Originally Posted by James Lacey
As far as I know, no CNN news personalities have ever interacted with the White House as directly and with the intent of coordinating messaging the way Fox News did during the Trump years.
I don't watch CNN much, so I don't have much opinion of their Haley reporting, but I can tell you this. CNN has a vast ethics compliance department and takes ethics seriously. Like any large corporation does, if for no other reason than the cost of unethical behavior. For example, FOX is facing a colossal defamation lawsuit from Dominion. If Dominion wins, not likely, to be honest, it will cost Fox news big. In any case, just defending against the suit is costly enough.
I don't subscribe to the theory that CNN, the NYT, and WaPo were pushing a "collusion lie." They were reporting on the story, and the right created a narrative of the "Russia Hoax" to discredit any investigation or reporting. So, of course, you had this back-and-forth where one side is reporting, and the other is calling all of it "fake news."
Yes, Mueller found no evidence of collusion, and ultimately Trump was never charged with anything. But was all the journalistic reporting "fake news?" Hardly. The Mueller report did say that the Trump campaign had improper contacts with Russia and even accepted some offers of assistance. The report also said there were multiple acts by Trump where he improperly used the influence of office to interfere with and obstruct the investigation, which is not how an innocent man acts. The report did not exonerate Trump. The person genuinely responsible for the Russia probe and its fallout is Trump, not the journalists.
We disagree. CNN and the other outlets beat the drum of Russian collusion for over two years. There was never any doubt expressed in the press. Trumps guilt was a foregone conclusion.
Just for grins, google "CNN the walls are closing in" and watch any of the dozens of clips from CNN. I think they knew the dossier and the whole collusion story was BS, but they ran with it anyway. In news nowadays, left and right of course, the narrative is everything. If CNN had no knowledge that the story was bogus, they did no real investigation, and were willfully blind. This is just as bad. The collusion story was received as truth by CNN and the other left biased press because they hated Trump so much. There has been plenty of serious analysis that draws this conclusion.
Please note that Trump caused his own mess with
obstruction. These are entirely separate issues. Even so, as much as I despise him, he was framed on the Russian collusion story, and the press is complicit.
Rolling Stone seems to have paywalled Matt Taibi's writing from 2018 - 2020 about the Russian collusion hoax and press complicity, but I think it was compelling analysis. Have you read it? I've linked to it before.
