Some online conspiracy-spreaders don’t even believe the lies they’re spewing

  There has been a lot of research on the types of people who believe conspiracy theories and their reasons for doing so. But there’s a wrinkle: My colleagues and I have found that there are a number of people sharing conspiracies online who don’t believe their own content.

  They are opportunists. These people share conspiracy theories to promote conflict, cause chaos, recruit and radicalize potential followers, make money, harass, or even just to get attention.

  There are several types of this sort of conspiracy-spreader trying to influence you.

Trump nearly derailed democracy once − here’s what to watch out for in reelection campaign

  Elections are the bedrock of democracy, essential for choosing representatives and holding them accountable.

  The U.S. is a flawed democracy. The Electoral College and the Senate make voters in less populous states far more influential than those in the more populous: Wyoming residents have almost four times the voting power of Californians.

Rupert Murdoch: His Fox News legacy is one of lies, with little accountability, and political power that rose from the belief in his power

  Rupert Murdoch, 92, one of the world’s most influential modern media figures, announced on Sept. 21, 2023, that he is stepping down as chair of Fox Corp. and executive chairman of News Corp. By mid-November, he will no longer be at the helm of the multibillion-dollar media empire that has stirred so much controversy over decades.

  Through Fox News, Murdoch is leaving a lasting impression on American journalism and politics. It just may not be what most people think.

Anyone can claim to be a journalist or a news organization and publish lies with almost total impunity

  Headlines in early March 2023 implied Fox News mogul Rupert Murdoch had made a damning confession. He had affirmed that some of his most important journalists were reporting that the 2020 presidential election was a fraud – even though they knew they were propagating a lie.

  It was an admission during pretrial testimony in a libel lawsuit filed against Fox by a voting machine company that says it was defamed by the lie. For journalism practitioners and devotees, the admission should signal the end of the Fox News empire.

  Nope. It didn’t.

A brief history of television interviews – and why live TV helps those who lie and want to hide

  First, it happened on Fox News. Chris Wallace asked White House adviser Stephen Miller about the president’s decision to use private lawyers “to get information from the Ukrainian government rather than go through … agencies of his government.”

  Miller’s response began, “two different points –” when Wallace cut him off.

  “How about answering my question?” Wallace asked. Miller, changing the subject, ignored Wallace.

  Wallace’s question was never answered.

The problem of living inside echo chambers

  Pick any of the big topics of the day – Brexit, climate change, or Trump’s immigration policies – and wander online.

  What one is likely to find is radical polarization – different groups of people living in different worlds, populated with utterly different facts.

  Many people want to blame the “social media bubble” - a belief that everybody sorts themselves into like-minded communities and hears only like-minded views.

Hate groups reach record high

  The number of hate groups operating across America rose to a record high – 1,020 – in 2018 as President Trump continued to fan the flames of white resentment over immigration and the country’s changing demographics.

  It was the fourth straight year of hate group growth – a 30 percent increase roughly coinciding with Trump’s campaign and presidency – following three consecutive years of decline near the end of the Obama administration.

Tucker Carlson and Fox News are wrong, on both immigration and free speech

  Fox News commentator Tucker Carlson got himself into some hot water with Fox News advertisers last month after he made a derogatory comment about immigrants on his show. According to Hollywood Reporter, at least 24 advertisers decided to boycott Carlson’s show in response to his comment, including Toyota, Lexus, Farmers Insurance, ancestry.com, IHOP, Pacific Life Insurance, Bowflex, and Samsung.

  What did Carlson say that caused this large exodus of advertisers from his show? He suggested that immigrants make America “dirtier.” Carlson’s advertisers clearly did not agree with his assessment and registered their discontent by pulling their ads from his show.

Sorry, Mr. President — You don't get to choose

  Sorry Mr. President, but you don’t get to just pick and choose who — on behalf of the public — gets access to the White House to ask you questions on our behalf.

  Your predecessors in the White House — Washington, Jefferson, Madison and the like — settled that matter with the Bill of Rights some time ago.

  Whoever told you that you should pull the security pass for CNN’s Jim Acosta — or failed to tell you that you shouldn’t — was wrong.

Violence and hate, that's The Proud Boys in a nutshell

  On October 12, members of the hate group Proud Boys and at least three ultranationalist skinheads attacked protesters outside the Metropolitan Republican Club in New York City.

  By the following Monday, NYPD announced it had enough evidence to charge nine of them.

  Even a few seconds of footage of the attack makes it clear why. In one video, an assailant in a group of at least 15 people kicks a person curled in the fetal position, yelling “Faggot!”

Dangerous racialization of crime in U.S. news media

  From the start of his presidency, Donald Trump has consistently proven his effectiveness at using fear as a political weapon. At his 2016 inauguration, President Trump claimed that the United States was ridden with poverty and “rampant crime,” vowing to put an end to this “American carnage.” Since then, he has perpetuated false claims that murder rates are rising overall, even though violent crime rates declined in the nation’s largest cities in 2017, continuing the national trend of reduced crime. President Trump has also put unauthorized immigrants at the center of crime by exaggerating the scope and threat of MS-13.

From cable to the White House, the mainstreaming of white nationalism

  It doesn’t take the infiltration of a hate group meeting or a deep dive into extremist chat rooms to be exposed to white nationalist ideas.

  Take Dylann Roof, who murdered nine black churchgoers in Charleston, South Carolina, after a chain of events that started with a simple Google search.

  As Roof wrote in an online manifesto, when he typed the words “black on White crime” into Google, he came across the website of a crudely racist group called the Council of Conservative Citizens. There, he found what he described as “pages upon pages of these brutal black on White murders.”

Hannity Hassle: Let’s apply ‘The Five W’s and How’

  If the burning national question of the moment is whether Fox News Channel star Sean Hannity is a “journalist” or not, let’s use the long-held set of journalistic questions to investigate: The proverbial who, what, when, where, why and how?

  First, the “who”: Sean Patrick Hannity is a cable TV conservative talk show host and best-selling author. Most recently he is said to serve as an unpaid advisor to President Trump — some say that relationship is so close that he “has a desk” at the White House. Hannity was born in New York City and has spent much of his broadcast career there.

Gene Policinski: Wrong. Good idea – if it works both ways. Missed the point

  In order: Wrong. Good idea — if it works both ways. Missed the point. And, wrong.

  Trump administration senior advisers Stephen Bannon and Kellyanne Conway each vented — again — against “the media” in the midst of a turbulent week. Their comments are worth parsing.

  Bannon, not long departed from the perpetually vocal, ultra-conservative Breitbart News online site, said on Jan. 25 that “the media should … keep its mouth shut and just listen for a while.” In that rare news interview, he also called the news media “the opposition.”

  And then there’s Conway, complaining to “Fox News Sunday” on Jan. 29 that “Not one network person has been let go. Not one silly political analyst and pundit who talked smack all day long about Donald Trump has been let go….”

Richard Cohen: Trump’s whisperer-in-chief is treading on dangerous ground

  The chief strategist in the White House, a man who rallied a growing white nationalist movement behind Donald Trump, is now telling the news media to “keep its mouth shut and just listen for a while.”

  We should all be outraged – and more than a little unnerved.

  We all know that conservative politicians have been trying to delegitimize the mainstream press for decades. And, indeed, conservatives have created a constellation of alternative media more to their liking – Fox News and Rush Limbaugh, to name the most obvious.

  But with Trump, we’re witnessing something different, something more insidious. Something that seems pathological.

Sharon Shahid: Now trending: Hoaxes and fake news

  In 1835, the story that was trending in New York City involved the discovery of batlike creatures on the moon by a powerful telescope of “vast dimensions” located at the Cape of Good Hope in South Africa.

  According to the spunky New York Sun, the groundbreaking penny paper that published the exclusive story, the four-foot-tall talking creatures had wings composed of thin membranes, with short, glossy hair the color of copper. The story, complete with an artist’s rendering of life on the moon, ran in six parts, captivating readers still mesmerized by the real-life appearance of Halley’s comet.

Steve Flowers: Inside the Statehouse: The rising role of Jeff Sessions

  Throughout this year’s prodigious presidential selection process, our junior senator, Jeff Sessions, has been at the forefront. He has become the darling of the extreme right throughout the country. He is and has been one of the most conservative members of the U.S. Senate for close to two decades now. Throughout his tenure in the Senate, he has been consistently ranked as one of the five most conservative members of this august body.

  It is because of Sessions' staunch conservatism that he is probably the most popular major political figure in Alabama. He adroitly reflects the philosophy and values of arguably the most conservative state in America.

Charles C. Haynes: Trump and the future of the First Amendment

  After Super Tuesday, what was once unthinkable may now be inevitable: Donald Trump, Republican nominee for president of the United States.

  That’s my cue to join the hundreds of other columnists and pundits scrambling to inform Republican primary voters so that when they vote, they understand the implications of their vote. Of course, the joke is on us. The more we pile on Trump, the more he piles up votes.

  Nevertheless, we have a civic duty at moments like this “to take alarm at the first experiment on our liberties,” to quote James Madison. There are troubling signs in this campaign that a Trump presidency could be a disaster for First Amendment freedoms.

Gene Policinski: Trump, Fox, Kelly and the history, hype and hope of debates

  What’s going on with presidential primary debates?

  And I don’t mean the latest issue many will think of first: The flap between Fox News and GOP front-runner Donald Trump over Fox News anchor Megyn Kelly.

  Granted, the discussion over which journalists will or will not get to ask questions in televised debates generally plays out behind closed doors — in talks between campaign officials and debate sponsors — not in the Twittersphere and in the nightly news.

  Rather, the observation that should catch the attention of First Amendment advocates is Trump’s view of the purpose behind this last Republican debate before the Iowa primary, apparently shared by many, that the point of the exercise is television ratings and network profits.

Public schools in the crosshairs: Far-right propaganda and the Common Core state standards

  Across the United States, a fierce wave of resistance is engulfing the Common Core State Standards, threatening to derail this ambitious effort to lift student achievement and, more fundamentally, to undermine the very idea of public education.

  Developed by the National Governors Association and an association of state school superintendents, the standards were conceived as a way to promote U.S. competitiveness, increase educational equity, and resolve problems created by the No Child Left Behind Act.