Comment by willholloway | Hacker News Reader

Comment by willholloway | Hacker News Reader

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What is really dangerous is the mainstream media (NY Times, Washington Post) running stories based solely on anonymous sources.

The public has no capacity to vet the credibility of anonymously sourced claims.

Almost all of the current media narrative on the Russian story comes from stories with nothing more than "American officials say".

Remember that "American officials said" that Iraq definitely had WMD. Public support for the invasion was built solely on anonymously sourced news. American officials were actually politically motivated ideologues manufacturing consent, with journalists at the New York Times like Judith Wilson playing the part of the useful idiot.

The same thing is happening right now. This [1] New York Times story is a perfect example.

There is no place for anonymous sources on issues of war and peace in a republic. Allowing this low a bar for journalistic evidence leaves us completely vulnerable to manipulation.

[1] https://mobile.nytimes.com/2017/03/30/us/politics/devin-nune...

The choice is not to get the same information but from known sources. In most cases, you won't get the information at all.

And people misunderstand the mechanism here: journalists quoting unnamed sources put their own reputation on the line as a stand-in for their sources. They know the names, and they build relationships with these sources. The sources/treacherous illoyal leakers/whistleblowers are career politicians or officials, and their relationship with someone at the Journal or the Times is equally valuable for them.

Looking at the current storyline on Russia, I know there are daily leaks from "unnamed sources". But I can't think of a case where these sources turned out to be wrong – maybe there are, but I'm pretty sure the vast majority have turned out to be accurate. See for example "leak zero" of Flynn talking to the ambassador. We'll see about the example you added on Nunes' sources, but it seems like that information also has multiple confirmations by now.

I'd also like to point out that you're moving the goalpost and not answering my question, and that I actually thought about a specific exclusion of the NYT's failure on WMDs because it's getting old.

I also seem to remember that it was a very-much-not-anonymous Colin Powell who made the WMD case to the UN which actually allowed the US to invade.

> The choice is not to get the same information but from known sources. In most cases, you won't get the information at all.

Since the "information" is claimed to be from anonymous sources, there is no way to determine whether the information is accurate or wholly fabricated. Given the media's extreme bias now, it is not a given that it is not the latter.

BTW, seems like few people have seen this article: https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2014/10/14/world/middlee...

>Since the "information" is claimed to be from anonymous sources, there is no way to determine whether the information is accurate or wholly fabricated. Given the media's extreme bias now, it is not a given that it is not the latter.

It's not immediately possible, but of course, as more information comes to light, you can verify of falsify it. So please show an example, from the last year, from the New York Times, where they published something from an anonymous source that was later disproven[1].

Here, I'll start with something that was proven to be right: Flynn's phone call with the ambassador was reported (with anonymous sources, on Jan 12th, and confirmed by the president's spokesman the next day: https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2017/02/14/us/politics/f...

[1] Because I've learnt to qualify everything: This may actually happen on occasion, but I'd expect the journalist in question to acknowledge it, give an account of their relationship with the source, and what steps they are taking to avoid a repetition.

A major problem with anonymous sources is not just the inability to verify the claims, even more troubling is the inability to assess the motives of the source and their context and agenda.

The phrase "American officials" connotes an objectivity, as if the information was revealed by God himself.

> journalists quoting unnamed sources put their own reputation on the line as a stand-in for their sources.

Isn't that exactly the point? Their credibility is gone.

>> Looking at the current storyline on Russia, I know there are daily leaks from "unnamed sources". But I can't think of a case where these sources turned out to be wrong – maybe there are, but I'm pretty sure the vast majority have turned out to be accurate.

>> journalists quoting unnamed sources put their own reputation on the line as a stand-in for their sources.

> Isn't that exactly the point? Their credibility is gone.

What makes you say that?

I could see a good argument that they are not impartiality, but that seems a different thing.

To some degree one can look on a case-by-case basis.

For a specific example, I find Fox's George Russell reasonably credible, but he is clearly not impartial.

On the other hand, Fox's Judith Miller seems more impartial but has some pretty serious credibility issues.

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