Mainstream media, such as the New York Times, and even, mostly, The Intercept, have been exposed as manufacturing consent shills for the endless promotion of the evidence free Russiagate conspiracy theory.
Now, strangely, a reverse thing is happening. Long time self-proclaimed antiwar journalists may be exposing themselves as a different kind of manufacturing consent shills for the endless promotion of the relatively trivial Hunter Biden allegations. This includes MoonOfAlabama, Glenn Greenwald, Caitlin Johnstone, and many others.
This is ultimately about Garden Variety corruption, in which by one means or another Hunter picks up $50,000 or whatever here or there. I frankly don't care about such things. I have never spent more than a minute watching Rachel Maddow or others on MSNBC talk about Trumps infinite dealings here or there either, even when there might have been some facts to back them up (which is possible on topics other than the fact-free Russiagate). I wish journalists would stop obsessing about such things, but they do because they can get a lot of attention, ("dirty laundry") and steer it what every way they want, because of course the entire establishment, even capitalism itself, is based on corruption. So all you have to do is look exclusively to one side or another to use corruption to steer your audience away from one side and towards another. The corruption is everywhere, that's not an issue in this election, or any other, or of much importance to making progress vs regress to society in general. Corrupt societies might well advance more than less corrupt societies following stupidly antisocial policies (such as neoliberalism), corruption is a relatively independent factor, compared with degrees of public support and investment and general social policies.
Some of my friends do take these kinds of corruption things seriously. I don't speak for them, but I suspect they could claim what is likely true...that Trump and his family have been proven to be involved in far more and/or more serious cases of corruption. Mainstream media will generally reach for doubt rather than context.
By huffing and puffing about these trivial allegations against Hunter Biden, many of my favorite alternative media reporters are enhancing continued war with China by two means:
1) Possibly helping the Trump administration retain power, by weakening the resolve of many to vote effectively against Trump by voting for Biden, his leading and only relevant rival. Trump has had China in his sights from day one, hiring an endless series of anti-China (and anti-Iran) hawks.
2) If people like me manage to get Biden elected (which may require aiding the many groups which are trying to do so, rather than merely Biden and the DNC themselves) the continued huffing and puffing about Hunter Biden could in fact help stall peace with China.
Sadly, I have to say, all these fine journalists who I deeply respect as journalists (but not as analysts--that's my job of course) are following in this self-defeating and self-discrediting track. I'm still giving them the benefit of the doubt as not having been GOP (and/or Russian) shills all along, as I'm sure many long have, but it is clear they don't care if Trump is reelected, Moon has listed that as his slight preference (and prediction), whereas Caitlin and Glenn simply say it doesn't matter. This is a mark against them all in my book, though I'd say at this point Moon is not replaceable, because he's currently the best journalist I know of (as well as an often crappy analyst and forecaster and anarcho-Trumper). Caitlin is brilliant occasionally, but highly variable (which led me to quit my patronage) and Glenn is like that too though I think he's more professional and less variable--when edited. I should have also mentioned Taibbi, he's in this bunch too, very good writer, but too long winded in his huffing and puffing for me to take much of.
I'll be looking for replacements who are clear anti-Trumpers. I believe David Sirota and Aaron Mate are in that category. I would have believed the late Robert Parry to be, though many of the writers at Consortium News, such as Patrick Lawrence, are not. When edited for Consortium News, generally Trumpism is restrained if not completely hidden.
Note: I don't think Russia's or Putin's effect on the 2016 or any other US election has been or will be significant. There is not evidence that it has been, and Putin clearly would not want to appear to be the meddler he well knows the US to be (unlike most Americans, who seem unaware of how much US hac sontrolled Russia and other countries). However, this is not necessarily to say Putin wouldn't have any preference. I would believe he has a soft preference for Trump, and China the reverse. So could Russians be key sources for people I've mentioned here? Quite possibly, yes. Do I care about that? No, I care about the importance, accuracy, relative fairness, and contextuality of the reporting and opinions expressed or implied, not where the facts came from. But it may require highly professional standards to prevent sources from becoming leans. We know that's a problem in the mainstream media.
Not all stories that may originate or pass through the hands of Russians are disinformation or the result of unethical operations. Russians--including Putin--may have a lot of truths to tell, and if some journalist can distill these truths into journalistic reports, even lacking combination with others, that's an asset of some kind. However full contextualization is important, and that is in principle why a organization of journalists and editors is useful.
There can be a fine line between advocacy and reporting. To some degree, all reporting is advocacy by selection, merely deciding which stories to tell. Excessive reporting on unimportant stories is clear advocacy.
Advocacy is fine...for advocates. Self-proclaimed objective or non-partisan should not be involved in advocacy--even on their own time--because it reduces their appearance and ability to maintain objectivity. This used to be well understood. Now it's violated by all, including otherwise exemplary journalists in alternative media.
Taibbi wrote the book on Hate Media. Now he seems to relish becoming a part of it himself.
I will see if I can add Greenwald and/or Taibbi to my pile of subscriptions I already don't have time for, when they start reporting important stories that need to be reported in their depth.
The truth behind Russiagate was one of those stories, precisely because it was never just about Trump corruption, it was about an alleged justification for endless war with Russia, and a new McCarthyism that painted any skeptics as tools of Moscow. I could tell from the very beginning that Trump would never be removed, only controlled, as if he needed some such controlling (and not mere insider pressure) to maintain the cold war with Russia. The National Security State was taking no chances. Trump might be too big to be pressured (an idea which has been proven false in many cases).
Russiagate was also about destroying the left. It started as a distraction from the important confirmation that the DNC was strongly working against Sanders. That real news was immediately drowned out by the fake story that Russia had been behind obtaining that real news, which was essentially irrelevant to the first story even if it was true. And it would be the illegal activities that Russia engaged in, as opposed to merely assisting a journalistic operation, which would be of some limited interest. The US has of course engaged in such illegal activities in other countries on a vast scale for decades. Failing to include that context was also a fault in nearly all Russiagate reporting from the outset.
Biden does deserve calling out whenever he (or anyone else) continues to peddle Russiagate stories, as he has done from time to time. Trump in some cases rightfully dismisses them. Fortunately this does not appear to be a big obsession with Biden. But this kind of thing is so ordinary, it is not big news. Trump is far more full of fake stories. I pretty much ignore those too.
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