We are overreacting to the fake new phenomena. Let me be clear, I think fake news is a problem. I also think it’s symptomatic of a larger problem Democrats have coping with an online campaign cycle that is 24-7/365 days a year. Here’s a google search for Democrat Memes.
Notice something, they are almost all anti-Democrat. Even the first meme under the Pro-Democrat header is actually anti-Democrat. And this is what people are getting in their Facebook and twitter feeds, ten or twenty images a day.
Fake news is a big deal, because it is something our leaders can understand. Fake news is understandable under the old rules of politics. Something created a bunch of fake news stories and they caused Democrats to lose. You don’t have to have a deep knowledge of the digital world to understand that.
The truth is that our leadership is, in many case, out of touch seventy or eighty year olds that still sees TV advertising as the main way to run a campaign. We simply do not, currently, have the infrastructure to respond to the digital cycle. Right now, at this very minute, the 2018 election is being lost. Voters are being barraged by right wing propaganda and the Democratic Party has NO RESPONSE. If we keep doing this, we are going to continue to lose. Fake news is party of the weakness in Democrats online strategy, but the problems go much deeper than that.