God, Guns, Classified Docs, Burisma, the Biden’s & Journalistic Standards – Top 3 Takeaways – April 14th, 2023
- A tale of two bombshell stories. The first story involves a former vice-president, former National Security Advisor to the Vice President and son of former vice-president, current president, his National Security Advisor, son to current president and former president. I know, I know, that’s a lot of people to keep track of but in reality, it’s far fewer than it sounds. We’ll come back to those folks and that story. Now for the people involved in the second story. It involves an alleged guy in his “early to mid-20s" who’s described as being... “He’s fit. He’s strong. He’s armed. He’s trained. Just about everything you can expect out of some sort of crazy movie”. Cool? Cool. Alright, let’s move along. So back to the first story for a moment. The headline for the first story is this: Ex-Obama staffer blows whistle on Biden 'kickback scheme' after Hunter joined Burisma: 'Malfeasance in office'. The headline for the second story is this: Leaker of U.S. secret documents worked on military base, friend says. Hmm, alright. So, in the first story, we have information sourced from an identified Ex-Obama administration staffer. In the second story we have information sourced from...” a friend”. I mean, yeah. What major news organization wouldn’t run with a story of extreme national and international security interest sourced from “a friend” is all I’m saying. Right? After all, this wasn’t just any unidentified friend. Quoting the Washington Post story: He is under 18 and was a young teenager when he met OG (OG is the alleged handle on Discord of the alleged leaker). Right, now, we not only have a bombshell story run by the Washington Post, but that’s also sourced through an unidentified minor. So naturally, of the two bombshell stories, the one presented by Fox News which includes a named source, Mike McCormick, a White House stenographer of 15 years, has been completely ignored by every news organization except by Fox News and the story fashioned around the accounts of an unidentified minor was picked up by every news outlet in the world – prior to the developments later in the day. Now, it has been a few years, 23 to be exact, since I studied journalism in college. And to be fair I didn’t finish (I dropped out of college as a dean’s list student on a full academic scholarship). But had I not dropped out, I’m pretty sure I would have flunked out had I attempted to present a story based on a single anonymous source who also happened to be a child. In fact, I know at a minimum I would have been thrown out of class for attempting something so patently absurd. Over the course of my studies, we were never allowed to bring fewer than three sources to the table for a story and I distinctly remember sourcing as many as eight. And that brings me to...
- Journalistic standards. So yeah, in case anyone wondered what the journalistic standards of the Washington Post happened to be... An unidentified minor now qualifies as all the sourcing required to run with bombshell stories...except that’s a violation of their very own publicly stated policy on sources. Now it’s been just a bit since the Washington Post updated their “Confidential Sources” policy – 2004 to be exact, so actually not many years removed from when I was on the periphery of what’s considered official journalism...but anyway, what is stated by WaPo is this: Named sources are vastly to be preferred to unnamed sources. Reporters should press to have sources go on the record. We have learned over the years that persistently pushing sources to identify themselves actually works – not always, of course, but more often than many reporters initially expect. If a particular source refuses to allow us to identify him or her, the reporter should consider seeking the information elsewhere. We prefer at least two sources for factual information in Post stories that depends on confidential informants, and those sources should be independent of each other. We prefer sources with first-hand or direct knowledge of the information. Umm, ok, alright, yep. So, the Post demands a minimum of two first-hand sources to verify material that’s to be published. And yet they ran with the account of one 2nd hand child. And then everyone else ran with that too citing the Washington Post as the source of the reporting. It’s hard to fully state the extent of the absurdity associated with all of this but those are evidently the real journalistic standards these days.
- The real deal. When a news organization runs with stories of great significance sourced in a way that would have had me flunk out of college had I pulled the crap they pulled – there’s more to the story. As it turned out, the Washington Post was onto the alleged leaker. And it was the New York Times who actually named him. Now let’s be real for a moment. Why is it that WaPo really found the unidentified minor who they ran with for the story in the first place? Why is it that the New York Times had the name of the suspect prior to the Feds making an arrest? Is it because a bunch of young gamers instantly think the go to for disseminating news is the Washington Post and New York Times? Let’s get real. Does CNN and Roger Stone come to mind? This is a story about a leaker. And it would appear likely that he’s not the only leaker. Oh, and as for Fox’s firsthand named source in a story you likely haven’t even heard about... Quoting the source, Mike McCormick: In February, I went to the FBI and filed one of their tips on their website. If you do that, and you're lying to them, you go to jail. I'm not lying. I'm telling the truth, and I'm not going to jail. Joe Biden is a criminal. He was conducting malfeasance in office to enrich his family. Jake Sullivan is a conspirator in that, and there's more... Obama officials involved in it, I believe. It’s detailed in the story for those who’re interested – which should be everyone. Interestingly, he’s been attempting to testify before the grand jury in the Hunter Biden case and the prosecutor won’t let him. He’s been trying to get the FBI to investigate his claims. They won’t do it. But yeah, now we don’t even have to pretend this huge development in the story exists because of Jack Teixeria. And isn’t the timing perfect? Almost like it was planned that way...