With the November elections barreling towards us, The New York Times has gone into full panic mode.
It’s understandable. The Gray Lady has realized it is losing the “war over disinformation.”
The news was so shocking to The Times, that it took two writers — Jim Rutenberg and Steven Lee Myers — to sound the alarms: “How Trump’s Allies Are Winning the War Over Disinformation.”
“Their claims of censorship have successfully stymied the effort to filter election lies online,” they ominously report.
It is a masterpiece of gaslighting and propaganda.
The first few paragraphs read like the opening text of a Star Wars movie:
In the wake of the riot on Capitol Hill on Jan. 6, 2021, a groundswell was built in Washington to rein in the onslaught of lies that had fueled the assault on the peaceful transfer of power.
Social media companies suspended Donald J. Trump, then the president, and many of his allies from the platforms they had used to spread misinformation about his defeat and whip up the attempt to overturn it. The Biden administration, Democrats in Congress and even some Republicans sought to do more to hold the companies accountable. Academic researchers wrestled with how to strengthen efforts to monitor false posts.
Mr. Trump and his allies embarked instead on a counteroffensive, a coordinated effort to block what they viewed as a dangerous effort to censor conservatives.
They have unquestionably prevailed.
Everyone — except The Times, of course — has played a role in hampering the government’s ability to protect elections from “twisted” speech.
“Waged in the courts, in Congress and in the seething precincts of the internet, that effort has eviscerated attempts to shield elections from disinformation in the social media era. It tapped into — and then, critics say, twisted — the fierce debate over free speech and the government’s role in policing content,” the duo writes. “Projects that were once bipartisan, including one started by the Trump administration, have been recast as deep-state conspiracies to rig elections. Facing legal and political blowback, the Biden administration has largely abandoned moves that might be construed as stifling political speech.”
And on and on it goes, for thousands of words.
Rutenberg and Myers take potshots at Rudy Giuliani, Trump advisor Stephen Miller, Rep. Jim Jordan (R-Ohio), Elon Musk, and cyber expert Mike Benz, who recently revealed to Tucker Carlson the inner workings of Big Tech and the mainstream media.
“While little noticed by most Americans, the effort has helped cut a path for Mr. Trump’s attempt to recapture the presidency,” they warn. “Disinformation about elections is once again coursing through news feeds, aiding Mr. Trump as he fuels his comeback with falsehoods about the 2020 election.”
Predictably, Rutenberg and Myers can’t resist accusing conservative donors of doing exactly what billionaire Democrat donors — such as George Soros and Mark Zuckerberg — have done and are continuing to do:
Those involved draw financial support from conservative donors who have backed groups that promoted lies about voting in 2020. They have worked alongside an eclectic cast of characters, including Elon Musk, the billionaire who bought Twitter and vowed to make it a bastion of free speech, and Mike Benz, a former Trump administration official who previously produced content for a social media account that trafficked in posts about “white ethnic displacement.” (More recently, Mr. Benz originated the false assertion that Taylor Swift was a “psychological operation” asset for the Pentagon.)
“Three years after Mr. Trump’s posts about rigged voting machines and stuffed ballot boxes went viral, he and his allies have achieved a stunning reversal of online fortune,” they state. “Social media platforms now provide fewer checks against the intentional spread of lies about elections.”
Benz responded to The Times’ “hit piece” on X.
“The New York Times mentioned me 24 times as the top story on the front page of the Sunday Edition,” he wrote.
“They tried a hit piece. All I saw were two words: ‘Winning Successfully.’”
The New York Times mentioned me 24 times as the top story on the front page of the Sunday Edition.
They tried a hit piece. All I saw were two words:
“Winning Successfully.” pic.twitter.com/nl3sIdeCAI
— Mike Benz (@MikeBenzCyber) March 18, 2024
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Author: Melissa Fine
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