Technically the Iraq government did have weapons of mass destruction, in that they had old chemical weapons. And that's exactly Scott's point- the media can imply something totally different than what they're technically saying with certain wording, or do a motte and bailey where they say "We know this 1 fact for sure" and it's something moderate but then also say "Here's our opinion on what may also be happening" and it's something crazy. And the crazy part is what's in the headline.
So if you're strategy to prevent another "Weapons of mass destruction" disinfo being disseminated is just to shut down anyone who's caught in a hard lie, you'll fail. You need a more nuanced strategy of catching people who spread disinfo, and a better strategy of making sure accurate info spreads.
The media might not know whether something is true or not but they certainly transmitted the lies of others to great effect:
There's a whole list of Bush-era flat-out lies here. Bush said Iraq had biological weapons, that there was uncertainty as to whether they had nuclear weapons (when intelligence concluded that they couldn't have a bomb before 2007-8), they lied that the infamous aluminium tubes were only suitable for nuclear weapons, the ridiculous Hussein/Al-Qaeda connection.
It'd also help if we shut down the liars who pretended Afghanistan was a successful operation, or on the verge of success. By 2010 it was pretty clear to those in the know that things were going badly, there were internal reports where they said it was a complete mess. Yet we stuck around for another 12 years because they lied about it. The trouble is that those verity-dodgers were and still are leading our militaries.
Even though punishing the liars isn't a complete solution, it is at least a good start. We don't need to wait for a perfect level of rationalism and idealized truth-telling, we can start by punishing people who blatantly lie and cause vast destruction. We could also punish the credulous media that transmits these lies uncritically. The greatest enemy of a good plan is the dream of a perfect plan.
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Notes -
Technically the Iraq government did have weapons of mass destruction, in that they had old chemical weapons. And that's exactly Scott's point- the media can imply something totally different than what they're technically saying with certain wording, or do a motte and bailey where they say "We know this 1 fact for sure" and it's something moderate but then also say "Here's our opinion on what may also be happening" and it's something crazy. And the crazy part is what's in the headline.
So if you're strategy to prevent another "Weapons of mass destruction" disinfo being disseminated is just to shut down anyone who's caught in a hard lie, you'll fail. You need a more nuanced strategy of catching people who spread disinfo, and a better strategy of making sure accurate info spreads.
The media might not know whether something is true or not but they certainly transmitted the lies of others to great effect:
There's a whole list of Bush-era flat-out lies here. Bush said Iraq had biological weapons, that there was uncertainty as to whether they had nuclear weapons (when intelligence concluded that they couldn't have a bomb before 2007-8), they lied that the infamous aluminium tubes were only suitable for nuclear weapons, the ridiculous Hussein/Al-Qaeda connection.
https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2019/3/20/18274228/ari-fleischer-iraq-lies-george-w-bush-wmds
It'd also help if we shut down the liars who pretended Afghanistan was a successful operation, or on the verge of success. By 2010 it was pretty clear to those in the know that things were going badly, there were internal reports where they said it was a complete mess. Yet we stuck around for another 12 years because they lied about it. The trouble is that those verity-dodgers were and still are leading our militaries.
Even though punishing the liars isn't a complete solution, it is at least a good start. We don't need to wait for a perfect level of rationalism and idealized truth-telling, we can start by punishing people who blatantly lie and cause vast destruction. We could also punish the credulous media that transmits these lies uncritically. The greatest enemy of a good plan is the dream of a perfect plan.
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