Propaganda is defined as “information, primarily of a biased or misleading nature, used to promote or publicize a particular political cause or point of view”. Authoritarian governments (i.e. non-democratic) use propaganda to cultivate a societal mindthink which supports the activities of the ruling despot, the military junta, the Communist Party, etc.
Citizens in nations like Russia, China, North Korea, Cuba, Iran, etc., are exposed to propaganda from birth to death, extolling the virtue of the State, blaming failures on foreigners, and excusing the atrocities of the ruling elite.
In societies with a free press, there is much less opportunity for government propaganda, because lies will be sniffed out by reporters and the out-of-power political parties will seize on the information to make their rivals squirm.
This is how democracies work, to the extent that they do. The truth eventually comes out, and, when that happens, the political winds change.
At least, that is the norm; i.e. the way that things are supposed to work in a democratic society.
The phenomenon that is Donald Trump is changing this democratic norm. Lying has become legal tender with this Administration; the President lies continuously, his spokespeople lie to cover up those lies, and Congress pretends that they didn’t hear the lies, or, worse, enables and cooperates with the dishonesty.
It has been estimated by various reputable news organizations (which track such things) that President Trump publicly lies, on the average, between five to six times per day. Those lies range from misstating facts, repeating disproved conspiracy theories, denying that he has said or done something that is public record, inventing his own fact-less conspiracy stories, publicly calling-out something known to be true as “Fake”, or, conversely, re-Tweeting a known falsehood that he picked up in cyberspace or on Fox News.
Trump’s inveterate difficulty with the truth, and his ease in using lying to further his personal, business, and political ambitions were legendary before he became President. Unfortunately for the Nation, his ascension to the pinnacle of political power has emboldened him in his pathological behavior.
It has now become accepted fact that the Russians interfered with the 2016 elections in the United States. Our intelligence agencies and F.B.I. say so, both political parties say so, social media companies say so, and the evidence that the Russians meddled, and how they accomplished it, grows by the day. And, that’s just the information that the public has become privy to; one can only imagine what our intelligence agencies, and the Special Prosecutor’s office, now knows.
There seems to be only one person in America who won’t admit that this occurred: the President of the United States.
This is probably due to the appearance of collusion by parties involved in the Trump presidential campaign. I say appearance, because numerous participants from the Trump team have been charged with crimes and a half-dozen have already plead guilty. Only Special Prosecutor Mueller knows if there is any meat on the bone, regarding serious collusion with the Russians, and his investigation is still ongoing.
In the end, we may find that some parties involved in the Trump campaign unwittingly assisted the Russians in assisting the Trump campaign…because they were inexperienced politically and naive regarding the motives of foreign governments. That might include some of Trump’s relatives, like his son Donald Jr. and his son-in-law, Jared Kushner. That would be the best case, I suppose, because that type of collusion would just indicate ineptitude and stupidity.
Of course, there could be other motivations: business deals, blackmail, or political favor once elected. Those would be very serious matters.
President Trump, ever since he was elected, has made numerous efforts to head-off the Mueller investigation. He’s fired people, he’s threatened people, he’s conspired with Congressional flunkies to sidetrack or tarnish the investigation of the Special Prosecutor, and he’s called it a “witch hunt” virtually every day for the past year.
In short, he’s done pretty much everything a person would do…if he were guilty of something. The President has tried to impede the investigation…for reasons only he knows. Both he, Fox News, and most conservative media have coordinated a relentless propaganda campaign to marginalize Mr. Mueller and the F.B.I., portraying them as traitors, tools of the Democratic Party, and Trump haters, in general.
Basically, there has been a 24/7 disinformation campaign aimed at American voters to discredit the investigation, the participants, and, in advance, any findings that might tarnish the Trump campaign.
The latest fly that the Trump team has attempted to insert into the ointment is the conspiracy theory that the F.B.I. had a “spy” in the Trump campaign, and that, somehow, this (assertion) would negate anything that the Mueller investigation might find. Within minutes of this theory, Trump and his Fox News cohorts were loudly announcing a “Spygate” conspiracy…another dastardly attempt by President Obama and Hillary Clinton to mistreat Donald Trump.
In his book, Mein Kampf, Adolph Hitler described a primary tool of propaganda: the Big Lie. It describes a lie “so colossal” that no one would believe that someone “could have the impudence to distort the truth so infamously”.
Hitler went on to say: “All this was inspired by the principle—which is quite true within itself—that in the big lie there is always a certain force of credibility; because the broad masses of a nation are always more easily corrupted in the deeper strata of their emotional nature than consciously or voluntarily; and thus in the primitive simplicity of their minds they more readily fall victims to the big lie than the small lie, since they themselves often tell small lies in little matters but would be ashamed to resort to large-scale falsehoods. It would never come into their heads to fabricate colossal untruths, and they would not believe that others could have the impudence to distort the truth so infamously. Even though the facts which prove this to be so may be brought clearly to their minds, they will still doubt and waver and will continue to think that there may be some other explanation. For the grossly impudent lie always leaves traces behind it, even after it has been nailed down, a fact which is known to all expert liars in this world and to all who conspire together in the art of lying.”
The “Spygate” conspiracy is only the latest big lie effort to derail the Mueller investigation.
Many months ago, President Trump’s lackey on the House Intelligence Committee, Devin Nunes, shocked the nation with the news that he was going to release a blockbuster report which would detail all manner of wrongdoing by the F.B.I. with regard to the Russiagate investigation. Conservative media licked their chops, and the President egged them on to proclaim the Mueller probe dead in the water. As it turned out, the Nunes “top secret” report was a dud, a conspiracy theory with cherry-picked facts that proved…nothing. Another embarrassment for President Trump, one would think.
However, as noted by Adolph Hitler, “the grossly impudent lie always leaves traces behind”. Thus, a considerable amount of shade was thrown on Mueller and the F.B.I., albeit undeserved, which continued to buoy Trump’s gullible political base. The legacy of the big lie is that, certainly, to the gullible, some of it must be true. And, so, it is an effective propaganda tool, even in defeat.
The “Spygate” conspiracy resulted in some special, top secret briefings of Congress by our intelligence agencies and the F.B.I. to explain the confidential informant who had dogged the Trump campaign. Evidently, this F.B.I. source was reporting on the interaction of Russian agents with American businessmen…who coincidentally?…were participating in the Trump campaign. The F.B.I. investigation of the bad guys pre-dated the Trump campaign, and the F.B.I. was doing what it always does…properly…to investigate foreign agents up to no good here in the United States.
The upshot: “Spygate” was an obvious big lie effort, meant to derail Russiagate. For those who actually search for the facts, the conspiracy theory turned out to be another colossal lie promoted by Trump and his crew.
What do you expect from a guy who made his political bones by promoting the “Birther” claim that Barack Obama was not born in the United States?
Or, that the crowd at his inauguration was larger than that of Barack Obama?
Or, that President Obama had his phones tapped to surveill the Trump campaign for Hillary Clinton?
Or…the numerous whoppers that Trump puts out weekly to comfort and enrage his gullible political base.
Adolph Hitler would be impressed with Donald Trump: the man and his GOP enablers has taken the Big Lie to an art form.
