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Tucker Carlson was frightened by Obama’s disinformation speech

via Fox

Former President Barack Obama delivered a keynote address at Stanford University on Thursday, stressing the importance of fighting misinformation because of the damage it does to democratic institutions. The next night, of course, conspiracy dealer Tucker Carlson looked more upset than that speech and the man who delivered it.

Obama “is a complete fascist who hates you,” Carlson insisted at one point.

Several times over a period of two minutes, Carlson inaccurately framed what Obama said, only to release the relevant clips of the speech, which in fact made the disconnection quite obvious.

“Obama claims that only his political opponents are lying and they must be stopped immediately,” Carlson began. Here is what Obama said to those present:

“People like it [Vladimir] Putin and Steve Bannon understand that it is not necessary for people to believe this information in order to weaken democratic institutions. You just have to flood the country’s public square with enough raw wastewater, you just have to raise enough questions, scatter enough dirt, plant enough conspiracy theory that citizens no longer know what to believe. ” (In 2018, Bannon did tell a Bloomberg reporter about his strategy to “flood the shit zone.”)

Yet Carlson did not mention Bannon’s previous comment to provide useful context. Instead, he reacted as follows:

“Oh, so people who disagree with Barack Obama are not just saying things that are wrong – they are flooding our country with raw wastewater. So this man is not just a liberal. In fact, he is not a liberal at all. He is a complete fascist who hates you and wants to stop you from talking anyway.

This is not all. Obama, added the Fox News presenter, “wants censorship of anyone who disagrees with him, and now he’s just coming out and saying it.”

Carlson then released this video to the 44th president:

“While content moderation can limit the spread of obviously dangerous content, it doesn’t go far enough. Consumers who want to spread misinformation have become experts at pushing the limits of what the least published company policies allow, and within those limits, social media platforms usually don’t want to do anything. Not only because they don’t want to be accused of censorship, but because they still have a financial incentive to engage as many consumers as possible. “

The story continues

Carlson’s reaction was again overestimated: “So my friends at the Aspen Institute and I have to have complete control over every word we say, otherwise it’s not democracy.” That’s what he does. That’s the way everyone does it. “

All of this is normal for Carlson, as even his own lawyers have successfully argued that he should not be taken seriously because of his propensity for exaggeration and “non-literal comments.” And yet, when the topic itself is how information and misinformation are spread, Carlson’s presentation of it becomes particularly rich.

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