Coffee With Scott Adams — Knowledge Archive July 10, 2026
Scott Adams Philosophy Archive
Search ideas
Episodes Episode #2637 Segments
MainContent Media & Fake News

Back to episode — Episode 2637 CWSA 10/23/24

Context —

's immediately corrected or something. So I can't say there isn't a problem. I'm just saying that it would be dicey to believe any of the individual reports. Most of them will be fake, but we don't know which ones. I did see a report today, and I saw the documents. I can't be specific about it, but apparently NBC is hopefully sending out guides to people to tell them how to vote in their state. A…

← Previous segment →

to trust it. But oh my God, it's like we found the problem.

And I often say you can't really have a conversation about anything important with anybody who thinks the news is real. I mean, if you believe the *Washington Post* is like real news on politics, you would be so lost. So lost.

Well, here's your propaganda update. Remember I tell you that if you know what happened, you don't know anything. But if you know who is involved, well, you might know everything. So Bob Woodward, who many people smarter than me say has always been part of the intelligence apparatus of the United States, including his actions in the Watergate stuff. But if that's true, does it make sense that he just went on CNN and said that Joe Biden might get the Nobel Peace Prize for his good work in Ukraine for preventing Americans from getting into a ground war? Does that sound like something that somebody just thought was their own opinion and it would be good to say on TV? Or does that sound like propaganda?

And he would think of himself... I can't read his mind, so I don't know what he's thinking. But does it look like that was a real opinion? Because he's not stupid. You don't get to be Bob Woodward if you're literally just stupid. He's not stupid. So why would you say this, which is obviously ridiculous? The only reason you would do it is propaganda. I mean, it doesn't have any news value whatsoever. There's no news. It's literally just weird propaganda.

Let's see, is there any other propaganda happening? So there's a publication called *The Atlantic*, which is owned by Steve Jobs' widow. And here's the thing. We need to make a distinction between news, which is biased, and pure propaganda. CNN is biased, but they do show, quite regularly, and I give them credit, especially recently, they have Scott Jennings on almost every night giving the Republican view of all the stories. And they've got two or three other people who look like they're pretty capable. I forget their names, but they're also Republican voices. So whenever there's a panel of five people, they throw in the one Republican. And I don't mind bias when it's transparent. If you show me five left-leaning people and one right-leaning person at the table, I know what you're doing. You're not making it even. I get it. But it's also completely transparent.

You know when Fox News does it, if they have the one Democrat on the five and four of them are the opposite opinion, I'm fine with that because nobody's hiding anything. Hey, we're leaning in this direction, but we'll let you see the other side. Now that is completely different than something like *The Atlantic*. *The Atlantic* is just a pure propaganda entity. But because they're both publications in some way, media entities, we act like they're all legitimate. *The Atlantic* is not legitimate. And we keep acting like we should talk about it like it's one of the media sources. It's not really. It's not even close to being anything like news or just biased news. It's just pure propaganda, at least on the political stuff.

So Jeffrey Goldberg, who these smart people say is one of the most famous political liars in America — like he has a history of known gigantic lies where surely he knew he was lying when he did it. Now that's the accusation against him. And there are a number of specific examples that the smart people like Glenn Greenwald, who watch this stuff, will give you. So if you want to know the examples, follow Greenwald. But his latest hoax is that General John Kelly says that Trump said that Hitler did some good things and he wishes he had some generals like Hitler or something like that.

Now, it doesn't matter because it's made up. How do you know it's made up? Because it's in *The Atlantic*. You don't have to wonder if it's made up. It's in *The Atlantic*. That's all you need to know. It is. John Kelly, General Kelly, is he a reliable and credible source? No, not even a little bit. You would be the opposite of that based on past experience. So no, there's no evidence that any of that happened. It's in the least credible outlet and the story is by the least credible person in the least credible outlet. So but of course it's news because propaganda is news too anyway.

We really should have a list of the things which are not really even trying. The *Washington Post* sometimes a little bit will show a little bit of the

Context —

other side. But I think when it comes to the political stuff, you could call them pure propaganda. They don't seem like they're trying too hard to show both sides anyway. The latest is that Harris will not be on Joe Rogan, but Trump will be, I think on Friday. And she will not be on the All-In pod, which Trump has already done. And those are not the wrong decisions. If I were in charge of the Har…

Next segment → →