How Republicans Fed a Misinformation Loop About the Pelosi Attack

[Nevilledog]

https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2022/11/05/us/politics/pelosi-attack-misinfo-republican-politicians.html

No paywall
https://archive.is/oYe1i


WASHINGTON — Within hours of the brutal attack last month on Paul Pelosi, the husband of the speaker of the House, activists and media outlets on the right began circulating groundless claims — nearly all of them sinister, and many homophobic — casting doubt on what had happened.

Some Republican officials quickly joined in, rushing to suggest that the bludgeoning of an octogenarian by a suspect obsessed with right-wing conspiracy theories was something else altogether, dismissing it as an inside job, a lover’s quarrel or worse.

The misinformation came from all levels of Republican politics. A U.S. senator circulated the view that “none of us will ever know” what really happened at the Pelosis’ San Francisco home. A senior Republican congressman referred to the attacker as a “nudist hippie male prostitute,” baselessly asserting that the suspect had a personal relationship with Mr. Pelosi. Former President Donald J. Trump questioned whether the attack might have been staged.

The world’s richest man helped amplify the stories. But none of it was true.

*snip*

[question everything]

1. "The world richest man" - Musk?

[Nevilledog]

2. He was at the time.

[Meadowoak]

3. It won't make any difference to the 20% on the far right, but

It will to the 40% in the middle.

[Yo_Mama_Been_Loggin]

4. All they know how to do is lie

The party of nepo babies never learned how to build or create anything beyond a bowel movement.