NPR Defines Down ‘Misinformation’ as the White House Cracks Down On It

Welcome back to “Forgotten Fact-Checks,” a weekly column produced by National Review’s News Desk. This week, we consider the tenability of the White House’s plan to flag false information about the pandemic for Facebook, celebrate the Brian Stelter-Michael Wolff spat, and lament Tucker Carlson’s continued commitment to anti-vaxxerism.

What Could Possibly Go Wrong?

Last week, the White House press secretary Jen Psaki announced that the White House is “flagging problematic posts for Facebook that spread disinformation.” She went on to insist that “It’s important to take faster action against harmful posts. As you all know, information travels quite quickly on social media platforms, sometimes that’s not accurate.”

Of course disinformation can be harmful. And of course, the government has an interest and even an obligation to combat it during a crisis like the COVID-19 pandemic. However, a government-sponsored censorship program — even if it’s just a government-sponsored censorship encouragement program — is going to be one tough cat to stuff back in the bag. 

In fact, once it starts, partisan calls for an expansion of such programs will likely swamp any calls to do away with it once the pandemic recedes. Consider NPR’s contribution to this debate, which critiques the conservative Daily Wire for its business model and Facebook for providing it with a platform. It asserts that:

The articles The Daily Wire publishes don’t normally include falsehoods (with some exceptions), and the site said it is committed to “truthful, accurate and ethical reporting.” But as Settle explains, by only covering specific stories that bolster the conservative agenda (such as negative reports about socialist countries and polarizing ones about race and sexuality issues) and only including certain facts, readers still come away from The Daily Wire’s content with the impression that Republican politicians can do little wrong and cancel culture is among the nation’s greatest threats.

…

“They tend to not provide very much context for the information that they are providing,” Settle said. “If you’ve stripped enough context away, any piece of truth can become a piece of misinformation.”

While the piece does not overtly call for the suppression of the Daily Wire’s content, the implication that its success is America’s failure is clear. Moreover, it critiques the site for pieces like this one that report on the Centers for Disease Control’s investigation of myocarditis in a small number of vaccine recipients. But mainstream outlets such as the New York Times did the same thing! The timing of the piece, which was published on Monday, further suggests that it is tied to the White House’s announcement.

Once you whet the appetite for partisans eager to shut down their political opponents, they will only become more ravenous — and the definition of “disinformation” will only broaden.

Can They Both Lose?

What happens when a tendentious author meets a mendacious TV host? We got to find out on Sunday when Michael Wolff — who’s written three books on the Trump presidency — joined Brian Stelter on the latter’s show.

The exchange went hostile when Stelter accused Wolff of bashing the media only to gain access to the Trump White House. Wolff doubled down at that point, saying that he was not being “inauthentic” in his criticism of Stelter and the media writ large:

“I think the media has done a terrible job on this, I think you yourself, while you’re a nice guy, you’re full of sanctimony. You know, you become one of the parts of the problem of the media. You know, you come on here and you have a monopoly on truth — you know, you know exactly how things are supposed to be done. You know you are why, one of the reasons why people can’t stand the media. Sorry!”

Stelter responded with what seemed to be a contrived laugh and by telling Wolff that he was cracking him up.

“It’s your fault,” shot back Wolff.

As spot-on as Wolff’s analysis is — and as satisfying as it is to watch Stelter squirm — it’s worth remembering that Wolff has a long history of smearing people in his work. In one of his books, Fire and Fury, he even goes so far as to insinuate that Donald Trump and Nikki Haley were having an affair — a rumor whose flames were fanned by Wolff on Bill Maher’s show.

Berenson on Tucker

Tucker Carlson continues to use his platform as the most-watched cable news host in the country to amplify irresponsible voices and propagate dubious information about the coronavirus vaccines. 

On Friday, Carlson invited anti-vaxxer Alex Berenson on his show, ostensibly to discuss Los Angeles County’s ridiculous reimposition of a mask mandate. Quickly though, host and guest began working together to undermine confidence in the vaccines.

“How effective are the vaccines, do we know?” asked Carlson of a man who spends his every waking moment blasting the vaccines on Twitter.

Berenson contended that they are “declining in effectiveness very quickly,” and went on to assert that there was “financial pressure” to lie about how well-suited they are to containing the pandemic.

In truth, the Delta variant is afflicting the unvaccinated primarily. Vaccinated Americans are far less likely to contract it — and are more likely to experience only mild symptoms if they do — than their unvaccinated counterparts.

Far from a one-off mistake, this latest segment joins a long string of deceptive ones about the coronavirus vaccines. 

Headline Fail of the Week

The Associated Press covers the “the long, ‘surreal’ days of the runaway Texas legislators,” and sympathizes with them thusly:

These people are paid directly by taxpayers to show up to the Texas State House and do their jobs whether they’re in the majority or minority. Instead, they’ve chosen to flee to the capital on private planes stocked with beer to gallivant in the spotlight they knew outlets like the AP would shine on them. I’ll save my tears for a more deserving group.