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Salon: Republicans Are Launching Fake Local News Sites To Spread 'Propaganda' (salon.com)
"The Tennessee Star claims to be the 'most reliable' online local paper in the state," reports Salon. "In fact it's just a GOP front." An anonymous reader quotes their report:
An investigation by the fact-checking outlet Snopes found that several new local news websites are actually being launched by Republican consultants whose company is funded in part by the candidates the sites cover. Politico first reported last year that Tea Party-linked conservative activists Michael Patrick Leahy, Steve Gill and Christina Botteri were behind the "Tennessee Star," a website that purported to be a local news website but mostly posted content licensed from groups linked to big Republican donors. Snopes discovered that the trio has since launched similar sites in other battleground states ahead of the 2020 elections: the Ohio Star and the Minnesota Sun...
The group behind the sites does not appear content with just three outlets. According to Politico, Leahy has purchased domain names associated with Missouri, New England, the Dakotas, Michigan, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, Virginia and Wisconsin, most of which are electoral battleground states that will be vital in 2020.
Kathleen Bartzen Culver, who heads the Center of Journalism Ethics at the University of Wisconsin at Madison, told Snopes that political operatives are free to launch their own news platforms, but it's a problem if they are trying to deceive readers into believing the sites are nonpartisan local news. "I have no problem with advocacy organizations creating content that reinforces the positions they take on public policy issues on the left, right or center. The issue comes in when they're not transparent about that advocacy," Culver said... "The information sphere is so polluted right now that the average citizen has trouble telling what is real and what is not," Culver told Snopes. "I find that very troubling within a democracy."
An investigation by the fact-checking outlet Snopes found that several new local news websites are actually being launched by Republican consultants whose company is funded in part by the candidates the sites cover. Politico first reported last year that Tea Party-linked conservative activists Michael Patrick Leahy, Steve Gill and Christina Botteri were behind the "Tennessee Star," a website that purported to be a local news website but mostly posted content licensed from groups linked to big Republican donors. Snopes discovered that the trio has since launched similar sites in other battleground states ahead of the 2020 elections: the Ohio Star and the Minnesota Sun...
The group behind the sites does not appear content with just three outlets. According to Politico, Leahy has purchased domain names associated with Missouri, New England, the Dakotas, Michigan, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, Virginia and Wisconsin, most of which are electoral battleground states that will be vital in 2020.
Kathleen Bartzen Culver, who heads the Center of Journalism Ethics at the University of Wisconsin at Madison, told Snopes that political operatives are free to launch their own news platforms, but it's a problem if they are trying to deceive readers into believing the sites are nonpartisan local news. "I have no problem with advocacy organizations creating content that reinforces the positions they take on public policy issues on the left, right or center. The issue comes in when they're not transparent about that advocacy," Culver said... "The information sphere is so polluted right now that the average citizen has trouble telling what is real and what is not," Culver told Snopes. "I find that very troubling within a democracy."
One that goes back to our oldest elections, though I think those papers were mostly focused on slandering opponents.
for the party the coined the term 'fake news' (and 'alternative facts'), the Republicans seem to generate more of it than the rest of the world combined.
This has nothing to do with nerds. Nor is it news... /.
Salon is the biggest piece of shit masquerading as journalism out there right next to Mother Jones and The Daily Stormer. Who gives a rat's ass what they think?
Do better,
When did slashdot become a politics site where propaganda sources are allowed like salon? Np, we do not want this in our nerd news. Keep this crap on twitter.
Salon is one of the worst left wing ones pretending to be neutral.
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Why are political news on Slashdot all of a sudden? Actually there has been an increase of this garbage. I don't give a fuck if you are Republican, Democrat, anarchist, whatever, don't post your garbage here. Fuck off already.
Maybe Salon doesn't know this but it been like FOREVER that CNN, MSNBC, CBS, ABC, etc are all in bed with the democrats. Clinton or Obama says something and the media forwards it on as truth but if Bush or Trumps says something they are suddenly obligated to "fact check" and doubt everything the say and filter it to the people with "the Republican is claiming that allegedly water is wet and the sky is blue but we have some political pundits here who disagree with those outrageous claims".
THEN you'd be all rage induced spittle flinging. Because you're only bored because (a) This is from the right, which you expected, though insist is a lefitst only thing, and (b) because you dont want to know or anyone else to care that the rightwing are doing it.
The irony here is that you get a shrill call out if there's any perceived partisanship in the media that favors republican interests in a backdrop where there is an overwhelming bias for democrat interests across a wide swath of mainstream media that SJW's just wink at.
And this has zero to do with technology and is another nail in the relevancy coffin of slashdot. The political crap is boring. If I wanted that, there are plenty of other places to go that offer more insightful analysis.
You know Fox is basically controlled opposition and that any time one of their, in many cases real conservative hosts, start talking too close to the core about what's wrong they get shit-canned right? Fox news is right-wing news with a restraining bolt.
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Yeah, but we're hell-bent on having a the Communist Revolution in America, so, like...it's ok for Salon to be biased. You know??? OMG *rolls eyes*
"You can vote yourself into Socialism, but you have to shoot your way out"
Life is not for the lazy.
Its probably true, but Snopes is no longer a reliable source. They compromised integrity for partisanship a couple years ago and its going to take a long time to regain credibility. Snopes is supposed to call out misinformation. Deciding to rank certain and provable false claims as a 'we arent sure, its possible but we just dont know' for DNC related stuff was a stupid ass move. If your going to call out misinformation, you have to have a religious level of commitment to the truth, regardless where it leads you. Using influence to sway opinion was never what the site was intended for. Thats an abuse of trust that is hard to regain. I have never seen them call a truth a lie, but I have seen them abuse the in-between-ratings and thats poor journalism if you ask me.
Correct. The GOP managed to...
Get Buzzfeed to run a story that Trump told Cohen to lie to Congress, which CNN, MSNBC, ABC, CBS, ... all ran as well.
They then got them all to run the story on how racist the kids from Covengton were despite overwhelming evidence showing otherwise. Now WaPo and CNN are both being sued for $250 million for these "Fake News" stories.
The GOP followed that up with all those same outlets running the fake Jussie Sommellet story as well.
They are getting good at planting blatantly "Fake News" stories in NYT, WaPo, CNN, MSNBC, CBS, ABC, and so on. They have gotten so good at it those news outlets have lost all credibility.
So you are correct GOP has managed to destroy the left's credibility on issues.
OR
The left is so dip shit stupid they can't figure out a fact to save their own lives.
Which is more believable?
Is Full On Venezuela Communist Now?
Of course, if a bunch of Democrats get together and put together a biased newspaper, then it's okay?
It's not just OK, it's virtuous! The dems might as well just go ahead an launch a newspaper actually called The Virtue Signal.
Don't disappoint your bird dog. Go to the range.
I think it's funny you pointing to Salon's political bias (which it certainly does have) while making claims of an eminent communist revolution in this country. You either don't understand what communism is or have a personal political bias so far departed from reality that you're consciously choosing to characterize the mild Leftist push the Democrats are actually experiencing as communism.
I ignore Anonymous Coward posts. If you want to discuss something, that's awesome. Log in.
"I think it funny that you believe that AOC is "mild Leftist"."
I think it's funny that you think that AOC is the entirety of the Democratic party and not just one of 235 Democratic house members who represent's only one of New York's 27 congressional districts. Is the entire Republican party libertarian because the people of Kentucky elected Rand Paul to the Senate?
" What they want is to take my money so that the politicians can decide who deserves it."
Every government, no matter where on the political spectrum, does this. It's what governments do and the odds are fairly certain you're in favor of government doing this in some sort of context so you can quit with the delusion that only those on the Left practice what you describe.
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