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"Flood the zone" => The specific strategy put forth and now enacted by the current US admin in order to overwhelm the media's ability to cover issues and theref

"Flood the zone" => The specific strategy put forth and now enacted by the current US admin in order to overwhelm the media's ability to cover issues and therefore by extension the ability for the public at large to keep themselves informed. It's a fundamental attack on one of the pillars of democracy. Mental bandwidth saturation is a feature here, not a bug. Additionally, the gradual removal of personal privacy, and the normalization of it, is another attack on a democratic pillar. It really does seem like structural cracks are widening rapidly. I too hope that our current realities cause a sort of 'wake up' to occur in the minds of those whom are too busy, deep in "my team" politics or otherwise not concerned about what's going on right now.

davidw 1y ago
The media does plenty of shooting itself in their own feet though. There was tons of coverage of Jake Tapper's book taking time away from everything that is happening right now.
- willcipriano 1y ago
  The book about how the media covered up the president's decline?
  - abridges6532 1y ago
    Tapper was like #1 in the coverup lmao
  - davidw 1y ago
    If it was such a big deal, why did they wait to publish it in a book about a guy who will never see elected office again? They do this a lot and it damages their credibility. Also, the current guy is not exactly that sharp, or improving with age, either. But age seems to no longer be of interest to the press.
gosub100 1y ago
It's never limited to a single administration.
- toss1 1y ago
  That is trivially true, but stop both-sides-ing it with false equivalency. At this point, the major party in power is doing all they can to undermine democracy and strip-mine the country for their own benefit and that of their few multi-billionaire sponsors. The other party is attempting to herd a broad coalition of people to maintain democracy. Yes, it is imperfect, and the country has fallen often far short of perfection through it's entire history. That is no reason to set the perfect as the enemy of the good. Simply declaring "every form of government is (or all parties are) awful" is a cop-out, and the logical conclusion of that is a complete power vacuum which leads only to the population being ruled by rival gangs & fiefdoms.
  - gosub100 1y ago
    I'll happily stop both-sides-ing it when people stop emphasizing "the current administration" when it's not relevant to the topic. Your guy lost, learn from your mistakes and carry on. Or criticize both presidents equally. If you criticized Biden in his tenure it was still Trump's fault. Believe me, I tried. It's Logical nonsense.
    - exceptione 1y ago
      > I'll happily stop both-sides-ing it when No, you unconditionally need to stop both-siding. When you want to bring a broader issue in the spotlight, do bring the broader issue in the spot light. But when you feel you are inclined to throw in a bothsidism, which is a negative sum contribution to discourse, then the chance that you actually have an insight on the broader issue is quite small. > Your guy lost, learn from your mistakes and carry on As a bystander I can say on behalf of the ones that have been "othered" by means of political marketing, there is no guy. The pressing issue at play is the rule of law, separation of powers, due process, fair elections, and basic respect for human rights. If anyone feels they should continue to shout while waiving the merchandise of their favorite team, if anyone thinks this is the right moment to continue behaving like a spoiled hooligan, then they lose the aforementioned basic prerequisites of democracy, and with that, the democratic constitutional state.
zzrrt 1y ago
I’ve been wondering lately why they told us about “flood the zone” and published Project 2025. Is it because they don’t have regular communication with every person who is willing and able to employ these strategies, so they just communicate them in the open?
- yeahokbut 1y ago
  They’re used to openly saying what they are doing and expecting everyone to ignore it: https://www.nytimes.com/1997/02/27/business/job-insecurity-of-workers-is-a-big-factor-in-fed-policy.html https://www.nytimes.com/1997/02/27/business/job-insecurity-o... Worked so far. But social media put everything up for scrutiny. The smart ones hide it. Trump doesn’t care cause no one will revolt with violence.
- godelski 1y ago
  You need broad support and to recruit. It is hard to do those things while being highly secretive. Besides, who's going to read a 500 page book? They'll read parts, but all of it? Of course not. By just using parts it is easier to dismiss. People don't want it to be true in the first place, so it's easy to buy the lie. The truth requires understanding a lot of moving parts. The lie is simple. We hate complexity (and long comments ;) Some people they'll never convince, but they don't matter because they'd resist no matter what was proposed. I mean look at Russia's invasion of Ukraine. It's a major logistical effort to invade a country. They amassed military forces all along the border. The whole time saying "nothing to worry about" and "if we were really going to invade we wouldn't be so obvious about it!" It was happening for months! (Starting in March!) Meanwhile lots of people, including news outlets, bought the lie. Everything was there plain as day, but it's easy to buy the lie. No one wanted to see war break out. Every day they didn't proved they were right too! Sure, plenty of people asserted that the attack would happen and time showed them correct. But that doesn't change how many misses there were nor did it actually stop the attack.[0] Being right didn't matter But it's impossible to make an attack without telegraphing it. Same thing here. [0] certainly all the military leaders responded appropriately. You don't take those risks, especially when so blatant. But that also doesn't mean they aren't going to lie through their teeth trying to prevent public panic. Not when there's the faintest of hopes that a war could be stopped before it happens. Again, you can see similarities

davidw 1y ago

The media does plenty of shooting itself in their own feet though. There was tons of coverage of Jake Tapper's book taking time away from everything that is happening right now.

willcipriano 1y ago
The book about how the media covered up the president's decline?
- abridges6532 1y ago
  Tapper was like #1 in the coverup lmao
- davidw 1y ago
  If it was such a big deal, why did they wait to publish it in a book about a guy who will never see elected office again? They do this a lot and it damages their credibility. Also, the current guy is not exactly that sharp, or improving with age, either. But age seems to no longer be of interest to the press.

gosub100 1y ago

It's never limited to a single administration.

toss1 1y ago
That is trivially true, but stop both-sides-ing it with false equivalency. At this point, the major party in power is doing all they can to undermine democracy and strip-mine the country for their own benefit and that of their few multi-billionaire sponsors. The other party is attempting to herd a broad coalition of people to maintain democracy. Yes, it is imperfect, and the country has fallen often far short of perfection through it's entire history. That is no reason to set the perfect as the enemy of the good. Simply declaring "every form of government is (or all parties are) awful" is a cop-out, and the logical conclusion of that is a complete power vacuum which leads only to the population being ruled by rival gangs & fiefdoms.
- gosub100 1y ago
  I'll happily stop both-sides-ing it when people stop emphasizing "the current administration" when it's not relevant to the topic. Your guy lost, learn from your mistakes and carry on. Or criticize both presidents equally. If you criticized Biden in his tenure it was still Trump's fault. Believe me, I tried. It's Logical nonsense.
  - exceptione 1y ago
    > I'll happily stop both-sides-ing it when No, you unconditionally need to stop both-siding. When you want to bring a broader issue in the spotlight, do bring the broader issue in the spot light. But when you feel you are inclined to throw in a bothsidism, which is a negative sum contribution to discourse, then the chance that you actually have an insight on the broader issue is quite small. > Your guy lost, learn from your mistakes and carry on As a bystander I can say on behalf of the ones that have been "othered" by means of political marketing, there is no guy. The pressing issue at play is the rule of law, separation of powers, due process, fair elections, and basic respect for human rights. If anyone feels they should continue to shout while waiving the merchandise of their favorite team, if anyone thinks this is the right moment to continue behaving like a spoiled hooligan, then they lose the aforementioned basic prerequisites of democracy, and with that, the democratic constitutional state.

zzrrt 1y ago

I’ve been wondering lately why they told us about “flood the zone” and published Project 2025. Is it because they don’t have regular communication with every person who is willing and able to employ these strategies, so they just communicate them in the open?

yeahokbut 1y ago
They’re used to openly saying what they are doing and expecting everyone to ignore it: https://www.nytimes.com/1997/02/27/business/job-insecurity-of-workers-is-a-big-factor-in-fed-policy.html https://www.nytimes.com/1997/02/27/business/job-insecurity-o... Worked so far. But social media put everything up for scrutiny. The smart ones hide it. Trump doesn’t care cause no one will revolt with violence.
godelski 1y ago
You need broad support and to recruit. It is hard to do those things while being highly secretive. Besides, who's going to read a 500 page book? They'll read parts, but all of it? Of course not. By just using parts it is easier to dismiss. People don't want it to be true in the first place, so it's easy to buy the lie. The truth requires understanding a lot of moving parts. The lie is simple. We hate complexity (and long comments ;) Some people they'll never convince, but they don't matter because they'd resist no matter what was proposed. I mean look at Russia's invasion of Ukraine. It's a major logistical effort to invade a country. They amassed military forces all along the border. The whole time saying "nothing to worry about" and "if we were really going to invade we wouldn't be so obvious about it!" It was happening for months! (Starting in March!) Meanwhile lots of people, including news outlets, bought the lie. Everything was there plain as day, but it's easy to buy the lie. No one wanted to see war break out. Every day they didn't proved they were right too! Sure, plenty of people asserted that the attack would happen and time showed them correct. But that doesn't change how many misses there were nor did it actually stop the attack.[0] Being right didn't matter But it's impossible to make an attack without telegraphing it. Same thing here. [0] certainly all the military leaders responded appropriately. You don't take those risks, especially when so blatant. But that also doesn't mean they aren't going to lie through their teeth trying to prevent public panic. Not when there's the faintest of hopes that a war could be stopped before it happens. Again, you can see similarities