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Category: Lies

Fear is a powerful motivator in propaganda messaging: How its used to sell third party solar

Fear is a powerful motivator in propaganda messaging: How its used to sell third party solar

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Third party companies offer to install solar PV arrays on your home and promise to save you money on your monthly electric utility costs. Bloomberg found they use a mix of false assertions, lies, cherry picking and fear as sales methods, to persuade homeowners to sign up and lease the solar PV system for decades. Over time, the lease costs increase such that the homeowner spends far more in the future, while the third party company collects large government subsidies. Few homeowners understand what they got in to. When they go to sell their home, the lease is transferred to the buyer – in effect, TPO solar PV arrays become a dead weight on the home’s future sales potential, particularly to informed buyers who understand the game.

Controversial “viral” video clip was pushed on social media by “a network of anonymous” and apparently fake accounts

Controversial “viral” video clip was pushed on social media by “a network of anonymous” and apparently fake accounts

Social media is the new battleground. It’s being used to push people over the edge, to threaten violence against others, and in some cases, leading to actual violence. A controversial video clip that spread online in the past day was pushed by what appears to have been a fake account.

How the news media protects and covers up for its own

How the news media protects and covers up for its own

In 2012, an editor for The Oregonian newspaper died of a heart attack. The paper printed his obituary citing his wonderful career, awards and track record. Left out of the story was the married editor died in the arms of his prostitute, a fact which another editor deliberately covered up.

Der Spiegel star reporter and editor admits to having made up stories and facts

Der Spiegel star reporter and editor admits to having made up stories and facts

A “star” reporter and editor at Der Spiegel has admitted to fabricating his stories over a period of many years. He was the four time winner of Germany’s “Reporter of the Year” award and a two time winner of CNN’s Journalist of the Year. Yet the journalists who selected the winner never saw problems. Think of the role that such fake news plays in shaping public opinion, and its sharing on social media as part of propaganda campaigns.

The role played by propaganda in the public discussion of the #ACA #ObamaCare-Did you know the ACA has a pre-existing condition waiting period?

The role played by propaganda in the public discussion of the #ACA #ObamaCare-Did you know the ACA has a pre-existing condition waiting period?

Propaganda messaging played and continues to play an enormous role in the public’s view on the Affordable Care Act a.k.a. ObamaCare. For example, Democrats have made pre-existing condition exclusions the centerpiece of their 2018 public commentary on the ACA.

Yet, never explained is that most Americans already had protections against pre-existing condition exclusions – it was the individual market that did not have protections (details in the post). Further, contrary to what you have been led to believe, the ACA does, in fact, establish a pre-existing condition waiting period. The ACA did not eliminate pre-existing condition waiting periods (see post for details).

The propaganda messaging used the methods of Fear, Assertion, Lying and What You See Is All There Is and has been extraordinarily effective. The Republican opposition has been clumsy and largely counterproductive with utterly ineffective propaganda messaging of its own.

(This is a major update to a previously posted item on this topic – formatting, editing and a better explanation of the propaganda methods used have been done to improve the previous post and make it easier to understand.)

Are social media posts badly misinformed? Probably

Are social media posts badly misinformed? Probably

In light of the survey finding most voters are badly misinformed on well known and popular public policy issues the same is likely true about social media posts. It is likely that more than half of political or policy oriented social media posts are incorrect. But depending on who makes the posts, and how many followers they have, their incorrect posts can be influential – and plant non factual and illogical constructions in the minds of their targets.

Official, provable, corporate funded marketing lies from Code.org

Official, provable, corporate funded marketing lies from Code.org

Code.org is a lobbying organization funded by high tech industrial giants. They are lobbying to have more kids K-12 studying computer science and less time spent studying other subjects in school. One of their methods is to straight up lie about the size of the job market, as you’ll see on the attached post. And its not a little lie, but being off by a factor of ten. This is a great example of corporate funded propaganda that turns into “facts” quoted in media news stories and then likely gets quoted by politicians.