It is now clear that the Steele dossier was bogus. This should set off shockwaves across the media landscape..
You can get an idea of how disturbing the latest developments in the Durham Report were, which confirmed the fraud nature of the FBI-backed document from British G man Christopher Steele. Yesterday’s edition of CNN’s Trustworthy SourcesThe matter was handled with great reticence by Stelter. Brian Stelter’s media-centric program was not concerned with the biggest media scandal over the past couple of weeks.
Stelter is a journalist who loves to list the stories Fox News doesn’t cover. However, his inability to pay attention to one story isn’t a problem. However, he did manage to find a way for Mike Lindell, My Pillow CEO, to be covered in over 8 minutes to give him a sense balance.
The Washington Post has a different approach to the Durham results coverage, however, they are focused on cleanup. Bonchie recently covered that WaPo had a “cleanup” mission.These steps have been takenRewriting of past coverage of the saga involving the Steele dossier — in a rather significant fashion. It isn’t a matter of making a few quick edits or adding a brief clarification at the end. It has literally changed its coverage, and then released the articles again.
Two pieces are at the top of this page, and they were written especially by Rosalind Helderman, Tom Hamburger. This is because Sergei Millian (a business executive) was not the original source. He has been indicted for lying to the FBI. Danchenko’s arrest, as a result of the Durham probe, proves him to be the conduit of the intel in the dossier, and further, that he had been fed the details provided by a long suspected source — Hillary Clinton.
Danchenko might have received information regarding the encounter at the hotel from someone other than Millian, but possibly from an operative of Democratic Party with long-standing connections to Hillary Clinton. The indictment doesn’t name the executive by name, but he has been identified as Charles Dolan Jr. by Dolan’s attorney, Ralph D. Martin
They are not being rewritten but completely overhauled. The newspaper’s Executive Editor Sally Buzzbee announced the work being undertaken on these entries.
The story’s headline was amended, sections identifying Millian as the source were removed, and an accompanying video summarizing the article was eliminated. An editor’s note explaining the changes was added.
WaPo has made changes to 12 articles that it ran over the years. Consider what this means; this is not chalked up to an error in one or two articles, but the newspaper’s entire coverage has been compromised and exposed. Years of promises and reports have been thrown out the window. This is not a simple fix that can be swept aside — this is unspooling and affecting a great swath of the media complex.
Those two reporters — Hamburger and Helderman — were members of a consortium of reporters from WaPo and the New York Times Pulitzer Prize jointly wonThis coverage was greatly appreciated. Nine reporters from the two publications were awarded the honor, which included 20 articles published on the topic. Their win was acknowledged by the commission. “For deeply sourced, relentlessly reported coverage in the public interest that dramatically furthered the nation’s understanding of Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election and its connections to the Trump campaign, the President-elect’s transition team and his eventual administration.”
Given the Washington Post executives’ explanations, those words have become ironic. While there is no denying this Russian scandal was “relentlessly reported” (this is an apt description of over four years of recanting a lie), calling this deeply sourced is now a punchline, and to suggest the obfuscation and prevarications did anything approaching the furthering of understanding is just embarrassing.
This newspaper describes how badly this reporting was sourced. It is an amazing list of problematics, any one of which should have raised red flags within the paper’s editorial desks, but had been allowed to go forward for years.
– A collection of largely unverified reports that claimed the Russian government had compromising information about then-candidate Donald Trump.
– The Post could no longer stand by the accuracy of those elements of the story.
– The allegation, which the dossier said was confirmed by a second person described only as “Source E,” has never been substantiated.
– Steele’s dossier consisted of raw information and unconfirmed tips from unidentified sources.
– The new reporting included an interview with one of the original sources in its 2017 article, who now is uncertain that Millian was Source D.
Analysis | Republicans’ Steele dossier conspiracy theory was dealt a big blow this weekend https://t.co/b556S6b8P0
— Glenn Kessler (@GlennKesslerWP) January 2, 2018
This fiasco of ethical problems has been awarded journalism’s highest honor, The Pulitzer Prize. It is important to understand the ramifications. These methods, which were not carefully vetted by the media, were actually rewarded. This encouraged more reporting, and in turn, encouraged other outlets to seek out similar fame using corrupt means.
This new development draws criticism from a few news outlets who not only repeat general claims but contributed to the increasing storyline. The New York TimesNow suspect is s in WaPo’s partnership. The Wall Street Journal was prominent and in the centerMillian is the source. ABC News claims it has independently verified Millian’s involvement. NPR has forwarded the claimsThe dossier was compiled from many sources.
Then there were the signs of collusion between the government and journalists to “verify” the dossier, in order to build up the case known as Crossfire Hurricane. The FBI gave Steel to media outlets, despite not being able to support the dossier. David Corn, Mother JonesAnd Michael Isikoff from Yahoo News, filed stories about the British agent, and these reports were considered corroborating evidence — despite it being the same evidence, only fed to the reporters. They had submitted their reports with the dossier that was used to obtain the FISA warrant for Carter Page. This set off the entire scam.
BuzzFeed started a firestorm. The dossier was leaked by the outlet.In January 2017. Every news organization was able to cover all salacious details of this story and report them as fact, even though they provided disclaimers. The ensuing years of coverage can be boiled down to, “Although we cannot confirm all elements in this dossier, we will continue to update it almost daily.”
This is as meaningless as putting used tissues in a trash bin at a bus stop. We will see how much accountability takes place. There is no one major media outlet that is free from blame for this story. There are many people who were responsible for knowingly forwarding incorrect information or failing to verify the facts but still ran in their desire to become part of the mob.
It is an egregious scandal with only villains and no heroes. It’s a shame and should be exposed under interrogation floodlights.
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