ADDED: That green-highlighted stuff (and Tur's furious greening of it) — is that fake news? If we're using
the Allcott/Gentzkow definition, then probably not. It's not intentionally fabricated... is it??? How would I know?! It's a story that could be passed around and embellished. It's sexual rumor with a big dose of comedy.
Allcott and Gentzlow exclude "unintentional reporting mistakes"? But I don't know if that's a mistake, and what is really meant by "reporting"? If you pass along a good story without even including a phrase like "some people in a position to know said," then does this deserve to be called "reporting." It looks like great gossip that was too good not to monger. Maybe it doesn't deserve the label "fake news" because it's not presented as news. It just looks like trash. But the story may actually be true, in which case I'd call it "true trash." The author stumbled into passing along something that happened to be true.
I don't mean to be unfair to Michael Wolff. I don't have access to the full text of the book, and perhaps the sources and methods supporting this story are explained somewhere other than under the green slashings of an over-excited Katy Tur. I can see that 2 paragraphs up there's a reference to "A close Trump friend who was also a good Bill Clinton friend," but this unnamed person is
not said to be the source of the speakerphone story, only the observation that Clinton and Trump were "eerily similar" (except for Clinton's "respectable front").
The Allcott/Gentzlow definition also excludes "rumors that do not originate from a particular news article." This exclusion helps Katy Tur, who's only passing along something she found in a book. Her tweet — if we may call that a "news article" — did not originate the story. She found it in Michael Wolff's book. So her story isn't #1:
Trump did X, but #2:
a book says that Trump did X. Whether or not statement #1 is untrue, statement #2 is true, so Katy Tur is not within the Allcott/Gentzlow definition of fake news.
Now, I'd like to get out my highlighter and— in a different color (perhaps
blue) — mark "Trump and Clinton... brand of harassing." I don't know what we'd read if we could turn the page — maybe something more Clintonesque — but what Trump is described as doing in that green-highlighted passage isn't anything like Clinton's modus operandi.
Bill Clinton allegedly made very sexual moves on women when he had them alone in a room somewhere. It was more the Harvey Weinstein tactic. Trump has the man in his room with him. And Trump isn't touching anybody, he's just talking in an exuberant, comical way about sex with this man. He's not trying to get sexual satisfaction from the person who is in his presence. He's
fucking with the man. Meanwhile, he's a confidante to the woman, whom he has on the speakerphone, listening to what a scumbag her husband is. That's all very screwy, and I have no idea whether it's true. My point is: It's not like Bill Clinton. Bill Clinton did not use words to try to work his way into the woman's mind by staging some elaborate theater with her husband. Bill just lunged for the woman (if the stories are true).
But Bill Clinton had the more "respectable front"? That's interesting, considering that what Bill Clinton is accused of doing is criminal, and what Trump supposedly did was a lot of talk — sadistic and destructive talk, yes. But talking about sex and letting a woman hear that her husband is a cheater is more respectable than rape, groping, and exposing your naked penis to an underling and telling her to kiss it.
But "respectable" is just a word. And maybe Wolff or that "close Trump friend" gives the furtive behind-closed-doors physically aggressive guy a little pat on the head that is withheld from the exuberantly expressive man who talks about sex. That's fine with me as long as you say "respectable" in a very sarcastic way.
In
the words of Emile Zola: "Respectable people... What bastards!"
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