I n his keynote survey of the descent of American democracy in the Trump era at the recent Zionism 3.0 conference in Palo Alto Atlantic editor Jeffrey Goldberg dwelled for some time on the proliferation of “fake news” which he attributed in large part to the thousands of portals of entry of information — be it true or false — into the public consciousness. Not surprisingly he gave much higher marks for accuracy and objectivity to the old media which while not perfect does a pretty good job of bringing pertinent and accurate information to the public.
Now the Atlantic is an often-stimulating magazine with much worth reading. But as in his one-sided depiction of the sources of threat to America’s democratic culture Goldberg is far too easy on his colleagues in the traditional media whose selection of what to present is often highly partisan in nature.
That may seem an odd claim this week when the left-leaning Washington Post revealed that the Democratic National Committee and the Clinton campaign commissioned the notorious and discredited Trump dossier from Fusion GPS a firm that itself has worked as an unregistered agent of Russia. The dossier was produced by Christopher Steele an ex-British intelligence official largely based on (dis)information supplied by Russian contacts.
Yet the Washington Post and the rest of the mainstream media are ignoring an equally explosive story. The latter concerns not just the relationship of Hillary Clinton and the Clinton Foundation to Russia but also actions taken by the FBI and Justice Department to preserve the Obama administration’s narrative of a Russian “reset.” And it implicates former FBI director and current special prosecutor Robert Mueller.
