Time - USA (2020-11-30)

36 Time November 30/December 7, 2020

Trump’s Twitter feed is full of debunked

rumors and false claims, but in the late morn-

ing of Nov. 12, he reached a new level of wild

speculation. In all caps, he tweeted, “RE-

PORT: DOMINION DELETED 2.7 MILLION

TRUMP VOTES NATIONWIDE. DATA ANALY-

SIS FINDS 221,000 PENNSYLVANIA VOTES

SWITCHED FROM PRESIDENT TRUMP TO

BIDEN. 941,000 TRUMP VOTES DELETED.

STATES USING DOMINION VOTING SYS-

TEMS SWITCHED 435,000 VOTES FROM

TRUMP TO BIDEN.”

He cited the Trump-friendly One America

News Network as the source for his explosive

claim, but it’s pure and utter nonsense. As the

Associated Press reported, a clerical error in a

small Michigan county “has snowballed into

a deluge of false claims that Democrats have

deep ties to Dominion Voting Systems, the

company that supplies election equipment to

Michigan and doz-

ens of other states

nationwide.”

Given the pub-

lic’s vulnerabil-

ity to tech-based

conspiracies, it’s

incumbent upon

public officials to

be especially care-

ful before making

any allegation. But

careful is never a

word that’s applied

to Donald Trump.

It’s also not a word

that applies to vast segments of conservative

media, and it’s conservative media celebrities

who truly matter in the fight for truth in

right-wing America.

MeMbers of the house and senate are

largely irrelevant to the creation and evolu-

tion of right-wing public opinion. Republican

politicians have little independent political

or cultural influence, and their fortunes de-

pend greatly on remaining in the good graces

(or at least staying out of the line of fire) of

a specific constellation of media celebrities

concentrated in Fox prime time, talk radio

and a select group of online outlets like Breit-

bart or Newsmax. They’re the gatekeepers,

and they make or break political careers.

Trump is deeply aware of the importance

of maintaining power and influence within

conservative media. He’s lashed out at Fox

News repeatedly—a transparent effort both

to intimidate Fox and to promote those out-

lets he believes are even more friendly to his

presidency and to his claims of vote fraud.

Here’s the blunt reality. As Trump leaves

the White House and enters private life, the

trail back to moral norms, back to integrity

and back to robust and meaningful ideologi-

cal debate (as opposed to “own the libs” troll-

ing, conspiracy theories and personal insults)

will be extraordinarily difficult. After all,

conservative media is still dominated by the

same personalities and the same outlets.

Moreover, because the election was close,

the argument for conservative media to re-

form itself will have to be moral and patriotic

rather than self- interested and pragmatic—

made to a community that specifically scorns

norms and often mocks arguments based on

character or integrity. Trump lost, but his

constituency remains vast. His personal style

remains dominant. Imitating him and de-

fending him will

remain the path of

least resistance.

But the need

for courage re-

mains. Conspiracy

theories like the

Dominion theory

Trump tweeted

are false. Belief

in conspiracies

harms this nation.

Indeed, we’ve wit-

nessed the high

cost of low trust

in our nation’s re-

sponse to the corona virus. Anti masking ide-

ologies, “just the flu” misinformation and

“plandemic” conspiracies have cost lives.

Conservative media was created and

thrived in large part because of the realiza-

tion that mainstream media had glaring blind

spots. Fox pledged, for example, to be “fair

and balanced.” And while a few publications

have stayed true to their purpose, others

mainly feed the right’s outrage machine.

Trump’s relentless disinformation cam-

paign raises the question: Is there a line left

that angry right-wing celebrities won’t cross?

They can help spare this nation an even deeper

level of animosity and mistrust. There is no

path back to sanity that doesn’t travel at least

partway through the very loud voices of the

vast right-wing media- entertainment complex.

French is a columnist for TIME. His new book

is Divided We Fall: America’s Secession

Threat and How to Restore Our Nation

A reporter with One America News Network at a Trump

campaign rally in Newport News, Va., on Sept. 25

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A new

chapter

Katie Couric tried to

keep an open mind

when Donald Trump

was elected President,

but, she writes, he grew

smaller, not bigger,

in the job: “I’m just

looking forward to, as

Joe Biden said, lowering

the temperature of our

national thermostat

and seeing each other

as human beings, not

bumper stickers or lawn

signs.”

Brief

relief

Brittany Packnett

Cunningham, host of the

podcast Undistracted

With Brittany Packnett

Cunningham, rejoiced

when Joe Biden and

Kamala Harris were

declared the winners,

but she says the work

is not done: “Trump

will not take systemic

oppression with him

when he packs up in

January, and millions

of our neighbors don’t

want to see it go.”

Love

and loss

After he was killed in

action, Annie Sklaver

Orenstein’s brother Ben

was treated as a saint.

But reading his journals

in quarantine helped

Orenstein, founder of

the site Dispatch From

Daybreak, rediscover the

real him. “I had no idea

he’d been so scared,”

she writes. “How did I

not know he’d been so

scared?”

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