The Washington Post’s Paul Farhi Shows Why ‘Professional’ Journalism Can’t Be Salvaged
If The Washington Post were doing journalism instead of propaganda, its reporter who covers the news media might be focused nonstop on the fact that trust in the media is extremely low. But Paul Farhi thinks there are more important problems. Namely, he’s worried that some unwashed masses might be practicing their First Amendment right to do journalism without a license.
But journalism? Journalism needs credentialing? Really? Farhi has been on this kick about the need to keep the lower castes out of journalism for a while now. Seven years ago he wrote, “Is there any other profession in which more people think they can do the job better than the pros than journalism? Medicine? Teaching?”
Again, one of these things is not like the others. There is a reason why people generally respect surgeons and don’t try to do their jobs. And there is a reason why people have taken to reporting real news and information since those at corporate media outlets such as The Washington Post are so bad at doing actual journalism.
The Washington Post, we might recall, launched the Russia-collusion scam by having one of its longtime journalists launder an information operation against the American people. The criminal leak against the Trump administration remains one of the great uninvestigated and unsolved crimes of recent memory. That the Post gleefully and willingly took part in an information operation against the country is reprehensible. The paper perpetuated the Russia-collusion hoax with hundreds of stories based on anonymous sources from the intelligence bureaucracy. This scam was no minor thing. It was the lie that Donald Trump was a traitor who had stolen the 2016 presidential election by colluding with Russia. It caused massive amounts of damage to the republic.
Farhi, for his part, seemed to think that many things in the invented “Steele dossier” were true. Falling for a completely false and unsubstantiated claim from fellow Russia hoax outlet McClatchy, Farhi wrote, “If this is accurate, put another check mark next to the Steele Dossier.” Another? ANOTHER? Way to showcase the bare minimum of skepticism and do real professional journalism there, guy.
After finding out the absolutely jaw-dropping news that the Steele dossier was an information operation, bought and paid for by the Hillary Clinton campaign, Farhi wrote, “Most surprising thing abt Clinton’s involvemnt w/Steele Dossier (aside from paying for it) is why her campaign didn’t make more of it.” Citizen journalists knew enough to be even more suspicious about the quality of the shoddy product after realizing its provenance, but not the “professionals” at The Washington Post! In fact, Farhi seemed to be bitterly clinging to the Russia-collusion scam as of a month ago, even after the Post begrudgingly corrected some of its fake news on the matter.
One citizen on social media replied to Farhi’s smug arrogance about the superiority of professional journalists, “The media’s track record in the last 5 years is like a prostitute’s track record on being a virgin.” A bit too kind, but the point is made.
As one of the exceedingly few “professionals” — to use Farhi’s parlance — to do actual journalism on this story and thereby debunk the information operation the Post pushed relentlessly for years, I have nothing but respect for the many “citizen journalists” who did the work corporate media refused to do. I frequently relied on them and their detailed research in the Herculean task of taking on the Post, The New York Times, CNN, and every other media outlet that participated in the intelligence agencies’ information operation against Americans.
In addition to the many articles the full-time professional team at The Federalist researched, reported, and published, we also published many articles from some of these citizen journalists who researched details far better than the entire “professional” journalism class combined.
The Federalist and citizen journalists may not have the corporate sponsorship that Farhi and his cohorts have, but we are wealthy in something few if any at The Washington Post have: a desire to find the truth and share it with others.
This situation is not one of Professional vs Citizen or Amateur but rather one of Ideology vs Truth .... most of the so called professionals have sold their souls on the Altar of Progressive Politics - Slanting News Stories for ' the cause ' rather than laying out the facts, every story is an attack on anyone or anything NOT supporting Progressive Intersectional causes
YOU Are too stupid to understand the nuance of the situation, you have to be lied to
Trump is a blowhard and a braggart ... but you have to be lied to over
Very Fine People,
bleach to cure Covid,
Feeding Fish in Japan,
Steel Dossier,
Russian Collusion,
Russian Meddling in the election [ even the NYT ended up proving this wrong with their analysis of Russian bought Facebook ads - a paltry 2 million dollars spent vs nearly 1 billion dollars combined, spent by both Campaigns ]
Covid will be over by Spring
As promised, on Monday Elon Musk filed his “thermonuclear” lawsuit against leftist attack dog Media Matters. I’ll soon give you a more detailed legal analysis of the merits, which I believe are strong, but here is a key paragraph from the complaint that nutshells the case:
