“The major German newspaper Der Spiegel revealed that one of its most renowned reporters, Claas Relotius, has been making up news for years. In a case of journalistic fraud ‘on a grand scale,’ Relotius has reportedly confessed to fabricating parts of at least 14 stories over the years, including an interview with Colin Kaepernick’s parents and a story about a sign on the outskirts of a Minnesota town reading ‘Keep Mexicans out.’ Ironically, Relotius won awards for his investigative exposes, including CNN Journalist of the Year in 2014. After many years of making up ‘facts’ to fit his preconceived narratives, Rolotius finally tripped up when he--like so many arrogant liberal reporters--slandered and underestimated the intelligence of rural American Trump voters whom he had never really talked to. In trying to ‘explain’ to European readers how those backward, knuckle-dragging, gun-toting, racist small town yahoos (a stereotype he could have lifted straight out of a 1960s drive-in movie) could have chosen the odious Trump over the resplendent Hillary, Rolotius wrote a profile of Fergus Falls, Minnesota, which voted for Trump by 62.6%. The intent was obviously to confirm the negative biases held by urban liberal bubble dwellers. Rolotius put damning quotes into the mouths of people he’d never talked to; invented demeaning descriptions of locals that were wildly inaccurate; created residents who didn’t really exist; made up ‘facts’ out of thin air that a Google search could have debunked. When residents saw to their shock what he had written about them, local blogger Michele Anderson posted a list of just his top 11 lies about Fergus. Adding more layers to the irony, Anderson is actually a Hillary-voting liberal who works for a local arts group and moved there from Portland, Oregon--but she loves her small town and gets along fine with her neighbors, liberals and conservatives alike.” “Der Spiegel Reporter Fired after Fake News Story” by Mike Huckabee, The Stream, Dec. 22, 2018 Comments are closed.
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