I mentioned in my last column that I would address issues regarding misinformation and its threat to our electoral process, as well as the ongoing threats of violence by political extremists.
You don’t have to look far to find examples of both, unfortunately, as those delusional zealots work secretly or openly trying to influence, intimidate, and determine outcomes to their liking.
I wrote last time about the Montana representative who was targeted with death threats upon announcing he would seek a Senate seat after former president Donald Trump had backed another candidate. Even when he withdrew, saying he would seek reelection to his House seat instead, he had to seek police protection for himself and his family due to ongoing death threats. Ultimately, he announced he would resign from Congress altogether because of them.
Image courtesy of Newsroom.Carlton. CA
When the Colorado Supreme Court ruled Trump could be kept off the ballot over encouraging insurrection under the constitution’s 14th Amendment, that was then overruled by the U.S. Supreme Court. Secretary of State Jena Griswold received dozens of death threats, though she hadn’t even brought the suit.
While some of these threats are most certainly bogus, posted by online wanna-be badasses who think they can’t be traced, some, from individuals and far-right groups are not, and represent serious threats such as those seen in the insurrection attempt of Jan. 6, 2021.
Ark Valley Voice has assiduously investigated and reported on the strategy of using and threatening violence by some to try to ‘get their way’ — recalling now the individual who pointed a realistic-looking squirt gun at County Clerk and Recorder Lori Mitchell, our election chief. Cowardly and shameful.
Also focusing often on the extremist threat rhetoric, Denver Channel 9 anchor and reporter Kyle Clark recently cited online far-right commentator and gun dealer Joe Oltmann. The day after Biden’s State of the Union Speech where he called for a ban on so-called assault weapons, Oltmann, on his show, called for President Biden to be tried for treason and executed by hanging.
Oltmann has also called for building gallows across the country, Clark reported, to hang politicians and others he thinks are traitors. Quickly covering his backside, he says “to the FBI listening…” he wasn’t saying he himself was threatening to harm Biden. Very telling, isn’t it?
Progressive legal experts and David French, columnist for the New York Times point out that these threats are part of the Trump MAGA strategy to try to intimidate critics, prosecutors, judges, election officials, other politicians, and journalists. French has personally received death threats.
Remember that Trump even stated that Joint Chiefs of Staff General Mark Milley should be executed.
Various political experts and analysts have posted that violence is a working strategy of fascism, as exemplified by the terror undertaken by Hitler’s supporters in his rise to power in Germany. Not far-fetched at all given the former president’s stated admiration for past and present dictators such as Hungary’s Viktor Orbán, North Korea’s Kim Jong Un, Russia’s Vladimir Putin and, according to a former Chief of Staff, Hitler himself.
Many observers say they expect to see scattered outbreaks of violence during the election campaign, and overt threats of violence. I have said the same for some time, expecting even worse if Trump should lose again, and again claiming he somehow won.
Disinformation can be as much of a threat to our democracy as extremist violence. Except it often surreptitiously creeps into our political dialogue environment like a cockroach in the night, often later disappearing to escape detection.
The impact of these campaigns can already be seen; from the die-hard beliefs of some QAnon adherents in the recent past to those who attempt to spread conspiracy theories and outright lies on social media and even some mainstream media outlets – (I’m looking at you, Fox News).
One recent example locally was the outlandish story, apparently by the wife of a Republican county board candidate, who claimed publicly she’d heard a ‘busload of illegals’ had recently unloaded at Heart of the Rockies Regional Medical Center. AVV promptly contacted HRRMC, got a quick denial and a thank you for correcting the half-baked lie.
Chaffee County Department of Human Services and Public Health officials also commented later they were not aware of any immigrant increases in demand for county services.
A group of several people appeared at the March 5 Chaffee County Board of Commissioners meeting and during the public comment period, expressed positions against what they portrayed as a crisis caused by ‘open borders’ and urged the board to declare the county was not a ‘sanctuary county.’
An organized effort to pressure the board to take such an action was previously done in heavily right-wing Colorado Springs and at least one or two other Colorado communities. But by whom? The list of those who commented wasn’t available on the county website minutes of the meeting as this was being written, but is being sought by AVV.
Disinformation in our ‘information age’ is all too prevalent in almost every aspect of life aided by our ability to access technology for a universe of information. It’s also increasingly easy for the distribution of false stories, prejudices, slander, and wild rumors in text, and now, with the onset of Artificial Intelligence, (AI) visual images on many sources, especially social media.
I remember as a reporter writing about so-called ‘dirty tricks’ used at election time in the past, from phone calls telling voters lies such as the election date had been moved, or they were not eligible to vote for some fake reason or another. AI recently was implicated in a similar fake scheme that imitated Joe Biden’s voice on automated phone calls. Worse yet, AI can be used to produce fake photos and videos of people that are hard or impossible to discern from reality. We might well see more of those as election day approaches. Be aware.
Disinformation allows purveyors of such garbage to reach a wide audience, often feeding into already-held beliefs and prejudices (confirmation bias) and allowing the disinformation to be spread further among the often too-gullible public.
A quote incorrectly attributed to Mark Twain goes “A lie can travel halfway around the world while the truth is putting its shoes on.” It’s even more true today with the global Internet and with the seeming ease with which bad actors can concoct and spread deliberate disinformation for nefarious purposes, (as opposed to misinformation, which can be a product of carelessness).
One need only harken back to the last few campaigns, with U.S. news organizations revealing that Russian government fake news organizations were actively distributing false stories on social media. Some were designed to help one candidate over another or to spread lies designed to further divisiveness, distrust, and animosity against the government and our democratic standards.
It needs to be repeated that such domestic disinformation tactics even back in 2016, were a core factor in the acceptance by many of ‘The Big Lie’ that the 2020 presidential election was fraudulent and ‘rigged.’
It’s been debunked over and over by dozens of court cases and solid, fact-based reporting that did uncover organized GOP attempts to get state officials to change vote totals and in some cases, replace Electoral College designees with the now-infamous ‘fake electors.’
We all remember where that led — to the attempted insurrection of Jan. 6 2021, and unprecedented violence, destruction and even death at our Capitol. Later, disinformation campaigns also tried to rewrite the history of that democracy-threatening moment, while the Big Lie is still gospel to some of the ‘true believers.’ Exasperating, to say the least.
But disinformation is a much more complex issue than simply guessing at detecting lies and truth. Experts in the field say critical thinking skills, information and media literacy is crucial. Citizens need to be cautious information consumers; partner with government and especially tech platforms to blunt the wave of deliberate disinformation. Checking sources and facts is imperative.
The mainstream news media are not ‘the enemy of the people,’ as Trump said in his first campaign. A free press is one of the pillars of our democracy and the watchdog of government. Also vital is an educated and informed electorate, able to objectively discern deception and in some cases, delusion.
We all need to commit to doing our part in what undoubtedly will be one of the most consequential elections of our lives. Vote, and call out misinformation right when it appears. Democracy itself may be at stake.
Thank you for reading Ark Valley Voice and supporting our independent journalism.
It is a shame that we can’t just send all of these stupid angry America-hating racists and theocrats back to Nazi-era Germany, since it seems pretty obvious that a lot of them would be happier than pigs in slop to find themselves in a murderous fascist state, especially if they are the ones doing the murdering.
Since time travel doesn’t exist (if you believe what the government says, anyway), maybe we should encourage these America haters to move away to places like Russia and Hungary since they love dictators so much, and have such hatred for American democracy. Maybe we could start some kind of billion-dollar nationwide GoFundMe effort with the goal of shipping off as many of these hateful people as possible, at no expense to them! All they need to do is promise to never come back to America. no matter what.
Patriots, my ass. You people hate America.