Final Word from Wednesday, February 14, 2018

In mid-Nov. Hospodářské noviny wrote that the lithium-mining scandal began on the pro-Russian website Aeronet, was shared on the internet by supporters of Tomio Okamura's SPD, was picked up by Parlamentní listy and Andrej Babiš on Facebook and then entered the mainstream media. The speculation that ČSSD was going to benefit from the memorandum signed by its minister was not backed up by facts, HN said, but the scandal nevertheless contributed to ČSSD's poor election results. HN called it an example of a Russian hybrid threat and fake news. Czexit is now one of the hot topics on pro-Russian websites. Its biggest proponents are supporters of Tomio Okamura's SPD, and it has now entered the mainstream media. It's at least as big a canard as the lithium-mining scandal, yet it is now HN itself that has become the biggest propagator of the myth of impending Czexit. HN has found a Putin-like way to create a fake threat that can then be bombastically defeated. [Czech Republic referendum leaving European Union EU]