Sunday, April 15, 2018 by JD Heyes
http://www.lizwarren.news/2018-04-15-fake-news-media-regurgitates-old-discredited-story-michael-cohen.html
It’s obvious now that the discredited, disgusting, American Pravda media a) are fully aware that President Donald J. Trump never “colluded” with Russia to “steal the election” from Hillary Clinton; and b) they have to keep lying about it in order to keep Democratic voters energized ahead of the 2018 elections.
On Friday McClatchy Papers ran a story with this headline: “Sources: Mueller has evidence Cohen was in Prague in 2016, confirming part of dossier.”
The news service reported (as breathlessly as previous reports along this narrative):
The Justice Department special counsel has evidence that Donald Trump’s personal lawyer and confidant, Michael Cohen, secretly made a late-summer trip to Prague during the 2016 presidential campaign, according to two sources familiar with the matter.
Confirmation of the trip would lend credence to a retired British spy’s report that Cohen strategized there with a powerful Kremlin figure about Russian meddling in the U.S. election.
It would also be one of the most significant developments thus far in Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation of whether the Trump campaign and the Kremlin worked together to help Trump win the White House. Undercutting Trump’s repeated pronouncements that “there is no evidence of collusion,” it also could ratchet up the stakes if the president tries, as he has intimated he might for months, to order Mueller’s firing.
This fake news story has been circulated — over and over and over again — since President Donald J. Trump beat the most corrupt presidential candidate to ever run for the nation’s highest office.
It’s been disproven each and every time a new claim is made: Cohen coming out publicly to say not just no, but heck no regarding the validity of the claim.
He did so again following the McClatchy story, in a tweet, according to The Gateway Pundit.
“Bad reporting, bad information and bad story by same reporter Peter Stone @McClatchyDC. No matter how many times or ways they write it, I have never been to Prague. I was in LA with my son. Proven!” he wrote.
Bad reporting, bad information and bad story by same reporter Peter Stone @McClatchyDC. No matter how many times or ways they write it, I have never been to Prague. I was in LA with my son. Proven! https://t.co/ra7nwjUA0X
— Michael Cohen (@MichaelCohen212) April 14, 2018
Even Benjamin Wittes, a Trump-hating, Left-wing confidant of James Comey tweeted out his own doubts about the veracity of the reporting.
“I’ve thought about this story overnight — and frankly, count me cautious about it until some other news organizations confirm it and fill in some details,” he tweeted, adding there were “a few reasons” why he was skeptical.
“(1) The sourcing is relatively thin. It is sourced to two sources familiar with the matter, who are presumably not Mueller shop folks. It’s not clear to me what the universe of people who would know this sort of thing from a distance looks like.”
(1) The sourcing is relatively thin. It is sourced to two sources familiar with the matter, who are presumably not Mueller shop folks. It's not clear to me what the universe of people who would know this sort of thing from a distance looks like. pic.twitter.com/tXlolwgunI
— Benjamin Wittes (@benjaminwittes) April 14, 2018
He also tweeted out a passage (part of which is reproduced above) regarding “confirmation” of a portion of British ex-spy Christopher Steele’s very uncorroborated “Russia dossier,” with the following:
“Note how the story here hedges on this point, describing the confirmation of Cohen’s presence in Prague only in hypothetical terms. The reporters are being careful not to say that Cohen was actually in Prague—merely that Mueller has developed some reason to doubt his denial.”
Note how the story here hedges on this point, describing the confirmation of Cohen's presence in Prague only in hypothetical terms. The reporters are being careful not to say that Cohen was actually in Prague—merely that Mueller has developed some reason to doubt his denial. pic.twitter.com/BnS9rSP23v
— Benjamin Wittes (@benjaminwittes) April 14, 2018
Finally, he tweeted:
“And, (3) It’s a little too good. The Prague meeting is part of the heart and soul of the Steele Dossier. Good intel analysts need to be skeptical of intel that perfectly supports their premises, particularly when it’s a bit thin. Let’s show that discipline here.”
Thin? This story is downright anorexic.
So why does the Pravda media continue to run versions of it?
Because Democratic voters need to be tantalized from time-to-time prior to the midterm (and 2020) elections that hey, maybe, possibly there might actually be something to that ‘Trump Russia collusion’ story, so they’ll remain energized enough to go vote.
Boy, are they going to be disappointed (and ticked off) at their media and politicians when they finally realize it’s always been a hoax.
PS: Cohen filed a defamation lawsuit in January against bottom-feeding Buzzfeed, for publishing the Steele dossier in full a year earlier — in which Steele claimed Cohen traveled to Prague.
Does that sound like a guy who’s lying?
Speaking of which, see more of this reporting at NewsFakes.com.
J.D. Heyes is a senior writer for NaturalNews.com and NewsTarget.com, as well as editor of The National Sentinel.
Sources include: