What’s interesting to note, however, is that the Trump media-management style borrows heavily from propaganda techniques honed by the Russians. These include negativity and disdain toward institutions and the traditional media to demoralize the “enemy” and the widespread use of disinformation (false assertions or allegations), such as Trump’s unproven accusation that President Barack Obama wiretapped Trump Tower illegally.
Another technique is called “whataboutism.” This is the use of false moral equivalencies to reduce the truth to just one of many possibilities. It litters the conversation and gives equal play to ludicrous assertions.
For instance, Fox News host Bill O’Reilly questioned Trump’s admiration for Putin and called him a “killer.” The president responded by saying, “We’ve got a lot of killers.”
Propaganda techniques include hacking to embarrass or impair rivals, as happened during the election, but also to perpetuate “fake news” or hoaxes on social media sites. The most odious example involved Hillary Clinton and a Washington, D.C., pizzeria and pedophilia.
The cumulative danger of these shenanigans is serious, writes Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny: “Paid trolls have made it impossible for the normal Internet user to separate truth from fiction.”
He said such efforts are paid for by Russian officials and oligarchs to gain control over media outlets they don’t own, with the added benefit of spreading lies internationally.
Another gambit is known as “gaslighting,” named after an American suspense film about a man who drives his wife mad by accusing her of doing things that she didn’t do—but that he had done.
An example was when Trump began labeling critics who prove his allegations to be inaccurate as “fake news” purveyors. Such memorable lines are repeated in order to become a hashtag on social media or a colloquialism.
At this point new evidence that Donald Trump and his campaign were working in collusion with the Russians to steal this election is literally popping up everywhere.
And yet he continues to deny that fact and dares the media to prove otherwise.
Trump reminds me of a toddler caught elbow deep in a chocolate cake.
The toddler will deny to his last breath that he ate the cake despite literally being covered head to toe with the evidence of his crime.
Source http://ift.tt/2oFkQrS
