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Following reporting rules is only for the little people, apparently.

This has so much WTF written all over it that it is hard to comprehend.

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You are here: Home / Politics / America / Watching the Creation of Anti-Biden Misinformation & Agitprop In Real Time: All Lines Are Open, All Reporters Are Standing By

Watching the Creation of Anti-Biden Misinformation & Agitprop In Real Time: All Lines Are Open, All Reporters Are Standing By

by Adam L Silverman|  May 3, 20201:08 pm| 212 Comments

This post is in: America, Domestic Politics, Election 2020, Information Warfare, Media, Open Threads, Politics, Silverman on Security

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Last night ABC News’ Sasha Pezenik reported by twitter thread on a new allegation against Vice President Biden. This reporting included the actual debunking of the claim, but Pezenik led with the bogus, fabricated allegation in the first couple of tweets before getting to the actual facts that conclusively demonstrated that the allegations were bogus in the subsequent tweets in the thread. Buried lede by twitter thread. Here’s the factual debunking tweets:

Watching Anti-Biden Misinformation & Agitprop In Real Time: All Lines Are Open, All Reporters Are Standing By

And here’s what she has pinned to the top of her page now:

Last night I posted a tweet about Vice President Biden. The allegations in my tweet had not been vetted or put through the ABC News standards process. I have since removed the tweet and I apologize for posting it.

— Sasha Pezenik (@SashaPezenik) May 3, 2020

Leaving aside ABC news vetting and standards for reporting, the real problem was that she had the debunking in her reporting, she just buried it beneath a false, but new, scandalous accusation of Vice President Biden’s being sexually inappropriate around and with women. The allegations were pushed to Pezenik by Christine O’Donnell, yes the “I am not a witch” Christine O’Donnell and it involved VP Biden and her niece. As Pezenik’s own reporting, cut and pasted above demonstrates, IT NEVER HAPPENED!!!! O’Donnell is tap dancing on her Facebook page over this as fast as she can, but whatever she thought she was going to achieve for herself by promoting this, she hasn’t.

What she has done, however, with a helpful assist of Pezenik, is get the allegation out there. And that’s all that really matters in the influence operation against Vice President Biden. Tulsi Gabbard’s former deputy policy coordinator amplified it, which brought it to the attention of Rich McHugh, who broke the story of Lynda LaCasse coming forward to provide corroboration for Tara Reade. Corroboration that now appears to have been coached by Reade.

Watching Anti-Biden Misinformation & Agitprop In Real Time: All Lines Are Open, All Reporters Are Standing By 1 Watching Anti-Biden Misinformation & Agitprop In Real Time: All Lines Are Open, All Reporters Are Standing By 2 Watching Anti-Biden Misinformation & Agitprop In Real Time: All Lines Are Open, All Reporters Are Standing By 3

McHugh is also pushing for the University of Delaware archive of Vice President Biden’s personal senatorial papers be opened and accessed immediately. Which, as I explained the other night, will not actually provide any clarity to any of these issues because any personnel documents would be filed with what is now the Senate personnel office because staffers in the House and the Senate officially work for the House or the Senate, not the representative or senator they work for day to day.

It was also, of course, picked up and flogged by Ryan Grim and others who have been pushing Tara Reade’s constantly evolving and adapting allegations.

Watching Anti-Biden Misinformation & Agitprop In Real Time: All Lines Are Open, All Reporters Are Standing By 4

Allegations that have always been impossible to verify and substantiate because there is no time, day, and/or date to her allegations, nor was there ever an actual complaint filed.

What is really going on here, and it is going to accelerate and grow until or unless reporters, editors, and producers get their acts together, is a two pronged influence operation. The first part is to get misinformation about Vice President Biden out into the mainstream media as quickly as possible, Because once it is reported on, no matter how quick the debunking is, the misinformation will be seized on and promoted, while the debunking will, at best, get pointed to by people like me. Pezenik had a legit news story to break last night, but it wasn’t the story she broke. She even had all the pieces to break the real news, which was “failed Delaware Republican Senate candidate Christine O’Donnell is attempting to smear Vice President Biden with a false allegation, which we were able to debunk with two phone calls. We are continuing our investigation in an attempt to learn why O’Donnell is doing this.” That framing would have allowed Pezenik and ABC News to break the story last night. But that isn’t what they did. O’Donnell and whoever put O’Donnell up to this knows that reporters have a sweet tooth for this type of thing. And they also know that if they can get the allegation out there through a legitimate news source, they will have laundered the misinformation successfully because almost no one they’re trying to message to is going to pay attention to the debunking.

The second part of this influence operation is agitprop. It is to further the President’s, the Republican Party’s, the conservative movement’s, Fox News’s, prominent Republicans’, conservatives’, and their surrogates’ argument that the real and legitimate news sources in the US are actually fake. That they cannot be trusted to report accurately or fairly. It is to create cognitive dissonance where the false and debunked in real time accusations against Vice President Biden are accepted as true, while at the same time the argument that the news media is lying to everyone and can’t be trusted because they botched the story by reporting factually wrong information is reinforced. It is a have your cake and eat it too influence operation. It is also, exactly, what Putin has been trying to do within Russia, within the US, and around the world for well over a decade. It is the attempt to create the dynamic where because nothing is true anything and everything is possible.

Open thread!

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Reader Interactions

212Comments

  1. 1.

    lamh36

    May 3, 2020 at 1:12 pm

    @joelockhart 16m16 minutes ago

    More

    Whats the damage of sloppy journalism you ask? Someone publishes a BS story, other outlets repeat if even though they have confirmation it’s not true, and tomorrow the Trump people will say multiple allegations against Biden. Makes you wonder where this allegation started.

    https://twitter.com/joelockhart/status/1256991013622734850

  2. 2.

    Baud

    May 3, 2020 at 1:16 pm

    We now see the pattern though. We can name it and call it out.  This isn’t 2016 when we were caught flat footed.

  3. 3.

    debbie

    May 3, 2020 at 1:17 pm

    This many years into Twitter, it’s surprising that ABC doesn’t have some sort of prescreening process in place. One would think reputational risk would count for something.

  4. 4.

    eric

    May 3, 2020 at 1:19 pm

    I am a big proponent of the law of unintended consequences.   Now we have a lie told about Biden being a creep (beyond what we know about his unwanted physicality).  It make sit much easier for people to conclude all accusers are not telling the truth about him.  The bigger victim here are real victims of sexual assaults.  Now the defense is not “she asked for it,” it is “she is weaponizing me too.”

    If Biden’s allies aggressively go after this clearly false story, they can leverage that for all future “false” allegations.

    Pretty soon, QAnon will call this a false flag operation by the DNC.

  5. 5.

    Baud

    May 3, 2020 at 1:19 pm

    “The Misinformation Campaign Against Joe Biden” should be a standard phrase in our sides’ lexicon.

  6. 6.

    Adam L Silverman

    May 3, 2020 at 1:20 pm

    @lamh36: Fine, from now on you can have Joe Lockhart do these posts!//

  7. 7.

    Adam L Silverman

    May 3, 2020 at 1:20 pm

    @Baud: Some of use were calling it out in 2016.

  8. 8.

    Adam L Silverman

    May 3, 2020 at 1:22 pm

    @Baud: I did an entire formal assessment on this stuff that someone with a lot of standing asked me to prepare early last year. He pushed it to every campaign, including Biden’s, where he had good contacts either with the candidate, members of the senior staff, or both with the recommendation they follow up. He got crickets from all of them.

  9. 9.

    lamh36

    May 3, 2020 at 1:23 pm

    SMH…this POS…

    Bernie-journos are becoming as disgusting as regular ole Bernie-bros

    Ryan Grim‏Verified account @ryangrim

    BlockedBlocked @ryangrim

    More

    Ryan Grim Retweeted Cognitive Decline

    I deleted this because he was not at the event where the woman said it happened.

    Ryan Grim added,

    Cognitive Decline

  10. 10.

    Mike in NC

    May 3, 2020 at 1:23 pm

    So sick of these mendacious assholes in the media. On the other hand, the Boston Globe has endorsed a Biden/Harris ticket. Works for me.

  11. 11.

    zhena gogolia

    May 3, 2020 at 1:24 pm

    Thanks, Adam. I sent your other post to a friend who was confused. I wish you had front-page real estate at NYT or WaPo. You should.

  12. 12.

    Hunter Gathers

    May 3, 2020 at 1:26 pm

    The press is going to do everything in their power to re-elect Trump.

    They require the freak show to drive web traffic and TV ratings.

    Trump may be bad for the country, but he’s good for CBS.

  13. 13.

    Baud

    May 3, 2020 at 1:27 pm

    @lamh36:

    I deleted this because he was not at the event where the woman said it happened. we got caught.

    Fixed.

  14. 14.

    Adam L Silverman

    May 3, 2020 at 1:32 pm

    @zhena gogolia: I’m pretty sure NY Times and WaPo have rules against writing “fuck!” repeatedly in their publications.

  15. 15.

    Sab

    May 3, 2020 at 1:33 pm

    @Adam L Silverman: I just cut off all contact with my RWNJ younger brother after he informed me that Anthony Fauci used US money to help the Chinese develop the Corona virus.

    My parents paid a lot of money to give my brother a first rate education. And having obtained that education he used it to suck up to billionaires in hopes of being one someday, and this is the result.

    By the way, he did not bother to ask how our dad was doing in the nursing home with corona virus.

  16. 16.

    lamh36

    May 3, 2020 at 1:34 pm

    @Adam L Silverman: hey he was short and sweet…but you did ahright//

     

    ;-)

  17. 17.

    MattF

    May 3, 2020 at 1:34 pm

    This may be a forlorn hope, but I wonder if the ratfuckers are overdoing it. They took their best shot with Reade, and are now coming up with accusations that are easily batted away. The barrage of lies worked with Hillary (Dildoes on the Christmas tree!!! Satanic cannibals in the basement of a pizza parlor!!! Vince Foster!!!) but at some point, if you try to do everything in a rush, all at once, it could become a WTF. We shall see, I guess.

  18. 18.

    Adam L Silverman

    May 3, 2020 at 1:34 pm

    @Sab: I’m sorry.

    And I hope your dad is doing okay.

  19. 19.

    Baud

    May 3, 2020 at 1:34 pm

    @Sab:

    It’s the right thing to do, but I’m sorry.

  20. 20.

    Chris Johnson

    May 3, 2020 at 1:34 pm

    I’ve been seeing more ‘dirtbag left’ getting mysteriously well paid for being in despair of the state of things, and for asserting that probably people are more likely to get financial rescue out of Trump (!) than the Democrat. This time it’s not Chapo, this time it’s Trillbilly Worker’s Party. I was following them back when they were (I think) real, but now they’re VERY SAD y’all, in complete despair at the failure of Bernie Sanders, they kinda think you’re more likely to get rescued from all this by voting for Trump, and they are making upwards of fourteen thousand dollars a month on Patreon.

    I’m on Patreon myself, for its intended purpose. It’s like a PayPal, but for artists and such. And maybe saying such things in the deep South is genuinely what makes people uncork their wallets, and they’ve had a lot of valid criticisms of largely Clinton-era Dem policy and approach to politics, and I could see if that is so compelling that they’re pulling nearly ten times the patronage I get after more than a decade of (more specialized) work, for a low-key podcast without pretensions.

    But jesus fucking christ does it make me wonder sometimes whether shitting on Democrats from the left is a profitable racket, and whether Patreon (first Chapo, now Trillbilly) is a good money laundering operation for Russia. All those folks are making a LOT of money sticking to their script (a script they started out half-believing and had reason to find plausible). Maybe you can influence influencers just by dumping money on them whenever they act a certain way, and human nature does the rest? I’m like ‘there isn’t that much money IN left-wing Kentucky, radical or otherwise, and you all know it!’

    Jesus CHRIST are they making a lot of money for doing what they do. I know that I notice small upticks and downswings in my Patreon.

    Are there Russian radicals griping about Putin whose Patreons we can, in turn, support?

  21. 21.

    Emerald

    May 3, 2020 at 1:35 pm

    Folks keep asking, “Will the media learn from their butter emails debacle in 2016?” Oh, I think they have learned.

    They learned that it works.

  22. 22.

    ?BillinGlendaleCA

    May 3, 2020 at 1:35 pm

    @lamh36:

    Cognitive Decline

    Is Ryan referring to himself or Joe?  //

  23. 23.

    Mike R

    May 3, 2020 at 1:39 pm

    @?BillinGlendaleCA: He reports, you decide.  My vote goes for Ryan.

  24. 24.

    Sab

    May 3, 2020 at 1:39 pm

    @Adam L Silverman: He is. He just misses his car rides.

  25. 25.

    Chief Oshkosh

    May 3, 2020 at 1:39 pm

    @debbie: I think you’re way too optimistic. ABC knows what it’s doing, and at this point, I don’t see this ending.

  26. 26.

    James E Powell

    May 3, 2020 at 1:39 pm

    The press/media put Trump in the White House and he has turned out to be a goldmine for them. He produces content every day that draws viewers and readers. Even the people who are on cable every night talking about how awful he is are making money off of him. They do not want to go back to covering a government where people do their jobs competently.

    And it isn’t just FOX and RW radio. They are doing what they have always done. It’s everybody else. And every reporter, editor, and news director knows that there is nothing to be gained by yet another story showing that Trump is a corrupt, incompetent liar. What’s going to get people excited is a negative story about Biden. So that is exactly what they are going to be doing all summer.

  27. 27.

    lamh36

    May 3, 2020 at 1:39 pm

    @?BillinGlendaleCA: apparently since the hit job didn’t work…they are back on the dementia beat…smh

  28. 28.

    Chief Oshkosh

    May 3, 2020 at 1:41 pm

    @Adam L Silverman: What did you conclude from their ignoring your work? Are they in complete denial, or do you think they are working “secretly” to counter the agitprop? Or something else?

  29. 29.

    HumboldtBlue

    May 3, 2020 at 1:42 pm

    @Sab:

    That’s terrible, all the best to pops.

  30. 30.

    Ruckus

    May 3, 2020 at 1:45 pm

    @Hunter Gathers:

    The only people that shit for brains is good for is the wealthy 1%.

    And he’s only good for them where their bank accounts are concerned. Which for them is the only thing that matters. They are already far more wealthy than necessary to live an extremely privileged life but being top dog is vital to them, in the race to see who can out Scrooge McDuck each other at a horrible cost to the society that they are trying to destroy for their egos

    The other point is that it is the wealthy that own the media, like the FTFNYT. The reporting and bullshitting that they pay for is not about the news, other than superficially, it’s abut them getting and maintaining their place in society – a wealthy society. Now money is nice but really there is a limit to how much anyone needs.

  31. 31.

    Mnemosyne

    May 3, 2020 at 1:45 pm

    @Chris Johnson:

    whether Patreon (first Chapo, now Trillbilly) is a good money laundering operation for Russia.

    I’m guessing this is more likely, though there’s probably some Koch money getting thrown into the kitty, too.

  32. 32.

    Sab

    May 3, 2020 at 1:46 pm

    @Chief Oshkosh: I do worry that with the upcoming election everyone is stuck at home watching network news.

  33. 33.

    Adam L Silverman

    May 3, 2020 at 1:46 pm

    @Chief Oshkosh: I largely concluded that despite how well known, prominent, and highly regarded the person who asked me to do the assessment and pushed it across is, the campaigns are organized and run by people who think a campaign is a campaign regardless of who is the candidate and when the campaign is being run. And, also, they don’t know me from Adam, and I am Adam, so why should they listen to anything I say despite my experience and expertise. They don’t know me, they’ve never heard of me, I’ve never worked on a political campaign, so what do I know?

  34. 34.

    Frankensteinbeck

    May 3, 2020 at 1:47 pm

    Their problem is that if, as it looks, they try this and fail a couple of times, you get a vaccination effect.  Every further accusation becomes “What kind of bullshit are Biden’s opponents making up this time?”  It certainly does damage general news credibility, but it actually strengthens Biden.

  35. 35.

    Mnemosyne

    May 3, 2020 at 1:48 pm

    The thing that seems very revealing to me is how closely the dirtbag “left” and the right are working together. This was laundered through Dan Abrams’ site and pushed by folks who worked for Tulsi and Bernie in addition to teabagger McDonnell. The Reade thing was pushed by Halper and Taibbi, who similarly claim to be “left” but also seem to have a whole lot of ties to Russian propaganda — Halper is an Assad “Truther” who uses her platform to claim that everything Assad and Russia do in Syria is just fine.

    Russians to the left of me, Russians to the right …

  36. 36.

    Immanentize

    May 3, 2020 at 1:50 pm

    Jim Carroll Band:
    Nothing is True (Everything is Permitted)

    Things just go from bad to worse
    Starts like a kiss and ends like a curse
    But nothing’s true, she said everything is permitted.

  37. 37.

    Mnemosyne

    May 3, 2020 at 1:50 pm

    Also, I saved the ThreadReader App version from last night if anyone wants to see the whole thing and just how badly the ABC reporter fucked it up:

    https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/1256779429956780033.html

  38. 38.

    Sab

    May 3, 2020 at 1:50 pm

    @HumboldtBlue: Pops is fine so far. Misses his car rides. My older sister ( his favorite) is computer literate and the nursing home has a program for virtual visiting so that should be okay. Just way way way beyond irked at my brother.

  39. 39.

    Immanentize

    May 3, 2020 at 1:51 pm

    @Mnemosyne: Weren’t you saying Biden should apologize for this the other night?

  40. 40.

    Mnemosyne

    May 3, 2020 at 1:51 pm

    @Adam L Silverman:

    Hopefully today someone at the Biden campaign is like, Hey, didn’t some dude send us a report about this last year?

  41. 41.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    May 3, 2020 at 1:53 pm

    @lamh36:

    Ryan Grim Retweeted Cognitive Decline

    Ryan Grim spreading cognitive decline every time he tweets or takes to a keyboard.

  42. 42.

    Adam L Silverman

    May 3, 2020 at 1:53 pm

    @Frankensteinbeck: It doesn’t actually work that way. Repeated false accusations, even if quickly debunked, work because the accusation part becomes the cognitive hook that everything else is hung on, not the false part. The President, his campaign, the GOP, McConnell, the people that fund all this stuff are very, very, very worried about suburban, college educated white women. If you can deactivate them by dirtying up VP Biden with accusations of sexual harassment, assault, and/or rape and drive his negative ups then you’ve achieved the objective.

  43. 43.

    Mnemosyne

    May 3, 2020 at 1:54 pm

    @Chief Oshkosh:

    This specific reporter will be out on her ear come Monday. She did the one unforgivable thing: she put the Mouse in danger of losing a defamation lawsuit.

    But another will take her place and push the same bullshit, if slightly more carefully.

  44. 44.

    MattF

    May 3, 2020 at 1:54 pm

    @Mnemosyne: I hope some actual journalist somewhere is building a database, maybe like the TrumpLieDB at the WaPo, that identifies the various bad actors and their, um, ‘political’ affiliations. Maybe not, since many of them claim to be journalists.

  45. 45.

    Adam L Silverman

    May 3, 2020 at 1:54 pm

    @Mnemosyne: They’re not.

  46. 46.

    Anya

    May 3, 2020 at 1:56 pm

    I’ve definitely learned a valuable lesson from this sordid story. I’ll just wait before I react to another story. There are a lot of soulless people out there (like Ryan Grim) who will use something as serious as rape and sexual assault as a way to defeat their political opponents. This sickens me. My heart breaks for all the real victims and how this reverses what the Me Too movement was able to achieve.

  47. 47.

    HumboldtBlue

    May 3, 2020 at 1:56 pm

    @Sab:

    I am enduring a very serious rift (not politics, one thing about my clan we are some proud liberals, even our Nixon-voting father has been forced in the ensuing years to catch up to his wife and kids) in my family as well and I feel for you.

  48. 48.

    lamh36

    May 3, 2020 at 1:57 pm

    What did I say last night:

     

    @KFILE

    FollowFollow @KFILE

    More

    Christine O’Donnell says this might have occurred another year now, says specifically 2007. Though it’s unclear to me if Biden attended this year either. His calendar on his campaign website on the Web Archive and it indicate he was in Iowa this whole day.

    https://twitter.com/KFILE/status/1257005749177405440

    Forget anythng good I ever said about Fox news BTW…they still trash.

  49. 49.

    Mnemosyne

    May 3, 2020 at 1:58 pm

    @Immanentize:

    That was my knee-jerk reaction, yes. I still find the story itself to be pretty plausible because I had similarly gross and humiliating things said to me at the same age. I now think it was a different old white dude and Aunt Christine “helpfully” told her it was Biden. Now I’m kind of wondering who it actually was — maybe a Republican that McDonnell was trying to shield?

  50. 50.

    Steeplejack

    May 3, 2020 at 1:59 pm

    @Sab:

    Sorry to hear that. I can sympathize. About the only RWNJ I know is my youngest brother, the one in Las Vegas. We don’t talk much, but I get Facebook notifications because I turned them on when he was doing his extended motorcycle expeditions. He posts a lot of right-wing agitprop and straight-up bullshit from the usual awful sources and even from some I had never heard of.

    I remind myself that he is mentally ill—he has battled clinical depression for decades—but then that other inner voice pops up to remind me: “There’s a fine line between mental illness and just being an asshole.” And he is all over that line.

    I hate to say it, but I can see a time, after our mother dies—hopefully not soon!—when I cut him off completely.

  51. 51.

    Anya

    May 3, 2020 at 1:59 pm

    It’s interesting how popular Biden used to be with the Bernie wing when he was convenient to be used against Obama but all of a sudden he’s satan.

  52. 52.

    cain

    May 3, 2020 at 2:01 pm

    Somebody should sit her down and show that she’s being an idiot and being used to smear politicians. But they used her own ambition against her – she wanted to break that story and then debunk it, but instead the debunking is going to get lost in the noise as all the enemies take this and spread it all the way and because she is from a “real news source” it will look like real news.

    These assholes will fake news things on things that are real but will use ABC and others as real news as needed. We are morons. The media are morons.

    When we win, it’s time to look at this entire media set up and put in some safe guards for the press.

  53. 53.

    Frankensteinbeck

    May 3, 2020 at 2:01 pm

    @Adam L Silverman:

    It doesn’t actually work that way.

    Witness the career of O’Keefe.  Every time he tried something, he got less traction.  In fact, there’s been a slew of crap like this since, and almost none of it has gone anywhere, because Democrats learned the lesson more each time.  Hillary had a long history of smears and one Hell of a lot of people looking for any excuse to hate her.  Biden is known and liked, and their best attempt, instead of becoming a bonfire, is already sputtering.  ‘Keep making smoke until people assume there’s a fire’ is a thing, but so is crying wolf.

  54. 54.

    HumboldtBlue

    May 3, 2020 at 2:03 pm

    I’m off to get beer, anyone need anything?

  55. 55.

    lamh36

    May 3, 2020 at 2:03 pm

    @Mnemosyne: except now O’Donnell is saying maybe it was 2007, but it totally happened.

     

    It’s a lie and the niece likely knowingly partitcipated in the lie

  56. 56.

    Ruckus

    May 3, 2020 at 2:04 pm

    @Frankensteinbeck:

    Nice.

    And you’d think that. But. Most people are not real logical, do not look at things objectively, but always with a bias. Their particular biases depend on a lot of things, their upbringing, their position in the world around them, their personalities, if they desire to be logical/objective, if they like other humans – or even themselves….

    The people for whom this sort of thing is a vaccination are those who are looking for a vaccination in the first place. If they don’t see anything wrong with the crap, they aren’t going to seek out/get the vaccination in the first place. It isn’t medicine, it would be a mental vaccination at best, and that is one that is built and applied by the person. The person has to be receptive to the medicine, the vaccine is not about an external disease but an internally built and accepted one. They don’t see it as a disease to be treated. They see it as normal. A vaccination is about stopping the abnormal, not about stopping the accepted normal.

  57. 57.

    cain

    May 3, 2020 at 2:04 pm

    @eric:

    This. Real damage is being done to actual victims of sexual assault and women and men supporters need to push back on this hard. The media is vulnerable to this attack from sexual abuse victims  – it’s obvious though that we need to be very aggressive on our side that we cannot just be passive. This is why I appreciate never trumpers like Rick Wilson who will fucking bring a gun to a scheduled knife fight. (It’s hwy he has lot of fans on our side of the aisle – we do most of our business out of site, but we still need the theater for the rubes)

  58. 58.

    Anya

    May 3, 2020 at 2:05 pm

    @cain: I sound like a broken record but I think it’s bigger than ambition. Sasha Pezenik is invested in the whole “Biden is a sexual predator” angle. Just look at her twitter timeline. It’s all about the Tara Reade accusation. She’s either tweeting about it or retweeting the same thing over and over again. This is not the actions of an unbiased journalist who sees an opportunity to make a name for herself. This is the actions of someone with an agenda.

  59. 59.

    Adam L Silverman

    May 3, 2020 at 2:06 pm

    @Frankensteinbeck: What is being done isn’t what O’Keefe is doing. O’Keefe is a child swinging a sledge hammer compared to what I’m describing is going on.

  60. 60.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    May 3, 2020 at 2:06 pm

    @lamh36: could’ve happened any year, any time, she could’ve been fourteen, she could’ve been sixteen, could’ve been at this dinner, that funeral, maybe a debate…. they’ll keep moving the goalposts, like with Benghazi, like the butter emails, the point is to keep implying it’s incumbent on Biden to prove the negative

  61. 61.

    Mnemosyne

    May 3, 2020 at 2:06 pm

    @lamh36:

    Is it Mc or O’Donnell? I keep getting confused.

    Either way, not only do I 100 percent think that the aunt is lying, I suspect that she was the one who created the lie/false memory in the first place by telling her niece that the gross old man who said that was Biden. I’m not quite ready to say that the niece is lying, but I’m waiting for the next statement directly from her. If she also changes her story to a different year, then I’ll know that she’s a lying liar, too.

  62. 62.

    Frankensteinbeck

    May 3, 2020 at 2:07 pm

    @Ruckus:

    Most people are not real logical, do not look at things objectively, but always with a bias.

    And that’s part of why my point works.  People inclined to like Biden could be turned away with a real rape accusation.  Accusation turns out to be bogus plus accusation turns out to be bogus hardens them in defending Biden until no accusation of anything will be taken seriously.  Hillary was a case where that worked against her, because so many white men distrust a woman seeking power.  Biden has a reputation for friendliness, and once ‘His enemies make up shit to slander him’ floats up, it’s going to be latched onto by everyone who didn’t already hate him.

  63. 63.

    Immanentize

    May 3, 2020 at 2:07 pm

    @Anya: @Mnemosyne:

    I totally understand why people thought it was plausible. She was 14. A creepy old man said a creepy thing to her. Others heard it or she told them….

    This is why this shit works. The fact that it is plausible suddenly becomes exactly the same as “really happened.” But lies work in the places that feel like truth.

    Look at the things you had to believe about Biden to believe this thing actually, no doubt happened.

    (For me, the word “endowed” didn’t sound like a Biden off the cuff remark. But I’ve met him a few times….)

  64. 64.

    Anya

    May 3, 2020 at 2:08 pm

    @Sab: This sucks. I am sorry.

  65. 65.

    Sab

    May 3, 2020 at 2:08 pm

    @Sab: Part of the issue with nursing homes is we don’t actually know how anyone is doing.

    My dad in a memory unit had a private duty nurse. They blocked her with the shutdown. They blocked me with the shutdown. She found a company that would take her on without a six week background check, relying on my twelve year personal reference.

    She found that residents diapers weren’t being changed. They were taken to the dining room but nobody cared if they ate. Nobody cared if they drank water. The young help was there but too scared to interact with patients.

    I will be eternally grateful to the nurses’ aide contract outfit that signed her on to let her back in.

  66. 66.

    JPL

    May 3, 2020 at 2:09 pm

    @Sab: When someone stresses you, it’s best to step back.   let it go

    For years my brother was focused on fox and conspiracy theories, and after losing so many relations, he let it go.    In between we didn’t converse at all.

  67. 67.

    Adam L Silverman

    May 3, 2020 at 2:09 pm

    @lamh36:

    May 5, 2007. All his events that day are in Iowa. https://t.co/ZYwG1Oe720 pic.twitter.com/LGCHg52XF0

    — andrew kaczynski? (@KFILE) May 3, 2020

  68. 68.

    Adam L Silverman

    May 3, 2020 at 2:10 pm

    @Mnemosyne: Christine O’Donnell.

  69. 69.

    PJ

    May 3, 2020 at 2:11 pm

    @Mnemosyne: This is the way these stories are supposed to work – someone hears it, says to themselves, “Oh, I can totally believe that THAT GUY did it, because something similarly traumatic/gross/creepy happened to me.  He needs to apologize/drop out/turn himself in immediately.”  Because these things do happen to a lot of people, as women, particularly women of a certain age who are crucial to this election, can relate.

    But there’s no reason to suppose a half lie (“this must have happened to her, she is just lying about who did it”) when the willingness to lie – to smear someone’s life possibly forever – is the only moral step to overcome.  Specific details that might have happened to someone make the story more credible, but they do not make it more true.

  70. 70.

    cain

    May 3, 2020 at 2:12 pm

    @Adam L Silverman:

    I feel like we are just pissing in the wind though. We had millions march to stop the Iraq War from happening and when over a million voices crying out ‘no’ was ignored by the press – what power do we have?

  71. 71.

    Immanentize

    May 3, 2020 at 2:13 pm

    @lamh36: There was no Gridiron dinner in 2007.  Oooppps!  2008 was the first.

    They clearly checked some on line sources to see he was supposed to attend.  The doings at those dinners is strictly off the record.  Perfect set up for a fabrication.

    Or maybe there is a Biden look alike going from place to place, leching on children and sticking his hands inside of interns?

    I’m really over this. The goal is to insulate Trump as well as dirty up Biden.

  72. 72.

    JPLSo

    May 3, 2020 at 2:13 pm

    @lamh36:  So she’s now thirteen and he made a comment about her boobs.   I didn’t read the comment btw

  73. 73.

    different-church-lady

    May 3, 2020 at 2:13 pm

    As far as agitprop goes, you’re letting Bernie daed-enders off the hook. I predicted they’d go scorched-earth on this, and the fact that it’s coming from “the left” give cover to the attacks from the right. The damage is proportionally far greater than just their numbers imply.

  74. 74.

    Immanentize

    May 3, 2020 at 2:13 pm

    @PJ: This.

  75. 75.

    Mary G

    May 3, 2020 at 2:13 pm

    #FireSashaPezenik is trending on my Twitter feed. Before I started reading you, Adam, I would have thought that was the end of it. Now I know better

    ETA: The witch is still at it:

    Christine O'Donnell says this might have occurred another year now, says specifically 2007. Though it's unclear to me if Biden attended this year either. His calendar on his campaign website on the Web Archive and it indicate he was in Iowa this whole day.https://t.co/XyzrP7Hl7T pic.twitter.com/VyITxZIx4t— andrew kaczynski? (@KFILE) May 3, 2020

  76. 76.

    Ruckus

    May 3, 2020 at 2:13 pm

    @Mnemosyne:

    Look at the big picture.

    The far left and the far right actually have a lot in common. Tactics are similar. How far apart are the desired end results? In reality not that far. They are both about control and in many ways, lack of free will. They may look different but they actually like similar realities. The far left wants everyone to be nice towards each other. The far right just wants a smaller population to be nice towards each other. The far left seems like they want inclusion but look who’s in the far left, what they look like and do the same for the far right and tell me how much different those two groups actually look. It’s the big squishy middle that is everyone else, the people that just want to get along, to have the same rights as everyone else, to not care what language is spoken, not care what religion is practiced or not believed, not what people look or dress like, the middle is the one that just wants to actually get along, rather than belong.

  77. 77.

    lamh36

    May 3, 2020 at 2:14 pm

    @Adam L Silverman: Yup…smh

    I’m sure the next time she’s make sure to check his schedule before changing the date again.

  78. 78.

    germy

    May 3, 2020 at 2:14 pm

    So, the NY Times has now published two front pages stories about Tara Reade's questionable claims (without noting the contradictions) in the past two days, which is two more front page stories than they published about E. Jean Carroll's rape accusation against Trump last year.
    — Daily Trix (@DailyTrix) May 3, 2020

  79. 79.

    Immanentize

    May 3, 2020 at 2:15 pm

    @eric: Very true.

    All OK?

  80. 80.

    Mnemosyne

    May 3, 2020 at 2:16 pm

    @Sab:

    Ugh. What a terrifying thing to find out. Hopefully your dad’s nurse is able to keep him as her only patient and she’s able to keep her distance from the other aides/nurses. They’re finding that one of the reasons this is spreading so exponentially in nursing homes is because most of these kinds of aides need to work multiple jobs to pay their bills, so they inadvertently become super-spreaders.

    There was a nursing home in I think South Korea (maybe Europe, though) who basically had their nursing staff form little units for each building that would only work and eat together as a group with no outsiders. That seemed to work pretty well in preventing infections for each unit.

  81. 81.

    lamh36

    May 3, 2020 at 2:17 pm

    @Mnemosyne: Sure you see yourself in the niece as a 14 year old girl who developed early and I get that’s not something to let go.

     

    But it could also be that the niece idolizes her aunt so much that she as much of a RWNJ as her beloved auntie, willing to help her tarnish the Dem guy even knowing it was NOT true

  82. 82.

    Anya

    May 3, 2020 at 2:18 pm

    Joe Biden won the Kansas Democratic Primary. And the turn out was four times what it was on 2016.

    Still don’t understand why any state will keep the undemocratic caucuses.

  83. 83.

    Sab

    May 3, 2020 at 2:19 pm

    @Anya: When I was a kid he used to launch frogs in little baskets with helium balloons. I thought it was cruel but typically male. When I got married ( for the second time) my husband explained that it was cruel and sociopathic, but not typically male.

  84. 84.

    Baud

    May 3, 2020 at 2:19 pm

    @Anya:

    Primary voters > twitter manipulators

  85. 85.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    May 3, 2020 at 2:19 pm

    @Mnemosyne: the original piece at the Examiner has been updated and includes  paragraph I don’t remember from the original, in which the elder sister of the then 14YO (I’m not even giving her “alleged victim” at this point) says the family talked about it, including “Aunt Chris”. No way in hell would that publicity hound from the uncanny valley sit on information like this.

    Even twenty five years ago when she was part of Bill Maher’s rotating line-up of pretty rightwing women she stood out as someone who ought not to be allowed to use the grown-up scissors.

  86. 86.

    different-church-lady

    May 3, 2020 at 2:20 pm

    @Chris Johnson:

    But jesus fucking christ does it make me wonder sometimes whether shitting on Democrats from the left is a profitable racket

    Now let’s be fair here: they’d be perfectly willing to do that for free.

  87. 87.

    JPLSo

    May 3, 2020 at 2:20 pm

    Are we sure that Christine O’Donnell is not a witch?

     

    PLEASE JUST DELETE

  88. 88.

    Adam L Silverman

    May 3, 2020 at 2:20 pm

    @cain: You really don’t want me answering that here.

  89. 89.

    Steeplejack

    May 3, 2020 at 2:21 pm

    @Frankensteinbeck:

    Witness the career of [James] O’Keefe.

    That little shitbird is doing fine. His Project Veritas is a 501(c)(3) tax-exempt organization that has received millions of dollars in donations from the Koch brothers and other right-wing entities.

  90. 90.

    Raven Onthill

    May 3, 2020 at 2:21 pm

    @Adam L Silverman: people like the podcasters who do the Professional Left have been calling it out since 2005. And, as one of them is wont to remind us, the whole Bush II administration has been shoved down the memory hole. They occasionally rerun old columns just to make the point.

    I don’t know what it is going to take. Maybe when some of the media execs and owners come down with COVID-19, maybe when half the Senate does, that will make a difference.

    (After I wrote the above, I found one of the Professional Left commentators rerunning a 2014 blog post to make the point: https://driftglass.blogspot.com/2014/06/today-in-i-told-you-so-ctd.html.)

  91. 91.

    Adam L Silverman

    May 3, 2020 at 2:21 pm

    @Mary G:

    May 5, 2007. All his events that day are in Iowa. https://t.co/ZYwG1Oe720 pic.twitter.com/LGCHg52XF0

    — andrew kaczynski? (@KFILE) May 3, 2020

  92. 92.

    Omnes Omnibus

    May 3, 2020 at 2:22 pm

    @cain: Fucking vote in fucking November.

  93. 93.

    Cheryl Rofer

    May 3, 2020 at 2:22 pm

    Adam – I don’t disagree with what you’re saying about how this is supposed to work, but I have a sense that some of it is going wrong this time around.

    • People have seen it before; always a limiting factor in information operations
    • Biden is responding capably and in the right ways
    • The accusers are going overboard and tripping over themselves
    • It’s an accusation that boomerangs back to Trump

    There’s a stink of desperation in all this. Trump has been sinking his own poll results with his Coronavirus Follies. All Biden had to do was sit back and watch his numbers go up.

    Trump very badly wants some good news, and it just ain’t there. Last weekend he was supposed to back off his daily rally substitutes, which lasted 48 hours. This weekend, Axios reports he is going to emphasize the good news of restrictions coming off and everyone being happy.

    Trump will host businesses who’ve been harmed by the coronavirus, and he’ll highlight the governors who are reopening their economies in line with the Trump administration’s guidelines.

    In other words, nobody. The guidelines say falling cases and deaths for fourteen days. Nobody has seen that. Perhaps New York City; I’m not following that closely.

    And when the numbers start up again, as they will, Trump’s poll numbers will continue to go down.

  94. 94.

    JPL

    May 3, 2020 at 2:22 pm

    Are we sure that Christine O’Donnell is not a witch?

  95. 95.

    zhena gogolia

    May 3, 2020 at 2:22 pm

    @Immanentize:

    Hey, Ivan Karamazov said that first!

  96. 96.

    Mnemosyne

    May 3, 2020 at 2:23 pm

    @PJ:

    As I said, false memories are common enough that I’m not completely ready to call the niece a bald-faced liar. I am 100 percent ready to call O’Donnell a bald-faced liar based on her previous history, and also to suspect her of planting the notion in her niece’s head that the gross old dude who said that to her was Joe Biden.

    IOW, there’s at least one liar here, and it’s O’Donnell for sure. If the niece is also bald-faced lying, she also convinced at least 5 or 6 other people to make very plausible supporting statements to the original reporter that were also bald-faced lies, which is more than a little scary.

  97. 97.

    Leto

    May 3, 2020 at 2:25 pm

    @Adam L Silverman:

     

    They don’t know me, they’ve never heard of me, I’ve never worked on a political campaign, so what do I know?

    It’s funny how closely related political campaigns and the military are. I know it’s not just those two, but it’s such a dumb thing.

  98. 98.

    Sab

    May 3, 2020 at 2:25 pm

    @Mnemosyne: My mother always said you shouldn’t pay help above the market rate. I always said fuck you mom, I work for a living and so do they. We hired her during the 2008 econ collapse and when her factory called her back to work I said ” can we match you” so we did. She has been amazing. Treats my dad like her own grandfather.

  99. 99.

    ruemara

    May 3, 2020 at 2:25 pm

    @Sab: I’m so sorry. On both counts.

     

     

    The way that accusation was picked up and the level of impressions on the tweet alone was a breathtaking example of a lie goes around half the world while the truth is still putting on it’s shoes. Penzik knew exactly what she was doing when she wrote that thread.

  100. 100.

    Anya

    May 3, 2020 at 2:25 pm

    @Immanentize: Thanks for your kindness. I feel really bad about it. I’ve been at the other end of creepy old man leering at me and saying some awful stuff as young as 13 so it hit home. I felt what she described. This is why I hope the original accuser wasn’t lying but was gaslighted by her awful aunt and her genuine experience was used by people who have alternative motives. Hopefully she’ll do a lot of soul searching and retract her accusation. Maybe her friend said to her “hey remember that old guy who harassed you at the event? Remember how you said it was Joe Biden?” I don’t know but I am still hopeful she’s not in on this disgusting scam but maybe an unwitting victim of dirty tricksters.

  101. 101.

    JPL

    May 3, 2020 at 2:26 pm

    @Mnemosyne: Maybe an industrious reporter will ask her how she found out his name.

  102. 102.

    Leto

    May 3, 2020 at 2:26 pm

    @JPL: I think there’s a body of water nearby so we can test that theory. /s

  103. 103.

    Mnemosyne

    May 3, 2020 at 2:28 pm

    @Ruckus:

    A lot of folks on Black Twitter have been pointing out for months that a lot of “leftists” mostly seem pissed that mediocre white people are no longer in control of the Democratic Party, and they want to take over and install themselves as the new white saviors. This rings very true to me, frankly, especially when they start whining about how the evil “establishment” of Jim Clyburn and Hakeem Jeffries is running everything and doing it wrong. ?

  104. 104.

    different-church-lady

    May 3, 2020 at 2:28 pm

    @Mnemosyne: It’s Christine fucking O’Donnell, probably none of it happened. I wouldn’t be surprized to find out she doesn’t even have a niece.

  105. 105.

    Ruckus

    May 3, 2020 at 2:28 pm

    @Steeplejack:

    That was what allowed me to cut ties with my sister, everyone else has passed away. Said sister once told me that after everyone else passed away, we’d be friends. Once again, she totally misinterprets reality. scientology does that. Totally opposing politics can do that as well. And the very conservative are beyond nuts. They are lunatics. And have pulled the vast majority of their side into that lunacy.

  106. 106.

    Ruckus

    May 3, 2020 at 2:30 pm

    @Mnemosyne:

    Exactly. The great white hope doesn’t just wear a pointed white hood.

  107. 107.

    Adam L Silverman

    May 3, 2020 at 2:30 pm

    @Leto: I don’t have the same issue on the military side. The issue on the military side is that because of the sequester no one has either authorization or funding to put me on a funded line of any sort to actually be able to do what they trained me to do.

  108. 108.

    Mnemosyne

    May 3, 2020 at 2:30 pm

    @lamh36:

    Oh, it’s possible. I’m reserving judgement until the niece makes her own statement, and there’s a good chance she will disappoint me. I’m definitely not taking a firm stand to say she couldn’t be lying, just waiting for more evidence either way.

  109. 109.

    HumboldtBlue

    May 3, 2020 at 2:30 pm

    I love British humor. A Yorkshire woman has put up a sign in front of her house warning walkers and joggers they have now entered THE JURISDICTION OF THE MINISTRY OF SILLY WALKS and followed up with some absolute gems on her Instagram page.

  110. 110.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    May 3, 2020 at 2:31 pm

    @JPL:

    Are we sure that Christine O’Donnell is not a witch?

    New Netflix series idea: Aunt Clara, The Early Years

  111. 111.

    Immanentize

    May 3, 2020 at 2:32 pm

    @zhena gogolia: I think it is originally attributed to
    Hassan Sabbeh,
    The Master Assassin on his death bed

    Of course, now it is the motto of a game franchise — Assassin’s Creed. I still like Jim Carroll’s punk take on it best.

  112. 112.

    ?BillinGlendaleCA

    May 3, 2020 at 2:32 pm

    @Frankensteinbeck: Hillary was well liked, before she ran for President.

  113. 113.

    lamh36

    May 3, 2020 at 2:33 pm

    The former Gabbard staffer, friend of the neice just tweeted this:

     

    @_nalexander

    FollowFollow @_nalexander

    More

    Nicole Alexander Fisher Retweeted

    I’m not going to comment on this further until I hear clarification from her side. I had shared the story of a classmate–one she had already publicly shared widely, and one she had already told others for years. I look forward to the clarification.

    I can also believe she found 6 people who believed and vouched for her, because her entire circle is just as likely to be the part of the same type of folks who WANTED it to be true

  114. 114.

    PsiFighter37

    May 3, 2020 at 2:34 pm

    @ruemara: As I said in the other thread – she appears to be a mediocre wannabe journalist of the Caucasian persuasion who probably thinks breaking this story (and getting the number) will boost her career. Takes a lot of privilege to think that life is all about shortcuts.

    I hope ABC fires her, or at the very least, tells her to suspend her Twitter and any stories she works on while they review her work. But I doubt it. I do not think any journalistic enterprise actually knows what it means to do proper journalism anymore.

  115. 115.

    Immanentize

    May 3, 2020 at 2:36 pm

    @Mnemosyne: There will never be another statement from the niece, ever.

    That is my prediction.  Or if there is, it will be: “I have nothing more to say because of death threats.”

  116. 116.

    PsiFighter37

    May 3, 2020 at 2:36 pm

    @lamh36: I guess my question in this case: does it make sense for Biden (on a personal level) to sue? It highlights the false accusations, but at the same time, it could scare folks away from continuously spewing slanderous claims if they are going to be held financially accountable.

  117. 117.

    Baud

    May 3, 2020 at 2:36 pm

    @lamh36:

    I’m not going to comment on this further until I hear clarification from her side. I had shared the story of a classmate–one she had already publicly shared widely, and one she had already told others for years Norman has a chance to coordinate. I look forward to the clarification.

    Fixed.

  118. 118.

    Steeplejack (phone)

    May 3, 2020 at 2:37 pm

    Thank you for your poetry submission to @NewYorker. We get 1,000s of submissions each day from the president and can only read a small fraction. After careful consideration, we felt that, while full of creative punctuation, this did not suit our editorial needs at this time.
    https://t.co/nPhSD14FSH

    — Joel Stein (@thejoelstein) May 3, 2020

  119. 119.

    Anya

    May 3, 2020 at 2:37 pm

    @Sab: It’s hard to lose the idea of a sibling or a parent so I get how devastating this might be. I hope you are at peace with your decision because he sounds like someone you would be better off if he’s not in your life.

  120. 120.

    Sab

    May 3, 2020 at 2:38 pm

    @ruemara: Thank you ruemara. This means a lot. A couple of years  (or more ago) when I was being appalling on this website you told me to stop digging. I did. Thank you then and thank you now. I always value your input.

  121. 121.

    Omnes Omnibus

    May 3, 2020 at 2:38 pm

    @PsiFighter37: does it make sense for Biden (on a personal level) to sue?

    No.  He won’t win.  It keeps it alive.  He would look vindictive.

  122. 122.

    Mnemosyne

    May 3, 2020 at 2:39 pm

    @Jim, Foolish Literalist:

    As I keep saying, I 100 percent see “Aunt Chris” as patient zero with this lie. If your sister Christine comes back from the Gridiron Dinner with your daughter and tells you that Joe Biden said something gross to her, of course that’s going to be a topic of family conversation for years to come. Hell, it’ll probably come up at every family gathering and in every election year, at a minimum.

    We already know that Christine O’Donnell is not only a liar but a fabulist who loves to make up sensational stories, so that’s another reason why I’m seeing her as the originator, not her niece.

    ETA: She would “sit on it” because #metoo wasn’t a thing yet, so she wouldn’t think she could bring Biden down on the strength of this story alone. Now the atmosphere has changed and she sees an opportunity to use this old family story as a club.

  123. 123.

    Omnes Omnibus

    May 3, 2020 at 2:40 pm

    @Mnemosyne: But she’s not a witch.

  124. 124.

    ?BillinGlendaleCA

    May 3, 2020 at 2:41 pm

    @Mnemosyne:

    Is it Mc or O’Donnell? I keep getting confused.

    She’s not a witch.

  125. 125.

    Immanentize

    May 3, 2020 at 2:42 pm

    @Baud: Ha.

  126. 126.

    Omnes Omnibus

    May 3, 2020 at 2:42 pm

    @?BillinGlendaleCA: I already said that, but it bears repeating.

  127. 127.

    Anya

    May 3, 2020 at 2:43 pm

    @Baud: I still see Bernie twitter still say “half of the primary voters didn’t have their say yet” or a variation of that whenever someone tells them to support the nominee.

  128. 128.

    Sab

    May 3, 2020 at 2:43 pm

    @Anya: I won’t even tell you what he did with baby rays in the rowboat.

    I used to think my childhood was idyllic. With that creep on the loose, maybe not.

  129. 129.

    lamh36

    May 3, 2020 at 2:43 pm

    @PsiFighter37: I sure wish they would, but I think it wouldn’t be a good idea.

    But you can BET Chump co would be bombastically talking about bringing a lawsuit if the same were to happen to them

  130. 130.

    HumboldtBlue

    May 3, 2020 at 2:44 pm

    @lamh36:

    because her entire circle is just as likely to be the part of the same type of folks who WANTED it to be true

    Oh you know they were fucking drooling at being in the know and given the chance to get back at the man who made O’Donnell a national laughingstock.

  131. 131.

    ?BillinGlendaleCA

    May 3, 2020 at 2:45 pm

    @Immanentize:

    The goal is to insulate Trump as well as dirty up Biden.

    Yup.  Worked with Hillary.

  132. 132.

    Ruckus

    May 3, 2020 at 2:46 pm

    @Frankensteinbeck:

    Your story breaks down when compared to diseases. O’Keefe is one person. You don’t need a vaccine against one person. Yes he’s spreading a disease but you stop that by recognizing that the source can be localized and controlled. He’s not highly communicable. He’s a carrier – he’s diseased, not the disease. You isolate the carrier, you vaccinate for the disease itself.

    Our media is a carrier, not the disease.

    The disease is hate and theft, or conservatism if you will.

    The carriers are the people with the disease.

  133. 133.

    ?BillinGlendaleCA

    May 3, 2020 at 2:46 pm

    @JPLSo: If that doesn’t stick, she was 8 and…

    ETA: Then again, Trump said it about his 2 year old daughter.

  134. 134.

    Mnemosyne

    May 3, 2020 at 2:48 pm

    @Immanentize:

    I think you’re right. Either this was a total fabrication and she’ll want to lay low, or she’ll be embarrassed and questioning herself since she’s “known” for years it was Biden but now has proof it wasn’t.

    If it’s the latter, Thanksgiving is going to be real awkward this year.

  135. 135.

    Baud

    May 3, 2020 at 2:48 pm

    @Anya:

    The views of Bernie twitter are irrelevant aside from the misinformation they contain.

  136. 136.

    lamh36

    May 3, 2020 at 2:49 pm

    And now here’s Lisa “I helped Harvey Weinstein discredit his victims” Bloom is jumping on the bandwagon

     

    @LisaBloom

    FollowFollow @LisaBloom

    More

    Lisa Bloom Retweeted BuzzFeed News

    I believe you, Tara Reade. You have people who remember you told them about this decades ago. We know he is “handsy.” You’re not asking for $. You’ve obviously struggled mightily with this. I still have to fight Trump, so I will still support Joe. But I believe you. And I’m sorry

    smh…this opportunist.  I know the parody that is her mother Allred, but is Lisa more shamelessly opportunistic than her mother?

  137. 137.

    germy

    May 3, 2020 at 2:49 pm

    Colbert is “helping:

    starts at roughly the 9 minute mark:

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yc1Y9ylKxOw

  138. 138.

    ruemara

    May 3, 2020 at 2:49 pm

    @Chris Johnson: It is, has been and will be a profitable market to shit on Democrats and any progress made under Democrats as not enough progress. This has been true since the Clinton era at least, as I’m not that old.

  139. 139.

    ?BillinGlendaleCA

    May 3, 2020 at 2:51 pm

    @Anya:

    Still don’t understand why any state will keep the undemocratic caucuses.

    For Iowa, it’s the money.

  140. 140.

    Baud

    May 3, 2020 at 2:53 pm

    @lamh36:

    Is she apologizing for “supporting” the person she says she believed sexually assaulted the person she’s talking to?

  141. 141.

    ?BillinGlendaleCA

    May 3, 2020 at 2:56 pm

    @Leto: Corporations are  pretty insular too.  “Not invented here” is pretty prevalent.

  142. 142.

    lamh36

    May 3, 2020 at 2:59 pm

    @Baud: I guess so.  just ugh

  143. 143.

    germy

    May 3, 2020 at 3:03 pm

    @lamh36:

    You’d think @LisaBloom would stay off social media for a few years, after she was exposed as a Weinstein enabler/attack dog.

    These people are completely without shame.

  144. 144.

    Kent

    May 3, 2020 at 3:05 pm

    @MattF:This may be a forlorn hope, but I wonder if the ratfuckers are overdoing it. They took their best shot with Reade, and are now coming up with accusations that are easily batted away. The barrage of lies worked with Hillary (Dildoes on the Christmas tree!!! Satanic cannibals in the basement of a pizza parlor!!! Vince Foster!!!) but at some point, if you try to do everything in a rush, all at once, it could become a WTF. We shall see, I guess.

    That is basically what happened with the “Bush skipped out on his National Guard service obligation like a rich dilettante” accusation because of some font issue in a memo that I don’t exactly remember.  and Dan Rather got spanked.  After that the entire issue quickly vanished down the memory hole.   If only the media were as quick to exonerate Dems as they are the GOP.

  145. 145.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    May 3, 2020 at 3:06 pm

    @lamh36:@Baud: maybe Bloom is hoping Reade will reconsider that whole ‘not looking for $$’ thing.

  146. 146.

    PJ

    May 3, 2020 at 3:07 pm

    @Mnemosyne: Have you ever met a liar?  They’ll lie to anybody, the only important thing to them is making sure they have their stories straight.  Also bear in mind that the people repeating the lie may have their own axe to grind, like the Tulsi Gabbard campaign staffer.

  147. 147.

    Enhanced Voting Techniques

    May 3, 2020 at 3:08 pm

    @eric: I am a big proponent of the law of unintended consequences. Now we have a lie told about Biden being a creep (beyond what we know about his unwanted physicality). It make sit much easier for people to conclude all accusers are not telling the truth about him. The bigger victim here are real victims of sexual assaults. Now the defense is not “she asked for it,” it is “she is weaponizing me too.”

    Outing the GOP lie machine was one of the points of the Impeachment.

  148. 148.

    Enhanced Voting Techniques

    May 3, 2020 at 3:10 pm

    @MattF: This may be a forlorn hope, but I wonder if the ratfuckers are overdoing it. They took their best shot with Reade, and are now coming up with accusations that are easily batted away.

    What do you think the whole thing about Biden’s son and the Ukrane was about? That was their best shot, if this Reade thing had any legs they would have used in 2008 or 2012. Not to mention, if they were being rational about, wouldn’t this fall be the time to pull it when the Virus was off the front page and not drowning everything else out?

  149. 149.

    James E Powell

    May 3, 2020 at 3:14 pm

    @?BillinGlendaleCA:

    Hillary was well liked, before she ran for President.

    Hillary had high public approval ratings before the campaign, but the press/media and most definitely the NYT always hated her and Bill.

  150. 150.

    HumboldtBlue

    May 3, 2020 at 3:17 pm

    The disparity in police response to the astroturf white supremacist marches taking place and how they treat minority communities is best summed up in this comment.

  151. 151.

    germy

    May 3, 2020 at 3:19 pm

    Biden campaign spokesman chastises a prominent Biden supporter for calling on the FBI to investigate journalists / columnists who covered the Tara Reade allegations ? https://t.co/TLvoxiNI4q

    — Sahil Kapur (@sahilkapur) May 3, 2020

  152. 152.

    Adam L Silverman

    May 3, 2020 at 3:27 pm

    @James E Powell: That was what the Special Select Committee on Benghazi and the coverage of it was for.

  153. 153.

    HumboldtBlue

    May 3, 2020 at 3:30 pm

    @germy:

    Appears it got deleted rather quickly.

  154. 154.

    different-church-lady

    May 3, 2020 at 3:33 pm

    @Adam L Silverman: Ok, she’s now gotten the wrong twice, but everything else is totally on the level donchano.

  155. 155.

    Ruckus

    May 3, 2020 at 3:33 pm

    @Cheryl Rofer:

    trump is the first conservative politician whose only achievement was that he inherited a large sum of money, which he’s turned into a career of screwing up every single thing he touched. He’s ignorant, crude, lies, has a massively obnoxious personality disorder and may be in dementia. And those are his positive attributes.

    He can’t help himself from screwing this up, like every single other instance in his life. If there is a higher life form or guide if you will,  he/she may have sent trump here to explain to us what conservatism, selfishness, ignorance, self aggrandizement, and monetary worship does to the world and to get the hell over ourselves and live better. I’m not holding my breath.

  156. 156.

    Mnemosyne

    May 3, 2020 at 3:33 pm

    Eva Murry is standing by her lie, so I’m done with her. She’s a lying liar who lies.

    https://lawandcrime.com/2020-election/biden-campaign-provides-documents-to-dispute-eva-murry-sexual-harassment-allegation/amp/

  157. 157.

    different-church-lady

    May 3, 2020 at 3:35 pm

    @PJ:

    the people repeating the lie may have their own axe to grind, like the Tulsi Gabbard campaign staffer.

    Seagulls on a fallen french fry.

  158. 158.

    debbie

    May 3, 2020 at 3:35 pm

    @Sab:

    I did the same with one of my brothers after he posted something like that on FB. Fuckem.

    (Actually, it was just a copy and paste job from somewhere else. The dickhead isn’t smart enough to come up with any kind of theory, other than why he’s so persecuted.)

  159. 159.

    Ruckus

    May 3, 2020 at 3:35 pm

    @Leto:

    Don’t all in groups preface the existence of out groups?

  160. 160.

    Raven Onthill

    May 3, 2020 at 3:39 pm

    @PsiFighter37: “who probably thinks breaking this story (and getting the number) will boost her career.”

    It probably will. Look at how many of the people who shilled for W. Bush still have jobs with major media outfits. Even the ones who lost their jobs still found new jobs, not as prestigious but still good work, with right-wing outfits.

  161. 161.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    May 3, 2020 at 3:40 pm

    @germy: @HumboldtBlue: I saw some Biden delegate or supporter last night calling for an FBI investigation. If it’s the same person, “prominent” is doing lifting like Atlas in that Kapur tweet– somebody prominent in their state party hierarchy and conference calls with high-ranking campaign operatives, well-known to a political reporter who has cultivated a source.

  162. 162.

    PJ

    May 3, 2020 at 3:40 pm

    @Mnemosyne: C’mon, man!  If it wasn’t 2008 or 2007, it must have been 2006 or 2009 or 2010.

  163. 163.

    different-church-lady

    May 3, 2020 at 3:41 pm

    @Anya: The candidate they support had his say, but they don’t want to listen anymore.

  164. 164.

    HumboldtBlue

    May 3, 2020 at 3:41 pm

    Biden campaign has a lot of names to consider for VP.

    Former Vice President Joe Biden for the first time on Saturday said that his vice presidential vetting committee is looking at “more than a dozen women” and that there is “significantly more than one black woman” being considered.

  165. 165.

    Steeplejack (phone)

    May 3, 2020 at 3:41 pm

    @Steeplejack:

    And, just like clockwork, this arrives from Facebook: “[RWNJ brother] has shared Dan Bongino’s post . . .”

  166. 166.

    different-church-lady

    May 3, 2020 at 3:42 pm

    @PJ: Maybe it was 1908. Or 2028. BUT I REMEMBER IT VIVIDLY!!1!

  167. 167.

    different-church-lady

    May 3, 2020 at 3:46 pm

    @HumboldtBlue:

    …his vice presidential vetting committee is looking at “more than a dozen women” …

    “I TOLD YOU HE WAS A CREEP!”

  168. 168.

    JPL

    May 3, 2020 at 3:46 pm

    @HumboldtBlue: Kamala, Stacy and Val come to mind.   Although I’m impressed with Kamala, the Governor of New Mexico is a possibility and Gov. Whitmer handled Jake Tapper easily.

  169. 169.

    Anya

    May 3, 2020 at 3:48 pm

    @germy: she’s trying to get her redemption  through Biden. She’s hoping to be the darling of the Bernie deadenders and this might get her booked on tv again.

    i am actually surprised that her mom didn’t decide to represent TR.

  170. 170.

    HumboldtBlue

    May 3, 2020 at 3:50 pm

    @different-church-lady:

    That was my first fucking thought when I read that as well!

    @JPL: I linked to this earlier, but this editorial from Micheal Cohen has convinced me Kamala Harris is the best choice (the link I used is in Firefox reader mode)

  171. 171.

    Mnemosyne

    May 3, 2020 at 3:56 pm

    @Steeplejack (phone):

    I think other people have speculated that one attempted effect of these stories is not only to try and depress turnout for Biden, but to try and shore up Trump’s voters. They won by so few votes last time that they can’t risk having any of Trump’s voters sit out this year.

  172. 172.

    ?BillinGlendaleCA

    May 3, 2020 at 3:56 pm

    @HumboldtBlue: So he’s got “Binders full of Women”, then?  //

  173. 173.

    James E Powell

    May 3, 2020 at 3:56 pm

    @Mnemosyne:

    And as an example of how the press/media will hold to as much of a lie as they can, they say the documents “cast doubt” on the story as opposed to “show that the story is not true.” They leave enough of the stump for it to grow back into a “fact” that more than half the world believes. Remember, they don’t need everyone to buy this bullshit. They only need about 100K in three states.

  174. 174.

    JoyceH

    May 3, 2020 at 3:57 pm

    Does anyone else remember the Paula Jones story being pretty much conclusively debunked several years after the whole issue had been concluded? I read an article from a college professor who actually worked the timeline, and thought it would be a bigger story, but it just sank into oblivion.

  175. 175.

    Ella in New Mexico

    May 3, 2020 at 3:58 pm

     

    @Mnemosyne:

    If the niece is also bald-faced lying, she also convinced at least 5 or 6 other people to make very plausible supporting statements to the original reporter

    What do they call it on Law and Order? “Fruit from the poison tree”?

    If the niece of Christine ODonnell, who was running against Joe Biden for his Senate seat, actually did attend the Grid Iron dinner in the first place, how likely would it be she ever got close enough to Biden–if he were actually even there–in order for him to make a random sexual comment about her boobs? And given O’Donnell’s flakey history, is there any reason to think maybe this ran in the family, so to speak, and the kid made it up? Or that she couldn’t have told the niece “Hey, Joe Biden said such and such about you at the dinner” and she’d have believed her? Or like you suggested, it was some other guy but now Auntie Christine wants to hurt Joe Biden so she rang up niece to “remind her” of the details?

    If the initial story is untrue, then I don’t care how many people say she told them in real time, it was a lie. They’re just verifying she told them.

    Just like Tara Reade is getting some traction here because she apparently told some woman decades ago that she’d been raped by the Senator she worked for, as part of a conversation in which she was trying to “empathize” with the woman who was distraught over her own domestic violence issues.

    Now, having learned all that we have about her life story, past history and current behaviors I’m convinced she made it up, period. For reasons i’ve already posted here a while ago but including the very real possibility she’s got a couple of personality/mental disorders swirling around inside that head that craved the kind of dramatic attention and pity “I was Raped” got her.

    And because of that, anyone sincerely attesting to her having told them that story years ago wouldn’t be lying–just repeating her lie.

    Maybe “Fruit from the Poison Tree” isn’t the concept. How about “Garbage In-Garbage Out”?

  176. 176.

    Fair Economist

    May 3, 2020 at 4:00 pm

    @Chris Johnson:

    Maybe you can influence influencers just by dumping money on them whenever they act a certain way, and human nature does the rest?

    I think yes. I remember Naked Capitalism taking a psycho nosedive shortly after they started begging for money.

  177. 177.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    May 3, 2020 at 4:02 pm

    @JoyceH: from my perspective, the Paula Jones story was never bunked. She and Bubba had a coincidence of wants, at some point she got the idea she could cash in, and she got used by a bunch of nasty people. I wonder if Susan Carpenter McMillan still takes her calls

    ETA: but to actually answer your question: That article doesn’t ring a bell, but I’d be very interested in reading it if you remember where you saw it.

  178. 178.

    JPL

    May 3, 2020 at 4:03 pm

    @HumboldtBlue: Thanks..

  179. 179.

    JPL

    May 3, 2020 at 4:05 pm

    Stephanie Carter just spoke out about the picture of her and Biden floating around.     It’s good and the Biden camp should use it.      Sec. Def. wife, Stephanie Carter

  180. 180.

    lamh36

    May 3, 2020 at 4:06 pm

    @Mnemosyne:

    The elder Murry insisted that her sister wasn’t mistaken.

    “To provide context for my certainty, my aunt Chris got our whole family involved in her work, so both my grandparents, my aunt Jenny, Jenny’s wife, and even on one notable occasion our entire extended family, went to campaign events with her from well before 2008 up through 2010,” she continued.

    like I said..birds of a feather ??‍♀️

  181. 181.

    JoyceH

    May 3, 2020 at 4:12 pm

    @Jim, Foolish Literalist: I can’t remember where I saw it, but I remember the gist of the article.

    Recall that both sides stipulated that Jones and Clinton met – the only disagreement is what happened during the meeting. Clinton was giving a speech at some civics luncheon and had been given a suite at the hotel for office, meeting, green room sorta thing. And that’s where he and Jones met.

    Originally Jones told her family that she’d met the governor and how exciting it was and how flattering. Later she told a different story, about a gross and unwelcome pass. She gave depositions about what she said happened, and since neither side denied that the two had met, apparently no one even asked Jones what time this meeting occurred.

    But she DID say in her deposition that the meeting upset her so much that she couldn’t go back to work and clocked out immediately after the meeting. She clocked out in the middle of the afternoon.

    But this professor went back to the state archives and got the governor’s schedules, and turns out that Clinton used that room for meetings before the speech and luncheon, and did not return to it in the afternoon, but went directly back to his office. At the time when he would have been meeting with Jones, directly before she clocked out in great distress, he was back in his office having meetings.

    So the meeting had to have taken place in the morning because he wasn’t even there in the afternoon. This doesn’t tell us what passed between them, whether he was a  perfect gentleman or a creepy groper – but she lied about being so upset that she had to leave work immediately afterwards.

  182. 182.

    Immanentize

    May 3, 2020 at 4:15 pm

    @different-church-lady:
    I can remember everything as if it were yesterday!
    Maurice Chevalier — from Gigi

  183. 183.

    Mnemosyne

    May 3, 2020 at 4:18 pm

    @Ella in New Mexico:

    Yeah, that’s why I suspect it’s a family story that metastasized. That’s why she would have people who remember being told the story “a few years after it happened.” She did tell them the story, but the story wasn’t true.

    ETA: Also, as I said above, it makes me think of the McMartin preschool kids who had to get therapy to deal with the fact that things they “remembered” vividly were actually false memories that careless social workers and cops and prosecutors had helped them create.

  184. 184.

    Mnemosyne

    May 3, 2020 at 4:24 pm

    @lamh36:

    Interestingly, her sister wasn’t at the event where this allegedly happened. She heard about it afterwards.

    It looks as though, somehow, Eva came home from that event with a nasty story about Joe Biden. Whether she came up with it herself or Aunt Christine helped her, I have no idea, but the only two people who would know are Eva and Christine, and they’re both insisting that it’s true despite the evidence. ? Everyone else was told about it after the fact, so they really don’t have any way of knowing whether or not it was true except by what they were told. That’s a really easy way to spread a lie.

  185. 185.

    JPL

    May 3, 2020 at 4:25 pm

    @JPL:  This is from the article

     Last night, I received a text from a friend letting me know that picture was once again all over Twitter in connection to Lucy Flores’ personal account of a 2014 encounter with Joe Biden. Let me state upfront that I don’t know her, but I absolutely support her right to speak her truth and she should be, like all women, believed. But her story is not mine. The Joe Biden in my picture is a close friend helping someone get through a big day, for which I will always be grateful. So, as the sole owner of my story, it is high time that I reclaim it — from strangers, Twitter, the pundits and the late-night hosts.

  186. 186.

    Ruckus

    May 3, 2020 at 4:38 pm

    @Anya:

    The voters didn’t have their say. Not the voters didn’t vote for him.

    They don’t want to vote for BS, they want to have him anointed to the throne. Of course that throne doesn’t exist but reality isn’t their strong point.

  187. 187.

    Steeplejack (phone)

    May 3, 2020 at 4:39 pm

    @Mnemosyne:

    I think they’re just churning that constant sense of aggrievement and victimhood. Sorest winners ever, as many have pointed out.

    My brother claims that he voted third party in ’16 (Gary Johnson?), but I am skeptical of that. He is not quite all in on Trump; that’s the only chink in his RWNJ armor.

  188. 188.

    Bill Arnold

    May 3, 2020 at 4:40 pm

    @germy:

    So, the NY Times has now published two front pages stories about Tara Reade’s questionable claims (without noting the contradictions) in the past two days, which is two more front page stories than they published about E. Jean Carroll’s rape accusation against Trump last year.

    Enemy action.

  189. 189.

    catclub

    May 3, 2020 at 4:56 pm

    @debbie: One would think reputational risk would count for something.

     

    What risk? They have a big three broadcast channel, and a complete boycott is out of the question?

  190. 190.

    James E Powell

    May 3, 2020 at 4:58 pm

    @germy:

    We cannot expect the NYT to change. This is who they are and this is what they do.

    We can and should call them out for being consistently unfair and stop giving them money.

  191. 191.

    Brachiator

    May 3, 2020 at 5:03 pm

    @Jim, Foolish Literalist:

    from my perspective, the Paula Jones story was never bunked. She and Bubba had a coincidence of wants, at some point she got the idea she could cash in, and she got used by a bunch of nasty people.

    I agree that  Jones got used by a bunch of nasty people, but I don’t recall any evidence that she had ever indicated any attraction to Clinton, or that there was anything like a “coincidence of wants.” It is not clear that she wanted to cash in.

    Clinton was often a junky man with junky appetites. As with JFK, some of his pursuit of women might at the time be interpreted as “persistent,” but might reasonably be viewed more negatively today.

    Clinton also seemed to have a thing for Miss Arkansas winners.

  192. 192.

    JoyceH

    May 3, 2020 at 5:10 pm

    @Brachiator: “I agree that Jones got used by a bunch of nasty people, but I don’t recall any evidence that she had ever indicated any attraction to Clinton, or that there was anything like a “coincidence of wants.” It is not clear that she wanted to cash in.”

    No? How about the testimony of her own sister? The sister went on Larry King and said that she didn’t believe Paula, and she didn’t believe her because her story changed substantially from the innocuous story she first told her family and when the sister asked her why she’d changed the story, she said, “There’s money in it.”

    So yeah, I think the cash-in motive was pretty well established.

  193. 193.

    SiubhanDuinne

    May 3, 2020 at 5:14 pm

    @Sab:  I also share best wishes for your dad, and hope he recovers fully and soon.

    He just misses his car rides.

    When my grandmother was a young woman in Oak Park, she witnessed a terrible accident involving a driver and a Chicago “el” train. The car driver was decapitated. I think my gm knew how to drive, but it is certain that she never again took the wheel of any vehicle.

    But she loved going for a ride in the car. She was like a golden retriever that way. Unless the weather was dreadful, she was all about Sunday afternoon excursions. When we grandchildren were kids, the family would engage a taxi for the afternoon to just drive around. There was rarely a specific destination, just … around. When we grew up and got our own driver licenses, we would take her for long drives through the Chicago suburbs and into the country. She was an appreciative and enthusiastic passenger.

  194. 194.

    SiubhanDuinne

    May 3, 2020 at 5:24 pm

    @Steeplejack:

    About the only RWNJ I know is my youngest brother, the one in Las Vegas.

    My youngest brother is not only a RWNJ, he is an end-times dominionist and a flat-earth zealot. It’s amazing I still talk to him, but he’s always been my favourite sibling despite everything, and when we were thoroughly estranged in the 1990s, it was one of the most painful experiences of my life. So I listen to his bullshit and push back and end up ignoring his bizarre theology, and I still love him.

  195. 195.

    trollhattan

    May 3, 2020 at 5:25 pm

    @JPL:

    A very well written and heartfelt piece. I feel as sorry for her as the VP, knowing the image (frame grab) was misused with ill intent.

  196. 196.

    rikyrah

    May 3, 2020 at 5:39 pm

    She should have lost her job for that bullshyt last night.

  197. 197.

    rikyrah

    May 3, 2020 at 5:42 pm

    Putin is all in on Trump. Without Trump, Putin faces heavy sanctions and no money laundering outlet. And as the US re-emerges as a force for democracy, Putin may even face revolution. Trapped rats fight like hell, but Active Measures don’t work on squeaky clean guys like Biden.— Uncle Blazer (@blakesmustache) May 3, 2020

  198. 198.

    Brachiator

    May 3, 2020 at 5:42 pm

    @JoyceH:

    No? How about the testimony of her own sister? The sister went on Larry King and said that she didn’t believe Paula, and she didn’t believe her because her story changed substantially from the innocuous story she first told her family and when the sister asked her why she’d changed the story, she said, “There’s money in it.”

    So yeah, I think the cash-in motive was pretty well established.

    I hate revisiting the Clinton crap. But one of the sisters and her husband seemed to want to slam Jones, and clearly lied in a couple of cases. From Newsweek:

    Three family members told Isikoff that Jones had come to them about the incident. Lydia Cathey, her older sister, said that Jones had been in tears because “she didn’t know what to do.” Only Jones’s other sister, Charlotte Brown, disputed that she was upset. Jones’s tone, said Brown, was “matter of fact.”

    A lot of mud has been thrown at Clinton, his wife, and family. But some of Clinton’s own reckless behavior gave his enemies a stick and they happily used it to bash him.

  199. 199.

    rikyrah

    May 3, 2020 at 5:44 pm

    I appreciate the post,Silverman, and that you called it out a lonnnnngggg time ago.

  200. 200.

    Bonnie

    May 3, 2020 at 5:52 pm

    Fox News should have it’s FCC License taken away.

  201. 201.

    compassrose.pdx

    May 3, 2020 at 5:57 pm

    Well, this is the Year of the Rat…and they are fornicating as we speak.  Tiny question; why didn’t Ms. Reade come forward with these allegations when Mr. Biden was running for VP in 2008, 2012?

    As always, excellent piece by Mr. Silverman, providing insight into how political warfare works.  It’s important to debunk, but also to understand why people believe things, and how to get people to believe things (association, repetition, etc.)

  202. 202.

    rikyrah

    May 3, 2020 at 6:02 pm

    @Anya: \\were you the one who took a look at her timeline?

     

    someone did in the other post. I appreciated that, because now, I know how to approach her, and I am definitely spreading the words about her

  203. 203.

    Brachiator

    May 3, 2020 at 6:23 pm

    @rikyrah:

    I appreciate the post,Silverman, and that you called it out a lonnnnngggg time ago.

    I second that!

  204. 204.

    hitchhiker

    May 3, 2020 at 6:32 pm

    Too late for this thread, but I’m going to say it anyway.

    Kinda sad to see Rich McHugh — who was Ronan Farrow’s producer in the ill-fated series NBC cancelled about Harvey Weinstein — playing this story up. I had so much respect for him after reading Catch and Kill, and now he’s coming off like just another Republican news guy, happy to promote mud.

    That Lisa Fucking Bloom should choose to insert herself into this mess is insane. Does she think her efforts to smear Weinstein’s victims are all forgotten?

  205. 205.

    Another Scott

    May 3, 2020 at 7:08 pm

    @Anya:

    I’ve definitely learned a valuable lesson from this sordid story.

    I thought I had learned after the story about Clinton having a private e-mail server (rather than using the State server) and the way I freaked out (the way our own John Cole did, also too) on the news.

    But I was one of those demanding Gov. Northam’s resignation after his disastrous press conference. :-/

    This time, I held my tongue. I’ve learned to (or at least tried to) wait at least 2 days before taking Twitter-originated stories as accurate. Maybe waiting even longer makes sense. But, it’s hard. We’re too conditioned to think that if a major media organization reports it, it should be regarded as mostly factual. It’s really, really hard to give up that presumption.

    But we must.

    Our trust has been weaponized against us. Too much is at stake for us not to carefully check our priors, and think about the big picture and who is doing the pushing of the stories.

    (Thanks for this Adam. You continue to do great work on these issues.)

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  206. 206.

    Bill Arnold

    May 3, 2020 at 7:34 pm

    @Another Scott:
    I’m recording names of media figures and their (dis)information feeds.
    (If Adam wants more traction one thing he could try is dropping more googleable names in his pieces, and not just names of those who are misbehaving. Google is a thing, and is one reason (besides being good form/respectful) why I almost always include bylines in links.)

  207. 207.

    Hkedi [Kang T. Q.]

    May 3, 2020 at 8:07 pm

    @Raven Onthill: I listen to their podcast every week. and now that they are on Youtube, I can listen to them twice! (for the analytics so more people find them)

  208. 208.

    Ella in New Mexico

    May 3, 2020 at 8:27 pm

    @Mnemosyne: 
    I guess my only worry right now is the number of people who say she told them something to the effect of what he said.

    Even so, this has SOOOO moved into Al Franken territory now. I’m sorry but how is someone saying “How old are you? You’re very well-endowed for your age” verbal sexual harassment” or traumatic?

    Also, too, where was Auntie Christine, who had literally just seconds before this supposed statement, introduced the girl to Biden? Would you have stood by and not say something to him like “Uh, THAT’s really inappropriate, Senator”?

    And TBH, I can see a situation in which he didn’t use the term “well endowed” but instead made a comment generally referring to her presenting as more mature than 14…and she interpreted it the way lots of 14 year-old girls would who’s Crazy Fucking Aunt was running a joke of a campaign for the Senate seat in Delaware and had been dragging their entire family along for every campaign event, pouring the Kool-Aid to fuel their mutually shared delusions that she was some kind of legit contender for the seat and he was a bad guy.

  209. 209.

    Ed Smart

    May 3, 2020 at 9:35 pm

    These people have all the civic responsibility of someone leaving their outdoor trash fire unsupervised in California during a drought year in August.

  210. 210.

    No One You Know

    May 3, 2020 at 10:43 pm

    @JPLSo: Witches actually have a creed not too different from the Two Commandments of the Christian Scriptures.  No self- respecting witch would acknowledge her.

  211. 211.

    Origuy

    May 4, 2020 at 12:07 am

    @Bonnie: Cable channels do not have licenses. Only broadcast radio and TV stations have licenses.

  212. 212.

    Another Scott

    May 4, 2020 at 12:43 pm

    @Origuy: Cable channels bounce stuff off of satellites which use FCC licensed frequency bands. I don’t know the details, but I’m sure someone clever could come up with a way to make the playing field more level between “broadcast” and “cable” if they wanted/needed to. But probably not totally level…

    Cheers,
    Scott.

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