by Fabius Maximus, FabiusMaximus.com
Summary: Zero Hedge gives today’s example of an ominous trend. The manufacturers of clickbait thrive while journalists are fired and the revenue of newspapers evaporates. They provide a dramatic mixture of fact and fiction, optimized for specific tribes of Americans. Worse, our diminished interest in telling fact from fancy creates audiences for fringe politicians (promoted by clickbait manufacturers) – the kind of people who shouldn’t be allowed near the controls of a great nation. {2nd of 2 posts.}
Zero Hedge breaks a big story: “Why Has The Government Stopped Reporting Lake Mead Water Levels?“ And they point the finger:
“In the spirit of data obfuscation a la China and Obama, Lake Mead’s daily reporting has not been posted for six (6!) weeks.”
As evidence they go to the private website the “Lake Mead Water Database“.
Update: on the morning of day two, Zero Hedge’s allegation has already has been repeated on 5,500 websites (hundreds of tweets). It will echo through the right-wing internet for weeks.
Through the magic of Google in fifteen seconds I found the Bureau of Reclamation website giving daily water levels through yesterday. And, for a better perspective, the monthly water levels from February 1935 to July 2015. Unfortunately, the truth will never catch up with this lie – and American’s trust in the US government erodes away one particle more.
For fun I suggest scrolling through Zero Hedge‘s headlines to see what wing-nuts are worrying about these days. Enemies everywhere. Conspiracies behind every door. Markets are crashing or about the crash, always. The government is broke, with a rising tide about to overwhelm America. Then there are Zero Hedge‘s really weird headlines…
Larger conclusions
The important aspect of this story: it is commonplace in our America.
Zero Hedge provides daily proof that in today’s tribal America almost any nonsense will be unquestioningly accepted if it matches the tribe’s prejudices. Providing clickbait to gullible Americans has become a lucrative business. The Right has the largest disconnect with reality – and so the largest market for truthiness and outright fiction (have you read that Obama is a foreign Islamic usurper?).
But the Left is affected, albeit to a lesser degree. It’s easy to find examples See Real News Network‘s video compendium of misinformation: Climate Change: Have We Reached the Point of No Return? My favorite is The North Pole is Melting!
I’ve documented scores of examples on both the Left and the Right.
This gullibility makes us easy to rule. Can such a people govern themselves? I doubt it. The good news: it’s a fixable problem, requiring only our will to do so. For more about this see…
- Learning skepticism, an essential skill for citizenship in 21st century America.
- Remembering is the first step to learning. Living in the now is ignorance.
- Swear allegiance to the truth as a step to reforming America.
For More Information
If you liked this post, like us on Facebook and follow us on Twitter. For more information about this vital issue see The keys to understanding climate change and My posts about climate change. See all posts about propaganda, about Zero Hedge, and especially these…
- Start of another swing of the media narrative – to global cooling?,
- Global Cooling returns to the news, another instructive lesson about America,
- A look into the GOP mind: untethered from reality and drifting in the wind,
- Climate science deniers on the Left, captured for viewing,
- Watch the Left burn away more of its credibility, then wonder why the Right wins, 29 January 2014
- Apocalyptic thinking on the Left about climate change risks burning their credibility,
