Brendan Ahern on the false China narrative

In general, Western media is a source of disinformation.  It’s not a good source for what’s going on [in China]…  Business people and investors have been getting along just fine and the diplomats from both sides have not.  I think the media plays with what DC wants.

~ Brendan Ahern, "Don't Believe the China Boogeyman Narrative," Stansberry Investor Hour, October 7, 2024

George Kennan on the false "good vs. evil" narrative

In this day of another great political-emotional preoccupation, when the image of the Soviet Union leaders has replaced that of Hitler in so many Western minds as the center and source of all possible evil, it is perhaps particularly desirable that we should remember these things.  Let us not repeat the mistake of believing that either good or evil is total.  Let us beware, in future, of wholly condemning an entire people and wholly exculpating others.  Let us remember that the great moral issues, on which civilization is going to stand or fall, cut across all military and indeological borders, across peoples, classes, and regimes - across, in fact, the make-up of the human individual himself.  No other people, as a whole, is entirely our enemy.  No people at all - not even ourselves - is entirely our friend.

~ George Kennan, Russia and the West Under Lenin and Stalin, Chapter 23: "Russia and the West as Allies," p. 369

1961

Tom Woods on the changing Covid narrative

Maybe you've noticed the same phenomenon I have.  There's a sudden and distinct ratcheting down of the COVID hysteria in some quarters.  My old friend Steve Deace, the radio host, even compiled a bunch of them. 

For example: 

NPR headline the day before the inauguration: 

"As Death Rate Accelerates, U.S. Records 400,000 Lives Lost to the Coronavirus" 

NPR headline the day after the inauguration: 

"Current, Deadly U.S. Coronavirus Surge Has Peaked, Experts Say" 

Then, too: 

The governor of Kansas lowered the PCR testing threshold (it's still too high, but that's a step in the right direction). 

Washington, D.C., is reopening bars and restaurants, and Massachusetts is easing restrictions. 

In Chicago, the mayor is calling for bars and restaurants to reopen as soon as possible, and unionized teachers are being punished for not returning to in-person instruction. 

The so-called Republican governor of Maryland is suddenly demanding the return of in-person schooling, arguing that there is absolutely no scientific justification for any further delay. 

I've already written to you about the governor of New York urging that the state must reopen or "nothing left to open." 

And then the World Health Organization issued a document, one hour after Biden was sworn in, explaining that PCR cycle thresholds were too high, and our obsession with asymptomatics too great. 

Now look: this could all just be an amazing coincidence.  I do not rule that out.  I am saying only that it's interesting.  Because it is, isn't it?

~ Tom Woods, January 22, 2021

Bretigne Shaffer on official narratives

Some very powerful and very deep narratives have been crafted and fed to us over generations.  What are those narratives?  Primarily, that freedom is dangerous and that the state is a benign entity that acts for the good of “the people”, and that we, “the people,” control it. 

This narrative is deadly.

~ Bretigne Shaffer, "Letter to My Grandchildren from Inside a Cult," LewRockwell.com, November 18, 2020

Jason Riley on the penalty for disagreeing with the racism narrative

Many whites fear being called racists. And many black leaders have a vested interest in blaming black problems primarily on white racism, so that is the narrative they push regardless of the reality. Racism has become an all-purpose explanation for bad black outcomes, be they social or economic. If you disagree and are white, you're a bigot. If you disagree and are black, you're a sell-out. 

~ Jason L. Riley, from a speech given at Hillsdale College's Allan P. Kirby, Jr. Center for Constitutional Studies and Citizenship in Washington, DC as part of the AWC Family Foundation Lecture Series, January 31, 2015

Jason Riley on the race industry in America

We're not post-racial, but I'd argue that the Left has no interest in being post-racial. They claim they want to be post-racial, but they really don't. They want to keep race front and center in our national conversations, because it serves their agenda that racism is the all-purpose explanation for what ails black America. There are a lot of people making a lot of money on that narrative, and they want to keep it out there. There are political parties who gain and keep political power with that narrative out there, and they want to keep talking about it.

~ Jason Riley, "Black Americans Failed by Good Intentions: An Interview with Jason Riley," 17:22 mark, Reason TV, September 3, 2014

Vasko Kohlmayer on the false narrative of Western oppression of minorities

Here is another politically correct lie: In Western democracies minorities are oppressed. To every reasonable person the falsity of this is immediately evident. Rather than being oppressed, racial minorities in the United States and most western countries enjoy more protections and privileges than the majority. This is exactly the reason why minorities from non-western societies are so eager to come and live in western societies. So much so that we have to expand considerable efforts and resources to keep them out for fear of being overrun. Conversely, we do not see minorities living in Western democracies running away from their oppression to live in those wonderful non-Western cultures and societies of which multiculturalists are so fond. Why do you think this is? The reality of the situation and the behavior of people themselves completely disprove the official PC narrative. Any intimations of the obvious, however, immediately draws the ire of the politically correct organs and can result in prompt cancellation.

~ Vasko Kohlmayer, "The Aim of Social Justice Movement is Subversion of Core Western Values," LewRockwell.com, August 31, 2020

Samuel Mitcham on when "all about slavery" became the official narrative of the Civil War

From the 1870s to the late 1950s, there was an unofficial truce between the North and South.  Each side recognized and saluted the courage of the other; it was conceded that the North fought to preserve the Union and because Old Glory had been fired on, and the Southerner fought for liberty and to defend his home; the two great heroes of the war were Abraham Lincoln and Robert E. Lee; and the South admitted that slavery was wrong but never conceded that it was cruel.

Around 1960, the Democratic Party—led by Lyndon B. Johnson—advanced the modern incarnation of identity politics.  It worked very well for them.  In the election of 1956, 75% of African-Americans voted Republican.  By 1964, more than 90% of them voted Democrat, and they have been doing so until 2020.  As part of their effort to control and manipulate the black vote, the Leftists and their myrmidons advanced the myth that the Civil War was all about slavery.  It wasn’t.  It was, in my opinion, about money, more than anything else.

~ Samuel W. Mitcham, Jr., "Why the Civil War Wasn't About Slavery," LewRockwell.com, July 15, 2020

Karen DeCoster Campbell on media coverage of Michigan lake party

This is all over the news in Michigan ["Millions view video of massive Michigan lake party causing concern about Covid spread"]

Now, if you truly accept the Covid Narrative (if you can follow the moving goalposts), what is missing from being all over the news is the "concern" regarding all of the riots, looting, and protests. But every single time someone enjoys their *normal* life and goes to the beach, hangs with friends, goes to the bar, or goes out to eat, they invoke the "concerns" of the tyrant politicians, the liars in the media machine, the proletariat mask warriors, and the medical politburo.

And of course, some sinister silhouetted photo is used that makes a beach gathering look like an all-out orgy.

~ Karen DeCoster Campbell, Facebook post, July 9, 2020

Vasko Kohlmayer on the twilight zone of official narratives in the Soviet Union

The narrative of the twilight zone of my youth went roughly as follows: Socialism was the greatest socio-economic system ever devised while capitalism was very, very bad. The Soviet Union was a paradisiacal land of freedom, opportunity, prosperity and happiness. The United States, on the other hand, was a country of exploitation and oppression where most people were bound, destitute and miserable. This official narrative was constantly and relentlessly promulgated from every quarter of our twilight zone: television, radio, textbooks, arts, newspapers, magazines, etc. Needless to say, the narrative ran in complete contravention of reality. The actual truth was that socialism was no good. On the other hand, most people in the United States were free, quite prosperous and reasonably happy while the Soviet Union was pretty much an all-around hellhole.

Those who attempted to point out the truth or question the authorized storyline were promptly silenced, suppressed and punished. As a result of the swift and efficient censorship the false narrative prevailed and took a deep hold on the societal mind. And because it served as the paradigm for reality, it distorted and turned upside down almost every aspect of life: the good was bad and bad was good; white was black and black was white. The values and ethics in the twilight zone became inverted.

~ Vasko Kohlmayer, "Twilight Zone USA," LewRockwell.com, June 19, 2020