Here’s why you should be willing to believe anonymous sources

The biggest news story of the past few days was based on anonymous sources.

The Atlantic editor-in-chief Jeffrey Goldberg wrote how President Donald Trump has little regard for veterans and military members, calling them “losers” and “suckers” for getting killed in battle and/or volunteering for something bigger than their personal well-being.

Other news outlets, including the Associated Press and Fox News, have done their own reporting to confirm The Atlantic’s story, while Trump and his team have vehemently denied it. Critics of The Atlantic story are lashing out at its use of anonymous sources.

“We all have to use anonymous sources, especially in a climate where the president of the United States tries to actively intimidate,” Goldberg told CNN’s Brian Stelter on this weekend’s “Reliable Sources.” “These are not people who are anonymous to me.”

In the same episode, famed Washington Post reporter Carl Bernstein, who worked with Bob Woodward to break many of the Watergate stories, told Stelter, “Almost all 200 of our stories about Watergate were based on anonymous sourcing.”