Mother Jones: Trump's nonstop lies bear a disturbing resemblance to Putin-style propaganda

[highplainsdem]

http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2017/08/trump-nonstop-lies/

Trump’s chronic duplicity may be pathological, as some experts have suggested. But what else might be going on here? In fact, the 45th president’s stream of lies echoes a contemporary form of Russian propaganda known as the “Firehose of Falsehood.”

In 2016, the nonpartisan research organization RAND released a study of messaging techniques seen in Kremlin-controlled media. The researchers described two key features: “high numbers of channels and messages” and “a shameless willingness to disseminate partial truths or outright fictions.”

The result of those tactics? “New Russian propaganda entertains, confuses and overwhelms the audience.”

Indeed, Trump’s style as a mendacious media phenomenon resonates strongly with RAND’s findings from the study, which also explains the efficacy of the Russian propaganda tactics. Here are the key examples:

-snip-

[no_hypocrisy]

1. Trump's rhetoric reminds me of why so many people buy the National Enquirer,

Globe, Star magazines, etc. instead of The Economist, Business Insider, Kipplinger, U.S. World News & Report, etc.

It's easy to understand and far more fun and interesting.

Trumpworld is getting to eat your dessert first and then pushing away the plate of vegetables.

[thucythucy]

4. The National Enquirer is shamelessly pro-Trump.

A recent headline was about how "Hillary framed" the Trump family.

It was the biggest headline and most prominently placed "newspaper" in my supermarket.

[Girard442]

2. There was an article a while back about these right-wing urban legends...

...like, say, the Proctor and Gamble logo is actually Satanic, those kinds of things. Turns out that most of the people who propagated these things didn't actually believe them -- but by posting these things on Facebook and forwarding emails they got to join the club of those insiders who "really know what's going on."

Of course, once a lie is seen everywhere, it turns into a Big Lie and people start to believe it in earnest.

[DetlefK]

3. Russia Today and Sputnik are working in the "partial truth" division:

They do not lie per se. That's why it's so hard to call them out on a lie.

What they do instead is they cut facts away from a report until the report fits a preconceived narrative. The most obvious example:

* 99% of articles about the US on rt.com are about what a desolate and corrupt hell-hole this place is.

* 99% of articles about Russia on rt.com are about how just and wise the russian government is. (They have finally outlawed certain kinds of kidnapping!!! Yay!!!)

* They love to write about the US bombing Mosul, but not a peep about Syria and Russia bombing Raqqa.



The same with individual articles:

* They published an excerpt from an Amnesty International torture-report condemning syrian rebels for torturing prisoners. But RT somehow forgot to mention that that very same report also condems Assad's regime for torturing prisoners.

* The voting-machine company who called Maduro's constitutional referendum a fraud because the official numbers of votes don't match the measured numbers, RT described them as "London-based".
"London-based" meaning "western".
"Western" meaning that the company is part of some sinister US/NATO/EU scheme to topple Maduro.
RT somehow forgot to mention that Smartmatic has headquarters in London, but is owned by the venezuelan government.

* Or an article about the european soccer-championship 2016 in France. Russian and british hooligans brawled and punched each other bloody.
When the British were the aggressors, RT reported on them as "british hoologans".
When the Russians were the aggressors, RT reported on them as "hooligans".




Oh, and they employ experts like foreign-policy expert Ron Paul. Or political journalist Mike Cernovich.
Ron Paul is a biased ex-politician and Cernovich is a professional online-troll from the Alt-Right, but on RT they are unbiased experts without baggage.