Glenn Greenwald recently reported that MSNBC has been held in court to be a bunch of liars.
What happened was MSNBC's Rachel Maddow lied that cable outlet One America News (OAN) was a paid propaganda outlet for the Kremlin. So OAN sued for libel, and it went to court, but the judged dismissed the suit because apparently everyone expects MSNBC and Maddow to be liars:
Maddow does not keep her political views a secret, and therefore, audiences could expect her to use subjective language that comports with her political opinions.
The point of Maddow’s show is for her to provide the news but also to offer her opinions as to that news. Therefore, the Court finds that the medium of the alleged defamatory statement makes it more likely that a reasonable viewer would not conclude that the contested statement implies an assertion of objective fact.
And Fox News made the same argument when they were sued for an item on their programme Tucker Carlson Tonight. Fox argued, in effect, that everyone knows Tucker Carlson talks hyperbole and bollocks, which makes it OK for him to do so.
Let Liars call themselves Liars
And I agree. If Maddow and Carlson talk shite, and everyone knows they talk shite, no harm is done. Does everyone know? Probably not, but they should.
I therefore propose that all news organisations be required to register as either a newspaper of a liespaper.
A newspaper would have to uphold standards of truth. When it gits it wrong, it would have to publish a retraction, giving it equal prominence to the original story. In return, since they are performing a public service, newspapers would receive tax breaks.
A liespaper would not have to tell the truth. It could tell as many lies as it likes. It could say the Pope shits in the woods, that bears are Catholics, and that water isn't wet. But it would have to declare prominently in all its stories that it's a Liespaper. It would have to use "Lie" or "Liar" in its name, and would have to display a tasteful logo of a cartoon figure with shit coming out of their mouth.
So we would all know which publications want to be knows for telling the truth and which are just a pack of lies.
Furthermore -- and this is the best bit -- if a publication calling itself a Newspaper is caught telling lies, they have automatically committed tax fraud, and would receive a big fine and a custodial sentence.