mud machine

plural mud machines

1. A system or program (e.g. a campaign or newspaper) considered particularly busy at throwing mud at, that is defaming, a certain target, usually for political reasons.

   In response, the Democrats cranked up their own mud machine.

   2008, Kerwin C. Swint, Mudslingers, Union Square Press, page 82

   1 more example

   2012, Michele Sorice, Assessing Communication. Integrated Approaches in Political, Social and Business Context, LUISS University Press, p. 64. This is not the only effect of such a system of (dis)information: as many authors underlined, the subversive power underlying the functioning of the mud machine seems to be even more devastating since it achieves its goal simply extending its menacing shadow over potential objectives.