Flatworm7591

Visit us @ [email protected] for all the latest news on the topics of astroturfing, propaganda and disinformation.

Quick Take

President Donald Trump said his administration blocked $50 million for condoms to be sent to Gaza through its pause on foreign aid. But it has provided no evidence that $50 million was ever directed toward condoms for Gaza. The contractor identified by the State Department said it has not used U.S. aid “to procure or distribute condoms.”

Visit us @ [email protected] for all the latest news on the topics of astroturfing, propaganda and disinformation.

A constant narrative evolution

The Kremlin’s take on peace has evolved over the last three years. During the early days of Russia’s full-scale war, there was no space for narratives about peace, only for an ill-advised tone of triumphalism. Then, realising the Ukrainian resolve to defend their homes would not be easily broken, the Kremlin started talking about peace while its bombs rained down on Ukrainian civilians. Moscow quickly devised ‘peace proposals’ that were merely empty PR stunts, deploying the narrative of peace to support Russia’s war, masking Moscow’s true imperial ambitions.

As the war raged on, the Kremlin’s disinformation peddlers continued to spin their twisted tale of peace, increasingly reaching out to more global audiences and depicting Russia’s war against Ukraine as a noble fight to dismantle the ‘Western hegemony’ and establish a ‘truly multipolar’ world order.

But, there was a complication in maintaining this knight-in-shining-armour image. Ukraine and its supporters interested in just and lasting peace were already working toward their goal, including building a global community to support real peace. The Kremlin then pivoted from polishing its own image to disparaging the West or any proposals for peace that were not rooted in Russian imperialist ultimatums. This dichotomy – disguising Russia’s aggression as attempts for peace and accusing the West of not being serious about peace – has now become the Kremlin’s go-to tactic to manipulate the public perception of achievable peace in Ukraine. [...]

Visit us @ [email protected] for all the latest news on the topics of astroturfing, propaganda and disinformation.

As Robert F. Kennedy Jr. faces a Senate vote to lead the Department of Health and Human Services, right-wing media are split on whether to support his nomination.

Some claim the nominee — who has a long history of undermining scientific research and promoting health misinformation — is a “bipartisan” solution for “Making America Healthy Again,” while others have highlighted his past extremism, Democratic affiliations, and pro-abortion beliefs. Some right-wing media have also covered for Kennedy’s extremism in the past, largely ignoring his vaccination views.

Kennedy has a history of pushing harmful policies and embracing extremism — and right-wing media have played cover for him [...]

Visit us @ [email protected] for all the latest news on the topics of astroturfing, propaganda and disinformation.

Visit us @ [email protected] for all the latest news on the topics of astroturfing, propaganda and disinformation.

“We’re thinking in terms of 25% on Mexico and Canada because they’re allowing vast numbers of people … to come in and fentanyl to come in,” Trump told a reporter who asked about the tariffs while Trump was signing executive orders in the Oval Office on Jan. 20.

The following day, in a press conference from the White House, Trump again explained why he may move forward with the tariffs.

“They’ve allowed, both of them, Canada very much so, they’ve allowed millions and millions of people to come into our country that shouldn’t be here,” Trump said. “They could’ve stopped them and they didn’t. And they’ve killed 300,000 people last year, my opinion, have been destroyed by drugs, by fentanyl. The fentanyl coming through Canada is massive. The fentanyl coming through Mexico is massive.”

Trump is exaggerating the number of fentanyl-related deaths in the U.S., and his Canada and Mexico comparison is off-base, too.

In this post, we take a quick look at the numbers to give some relative perspective. [...]

Visit us @ [email protected] for all the latest news on the topics of astroturfing, propaganda and disinformation.

Even before Putin ordered the full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, he professed that Russia only wanted peace, if only Ukraine and Western countries would give him the peace he wants. Towards the end of 2021, he made unrealistic and unreasonable security demands whose conditions, if fulfilled, would have made NATO allies feel profoundly insecure. Just a few days before Russia’s invasion, he sent a low-level official to present Ukraine with conditions for peace that it could not possibly meet. Since then, his negotiation proposals have insisted upon the ’denazification’ of Ukraine, an impossible demand since the Kremlin considers any Ukrainian who believes in Ukraine’s sovereignty to be a Nazi.

Visit us @ [email protected] for all the latest news on the topics of astroturfing, propaganda and disinformation.

A new memo issued by the Trump administration directing the federal government to temporarily cease disbursing billions of dollars in funds appears to draw on arguments made by Russ Vought, the president’s selectee to run the Office of Management and Budget.

Vought was a primary architect of Project 2025, a sprawling effort organized by The Heritage Foundation to provide policy and staffing recommendations for President Donald Trump’s second term. In addition to that role, Vought is also the founder of the Center for Renewing America, a MAGA-aligned think tank that has spent over a year arguing that the president can unilaterally refuse to spend funds allocated by Congress, an authority known as the impoundment power that was severely curtailed by Congress in 1974.

Visit us @ [email protected] for all the latest news on the topics of astroturfing, propaganda and disinformation.

Visit us @ [email protected] for all the latest news on the topics of astroturfing, propaganda and disinformation.

The post available on LinkedIn (archived) and Facebook (archived) was a response to Musk's controversial gesture at U.S. President Donald Trump's inauguration rally, which many observers called a Nazi salute. The post said Low had known Musk for 14 years and that they texted frequently and went to each other's birthdays before they had a falling out. Part of the post reads:

Elon is not a Nazi, per se.

He is something much better, or much worse, depending on how you look at it.

Nazis believed that an entire race was above everyone else.

Elon believes he is above everyone else. He used to think he worked on the most important problems. When I met him, he did not presume to be a technical person — he would be the first to say that he lacked the expertise to understand certain data. That happened later. Now, he acts as if he has all the solutions.

[…]

Visit us @ [email protected] for all the latest news on the topics of astroturfing, propaganda and disinformation.

What the memo says

The Jan. 27 memo directs federal agencies to "temporarily pause all activities related to obligation or disbursement of all federal financial assistance" until officials ensure that the programs are consistent with Trump’s policies.

The memo singles out programs related to foreign aid, diversity, equity and inclusion, "woke" gender ideology and funding related to the "green new deal" pending a review. (The "Green New Deal" was a policy blueprint focusing on the environment that was backed by some Democrats in 2019 but was never enacted. Trump has used the term in the past as a catchall for green energy initiatives.)

Visit us @ [email protected] for all the latest news on the topics of astroturfing, propaganda and disinformation.