What exactly has changed since then to make foreign propaganda far more dangerous today? During
the Cold War, most Americans received their news and information via
mediated platforms. Reporters and editors serving in the role of
professional gatekeepers had almost full control over what appeared in
the media. A foreign adversary seeking to reach American audiences did
not have great options for bypassing these umpires, and Russian
dezinformatsia rarely penetrated. While
television remains the main source of news for most Americans, viewers
today tend to select a network in line with their political preferences.
Even more significantly, The Pew Research Center has found that two-thirds of Americans are getting at least some of their news through social media. After
the election, around 84 percent of Americans polled by Pew described
themselves as at least somewhat confident in their ability to discern
real news from fake. This confidence may be misplaced.
Now let's go back a bit. Remember Hearst and the Spanish American Wat? You don't you say, well you should. Had it not been for his papers we most likely would never have had the hill climbing Teddy. Strange how events turn out.
Now one should also remember Radio Moscow. I do. In 1952 I had a Hallicrafters Short Wave receiver. I listened to the BBC, to Radio Moscow, and a slew of other stations. Even at a young age one could tell Radio Moscow was propaganda, I did not need the Nuns to tell me that. But they did offer a free magazine, Soviet Life. So like a good young Catholic student I wrote a letter asking for my free subscription, doing so on my lined note paper using my best Waterman Blue Ink pen and placing the cross and "JMJ" atop the letter ans mandated by the Nuns. I unfortunately never got my Soviet Life then, perhaps it was the JMJ or perhaps it was intercepted before ever getting out of the US. But that did not stop my listening to what, even at that age, I knew was fake news. It was comedic, the Soviet exaggeration. Then of course there was Voice of America and Radio Free Europe. The list went on.
You see a rational person can readily identify "fake news". We see it everywhere today. It starts with advertising and then fills the cable news channels. Newspapers all have their own slant on what they consider news. As for social media, I have no use for it.
Proper education is the solution. A Civics class, a real History class, reading from what the Founders based their decisions on, ie the Federalist Papers and their opposition. Then rely upon educated reason. "Confidence misplaced" is a rather snarky way to say. "I know the truth and you have no clue" Rather in a democracy people are bombarded with "facts", many contorted, many twisted and bent to meet some other objective. But that is life.
Oh, by the way, if anyone in Russia is monitoring this, any chance I can get my Soviet Life subscription? I liked the pictures and it was free. Thanks.
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