This morning, I was listening to a podcast discussing the Fox misinformation effect, and one of the assertions made in the podcast is that a large part of Fox's success is based on the production brilliance of Roger Ailes. An offhand comment in that podcast associates Roger Ailes with the Willie Horton attack ad from the 1988 George H.W. Bush election. I was vaguely familiar with the ad, and remember it being discussed in the Lee Atwater documentary, but the Roger Ailes connection was new information for me. However, Wikipedia has referencing indicating that the connection between Ailes and the Willie Horton advertisement is speculative. Surely there is more to this story. New information is welcome.
I am intellectually fascinated by political polarization in general and specifically Fox effect. I even encountered intelligent and well spoken people who succumbed to it and adopted some very strange in flawed views. For me important question is - Am I vulnerable to getting intellectually corrupted in the same way, and if so how do I recognize the signs and/or how do I take advantage of this phenomena? Politifact wrote about Echo Chamber effect and Fox News a while ago. Politifact is the only news source I respect purely for journalistic integrity, if you follow politics you need to start using it right away to see through the spin on both sides.
Everyone is susceptible. Political reality can be quite, quite different from actual reality (which in and of itself is somewhat subjective), and it's not just the echo chamber. It's the big lie, it's the reality consensus, it's why ideas are among the most dangerous things ever. The fraud that is the Protocols of the Elders of Zion has been in existence over a century and been known to be a forgery since the 20s. Yet it was a major text of the Nazi party in the 30s, various anti-Semitic groups since then and even referred to by Iran in the 21st century. Granted, Jews haven't done themselves much of a favor by being over-represented in the media and banking (thus continuing to live up to the Protocols) since, but you can hardly blame them for that. As late as 1996, in my high school, in social studies class where we were studying World War II, I had my teacher of all people show Goebbel's own propaganda videos of Polish cavalry attacks against tanks. It's utterly absurd and lead to a giant argument in class that I don't think I ever successfully resolved, but that's the power of the idea. 57 years after the fraud, by a known propaganda artist and fraudster who worked for the most vilified regime in history, I still had to fight it and was unable to decisively win the argument. This from a teacher whose grandfather served in the war. How do you take advantage? You join a movement that you believe in. One that wants to shape the world your way. You reject popular media, you insulate yourself with fellows who believe as you do, and you propagate the belief. It also helps if you're a ruthless Australian billionaire who believes in a perpetually indebted servile lower class that supports his lifestyle.
