Russia wants to decrease our faith: our faith in one and another, and our faith in our institutions
We’ve spent the past two years studying online disinformation and building a deep understanding of Russia’s strategy, tactics, and impact. … As good marketers, professional trolls manipulate our emotions subtly. … Russia’s goals are to further widen existing divisions in the American public and decrease our faith and trust in institutions that help maintain a strong democracy.
Devin Nunes must stop suing fake cows (and the media)
“No reasonable person would believe that Devin Nunes’ cow actually has a Twitter account, or that the hyperbole, satire and cow-related jokes it posts are serious facts,” reads the filing in Virginia’s Henrico County Circuit Court. “It is self-evident that cows are domesticated livestock animals and do not have the intelligence, language, or opposable digits needed to operate a Twitter account. Defendant ‘Devin Nunes’ Mom’ likewise posts satirical patronizing, nagging, mothering comments which ostensibly treat Mr. Nunes as a misbehaving child.”
Couple Articles on Buttigieg and White Privilege
Couple of interesting articles from the perspective of black Americans, both in structure and content. Pretty solid writer with some interesting things to say.
- Buttigieg called me.
“Here’s why black voters support black candidates,” I said. “When you go into a room and sit around a table of white men, we are worried that this is what will happen; that a roomful of white people will talk about role models and confidence and crime and no one in the room will say: ‘Hold up, we can’t talk about any of this without talking about racism. We can’t talk about education without talking about discrimination.’ That is our fear.”
“A mediocre white kid with mediocre intelligence and mediocre parents can easily make it in America,” I explained, blackly. “A smart black kid with smart parents and a supportive community still has to fight every day to hope to reach the levels of what a mediocre white man accomplishes. And, odds are, they still might not make it.” - …because (from this author’s perspective) Buttigieg’s position on race is dishonest.
Majority-minority schools receive $23 billion less in funding than majority-white schools, according to a recent study by EdBuild. Black students in Indiana, the state where Buttigieg serves as mayor, and across the country, are disciplined more harshly than white students. But even though Buttigieg has never attended a school with more than 10 percent black students, he thinks he knows what’s stopping black kids from achieving their educational dreams.
Apparently, it’s not the fact that the unemployment rate for black college graduates is twice as high as the unemployment rate for white grads. Black college graduates are paid 80 cents for every dollar a white person with the same education earns. White people leave college with lower debt and higher earnings. White kids get more resources, more advanced classes and have access to more technology. But Pete says it could all be solved with [an inspiring role model].
Dunning Krueger effect rules them all
As predicted, the results showed that those who scored low on political knowledge were also the ones who overestimated their level of knowledge. But that wasn’t all. When participants were given cues that made them engage in partisan thought, the Dunning-Kruger effect was made even stronger. This occurred with both Republicans and Democrats, but only in those who scored low on political knowledge to begin with.
Bloomberg probably isn’t catastrophically stupid, after all
The price of airing TV ads varied significantly by media market, but it’s almost always cheaper [as in, 50% cheaper] to buy ads as a political candidate than it is for PACs and super PACs — which can spend unlimited sums of money on electioneering. In the 2016 campaign cycle, for example, the Sunlight Foundation found that while Hillary Clinton’s campaign was charged just $1,500 per ad to air three spots in the 10:00 p.m. hour on the CBS affiliated station KCCI in Des Moines, Iowa, KCCI charged Right to Rise, the super PAC affiliated with the Republican candidate Jeb Bush, double that amount, at $3,000 per ad, to also air ads during the 10:00 p.m. hour.
