Ministry of Truth

 

Steve Benen, “Ministry of Truth: Democracy, Reality, and the Republicans’ War on the Recent Past, Mariner Books, 2024, 190 pp.

This book by the producer of the Rachel Maddow show, is intended as a lens through which to see GOP misinformation campaigns that were, and are, intended to convince people they do not remember the events Republicans would prefer they forget.

For as long as historical records have existed, authoritarian regimes have tried to rewrite history to suit their purposes, using their dictatorial powers to create myths, spread propaganda, justify decisions, erase opponents, and even dispose of crimes.

As the Republican Party becomes increasingly radicalized, the GOP is putting their own twist on a similarly despotic script. Indeed, the party is taking dangerous, aggressive steps to rewrite history—and not just from generations past.

Unable to put a positive spin on Trump-era scandals and fiascos, GOP voices and their allies have grown determined to rewrite the stories of the last few years—from the 2020 election results and the insurrection of January 6^th to their own legislative record. 

Extraordinarily timely and undeniably important, Steve Benen’s new book tells the staggering chronicle of the Republican party’s unsettling attempts at historical revisionism. It reveals not only how dependent they have grown on the tactic, but also how dangerous the consequences are if we allow them to continue. The stakes, Benen argues, couldn’t be higher: the future of democracy hinges on both our accurate understanding of events and the end of alternative narratives that challenge reality.

My Notes:

Pg. 7:  As 2023 neared its end, national public-opinion surveys found that a majority of Republican voters believed that Trump made no effort to overturn the 2020 election; Trump did not keep classified documents at Mar-a-Lago; the January 6 attack on the Capitol did not deserve to be seen as an insurrectionist riot; and the January 6 assault was not perpetrated by those intent on keeping Trump in power.

Pg. 16:  The day before Election Day 2020, Trump signed an executive order establishing the 1776 Commission:  He explained the initiative would help “clear away the twisted web of lies in our schools and classrooms,” adding that versions of history at odds with conservatives’ values constituted “a form of child abuse.”

Pg. 21:  When Orwell wrote 1984 just after WWII the hero of his novel, Winston Smith, worked for the ruling party’s propaganda arm.  It was called the Ministry of Truth (the title of this book), and it was responsible for, among other things, rewriting history.  Smith was told to embrace the notion that “the past was alterable.”  Today’s Republicans have embraced this notion.

Pg. 62:  In November 2020, after Biden’s election, a national poll found that 60 percent of Americans overall saw Biden as the legitimate victor, but 70 percent of Republican voters—and 77 percent of Trump voters—believed the opposite. It was felt that as time went by, these results would moderate.  Yet, in the summer of 2023, similar results were found. More than one thousand days after Trump’s defeat, more than two-thirds of Republicans were still more inclined to believe the rewritten story than the truth.  (In August 2020 NPR conducted a poll and found 87 percent of Republican voters said they approved of Trump’s handling of the pandemic.  Pg. 153)

Pg. 93:  On September 5, 2019, the Washington Post revealed that Trump had delayed US military support for Ukraine as part of an attempt to force Zelensky to “intervene in the 2020 US presidential election by launching an investigation of Joe Biden.”  What the Post’s editors described was, for all intents and purposes, an organized crime shakedown, launched by the sitting president of the US.  The Trump administration was slow-walking $250 million in military assistance already approved by Congress.

Pg. 115f:  From the Alien and Sedition Acts of the eighteen century to the Chinese Exclusion Act of the nineteenth century to Eisenhower’s “Operation Wetback” in the twentieth century, efforts to target immigrants and their communities have routinely fallen far short of the Nation’s ideals.  (at least those ideals on the Statue of Liberty; also, the 1924 Act belongs on this list).  In the twenty-first century,  Trump’s border-wall crusade became the latest installment in this crusade.  A wall of 47 miles that taxpayers paid for; Mexico refused to pay, but Trump said they did. (Trump did repair over 400 miles of the pre-existing wall).

Pg. 138:  In April 2020, Trump halted US financial support for the World Health Organization, during the pandemic, for reasons he struggled to explain.  In July 2020, Trump encouraged the public not to trust the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).  In September 2020, he publicly scolded his CDC director for sharing accurate information on COVID with the public.

Pg. 153:  Ahead of Election Day 2020, a majority of Republicans nationwide said they trusted Trump more than CDC scientists for accurate information about the coronavirus.  As a political matter, Republicans convinced themselves that Trump and his allies' failures were actually triumphs, creating an accountability-free dynamic in the wake of a tragic US response to the century’s most dramatic public health crisis.

Pg. 163:  Excluding the devasting losses caused by the pandemic, the US economy created roughly 6.4 million jobs during the first three years of Trump’s presidency.  That’s not a bad number but in Obama’s final three years, the economy created just over 8 million jobs. Also, GDP growth under Clinton and Reagan was far more robust than Trump’s 2.5 and 3 percent during the pre-pandemic years.

Pg. 169:  When Trump passed the poorly named Tax Cuts and Jobs Act, a great many corporate giants, instead of hiring more workers or making new investments, simply used their windfalls for stock buybacks.

Pg. 173:  As part of their tax package from 2017, Republicans cut the corporate tax rate from 35 to 21 percent.  Planning to return to power in 2025, they are eyeing a 15 percent threshold.