The tendency of many in the mainstream media to question those who question authority rather than questioning those who are in authority, including the administration of President Barack Obama, is "confusing" and a "disturbing trend," Sharyl Attkisson told
Newsmax TV's "America's Forum."
Attkisson, a former CBS investigative reporter, said she expected to come "under attack" when she wrote her new book, "Stonewalled: My Fight for Truth Against the Forces of Obstruction, Intimidation, and Harassment in Obama's Washington," but explained media outlets were not verifying information about the federal government that sometimes originated as propaganda.
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"The disturbing trend is that when the surrogates get busy, meaning Media Matters, which, in essence, works in the interest of the Obama administration (and Former Secretary of State) Hillary Clinton, and they put out propaganda and false claims, but, it kind of bleeds over into the quasi-legitimate press. And, pretty soon, it's being picked up uncritically, without question, unskeptically, by the so-called — some in the mainstream press.
"That's the trend that's really disturbing, that some in what's considered the real news media are complicit and so sloppy and so contradictory by accepting claims, on the one hand, that are unverified and unproven, and then approaching me with the skepticism that they would never consider applying to the federal government or to the agencies or politicians with a proven track record of providing misinformation," Attkisson said Monday. "That's the dynamic that's confusing."
Attkisson recently revealed that her computer was hacked while she was still at CBS investigating the 2012 bombing of the U.S. consulate in Benghazi. She said her email accounts and her family's computer were also hacked, and that her conversations were monitored through Skype, even when she wasn't on a phone call.
A government employee conducted a forensics review of Attkisson's computer and she said "immediately confirmed these remote intrusions and surveillance that had gone on for quite some time," adding that "it was very extensive monitoring."
Attkisson said she had the name of the person she thought was responsible for the surveillance, but on the advice of her attorney, she would not reveal who it was. She did say the monitoring began during the Obama administration, and that the software used to hack her computer was "proprietary to one of four federal government agencies."
Attkisson also recently revealed that CBS News withheld an interview they conducted with Obama shortly before the 2012 election that included a quote by the president where he refused to call the Benghazi bombing "terrorism." She has contended it was done in an attempt to help Obama win re-election.
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Only the CBS evening news producers, managers, Managing Editor Scott Pelley, a few network executives, and other managers received the original transcript of Obama's interview, Attkisson said, adding that she "didn't know the interview existed initially."
She said at the time it "wasn't such a big deal," because the interview took place soon after the bombing, when few details about it were known. It was only later after one of the debates between Obama and Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney, that she was given a different sound bite from the interview "that gave the opposite impression" about the president.
Since she didn't know about Obama's other quote, Attkisson said she "didn't question that it was out of context" until just prior to the election "when the full transcript was leaked out to some of us at CBS News and showed this contradiction."
"Several of us confronted our superiors, and just said we thought this was a really terrible breach, and that it was intentional, and that it could be very problematic for CBS News, and that we needed to protect the company by publishing it as soon as possible, and prior to the election," she said.
CBS published the correct information on its website days before the election, Attkisson said, adding that no one was held accountable over the issue.
"There was no follow up done, to my knowledge. At least, nobody ever came back to me, after an investigation was promised. Nobody ever came back to me and told me that anything happened because of it," she said.
Attkisson's book details her view of the current state of investigative journalism and the surveillance she underwent while searching for information about the Obama administration, including the Benghazi bombing and the Fast and Furious gunrunning scandal.