Fake Politics
How Corporate and Government Groups Create and Maintain a Monopoly on Truth
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Narrated by:
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Brian Sutherland
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By:
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Jason Bisnoff
About this listen
In “grassroots” campaigns, the grass isn’t always green - or natural.
In today’s chaotic world, where the multiplication of information sources creates competing narratives, credibility is the key to winning the war of ideas. This is the reason why governments and corporations resort to astroturfing - creation of ostensibly grassroots movements set up to advance political agendas and commercial campaigns. The democratization of information and polarization of politics offer a perfect storm.
Fake Politics tells the stories of how this practice has transformed political activism into a veiled lobbying effort by the rich and the powerful. Through a series of vignettes involving the tea party, oil industry, big tobacco, big data, and news media, this book will explore the similarities and differences between various campaigns that appeared as grassroots, but in reality, were lobbying efforts fueled by governments, corporations, major industries, and religious institutions.
The process, named for the artificial grass fields at football stadiums and high schools across the country, became so prevalent in the last two decades that it now sits at a tipping point. In the era of “fake news” and “alternative facts”, with the truth well on its way to becoming indistinguishable from fabrication, what can the past of astroturfing tell us about the future of grassroots activism?
©2019 Jason Bisnoff (P)2019 Audible, Inc.Listeners also enjoyed...
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Story
America is under attack. Its institutions and values are under daily assault. But the principal culprits are not foreign terrorists. They are influential and powerful Americans secretly stirring up disunion and disloyalty in the shifting shadows of the Democratic Party. Radical infiltrators have been quietly transforming America's societal, cultural, and political institutions for more than a generation. Now, backed by George Soros, they are ready to make their move.
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Best introduction to the Democrat party in 2019
- By Larry on 06-12-19
By: David Horowitz, and others
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The Impostors
- How Republicans Quit Governing and Seized American Politics
- By: Steve Benen
- Narrated by: Ron Butler
- Length: 11 hrs and 4 mins
- Unabridged
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The award-winning producer of The Rachel Maddow Show exposes the Republican Party as a gang of impostors, meticulously documenting how they have abandoned their duty to govern and are gravely endangering America.
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Three Card Monte Politics
- By J.B. on 06-19-20
By: Steve Benen
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Election Meltdown
- Dirty Tricks, Distrust, and the Threat to American Democracy
- By: Richard L. Hasen
- Narrated by: Tim Paige
- Length: 3 hrs and 57 mins
- Unabridged
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As the 2020 presidential campaign begins to take shape, there is widespread distrust of the fairness and accuracy of American elections. In this timely and accessible book, Richard L. Hasen uses riveting stories illustrating four factors increasing the mistrust. Voter suppression has escalated as a Republican tool aimed to depress turnout of likely Democratic voters, fueling suspicion. Pockets of incompetence in election administration, often in large cities controlled by Democrats, have created an opening to claims of unfairness.
By: Richard L. Hasen
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The Best Worst President
- What the Right Gets Wrong About Barack Obama
- By: Mark Hannah
- Narrated by: Kaleo Griffith
- Length: 7 hrs and 56 mins
- Unabridged
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Political analyst and Democratic campaign veteran Mark Hannah gives Barack Obama the victory lap he deserves in this compendium that takes the president's critics head-on and celebrates the president's many underappreciated triumphs.
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Thought-provoking
- By Jean on 07-11-16
By: Mark Hannah
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The Party Is Over
- How Republicans Went Crazy, Democrats Became Useless, and the Middle Class Got Shafted
- By: Mike Lofgren
- Narrated by: Mel Foster
- Length: 7 hrs and 49 mins
- Unabridged
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There was a time, not so very long ago, when perfectly rational people ran the Republican Party. So how did the party of Lincoln become the party of lunatics? That is what this book aims to answer. Fear not, the Dems come in for their share of tough talk - they are zombies, a party of the living dead. Mike Lofgren came to Washington in the early eighties - those halcyon, post-Nixonian glory days - for what he imagined would be a short stint on Capitol Hill.
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A Great Analysis
- By Dan D on 09-04-12
By: Mike Lofgren
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The Center Holds
- Obama and His Enemies
- By: Jonathan Alter
- Narrated by: Jonathan Alter
- Length: 18 hrs and 41 mins
- Unabridged
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In The Center Holds: Obama and His Enemies, Jonathan Alter uses his unmatched access and deep knowledge of politics and history to produce the first full account of America at the crossroads. He pierces the bubble of the White House and of the presidential campaigns with exclusive reporting and rare historical insight. More than a campaign book, this is the epic story of an embattled president facing a historic moment he considered more pivotal than 2008.
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The Best Telling of the 2012 Campaign So Far
- By Mike on 06-11-13
By: Jonathan Alter
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We Should Have Seen It Coming
- From Reagan to Trump - A Front-Row Seat to a Political Revolution
- By: Gerald F. Seib
- Narrated by: Jason Culp
- Length: 9 hrs and 52 mins
- Unabridged
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The executive Washington editor of The Wall Street Journal chronicles the astonishing rise, climax, and decline of the conservative movement, from the election of Ronald Reagan to the Republican Party's takeover by Donald Trump - with a new introduction covering the 2020 election and the future of the GOP.
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Brilliant!!!
- By Amazon Customer on 11-04-20
By: Gerald F. Seib
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Donald J. Trump
- A President like No Other
- By: Conrad Black, Victor Davis Hanson - foreword
- Narrated by: Tom Parks
- Length: 8 hrs and 12 mins
- Unabridged
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Conrad Black, bestselling author of Franklin Delano Roosevelt: Champion of Freedom and Richard M. Nixon: A Life in Full, turns his attention to his "friend" President Donald J. Trump and provides the most intriguing and significant analysis yet of Trump's political rise. Ambitious in intellectual scope, contrarian in many of its opinions, and admirably concise, this is surely set to be one of the most provocative political books you are likely to listen to this year.
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45th President of the United States of America
- By JEYCEE on 05-16-18
By: Conrad Black, and others
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We've Got People
- From Jesse Jackson to AOC, the End of Big Money and the Rise of a Movement
- By: Ryan Grim
- Narrated by: Sean W. Stewart
- Length: 16 hrs and 57 mins
- Unabridged
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Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez may seem like she came from nowhere, but the movement that propelled her to office - and to global political stardom - has been building for 30 years...With the party and the nation at a crossroads, this timely and original audiobook offers new insight into how we’ve gotten where we are - and where we're headed.
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Excellent and illuminating, despite tech "issue"
- By DanoB on 08-25-19
By: Ryan Grim
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The Making of the President 2016
- How Donald Trump Orchestrated a Revolution
- By: Roger Stone
- Narrated by: BJ Pottsworth
- Length: 14 hrs and 51 mins
- Unabridged
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In the early hours of November 9, 2016, one of the most contentious, polarizing, and vicious presidential races came to an abrupt and unexpected end when heavily favored presidential hopeful Hillary Clinton called Donald J. Trump to concede, shocking a nation that had, only hours before, given little credence to his chances. Donald Trump pulled the greatest upset in American political history despite a torrent of invective and dismissal of the mainstream media.
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behind the scenes
- By Rocker on 04-06-17
By: Roger Stone
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The Deep State
- The Fall of the Constitution and the Rise of a Shadow Government
- By: Mike Lofgren
- Narrated by: Brian O'Neill
- Length: 10 hrs and 18 mins
- Unabridged
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Mike Lofgren is back with a book perfectly pitched for the frenzied circus of the primaries. His argument this time is that for all of the backstabbing and money grubbing of the campaign season, the politicians we elect have as little ability to shift policy as Communist party apparatchiks. Welcome to Mike Lofgren's Washington, DC - a This Town where the political theater that is endlessly tweeted and blogged about has nothing to do with actual decision making.
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Almost good, but profoundly misunderstands economics and very biased towards Democrats
- By Nina Prevot on 04-08-16
By: Mike Lofgren
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935 Lies
- The Future of Truth and the Decline of America’s Moral Integrity
- By: Charles Lewis
- Narrated by: Don Lee
- Length: 8 hrs and 59 mins
- Unabridged
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Facts are and must be the coin of the realm in a democracy. Unfortunately, for citizens in the United States and throughout the world, distinguishing between fact and fiction - always a formidable challenge - is now more difficult than ever, as a constant stream of questionable information pours into media outlets. Lewis argues forcefully that while data points and factoids abound, it is much harder to get to the whole truth of complex issues in time for that truth to guide citizens, voters, and decision makers.
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This Is the Book We All Should Read
- By Chris Reich on 07-09-14
By: Charles Lewis
What listeners say about Fake Politics
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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- steve finkelstein
- 07-08-22
Book is good, narrator is B.O.R.I.N.G.
The narrator is awful. That being said, I don’t know how you can make the text of this book more interesting. Maybe get Stefan Rudnicki to do foreign voices.
The contents of this book are well known and very factual. The fact that some of the reviewers dislike the bias is the result of Republicans cheating and lying to get elected. Plain and simple. If they offered an agenda for the American people, then they might get elected based on merit. But they don’t. They use fake outrage and astroturfing to deny the American people the rights and freedoms they desire. The one star reviews that appear for this book have probably written by people who didn’t even read the book. In fact, they might have been paid to write a bad review. So, in the end, they are astroturfing a book about astroturfing. Ironic?!
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1 person found this helpful
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Overall
- mkaties
- 07-15-21
Half of a Book
This book covered the interesting topic of "astroturfing", a term I am fairly certain the author made up, but what it means is basically corporations using social media (including bots or multiple accounts) to promote political agendas via social media. While there is no doubt that the cases in the book occurred to pretend that only corporations with a right wing agenda partake in this activity is exceptionally myopic. often the biggest corporations are fans of the biggest government and we regularly see corps exploiting social issues to curry favor with left wing candidates (no doubt more than the cases in this book). The author choosing to only look at half of the picture makes this book incomplete and come off as mostly ignorant, although I can at least say I took away a new piece of terminology from it.
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3 people found this helpful
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- Dan
- 10-06-21
reader is very bland, book is one sided
reader is bland,
topics are only one sided, so the sense of irony is strong. makes me want to research the authors background. but if you're just interested in how astroturfing is done... it's a tolerable book.
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2 people found this helpful
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- Anonymous User
- 05-11-22
your apolitical bias is showing.
listened to the entire thing. this writers claims of facts have been proven false months after this book was written. seems to me he counted his eggs a bit too soon. I'm not even on the right of politics and it's obvious.
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- Kristin Mainprize
- 10-08-21
Now do the Left and the democrats.
I was hopeful for a book that would expose the issues of money in politics and money used to sway public thought across the spectrum. Unfortunately the author only focused on one side of the political spectrum. So this book is more a partisan hit piece than an exposure of corruption. Left wingers will love this book, right wingers will probably turn it off, centrists will learn mainly about the authors own political biases. The author apparently believes only people on the right side of the aisle are corrupt or use PR campaigns to sway public thought, and that all left wing movements are noble grassroots campaigns with 0 money invested n them. Both sides are guilty of this kind of stuff.
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4 people found this helpful