Hey, I'm Brian Salter live in New York, and this is Reliable Sources.

We examine the story behind the story and figure out what is reliable.

This hour, brand news stories, scoops you haven't heard yet from the new book, Parallel

about Trump's final days in office.

Plus, Fallout from the Facebook files, why this new Wall Street Journal series is different

from all the past reporting about social media problems.

And later what Nicki Minaj and Sean Hannity have in common, they do have something in common

and the answer is coming up.

But first, the political tactics that are causing so much chaos, it's a three-parter,

lie, rinse, and repeat, and we have to see it clearly and cover it clearly.

Let's start in California, where the recall was an example of lie, rinse, and repeat.

Fox and other GOP promoters acted like Larry Elder had a real chance to win.

They swore that Californians were desperate to dump Gavin Newsom.

Some right-wing talking heads lied about voter fraud and someone even set up a website

calling the election rigged before the election even happened.

But then, when the recall failed predictably, Fox just made excuses and quickly moved on,

like the GOP was determined not to learn any lessons, and thus maybe destined to repeat

the same mistakes.

The even further right channel won American News, pretended like Newsom didn't win.

They pretended like the recall result was a mystery until I called them out on Twitter.

And some of these shows still portray Elder as a winner, I guess just for trying.

I guess it's like a participation trophy.

...