thebulwark--2020-06-04--The GOP Section 230 Strategy Will Benefit Trump and Only Trump

By now most people will have seen various Republican politicians , including President Trump , lash out at tech giants in one way or another .
The attacks stem from a perception that these companies , mostly based in West Coast liberal bastions , are using their power to silence voices on the right .
It certainly makes for good political fodder with the conservative base .
Conservatives spent decades justifiably frustrated with the traditional mainstream media , but this is very different .
The current GOP strategy of attacking big tech may produce some short-term political gain for President @ @ @ @ @ @ @ will come at the cost of a long-run political and economic nightmare for the Republican party .
These days , their favored strategy is targeting a provision of the Communications Decency Act called Section 230 .
President Trump signed an executive order targeting it last week .
Some critics on the right see Section 230 as a license to be biased .
That is incorrect .
It is a license for companies to exercise their protected rights of free speech , association , and property rights .
In doing so , Section 230 @ @ @ @ @ @ @ mostly free and open to those who agree to abide by their terms and conditions .
Section 230 provides third-party liability protection critical to the rise and survival of the Internet companies we know today , from Airbnb to Zoom .
With a few exceptions , it means that you are responsible for what you say on Twitter or Facebook or any other website , not the website itself .
In the very early days of the web , before Section 230 became law in 1996 , if a website moderated content—by , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ site assumed liability for the thousands of things posted daily .
As a result , many sites wouldn ’ t moderate at all .
Or allow comments .
This is one of the many reasons a world without 230 looks very different and very grim for conservatives , and they should be careful what they wish for .
Without Section 230 , companies would be forced to choose between heavily restricted access and completely open access .
In the latter case , content moderators would no longer be able to remove objectionable content @ @ @ @ @ @ @ from Facebook , Twitter , or YouTube .
The Internet would quickly become inundated with such objectionable material .
Like it or not , such content is generally protected by the First Amendment .
After all , the First Amendment has never been about protecting speech everyone likes .
Despite what may be legitimate issues of bias in tech companies ’ application of their terms and conditions , conservatives must look at the overwhelmingly positive net impact that big tech has had in allowing them to advance their ideas .
For example , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ without Section 230 .
In practice , that means conservative radio host Dennis Prager ’ s PragerU videos would not have 1 billion-plus collective views .
Prager ’ s example perfectly illustrates a broader problem on the right .
Despite amassing astronomical numbers of clicks and views—enormous in comparison even to some of the most-watched programs on television news—Prager filed an ill-fated suit against Google , YouTube ’ s parent company , alleging bias and censorship .
The Ninth Circuit tossed the suit in an unanimous 3-0 decision with two GOP-appointed judges affirming @ @ @ @ @ @ @ to determine what content to allow on its platform .
The strategy to target big tech now has shifted from courts of law to the court of public opinion .
Conservatives are now arguing that since big tech companies are making editorial judgments about the content on their websites , they should lose the protection of Section 230 .
Yet Section 230 explicitly allows companies to make such constitutionally protected judgments without fear of tort lawsuits for anything else on their websites they may have missed .
A company shouldn ’ t be @ @ @ @ @ @ @ slanderous content among the sea of routine posts just because they choose to filter out pornography .
It ’ s impossible to know , for example , if a comment is libelous in every instance .
Let ’ s bring this into focus in terms of the right ’ s political strategy .
Some conservatives do not like the way private companies are exercising their constitutional rights .
In response , they are threatening to let trial lawyers , an industry notorious for its deep ties to the political left , and long @ @ @ @ @ @ @ suing tech companies into oblivion .
Adding insult to injury for conservatives is the other industry that would benefit the most from the elimination of Section 230—print and broadcast journalism .
Ultimately , most “ free ” online services rely on advertising dollars .
They compete vigorously for those dollars with traditional media companies .
Eliminating Section 230 would reinvigorate the dominant media gatekeepers that conservatives have long accused of shutting out their viewpoints .
For web services focused on user-created content that do manage to survive , content-moderation practices would be significantly @ @ @ @ @ @ @ being accused of anti-conservative bias today .
Put simply , it would give even more power to tighten the screws to the people that Senator Josh Hawley , a leading critic of Sec .
230 , distrusts in the first place .
Prominent conservative voices would find themselves back at square one and forfeit the largely open access to enormous audiences they enjoy today .
Perhaps it would be useful for a victimhood-themed donation appeal , but it seems penny wise and pound foolish as a long-term strategy .
Conservatives should also be @ @ @ @ @ @ @ of modifying Sec .
230 .
President Trump loves to tout the stock market as an indicator of the success of his policies .
What do you think will happen to the market if he is successful in his effort to “ revoke 230 , ” as he recently Tweeted ?
( With no sense of irony . )
Alphabet ( parent company of Google ) , Facebook , Apple , Amazon , Microsoft , and other tech giants capitalized at or nearing $ 1 trillion rely on Section 230 in many critical @ @ @ @ @ @ @ s hard to comprehend the impact on financial markets of telling the most valuable companies in history to throw much of their business model out the window .
But Section 230 isn ’ t just about the big guys .
Section 230 is a key ingredient in the lifeblood of many mom-and-pop businesses and other small businesses aspiring to take on the big guys .
Today , major tech companies devote enormous resources to moderate content on their websites—resources the next Facebook or Google being coded in a dorm room or garage today @ @ @ @ @ @ @ allows these upstarts to focus time and resources on building a better core product instead of policing content that is growing at an exponential rate .
MySpace was being called a monopoly just over a decade ago , while no one realized Facebook was eating MySpace ’ s lunch .
This probably won ’ t happen again if Section 230 protections are eliminated .
Some conservatives might not care about what happens to Silicon Valley firms and entrepreneurs with deep pockets .
They should .
Section 230 is responsible for countless small non-tech @ @ @ @ @ @ @ parents sustain their retirement with a small cottage-rental business powered by Airbnb and HomeAway .
Without Section 230 , they ’ d be left sticking “ For Rent ” signs in the yard and hoping someone interested happened to be driving by on the back roads of New England .
Again , the crux of Section 230 is that you , not the website where you post it , are liable for what you post online .
This doesn ’ t just apply to social media , but to online marketplaces as well @ @ @ @ @ @ @ hard to see how Airbnb ’ s , or eBay ’ s , or Craigslist ’ s , or much of Amazon ’ s business model would survive .
Yet all of these services allow countless small mom-and-pop businesses to reach the customers they need to remain sustainable .
There ’ s a reason why the hotel industry has aggressively lobbied for repeal of Sec .
230 as part of its assault on Airbnb .
They hate the competition .
Yes , Section 230 has helped make many people in San Francisco and @ @ @ @ @ @ @ not mean it has come at the expense of the political or economic power of communities in red states .
In fact , just the opposite has happened .
Anyone with a smartphone is now his or her own journalist , advertiser , or entrepreneur with direct access to virtually limitless audiences and customer bases .
What would truly empower the few at the expense of the many , and conservatives in particular , would be to allow President Trump and his allies to amend Section 230 for their own short-term political gain @ @ @ @ @ @ @ as dragon slayers when all they really did was kill a golden goose .

By now most people will have seen various Republican politicians, including President Trump, lash out at tech giants in one way or another. The attacks stem from a perception that these companies, mostly based in West Coast liberal bastions, are using their power to silence voices on the right. It certainly makes for good political fodder with the conservative base. Conservatives spent decades justifiably frustrated with the traditional mainstream media, but this is very different.
The current GOP strategy of attacking big tech may produce some short-term political gain for President Trump and his allies, but it will come at the cost of a long-run political and economic nightmare for the Republican party.
These days, their favored strategy is targeting a provision of the Communications Decency Act called Section 230. President Trump signed an executive order targeting it last week.
Some critics on the right see Section 230 as a license to be biased. That is incorrect. It is a license for companies to exercise their protected rights of free speech, association, and property rights. In doing so, Section 230 has empowered companies to leave their websites mostly free and open to those who agree to abide by their terms and conditions.
Section 230 provides third-party liability protection critical to the rise and survival of the Internet companies we know today, from Airbnb to Zoom. With a few exceptions, it means that you are responsible for what you say on Twitter or Facebook or any other website, not the website itself.
In the very early days of the web, before Section 230 became law in 1996, if a website moderated content—by, for example, deleting pornography or spam—the site assumed liability for the thousands of things posted daily. As a result, many sites wouldn’t moderate at all. Or allow comments. This is one of the many reasons a world without 230 looks very different and very grim for conservatives, and they should be careful what they wish for.
Without Section 230, companies would be forced to choose between heavily restricted access and completely open access. In the latter case, content moderators would no longer be able to remove objectionable content like pornography, violence, terrorist propaganda from Facebook, Twitter, or YouTube. The Internet would quickly become inundated with such objectionable material. Like it or not, such content is generally protected by the First Amendment. After all, the First Amendment has never been about protecting speech everyone likes.
Despite what may be legitimate issues of bias in tech companies’ application of their terms and conditions, conservatives must look at the overwhelmingly positive net impact that big tech has had in allowing them to advance their ideas. For example, YouTube would not exist in a world without Section 230. In practice, that means conservative radio host Dennis Prager’s PragerU videos would not have 1 billion-plus collective views.
Prager’s example perfectly illustrates a broader problem on the right. Despite amassing astronomical numbers of clicks and views—enormous in comparison even to some of the most-watched programs on television news—Prager filed an ill-fated suit against Google, YouTube’s parent company, alleging bias and censorship. The Ninth Circuit tossed the suit in an unanimous 3-0 decision with two GOP-appointed judges affirming the company’s First Amendment rights to determine what content to allow on its platform.
Podcast · August 15 2023 A.B. Stoddard: All the Ex-President’s Conspirators Donald Trump has been a low-rent mobster for his entire career, and now he’s getting…
The strategy to target big tech now has shifted from courts of law to the court of public opinion. Conservatives are now arguing that since big tech companies are making editorial judgments about the content on their websites, they should lose the protection of Section 230. Yet Section 230 explicitly allows companies to make such constitutionally protected judgments without fear of tort lawsuits for anything else on their websites they may have missed. A company shouldn’t be responsible for small amounts of libelous or slanderous content among the sea of routine posts just because they choose to filter out pornography. It’s impossible to know, for example, if a comment is libelous in every instance.
Let’s bring this into focus in terms of the right’s political strategy. Some conservatives do not like the way private companies are exercising their constitutional rights. In response, they are threatening to let trial lawyers, an industry notorious for its deep ties to the political left, and long a GOP bogeyman, enrich themselves by suing tech companies into oblivion.
Adding insult to injury for conservatives is the other industry that would benefit the most from the elimination of Section 230—print and broadcast journalism. Ultimately, most “free” online services rely on advertising dollars. They compete vigorously for those dollars with traditional media companies.
Eliminating Section 230 would reinvigorate the dominant media gatekeepers that conservatives have long accused of shutting out their viewpoints. For web services focused on user-created content that do manage to survive, content-moderation practices would be significantly tightened—and ultimately enforced by the same people being accused of anti-conservative bias today. Put simply, it would give even more power to tighten the screws to the people that Senator Josh Hawley, a leading critic of Sec. 230, distrusts in the first place.
Prominent conservative voices would find themselves back at square one and forfeit the largely open access to enormous audiences they enjoy today. Perhaps it would be useful for a victimhood-themed donation appeal, but it seems penny wise and pound foolish as a long-term strategy.
Conservatives should also be extremely wary about the negative economic impact of modifying Sec. 230.
President Trump loves to tout the stock market as an indicator of the success of his policies. What do you think will happen to the market if he is successful in his effort to “revoke 230,” as he recently Tweeted? (With no sense of irony.) Alphabet (parent company of Google), Facebook, Apple, Amazon, Microsoft, and other tech giants capitalized at or nearing $1 trillion rely on Section 230 in many critical aspects of their businesses. It’s hard to comprehend the impact on financial markets of telling the most valuable companies in history to throw much of their business model out the window.
But Section 230 isn’t just about the big guys. Section 230 is a key ingredient in the lifeblood of many mom-and-pop businesses and other small businesses aspiring to take on the big guys.
Today, major tech companies devote enormous resources to moderate content on their websites—resources the next Facebook or Google being coded in a dorm room or garage today doesn’t have. Section 230 allows these upstarts to focus time and resources on building a better core product instead of policing content that is growing at an exponential rate. MySpace was being called a monopoly just over a decade ago, while no one realized Facebook was eating MySpace’s lunch. This probably won’t happen again if Section 230 protections are eliminated.
Some conservatives might not care about what happens to Silicon Valley firms and entrepreneurs with deep pockets. They should. Section 230 is responsible for countless small non-tech businesses across the country. My own parents sustain their retirement with a small cottage-rental business powered by Airbnb and HomeAway. Without Section 230, they’d be left sticking “For Rent” signs in the yard and hoping someone interested happened to be driving by on the back roads of New England.
Again, the crux of Section 230 is that you, not the website where you post it, are liable for what you post online. This doesn’t just apply to social media, but to online marketplaces as well. Without 230, it’s hard to see how Airbnb’s, or eBay’s, or Craigslist’s, or much of Amazon’s business model would survive. Yet all of these services allow countless small mom-and-pop businesses to reach the customers they need to remain sustainable. There’s a reason why the hotel industry has aggressively lobbied for repeal of Sec. 230 as part of its assault on Airbnb. They hate the competition.
Yes, Section 230 has helped make many people in San Francisco and Seattle very rich, but that does not mean it has come at the expense of the political or economic power of communities in red states. In fact, just the opposite has happened. Anyone with a smartphone is now his or her own journalist, advertiser, or entrepreneur with direct access to virtually limitless audiences and customer bases.
What would truly empower the few at the expense of the many, and conservatives in particular, would be to allow President Trump and his allies to amend Section 230 for their own short-term political gain. They’re going to pose as dragon slayers when all they really did was kill a golden goose.


thebulwark--2020-06-04--Racial Injustice Remains the Great Weakness of American Democracy

The sickening video of a Minneapolis police officer kneeling on the neck of George Floyd—impairing his breathing and ultimately killing him—has once again laid bare the great weakness of American democracy : racial injustice .
In the days since the video gained public attention , this chronic civic ailment has only seemed to metastasize , damaging a number of other basic rights .
The United States arguably has one of the most dynamic political systems in the world , with powerful legal protections for the news media and expansive freedom to associate and peacefully protest .
Yet journalists covering the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , and arrested even as they identify themselves as reporters—a profound breach of constitutional guarantees .
And the right to assemble is being denied , as militarized police forces tear-gas peaceful protesters in many cities .
These immediate abuses must stop , but the nation must also come together to address the underlying problem .
It has been over half a century since the landmark laws won by the civil rights movement were passed by Congress and signed into law by President Lyndon Johnson .
Freedom House supported these measures , as we @ @ @ @ @ @ @ America ’ s ability to uphold freedom abroad depends on the steady improvement of justice and democracy at home .
Important changes for the better have taken place , but we still have far to go .
As many citizens and leaders of all backgrounds have noted during the current crisis , when it comes to the crucial matters of daily life , like getting a job , buying a home , finding a good neighborhood school for one ’ s children , or simply walking the streets without fear of police profiling @ @ @ @ @ @ @ amounts to second-class citizenship .
Crucially , they are more likely to be targets of police violence and harsh sentencing .
The United States is certainly not alone in its shortcomings .
As part of our annual Freedom in the World report , Freedom House assesses the quality of political rights and civil liberties in every country in the world .
Democracy has suffered a decline globally in recent years , due especially to the pernicious ways in which many governments and societies have discriminated against certain racial , ethnic , and religious @ @ @ @ @ @ @ their entire countries , political leaders in a variety of settings are pursuing narrow visions of national interest that exclude or , worse , persecute vulnerable populations .
Unfortunately , America is contributing to the problem when it should be offering solutions .
Authoritarian leaders worldwide will use our behavior to justify their own .
While many protests triggered by George Floyd ’ s death have proceeded or commenced peacefully , there have also been nightly televised images that suggest a nation careening out of control .
Social media help Americans organize , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ of violence and the spread of disinformation about conditions on the ground .
Instead of attempting to calm the unrest , President Trump has offered polarizing tweets and Rose Garden threats that further strain our country ’ s social and political fabric , and he has put forth proposals intended to chill speech rather than protect it .
Coupled with the human and economic impact of the COVID-19 pandemic , all of this makes for a profoundly unsettling time that calls for moral and political leadership to bring our country together .
We @ @ @ @ @ @ @ to address the deficit in racial justice .
African Americans are imprisoned at a vastly disproportionate rate .
There has been an impressive bipartisan movement to reform the criminal justice system with the goal of reducing mass incarceration , and this should press forward .
The events of the past week should also act as an impetus to implement reforms in policing tactics .
Numerous studies have identified police methods that are overly aggressive and too reliant on tools and ideas borrowed from the military .
Governors , mayors , and chiefs of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ back the “ warrior ” approach to law enforcement and move swiftly to adopt institutional improvements , including greater training on deescalation techniques .
Presidential leadership at this moment is critical .
We will not move toward racial justice if our public officials are focused on shifting blame , engaging in partisan attacks , and stoking polarization .
Instead , leaders should be enjoining Americans to remember and act on our highest ideals of equality , unity , and freedom .
There is reason for hope .
Racial injustice has plagued this country @ @ @ @ @ @ @ includes moments of great bravery and righteousness as well .
We now live in a world where technology can be used to expose injustice in real time .
We have no choice but to confront it .
And civil society—active citizens who are organizing themselves to create a more perfect union—is out in full force and ready to do so .
Ordinary people willing to speak , protest , and mobilize for lasting change are the bedrock of a robust democracy .
Viewed through that lens , our democracy is very strong indeed @

The sickening video of a Minneapolis police officer kneeling on the neck of George Floyd—impairing his breathing and ultimately killing him—has once again laid bare the great weakness of American democracy: racial injustice. In the days since the video gained public attention, this chronic civic ailment has only seemed to metastasize, damaging a number of other basic rights.
The United States arguably has one of the most dynamic political systems in the world, with powerful legal protections for the news media and expansive freedom to associate and peacefully protest. Yet journalists covering the recent demonstrations have been harassed, assaulted, and arrested even as they identify themselves as reporters—a profound breach of constitutional guarantees. And the right to assemble is being denied, as militarized police forces tear-gas peaceful protesters in many cities. These immediate abuses must stop, but the nation must also come together to address the underlying problem.
It has been over half a century since the landmark laws won by the civil rights movement were passed by Congress and signed into law by President Lyndon Johnson. Freedom House supported these measures, as we have recognized throughout our long history that America’s ability to uphold freedom abroad depends on the steady improvement of justice and democracy at home.
Important changes for the better have taken place, but we still have far to go. As many citizens and leaders of all backgrounds have noted during the current crisis, when it comes to the crucial matters of daily life, like getting a job, buying a home, finding a good neighborhood school for one’s children, or simply walking the streets without fear of police profiling, African Americans still regularly experience what amounts to second-class citizenship. Crucially, they are more likely to be targets of police violence and harsh sentencing.
The United States is certainly not alone in its shortcomings. As part of our annual Freedom in the World report, Freedom House assesses the quality of political rights and civil liberties in every country in the world. Democracy has suffered a decline globally in recent years, due especially to the pernicious ways in which many governments and societies have discriminated against certain racial, ethnic, and religious groups. Rather than trying to represent their entire countries, political leaders in a variety of settings are pursuing narrow visions of national interest that exclude or, worse, persecute vulnerable populations. Unfortunately, America is contributing to the problem when it should be offering solutions. Authoritarian leaders worldwide will use our behavior to justify their own.
Podcast · August 15 2023 A.B. Stoddard: All the Ex-President’s Conspirators Donald Trump has been a low-rent mobster for his entire career, and now he’s getting…
While many protests triggered by George Floyd’s death have proceeded or commenced peacefully, there have also been nightly televised images that suggest a nation careening out of control. Social media help Americans organize, but they also facilitate the deliberate encouragement of violence and the spread of disinformation about conditions on the ground. Instead of attempting to calm the unrest, President Trump has offered polarizing tweets and Rose Garden threats that further strain our country’s social and political fabric, and he has put forth proposals intended to chill speech rather than protect it.
Coupled with the human and economic impact of the COVID-19 pandemic, all of this makes for a profoundly unsettling time that calls for moral and political leadership to bring our country together.
We urgently need a new, bipartisan effort to address the deficit in racial justice. African Americans are imprisoned at a vastly disproportionate rate. There has been an impressive bipartisan movement to reform the criminal justice system with the goal of reducing mass incarceration, and this should press forward. The events of the past week should also act as an impetus to implement reforms in policing tactics. Numerous studies have identified police methods that are overly aggressive and too reliant on tools and ideas borrowed from the military. Governors, mayors, and chiefs of police should take immediate action to roll back the “warrior” approach to law enforcement and move swiftly to adopt institutional improvements, including greater training on deescalation techniques.
Presidential leadership at this moment is critical. We will not move toward racial justice if our public officials are focused on shifting blame, engaging in partisan attacks, and stoking polarization. Instead, leaders should be enjoining Americans to remember and act on our highest ideals of equality, unity, and freedom.
There is reason for hope. Racial injustice has plagued this country since its founding, but our history includes moments of great bravery and righteousness as well. We now live in a world where technology can be used to expose injustice in real time. We have no choice but to confront it. And civil society—active citizens who are organizing themselves to create a more perfect union—is out in full force and ready to do so. Ordinary people willing to speak, protest, and mobilize for lasting change are the bedrock of a robust democracy. Viewed through that lens, our democracy is very strong indeed.


thebulwark--2020-06-04--The ‘Tear Gas Hoax’ Hoax

The ‘Tear Gas Hoax’ Hoax

By now , everyone reading this is aware that on Monday night President Trump committed a grotesque and unconstitutional abuse of power : To show that he was “ reclaiming the territory ” around the White House , our channel-surfing faux-strongman had law enforcement officers use gas , rubber pellets , batons , and smoke grenades to violently disrupt a peaceful protest just north of Lafayette Square—before curfew—under orders of Attorney General William Barr .
After the inevitable blowback from this action on “ the shows , ” the Trump administration and its propagandists—both in the public and private sectors—began @ @ @ @ @ @ @ of Monday evening .
Maybe the U.S. Park Police acted on its own out of self-defense , they suggested .
Maybe its officers didn ’ t use tear gas , they suggested .
Maybe this was all one big coincidence .
In short , they think you are fucking stupid .
But because this is how we live now , we have to take apart this hoax that tries to convince Americans that a real thing , that they saw with their own eyes , was actually something else .
Not that we @ @ @ @ @ @ @ tried this before .
Before we get to the debunking of the “ debunking , ” if you feel at all uncertain about what happened outside the White House on Monday , I implore you to not take my word for it .
Stop , click this link , and go to the 24:00 mark .
Watch for as long as you can stomach it .
That video is the enraging , sickening , unconscionable , and un-American reality .
Now , let ’ s go to the Trumpist lies and propaganda .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ Monday night was that ackshually , the protest wasn ’ t “ peaceful.
” In this telling , the police were merely responding to violence and the entire coordinated move to clear the area moments before the president walked through it was mere coincidence .
This line was elevated in a statement released Tuesday by the acting head of the Park Police ( who is a fellow reportedly with a history of lying ) .
He alleges that a violent attack began in the area at 6:33 p.m and the Park Police began @ @ @ @ @ @ @ response to that violence .
This claim is absurd on its face .
The president of the United States was going to walk down that street 28 minutes later , at 7:01 p.m. , and the Secret Service does not allow the president to wade through throngs of screaming protesters .
It is obviously the case that the street clearance was ordered to protect the president ’ s movement .
The preposterous Park Service story would have you believe that in the moments before the request to clear the area came down from @ @ @ @ @ @ @ launched an attack that required snuffing out .
But even that improbable version of events has quite a few problems : • For starters , a senior Justice Department official said that it was William Barr who ordered the police action .
• This statement makes some sense .
Look here , Barr is the guy in the Jos .
A .
Bank suit .
He ’ s standing around behind the police at 6:19 , shortly before the supposed “ violence ” broke out .
What would he be doing here if @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ?
• Also , in the raw video you can see the addition of the Secret Service civil disturbance unit forming behind the Park Police .
The Washington Post reported that Trump ’ s deputy chief of staff Tony Ornato requested that the Secret Service prepare the area for the president ’ s stroll .
So we have common sense , video evidence , and an admission by administration officials that law enforcement ’ s violent actions were directed proactively by the White House in order to create Trump ’ s photo op @ @ @ @ @ @ @ me .
Even though the discussion regarding whether the protesters instigated the police action is resolved , it ’ s worth looking at the accusation that they were violent .
All the evidence indicates they were peaceful : • Several journalists who were on the scene reported that they saw no evidence of violent protest .
• Radley Balko of the Washington Post scoured videos for evidence of protesters instigating attacks and found none .
• An Episcopal priest wrote a harrowing first-person account on Facebook of her experience being violently driven off @ @ @ @ @ @ @ s Church with gas and grenades and riot gear , after peaceably gathering with other clergy and volunteers .
Which means that we have hours of video footage and multiple on-the-record accounts on one side against a vague claim—with no supporting testimony or documentation—from a government bureaucrat with an alleged history of lying .
No reasonable person could look at the timeline , the video and photographic evidence , and the testimony and conclude that law enforcement cleared the area because the protest turned violent .
Anyone trying to further that story is @ @ @ @ @ @ @ faith .
The next story put out in defense of the president came from White House press secretary Kayleigh McEnany , who claimed on Wednesday that the police did not actually use tear gas or rubber bullets during the action by Lafayette Square .
McEnany did not come up with this line on her own .
She ripped it from the Federalist ’ s Mollie Hemingway , who , in a Tuesday-night article tweeted out by the president , asserted that “ tear gas was never used—instead smoke canisters were deployed.
” Before @ @ @ @ @ @ @ merits , it is worth pausing to underscore something important : The attorney general forcibly removing law-abiding , peaceful protesters who are exercising their right to assembly is an affront to our constitutional order no matter which specific means are employed .
Whether the government uses batons or tear gas or horse-sized ducks , it ’ s still wildly out of bounds .
It makes no sense to say , They only violated the Constitution with smoke bombs .
We ’ re good here .
That is not how the Constitution works .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ its democratic values to the world .
But this “ no tear gas ” claim isn ’ t just idiotic .
It is also untrue .
Nathan Baca , a WUSA9 reporter on the scene , picked up one of the very canisters that Hemingway claimed was a “ smoke canister.
” You can see it here .
Right there on the canister it says “ OC ” gas .
Now I ’ m not a lachrymator-agent expert so I went to the trusty Google machine and typed in “ OC gas canister @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
Voila : ( 1 ) The first hit was the Wikipedia entry for tear gas , which states : “ Common lachrymators , which were used as tear gas , include pepper spray ( OC gas ) , PAVA spray ( nonivamide ) , CS gas , CR gas , CN gas ( phenacyl chloride ) , bromoacetone , xylyl bromide , and Mace ( a branded mixture ) .
” ( 2 ) Next was KeepShooting.com advertising a “ Tear Gas Grenade ” that is a CS/OC gas mixture .
( @ @ @ @ @ @ @ offers a comparison between OC Pepper Gas Spray and CS Tear Gas Spray .
Let ’ s take a look at how that page , published by a company that specializes in “ trauma cleaning and biohazard removal , ” explains the effects of each : As far as the semantic debate over whether OC pepper spray is concerned , “ tear gas ” is not a brand name .
It does not refer to a specific chemical compound .
It is a generic category for any number of airborne substances that achieve @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
So in the real-world sense , it is untrue to say that no tear-gas was used against the protesters gathered near Lafayette Square .
But it ’ s also untrue in even the most hypertechnical sense .
Trump ’ s Baghdad Betties could have been a little more precise and said , “ the police didn ’ t use CS gas or CR gas ” and tried to play a shell game .
Instead they flatly claim that “ tear gas ” was not used .
And this claim is just not @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the way that protesters experienced the gassing .
Because here are the facts : • There is physical evidence in the form of a used OC canister .
• There is testimony from multiple people who experienced the effects of tear gas .
• There is an extremely disturbing video of individuals suffering the effects of tear gas .
Again : The very definition of “ tear gas ” is an airborne chemical agent that acts as a lachrymator .
Which is exactly what was used against the protesters .
There is no @ @ @ @ @ @ @ identical on the question of the use of “ rubber bullets.
” Though in this case , Trump ’ s obfuscators have at least a veil of pedantry to hide behind .
Witnesses on the scene claimed to have been shot by the police with rubber bullets .
One woman showed a reporter massive welts that she believed came from a rubber bullet .
Another found what she believed were rubber bullets on the ground .
But the next morning a passerby found an unexploded flash-bang grenade on the ground .
Have a @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ordnance : “ Rubber.
” It turns out that the device in the picture , the Stinger Grenade , is a “ maximum effect device that delivers three stimuli for psychological and physiological effects : rubber pellets , light , and sound.
” We can finally score one for the Always Trumpers .
The peaceful protesters gathered north of Lafayette Square were not hit by rubber bullets shot from guns by police officers targeting violent actors .
No .
Absolutely not .
That ’ s just what the media wants you to think @ @ @ @ @ @ @ protesters were hit by rubber shrapnel exploding from grenades tossed indiscriminately into their midst .
So , you know , take that ?
A few years ago David Frum wrote about how gun-rights activists defend their turf whenever there ’ s a mass shooting .
Rather than discussing the broad fact pattern , they beat the reformers to death with minutiae .
“ It wasn ’ t an automatic weapon , you ignorant slut .
It was a semi-auto on burst-mode with a clip extender !
” And then the two sides go @ @ @ @ @ @ @ until you turn into a corn cob and another school gets shot up .
Rinse and repeat .
But whatever you think about the gun crowd , at least they know the technical details they ’ re talking about .
The MAGA Pravda Gaslighters don ’ t even bother going that far .
Like their leader , they ’ ve come to understand that the Big Lie doesn ’ t even have to be plausible .
Its power comes just from the act of speaking it out loud .
It shows that the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ does not .
It gives the uneducated foot soldiers the only talking point they need to feel like they “ won ” the battle in the comments section on their niece ’ s Facebook post .
This isn ’ t an attempt to cover the government ’ s tracks .
It ’ s just another assertion of dominance .
But facts do matter .
And here they are : A large group of Americans assembled on Monday to exercise their constitutional rights of free speech and free assembly .
There is no evidence @ @ @ @ @ @ @ is a great deal of evidence to suggest that they were peaceful .
The government decided to forcibly remove these citizens and practice physical violence against them at the order of the attorney general , so that the president could have a photo op .
These citizens were struck with batons and shields .
They were punched .
They were subjected to tear gas .
And they were hit with rubber bullets .
No , sorry : rubber pellet shrapnel .
They were hit with rubber pellet shrapnel which was ejected over a @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the police threw at them .
It is so important to get the facts right .
Last night General James Mattis , the former secretary of defense , ended his silence about this administration and spoke out on this horrific scene in particular saying : “ Never did I dream that troops taking that same oath would be ordered under any circumstance to violate the Constitutional rights of their fellow citizens—much less to provide a bizarre photo op for the elected commander-in-chief , with military leadership standing alongside.
” What Mattis offers is @ @ @ @ @ @ @ of what transpired .
What Trump and McEnany and Hemingway ( and Hume and Grenell and on and on ) are demanding is that you not believe your lyin ’ eyes .
So watch this deeply un-American scene one more time .
Share it with your friends .
It should be enough to make you shed a tear .

By now, everyone reading this is aware that on Monday night President Trump committed a grotesque and unconstitutional abuse of power: To show that he was “reclaiming the territory” around the White House, our channel-surfing faux-strongman had law enforcement officers use gas, rubber pellets, batons, and smoke grenades to violently disrupt a peaceful protest just north of Lafayette Square—before curfew—under orders of Attorney General William Barr.
After the inevitable blowback from this action on “the shows,” the Trump administration and its propagandists—both in the public and private sectors—began test-driving some alternative facts about the events of Monday evening. Maybe the U.S. Park Police acted on its own out of self-defense, they suggested. Maybe its officers didn’t use tear gas, they suggested. Maybe this was all one big coincidence.
In short, they think you are fucking stupid.
But because this is how we live now, we have to take apart this hoax that tries to convince Americans that a real thing, that they saw with their own eyes, was actually something else.
Not that we should be surprised: They’ve tried this before.
Before we get to the debunking of the “debunking,” if you feel at all uncertain about what happened outside the White House on Monday, I implore you to not take my word for it. Stop, click this link, and go to the 24:00 mark. Watch for as long as you can stomach it.
That video is the enraging, sickening, unconscionable, and un-American reality.
Now, let’s go to the Trumpist lies and propaganda.
Podcast · August 15 2023 A.B. Stoddard: All the Ex-President’s Conspirators Donald Trump has been a low-rent mobster for his entire career, and now he’s getting…
The first claim that started percolating on Monday night was that ackshually, the protest wasn’t “peaceful.” In this telling, the police were merely responding to violence and the entire coordinated move to clear the area moments before the president walked through it was mere coincidence.
This line was elevated in a statement released Tuesday by the acting head of the Park Police (who is a fellow reportedly with a history of lying). He alleges that a violent attack began in the area at 6:33 p.m and the Park Police began to clear out the protesters only in response to that violence.
This claim is absurd on its face. The president of the United States was going to walk down that street 28 minutes later, at 7:01 p.m., and the Secret Service does not allow the president to wade through throngs of screaming protesters. It is obviously the case that the street clearance was ordered to protect the president’s movement.
The preposterous Park Service story would have you believe that in the moments before the request to clear the area came down from the Secret Service, some rogue protesters launched an attack that required snuffing out. But even that improbable version of events has quite a few problems:
For starters, a senior Justice Department official said that it was William Barr who ordered the police action.
This statement makes some sense. Look here, Barr is the guy in the Jos. A. Bank suit. He’s standing behind the police at 6:19, shortly before the supposed “violence” broke out. What would he be doing here if he hadn’t ordered the action?
Also, in the raw video you can see the addition of the Secret Service civil disturbance unit forming behind the Park Police. The Washington Post reported that Trump’s deputy chief of staff Tony Ornato requested that the Secret Service prepare the area for the president’s stroll.
So we have common sense, video evidence, and an admission by administration officials that law enforcement’s violent actions were directed proactively by the White House in order to create Trump’s photo op. Seems like an open-and-shut case to me.
Even though the discussion regarding whether the protesters instigated the police action is resolved, it’s worth looking at the accusation that they were violent. All the evidence indicates they were peaceful:
Several journalists who were on the scene reported that they saw no evidence of violent protest.
Radley Balko of the Washington Post scoured videos for evidence of protesters instigating attacks and found none.
An Episcopal priest wrote a harrowing first-person account on Facebook of her experience being violently driven off of the patio of St. John’s Church with gas and grenades and riot gear, after peaceably gathering with other clergy and volunteers.
Which means that we have hours of video footage and multiple on-the-record accounts on one side against a vague claim—with no supporting testimony or documentation—from a government bureaucrat with an alleged history of lying.
No reasonable person could look at the timeline, the video and photographic evidence, and the testimony and conclude that law enforcement cleared the area because the protest turned violent.
Anyone trying to further that story is either willfully uninformed or arguing in bad faith.
The next story put out in defense of the president came from White House press secretary Kayleigh McEnany, who claimed on Wednesday that the police did not actually use tear gas or rubber bullets during the action by Lafayette Square.
McEnany did not come up with this line on her own. She ripped it from the Federalist’s Mollie Hemingway, who, in a Tuesday-night article tweeted out by the president, asserted that “tear gas was never used—instead smoke canisters were deployed.”
Before we deal with this claim on the merits, it is worth pausing to underscore something important:
The attorney general forcibly removing law-abiding, peaceful protesters who are exercising their right to assembly is an affront to our constitutional order no matter which specific means are employed. Whether the government uses batons or tear gas or horse-sized ducks, it’s still wildly out of bounds.
It makes no sense to say, They only violated the Constitution with smoke bombs. We’re good here.
That is not how the Constitution works. Nor is it how America should project its democratic values to the world.
But this “no tear gas” claim isn’t just idiotic. It is also untrue.
Nathan Baca, a WUSA9 reporter on the scene, picked up one of the very canisters that Hemingway claimed was a “smoke canister.” You can see it here.
When @usparkpolicepio says they didn’t use “CS or CN” tear gas, technically that’s correct. “OC” gas cannisters used instead. Causes same tears, tight breath and comes out green. This is not a smoke canister. I picked this off the street after it was launched at us Monday. pic.twitter.com/UuGJy0A6cr — Nathan Baca (@NathanBacaTV) June 3, 2020
Right there on the canister it says “OC” gas.
Now I’m not a lachrymator-agent expert so I went to the trusty Google machine and typed in “OC gas canister” to see what would come up. Voila:
(1) The first hit was the Wikipedia entry for tear gas, which states: “Common lachrymators, which were used as tear gas, include pepper spray (OC gas), PAVA spray (nonivamide), CS gas, CR gas, CN gas (phenacyl chloride), bromoacetone, xylyl bromide, and Mace (a branded mixture).”
(2) Next was KeepShooting.com advertising a “Tear Gas Grenade” that is a CS/OC gas mixture.
(3) And then a website that offers a comparison between OC Pepper Gas Spray and CS Tear Gas Spray. Let’s take a look at how that page, published by a company that specializes in “trauma cleaning and biohazard removal,” explains the effects of each:
[OC Pepper Gas Spray] Physical Effects: Uncontrollable watering of the eyes, extreme burning of the eyes and nose, temporary blindness, nasal and sinus discharge, burning of the skin, increase in blood pressure. In most cases, the symptoms of pepper spray last no longer than 45-60 minutes. . . . [CS Tear Gas Spray] Physical effects: Extreme burning of the nose, eyes, and throat, involuntary closing of the eyes, coughing, rise in blood pressure, mucus secretion, nausea, and vomiting. In most cases, the symptoms of tear gas spray subside within 30 minutes.
As far as the semantic debate over whether OC pepper spray is concerned, “tear gas” is not a brand name. It does not refer to a specific chemical compound. It is a generic category for any number of airborne substances that achieve a set of physical effects on people.
So in the real-world sense, it is untrue to say that no tear-gas was used against the protesters gathered near Lafayette Square.
But it’s also untrue in even the most hypertechnical sense. Trump’s Baghdad Betties could have been a little more precise and said, “the police didn’t use CS gas or CR gas” and tried to play a shell game. Instead they flatly claim that “tear gas” was not used.
UPDATE: After this article was published, a new report indicated that the claim that law enforcement didn’t use tear gas was not just untrue in the technical or colloquial senses, but in the most literal possible interpretation as well. WUSA9 reporter Nathan Baca, who first reported finding the OC canister pictured above, on Thursday morning tweeted pictures of another canister found at the scene on Monday night, this one labeled “CS”—the very type of tear gas that the Trump administration and its apologists have repeatedly claimed was not used in the Lafayette Square incident:
I’ve reached out to @usparkpolicepio to explain why our @wusa9 crew picked up both artificial CS & natural CS tear gas canisters on H & 17th St Monday night. Please explain @realDonaldTrump @PressSec https://t.co/72Hs2eNMMY pic.twitter.com/s7wgzf9Pc2 — Nathan Baca (@NathanBacaTV) June 4, 2020
And this claim is just not true in the technical sense or in the way that protesters experienced the gassing.
Because here are the facts:
There is physical evidence in the form of a used OC canister.
There is testimony from multiple people who experienced the effects of tear gas.
There is an extremely disturbing video of individuals suffering the effects of tear gas.
Again: The very definition of “tear gas” is an airborne chemical agent that acts as a lachrymator. Which is exactly what was used against the protesters.
There is no alternative explanation.
The story is almost identical on the question of the use of “rubber bullets.” Though in this case, Trump’s obfuscators have at least a veil of pedantry to hide behind.
Witnesses on the scene claimed to have been shot by the police with rubber bullets. One woman showed a reporter massive welts that she believed came from a rubber bullet. Another found what she believed were rubber bullets on the ground.
But the next morning a passerby found an unexploded flash-bang grenade on the ground. Have a look:
Very relieved that the unexploded flash-bang grenade that my daughter found and innocently picked up this morning didn't explode in her face. Beyond angry that it was left on the streets of our capital city. pic.twitter.com/ruAQ7dCotC — Ed Felten (@EdFelten) June 2, 2020
Note the word on the ordnance: “Rubber.”
It turns out that the device in the picture, the Stinger Grenade, is a “maximum effect device that delivers three stimuli for psychological and physiological effects: rubber pellets, light, and sound.”
Rubber pellets.
Here’s how the Stinger operates:
The Stinger Rubber Ball Grenade has an initial 1.5 second delay that initiates fuze assembly separation, followed by another .5 second delay before the blast which is sufficient to project the rubber balls in a 50 foot radius.
We can finally score one for the Always Trumpers. The peaceful protesters gathered north of Lafayette Square were not hit by rubber bullets shot from guns by police officers targeting violent actors.
No. Absolutely not. That’s just what the media wants you to think.
The real story is that peaceful protesters were hit by rubber shrapnel exploding from grenades tossed indiscriminately into their midst.
So, you know, take that?
A few years ago David Frum wrote about how gun-rights activists defend their turf whenever there’s a mass shooting. Rather than discussing the broad fact pattern, they beat the reformers to death with minutiae. “It wasn’t an automatic weapon, you ignorant slut. It was a semi-auto on burst-mode with a clip extender!” And then the two sides go round and round on what Armalite is until you turn into a corn cob and another school gets shot up. Rinse and repeat.
But whatever you think about the gun crowd, at least they know the technical details they’re talking about. The MAGA Pravda Gaslighters don’t even bother going that far. Like their leader, they’ve come to understand that the Big Lie doesn’t even have to be plausible.
Its power comes just from the act of speaking it out loud. It shows that the liar has the power and the listener does not. It gives the uneducated foot soldiers the only talking point they need to feel like they “won” the battle in the comments section on their niece’s Facebook post.
This isn’t an attempt to cover the government’s tracks. It’s just another assertion of dominance.
But facts do matter. And here they are:
A large group of Americans assembled on Monday to exercise their constitutional rights of free speech and free assembly. There is no evidence that they broke any laws. There is a great deal of evidence to suggest that they were peaceful.
The government decided to forcibly remove these citizens and practice physical violence against them at the order of the attorney general, so that the president could have a photo op.
These citizens were struck with batons and shields. They were punched. They were subjected to tear gas. And they were hit with rubber bullets. No, sorry: rubber pellet shrapnel. They were hit with rubber pellet shrapnel which was ejected over a 50-foot radius by each Def-Tec Stinger grenade the police threw at them.
It is so important to get the facts right.
Last night General James Mattis, the former secretary of defense, ended his silence about this administration and spoke out on this horrific scene in particular saying: “Never did I dream that troops taking that same oath would be ordered under any circumstance to violate the Constitutional rights of their fellow citizens—much less to provide a bizarre photo op for the elected commander-in-chief, with military leadership standing alongside.”
What Mattis offers is clarity about the moral and civic meaning of what transpired.
What Trump and McEnany and Hemingway (and Hume and Grenell and on and on) are demanding is that you not believe your lyin’ eyes.
So watch this deeply un-American scene one more time. Share it with your friends.
It should be enough to make you shed a tear.
****
NOTE (June 4, 2020, 12:06 p.m. EDT): This article has been updated to reflect a new report indicating that a used CS gas canister was found by journalists on Monday at the scene of the Lafayette Square incident.


thebulwark--2020-06-04--Trump and the American Idiocracy

Trump and the American Idiocracy

Now it is .
Just in time for Donald Trump to mishandle a lethal pandemic and inflame an incendiary racial crisis .
The cost in lives , and to our national spirit , has yet to be reckoned .
“ How , ” asks Stephen Walt , “ could a serious country possibly choose as its leader a narcissistic , manifestly unqualified self-promoter with a long track record of failure and deceit ?
” The answer , in great measure , is that too many Americans stopped caring about capacity or knowledge , and so elected an uncredentialed ignoramus .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ of a growing disdain among Republicans for the intellect , experience , wisdom , and respect for expertise essential to governance .
Historically , American anti-intellectualism has been as bipartisan as ignorance .
But by trafficking for decades in a pseudo-populist contempt for perceived elites , the GOP wound up creating a political Frankenstein monster : an American idiocracy governed by an idiot .
The earliest , and most deserving , target of anti-elitism as politics was liberal academe .
In the 1960s , the ferociously intellectual William F. Buckley , Jr. propagated @ @ @ @ @ @ @ sooner live in a society governed by the first 2,000 names in the Boston telephone directory than a society governed by the 2,000 faculty members of Harvard University.
” But such tropes , as Buckley implied , soon influence our broader view of government .
Speaking on behalf of Barry Goldwater , Ronald Reagan asked voters to decide “ whether we believe in our capacity for self-government or whether we abandon the American revolution and confess that a little intellectual elite in a far-distant capital can plan our lives for us better than @ @ @ @ @ @ @ mind that , as the well-read Reagan well knew , the fathers of our revolution were an intellectual elite—the idea took hold .
“ We will never have the elite smart people on our side , ” Republican presidential candidate Rick Santorum said in 2012 , “ because they believe they should have the power to tell you what to do.
” “ The war on academia bleeds into a war on the very idea of expertise , ” writes Zack Beauchamp in Vox .
Scapegoating experts as the enemies of ordinary people @ @ @ @ @ @ @ instilling a belief “ that liberal elites are conning you , that they ’ re less competent than an ordinary person .
.
.
.
The very idea of nonpartisan knowledge production is obliterated.
” Tom Nichols , the conservative academic who teaches at the U.S .
Naval War College , addressed this phenomenon in his 2017 book The Death of Expertise .
Too many Americans , Nichols argues , prefer magical thinking to the fruits of education or experience .
A primary cause is that the complexity of modern life engenders feelings @ @ @ @ @ @ @ by increasingly unfathomable forces—and the sophisticated experts who propound them .
As it grows harder to comprehend subjects such as climate change , global trade , or virology—let alone our fraught and divisive experience of race—such people may seize upon contentions , however bogus , that facilitate believing whatever they wish .
This rejection of established knowledge and historical perspective serves as a psychic equalizer , enabling the angry and insecure to assert their autonomy from an effete and alien elite .
As hostility displaces humility and curiosity , public discourse devolves from @ @ @ @ @ @ @ misinformation .
This devolution is particularly acute in shaping our views about politics , decoupling our biases and delusions from the need for objective verification .
In this swampland of subjectivity , beliefs justify themselves simply by existing , creating a thickening fog of incomprehension wherein expertise competes with bunk .
The result is a pernicious intellectual populism in which anyone ’ s opinion , no matter how groundless , is equal to those rooted in assiduous research and analyses .
All one needs to validate an assertion is to express it .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ Republicans—59 percent , per a 2019 Pew Research survey—believe that colleges and universities have a negative effect on American life .
This attitude , in turn , accelerates a craving for simple answers , and a resentment of those who refute them .
Writes Nichols : “ When people are told that ending poverty or preventing terrorism or stimulating economic growth is a lot harder than it looks , they roll their eyes .
Unable to comprehend all the complexity around them , they choose instead to comprehend almost none of it and @ @ @ @ @ @ @ of their lives.
” In theory , the Internet should breed a more informed populace with widening access to knowledge .
Instead , Nichols argues , it has become a sorcerer ’ s apprentice in swamping genuine learning with nonsense .
“ The digital age , ” he contends , Moreover , this accretion of junk is ripe for manipulation .
Says Nichols : Such intellectual sloth helps proliferate conspiratorial thinking and undifferentiated outrage .
Nichols describes the process : Inevitably , such theories thrive by creating their own cul-de-sacs of irrefutability .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ ’ diabolical cleverness ; all who deconstruct the theory are agents of the conspiracy .
Paranoia suffocates logic .
Enter Trump .
“ In the Trump era , ” writes Beauchamp , “ [ Buckley ’ s ] vision has linked up to Trump ’ s swamp-draining , deep-state-blaming political style to produce a form of right-wing populism that treats the very idea of nonpartisan expertise as deeply suspect .
.
.
.
This is not a bug in Trumpism , but rather a feature .
The idea that all elites—not just intellectual @ @ @ @ @ @ @ has been central to the president ’ s political message from day one .
‘ Drain the swamp ’ and the war on the ‘ deep state ’ have served to position Trump as the ethical people ’ s champion ; he puts his unqualified daughter and son-in-law in the White House because it ’ s important to have people who are , first and foremost , loyal to Trump.
” Trump ’ s contempt for knowledge unleashes a related pathology which makes him as dangerous to our climate as he is to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ his own intellectual deficiencies that melds him with his followers .
Not only is Trump ignorant of his ignorance but , as George Will put it , “ he does not know what it is to know something.
” Hence our president ’ s most destructive lie : his claims of universal expertise .
Repeatedly , Trump has claimed some variant of “ nobody knows more than I do ” regarding a multitude of complex subjects : fiscal policy , the Federal Reserve , trade , tariffs , global warming , geopolitics , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , most recently , epidemiology and law enforcement .
Even for a self-proclaimed genius , Trump ’ s range impresses .
That ’ s the problem .
Perceiving the infinity of all they can never know , true geniuses are disinclined to overstate their gifts .
By contrast , Trump is a classic exemplar of the Dunning-Kruger Effect , named for two psychologists who demonstrated that the less knowledgeable and competent you are , the more you believe in your own superlative abilities .
Such benighted folks , wrote Dunning and Kruger , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ make unfortunate choices , but their incompetence robs them of the .
.
.
ability to realize it.
” Deaf to the voices of attainment and experience , Trump daily subjects America to his staggering incapacities .
The few capable advisers whom he hired have been replaced with sycophants who survive by indulging his groundless and dangerous conceits—condemning us to a president whose actions grow ever more unhinged .
In place of reason , he treats his followers to that staple of a stunted worldview : a mind-numbing series of conspiracy theories .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ disorder following George Floyd ’ s videotaped murder—is patently false ; another , Obamagate , is so diabolical that it not only defies refutation , but comprehension .
Not even our genius of a president can explain it .
This exemplifies a lynchpin of Trump ’ s quest for re-election : the deliberate destruction of our shared belief that verifiable truth is the foundation of political discourse .
As our societal agreement about credible sources and objective fact crumbles , so does our capacity to resist baseless theories , political quackery , and @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Trump with a credulous audience unwilling , or unable , to perceive his constant lies and lethal grandiosity—or to comprehend his subversion of our democratic institutions and traditions .
Trump ’ s intellectual Lotusland has a chorus of charlatans—Breitbart , Limbaugh , Fox News—whose counterfactual fulminations cement a class system of the mind that separates those addicted to fabulism and propaganda from those who are not .
Like other class systems , this perpetuates itself , enhancing the danger that the Trump presidency will prove to be not an aberration but a prototype @ @ @ @ @ @ @ s ignorance turned deadly .
Trump did not spawn this pandemic ; his inherent character , and the credulity of his loyalists , have simply made it worse—with no certain end in sight .
Many leaders—like those in Germany , South Korea , Taiwan , Australia , and New Zealand—managed to control the spread of COVID-19 by promptly heeding the advice of public health experts .
Not Trump .
He rejected expert counsel while encouraging true believers to ignore the risks , displaying , as usual , impatience with briefings from those who @ @ @ @ @ @ @ And , as usual , others paid the price : had he acted sooner , according to modelers at Columbia University , he could have prevented the vast majority of American deaths .
Instead , Trump and his supporters ginned up yet more conspiracy theories—among the most perverse of which is that deep state actors both spawned the disease and exaggerated the death toll .
Here Nichols was especially prescient : “ Just as individuals facing grief and confusion look for meaning where none may exist , so , too , will entire @ @ @ @ @ @ @ subjected to a terrible national experience.
” Now we have a national racial and civic crisis that requires from our president a deep and nuanced understanding of its causes and dangers—not only the willingness to lead , but to listen , to learn , and to speak across our divides of experience and understanding .
God help us .
None of this suggests that America should be run by unelected experts—far from it .
Rather our democratically elected leaders often need the advice of experts to help them govern wisely .
But grasping @ @ @ @ @ @ @ fetishizing ignorance .
Nichols warns : Lamentably , that ’ s not where matters stand .
“ Like anti-vaccine parents , ” Nichols concludes , “ ignorant voters end up punishing society at large for their own mistakes.
” And so they have .
Come November , we will find out what we ’ ve learned .

Precisely 100 years ago, H.L. Mencken wrote:
As democracy is perfected, the office [of president] represents, more and more closely, the inner soul of the people. . . . On some great and glorious day the plain folks of the land will reach their heart’s desire at last, and the White House will be adorned by a downright moron.
Now it is. Just in time for Donald Trump to mishandle a lethal pandemic and inflame an incendiary racial crisis. The cost in lives, and to our national spirit, has yet to be reckoned.
“How,” asks Stephen Walt, “could a serious country possibly choose as its leader a narcissistic, manifestly unqualified self-promoter with a long track record of failure and deceit?”
The answer, in great measure, is that too many Americans stopped caring about capacity or knowledge, and so elected an uncredentialed ignoramus. But Donald Trump is merely the apotheosis of a growing disdain among Republicans for the intellect, experience, wisdom, and respect for expertise essential to governance.
Historically, American anti-intellectualism has been as bipartisan as ignorance. But by trafficking for decades in a pseudo-populist contempt for perceived elites, the GOP wound up creating a political Frankenstein monster: an American idiocracy governed by an idiot.
The earliest, and most deserving, target of anti-elitism as politics was liberal academe. In the 1960s, the ferociously intellectual William F. Buckley, Jr. propagated this semi-playful hyperbole: “I should sooner live in a society governed by the first 2,000 names in the Boston telephone directory than a society governed by the 2,000 faculty members of Harvard University.”
But such tropes, as Buckley implied, soon influence our broader view of government. Speaking on behalf of Barry Goldwater, Ronald Reagan asked voters to decide “whether we believe in our capacity for self-government or whether we abandon the American revolution and confess that a little intellectual elite in a far-distant capital can plan our lives for us better than we can plan them ourselves.” Never mind that, as the well-read Reagan well knew, the fathers of our revolution were an intellectual elite—the idea took hold. “We will never have the elite smart people on our side,” Republican presidential candidate Rick Santorum said in 2012, “because they believe they should have the power to tell you what to do.”
“The war on academia bleeds into a war on the very idea of expertise,” writes Zack Beauchamp in Vox. Scapegoating experts as the enemies of ordinary people has polarized perceptions of learning itself, instilling a belief “that liberal elites are conning you, that they’re less competent than an ordinary person. . . . The very idea of nonpartisan knowledge production is obliterated.”
Podcast · August 15 2023 A.B. Stoddard: All the Ex-President’s Conspirators Donald Trump has been a low-rent mobster for his entire career, and now he’s getting…
Tom Nichols, the conservative academic who teaches at the U.S. Naval War College, addressed this phenomenon in his 2017 book The Death of Expertise. Too many Americans, Nichols argues, prefer magical thinking to the fruits of education or experience. A primary cause is that the complexity of modern life engenders feelings of helplessness among those who feel threatened by increasingly unfathomable forces—and the sophisticated experts who propound them. As it grows harder to comprehend subjects such as climate change, global trade, or virology—let alone our fraught and divisive experience of race—such people may seize upon contentions, however bogus, that facilitate believing whatever they wish.
This rejection of established knowledge and historical perspective serves as a psychic equalizer, enabling the angry and insecure to assert their autonomy from an effete and alien elite. As hostility displaces humility and curiosity, public discourse devolves from reasoned debate to vituperation, vilification and misinformation.
This devolution is particularly acute in shaping our views about politics, decoupling our biases and delusions from the need for objective verification. In this swampland of subjectivity, beliefs justify themselves simply by existing, creating a thickening fog of incomprehension wherein expertise competes with bunk. The result is a pernicious intellectual populism in which anyone’s opinion, no matter how groundless, is equal to those rooted in assiduous research and analyses. All one needs to validate an assertion is to express it.
Little wonder that an increasing number of Republicans—59 percent, per a 2019 Pew Research survey—believe that colleges and universities have a negative effect on American life. This attitude, in turn, accelerates a craving for simple answers, and a resentment of those who refute them. Writes Nichols: “When people are told that ending poverty or preventing terrorism or stimulating economic growth is a lot harder than it looks, they roll their eyes. Unable to comprehend all the complexity around them, they choose instead to comprehend almost none of it and then sullenly blame elites for seizing control of their lives.”
In theory, the Internet should breed a more informed populace with widening access to knowledge. Instead, Nichols argues, it has become a sorcerer’s apprentice in swamping genuine learning with nonsense. “The digital age,” he contends,
has simply accelerated the collapse of communication between experts and laypeople by offering an apparent shortcut to erudition. It has allowed people to mimic intellectual accomplishment by indulging in an illusion of expertise provided by a limitless supply of facts. But facts are not the same as knowledge or ability—and on the Internet, they’re not even always facts.
Moreover, this accretion of junk is ripe for manipulation. Says Nichols:
The Internet . . . is less a library than a giant repository where anyone can dump anything. In practice, this means that a search for information will rely on algorithms usually developed by for-profit companies using opaque criteria. Actual research . . . requires the ability to find authentic information, sort through it, analyze it, and apply it. But why bother with all that tedious hoop jumping when the screen in front of us presents neat and pretty answers in seconds?
Such intellectual sloth helps proliferate conspiratorial thinking and undifferentiated outrage. Nichols describes the process:
Facts come and go as people find convenient at the moment, making arguments unfalsifiable and intellectual progress impossible. And unfortunately, because common sense is not enough to understand or judge plausible alternative policy options, the gap between informed specialists and uninformed laypeople often gets filled with crude simplifications or conspiracy theories. Conspiracy theories are attractive to people who have a hard time making sense of a complicated world and little patience for boring, detailed explanations. They are also a way for people to give context and meaning to events that frighten them.
Inevitably, such theories thrive by creating their own cul-de-sacs of irrefutability. The absence of proof signifies the conspirators’ diabolical cleverness; all who deconstruct the theory are agents of the conspiracy. Paranoia suffocates logic.
Enter Trump. “In the Trump era,” writes Beauchamp, “[Buckley’s] vision has linked up to Trump’s swamp-draining, deep-state-blaming political style to produce a form of right-wing populism that treats the very idea of nonpartisan expertise as deeply suspect. . . . This is not a bug in Trumpism, but rather a feature. The idea that all elites—not just intellectual elites, but bureaucratic ones too—are untrustworthy has been central to the president’s political message from day one. ‘Drain the swamp’ and the war on the ‘deep state’ have served to position Trump as the ethical people’s champion; he puts his unqualified daughter and son-in-law in the White House because it’s important to have people who are, first and foremost, loyal to Trump.”
Trump’s contempt for knowledge unleashes a related pathology which makes him as dangerous to our climate as he is to public health: the comprehensive incomprehension of his own intellectual deficiencies that melds him with his followers.
Not only is Trump ignorant of his ignorance but, as George Will put it, “he does not know what it is to know something.” Hence our president’s most destructive lie: his claims of universal expertise.
Repeatedly, Trump has claimed some variant of “nobody knows more than I do” regarding a multitude of complex subjects: fiscal policy, the Federal Reserve, trade, tariffs, global warming, geopolitics, fighting ISIS, military strategy in general—and, most recently, epidemiology and law enforcement. Even for a self-proclaimed genius, Trump’s range impresses.
Everything Donald Trump Is an Expert In, According to Him | NowThis
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That’s the problem. Perceiving the infinity of all they can never know, true geniuses are disinclined to overstate their gifts. By contrast, Trump is a classic exemplar of the Dunning-Kruger Effect, named for two psychologists who demonstrated that the less knowledgeable and competent you are, the more you believe in your own superlative abilities. Such benighted folks, wrote Dunning and Kruger, not only “reach erroneous conclusions and make unfortunate choices, but their incompetence robs them of the . . . ability to realize it.”
Deaf to the voices of attainment and experience, Trump daily subjects America to his staggering incapacities. The few capable advisers whom he hired have been replaced with sycophants who survive by indulging his groundless and dangerous conceits—condemning us to a president whose actions grow ever more unhinged.
In place of reason, he treats his followers to that staple of a stunted worldview: a mind-numbing series of conspiracy theories. One of the latest—that antifa fomented the disorder following George Floyd’s videotaped murder—is patently false; another, Obamagate, is so diabolical that it not only defies refutation, but comprehension. Not even our genius of a president can explain it.
This exemplifies a lynchpin of Trump’s quest for re-election: the deliberate destruction of our shared belief that verifiable truth is the foundation of political discourse. As our societal agreement about credible sources and objective fact crumbles, so does our capacity to resist baseless theories, political quackery, and rank demagoguery. This fact-free environment provides Trump with a credulous audience unwilling, or unable, to perceive his constant lies and lethal grandiosity—or to comprehend his subversion of our democratic institutions and traditions.
Trump’s intellectual Lotusland has a chorus of charlatans—Breitbart, Limbaugh, Fox News—whose counterfactual fulminations cement a class system of the mind that separates those addicted to fabulism and propaganda from those who are not. Like other class systems, this perpetuates itself, enhancing the danger that the Trump presidency will prove to be not an aberration but a prototype.
But with COVID-19, Trump’s ignorance turned deadly. Trump did not spawn this pandemic; his inherent character, and the credulity of his loyalists, have simply made it worse—with no certain end in sight.
Many leaders—like those in Germany, South Korea, Taiwan, Australia, and New Zealand—managed to control the spread of COVID-19 by promptly heeding the advice of public health experts. Not Trump. He rejected expert counsel while encouraging true believers to ignore the risks, displaying, as usual, impatience with briefings from those who know more than he does—meaning everyone. And, as usual, others paid the price: had he acted sooner, according to modelers at Columbia University, he could have prevented the vast majority of American deaths.
Instead, Trump and his supporters ginned up yet more conspiracy theories—among the most perverse of which is that deep state actors both spawned the disease and exaggerated the death toll. Here Nichols was especially prescient: “Just as individuals facing grief and confusion look for meaning where none may exist, so, too, will entire societies gravitate toward outlandish theories when collectively subjected to a terrible national experience.”
Now we have a national racial and civic crisis that requires from our president a deep and nuanced understanding of its causes and dangers—not only the willingness to lead, but to listen, to learn, and to speak across our divides of experience and understanding. God help us.
None of this suggests that America should be run by unelected experts—far from it. Rather our democratically elected leaders often need the advice of experts to help them govern wisely. But grasping this requires a mass cognizance incompatible with fetishizing ignorance. Nichols warns:
Too few citizens today understand democracy to mean a condition of political equality in which all get the franchise and are equal in the eyes of the law. Rather, they think of it as a state of actual equality, in which every opinion is as good as any other, regardless of the logic or evidentiary base behind it. But that is not how a republic is meant to work, and the sooner American society establishes new ground rules for productive engagement between educated elites and the society around them, the better.
Lamentably, that’s not where matters stand. “Like anti-vaccine parents,” Nichols concludes, “ignorant voters end up punishing society at large for their own mistakes.”
And so they have. Come November, we will find out what we’ve learned.


thebulwark--2020-06-04--Hong Kong Is the Latest Battle for the Values of the Free World

Hong Kong is the new frontline in a clash of value systems—a clash about to be lost if the free world does not act immediately , robustly and in unity .
Today is the 31st anniversary of China ’ s crushing of the democracy protesters in Tiananmen Square , an appropriate moment to sound the alarm about what is happening to Hong Kong .
Last Thursday in Beijing , the National People ’ s Congress—the Chinese Communist Party ( CCP ) ’ s sham pretense of a parliament—approved a national security law on Hong Kong which would decimate the city @ @ @ @ @ @ @ China ’ s commitments under an international treaty .
The resolution vote was nearly unanimous , of course , and thus real democracy in Hong Kong is set to be crushed by a mockery of democracy in Beijing .
When Hong Kong was handed over to China in 1997 , it was on the principle of “ one country , two systems , ” enshrined in the Sino-British Joint Declaration , a treaty lodged at the United Nations and signed by the former colonial rulers and the new ones .
Hongkongers had no @ @ @ @ @ @ @ with the promise of a “ high degree of autonomy ” and “ Hong Kong people ruling Hong Kong.
” For the first decade or so of Chinese rule the experiment largely worked and Hong Kong continued to be one of Asia ’ s freest , most open cities—in stark contrast to every other city in China .
For 23 years it has been the only city in China to be able to commemorate the anniversary of the Tiananmen massacre of June 4 , 1989 , for example .
Today is the first @ @ @ @ @ @ @ of Hongkongers defied the ban to honor the victims and their cause .
In recent weeks we have seen a precursor of what is in store for Hong Kong , with the arrest of fifteen of the city ’ s most distinguished pro-democracy politicians , including the “ father of the democracy movement , ” Martin Lee .
Under the new law , every activist , every reporter , every ordinary citizen who utters a word against Xi Jinping ’ s regime will be in danger , as is already the case in @ @ @ @ @ @ @ regime eventually has to choose between economic development and the power structure .
Having determined that the democracy movement is too dangerous , Beijing is willing to kill the golden goose in order to bring Hong Kong ’ s vibrant citizenry to heel .
Along with seizing its opportunity in the current crisis , Beijing also learned from the tepid global response to Vladimir Putin ’ s conquest of Crimea in 2014 .
China has far more geopolitical leverage than Russia and clearly doesn ’ t believe the international community has the will @ @ @ @ @ @ @ latest crackdown .
Now Xi Jinping will again watch and learn from the world ’ s reaction , with an eye on the South China Sea and , as ever , on Taiwan .
And yet what has the world done in the past week ?
There have been tepid words from Britain ’ s foreign secretary—even though Britain is a signatory to the treaty that has been brazenly flouted and has a moral obligation to defend its former colony .
There have been more robust words from U.S. Secretary of State Mike @ @ @ @ @ @ @ administration seems more interested in re-enacting Tiananmen Square in America than preventing its repeat in Hong Kong .
And there has been a call for action by over 230 senior parliamentarians , former prime ministers and foreign ministers , and public figures from 25 countries , initiated by the last governor of Hong Kong , Chris Patten , which I am proud to have signed .
But there is a need for more than just words .
For too long the free world has sold out to the Chinese Communists in pursuit of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ failed engagement policy .
Hong Kong , and the over one million Uighur Muslims incarcerated in concentration camps in western China , are the casualties not only of the Chinese regime ’ s brutality but of Western appeasement .
So what now ?
The free world must stop kowtowing to this mendacious , brutal regime whose duplicity led to a global pandemic with untold impact .
There must be a coherent international response—bipartisan and multilateral .
Britain—as the country with particular responsibility—should work to bring together like-minded allies across the world to coordinate @ @ @ @ @ @ @ about how the free world could collaborate to offer sanctuary for vulnerable , courageous frontline Hong Kong activists who will be in grave danger if this law is imposed .
On Wednesday , U.K. prime minister Boris Johnson pledged to admit 2.8 million Hongkongers if China adopts the security law .
It ’ s an admirable if belated move , but no one country can do this by itself , particularly during the global economic catastrophe caused by the pandemic .
Surely it is not beyond the ability of democratic nations to coordinate @ @ @ @ @ @ @ of protection .
Magnitsky-style targeted sanctions against Chinese officials complicit in violating human rights in Hong Kong—and their family members enjoying the good life abroad—would be welcome , but are unlikely to be sufficient .
Consideration must go to announcing the intention of recognizing Taiwan if China refuses to respect Hong Kong ’ s autonomy .
Anything less will be shrugged off by Beijing as a price they are willing to pay .
This would require the type of global leadership in support of values that has long been absent in the free @ @ @ @ @ @ @ exactly how we reached this point .
The free world may have lost its appetite for deterrence since the end of the Cold War , but Beijing is already launching preemptive strikes .
Massive new Chinese tariffs against Australia are a poorly disguised retaliation for Australia ’ s leadership in holding China accountable for covering up the COVID-19 outbreak .
The CCP hopes its economic might will quiet its international critics the way its police silence domestic ones .
This is a battle between two contrasting visions of the future—freedom , openness , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , represented by the Hong Kong of yesterday , and deception and vicious repression , represented by the Chinese regime that seeks to impose its will on the Hong Kong of today .
We must act , at least if we still believe in freedom half as much as the brave Hongkongers risking their lives for it .

Hong Kong is the new frontline in a clash of value systems—a clash about to be lost if the free world does not act immediately, robustly and in unity. Today is the 31st anniversary of China’s crushing of the democracy protesters in Tiananmen Square, an appropriate moment to sound the alarm about what is happening to Hong Kong.
Last Thursday in Beijing, the National People’s Congress—the Chinese Communist Party (CCP)’s sham pretense of a parliament—approved a national security law on Hong Kong which would decimate the city’s freedoms and autonomy and break China’s commitments under an international treaty. The resolution vote was nearly unanimous, of course, and thus real democracy in Hong Kong is set to be crushed by a mockery of democracy in Beijing.
When Hong Kong was handed over to China in 1997, it was on the principle of “one country, two systems,” enshrined in the Sino-British Joint Declaration, a treaty lodged at the United Nations and signed by the former colonial rulers and the new ones. Hongkongers had no say in the deal—but they kept faith with the promise of a “high degree of autonomy” and “Hong Kong people ruling Hong Kong.”
For the first decade or so of Chinese rule the experiment largely worked and Hong Kong continued to be one of Asia’s freest, most open cities—in stark contrast to every other city in China. For 23 years it has been the only city in China to be able to commemorate the anniversary of the Tiananmen massacre of June 4, 1989, for example. Today is the first time that vigil has been banned—although thousands of Hongkongers defied the ban to honor the victims and their cause.
In recent weeks we have seen a precursor of what is in store for Hong Kong, with the arrest of fifteen of the city’s most distinguished pro-democracy politicians, including the “father of the democracy movement,” Martin Lee. Under the new law, every activist, every reporter, every ordinary citizen who utters a word against Xi Jinping’s regime will be in danger, as is already the case in the rest of China.
Podcast · August 15 2023 A.B. Stoddard: All the Ex-President’s Conspirators Donald Trump has been a low-rent mobster for his entire career, and now he’s getting…
Every non-democratic regime eventually has to choose between economic development and the power structure. Having determined that the democracy movement is too dangerous, Beijing is willing to kill the golden goose in order to bring Hong Kong’s vibrant citizenry to heel. Along with seizing its opportunity in the current crisis, Beijing also learned from the tepid global response to Vladimir Putin’s conquest of Crimea in 2014. China has far more geopolitical leverage than Russia and clearly doesn’t believe the international community has the will or ability to deter it from this latest crackdown. Now Xi Jinping will again watch and learn from the world’s reaction, with an eye on the South China Sea and, as ever, on Taiwan.
And yet what has the world done in the past week? There have been tepid words from Britain’s foreign secretary—even though Britain is a signatory to the treaty that has been brazenly flouted and has a moral obligation to defend its former colony. There have been more robust words from U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, but these days the Trump administration seems more interested in re-enacting Tiananmen Square in America than preventing its repeat in Hong Kong. And there has been a call for action by over 230 senior parliamentarians, former prime ministers and foreign ministers, and public figures from 25 countries, initiated by the last governor of Hong Kong, Chris Patten, which I am proud to have signed. But there is a need for more than just words.
For too long the free world has sold out to the Chinese Communists in pursuit of filthy lucre under the guise of a failed engagement policy. Hong Kong, and the over one million Uighur Muslims incarcerated in concentration camps in western China, are the casualties not only of the Chinese regime’s brutality but of Western appeasement.
So what now?
The free world must stop kowtowing to this mendacious, brutal regime whose duplicity led to a global pandemic with untold impact. There must be a coherent international response—bipartisan and multilateral. Britain—as the country with particular responsibility—should work to bring together like-minded allies across the world to coordinate a global response.
We should think about how the free world could collaborate to offer sanctuary for vulnerable, courageous frontline Hong Kong activists who will be in grave danger if this law is imposed. On Wednesday, U.K. prime minister Boris Johnson pledged to admit 2.8 million Hongkongers if China adopts the security law. It’s an admirable if belated move, but no one country can do this by itself, particularly during the global economic catastrophe caused by the pandemic. Surely it is not beyond the ability of democratic nations to coordinate a scheme to welcome Hongkongers in need of protection.
Magnitsky-style targeted sanctions against Chinese officials complicit in violating human rights in Hong Kong—and their family members enjoying the good life abroad—would be welcome, but are unlikely to be sufficient. Consideration must go to announcing the intention of recognizing Taiwan if China refuses to respect Hong Kong’s autonomy. Anything less will be shrugged off by Beijing as a price they are willing to pay. This would require the type of global leadership in support of values that has long been absent in the free world’s relationship with China—which is exactly how we reached this point.
The free world may have lost its appetite for deterrence since the end of the Cold War, but Beijing is already launching preemptive strikes. Massive new Chinese tariffs against Australia are a poorly disguised retaliation for Australia’s leadership in holding China accountable for covering up the COVID-19 outbreak. The CCP hopes its economic might will quiet its international critics the way its police silence domestic ones.
This is a battle between two contrasting visions of the future—freedom, openness, the rule of law and human rights, represented by the Hong Kong of yesterday, and deception and vicious repression, represented by the Chinese regime that seeks to impose its will on the Hong Kong of today. We must act, at least if we still believe in freedom half as much as the brave Hongkongers risking their lives for it.