'A tested formula': Columnist explains how the GOP spreads misinformation 'to brainwash its base'
Daily Beast columnist Wajahat Ali penned an extensive expose on how the Republican Party is able to manipulate their voter into believing lies and acting out on their behalf.
It's been mere weeks since the Republican Party decided to go all-in on attacking a 10-year-old who'd been raped and impregnated. The girl was forced to go to Indiana because she was three days over the six-week cutoff date for Ohio abortions. Attorney General Dave Yost doubted the rape ever happened, on national television saying that he'd never heard of a police report or a rape kit being done.
"The entire right-wing ecosystem unleashed its full arsenal to discredit the 10-year-old girl as a liar, intimidate her physician, demonize liberals, and continue its march backward, undeterred, in its quest to make Handmaid’s Tale cosplay a reality—in an America that subordinates and punishes women for having the audacity to control their own bodies," wrote Ali.
It was all reported to local police and a man was arrested and ultimately confessed. Yost never apologized. When he was asked to, he replied, "Apologize for what? Questioning a newspaper story?"
Ali's other example is the so-called "big lie," the claim that Donald Trump won the 2020 election, which he didn't.
Each of these perfectly illustrates what Ali said is the four-point plan Republicans have for "brainwashing" their supporters.
"First, Republicans use any means necessary to achieve power and promote their unpopular, extremist, counter-majoritarian agenda," he explained. "Second, they create and promote disinformation and lies to frighten their base and Jedi mind-trick them into believing they are being oppressed by the actual victims."
The third step, he explained, is to create a villain and target them. One method is to destroy them, their careers, family, lives, and if there's no inflammatory information about them, they make it up. The best example is Dr. Anthony Fauci, who was the villain for the COVID-19 crisis because he told Americans to wear a mask and stay home until more was known about transmitting the virus.
They scapegoat, smear and intimidate, Ali wrote.
"Fourth, they never apologize or back down once their lie is exposed, but instead, they double down, and in times of doubt, always pivot towards racism and fear-mongering," he said.
Dave Yost is the perfect example, as he attacked the media for what he said was a fake story. Even if that means Yost actually claimed that her rape never happened and she never had to have an abortion, he gets away without apologizing to her by claiming he wasn't blaming a molested child but his local newspaper. He's made it clear that he's dodging accountability by scapegoating the media.
Indiana Republican Attorney General Todd Rokita tried to change the subject by scapegoating the doctor who performed the abortion, and alleged that the doctor didn't report the rape and that's why the attorney general didn't know that the story was true. That turned out to be a lie as well. Still, he formed his own investigation of the doctor. After it was revealed that he was lying, Rokita is facing a formal complaint for lying about the whole ordeal publicly. He's been sued for damages by the doctor and he's never apologized either.