My current audiobook is My Life, a biographical interview of Fidel Castro. I have a lot more respect for the man now, but that’s not the point of this post. At one point during the interview he talks about a rumor that was spread after the Cuban revolution, to the effect that the new government was going to take people’s children away. He remarked that it was a good example of Goebbel’s theory that you can get people to believe any lie by repeating it often enough. Of course, that made me think of Republicans, who have certainly learned more than one lesson from Goebbels.
But it also occured to me that it’s the repetition that counts. The lie is neither necessary nor sufficient to get people to believe something so it occured to me that it might behoove the Democrats to consider endlessly repeating the truth. Take global warming, for example. People with brains know that it’s real, and it’s the most important issue facing the world. People without brains only know that they have heard endlessly repeated lies from the likes of Fox News, to the effect that global warming is a hoax. Wouldn’t endless repetition of the truth at least neutralize the liars? (Who knows, even mentioning it occasionally might help) It’s really a strategy that Democrats might consider. Imagine what might happen if the Democrats started to endlessly repeat the truth about climate change, deficits, social security, Medicare, and inequality. Besides global warming they might start by repeating the fact, against the Republican attempt to suppress it, that higher taxes on the rich don’t reduce economic growth.
At any rate, it couldn’t hurt to try.
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