How’s that healing and unity going to work when Democrats and their pet media want to eradicate the ability of their opposition to speak out? Also, place your bets when the unhinged finally move on from Trump
Trump may be gone, but the instruments of information warfare that empowered him remain
Donald Trump might no longer be in office, but the information infrastructure he exploited to ascend to the Oval Office and then exert a firm grip over the Republican Party is still largely in place. During Trump’s 2016 run for office and throughout his presidency, the focus was mostly on spotlighting the lies he told and the conspiracy theories he promoted. And to be clear, that was important work.
But the conversation should — and, frankly, needs — to go deeper than that. Trump was only one person who took advantage of the existing instruments in place to wage information warfare on his political opponents and critics in the media. Yes, he’s now out of office. But those instruments he used to amass power still remain out on the battlefield ready for another aspiring candidate to come along, pick up, and use for their own benefit.
These tools include right-wing cable channels, talk-radio, hyper-partisan news websites, Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube. In the wake of the domestic terrorism that took place on Capitol Hill earlier this month, some of these platforms have made some tweaks that have helped curb the spread of disinformation. But if you speak to experts, most aren’t convinced that these tweaks are enough. And elsewhere in the information economy, such as on Fox News, nothing has fundamentally changed.
This is the kind of thing that Fascists do. That we see in Communist China, Cuba, Venezuela, Iran, Russia, etc, where they do not allow opposition voices to flourish. It’s insidious and against every notion of being America.
While Big Tech certainly deserves to face questions for helping to radicalize untold numbers of Americans, other platforms that disseminate disinformation and conspiracy theories for profit really shouldn’t be left without scrutiny. That includes channels like Fox News, Newsmax, and OAN. But it also includes TV providers that willfully deliver such channels into the living rooms of millions and companies such as Premiere Networks that distributes shows from dishonest talk-radio hosts like Rush Limbaugh.
How’s this going to work with healing? With unity? It’s like Democrats actually want a physical civil war. Resistance is apparently no longer patriotic. And things will not go very well if they try and shut down people’s voices.
We need to do all we can to discourage the Big Lies and open bigotry that propelled the Trump Movement.
Trump’s strategy was to destroy the legitimate media and flood FOX, OAN, Newsmax, twitter and facebook with his lies and bigotry. Unfortunately, millions of Americans rely on the likes of FOX, OAN and right-wing blogs which swim in lies and conspiracies.
On the other hand, America is based on not suppressing free speech, even conspiracies and outright lies.
If you choose to believe that Trump won the election (he didn’t), that Covid is a hoax (it isn’t), that global warming is a scam (it isn’t), that liberals are running a global pedophile/cannibalism ring (they aren’t), that President Biden is a communist (he’s not) or tax cuts pay for themselves (they don’t), that’s your allah-given right as a human. Perhaps you believe the Earth is 10,000 years old (it isn’t) or that the Earth is flat (nope). What we cannot do as a nation is to base policy on these sorts of mythology. We limit interference of government on religion and likewise limit religion’s impact on policy.
As a people we need to mock, ridicule and refute the lies and mythology and flood the zone with truths. Overwhelmingly.
We understand that conspiracists are hypersensitive to criticism, snowflakian in fact. Tough. We can’t have unity or function as a nation until we differentiate facts from fiction.
Good one J-prove “lies and bigotry’. Especially lies that we’re different than any other president made. But most important, please direct us to the “telling alleged lies†exclusion to the First Amendment. This should be hilarious to hear. Is it near the “prior restraint†section that also isn’t there?
“America is not based on suppressing free speech†yes, so why are your Brownshirt tech giants friends suppressing free speech.?
Jil,
We would think that connies would understand a bit more about the Constitution they claim to revere. It is not unConstitutional to “discourage the Big Lies”, just as twitter refusing to carry dangerous lies doesn’t violate the 1st Amendment.
What lies? Read Trump’s Jan 6 exhortations, lie after lie about state votes, voting machines, dead voters, “illegals” voting, out of state voters, more votes than voters… he spent an hour lying to the crowd to energize their storming of the US Capitol. “Stop the Steal” they cried. Except there was no steal. All legal speech, by the way. But twitter has no legal obligation to print trump’s lies.
You may not like it, but that’s the truth.
Twitter has no obligation to print Trump’s lies..â€. Except that the person calling them “liesâ€, does. And you haven’t. Do you really think the only things they’re not printing are just from Trump? But again, then bakers don’t have to bake cakes for gays, for example, correct? They’re private entities, right? And that means they can open, right? Or would this be another in a long line of liberal double-standards? Why, yes
Mr Dowd wrote:
And that is absolutely within your constitutional rights!
I’m thinking they didn’t use a big enough bomb in Atlanta last time…
Hmmm, Elwood P Dowd, a chronic drunk who claimed to see a 6′ tall rabbit.
Perfect.
You may think you’re not full of shit, but you are.
Harvey was a 6’3 1/2″ tall Pooka.
Carlos the Jackal is a cowardly Venezuelan Marxist-Leninist terrorist and mass murderer imprisoned in France for life.
I prefer Elwood to Carlos the Jackal.
As a child, Elwood’s mother told him, “To make it in this world one needs to oh so smart or oh so pleasant.” The adult Elwood says he’s tried smart (he was very successful early, and rich) but recommends pleasant. Not bad advice, even for a jackal.
We need to do all we can to discourage the Big Lies and open bigotry that propelled the Trump Movement.
I agree. IF Elwood and the left would just shut up with their lies then the country might be able to get along again.
Open bigotry….I call bullshit.
Bigotry…..intolerance toward those who hold different opinions from oneself.
Sound like the left to me, Elwood. I mean they are the ones wanting to cancel everyone who doesnt think like they do.
Keep that civil war rhetoric flowing Elwood. Perhaps you will incite it and kill every living conservative, but unfortunately for you not before their is nothing left of your side or this country to call a home.
For once I will drop my civility. You are a dangerous person. Every much so as those you accuse on the right of inciting violence you do it here 100 times a day. Sad individual you are.
Mr 1950 wrote:
And yet, for all of that, you did not ask our esteemed host to ban Mr Dowd. Good on you.
Dana,
And exactly how do we benefit from Jeff’s lies and childish behavior? This has nothing to do with freedom of speech. Jeff should be banned. His comments are harmful.
David7134, I would agree with you but Teach, in his infinite wisdom actually believes his masthead motto: If we don’t believe in freedom of expression for people we despise, we don’t believe in it at all.
In a previous America, one where those who disagreed with the Elitists like Elwood wouls at least be treated like human beings that may have been true. Today, after 100 years of radical fascism and communism infiltrating every institution in America by using OUR OWN CONSTITUTION AGAINST US there can be no more benevolent tolerance of leftist principles. Today, after at least 20 -30 years of the radical left outsourcing their censorship of conservatives, Republicans, Christians and anyone they decide is a “white supremist” to the media/social media cabal and forcing Free Expression out of existence except in private blogs like this one if we continue to tolerate the Elwood’s soon they will turn on Teach and us by reporting our “anti Xiden behavior” to the proper authorities.
Even as I type this there remains 25,000 troops occupying Washington (soon to have it’s name changed) DC to protect the pretender pResident Chairman Xiden from all those “Insurrectionists” that are lurking all over the USA. We have a man in woman’s clothing heading a health department and if you point out the crazy bastard is a male you’re a homophobe (which is a stupid made-up term). The main goal of the usurper seems to be to establish the first kakistocracy of non-qualified minorities, perverts, idiots and unstable dopes as long as they aren’t White, straight and Christian. The very people who created this country they want to destroy.
Today just to make the truthful statement that White people discovered, explored, conquered, settled and built this country into the greatest country in history gets you called a racist and White supremist. And why not? The object of all tyrannies is to erase the past and create an endless today where the rules change hourly. The best way for them to raise up these people to their phony positions is to erase what Whites really did and create an alternate reality where the light bulb was created by a black doctor, the airplane by a transsexual bicycle builder and the computer by a handicapped, Hispanic homosexual in his garage.
Jeff’s comments are really only harmful to himself as long as he’s commenting here and not teaching a class of 15 year old’s in a public school. His remarks are tedious, ill informed, closed minded, racist, frequently foolish, almost always insulting and always hateful but can’t hurt us here.
But I do suspect Elwood would not hesitate to turn Teach and the rest of us over to the Stasi for reeducation or elimination as soon as he can. Without a doubt.
“Actually believes his masthead motto..â€. Unfortunately, the Brownshirts of the left don’t.
You are the most hateful and despicable individual I have run across on the web, Elwood. And I’ve run across quite a few. Your ability to be shown the truth about a subjects and completely ignore is psychotic. One has to be mentally ill to keep repeating the small riot of a couple hundred supposedly Trump supporters is an “insurrection” but 26 cities burned, over 26 people murdered, billions in destruction, hundreds of private businesses burned, hundreds of homes burned theft, rape and hate by Known Marxists BLM with their anti white anti American slogans and members along with Antifa with their anti American fascist destruction were “mostly peaceful protests”. You are all liars. Filthy, bigoted, racist liars.
Daniel Greenfield also nails it:
There were no crowds, just soldiers. After the military and police contingent, the second largest group there for the inauguration weren’t Biden’s civilian supporters, but his propagandists. With few people, the media had to work twice as hard to manufacture the illusion that this was a popular leader taking office instead of a usurper imposed by Amazon, Google, Facebook, and the rest of the political, cultural, and economic oligarchy which owns the media on America.
CNN, a subsidiary of AT&T, had already gushed about, “Joe Biden’s arms embracing America”. MSNBC, a subsidiary of Comcast, compared Biden to God. “He heals the brokenhearted and binds up their wounds.” The only wounds being bound up were those of the ruling class which had temporarily lost electoral power to an army of flyover country workers and peasants, only to reclaim it with sedition, wiretapping, abuse of power, billions of dollars, and soldiers in the street……Biden isn’t a charismatic leader. He isn’t moving the cause forward. He’s a placeholder for a ruling class that wants homes in Dupont Circle that it buys by selling out America to China, by ruining our economy with environmental consulting gigs and racial contract quotas, and for all the manifold ways which the swamp is coming back as Biden’s wetlands restoration project.
“Hail to the Thief” is as much their anthem as it is Biden’s. They fought to keep hold of D.C., the center of their power base not because they care about its history or that of this country, but because it’s where they network, collaborate, and do their dirty little deals at our expense.
The troops in the street are their warning to the rest of the country about who is really in charge.
Once again you leftists give us Patriotic Americans the middle finger.
Kye,
We understand that you consider yourself a superior American and a superior patriot, yet you support Trump and his attack on the US Capitol, the seat of Congress. You keep trying to conflate the BLM protests/riots to the failed attempt to stop the pro forma certification of the electoral college vote.
We all know by now that the election was not stolen, but psychotic folk insist it was, while others just tell the lie to weaken America.
Patriotic Americans do not attempt to overthrow the elected President. Patriotic Americans do not storm and ransack the US Capitol just because they lost an election.
And you still claim that Donald Trump won the election.
Jeff,
Everyone on this blog is superior to you. Kye is certainly your superior. Your pathetic existence is spent running from one blog site to another calling good people names and making up junk.
As to the election, Trump won hands down. Fifty percent of Americans feel the same. But regardless of what really happened a movement has been started and is being fueled by the idiot liberals/ communist. That movement will result in a civil war, which I think is way overdo.
darvon,
Anyone who believes Donald Trump won the election is inferior to at least 81 million Americans. Only an ignorant buffoon or a liar would still claim that Trump won. You are likely both.
Do you think the federal government will side with you rebels or with America?
My good friend John wrote:
You seem to have forgotten the late Perry.
Alas! He has gone to his eternal reward.
Elwood, we have told you dozens of times we are not “climate deniers” Hell, the term itself is fukin stupid, who denies the climate? We are man made global warming skeptics. Still, you in your stubborn ignorance continue to name us falsely and ridicule us for something we’re not.
You know I’m married to a Korean lady. You know my first wife was Jewish. You know I have two black foster sons. Yet you have continued to label me a white supremist, a racist and an anti-Semite. Again, faced with the truth you ignore it and continue to repeat the only crap you understand, hate.
My Foster son was at the 1/6 protest as you know. He was not up front however, he could see the mayhem and people trying to get into the Capitol. He watched as cops moved the barricade and allowed them in. He told me the protest was just that, a protest. The riot was caused by a few disruptive individuals, some of whom were Antifa breaking windows and such. No Congresscreep was ever “in danger”. nobody was getting kidnapped. Nobody set fires, spray painted the halls and walls of the House and that’s a fact, Jack. Calling the entire protest “white supremacist”, “Proud Boys” (who you should look up because you obviously have no clue what they’re about) Qanon (same goes to that farce of a club), racists and the rest of your usual litany of hateful, ignorant, bigoted names. Just because one, a few or even several people in a group do something wrong, stupid or even illegal does not mean the entire group is bad. Especially when they actually had NOTHING to do with the “Stop the Steal” protest. They were paid agitators, not even members of the groups you named. That’s like saying all blacks are bad because the Marxist/racist BLM gang murdered a few people during their “mostly peaceful riots”.
I could go on but it’s useless to try to reason with the unreasonable. Fact is, you are one of the most hateful and ignorant leftists I have ever read. Your whole fuking clan exist only to harm America. You’ve always hate our country and the fact is you can’t even say “I love America” honestly.
Kye,
I doubt that I called you a climate denier, although “climate denier” likely qualifies as a synecdoche, a contracted phrase where a part conveys the whole, like “Philadelphia Wins Super Bowl!”
You have averred more than once that whites are smarter than blacks. You describe the US as a nation built by and for white people.
Really? You expect us to believe that right-wingers were innocent victims of paid agitators on Jan 6??? What of personal responsibility? The “protest” was largely paid for out of trump campaign funds ($2.7 million) and was to interfere with the Constitutional certification of the electoral vote.
Your klan lost the election, bigly. You lost the Senate because of Trump. The Dems have a narrow advantage of both the House and Senate, and of course won the WH. You believed the appropriate response to losing was to overturn the election and failing that, to overthrow the government.
You don’t want to feel/believe that trump could have lost. He did. Americans were ready to crawl over broken glass to vote against him. Elections have consequences.
Our man Jeff bounces between several conservative sites. On all these sites he elicits the same contempt for which we have developed. All the commenters at these sites have similar post as to what you see here. In addition, Jeff has fixed himself just as he did here.
This clown is dangerously ill. Do not let him get under your skin and it would be very wise to ignore him and try not to return a comment or take anything he says as serious.
demented,
No. I didn’t storm and ransack the US Capitol, that was you guys.
The poor Capitol can stand being stormed a few more times. And if what minimal property damage that occurred is “ransacking” you’d have made a lousy Mongolian horde.
Antifa/BLM showed how its done all summer, and even then, with their assistance, the little crowd at the Capitol couldn’t get it right. Pitiful.
Fake fraudulent elections have consequences too. Just not the kind Elwood/Jeff is thinking.
What a bunch of whiny snowflakes! We have been led to believe how tough and independent conservatives are, rublecounsel.
There was no fraudulent election. It’s just another false conspiracy from the nuCons.
What consequences do you have in mind?
Bottom line? They really just want to make it illegal to disagree with them. About anything.