[ANALYSIS and OPINION]
The credibility of any information or opinion source is always hugely important in any decision-making process. Information and opinions that lack credibility should not be considered in any rational decision-making process. Determining the credibility of news, information and opinion sources is, however becoming both more difficult and important these days because: (i) of the seemingly increasing willingness of various news media and opinion sources to slant and/or put spin on the news to suit some political position or agenda of the news or opinion source;(ii) of advances in artificial intelligence (AI) and other technologies that allows one to alter, duplicate, mimic and/or publish faked or altered voices, pictures, and videos etc.; (iii) the highly polarized political environment; (iv) the increasing number of global hotspots and (v) the increasing lethality and effectiveness of weapons systems worldwide. Rarely has there been a more dangerous time to be on planet Earth than the present.
All of the foregoing has huge political significance because it will obviously affect the ability of politicians to attract voters, supporters and campaign donations. Thus, the ability of the public to determine whether the information that they hear, read or see is credible will have a huge affect on who gets elected and/or re-elected to public office. This is because it affects the persuasiveness of candidates, political parties and interest groups when they make an argument and/or take a position on any issue. In short, the credibility of news, opinion and information sources affects who gets power, who stays in power and how much power they have. This is true not only on a local, state and national level, but on an international level too.
In this regard, one is reminded of the true story of Kim Philby and a group of British Cambridge students (who were recruited by Russian during their college days and ultimately became very high ranking double agents in British intelligence) back in the 1930s. The Russians were, and very probably still are, very aggressive about infiltrating college campuses and influencing, some would say infecting, the minds of Western youth. Other nations have undoubtedly engaged in similar activities. And to be fair, the United States employed devices such as Radio Free Europe to try to win the hearts and minds of folks living behind the Iron Curtain. However, the main point is that the Russians and very probably the Chinese as well play the “long game” and devote a tremendous amount of time and resources to infiltrating places like college campuses as well as news and other information outlets and influencing, if not infecting, the minds of not only of students but the general public as well.
All of this is not to mention that back in 2016, then candidate for President Trump publicly asked the Russians to dig up dirt on Hillary Clinton. Thus, it is apparent that some of our own political leaders highly suspect that the Russians try to influence the outcome of American elections. Why wouldn’t they? Wouldn’t Kremlin leaders want to see politicians in this country, who are opposed to further U.S. war assistance to Ukraine, elected instead of those who support Ukraine independence, or worse (from a Russian perspective) membership in NATO? Wouldn’t Kremlin leaders be attracted to the idea of flooding the American airwaves, web and print media with any and all information and even lies and misinformation, designed to make further aid to Ukraine look immoral, foolhardy or wrongheaded? The point is that regardless of how one feels about aid to Ukraine, the Russians have a huge incentive to influence American elections[i], and in doing so, to flood America with lies and misinformation on this vitally important issue– one that has huge geopolitical significance.
The major point however, is that going forward, determining the credibility of news sources might well well become more difficult to do. A month or so ago we wrote an article titled “How to Get Unbiased News” which is naturally about finding unbiased, objective and truthful news. Reliance on biased news, opinion or information must always be taken with a healthy amount of skepticism, and many times totally disregarded, simply because of the increased likelihood that the news, information or opinion provided by a biased source lacks credibility. Here’s the link to that article:
https://reasonandbalance.com/how-to-get-unbiased-news/
The question then is: Beyond use of the news sources we mentioned in the foregoing article, what can be done if one runs across a news article or opinion from some other source? This is a very important question, because there’s no doubt that everyone will, at some point, hear, see and/or read just about anything on the internet, TV, radio, Youtube etc. Under these circumstances one can always do a quickie Wikipedia search on the topic or the source of the information. Wikipedia will often publish the name of the owner of the information source and sometimes even indicates whether the source is politically right or left-leaning. It might even offer some information on relevant controversies such as lawsuits involving the news source.
Beyond Wikipedia, however, we have found another possible resource that one searching for unbiased objective news might find of interest. It provides far more comprehensive credibility assessment and analysis than Wikipedia and for that reason should be more useful. That resource is NewsGuard.
According to Wikipedia:
“NewsGuard is a rating system for news and information websites. It is accessible via browser extensions and mobile apps. NewsGuard Technologies Inc., the company behind the tool, also provides services such as misinformation tracking and brand safety for advertisers, search engines, social media platforms, cybersecurity firms, and government agencies.
…..
“NewsGuard is based in New York City.[9] Its advisors include high-profile former officials such as Tom Ridge, former homeland security secretary, Richard Stengel, former undersecretary of state for public diplomacy, and Michael Hayden, former CIA director general, Anders Fogh Rasmussen, former NATO chief, as well as Wikipedia founder Jimmy Wales.[10][7] “ “
It’s very important to note who NewsGuard’s contributing “advisors” are. They include former public officials who would have more knowledge than anyone as to the extent of the danger that foreign manipulation of America’s news poses.
Here’s the link for News Guard:
https://www.newsguardtech.com/
David Dixon Lentz
November 5, 2023
© Copyright 2023, David Dixon Lentz, All Rights Reserved.
END NOTES
[i] For an example, one might point to Paul Manafort’s high and influential position with both Putin backed puppet leader of Ukraine, Viktor Yanukovych (and his Russian backers) and his similar high and influential position in President Trump’s 2016 campaign.