Chris Stritzel, founder of real estate-focused CityScene STL, was contacted by a whole host of people claiming to be radio hosts or state representatives tipping him off about disgraced former Gov. Eric Greitens’s (R) impending comeback on the political scene.
The sources — and their tips — turned out to be fake.
According to a Thursday Kansas City Star report, Stritzel was contacted, unsolicited, by the sources. He took the story down when he realized that the personas were fake.
The sources, Stritzel said, “admitted that they were coordinating their claims in the hope of destroying my credibility.”
Unfortunately I was duped into writing something almost entirely false. It was my fault for not checking the sources, so I pulled the story down. The other two sources I could confirm as real but the 3 of us decided it was a good idea to take it down. https://t.co/VhbhdtiLNV
— Chris Stritzel (@chris_stritzel) April 11, 2019
Read TPM’s reporting on the downfall of Greitens here.
Unfortunately I was duped into writing something almost entirely false. It was my fault for not checking the sources, so I pulled the story down. The other two sources I could confirm as real but the 3 of us decided it was a good idea to take it down. https://t.co/VhbhdtiLNV
— Chris Stritzel (@chris_stritzel) April 11, 2019
Sounds good, dumbass. Stick to real estate. Or maybe you could get a job at Jiffy Lube. Seriously when seven people you don’t know independently send you the same “tip” there’s something wrong. That’s not how it works.
I think you miss the point. This was a coordinated, targeted, attempt to discredit a specific reporter with DT’s favorite phrase, fake news.
No shit? I noticed that, actually. I thought it went without saying. It’s not the first time and it won’t be the last. It’s entirely possible they did it first to real journalists who yawned them off. If you want to see how real journalists handle this situation, google up the Washington Post’s Stephanie McCrummen taking down Jaime Phillips as a James O’Keefe plant with a false story. The point is this dude’s an amateur who got played and hurt our side, Team Democracy, a little in the process. I assure you I already know the GOP is corrupt and antidemocratic and can even talk about how this technique of sowing confusion and mistrust goes all the way back to Putin’s lieutenant Vladislav Surkov and the long tradition of deza but thanks anyway.
This is what happens in the 24x7 news cycle environment where it is of paramount importance to be FIRST, not to be correct or factual.
There is no time to check sources, verify accounts, get corroboration, you MUST PUBLISH NOW or risk losing out on the BIG SCOOP.
That makes you ridiculously easy to manipulate into debasing the entire idea of JOURNALISM, and you did just that.
Now, even if you DO uncover something, no one will believe you. You have been effectively sidelined as an honest source of news. Good job destroying your career buddy. How does it feel to have been, as the Soviets used to say: “A Useful Idiot.”?
Something tells me this was a “dry run” to set up stings against media voices all over the country in the run-up to the 2020 elections. “NewSpeak” will rule the day in the 2020 elections as the feckless, and lazy MSM will be led around by the nose the entire time, becoming either mindless stenographers for the Oligarchs (looking at YOU NYT) or easily dismissed rubes who have been discredited by their eagerness to get the BIG SCOOP.
It’s going to be a long, difficult election.