Deliberate misinformation has a pretty long history. Here's a good report about the CIA manipulating the US media from Carl Bernstein (yes, that Bernstein) circa 1977:

http://carlbernstein.com/magazine_cia_and_media.php

I agree this is causing a great deal of damage to democracy around the world, I'm just pointing out that it has been going on for a very long time.

Thanks to the Google News archive, you can see lots of examples of those CIA "journalists" advancing the interests of the CIA throughout the '50s and '60s. It is fascinating to compare that known manipulated media content to what is now contained in the historical record about those same events. You'll also see many striking similarities to the way every modern story is reported and commented on in the modern media.