The “banned books” narrative was always bs, as I’ve repeatedly shown on this page, but it was very effective. School board elections across the country rejected conservatives. Where I live, the Moms For Liberty type challengers were soundly defeated, like 2 to 1. Which surprised me since I live in a relatively sane family-focused suburban area where I thought parents would be freaked out by the woke stuff in schools.
Anecdotally, the main concern I saw in our community was that there would be “book bans” from the M4L types. People unironically feared books would be banned despite no books actually banned anywhere. There was just some inkling that books were banned down in Florida or something.
Of course, when you actually talk with them they quickly realize they have no rational fear of book bans, they can easily obtain whatever books they wish for their kids and that won’t change. Of all the things to worry about with your children, “banned books” shouldn’t even register. Sane people realize this once you have them actually think about it. But the narrative was powerful. So if you wonder why the banned book hysteria was spread everywhere, it’s because it worked.
It’s funny to see the left use the same conspiratorial rhetoric as the right did a year ago regarding the jobs numbers being downwardly revised. So many on the right, who knew nothing of how the jobs numbers are calculated or why they revise them, were convinced the downward revisions were a conspiracy to help Biden win.
If people want to have a debate about the birth death model or the survey methods, ok, but that’s not what’s happening here. Most people are under the delusion that the BLS report is the govt reporting every job created and lost, and are thus easily swayed it’s rigged when it suits their political ends.
This is almost laughingly misleading, as it leaves out everything before the letter.
▪️After being repeatedly lampooned by the Smothers Brothers over Vietnam, Johnson finally had enough. One night at 3 am he called the head of CBS William Paley, demanding that he “get those bastards off my back.”
▪️Paley then asked the heads of CBS entertainment to get them to back off of LBJ. However, instead of backing off the Smothers Brothers doubled down, booking a folk musician performing “Waist Deep,” an anti-war song about a soldier being stuck in the mud while “the big fool says to push on,” clearly a dig at LBJ.
▪️At the last minute, CBS cut the song from the pre-taped show to the outrage of the Smothers. They continued to push the boundaries off and on for the rest of his presidency, with CBS sometimes cutting segments that they thought went too far. Basically, it was a soft form of censorship.
▪️It wasn’t until Johnson made his surprise announcement not to run in 1968 ...
