{"id":59659,"date":"2016-12-09T19:31:12","date_gmt":"2016-12-09T23:31:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/stateofthenation2012.com\/?p=59659"},"modified":"2016-12-09T19:31:12","modified_gmt":"2016-12-09T23:31:12","slug":"washington-post-under-threat-of-multiple-lawsuits-after-fake-news-article","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/stateofthenation2012.com\/?p=59659","title":{"rendered":"Washington Post Under Threat Of Multiple Lawsuits After ‘Fake News’ Article"},"content":{"rendered":"
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UH OH<\/h4>\n<\/div>\n

Washington Post on the \u2018Fake News\u2019 Hot Seat<\/h1>\n

At least one of the websites blamed in a story for supposedly circulating Russian propaganda is threatening to sue the storied newspaper.<\/h3>\n


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LLOYD GROVE<\/h4>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
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The Washington Post<\/i>\u2014whose coverage of Watergate four decades ago<\/a>angered the powers that be, toppled a president, and defined courageous journalism\u2014has unleashed a hornet\u2019s nest of a different sort, one unlikely to earn a Pulitzer Prize.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Indeed, Washington\u2019s newspaper of record\u2014which was purchased in 2013 by Amazon billionaire Jeff Bezos<\/a> from the storied Graham family\u2014is uncomfortably weathering a barrage of criticism from fellow journalists and others for a front-page story published over the Thanksgiving holiday.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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The story, by Post<\/i> technology reporter Craig Timberg and published Nov. 24, purported to reveal how \u201csophisticated\u201d Russian propagandists had spread fake news<\/a> through hundreds of web sites to destabilize American democracy, thwart Hillary Clinton<\/a> and elect Donald Trump<\/a> to the White House.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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So far the story\u2014which has attracted millions of page views and more than 14,000 comments\u2014has provoked lawsuit threats from at least two of the web sites, notably the widely respected financial blog Naked Capitalism<\/a>, which fired off a legal letter demanding a retraction and apology even though the Post story does not specifically mention Naked Capitalism or any of the other allegedly Russian-influenced websites.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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There has also been a fusillade of disparaging commentary in publications ranging from The Intercept<\/a><\/em> to The New Yorker<\/a><\/em>.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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\u201cI thought it was completely ridiculous that the Post <\/i>would put this sorry piece of trash on the front page,\u201d Andrew Cockburn, the Washington editor of Harper\u2019s<\/i> magazine, told The Daily Beast in a typically vehement slam.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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\u201cThe \u2018Washington Post\u2019 \u2018Blacklist\u2019 Story Is Shameful and Disgusting,\u201d was the headline on Rolling Stone <\/i>writer Matt Taibbi\u2019s takedown<\/a>.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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The critics panned the Post<\/em> story\u2019s heavy reliance on the judgments of unnamed \u201cresearchers\u201d for PropOrNot.com<\/a>, a shadowy website launched three months ago ostensibly to expose \u201cRussian influence operations targeted at US audiences, distinguish between propaganda and commercial \u2018clickbait\u2019, and help identify propaganda and push back.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Granting PropOrNot\u2019s \u201cexecutive director\u201d anonymity to save him from \u201cbeing targeted by Russia\u2019s legions of skilled hackers,\u201d the Post<\/i> credulously cited the group\u2019s assessment of \u201cmore than 200 websites as routine peddlers of Russian propaganda during the election season\u201d\u2014a list<\/a> that included not only Naked Capitalism, but also such independent enterprises as Counterpunch.org (founded by Alexander Cockburn, Andrew\u2019s late brother), the right-leaning DrudgeReport.com<\/a>, the libertarian website of former Reagan administration assistant treasury secretary and ex-Wall Street Journal<\/i> editor Paul Craig Roberts<\/a>, and the left-leaning Truthdig.com<\/a> and Truth-out.org.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Political satirist and sometime journalist Harry Shearer<\/a>\u2014best known as the voice of Mr. Burns, Ned Flanders and dozens of other characters on The Simpsons\u2014has been regularly tweeting about the controversy.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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In an interview with The Daily Beast, he especially praised the journalism of Naked Capitalism during the 2008 financial meltdown. \u201cMy first reaction when I saw it [the Post story] was that they\u2019re going to be walking this story back within a week,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Naked Capitalism\u2019s editor \u201cYves Smith,\u201d the pen name of investment advisor Susan Webber who launched the blog in 2006, has so far not threatened to sue PropOrNot, whose so-called \u201cblacklist\u201d went online a few days after the group launched its Twitter feed on Nov. 5<\/a>. The secretive group, which lists its business address in Santa Fe, New Mexico<\/a> but has apparently registered, if at all, under an unknown name, had enjoyed negligible traffic until the Post<\/i>trumpeted its existence.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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\u201cI really don\u2019t want to discuss our possible litigation strategy,\u201d Webber told The Daily Beast, when asked why she was focusing her legal firepower on the Post<\/em> and not PropOrNot. \u201cThe real damage here was done by the Washington Post\u2019s amplification of a group that had no background\u2026that was non-existent before it announced itself on Twitter.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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She added: \u201cThat does not mean that we were not significantly harmed by PropOrNot, the originator of this false tale, but I had chosen not to respond to them when I first saw their site, which was several days before the Post story ran, because they had no traffic. There\u2019s no point in calling attention to a site that has no traffic.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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But after the Post<\/i> published its story, \u201cthey got traffic and their Twitter lit up immediately,\u201d Webber said, \u201cand it was very clear the reputational damage was done.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Timberg declined to comment on the controversy, and PropOrNot didn\u2019t respond to an email. The Post <\/i>has yet to walk back Timberg\u2019s story, and maybe never will. But amid the storm of condemnation and an open letter from Naked Capitalism\u2019s attorney demanding a retraction and apology<\/a>, the paper appended a highly unusual editor\u2019s note to the online version, attempting to distance the Post <\/i>from PropOrNot.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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The note claimed that PropOrNot\u2014by most accounts the dominant source of the Post<\/i>\u2019s report\u2014was only one of \u201cfour sets of researchers [consulted for the story] who have examined what they say are Russian propaganda efforts to undermine American democracy and interests.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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The note added that while the story cited PropOrNot\u2019s \u201creport identifying more than 200 websites that, in its view, wittingly or unwittingly published or echoed Russian propaganda,\u201d it didn\u2019t name any of the sites.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Astonishingly, considering the Post<\/i>\u2019s respectful treatment of PropOrNot and the story\u2019s front-page play, the editor\u2019s note argued that the paper \u201cdoes not itself vouch for the validity of PropOrNot\u2019s findings regarding any individual media outlet, nor did the article purport to do so.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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That surprising assertion seemed to conflict with a statement the paper issued the previous week, as the criticisms were gaining traction, that \u201cThe Post reviewed [PropOrNot\u2019s] findings, and our questions about them were answered satisfactorily during the course of multiple interviews\u2026We granted PropOrNot anonymity in this case because of a credible fear of reprisal.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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The Post declined to comment further. But in a letter to an attorney for Truthdig.com<\/a>, the leftist news and commentary site founded by investigative reporter Robert Scheer, the Post\u2019s lawyer said the paper won\u2019t retract the story, as Truthdig also has demanded, because, among other reasons, Timberg\u2019s story didn\u2019t mention Truthdig or link to PropOrNot\u2019s \u201clist,\u201d and thus had no \u201cbasic journalistic\u201d obligation to contact the site for a response.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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\u201cIf it were truly \u2018basic journalistic practice\u2019 to contact every entity named in an unflattering way in any document about which the press reports,\u201d wrote Post attorney James A. McLaughlin, \u201cit would be all but impossible for the news media to function.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Webber, meanwhile, said the paper\u2019s explanations \u201care not satisfactory,\u201d and she\u2019s keeping open her options for legal redress.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Writing as \u201cYves Smith<\/a>,\u201d she argued: \u201cThe Post is being disingenuous in trying to take the position that its featuring of a newbie group with no track record whatsoever was not tantamount to an endorsement\u2026 The fact that journalists almost immediately found the blacklisted sites and took the Post to task on Twitter and shortly thereafter in news stories shows that the Post did damage to Naked Capitalism and other publishers vastly beyond the original publication of the [PropOrNot] list by amplifying it\u2026\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Paul Craig Roberts, meanwhile, told The Daily Beast that he\u2019s ready to join a potential lawsuit against the newspaper.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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\u201cWhy don\u2019t we just get all 200 of us to sue,\u201d Roberts said, \u201cso we can get all of Bezos\u2019s billions?\u201d<\/p>\n

___
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