"a lazy practice of matching critical observations about one protagonist with an equivalent criticism of the other."
The motivation is deeper than mere laziness. It is designed to get greater media attention by increasing conflicts, so that everything becomes"breaking news." Whether or not something is true is no longer important, it is whether it will stir up more conflict and interest. Most of Trumps tweets are designed to be combative and conflictual. Like the Romans we have become addicted to the circus of conflicts and combatants.
"It is designed to get greater media attention by increasing conflicts, so that everything becomes"breaking news." I think you are right, Jack. I haven't read the Comey book yet, but I hope to. Both he and Mueller impress me as people of integrity.
Well, here I go again defending the media. But. Do not overlook laziness. Do not overlook those grizzled old editors, Whim and Caprice. The Comey book is famous for being famous, just like most of the mooseheads talking about it on TV.
I've heard several of the Comey interviews. So far I have not heard, with one exception, any information that wasn't there for someone who had been following events. The thing is how congruent what he has said and testified is to what he has written. So if you watched his testimony you have, again with an exception, heard what you will hear in an interview or, I guess, read.
The exception for me was the Town Hall (NY) interview with David Remnick of New Yorker. Remnick went into Trump's pre-2015 adventures with The Mob and various Mob figures prosecuted while Comey was in the office of the AG for Southern New York. I am vaguely aware that everybody in New York knew all about the overpriced cement and the blind building inspectors, since New York and other magazines wasted a lot of space, presciently, on the windbag developer back in the '80-s and '90s. But the rest of the world didn't read New York, New Yorker, the Village Voice or the New York Times. Comey told Remnick he didn't have much of an impression of Trump in those days. Hell, I was in Miami and Palm Beach, not in New York, and I had impressions of Trump even though I never prosecuted any of his buddies.
Awhile back I remarked in one of these blogs that Gary Kasparov, chess champ and one-time election opponent of Vladimir Putin said if you want to understand Putin, before you read Machiavelli, read Mario Puzo's The Godfather. I did. It not only explains Putin; it prepares you for Putin's wannabe fellow Don. He wants respect to be shown to him, and if it isn't, he will punish the offender. And claim the respect was paid.
And to TB's....Defense of the Media...how about stupid?
I think much of the media, including the NYTimes has met its match in Trump...I may enjoy the bear baiting that goes on with the Maggie Haberman team in leaking everything about Trump except how many times a day he brushes his teeth.
But I don't really believes it's good for me, for readers of the NYT, or for the NYTimes itself.
I offer an off-subject example of what we're up against: a review at the WashPost by Carlos Lozada of a book by Amy Chozick who covered the Clinton campaign...if even half of Lozada's critique is accurate you have to ask how and why the Times ever hired such a whiny, narcissist.
The downfall of print media is being engineered by its desperate grasping of straws and the likes of Amy. https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/book-party/wp/2018/04/20/amy-chozick-covered-hillary-clinton-for-a-decade-heres-what-she-learned-and-what-she-endured/?utm_term=.ec7e0eb4f66a
But yes, I should read the book myself. I will when its remaindered for $1.99.
In my lifetime, the media lost focus on events and turned to covering personality. Case in point: Mark Zuckerberg testified before congressional committees about on-lie privacy. Some of the "quality press" offered one-time "explainers," but for a week the coverage was of Zuckerberg. Now, privacy itself has been discussed in the back "tech pages" with material that only techies would care about. This was one everybody could understand, but the issue itself was not covered where everybody looks for news. But on a big public issue, the coverage was about Zuckerberg, not privacy.
I thought at the time the original sin was Jack and Jackie on the cover of Photoplay. (That isn't around anymore, is it?) You never saw Harry and Bess or Herbert and Lou there, did you?
That said, Emmanuel Macron is here. And the European leaders make no secret of treating Trump as a child who has to be mollified and gently corrected. "Yes, Mr. President, Japan is in Europe, to a point. To a point, Sir." "Yes, yours is the biggest, brightest and best, and nobody ever thought of priming the pump before you did. Now can we talk about Iran?" So, even to European heads of state, this personality is an issue.
Re the Amy Chozick book about Clinton and her Campaign....a much friendlier review at the NYTimes Book Review. https://www.nytimes.com/2018/04/24/books/review/amy-chozick-chasing-hillary.html?rref=collection%2Fsectioncollection%2Fbook-review&action=click&contentCollection=review®ion=rank&module=package&version=highlights&contentPlacement=2&pgtype=sectionfront
Really pretty damning of all concerned. My faith isn't shaken, because I never had any in the first place (in the political candidates). I am convinced that if HRC had won we would still be in a mess. Just a different mess.
Yes, a different mess. For example, why is President Clinton okay with the U.S. military's undeclared military actions in Africa, and who knows where else. And her VP Tim Kaine: where is he with his AUMF legislation to get Congress to ask questions about U.S. military adventures that they don't seem to know anything about.
It's 6th today on the Amazon best-seller list. And Amazon sells a lot of books. Of course, it makes the Post Office deliver its packages at a terrible loss (a lot of people tell me), and Jeff Bezos is the lying publisher of the lying Washington Post.
Sideways from topic but there's a nice group photo with Bushes, Clintons, Obamas and Melania. Melania has a nice natural smile on her face. She needs these breaks now and then.
"Turn the diagnosis around and ask whether the media’s Trump obsession hasn’t clouded the mental acumen of the gaggle that regularly follows the president and must now take account of Comey’s full-court criticism. "
Yes, my sense is that Trump-myelitis is making journos cynical, looking for truth twisting, prevarications, and assuming everyone has a self-serving agenda.
I think we all have to strengthen our moral rectitude if we're going to get through the next few years with our self-defense intact.
I go back and forth, and then back, and then forth again, on the whole saga of Comey, Trump, Clinton and the 2016 campaign. I guess this is where I am now:
* Comey was out of line in verbally chastising Clinton in the summer of 2016, when announcing that charges against the campaign wouldn't be pursued for emailgate
* Comey arguably was out of line a week before the election in announcing there was to be a new investigation
* Trump made the mistake of his presidency (so far) in firing Comey
* McCabe's transgressions are real, and he deserved to be fired. See David French for one view on this, from a conservative with no love for Trump or his campaign thugs.
As to whether the FBI was out of line to open an investigation of Russian collusion with the Trump campaign, and then pursue FISA wiretap warrants, based on oppo research - I'm withholding my opinion until more is known.
As to whether the Mueller investigation is a fishing expedition: I think the answer is Clearly Yes, but I also think that Rosenstein authorized a fishing expedition, so I'm not going to argue that Mueller has exceeded his charter.
One of the unknowns, unless I've missed something is the report of leaks from the NYFBI office re Clinton e-mails. I recall, but could be misrecalling that the July press conference was prompted in part by rumors that the NYFBI office had agents ready to leak...But was that before or after Comey's July press conference.
And then, there were after the fact reports of would-be leakers in October...I now see that Guiliani was promoting news that there would be such leaks before the October surprise.
Did any of this prompt Comey's press conferences. About July, it seems to me he did not trust Loretta Lynch for all of his saying how much he likes her.
Peggy, I don't know if you happened to read that David French article I linked to in my previous comment, but one of his theses was that, contrary to a ton of conservative popular opinion, it seems that the FBI worked pretty hard to ensure that Clinton didn't get elected. The picture he paints is of an FBI that didn't like her, working at cross-purposes against an Obama administration Justice Department led by Lynch that crossed a few lines to help her win.
A lot of grist for the conspiracy-theory mill. Based on past and present performance, the conspiracy I have the hardest time buying is any conspiracy involving the Trump organization, whether with Russia or Julian Assange or anyone else. A successful conspiracy requires competence and discipline. I don't think Trump or his family (using that word with multiple meanings in mind) would make it out of the starting gate without stepping on seven banana peels if those are the criteria.
Did read French's article...quickly...not sure that "the FBI worked hard to ensure that Clinton didn't get elected," not sure that's what he claims...and the FBI is a big organization...so ...we may have overlapping "claims" about the FBI...The only thing I've read or seen claimed [French is ambiguously general on this] is that some in the NYFBI were prepared to leak (presumably about Anthony Weiner's computer [per Giuliani]).
Is Trump capable of colluding with Russia or Assange? Don't know. He was surrounded by people who were: Manafort, the Trump brothers, if not Kushner...a Kushner associate...Jared Kushner owned a local New York rag that seemed to produce a certain amount of fake new...but which I only saw reported elsewhere, did not read myself.
Will Mueller sort this out in a convincing manner; we can all hope so.
Jim: How about this....Mueller and Comey who are both "reported" to be members of your party may actually be trying to save it from itself--or at least the current national expression of itself.
I just want them to catch the bad guys, of whatever party or stripe. I don't want them to put on capes and be superheroes saving the party, the country or the world. If Trump or his minions broke the law, let's get them charged (or in the prez's case, impeached). Same with Clinton and her coterie.
Here is more on McCabe. Not sure that this reflects directly on Comey, except insofar as it helps paint the picture of what Comey had to deal with as head of the bureau during that period. It even further complicates French's narrative about the FBI and Obama Justice Dept. The conflict of interest for McCabe raises questions and eyebrows. Take it, and everything else on these stories, with the appropriate lump of salt.
"To the extent that the news media in general isn’t taking Devin Nunes’s FISA memo with the seriousness he thinks it deserves — or is giving short shrift to Hillary Clinton’s collusion-with-the-Russians story — Sara Carter is energetically filling a void, and it’s hardly a surprise that she is Sean Hannity’s — and perhaps even Donald Trump’s — favorite reporter.”
When Nunes, head of the House Intelligence Committee was caught out feeding Trump-generated info into his hearings and press conferences, I thought he recused himself and also announce he would not run again. He's on and off the Times's radar screen. So is he just a Trump whisperer. It sounds like Sara Carter has been available to take his recused whispers.
I am always puzzled by claims about Clinton collusion with the Russians. Since it seems unlikely, I don't read into the weeds. Is there any there there?
I have a hard time keeping up with all the conspiracy theories, but isn't the Hillary-colluding-with-Russians theory essentially the claim that her friends in the DNC paid a law firm who paid an oppo research firm who paid an ex-spy who paid some unnamed Russians to make up a pack of lies, rumors and innuendo about Trump, and that this became the (in)famous Steele Dossier? I think that's fairly well-established, except for the making-up-the-contents part; if the dossier contents have been established as being categorically true or categorically false, I haven't heard that that's been leaked yet.
Re: Sara Carter: I had never heard of her, either. I found that piece in Real Clear Politics. Seems she's a soldier in the field in the competing-narratives war along with Devin Nunes, Adam Schiff, Andrew McCarthy, Byron York, the NY Times and many others. In the article I linked to, she was relying on unnamed sources. As best sa I can tell, that's been pretty much the journalistic gold standard from the very beginning of the Trump investigation, on all sides. A lot of lumps of salt to be taken.
The Steele Dossier: Here is a time-line from the Washington Post. It begins with the original hire by the Washington Free Beacon in 2015. It was opposed to Trump's primary candidacy according to the time-line. (I see no mention of what I had read elsewhere that the undertaking was being funded by one of the other Republican primary candidates. Rubio? Bush? Cruz? Can't remember.) What was in the dossier is not clear at the point is in Spring 2016 when a law firm working for the Clinton Campaign took it on to find out about Trump.... But you can look at the time line here:
Jim, One of the things that made the Steele dossier infamous is that the ever virtuous Donald Trump pointed out that he never spent a night in Moscow, with or without prostitutes. But yesterday in his Foxrant, the Protean President said he did. So whom do you believe, Trump or Trump?
But this tidbit of knowledge may save you some salt: When the Times of the WAPost cites an unnamed source, you can be sure an editor and some other members of a team that is on staff know who the source is. When a semi freelance "correspondent" like Carter cites an unnamed source she may be the only one who knows whether the source is an undersecretary of State or her Uber driver.
In other words, if the media outlet has the reporter's pension covered, it is believable. If the reporter is paid as an independent contractor, it is meh.
Tom - fair enough. Let's stipulate that the NY Times and the WAPost reporters and their editors know that it was Comey's law professor/attorney who was the unnamed source for certain leaks, even if nobody has publicly acknowledged that to be the case. Whether the reporter knows it by herself, or she shares his identity with a couple of editors, it's still very difficult for us the reading public to know whether or not what the unnamed source is alleging is actually true or not. I've written before that I'm more apt to trust mainstream, professional news sources. My trust in them is waning these days, but maybe all the other options are even worse. It stinks living in an untrustworthy world.
Officially, the world is trustworthy. There are facts, and there are alternate facts. You may trust either one. Macron and Merkel warn there is no Planet B; Trump and Pruitt say that doesn't matter. Sean Spicer established this right out of the starting gate. Sarah Sanders practices it every day.
"Officially, the world is trustworthy. There are facts, and there are alternate facts."
Yes. But. When our knowledge of the facts is mediated by another person or organization, our trust in the mediating person/organization becomes paramount. Otherwise the market for salt lumps remains robust.
"a lazy practice of matching critical observations about one protagonist with an equivalent criticism of the other."
ReplyDeleteThe motivation is deeper than mere laziness. It is designed to get greater media attention by increasing conflicts, so that everything becomes"breaking news." Whether or not something is true is no longer important, it is whether it will stir up more conflict and interest. Most of Trumps tweets are designed to be combative and conflictual. Like the Romans we have become addicted to the circus of conflicts and combatants.
"It is designed to get greater media attention by increasing conflicts, so that everything becomes"breaking news." I think you are right, Jack.
DeleteI haven't read the Comey book yet, but I hope to. Both he and Mueller impress me as people of integrity.
Well, here I go again defending the media. But. Do not overlook laziness. Do not overlook those grizzled old editors, Whim and Caprice. The Comey book is famous for being famous, just like most of the mooseheads talking about it on TV.
DeleteI've heard several of the Comey interviews. So far I have not heard, with one exception, any information that wasn't there for someone who had been following events. The thing is how congruent what he has said and testified is to what he has written. So if you watched his testimony you have, again with an exception, heard what you will hear in an interview or, I guess, read.
The exception for me was the Town Hall (NY) interview with David Remnick of New Yorker. Remnick went into Trump's pre-2015 adventures with The Mob and various Mob figures prosecuted while Comey was in the office of the AG for Southern New York. I am vaguely aware that everybody in New York knew all about the overpriced cement and the blind building inspectors, since New York and other magazines wasted a lot of space, presciently, on the windbag developer back in the '80-s and '90s. But the rest of the world didn't read New York, New Yorker, the Village Voice or the New York Times. Comey told Remnick he didn't have much of an impression of Trump in those days. Hell, I was in Miami and Palm Beach, not in New York, and I had impressions of Trump even though I never prosecuted any of his buddies.
Awhile back I remarked in one of these blogs that Gary Kasparov, chess champ and one-time election opponent of Vladimir Putin said if you want to understand Putin, before you read Machiavelli, read Mario Puzo's The Godfather. I did. It not only explains Putin; it prepares you for Putin's wannabe fellow Don. He wants respect to be shown to him, and if it isn't, he will punish the offender. And claim the respect was paid.
The book gives a fairely full description of his life, his career, and ends with his tete a tetes with Trump and his firing.
DeleteComey's canonization it not in order. Fair treatment. So read the book and decide for yourself.
DeleteAnd to TB's....Defense of the Media...how about stupid?
DeleteI think much of the media, including the NYTimes has met its match in Trump...I may enjoy the bear baiting that goes on with the Maggie Haberman team in leaking everything about Trump except how many times a day he brushes his teeth.
But I don't really believes it's good for me, for readers of the NYT, or for the NYTimes itself.
I offer an off-subject example of what we're up against: a review at the WashPost by Carlos Lozada of a book by Amy Chozick who covered the Clinton campaign...if even half of Lozada's critique is accurate you have to ask how and why the Times ever hired such a whiny, narcissist.
The downfall of print media is being engineered by its desperate grasping of straws and the likes of Amy.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/book-party/wp/2018/04/20/amy-chozick-covered-hillary-clinton-for-a-decade-heres-what-she-learned-and-what-she-endured/?utm_term=.ec7e0eb4f66a
But yes, I should read the book myself. I will when its remaindered for $1.99.
In my lifetime, the media lost focus on events and turned to covering personality. Case in point: Mark Zuckerberg testified before congressional committees about on-lie privacy. Some of the "quality press" offered one-time "explainers," but for a week the coverage was of Zuckerberg. Now, privacy itself has been discussed in the back "tech pages" with material that only techies would care about. This was one everybody could understand, but the issue itself was not covered where everybody looks for news. But on a big public issue, the coverage was about Zuckerberg, not privacy.
DeleteI thought at the time the original sin was Jack and Jackie on the cover of Photoplay. (That isn't around anymore, is it?) You never saw Harry and Bess or Herbert and Lou there, did you?
That said, Emmanuel Macron is here. And the European leaders make no secret of treating Trump as a child who has to be mollified and gently corrected. "Yes, Mr. President, Japan is in Europe, to a point. To a point, Sir." "Yes, yours is the biggest, brightest and best, and nobody ever thought of priming the pump before you did. Now can we talk about Iran?" So, even to European heads of state, this personality is an issue.
Re the Amy Chozick book about Clinton and her Campaign....a much friendlier review at the NYTimes Book Review.
Deletehttps://www.nytimes.com/2018/04/24/books/review/amy-chozick-chasing-hillary.html?rref=collection%2Fsectioncollection%2Fbook-review&action=click&contentCollection=review®ion=rank&module=package&version=highlights&contentPlacement=2&pgtype=sectionfront
Re: the Amy Chozik book: this review in National Review isn't friendly at all. In fact, it's pretty damning. My faith is shaken (really).
Deletehttps://www.nationalreview.com/2018/04/amy-chozick-chasing-hillary-review-media-bias-display/
Really pretty damning of all concerned. My faith isn't shaken, because I never had any in the first place (in the political candidates). I am convinced that if HRC had won we would still be in a mess. Just a different mess.
DeleteYes, a different mess. For example, why is President Clinton okay with the U.S. military's undeclared military actions in Africa, and who knows where else. And her VP Tim Kaine: where is he with his AUMF legislation to get Congress to ask questions about U.S. military adventures that they don't seem to know anything about.
DeleteThe book is not doing so well … at least out here in this little bastion of the Left Coast:
ReplyDeletehttps://www.sfchronicle.com/entertainment/garchik/article/All-James-Comey-s-talks-have-damaged-his-book-12852714.php
https://www.sfchronicle.com/politics/article/On-SF-stop-James-Comey-unites-partisans-12855658.php
But the Editors liked it:
https://www.sfchronicle.com/opinion/editorials/article/Editorial-Comey-book-and-memos-show-consistency-12852588.php
It's 6th today on the Amazon best-seller list. And Amazon sells a lot of books. Of course, it makes the Post Office deliver its packages at a terrible loss (a lot of people tell me), and Jeff Bezos is the lying publisher of the lying Washington Post.
DeleteApril 25. 600,000 sold by Amazon according to the NYTimes. And then there's the 1 I bought at my local book store.
DeleteSideways from topic but there's a nice group photo with Bushes, Clintons, Obamas and Melania. Melania has a nice natural smile on her face. She needs these breaks now and then.
ReplyDeletehttp://amp.timeinc.net/time/5250307/barbara-bush-obama-clinton-trump-funeral-photo
Does her smile require the death of a former president or first lady? That's sooo rude, Peggy!
DeleteHa! I thought something similar--that a funeral for a dead first lady is more pleasant than living with a live Trump.
Delete"Turn the diagnosis around and ask whether the media’s Trump obsession hasn’t clouded the mental acumen of the gaggle that regularly follows the president and must now take account of Comey’s full-court criticism. "
ReplyDeleteYes, my sense is that Trump-myelitis is making journos cynical, looking for truth twisting, prevarications, and assuming everyone has a self-serving agenda.
I think we all have to strengthen our moral rectitude if we're going to get through the next few years with our self-defense intact.
I go back and forth, and then back, and then forth again, on the whole saga of Comey, Trump, Clinton and the 2016 campaign. I guess this is where I am now:
ReplyDelete* Comey was out of line in verbally chastising Clinton in the summer of 2016, when announcing that charges against the campaign wouldn't be pursued for emailgate
* Comey arguably was out of line a week before the election in announcing there was to be a new investigation
* Trump made the mistake of his presidency (so far) in firing Comey
* McCabe's transgressions are real, and he deserved to be fired. See David French for one view on this, from a conservative with no love for Trump or his campaign thugs.
https://www.nationalreview.com/2018/04/andrew-mccabe-report-explodes-republican-and-democratic-myths-alike/?utm_source=facebook&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=french&utm_content=mccabe
As to whether the FBI was out of line to open an investigation of Russian collusion with the Trump campaign, and then pursue FISA wiretap warrants, based on oppo research - I'm withholding my opinion until more is known.
As to whether the Mueller investigation is a fishing expedition: I think the answer is Clearly Yes, but I also think that Rosenstein authorized a fishing expedition, so I'm not going to argue that Mueller has exceeded his charter.
One of the unknowns, unless I've missed something is the report of leaks from the NYFBI office re Clinton e-mails. I recall, but could be misrecalling that the July press conference was prompted in part by rumors that the NYFBI office had agents ready to leak...But was that before or after Comey's July press conference.
DeleteAnd then, there were after the fact reports of would-be leakers in October...I now see that Guiliani was promoting news that there would be such leaks before the October surprise.
Did any of this prompt Comey's press conferences. About July, it seems to me he did not trust Loretta Lynch for all of his saying how much he likes her.
Peggy, I don't know if you happened to read that David French article I linked to in my previous comment, but one of his theses was that, contrary to a ton of conservative popular opinion, it seems that the FBI worked pretty hard to ensure that Clinton didn't get elected. The picture he paints is of an FBI that didn't like her, working at cross-purposes against an Obama administration Justice Department led by Lynch that crossed a few lines to help her win.
DeleteA lot of grist for the conspiracy-theory mill. Based on past and present performance, the conspiracy I have the hardest time buying is any conspiracy involving the Trump organization, whether with Russia or Julian Assange or anyone else. A successful conspiracy requires competence and discipline. I don't think Trump or his family (using that word with multiple meanings in mind) would make it out of the starting gate without stepping on seven banana peels if those are the criteria.
Did read French's article...quickly...not sure that "the FBI worked hard to ensure that Clinton didn't get elected," not sure that's what he claims...and the FBI is a big organization...so ...we may have overlapping "claims" about the FBI...The only thing I've read or seen claimed [French is ambiguously general on this] is that some in the NYFBI were prepared to leak (presumably about Anthony Weiner's computer [per Giuliani]).
DeleteIs Trump capable of colluding with Russia or Assange? Don't know. He was surrounded by people who were: Manafort, the Trump brothers, if not Kushner...a Kushner associate...Jared Kushner owned a local New York rag that seemed to produce a certain amount of fake new...but which I only saw reported elsewhere, did not read myself.
Will Mueller sort this out in a convincing manner; we can all hope so.
Jim: How about this....Mueller and Comey who are both "reported" to be members of your party may actually be trying to save it from itself--or at least the current national expression of itself.
DeleteI just want them to catch the bad guys, of whatever party or stripe. I don't want them to put on capes and be superheroes saving the party, the country or the world. If Trump or his minions broke the law, let's get them charged (or in the prez's case, impeached). Same with Clinton and her coterie.
DeleteHere is more on McCabe. Not sure that this reflects directly on Comey, except insofar as it helps paint the picture of what Comey had to deal with as head of the bureau during that period. It even further complicates French's narrative about the FBI and Obama Justice Dept. The conflict of interest for McCabe raises questions and eyebrows. Take it, and everything else on these stories, with the appropriate lump of salt.
ReplyDeletehttps://saraacarter.com/did-mccabe-issue-stand-down-order-on-fbi-clinton-email-investigation/
Yes, lump of salt: Sara A. Carter is not a known press/media person to me. What do you know that you can tell us?
DeleteSara A. Carter is described as no Seymour Hersh by MEDIAite:
Deletehttps://www.mediaite.com/online/who-is-sara-carter-hannitys-go-to-reporter-on-the-real-russia-scandal/
Of course, that is guilt by association. But as Mother said, show me who you hang out with, and I'll show you who you are.
Tom, thanks for the link..this appears therein:
Delete"To the extent that the news media in general isn’t taking Devin Nunes’s FISA memo with the seriousness he thinks it deserves — or is giving short shrift to Hillary Clinton’s collusion-with-the-Russians story — Sara Carter is energetically filling a void, and it’s hardly a surprise that she is Sean Hannity’s — and perhaps even Donald Trump’s — favorite reporter.”
When Nunes, head of the House Intelligence Committee was caught out feeding Trump-generated info into his hearings and press conferences, I thought he recused himself and also announce he would not run again. He's on and off the Times's radar screen. So is he just a Trump whisperer. It sounds like Sara Carter has been available to take his recused whispers.
I am always puzzled by claims about Clinton collusion with the Russians. Since it seems unlikely, I don't read into the weeds. Is there any there there?
I have a hard time keeping up with all the conspiracy theories, but isn't the Hillary-colluding-with-Russians theory essentially the claim that her friends in the DNC paid a law firm who paid an oppo research firm who paid an ex-spy who paid some unnamed Russians to make up a pack of lies, rumors and innuendo about Trump, and that this became the (in)famous Steele Dossier? I think that's fairly well-established, except for the making-up-the-contents part; if the dossier contents have been established as being categorically true or categorically false, I haven't heard that that's been leaked yet.
DeleteRe: Sara Carter: I had never heard of her, either. I found that piece in Real Clear Politics. Seems she's a soldier in the field in the competing-narratives war along with Devin Nunes, Adam Schiff, Andrew McCarthy, Byron York, the NY Times and many others. In the article I linked to, she was relying on unnamed sources. As best sa I can tell, that's been pretty much the journalistic gold standard from the very beginning of the Trump investigation, on all sides. A lot of lumps of salt to be taken.
The Steele Dossier: Here is a time-line from the Washington Post. It begins with the original hire by the Washington Free Beacon in 2015. It was opposed to Trump's primary candidacy according to the time-line. (I see no mention of what I had read elsewhere that the undertaking was being funded by one of the other Republican primary candidates. Rubio? Bush? Cruz? Can't remember.) What was in the dossier is not clear at the point is in Spring 2016 when a law firm working for the Clinton Campaign took it on to find out about Trump.... But you can look at the time line here:
Deletehttps://www.washingtonpost.com/graphics/2018/politics/steele-timeline/?utm_term=.d61a3e3be060
Jim, One of the things that made the Steele dossier infamous is that the ever virtuous Donald Trump pointed out that he never spent a night in Moscow, with or without prostitutes. But yesterday in his Foxrant, the Protean President said he did. So whom do you believe, Trump or Trump?
ReplyDeleteBut this tidbit of knowledge may save you some salt: When the Times of the WAPost cites an unnamed source, you can be sure an editor and some other members of a team that is on staff know who the source is. When a semi freelance "correspondent" like Carter cites an unnamed source she may be the only one who knows whether the source is an undersecretary of State or her Uber driver.
ReplyDeleteIn other words, if the media outlet has the reporter's pension covered, it is believable. If the reporter is paid as an independent contractor, it is meh.
Tom - fair enough. Let's stipulate that the NY Times and the WAPost reporters and their editors know that it was Comey's law professor/attorney who was the unnamed source for certain leaks, even if nobody has publicly acknowledged that to be the case. Whether the reporter knows it by herself, or she shares his identity with a couple of editors, it's still very difficult for us the reading public to know whether or not what the unnamed source is alleging is actually true or not. I've written before that I'm more apt to trust mainstream, professional news sources. My trust in them is waning these days, but maybe all the other options are even worse. It stinks living in an untrustworthy world.
DeleteOfficially, the world is trustworthy. There are facts, and there are alternate facts. You may trust either one. Macron and Merkel warn there is no Planet B; Trump and Pruitt say that doesn't matter. Sean Spicer established this right out of the starting gate. Sarah Sanders practices it every day.
Delete"Officially, the world is trustworthy. There are facts, and there are alternate facts."
DeleteYes. But. When our knowledge of the facts is mediated by another person or organization, our trust in the mediating person/organization becomes paramount. Otherwise the market for salt lumps remains robust.