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How is this any different from the 1970s Eyewitness News videos constantly showing black on black crime? Or for years the misinformation that people of color are storming our boarders or that reverse racism is a real thing? It's not, it's just the latest scheme by a party that has been dividing this country for decades in hopes of carrying out its coup on behalf of their billionaire donors. Facts do not matter to these right wing followers, they never did. Sadly, fear mongering is a centuries old technique that works. We wear designer jeans instead of togas but little has changed. Lies, division, and corruption brought down the Roman Empire. It's bringing down this one was well. I wonder if the Roman Times published reports that both sides did it?

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The Sunday morning shows collective refusal to deal with election deniers reminds me of Chuck Todd's laughable excuse for not calling out Republican pols when they would come on Meet the Press and spew the nonsense du jour. Chuck said if he did that, "No one would come on the show." As was the case with Tim Russert, GOPers know they can go on Todd's MTP and "catapult the propaganda."

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“The Post also made no effort to quote any Democrats about a Republican strategy to use the classroom wedge issue to defeat them next year.”

Another example of how Both Sides most emphatically does not mean both sides.

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founding

We need a national discussion about how to combat propaganda, conspiracy theories, etc. Finland’s media literacy program is a good place to start since Finland is rated as the country in Europe most resistant to fake news. Another might be to have more of this kind of statement from religious leaders”

“Southern Baptist Convention Leader Ed Litton Says QAnon Conspiracy Theories Are 'Fables'”

https://www.newsweek.com/southern-baptist-convention-leader-ed-litton-says-qanon-conspiracy-theories-are-fables-1601900

Off topic but why does MSNBC think that treating the NYC mayoral race like a national election is a good idea? It is boring and insulting to the rest of the country. They barely cover elections in other large cities like LA. or Chicago. Talk about being egocentric!

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While I glimpsed the phrase in passing, it seems fairly self-explanatory: panic porn.

The GOP manufactures threats and uses them to stir up its base. The adrenaline rush becomes addictive in its own right; the belief that something is an existential threat justifies any action. Lather, rinse, repeat.

And the fact that "fear is the mind-killer" sums up how it works so well. Fear short-circuits the higher critical functions of the brain. Pretty soon the Brain is subsumed by the Gut.

(As Charlie Pierce has observed in "Idiot America" https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/131057/idiot-america-by-charles-p-pierce/)

Another advantage to panic porn is this. With a multitude of manufactured threats swamping attention spans, it makes it that much easier to slip real threats under the radar.

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Absolutely maddening. Thanks, Eric, for highlighting yet another dangerous and dastardly big lie today. Each time I hear about CRT blah, blah, blah, I think of the kindergartens I taught a million years ago who could barely sit still for story time let alone have a clue about white kids vs black kids. I taught in a very poor neighborhood in Boston and crt was as real to them as was astrophysics. Shame on the media folks who abet the demise of our formerly cherished by all democracy.

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I have actually written to several alleged reporters covering this and asked them if they are asking members of the republikkkan party to define Critical Race Theory. None has responded, so we know the answer. And the reason for the answer is that the L word for the political media remains not Liberal, but Lazy. To put it another way, note that Orange Hitler's DOJ didn't try to get records from "The Habes," who was publishing insider gossip. Why? Because I can count on the fingers of both hands the number of actual reporters who cover national politics any more.

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Today’s CRT panic is yesterday's Common Core panic.

The thing I find funny about the Right’s panic response is that it is giving us an object-lesson in why Critical Race Theory needs to be studied.

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Honestly, and I consider myself fairly well-read, I don't have the faintest idea of what this is????

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Open source internet forums can be a very useful source of information...for the critical reader. If the Congress was an internet forum, the GOP would be the contributor who begins their post saying, "I've never "(done this), (seen one), (tried this......) etc." And then proceed to tell us all about how it's done.

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My dad, who was in radio, used to tell the story about a radio station in LA that created panic when announcers reported than an amoeba was loose. This incident was notable enough to be included in A History and Analysis of the Federal Communications Commission's Response To Radio Hoaxes:

"Although most of the examples cited did not

involve hoaxes or deceptive behaviors, the FCC included the following

among the list of promotions deemed to have an adverse effect on the

public interest:

The broadcast of "scare" announcements or headlines which either

are untrue or are worded in such a way as to mislead and frighten the

public: e.g., a sudden announcement delivered in a tone of excitement

to the effect that "amoebas" were invading a certain city, implying that

the amoebas were dangerous creatures."

Same as it ever was. I see the current media's failure to state the facts about CRT in education as today's version of "an amoeba is loose".

Here's a link to the entire article which appeared in Federal Communications Law Journal:

https://www.repository.law.indiana.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1226&context=fclj

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Thanks Eric.

I hope the Rs are as successful with using CRT "on the ballot" as they were in 2012 using bans on same-sex marriage.

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