Four years into a war fought to eliminate a nonexistent threat, we all have renewed appreciation for the power of the Big Lie: people tend to believe false official claims about big issues, because they can't picture their leaders being dishonest about such things.
But there's another political lesson I don't think has sunk in: the power of the Little Lie - the small accusation invented out of thin air, followed by another, and another, and another. Little Lies aren't meant to have staying power. Instead, they create a sort of background hum, a sense that the person facing all these accusations must have done something wrong.
Tuesday, April 10, 2007
Big Lies, Little Lies
NYT's Paul Krugman gives us a kick-ass editorial via TruthOut about the power of the repeated "little lie" which lends credence to BushCo propaganda.
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And then there's the grandaddy of all kinds of lies, wherein George Bush tars his opponents with his own failings - most recently, "How dare Congress take a vacation without sending me a war funding bill to sign?" (a day before his own vacation starts)
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