Alt Media Rising — And Its Discontents

Time Magazine selected The Donald for Person of the Year. Trump’s rise to “power” certainly marks a sea change in the political arena and beyond. A good choice, but Our unanimous preference at the Preservation Society was for Wikileaks. No one has affected politics and life in recent years as this outlet. The Donald might not have been elected without it. Wikileaks, along with Bernie Sanders, has seriously damaged the Liberal brand. And they have done much more than that. Wikileaks brought the Democratic Party to a state of existential crisis. The exposure of CNN and a host of other media colluding with the Clinton campaign has also significantly damaged the corporate media machine, dealing a significant blow to its already pathetic credibility issues. The corporate media has just a six percent approval rating.

Meanwhile, Julian Assange has not been heard form in weeks. Then, out of nowhere “he” releases a transcript of this testimony, allegedly to beat Ecuador in doing so — and in the mist of Pizzagate no less, and without making a personal appearance? Did officials take advantage of Trumpmania and Pizzagate to take over the Wikileaks collective? If so, it has been very effective. No one is asking “where’s Julian?”

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Shortly after Pizzagate began picking up steam, the absurd “fake news” PropOrNot website appeared. This supposed group of “scholars”, not wanting to give Pizzagate publicity, and desiring to expand the government’s McCarthyist reach, determined that Russia was the main culprit in disseminating propaganda through Wikileaks.

Paul Craig Roberts, a prominent voice of reason in recent years turned Trump cheerleader, said of the PropOrNot website, “I think this is the death knell for the mainstream media. I think this list essentially kills the credibility of the mainstream media and certainly the Washington Post.” We agree with this assessment. Another benefit of this is farcical website is that it provides a good list of alt media, some good, some bad, and many of whom never even reported on Pizzagate.

PropOrNot is a desperate self-inflicted wound of the Washington Post, on behalf of “debunking” Pizzagate. It is an excellent metaphor for the state of corporate media. But it is even bigger than that. Pizzagate appears to be the biggest threat besieging the status quo today.

Pizzagate appears to be so dangerous for anyone to touch that it can claim another, albeit unexpected, victim: much of the so-called alternative media.

Like most political “cultures”, the alternative media runs the gamut of the political spectrum of the Washington Consensus and then some. Pizzagate, whatever one thinks of it, forms a natural fault line that separates the truly independent outlets from the less independent outlets or the more fearless ones from the more frightened or the more gullible from the less gullible, or however you want to divide them up. Whatever your criteria, the discerning reader/listener must have noticed this division occurring (that is, if you look at a wide range of non-MSM news providers, which We highly urge).

The Preservation society has not thoroughly examined the entire alternative media landscape, but has merely noted with some surprise that many of those outlets have not reported much on Pizzagate.

The alternative media seem to be as afraid of this phenomenon as the MSM. Many refuse to actually engage in debunking, if there is anything “debunkable”. Why the alt media is so afraid to tackle Pizzagate, especially when they have not been afraid to go after 9/11, or other alleged pedophile rings? Most of these sites deal with Pizzagate, if at all, by doing stories that mention the scandal without going into it (something, we suppose, you can accuse Us of doing).

Here Our modest survey of some of the alt media wrestling with Pizzagate and credibility:

• Counterpunch, allegedly a leftist newsletter, which  boasts articles purportedly debunking 9/11 with “Fearless Muckraking Since 1993”, won’t touch Pizzagate. A search for the term only brings up an article by Chris Floyd, In Like Flynn: Blowback for Filth-Peddling Fascists. Floyd follows the lead of the MSM in denying Pizzagate on the assumption that it is nothing but unfounded lies. They are lies because Pizzagate hasn’t been proven. But, of course, how could Pizzagate be proven true or false without an investigation? Like the MSM, Floyd is not the slightest bit interested in attempting to debunk the biggest scandal today. Instead, everyone who is concerned about Pizzagate is labeled as “these fascists, these racists, these witless goobers and giddy slobberers…”, to which he ironically appends “with a child sex fixation”. Floyd further “points out”, that Flynn’s Twitter feed and Gab account (which the Preservation Society has not reviewed), “shows that any evidence offered to disprove the entirely specious ‘Pizzagate’ story is immediately rejected by Flynn and his ilk as ‘false flags’ or ‘leftist propaganda’ or ‘MSM deceit’, etc. etc.” The opposite holds true for Counterpunch and the MSM.
• Perhaps an even more blatant towing of the MSM’s line is the right wing’s Alex Jones and his Infowars. Recently, the online publication printed an article called, It’s Time to Admit The ‘9/11 Truthers’ Were Right. Infowars and Alex Jones have become pillars of the “Alt Right Media”, an antidote to the corporate status quo and Liberal menace. At first, Infowars covered Pizzagate: Law Enforcement Begs World: Read Hillary Emails to Find Child Rape Evidence and Pizzagate is Real! But then Jones apparently got the memo — better late than never. Consequently, Pizzagate became too hot to touch. It became “complicated”. Jones backed away from the story.This is a major event in the annals of the alt right media’s short history, and potentially devastating for Jones. He built his reputation on coverage of the deep state, and bashing Liberals and “globalists” who, strangely enough, are “communists”. In a video that could very well be equivalent of committing seppuku, the highly testosterized Jones, sitting in front of a lovely antique globe, proceeds to distance himself from Pizzagate.He makes a dreadfully unconvincing case and only raises questions for those interested. Jones tells his audience something fishy is going on, codes are definitely being used. No doubt! Bill Clinton is a pedophile — absolutely true! We know this stuff is going on. But! There’s always a but! We need to be careful. Innocent people might get hurt! This needs to be investigated! It must be dealt with by law enforcement and the media … but judiciously. Don’t focus on this one pizza place, it’s a distraction from bigger things …. yada, yada… The title of the video is “Pizza Gate Is A Diversion From the Greater Crimes in Podesta Wikileaks”. What alleged crime could be bigger?

  It is a melange of excuses. Jones is trying to have his credibility and eat it too. A perusal of the comments below the video shows his audience isn’t buying.

  “Alex,” one may query, “if all this stuff is really going on, then Pizzagate is the biggest best lead that has the attention of the MSM. Doesn’t that make Pizzagate the star witness and not a mere diversion? It could break the whole thing open!”

• The Intercept, created by ebay billioniare Pierre Omidyar, ran a piece by Robert Mackey called Disinformation, Not Fake News, Got Trump Elected, and It Is Not Stopping. Like Floyd at Counterpunch, Mackey dismisses the controversy out of hand, and cites as a corroborating opinion, among others, Jake Tapper of CNN. In Our estimation that works against Mackey. The article also features a video from Alex Jones, no less. Jones is speaking to Sharif Silmi, a lawyer who was eating pizza with his family at the restaurant when the gunman walked in. He told Jones that there was “no weirdness” in the restaurant prior to that. Why would anybody expect weirdness in the bright light of day, when a restaurant is open to the public. How does his testimony debunk what has been uncovered? Mackey never tells us why this individual is at all relevant, except that he has been asked, after berating people interested in knowing about Pizzagate  on Twitter, for proof that Pizzagate is fake as he claimed, and not merely unfounded.
• We came across another Youtube channel called AMTV with Christopher Greene, with an eye popping 368,185 subscribers for a relatively small time operation. Or is it? A former Merrill Lynch broker and Trump supporter, Greene like Jones, built his reputation on reporting on right wing subjects and some deep state. He does us a public service with WARNING! Pizza Gate is a Trap. Like Jones, Greene has no choice but to agree that there are allegedly major pedophilia rings in existence, the Lolita Express, the whole bit. But he goes farther. George H. W. Bush is a “friggin’ alien, and so are the others” — 368,185 subscribers!So, We in the ruling class are a group of aliens and Pizzagate is a foolish trap! Even though Christopher Greene accepts that elements of Pizzagate are true. He says it’s not that he doesn’t want to investigate but its “not fun”. Greene continues, “The MSM is using this false flag at Comet Pizza as a friggin trap to corral the alternative media, to lump us all into a ‘conspiratorial fake news group’ to take us out”. How they would “take out” so many people is a minor detail he left out.”But Chris,” our intrepid enthusiast might ask, “If you drop Pizzagate because its a “trap to corral the alternative media”, then you must drop every story that starts to gain traction and does not get the ruling class’s approval.” Furthermore, why would the MSM want to “trap” their enemies with something real? Isn’t that playing with fire? Wouldn’t that be handing evidence over to their heretofore ignored enemies. Information that could bring down the whole system down?
• Even Brit David Icke dances around Pizzagate. Another mildstone. His lectures have filled Wembley Stadium. He is known for his “Illuminati” studies, pedophile rings, and being the king of the Reptilian Theory of the Ruling Class. Icke is not usually afraid to take on unconventional issues. One might have expected him of all people to explore this phenomenon.Icke fully acknowledges alleged pedophiles rings that go to the very top and the rest of it. But he demands caution! A man who has called Bush and Clinton rapists and aliens wants caution! He detests the two “polarities” of Pizzagate. There’s the MSM that sits back and pretends there’s nothing to see here, and then there are those who “believe every detail about Pizzagate is true”. Apparently, there’s nothing in between. Icke goes on to lament the “gross hypocrisy” — not of the silence of the MSM — but of those involved in exploring Pizzagate who supposedly attack others for not believe everything.What about the facts of the matter as we know them, David? Don’t “polarities” of opinion exist on most subjects, especially the more controversial ones? Why focus on them? Like the many of the others, Icke accepts the sorted world of high level pedophile rings, and does not deny that elements of Pizzagate…. and then goes on to talk about the “bigger context”.

To reiterate, The Preservation Society is not endorsing or condemning any of these sites, nor agreeing or disagreeing with their content. It is surveying the somewhat uncharacteristic fear of something like Pizzagate found in the alt media. This demonstrates the caution the individual must have in assessing information. The masses must not embrace their new media as the herd embraces the old. Have suspicions. Cover Pizzagate and be done with it. If it is nothing it will be revealed. The real question is who will investigate?

Despite some of its fears of Pizzagate, alternative media is gaining ascendancy while the MSM is dying. We think this is a good thing, a bit frightful, but good. With that breakdown of centralized media authority, it is natural that there should crop up many entities to take it’s place. It is also quite natural that the loss of credibility of the official consensus, means the liberation of many previously unacceptable facts and ideas.

There are many other outlets that deal directly with with Pizzagate a few of which We list here. This makes for strange bedfellows. The Liberal wishing to learn about Pizzagate or George Soros’s connection to the Democratic Party and Black Lives Matter have to go to the right to find out.

This more libertarian (sometimes Christian) alternative media are leading the charge against the established order, which often espouse the more eccentric visions of the deep state and related subjects. They are the groups taking on the Establishment status quo more effectively at the moment. The lefties, on the other hand, continue to critique the Establishment in the same old ways, a practice that has become an Establishment institution itself and stagnating into harmless, but noisy, identity politics. The ruling class has successfully steered Liberalism into an identity box, out of which it needs to extricate itself if it wants to remain relevant. We believe a class orientation will revive their fortunes as many in the “alt left” media advocate.

These “left” and “right” alternative media need to be married: the political and economic analysis of the “left”, and the deep state studies of the “right”. Liberal leaning individuals are too trusting of their government, and their conservative counterparts are too distrusting of the masses. This is not to say the alt media are totally independent from the Washington Consensus, as the Pizzagate controversy demonstrates. You better believe We have Our tentacles all over the media world.

In the vacuum of today’s media landscape the masses must mobilize of their own accord and and compare and contrast. It will become clear, to those who pay attention, who is trustworthy and who isn’t.

Among the breakdown of authority and the flood of ideas, a new equilibrium will emerge and must be found. This is the race today. Can the masses establish their own consensus on the regime, free of the herd mentality? Would that mean the end of the ruling class?