Trumpaganda: An Attack on American Democracy

 

The University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign has launched a course examining President Trump’s impact on democracy and the media. The course, “Trumpaganda: The War on Facts, Press and Democracy,” is an eight week class highlighting Donald Trump’s effective propaganda machine.

What is propaganda? According to Webster’s Dictionary, “propaganda is a deliberate spread of information, ideas, or rumors to help or harm a person, group, movement, institution, or nation.”

Propaganda concentrates on a few plausible points, presents those ideas as slogans as they attract the emotions of the listener. Successful propaganda never appeals to reason because it must avoid any attempt at being based in facts.

Propaganda is effective only when camouflaged as something else—news, advertisements, and even press releases. And it must present everything in black and white without any shade of grey—love or hate, right or wrong, truth or lie—and nothing in between.

Since Donald Trump’s rise to national prominence he’s used the bully pulpit to declare war on facts, the free press, and democracy as he indoctrinates his base.

Here’s a Trump fact: At a rally in Pennsylvania on October 10, 2018 Trump accused Hillary Clinton, without providing evidence, of conspiring with Russia to try to swing the 2016 election. According to a Washington Post article Trump said, “There was collusion between Hillary, the Democrats, and Russia.” The attending crowd responded, “Lock her up!” Trump’s assertion about Clinton is pure propaganda to deflect the Muller investigation away from the White House.

According to fact checkers around the nation the Clinton accusation was one of Trump’s 5000 fake and misleading statements during his tenure as Commander-in-Chief. Surprisingly, major news organizations and social media feeds continue to report Trump’s claims without clearly informing the public that the president stated a falsehood.

However, not all news agencies are complicit. More than three hundred news outlets around the nation have launched a campaign to counter the president’s attacks and promote a free press. They include the New York Times, The North Little Rock Times, and The Arizona Daily Sun, to name just a few. In early August 2018 the Boston Globe called for a nationwide denouncement of Trump’s “dirty war” against the media using the hashtag #EnemyOfNone. This is the Boston Globe’s counter to Trump’s “fake news” slogan and his attack on journalists as “enemies of the people.” Unfortunately, Trump’s reckless tweeting has placed reporters at risk of violent attacks.

The incident in May 2017 in Montana is a perfect example. Reporter Ben Jacobs asked Republican candidate for the House of Representatives, Greg Gianforte, about his party’s plans for health care. Instead of answering the question, Gianforte grabbed Jacobs by the neck and slammed him to the ground. Days later President Trump said at a rally in Missoula, Montana, “Any guy that can do a body slam, he’s my kind of guy.”

Mr. Trump is undermining our democracy by mocking representatives like Rep Maxine Waters (Dem. CA) as “crazy” and “low IQ” when she called for his impeachment. This is no surprise. The former reality TV celebrity has a history of mocking his black critics’ intelligence, trustworthiness, and ability to do their jobs. Earlier this month Trump called Tallahassee Mayor Andrew Gillum (D) and gubernatorial candidate in Florida, a “thief” and declared that Stacey Abrams, the former minority leader of the state House in Georgia and the Democratic candidate for governor “not qualified” for the job.

CNN reported about Retired Admiral William McRaven, who over saw the operation that killed Osama bin Laden, on November 18, 2018, saying, “President Trump’s attacks on the media represent the greatest threat to democracy,” after Trump dismissed McRaven as a Hillary Clinton backer during a Fox News interview. McRaven, on the other hand, considers himself impartial having worked for Republican as well as Democratic administrations. He also said, “When you undermine the people’s right to a free press and freedom of speech and expression, then you threaten the Constitution and all for which it stands.”

Nothing is worse for a democracy than authoritarian leadership, for an authoritarian style depends on intimidation and fear. The technique of the fascist leader is to make reality uncertain. After the 2018 mid-term elections Trump undermined the elections in Arizona and Florida. About the Arizona senate race, the president tweeted, “Just out—in Arizona, signatures don’t match. Electoral corruption—Call for new election? We must protect our democracy!” Is this how Trump will react in 2020 if he loses the election?

 

According to Ruth Ben-Ghiat, a professor of history at New York University, “The president was testing his ability to corrupt election results and attempt an authoritarian technique to make our reality uncertain.”

According to The Guardian, Ben-Ghiat said, “The authoritarian wants us to lose faith in our ears and our eyes, what we read and what we observe, so that we can be more dependent on him. Reality is what I say it is.” Trump’s attack on our electoral process is a direct attack on democracy and our free and fair elections.

Like the best propagandists before him—Benito Mussolini, Karl Marx, or Joseph McCarthy, Donald Trump’s effective Trumpaganda machine has had its successes. Forty-six percent of the American electorate believes that national news organizations fabricate stories about the president. The Nazis called this “Lugenpresse” or lying press. The media bears responsibility, too. The 24/7 news cycle forces reporters to rush to get their story to print regardless of checking their facts so they get the scoop, thus adding fuel to Trump’s assertions.

It is up to the American people to self-educate by checking facts themselves, reading and listening to news reports from various sources, and show a willingness to open their minds to competing ideas. If American democracy is to survive the presidency of Donald J Trump and beyond, this is a must, for Trumpaganda is successful in delivering lies as truth to a base willing to believe such fabrications as gospel.