The Deepfake iPhone Apps Are Here — Jacob Schulz

"Photoshopping" video.

Lawfare
The Deepfake iPhone Apps Are Here
Jacob Schulz

Who Will Tell the Truth About the So-Called ‘Free Press’?­ — Jeremy R. Hammond

Longish but detailed exposé of the corporate media as the "custodians" of the narrative, with "the paper of record" in the lead.

Foreign Policy Journal
Who Will Tell the Truth About the So-Called ‘Free Press’?­
Jeremy R. Hammond

Bill Mitchell — Latest instalment in Project Fear is not very scary at all despite the headlines

A short blog post today – being Wednesday. I am still catching up on things after being away for a few weeks. The British Institute of Fiscal Studies (IFS) offered its latest contribution to Project Fear this week with their claim that the fiscal response to a no-deal Brexit would “would send government debt to its highest level in more than half a century”. Sounds scary. Which, of course, was the intention. That is what Project Fear is about. Creating illusions of disaster to discipline the political debate in a particular direction. Nothing new about that. But the media, including the UK Guardian had lurid headlines such as – No-deal Brexit would ‘push national debt to levels last seen in 60s’ (October 8, 2019). But if you think about it the worst case estimates are hardly anything to worry about, even if we took the estimates seriously and were concerned about movements in public debt ratios for a currency-issuing nation (which I am not). Here are a few graphs so that all my British friends can come from under their bed covers and face the day with a smile as the No-Deal data gets closer....

Bill Mitchell – billy blog
Latest instalment in Project Fear is not very scary at all despite the headlines
Bill Mitchell | Professor in Economics and Director of the Centre of Full Employment and Equity (CofFEE), at University of Newcastle, NSW, Australia

Fact checking — Paul Robinson

The big news from Italy this week is the seizure by Turin police of a massive arsenal of weapons held by a neo-Nazi group. Among the weapons was a stonking-big air-to-air missile. Reporting the story, the BBC links the neo-Nazis to ‘Russian-backed separatist forces’ in Ukraine….

Naughty separatists. Despite all that talk of fighting ‘fascism’, it appears that they’re in bed with neo-Nazis. But then again, maybe not. For as Mark Ames points out on Twitter, there’s a problem with the BBC report. The official police statement says something very different. In fact, it says the following:…

Which for those of you who don’t speak Italian, translates as:

The investigations had begun about a year ago when the police headquarters in Turin, coordinated by the Central Directorate of Prevention Police, monitored some people linked to political movements of the ultra-right who had fought in the Ukrainian region of Donbass against the separatists.

So it turns out that they fought not ‘for the separatists’ but ‘against the separatists’....

But here’s the thing. It’s not just the BBC which makes that claim. CNN, for instance, reports that:

The stockpile was discovered by police who were investigating Italians ‘with extremist ideology’ who had fought alongside Russian-backed separatist forces in Donbass, eastern Ukraine, last July, according to the police statement.Similarly The Guardian writes that:

Police said that the discoveries stemmed from a previous investigation into Italians who took part in the Russian-backed insurgency in eastern Ukraine.

This is word for word what the Associated Press (AP) writes. And that perhaps explain why so many media outlets are repeating the same story. They’ve just copied it from AP without verifying it.

There is one exception, however. One media organization seems to have actually checked what the police statement said, telling us that:

The police say the groups had fought “against the separatists” in the Donbass region of Ukraine – the forces of the self-proclaimed People’s Republics of Donetsk and Lugansk in the east of the country.
Who’s this? The answer – RT....

Irrussianality

Fact checking
Paul Robinson | Professor, Graduate School of Public and International Affairs at the University of Ottawa

See also

RT

Media link Italy neo-Nazi missile to ‘pro-Russian separatists’ despite police saying the OPPOSITE

Italian police seize MISSILE, guns and neo-Nazi material in raid on far-right militants

Ray McGovern — CIA: Mission Accomplished; Americans Believe What We Tell Them

At his first White House performance with other senior officials of the incoming Reagan administration, freshly appointed (but veteran covert action operative) intelligence chief William Casey told President Reagan and the others assembled:“We’ll know our disinformation program is complete when everything the American public believes is false.”

Hard to believe? Read below what an eye-witness has attested to:

“I am the source for this quote, which was indeed said by CIA Director William Casey at an early February 1981 meeting of the newly elected President Reagan with his new cabinet secretaries to report to him on what they had learned about their agencies in the first couple of weeks of the administration. The meeting was in the Roosevelt Room in the West Wing of the White House, not far from the Cabinet Room. I was present at the meeting as Assistant to the Chief Domestic Policy Adviser to the President.

As he did to all the other secretaries of their departments and agencies, Reagan asked Casey what he saw as his goal as director for the CIA, to which he replied with this quote, which I recorded in my notes of the meeting as he said it. Shortly thereafter I told Senior White House correspondent Sarah McClendon, who was a close friend and colleague, who in turn made it public.” Barbara Honegger

There are hundreds of examples that could be adduced to show that the major corporate-owned media — whether by intimidation, misguided “patriotism,” or self-censorship — have made Casey’s dream come true....

Ray McGovern
CIA: Mission Accomplished; Americans Believe What We Tell Them

Caitlin Johnstone — CONFIRMED: Chemical Weapons Assessment Contradicting Official Syria Narrative Is Authentic

Big. The "official" narrative is unraveling.

Caitlin Johnstone.com
CONFIRMED: Chemical Weapons Assessment Contradicting Official Syria Narrative Is Authentic
Caitlin Johnstone

Also

RT
‘How do they sleep?’ Roger Waters calls out US, UK & France over ‘faked’ Douma chemical attack

Also

Col. Lang publishes the full assessment, which he reports receiving from the authors.

"Taken together, these findings establish beyond reasonable doubt that the alleged chemical attack in Douma on 7 April 2018 was staged." — OPCW Engineering sub-team assessment

Sic Semper Tyrannis
OPCW Engineering sub-team assessment on the Douma gas "attack" in April 2018
Col. W. Patrick Lang, US Army (ret.)

At the Defense Intelligence Agency, Lang was the Defense Intelligence Officer (DIO) for the Middle East, South Asia and counter-terrorism, and later, the first Director of the Defense Humint Service. At the DIA, he was a member of the Defense Senior Executive Service. He participated in the drafting of National Intelligence Estimates. From 1992 to 1994, all the U.S. military attachés worldwide reported to him. During that period, he also briefed President George H. W. Bush at the White House, as he had during Operation Desert Storm.

He was also the head of intelligence analysis for the Middle East for seven or eight years at that institution. He was the head of all the Middle East and South Asia analysis in DIA for counter-terrorism for seven years. For his service in the DIA, Lang received the Presidential Rank Award of Distinguished Executive. — Wikipedia

See also

A new book called Bitten: The Secret History of Lyme Disease and Biological Weapons by Kris Newby adds significantly to our understanding of Lyme disease, while oddly seeming to avoid mention of what we already knew.

Newby claims (in 2019) that if a scientist named Willy Burgdorfer had not made a confession in 2013, the secret that Lyme disease came from a biological weapons program would have died with him. Yet, in 2004 Michael Christopher Carroll published a book called Lab 257: The Disturbing Story of the Government’s Secret Germ Laboratory. He appeared on several television shows to discuss the book, including on NBC’s Today Show, where the book was made a Today Show Book Club selection. Lab 257 hit the New York Times nonfiction bestseller list soon after its publication.

Newby’s book reaches the same conclusion as Carroll’s, namely that the most likely source of diseased ticks is Plum Island....

Counterpunch
Where Lyme Disease Came From and Why It Eludes Treatment

David Swanson

For nearly two decades, one of the most overlooked and little known arrests made in the aftermath of the September 11 attacks was that of the so-called “High Fivers,” or the “Dancing Israelis.” However, new information released by the FBI on May 7 has brought fresh scrutiny to the possibility that the “Dancing Israelis,” at least two of whom were known Mossad operatives, had prior knowledge of the attacks on the World Trade Center.

Shortly after 8:46 a.m. on the day of the attacks, just minutes after the first plane struck the World Trade Center, five men — later revealed to be Israeli nationals — had positioned themselves in the parking lot of the Doric Apartment Complex in Union City, New Jersey, where they were seen taking pictures and filming the attacks while also celebrating the destruction of the towers and “high fiving” each other. At least one eyewitness interviewed by the FBI had seen the Israelis’ van in the parking lot as early as 8:00 a.m. that day, more than 40 minutes prior to the attack. The story received coverage in U.S. mainstream media at the time but has since been largely forgotten.

The men — Sivan Kurzberg, Paul Kurzberg, Oded Ellner, Yaron Shimuel and Omar Marmari — were subsequently apprehended by law enforcement and claimed to be Israeli tourists on a “working holiday” in the United States where they were employed by a moving company, Urban Moving Systems. Upon his arrest, Sivan Kurzberg told the arresting officer, “We are Israeli; we are not your problem. Your problems are our problems, The Palestinians are the problem.”

For years, the official story has been that these individuals, while they had engaged in “immature” behavior by celebrating and being “visibly happy” in their documenting of the attacks, had no prior knowledge of the attack. However, newly released FBI copies of the photos taken by the five Israelis strongly suggest that these individuals had prior knowledge of the attacks on the World Trade Center. The copies of the photos were obtained via a FOIA request made by a private citizen....

Mint Press News
Newly Released FBI Docs Shed Light on Apparent Mossad Foreknowledge of 9/11 Attacks

Whitney Webb

Moon of Alabama Syria - OPCW Engineering Assessment: The Douma 'Chemical Weapon Attack' Was Staged —

If true.…

Moon of Alabama
Syria - OPCW Engineering Assessment: The Douma 'Chemical Weapon Attack' Was Staged

RT — Fake news alert: CNN says Venezuelan opposition leader Juan Guaido 'won election in January'

US media not even pretending anymore. Prepping the American public for military intervention?

RT

Fake news alert: CNN says Venezuelan opposition leader Juan Guaido 'won election in January'

NBC — Russia's propaganda machine discovers 2020 Democratic candidate Tulsi GabbardExperts who track websites and social media linked to Russia have seen stirrings of a possible campaign of support for Hawaii Democrat Tulsi Gabbard.

Experts who track websites and social media linked to Russia have seen stirrings of a possible campaign of support for Hawaii Democrat Tulsi Gabbard.

Here we go with the swiftboating or Tulsi. Are Americans this stupid?

Mark Ames comments.

NBC News

Russia's propaganda machine discovers 2020 Democratic candidate Tulsi Gabbard. 

Robert Windrem and Ben Popken

Also

Wait for the birther "argument."

Samoa News
Tulsi Gabbard’s birthplace could create political fodder in national campaign

See also

We hardly knew ye.

The Hill
Sherrod Brown: Medicare for all not 'practical'
Nathaniel Wiexel

Raúl Ilargi Meijer — Trump Derangement International

The problem with all of this obviously is that all these news outlets are supposed to report the news, and none of them do anymore. They ‘report’ the opinions of their editors and ‘journalists’, and if these people don’t like whoever it is the American people elect as their president, it’s open season.

American media has made it acceptable for foreign media to write fake articles about the US president, which means ridicule of the Office of the President is fine too, and thereby the process by which he was elected. Re-read Kurbjuweit’s statement, that is what he says.

This is a sort of new normal that may well be the main legacy of 2018. It’s where the surge of social media and the internet in general have led us. In the process, they’ve swallowed the truth whole, and we may never see it again.

The truth is not a winning proposition. Fabricating stories and narratives and using them to string readers and viewers along like a modern version of the Pied Piper is a much bigger winner than the truth, and they’re all waking up to this new reality.

Der Spiegel’s response to being exposed as liars is to pretend to be open about it, but only by blaming one individual, while sparing the editors who let him roam free for 7 years.

The Guardian, which ran a fabricated story about meetings between Paul Manafort and Julian Assange in London’s Ecuadorian embassy a few weeks ago and was also exposed, has chosen a different approach: they attempt to smother the truth in silence. Both the writers of the story and editor-in-chief Kathy Viner, responsible for publishing blatant lies and fabrications are still on the payroll, there’s been no retraction and no apologies.

But there’s a flipside to this kind of thing. If you try to get away with murdering the truth the way Der Spiegel and the Guardian have done in these two instances, who’s going to read you next time around if they want to know what really happens, and take your words as true? No-one in their sound mind. So it’s necessarily a short term strategy....

The boy who cried "wolf" comes to mind. When the public begins to suspect that they are being gaslighted by the corporate media the purpose of having a free press is undermined.

The Automatic Earth

Trump Derangement International
Raúl Ilargi Meijer

T. J. Coles — How Fake News Perpetuates Neoliberalism

Neoliberalism is a toxic economic dogma that has serious social and political consequences. In Britain and the US, mainstream media have a long record of selling neoliberalism to the public and political lawmakers. Recall Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher’s slogan, “There is no alternative” (TINA). As I document in my new book, Real Fake News (Red Pill Press), elites throughout history have always used information to control the thoughts and actions of the public. But the modern project has stretched itself to the limit, and people are starting to say No.…

Fake news is perception management through narrative control, reality being a function of perception. When most of one's reality is not experienced directly, which Bertrand Russell called "knowledge by acquaintance." Rather, it is shaped by testimony, which Russell called "knowledge by description."

Knowledge by description is heavily influenced by authority. When authoritative sources are corrupted, perception strays from reality, which cannot endure in the long run. Truth will out and is victorious eventually. But deception can go on a long time before events that are experienced contradict "authoritative" reports.

Take, for example, the mainstream’s fake news about the crash. Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism at Oxford University published a report on mainstream media coverage in the US and Europe. The authors found that one of the goals of big businesses, which rely on PR firms that often hand copy to journalists, is to perpetuate a “narrative of normality,” in which their greed is kept out of public view for as long as possible. As the authors put it, “no news is good news.” When a crisis does occur, the task is perception management.

“[S]tories originate from six main categories of sources,” the researchers found: from journalists, corporations, analysts, authorities and politicians and shareholders. Notice that unions, activists, alternative currency purveyors and dissident academics are not included. They can be found in the alternative online media and are thus at risk of being labelled “fake news” by the powerful. “When excluding the ‘default category’ of journalists, most of the information in news stories about the banking crisis comes from banks themselves.” Indeed, more than half came from financial institutions. “On average 52% of all information comes from banks, another 18% from analysts/experts.”…

Renegade, Inc.
How Fake News Perpetuates Neoliberalism

T. J. Coles | postdoctoral researcher at Plymouth University’s Cognition Institute and the author of several books, including Real Fake News

See also

RT
Tanks on Maidan, president’s gold bath & more outrageous Ukraine fakes by disgraced Spiegel reporter

DW (Deutsche Welle)
Opinion: Truth is the first casualty of Claas Relotius
The Guardian (UK)
Der Spiegel to run 23-page special on reporter who faked stories

AFP

SouthFront — British Foreign Secretary Confirms Integrity Initiative Documents, Blames Russia For Everything

Ha ha.

Same as the Clinton faction in the US about revelations about documenting facts that were obtained by "hacking,"arguing the facts are irrelevant because Russia.

SouthFront
British Foreign Secretary Confirms Integrity Initiative Documents, Blames Russia For Everything

Moon of Alabama The 'Integrity Initiative' - A Military Intelligence Operation, Disguised As Charity, To Create The "Russian Threat"

The British government financed Integrity Initiative is tasked with spreading anti-Russian propaganda and with influencing the public, military and governments of a number of countries. What follows is an incomplete analysis of the third batch of the Initiative's papers which was dumped yesterday.

More evidence.

Moon of Alabama
The 'Integrity Initiative' - A Military Intelligence Operation, Disguised As Charity, To Create The "Russian Threat"

See also

Zero Hedge
Leaked Memo Touts UK-Funded Firm's Ability To Create "Untraceable" News Sites For "Infowar Campaign"

Tyler Durden

Moon of Alabama — Syria - 'Activist' Posts Fake Picture - Fact Checkers Fall For It

More MSM fake (Photoshopped) news  exposed. If you are wondering whether The Guardian is also involved, the answer is yes.

Morons (anchor bias, confirmation bias) or complicit (propaganda).

Hey editors, unanalyzed pictures are no longer evidence. Save yourselves some embarrassment Oh, wait, you already knew that!

Moon of Alabama
Syria - 'Activist' Posts Fake Picture - Fact Checkers Fall For It

See also

With its strongly misleading report Reuters, or at least its correspondent in Geneva, is obviously supporting the neocon campaign that they hope will lead to war on Iran.
It is fakenews from one of the prime 'western' news agencies about Iran's declared intentions.

Reuters Creates Fakenews About Iran - Intentionally Conflates Two Different Missiles - Misquotes Official

Also from Moon of Alabama

The People Of France Reject Macron's Policies - How Long Can He Survive?

Elizabeth Vos — The Guardian’s Reputation In Tatters After Forger Revealed To Have Co-Authored Assange Smear

Anyone still reading The Guardian? "Guardian" of what one asks? The Establishment?

Is there another option to the editor being either a moron or else complicit? Unless there is an exculpatory explanation quickly forthcoming that passes the smell test, some people need to be fired.

Needless to say, The Guardian has joined a growing list of unreliable media that I will no longer be linking to, at least until there is a change in management.

Disobedient Media
The Guardian’s Reputation In Tatters After Forger Revealed To Have Co-Authored Assange Smear
Elizabeth Vos

See also

Zero Hedge
Top Ecuadorian Diplomat Destroys Guardian's Claim That Manafort Visited Assange

Tyler Durden

See also

Consortium News
The Guardian’s Vilification of Julian Assange

Jonathan Cook

Caitlin Johnstone — Never, Ever Forget The Guardian/Politico Psyop Against WikiLeaks

Two more sources crossed off the list of links for me to cite here at MNE. Compromised.

Caitlin Johnstone — Rogue Journalist
Never, Ever Forget The Guardian/Politico Psyop Against WikiLeaks
Caitlin Johnstone

Paul J. Saunders — Why Bloomberg Got It Wrong

Devastating smackdown. Implies the reporters should be fired. I would add, probably the editor responsible as well.

Want better news? Demand accountability for fake news, lies, and reputational smears.

The National Interest
Why Bloomberg Got It Wrong

Paul J. Saunders | Executive Director of the Center for the National Interest and associate publisher of the National Interest, and a State Department Senior Adviser during the George W. Bush administration

A Political Junkie — The RussiaHoax Theme Got Started As a Dirty Trick by Hillary's 2016 Campaign

In fairness to the Democrats, they likely saw it as payback for the attackers on John Kerry's military recored and the Obama birther conspiracy theory that Trump backed at least obliquely. Then the GOP Never Trumper's jumped on board, too, followed by some US intel chiefs aligned with one of the above.

Those who know American history know that this is an American tradition. There's nothing new under the sun.

All's fair in love, war — and politics.

And it was not just to crush Trump in the campaign, but also Bernie as a Clinton rival.

Russia Insider

The RussiaHoax Theme Got Started As a Dirty Trick by Hillary's 2016 Campaign

A Political Junkie

See also at RI

Trump Derangement Syndrome

People Aren't Having Intelligent Conversations Anymore, They're Just Yelling at Each Other

Michael Krieger

More on Wikipedia, Philip Cross and Wikispooks — 22 May 2018

Intel Today
Wikipedia & the Spooks — The Remake? [The Philip Cross Affair]
L (Ludwig De Braeckeleer)

Craig Murray Blog
Philip Cross Madness Part IV
Craig Murray, formerly British ambassador to Uzbekistan and Rector of the University of Dundee

TruePublica — The Guardian/Sky News Team Up To Promote Fake News About Fake News

On the 19th of April, The Guardian (International Edition) published an article making the assertion that two Twitter accounts were Russian propaganda operations or as they like to put it ‘trolls and bots’ to unleash disinformation on to social media in the wake of the Salisbury poisoning. 

The article is written by a rather unsuspecting and maybe, let’s be charitable here, nieve Heather Stewart, who went along with the government operative who fed this nonsense to her in the first place. Either that or she and The Guardian is deliberately distributing stories that are fake....

But there’s a problem with this.

The owners of both these Twitter accounts quickly stepped forward and on video too, remonstrating in no uncertain terms that they were, indeed are, in fact, real humans – and weren’t even Russian. They have defended themselves to prove they are definitely not software programs.

The Guardian should have taken this story down – its fake news, but they haven’t.
Ian of @Ian56789 even went on national TV, Sky News to be precise and he was quite definitely miffed about being called an automated Russian bot.…

TruePublica

The Guardian/Sky News Team Up To Promote Fake News About Fake News
TruePublica Editor

See also

Scott Ritter is arguably the most experienced American weapons inspector and in this interview with Dennis J. Bernstein he levels a frank assessment of U.S. government assertions about chemical weapons use.

Consortium News
Weapons Inspector Refutes U.S. Syria Chemical Claims
Dennis J. Bernstein interviews Scott Ritter

Also

Media Lens
Douma: Part 1 - Deception In Plain Sight

Douma: Part 2 - 'It Just Doesn't Ring True'

Editor