The American press and public really need to figure out how to simply dismiss Trump's pretextual claims for authoritarian attacks and then resist the attack itself, not debate the claim. We have spent months asking "but is the Ivy League really antisemitic?" and now "but is DC really crime-ridden?"
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People still think there is a marketplace of ideas where they participate. It isn't. Dictators don't listen to your ideas, they act. People need to WAKE UP and act ourselves collectively to oppose these bastards.
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The American press has let itself be completely gleichgeschaltet months and months ago. It was a purely financial decision. Meet the Third Reich loanword of the year: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gleichs...
Gleichschaltung - Wikipedia
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Completely agree. We all know it’s disingenuous BS- don’t engage the debate and fight the action
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yes - and the entire pretext for the authority to do these things (and ICE, and tariffs) are based on emergencies that don't exist. It's telling that the press isn't even debating, well are we really be invaded by a foreign nation, because everyone knows it's bs and would be stupid to even debate
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He’s the ppl eating cats and dogs guy. Way too late.
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lmao at Not Getting It This Hard.
Of course they're debating the claim. They support it! They want him to do these things and they're laying the out the red carpet for him.
Do you really think that EVERY media outlet is uniformly stupid in the exact same way?
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The American press and public have self identified into 1 of 2 camps. The first knows he’s a liar and a criminal and want him out and the second also know he’s a liar and a criminal but want him as THEIR criminal. They know this isn’t “normal” politics. Claiming to misunderstand is, itself, a lie.
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No shit. Also referencing the "deep state" as if there actually were one.
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Just checked stats on murders in Houston. Not very impressive! But you're right, too many are attracted to the rabbit holes. Silly unaware Americans.
Many Americans will say "Why is it raining so hard" when they ignored the hurricane warnings.
Folks! The fascist hurricane "Donald" is here!
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When will we get it? They pose arguments, because we bite, and are caught up in the fantasy, "if we only find the right words, they will throw up their hands and say, "oops"".
This is a diversion tactic in its own. Reel back the lens and look at the big picture. National destruction is the point.
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The incentives are all wrong for that, unfortunately
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I think people are bad at internalizing his abnormal behavior. Trump is odd, he doesn't think like most of us. We can know he is insincere and lies constantly but we don't internalize it.
When he says a thing, we think, "why does he believe this?"
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Hey @morningjoe-msnbc.bsky.social @joe-scarborough.bsky.social @mika-brzezinski.bsky.social TAKE NOTE!!!
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It's a cycle of stupidity initiated by the stupid we haven't learned to stop...
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"But what if US presidents perform better when given unchecked power & carte blanche to enrich themselves personally? What if trans people really ARE responsible for all the evils afflicting society? What if democracy & civil rights are, in fact, un-American? We hear from experts on both sides …"
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Exactly... thank you!👍🏽
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Project 2025 is a prima facae act of treason on every single page. It should have been challenged immediately.
John Roberts has clearly violated his oath to the constitution by declaring immunity of a conviction felon
This has been in the works for decades & these bad actors must be prosecuted
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Yes. We know the answer to both questions but I would say we should attack these things in ways that avoid the more radical stances even though those things are likely realistic. Just say "How much does it cost to deploy troops to do nothing" and don't get into the speculative part of the argument.
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Yeah, but if you took action with one politicians when they lied, it would start a trend of action against other politicians when they lied. That's why none of your state officials have had the spine to arrest ICE officials for committing illegal acts. Your government can't take accountability.
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They can't dismiss his bullshit without being punished, but they fear punishment. This isn't going to change unless the public stops accepting the lies, yet most don't seem to care.
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They've had several years to figure it out. If they haven't yet, they never will.
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Also: the DNC needs to figure out the same. He’s trolling with preposterous claims. Don’t take the bait! Don’t feed the troll!
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I fear a lot of the press and public accurately see what Trump’s doing and agree with him. That when it comes down to it, they are siding with authoritarianism over liberalism to protect their perceived interests. Need to challenge that. They aren’t confused about what’s happening.
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America is a racist colonizer word
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💯
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In order for the American press to dismiss Trump, they would 1st have to disagree with Trump. Every US media outlet is captured by a billionaire with zero incentive to do so.
Nothing will change untill we outlaw billionaires.
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The press knows how, they just don't have the will to dismiss or resist.
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And miss us by a mile with this “Trump has a point on crime” shite. 🖕🏼
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Waiting for the day headline writers discover the phrase "Why X's claims about Y don't hold up" or the phrase "The issue with X's claims about Y" or...
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One problem with the latter is that local media are addicted to clickbait crime stories that collectively create the impression of much more danger in cities than actually exists in most of them
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Exactly! This is infuriating, thank you for stating this so clearly!
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it’s barely even pretext. “we’re being invaded by a gang you’d never heard of.” “crime exists in a city.” god help us when a reichstag fire moment inevitably happens at some point during this presidency.
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Anybody that's ever lived with someone suffering a personality disorder is aware of how exhausting that is. No solutions, just endless frustration and destruction.
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Exactly.
This is like a wrestling match, in that you look at every move your opponent makes with an eye to avoiding a pin.
Each of these rhetorical moves is a tactic to try and pin us.
Process it that way, and respond accordingly.
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The public, yes. The press, I fear, is a lost cause.
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Hey what do you think the Epstein Files say about Trump?
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CNN? Not debate the claim? That's all they understand about journalism. They pay a fortune for MAGA monkeys to throw excrement against the wall hoping that something sticks.
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At 3 p.m. today, I'm going to stand on the sidewalk in front of my house, jump as high as I can and try to touch the moon.
The odds of me succeeding are orders of magnitude better than the odds of the American press and public figuring out how to dismiss Trump's lies and simply attack his policies.
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THIS.
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It's because the Vichy corporate press supports Trump's authoritarianism. Occam's razor.
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They need to stop accepting right wing framing on their issues. Just fully reject their premises.
Big Cities are very safe, actually! Immigrants are good, actually! Government employees are efficient, actually!
Etc…
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An effective way to dismiss Trump’s claims is to Make fun of the claims. Make memes mocking the claims. Crack jokes. Sing satirical songs. For examples, South Park and also Tom Lehrer’s songs.
Also mock the lesser things, such as JD Vance having the govt release water from a dam to go kayaking.
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Trump “produces” a melodrama every day casting himself as the hero with a rotating cast of villains and victims. Libs act as theater critics when they should be putting on their own show. Create a better show with a better story and you win.
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But white wing ideas, which channel the white American herrenvolk, always deserve deference.
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This
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The public is calling bullshit just fine, the press are the ones trying to make us treat this situation as though magats are engaging in good faith.
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Seriously wish the press would look out the gd window to actually report if it's raining or not.
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The US press do not want to say that Trump is bad, that therefore the Republicans are bad, that therefore the political party that protects white folk from the influence & power of BIPOC is bad. Not unless enough white supremacists who voted Trump into power claim he's now bad, which they won't.
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That's the media sanewashing, and it's how he was reelected. Those are classic bs NYT style qs the media is asking. The people and local gov't knows and states the illegality and the media declines to cover it.
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Its a very easy thing to do. They just do not want to do it. The reason is because they are not detached institutions with obligations to the public. They operate in collaboration with the state. Enemies, not flawed allies.
People like you need to figure this out and stop pretending this is 2015.
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👏👏👏👏🎯🎯🎯🎯
Well said Ryan
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Unfortunately it would require Dem Leaders and media whores who insist on standards and are offended and respond aggressively when those standards are violated.
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Yes!!! We need to resist the attacks themselves. Better yet, go on offense. He is not going to stop. And we won’t be able to vote him out. We will have to stop him. The sooner, the easier.
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Seriously, I mean if you asked six months ago “what is the Trump admin’s Reichstag fire moment going to be,” you’d never had said “sandwich throwing guy” but you knew it was going to be something weird and dumb like this.
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There is so much disinformation that nothing, nothing, that comes from Trump and his administration can be trusted. The country is in a dangerous place if the media doesn’t understand this and questions everything, every day.
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Perfectly put, its maddening no pretext is fhin enough not to be credibly considered by the media.
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They don’t want to. They’re owned by billionaires and at this point have to be treated as vehicles for enhancing their interests and nothing more.
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Bingo
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Absolutely fundamental point—but with a fundamental mistake thinking this is something "the press has to figure out." They've shown they know how to do this. After a decade of Trump, it's clear that the US press is along for the ride. They've made a choice to normalize, not resist
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It's important to navigate the nuances correctly and not use resisting Trump as rationale for stifling the occasional broader public debate on topics.
In some cases we can just not comment on the issue and critique the how (and achieve broader agreement that way).
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Believe nothing this Administration says about anything!
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Yup. Facts and truth so not matter to these people.
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🎯
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Seriously
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It won't matter. America is lost.
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Mainstream media is now ESPN. Just an endless stream of debate shows without any substance or integrity. Same BS, different faces. Every hour for the entire day.
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We?! I'm so tired. That's all certain people in the US do is debate the claim. Inaction and performance are their only tools. Those who actively resist are negativly labeled. "Systemic racism?! Oh you guys are perpetual victims. Protest?! Those ppl are violent"
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I hope the response to Texas' redistricting helps pave the way on this. Instead of wasting time debating their claim, it's correctly seen as gerrymandering and treated as such.
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👆👆👆
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It seems pretty clear that the dominant media is far more interested in the engagement numbers driven by the “debate” than the validity of Trump’s claims, which are extremely easy to prove false with widely available data, and actual feedback from real residents and not republican operatives.
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Yes!! I agree!! Why treat these often ridiculous claims as legit? It’s like debating over whether the tooth fairy is real. Drives me bananas!
The response to the DC issue should have been a brief summary of the facts that crime is trending downward. That’s it. False claim, President Trump.
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Way too many news article headlines start with “Trump says” or “Musk says” as if they’re not pathological liars and you can trust their word.
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Worth thinking through how many in the American press (especially the owners) as well as the public are already pro-fascist.
Folks, there's reasons why this authoritarian takeover is accelerating so quickly.
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Those are valid questions to ask, but not in the context they are asking them. The media has missed the goddamned point for over a decade. They should be asking if journalism schools are committing malpractice for giving degrees to fucking idiots.
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Nearly 24 years after 9/11 and the insane disinformation campaign ran by Cheney and Co, US media is still incompetent at handling the most obvious propaganda.
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People must overcome their desire to be seen as reasonable people to make this transition. And I don’t think most people will ever do that, alas, not on their own. They must be propagandized.
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so much this. even BBC and NPR are failing -- all they did yesterday was host guests debating the claim, rather than simply stating the fact that it is not
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you do not 'gotta hand it to him'
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John Reed, ca. 1917:
Cranks, cranks, cranks, cranks Blanks, blanks, blanks, blanks Talk about talking And think about thinking And swallow each other Without even blinking.
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Reacting to T as anything other than a hostile actor has been folly since 2015, and honestly, it has been infuriating to watch.
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It is difficult to believe this is our reality now. A barely functional moron, serial criminal, sexual abuser, pathologically spouts baseless lies as he shreds the Constitution and consolidates dictatorial power; and the legacy media says…nothing.
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well, "is enough of the Ivy League NOT antisemitic?" the answer is no.
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Keep falling in the trap
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No Kings share.google/Es2Ek9sKR0kX...
No Kings
On June 14—Flag Day—Donald Trump wants tanks in the street and a made-for-TV display of dominance for his birthday. A spectacle meant to look like strength. But real power isn’t staged in Washington. ...
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Yep
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Please continue to repeat this.
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Talking about Trump plainly and honestly naturally sounds like you’re attacking him, so they have to lie (whether by lies of omission or outright lying) to sound unbiased.
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They have no problem covering dictatorships in other countries, but NOBODY ever told them how to cover one on our own soil.
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I do not understand the continuous acceptance of his framing of things by the press. It seems that’s always where they start, as though he has ever operated in good faith.
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I mean, my go to is 'a republican said it, ergo it's not true' and you move on from there.
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But that "pivot to real news" is beyond the ability of any of the press to capture because: 1) it can't have a sponsor; 2) it doesn't fit neatly into an 8 min segment; 3) the talking heads haven't prepared the right questions, and 4) the guest they have lined up isn't an expert on that subject.
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Smokescreens.
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I can't find the thread from yesterday, but a Votebeat reporter made an inquiry to the DOJ and the response was a combination of refusal to answer the question and bullying. They are putting state-controlled content in place. The entire exchange is here. www.documentcloud.org/documents/26...
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It’s the press. The press do this.
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Trump is a liar doing what authoritarians do. There should be zero discussion of his purported reasons for doing it. The only story is that Trump is attacking the liberties of Americans.
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Essentially making an excuse to attack anybody under a spurious pretense and crying grieve- that is exactly like Putin doing against Ukraine and EU - but here against fellow citizens
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Because it's all theater. Trump and his incompetent Fox News administration are doing it for the cameras, while the federal government is crumbling. Focus on the harm that is being done to our country by these imbeciles.
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Especially since trump id, yanno, an anti-Semitic criminal himself
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It's a cycle of stupidity initiated by the stupid we haven't learned to stop...
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“But aren’t there at least some fraudulent votes?”
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Yes! Just stop giving the lying liars the benefit of the doubt.
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A 19-year old Elon Musk gang member & KKK lover,Edward Coristine, has fight in DC which leads to taxpayers funding unneeded FBI & army in DC while Epstein criminals are free. "Coristine created multiple disturbing web URLs, including… URLs promoting…date rape drugs.” youtu.be/xrXMefSDApM?...
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Agreed. It’s unbelievable how much momentum and mind share the man gets from the debate activity.
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Respectfully, it seems like the public gets it. There are protests every day. The No Kings protest was reportedly the largest of its kind.
It really seems like it's the press and elite institutions that are failing at this task, no? The public seems to be on the right side here.
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We need to ask how the Epsteins Epstein. We also need to understand what Epsteins Epstein in relation to Epsteins.
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💯At this point, any journalist STILL giving benefit of the doubt to Trump's bullshit, is intentionally aiding a fascist coup.
If they're offended by the accusation? Good.
They should wonder why their actions are indistinguishable from an accomplice.
There's no playing dumb this late in the game.
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Anyone with a functioning sense of reality knows that everything out of their mouths is a lie.
Liberals in this country are far too obsessed with being correct. Not only do they fail to even do that, but they fail at recognizing when it is politically necessary to stop debating and act.
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A-fucking-men
Not taking the bait is also good business. Idiot reporters, newspapers, and cable shows have been dumbly manipulated for a DECADE. I have cancelled my subscriptions to the idiot media.
I’m paying more for the Atlantic, Wired, Rolling Stone, the Bulwark. But it’s worth the $$$!
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The pretext is the locus of distraction, insofar as any argument about distraction matters.
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How hard is it to just say "No." Next question?
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Thank you. The default to his authoritarian actions almost always include his stated reasons for doing so, implying some legitimacy. People need to just dismiss his “reasons” as fabrications and resist. Including the business community.
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Omg this!!!
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The problem with this is that a large number of those in prominent leadership positions at, say, media organizations or higher education institutions at least implicitly (though increasingly overtly!) agree with the overall thrust of these attacks. They have become radicalized reactionaries, too.
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📌
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Reminds me of the "why are you defending gang bangers" bad faith BS when people pointed out the disregard of due process and rule of law in regards to the renditions to CECOT. Similar response works here too. The crime rate is irrelevant. POTUS sending military into a US city is authoritarian.
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Goodness this is so true. It's like they all still automatically start with the default notion that the orange idiot always tells the truth. Nothing could be more wrong than that
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Once this happened we knew they would do it with anything.
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DC’s crime rate wasn’t even in the news until Trump’s military action and now it’s all anyone is talking about. Don’t the media see how easily played they are?
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Anytime Trump or his minions make some outrageous claims, ask for proof. If he says "many people are saying", say that's not proof, show us the data If the press is going to cover him live unfiltered, they should challenge the claim so the public knows the truth.
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No one even bothered to have the debate about the economic "emergency" that's the basis for all the random tariffs.
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Really good point!
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This speaks to the basic fallacy we operate under; people are acting out of good intentions. This is demonstrably not true in the case of this administration yet no one can adjust their behavior towards them.
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The fix is in.
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The American press has accepted conservative framing on everything for decades. It's fucking bullshit.
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Yes, crucial.
But Trump owns the press, and even the best of them say this like "Trump criticizes someone about something" and never address how stupid or is for a felon/bankruptcy/loser to criticize anything.
