PrintMSM fake news feeding frenzy to take down Trump
How serious has the war gotten between Donald Trump's White House and the government he supposedly runs?
Gizmodo – a website that deals with science and technology as well as politics – has launched a new site to encourage government employees to leak damning information about the Trump administration. TellonTrump.com is the subject of a massive advertising campaign on Facebook and will give government turncoats a safe and secure means of passing along damaging documents.
"One thing we know about Donald Trump is that there are a lot of things Donald Trump doesn't want people to know about. If you've reached this page, you might have information about the conduct of Donald Trump or his administration that you'd like people to know about. Here's how you can tell us," the site explains.
The Univision Communications Inc.-owned media group, which operates sites like Fusion and the former Gawker Media sites like Gizmodo, Deadspin and Jezebel, started running ads on the social media platform within the last week that specifically target people who list certain government agencies as their employers. The ads don't specify which news outlet is running the campaign, but the site which the ads point to clearly identifies the Gizmodo special projects desk.
"We are targeting people who are employed by federal agencies because we want them to know that if they see or know about something they think is newsworthy, we are here for them," said John Cook, Gizmodo's head of investigations.
Mr. Cook said Gizmodo is also working to purchase bus shelter ads near certain government agencies in Washington, D.C., encouraging people to contact them with information about the Trump administration.
Amazing, incredible – frightening. The German word that describes what's going on is Götterdämmerung – a "cataclysmic downfall or momentous, apocalyptic event, especially of a regime or an institution." Trump's enemies are willing to tear the entire country down in order to destroy the president. The fact that they will destroy the presidency and the country in the process is regrettable but worth it because Trump is...well, evil.
I am myself unnerved by the evidence of high-level lawlessness in the Flynn matter, but a "coup d'etat" refers specifically to a military ouster of a leader, not a leak-driven campaign using the press to nail someone. This is sure to persist, though, if the Flynn-Russia matter accelerates—and if the reluctant House and Senate do begin investigating the matter in earnest. If the language surrounding the investigation remains florid and purple, if Democrats try to please their Trump-hating constituents by screaming impeachment and liberal media tries to garner audience by jumping openly and vociferously on the bandwagon, the Trumpians will respond in kind by stirring the pot through their media and their argumentation.
The result might well be violence. Not rhetorical violence. Actual violence. Actual political violence. Actual conflicts between anti-Trumpers and Trumpers. At demonstrations. In the streets. Of our cities. Political violence of a sort we haven't seen in 50 years, and maybe haven't really seen in this country in the modern era. Those who believe Trump is a unique menace whose threat to our democratic way of life will be met with those who believe the elites are using illicit means to oust the legitimately elected president of the United States.
This is not a fantasy. This is one possible future. And every rational person who cares about the future of the country should be mindful of it, and should work to forestall it.
The media feeding frenzy is unprecedented – and that's saying a lot. To read most of the media stories the last 48 hours, you would think Trump is a heartbeat away from impeachment, resignation, or an internal revolution. Hysterical hit pieces like this N.Y. Times anonymously sourced, non-specific story about Trump campaign aides talking with senior Russian intelligence officials "around the same time they were discovering evidence that Russia was trying to disrupt the presidential election by hacking into the Democratic National Committee" are fueling an innuendo-driven storyline that Trump aides – and possibly Trump himself – committed treason by colluding with Russians to elect Trump president.
Except the Times story also states flatly, "The officials interviewed in recent weeks said that, so far, they had seen no evidence of such cooperation." In other words, there is no story. In fact, the "evidence" in the story comes to the Times as hearsay – the reporter talked to someone who knows something about intercepts and communications between Trump's people and the Russians.
Why weren't the Times reporters given access to the actual intercepts? Why didn't the Times report which campaign aides were in contact with the Russians? If no evidence exists of collusion, just what the hell was the Times doing publishing this blatant innuendo and smear?
This is what passes for "journalism" in the age of Trump. Evidence is not necessary. An active imagination is.
And now we learn that the intel agencies are withholding information from the president of the United States because they don't trust him.
U.S. intelligence officials have withheld sensitive intelligence from President Donald Trump because they are concerned it could be leaked or compromised, according to current and former officials familiar with the matter.
The officials' decision to keep information from Mr. Trump underscores the deep mistrust that has developed between the intelligence community and the president over his team's contacts with the Russian government, as well as the enmity he has shown toward U.S. spy agencies. On Wednesday, Mr. Trump accused the agencies of leaking information to undermine him.
In some of these cases of withheld information, officials have decided not to show Mr. Trump the sources and methods that the intelligence agencies use to collect information, the current and former officials said. Those sources and methods could include, for instance, the means that an agency uses to spy on a foreign government.
A White House official said: "There is nothing that leads us to believe that this is an accurate account of what is actually happening."
A spokesman for the Office of Director of National Intelligence said: "Any suggestion that the U.S. intelligence community is withholding information and not providing the best possible intelligence to the president and his national security team is not true."
Intelligence officials have in the past not told a president or members of Congress about the ins and outs of how they ply their trade. At times, they have decided that secrecy is essential for protecting a source, and that all a president needs to know is what that source revealed and what the intelligence community thinks is important about it.
Are you getting this? Intelligence officials are withholding information from the president – just as they have with other presidents. In short, once again, there is no story. This is what is known in the business as "stirring the pot" – generating what appears to be "news" that, in fact, is business as usual.
The catalyst for this feeding frenzy was Michael Flynn's incredible lapse in judgment in speaking to the Russian government and then lying about it. But the Flynn resignation has taken on a larger symbolism – it is a metaphor for the "chaos" that exists in the White House.
How much of this is true and how much is invention?
The head of US Special Operations Command said Tuesday that the US government is in "unbelievable turmoil," a situation that he suggested could undermine US efforts to fight adversaries such as ISIS.
"Our government continues to be in unbelievable turmoil. I hope they sort it out soon because we're a nation at war," Army Gen. Raymond "Tony" Thomas told a symposium in Maryland.
While it wasn't exactly clear what Thomas was referring to, his remarks come less than 24 hours after retired Lt. Gen. Michael Flynn was forced to step down as national security adviser, becoming by far the shortest tenured adviser in history.
Thomas oversees America's elite Special Operations troops, including Navy SEALs and Army Green Berets, which have played a large role in carrying out the nation's conflicts since 9/11.
Asked later about his comments, Thomas, a veteran of Iraq and Afghanistan, said: "As a commander, I'm concerned our government be as stable as possible.
This is extraordinary, considering that CNN admits "it wasn't exactly clear what Thomas was referring to." If it's "not exactly clear" why report the damn story in the first place?!
Thomas should be at least disciplined and perhaps fired for commenting on politics while on active duty. What does he know about Washington politics sitting in his office at SOCOM headquarters in Florida? His indiscretion has given ammunition to the political enemies of his commander in chief. As a senior military commander, he should have known better.
These are just a sampling of the over-the-top, exaggerated, hysterical reporting done that is deliberately, consciously being created to undermine and eventually destroy a legitimately elected president. It's never been done on this scale before. Fed by social media and the interconnectedness of the internet, Donald Trump is facing a challenge far greater than Richard Nixon faced when his presidency began to unravel. And the speed at which the attacks are rolling downhill is making it difficult – if not impossible – for Trump and his people to turn the situation around.
