TRUMP LOST THE ELECTION, BUT HIS CONSTITUENCY REMAINS CULT-LEVEL STRONG

 

…”One America News Network” should actually be called the “Trump News Network”

 

Few Right-Wing Media network outlets have any respect for the truth

It is important for all American citizens to understand that the Fox Network is not the only far right operation that is responsible for the utter nonsense that gets presented to the American public.  Besides Fox, there once was only: Breitbart, Citizen Free Press, Daily Caller, Epoch Times, The Federalist, Info wars, Newsmax, Rasmussen Reports, Rush Limbaugh, Washington Free Beacon, Weekly Standard and World Net Daily, now called WND.

These were the regular right wing operations that would give out the conservative thinking to compete with the regular networks, and this was before there was a cable TV network with 500 channels for the American public.  But back then, even these conservative media networks did, for the most part, not offer a lot of false information.  Yes, they would offer their points of view on issues, but not so much just out-right lies.

Well, that world no loner exists.  As of today, you can Google an operation called The Righting.  This is an operation that offers a Right Wing Media Guide.  In the guide, it will most often list in alphabetical order the list of current, right-wing media operations in the US.  They will often tell you when the operation started, who is the key individual or corporation behind the operation and they will give you what the operation focuses on such as their politics, anti-abortion, Trump’s presidency, foreign policy, and any other key focus issues.  It also gives you the web site for each of these media organizations.

I can tell you, as of today, the Right Wing Media Guide now lists 69 American right wing media organizations.  In addition, the basis of many of those that started after 2012, today they are much like our current Commander-in-Chief.  That being, they have very little necessity for telling the truth with whatever news they have to offer.

One of these newer operations is One America News Network, or OANN as shown above.  They are a San Diego, CA based cable operation launched by the Herring family in partnership with the conservative Washington Times.

For a long time, their operation had only about 100,000 viewers and followers at any one time.  But after they became a serious Trump supporter, their viewership has grown to a daily, 1 million viewers or better.  They have become a ready supplier of whatever the president says or does, and they only offer whatever President Trump says, word for word.  They will also make up whatever Trump would want them to present in support of the president.

Here is an example of what Trump recently tweeted in all caps, but it was based on the nonsense that OANN had offered to its audience.  And President Trump decided to re-tweet what they offered to his twitter base.  The info that Trump tweeted was about a company, Dominion Voting Systems.  This is a company that supplies voting systems to Michigan, and other states nationwide.  The info that OANN broadcast was false info, that had been spread by far-right media companies over a year ago that the Dominion machines had switched votes from one candidate to another candidate.  The whole thing was eventually debunked, but OANN’s Trump info broadcast, and Trump’s tweet started the whole conspiracy thing all over.

Here was Trump’s tweet: “REPORT: DOMINION DELETED 2.7 MILLION TRUMP VOTES NATIONWIDE. DATA ANALYSIS FINDS 221,000 PENNSYLVANIA VOTES SWITCHED FROM PRESIDENT TRUMP TO BIDEN. 941,000 TRUMP VOTES DELETED.  STATES USING DOMINION VOTING SYSTEMS SWITCHED 435,000 VOTES FROM TRUMP TO BIDEN.”  Yes, it was all in caps and Trump later cited the Trump friendly, One America News Network, as the sole source for this claim.  Of course, the info was total nonsense.  Once again, there was never any votes deleted or switched.

The problem is that with the public’s attitude, especially Trump’s supporters, toward tech-based conspiracies, it’s so important that any allegation made such as this one, must be made only when it is offered with serious proof and evidence.  Of course as usual, there was neither.

It must be noted that the word “careful” is never a word that can be applied to Donald J. Trump.  It also can’t be applied to those vast segments of the conservative media outlets.  The word “truth” has little to do with the right-wing media and those personalities such as Sean Hannity, Laura Ingraham, and of course, Rush Limbaugh.

As it urns out, that group of media celebrities in Fox prime time, and those in talk radio and on-line outlets like Breitbart and Newsmax, those are the gate keepers that can make or break right-wing political careers.

Unfortunately, Trump is today deeply aware of the importance of maintaining power and influence within the conservative media.  He  has lashed out at Fox repeatedly, only to intimidate them, while promoting those other outlets that he believes are more friendly to him and his claims of voter fraud.

We need to face the blunt reality.  As Trump will eventually leave the White House, the trail back to moral norms and political integrity will be extraordinarily difficult.  That’s because the conservative media is still dominated by these same outlets with these same personalities.

Yes, we know that Trump lost the election, but his constituency remains vast, and they remain dedicated to Trump at serious cult-like levels.  The conspiracy theories like the Dominion Voting Systems issue that Trump tweeted are obviously false, and there is the need for courage by the rest of the nation.  Just as the high cost of the low trust in our nation’s response to the coronavirus has shown, and the “anti-mask wearing” theory or “it’s just the flu” misinformation, have all cost so many lives, we have to rise above all that and keep spreading the real truth.

The reality is that because of the growth of the importance of the conservative media outlets, whether they tell the truth or not, it is going to be an up hill climb.  Let’s face it.  There is no path back to sanity that doesn’t at least travel partway through the very loud voices of the vast, right-wing media-entertainment complex.

Sorry folks, but that’s the truth.

Copyright G. Ater 2020