Glenn had a 3 hour long conversation on a podcast a few days ago where he laid out the problem really well: Journalists have essentially become socialites. They don't want to publish articles that will rock the boat, because the people they are friends with are the ones that own that boat, invite them to parties, and are a part of their friend groups. The reporting around this story has been absolutely unbelievable t…
I'll have to listen to the podcast, but I think you're way off in thinking this kind of story makes careers. Journalists take their credibility very seriously and this story doesn't have it, at least not yet if it ever will. Going with a story that hasn't been vetted marks a serious journalist as a dupe for the rest of their lives.
Do you really believe if the same story were about a member of the Trump family, that NPR would refuse to cover it?
One more point on credibility - we literally have videos, images, text messages, e-mails of which the other recipients have been confirmed - this is all basically undeniable at this point. So the only question is, is the actual story of how the material was obtained (the laptop repair shop) true, or was the material hacked and then they basically used parallel construction to hide the true origins? That's a fine question to ask, but if you think that the material itself is false that's just completely incredible.