Elon Musk has dropped the hammer on corporate media outlets after the latest batch of Twitter Files exposed the “biggest journalism scam in a very long time.”
As Slay News reported, The new release of Twitter’s internal communications files shows that claims of “Russian bots” spreading so-called “disinformation” was a fabricated narrative that was peddled by leftist media outlets using phony data.
Journalist Matt Taibbi reported the new batch of Twitter Files and detailed how left-wing propaganda outlet Mother Jones heavily pushed the false narrative on social media.
Taibbi reveals how a shadowy group of leftists peddled the “Russian disinfo” narrative and used it massively to censor conservatives online.
A group of very familiar names created “Hamilton 68.”
Taibbi explains that “Hamilton 68” is a computerized “dashboard designed to be used by reporters and academics to measure ‘Russian disinformation.’”
He reveals that the system claimed to target and block “Russian bots” but, instead, it just censored legitimate conservative accounts.
Former COO of Paypal David Sachs summed up the new files: “The widely repeated claims of ‘Russian disinformation’ were based on bogus data Twitter knew to be false.
“In other words, the political partisans & pundits claiming to protect you against disinformation were most likely to be the ones spreading it.”
Musk replied to Sachs’ comments, saying: “Exactly.
“This is the biggest journalism scam in a very long time.
“Well, Mother Jones, are you going to retract your fake stories or simply hope that people forget about them?”
Exactly
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) January 28, 2023
Well, @MotherJones, are you going to retract your fake stories or simply hope that people forget about them?
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) January 27, 2023
Taibbi quotes former Twitter executive Yoel Roth specifically stating that the data was false and saying about the scam:
“I think we need to just call this out on the bullsh*t it is.
“Falsely accuses a bunch of legitimate right-leaning accounts of being Russian bots.
“Virtually any conclusion drawn from it will take conversations in conservative circles on Twitter and accuse them of being Russian.”
Taibbi writes:
“Virtually every major news organization in America is implicated, including NBC, CBS, ABC, PBS, CNN, MSNBC, The New York Times, and the Washington Post.
“Mother Jones alone did at least 14 stories pegged to the group’s ‘research.’
“Even fact-checking sites like Politifact and Snopes cited Hamilton 68 as a source.
“Hamilton 68 was and is a computerized ‘dashboard’ designed to be used by reporters and academics to measure ‘Russian disinformation.’
“It was the brainchild of former FBI agent (and current MSNBC ‘disinformation expert’) Clint Watts, and backed by the German Marshall Fund and the Alliance for Securing Democracy, a bipartisan think-tank.
“The latter’s advisory panel includes former acting CIA chief Michael Morell, former Ambassador to Russia Michael McFaul, former Hillary for America chair John Podesta, and onetime Weekly Standard editor Bill Kristol.
“The Twitter Files expose Hamilton 68 as a sham.
“Examining further, Twitter execs were shocked. The accounts Hamilton 68 claimed were linked to ‘Russian influence activities online’ were not only overwhelmingly English-language (86%), but mostly ‘legitimate people,’ largely in the U.S., Canada, and Britain.
“Grasping right away that Twitter might be implicated in a moral outrage, they wrote that these account-holders ‘need to know they’ve been unilaterally labeled Russian stooges without evidence or recourse.’
“These people never knew they were used for years to drive hundreds if not thousands of media headlines about supposed Russian bot infiltration of online discussions: about the Brett Kavanaugh hearings, Tulsi Gabbard’s campaign, the #ReleaseTheMemo affair, the Parkland shooting, Donald Trump’s election, the #WalkAway, and #IStandWithLaura hashtags, U.S. missile strikes in Syria, the Bernie Sanders campaign, the ‘Blexit’ movement to peel black voters away from Democrats, calls to fire National Security Advisor H.R. McMaster, ‘attacks’ on the Mueller investigation, and countless other issues.”
28.What makes this an important story is the sheer scale of the news footprint left by Hamilton 68’s digital McCarthyism. The quantity of headlines and TV segments dwarfs the impact of individual fabulists like Jayson Blair or Stephen Glass. pic.twitter.com/zfyjLb5Tkq
— Matt Taibbi (@mtaibbi) January 27, 2023
