How Macedonians won the election for Trump
Eager to explain to themselves how, Donald Trump won the election the other night, New York Magazine breathlessly explains that Macedonian teenagers writing false stories on Facebook put him over the top. A Pew Research survey says that 44% of adult Americans get their news from Facebook, so they extrapolate that to a Trump win, since someone in Veles, Macedonia launched 140 fake news sites to publish on Facebook.
All throughout the election, these fake stories, sometimes papered over with flimsy “parody site” disclosures somewhere in small type, circulated throughout Facebook: The Pope endorses Trump. Hillary Clinton bought $137 million in illegal arms. The Clintons bought a $200 million house in the Maldives. Many got hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of shares, likes, and comments; enough people clicked through to the posts to generate significant profits for their creators. The valiant efforts of Snopes and other debunking organizations were insufficient; Facebook’s labyrinthine sharing and privacy settings mean that fact-checks get lost in the shuffle.
The LA Times wrings it’s hands over the fact that only 2 in 10 Americans get their news from the traditional media;
The consequences of Facebook’s growing sway became clear during an election cycle that saw the rise of partisan news, conspiracies, fake articles and a winning candidate who fully embraced social media as a way to circumvent the media establishment and its proclivity for checking facts.
Bloomberg is concerned because the media wasn’t able to spin news through their filters before it got to consumers;
“This is a landmark,” [Ed Wasserman, the dean of the University of California, Berkeley Graduate School of Journalism] said. “Trump was able to get his message out in a way that was vastly influential without undergoing the usual kinds of quality checks that we associate with reaching mass public. You had a whole set of media having influence without really having authority. And the media that spoke with authority, the authority that comes after careful fact checking, didn’t really have the influence.”
I guess we can’t trust that editorial filter in our heads.
Category: Media
Yeah, fuck them and their editorial filtering
“….and their editorial spin.”
There. Fixed it for ya. Yer welcome.
Here’s one CBS reporter who gets it right:
http://www.cbsnews.com/news/commentary-the-unbearable-smugness-of-the-press-presidential-election-2016/
It’s quite an analysis/confession, best I’ve ever seen in fact.
It is a good one, Poetrooper. Unfortunately, we have probably seen the last of Will Rahn because he has committed the cardinal sin against the Lame Stream Media – he has pointed out that they are full of crap. He will be covering garbage strikes in small towns in Alaska in January for the rest of his time at CBS (which might not be that long). Well, at least one ‘journalist’ has had his eyes opened and can now smell the crap all around him.
Will Rahn can say “I told you so”. From his 16 May piece:
“The consensus among all the poll-watchers and data-heads who have consistently underestimated Trump from the onset is that Hillary is all but certain to win in November. And they might be right. But if Trump pulls off the upset, the smugness and lack of empathy that defines too many of his detractors will be in large part to blame.”
Very fine commentary.
Very fine link.
Thanks Poetrooper.
That is a good article, Poetrooper. Thanks for the link.
The impression that the ‘press’ leave, in general, is that we’re on the receiving end of tabloids at the checkout line in the grocery store, and that Louella Parsons is at the helm. That isn’t journalism. It’s sensationalism. Everything in reporting the news has gone from standard journalism in the manner of Ernie Pyle’s reports from the Pacific theater to explosive, hysterical theatrics that are mostly based on hot air, pocket lint and dust bunnies.
The ‘media’ haven’t been about reporting the real news for some time, as Rahn says quite clearly. I don’t know exactly when it started, but journalism went right down the sewer a while back, and has not yet emerged into the light of day.
I remember something my Dad said about 16 years ago after he retired for the first time and he and Mom got back from their dream European vacation. They had spent part of it in Great Britain and he told about how by then the European news media had become like the National Enquirer and said then that the US News media would soon be the same, he was right and I see it in how the lamestream moonbat media reports on Trump’s election victory, they try to paint it as a resurgence of Jim Crow, etc….
How horrifying….the unwashed and deplorable masses using their own common sense rather than the prechewed, predigested, prespun, and “now fit for human consumption” editorializing that is fit and proper??
Oh. Oh, the censors of the leftward-leaning media didn’t like the fact that Trump didn’t come to them for approval or whatever?
Oh, how butthurt can you get?
“The valiant efforts of Snopes ”
muhahahahahahahaha
“without undergoing the usual kinds of quality checks that we associate with reaching mass public.”
Quality checks? What the fuck is he smoking?
How much does it cost?
And where can I buy an ounce?
He means like the Dan Rather/Brian Williams School of Ethical and Unbiased Journalism.
This piece I wrote years ago for American Thinker rather addresses (sorry, couldn’t resist) the issue of big media’s contempt for the ordinary folks:
http://www.americanthinker.com/articles/2004/09/the_road_less_graveled.html
Yeah, I just live for Facebook.
/sarc
As for the good Dean at Berzerkeley, fuck him if he can’t take a joke.
Maybe he and Lars can get together and “console” each other. Anybody got some spare Playdough and Crayons we can send to their “safe spaces” at UC Berzerkley.
I don’t FB. Anti-social, as Jonn labels us anti-social types. Can you imagine? Anyhow, I get my news from various sources and never from the TV, except for the occasional breaking stories that interest me. And, then, I usually last only a few minutes.
Same here. My social media footprint is nonexistent.
I get most of the news from TAH articles and discussions. The rest I get from “The Duffel Blog”.
Don’t do FB. They don’t like me and tole me as much re my political opinions. So, well … bye.
They ‘tole’ me so? Bwhaaaa
Got it…so not only is the virtuous mainstream media being unfairly maligned by some teenager in a foreign country, but Trump voters are too stupid to recognize fake news. Will someone please think of the poor, poor MSM!!! A tragedy!!!
Oh, the vapors!
The mediots are so self-deluded it is pathetic.
I’d prefer to read ridiculous media fiction concerning how Macedonian teens allegedly “put Trump over the top” than to read accurate accounts some months or years from now of how voter fraud stole the election for Clintoon.
These progtards/libtards have again proved how delusional they are.
True. But ask a guy named Coleman from Minnesota about the “stealing elections” part. They’re pretty good at that sometimes, too.
You can thank Al “I Love Felon Votes” Franken for ObamaCare passing. Without his 60th vote, the Senate can’t invoke cloture in order to prevent that abomination from being filibustered.
I don’t think it passes without Franken’s Senate seat having been stolen in the 2008 election.
Clutching my moral pearls and wondering how it is that these little fuckers get to “protest” the will of the people and make stuff up…because they are exactly as we have portrayed them: Snot-nosed little shits who need safe
spaces and someone to blame for the fact that reality can bite. Sigh.
Please don’t sigh. Laugh. You just know that one day, when many of them are dropped off in the real world, they, too, will start thinking, “WTF? That’s all my take is for 80 hours in this salt mine?” And when they reach age–what is it, 29–and have to pay for their own health plan, they’ll be wondering why, when they are healthy and hale and would rather use their money for something else.
Age 26. Children can stay on their parents’ healthcare policy until they turn 26 per that legal abomination commonly called ObamaCare.
Interesting. Last time I checked, Facebook’s shot-callers were pro-Hildabeast.
Well, well, here we go hearing the liberal mess media proglodytes screeching and drooling while they shit their britches and skirts because they no longer have the monopoly they once had, I say SCREW ‘EM!! Since when hasn’t a mainstream liberal media proglodyte not had the attitude of “Here’s what we elites think you filthy peasants should hear and how you should think about it” attitude? Just a peek as mainstream media coverage of the election made me want to puke, their urinalism is so biased and editorialized it’s sickening, they write their shit to make people think that Trump won the election just to bully pooooor innocent Hitlery Cankles, they give her/it a free pass on the shit she’s done while they screech that Trump is unfit because it’s rumored that he once cut a fart in class when he was in kindergarten.
Wait..what?? It sez up there that Trump won due to social media “…a winning candidate who fully embraced social media..”
Wasn’t part of Obama’s 2012 win due to his great, fantastic, absolutely-positutly the best ever use of social media, something those troglodytes in the Republican party would never understand?
These left-wing prog’s are totally unable to look at their own past. What idiots.
Excellent point, George, one which most of us had probably forgotten.
It’s always someone else’s fault, isn’t it? Always. It’s Obama’s fault for not stifling Comey enough, and it’s some kids cranking out baloney some vague somewhere in the Med for putting out baloney. It’s never because the fact is that Mrs. Crankypants pissed of her own support enough to make them stay home, or never because the pundit pollsters didn’t talk to or report results from anyone who didn’t meet their angst-ridden needs.
Lysenkoism, anyone?
Yeah, I like storytelling, too, but my stories at least make sense.
Not to be a smart-ass, but I’m willing to bet that the 44% of fucktards claiming to be adults who get their news from Facebook are the same group of assclowns getting their news from the Daily Show….and I can state unequivocally that the majority of this particular demographic would in NO way support Mr. Trump…
Fucking hipster doofuses in skinny jeans get their news from Facebook and the Daily Show while drinking some faggy vanilla mocha chai latte and sporting their mandals….the number of young people buying into InfoWars style conspiracy theories is unsettling to me as it indicates just how fucking ignorant some of these kids are today.
But hey keep dreaming liberal media ass clowns…it was as much those kids in Macedonia’s fault as Libya was caused by a fucking video.
By “Libya,” I assume you are referring to the notoriously bogus narrative of what caused the Benghazi attack. Those of us who read the book and watched the movie will never forget or forgive Cankles, her crew and King Putt for those 4 deaths and the many wounded. Nothing demonstrated her unfitness to be POTUS/Cmdr-in-Chief than that event and her/their performance in its aftermath. And, I don’t “Facebook,” and I would venture a guess that most Trump voters didn’t get their news their either.
“there,” dammit. I don’t want any grammar/spelling criticism.
No grammar nazis here…no worries
Well, except for when I fuck with Lars…
Prepositions are mighty important, Poetrooper. Proof? Omit the ones in your sentence.
2/17 Air Cavaliers has corrected my horrible Spall Ling and grammor before.
Cavaliers? Thank you spell check for helping with the joke.
That’s funny.
To be fair, I’ve thrown the BS flag on a lot of crap that people post on Facebook – both from the right and the left – that could have easily been fact-checked before posting but obviously wasn’t.
On a related note, the Facebook postings of a couple of my lefty friends have increased since the election. They’re in mourning, I guess, so there’ll probably still be a few more days (weeks?) of wailing and gnashing of teeth.
Ask them to collect their tears as they cry, MrBill. There’s at least one commenter here (and possibly several) who’d like to purchase said collected tears so he/they can use them for washing their cojones. (smile)
My daughter is in Veles with the Peace Corp. I’ll ask if it was her! ( Though I really, really doubt it…)
“And the media that spoke with authority, the authority that comes after careful fact checking, didn’t really have the influence.”
Careful fact checking….BWAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!!!!
Yep, that was the line that should have been preceded with a spew alert. The greatest chuckle of my day.
Millennials…
That was awesome!
That one just never gets old. Always brings a smile.
Excellent!
Just remember who lied to you this election in the media and never take them as a serious source of information again. When you come across a new source of information just google them to find out what they said during this election cycle.
One thing is for sure and it’s that ALL OF those millennial candyassed snowflakes that think life is so hard for them right now are going to get chewed up and spit out by the real world even faster than Lars will be when they finally get out of school and their parents’ homes!
Not to beat up on Wasserman, but his title as dean of the UCB graduate school points to one of the problems. In what way does having an advanced degree in journalism actually have anything to do with being a good journalist? It used to be that the career arc of a journalist was not unlike being an apprentice plumber, or a pitcher in minor-league baseball. Learn to make the toilet flush properly, and you could become the boss someday. Or, if you were lucky enough to have your fastball last past the seventh inning, you might make it to the Cubs.
I remember a comment about reporters by a copydesk editor at the Philadelphia Enquirer from a few years ago. What he said was that he saw his job as making the diggers better writers, and the writers better diggers. Some had more natural talent, but everybody was supposed to pay dues.
It would be possible for me to write a 10,000-word essay on why the news media is now badly damaged. Most of it would relate to the fact that good journalism costs money. And a big part of why the money isn’t there anymore is because the advertising business is screwed up, and a lot of what should be being cycled back to produce the news media we deserve is subject to, in business terms, interception of the value add.
For those tempted to throw the baby out with the bath water, it might also be pointed out that in another TAH post this morning is the tale of Larry Dahl at a place and time I happen to be familiar with. Dahl’s story, like that of Horatio on the bridge, is one that needs to be told.
It’s not a surprise to hear a lot of sniveling from the news media about how Trump’s win is the fault of some kids in Macedonia enabled by Facebook. Call it a variation of the victim card being played. Here are a couple of links to some voices at least trying to work out the real cause:
http://www.niemanlab.org/2016/11/the-forces-that-drove-this-elections-media-failure-are-likely-to-get-worse/
http://www.politico.com/blogs/on-media/2016/11/what-the-media-missed-editors-executives-and-journalists-weigh-in-231167
Oh. So you’re not saying that we had bands of Macedonian youth roaming American neighborhoods skewing the election results by talking to folks, convincing them that he was the better candidate and traditional stuff like that.
OK.
In similar news, the day after the election Amy Goodman’s guest on her per-usual execrable program wove a contorted case to say the media are to blame for Trump getting elected.
I dunno. The Republicans swept both Houses and the presidency. Maybe a lot of folks are just fed up with how things have gone for eight years? Maybe it is THAT simple?
Gee – ya think?
Don’t expect to hear the media admit that fact, though. That would be like them retroactively and in unison praising Nixon for exposing Alger Hiss as a Communist spy.
Some admissions of error are simply beyond today’s politicized libidiot media. Collectively, they’ve backed the
Communist“Progressive” agenda en masse for so long that expecting them to admit most of the nation doesn’t “swing that way” is a pipe dream.And the MSM continues blissfully on it’s way, totally unaware that they hold a false belief that most Americans, here in “fly over country”, are totally stupid.