Read on Twitter
For kicks, I decided to see how the Hunter Biden's laptop story has unfolded on the Twitter timelines of conservative journalists who were all over the story before the election. Byron York last tweeted about it on October 30. https://twitter.com/search?q=hunter%20(from%3AByronYork)&src=typed_query&f=live
This DC Examiner journo was very invested in the Hunter laptop story, but after the election just seemed more interested in mentioning Hunter's name apart from laptops. https://twitter.com/search?q=hunter%20(from%3Adanielchaitin7)&src=typed_query&f=live
No laptop updates from this journo since Nov. 2, tho some other Hunter content. https://twitter.com/search?q=hunter%20(from%3AJerryDunleavy)&src=typed_query&f=live
18 Hunter laptop tweets in the month of October from this Daily Caller journo, none since then. https://twitter.com/search?q=hunter%20(from%3AChuckRossDC)&src=typed_query&f=live
I wouldn't call Cernovich a journalist, but he is an influential figure on the right. And, shockingly, Hunter vanished from his timeline after Nov. 4. https://twitter.com/search?q=hunter%20(from%3ACernovich)&src=typed_query&f=live
That paragon of journalistic integrity, Brit Hume, tweeted about Hunter's laptop a few times before the election, but oddly not since. I'm sure he's still digging into it though, in dogged pursuit of the truth. https://twitter.com/search?q=hunter%20(from%3Abrithume)&src=typed_query&f=live
Mollie from the Federalist, also a real paragon of truth telling, tweeted THIRTY TIMES about Hunter and his laptop between Oct 27 and Oct 29...but radio silence since then (other than to complain yesterday about the story being censored by Twitter). https://twitter.com/search?q=hunter%20(from%3AMZHemingway)&src=typed_query&f=live
The editor of the Federalist was promoting the Hunter laptop story and complaining about how it was being censored back in October, but now has strangely lost interest in the story. https://twitter.com/search?q=hunter%20(from%3Abdomenech)&src=typed_query&f=live
Also weird how the President's grown son tweeted about Hunter and his laptop all the time this fall, and then suddenly on Nov. 3 stopped. https://twitter.com/search?q=hunter%20(from%3ADonaldJTrumpJr)&src=typed_query&f=live
22 tweets about Hunter from Trump surrogate and former Acting DNI Grenell in October...but oddly, nothing since then. https://twitter.com/search?q=hunter%20(from%3ARichardGrenell)&src=typed_query&f=live
To their credit, Breitbart has tweeted twice about Hunter in the two weeks since the election...after doing so several times a day before the election. https://twitter.com/search?q=hunter%20(from%3Abreitbartnews)&src=typed_query&f=live
Ok, hear me out now, I'm starting to think that right wing media chooses to foreground stories based more on how those stories further the political interests of the GOP than on whether those stories have any evidentiary basis. Just spitballin here.
And it's weird how all of these right wing media outlets complain incessantly about "the narrative" that the mainstream media is supposedly forcing on the country, and encourage their readers to think of them as brave truth tellers who resist such "narratives."
This article from February prepared us for these sorts of shenanigans. None of this is surprising, but it is pretty bad for our democracy. https://twitter.com/SethCotlar/status/1231016038512283649?s=20
There's a difference between covering the news from a particular perspective--that's unavoidable--and willingly contributing to a coordinated propaganda campaign based on "evidence" that was clearly fabricated by cynical political operatives with a long track record of lying.
Erasing the distinction between a) perspectival, but evidence-based media and b) intentionally propagandistic media is absolutely central to the success of the GOP and the media outlets that make money by promoting its messaging by dressing it up as "journalism."
People engage in propaganda because it works. Platforms need to figure out ways to distinguish between propaganda and real reporting. They need to find ways to sanction cynical operators who use their platforms to knowingly circulate disinformation. Democracy depends upon it.
The people who obliterated the gatekeepers thought they were liberating us. They were not. They just created the conditions for new, cynical operators to rush in to the vacuum like warlords in one of the many countries recently "liberated" by our military.
