Three Years

In a comment published in Nature, Christiana Figueres et al announce the launch of Mission 2020 and explain the need to start reducing carbon dioxide emissions before it's too late.

The technology-driven transition to low-carbon energy is well under way, a trend that made the 2015 Paris climate agreement possible. But there is still a long way to go to decarbonize the world economy.

When it comes to climate, timing is everything. According to an April report, should emissions continue to rise beyond 2020, or even remain level, the temperature goals set in Paris become almost unattainable.

Gorilla Option

A world poll from Pew indicates that 70 percent of respondents lack confidence in U.S. leadership "to do the right thing regarding world affairs".

Which makes sense given Seymour Hersh's investigation of the U.S.April bombing of a Syrian air base in response to the alleged use of chemical weapons. Von Clownstick ignored the lack of evidence in making the decision to bomb. Hersh quotes his anonymous source:

“The Salafists and jihadists got everything they wanted out of their hyped-up Syrian nerve gas ploy,” the senior adviser to the U.S. intelligence community told me, referring to the flare up of tensions between Syria, Russia and America. “The issue is, what if there’s another false flag sarin attack credited to hated Syria? [Von Clownstick] has upped the ante and painted himself into a corner with his decision to bomb. And do not think these guys are not planning the next faked attack. [Von Clownstick] will have no choice but to bomb again, and harder. He’s incapable of saying he made a mistake.”

Update (June 29):  Ken Klippenstein interviews Hersh who makes a good point on our political situation:

The Democrats may be playing with fire on all of these investigations because unless they really think they have something… I don’t see anything but getting sympathy for [von Clownstick]. The Democrats aren’t attacking specific ideas, they’re just wallowing and trying to talk about what the Russians did, they stole the elections, and you know, the cover-up—which they’re not going to prove, I don’t think. I don’t see any reason to be optimistic about it. So they may end up giving this guy another run, he may hold the Congress and he may be reelected, unless they start talking about real issues—you know, jobs. He’s not delivering, but they don’t talk about [that]. They only talk about, did he cover up something that nobody’s clear on what. It’s not clear what he was covering up—Russian mob money? I don’t know. Nobody’s quite made a case to me.

Update (June 30):  Jonathan Cook is troubled by mainstream media's lack of interest in Hersh's story.

Meanwhile, we seem to experience a daily revelation of embarrassments that are merely par for the course for our psychotic Dear Leader.

This pattern of distraction is classically [von Clownstickian] behavior, fully in line with his decades-long behavior of calling up journalists under a fake name to spread amusing or even occasionally embarrassing stories as a means of getting his name in the headlines.

The sheer incompetence makes him dangerous. I expect the advent of a real crisis to provide the cover needed to push him aside in favor of some measure of sanity.

Update (July 4):  Or not.

Update (July 7):  More from Jonathan Cook about Hersh's critics.

Health Insurance

As the Congressional Budget Office report shows how Republicans are either incompetent at and/or uninterested in actual governing (in what universe is 22 million fewer insured people seen as an improvement?), it turns out that a handful of Republican Senators got cold feet and the vote is postponed. Heather Digby Parton:

[T]he fact that there are only a small handful of Republican senators who are prepared to make some phony mumbling noises against it says everything we need to know about the moral rot at the heart of this Republican congressional majority.

Meanwhile, Senator Elizabeth Warren says single-payer insurance is the next step. Unfortunately, Democrat dominated California isn't seeing it that way. Jim Kavanagh:

[O]nce single-payer becomes a reality in California, it will catalyze a movement in every other state and on the national level. That—the fact that it will start a wildfire of imitation—and not the fact that it’s too expensive, is what the California Democratic Party is desperate to avoid, and what its donors and lobbyists are ordering it to block.

Update (June 29):  Some backlash to the California state Assembly Speaker's decision to hold back single-payer insurance.

Update (July 1):  Matthew Rozsa highlights the dilemma in Congress:

Republicans have found themselves unable to repeal Obamacare, at least to the extent that they clearly wanted to, because doing so would cause people to die.

Update (July 10):  ACA has its flaws. Which is why "Medicare for All" becomes more important. It's not like the Republicans have any useful ideas.

Update (July 12):  Christy Ford Chapin explains why Republican aren't going to be able to figure out anything on health insurance.

The House and Senate bills obliterate the idea – for which their party purportedly stands – of competitive markets lowering prices and enhancing consumer welfare. That’s both a political and a policy problem for Republicans.

[A]re they ready to create a health care system that aids every group except the working poor? The wealthy will have their health care and their tax cuts. The middle classes will continue to enjoy expensive, generous insurance that’s indirectly funded through the tax code. And insurance companies will accept whatever assistance the government provides – from tax cuts to coverage penalty periods – to continue increasing their authority over the medical system.

That’s an arrangement that leaves out the very groups that are most desperate for health care reform: lower-income families and the working poor.

Update (July 14):  Boo hoo.

[Majority Leader] McConnell released a revised version of the Senate GOP’s plan to repeal and replace the Affordable Care Act, or Obamacare. Faced with complaints and threats of defection from both flanks of his party — ultra-conservatives and so-called moderate Republicans — McConnell opted to revise the bill towards appeasing conservatives. In turn, the moderates greeted Thursday’s release of the revised bill with reservations.

Despite his cajoling, the so-called master tactician of the Senate is now at the edge of not having enough votes to even call up the health care bill next week for a vote, as McConnell pledged he would do after he delayed the Senate’s August recess by two weeks.

Update (July 15):  When insurers don't like your bill, that should tell you something.

Update (July 18):  McConnell doesn't even have the votes to repeal without replacement.

Update (July 19):  It pleases me to no end that health insurance reform failed because Republicans can't agree on how hard they wanted to fuck over poor people. Now they hope the ACA fail will on it's own. Jeffrey Young:

The president of the United States and members of the party that controls Congress are saying that they see problems in the health care system, and their plan is to stand by and do nothing while people suffer.

This is breathtakingly cynical, and reveals the Republican Party’s priorities. Getting rid of the dreaded Obamacare at any cost is more important to [Fuckface] and his party than acting to improve the health care system for the people they represent.

Update (July 22):  The fuckers just can't catch a break.

Efforts to repeal the Affordable Care Act ran into big trouble on Friday afternoon, when the Senate parliamentarian ruled that nearly a dozen key provisions of GOP repeal legislation violate special procedural rules that Republicans are using to pass their bill.

Update (July 24):  Totally nuts.

Update (July 25):  The vote was 51 to 50 to start debate on who the fuck knows. Heather Digby Parton:

This is just a mindless drive for a “win,” in order to justify a cynical political ploy that energized their voters to oppose the hated Obama and took on a life of its own. Now Republicans would rather see people’s lives destroyed than admit to all that.

And they are scrabbling to find anything that can pass after the Better Care Reconciliation Act was defeated 43 to 57. There's a bit more dissent than I thought when it seemed they might have 48 votes.

Update (July 26):  The  Obamacare Repeal Reconciliation Act failed 45 to 55. Keep trying you immoral assholes.

Update (July 27):  An insurance trade group sent the Senate a stern letter. And this is how we run the government now.

All of the entreaties by Democrats, and some Republicans like Arizona Sen. John McCain, to resurrect the traditional Senate way of doing business—legislating in the open and holding hearings, debating amendments, etc.—seemed to be for naught.

Also, still a thug.

Update (July 28):  The Health Care Freedom Act failed 49 to 51. Interesting that McCain is the only senator to vote for both starting debate and against this (possibly) last failed attempt. I'm thinking this is a little bit of payback to good old Fuckface.

It's important to remember that Susan Collins and Lisa Murkowski were the most consistent Republican Senators in their opposition to this legislative charade.

Update (July 29):  Celisa Calacal highlights the work of ADAPT and other activists in defending the Affordable Care Act.

Update (July 30):  Even as repeal has been stopped for now, the Republican sabotage continues.

Update (July 31):  Constant bullshit threats from Fuckface.

If a new HealthCare Bill is not approved quickly, BAILOUTS for Insurance Companies and BAILOUTS for Members of Congress will end very soon!

Update (August 7):  Steven Rosenfeld examines what states can do to start transitioning to a single-payer insurance system.

Update (August 9):  Grab some popcorn.

Last month’s epic failure to deliver on their 7-year-old promise to repeal the Affordable Care Act is causing angst among GOP candidates up and down the ticket ahead of next year’s congressional midterm election.

Update (August 14):  Jonathan Cohn explains how it all went wrong.

[H]e never stopped making ambitious promises about repeal legislation, vowing over and over again that it would mean lower premiums and deductibles while protecting people with pre-existing conditions ― vows that, independent analyses showed repeatedly were simply not true.

It is possible that [von Clownstick] understands he is lying when he says these things, and simply doesn’t care. It is also possible that [Fuckface] has no idea what’s actually in the recent Republican legislation and actually believes it would improve access and affordability. Nothing he has said or done, as a candidate or president, suggests he understands health care policy at even the most basic level.

Either way, the Republican dilemma remains the same. Their health care agenda is incompatible with their rhetoric and, from the looks of things, inconsistent with what the American people want as well. Instead of acknowledging this reality, and adjusting either what he’s been promising or what he’s been proposing, [von Clownstick] is continuing to demand the impossible ― and then acting indignant when it doesn’t happen.

Update (September 15):  They lost the Senate vote, but are still looking for ways to screw over people who benefit from ACA.

[Von Clownstick's] intransigence about paying Obamacare subsidies [which could raise premiums by 15 percent in 2018] is one facet of marketplace chaos created by Republicans that is making health care more expensive. In Congress, a handful of senators are making a final effort to repeal Obamacare and eviscerate Medicaid, which analysts said could cause 32 million people to lose coverage over the next decade.

Update (September 17):  Unbelievably, there may be yet another attempt to repeal.

Update (September 18):  The saucer sure knows how to fuck people over in a hurry when they want to.

And because the Senate has weird rules, the Cassidy-Graham legislation could go straight to a vote after just two minutes of debate or less.

Update (September 19):  These fucking fucks are not only misleading their own colleagues, they also want to prevent states from establishing single-payer systems. They just want to pressure one person to change their vote and rush this thing through.

Update (September 22):  Suddenly, ACA is unfair because "red" states refused to expand Medicare and accept federal funding. The new repeal effort is widely unpopular. Unfortunately, Republican Senators who stand for any principle whatsoever are very scarce. One is John McCain.

As I have repeatedly stressed, health care reform legislation ought to be the product of regular order in the Senate. Committees of jurisdiction should mark up legislation with input from all committee members, and send their bill to the floor for debate and amendment. That is the only way we might achieve bipartisan consensus on lasting reform, without which a policy that affects one-fifth of our economy and every single American family will be subject to reversal with every change of administration and congressional majority.

I would consider supporting legislation similar to that offered by my friends Senators Graham and Cassidy were it the product of extensive hearings, debate and amendment. But that has not been the case. Instead, the specter of September 30th budget reconciliation deadline has hung over this entire process.

... 

I cannot in good conscience vote for the Graham-Cassidy proposal. I believe we could do better working together, Republicans and Democrats, and have not yet really tried. Nor could I support it without knowing how much it will cost, how it will effect insurance premiums, and how many people will be helped or hurt by it. Without a full CBO score, which won't be available by the end of the month, we won't have reliable answers to any of those questions. 

...

I hope that in the months ahead, we can join with colleagues on both sides of the aisle to arrive at a compromise solution that is acceptable to most of us, and serves the interests of Americans as best we can.

So the donors are disappointed, but they'll still get most of their tax cuts.

Update (September 26):  Looks like the old, white men who run the country have failed again. Sure would be nice if someone else could be in charge for a change.

Update (October 2):  Will those old, white, rich men give health insurance to children?

Update (October 9):  Fuckface is planning to use an executive order to undermine parts of the ACA.

Update (October 12):  The executive order could definitely make the markets worse, but Matthew Rozsa thinks the impact is somewhat mitigated.

[T]he regulatory process is notoriously slow. Any real-world impact would likely take years -- if it ever happens at all.

Update (October 13):  The executive order is deliberate sabotage and is a failure to "take care that the laws be faithfully executed".

Update (October 15):  Even Steve Bannon says Fuckface is trying to destroy the ACA.

Update (October 17):  There might be some kind of fix for ACA, but von Clownstick's position seems unclear.

Update (October 18):  Paul Ryan opposes the new ACA plan.

Update (October 24):  Von Clownstick's actions might unintentionally boost ACA.

Update (November 25):  Jonathan Cohn reports that Republican Senators are ready to eliminate the penalty for the individual mandate even though the idea originated with the Heritage Foundation.

[I]t’s telling that, as these efforts to repeal the mandate move forward, only one Republican senator, Susan Collins of Maine, is talking seriously about different policy mechanisms that could achieve the same basic goals of spreading the financial burden of illness and keeping a stable market for comprehensive coverage.

The rest are talking about jettisoning the mandate without a real replacement ― a move that would mean fewer people with insurance, higher premiums for those who hold onto coverage and less stable insurance markets generally. Apparently that outcome is ok with the vast majority of Republicans and their allies. That’s quite a statement about the party’s priorities.

Update (December 10):  Cohn recounts the Republican "campaign of neglect and sabotage" against ACA.

Update (December 19):  While they couldn't pass outright repeal, Republicans managed to do a lot of damage through the tax bill.

Update (February 7, 2018):  Jeff Bezos, Warren Buffett, and Jamie Dimon apparently want to do something about the cost of health care in the U.S. Marshall Auerback has an answer for them: Medicare for All.

Update (April 8, 2018):  Republicans in Iowa have found a devious way to undermine ACA with new "health plans".

[T]he legislation declares that the new plans “shall not be deemed to be insurance,” and there’s a reason for that. Iowa’s lawmakers want to make sure the policies aren’t subject to the Affordable Care Act’s insurance regulations, including those that protect people with pre-existing conditions.

Unless a court challenge gets in the way, nothing will stop the Farm Bureau and Wellmark from jacking up premiums on people with conditions such as cancer and diabetes ― or denying those people coverage altogether. Nor will anything keep the plan sponsors from limiting or excluding benefits the Affordable Care Act considers “essential,” a list that includes treatment for mental illness, maternity care and prescription drugs.

And if the Farm Bureau and Wellmark want to impose annual or lifetime limits on benefits, they can do that, too. People who receive organ transplants or have rare genetic disorders, such as hemophilia, frequently run up bills that exceed those limits.

There is an issue with unsubsidized, higher income people paying increasing premiums. But other states are finding ways to lower premiums while preserving ACA protections.

In Alaska and Minnesota, state officials faced remarkably similar situations, with premiums that put insurance out of reach for consumers who got little or no financial aid. They responded very differently than their counterparts in Des Moines. They created “reinsurance” pools that reimburse carriers for their most expensive-to-cover beneficiaries. Premiums fell in both states, and just this past week officials in Wisconsin said they were going to try the same thing.

Iowa’s GOP leaders could have tried some version of that. They also could have launched, finally, a serious outreach effort to boost enrollment.

Update (June 12, 2018):  Here's the Republican argument: Because ACA doesn't work as it was intended since we destroyed a key part of it, then we shouldn't have to enforce any of it.

On Thursday the Justice Department threw its support behind a lawsuit arguing that Obamacare’s protections for people with pre-existing conditions are unconstitutional. The suit, brought by 20 states led by Republicans, argue that those protections were supposed to work in tandem with the mandate that individuals have health insurance. Because Congress is no longer enforcing the mandate, they say, insurers no longer have to sell policies to everyone regardless of medical status.

Update (August 1, 2018):  A study sponsored by the libertarian Mercatus Center and apparently funded by the Koch brothers finds that Medicare for All would reduced health care spending by $2 trillion over ten years.

Update (August 4, 2018):  Justin Anderson points out how most headlines about the Medicare for All study gave the total cost of the plan and overlooked the savings.

Update (August 13, 2018):  Dean Baker criticizes the "fact-checkers" who blasted Democrats for emphasizing savings over costs.

Update (August 29, 2018):  Kevin Zeese and Margaret Flowers say the time is right for Medicare for All citing a poll from Reuters/Ipsos showing 70 percent support nationwide.

Update (October 15, 2018):  Maine's former health commissioner Mary Mayhew has been hired by the administration. According to Dr. Cathleen London:

She destroyed Medicaid in Maine now she will destroy it in the whole country.

Update (December 1, 2018):  A study from the Political Economy Research Institute finds that Medicare for All would save $5.1 trillion over the first ten years.

Update (January 7, 2019):  Hearings on the topic of Medicare for All are being planned by two House committees.

Update (January 16, 2019):  Analysis of the midterm election shows that Democrats who support Medicare for All are not more likely to lose.

Update (February 27, 2019):  Representative Pramila Jayapal has introduced the Medicare for All Act of 2019.

Under the new House bill, an expanded Medicare program would replace private health insurance, Medicaid and all other forms of health coverage except existing programs for military veterans and Native Americans. Private plans would be permitted only to cover services, such as cosmetic procedures, not covered by Medicare.

Update (April 2, 2019):  With Fuckface making noise again about repealing ACA, Cody Fenwick argues Republicans have backed themselves into a corner.

If Republicans do nothing, Democrats will run against their failure to improve health care. If they move forward with a plan that would make health care worse, Democrats will run against that. And if they allow the courts to destroy Obamacare, Democrats will run to restore coverage to millions.

Of course, they could "pass legislation that would actually improve health care in the United States", but that's crazy talk.

Update (May 14, 2019):  Washington State will be the first to offer a public option for health insurance.

Update (July 3, 2019):  Only four of 20 Democratic presidential candidates supported ending private insurance (though one claimed she "misheard" the question).

According to a Morning Consult/Politico survey conducted after the first Democratic presidential primary debates, support among voters for Medicare for All falls to 46 percent from 53 percent when respondents are told the government-run health system would diminish the role of private insurers — but rises back to 55 percent when voters learn that losing their private plans would still allow them to keep their preferred doctors and hospitals.

Update (July 14, 2019):  Shira Tarlo examines the benefits and addresses criticism of Medicare for All.

Three Hundred Fifty-First!

So nice to see that nothing much has changed.

I don't think I'm really concerned about whether the President resigns next month or serves eight years. It will be one long, highly entertaining, highly rated "reality" drama that won't be favorably viewed by history.

I'm worried about what comes next.

Post-Truth

It seems astonishing that the person most often complaining about "fake news" is our greatest purveyor of bullshit.

When facts get in the way, you simply find "alternatives" that suit you better. The nature of reality and whether facts even matter has become a partisan issue. A study from Duke University shows that even fact-checking as an activity is not beyond controversy.

[T]he Duke study adds another layer to the battle between fact and fantasy. Their research shows that the words “fact check” are now perceived to have a liberal slant. Again and again the researchers found moments when conservative media referred to fact-checking in a negative way, regardless of the nature of the facts checked.

In one example from the Weekly Standard, fact-checking was referred to as “the liberal media’s latest attempt to control the discourse.” The entire article suggested that fact-checking was a liberal scheme designed to make conservatives look bad.

Obviously, an existential threat like climate change can't be addressed if we can't even agree that humans are the cause. We can't recognize that democracy is under attack if actions taken are "legal".

One lesson is that the road away from democracy is rarely characterized by overt violations of the formal rule of law. To the contrary, the contemporary path away from democracy under the rule of law typically relies on actions within the law. ... Ironically, the law is deployed to undermine legality and the rule of law more generally.

Theoretically, education would be able to overcome this dilemma. Henry Giroux:

The crisis of capitalism and the production of widespread misery has opened up new political opportunities to reclaim education as a central element of politics and resistance. Education as it functions on multiple levels and through diverse registers matters. It is one of the most powerful sources for changing consciousness, desires and agency itself.

But facts are not welcomed by powerful interests.

In the present moment, it becomes particularly important for progressives, educators and concerned citizens to protect and enlarge the formative cultures and public spheres that make democracy possible. The relentless attack on truth, honesty and the ethical imagination makes it all the more imperative for the public to think dangerously, especially in societies that appear increasingly amnesiac — that is, countries where forms of historical, political and moral forgetting are not only willfully practiced but celebrated. All of which becomes all the more threatening at a time when a country such as the United States has tipped over into a mode of authoritarianism that views critical thought as both a liability and a threat.

Giroux describes the rising phenomenon of manufactured illiteracy which is "designed primarily to make war on language, meaning, thinking and the capacity for critical thought."

This updated form of illiteracy does not simply constitute an absence of learning, ideas or knowledge. Nor can it be solely attributed to what has been called the “smartphone society.” On the contrary, it is a willful practice and goal used to actively depoliticize people and make them complicit with the political and economic forces that impose misery and suffering upon their lives. At the same time, illiteracy bonds people: It offers the pretense of a community bound by a willful denial of facts and its celebration of ignorance.

Update (July 21):  Fox News has long been the propaganda arm for the Republican Party, and now Steven Rosenfeld reports on how Breitbart News Network is even worse.

Breitbart's disruptive template fueled the political and information universe we now inhabit, where the right dismisses facts and embraces fantasies.

There is no corollary dynamic on the left or among pro-Clinton audiences in 2016. The left's news sources, media consumption and patterns of social media-sharing are more open-minded and fact-based and less insular and aggressive. Still, Breitbart’s obsessive focus on fabricating and hyping scandals involving Hillary Clinton (and Jeb Bush early in the primary season) pushed mainstream media to disproportionately cover its agenda.

These observations are among the takeaways of a major study from Columbia Journalism Review that analyzed 1.25 million stories published online between April 2015 and Election Day 2016. While the study affirmed what many analysts have long perceived—that right-wing media and those who consume it inhabit a paranoid and dark parallel universe—it also documented shifts in the right’s media ecosystem; namely, Breitbart supplanting Fox News as the leading purveyor of extreme disinformation.

Update (August 4):  Christina Lopez G. lists five current lies that make the rounds of rightwing media.

Update (August 5):  Laurie Penny argues that successful politics takes more than just the facts.

One of the things that the left and the kind of liberal press doesn’t really understand at the moment is the influence of emotion and feeling in politics. It sounds like such a simple thing, but we have this way of thinking, on the left, that facts are enough. That it’s enough to be right. And if it was enough to be right, we’d win every election, because obviously we are right.

The right gets this. They go for fear. They hit people where they’re feeling least prideful. They kind of invoke this sense of pride and nationalism, and what people are lacking in the modern world: A sense of security, a sense of safety, a sense that they’re important, that their lives might matter, that they have a future that they can, in some way, look forward to.

I’m not trying to say that facts don’t matter. Obviously, just saying that facts matter and that there is such thing as objective truth seems radical today, in this rather frightening way it didn’t used to before. But actually telling a story about a future that is livable for a great deal of people is radical.

Update (August 7):  Phil Torres lists a set of values he seeks to reaffirm as part of his critique of the "new atheism". Among them:

[Putting epistemology before ideology] ... means caring more about the truth, as best we know it, than one’s prejudices and preferred beliefs. It means changing one’s beliefs as new evidence is introduced, even when doing so is psychologically uncomfortable. Good thinkers aren’t those who never make mistakes; rather, we should say that bad thinkers are those who make mistakes and then refuse to change their minds when those mistakes are pointed out to them.

Update (August 8):  Gabriel Bell summarizes an interesting point from a Judd Apatow interview about why conservatives can't make good comedies.

The conservative viewpoint indeed has difficulties admitting fault, admitting weakness, admitting doubt or any kind of internal battle. So much of what makes good television or movies hangs on character development, and — in many ways — the conservative viewpoint only allows characters to develop in one, mostly unquestioned way: toward faith and complete confidence.

 Apatow was answering a question about making a movie about the Vice President.

When you see Mike Pence, you think there’s a lot going on inside that guy. At least I do. But the problem is that Mike Pence will not tell you that. Lena [Dunham] will. There’s an openness and an honesty to what she does. She’s saying, I have these values, but I’m also a human being, and I make mistakes, and sometimes I’m crazy and selfish and other times I’m loving and supportive. And that’s why there’s no incredible, hysterically funny show about conservatives, because they’re too concerned about trying to present themselves as correct. They’re all going, I’m not neurotic. I’m not a disaster in any way. They don’t admit how lost they are. There’s something dishonest to me about that; it’s living a lie.

Update (August 11):  Poll results show that Republicans will believe anything.

Despite the president's record-low approval ratings, a majority of Republicans say they would be willing to postpone the 2020 election if [von Clownstick] were to propose such a plan. According to the poll conducted by two academic authors and published in the Washington Post, 52 percent support the idea.

The pollsters also found that 47 percent of Republicans believe [von Clownstick] won the popular vote, while 86 percent believe that millions of illegal immigrants took part in the election. Seventy-three percent think voter fraud happens somewhat often to very often.

Update (August 23):  Von Clownstick, like all good authoritarians, continues to attack the press.

Honestly, these are really, really dishonest people. And they are bad people. And I really think they don’t like our country. I really believe that.

How is the media biased for reporting verbatim what he says? And yet, his supporters eat it up.

He’s got a point about the media. It’s hard as a consumer to find an outlet that tells you the basic facts. They should be giving us the facts so a human being with a little bit of brains can make their own minds up.

Update (September 17):  Jane Lytvynenko tries to uncover the disinformation.

Update (October 2):  R. Kelly Garrett reports on a survey that finds 50.3 percent of Americans trust their gut for the truth.

[W]hen it comes to fighting the scourge of misinformation, there’s a simple strategy that everyone can use. If you are someone who consistently checks your intuition about what is true against the evidence, you are less likely to be misled. It may seem like common sense, but learning to dig into the story behind that shocking headline can help you avoid spreading falsehoods.

Also, Common Sense Media has advice for media literacy.

Don't start believin'. While it's important to be open-minded, in today's world you have to be just a little skeptical of pretty much everything.

It takes all kinds. Talk about how there are lots of different kinds of news sources: investigative journalism, research studies, opinion pieces, blogs, punditry, evening news, and so on.

From both sides now. There's usually more than one side to a story.

Play bad cop. Interrogate the source.

Putting the pieces together. Sometimes the news can be like a puzzle with information coming in bits.

Update (October 8):  Joseph Bernstein digs into the racist cesspool of Breitbart News.

The Breitbart alt-right machine ,,, was a brilliant audience expansion machine, financed by billionaires, designed to draw in people disgusted by some combination of identity politics, Muslim and Hispanic immigration, and the idea of Hillary Clinton or Barack Obama in the White House. And if expanding that audience meant involving white nationalists and neo-Nazis, their participation could always be laundered to hide their contributions.

Update (November 26):  Amanda Marcotte explains that "fake news" works because it reinforces what people already believe. For example, myths about immigrants let voters rationalize their choice in the election.

The internet absolutely helped spread rumors that there were secret federal assistance programs only available to non-white people and immigrants. But the fact of the matter is, those stories have been around for decades, spread by word of mouth. Russians may have pumped some money into elevating that propaganda, but it found an audience because so many people were willing to believe. And they want to believe because they are racist and want to justify their racism.

Update (November 27):  Not that it will matter to the right, but the Washington Post demonstrated who is the real source of fake news.

A woman who made up a false story about her relationship with disgraced Alabama Senate candidate Roy Moore, then relayed it to the Washington Post in an attempt to discredit the newspaper, found herself the target of a media firestorm after her plan backfired and Post reporters revealed her deception as part of a plot orchestrated by a right-wing organization.

Post executive editor Martin Baron:

We always honor ‘off-the-record’ agreements when they’re entered into in good faith. But this so-called off-the-record conversation was the essence of a scheme to deceive and embarrass us. The intent by Project Veritas clearly was to publicize the conversation if we fell for the trap. Because of our customary journalistic rigor, we weren’t fooled, and we can’t honor an ‘off-the-record’ agreement that was solicited in maliciously bad faith.

Update (December 9):  Steven Rosenfeld writes about the proliferation of lying in politics.

[N]ot only is there a tidal wave of lies swamping the nation’s political shores, there’s more political froth dampening any truth-telling, especially if that stands in the way of politically expedient goals.

“There is no such thing as an outright political lie,” [James Cusick] wrote. “Instead there’s distortion, exaggeration, misrepresentation, deception, half-truth and overstatement. The assumption is that the risk is worth it. Hubris and narcissism mean the consequences of a politician getting caught are outweighed – they think – by the benefits of telling voters what they want to hear. They know we seek support for our preconceived notions, and avoid information that challenges established views.”

“The primary role of the Fourth Estate, the media, is to act as a lie detector, and that—more than courts—acts as a deterrent to politicians.”

Update (December 10):  Conor Lynch notes that von Clownstick could be both a con man and delusional.

[A]ll Republicans are, to varying degrees, committed to “alternative facts.” This is because modern conservatism is an ideology that was built on them.

[The tax bill] is just the tip of the iceberg. The Republican Party as a whole is hostile to the truth, just like [Fuckface's] administration. Yet facts no longer seem to carry the same weight that they once did. Daniel Patrick Moynihan’s famous maxim — “You are entitled to your opinion, but you are not entitled to your own facts” — seems rather quaint in the post-truth era ....

Still, as the president’s delusions continue to multiply, it may become too much even for some Republicans to bear. The difference between an ordinary Republican and [von Clownstick] is that the former’s delusions revolve around his or her ideology, while the president’s revolve around his narcissistic personality. [Fuckface's] falsehoods are easier to spot, therefore, because they are often so flagrant and petty, while the lies of conservatism are propped up by a massive propaganda machine, with right-wing think-tanks, media organizations and political action committees all devoted to refuting reality.

Republicans have become exceptionally tolerant of bullshit, but [von Clownstick's] bullshit has come to be a problem. It is so brazen and transparent that it has revealed how little the party actually cares about the truth — just as [Fuckface's] racist and xenophobic rhetoric revealed the deep-seated racism within the Republican electorate. One can only spurn reality for so long before it finally takes its revenge ....

Update (December 13):  The press secretary lectured reporters that "[t]here's a very big difference between making honest mistakes and purposefully misleading the American people". Jake Tapper points out that mistakes in the press have been corrected while Fuckface is a hypocrite.

The White House run by the president who came to political prominence by promoting the lie that the first African-American president was born in Africa is finding time to take issue with those who mislead people.

The White House run by the president who said with no evidence that crowds of American Muslims were seen on TV celebrating in New Jersey after 9/11, the man who repeated the ludicrous National Enquirer claim that Ted Cruz's father had something to do with the Kennedy assassination and the man who has said with no evidence that there were three to five million fraudulent votes for Hillary Clinton, that same president is taking issue with people being misled.

Update (December 16):  Jennifer Mercieca says "retweeting" invokes a deliberate strategy.

[I]t’s becoming increasingly clear that what sets [von Clownstick] apart is his reliance upon paralipsis, a device that enables him to publicly say things that he can later disavow – without ever having to take responsibility for his words.

[Fuckface] dismissed [a] question with “it was a retweet” – as if to say that retweeting someone else’s claim meant that he wasn’t responsible for the content. ... "I retweet things and we start dialogue and it’s very interesting".

It’s a response that can be reduced to I’m not saying it, I’m just saying it.

Update (December 18):  Cenk Uygur talks about how the truth didn't matter to Stalin and the Nazis--what they communicated wasn't meant to be scientifically correct or legally correct, it was meant to be politically correct.

[T]he Washington Post first reported that a senior CDC leader instructed policy analysts at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention not to use certain words in documents “related to the budget and supporting materials that are to be given to the CDC’s partners and to Congress”, citing an unnamed policy analyst.

And a denial:

CDC Director Dr. Brenda Fitzgerald pushed back against reports that the agency had prohibited use of the words "vulnerable," "entitlement," "diversity," "transgender," "fetus," "evidence-based" and "science-based".

Update (December 20):  The restrictions at CDC are being described as "self-censorship".

Unnamed sources ... assert that the CDC’s reported “word bans” are only for the purposes of budget approvals and wouldn’t affect actual research. But the agency’s history shows that politicizing science goes hand in hand with restricting research and silencing public health communication, says Dr. Stephanie Zaza, president-elect of the American College of Preventive Medicine and a former medical officer at the CDC for 25 years.

Update (December 22):  I want to paraphrase an actual conversation:

Dutch reporter:  You said this.
U.S. Ambassador:  I never said that. We call that fake news.
Dutch reporter:  Here's a video where you say exactly what I claimed. Why did you say it's fake news?
U.S. Ambassador:  I didn't call that fake news.
* Dutch reporter looks at the cameraman in disbelief. *

Update (December 24):  The ambassador apologizes.

Update (July 24, 2018):  Despite enormous criticism over the imposition of tariffs, Dear Leader seeks to reassure his faithful followers.

It's all working out. Just remember: what you're seeing and what you're reading is not what's happening.

Update (October 28, 2018):  When confronted about an unsubstantiated claim about people from the Middle-East being part of a "caravan" from Central America, Fuckface offers this gem:

There’s no proof of anything. But they could very well be.

Update (November 20, 2018):  Lee McIntyre makes a distinction between lying and post-truth.

[T]he point of post-truth is domination. In my analysis, post-truth is an assertion of power.

Update (March 22, 2019):  Heather Digby Parton cites a poll that finds Fox News propaganda creates an alternate reality for their viewers.

One can see this most clearly in this one finding. Among Fox News viewers, the authors write, 78 percent "believe the [von Clownstick] administration has accomplished more than any administration in history," compared to 17 percent of all other people.

Night Thoughts

Wallace Shawn's Night Thoughts has a lot to say about "lucky" and "unlucky" people--and about murder. The darkness of the election leaves us less likely to survive as a species. Dark times are frightening, but perhaps also an opportunity to consider how "we might be able to stop being murderers".

This could be our night, and during this night we might be able to stop. Stop. Think. And start again in a different way.