A Catastrophe for the News Media

Matt Taibbi: “For years, every pundit and Democratic pol in Washington hyped every new Russia headline like the Watergate break-in… The story hyped from the start was espionage: a secret relationship between the Trump campaign and Russian spooks who’d helped him win the election…”

“There was never real gray area here. Either Trump is a compromised foreign agent, or he isn’t. If he isn’t, news outlets once again swallowed a massive disinformation campaign, only this error is many orders of magnitude more stupid than any in the recent past, WMD included. Honest reporters like ABC’s Terry Moran understand: Mueller coming back empty-handed on collusion means a ‘reckoning for the media.’”

“Of course, there won’t be such a reckoning. (There never is). But there should be. We broke every written and unwritten rule in pursuit of this story, starting with the prohibition on reporting things we can’t confirm.”