The Washington Post Dabbles in Orwell
In scrubbed piece about Edward Snowden, the Bezos Post offers a preview of how history will be re-written
A Monday story in the Washington Post, “Putin grants citizenship to Edward Snowden, who disclosed U.S. surveillance,’” began as follows:
Russian President Vladimir Putin granted citizenship on Monday to Edward Snowden, a former security consultant who leaked information about top-secret U.S. surveillance programs and is still wanted by Washington on espionage charges.
The story added:
Snowden’s disclosures, published first in The Washington Post and the Guardian, were arguably the biggest security breach in U.S. history. The information revealed top-secret NSA surveillance as part of a program known as PRISM and the extraction of a wide range of digital information.
Snowden is America’s most famous revealer-of-secrets, and the way he’s talked about has evolved to an extreme degree in less than a decade, showing how quickly a story about security overreach can be flipped into an argument for more vigilance. The press, which once worked with Snowden in its proper role as a bulwark against government excess, is effectively an arm of the state now, as is shown again in this absurd episode.
This article began as an aggressive rewrite of history and the Post’s own views, but underwent numerous alterations after it attracted criticism online yesterday.
Keep reading with a 7-day free trial
Subscribe to Racket News to keep reading this post and get 7 days of free access to the full post archives.