As the “fake news” narrative grows, and The House quietly passes a bill to “counter Russian propoganda” websites, one alleged ‘fake’ news wesbite – as defined by the farcical PropOrNot organization – has struck back. Naked Capitalism’s Yves Smith has threatened The Washington Post with a defamation suit and demanded a retraction.
As the lawyers like to say, res ipsa loquitur. Please tweet and circulate this letter widely. You will notice that our attorney Jim Moody is a seasoned litigator who has won cases before the Supreme Court. He has considerable experience in First Amendment and defamation actions. Past high profile representations include Westomoreland v. CBS and defending Linda Tripp.I also hope, particularly for those of you who don’t regularly visit Naked Capitalism, that you’ll check out our related pieces that give more color to how the fact the Washington Post was taken for a ride by inept propagandists, particularly our introduction to our spoof PropOrNot.org site, which uses the PropOrNot project as an example of sorely deficient propaganda and shows where it went wrong, or the humor site itself. Be sure not to miss its FAQ.
We have another post today that describes how the few things that are verifiable on the PropOrNot site don’t pan out, as in the organization is not simply a group of inept propagandists but also appears to deal solely in fabrications.
If the site is flagrantly false with respect to things that can be checked, why pray tell did the Washington Post and its fellow useful idiots in the mainstream media validate and amplify its message? Strong claims demand strong proofs, yet the Post appeared content to give a megaphone to people who make stuff up with abandon. No wonder the members of PropOrNot hide as much as they can about what they are up to; more transparency would expose their work to be a tissue of lies.
We fully endorse Yves Smith’s efforts.
Additionally, we note that the only reason we haven’t followed up with a similar action is because i) the allegations were beyond laughable – we have rejected all of them on the record, and ii) there are simply too much other events taking place in what should otherwise be a quiet end to the year taking place to focus on what may be a lenghty, if gratifying, legal process.
Even though the majority of sites on their list really are fake, they should ALL file lawsuits at once.
Massive litigation has a way of intimidating corporations somewhat… up to a point, anyhow.
Here’s the other reason why the Pizzagate and the podesta stories are true
Because if they weren’t
They have enough power and money to come back fighting this with lawsuits and lawyers and they arnt
They are just trying so hard to make it into a fake story when people are finally putting 2 and 2 together and the pressure is on