On October 20, CNN reported, through unnamed officials, advisers and allies, that Trump aides are jockeying ahead of possible post-midterm shakeups. Its headline calls the feared result a “rampage”; its 32-paragraph text never does. The headline’s two hottest words have different owners. “Brutal” belongs to one unnamed Trump ally. “Rampage” belongs to no one quoted: the 32-paragraph story never uses it. Every claim of infighting rests on “one Trump adviser”, “two people familiar with the matter” and “one source familiar with the dynamics”. The only people named are spokesmen denying it, and Trump. That is the weasel word at work: a claim with no owner, here carried by the word “Fears”, which never says whose. The page answers its headline further down. Paragraph 25 says administrations traditionally see turnover after midterms, a natural exit point. Paragraph 27 says Trump has not given overt signs he plans personnel changes, according to people who have spoken with him. What has happened is concrete: Kimberly Guilfoyle out as ambassador to Greece, press secretary Katie Zacharia fired after five days. A plain sentence would say aides expect shakeups if Republicans lose badly, according to unnamed sources, and the White House denies it. The line hands readers who already see Trump as volatile the proof they were looking for, and each copy makes the proof hotter. Mediaite restores “Reportedly”. Raw Story adds “bloodbath”, a word CNN never printed. The further the story travels from a named person, the louder it gets. Readers on the other side get their proof too, in the Pentagon’s “fake news or DC noise”. Both feelings arrive 13 days before a vote, and neither rests on a fact anyone has to sign.
