fandomhigh | Practical Civics, Friday, October 4, 2019

"Well," Steve said, blowing out a breath, "the government seems to be imploding in real time and that is just--" he ran a hand through his hair, "--horrifically depressing and more than a bit scary."

"Remember when it was just a normal dumpster fire?" Tony asked, rubbing the bridge of his nose. "I miss that."

"Let's make this completely, crystal clear. Asking another country to help your election campaign, whether you're a mayor or president or even just a candidate is a felony. Tying it to a vulnerable nation's need for weapons to protect itself against a Russian invasion?" Steve's face was a picture. "I don't toss 'treason' around lightly, but. Yes. Definitely impeachable. This makes Nixon look like a choir boy."

"Twice! He did it twice!" Tony needed to take a deep breath.

"ONCE LIVE ON TELEVISION." Steve.

Another deep breath. "So to avoid having blood pressure spikes in class, we're going to talk about the stupidest news story yesterday: how a moron felt that making up his own opposition research where Senator Warren was carrying on an alleged affair with a 24 year old Marine would possible be considered a bad thing."

"Telling us that Senator Warren is a dominatrix cougar was somehow supposed to deter people from voting for her," Tony said. "I hope that's her Secret Service code name now."

Steve snorted. "Okay, in an effort to keep this slightly on topic, let's discuss propaganda and its effects on a population. Because right now that is a real problem. The White House released a rough transcript with the President asking for a personal, political favor from the Ukrainian president, and 4 in 10 Republicans don't believe it happened. How do you combat that kind of wilful ignorance? Do you even try?"

"How would you solve this issue?" Tony asked. "Murder is not an option."

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Not mad, just disappointed.

Tisarwat

Lana Beniko

The rant? The ranting lecture?

Just when Tisarwat was thinking there's no way the current class could top the last classes for sheer bewilderment and confusion...she was proven wrong yet again. Since she was pretty sure a nicely selective ~~genocide~~ culling of the problematic individuals fell under the blanket of murder in the eyes of her instructors, she....might need to take a while to really think on this one.

"Now I was part of the World War II propaganda machine," Steve admitted. "I made ridiculous movies and posed for posters and told mothers and wives that every dollar they donated was a bullet in their best guy's gun. Is that different than what's going on now?"

After a long, long, looooooong moment to think about this question and quite a few conflicting ideas in her own head, what with the multiple minds and everything, Tisarwat ventured, with at least a little disgust, though for which part of it, even she wasn't feeling sure, "There's at least subtly to your examples. The current situation is just blatant, no finesse...."

Very her, without the benefit of having even a fraction of her power or influence or might. A big, bold gesture, out of the assumption that it was so big, so bold, that people wouldn't know what to do about it...She's seen moves like this work for thousands of years.

And she's seen them go completely sideways in the last few months.

"Well," Lana said after thinking about it, "what you were a part of was designed to help your country, wasn't it? What this other person did, if I'm understanding it correctly, was designed to just help themselves. So it's more selfish." There were entirely too many Sith like that, too.

Who are checking Twitter and muttering.

This week has been just the longest year.

Practical Civics, Friday, October 4, 2019

Sign in 10/4

Re: Sign in 10/4

Re: Sign in 10/4

Listen to the lecture!

Re: Listen to the lecture!

Let's talk propaganda!

Re: Let's talk propaganda!

Re: Let's talk propaganda!

Talk to Steve and Tony

OOC