This story will move forward only if journalists expose what politicians are hiding (Mother Jones)
Now It's About Much More Than Trump and Russia
It's about which will prevail: truth—or power.
Monika Bauerlein and Clara Jeffery May 12, 2017 10:05 AM
Lots of snip here. Mother Jones laying out what they are planning to do and how.
"Why, you might ask, the extra push on an issue that many others are now covering? Because the past year has shown that even when lots of journalists are on the same beat—back then, it was the presidential campaign—the news ecosystem is not necessarily built to expose the most challenging stories. Here's an example: In October, Corn was the first and only reporter to break the explosive news that a former British counterintelligence officer had assembled memos containing allegations that Moscow had tried to co-opt and compromise Trump, and that the FBI was interested in this material."
snip
"We now know those Russia memos are at the heart of the biggest scandal yet for an administration that, scandal-wise, has set a high bar. Yet it wasn't until January that others were willing to touch the story. The New York Times' public editor, Liz Spayd, wrote a column about how the Times had known about the memos before the election and had even drafted a piece about them—but then killed it. In retrospect, she said, MoJo's approach presented a "model" for other newsrooms.
Trump was able to fend off the Russia story for much of the campaign because he exploited Washington's—and political journalism's—tendency to coalesce around a he-said-she-said storyline. In this sense, his attacks on media worked: He was able to characterize a genuine scandal as partisan mudslinging, and suggest that to pursue it was to carry water for Hillary Clinton. The Obama administration, as we now know, feared being painted with that brush. So did James Comey. So did many in the press.
This story will move forward only if journalists expose what politicians are hiding.
Journalists' tendency to recoil in the face of such attacks has waned a bit with Trump ratcheting up his "enemy of the people" venom. But it's also becoming clearer than ever that the story of foreign influence and corruption has barely begun to be told. Take the not-so-subtle signals from the few people on Capitol Hill who have access to top-secret intelligence briefings. Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.), who happens to be the son of an investigative reporter, recently told MoJo, "There is a big gap between what the public had a right to know and what came out. And that continues to be true to this day." Wyden's California colleague, Sen. Dianne Feinstein, says that if the public had known what she knew about Trump and Russia, the election would have turned out differently: "I deeply do believe that."
Feinstein and Wyden can't disclose the intelligence they've seen. And the White House and its allies are evidently determined to make sure no one else does either. That means this story will move forward only if journalists expose what politicians are hiding—and journalists can only do that when they have the time, and space, to go deep. "
Lots of snip
They are starting a huge project to cover this and asking for subscribers to cover the cost. It is not much to subscribe:
"And so, right now, we're going to double down. We are launching a new project to investigate the Trump-Russia question, and we hope you'll be part of it. We're looking to sign up 1,000 new sustaining donors with a tax-deductible donation of $15 a month to help make it happen. (We'd be grateful for one-time gifts, too.) There's even a matching gift (and details below) to boost your impact."
More details at link about what exactly they are planning to do.
http://www.motherjones.com/media/2017/05/facts-trump-russia
= new reply since forum marked as read
