(2/2) The Post should have gone scrambling back to re-examine all the stories, like this one, that they’d printed using that firm (or people who worked there) as a key source: washingtonpost.com/technology/201…
The Twitter Files help clarify what went wrong here, but we’d learn a lot more faster if outlets like the Post were as interested as they should be in following basic leads. Same with the New York Times, which needs to look back at stories like this: nytimes.com/2017/10/30/tec…
All of these stories are echoes of Bush-era initiatives that poured money into counterterrorism efforts. When the CT mission lost momentum, there was an effort to move money and personnel to new agencies and task forces to fight a new enemy: “disinformation.”
A key subtext of TF stories involves government using issues like “Russian interference” or “Chinese Covid disinfo” to gain control over public conversation. It isn’t a partisan issue, but reporters are pushing that idea, to avoid having to admit to being accomplices in this.