The people who believe this lie, or the one about the impeachment being a distraction, or any of the others that will come, are people who have decided to believe lies, and should be understood as such.
They'll do what people who don't want to know truth always do: become confused. So many competing stories! Everybody's pointing fingers! Who can say who's right or wrong. *Everybody's* bad.
Deliberately ignoring the difference between what the president said last week and this.
Deliberately ignoring the difference between what the president said last week and this.
They'll have help, of course. There's a large market of people who want to hide their deliberate ignorance of truth behind a convenient scrim of confusion between what is true and what is not.
More and more, that market is being served. Facts and lies given equal billing.
More and more, that market is being served. Facts and lies given equal billing.
But last month the president said it was a hoax being overblown by Democrats and media. Fox news spread his narrative.
Last week he spoke of pews packed for Easter.
He withholds supplies even now.
And now this week he says 200,000 dead would be a heckofa good job.
Last week he spoke of pews packed for Easter.
He withholds supplies even now.
And now this week he says 200,000 dead would be a heckofa good job.
The truth is, the president disbanded the pandemic response office.
The truth is, he did nothing for months but downplay the threat.
He made ignoring the threat a sign of loyalty to himself.
And now blames doctors and nurses and even patients.
The truth is, he did nothing for months but downplay the threat.
He made ignoring the threat a sign of loyalty to himself.
And now blames doctors and nurses and even patients.
The truth is easy to see and impossible to miss.
People are confused because confusion is more comfortable than truth, and comfort is for them the higher priority.
Knowing the truth means knowing what needs to be changed, and that change will be personally uncomfortable.
People are confused because confusion is more comfortable than truth, and comfort is for them the higher priority.
Knowing the truth means knowing what needs to be changed, and that change will be personally uncomfortable.
The question many of us have to answer now is whether we want to fundamentally change economic power structures that eat people for profit or if we just want to go back to the moment when it wasn’t eating us specifically.
Which we choose will be quite obvious to everyone.
Which we choose will be quite obvious to everyone.
Our job will be denying those who prioritize comfort over truth the comfort of confusion.
Be polite if you can, and kind if you're able, prioritize your safety over confrontation, but be firm.
Refuse to allow convenient confusion about what we can all see if only we look at it.
Be polite if you can, and kind if you're able, prioritize your safety over confrontation, but be firm.
Refuse to allow convenient confusion about what we can all see if only we look at it.
They'll mostly stay in their confused ignorance, which allows them to put space between themselves and the inconvenience of caring.
But at the very least we can make that ignorance uncomfortable to those who prioritize comfort above all.
We can do that. It's our duty.
But at the very least we can make that ignorance uncomfortable to those who prioritize comfort above all.
We can do that. It's our duty.
The President, abetted by his party—which certified his right to abuse the power of his office and treat his position transactionally—engaged in a pandemic response that not only exacerbated disaster, but seems designed to strategically punish political opponents.
That's truth.
That's truth.
This is truth:
This sort of thing happens a million times a day across the country, and it makes this pandemic worse, and the people who behave this way do so because the president and his propaganda machine at Fox News told them to behave that way.
And that is truth.
And that is truth.
Oh and the thread in the previous tweet is a good example of how to enforce the truth on somebody who has decided to believe the lie, if you, like me and the author, is the sort of person who is privileged enough to be able to confront MAGA America relatively safely.
The president made the states compete for medical supplies and then outbid them, and lots of people will die because of it, which means Trump's joined the list of leaders who deliberately murdered their own citizens for political gain.
That's the truth.
That's the truth.
The president's pandemic response has aspects of both gross incompetence, deliberate cruelty, and premeditated mass murder. He's used the virus to punish enemies.
We're projected to lose more lives than in great wars.
And it didn't need to be like this.
That's the truth.
We're projected to lose more lives than in great wars.
And it didn't need to be like this.
That's the truth.
The president should be forced from office immediately, investigated thoroughly, charged with crimes against humanity, judged by a jury, and sentenced according to the verdict.
That's the truth.
That's the truth.
