non complex stories. If that\u2019s being done in good faith, one would expect\n the errors would be roughly 50\/50 in terms of the agenda served by the \nfalse stories. That is most definitely not the case here. Just as was \ntrue in 2002 and 2003, when the media clearly wanted to exaggerate the \nthreat posed by Saddam Hussein and thus all of its \u201cerrors\u201d went in that\n direction, virtually all of its major \u201cerrors\u201d in this story are \ndevoted to the same agenda and script:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

10. RT Hacked Into and Took Over C-SPAN (Fortune)<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

On June 12, 2017, Fortune claimed that RT had hacked into and taken \nover C-SPAN and that C-SPAN \u201cconfirmed\u201d it had been hacked. The whole \nstory was false:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

C-SPAN Confirms It Was Briefly Hacked by Russian News Site https:\/\/t.co\/NUFD662FMz<\/a> pic.twitter.com\/POstGFzvNE<\/a><\/p>

\u2014 Fortune Tech (@FortuneTech) January 12, 2017<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

Kremlin-funded Russian news network RT interrupted C-SPAN\u2019s online feed for about ten minutes Thursday afternoon https:\/\/t.co\/Z25LqoCW2H<\/a><\/p>

\u2014 New York Magazine (@NYMag) January 12, 2017<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

Holy\n shit. Russia state propaganda (RT) “hacked” into C-SPAN feed and took \nover for a good 40 seconds today? In middle of live broadcast. https:\/\/t.co\/pwWYFoDGDU<\/a><\/p>

\u2014 Isaac Saul (@Ike_Saul) January 12, 2017<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

RT America ominously takes over C-SPAN feed for ten minutes @tommyxtopher<\/a> reviews today’s events for #shareblue<\/a> https:\/\/t.co\/uiiU5awSMs<\/a><\/p>

\u2014 Leah McElrath (@leahmcelrath) January 12, 2017<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

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After investigation, C-SPAN has concluded that the RT interruption was not the result of a hack, but rather routing error.<\/p>

\u2014 ErikWemple (@ErikWemple) January 18, 2017<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

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9. Russian Hackers Invaded the U.S. Electricity Grid to Deny Vermonters Heat During the Winter (WashPost)<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

On December 30, 2016, the Washington Post reported that \u201cRussian \nhackers penetrated the U.S. electricity grid through a utility in \nVermont,\u201d causing predictable outrage and panic, along with threats from\n U.S. political leaders. But then they kept diluting the story with \neditor\u2019s notes \u2013 to admit that the malware was found on a laptop not \nconnected to the U.S. electric grid at all \u2013 until finally \nacknowledging, days later, that the whole story was false, since the \nmalware had nothing to do with Russia or with the U.S. electric grid:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Breaking: Russian hackers penetrated U.S. electricity grid through a utility in Vermont https:\/\/t.co\/LED11lL7ej<\/a><\/p>

\u2014 The Washington Post (@washingtonpost) December 31, 2016<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

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NEW: “One of the world’s leading thugs, [Putin] has been attempting to hack our electric grid,” says VT Gov. Shumlin https:\/\/t.co\/YgdtT4JrlX<\/a> pic.twitter.com\/AU0ZQjT3aO<\/a><\/p>

\u2014 ABC News (@ABC) December 31, 2016<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n