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Breaking down the House of Lies, House of Delusion [1]
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Date: 2023-03-22
Here Rick Wilson nails things on the head:
"You can talk about any of these candidates, but all of their presentations are dystopian," said anchor Joy Reid. "They're all saying America is in the toilet, they're all taking up Donald Trump's sort of downing the country and saying that it's awful, and they only are doing social issues and culture wars, none of them have offered a vision that's beyond that. I don't know how any of them would appeal in a general election." "You know, Joy, that's exactly right," said Wilson. "This is the secret of MAGA: it's dark and paranoid and depressing and pessimistic and weak philosophy. Because they may beat their chests and do the whole monster truck thing, but the reality is they think we're weak. They think our country is bad. They think the things that make this big crazy country work and go forward are wrong. They want to turn the clock back to this imaginary past that never existed in any reality at all. They want to enter some alternate universe." And the problem for Republicans, Wilson continued, is that that sort of messaging "will never work" on the median voter.
"The average person out there — they're not worried about wokism or whatever the hell it means," said Wilson. "They can't define it, of course. They're not worried about that. They're worried about the economy, their kids' education, their jobs, they're worried about things that matter to their families. And when they see things that threaten their families and hurt their families, because like it or not, Ron DeSantis, there are a lot of gay people in the country, there are a lot of African-American people in the country. You're just banning books, banning books about Rosa Parks and Hank Aaron in Florida schools because you don't like them, or taking out the fact that Rosa Parks was African-American in a school textbook, that's insanity. People will see that. So the darkness and the weirdness all together is going to make him, I think, very off-putting, until, of course, Donald Trump tears his liver out and eats it live on stage."
This is the world these people believe in. Where they themselves are perpetual victims of “Global elites” and “Wokeism.” The Deep States controls everything, everyone is corrupt, all the media are Left-Wing Liars and the only people they can trust are Donald Trump and Tucker Carlson. Sometimes Maria Bartiromo.
The Dominion Defamation Lawsuit has revealed that Fox News knew very well that Trump lost the 2020 election. Still, internally they wouldn’t admit that fact because the deluded hordes who watch the network would never accept it and would quickly switch to their competitors OAN and Newsmax.
If you're a "straight news" reporter working for Fox, reporting news that's damaging to the Republican Party—or damaging to the egos of opinion bigshots like Sean Hannity—has a good chance of getting you fired. It's yet another clear demonstration of the Republican-backing propaganda network using their "straight news" team as a front for the network heads' real goals, and those goals are "boost Republican Party rhetoric, even if you have to lie to do it."
Fox can’t afford to report the truth or else they would lose viewers and lose their market share and stock value. They are trapped by their own business model into being shills for the craziest and wackiest wingnut theories out there.
They have to LIE to exist.
Similarly, GOP politicians also have to lie. They have to keep promoting the most fever-dream delusions of their flock or else they lose votes. We saw very clearly what happened to Liz Cheney and Adam Kinsinger when they bucked the party line on January 6. We saw it in real-time when Kevin McCarthy initially blamed Trump for the attack and was ready to ask him to resign and then reversed course within weeks and trodded down to Mar-A-Lago to kiss Trump’s ring to apologize.
x x YouTube Video “I’ve had it with this guy. What he did is unacceptable. Nobody can defend that and nobody should defend it” McCarthy said.
Later speaking to Liz Cheney about Trump he stated: “It would be my recommendation that you should resign. I mean that would be my take, but I don’t think he would take it.”
But somebody did defend it. Kevin McCarthy defended it.
Now you have McCarthy whining that the impending indictment of Trump for Campaign Finance and Disclosure violations is “unfair” because charges weren’t filed against Hillary Clinton over the Steele Dossier.
At a House Republican retreat near Orlando, McCarthy was asked about the possibility that Trump would be indicted over hush money payments to porn star Stormy Daniels. "You guys have raised a lot of concerns about the prosecutor, but what about the actual allegations here that the former president may have falsified business records to cover for hush money payments to cover up this alleged affair with an adult film actress?" CNN's Manu Raju told McCarthy, "Do you have any concerns about that?" McCarthy quickly pivoted to Clinton. "Remember when the DNC and Hillary Clinton paid the law firm a million dollars and said that it was for something else, and we found out later it wasn't," the Speaker said. "And so they went through, and they got investigated. A million dollars they spent, and you know what, at the end of the day, they didn't get arrested. They got fined." "So, I look at it from this perspective. We live in America, and it should be equal justice," he continued. "This was personal money. This wasn't trying to hide. This was seven years ago." McCarthy insisted the reporter knew in his "heart of hearts.. that you think this is just political." "And I think that's what the rest of the country thinks, and we're kind of tired of that," he said.
You’re kinda tired of it? Yeah, I think John Edwards would like to have a word. He says this while he has Gym Jordan on his “weaponization” committee and James Comer re-re-reinvestigating Hunter Biden yet again. Yeah, we’re kinda tired of it.
This is the trap. People have to LIE to stay on the good side of the DELUDED. The Right complains loudly about what they think their flock cares about, but they don’t really mean any of it.
x Democrats passed a bill on Inflation - and it's (slowly) coming down. Repubs have no bill.
Crime is down in New York & Chicago - but it's going *up* in Red States.
The Border is better protected than it's *Ever* been with over 2.5 Million migrants arrested and expelled.
https://t.co/F8RmH70ik8 — F. Vyan Walton (@Vyan1) March 22, 2023
x From Day One, I said the so-called “Weaponization” Subcommittee was more aptly named “the Committee to Obstruct Justice.”
As if on cue, House Republicans are now using the official power of the Congress to try to obstruct a state prosecution of Donald Trump.
https://t.co/D6fUy9DNTp — Rep. Dan Goldman (@RepDanGoldman) March 20, 2023
x Sorry, but did any of that matter to you with John Durham? Did it matter with Bill Barr? Did it matter with John Edwards? Did it matter during the Benghazi hearings? Did it matter during Clinton's Impeachment?
https://t.co/vTbGyFD8xe — F. Vyan Walton (@Vyan1) March 21, 2023
x GOP: We protect kids
Ban child labor?
GOP No⁰
Ban child marriages?
GOP No⁰
Ban children from carrying guns?⁰GOP No⁰⁰Ban corporal punishment for special needs kids?
GOP No⁰
How do you protect kids?
GOP: We ban books, discussions on racism, drag and free school lunch — Anonymous Operations (@AnonOpsSE) March 21, 2023
All they have is performative theatre, they have to keep up the act — keep dancing for their audience — they don't have any solutions for anything.
As a result of the Dominion revelations — even before they’ve had the trial — and knowing that Fox news themselves are not covering the story they've already lost the support and confidence of 21% of their audience, but they continue to watch.
More than a fifth of Fox News Channel viewers are less trusting of the cable network in the wake of publicly disclosed text messages and emails from Fox executives and on-air personalities, according to a new survey. Trust in Accuracy of Information Provided by Fox News Survey Q: How has your trust in the information provided by Fox News changed following Murdoch's testimony and private texts from Fox News hosts that voter fraud claims were false? Trust in Fox News But only 9% of Fox News viewers say they aren’t watching the network as much as they used to, per research provided exclusively to Variety Intelligence Platform by consumer insights specialists Maru Group. (Click to an expanded subscriber version for full results.) A representative for Fox News told VIP+, “There has been no impact to advertising, with no advertisers dropping or pausing,” and confirmed that viewership levels had not been impacted.
So there’s a small crack in the shell.
The emails and text messages documenting that Fox knew that they were repeating lies are so damning that the entire network just might face the “financial death penalty.”
Should Dominion Voting Systems be successful in winning its $1.6 billion defamation lawsuit against Fox News, it could have a devastating financial impact that would cloud its ability to survive. In a column for MSNBC, former prosecutor and current host of her own show, Katie Phang, claimed the network is looking at a "financial death penalty" because there is no cap on punitive damages.
The legal expert noted that "Fox is now trapped in an ever-worsening spiral of lies of its own creation. Time and time again, Fox allegedly trafficked in lies and falsehoods."
Weighing against the network's defense over spreading lies about the 2020 presidential election, with on-air personalities pointing the finger at Dominion among others, are texts and private emails where execs and hosts admitted to each other they knew they were trafficking in lies. According to Phang, "Dominion doesn’t just have the upper hand, it has the truth on its side. If Dominion is successful, then all that would be left to determine is the amount of damages that Dominion is entitled to receive. That’s where the numbers become astronomical. Dominion is seeking $1.6 billion in lost profits and reputational harm." Beyond that $1.6 billion, is the prospect of punitive damages that could also be in the billions -- putting the financial stability of the network at risk.
If Fox goes down just like Gawker did, there’s still OAN, and there’s still Newsmax, even though Dominion and Smartmatic have sued them also.
And this is where things get interesting. Suppose — just suppose — all three of these networks go down and flames as a result of this suit? Clearly, their various hosts, from Tucker to Hannity will land elsewhere on their feet. On the DailyWire. On Youtube or something.
It might not make that much of a difference. New platforms, same story.
But If the judge orders them to finally tell the truth. If he orders them to openly admit that they knowingly LIED on the air. If the judge makes them document exactly WHY they lied to their audience.
Maybe, just maybe, it might make a difference. Of course, some will blame the deep state and the globalist for making Fox say these things. They’ll ignore it, they’ll makeup excuses and just keep going as they have through all of Trump and GOP many scandals.
But It might make some of them see the House of Wet Cards that the GOP is constructed on. It just might set some of them free. It just might, possibly, break the delusion.
Something has to finally break through.
[END]
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