MSM Manufactures Consent For An Illegal War As Venezuela Invasion Disinfo Floods Your Feed
Stories you might have missed this week. Sharing, donating, and subscribing to public interest journalism is literally an action you can take to fight for democracy.
Good afternoon, everyone. We see the repercussions of Americans relying on disinformation to shape their beliefs every day as our MAGA friends and loved ones consume a toxic media diet that causes them to cheer Trump’s lawless agenda.
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Here’s what you may have missed:
Wired, Disinformation Floods Social Media After Nicolás Maduro’s Capture
After Trump announced that US troops had captured Nicolás Maduro and his wife, disinformation about the operation flooded TikTok, Instagram, and X within minutes. People reshared old videos as if they showed the attack on Caracas and circulated AI-generated images and videos claiming to show Maduro’s arrest by US law enforcement, including a widely shared image WIRED says was likely AI-made based on a SynthID watermark. Platforms did little to stop the misleading posts, and the article says this fits a broader pattern as companies have pulled back moderation in recent years.
As well as the likely fake image, some people have used AI tools to create videos from the image that purport to show Maduro’s arrest. On TikTok, multiple examples of these apparently AI-generated videos racked up hundreds of thousands of views within hours of Maduro’s capture. A number of the TikTok videos appear to be based on AI-generated images originally posted on Instagram by a digital creator named Ruben Dario and viewed over 12,000 times. Similar videos have appeared on X as well.
The US invasion of Iraq was based on government lies laundered into the public discourse by major news organizations. Now, we must contend with the ability of any random human to flood the internet with convincing, AI-generated lies about this new conflict. A healthy media diet full of reputable sources that provide clear-eyed context is more important than ever. See below.
Current Affairs, The Real Reason Trump Kidnapped Maduro
So, what is the push for war with Venezuela really about? Control of valuable resources. This isn’t even speculation, because Trump just says it openly. When I left, Venezuela was ready to collapse. We would have taken it over, we would have gotten all that oil, it would have been right next door,’ he said at a meeting of the North Carolina Republican Party in 2023. ‘But now we’re buying oil from Venezuela, so we’re making a dictator very rich.’ Trump has contempt for the very idea that he might treat another world leader as an equal and strike a fair deal to get what he wants. He would rather just ‘take it over.’
Current Affairs has yet to publish the article the above Instagram carousel is based on. I will update when they do.
Marisa Kabas, The consent manufacturing has begun
Meanwhile, independent journalist, Marisa Kabas, is chronicling examples of how our corporate, commericialized system for informing the public is already manufacturing consent by framing the US invasion of Venezuela as anything other than illegal regime change.
I found CBS also highlighting Venezuelan immigrants celebrating the invasion.
My recommendation is to add Marisa Kabas and her outlet The Handbasket to your media diet immediately. And a reminder that Current Affairs took Bret Stephens to task for casually making the case for this illegal war in The New York Times opinion section last month.
More Perfect Union, We Had 400 People Shop For Groceries, What We Found Will Shock You
More Perfect Union exposed Instacart’s shady price manipulation scheme. The company was using AI algorithms to charge customers different prices for the same items.
What do I mean when I say journalism is a democracy’s immune system? I mean that by informing the public of harms—to their health, to their community, even to their wallet—journalists are the catalyst for citizens taking action to protect themselves againt corporate and political corruption.
Instacart was instantly shamed into discontinuing the practice.
More on how More Perfect’s coverage led to accountability:
Associated Press, Instacart ends a program where users could see different prices for the same item at the same store
The Guardian, US sees surge in violence against journalists under Trump, report says
Corrupt corporations and politicians loathe being watched and exposed, which is why people like Donald Trump never stop attacking the press.
“When the president models ridicule and delegitimization, it signals to supporters that journalists are fair targets,” said Lars Willnat, a Syracuse University professor who has studied the impact of political polarization on perceptions of journalists. “That shift matters because violence becomes easier to justify once journalists are seen as political combatants rather than neutral observers.”
The [Freedom of the Press Foundation] has reported 170 assaults against journalists – most of which occurred at protests concerning the administration’s immigration policies – this year before 16 December. From 2022 to 2024, there were a total of 175 assaults.
Donald Trump doesn’t attack the press because they are the enemy of the people. He attacks them because journalists are the enemies of corrupt people. And Donald Trump is the most corrupt president in US history.
The Guardian, Thanks to Donald Trump, 2025 was a good year … for white-collar criminals
We know Donald Trump is the most corrupt president in US history when we have a healthy media diet full of factual reporting. about reality.
Karoline Leavitt, the White House press secretary, framed the decision [to pardon Zhao] as a corrective to what she called the Biden administration’s “war on cryptocurrency”, insisting that Zhao’s crimes had produced no “identifiable victims”.
It was a familiar refrain, dressed up for a new audience: that corruption is somehow a “victimless crime”. The claim is absurd. Terrorist organisations do not exist in a vacuum. They depend on white-collar criminals capable of building and maintaining secretive financial pipelines. The victims of bombings, shootings and mass casualty attacks are, all too often, also the victims of bankers, executives and financiers who made that violence possible…
…Trump has pardoned Juan Orlando Hernandez, the former Honduran president.
…In 2024, Hernández was convicted by a US jury of an extraordinary catalogue of crimes, including conspiring to import roughly 400 tonnes of cocaine into the United States. As the US attorney general said at the time, Hernández stood “at the centre of one of the largest and most violent drug-trafficking conspiracies in the world”, entwining his finances with the cartels and transforming Honduras into a key transit hub for narcotics bound for American streets and, in the process, one of the most dangerous countries on Earth…
…Trump announced in early December that Hernandez was “treated very harshly and unfairly” and would walk free. Hernandez spent months lobbying Trump acolytes and conservative media personalities, pitching himself as a pro-Trump “ally on migration and security” and casting himself as a victim of political revenge by the Biden administration that he said had also been used to target Trump.
Read this piece then send it to a loved one who might be unsure whether or not Trump is corrupt. Engaging our friends and loved ones about their media diets and helping them see what they might be missing is a step towards saving democracy.
Committee To Protect Journalists, No justice for journalists targeted by Israel despite strong evidence of war crime
When a corrupt person leads a nation AND attacks the press, and the public does nothing, we become complicit in attacks on journalists throughout the world. That’s why this older reporting from the CJP is essential.
On October 13, 2023 at 6:02 p.m., CPJ reports the Israeli military fired two tank shells 37 seconds apart at a group of seven clearly identified journalists in southern Lebanon, killing Reuters videographer Issam Abdallah and injuring six others (including AFP’s Christina Assi, who later had her right leg amputated).
CPJ says four separate investigations by AFP, Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch, and Reuters all concluded the journalists were deliberately targeted, which CPJ notes would constitute a war crime if the target was civilians.
The video journalism by American reporter Dylan Collins, embedded in this article, is harrowing but must be watched by every American who believes in the Constitution and the promise of a free press. Here is the link straight to that video.
Pro Publica, The FDA Often Doesn’t Test Generic Drugs for Quality Concerns, So ProPublica Did
A Hands-Off Approach: The FDA rarely tests generic drugs for quality concerns, despite warnings from doctors, universities and the Department of Defense about contaminants and other issues.
A Risky Gamble: The agency also failed to routinely test medications from factories that had so many serious quality and safety violations that they were banned from the U.S. market.
Concerning Results: ProPublica tested several versions of widely prescribed generic drugs and found two samples with irregularities that experts say could compromise their effectiveness.
These highlights were written by the reporters and editors who worked on this story.
I am constantly encountering folks who believe journalism is dying because newsrooms are unwilling to adapt to make their reporting easily digestible. Above we see highlights of the Pro Publica article written by the journalists who worked on the story. Below is an easy to consume companion video piece Pro Publica posted to their social media accounts.
Folks can support great journalism by following newsrooms directly. When you go straight to the source, avoiding sensationalizing middle-men like Aaron Parnas, you help sustain reputable newsrooms. Even better, reposting journalist’s hard work and donating to their pro-democracy reporting is a literal action you can take to fight for truth every day.
Mother Jones, The Horns and Whistles Work: What it’s like to watch community activists stand up to a Border Patrol raid.
Border Patrol and ICE are violating human rights and basic decency with their neighborhood sweeps, leading residents and activists to disrupt them by using whistles, car horns, and vehicles to alert targets, track agents, and physically block operations. The alerts draw neighbors, protesters, and journalists, slowing raids, exposing agent movements, and making detentions harder or impossible.
This essential reporting by Mother Jones details how a specific instance of coordinated community action in Kenner, Louisiana, forced agents to abandon their operation without detaining anyone.
Highlighting the tactics of citizens standing up for democratic processes like due process in the face of fascist terror is just another example of the vital role journalists play in a healthy society.
The New York Times, Hundreds of Big Post-Election Donors Have Benefited From Trump’s Return to Office
The New York Times fails the public regularly and I have criticized them for it for years. But our information ecosystem is complicated and we cannot throw out the baby with the bath water when they deign to do the bare minimum with their massively powerful newsroom. Here is essential, albeit paywalled, reporting by the Times in the public interest, as only they can do with their nearly unlimited resources.
To shed light on what has been a largely opaque fund-raising apparatus, The New York Times conducted a comprehensive investigation. It relied on previously unreported documents and public campaign finance filings, as well as interviews with dozens of people who are familiar with the solicitations or are involved in the fund-raising. It traced a large portion of the funds raised — more than half a billion dollars’ worth — back to 346 donors who each gave at least $250,000. It also found that more than half of them have benefited, or are involved in an industry that has benefited, from the actions or statements of Mr. Trump, the White House or federal agencies.
That said, DO NOT support the Times with a subscription. They don’t need your money nearly as much as the other newsrooms in this newsletter. Of course, if you have a Times subscription is it your duty as a citizen to send a gift version of this article to everyone you know.
Our president is an unhinged, corrupt criminal who attempted a coup on January 6, 2021. Below is how—after thousands of election lies, chronicled corruption, boasts of sexual assault, and countless other disqualifying actions—three outlets chose to frame Trump’s insane Christmas day social media posts. I’m not reccommending the outlets below, but it’s imperative that we see what ISN’T journalism, too. Removing context of Trump's numerous heinous actions while covering other evidence of his lack of fitness is a sign of mainstream media not meeting the moment. This type of normalization disguised as accountability happens every day.
The Daily Beast, Trump Posts Nearly 150 Times in Unhinged Christmas Day Spree
President Donald Trump gifted the world nearly 150 Truth Social posts (and counting) on Christmas Day, where he complained about the 2020 election, the media, Democrats, Somali immigrants, and other favorite targets.
In the early hours of Thursday, Christmas Day, the president shared a flurry of posts, many of which amplified baseless claims made by his allies and fans. It’s unclear if Trump, 79, published the posts himself or if he was in bed after attending a holiday dinner at Mar-a-Lago with his wife and father-in-law, then wishing a Merry Christmas to everyone—including “Radical Left Scum.” The White House did not immediately return a request for comment.
The New York Times, ‘Go to Hell,’ ‘The Light of Freedom’ and Other Ways to Send Presidential Christmas Messages
Merry Christmas to the “wonderful soldiers of China” and to “Governor Justin Trudeau of Canada” and “the people of Greenland.” As for the 37 men on federal death row who recently received commutations from President Biden? “GO TO HELL!”
The messages, posted online by President-elect Donald J. Trump on Christmas, were characteristic for a man known for his bombastic social media presence, but they veered sharply from the standard holiday ideals of unity delivered from the White House.
USA Today, ‘Radical Left Scum.’ Trump Xmas cheer greets rivals
WASHINGTON – President Donald Trump rang in Christmas with enough social media posts to fill Santa’s sack with holiday cheer for “Radical Left Scum,” his political antagonists and the growing economy.
In return, Russia’s President Vladimir Putin wished Trump a merry Christmas and sent him a congratulatory message, Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said Dec. 25.
But Trump wasn’t about to put a lump of valuable coal in the stockings of his adversaries. He reminded a child during a round of Christmas eve calls that coal is “clean and beautiful.”
The Marshall Project, We Spent a Year Covering Deaths Behind Bars. Here’s What We Learned.
The Marshall Project found that thousands of people die each year in U.S. prisons and jails from causes including medical neglect, untreated illness, violence, suicide, and overdoses, with many deaths preventable or poorly investigated.
This reporting is essential because it exposes how routine neglect, secrecy, and lack of accountability inside the criminal justice system lead to preventable deaths that would otherwise remain hidden from the public, quietly sanctioned by those in power.
It goes without saying that a prison sentence is not an automatic death sentence.
Known for covering global affairs, Drop Site News put together a contextualizing string of Bluesky posts about this one soccer fan’s unique form of activism, including the United States historical role in murdering the Democratic Republic of Congo’s last democratically elected leader.
The Guardian, Google AI Overviews put people at risk of harm with misleading health advice
Google’s AI Overviews have produced inaccurate and misleading health information, including errors about cancer screening, diagnostic tests, and dietary advice for serious illnesses. Medical experts and health organizations warn that these summaries could cause people to delay seeking care or misunderstand critical medical guidance.
This type of journalism is essential because it documents concrete failures in influential systems, warns the public about real-world harms, and forces accountability that would otherwise be avoided or obscured.
Associated Press, Big Tech’s fast-expanding plans for data centers are running into stiff community opposition
Big Tech’s rapid expansion of data centers is facing growing backlash from local communities across the U.S. Residents are organizing to block projects over concerns about energy use, water consumption, environmental damage, noise, and declining property values. Community opposition and zoning fights have delayed or stopped multiple proposed facilities.
Showing citizens that others are standing up to corporate power, as the AP does here, is part of journalism’s vital role in a democracy. It demonstrates that resistance is possible, collective action can have real impact, and power is not as unchallengeable as it often appears.
Status_, The Dokoupil Doctrine
Tony Dokoupil, ahead of taking over the CBS Evening News, released a video blaming public distrust in media on journalists relying too much on experts and “elites,” echoing long-standing right-wing grievances about coverage of major political stories. Journalists and media observers criticized the framing as undermining fact-based reporting by treating public sentiment as a substitute for accuracy. Critics warn CBS is repeating a failed strategy of sidelining expertise and appealing to conservative audiences, which has previously damaged credibility and driven audiences away.
This is one more example of how control of our media by the mega-rich (the Ellison’s in CBS’ case) undermines public enlightenment every day by prioritizing their agendas and pushing their narratives over the expertise of non-partisan scholars and academics.
Share other great journalism you saw this week in the comments so I can put it in the next one. And be sure to check out my Bluesky lists for an easy way to find pro-democracy journalism and commentary in just minutes each day.
I sift through the noise to provide the reporting that matters and point readers toward journalism that actually improves understanding. If this work makes staying informed easier for you, support it here.
WHAT’S A PETRO-TERRORIST?
Like “narco-terrorist” it is a made-up word now describing Drumpf who invaded Venezuela to capture its oil reserves. With no proof, his illegal war justified by claiming Maduro led gangs & drug lords. Putin is so proud!
Venezuelar???