Couldn't be more depressing, but it's our world, now, must be dealt with. I'd like to propose a new term for the constellation of news sites that have similar goals and business models to "engage" the conspiracist-right: Confederate News. Call it The Confederation of Conspiracists, but represent them with the old Confederate flag.
A point about it, though: it's still votes that count. Is all this psychological pressure that civilization is fighting a desperate battle against Wokeness getting out any more votes? America's 2020 election brought out a number of young people, unprecedented since the Vietnam draft, to vote the other way; the extra Democrats that showed up handily outvoted the extra Republicans.
I guess we find out in 2025 whether Poilievre, who lacks most of Trump's negatives, and might be able to make "cleaner" use of the must-fight-wokeness tactics, can bring out significant numbers of new conservative voters - or if even he will galvanize more liberals out of fear of fascism, than conservatives out of support for wokebeating.
Alberta only suggests to me that people fear Ottawa attacking oil jobs, and wanted an Ottawa-fighter; it's Doug Ford's victory via performative gestures that suggests Confederate News might work across Canada. I'm not so worried about 2025 bringing in Poilievre at all, it's *HOW* Poilievre gets in; if he uses Confederate News sites and they work, we'll have more and more of them for a long time.
This is truly disturbing. It seems like a form of mental illness. The most recent Canadian version of this kind of crazy I've heard of is, apparently, Justin Trudeau on a visit to Alberta said something nice about A&W restaurants. The hardcore haters are now threatening to boycott A&W... I guess to punish Justin Trudeau. Will Poilievre take responsibility for the madness that he has been promoting and tell them to grow up and back off? I know, stupid question.
Couldn't be more depressing, but it's our world, now, must be dealt with. I'd like to propose a new term for the constellation of news sites that have similar goals and business models to "engage" the conspiracist-right: Confederate News. Call it The Confederation of Conspiracists, but represent them with the old Confederate flag.
A point about it, though: it's still votes that count. Is all this psychological pressure that civilization is fighting a desperate battle against Wokeness getting out any more votes? America's 2020 election brought out a number of young people, unprecedented since the Vietnam draft, to vote the other way; the extra Democrats that showed up handily outvoted the extra Republicans.
I guess we find out in 2025 whether Poilievre, who lacks most of Trump's negatives, and might be able to make "cleaner" use of the must-fight-wokeness tactics, can bring out significant numbers of new conservative voters - or if even he will galvanize more liberals out of fear of fascism, than conservatives out of support for wokebeating.
Alberta only suggests to me that people fear Ottawa attacking oil jobs, and wanted an Ottawa-fighter; it's Doug Ford's victory via performative gestures that suggests Confederate News might work across Canada. I'm not so worried about 2025 bringing in Poilievre at all, it's *HOW* Poilievre gets in; if he uses Confederate News sites and they work, we'll have more and more of them for a long time.
Well, in the 2022 mid-term elections, at least, MAGA candidates were a drag on the results for Republicans:
https://open.substack.com/pub/erwindreessen/p/why-the-red-wave-in-the-1922-us-mid
Source: https://www.nytimes.com/2022/11/16/upshot/trump-effect-midterm-election.html (behind paywall).
This is truly disturbing. It seems like a form of mental illness. The most recent Canadian version of this kind of crazy I've heard of is, apparently, Justin Trudeau on a visit to Alberta said something nice about A&W restaurants. The hardcore haters are now threatening to boycott A&W... I guess to punish Justin Trudeau. Will Poilievre take responsibility for the madness that he has been promoting and tell them to grow up and back off? I know, stupid question.
One only needs to click on Rebel Media and Ezra Levants fundraiser pages to understand why conspiracy is such a growth industry.
Every time they appeal for money, dutifully rubes—mostly angry boomers, send in $10’s of thousands.
As with most things, money is what drives all these kook media sites.