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Most thought that saying America was a “post-racial” society, was a stretch — well how about “post-truth”? … We don’t need No Stinking Facts!
by Angie Drobnic Holan, PolitiFact.com — Dec 13, 2016
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Oxford Dictionaries selected "post-truth" as its word of the year and defined it as the state of affairs when "objective facts are less influential in shaping public opinion than appeals to emotion and personal belief."
Fake news is the boldest sign of a post-truth society. When we can’t agree on basic facts -- or even that there are such things as facts -- how do we talk to each other?
It’s a media ecosystem where "everything is true and nothing is true," said President Barack Obama in an postelection interview with the New Yorker. "And the capacity to disseminate misinformation, wild conspiracy theories, to paint the opposition in wildly negative light without any rebuttal — that has accelerated in ways that much more sharply polarize the electorate and make it very difficult to have a common conversation," he said.
The disturbing thing about this Post-Truth 2016 Lie aka “Fake News” — it has become the 2017 M.O. (modus operandi) for the Trump Team to avoid answering or analyzing anything, posed by the so-called “Fake Media”
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‘Fake news,’ ‘the lying press’ and our democracy
by Steve Zansberg, The Daily Sentinel, Grand Junction, CO — Mar 7, 2017
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Trump and his team have co-opted the term “fake news” in an effort to lump together credible and well-respected press entities with the Russian-backed promulgators of actual “fake news” reports that were posted on social media sites during the campaign. Among the most well-known (and widely circulated) examples of such completely baseless “reports” were bogus stories alleging that Hillary Clinton ran a child exploitation ring out of a DC-area pizza joint, that the Pope had endorsed Trump, and that an indictment had been drawn up for Hillary Clinton.
To thereafter attach the “fake news” label to unfavorable but fact-based reports concerning former NSA Chief Mike Flynn’s and other Trump campaign staffers’ repeated contacts with Russian officials during the campaign, is calculated to achieve only one purpose: to cause the American people to distrust the information they receive from the news media. “Believe me” Trump says. What he means is “Believe only me.”
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The multiple anonymous sources in The New York Times’ report about Trump campaign operatives’ contacts with Russian intelligence officials may turn out to have overstated the actual facts. But even that potential outcome does not render such a well-sourced news article “fake news.” It is very real news that credible sources within U.S. intelligence agencies are making these claims and assert that there is written documentation to substantiate them.
The worst thing about this Post-Truth 2016 Lie aka “Fake News” — it has become the 2017 M.O. for ‘anonymous agents’ to plant “Fake Thoughts” into the Twittering President’s head. Such an effective M.O. in fact, that the President’s own Team may have resorted to using to this “targeting” technique, to break through the clutter (aka. The President’s Brain).
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Five Revelations from the Senate's First Russia Hearings
by Tessa Stuart, rollingstone.com — Mar 31, 2017
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...And They [Internet Trolls] Are Targeting Trump's Twitter Account Specifically
Perhaps most interesting, [Clinton] Watts reported that bots have been observed tweeting dubious claims at Trump in an apparent effort to influence the president. "I can tell you right now, today, 'gray outlets,' Soviet-pushing accounts, tweet at President Trump during high volumes, when they know he's online, and they push conspiracy theories. So, if he is to click on one of those or cite one of those, it just proves Putin correct that we can use [this method] as a lever against the Americans," Watts testified.
Trump's own advisers on the National Security Council have considered similar tactics, as the Times reported, the idea of "feeding suggested Twitter posts to the president so the council's staff would have greater influence" was discussed at an NSC meeting in February.
The plot of “Inception” has nothing over these thought-implantors. Old Dog, old tricks … and all that.
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And Trumpian response to all of the most recent “fact-based” disclosures, that cast him in a not-so-favorable dim-bulb light?
He just keeps on Tweeting!
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Trump mocks Chuck Todd's appearance, Russia reporting in Saturday morning tweet
by Rebecca Morin, Politico.com — Apr 1, 2017
President Donald Trump went after Chuck Todd and NBC News on Saturday morning, asking when they will stop reporting on "the fake Trump/Russia story."
"When will Sleepy Eyes Chuck Todd and @NBCNews start talking about the Obama SURVEILLANCE SCANDAL and stop with the Fake Trump/Russia story," the president tweeted. Nearly 20 minutes later, he added: "It is the same Fake News Media that said there is 'no path to victory for Trump' that is now pushing the phony Russia story. A total scam!"
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"I think the biggest problem here is you have the president not wanting to accept the conclusion that Russia tried to interfere in the election and that there is going to be an investigation in this, whether he likes it or not," Todd said. "The source of all of the current problems for this West Wing right now, for this presidency right now, all stems from that tweet where the president accused President Obama of wiretapping him."
"This has all been self-inflicted. The Russia cloud is dark enough," Todd continued. "This sort of Nunes Keystone Kop situation has made it that much worse.
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When Chuck Todd sounds like a Rhodes Scholar when responding to Trumpian personal attacks — you know something has seriously ‘gone off the rails’ in Trump-land.
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SO what do you think the PolitiFact “2017 Lie of the Year” will be, if this keeps up?
They’re probably going to need a new adjective to describe someone who “habitually lies” … as often as, breathing.
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