In an April 17 NewsBusters post, Mark Finkelstein grouses that “volatile former Vermont governor” Howard Dean questioned the accuracy of a Hillary Clinton story on the website of the Daily Mail, countering that “if the story were inaccurate, don’t you think Hillary’s minions would be screaming bloody murder and trotting the attendees to refute the claims? Crickets, anyone?”
Fibnkelstein doesn’t mention the fact that the Daily Mail has a lengthy track record of publishing false and inaccurate stories. One writer notes that in its home country of Britain, the Daily Mail has seen 687 complaints filed against it to the country’s Press Complaints Commission — far more than any other British newspaper — that led either to a PCC adjudication or to a negotiated resolution. The writer adds: “The paper gets away with publishing libels and falsehoods and with invasions of privacy because the penalties are insignificant.”
Additionally, a former writer has discussed the Mail’s shoddy journalistic standards, explaining how “the Mail’s editorial model depends on little more than dishonesty, theft of copyrighted material, and sensationalism so absurd that it crosses into fabrication.”
Finkelstein also fails to mention that the Daily Mail’s U.S. political editor is David Martosko, the former editor of the conservative Daily Caller who’s best known for standing by a false claim about Sen. Robert Menendez and prostitutes.
Making up stuff is clearly within the realm of the Daily Mail, and there is good reason not to trust what appears there. Instead of telling his readers that, however, he huffs, “If attacking the media messenger is the best the Hillary camp can do, it is in serious trouble.” But isn’t attacking the messenger the entire reason NewsBusters and its parent, the Media Research Center, exist?