What if the news mediascape, so replete with falsities and failures to explore the depths of truth, is effectively fiction, a combination of facts, imperfect interpretations, and disinformation? Fiction not in the form of novels, short stories, films, but a type twisted to serve oligarchs and paid lackeys seeking to deceive us into believing in enemies who are not our enemies, while they are the worst of our enemies?
Early twentieth century masters of propaganda (advertising) passed on techniques developed by governments (fascist, democratic, communist), perfected over decades by intelligence agencies and military-industrial complexes of many nations, to the point of fiction dominating our news (i.e. "reality") intake.
I do not refer to Trump's "fake news." To some, the current President sounds dependable as a truth-teller when he shouts down some report, accusation, poll, or editorial slant as "fake news," but, as with the ease of saying "fake news," anyone can receive a quick lesson on how to operate a fire extinguisher and then put out a fire set by a fireman training a group of novices, while firefighting skills require time, effort, and risk to acquire. Saying "fake news" about a large portion (the political content) of the vast information universe generated by humanity, convinces millions of people to be skeptical, but Trump doesn't say that most of the news is based on imaginative interpretations driven often by motivations pushed forward by profit-making interests for the amassing of power--and the powerful are the greatest liars.
Five years ago I first saw Michael Cohen, former Vice President of the Trump Organization and former personal counsel to Donald Trump, interviewed on MSNBC. All I remember from that broadcast is Cohen's unwavering insistence on his boss's integrity, competence, and worthiness to be President. He seemed like a well-paid but fanatical devotee of a billionaire businessman who, in my view, couldn't possibly really be such an exemplar of integrity and goodwill.
Since I didn't believe Cohen's verbal sketch of Donald Trump, I remained unconvinced but convinced I wouldn't vote for the Republican (who had been a Democrat) in November 2016. I was, however, impressed by Michael Cohen's ability to make his case. Any objection to Trump's words or actions coming from the MSNBC host were flattened by Cohen, a steamroller relentlessly undeterred from relating his case: that Donald Trump is a great man, he will defeat Hillary Clinton, he will be a great President.
Only a few years later Michael Cohen, faced with a prison sentence for tax evasion among other offenses, told "the truth" about his former boss to Congress during the time of the Robert Mueller investigation into Trump's alleged collaboration with Russians to steal the 2016 election--a long fiction believed in by numerous Democrats and a huge complement of the news media.
Cohen, among other things, predicted then that there wouldn't be a peaceful transition to power if Trump would lose the 2020 election. He later wrote a book, out this year, called Disloyal: A Memoir The True Story of the Former Personal Attorney to President Donald J. Trump.
After the book was published, Cohen's daughter, Samantha, age twenty-four, was interviewed by Vanity Fair. CNN also took an interest in her story since she knew the Trump family. The first time she met Donald Trump she was fifteen. Seeing her from a distance, Trump said to Michael Cohen, "Look at that piece of ass!" Cohen said, "That's my daughter."
A normal person would apologize, of course, but when he was introduced to Samantha he asked for a kiss on the cheek and said in a few years he'd be dating her friends. Nonsensical talk, perhaps, nothing Trump actually intended to carry out, but why the fuck was he saying this to a fifteen year old girl? Why the fuck, too, was he saying this in the presence of her father?
Samantha Cohen, who, in the CNN interview from last month, comes across as a sane and sympathetic figure, said her father would spend ten hours a day with Trump. He would be browbeaten by him. Her father reported feeling bad witnessing Donald Trump, Sr., often belittling Donald Trump, Jr. Samantha says her father was a different person away from his job, treating his children and wife with care and compassion. He was, however, run ragged by Trump, sometimes kept from family gatherings, on call at all times, even during vacations.
This account of hers didn't enlighten me on something I've long known: Donald Trump, past and present, is a piece of shit.
Michael Cohen, though he participated in many questionable activities (as a party, for instance, to the Stormy Daniels hush money payment, which led him to lie about her husband's adultery to Melania Trump), also comes across, from his daughter's (granted, biased) words, as a sympathetic figure, due mainly to his public mea culpa. From him we've gotten a Trump administration member who's actually admitted wrongdoing and regret for his bad professional choices. Other former administration members, like the Defense Secretary, General Mattis, have revealed their own Trump stories in written accounts, but without admitting their own guilt (as a warmonger and war profiteer in his case).
Samantha Cohen spoke of First Daughter Ivanka Trump, the President's favorite, as an "icy cold" woman who ignored her, looked past her when they'd be in the same space. By contrast, Samantha's friendship with Tiffany Trump (they attended college together) was strong until Trump's presidency, when the younger of his two daughters made nice with her father after years of estrangement. Samantha, convincingly, says that Tiffany's friends in college and in California, where she grew up, were Black, gay, Latino. Samantha and Tiffany, both of them Millennials, interacted with a variety of people without judgment, but now, Samantha says, Tiffany just pretends to believe the Trump administration's rhetoric, going along to get along.
Throughout the interview, Samantha Cohen comes across as a genuine person. I can't say the same for Ivanka Trump.
Points of view add up in spite of their individualities to what Philip K. Dick referred to as koinos kosmos, the shared reality, that which we agree upon, as in 2 + 2 = 4, an equation even Trump would find difficult to declare as fake math.
Could it be a determination of the heart, of feeling and emotions, which leads us to recognize one story as truth, another as fake? I believe Samantha Cohen, in that ten minute interview at least. When she was a child her father worked strenuously for a rich businessman who now drops bombs on people in Asia.
The news is packaged. The truth isn't; it grows through the seams. Not even skilled propaganda pushers like CNN, MSNBC, Fox News Channel, The New York Times, Donald Trump, or the Joe Biden Campaign, can steamroll the minds of everyone, even though their jobs of distributing bullshit compensate them with the millions of dollars denied ordinary everyday truth tellers.
Vic Neptune
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