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To: DoodleBob
So you think our political system will work just fine if the news and information people get from what appear to be neutral sources is being secretly manipulated to affect the perception of the people looking for information.

OK, good luck with that.

102 posted on 06/27/2019 7:34:42 AM PDT by freeandfreezing
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To: freeandfreezing
Ok, I'll try this one more time.

Clearly, you believe the situation is such that the news and information people get from what appear to be neutral sources is being secretly manipulated to affect the perception of the people looking for information, has impacted the political system such that it won't work fine.

Let's examine your thesis line by line:

the news and information people get from what appear to be neutral sources

Stop. Few people buy that the news is neutral. Parenthetically, the people more inclined to BELIEVE the press are college graduates. Thus it isn't the "ignorants" being swayed by the media (though I've met plenty of dim graduates).

is being secretly manipulated

Stop. It's not a secret. Most people are aware of the manipulation.

to affect the perception of the people looking for information

Stop. We agree on that point.

has impacted the political system such that it won't work fine.

Stop. You didn't define "work fine" but I gather that you mean "people may vote in a way they wouldn't otherwise."

Now, that is a debatable point...some men, you can't reach. Hardcore liberals are stuck in their dogma that the state is better than the individual, regardless of the evidence. Liberty-loving Deplorables have facts and reason on their side. But at the margin, is it possible that people might have, for example, voted for Hillary because of biased and manipulated news?

For the sake of argument I'll grant you this point. But isn't it true that the risk of biased and manipulated "news and facts" has ALWAYS existed? Indeed, Jefferson himself wrote:

"From forty years' experience of the wretched guess-work of the newspapers of what is not done in open daylight, and of their falsehood even as to that, I rarely think them worth reading, and almost never worth notice." --Thomas Jefferson to James Monroe, 1816. ME 14:430

"Nothing can now be believed which is seen in a newspaper. Truth itself becomes suspicious by being put into that polluted vehicle. The real extent of this state of misinformation is known only to those who are in situations to confront facts within their knowledge with the lies of the day." --Thomas Jefferson to John Norvell, 1807. ME 11:224

"As for what is not true, you will always find abundance in the newspapers." --Thomas Jefferson to Barnabas Bidwell, 1806. ME 11:118

"Advertisements... contain the only truths to be relied on in a newspaper." --Thomas Jefferson to Nathaniel Macon, 1819. ME 15:179

Indeed, propaganda is as old as the written record. The Bible is full of bad men spreading lies begetting death and mayhem.

When it gets down to brass tacks, what's left of the argument isn't a fear Big Tech (though I agree there's is a lot of bad and evil manipulation going on there). It is a fear of the individual. It is a fear of freedom. It is a fear that Americans can't sort out all this deceit and manipulation from Big Tech (with government license) by themselves, because Big Tech and Leviathan are smarter and deeper than Americans. This renders the individual impotent when it comes to make an informed political decision. The only way out is government intervention.

That sure sounds like a liberal to me.

113 posted on 06/27/2019 4:17:45 PM PDT by DoodleBob (Gravity's waiting period is about 9.8 m/s^2)
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