Why, hello, CNN. Fancy seeing you blow a story up, getting it all wrong, and having to be corrected by other media… like the New York Times and the Washington Post.

To make a long story short:

Summary: Started with a CNN story that blamed Trump for losing key asset. NYT story then revealed that it had little to do with Trump and media questions led to the asset needing to be extracted. Finally, NBC News decided to irresponsibly reveal where that asset was now. https://t.co/tVSSdEVS99

— (((AG))) (@AG_Conservative) September 10, 2019

Let’s go through this, piece by piece.

CNN starts off with the premise that this Russian asset that the CIA used had to be extracted because President Trump had endangered him. The CNN article puts out some pretty damning details.

The decision to carry out the extraction occurred soon after a May 2017 meeting in the Oval Office in which Trump discussed highly classified intelligence with Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov and then-Russian Ambassador to the US Sergey Kislyak. The intelligence, concerning ISIS in Syria, had been provided by Israel.”

The disclosure to the Russians by the President, though not about the Russian spy specifically, prompted intelligence officials to renew earlier discussions about the potential risk of exposure, according to the source directly involved in the matter.”

Obviously, big if true. Not to mention that it fits perfectly with CNN’s editorial position of “ORANGE MAN BAD.” However, the CIA was quick to tell CNN that they were full of it.

And it wasn’t only the CIA telling CNN that they were way off base. The New York Times and the Washington Post both confirmed that the asset had been offered extraction in 2016 – before Trump became president.

Oops. But if there’s one thing that CNN can be counted on to do, it’s push the narrative that Trump is always at fault for everything.

And then NBC said to CNN, “hey, hold my beer… HEY EVERYONE, WE KNOW WHERE HE LIVES!”

New: Possible Russian spy for CIA living in Washington area https://t.co/TFnA5jhYJY via @nbcnews

— Ken Dilanian (@KenDilanianNBC) September 10, 2019

Why don’t you just draw a circle around the guy’s house with fluorescent paint while you’re at it, NBC? I’m sure that Putin thanks you for your service.

The bottom line is that CNN blew this story because they wanted to blame Trump for the asset’s exfiltration. The dates simply don’t line up, and both the NYT and the WaPo called them out. Then NBC poured gasoline on the story and lit a match. Well done.

But in case you thought that the New York Times had turned over a new leaf or something – no. The NYT has a “new” story about how Trump has a deal with Scotland for the use of an airport near his Trump Turnberry property.

Except that this story broke in February of 2016, well before the election. And the original writer of the piece in The Scotsman, Martyn McLaughlin, is rather angry with the NYT author Eric Lipton for pretty much ripping off his whole story and passing it off as “new” news without any acknowledgement.

Eric, the FoI docs your article is based on were disclosed to me in Feb '16. I revealed the Trump/Prestwick deal that same month & disclosed some docs this weekend. It'd be instructive to @nytimes readers, and courteous to me, if you acknowledged this. https://t.co/RkmQ7yIBj8 https://t.co/kkjycAZCCc pic.twitter.com/QzrYnJo5IV

— Martyn McLaughlin (@MartynMcL) September 10, 2019

But “ORANGE MAN BAD,” so who cares about small things like “journalistic ethics,” right? Stealing other people’s work and endangering former CIA assets is all okay if the media can JUST smear Donald Trump.

Featured image via Pixabay, Pixabay license