Glenn Greenwald's Blog, page 23

WashPost Is Richly Rewarded for False News About Russia Threat While Public Is Deceived

In the pastsix weeks, the Washington Post published two blockbuster stories about the Russian threat that went viral: one on how Russia is behind a massive explosion of “fake news,” the other on how it invaded the U.S. electric grid. Both articles were fundamentally false. Each now bears ahumiliating editor’s note grudgingly acknowledging that the core claims of thestory were fiction: The first note was posted a full two weeks laterto the top of the original article; the other was buried the...

Russia Hysteria Infects WashPost Again: False Story About Hacking U.S. Electric Grid

(updated below)

The Washington Poston Friday reportedagenuinely alarming event: Russian hackers have penetrated the U.S. power system through an electrical grid in Vermont. The Post headline conveyed the seriousness of the threat:

The first sentence of the article directly linked this cyberattackto alleged Russian hacking of the email accounts of the DNC and John Podesta — what is now routinely referred to as “Russian hacking of our election” — by referencing the code name revealed on Wedn...

The Guardian’s Summary of Julian Assange’s Interview Went Viral and Was Completely False

Julian Assange isa deeply polarizing figure. Many admire him and many despise him (into which category one falls in any given year typicallydepends on one’s feelings aboutthe subject of his most recent publication of leaked documents).

But one’s views of Assange are completely irrelevant to this article, which is not about Assange. This article, instead,is about areport published this week by The Guardian thatrecklesslyattributed to Assange comments that he did not make. This article is about...

Anonymous Leaks to the WashPost About the CIA’s Russia Beliefs Are No Substitute for Evidence

The Washington Post late Friday night published an explosive storythat, in many ways, is classic American journalism of the worst sort: The key claims arebased exclusively on the unverified assertionsof anonymous officials, who in turn are disseminating their own claims about what the CIA purportedly believes, all based on evidence that remains completely secret.

These unnamed sourcestold the Post that “the CIA has concluded in a secret assessment that Russia intervened in the 2016 election t...

A Clinton Fan Manufactured Fake News That MSNBC Personalities Spread to Discredit WikiLeaks Docs

The phrase “Fake News” has exploded in usage since the election, but the term is similar to other malleable political labels such as “terrorism” and “hate speech”; because the phraselacks any clear definition, it is essentially useless except as an instrument of propaganda and censorship. The most important fact to realize about this new term: those who most loudly denounce Fake News are typically those most aggressively disseminating it.

One of the most egregious examples was the recent Wash...

The Smear Campaign Against Keith Ellison Is Repugnant but Reveals Much About Washington

Ever since he announced his candidacy to lead the Democratic National Committee, Keith Ellison, the first American Muslim elected to the U.S. Congress, has been the target of a defamation campaign that is deceitful, repugnant, and yetquite predictable. At first expressed in whispers, but now being yelled from the rooftops by some of the party’s most influential figures, Ellison is being smeared as both an anti-Semite and enemy of Israel — the same smears virtually any critic of the Israeli go...

The Intercept Brasil Welcomes Ana Maria Gonçalves as a Columnist on Race, Politics, and Culture

The creation of The Intercept, and then the Intercept Brasil, was motivated by a core purpose: to provide crucial journalism and commentary that, for whatever reasons, isnot being adequately provided to the public. We are especially thrilled to announce the arrivalof Ana Maria Gonçalves as our new columnist because herwork so powerfully advancesthat objective.

By virtue of “Um Defeito de Cor” (A Color Defect),her 952-page 2006 novel about the life of an African woman enslaved and brought to...

The Intercept Brasil Welcomes Ana Maria Gonçalves as a Columnist on Race, Politics and Culture

The creation of The Intercept, and then the Intercept Brasil, was motivated by a core purpose: to provide crucial journalism and commentary that, for whatever reasons, isnot being adequately provided to the public. We are especially thrilled to announce the arrivalof Ana Maria Gonçalves as our new columnist because herwork so powerfully advancesthat objective.

By virtue of “Um Defeito de Cor” (A Color Defect),her 952-page 2006 novel about the life of an African woman enslaved and brought to...

Growing Far-Right Nationalistic Movements Are Dangerously Anti-Muslim — and Pro-Israel

The specter of a growing far-right nationalism anywhere, but particularly in Central Europe, immediately —and for good and obvious reasons — raises fears of an anti-Semitism revival. But at least thus far, the leaders of most of these nationalistic parties — increasingly inspired and fueled by one another’s success — have showcaseddangerous animosity toward Muslims, accompanied by strong policy support for Israel and a rhetoricalrepudiation of anti-Semitism.

Whether from cynical tactical cons...

Washington Post Disgracefully Promotes a McCarthyite Blacklist From a New, Hidden, and Very Shady Group

The Washington Post on Thursday nightpromoted the claims of a new, shadowy organization that smears dozens ofU.S.news sites that are critical of U.S. foreign policy as being “routine peddlers of Russian propaganda.” The articleby reporter Craig Timberg – headlined “Russian propaganda effort helped spread ‘fake news’ during election, experts say” – cites a report by a new, anonymouswebsite calling itself “PropOrNot,” which claims that millions of Americans have been deceived this year in a mas...