covers topics and people that would mainly be familiar to US audiences, but which are of little international salience or relevance", and that it rarely covers Russia except through the lens of U.S. politics. They also noted: "Its content selection, partisan framing and vernacular style is similar to right-wing US outlets like Fox News, NewsMax and One America News Network (OANN)." RT has been accused of different approaches to disinformation: Focusing on "presenting a negative picture of the United States and 'the West'", rather than extolling "Russia's virtues directly", publishing conspiracy theories about the West, criticizing U.S. influence abroad, and presenting Russia as "a 'global underdog'" to U.S. hegemony. (Michael Dukalskis in his 2021 book on tactics used by authoritarian regimes to construct a positive image of their regimes). Normally giving reporters and presenters considerable latitude, and saving straight-up pro-Russian government "message control" (propaganda), for "highly sensitive issues", such as the Russo-Georgian War or the trial of Mikhail Khodorkovsky, (Julia Ioffe). Functioning in some circumstances, (like the 2016 U.S. presidential election), as a part of a larger Russian disinformation apparatus with the goal of undermining "public faith in the U.S. democratic process,” and damaging enemies (like Hillary Clinton). RT and other state-funded Russian media, publicize "real information, some open and some hacked" (i.e. stolen), along with "false reports" they've created. These are "amplified on social media, sometimes by computer bots that send out thousands of Facebook and Twitter messages." (Steven Erlanger, quoting U.S. agencies). Only rarely taking a "single, anti-Western media line on any given story", which would be "too obvious". Instead, presenting "gaggles of competing and contradicting narratives which together create the impression that the truth is indecipherable". (Lithuania's STRATCOM Colonel). RT's "main message is that you cannot trust the western media". It seems "dedicated to the proposition that after the notion of objectivity has evaporated, all stories are equally true." (Peter Pomerantsev, writing in The Guardian in 2015) Using a strategy of distributing fake stories in "high-volume and multichannel, rapid, continuous, and repetitive" manner, with no regard to consistency. This "firehose of falsehood" makes propaganda difficult to counter. (Christopher Paul, Miriam Matthews of RAND Corporation). Though viewers may still oppose Russian policy and dislike Putin, RT's goal is for “a bit" of disinformation mud to "stick” to viewers and their doubts about Western institutions to grow. (Robert Pszczel, who ran NATO's information office in Moscow and watches Russia