Buzzfeed Double-Down!

[matt819]

28. You say it's a double down bet

I wouldn't use that characterization.

A source, whether of a journalist or an intelligence service, gets ranked. Access, accuracy, verifiability, reliability over time, confirmations over time from other sources or from information released publicly. Mueller's office, for whatever reasons, threw Buzzfeed's reporting into question.

Buzzfeed says, hang on a minute, Mr. M, we're pretty confident. On Monday, Buzzfeed says, hey, Mr. M, we're darn confident.

At this point, it's no longer a bet, IMHO.

They have a source - probably multiple sources. They have determined that these sources have access to the information. The sources have been shown to be reliable, which means that information they provided previously has proven to be spot on, i.e., consistent, correct, high-level, etc., etc. Whether the source is in Mueller's office is unknown. I would guess probably not. But the information that Mueller has received on this issue was available from any number of sources (even if that number is very small). That's where the Buzzfeed information has to be coming from. That may require an awful lot of parsing in terms of both accuracy and protecting sources. That's par for the course for investigative journalists.

So, is it really a bet if the confidence level is sufficiently high. Unless Buzzfeed is fucking around in some way, I would say that it's not a bet, but a sure thing.