The science of propaganda, spin and doubt: A short summary

At the least, the information in this post should be mandatory knowledge for both a high school degree and for any post high school credential. If a person does not know this, they are more susceptible to the dark arts than is justifiable in American democracy. -- Germaine, 2022

Context

Lots of books and thousands of research articles have been written on propaganda and why and how it works so well. Propaganda became sophisticated in America a couple of years before World War 1. To get the US into WW1, president Woodrow Wilson created the Committee on Public Information. The CPI was a gigantic US government deceit and emotional manipulation machine. Tens of thousands of spinning con artists worked for it. Wilson's goal was to con the American people into supporting American entry into the war and feeling emotionally justified, e.g., making the world safe for democracy. Some of the greatest propagandists of the 20th century, maybe of all time, worked on that effort. It was a smashing success.

Wilson's massive public disinformation effort jump-started modern propaganda ("public relations") in support of businesses and commerce (discussed here). Business leaders watching how effective propaganda could be to get people to walk into a brutal war quickly realized that good propaganda wasn't just for governments to use to deceive people into making the ultimate self-sacrifice. It could be used by businesses to deceive both customers and governments. It was, and still is, a freaking super rich gold mine chock full of diamonds, platinum, lithium and all the hot, juicy cheeseburgers that T**** could ever eat.

A short summary of propaganda tactics

In 2021, two researchers, Rebecca Goldberg and Laura Vandenberg, at the University of Massachusetts, Department of Environmental Health Sciences, and School of Public Health and Health Sciences, published a very nice summary of spin or propaganda tactics from 5 major sources.[1] Their paper is entitled, The science of spin: targeted strategies to manufacture doubt with detrimental effects on environmental and public health.

The paper's abstract includes these comments:

Results: We recognized 28 unique tactics used to manufacture doubt. Five of these tactics were used by all five organizations, suggesting that they are key features of manufactured doubt. The intended audience influences the strategy used to misinform, and logical fallacies contribute to their efficacy.

Conclusions: This list of tactics can be used by others to build a case that an industry or group is deliberately manipulating information associated with their actions or products. Improved scientific and rhetorical literacy could be used to render them less effective, depending on the audience targeted, and ultimately allow for the protection of both environmental health and public health more generally.

The list of tactics that special interests who used them is shown below in Table 1 from the article. Table 2 lists the logic fallacies the propagandists tend to rely on.

Tactics or strategies 1, 2, 3, 8 and 21 were all used by all five sources of deceit and doubt.

• 1. Attack Study Design: To emphasize study design flaws in A** that have only minimal effects on outcomes. Flaws include issues related to bias, confounding, or sample size
• 2. Gain Support from Reputable Individuals: Recruit experts or influential people in certain fields (politicians, industry, journals, doctors, scientists, health officials) to defend B** in order to gain broader support
• 3. Misrepresent data: Cherry-pick data, design studies to fail, or conduct meta-analyses to dilute the work of A
• 8. Employ Hyperbolic or Absolutist Language: Discuss scientific findings in absolutist terms or with hyperbole, use buzzwords to differentiate between “strong” and “poor” science (i.e. sound science, junk science, etc.),
• 21. Influence Government/Laws: Gain inappropriate proximity to regulatory bodies and encourage pro-B policy

** “A” refers to information generated to combat scientific evidence and facts

“B” refers to information generated to promote narratives that are favorable to the industry

Logic fallacies

Acknowledgement: Thanks to Larry Motuz for bringing the work of these two researchers to my attention.

Footnote: 

1. The researchers describe the five sources of propaganda like this:

The first, Big Tobacco, is widely considered to have “written the playbook” on manufactured doubt [1]. The tobacco industry has managed to maintain its clientele for many decades in part due to manufactured scientific controversy about the health effects of active and secondhand smoking [1, 2, 4, 6, 10,11,12,13].

The other industries we examined include the coal industry, whose employees often suffer from black lung disease [14], yet the industry has avoided awarding compensation to many affected miners by wielding disproportionate influence in the courtroom [15,16,17,18,19]; the sugar industry, which distracted from its role contributing to metabolic and cardiovascular diseases [20] by deflecting blame toward dietary fat as a plausible alternative cause for rising population-level chronic disease rates [21,22,23,24,25]; the agrochemical business, Syngenta, manufacturer of the herbicide atrazine [26,27,28], which conducted personal attacks against a vocal critic of atrazine whose research revealed disruptive effects on the endocrine systems of aquatic animals [29, 30]; and the Marshall Institute, a conservative think tank comprised of Cold War physicists eager to maintain their proximity to government, and associated scientists who deliberately misrepresented information to the government to both minimize and normalize the effects of fossil fuels on global temperatures [1, 4, 31].

Climate change notes

The AP writes about how pro-pollution interests have deceived the public and the damage that causes to society:

In 1998, as nations around the world agreed to cut carbon emissions through the Kyoto Protocol, America’s fossil fuel companies plotted their response, including an aggressive strategy to inject doubt into the public debate.

“Victory,” according to the American Petroleum Institute’s memo, “will be achieved when average citizens ‘understand’ (recognize) uncertainties in climate science... Unless ‘climate change’ becomes a non-issue... there may be no moment when we can declare victory.”

The memo, later leaked to The New York Times that year, went on to outline how fossil fuel companies could manipulate journalists and the broader public by muddying the evidence, by playing up “both sides” of the debate and by portraying those seeking to reduce emissions as “out of touch with reality.”

“The tragedy of this is that all over social media, you can see tens of millions of Americans who think scientists are lying, even about things that have been proven for decades,” said Naomi Oreskes, a historian of science at Harvard University who has written about the history of climate change disinformation. “They’ve been persuaded by decades of disinformation. The denial is really, really deep.”

And persistent. Just last month, even with record heat in London, raging wildfires in Alaska and historic flooding in Australia, the Science and Environmental Policy Project, a pro-fossil fuel think tank, said all the scientists had it wrong.

“There is no climate crisis,” the group wrote in its newsletter.

Now, even as those same companies promote investments in renewable energy, the legacy of all that climate disinformation remains.

It’s also contributed to a broader skepticism of scientists, scientific institutions and the media that report on them, a distrust reflected by doubts about vaccines or pandemic-era public health measures like masks and quarantines.

Aggressive approaches to address climate change are now dismissed not on scientific grounds but on economic ones. Fossil fuel companies talk about lost jobs or higher energy prices — without mentioning the cost of doing nothing, said Ben Franta, an attorney, author and Stanford University researcher who tracks fossil fuel disinformation.

“We are living within an extended multi-decade campaign executed by the fossil fuel industry,” Franta said. “The debate (over climate change) was manufactured by the fossil fuel industry in the 1990s, and we are living with that history right now.”

Another AP article comments on increasing migration that climate change is causing:

Climate migration growing but not fully recognized by world

Worsening climate largely from the burning of coal and gas is uprooting millions of people, with wildfires overrunning towns in California, rising seas overtaking island nations and drought exacerbating conflicts in various parts of the world.

Each year, natural disasters force an average of 21.5 million people from their homes around the world, according to the U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees. And scientists predict migration will grow as the planet gets hotter. Over the next 30 years, 143 million people are likely to be uprooted by rising seas, drought, searing temperatures and other climate catastrophes, according to the U.N.’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change report published this year.

A blog post at Neurologica comments:

It should come as a surprise to no one that the fossil fuel industry has been financing a vast public relations campaign over the last three decades to sow confusion and doubt about human-caused climate change. This is already well established. One Harvard study, for example, focusing on ExxonMobil, found:

That analysis showed that ExxonMobil misled the public about basic climate science and its implications. They did so by contributing quietly to climate science, and loudly to promoting doubt about that science.

Now, the BBC reports on two people who worked with a PR firm specifically to deny the science of climate change who are now telling their story, adding some more details and focus to the tale. Don Rheem and Terry Yosie worked for E Bruce Harrison, an industry PR guru, who, starting in 1992, landed the campaign to work for the Global Climate Coalition (GCC), an industry group comprised of oil, coal, auto, utilities, steel, and rail industries. What do all these industries have in common? They all contribute significantly to green house gas emissions.

They made great headway with this strategy [unwarranted lies and doubt], because journalists did not understand the complexities of climate science and welcomed the “help” provided by GCC. Then Harrison figured that they could be even more successful if they recruited the help of scientists and academics, whose voices would carry more weight. So they sought out the minority of climate change doubters in the community and paid them well to speak, significantly magnifying their voices. This strategy worked, and much of the public became convinced that there was uncertainty and disagreement among scientists about climate change. Journalists were also complicit, because it fit their narrative to find contrary voices and then present them as equal to the mainstream.

This strategy [of sowing lies and unwarranted doubt] worked so well that it has taken on a life of its own. First, the propaganda of the GCC essentially became the platform of the Republican party. It became tied to a political and ideological group. With the rise of social media it also became easy for people who identify with this ideological group, or who were just convinced by the GCC propaganda, to further magnify climate change denial. They repeat industry talking points cooked up a couple decades earlier by a PR firm without necessarily realizing it.

It is critical that we learn the lessons from this experience. What this means is a few things. Journalists need to do a better job in the aggregate – they need to learn how to report science in general, controversial science in particular, and how not to become the lap dogs of industry propaganda. Scientists and academics also need to develop their knowledge and skills in dealing with the public understand of science and other complex topics, and to make it a much higher academic priority. Skeptical science communicators, in my opinion, have largely filled the gap left by journalists and academics, but we also need to do a better job – of educating ourselves, engaging with the media and academics, and jumping on topics earlier in the disinformation cycle. At present we are mostly a hodge-podge of individual uncoordinated outlets. How we can improve the situation is a conversation for another day.

Republican tactics for subverting elections is coming into focus

Actually, it's been in focus for at least the last year or thereabouts. But that quibble aside, Salon writes:

GOP officials refuse to certify primaries: “This is how Republicans are planning to steal elections”

Election officials in three states refuse to sign off on primary results in a preview of likely November chaos

Republican election officials in at least three states have refused to certify primary votes, in a sign of things to come amid the party's baseless election fraud crusade.

Numerous allies of former President Donald Trump have echoed his lies about voter fraud on the campaign trail. Trump-backed Arizona gubernatorial candidate Kari Lake and Nevada U.S. Senate candidate Adam Laxalt both claimed evidence of "election stealing" before any votes were cast. Colorado secretary of state candidate Tina Peters has twice demanded recounts of her Republican primary race after losing by double digits. Nevada gubernatorial candidate Joey Gilbert filed a lawsuit alleging that his GOP primary loss was a "mathematical impossibility," even after a recount he requested confirmed the results.

While candidates are free to challenge the results of their elections under various state guidelines, Trump-allied election officials pose a more insidious threat. Echoing the same false narratives as Trump and his endorsed candidates, county officials in New Mexico, Nevada and Pennsylvania have tried to circumvent state laws and refused to sign off on primary results.

Republican commissioners in Otero County, New Mexico last month refused to certify primary results in their GOP-dominated jurisdiction, citing unspecified concerns about Dominion voting machines. These apparently stem from TrumpWorld's crusade to stoke baseless allegations that the machines had "flipped" votes from Trump to Joe Biden. The Otero County commissioners ultimately relented and certified the votes amid concerns that they could go to jail after state officials took them to court.

Well, at least there's still the threat of jail for people who subvert elections. Once that goes away, the dam is going to burst. Republican election integrity is going to gush out bigly. What's left of democracy that's still standing in the way will be swept away, never to be seen again.

The GOP plan for elections:

kill 'em with a gusher of election integrity

Republican Party social re-engineering tactics: Cowardice, lies, slanders & emotional crackpottery

By now, GOP propaganda tactics are well-known to people who can see them for what they are. Divisive lies, slanders, emotional button pushing and idiotic reasoning are all front and center as usual. That is at the heart of the morally rotted Republican Party. Adam Serwer at The Atlantic writes:

Republicans’ Cowardly Excuses for Not Protecting Marriage Equality

Republican senators such as Marco Rubio and Ben Sasse, as well as conservative outlets such as National Review, have insisted that the Respect for Marriage Act is unnecessary because there is no case currently on its way to the Supreme Court that has the potential to overturn Obergefell v. Hodges, the decision that recognized the right of same-sex couples to marry. Rubio said he would vote against the bill because it was a “waste of our time on a non-issue.” Sasse told reporters that House Speaker Nancy Pelosi was “trying to divide America with culture wars. I think it’s just the same bullshit. She’s not an adult.”

The reason some Republican senators are complaining about the existence of a marriage-equality bill is that they do not want to be forced to take a real position on the issue. They do not want to publicly take the unpopular position, even among the Republican rank and file, that these families should be destroyed, but they also do not want to do what is necessary to protect them and potentially earn the wrath of right-wing media and other members of their political coalition. This is cowardice, but also a GOP plan for as long as they can hold the Court: to avoid taking risky stands in Congress while the conservative justices act as a super-legislature that imposes an unpopular right-wing legal agenda on the entire country. Because the justices cannot be voted out of office, they can take the heat for imposing policies that elected officials would be nervous about supporting. If marriage equality were truly a “non-issue,” passage of the bill would be assured; GOP legislators are waiting for the Court to do their dirty work for them.

Contrary to Sasse’s blubbering about dividing the country, if the legislation were passed and successfully dissuaded the Supreme Court from trying to invalidate marriage equality, it would leave Democrats without a popular issue with which to criticize Republicans. And that’s good, because the duty of the Democratic Party should be to make sure their constituents—and by extension, all Americans—can retain their basic rights, not to have culture-war grievances to run on forever. I can understand, however, why Republican elected officials, used to offering their constituents little more than a steady diet of culture-war red meat, might have trouble grasping the concept.

Sasse lies when he claims that defense of same-sex marriage (SSM) is a non-issue. The Christian nationalist wing of the GOP, of which all six Republicans on the Supreme Court and Sasse himself are elite members of, is crystal clear that SSM has to go. God hates SSM so Christians nationalists hate it too. Because of that alone, there is no reasonable basis to claim that this is a non-issue. It is an issue.

The group that has the most influence in dividing America with culture war is the Republican Party. Sasse arguing that Pelosi is trying to divide us by doing what most Americans want is divisive. 

That exemplifies another prominent trait of Republican Party propaganda. Republican elites rhetoric projects an awful lot. When they accuse and criticize Democrats of doing something, it is usually a good bet that the Republicans are the main culprits. 

Gallup, June 2022

What is more divisive, 

supporting it or opposing it?

Raising enough hell might finally get it done…

People often claim that the Democrats’ messaging is weak.  I guess I can get that, especially vis-à-vis what happened late last week, with enough Republicans voting against the PACT Act* for it to fail. 

What we, the Dems, need is some people like Jon Stewart to raise a little lot of hell.  If Dems “came out swinging” on the issues they feel passionate about, maybe it could get the media’s attention.  (So far, Beto O’Rourke is one of the few passionate Dems I’ve seen.  And he is still lagging in the polls behind bastard Greg Abbott for Governor of Texas.)

Yes, we Dems need outrage.  We need passion.  We need to call a Republican spade a Republican spade.  Call them out!  Make a scene.  That always get the media’s attention, since the media always goes where the trouble goes.  But Jon is making “good trouble.”  And without media, our messages, especially “good trouble messages” go nowhere. 

Well said, Jon (warning, strong language):

-Does America owe the veterans, less than 1% of the population, anything?

-Does not passing the PACT Act disgust you as much as it disgusts me?

-Am I just blowing off some steam here?  (Oh, you betcha!)

______________________________

*The PACT Act, also known as the Sergeant First Class Heath Robinson Honoring Our Promise to Address Comprehensive Toxics Act of 2022, is a bill that directly addresses the impact on veterans and others who were exposed to environmental toxins, burn pits, radiation, and Agent Orange while serving.

Republican Party racism steps into daylight

A Washington Post opinion piece makes it about as plain as it can be made:

Opinion | A hero of the Trump right shows his true colors: Whites only

Thank you, Viktor Orban, for showing us where the American right is heading.

The Hungarian strongman, who derailed his country’s nascent democracy, has been a darling of the MAGA crowd for his anti-immigrant policies. He has enjoyed a fawning interview and favorable broadcasts from Budapest by Fox News’s Tucker Carlson, and he has been invited as a featured speaker to next week’s Conservative Political Action Conference in Texas alongside a who’s who of Republican senators, governors and members of Congress, as well as former president Donald Trump himself. Several such luminaries addressed a CPAC gathering in Hungary in May, at which Trump described Orban as “a great leader, a great gentleman.”

During a July 23 address (in which he said immigration should be called “population replacement or inundation”) he gave voice to the belief underlying his nationalism: He opposes the mixing of races.

“Migration has split Europe in two — or I could say that it has split the West in two,” he said, after commending to his listeners a 50-year-old racist treatise. “One half is a world where European and non-European peoples live together. These countries are no longer nations. They are nothing more than a conglomeration of peoples.” He went on to contrast that with “our world,” in which “we are willing to mix with one another, but we do not want to become peoples of mixed race.”

That was too much even for Orban’s longtime adviser Zsuzsa Hegedus, who resigned and lambasted the prime minister for “a pure Nazi speech worthy of Goebbels.” She said the speech could “please even the most bloodthirsty racists” and suggested he was “advocating an openly racist policy that is now unacceptable even for the Western European extreme right.”

But not for the American right! CPAC’s organizer confirmed to me on Wednesday that Orban is still scheduled to address the group next week. “Let’s listen to the man speak,” Matt Schlapp, chairman of the Conservative Political Action Coalition, told Bloomberg News on Tuesday. Orban’s name remained on CPAC’s speakers list, along with Trump; some two dozen GOP House members; Sens. Ted Cruz (Tex.), Rick Scott (Fla.) and Bill Hagerty (Tenn.); Fox News’s Sean Hannity; Texas Gov. Greg Abbott; and former Trump aides including Steve Bannon and Stephen Miller.

Republicans have hailed Orban as “Trump before Trump” (Bannon), whose government is doing “so many positive things” (Sen. Ron Johnson). Among the things it has been doing: seizing control of the judiciary and media, banning the depiction of homosexuality, demonizing Jewish billionaire George Soros, expelling asylum seekers and erecting a wire fence on the border, forcing out the country’s top university, and halving the size of parliament and redrawing districts to keep itself in power.

At its core, Orban’s rule has been about sustaining, and being sustained by, white nationalism. His July 23 speech was an extended articulation of the “great replacement” conspiracy idea — embraced by Carlson and House Republican Conference Chair Elise Stefanik (N.Y.), among others — that non-White people are plotting to wipe out White people.

One would think that given how sophisticated GOP propaganda can be, they would be less blatant about their racism. There's nothing wrong with opposing most immigration on grounds of overpopulation and/or concern for the environment. But, maybe Republicans cannot base their opposition to immigration on either ground because they do not believe either is a problem. That leaves racism as the cause.

Well, at least Republicans are being honest about their motive. That's a refreshing change.

Political moderates make their move

A Washington Post opinion piece announces the merger of three political groups: 

Opinion | Most third parties have failed. Here’s why ours won’t.

David Jolly is a former Republican congressman from Florida and is executive chairman of the Serve America Movement. Christine Todd Whitman is a former Republican governor of New Jersey and co-founder of the Renew America Movement. Andrew Yang is a former Democratic presidential candidate and is co-chair of the Forward Party.

Political extremism is ripping our nation apart, and the two major parties have failed to remedy the crisis. Last week, the House select committee investigating the Jan. 6 attack at the Capitol led us to relive one of the darkest days in U.S. history. The chilling culmination of an attempted electoral coup in the United States was the strongest evidence yet that we are facing the potential demise of our democracy.

Polarization is fueling a spike in political intimidation. In the past two years, we’ve seen death threats and assassination plots against members of Congress, governors, Supreme Court justices and even the vice president of the United States.

If nothing is done, the United States will not reach its 300th birthday this century in recognizable form. That’s why we are coming together — Democrats, Republicans and independents — to build a new, unifying political party for the majority of Americans who want to move past divisiveness and reject extremism.

Americans have lost faith in government. Nearly 8 in 10 say the country is headed in the wrong direction, according to a recent survey, and two-thirds of voters think neither the Democrats nor the Republicans have the right priorities.

Shockingly, roughly 30 million Americans believe violence against the current government is justified. The same number want to forcibly return former president Donald Trump to the White House. This is what happens when democracies fail: People feel their voices are not heard and radicalize to take up arms, leading to mainstream talk about “civil war.”

How do you remedy such a crisis? In a system torn apart by two increasingly divided extremes, you must reintroduce choice and competition.

The United States badly needs a new political party — one that reflects the moderate, common-sense majority. Today’s outdated parties have failed by catering to the fringes. As a result, most Americans feel they aren’t represented.

Most third parties in U.S. history failed to take off, either because they were ideologically too narrow or the population was uninterested. But voters are calling for a new party now more than ever.

For the first time in modern history, roughly half of Americans consider themselves “independents,” and two-thirds say a new party is needed (and would vote for it). Surprisingly, a majority of Democrats and Republicans say they want another option, too.

As leaders and former elected officials, we’re tired of just talking about a third way. So this month, we’re merging our three national organizations — which represent the left, right, and center of the political spectrum — to build the launchpad for a new political party called Forward.

The two major parties have hollowed out the sensible center of our political system — even though that’s where most voters want to see them move. A new party must stake out the space in between. On every issue facing this nation — from the controversial to the mundane — we can find a reasonable approach most Americans agree on.

On guns, for instance, most Americans don’t agree with calls from the far left to confiscate all guns and repeal the Second Amendment, but they’re also rightfully worried by the far right’s insistence on eliminating gun laws. On climate change, most Americans don’t agree with calls from the far left to completely upend our economy and way of life, but they also reject the far right’s denial that there is even a problem. On abortion, most Americans don’t agree with the far left’s extreme views on late-term abortions, but they also are alarmed by the far right’s quest to make a woman’s choice a criminal offense.

To succeed, a new party must break down the barriers that stand between voters and more political choices. Accordingly, we will passionately advocate electoral changes such as ranked-choice voting and open primaries; for the a reasonable approach most Americans agree on; and for the nationwide protection of voting rights and a push to make voting remarkably easy for anyone and incredibly secure for everyone.

Without such systemic changes, Americans will be left with a closed system and fewer options on the ballot. These reforms go hand in hand with a new party.

Some call third parties “spoilers,” but the system is already spoiled. There are more than 500,000 elected positions in the United States, but a recent study found more than 70 percent of races on ballots in 2020 were unopposed or uncontested. A tiny sliver of U.S. congressional seats will have close races this November. The two major parties have shut out competition, and America is suffering as a result.

That’s why we’re proposing the first “open” party. Americans of all stripes — Democrats, Republicans and independents — are invited to be a part of the process, without abandoning their existing political affiliations, by joining us to discuss building an optimistic and inclusive home for the politically homeless majority.

Our merged organizations are just the starting point, the launchpad for this movement. We are planning liftoff at a national convention next summer and will soon seek state-by-state ballot access to run candidates in 2024 and beyond. We are actively recruiting former U.S. representatives, governors, entrepreneurs, top political operatives and community leaders to make it happen.

America’s founders warned about the dangers of a two-party system. Today, we’re living with the dire consequences. Giving Americans more choices is important not just for restoring civility. Our lives, our livelihoods and our way of life depend on it.

Two quibbles need to be made. One is this announcement conveys a feeling of equivalence between the Dem and Repub parties. They are not equivalent. Of the two, the Republican Party is far more radical, mendacious, authoritarian and anti-democratic.

The other is an implied assertion that all Democrats are leftist extremists. That is just not true. Of the two parties, the GOP is far more radical right than the Dem party is radical left. Unlike the radical left in the Dem party, radical right is mainstream and dominant in the GOP. 

But other than those two things, the idea of (i) trying to save democracy by imposing election integrity by law, (ii) ending gerrymandering, and (iii)  trying to find reasonable policies that most Americans agree on, is very appealing. 

The laissez-faire capitalism files: Corporate opposition to climate change measures

“Social responsibility is a fundamentally subversive doctrine" in a free society, and have said that in such a society, "there is one and only one social responsibility of business–to use it resources and engage in activities designed to increase its profits so long as it stays within the rules of the game, which is to say, engages in open and free competition without deception or fraud.” -- Milton Friedman, 1969

“Most big businesses dictate the rules of the game by corrupting and subverting governments. They routinely operate with deception and fraud. They always try to minimize competition as much as possible.”-- Germaine, 2022

The Guardian writes:

Leaked: US power companies secretly spending millions to protect profits and fight clean energy

The CEO of the biggest power company in the US had a problem. A Democratic state senator was proposing a law that could cut into Florida Power & Light’s (FPL) profits. Landlords would be able to sell cheap rooftop solar power directly to their tenants – bypassing FPL and its monopoly on electricity.

“I want you to make his life a living hell … seriously,” FPL’s CEO Eric Silagy wrote in a 2019 email to two of his vice-presidents about state Senator José Javier Rodríguez, who proposed the legislation.

Within minutes, one of them forwarded the directive to the CEO of Matrix, LLC, a powerful but little-known political consulting firm that has operated behind the scenes in at least eight states.

Rodríguez was ousted from office in the next election [he lost by 40 votes]. Matrix employees spent heavily on political advertisements for a candidate with the same last name as Rodríguez, who split the vote. That candidate later admitted he was bribed to run.

Hundreds of pages of internal documents – which are only coming to light now because Matrix’s founders are locked in an epic feud – detail the firm’s secret work to help power companies like FPL protect their profits and fight the transition to cleaner forms of energy.

In Florida, Matrix’s work touched almost every level of politics, from influencing local mayoral and county commission elections to combating attempts to reshape the state constitution. In each of those cases, Matrix was working against politicians or policies fighting to curb the climate crisis by encouraging renewable power.

Matrix employees had a Jacksonville journalist spied on after he wrote critically about FPL. And in 2020, Matrix even harnessed the power of the press for itself, when its employees acquired control of The Capitolist, a Tallahassee-based political news site which it used for favorable coverage, leaked records show.

Big polluting corporations do not hesitate to use sleaze, slanders and lies to protect profits. There is far too much money in polluting for big polluters to not fight tooth, claw and dagger against any efforts to even try to deal with climate change. Corporations have great power to subvert and corrupt governments and politicians with a combination of dark free speech and campaign contributions (bribes). It is therefore no surprise that the US cannot act decisively to at least try to deal with climate change.

This is just laissez-faire capitalism as usual. Social conscience is non-existent. The only relevant moral value is profit. Nothing else counts.

Fascist Republican Party oppression is intensifying

America’s radical right Republican Party is increasingly aggressive about tracking down and persecuting people they want to track down and persecute. The GOP is dead serious about this. Gizmodo writes:

Republicans Warn Google Not to Limit Search for 

Misleading Anti-Abortion Clinics...Or Else

They said attempts to limit “crisis pregnancy centers,” in search results would, “constitute a grave assault on the principle of free speech.”

A coalition of 17 state attorney generals are pressuring Google to prevent it from limiting the search results of so-called “crisis pregnancy centers” known for masquerading as legitimate abortion clinics and persuading pregnant people away from receiving abortions.

Critics warn unrestricted search results could steer abortion seekers toward these clinics, potentially putting their health at risk. Republicans, on the other hand, say efforts to limit those bad faith clinics in search results amounts to market discrimination against anti-abortion organizations.

In a letter spearheaded by Virginia Attorney General Jason Miyares, the Republican lawmakers pushed back against earlier pleas from Democrats and claimed Google’s decision to moderate its results, “would constitute a grave assault on the principle of free speech.” The Republicans then lashed out at previous Democratic efforts to pressure the company before proceeding to, seemingly unironically, threaten Google if they didn’t get their way.

“We wish to make this very clear to Google and the other market participants that it dwarfs: If you fail to resist this political pressure, we will act swiftly to protect American consumers from this dangerous axis of corporate and government power,” the lawmakers wrote.

If Google does opt to alter the search results, Republicans say they will conduct investigations to determine whether or not the actions violate antitrust or religious discrimination laws. In other words, don’t moderate your search results…or else.  

Tuesday’s letter comes partly in response to a June study conducted by the Center for Countering Digital Hate which found 11% of Google searches in trigger law states for the terms “abortion clinic near me” and “abortion pill” directed users toward so-called crisis pregnancy centers, which the CCCDH refers to as “anti-abortion fake clinics.” Google Maps results led users to such clinics 37% of the time. Though these organizations often present as neutral health clinics, critics say their main purpose is actually to dissuade women from going through with abortions. One of those critics is Massachusetts Senator Elizabeth Warren, who last month introduced a new regulation that would direct the Federal Trade Commission to prevent these clinics from engaging in misleading advertising.

“Anti-abortion fake clinics are the conversion therapy wing of an anti-abortion movement that is hell-bent on sending people to jail for abortion, miscarriage, and pregnancy,” Reproaction Co-Founder and Executive Director Erin Matson, said in a statement. “Misleading online advertising targeting abortion seekers is not a new concern, although it becomes more urgent as constitutional protections for abortion disappear.”

Fascist threats by the GOP are now right out in the open. No one can deny or downplay it, except of  course nearly all Republicans and non-republicans who support the GOP. 

As usual, Republicans fall back on crackpot motivated reasoning in issuing their threats. They are demanding that false and misleading advertising by crisis pregnancy centers be forced on people. That is not a concern about free speech. It is a concern that their hate of abortions will be thwarted. The GOP does not care about any speech except its own lies, slanders and other forms of dark free speech. 

American democracy, truth, the rule of law and civil liberties are all in the fight of their lives. All of them are under a massive, direct fascist attack by the Republican Party. This fascist GOP effort is nationwide, not just in the federal government.

Another person sees the threat

The threat to democracy, the rule of law and civil liberties I keep arguing is present seems to still be slowly sinking with more people. In my opinion, that’s good. We can all hope it’s just not too little or too late. A Washington Post opinion piece opines:

Certainly, dumping a compulsive liar, authoritarian narcissist and possible defendant in multiple criminal cases could be a plus for Republicans. But it’s not a panacea. The two most dangerous features of Trumpism are very much alive and dominate the GOP.

First, the party has inarguably turned antidemocratic. It wants fewer voters. It wants partisan control of election administration. Many “mainstream” Republicans still leave open the possibility they would have refused to certify Joe Biden’s victory. And state parties continue to drum out of their ranks 2020 truth-tellers such as Arizona House Speaker Rusty Bowers. Remember: Sen. Lisa Murkowski (Alaska) was the only Republican senator willing to debate a national voting rights bill, including a reinstatement of Section 5 of the Voting Rights Act.

Second, the Republican Party has gone all-in when it comes to White Christian nationalism, insisting the state use its power to impose reactionary religious views.

Indeed, it’s arguably more important for Republican politicians to be warriors for Christian nationalism and generators of racial grievance than Trump apologists. Republican Govs. Ron DeSantis of Florida and Greg Abbott of Texas continue to build their brands around fear-mongering against critical race theory, anti-immigrant animus and attacks on LGBTQ families. Sen. Rick Scott (R-Fla.)[1], chair of the National Republican Senatorial Committee, put out a multi-part plan strewn with talking points on abortion, LGBTQ Americans and race with ample references to Christianity, including a declaration that “the nuclear family is crucial to civilization, it is God’s design for humanity, and it must be protected and celebrated.” More than 70 percent of House Republicans voted against a bill that would protect gay marriage.

So while it’s true that some Republicans are moving on from Trump, his two legacies — authoritarianism and ethno-nationalism — still dominate the GOP. The threat to pluralistic democracy remains.

YAY!! Someone else is calling out Christian nationalism for the fascist threat it is. I feel vindicated in calling them out. They are just as nasty as demagogue dictators because that is exactly what they openly support.  

But, the author did leave out something that is just as influential in the GOP as its fascism and its Christian nationalism, namely its laissez-faire capitalism. Three toxic dogmas, fascism, Christian nationalism and laissez-faire capitalism are all squarely aimed at democracy, the rule of law and civil liberties.

Footnote: 

1. Don’t forget Scott’s blast at climate change in his 11 point plan to make American corrupt and fascist:

The weather is always changing. We take climate change seriously, but not hysterically. We will not adopt nutty policies that harm our economy or our jobs.

The Republican Party will vehemently argue that anything that is done to try to deal with climate change is hysteria and damaging to the economy and jobs. The Republican Party is a fascist, pro-pollution, pro-corruption party built on divisive dark free speech and voter ignorance.

How some modern Republicans show their respect

 

Dark free hate speech in action

And then disgusting people like this complain that they are being disrespected and their widdle fee-fees are being hurt. What a load of hypocrisy. 

Q: Why aren't T****, Republican politicians, the Proud Boys and other fascist groups on the hit list? 

A: Because Christian nationalist Christofascists like them support Republican Party fascism.

How the radical right sees Democrats

By now it’s obvious to those who can see that we are in the midst of an openly fascist attack on democracy, civil liberties and inconvenient facts, truth and sound reasoning. Republican Party big lies are brazen, being completely contradicted by real facts. Nonetheless, the lies are repeated thousands of times by both cynical, knowing elites, and by the deceived and betrayed rank and file. Decades of divisive Republican Party dark free speech has finally torn this country apart.

What the Republican rank and file believe is reality and what they think about it is of great interest. That drives behavior. It is powering an openly fascist political movement that just might topple democracy and gut the rule of law and civil liberties.  

Writing an opinion piece in the New York Times, columnist Paul Krugman writes:

The Dystopian Myths of Red America

Desensitization is an amazing thing. At this point most political observers simply accept it as a fact of life that an overwhelming majority of Republicans accept the Big Lie that the 2020 election was stolen — a claim with nothing to support it, not even plausible anecdotes.

What I don’t think is fully appreciated, however, is that the Big Lie is embedded in an even bigger lie: the claim that the Democratic Party is controlled by radical leftists aiming to destroy America as we know it. And this lie in turn derives a lot of its persuasiveness from a grotesquely distorted view of what life is like in blue America.

Urban elites are constantly accused of not understanding Real America™. And, to be fair, most big-city residents probably don’t have a good sense of what life is like in rural areas and small towns, although it’s doubtful whether this gap justified the immense number of news reports interviewing Trump voters sitting in diners.

But I’d argue that right-wing misperceptions of blue America run far deeper — and are far more dangerous.

Let’s start with the politics. The other day The Washington Post’s Dave Weigel, reporting from the campaign trail, noted that many Republican candidates are claiming that Democrats are deliberately undermining the nation and promoting violence against their opponents; some are even claiming that we’re already in a civil war.

Some (many?) of these candidates have been winning primaries, suggesting that the G.O.P. base agrees with them. Actually, I’d like to see some surveys along the lines of those showing that most Republicans accept the Big Lie. How many Republicans believe that President Biden and other leading Democrats are left-wing radicals, indeed Marxists?

Relatedly, I’d like to know how many Republicans believe that Black Lives Matter demonstrators looted and burned large parts of America’s major cities.

On the domestic violence front, a study by the Anti-Defamation League found that 75 percent of extremist-related domestic killings from 2012 to 2021 were perpetrated by the right and only 4 percent by the left.

Finally, about B.L.M.: The protests were, in fact, overwhelmingly peaceful. Yes, there was some arson and looting, with total property damage typically estimated at $1 billion to $2 billion. That may sound like a lot, but America is a big country, so it needs to be put in perspective.

Here’s one point of comparison. Back in April, Greg Abbott, the governor of Texas, pulled a political stunt at the border with Mexico, temporarily imposing extra security checks that caused a major slowdown of traffic, disrupting business and leading to a lot of spoiled produce. Total economic losses have been estimated at around $4 billion[1]; that is, a few days of border-security theater appear to have caused more economic damage than a hundred days of mass protests.

The fact is that a large segment of the U.S. electorate has bought into an apocalyptic vision of America that bears no relationship to the reality of how the other half thinks, behaves or lives. We don’t have to speculate about whether this dystopian fantasy might lead to political violence and attempts to overthrow democracy; it already has. And it’s probably going to get worse.

Waldman asked about Democratic sentiment toward Marxism, a false allegation the radical right demagogues all the time. Despite radical right lies, e.g., Faux News, about Democrats being socialists, which most are not, public opinion has not changed much in recent years. It is reasonable to think that even fewer Democrats would say they are Marxists.**

** Asking for positive feelings about capitalism and socialism seems inadequate to me. Neither capitalism nor socialism are defined. Who knows what definitions individual people have. It is possible, e.g., me, to have both positive and negative feelings about both. In my opinion, the question alone doesn’t shed much light on how people really feel. It is arguably misleading.

Qs: It is reasonable to believe on the basis of the current situation in American politics and society that decades of divisive, radical right Republican dark free speech is mostly responsible for (i) tearing American society apart (unwarranted distrust and animosity, belief in lies, etc.), and (ii) significantly subverting and corrupting normal functioning of the federal government? 

Footnote: 

1. In addition to the ~$4 billion in damage that the Texas border stunt cost, one source reported that congress approved $521 million to pay for National Guard costs related to T****’s 1/6 coup attempt. Another source reported that D.C. police costs related to the coup attempt were about $71 million. Another ~$30 million was estimated for personnel and physical damage at the capitol building. Who knows what other economic and non-economic damages came from and are still coming from the ‘incident’ on 1/6? It was a fairly expensive but damaging little shindig.

President Biden still does not get it

The New York Times writes:

Biden Lashes Trump Over Jan. 6, Saying He ‘Lacked the Courage to Act’

President Biden on Monday denounced former President Donald J. Trump’s refusal to decisively intervene to stop the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol, declaring that his predecessor “lacked the courage to act” and betrayed the police officers he claimed to support.

Evidence the 1/6 Committee laid out in public made what T**** was doing plain and clear to everyone who can see. T**** did not lack the courage to act. He had the courage to not act in the hope that certifying the election would be subverted. That was T****’s intent. The 1/6 coup attempt was planned, not some spontaneous outburst. 

That Biden cannot see that simple, plain reality says about all anyone needs to conclude he should not run for re-election. He just doesn’t get it. He is not up to the job. At this point, we would probably be better off if he resigned and let Harris finish out the rest of his term. She cannot be worse than he is at this point.

The climate and the human condition

The human condition includes many or most people on planet Earth (1) living on the edge of survival, and (2) allowing corrupt demagogue tyrants to lead their societies to ruin if they believe there is profit enough in it. That includes essentially all or all laissez-faire capitalists everywhere. These days, corrupt demagogue tyrants and laissez-faire capitalists are leading us all to hell on Earth.

The New York Times writes:

Congo to Auction Land to Oil Companies: ‘Our Priority Is Not to Save the Planet’

Peatlands and rainforests in the Congo Basin protect the planet by storing carbon. Now, in a giant leap backward for the climate, they’re being auctioned off for drilling.

The Democratic Republic of Congo, home to one of the largest old-growth rainforests on Earth, is auctioning off vast amounts of land in a push to become “the new destination for oil investments,” part of a global shift as the world retreats on fighting climate change in a scramble for fossil fuels.

The oil and gas blocks, which will be auctioned in late July, extend into Virunga National Park, the world’s most important gorilla sanctuary, as well as tropical peatlands that store vast amounts of carbon, keeping it out of the atmosphere and from contributing to global warming.

“If oil exploitation takes place in these areas, we must expect a global climate catastrophe, and we will all just have to watch helplessly,” said Irene Wabiwa, who oversees the Congo Basin forest campaign for Greenpeace in Kinshasa.

Congo’s about-face in allowing new oil drilling in environmentally sensitive areas comes eight months after its president, Félix Tshisekedi, stood alongside world leaders at the global climate summit in Glasgow and endorsed a 10-year agreement to protect its rainforest, part of the vast Congo Basin, which is second in size only to the Amazon.  

Congo has taken note of each of these global events, said Tosi Mpanu Mpanu, the nation’s lead representative on climate issues and an adviser to the minister of hydrocarbons.

Congo’s sole goal for the auction, he said, is to earn enough revenue to help the struggling nation finance programs to reduce poverty and generate badly needed economic growth.  

“That’s our priority,” Mr. Mpanu said, in an interview last week. “Our priority is not to save the planet.”

One thing that is pretty certain, oil companies (OCs) could not care less about anything that impairs profits. If an OC sees enough threat to profit, then they will probably take the minimum action necessary to relieve the threat. In America, taking minimum action mostly means quietly bribing politicians ("campaign contributions") and hiring public relations firms (sophisticated professional liars). That is the most profitable way forward.

In jolly old America, OCs always act to subvert any government effort to serve the public interest by defending the environment. OCs also routinely try to deceive the public into a false belief that they are on our side. The OCs are on their side, not ours.

It's always a discouragingly huge, effective con job by pro-pollution interests. In America, our government gets subverted and the public gets deceived and screwed. It's a win-win for polluter OCs. OCs profit from polluting. The environment and non-wealthy people get poisoned. It's also a win for corrupted politicians who get re-elected, e.g., corrupt Joe Manchin and the almost the entire Republican Party in congress.

For what it is worth in terms of corruption, Transparency International ranks Congo as 162 out of 180 countries on Earth. It's a kleptocracy.

Why it is so hard to trust polls

 TALK ABOUT A CONTRADICTION! 

ON 7/21/22

Joe Biden and Kamala Harris would both beat the two favorites for the GOP

nomination in 2024—Donald Trump and Ron DeSantis—in either hypothetical

matchup, according to a new poll.

An Echelon Insights survey found that if the next election were being held today,

voters would narrowly back Biden (46 percent) over Trump (44 percent), 

with the president also the preferred choice when up against the Florida governor 

(45 percent to 41 percent).

https://www.newsweek.com/2024-odds-biden-harris-trump-desantis-1726687

ON 7/23/22 

Former President Donald Trump is still favored to defeat President Joe Biden 

in a 2024 rematch if both politicians ultimately become their respective party's 

nominees, despite the evidence and testimony presented in televised hearings 

by the House select committee investigating the January 6, 2021, attack on the 

U.S. Capitol.

The current Real Clear Politics average of recent national surveys, which includes 

four separate polls from June 28 through July 20, shows Trump ahead by about 

2 points.

The most recent poll, carried out by Emerson College from July 19 to 20, showed 

Trump ahead of Biden by 3 points.

https://www.newsweek.com/trump-still-beats-biden-2024-rematch-despite-jan-6-hearings-polls-1727393

Either way, too close for comfort I would say. Maybe time for Biden to heed what 

Democrat voters want?

Most Democrats Would Prefer Biden Not Run Again in 2024, 

Poll Finds

https://www.voanews.com/a/most-democrats-would-prefer-biden-not-run-again-in-2024-poll-finds/6654889.html

House Hearing on Long Covid Reveals Widespread and Serious Crisis in US

 

How widespread is long COVID? It’s put millions of US adults out of work, expert says By Julia Marnin July 19, 2022 5:31 PM (Fr. Miami Herald)

How widespread in long COVID? It’s put millions of U.S. adults who were previously infected with COVID-19 out of work, an expert testified at a House hearing. If you have heard about long COVID — a condition in which symptoms of a coronavirus infection can linger for weeks, months or years — you may wonder how widespread it is.

By February, more than half of the U.S. population was estimated to have already been infected with COVID-19, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Long COVID may occur at least four weeks after a COVID-19 infection, the agency notes.

About 28 million working-age adults in the U.S., and likely more to date, have developed the condition after testing positive for the virus, workforce expert Katie Bach, a nonresident senior fellow at the Brookings Institution, testified at a House subcommittee hearing on Tuesday, July 19.

“Long Covid is leading millions of Americans to reduce their work schedules or stop working,” Bach wrote in testimony ahead of the House Select Subcommittee on the Coronavirus Crisis hearing.

Currently, about 16 million people in the U.S. are estimated to have long COVID, according to federal data, and 3.3 million adults are estimated to be out of work full-time because of how the condition has affected their health, Bach said. This is 2.4% of full-time workers in the U.S.

Additionally, an estimated 2.6 million more workers dealing with long COVID symptoms have had their work hours reduced by 25%, Bach testified.

Among affected workers are those in health care, according to written testimony by Dr. Monica Verduzco-Gutierrez, a physiatrist and professor at the University of Texas Health Science Center at San Antonio, who spoke at the hearing.

Verduzco-Gutierrez said she has treated a number of nurses and physicians experiencing long COVID, including some who “have not been able to return to the operating room or to the frontline or the patient bedside.”

Meanwhile, Bach said “the number of people not working due to long COVID will likely continue to grow as more people become infected.”

The hearing was held as the infectious omicron subvariant BA.5 made up roughly 78% of COVID-19 cases nationwide for the week ending July 16, CDC data estimates show. UC Davis Health has described it as the “most easily transmissible” subvariant.

In May, the CDC estimated 1 in 5 adults may develop at least one post-COVID symptom following a COVID-19 infection, McClatchy News previously reported. For those 65 and older, the risk is slightly higher.

 Of the Americans currently out of work because of long COVID, “many of these impacted families lose necessary income and employer-based health insurance at a time when they need it the most,” House Majority Whip James E. Clyburn, D-S.C., the subcommittee chairman, said in his opening remarks at the hearing.

Symptoms of Long COVID

 “Each of these persons with Long COVID are suffering and has a story that needs to be heard. Each of them has a different course – some even starting as asymptomatic or mild COVID-19 – with lingering and debilitating symptoms,” Verduzco-Gutierrez wrote.

Most people diagnosed with long COVID were never hospitalized due to their initial infection, a study published as a white paper in May found, McClatchy News previously reported.

Long COVID patients can have “a wide range of symptoms,” according to the CDC, and some include:

Fatigue

Fever

Breathing troubles

Cough

Chest pain

Heart palpitations

Brain fog

Headache

Dizziness

Digestive issues

Depression or anxiety

Muscle pain

“I have had cancer survivors get Long COVID. They tell me that their post-COVID fatigue is 100-times worse than their cancer fatigue ever was,” Verduzco-Gutierrez said.

Another witness at the long COVID hearing, Cynthia Adinig, who described herself as a formerly “mulitasking supermom,” said before her COVID-19 infection in March 2020, she ran two businesses while homeschooling her child, was involved in her local church and volunteered for a charity, according to her written testimony.

“Unfortunately, I can no longer be part of those spaces in the capacity that I used to because from time to time now my body becomes overwhelmed with nausea, dizziness, intermittent paralysis, fluctuating oxygen levels, crippling joint pain and unexpected high heart rate.”

‘Immediate changes’needed

Another witness who testified at the hearing, Hannah Davis, a co-founder of the Patient-Led Research Collaborative, called for “immediate changes” when it comes to long COVID, according to her written testimony.

“We need an urgent public information campaign on Long Covid, to explain that it happens after mild cases and to all ages, is debilitating, and requires immediate pacing and rest.” In terms of lessening long COVID’s “economic burden,” Bach named at least “five critical interventions that the government can support.” They include:

Better long COVID treatment

Improved sick leave

Greater access to Social Security Disability Insurance benefits

Improved employer accommodation

Better data collection

“To fully assess the labor market impact of long Covid, and to track the efficacy of any interventions, better data collection is required,” Bach wrote.

In Clyburn’s opening statement, he acknowledged that there is still more to learn about long COVID.

“The millions of Americans experiencing Long COVID, and their families, are desperate for answers and support,” he said

 

https://www.miamiherald.com/news/coronavirus/article263619353.html