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All your Prism Metanews audio content covering the world of misinformation, from recordings of our Twitter live chat Misinfo Meetups to our Guide to January 6th. prismmetanews.substack.com

11/28/2022

The Prism Metanews Guide to January 6th - Part 4

This segment is the final of four parts that comprise this voice essay. You can find this episode on Apple Podcasts here. Chapter 11 - Aftermath Ray Epps was there on January 6th, but he never went into the Capitol. But conspiracy theories about him and January 6th derailed his life. You see, Epps is on video, and got Internet-famous, for trying on the eve of the attack to agitate others to not just go *to* the Capitol, but to go *in* to the Capitol. Some people listening supported what he was saying. Some people pushed back. He said it over and over. After Trump’s speech, he directed people in the crowd toward the Capitol. But the kicker was a short clip, taken at an entry point along the Capitol perimeter where a younger guy was frontin’ the police. Ray Epps pulled him aside and whispered something in his ear. Shortly after, the guy busted through the barricade and on toward the building. Despite appearing on an FBI list of persons of interest for a short time, Epps was never charged. He was not detained. And this seemed suspicious to many people, considering how the government seemed to be throwing the book at all kinds of offenders besides him. The hypothesis arose that he was working for corrupt elements of the federal government, who worked in premeditated fashion to cajole and nudge Trump’s peaceful supporters into violence and anarchy. A trap to lure patriots. Trump himself, along with other prominent Republicans and media personalities, have boosted this narrative. A few things to say here. First: if this was a trap, you really have to wonder whether anyone at all even fell for it. A person who wasn’t already game for intruding on the Electoral College certification before they encountered Ray Epps on the streets of Washington, DC almost certainly wouldn’t have been swayed to do it on his say-so. To believe that Epps, or even a hundred people on the government payroll if that’s where your imagination takes you, could make lawbreakers out of a crowd of tens of thousands of peaceful people is frankly laughable. And that’s before you consider that the feds have no interest in doing anything like this. Second, there are many good reasons the FBI would not charge a person like Ray Epps that have nothing to do with him working for the feds. Foremost among them: MAYBE HE DIDN’T BREAK ANY LAWS. Seriously, what is the argument here, that we can arrest people just for *talking* about breaking the law even when they never followed up with action? That’s not the country we live in, and we shouldn’t want to. Third, the people pushing the Ray Epps conspiracy theory mostly do it in the hope of convincing others that the feds could have masterminded the attack and conned innocent Trump supporters into going along. But the existence and actions of Ray Epps don’t prove anything of the sort, and there is literally no other evidence to even suggest it. For his part, Ray has had a pretty crummy time of it since January 6th, as these conspiracy theories have given him a bad rap with the MAGA crowd he used to hang with. Now, he is persona non grata. Epps was wrong to say what he did, and to condone what became a lawless riot that got people killed, but I do feel a little bad that, like QAnon Shaman Jacob Chansley, he fell victim to the face-eating leopard of online disinformation. This chapter deals with the effects that January 6th directly caused. Let’s do a brief recap. It’s 2020. The President of the United States sows doubt about mail-in ballots for months, then loses reelection in a way that seems suspect to people who believe there is reason to doubt mail-in ballots. He insists without evidence that he actually won and vows to sue to fight to stay in power. All his lawsuits are ultra-fails. He tries to get the Justice Department to make it seem like there are real questions about the validity of the election. Fail. He tries to have the Defense Department look into nonexistent foreign hacking of election machines. Believe it or not, fail. He orchestrates a scheme to have states he lost submit electors for him to the Electoral College, leans on his Vice President to throw out Biden electors from those states, and calls for a wild protest on the counting day. All fail, repeatedly, except summoning supporters to DC. In a final gambit to stop the certification of Biden’s win, he turns the mob loose on the Capitol to strong-arm Congress and the Vice President into assisting him. This gets very ugly for several hours but, thankfully, in the end also fails to achieve the overthrow of the election. Donald Trump has lost about seven different ways at this point. So, what happened next? Well, a lot of people started getting in trouble for breaking the law, starting with the most obvious among the attackers. Not many arrests were made on the day itself, but for more than a few it was a simple task to figure out who did what. Drip by drip, tip by tip, video clip by video clip, many of those who perpetrated violence against the police or damaged federal property were brought in. Some made it almost too easy; all one had to do was look at what they posted on main before and during the action. Donald Trump also took a bit of immediate heat, though in the end he would be able to claim vindication. Seeing his role in bringing the mob to the Capitol and directing angry supporters toward where they and the Vice President were, the majority of the House of Representatives voted to impeach the President. It was the first time in American history a president had been impeached twice. Ten Republicans joined in. Yes, it was also the first time a president had been twice acquitted by the Senate, largely behind arguments that it was too close to–or even past–the inauguration that would end his time in office anyway. There are good arguments counter to that, and it’s questionable how sincere any of those saying this were to begin with. But politics are what they are, and so Donald Trump stayed in office and retained the ability to run again. A good amount of lies about January 6th also sprang up around this time, in addition to the ones we have already discussed, apparently driven by the imperative to defend Trump from impeachment, the Republican Party from embarrassment, and those being charged with federal crimes from the consequences of their actions. To wit: the false flag narrative–that villainized Ray Epps and Jacob Chansley and others who were clearly on Trump’s side–was done in the service of constructing a counterfeit alternative reality to that which really took place. To create the impression of the situation that is sometimes based loosely on facts, but even then delves so narrowly and context-free as to be impossible to interpret correctly. Sean Hannity, for example, texted President Trump during the violence to communicate that it was a serious mistake and could lead to disaster. He knows the reality, or at least he did then. Mr. Hannity, however, along with his Fox colleagues and others in the right-wing mediasphere, has since then also worked diligently to shift attention off of Donald Trump, spread lies about the attack, and turn his Republican viewers against the very idea that the United States should seriously investigate it. And in this we can understand a key the reason why Americans have gotten on such different pages about it all. They are divided about January 6th because propaganda works. Trump-loyal Republicans and the media ecosystem that advocates for them with their audience of millions of Americans have purposely injected canards and falsehoods into the discourse. They have misrepresented what occurred on January 6th, changed the subject when damning headlines broke, and aligned against any efforts to get to the bottom of the schemes and ultimate attack. It would be funny if it weren’t so damaging to the stability of our government. These influential figures–and think for a second about how they could have influenced you, either directly or indirectly–have consistently suggested that neither reporters nor Congress nor the Department of Justice should investigate January 6th. They would prefer we all just stay in the dark about this dark episode, or, failing that, trust only the Republicans in Congress who helped Trump try to stay in power to probe or examine these extraordinary events. Even if you generally agree with Republicans, this argument should seem ridiculous. Because it is. So, what kinds of fairy tales did the January 6th apologists deploy to deflect the blame? What do people say should really be looked at whenever the commonsense suggestion is made that we find out why the supporters Trump told to go to the Capitol to fight went to the Capitol and fought? “The feds disguised as Trump supporters did it” baloney is a variation on the earlier baloney trotted out on January 6th itself: that antifa dressed like Trump supporters and did it. Both of these take advantage of the cognitive dissonance that so many Republicans watching from home felt. That was a very natural reaction on the part of peace-loving people, who by and large would never condone political violence. Fans of the police and law and order generally, seeing MAGA-hatted men attacking the police with Trump flags in a direct attack on the rule of law, surely hoped against hope that there was an explanation that could reverse the impression that their own eyes had given. They were primed to believe it was perpetrated by almost anyone but people like them. Someone else HAD to have done it. So the false flag fairy tales were designed to alleviate that cognitive dissonance, and they worked. It’s how human beings are wired. Among the set of people unable to acknowledge the truth about January 6th but not willing to go full conspiracy theory calling it a government op, another false narrative gained widespread popularity: that the protest was peaceful. There was no insurrection at all, and the pro
11/28/2022

The Prism Metanews Guide to January 6th - Part 3

This segment is the third of four parts that comprise this voice essay. You can find this episode on Apple Podcasts here. Chapter 9 - The Bat Signal Ali Alexander stepped up to the microphone. It was the evening of January 5th, a cold night, on the streets of Washington, DC. Tens of thousands had come for the big day. Trump had called them there. Alexander had helped. Behind him on stage was a banner, upon which was emblazoned the words, in all caps, “MARTIAL LAW NOW.” For a bit of context on what Alexander had been up to since we last checked in on him, I’m going to read a quotation from a deep dive that Right Wing Watch did on him this year. Begin quote: “Alexander spent weeks in the lead up to the Capitol insurrection calling for ‘rebellion,’ starting chants of ‘victory or death,’ and using rhetoric of the American Revolution and spiritual warfare to call for action should Congress certify the election of President Joe Biden. He engaged in violent rhetoric, appearing to even advocate for physical attacks against members of Congress who he said stole the election. “The Jan. 5 rally served as the penultimate event of those calls. Speakers delivered Christian nationalist messages and veiled threats of violence if Congress failed to reject Biden electors. Bikers for Trump founder Chris Cox told rally-goers that the United States was on the brink of a revolution and that he would ‘take the first bullet.’” End quote. So here was Ali Alexander, addressing the Stop the Steal mob, and he used the opportunity to once again encourage extralegal remedies to the imagined wrongs the country had been put through. With the events planned for the next day, the rhetoric could not have been intended to be metaphorical or theoretical. He wanted to see this crowd do some things. “Our government is only our government if it is legitimate,” said Alexander to the crowd. And, further: “1776 is always an option.” They were there to start “a rebellion against the Deep State,” referencing a conspiracy theory about anti-Trump forces in the federal bureaucracy and the national news media. The Trump followers in attendance joined him in chanting “Victory or death! Victory. Or death.” In the final days before January 6th, the many machinations I talked about in parts 1 and 2 came together. We’re finally ready… for the final act. We first rewind a bit, though, to December 19th. The primary call to action, the one that got people seriously making plans to come to the nation’s capital, was a tweet by President Donald Trump. The tweet was in two parts. First, a “boat parade logic” lie that it was “[s]tatistically impossible to have lost the 2020 Election.” Second, an invitation: “Big protest in DC on January 6th. Be there, will be wild!” A lot of people saw Trump’s tweet. Some of them immediately started working to ensure the big protest, then three weeks away, would indeed be WILD. Ali Alexander went out and nabbed the website wildprotest.com, which urged visitors saying “TRUMP WANTS TO SEE YOU IN DC.” Dates paired with images signaled where the action would be and when: Jan. 5 near the White House, Jan. 6 at 9 am at the White House proper, and Jan. 6 at 1 pm at the Capitol dome. Okay, it’s time we talk about Proud Boys, and Oath Keepers, and a smattering of lesser extremists, all bent on using force to keep Trump in power. These militant groups saw Trump’s tweet and reacted quickly and in ways that clearly foreshadowed violence. They were going to war, and this tweet was the bugle. Some set up encrypted communications channels; many acquired protective gear. The Oath Keepers coordinated to have heavily armed “quick reaction forces” staged outside Washington, which they did in the days just before the 6th, stockpiling weapons in hotel rooms. Their communications channels got, in their words, “apocalyptic.” At the same time, Trump’s tweet kicked off a rash of right-wing threats against members of Congress, though many remain unattributed. Within a day of the tweet, a Texan member of a militia called the Three Percenters sent pretty explicit messages in a private channel to other members. (We have the messages because he was charged, went to trial, and was convicted.) The man insisted that the group owed Trump a debt that had to be paid, and that “Our President” would need ALL of them. To do what, you ask? Well, the following day this man was figuring out how to get to DC before January 6th, which he said would be “Armageddon all day.” He would drive, he said, because they wouldn’t let him fly with all his “battle rattle.” This kind of talk was common among these extremist groups after Trump gave the green light to get there and get rowdy. Beyond their words, there was the planning. The day after Trump’s “wild” tweet, the leaders of the Proud Boys stood up a special, hand-selected crew of what they called “real men” for action on the 6th. They dubbed this crew the Ministry of Self Defense and set up an encrypted Telegram channel for its members to coordinate. The group launched crowdfunding campaigns to pay for travel to DC and gear. For some reason, the Proud Boys leader instructed members going to wear plain clothes to blend in, not the “traditional Black and Yellow” polo shirts the group had become known for. There was at least some degree of coordination between otherwise independent groups to help President Trump pressure Congress and be on standby in DC for his further orders. One Oath Keeper told co-militants via a Facebook post in December that there was an alliance between them, the Proud Boys, and the Florida Three Percenters with respect to January 6th. He noted that Proud Boys could be “force multipliers” to their operation. The day before the main day, leaders of the Proud Boys and Oath Keepers met together in a parking garage in DC–though what they discussed has not been reported. For real-time communication, Oath Keepers and Proud Boys, along with Mike Flynn and Roger Stone, had a running encrypted group chat that, beginning in November, they used to plan militant action across the broader pro-Trump coalition. One really has to ask, at this point: why were these men and women so confident about what President Trump would do? They knowingly committed serious crimes, putting themselves through extreme and legal exposure and even physical risk. Did none of them question whether their leader was as “all in” as they were? If not, why? When the former Oath Keepers spokesman Van Tatenhove testified in July 2022, he gave a hint about the motivations of that group’s leader, Stewart Rhodes: “We have to stop mincing words... He’s a militia leader. He has grand visions of being a paramilitary leader, and the Insurrection Act would have given him a path forward to that. The fact that the president was messaging, directly or indirectly, gave him the nod.” Few of the people who showed up when the President called knew everything that was going on. Most of the mob didn’t go into the attack thinking that Trump would declare martial law, even if they were convinced that Biden had won the presidency through subterfuge and they wanted to register their displeasure. Some clearly wanted January 6th to be a “1776 moment,” as Alexander and others had called it, and felt that violence was justified. But fewer would end up acting on that desire and belief. The people who *did* think that the mob itself would essentially end the government that day were discussing and planning it all online for weeks before. To take two examples: the owner of a website called Washington Tunnels, which had maps of underground spaces around DC including the Capitol, became so alarmed by the spike in traffic he was seeing that he alerted the FBI’s Washington Field Office. And on Dec. 21, the intelligence arm of the Capitol Police issued a 7-page report tracking an increase in activity on TheDonald.win, where threatening references were made to trapping lawmakers in the tunnels of the Capitol. (The FBI and Department of Homeland Security also received a flood of tips about stuff happening online, though they didn’t seem to take it too seriously.) There was at least one Republican member of Congress, Barry Loudermilk, who gave aid to elements of the mob that wanted to learn more about the passageways of the Capitol complex. On the eve of the attack, Loudermilk accompanied a group through parts of the buildings where tourists never go–and on a day when the grounds were off limits for tours! One man with that group was filmed the following day as he marched from Trump’s rally at the Ellipse across the National Mall to the Capitol. He talked openly about hunting down certain people there and giddily stabbed the air with a flag whose pole had been carved into a spear. And, of course, as has been widely reported, someone placed pipe bombs near the headquarters of the two major political parties in downtown Washington. How that incident relates to the attack on the Capitol, however, isn’t clear. Much more openly, though, was the push via the Internet and other means to bring masses of people to Washington to pressure Congress and the Vice President to not certify the Electoral College result. Rally planners received financial support from the Trump campaign, and at least one was reported to make use of “burner phones” to communicate with the White House and Trump’s team. Senior people advising Trump and helping organize January 6th events set up so-called “command centers” at fancy hotels around DC. They worked constantly, for days, to push Republicans to vote against Biden’s electors. And to make ready for the mob that would soon descend. As all this was happening, Pence was subjected to a few more last-ditch attempts by the President. The pressure on the Vice President had never been greater. On January 3rd, for example, Whit
11/28/2022

The Prism Metanews Guide to January 6th - Part 2

This segment is the second of four parts that comprise this voice essay. You can find this episode on Apple Podcasts here. Chapter 4 - The Boy Who Cried Fraud We start, again, in the middle of the night. It’s early on November 4th, 2020, and the votes from the day before have not all been counted. It’s too close to call, but Donald Trump has decided what he will do. He approaches a podium and, with all the world watching, declares victory over his opponent, Joe Biden. He just starts saying he won. This was unprecedented in American history. And it was stupid because, as it turned out, when the votes were counted he would be the clear loser. Trump’s inability to accept a loss would turn out to be a powerful engine giving energy to an entire movement, leading within two months to the violent assault on the Capitol. How is that even possible? You and I were there, but there is a lot to get into to make it make sense. First, Americans should all know and be proud that their democratic traditions are strong, and resilient, and getting better all the time. When a political candidate loses, they can challenge the results of an election—but our system requires proof, and our laws keep things fair. Bring it in court, and if you win there you can hold cheaters accountable. This is the way we, all of us, can make our elections fairer, more equal, and more transparent, too. Second, what Americans should know about Donald Trump is that he’s never demonstrated concern for the actual underlying reality of elections, or contests generally, in which he is personally invested. When he loses, his default, automatic response is to say the other guy cheated. He does not seem to believe in backing his claims up with evidence, though, and never has. For all the talk of “election security” since November 2020, Donald Trump himself has almost no regard for the integrity of elections. If he is embarrassed by the outcome, it was illegitimate. If he stands to lose power, even moreso. Let’s go through some examples. Trump won the 2016 contest, right? And he mopped the floor in the Republican primaries to secure the party’s nomination. But before all that, Trump lost to Ted Cruz in the Iowa Caucuses. He just… lost. And Cruz won. None of it was in dispute in any way. Initially, Trump congratulated Cruz, apparently acknowledging his loss. Days later, however, he cried “fraud.” Someone had rigged the caucuses for Lyin’ Ted. In a fair matchup, Cruz never could have defeated Trump. QED, the matchup wasn’t fair. It’s a circular logic, and one that is more familiar to us all now. But it’s one of the most consistent things about Trump. He makes things up about fraud when he loses. Fast forward to November of 2016, It wasn’t enough, having beaten Hillary Clinton, just to notch a win and take the presidency. Trump has to win in absolute terms: it was a landslide, it was the biggest win in history, he won the Electoral College AND the popular vote, he received the most votes ever, and so forth. Like many before him, Trump in fact didn’t win the popular vote; Hillary Clinton beat him by about 3 million. Trump’s response? Yep, he claimed illegal immigrants defrauded the popular vote, swinging 3—or maybe 5—million ballots ALL in Hillary’s direction. Trump actually won on all measures, you see—it’s just that Hillary cheated so it would seem like he didn’t. Take a much more recent example. Georgia’s Republican governor, whom Trump openly hates, ran for reelection this year and was challenged in the primary by a Trump-endorsed challenger. The governor, Brian Kemp, absolutely crushed that challenger, David Perdue, winning by more than 50 points. People paying attention noted that Trump didn’t seem to have the juice to help Perdue win. Trump’s reflex to cry foul was simply too strong, and he put out a statement boosting wild claims that his guy would have won if not for… you guessed it, fraud. The bit gets old when the races are close, but at least it is more believable. In this example, though, you can see how immaterial reality is to his reaction to losing. It doesn’t matter. It’s always fraud. And so it was when he lost to Joe Biden in 2020. When Trump got up to that podium, he knew what he would say: “we were getting ready to win this election… frankly, we did win this election.” Cheers from his staffers in the room. “This is a major fraud on our nation.” The question wasn’t whether President Trump would back down and concede if it turned out he lost. That was never going to happen. The question was simply how many people would choose to believe what he was saying, and buy into whatever excuses he would make for why he apparently lost. Would enough of the American public, and key officials at the federal and state levels, go along? Chapter 5 - Stop The Steal Shortly after Election Day, Tom heard from a reporter friend that a Korean Air flight to Phoenix had been loaded up with fake Biden votes. This fit very well with what he was hearing from Trump and other politicians about how sinister irregularities and outright shenanigans were cropping up all over the country. The plane had landed, so Tom and a couple other people who believed there was a conspiracy afoot went to see for themselves. They drove over to the airport, took a grainy video, recorded the tail number. One of them followed the cargo loading staff to their homes and took down the addresses. The video was posted online, and the suspicious activity was reported to a Pinal County sheriff. Tom and crew wanted to make sure the fake Biden ballots from the plane never got processed into the counting. But then, nothing happened. The plane had nothing to do with the election at all, so there was no call for suspicion, to say nothing of an investigation. The ballots weren’t real and therefore could not be fraudulently tallied. The story about fake ballots being flown into Arizona was just nonsense that someone threw out onto the Internet. Tom forgot to activate his critical thinking and got taken for a ride, wasting time and embarrassing himself chasing ghosts. What’s remarkable about this episode is that Tom Van Flein had been working in Congress for Paul Gosar, a Republican House member from Arizona, for about ten years when Biden beat Trump. Gosar is DC-famous for being one of the most ardently pro-Trump members of Congress, among other things, and he was all in on the election fraud narrative from the start. And Tom was his chief of staff. Along on the airport outing was also Josh Barnett, a Republican who had just lost a race to represent Arizona’s Seventh Congressional District–by 53 points, to Ruben Gallego. Barnett must have been hoping to bust the Korean Air affair *really* wide open. So that was the first order of business once Trump declared his intention to bluff his way through as more Biden votes were counted and the gentleman from Scranton ran off with the Electoral College. If you support Trump, you have to help stop Biden votes from being counted. In his midnight non-concession speech, Trump made clear that this was the strategy. He would ask the Supreme Court to intervene. Whatever it took. Doing this would a) prevent all the ballots from being tallied, so he would appear to lose by less than he had, and b) convey the sense that fake votes for Biden were flooding in all around, and it’s all quite suspicious, innit. On November 5th at 2:12 pm, he tweeted STOP THE COUNT exclamation point. Gentle listener, the patriotic response to questions about who won the election before the ballots are counted is to insist that all the ballots be counted. Maybe there needs to be an audit later, but never have I seen a candidate call for stopping the count before it was possible to tell with confidence who won. Let’s back up a minute and consider how we got to this place where it even made sense to some people that not counting all the votes, in the United States of America, was a good idea. In his final year as president, Trump had personally expended a great amount of effort into getting everyone to think that mail-in votes were easy to manipulate and counterfeit. You might have even found this persuasive; certainly many people did. He asserted it aggressively and often. For months before November, Trump repeatedly took to Twitter–he was still allowed to tweet then!–to rail against how easy it is to vote by mail in so many states, and insisted that in-person voting was the only way to go. Here’s an example, the full text of a Trump tweet dated June 22nd, 2020. You and I were canceling summer plans because COVID had reached everywhere. Donald Trump was blasting in ALL CAPS, “RIGGED 2020 ELECTION: MILLIONS OF MAIL-IN BALLOTS WILL BE PRINTED BY FOREIGN COUNTRIES, AND OTHERS. IT WILL BE THE SCANDAL OF OUR TIMES!” As election security experts will tell you, mail-in voting is in fact pretty well protected and has very low rates of fraud associated with it. Not perfect, but election results don’t get overturned, ever, because of fraudulent absentee ballots. We use them extensively, so there wasn’t any reason for Trump to take this line. Except. That what is true in many states is that the mail-in votes are counted last, even if sent in well before Election Day. Trump managed, whether on purpose or not, to create a situation in which the votes that would be counted first, in person on Election Day, would be tilted his direction–and the votes that would favor Biden would mostly be counted after that. Everyone who knows how elections are conducted, correctly guessed which political party would be taking COVID seriously in the fall, and saw Trump’s tweets realized there was going to be a “Red Mirage”: in many places, the impression given by early results would most likely be that Trump had established commanding leads that did not exist in reality. Red Mirage, in fact, is a longstanding pattern goi
11/28/2022

The Prism Metanews Guide to January 6th - Part 1

This segment is the first of four parts that comprise this voice essay. You can find this episode on Apple Podcasts here. Chapter 0 - Prologue The confusion that has taken hold around January 6th hit Caroline Edwards on a personal level. She had been on the receiving end of insults from people who supported the violent attack on the U.S. Capitol. In her words: “I was called Nancy Pelosi's dog, called incompetent, called a hero and a villain. I was called a traitor to my country, my oath, and my constitution.” Ms. Edwards, actually Officer Edwards of the Capitol Police, received all this abuse during and since the attack for the sin of simply doing her job and defending the Capitol from a mob intent on breaking through barriers and windows to get to people inside the building. Edwards was knocked unconscious in the early part of the attack. But on it went, for hours, and she got up and fought again, injured. Officer Edwards, testifying in front of Congress about the experience, later said she has asked herselves many, many times how we had gotten to the point where Americans were attacking other Americans on the steps of one our most American institutions. Maybe you have asked this as well. A lot of Americans have. A large part of the reason—and to why we are still asking the question 18 months later—is, my friends, that misinformation about January 6th is rampant and effective. As Caroline Edwards was recovering from her wounds late that evening, the Congress eventually assembled to finish formalizing the election of Joe Biden as the 46th President of the United States. They were supposed to have done it much earlier in the day. They had in fact convened for that purpose, but the mob disrupted those Constitutionally prescribed proceedings. Never before, until this time, had the United States seen a less-than-peaceful transition of power from one President to the next. Never before, until this time, had the United States seen a defeated President refuse to concede. Or call supporters together to “fight” for him. Our country had never seen anything like it before. As dramatic as these events were, and for all that we know about them, why do Americans find themselves arguing with one another over the basics about January 6th? We watched our TVs in shock as it unfolded. Almost no one had a clue in the days following, which you might expect in the near aftermath. But you could spend all your time reading and come away confused, still, 18 months later, about what went down. So… why is this episode so hard for us, individually and collectively, to make sense of? Welcome to our guide to January 6th, in which I will attempt to answer this important question. I’m Kevin, the editor of Prism Metanews. But that probably doesn’t mean anything to you! And you’d be right to question whether it makes sense to listen to me on this or any other topic. As an advocate for critical thinking about sources of information and media literacy habits generally… I ENDORSE. So here’s me in a nutshell: once upon a time and for a long time, I was in public service. I’m an economist who turned into a linguist who turned again into an intelligence analyst. The U.S. Government trained me to synthesize wide-ranging pieces of information into actionable analysis to help safeguard our national security. For many years, I specialized in understanding foreign media environments and analyzing propaganda. I have been doing Prism Metanews, and precursor projects related to misinformation, for over a year and a half, all on the side of a full-time job and on the margins of the responsibilities that come from being a father of four. It’s not a paying gig, and there’s no glory in it; I do it because I believe we all need to do something about misinformation culture. This is my something. It is essential that we as a nation deal with the big questions surrounding the bloody, nihilistic Capitol attack. This was the most significant aggression to pierce our temple of democracy since the War of 1812. Why did these people come to Washington, D.C. from all around the country? What was planned, and what was spontaneous? How close did we really come to a full-blown overthrow of the Republic? Which parts did Donald Trump know about, and when, and what did he do about it? And, again, what is it about the answers to these questions that they confound us so? For those of you who know what Prism Metanews is about, you already understand that I consider January 6th to be a seminal event in the history of misinformation. Believing things that are objectively wrong is what drove the lawlessness, and propagating things that are objectively wrong has surrounded the events of that day from as soon as they happened. With the stakes this high, it is the duty of every citizen to discern what’s fake–and form their judgments around the real things that are left. Week in and week out, Prism’s newsletter tries to help with this. This voice essay is a misinformation-focused recap of our weekly January 6th coverage since we started last year. We have written up January 6th and elections-related developments dozens of times in over 60 editions. I’m drawing here from hundreds of news articles, which you can find linked in our archived editions. Facts are the watchword. I am slow to draw conclusions, and never do so when unsupported. Some of what I say here is going to sound sensational, but please believe that it is not my style to exaggerate for effect. These events really happened, and they are extraordinary. I try to be fair to the many genuine people whose view of things is different from my own. If it matters to you, I consider myself a moderate conservative, and until recently was a Republican all my life. No editor is without bias. I also make mistakes like anyone else, and I hope you will make me aware of them when I do. But, also: the attackers weren’t Antifa. I believe our democracy’s future depends on wrapping our collective minds around January 6th, and coming to a shared understanding. With that as introduction, I hope you will find this voice essay necessary and useful. The January 6th Committee is finishing its work and will be putting out reams of the evidence it has collected and, probably, a final report. Those findings will be all over the place as the midterm election approaches in November. The Department of Justice’s investigations into related crimes will stretch still further into the future. You might be worried, as a lot of people are, that the Congressional hearings are partisan and too much to take in. And the DoJ communicates through dry court filings. And CNN and Fox and other sources sensationalize and editorialize to the point it seems unwise to rely on any one on its own. So what I’ll do is summarize, looking across the range of reliable reporting and weeding out the extra or questionable. I have done my best to make this an alternative yet unified, comprehensive explainer. Thanks for listening. Chapter 1 - The Facts of the Case Let’s begin with a few basic things about January 6th, 2021. This is the foundational reality, the parts that are broadly known to be true. In later chapters, we’ll talk more about what is known to be untrue about certain parts. The cutoff for this information is August 18th, 2022. * First. In the United States, finalization of the Electoral College vote happens every four years on January 6th, about eight weeks following the presidential election. By January, the states have counted their votes and certified a winner, usually by their Secretaries of State and Governors. The states have sent these certified results to Washington, D.C. to be counted along with those of the other states. They get counted, and the winner is inaugurated two weeks later on January 20th, the day specified by the Constitution. January 6th has been, with *one* exception in American history, a pretty dull, made-for-C-SPAN affair. Sometimes there are objections to individual states, but nothing really ever comes of them. These challenges have never gotten close to turning a win into a loss, or vice versa. After votes on the challenges, if any, the sitting Vice President oversees the final tally. * Second. President Donald Trump called for his supporters to come to the nation’s capital to be there on this particular January 6th. It was another in a series of demonstrations in his support in Washington, D.C.; two others had happened in the preceding month. But this time would be “wild,” he said. And when they came, in huge numbers to the White House… Trump told them his wish that they would march up the street to the Capitol and “fight like hell.” He said he would go with them. * Third. A mob sporting merch and waving banners emblazoned with Trump’s name descended on the Capitol, assaulted police officers, chanted “hang Mike Pence,” broke reinforced windows, swarmed into the building, caused lawmakers to be evacuated mid-session, and hunted aggressively for Pence, Nancy Pelosi, and others. One of the attackers was killed rushing a door that security officers had barricaded to keep the intruders from reaching members of Congress. They looted and trashed and desecrated the seat of our government. * Fourth. Trump did not keep his promise to walk with thousands of his supporters to the Capitol. It’s still not too clear what he did during the hours before he finally spoke up to stop the attack. There is no evidence that he talked with anyone who could have helped stop the attack, for example the National Guard. But it is clear that he knew what was happening down the street, and who was doing it. His chief of staff fielded request after request, mostly from friends and allies, for him to call off the mob. Everyone knew he was the only one who could make it stop. Hours later, after law enforcement had started to regain their footing against the mob, he finally did. * Fifth. Whatever wa
11/13/2022

Misinfo Meetup #12: "Misinformationism and the Midterms"

A chat with Media Matters reporter Alex Kaplan, who has been tracking politicians that endorse QAnon, and @QOrigins, who as you might guess takes a strong interest, to take stock of how misinformationism fared in the 2022 midterms. Turns out it was a great night for normies, not so much for the conspiracy theory enthusiasts running for office. Good discussion of QAnon influencer Juan O. Savin and his coalition of candidates for secretaries of state and other offices. Bottom line: almost all of these candidates lost, and many of them lost big. We're hopeful that this will mean the misinformation strain of politics will be weaker going into 2024--but who knows how Donald Trump's candidacy will swing the pendulum back? Follow Prism Metanews on Substack, Twitter, or Facebook! This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit prismmetanews.substack.com
06/23/2022

Misinfo Meetup #11: "Conspiracyland Grifters"

We talked a bit about the January 6th Committee hearings and what was covered there, especially as relates to misinformation. The conversation then turned to the ecosystem of fraudsters and charlatans who make a living off of people who believe in conspiracy theories. Our word for these predators is "grifters." Featuring good folks Paola (@PootDibou), Cosmos (@CPT_Cosmosis), VICE reporter David Gilbert (@daitaigilbert), Teddy Wilson (@reportbywilson) of Radical Reports, Rosalie (@NovelSci) of Hoaxlines, @Garrett_Archer a.k.a. The Data Guru with ABC 15 in Phoenix, and fan favorites @get_innocuous, @PokerPolitics, and @QOrigins. Follow Prism Metanews on Substack, Twitter, or Facebook! This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit prismmetanews.substack.com
03/04/2022

Misinfo Meetup #8: "Toward an Anti-Misinformation Community Infrastructure"

An impromptu Meetup in which Prism and friends talk what kinds of jobs the anti-misinformation community needs to do now and in the future--and the corresponding "infrastructure" that will enable us to do the work. Follow Prism Metanews on Substack, Twitter, or Facebook! This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit prismmetanews.substack.com
02/16/2022

Misinfo Meetup #7: "Shibboleths of Online Communities"

In which we talk about the language of communities such as QAnon and crypto (originally titled "Normies and Anons: The Linguistic Divide") with Dan Olson (@FoldableHuman), Professor Laura Dilley (@laura_greenaura), Sara Aniano (@coolfacejane), and QAnon experts @dappergander, @QOrigins, and @PokerPolitics. Summary: First, why “shibboleths”? Well, language being the amazing technology it is, people of all kinds deploy language to accomplish all kinds of things. Language is cool. Within online communities, language is used to do things like asking for and granting a feeling of belonging, signifying status, and communicating with deep meaning, efficiently. So you see people in online and other communities get really into jargon and inside speak, which aids in accomplishing the above. Speaking like the group is a kind of code. We thought it would be interesting to focus on two online communities that display strong shibboleth tendencies. Massive Internet places where it’s easy to get lost if you don’t know the lingo: conspiracy theories and crypto. [Note: These communities are not one and the same! We in no way mean to suggest or imply that everyone who holds or promotes crypto also believes in conspiracy theories. Vice versa as well. Fans of crypto, NFTs, web3, please know that we aren’t hostile to your enthusiasm for a movement that is clearly resonating with a lot of people. We are skeptical, though, about the sustainability of the boom.] With this intro, let’s hit on some of the many great points made by the speakers. 1. A lot of language you see in QAnon originated in much older chanspeak 2. Catchphrases are as vital to their communications as individual words (“watch the water”) 3. “Think mirror” is used as a kind of catch-all to cope with the cognitive dissonance arising from real world events as they play out contra to what was predicted 4. “Disinformation is necessary,” same kind of thing, and can be used to calm down any anon who is fretting 5. Language is a way to communicate meaning, signal group identification, and influence thought 6. The underlying logic of crypto world’s language is not extremely different from that of conspiracyland’s, for example a lot of chanspeak-rooted words in the crypto vocabulary, including that coming more directly from Reddit 7. The rest of the language commonly used in crypto comes from the finance industry 8. Crypto was also a topic of frequent mention by the social media account networks that promoted QAnon 9. This, combined with the digital astroturfing/inauthentic boosting that accompanied and probably helped grow QAnon, could be seen as evidence of accelerationist disinfo [This goes on for 26 more points; see the full recap thread here.] Follow Prism Metanews on Substack, Twitter, or Facebook! This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit prismmetanews.substack.com
02/02/2022

Misinfo Meetup #6: "Issues in Reporting on Misinformation"

In this Misinfo Meetup, we discuss "Issues in Reporting On Misinformation" with VICE News reporter David Gilbert, author Mike Rothschild, and journalists Steven Monacelli and Eric Levai. Summary: Misinformation is a newer kind of “beat” for news organizations to devote coverage to. A lot has sprung up in this area the past five-ish years, from books published to freelancers, dedicated reporters, and whole teams at major outlets. It’s great, really. So we wanted to talk about issues in this reporting. More news orgs are assigning misinformation stories because it’s a problem that has grown to the point that ignoring it carries large risks. And to understand a lot of what happens these days, the misinformation lens is clutch. We talked with our professional reporter/author guests about why news orgs choose to put resources toward misinformation coverage, how stories are framed, and what it’s like to produce them. Touched on the potential for bad actor blowback when reporters do this kind of work. In the Q&A, we got into principles of science communications and the challenges of writing headlines. Accessibility as an essential aspect of misinformation journalism. What we can learn from episodes like the Japanese ivermectin/omicron study. And more. Unfortunately we’re all at a bit of a loss re: solutions beyond documenting the misinformation issue in professional reporting. There are no easy answers. As always, Prism came down on the side of rallying society around anti-misinformation “infrastructure,” by which we mean primarily building tools and collaborating more and raising and deploying war chests to counter those of the bad actors. All agreed we could do a lot better than we have with the support of just one wealthy benefactor. Until then, we just scraping by! In the end, the meetup was the friends we met along the way. tfw you share in the yarn-boarder-i-ness that we yarn-board watchers have in common. Went away feeling grateful for the anti-misinformation community and hopeful that we can figure this all out soon. Many thanks to our guests. Follow Prism Metanews on Substack, Twitter, or Facebook! This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit prismmetanews.substack.com

9 Episodes

All your Prism Metanews audio content covering the world of misinformation, from recordings of our Twitter live chat Misinfo Meetups to our Guide to January 6th. prismmetanews.substack.com

Creator

Prism Metanews
Years Active

2022
Episodes

9
Rating

Clean
Copyright

© Prism Metanews
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Prism Audio