Imagine If MSM Consistently Applied The Evidentiary Standards It Is Applying To Hunter Bidens Emails by Ms Caitlin Johnstone!
(2020-10-15 at 16:36:25 )

Imagine If MSM Consistently Applied The Evidentiary Standards It Is Applying To Hunter Bidens Emails by Ms Caitlin Johnstone!

Mainstream media and social media platforms are actively blacking out an October surprise published by The New York Post which purports to show "smoking gun" emails from the laptop of Hunter Biden, son of Democratic nominee Joe Biden.

Both Twitter and Facebook have censored the story on their platforms, the first time we have seen the powerful social media giants deplatform a mainstream news media article, both citing concerns about the origins of the emails and an uncertainty about the veracity of the claims.

"Facebook was limiting distribution of the story while its outside fact-checkers reviewed the storys claims, spokesman Andy Stone said," reports NPR, adding that "Twitter said it decided to block the story because it could not be sure about the origins of the emails."

Twitter claims it found the emails to be in violation of its policies banning content which contained private information and its rules against "hacked materials", both of which would have forbidden all articles sharing the contents of the 2016 WikiLeaks drops if those rules had existed back then.

As I warned could happen back in August, these rules have set the stage for the cross-platform censorship of a 2020 October surprise.

Right behind him in lack of self awareness is - kyle griffin1.

He did not want anyone sharing the link to the Post story, but he was happy to share Rep Adam Schiffs conspiracy about Russian collusion even post-Mueller report.-Drew Holden October 14, 2020

There is a good thread going around Twitter compiling posts that mainstream media reporters have been making in objection to the circulation of Hunter Bidens emails alongside posts made by those same reporters promoting far more ridiculous and insubstantial allegations, like MSNBCs virulent Russia conspiracy theorist Kyle Griffin saying nobody should link to the New York Post report because if they do they will be "amplifying disinformation".

A new Reason article discusses how the mass media are not just avoiding the story but actively discouraging it:

On Wednesday, The New York Post published an attention-catching original report: "Smoking-gun email reveals how Hunter Biden introduced Ukrainian businessman to VP dad." In the previously unreleased email, which was allegedly sent on April 17, 2015, an executive with Burisma, the Ukrainian natural gas company, thanks Hunter Biden for "giving an opportunity" to meet Joe Biden, according to The NY Post.

It is a story that merits the attention of other journalists, political operatives, national security experts, and also the public at large-not least of all because there are serious questions about its accuracy, reliability, and sourcing. And yet many in the media are choosing not just to ignore the story, but to actively encourage others to suppress any discussion of it.

Indeed, two mainstream reporters who acknowledged (and criticized) the Posts scoop-The New York Times Maggie Haberman and Politicos Jake Sherman-faced thunderous denunciation on Twitter from Democratic partisans simply for discussing the story.

Center for American Progress President Neera Tanden accused Ms Haberman of promoting disinformation, and New York Times columnist Michelle Goldberg told Mr. Sherman that he was helping nefarious conservative activists "launder this bullshit into the news cycle." Historian Kevin Kruse asked why they were "amplifying" the story.

Indeed a scroll through todays mainstream news reporting does appear to show some consensus among most news media that the topic of the emails should be avoided, with most MSM articles on the matter covering the after-effects of the New York Post release or explaining why readers should be dubious about its contents.

A new Washington Post article titled "Hunter Bidens alleged laptop: an explainer" takes great pains to outline how important it is to be very, very certain that this story is everything it purports to be before investing any credulity in it.

"How do we know the email is authentic? We do not," WaPo tells us. "The New York Post posted PDF print-outs of several emails allegedly from the laptop, but for the "smoking gun" email, it shows only a photo made the day before the story was posted, according to Thomas Rid, author of Active Measures, a book on disinformation. "There is no header information, no metadata." The Washington Post has been unable to independently verify or authenticate these emails, as requests to make the laptop hard drive available for inspection have not been granted."

This would be the same Washington Post that has been circulating disinformation about Russia for years due to its disinterest in verifying information before reporting, and has alongside the rest of the mass media been promoting the narrative that Russia interfered in the 2016 United States election based solely on unproven assertions promoted by government agencies despite many gaping plot holes in that narrative.

Where was the journalistic concern for seeing the data and inspecting the hard drives then?

For the media to now say that they can not cover a story because it is not totally substantiated is quite rich after 4 years of taking anonymous gossip as the gospel.-Max Abrahms October 15, 2020

In and of itself there is no problem at all with mainstream news media applying high evidentiary standards to its reporting and making sure readers are aware when political manipulators could be pulling the wool over their eyes.

In and of itself this would be a good thing.

The problem is that all this emphasis on verification and truth only comes up when it is politically convenient for these plutocratic media outlets, because only favoring truth when it is convenient is the same as lying constantly.

Where were these high evidentiary standards when The Guardian reported without evidence and against all common sense that WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange had been having secret meetings with Donald Trump lackey Paul Manafort?

That evidence never came out, because the story was ridiculous bullshit from the beginning, yet mass media outlets everywhere parroted it to their audiences like it was a fact. You can still post that bogus Guardian story on Twitter and Facebook to this very day without so much as a warning.

Where were these high evidentiary standards when Politico published the idiotic, nonsensical story that Iran was plotting to assassinate the American ambassador to South Africa?

The report sparked many news reports and Twitter threats from the president, but when it was dismissed by the South African government itself there was barely a whisper about it.

You are still free to share this bogus Politico article anywhere online you like.

Where were these high evidentiary standards when leaks by anonymous spooks dominated headlines for days with their evidence-free allegation that the Russian government had been paying Taliban-linked fighters bounties on western occupying forces?

We now know that story was completely baseless and would have been dismissed by news reporters who were actually doing their due diligence, yet it is still being cited as fact on Twitter by sitting United States senators and in a recent vice presidential debate by Kamala Harris. If news reporters had spent anywhere near as much energy cautioning their audiences to be skeptical about this story and educating them about its plot holes as they are spending on Hunter Bidens emails, this would not be happening.

"No one has done more for our military" is the least believable thing Donald Trump can say when he has gone 110 days without speaking out about reported bounties on our troops.-Tammy Duckworth October 14, 2020

The problem is not that there are high evidentiary standards for Hunter Bidens emails, the problem is that there are virtually no evidentiary standards when the plutocratic media want to sell the world on a narrative which benefits the establishment upon which the media-owning class has built its kingdom.

News reports will be waved through on a vague assertion by some anonymous government operative if they are damaging to Russia, Iran, China, North Korea, or any other United States-targeted nation, and they are on a pretty much daily basis to greater or lesser degrees.

If a news report facilitates the national security state, all journalistic protocol goes out the window and nobody knows the meaning of the word evidence.

As soon as a report becomes inconvenient for a friend of the national security state like Joe Biden, suddenly strict evidentiary standards and warnings against potential disinformation are of paramount importance.

This is the same as lying all the time.

They lie because the mass media within the United States-centralized empire are the propaganda engine for that empire.

The drivers of empire understand that whoever controls the narrative controls the world, so they ensure that all points of narrative influence are tightly controlled by them.

A world where all news stories are held to the same evidentiary standards as Hunter Bidens emails are currently being held would be a world without empire.

People would never consent to the insanity of imperialism and endless war if their consent was not manufactured, and depriving them of the information that is inconvenient for that empire is essential in that manufacturing.

"This Ms Caitlin Johnstone article and its links are here:"

Thanks for reading!!
Everyone has my unconditional permission to republish or use any part of this work (or anything else I have written) in any way they like free of charge.

My work is entirely reader-supported, so if you enjoyed this piece please consider sharing it around, liking me on Facebook, following my antics on Twitter, throwing some money into my hat on Patreon or Paypal, purchasing some of my "sweet merchandise", buying my new book "Rogue Nation: Psychonautical Adventures With Caitlin Johnstone", or my previous book "Woke: A Field Guide for Utopia Preppers". The best way to get around the internet censors and make sure you see the stuff I publish is to subscribe to the mailing list for "my website", which will get you an email notification for everything I publish. For more info on who I am, where I stand, and what I am trying to do with this platform, "click here"._