Tag Archives: Russian election interference

Combating Fake News

Fake news and alternative facts are not new phenomena.  Although known by many names, they are as common as the air that we breathe and they are spread from many sources – sometimes our own government.

I was a 1950s elementary schooler when I first heard about “propaganda”. That was the word used in newspapers, radio and TV to characterize lies and half-truths told by Russians (USSR at the time) to trick people into supporting communist revolutions around the world.  There were reports of communist “infiltrators” manipulating the entertainment industry, civil rights movements, labor unions, and even government agencies.

It became personal when anonymous people called our home with threats because my mother was leading a PTA effort to apply fluoride to the teeth of elementary school students.  Some people were convinced by fake news that fluoride treatment was a communist plot; therefore my mother must be a communist sympathizer.

By the dawn of the 1960’s I wondered about a billboard in my hometown that read “Impeach Earl Warren”.  Warren was a Republican Chief Justice of the Supreme Court appointed by President Eisenhower.  The reason that I heard for wanting to impeach him was that he had led the court in deciding “Brown vs Board of Education” – the landmark court case which required integration of public schools across the nation.  Earl Warren sounded like a hero to me, not a villain.  The court’s decision held and Warren was not impeached but conservatives still rail against “activist” judges who “legislate from the bench” on issues such as same sex marriage.  To me, those decisions are supporting equal rights for all Americans.  I don’t understand people who see them as infringing on the rights of states unless the argument is that states have a right to discriminate against minorities.

Throughout history, strongly held beliefs and greed have tempted people to get their way by any means necessary including fake news, alternative truth, and propaganda.  By whatever name, lies persist.  Benjamin Franklin published a fake issue of a newspaper reporting that British loyalists sent the scalps of American patriots, taken by Native American allies of the crown, to King George as gifts.  The claim was untrue but it helped build revolutionary sentiment.  Was it OK for Franklin to do that in support of the revolutionary cause that he believed to be just?  More recently, an anti-abortion Christian group created fake news videos that seemed to show Planned Parenthood executives selling body parts of aborted fetuses.  The allegations are false but they still fuel efforts to de-fund and discredit Planned Parenthood.  Tobacco companies created fake science to convince us that cigarettes are not bad for our health.  Carbon fuel companies publish fake science to convince us that burning their products doesn’t cause climate change.

Russia publishes fake news with the obvious intent of undermining American confidence in our own political system, institutions and citizenry.  They will incite mistrust across racial, religious, cultural, political or any other American division if they think it will weaken us.  It works, and it shouldn’t surprise us.  Do we do similar things in Iran, Russia and other nations that we see as adversaries?

Our own government has fabricated fake news to create public support for wars.  President Johnson did it to gain congressional and public support for the Gulf of Tonkin resolution that authorized expansion of the Vietnam War.  The Reagan Administration did it in order to carry out the Iran-Contra affair.

If fake news is all around us, how do we find truth as a basis for decisions?  First, pay attention to competent, professional journalism across the political spectrum.  Journalists are not shyNazi Dinosaurs about pointing out the errors of competitors.  Their self-policing will help identify fake news.  Second, find credible sources in addition to mainstream news media.  Two of my favorites are “Scientific American” and “Commonwealth Fund”.  You can choose from many others.  Third, don’t spread stories on social media without checking whether they’re true.  Maybe it seems humorous, but there are people who actually believe even the most outrageous of posts.  Fourth, don’t allow, and whenever possible prosecute elected and other government officials responsible for intentional publication of untrue information.

Our commitment to truth must be stronger than our desire to persuade others to our point of view.  It is the truth that keeps us free.

 

HUG A JOURNALIST TODAY

Donald Trump, Jr has admitted arranging a meeting with someone introduced to him as a representative of the Russian government.  The stated purpose of the meeting was to receive Russian information that might damage Hillary Clinton’s candidacy (and thereby help his dad’s).  Junior had already been notified that the help would be provided as “…part of Russia and its government’s support for Mr. Trump…” He angrily denied all of this until he learned that persistent journalists had proof.  Then he began trying to explain it away.

Junior Trump arranged for candidate Trump’s campaign manager, Paul Manafort, and son-in-law, Jared Kushner to join him in a meeting with the Russian.  It was held at the Trump Tower in June 2016 while candidate Trump was present in the building; but the President’s press secretary now says that Trump knew nothing about it until the New York Times broke the story.

This stunning news contradicts a full year of denials by Donald Trump and his entire team of any Russian involvement or support for their campaign; and it’s clear that they would not have admitted it if the press had not uncovered evidence.  Do you believe that Junior Trump brought people that he had been told represented Russian government into Trump tower for a meeting with Senior Trump’s top advisers and none of them mentioned it to Senior Trump?  You can bet that journalists will be digging for evidence, one way or the other.

However they voted, most Americans wanted to believe the Trump team was honest.  Many still do, but evidence of lies and deception began mounting even before the inauguration.  They have blamed it on “leakers”, on the FBI Director’s incompetence, on fake news, and on the mainstream (lamestream they like to call it) press. Without professional journalists digging for facts we would have little basis for judging the integrity of our officeholders, regardless of political affiliation.

This phenomenon is not limited to the Trump administration.  It was the press who broke the story of the Pentagon Papers with evidence that multiple administrations intentionally misled the public and the Congress about our involvement in Vietnam and the ensuing war.  They documented President’s Nixon’s crimes including the Watergate burglary and his “plumbers” unit which burglarized a psychiatrist’s office to obtain medical records that would discredit an opponent of the war.  Those stories resulted in Nixon’s resignation and Johnson’s decision to not seek reelection.  It was the press who uncovered and reported on J. Edgar Hoover’s abuse of his power as FBI Director, including spying on Dr Martin Luther King, Jr in order to obtain any information that could be used to blackmail him.

Government officials who had violated public trust tried to cover up and deny their misdeeds.  They blamed leakers, liars and biased reporters.  They even arrested and jailed journalists for reporting true stories.  But journalists and news organizations persist.  They not only cover world-changing news, journalists are the ones who keep us informed about state legislatures, school boards, health departments, city councils, sports and weather.  Because of them we know that Flint is only one of the cities with lead in its water.  They inform our discussions about the local effects of charter schools, climate change, and myriads of issues affecting our lives.

Journalism can be messy.  Some  organizations sensationalize news in hopes of improved TV ratings or ad sales to the point where an arrest for jay-walking sounds like “breaking news”.  Some have liberal or conservative or religious or ethnic biases.    Just choosing which stories to cover and which to pass up is based on the judgments of journalists and editors.  And sometimes even the best of journalists make mistakes.

We Americans have plenty of sources with lots of different perspectives and fortunately for us they tend to fact-check each other. If we’re paying attention we can check their accuracy by comparing several sources.  And if any news organization is consistently wrong with the facts, they eventually pay a price in public trust.

At this critical time in our history journalists are ferreting out facts despite concerted efforts to stop them; and truth is gradually emerging.   Without them,  our freedom would be imperiled.  It is indeed the truth that makes us free.  This is a good time to hug and thank a journalist.

A HOUSE DIVIDED AGAINST ITSELF CAN NOT STAND

The title of this column came to mind as I observed events of the past few days.  Jesus taught that lesson.  President Lincoln used it to explain why America could not survive half slave and half free.  Our house is perilously divided by mistrust.

private espionage company, owned and staffed by retired British MI6 agents, produced a report alleging collusion, payments and sex scandals between President-elect Trump, his team and Kremlin officials including Vladimir Putin.  The report suggests that the Russians have succeeded at three goals, helping Trump win the election, getting information that can be used to blackmail him, and undermining the confidence of citizens in American democracy.  The report has been in the possession of the FBI and some news organizations since October, 2016.  US intelligence agencies did not mention it in the public version of their report on Russian involvement in our election, but they did provide a summary to President-elect Trump and President Obama.

Then on January 10, 2017 BuzzFeed, an online news organization, published the document. Donald Trump angrily denied all of the accusations, blasted the report as “fake news” and suggested that it was leaked by American intelligence agencies to embarrass him.  The US Director of National intelligence denies that.

In another example of mistrust, the FBI’s on then off then on-again investigations of Mrs. Clinton aroused suspicion of her and suspicion that the FBI was intentionally influencing the election.  FBI reports affirm that Russian operatives stole confidential information from American (Democratic Party) computers and used it in an attempt to influence our election.  In-arguably, the FBI Director relied on information thought to be stolen from Americans by Russian spies as a basis for publicly reopening the Clinton e-mail investigation at a critical moment in the campaign.

We don’t know whether the FBI investigated allegations about Trump and the Russians.  By talking about the Clinton investigation but not the Trump allegations, our FBI Director may have (intentionally or not) aided the Russian effort to influence our election.

I don’t know the whole truth about any of these matters and neither do readers of this column.  But I do know that there are millions of Americans ready to believe the worst about other Americans. Neither presidential candidate was trusted by the majority of Americans.  Many of us, like our President-elect, trust our intelligence agencies only when their reports confirm what we already believe.  Our trust problems extend beyond the federal government to other fundamental institutions like courts, police and public schools.

The corrosion of trust in American institutions and leadership is a slow and insidious process nourished by public officials who mislead us or lie to us.  Lies or deception by Presidents and other officials were used to generate support for the Vietnam War, to secretly and illegally sell arms to Iran then divert the revenue to support right-wing militia groups that overthrew the government of Nicaragua, and to support the Iraq war that destabilized the entire Middle East.

Pogo said, “We have met the enemy and he is us.”  Our house is divided against itself, and that makes us nearly defenseless against efforts like the Russian intervention in our election.  A free, democratic nation relies on the integrity and trust of its institutions, officeholders and citizens.  That is where our dangers and opportunities lie.

Here are a few ideas that might help us recover trust.

  • The congress should commission a full not-partisan investigation with subpoena powers and report  findings to the public.
  • Voters in both primary and general elections should consider the candidate’s integrity and character as absolutely vital credentials. Imagine where we might be today if our general election had featured Lindsay Graham or John Kasich against Joe Biden or Bernie Sanders.  Roughly half the nation would still be unhappy with the outcome of the election, but maybe fewer Americans would see our President-elect as the enemy.
  • A law should be passed making it illegal for any government official to intentionally lie to or mislead the public. The penalty for violations should be termination of employment or removal from elected office.
  • The Senate and Donald Trump should insist that all cabinet nominees complete their ethics reports and background checks before Senate committees vote.
  • Trump should release his tax returns immediately to shrink the cloud of suspicion hanging over him.

If you have more or better ideas, it’s time to share them.

Click green links above for background information and documents.

The new report alleging collusion, payments and sex scandals is also here 

If it’s accurate, this one is a bombshell:  BBC coverage of the report and its credibility.

The declassified version of the intelligence agencies report to Trump and Obama is here.

 

RUSSIAN INTERFERENCE IN OUR ELECTION

CLICK HERE FOR THE DECLASSIFIED VERSION OF THE CIA-FBI-NSA JOINT REPORT ON RUSSIAN INTERFERENCE IN AMERICAN PRESIDENTIAL ELECTION

Please read it for yourself.  It’s easy reading and remarkably short. Understanding the implications is more difficult.    Form your own thoughts.  Mine will come later.