The greatest cyberthreat this nation—and every nation—has faced isn’t the possibility of some foreign power grabbing control of the local electrical grid, or even interference in elections. It’s the erosion of authoritative sources for accurate, truthful information and the easy distribution of deliberately harmful disinformation.
That threat may seem as ephemeral as the tweets and emails and pop-up “news sites” on which it’s built, but it has contributed enormously to racism, violence, and division over the past four years. There may be no more decisive factor, from helping to elect Donald Trump to putting violent militia on our streets, than the simple lack of a trusted source for accurate information. Disinformation is no longer something that happens occasionally: It’s the medium in which much of the nation lives.
In the best of times, that sort of environment is toxic to sensible policies, to civil rights, and to democracies. In 2020, it’s been simply toxic to life. Because the lack of authoritative sources for health information has meant there is deadly confusion about such simple and effective ideas as wearing a mask.
But there is a difference between the erosion of faith in news sources, and the absolute collapse of faith in the World Health Organization, Food and Drug Administration, and Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Because that rapid collapse of health organizations was orchestrated deliberately—by just one man.
Donald Trump has taken advantage of the distrust of traditional news, academic sources, and government agencies like no one before him. From even before the moment he stepped onto the national political stage, Trump was tweeting out fact-free claims on topics ranging from President Obama’s birth certificate to climate change. And, of course, Trump was constantly proclaiming all his own “wins” and shouting about how he never settled … while quietly paying off lawsuits and filing bankruptcies.
In his 25,000 lies, Trump has continually not just counted on the idea that no one can actually fact-check him, he has also been a major contributor to undercutting what faith in traditional sources remains through his constant claims about “fake news” and his dismissal of government workers as being part of the “deep state.” With a major news network, hundreds of AM radio stations, and thousands of social media sources pushing distrust of news media as part of their disinformation campaign, the disintegration of any basis on which to build rational political discourse is staggering.
The result of this effort is measured in millions of votes … and in hundreds of thousands of bodies.
As CNN reports, Dr. Anthony Fauci is certainly aware of the extent to which the campaign against facts and sources of facts is weighing on efforts to control COVID-19. The "building distrust" in public health organizations is making it much more difficult to fight the rising tide of cases that are swelling across the nation.
Every day this week has seen thousands of more cases than the corresponding day in the previous week, which was thousands above the previous week. The United States is heading for a new peak that will exceed previous rates of disease as early as Friday. And this time, it’s not being fueled by a regional peak, but a near-universal increase. Meaning that it’s unclear when, or if, the growing toll of COVID-19 will stop.
Fauci noted that transparency in public health is “absolutely essential,” but even as the CDC has posted a new warning that COVID-19 may be transmitted even more readily than previously thought, visitors to the CDC web site will find most of the public health information that used to be available is now missing in action. Basic data has not been updated since the data from hospitals was made private back in July, leaving those trying to assemble a complete picture of what’s happening around the nation to scrounge information from a collection of state and local sources.
"We've got to admit it,” said Fauci. “Those of us in government, all of us, you and I and all of the people that work for me, and all the people that work for you, that there is a building distrust now in the transparency of what we do. It's the elephant in the room." It certainly is … an elephant. A bright orange elephant.
Last week, ProPublica published an extensive review of how the CDC, which for decades formed not just the basis of health information in America but was viewed around the world as an authority equal to the WHO, was simply removed from the table. Trump did this in the way he has destroyed other agencies:
- Discarding the idea of merit-based appointments to select leadership based on personal loyalty and strict partisan beliefs.
- Inserting a layer of political operatives who were given authority over scientists, doctors, and workers analyzing data and proposing guidelines.
- Purging the organization of the “disloyal,” even if the contrary voices were coming from some of the most knowledgeable, important voices in the field.
- Constantly pressuring the organization to make its message conform to Trump’s, even if that requires acting not just out of ignorance, but deliberate disinformation.
In the case of the CDC, that involved blocking guidelines that originated within the organization, and pushing down political statements to be issued with the CDC’s imprimatur. Such actions have led to the resignation of remaining experts, and to the public disregarding much of what the agency has to say. Under Robert Redfield, the CDC has become an agency whose statements are distrusted on the right and the left—for good reason.
And that’s horrifying. Not just because it’s costing thousands of lives now, but because it’s clear as mud how to set it right. Restoring faith in government agencies, in news media, and academic sources is a challenge that may be as great as that of halting climate change, and just as vital.
Let’s start by getting rid of that orange elephant. And the rest of his herd.