Thread by @PnictogenHorses

Ollie Stone's "Nixon" begins with Howard Hunt's CREeP boys prepping for the Watergate breakin and for some reason they're watching a short film on sales technique—for all I know, this is historical, but for now we take this as a reminder of a common *theme* about Nixon.

(cont'd)

the theme was most famously explored in Joe McGinnis's book "The Selling of the President, 1968"—Nixon, the book asserts, was a triumph of slick *marketing*. young Richard Nixon was not an appealing man, but he was able to rebrand himself as an older, wiser statesman.

(cont'd)

there's a direct line to be drawn between Mr. @dick_nixon's 1968 marketing machine, and the current-day attempts of the @GOP—an extremist Christian fascist party—to rebrand itself, with the help of frauds like @elonmusk and @mtaibbi, as somehow the rebellious outsiders.

(cont'd)

the Republicans think they can do this because they've fully internalized the values of #marketing itself, and marketers (including @mtaibbi) think that they can *sell anything to anyone*. they are manipulators and moulders of mass opinion, manufacturers of consent.

(cont'd)

@mtaibbi and @elonmusk are a fascinating marketing phenomenon: they're *captive rebels*. they're scarcely the only such fake rebels, but right now they're the *loudest*: even as @Jim_Jordan leads Matt Taibbi around on a leash, the pretense is that he's "independent".

(cont'd)

in a way, @mtaibbi is nothing new. it's long been known that capitalism finds ways of subsuming and destroying all criticism of itself. this is how #DiscoElysium, an anticapitalist manifesto, is now @DiscoElysium, worthless commercial franchise trash. it happens.

(cont'd)

@mtaibbi may have had some genuinely rebellious spirit in him once, but now he's crawling around @elonmusk and doing @GOP errands—there's nothing the tiniest bit rebellious about Matt Taibbi now, whatever he *used* to be. Taibbi's "independence" is a marketing ploy.

(cont'd)

here's the thing. the delicious irony of the whole awful @elonmusk / @mtaibbi marketing phenomenon is...these clods *believe their own horseshıt*.

Elon Musk, aristocratic corporate man-baby, really thinks he's Leonardo da Vinci. Matt Taibbi thinks he's Hunter Thompson.

(cont'd)

tell lies often enough—it's to be doubted whether @mtaibbi has told the truth in public for years, certainly not since he retroactively declared some of his own "journalism" to be "satire"—and you simply *believe them*. you can make yourself believe your lies are truth.

(cont'd)

it's *really* easy if you're a man of straw like @NateSilver538 (or @mtaibbi), someone who thinks "truth" is merely a matter of popularity and "tribalism" and "narratives"—someone without a moral center or backbone.

if you think truth is mere smoke, then do lies exist?

(cont'd)

does @mtaibbi really believe in...anything? (other than in his own genius and genes, which don't count as solid anchoring points.)

I'm a scientist by education; I *have* to believe in objective truth. but Matt Taibbi doesn't...maybe all he needs is a winning smile.

(cont'd)

and I think people may have noticed that @mtaibbi does like to *grin*.

A LOT.

~Mona Drafter of Pnictogen

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