November 1, 2022

Trump's Truth Social is "a vibrant right-wing ecosystem increasingly brimming with activity."

According to a NYT piece by Stuart A. Thompson and Matthew Goldstein, "Truth Social’s Influence Grows Despite Its Business Problems/The right-wing social network faces two federal investigations and an uncertain financial future. But it has still managed to outpace its rivals." 

The site has become a key organizing platform for election deniers ahead of the midterms, stoking concerns about voter fraud and spreading rumors about problems at the polls.... Mr. Trump has used the site... to shape Republican talking points and boost candidates running in close races. And he has embraced messages and imagery from QAnon....

The real test for Truth Social may arrive in the coming months, as initial excitement around the app fades and the problems with its financing possibly come to a head. The site shows few signs of courting a wider mix of users from across the political spectrum, which would be necessary to reach lofty targets set by the company before the app launched....

ADDED: I don't think the term "election deniers" should be used until voting has been completed and the usual legal procedures of challenging and contesting elections have played out. The Times seems to be adopting this term to refer to anyone who is worried about the security and accuracy of voting — but only when the worriers are on the right. That's not a good position for the New York Times.

72 comments:

rhhardin said...

Truthsocial seems like a nothing page to me. Apparently you have to download an app. No chance I'll do that. #MalwareOpenDoor

Charles said...

"ADDED: I don't think the term "election deniers" should be used until voting has been completed and the usual legal procedures of challenging and contesting elections have played out. "

They are not trying to be forthcoming but preemptively setting the battle space. They are othering as many as they can in the get go so they can take "The High Ground" in ANY debate on election irregularities.

The me it means they are going to cheat out their ass and want to call anyone that has issues with it "Deniers"

Thing is, ne side they are othering does not care anymore and they do this to their detriment.

Howard said...

I don't think the term "election deniers" should be used until voting has been completed and the usual legal procedures of challenging and contesting elections have played out.

The 2020 voting has been completed and I he usual and unusual legal and illegal procedures of challenging and contesting that election has been played out. The election deniers have not backed down and are already denying the validity of the election to come to sway the outcome through any means necessary, including Jim Crow intimidating and threats of violence.

Personally, it's all much Ado about nothing. The wackjobs get all the attention and the silent majority will prevail. Likely not in favor of Nancy Pelosi and Dim Joe, but it will be close.

Earnest Prole said...

As I’ve noted from time to time, fully two-thirds of Democrats believed Russia hacked our voting machines to steal the 2016 election from Hillary Clinton, but neither they nor she have ever been called election deniers by the New York Times.

KJE said...

I’m constantly amazed by the fear of competing ideas in a world that values diversity. It’s almost like that value is no more than skin deep.

ThatsGoingToLeaveA said...

"election deniers" for which election 2020,2022,2024?
if it really is election denier heaven, perhaps Trump will have created a truely non-partisan social platform.

rwnutjob said...

I'm a Right wing nutjob & I think TruthSocial is kinda boring. Opened an account in case I got nuked on Twatter

Enigma said...

"The site has become a key organizing platform for election deniers"

Who could have predicted that Al Gore, Hillary Clinton, Karine Jean-Pierre, and Stacey Abrams would join Trump's platform?

Temujin said...

"That's not a good position for the New York Times."

It is their default position.

hawkeyedjb said...

"Deniers" is the new term of art that refers to anyone who doesn't accept the Established Truth: the climate is in crisis, our elections are run with honesty and complete integrity. There are exceptions of course: the climate isn't as important as my need for a private jet, and elections are run perfectly when my party wins. But that's just fine print.

tim maguire said...

"denier" is like "phobia"--a smear. Nothing more. The New York Times should be better, but they're not.

typingtalker said...

I don't think the term "election deniers" should be used ...

Perhaps "election skeptics ... "

Mike (MJB Wolf) said...

I’m with Althouse. The whole “deniers” BS is played out. When one invents partisan epithets one narrows their applicability and render them meaningless eventually. The Progressive Golden Rule is no criticism of the Left, therefore any newly minted epithet like “election denier” is guaranteed only to be applied to Republicans and eventually the hypocrisy is so weighty, the efforts to ignore or excuse the very same thing done by the Left renders the term meaningless. Abrams Clinton Gore and Biden will never be held to the same standards used to measure Trump and Lake and Desantis and that absolute unfairness leaves a stink on the user of terms like denier now. It’s so overextended it looks like the race card.

Lloyd W. Robertson said...

My son has e-mailed me about past occasions when a society was bitterly divided. Protestants vs. Catholics in Europe. Different countries arrived at different solutions. Germany largely split into different states, which meant postponing the unification of Germany that was such a wonderful gift in the 20th century. France see-sawed back and forth--accept a large number of Protestants, persecute them, drive them out. The Catholic Church "won," but became known for its arrogance. If there was one consistent thread through all stages of the French Revolution, it was anti-clericalism. I believe Napoleon took his huge army to Moscow without a single priest. Eventually the Church came back, but surely an abject and beaten organization compared to what it was before. The Brits, long before the French Revolution, muddled through and settled on the Anglican Church and "the other sects." Peace more or less reigned, except in Ireland. Perhaps the two sides were exhausted. Some of the problems of France and Germany were avoided. The Brits had by quite a ways the biggest empire in the 1800s.

In the U.S., North vs. South. My son thinks it was terrible that the South, having lost the war, was allowed to re-instate so much dehumanizing cruelty affecting blacks. A big turning point was that Rutherford Hayes election; every vote from Electoral College through various "appeals" was decided on strictly partisan lines, and Hayes the Republican had to promise to pull the military out of the South, and end Reconstruction--a demand of the Democrats and the white South--to get elected.

Trump may have given Republicans some confidence that they can win national elections fair and square; at least, 2016 convinced Dems that they might not win, and this completely enraged them. The big lie is that 2020 was uniquely free and fair. The Electoral College is perhaps not the best tool to resolve all this, any more than it was in the 1800s. There are more rural states than urban ones, so the most populous states are under-represented. The House is somewhat closer to matching population than the Senate. For various reasons the Dems may be more tempted to cheat today, or may have more means to do so, than Republicans.

wendybar said...

Now do CNN, MSNBC, ABC, CBS, NBC, PBS, NPR ect..ect..ect..

Critter said...

I’m very interested in seeing how the left/Democrats spin election denialism when they lose big time in the midterms. Remember, modern election denialism was born in 2000 and was owned by Democrats through the 2016 elections. And that was when Democrats got serious about using the tools of election fraud to beat Trump in 2020. We are going to see some huge drops in Democrat votes in states where election integrity reforms have been put in place.

Achilles said...

I find it interesting that the NYT's is pushing Truth Social now that they have lost control of Twitter.

I think it is just as important to the globalist oligarchs that control the NYT's to keep everyone in separate echo chambers and divided as it is for them to censor and control speech.

Marc in Eugene said...

That is precisely how people are using the term 'election denier' here in this rainy valley in Oregon: anyone who voices concern about ballot security etc (or declares his preference for paper ballots, voting in person on Election Day etc, ahem) is classed with the 'election deniers', if not always called one explicitly. I do hope Election Fortnight (perhaps even Election Day!) results in indisputable and obvious winners.

clint said...

Seems like the NYT is leaping past the story.

The former President and likely future major-party candidate launched a website to communicate with his supporters, and the criminal investigatory power of the Federal government has been mobilized to try to shut it down.

Does that pass anyone's smell test?

Gahrie said...

The Times seems to be adopting this term to refer to anyone who is worried about the security and accuracy of voting — but only when the worriers are on the right. That's not a good position for the New York Times.

Why? What consequences will they face?

Michael said...

Alas, Althouse, the term only refers to conservatives. Deft use of freshly minted phrase.

Jersey Fled said...

When I was teaching a class in critical thinking I would encourage my students to bring an article from the front page of the Philadelphia Inquirer in for discussion. Any article. Their choice.

We would then examine the article for signs of bias, appeals to emotion, and so on.

We would have had a field day with this one.

Night Owl said...

Election denier, climate denier, vaccine denier, blah blah blah. These are propagandists terms leftists use to attract lazy thinkers and simpletons. Complex topics dumbed-down to an easy to remember catch phrase; talking points for dummies.

The New York Times is a propagandist rag, so their use of the term election-denier is not surprising at all.

And it's another example of the double standard; it's only OK for democrats to question elections results. ��

Dear corrupt left, go F yourselves said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Dear corrupt left, go F yourselves said...

"Election denier"... "Climate Denier"

These are Nazi words - used to corral and exterminate debate.

RoseAnne said...

As I’ve noted from time to time, fully two-thirds of Democrats believed Russia hacked our voting machines to steal the 2016 election from Hillary Clinton, but neither they nor she have ever been called election deniers by the New York Times.

Neither have they explained HOW the hack worked. What did it actually do to the machines to end up with the result? Because, if the Russians hacked the machines in 2016, either somebody fixed something - and therefore can make that information public - or the claim the 2020 election is the fairest ever is BS. If the Russians hacked the machines in favor of Trump (because he is a "Russian asset") then they didn't change their opinion. They would have done it again in 2020. Someone must have done something to "fix" the machines or the whole thing never happened.

Probably the biggest problem with the US system is that finding fraud takes time. It cannot be found, litigated and corrected in essentially 2 months between Election Day and Inauguration Day.

Iman said...

It is what it is, Professor. Unfit to line a birdcage.

Levi Starks said...

“Election denier”
Certain to have its own section in the upcoming DSM-6
Probably to replace the section that used to cover gender dysphoria.

Iman said...

Good news, so far, in Georgia… Tank is tanking and Warnock’s wanking.

Charlie Eklund said...

“That's not a good position for the New York Times.”

Indeed, it is not; on the other hand, such a position gives readers much insight into the Weltanschauung of those who produce that particular newspaper.

Mike Sylwester said...

... he [Trump] has embraced messages and imagery from QAnon

I can't read the linked NYT article, but I can explain some of the situation.

QAnon stopped posting a couple of years ago, but there are websites where some people still discuss QAnon and various political issues.

If some such person proposes a "conspiracy theory", then it is a "QAnon conspiracy theory".

If some such person develops some "imagery", then it is "QAnon imagery".

=======

Suppose that someone, comment on this Althouse blog, proposes some conspiracy theory.

Well, now it can be called "an Althouse conspiracy theory".

Bruce Hayden said...

Yes, well, FJB and the Dems stole the 2020, which means here the Presidency and the Senate. As a result, the country has gone into the crapper: Rampant inflation, crashing economy, surging illegal immigration, and the illegal drugs that come across with them, killing more people with their vaccines than died from the virus, etc.

So what does the FJB Administration do then? They use their control over the federal government to leverage the big tech platforms to prevent criticism of how they got control two years ago, by rampant egregious election fraud in 6 states, and what they did with that power. FJB’s DHS has a back door into these companies, like Twitter, Facebook, Google, etc, to allow them, the FJB Administration, to censure anything that they find politically inconvenient, including election denial, vaccine denial, etc.

Election denial is simply the Dems shutting up anyone who points out that they blatantly stole power in 2020.

Aggie said...

""ADDED: I don't think the term "election deniers" should be used until voting has been completed and the usual legal procedures of challenging and contesting elections have played out. "

I don't think the term 'denier' should be used at all. It's a Propagandist's tool, favored by Progressive Leftists and used against Conservatives to quash dissent. And nothing else.

The most objectionable part is the connotation to Holocaust deniers, where the pejorative term originated. There is no doubt that the Holocaust happened, that its evil progenitor, the Nazis, were vanquished. But the way the term is used now is itself, dehumanizing. The way that it's casually applied as a bludgeon to reasonable dissenting free speech is, at its root, as evil as the Holocaust in principle. Dehumanization of the Jews was the first deployed propaganda tactic, the first on a course of progressively evil tactics. Be careful of the company you keep, Progressives.

Wince said...

That's not a good position for the New York Times.

"That's not gonna be good for anybody."

Christopher B said...

RoseAnne said...

Probably the biggest problem with the US system is that finding fraud takes time. It cannot be found, litigated and corrected in essentially 2 months between Election Day and Inauguration Day.


For Presidential Elections it's about six weeks between Election Day and when the Electors meet (in 2020, 3 Nov to 14 Dec), and any controversies involving the selection of electors have to be resolved 6 days before that, so it's more like only a month.

Joe Smith said...

Why is nothing 'left-wing'?

To democrats, Lenin was a 'moderate.'

Fuck 'em...

TestTube said...

What about those of us who believe that the election is meaningless and will make zero difference, no matter which candidate "wins", and who only vote out of rote habit and as a nihilistic exercise in social conformity? Are we "Election Deniers"?

TestTube said...

What about those of us who believe that the election is meaningless and will make zero difference, no matter which candidate "wins", and who only vote out of rote habit and as a nihilistic exercise in social conformity? Are we "Election Deniers"?

TestTube said...

What about those of us who believe that the election is meaningless and will make zero difference, no matter which candidate "wins", and who only vote out of rote habit and as a nihilistic exercise in social conformity? Are we "Election Deniers"?

Sebastian said...

"That's not a good position for the New York Times."

Jeez, not that again.

It's a fine position for the NYT. It fits their political purpose and their business model. At some point the not-a-good-position laments become NYT denial.

Narr said...

The position of the NYT?

You mean bent over, lubed, and eager to receive whatever The Organs want to insert?

It's called The Willing Participant.

Sebastian said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Big Mike said...

The people who push the term "election deniers," all they have to do to convince me that the election of 2020 was not stolen is to prove to me that after the election observers were escorted from the premises by subterfuge, that the people counting the votes counted all legal and only legal votes.

That they don't even try to prove it says everything.

hombre said...

"Election deniers" and "QAnon", are fodder for NYT bubble people, groomers and political wankers.

If you are a person of reasonable or greater intelligence, questioning the fairness of the 2020 election is compelled by considerable evidence of irregularities.

Accepting the election as "the most secure in American history", or any variation on that theme, is an article of faith for people incapable of critical thinking.

And QAnon? WTF is that? From time to time I visit dozens of blogs, news and others. The only mention of QAnon as a serious entity I have seen is on lefty sites.

hombre said...

Howard: "The 2020 voting has been completed and I he (sic.) usual and unusual legal and illegal procedures of challenging and contesting that election has been played out."

As I recall how the legal procedures mostly "played out" was to declare that virtually no one had standing to challenge the legitimacy of the election.

Reminiscent of the findings that no one seemed to have standing to question Obama's place of birth, wasn't it.

Blair said...

I'm far more concerned about the continuing QAnon slur than I am the election denier one. I think many of us made the mistake of finding the whole QAnon straw man so preposterous that we didn't take it seriously. Unfortunately it's held on like a bad smell, and it's past time to call it out.

For the avoidance of doubt, it's a 4chan prank that ceased two years ago, and you could probably fit the total number of true believers in it comfortably into the lobby of the offices of the New York Times.

Michael said...

No one should use the terms "election denier" and "climate denier." They are simply propagandistic attempts to tar reasonable people with reference to Holocaust deniers. But there is massive eye-witness, documentary, and photographic (pre-Photoshop) evidence of the Holocaust. With a fair election in 2020 and catastrophic, anthropogenic global warming, not so much.

Tom T. said...

Maybe now that they've lost the ban hammer at Twitter, they're trying to encourage people on the right to self-select over to other platforms.

Richard Dolan said...

"That's not a good position for the New York Times."

I think you've hit on a point that has almost limitless applications.

Randomizer said...

Holocaust deniers believe that the Holocaust didn't happen or involved very few victims. That is what "deny" means.

A negligible number of people deny the existence of climate or elections.

The NYT should aspire to accurate terms. A good faith effort at a term might be "election contesters" or "election integrity skeptics".

Randomizer said...

Holocaust deniers believe that the Holocaust didn't happen or involved very few victims. That is what "deny" means.

A negligible number of people deny the existence of climate or elections.

The NYT should aspire to accurate terms. A good faith effort at a term might be "election contesters" or "election integrity skeptics".

Randomizer said...

Holocaust deniers believe that the Holocaust didn't happen or involved very few victims. That is what "deny" means.

A negligible number of people deny the existence of climate or elections.

The NYT should aspire to accurate terms. A good faith effort at a term might be "election contesters" or "election integrity skeptics".

Michael K said...

The election deniers have not backed down and are already denying the validity of the election to come to sway the outcome through any means necessary, including Jim Crow intimidating and threats of violence.

Well, Howard is obviously on the DNC email list. My wife and I will vote in person even though we received an unrequested mail-in ballot.

Antiantifa said...

Every time I hear the words “election deniers,” Stacy Abrams, Hillary Clinton, Kamala Harris, and Joe Biden come to mind. The key to eliminating such blatant partisan reporting is to remind people it runs both ways. Just as the “mostly. On the Right” characterization of political violence should be met with a reminder of the scads of violence coming from the Left, in the form of assassination attempts, rioting, arson, and looting. On both of these issues, not surprisingly, there are some people on the fringe on both sides.

JHapp said...

I prefers the words "skeptics" and "the gullible", vs "deniers" and "normal people with no need of a label", (credit Scott Adams). If you still have any inner search for truth in your soul, you will at least start in the skeptic category on just about any hot issue, but you have to be able to stand up for principle and be distasteful to the politically correct crowd. The strategy of the latter by saying things like "the science is settled" or "the 2020 election has been settled in the courts" is to stop some people from searching. Focusing on the election, of course it has be settled legally. But if you view the online videos of say Hima Kolanagireddy or Garland Favorito you cannot un-see them and you know significant cheating tool place. But we don't have election laws that in any way assure an honest election. Invalid ballots, once in the system, cannot be taken out. The crime is like murder, the person is dead and you can't undo that. Still we pursue the murderer, so he doesn't repeat the crime. Likewise, we want fair elections in the future.

Joe Smith said...

'You mean bent over, lubed, and eager to receive whatever The Organs want to insert?'

You got lube?

Why didn't I get lube?

Rusty said...

Michael K said...
"The election deniers have not backed down and are already denying the validity of the election to come to sway the outcome through any means necessary, including Jim Crow intimidating and threats of violence.

Well, Howard is obviously on the DNC email list. My wife and I will vote in person even though we received an unrequested mail-in ballot."
He reminds me of the "Today" show. A show I had the misfortune to watch while waiting for a flight. Half the depth of a Kiddie pool.





Narr said...

Joe Smith asks, "You got lube? Why didn't I get lube?"

I'm just lucky that way.

Mike said...

I saw that Joe Biden was asked to present photo ID when he early voted in Delaware. Photo ID to vote is the law in Delaware. In defense of the election worker who asked Slow Joe for his ID, even Joe sometimes doesn't know who he is.

But the idea of requiring voter ID in Texas or Georgia---why that's voter suppression! Bad! Bad! Bad!

"Denier" is one of those stupid labels that progressives love.

KellyM said...

From what I've read Truth Social is still pretty tame, and willing to curate (censor) certain content. Or you could gird your loins and throw yourself into the maelstrom that is Gab. It's kind of the Wild West there, and many flee, crying to the mods to ban hurty words. It's hilarious. There's also Free Speech Extremist and the Fediverse. All of these tend to favor the right, or at least tolerate equal opportunity offenders.

Jupiter said...

"That's not a good position for the New York Times."

You know, Althouse ..... you're starting to sound like one of those commenters who says "Why don't you blog about what I want you to blog about?". The New York Times has owners. It does what they want it to do. Get used to it. It's their dog, they named it Spot.

pacwest said...

You got lube?
Why didn't I get lube?


Your social score wasn't high enough to warrant it. Get with the program or its gonna hurt.

BUMBLE BEE said...

The other issue is the accuracy of the census and representation in congress. All points one way. If one can't fully present the anomalies in an election for examination without the Soros Secretary of State Initative/Attorney General quashing and threatening, you have what we've got in Biden/Harris puppet show. To infinity.

Joe Smith said...

'Your social score wasn't high enough to warrant it. Get with the program or its gonna hurt.'

I'm writing this standing up...

Jim at said...

Never been to it. Never will.
Not my style.

But I'd still like to know about this qanon thing. Maybe some leftist can explain it since they can't stop talking about it.

Michael K said...

I guess "Rusty" prefers mail-in ballots. I don't. I don't watch the "Today Show" either. I see that "Rusty" lives in Illinois. If I still did, I wouldn't care either.

Jersey Fled said...

“Good news, so far, in Georgia… Tank is tanking and Warnock’s wanking.”

It ain’t over till the water pipes burst.

Doug said...

. The Times seems to be adopting this term to refer to anyone who is worried about the security and accuracy of voting
The Time is adopting this term to refer to anyone who is conservative politically.

Joe Smith said...

'It ain’t over till the water pipes burst.'

Still within the margin of cheating...

ccscientist said...

The media is using "election denier" to refer to repub candidates, as if 1) no monkey business has ever happened and 2) only repubs contest elections (no one remembers Hilary claiming she really won?).

ccscientist said...

The media is using "election denier" to refer to repub candidates, as if 1) no monkey business has ever happened and 2) only repubs contest elections (no one remembers Hilary claiming she really won?).

Robert Cook said...

"Yes, well, FJB and the Dems stole the 2020...."

Assumes facts not in evidence.

"As a result, the country has gone into the crapper: Rampant inflation, crashing economy, surging illegal immigration, and the illegal drugs that come across with them, killing more people with their vaccines than died from the virus, etc."

Inflation is occurring around the world, and is not the result of a Democrat being in the White house; the US economy crashes periodically and regularly and has been doing so faithfully roughly every decade (if not more often) for most of the history of our nation, and has to do with a complex of circumstances that probably begin growing beginning at the end of the previous crash and coalesce over time until, like a coming thunderstorm, it breaks, and the economy falls. Crashes of the economy do not happen suddenly in an economy that is healthy and robust, and are largely outside the control of any president to prevent. They are seem sudden but they usually have been gestating for years. (If Trump had won the second election, we would still have inflation and probably the crashing economy as well.) Surges in illegal immigrants crossing our borders likewise wax and wane according to social/political/economic conditions in the nations from which the immigrants originate, and, again, if Trump were in office, we would probably be seeing the same surge; is there evidence to connect any increase in deaths resulting from use of illicit drugs to illegal immigrants? What evidence suggests more people have died from the COVID vaccinations than by COVID itself?