RFK Jr And the Slinging of Mud – Dr. Naomi Wolf 9/22/24

Source: naomiwolf.substack.com

It’s difficult even to follow the trajectory of the story, since legacy media propaganda and hit-piece campaigns are so co-ordinated now, and so universalized.

But on Friday Sept 20 2024 “the story” appeared all at once, in the constellation of news outlets guaranteed (developed?) to jump on any smear train that neo-Marxist globalists (yes, we need to coin that term) set in motion.

Puck.com ran a salacious summary of what the news site called, providing no evidence, “the sexting scandal”. The Daily Beast reported that the married RFK Jr had what the news outlet overtly and in a thoroughly defamatory way, termed an “affair.” A “source”, meaning an unnamed source, said that the Presidential candidate had also boasted that he had “intimate” photos of 31-year-old New York Magazine reporter Olivia Nuzzi. The word “Intimate”, also included in the headline, is not attributed to anyone. It is just floating around, as if RFK Jr said it, but there is no evidence presented that RFK Jr said it.

Then TheWrap.com also termed whatever this interaction may have been, an “Affair,” and also included that radioactive word (and let us not forget, one painful to any spouse) in the article’s headine:

“Olivia Nuzzi and RFK Jr’s Affair Was Exposed Because He Bragged to Friends About Her Nudes (Report)”

Lower in the body of the article, TheWrap.com refers to “the affair” or “the relationship” a total of four times:

The 71-year-old former independent presidential candidate reportedly [italics mine] boasted about the affair [italics mine], and about nude photos Nuzzi, 31, sent to him, so widely that word reached NY Magazine editor-in-chief David Haskell.

According to Daily Beast, Haskell subsequently confronted Nuzzi about it in a one-on-one meeting held Sept. 13 at the publication’s New York offices. The star Washington correspondent denied the affair [italics mine] several times before, as DB put it, Haskell “gave Nuzzi the option to come clean.”

As Haskell explained in an email to NY Mag staff on Friday, after Nuzzi confessed to the relationship [italics mine]she was taken off of all coverage of the 2024 presidential election and subsequently went on leave. He also revealed that, according to Nuzzi, the relationship [italics mine] began in December of last year, after the publication of a cover story she wrote about Kennedy, and ended near the end of August.

Haskell also reiterated the company position that an internal investigation found “no evidence of bias” in Nuzzi’s coverage of the election during her affair, [italics mine] or inaccuracies in her reporting. However, an “independent third party” is conducting a much more thorough investigation, the results of which will determine “final” disciplinary actions.

Far below all this, in this same article, we see that Ms Nuzzi calls whatever “it” was, never “physical” but rather “emotional and digital in nature”:

“In public statements and while speaking to Haskell, Nuzzi has insisted her relationship with Kennedy was never “physical.” Citing an individual close to Nuzzi, CNN reported that the affair “was emotional and digital in nature.” Puck News, citing another individual said to be close to Nuzzi, reported that she sent “demure nudes” to Kennedy.

Corollary “damning” story lines are unfolding all at once, including about Ms Nuzzi’s former fiance, also a reporter, having broken up with her. This random and personal information is spun, with no evidence, as if he broke up with Nuzzi over the alleged “affair”.

In yet another article about this alleged affair that is not “physical”, TheWrap.com commits this headline:

“Olivia Nuzzi’s Affair With RFK Jr Lasted Almost 9 Months, New York Magazine Editor Tells Staff”

But again, further down, we learn that the alleged affair is not an affair and was not “physical.”

So can we please take a breath here and address this sordid mess of what must be called anti-journalism, with its editorial and reportorial lapses so alarming as to be almost unprecendented?

Everyone is citing everyone else, in a circular way, with just one and a half named sources in total at this point.

In TheWrap.com, PuckNews.com cited an unnamed individual “close to Nuzzi” as being the only source for the existence of the alleged “demure nudes” that were allegedly sent to RFK Jr’s phone. CNN also cited an unnamed “individual close to Nuzzi.” TheWrap.com is also citing The Daily Beast. All these publications cite each other, with no more actual reporting or sourcing being done, and then outer-extending news sites cite the original maelstrom of innermost news sites that cite the other news sites.

Olivia Nuzzi or someone close to her is the one on the record source; and someone who appeared to share an email from Nuzzi’s editor David Haskell, is half of another.

In spite of this complete lack of verification or sourcing beyond Nuzzi, all of these publications are freely using the word “affair” – thus imprinting in the consciousness of the exhausted American public that “RFK Jr must have had an affair” — even though buried in the steaming mass of fecal non-journalism presented here are the nuggets of acknowledgement (sorry for the graphic metaphor but that’s the disgusting reality of this) that there was no affair.

An affair is not even in the realm of the allegations….

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