“Drones and the Cost of Lost Trust” published Dec. 15, 2024 at 5:15 pm ET.
The summary of this Wall Street Journal opinion from the Editorial Board reads: “Conspiracy theories fly and public anger builds when Americans don’t believe their government.”
Somewhat predictably, WSJ says this distrust blooms from the compost generated by the Chinese spy balloon debacle, something about poor communication during migrant relocation, the so-called cover-up of President Biden’s fitness and stamina ahead of the June debate, and all the supposed ‘lies’ told by well-meaning public health officers in the Covid pandemic. As if the pandemic did not begin spreading during the first Trump administration. The WSJ narrative is that it’s always the Democrats and the Elites that have lost the trust of American Voters through a particularly arrogant form of gaslighting. Come on. “There was a Chinese spy balloon last year, so those lights must be aliens?”
No. Conservative talk radio has spent my entire life telling us that we cannot trust the government to do anything. Donald Trump famously lies every day. The people quoted as advancing conspiracy theories about drones are literally sitting Republican politicians. And to top it off, The president-elect theorized that the government was covering things up in a press conference less than 24 hours after this editorial was published.
Republicans swim in a river of conspiracy and grievance churned up by right-wing media. Don’t blame Democrats as if Barack Obama personally shoved them in.