Metaphorical Floodwaters

     Friends and neighbors, does it seem lately that your zone has been flooded?  Is disinformation, misinformation, arrant BS and rumor crowding out accurate information?  Has it become far more difficult the distinguish between the true metal and mere dross?

     You may be suffering from The Russian Model of Propaganda!  Sometimes known as the "Firehose of Falsehood," if what you're seeing is:
A. High-volume and multichannel
B. Rapid, continuous, and repetitive
C. Lacking in commitment to objective reality
D. Lacking in commitment to consistency
     Then you may need to adjust your social media and news consumption to slow or dilute it.  RAND Corporation wrote a nice paper about it.

     In other news, I noticed our Vice President made the circuit of the Sunday morning politics shows, pressing hard on blaming the Democrats for the government shutdown* and Gish-galloping through questions that didn't fit his goal.  At one point, when an interviewer kept asking about things she wanted to cover, he scolded her, "You're talking to the Vice President, and you've spent five minutes on [unwanted topic.]"  Yes, dear boy, that's how it works: the person conducting the interview asks the questions, and you can answer them however you like or refuse to address them.  You don't get to set the agenda; that's what press conferences are for. 

     The Vice President, the President, members of Congress, judges, journalists, Cabinet members, police: they're all Just Some Guy.  This is the United States of America and none of them are more special than the others.  And if any of them decide to "flood the zone," know it for what it is, and judge it accordingly.
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* As I have noted before, this is nonsense.  Either party could break the impasse by giving the other one exactly what they want; neither of them have made a secret of what it will take.  Or they could sit down together and work out something they'd all dislike equally.  This last option is extremely not happening.  The GOP only needs a few votes in the Senate but they have so far been unwilling to unbend enough to get even a handful of Democrat Senators to come over.  The Dems have made an opening bid, and it's pretty high -- but the counteroffer is bupkis and an empty promise to talk later.  Meanwhile, if you bought your health insurance through the Feds, it's gonna cost a lot more; if you're counting on food stamps or other aid, those coffers are running dry.