Don Moynihan Profile picture
May 12, 2022 7 tweets 4 min read Read on X
You can tell the story of the transformation of the Republican Party almost entirely through its embrace of conspiracy theories: Birtherism, QAnon, the Big Lie, and the Great Replacement Theory.
* Embracing birtherism was key to Trump's rise
* Only 1 in 4 Republicans accepted that Obama was born in the US as late as 2016.
* Lots of evidence rebutting the conspiracy theory did not work, because believers are not working from an evidence-based world view.
*Pizzagate posters were embraced by the GOP mainstream
*QAnon beliefs are accepted by up to about half of Republicans
*GOP leaders increasingly use QAnon tropes like "groomer" to undermine public institutions like schools
donmoynihan.substack.com/p/the-qanoning…
It's not just that a majority of Republicans believe the Big Lie conspiracy theory that the election was stolen. They are picking primary candidates on that basis, which is why more and more of the people overseeing elections will be conspiracy theorists. donmoynihan.substack.com/p/a-year-on-th…
"Twenty-seven states will choose a secretary of state this fall, and in 17 of those states, at least one of the Republican candidates for the office actively denies that President Biden won the 2020 election." nytimes.com/2022/05/12/opi…
Much of the partisan gap in vaccination is a partisan gap in conspiratorial thinking, leading Republicans to become less willing to made medical choices to protect themselves.
donmoynihan.substack.com/p/fox-news-is-…
Concerns about immigration exist everywhere. The idea that it is a deliberate plot by elites to undermine native borns is a conspiracy theory that has been transferred from white nationalists to the majority of Republicans via vectors like Tucker Carlson. washingtonpost.com/politics/2022/…

• • •

Missing some Tweet in this thread? You can try to force a refresh
 

Keep Current with Don Moynihan

Don Moynihan Profile picture

Stay in touch and get notified when new unrolls are available from this author!

Read all threads

This Thread may be Removed Anytime!

PDF

Twitter may remove this content at anytime! Save it as PDF for later use!

Try unrolling a thread yourself!

how to unroll video
  1. Follow @ThreadReaderApp to mention us!

  2. From a Twitter thread mention us with a keyword "unroll"
@threadreaderapp unroll

Practice here first or read more on our help page!

More from @donmoyn

Sep 22, 2023
The connections are pretty clear. Leonard Leo of the Federalist Society helped bankroll the work of Ginni Thomas. He also arranged for Clarence Thomas to attend Koch fundraisers.
propublica.org/article/claren…

Image
Image
The shared purpose of Leonard Leo, Ginni Thomas, Clarence Thomas and the Koch network was to put right-wing judges on the court. And Clarence Thomas used his public position on the court to raise money for that. Image
Clarence Thomas used to support the Chevron doctrine, which allows delegation to administrative expertise. But the people who fund the Koch network can't buy off administrators, so they want to remove their influence from the process. Now Thomas agrees with the donors.
Image
Image
Read 4 tweets
Sep 12, 2023
Holy shit, its the original Avocado Toast guy!
Image
Also this guy: young people today can't afford a house because they occasionally buy new clothes
Image
Image
If the people @FinancialReview care for free speech at all, they will do the decent thing and allow replies to this tweet, allowing a full and frank exchange of views. Image
Read 4 tweets
Aug 28, 2023
America has 22 times the firearm homicide rates as the European Union.
We are less safe and less free because of how available guns are in this country.
healthdata.org/news-events/in…
Image
America makes up about 15% of gun homicides, and together with five other countries constitutes half of gun homicides in the world. vox.com/2018/8/29/1779…
Image
The reason more people in America are dying from guns is because there are more guns in America.
America is the only country with more guns than people. cnn.com/2021/11/26/wor…
Image
Read 5 tweets
Aug 17, 2023
New, from me: I wrote about how the emerging debacle at New College (one-third of faculty gone, students can't find classes, housed in airport hotels) reflects the incompetence of populists like DeSantis. Image
Competence, the ability to perform organizational core tasks, is an underrated quality. It is an especially overlooked quality by people who value other things, like ideological goals, or believe that existing institutions are corrupt, or who have never actually run things. Image
Fuck Around (left, celebrating the firing of a faculty who criticized the Regents)
and
Find Out: (right, soliciting faculty applications because you don't have enough to teach classes - one-third have left for some reason).
Image
Image
Read 6 tweets
Aug 16, 2023
The DeSantis takeover of New College was meant to offer a model of a conservative-run higher ed.

The result is chaos, which is what happens when incompetent people who don't actually care about organizational mission take over public services. insidehighered.com/news/students/…
The NY Times recently featured Chris Rufo to explain how DEI was undermining liberal education.

You know what actually undermines a liberal education?
Losing one-third of faculty.
Not offering core classes to students.
Raging incompetence and blind indifference.
Image
Image
Rufo is seeking to personally recruit replacements. Which is completely at odds with what university trustees are supposed to do. No way that could go wrong, right? Image
Read 4 tweets
Aug 3, 2023
Update: Kathleen McElroy receives a settlement of $1M from Texas A&M, who had offered her a senior tenured position, and then pulled that offer.

From the internal Texas A&M reports: it was A&M Regents who signaled their opposition to McElroy, at which point the university figured out they would not tenure her.
Seems like the Regents cost A&M $1M. Nice job.
: ... tamus.edu/wp-content/up
Image
Not great when a university President is saying "I'm assuming all texts were deleted" and then tells faculty she was not involved in hiring process. (She has since resigned).
Read 8 tweets

Did Thread Reader help you today?

Support us! We are indie developers!


This site is made by just two indie developers on a laptop doing marketing, support and development! Read more about the story.

Become a Premium Member ($3/month or $30/year) and get exclusive features!

Become Premium

Don't want to be a Premium member but still want to support us?

Make a small donation by buying us coffee ($5) or help with server cost ($10)

Donate via Paypal

Or Donate anonymously using crypto!

Ethereum

0xfe58350B80634f60Fa6Dc149a72b4DFbc17D341E copy

Bitcoin

3ATGMxNzCUFzxpMCHL5sWSt4DVtS8UqXpi copy

Thank you for your support!

Follow Us!

:(