It was a good 5 days. I’m an internet junkie, but my laptop died a few days before my flight, and while I considered bringing along an old clunker of a netbook, I eventually decided to be strong and go mostly cold turkey and hang out with the family. I had my phone as one slender lifeline to keep in touch with Mary, and that was it. So I visited my mother, my two sisters, my two brothers, my son and his wife, my grandson, and went to the beach and went fishing. I went for walks and looked at spiders. I went to a church, once. I didn’t do much of anything, actually.
I got home early evening last night, and was finally able to shuffle some money around on the internet and make the big announcement, but then I just hit the sack and slept in until 7am. I got up this morning and finally, after that respite, plunged back into the internet and…
AAAAAAAAIAIIIEEEE.
Nothing has changed. The right wing is still ginning up a culture war, and they look even more stupid when you haven’t been desensitized by the continual barrage. I mean, look at these two idiots:
The Left’s War on Hydroxychloroquine Continues
? What? Hydroxychloroquine is a dangerous drug that shows no effectiveness against the coronavirus — it was tossed out to the media by chickenshit politicians (like Ron Johnson there) as cheap snake oil to shut gullible people up. The “Left” didn’t buy it. Now we’ve got safe, effective vaccines, we lefties are happily lining up to get those while the righties are inventing conspiracy theories to avoid them. There never was a “war on hydroxychloroquine.” Johnson and every loudmouthed liar on Fox News can go gargle bleach if they want.
It only takes a little distance to see that the way these quacks operate is to tell an outrageous lie, and the first time you hear it, you think “That is the dumbest thing I ever heard.” The second, third, and fiftieth time they say it, you roll your eyes and tune it out. The hundredth time you think, “Am I gonna have to go dig into the scientific literature and read a bunch of papers?” The thousandth time you begin to have doubts and wonder, “Maybe I missed something? Should we fund another clinical trial?”, and then they’ve got you. Trust me, your first impressions were probably correct. Bullshit isn’t turned into science by a thousand Fox News morons churning it over.
Sometimes they even admit what they’re doing. Here’s Chris Rufo outlining their strategy against Critical Race Theory: they just lie about it, misrepresent it, and if they hammer it hard enough at the public, they’ll start to associate the lies with the real thing.
You just have to turn up the volume on your bullhorn and be really, really repetitive and you too can get any nonsense you want drilled into the discourse. If you can’t get on Fox News right away, there’s always Sam Harris and Joe Rogan to act as pre-amps and get you started on your program to purée everyone’s brains via mass media.
I strongly recommend the clarifying effects of watching ocean waves roll in for a while. Unfortunately, I have to warn you of the spectacular downer you will experience when you get back from the shore.
It seemed so innocent back in the 80s when it was just CNN. And it was just news. How could we have guessed that the 24hr news cycle would be so toxic? In retrospect, Fox News was inevitable. The news cycle was extremely addicting and sooner or later someone was going to abuse it. We are sadly trapped in universe A where Rupert Murdoch decided to make himself a regressive king maker and got a mad king elected.
Did you ever cook the salmon? How’d it turn out?
The salmon was excellent, but then, salmon is easy. I baked it with dill, added some fresh squeezed lemon and lemon slices, and we all chowed down.
Really, salmon is so perfect as it is that the lemon and dill were a bit superfluous.
Dr. Myers-with all due respect, these people are not “idiots.” The reason I feel compelled to cite this distinction is not to defend them, but rather to show how cynical, calculated and genuinely evil these people are. They bank on viewers being gullible, but they certainly are not.
“…they look even more stupid”
‘People are sometimes sticky’:
John Oliver explains to magnetic vaccine nuts why keys stick to them https://www.rawstory.com/john-oliver-magnetic-accine-people/
Hydroxychloroquine not only doesn’t treat Covid-19 but it can be toxic.
It is used to treat rheumatoid arthritis. It can also cause serious heart problems, sometimes fatal.
My friend was on Plaquenil, hydroxychloroquine for a while. I asked her why she went off it.
Cardiac arrhythmia. It was the choice between her heart or her joints.
Yes the repetition, and don’t forget the receiving end, those people who are barely informed. A brain empty of facts being repeatedly pounded with false information leaves those little brains leaves with a picture that cannot be corrected.
Growing up I was more into trout and crappie. Trout is like salmon; doesn’t need much of anything. Crappie is a bit more delicate so needs more TLC. And my dad was a skin diver so we always had rock fish.
Get a load of this. Rebellion with in the ranks of Fox? Stay tuned.
I have the impression that most people don’t like having to think for themselves. They prefer being told the answers to their questions. FuxNews lives off that attitude, always telling people what to think, not explaining their solutions, only presenting them as THE answer, saying
There is also the infamous aphorism by you know who [say a lie often enough and many will believe it is truth]
Sounds like you’re already due for another vacation.
What’s working for me at the moment.
there you go
ça va bien
If you want a dose of blissful sanity, Aron Ra has published “Supposed lies in the text books Ep6 “.
Watching him dismantle propaganda is great.
Randall Slonaker @ 4
They are evil and cynical. Fortunately most of them are not as clever as they think, a quality they share with Trump.
I would say many of them who actually go into politics are to politics what Neil Breen is to movies, they have the resources to try but not the talent to succeed.
And if the Qanon followers who intend to run for office in 2022 manage to get nominated, it will be a wonderful turkey shoot.
What they are doing with ‘Critical Race Theory’ sounds like political correctness gone mad.
Just like Margie Taylor Greene — a qAnonsener… that turkey shoot worked great.
As a reminder, the thugs (Republicans) are legislating madly (in multiple senses) to suppress voters and votes. They also happen to control a significant percentage of
redistrictinggerrymandering process now underway. And they installed numerous wingnut “judges” in the federal courts (not just the Supreme Court). And are still spreading the Big Lie about the election, to the point of (trying to) start Arizona-style in other states — a fraudulent undertaking that severely breaks the chain of security, rendering any further (genuine) examinations of the ballets, etc., impossible. And so on…The thugs are turkey shooting the States’s political system and replacing it with something that manages to be worse.
Ah yes, the good ol’ left’s war… Remember how Marx said that religion is hydroxychloroquine for the masses?
They will lose interest soon. 2-3 years ago they couldn’t shut up about “cultural marxism”. In a year they have the next thing they know nothing about to be mad at. In 5 years everyone on cable TV news shows will be Alex Jones screaming about how flouride in the water turns the frogs and grandkids gay and the other side shouts back how the Kremlin inflitrated the US postal service and Putin is using super secret microwave weapons to fry CIA agents brains.
stroppy@9:
She mentions Project Veritas (Latin for “Truth”; take a guess as to how truthful they are) near the end, which is a far right propaganda outlet. They’re indirectly responsible for shutting down ACORN, among many other things, by misleadingly editing videos to make people look like they’re saying or doing something that they aren’t. PZ has written about the founder, James O’Keefe, a few times.
I wouldn’t hold my breath.
@18
Ah. Thanks, I missed that.
Yeah, that news reporter is the character in a thriller who goes for help from a character who is actually one of the bad guys.