Lately I’ve been reading a book that came highly recommended and not a moment too soon, despite it being published in 2017 (I’m about 6 years behind on my reading, because reasons).
It’s called “The Death of Expertise,” written by never-Trump conservative Tom Nichols. While the title is pretty bold, the subtitle struck me as more profound: “The campaign against established knowledge.”
You see, when I started writing this year-end feature seven years ago, it was really a way to poke fun at the emerging fake news culture fostered by Liar-in-Chief, President Donald Trump.
It didn’t rain on Trump’s inauguration. Coronavirus is under control. Windmill noise causes cancer. Trump won.
Fake news, all of it.
In the moment, it just seemed like a random stream of “alternative facts,” as former presidential adviser Kellyanne Conway likes to say, but in reading Nichols’ book, it’s now clear to me that this is indeed a “campaign.”
One needs only to look at the regular reporting in this fine publication (and others, although fewer and fewer each year) to see it — regular people, good people, hardworking people so filled with rage against whatever it is they’re raging against that they allow themselves to be fooled into believing, accepting and distributing fake news.
“The Party told you to reject the evidence of your eyes and ears. It was their final, most essential command,” wrote George Orwell in “1984.” Well, that’s where we are today.
My tax bills are fake, so I won’t pay them....
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