OPINION:
An old Soviet joke goes like this: A boy asks his father why the party needs two separate newspapers, Pravda (“Truth”) and Izvestiya (“News”).
“Well, son,” the father replies, “because there’s no truth in News and there’s no news in Truth.”
Soviet citizens knew full well that authoritarian regimes lie about everything, but American journalists, observing these regimes from the outside, still haven’t grasped that concept.
CNN illustrated this lack of comprehension just last week when it published the headline “Iran claims victory, says it forced U.S. to accept 10-point plan.”
In fact, the U.S. had done no such thing.
President Trump immediately fired back on Truth Social, calling the story a “FRAUD” and demanding that CNN “immediately withdraw this Statement with full apologies for their, as usual, terrible reporting.”
Fortunately, CNN will soon come under new management. Paramount, led by Trump-friendly billionaire David Ellison, is expected to complete its acquisition of Warner Bros.-Discovery, the parent company of CNN, this fall.
Democrats in Congress are doing everything they can to delay or derail the deal, but none of their objections holds water. If the changes Mr. Ellison made after buying CBS News are any indication of how he will run CNN, then the network’s days of pushing foreign propaganda may soon be over.
Still, it’s worth examining what exactly was flawed in CNN’s reporting.
CNN could have avoided misleading its audience in several ways, including by hedging the story with phrases such as “CNN could not independently confirm” or by quoting other sources (such as U.S. government officials) who could refute false or misleading claims and/or highlight the Iranian regime’s history of lying to its people.
CNN did none of those things.
If this were an isolated incident, then the network would deserve the benefit of the doubt. Yet it wasn’t.
Let’s stay optimistic that a leadership change at CNN will promote a fairer, more skeptical stance toward authoritarian regimes, as it has consistently demonstrated toward the Trump administration.
HALEY KENNINGTON
Lead journalist and news editor, Wrong Speak Publishing
Nashville, Tennessee
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