The GOP under investigation for creating a network of fake "local news" sites - GoFuckYourself.com

Bladewire · 03-06-2019, 12:13 PM

It's a sad day for America.

The sites rank on search engines as legitimate news sites when you do a news search.

The sites are funded by the Koch-founded Americans for prosperity. None of the sites say how they are funded or that they're political propoganda, they masquerade as legitimate local news sites. They pretend to be journalists.

The fake news sites masqueraded as local newspapers online for the states of Tennessee, Ohio, Minesota, Missouri, New England, North Dakota, South Dakota, Michigan, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, Virginia and Wisconsin.

The "writers" all work for political action committees some are previous campaign workers. They don't disclose this on their fake news sites.

Roughly 40 percent of the sites content comes from prominent conservative news sites like the Daily Caller and the Daily Signal. The rest is promoting local Republican candidates and content from conservative think tanks.

The Snopes article below is extremely in depth and long I highly suggest giving it a full read. Only PART of the article is pasted below.

Hiding in Plain Sight: PAC-Connected Activists Set Up ‘Local News’ Outlets

On 6 February 2017, a website of uncertain origin named “The Tennessee Star” was born. At the time, it was unclear who funded or operated this “local newspaper,” which was largely filled with freely licensed content from organizations tied to conservative mega-donors. After some prodding by Politico in early 2018, the Tennessee Star revealed its primary architects to be three Tea Party-connected conservative activists: Michael Patrick Leahy, Steve Gill, and Christina Botteri.

Now, a Snopes investigation reveals in detail how these activists used the appearance of local newspapers to promote messages paid for or supported by outside or undisclosed interests. Gill, for example, is the political editor of the Tennessee Star, but he also owns a media consulting company that at least one candidate and one Political Action Committee (PAC) paid before receiving positive coverage in the Tennessee Star. Several Star writers have in the past or currently work for PACs or political campaigns that they write about, without disclosing that fact. Though its owners claim that the Tennessee Star is funded by advertising revenue, it appears to be supported by wealthy benefactors. Whatever the Tennessee Star is, it is not a local newspaper producing transparent journalism.

But this story is about more than just the Tennessee Star. Leahy, Botteri, and Gill have been expanding their version of journalism to other battleground states in the run-up to the 2020 presidential election. They are, they say, co-founders of a new, Delaware-registered company, Star News Digital Media, Inc., whose explicit strategy is to target battleground states with conservative news. So far, Leahy, Gill, and Botteri have added The Ohio Star and The Minnesota Sun to their network of purportedly local newspapers. These papers are effective carbon copies of the Tennessee Star.

If you were to search for these three “newspapers” in Google, they would each show up described identically as the “most reliable” newspapers in their respective locales, providing “unbiased updates on Investigative Reports, Thoughtful Opinion, Sports, Lifestyle”:

Across the political spectrum, according to a 2017 Pew Research Center study, local news is considered more trustworthy than other more national sources. It is perhaps for that reason that an estimated 30% of all links pushed by the Russian troll farm known as the Internet Research Agency during the 2016 presidential election were to stories on local news websites. In some cases, these Russian imposters created their own fake local news sites.

While Star News Digital Media does have actual ties to Tennessee politics, that company’s incursion into Ohio and Minnesota may be more about the appearance of being local. They don’t always nail it, either. For instance, The Minnesota Sun website, when we first began reporting this story, displayed a local weather bar on its home page. Its default location was Columbus, Ohio, likely because it is an incompletely altered clone of the Ohio Star website. The Ohio Star website, purportedly local to the state of Ohio, reproduced a “Letter to the Editor” titled “If You Want to Change State Politics Then Support Bill Lee for Governor.” Bill Lee is the governor of Tennessee.

An August 2018 press release in The Ohio Star announced the formation of the new, multi-region company, Star News Digital Media, Inc., listing three people who have either described themselves as conservative activists or have been described that way by their peers as founders:

Michael Patrick Leahy, Steve Gill, and Christina Botteri are the co-founders of Star News Digital Media, Inc, a for profit corporation based in Nashville, Tennessee. Leahy serves as CEO and editor-in-chief. Gill serves as vice president and chief marketing officer, as well as the political editor for The Tennessee Star and national political editor for The Ohio Star and The Minnesota Sun. Christina Botteri serves as vice president and chief technology officer, as well as managing editor of The Tennessee Star and executive editor of The Ohio Star and The Minnesota Sun.

The issue is not the creation of conservative content. The issue, according to Kathleen Bartzen Culver, the director for the Center of Journalism Ethics at the University of Wisconsin at Madison School of Journalism and Mass Communication, is disguising conservative activism as journalism. “I have no problem with advocacy organizations creating content that reinforces the positions they take on public policy issues on the left, right or center. The issue comes in when they’re not transparent about that advocacy,” Culver told us via phone. “In this case, if you have a conservative take on a policy issue and you want to promote that take, go ahead. But just claim it for what it is.”

We reached out to all three individuals for this investigation but received a response only from Leahy, who spoke on their behalf in a series of emails.

The Tennessee Star’s Undisclosed Conflicts of Interest

When Politico first reported on the Tennessee Star in April 2018, the Star was even more opaque with regard to content authorship than they are now. In that piece, Politico argued:

Though it looks like a normal newspaper site, many — if not most — Star stories lack a byline, and at the time [of their reporting] the site had no masthead nor information explaining who owns or runs it. A click on the “Contact Us” tab revealed a phone number, a couple of email addresses, and a mailing address that goes to a UPS store in Franklin, Tennessee.

King Mark · 03-06-2019, 12:45 PM

Sheesh. Fake news everywhere.

Bladewire · 03-06-2019, 01:27 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Dead Eye

Sheesh. Fake news everywhere.

The truth, trust & integrity are under attack by the GOP. Sad

TheSquealer · 03-06-2019, 01:29 PM

The unhinged Left now crying about fake news.

Nice.

RedFred · 03-06-2019, 01:51 PM

This is Asspimps wet dream.

Rochard · 03-06-2019, 01:59 PM

So... The Republican party runs fake news sites.

As in "fake news"?

LOL.

Bladewire · 03-06-2019, 02:09 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Rochard

So... The Republican party runs fake news sites.

As in "fake news"?

LOL.

Exactly

Here's one of them http://tennesseestar.com

They created a network of sites they told people are local news sites named stuff like The Tennessee Star or Baltimore Sun and they were all right wing propaganda sites with a little bit of local news to push local Republican candidates in fool the reader into thinking he was a legitimate online newspaper site.

TheSquealer · 03-06-2019, 02:16 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Bladewire

Exactly

Here's one of them Tennessee Star Newspaper, Nashville TN Local News, Latest Business, Investigative and Political News & Headlines

They created a network of sites they told people are local news sites named stuff like The Tennessee Star or Baltimore Sun and they were all right wing propaganda sites with a little bit of local news to push local Republican candidates in fool the reader into thinking he was a legitimate online newspaper site.

Ooooh. Wordpress sites aggregating real news from real news sites via RSS feeds and licensing agreements.

That IS sketchy.

VERY TROUBLING that the "GOP" is "Under Investigation" by the Uber Liberal couple running Snopes.com

crockett · 03-06-2019, 02:42 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by TheSquealer

Ooooh. Wordpress sites aggregating real news from real news sites via RSS feeds and licensing agreements.

That IS sketchy.

VERY TROUBLING that the "GOP" is "Under Investigation" by the Uber Liberal couple running Snopes.com

Squealboy is ok with fake news as long as it says Democrats BAAAAAAAD orange MAAAAAN goood.

Rochard · 03-06-2019, 02:43 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Bladewire

Exactly

Here's one of them Tennessee Star Newspaper, Nashville TN Local News, Latest Business, Investigative and Political News & Headlines

They created a network of sites they told people are local news sites named stuff like The Tennessee Star or Baltimore Sun and they were all right wing propaganda sites with a little bit of local news to push local Republican candidates in fool the reader into thinking he was a legitimate online newspaper site.

Here is another one: Patriot Newsletter – Making America Great Again!

And it's matching Facebook group with 200 likes.... https://www.facebook.com/Patriot-New...6569618527827/

TheSquealer · 03-06-2019, 02:46 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by crockett

Squealboy is ok with fake news as long as it says Democrats BAAAAAAAD orange MAAAAAN goood.

As always... no facts.

There was no fake news. So.....

Bladewire · 03-06-2019, 02:50 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Rochard

Here is another one: Patriot Newsletter – Making America Great Again!

And it's matching Facebook group with 200 likes.... https://www.facebook.com/Patriot-New...6569618527827/

Hey you're moving up awesome!

But you aren't pretending to be an online version of a local small town newspaper with local reporters

BaldBastard · 03-06-2019, 10:52 PM

Sounds more like a Murdoch plot. His game is to buy up all the small regional news media especially in swing vote areas, then the local politicians have no option but to suck his cock or lose. Once he has enough of those minor players on board.. he can take over a whole party.

Ploys been rinsed and repeated many times by Murdoch in numerous countries.

RedFred · 03-07-2019, 05:56 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by MrBaldBastard

Sounds more like a Murdoch plot. His game is to buy up all the small regional news media especially in swing vote areas, then the local politicians have no option but to suck his cock or lose. Once he has enough of those minor players on board.. he can take over a whole party.

Ploys been rinsed and repeated many times by Murdoch in numerous countries.

I could be wrong but I heard the Cock Brothers were behind this.

Bladewire · 03-07-2019, 08:37 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by RedFred

I could be wrong but I heard the Cock Brothers were behind this.

You are correct! The sites are funded by the Koch-founded Americans for prosperity.

crockett · 03-07-2019, 08:56 AM

If the Koch Brothers died in a fiery car crash the world would be a better place.. Well all except the decent one, I think its David Koch the 3rd brother who the other 2 fucked over is a decent guy. (Think his name is David anyway)

The Koch bros were responsible for killing multiple people in Texas because they didnt do maintenance on their oil/gas lines so they could save money.

They let it get so bad one of the lines hurts and burnt to death several people.. Being it was Texas they spread money around and got off Scott free despite their greed killing multiple people.

I think a fiery car cash would be justice tbh..

Oh shit was just looking they just killed people in 2016 as well. The case I was talking about was in the 90s/00s.. Seems their negligence is still killing people today.. Looks like they bought their way out again...

https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.al....tputType=a mp

They are also a serial violator of EPA regulations hence the reason they spend so much money trying to delete the EPA.

The volume of Koch Industries’ toxic output is staggering. According to the University of Massachusetts Amherst’s Political Economy Research Institute, only three companies rank among the top 30 polluters of America’s air, water and climate: ExxonMobil, American Electric Power and Koch Industries. Thanks in part to its 2005 purchase of paper-mill giant Georgia-Pacific, Koch Industries dumps more pollutants into the nation’s waterways than General Electric and International Paper combined. The company ranks 13th in the nation for toxic air pollution. Koch’s climate pollution, meanwhile, outpaces oil giants including Valero, Chevron and Shell. Across its businesses, Koch generates 24 million metric tons of greenhouse gases a year.

https://www.rollingstone.com/politic...empire-164403/

Really there is very few people in the world that I'd wish death on but Koch Bros are on the short list.. They are not fit to breath air..

VRPdommy · 03-07-2019, 10:26 AM

I actually thought this was common news everyone knew already...
Boy... am I off a bit.

Who do you think Rush and most of the talking heads quote their info from.
They send them to one of these, some who are fake non-profits.
And I really thought a true WEBMASTER would know the difference right away.

It's the modern version of the Rockford Files where he has a mini printing press under the back seat of his car to print biz cards to CON folks.
And the con goes on.... and on...

2MuchMark · 03-07-2019, 10:45 AM

Fuck the Kochs. The world would be a better place if they never existed.

03-06-2019, 12:13 PM	#1
Bladewire StraightBro Industry Role: Join Date: Aug 2003 Location: Monarch Beach, CA USA Posts: 56,229	The GOP under investigation for creating a network of fake "local news" sites It's a sad day for America. The sites rank on search engines as legitimate news sites when you do a news search. The sites are funded by the Koch-founded Americans for prosperity. None of the sites say how they are funded or that they're political propoganda, they masquerade as legitimate local news sites. They pretend to be journalists. The fake news sites masqueraded as local newspapers online for the states of Tennessee, Ohio, Minesota, Missouri, New England, North Dakota, South Dakota, Michigan, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, Virginia and Wisconsin. The "writers" all work for political action committees some are previous campaign workers. They don't disclose this on their fake news sites. Roughly 40 percent of the sites content comes from prominent conservative news sites like the Daily Caller and the Daily Signal. The rest is promoting local Republican candidates and content from conservative think tanks. The Snopes article below is extremely in depth and long I highly suggest giving it a full read. Only PART of the article is pasted below. Hiding in Plain Sight: PAC-Connected Activists Set Up ‘Local News’ Outlets On 6 February 2017, a website of uncertain origin named “The Tennessee Star” was born. At the time, it was unclear who funded or operated this “local newspaper,” which was largely filled with freely licensed content from organizations tied to conservative mega-donors. After some prodding by Politico in early 2018, the Tennessee Star revealed its primary architects to be three Tea Party-connected conservative activists: Michael Patrick Leahy, Steve Gill, and Christina Botteri. Now, a Snopes investigation reveals in detail how these activists used the appearance of local newspapers to promote messages paid for or supported by outside or undisclosed interests. Gill, for example, is the political editor of the Tennessee Star, but he also owns a media consulting company that at least one candidate and one Political Action Committee (PAC) paid before receiving positive coverage in the Tennessee Star. Several Star writers have in the past or currently work for PACs or political campaigns that they write about, without disclosing that fact. Though its owners claim that the Tennessee Star is funded by advertising revenue, it appears to be supported by wealthy benefactors. Whatever the Tennessee Star is, it is not a local newspaper producing transparent journalism. But this story is about more than just the Tennessee Star. Leahy, Botteri, and Gill have been expanding their version of journalism to other battleground states in the run-up to the 2020 presidential election. They are, they say, co-founders of a new, Delaware-registered company, Star News Digital Media, Inc., whose explicit strategy is to target battleground states with conservative news. So far, Leahy, Gill, and Botteri have added The Ohio Star and The Minnesota Sun to their network of purportedly local newspapers. These papers are effective carbon copies of the Tennessee Star. If you were to search for these three “newspapers” in Google, they would each show up described identically as the “most reliable” newspapers in their respective locales, providing “unbiased updates on Investigative Reports, Thoughtful Opinion, Sports, Lifestyle”: Across the political spectrum, according to a 2017 Pew Research Center study, local news is considered more trustworthy than other more national sources. It is perhaps for that reason that an estimated 30% of all links pushed by the Russian troll farm known as the Internet Research Agency during the 2016 presidential election were to stories on local news websites. In some cases, these Russian imposters created their own fake local news sites. While Star News Digital Media does have actual ties to Tennessee politics, that company’s incursion into Ohio and Minnesota may be more about the appearance of being local. They don’t always nail it, either. For instance, The Minnesota Sun website, when we first began reporting this story, displayed a local weather bar on its home page. Its default location was Columbus, Ohio, likely because it is an incompletely altered clone of the Ohio Star website. The Ohio Star website, purportedly local to the state of Ohio, reproduced a “Letter to the Editor” titled “If You Want to Change State Politics Then Support Bill Lee for Governor.” Bill Lee is the governor of Tennessee. An August 2018 press release in The Ohio Star announced the formation of the new, multi-region company, Star News Digital Media, Inc., listing three people who have either described themselves as conservative activists or have been described that way by their peers as founders: Michael Patrick Leahy, Steve Gill, and Christina Botteri are the co-founders of Star News Digital Media, Inc, a for profit corporation based in Nashville, Tennessee. Leahy serves as CEO and editor-in-chief. Gill serves as vice president and chief marketing officer, as well as the political editor for The Tennessee Star and national political editor for The Ohio Star and The Minnesota Sun. Christina Botteri serves as vice president and chief technology officer, as well as managing editor of The Tennessee Star and executive editor of The Ohio Star and The Minnesota Sun. The issue is not the creation of conservative content. The issue, according to Kathleen Bartzen Culver, the director for the Center of Journalism Ethics at the University of Wisconsin at Madison School of Journalism and Mass Communication, is disguising conservative activism as journalism. “I have no problem with advocacy organizations creating content that reinforces the positions they take on public policy issues on the left, right or center. The issue comes in when they’re not transparent about that advocacy,” Culver told us via phone. “In this case, if you have a conservative take on a policy issue and you want to promote that take, go ahead. But just claim it for what it is.” We reached out to all three individuals for this investigation but received a response only from Leahy, who spoke on their behalf in a series of emails. The Tennessee Star’s Undisclosed Conflicts of Interest When Politico first reported on the Tennessee Star in April 2018, the Star was even more opaque with regard to content authorship than they are now. In that piece, Politico argued: Though it looks like a normal newspaper site, many — if not most — Star stories lack a byline, and at the time [of their reporting] the site had no masthead nor information explaining who owns or runs it. A click on the “Contact Us” tab revealed a phone number, a couple of email addresses, and a mailing address that goes to a UPS store in Franklin, Tennessee.

03-06-2019, 01:29 PM	#4
TheSquealer BANNED Industry Role: Join Date: Oct 2004 Location: In Your Head Posts: 25,158	The unhinged Left now crying about fake news. Nice. __________________ . Yes, fewer illegal immigrants working equates to more job opportunities for American citizens. Rochard

03-06-2019, 01:59 PM	#6
Rochard Jägermeister Test Pilot Industry Role: Join Date: Dec 2001 Location: NORCAL Posts: 73,698	So... The Republican party runs fake news sites. As in "fake news"? LOL. __________________ “The choice is no longer between right or left. The choice is between normal and crazy.” - Sarah Huckabee Sanders YNOT MAIL \| THE BEST ADULT MAILING SOLUTION

03-06-2019, 12:45 PM	#2
King Mark So Fucking Banned Industry Role: Join Date: Aug 2016 Posts: 27,033	Sheesh. Fake news everywhere.

03-06-2019, 01:51 PM	#5
RedFred Confirmed User Industry Role: Join Date: Feb 2016 Posts: 9,782	This is Asspimps wet dream.

03-06-2019, 10:52 PM	#13
BaldBastard Too lazy to set a custom title Industry Role: Join Date: Jan 2001 Location: Sydney Posts: 16,071	Sounds more like a Murdoch plot. His game is to buy up all the small regional news media especially in swing vote areas, then the local politicians have no option but to suck his cock or lose. Once he has enough of those minor players on board.. he can take over a whole party. Ploys been rinsed and repeated many times by Murdoch in numerous countries.

03-07-2019, 08:56 AM	#16
crockett in a van by the river Industry Role: Join Date: May 2003 Posts: 76,806	If the Koch Brothers died in a fiery car crash the world would be a better place.. Well all except the decent one, I think its David Koch the 3rd brother who the other 2 fucked over is a decent guy. (Think his name is David anyway) The Koch bros were responsible for killing multiple people in Texas because they didnt do maintenance on their oil/gas lines so they could save money. They let it get so bad one of the lines hurts and burnt to death several people.. Being it was Texas they spread money around and got off Scott free despite their greed killing multiple people. I think a fiery car cash would be justice tbh.. Oh shit was just looking they just killed people in 2016 as well. The case I was talking about was in the 90s/00s.. Seems their negligence is still killing people today.. Looks like they bought their way out again... https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.al....tputType=a mp They are also a serial violator of EPA regulations hence the reason they spend so much money trying to delete the EPA. The volume of Koch Industries’ toxic output is staggering. According to the University of Massachusetts Amherst’s Political Economy Research Institute, only three companies rank among the top 30 polluters of America’s air, water and climate: ExxonMobil, American Electric Power and Koch Industries. Thanks in part to its 2005 purchase of paper-mill giant Georgia-Pacific, Koch Industries dumps more pollutants into the nation’s waterways than General Electric and International Paper combined. The company ranks 13th in the nation for toxic air pollution. Koch’s climate pollution, meanwhile, outpaces oil giants including Valero, Chevron and Shell. Across its businesses, Koch generates 24 million metric tons of greenhouse gases a year. https://www.rollingstone.com/politic...empire-164403/ Really there is very few people in the world that I'd wish death on but Koch Bros are on the short list.. They are not fit to breath air..

03-07-2019, 10:26 AM	#17
VRPdommy Too lazy to set a custom title Industry Role: Join Date: Oct 2014 Posts: 11,286	I actually thought this was common news everyone knew already... Boy... am I off a bit. Who do you think Rush and most of the talking heads quote their info from. They send them to one of these, some who are fake non-profits. And I really thought a true WEBMASTER would know the difference right away. It's the modern version of the Rockford Files where he has a mini printing press under the back seat of his car to print biz cards to CON folks. And the con goes on.... and on...

03-07-2019, 10:45 AM	#18
2MuchMark Videochat Solutions Industry Role: Join Date: Aug 2004 Location: Canada Posts: 49,073	Fuck the Kochs. The world would be a better place if they never existed.