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 bizarre to see them seesaw back and forth that Trump is totally clueless and aloof, just golfing all day, then all of a sudden he’s a dangerous king/dictator who’s diligently plotting to seize absolute power.
▪️This one is frustrating because, while it’s nice to see the vigor and speed that DOGE is acting with, they’re also sloppy with some of their findings. This is not some bombshell, millions of dead people’s SS numbers aren’t being paid out to fraudsters.
▪️This problem has been known for some time, you can read an inspector general’s report from 2015 about millions of names on the SS “numident” not being correctly annotated for deaths, even though they were older than 112 (the oldest known American at the time).
https://oig-files.ssa.gov/audits/full/A-06-14-34030_0.pdf
▪️There are innocent explanations for some of these. Expatriates that died outside the country, for example. Or immigrants given temporary work permit who returned to their country, people issued new numbers for various reasons, etc. However, most are simply due to the govt not diligently keeping track of deaths.
▪️It’s embarrassing that the govt has millions of numbers on the numident that are ...
