This Week in Misinformation: A 'Society' Approach, AI, Tucker and the Shaman, Help for Nina
9 March 2023
Gentle Reader,
A few friends and I have been working on something, and it’s time to loop you in. Safe to think that the set of people opening and reading this ‘letter week in and week out is the one that will be interested to learn: we are founding the American Anti-Misinformation Society (#AAMS) to formally tie the community of folks doing this work together, giving them ways to help one another, and grow to be a force capable of disrupting and subverting the misinformation culture that is holding Americans and all of humanity back. There is a lot we’d like to share if you are interested, so please email back to this address to request additional information and an invitation to our first all-members meeting later this month. Look forward to seeing you there (I’ll be sharing remarks and co-running the call)!
As always, reliability scores for the media outlets cited in the summary are in parentheses, we use the Ad Fontes Media ones because we like them best.
Now, on to our top stories.
We had a strong showing of various AI-related developments this week, and it feels good to lead with that for a change!
The rise of AI as a driver of misinformation isn’t great when you consider that humans don’t seem to have as much control as you’d hope over the technology (CBS News, 44.28)--and that major platforms like Twitter (BBC, 46.15) seem to care less and less about these things as time goes on.
But rising it is, and already impacts or soon will impact everything from medical care (Futurism, 41.75) to journalism (Nieman Lab, 43.07). Of course it will be used for politics, and I’ll just say: if you’re not worried about deepfakes yet, you probably should be (Vanity Fair, 35.66)
Tucker isn’t so much telling a new story of January 6th as he is just trying to confuse people by highlighting snippets of the QAnon Shaman’s day in the Senate.
His team having apparently extracted its first feature story from the 40,000+ hours of surveillance footage Kevin McCarthy gave exclusively to them, Carlson’s program entirely avoided talking about all that’s coming out about the network, its conflicted and dishonest response to Trump’s 2020 loss (New York Times, 42.48), the Dominion Voting Systems defamation case against it (NPR, 43.34), the FEC complaints filed as a result of documents filed in court (NBC News, 45.23, and especially not the flak they are taking from the hard right (CNN, 42.40).
No. Tucker, who lies to his viewers on the regular (New York Times, 42.48), instead spun a few minutes’ worth of footage of Jacob Chansley, the QAnon Shaman into a full alternative tale of the Capitol attack being something like something like a peaceful gathering (NBC News, 45.23). The former president for whom Chansley and others obstructed a Congressional proceeding found this version to his liking, and Donald Trump used it to demand both that imprisoned rioters be freed (Newsweek, 35.96) and that the members of Congress who investigated the incident be charged with ‘treason’ (MSNBC, 35.14).
Tucker’s attempt to rewrite history was ludicrous to the point that the U.S. Capitol Police chief criticized it as "offensive" (CNN, 42.40), the family of fallen officer Brian Sicknick laid into his callous dredging up of his memory (CBS News, 44.28), and both Democratic (NBC News, 45.23) and Republican (@AccountableGOP via Twitter) senators called it out for the lie it was. Still, that hasn’t stopped some January 6th criminal defendants (CNN, 42.40) from trying to use these supposed revelations to have their cases dismissed.
Disinformation specialist Nina Jankowicz is facing down Fox News and Jim Jordan.
On LinkedIn, Jankowicz announced that she was going to sue Fox for defaming her in connection with her appointed role as head of the DHS Disinformation Governance Board, which led to what she describes as severe harassment (Politico, 42.72). Editor’s privilege: I would like to personally ask that if you have the means, this person could use financial support in her bid to hold Fox accountable. Crowdfunding details are in the link above.
Over in the House Judiciary Committee, meanwhile, chair Jim Jordan issued a subpoena to compel Jankowicz to appear and answer his questions about government censorship (National Review, ). Jordan’s hearings on the Twitter Files (Deseret News, 43.99), in another committee this week, don’t appear to have made a strong case for the GOP position on these issues, but Jankowicz is already a right-wing bogeyman so maybe this approach will yield better results for him?
It’s not the best ever, but today’s grab bag is close: propaganda in the service of white supremacy is on the rise; new intelligence suggests a pro-Ukrainian group did the Nordstream sabotage, something the Ukrainian government denies involvement in; Bannon, Greene, Jordan, and others bombard the CPAC audience with untruths; the FDA commissioner says 'truth is losing the battle'; Republican-controlled states bail on a voting data partnership that was supposed to combat election fraud; Mike Pence asks judge to block the subpoena for his January 6th testimony; and ex-Trump attorney Jenna Ellis, who acknowledges she made false statements about the 2020 election, gets into a very public tiff with failed Arizona politician Kari Lake over the latter’s false statements about the 2022 election.
All that, and a lot more, below. This is This Week in Misinformation.
-- Kevin