I can attest to the ubiquitous Soviet friends active in Ottawa in the 1980s. As a left-wing Carleton social sciences undergraduate in the 1980s, the invitations to discussion sessions and coffee parties were plentiful. We were undergrads so the "idiots" goes without saying; "useful," for the most of us definitely not. Actually, given my lack of money at the time, I would have appreciated some sort of Soviet pay-off ;-) We used to joke about it.
Also true at Bell Northern Research in the 80’s in Ottawa. All new employees watched a film of how Russian agents would try and build relationships with engineers, but I never heard of it actually happening. Then again in the 90’s the Nortel CEO and others gave all the corporate tech to China to turn into Huawei - talk about useful idiots since they even did away with their/our own company to help Huawei compete.
I will consider a journalist well and truly smeared as a propagandist if you have either of two things for me, at an acceptable level of credibility: (1) they took money to propagate source's story, or (2) they knowingly offered up provable lies as truths, not disclosing the proof of lie.
Anything less than that - anything like merely being "sympathetic" to one side, getting their story out in full, respectful of what the journalist *suspects* are lies, but not provable ones - is just mainstream media, when it comes to being "America-sympathetic".
What was the NYT in 2002, but Cheney-sympathetic? That was one scurrilous pack of lies, but the journalists who'd covered "Saddam is in his box" a year earlier, all ate it up and gave it very, umm, sympathetic treatment.
Pugliese is ONLY a controversy because of the side he's perceived as helping; an American document noting that early scoops about funding for Israel should be given to Postmedia, because they will "give Israel sympathetic coverage", would generate no comment at all, except maybe, "duh".
I only learned of Pugliese's career when he appeared on Canadaland the other day, debunking the "2% of GDP" mantra with knowledge and common sense. I might stop reading a piece of his if he got deep into the evil-Ukraine news...but otherwise, he's far from the most-suspect material, out of what I read every day.
Speaking of that Canadaland appearance, I think it was Pugliese, of the two guests, that called out TV panel shows with a couple of "military analysts", who do not disclose their relationship with "think tanks" that promote more military spending, work with military-contractor lobbyists, or membership on boards of military contractors.
I would not have written this dispatch, or said much of anything about Pugliese, if not for the documents tabled by Alexander. But the conversation was happening, so I figured I could add some useful information.
I do think, however, that there is a sizeable difference between carrying water for a hostile foreign government and playing scribe for your own government and industry. There's no doubt that the propagandists for America's expeditionary wars were never appropriately tarred and feathered, but at least they were part of a national discourse where the sides were clearly saying what they wanted. It's just a different situation than a journalist happily promoting the bullshit narratives of a hostile foreign government.
To go back to your first point: I don't think Pugliese is guilty of 1, and I think it's reckless that people are confidently alleging he is. But I do think he's guilty of 2. I've got no problem with a journalist criticizing NATO or the war against Ukraine — but when you're doing so by actively borrowing lines from the Russian government, I think that puts you into some very bad territory.
Well, we certainly have an example case to guide us, here and now.
I saw the movie “Shock and Awe”, about the Knight-Ridder journalists who could not find any evidence of Saddam’s nuclear program. They certainly tried to get that message out, were drowned out by larger papers and TV repeating the Bush message.
What they did not do was charge the NYT and WaPo with knowingly repeating lies, knowingly lying to their readers.
In short, Knight-Ridder did not charge fellow journalists with my “(2)”.
I imagine, because they didn’t feel they could prove it, they held themselves to the same standards as a court.
Courts themselves, of course, hold themselves to that standard strictly, not even concluding Fox News had knowingly lied about the election until dispositive proof was presented, of journalists texting just that.
Pugliese is in a much, much more vulnerable position than the NYT and WaPo; those who carry water for governments and military-industrial complexes are held to much lower standards of truth than those who criticize such large institutions.
So, if you’ve got that confidence, that Knight-Ridder lacked; if you can show facts to your readers that Pugliese knowingly lied to his readers, you should present that evidence. It’s a grave charge.
“Kirill Kalinin was so impactful because he made real relations with journalists, designed to insert the Kremlin’s viewpoint into our national discourse. He didn’t need to pay off journalists or recruit assets. Kalinin’s impact was far more clever: He convinced journalists in Ottawa that they were managing the embassy, when in fact the embassy was managing them.”
I don’t believe it’s necessary to pay journalists when you can simply flatter them. At this point it looks to me that Pugliese has been played and has published russian talking points, maybe actually believing what he’s been fed. We’ve see Marjorie Taylor Green and Tucker Carlson do the same, and I’d be surprised if either of them are getting money for it. They’re just suckers.
So does the guy need to be tried for foreign interference? I guess not. There’s unfortunately no law against publishing russian garbage.
Thanks Justin for giving us first dibs on this astonishing story. So Canadian journalists are regularly approached by russian propagandists? I’m so naive. Sending enormous respect that you’ve resisted, because money talks. I need to read it again to absorb the details, but I have one question: in your opinion, is the government taking this as seriously as they should? The Line recently published an article exposing how an urgent CSIS warrant regarding foreign interference was ignored for over a year. Among all the other complaints I have with government, knowing Putin, Modi and other manipulators are playing this country as a patsy is seriously insulting.
In the seventh paragraph, you write of Burdett that "a cable told him to meet a man wearing one globe at a Belgrade tram stop." I suspect the Soviet contact was actually wearing one glove, but the image of a globe-wearing spy gave me great amusement.
Really good article. Thanks for being a voice of reason and sanity in a sea of chaos.
I can attest to the ubiquitous Soviet friends active in Ottawa in the 1980s. As a left-wing Carleton social sciences undergraduate in the 1980s, the invitations to discussion sessions and coffee parties were plentiful. We were undergrads so the "idiots" goes without saying; "useful," for the most of us definitely not. Actually, given my lack of money at the time, I would have appreciated some sort of Soviet pay-off ;-) We used to joke about it.
Also true at Bell Northern Research in the 80’s in Ottawa. All new employees watched a film of how Russian agents would try and build relationships with engineers, but I never heard of it actually happening. Then again in the 90’s the Nortel CEO and others gave all the corporate tech to China to turn into Huawei - talk about useful idiots since they even did away with their/our own company to help Huawei compete.
I will consider a journalist well and truly smeared as a propagandist if you have either of two things for me, at an acceptable level of credibility: (1) they took money to propagate source's story, or (2) they knowingly offered up provable lies as truths, not disclosing the proof of lie.
Anything less than that - anything like merely being "sympathetic" to one side, getting their story out in full, respectful of what the journalist *suspects* are lies, but not provable ones - is just mainstream media, when it comes to being "America-sympathetic".
What was the NYT in 2002, but Cheney-sympathetic? That was one scurrilous pack of lies, but the journalists who'd covered "Saddam is in his box" a year earlier, all ate it up and gave it very, umm, sympathetic treatment.
Pugliese is ONLY a controversy because of the side he's perceived as helping; an American document noting that early scoops about funding for Israel should be given to Postmedia, because they will "give Israel sympathetic coverage", would generate no comment at all, except maybe, "duh".
I only learned of Pugliese's career when he appeared on Canadaland the other day, debunking the "2% of GDP" mantra with knowledge and common sense. I might stop reading a piece of his if he got deep into the evil-Ukraine news...but otherwise, he's far from the most-suspect material, out of what I read every day.
Speaking of that Canadaland appearance, I think it was Pugliese, of the two guests, that called out TV panel shows with a couple of "military analysts", who do not disclose their relationship with "think tanks" that promote more military spending, work with military-contractor lobbyists, or membership on boards of military contractors.
A larger problem than David Pugliese, I suspect.
I certainly agree with this, in part.
I would not have written this dispatch, or said much of anything about Pugliese, if not for the documents tabled by Alexander. But the conversation was happening, so I figured I could add some useful information.
I do think, however, that there is a sizeable difference between carrying water for a hostile foreign government and playing scribe for your own government and industry. There's no doubt that the propagandists for America's expeditionary wars were never appropriately tarred and feathered, but at least they were part of a national discourse where the sides were clearly saying what they wanted. It's just a different situation than a journalist happily promoting the bullshit narratives of a hostile foreign government.
To go back to your first point: I don't think Pugliese is guilty of 1, and I think it's reckless that people are confidently alleging he is. But I do think he's guilty of 2. I've got no problem with a journalist criticizing NATO or the war against Ukraine — but when you're doing so by actively borrowing lines from the Russian government, I think that puts you into some very bad territory.
Well, we certainly have an example case to guide us, here and now.
I saw the movie “Shock and Awe”, about the Knight-Ridder journalists who could not find any evidence of Saddam’s nuclear program. They certainly tried to get that message out, were drowned out by larger papers and TV repeating the Bush message.
What they did not do was charge the NYT and WaPo with knowingly repeating lies, knowingly lying to their readers.
In short, Knight-Ridder did not charge fellow journalists with my “(2)”.
I imagine, because they didn’t feel they could prove it, they held themselves to the same standards as a court.
Courts themselves, of course, hold themselves to that standard strictly, not even concluding Fox News had knowingly lied about the election until dispositive proof was presented, of journalists texting just that.
Pugliese is in a much, much more vulnerable position than the NYT and WaPo; those who carry water for governments and military-industrial complexes are held to much lower standards of truth than those who criticize such large institutions.
So, if you’ve got that confidence, that Knight-Ridder lacked; if you can show facts to your readers that Pugliese knowingly lied to his readers, you should present that evidence. It’s a grave charge.
“Kirill Kalinin was so impactful because he made real relations with journalists, designed to insert the Kremlin’s viewpoint into our national discourse. He didn’t need to pay off journalists or recruit assets. Kalinin’s impact was far more clever: He convinced journalists in Ottawa that they were managing the embassy, when in fact the embassy was managing them.”
I don’t believe it’s necessary to pay journalists when you can simply flatter them. At this point it looks to me that Pugliese has been played and has published russian talking points, maybe actually believing what he’s been fed. We’ve see Marjorie Taylor Green and Tucker Carlson do the same, and I’d be surprised if either of them are getting money for it. They’re just suckers.
So does the guy need to be tried for foreign interference? I guess not. There’s unfortunately no law against publishing russian garbage.
Thanks Justin for giving us first dibs on this astonishing story. So Canadian journalists are regularly approached by russian propagandists? I’m so naive. Sending enormous respect that you’ve resisted, because money talks. I need to read it again to absorb the details, but I have one question: in your opinion, is the government taking this as seriously as they should? The Line recently published an article exposing how an urgent CSIS warrant regarding foreign interference was ignored for over a year. Among all the other complaints I have with government, knowing Putin, Modi and other manipulators are playing this country as a patsy is seriously insulting.
In the seventh paragraph, you write of Burdett that "a cable told him to meet a man wearing one globe at a Belgrade tram stop." I suspect the Soviet contact was actually wearing one glove, but the image of a globe-wearing spy gave me great amusement.
Yes! Someone else noticed this as well, it's been fixed. Thanks!