After years of flamboyant lies about what Foxconn would be able to achieve in Wisconsin, there’s a new deal with that foreign corporation. That new arrangement reflects a reduction of 90% or more in what Wisconsin expects and what the state will offer. Local governments have already wasted millions on absurdly grandiose, false promises Not…
Mendacity
Babbittry, Bad Ideas, Blogging, Boosterism, City, Confidence Schemes, Coronavirus, Culture, Local Government, Mendacity, Politics, School District, Special Interests, Whitewater's Local Politics 2021
Whitewater’s Local Politics 2021: Marketing
by JOHN ADAMS • • Comments
This is the ninth in a series on Whitewater’s local politics of 2021. Through all the difficult events of the last two decades (a Great Recession, an opioid epidemic, economic stagnation, creeping nativism, a pandemic, a pandemic recession), Old Whitewater has responded with the same question: how can we market the town to others? If…
Bad Ideas, Corporate Welfare, Development, Foxconn, Marketing, Mendacity, Public Relations, Scott Walker, Special Interests, State Capitalism, State Government, WEDC, WISGOP, YMBFKM
Foxconn’s Venture Capital Fund
by JOHN ADAMS • • Comments
Bruce Murphy has a solid assessment of Foxconn’s much-touted (by Foxconn) venture capital fund in About That Foxconn Venture Capital Fund. It’s well worth reading in full. A few key points: Unfulfilled: Louis Woo of Foxconn had promised this venture fund for startup companies would naturally connect to Foxconn’s innovation centers in Eau Claire, Green Bay…
Babbittry, Blogging, Boosterism, Culture, Disinformation, Freedom of Speech, Mendacity, Public Relations, Rhetoric
The Power of Refutation
by JOHN ADAMS • • 1 Comment
Laura Hazard Owen writes When’s the best time to correct fake news? After someone’s already read it, apparently: Debunking > prebunking. If you want someone to not believe that false or misleading headline they just read, when’s the best time to correct it? We hear a lot about inoculating people against fake news or “prebunking”…
Congress, Conspiracy Theories, Crackpots, Disinformation, Mendacity, Sen. Ron Johnson
Ron Johnson Searches for the Real Killer
by JOHN ADAMS • • Comments
United States Senator Ron Johnson wonders if, possibly, maybe, perhaps it is Nancy Pelosi who is responsible for the Capitol riot. He doesn’t have any proof for this contention, and after all, he’s only askin’ questions, so don’t ask Johnson for substantiation: “Is this another diversionary operation? Is this meant to deflect away from potentially…
Mendacity, Trump, Trumpism
The Liar’s Guide to Mendacious Hypocrisy
by JOHN ADAMS • • Comments
Authoritarianism, Mendacity, Trump, Trumpism
Trump’s Big Lie
by JOHN ADAMS • • Comments
Timothy Snyder, on Twitter, writes of Trump’s Big Lie: See also Snyder’s On Tyranny.
Babbittry, Boosterism, Conflicts of Interest, Culture, Disinformation, Local Government, Mendacity, Negligence, Politics, Public Relations, Reasoning, School District, Self-Dealing, That Which Paved the Way, Trump, Trumpism, University
Consequences, Accountability, Repentance, Redemption
by JOHN ADAMS • • 2 Comments
David Frum, writing of Trump & Trumpism in The Conservative Cult of Victimhood, observes that There is no redemption without repentance. There is no repentance without accountability. There is no accountability without consequences. He rightly concludes that for the Trumpists, the absence of a moral order of accountability and repentance has meant that Even as Trump commits…
Alt-Right, America, Authoritarianism, Congress, Herrenvolk, History, Law, Mendacity, Trump, Trumpism
Confederates, Copperheads, and Conservatives
by JOHN ADAMS • • Comments
It’s an understatement to say that a democratic society that endures a violent mob seizing its capitol building is a society in distress. We find ourselves in the twenty-first century facing movements as malevolent and mendacious as the nineteenth century’s Confederates and Copperheads. Karen L. Cox writes What Trump Shares With the ‘Lost Cause’ of the…
Mendacity, Scott Walker
Former Gov. Scott Walker Keeps Busy by Lying About Eating Pizza
by JOHN ADAMS • • Comments
People lie about the dumbest things. Here is Republican @ScottWalker (who has been caught lying before) posting a photo of his "great pizza tonight." Next to it is the uncropped version of the same pizza, in a photo he posted last year. pic.twitter.com/LvDkw0I5H7 — Brandon Friedman (@BFriedmanDC) December 27, 2020 …
Coronavirus, Mendacity, Sen. Ron Johnson
Sen. Ron Johnson: From Ludicrous to Malevolent
by JOHN ADAMS • • 2 Comments
I’ve previously described Sen. Ron Johnson as America’s Dumbest Senator™, and his years in office confirm that assessment. A man who was formerly ludicrous, however, may now be fittingly described as malevolently mendacious. Sophie Carlson, Laura Schultz, and Patrick Marley report Wisconsin reports record-high 48 coronavirus deaths as Sen. Johnson falsely claims state has flattened the curve:…