The Fortnightly Club of Redlands, California
Meeting No. 1915, January 4, 2018
The Big Lie
Propaganda and Fake News over the Decades
By
Richard A. Jones
INTRODUCTION:
Now is a difficult time for ethical journalists, a major transition time for all media. This paper begins with an introduction which I believe necessary mainly because of what has happened in our society since I originally considered propaganda and fake news as a topic prior to our 2016 national elections. Many articles books and other materials have pursued this topic over the past several years, accelerated by the 2016 presidential elections. As a matter of fact, I found more that 700 references to this topic most written recently. I have not reviewed any significant portion of those 700 references only a select few so that my bibliography reflects but a dozen or so, and frankly I’m mildly exhausted from just those.
The three certainties of life are death, taxes, and change. It is rapid change in technology introducing social media, cell phone capability expanding rapidly today that open wider the door for people to be more readily guided and or misguided with less analysis than in prior decades. The influence of propaganda and fake news and their ability to guide human behavior has increased. As we examine the history of propaganda, our understanding can be enhanced by considering the efforts of Adolph Hitler and his minister of propaganda Dr. Joseph Goebbels. Thus they will be referenced in this paper as will be Hitler’s book Mein Kampf (my struggles, my battles) which, among other topics, summarized his assessment of human nature and how best to utilize the masses in gaining power. So there will be some historical review.
It is my purpose in this paper to suggest how social media and the very nature of human beings make people increasingly susceptible to persuasion by propaganda, and, indeed, fake news. Not all propaganda is fake news and not all fake news is propaganda, but some propaganda can be fake news and some fake news can be propaganda as in concentric circles with overlapping space. In this paper, I shall be presenting a rather profound problem, but comprehensive solutions are not presented, if they exist at all.
THE BIG LIE: Propaganda and Fake News over the Decades
by
Richard A. Jones
Welcome to 2018 and its alternate realities, fake news, open lies, alt-right, alt-left, artificial intelligence, propaganda, algorithms that ferret out much personal information about you. This is but the beginning of a time now called the post- fact and post-truth era. Of course, logically, if this is the post-truth era then it must have been preceded by a truth era.
Well not quite, but the truth is that, on average, older generations of the general public (including most everyone here) did and do have a longer attention span than do younger generations today.. There are advantages and disadvantages to both. Some scientists today conjecture that we may be in a time when different people of different ages have different brains. (2)
Among the prime hijackers of attention spans are smart phones and tweets. The brain starts learning how to switch rapidly from one task to another to another which develops a habit in conflict with focused attention. As a result, the millennial generation has little tolerance for boredom. In the immediate future the ability to perform so –called deep work will become an important job skill and few will qualify. (2 ) Older folks spent much of their lives without the level of intense constant distraction current in today’s world.
One TV show that is highly popular with younger millennials is: “This Is Us” (The name is, of course, a profane rape of the English Language—the inverted sentence order commits two deadly sins, a subject-verb agreement error and a pronoun case error. Grammatically stated, it would be titled “We are it”).
In “This Is Us” the scenes constantly change every few minutes with flashbacks 20 years and less, constantly changing, meeting the expectation of the short attention span. The point is that the short attention span subjects people to rapid emotional response without analysis when receiving brief communications such as tweets. This essentially makes people more susceptible to persuasion by propaganda and fake news, more influenced by emotion than by reason.
Couple that with an alarming truth: Emotions and biases rule because “Facts seldom prevail over the fiction of perceptions.” (8)
We live in a propaganda age. Public opinion primarily results from a response to propaganda stimuli rather than the result of analysis and shared experience. In a sense, every articulate person with a purpose is a propagandist because it is simply a method for influencing the behavior of others in an environment of competing propagandas. The word propaganda is used here in a broad, generic sense which includes advertising and any effort to sell a point of view via governments, corporations, religions, service organizations, or individuals. In fact, in its earliest uses, it was an accepted sales or persuasion technique. Roman Catholics established a propaganda committee of cardinals in 1622 under Pope Gregory XV. In 1760, Pope Urban VIII established the college of propaganda for, of course, the purpose
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of propagation—increasing the number of its church members. It is a method or device for conditioning behavior; it is salesmanship. (12)
If there is a right or wrong in propaganda (or any persuasive technique), it is to be found in the relation between means and ends, methods and purposes, and not in the propaganda itself. (7) Although much propaganda, including advertising, may be true but selectively chosen as a part of the whole, Fake news is just that—untrue. Unlike propaganda which in itself is neither good nor evil, fake news is inherently evil. “In other words, fake new is like a weaponized infectious agent. Immunization through education can help, but it might not be a comprehensive defense.” (1) Today, amazingly enough some fake news disseminators have found advertisers who will pay to place their ads alongside fake news. One purveyor reports making as much as $30,000 a month from the ads he runs on the web with his fake news.
For example, a classic case of emotions and biases ruling an individual’s behavior is one which historically has some impact on all of us here today. It relates to the relationship between Germany’s Adolph Hitler and Russia’s Joseph Stalin.
Both were poster boys for villain of the 20th Century. The 16th Century French philosopher Nostradamus, gifted with the power of predicting future events prophesied that there would rise from Europe in the early 20th Century an Anti-Christ, a dictator, responsible for the death of millions of people to change the course of history. (6) Both Hitler and Stalin vie for that title. It is difficult to determine which one of them was responsible for the most millions of deaths. Hitler focused greatly on one group whereas Stalin swept assassination broadly across all classes including his senior military officers and this latter action cost Russia dearly when Germany invaded because he suffered the absence of a well-trained military cadre. (6)
Stalin’s behavior prior to the Nazi invasion of Russia emphasizes how selective people are in hearing what they want to hear, picking up what reinforces their biases regardless of the facts. Remember “Facts seldom prevail over the fiction of perception.”(8 ) And that is a fact. In other words, people are primarily driven by emotions, feelings, not concrete information or critical analysis.
That is when Hitler’s propaganda machine led by propaganda minister Dr. Joseph Goebbels proved its worth—delivering the most effective lie because it was what Stalin wanted to believe. Although Stalin’s military commanders told him otherwise, Stalin continued to believe the German propaganda that their buildup on the border was a bluff that might possibly be used to negotiate a long term “lease” of the Ukraine. Even his long-time loyalist Kliment Voroshilov yelled at him. Finally, though too late, his top military commanders, Timoshenko and Zhukov providing testimony from German defectors convinced Stalin to order his troops to battle stations on June 21, 1941, the eve of the German invasion. Too late, German saboteurs had crossed the lines and cut off communications. Stalin’s officers did not get the order; the Soviet air force was destroyed on the ground; most of the Soviet army was killed or captured, many in their sleep. Nazi forces took most of Ukraine, laid siege to Leningrad and approached Moscow. As history reports, it was not the brilliance of Soviet military forces that stalled Hitler, rather they were aided greatly by the fierce winters which followed. (4)
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Stalin’s failure to be analytical and open to facts presents one major example of what happens on a lesser scale daily to people world-wide who are imprisoned by their own biases, emotions, and limited –
perceptions. This plus limited attention spans today increase human susceptibility to persuasive communications—propaganda and fake news.
In this historic case, Hitler’s deceit was a classic example. The importance of deceit is explained in one of the basic principles written some 2,500 years ago in China in Sun Tzu’s The Art of War. His little booklet is required reading in many military schools and academies to this day. He wrote—-“All warfare is based on deception. Hence, when able to attack, we must seem unable; when using our force, we must seem inactive; when we are near, we must make the enemy believe we are far away; when we are far away, we must make him believe we are near. …If your opponent is of choleric temper, seek to irritate him. Pretend to be weak, that he may grow arrogant. “ Sun Tzu presents some two dozen principles including the importance of logistics. For the propagandist there is much to be learned and to be copied on how to publicize that which might deceive one’s opponent as suggested by Sun Tzu. (11)
I cannot resist sharing one other point emphasized by Sun Tzu and apparently missing among some leaders today–ethics. So common in the corporate world today is the so-called “tyranny of the bottom line,” “ it is just business,” or the end justifies the means—these would have been unthinkable values to Sun Tzu. He wrote, “If leaders do not maintain virtue, if they sink into negligence and evil, heaven will bestow its sanctions upon another group of leaders. …it is virtue alone that entitles a ruler to rule, and when he sets aside virtue he sets aside the right to call himself a sovereign.” (11)
In stark contrast to Sun Tzu’s point, I quote from a recent article in the Economist: “…politicians always lied; does it matter if they leave the truth behind entirely? Dishonesty in politics is nothing new, but the manner in which some politicians now lie, and the havoc they wreak by doing so are annoying.” (3)
Hitler’s book Mein Kampf written while he was imprisoned in 1924 is in a sense his playbook. It summarizes his assessment of human nature and how best to utilize the masses in gaining power.
In addressing the importance of the media, mostly the press (and radio) in 1924, Hitler wrote that the public can be classified into three groups: (1) Those who believe everything they read (hear and see) (2) Those who no longer believe anything, and (3) those who critically examine what they read
Hear and see and form their judgments accordingly. “Numerically the first group is by far the strongest composed of the broad masses of the people. Intellectually it forms the simplest portion of the nation. ..(it includes) those who have not been born to think for themselves or have not learned to do so and who, partly through incompetence and …ignorance, believe everything they read (and hear).(249) The second group (who believe nothing) is much smaller and is useless… The third group is easily the smallest being composed of real intellectuals whom natural aptitude and education have taught to think for themselves and who in all things try to form their own judgments. (The value of the third group)..lies in their intelligence and not in their numerical strength, an unhappy state of affairs in a period where wisdom counts for nothing and majorities for everything. …the decision lies in the hands of the numerically strongest group; that is to say the first group the crowd of simpletons and the credulous.” (6)
Thus it was that Hitler designed his campaigns to appeal to the first group—the masses—utilizing the big lie, appealing to their fears and emotions, telling them what they wanted to hear.
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There follows an excerpt from a psychological profile written of Hitler prior to our entry into World War II prepared by the U.S. Office of Strategic Services. “Hitler’s primary rules include: never allow the public to cool off; never admit a fault or wrong; never concede that there may be some good in your enemy; never leave room for alternatives; never accept blame; concentrate on one enemy at a time and blame him for everything that goes wrong; people will believe a big lie sooner than a little one; and when you repeat it enough people will sooner or later believe it.” (13)
Dr. Goebbels had to cope with many of Hitler’s idiosyncracies. One of which was Hitler’s leadership style of giving contradictory orders to his subordinates—keeping them uncertain was a method for maximizing his own power.
Hitler’s legacy to us if nothing else is the big lie. In James Murphy’s translation of Mein Kampf Hitler wrote, “…in the big lie there is always a certain force of credibility; because the broad masses of a nation are always more easily corrupted in the deeper strata of their emotional nature than consciously or voluntarily; and thus in the primitive simplicity of their minds they more readily fall victim to the big lie than to the small lie, since they themselves often tell small lies in little matters but would be ashamed to resort to large-scale falsehoods. It would never come into their heads to fabricate colossal untruths, and they would not believe that others could have the impudence to distort the truth so infamously. Even though the facts which prove this to be so may be brought clearly to their minds, they will still doubt and waver and will continue to think that there may be some other explanation. For the grossly impudent lie always leaves traces behind it, even after it has been nailed down, a fact which is known to all expert liars in this world and to all who conspire together in the art of lying.” (James Murphy translation) (6)
Consider a modern example of the big lie told over and over and still believed by some, It was the report that President Obama was not born in the United States and thus failed to meet the Constitutional requirements to serve as president. It was something many opponents wanted to believe and something aligned with their emotions and biases.
As a matter of fact, the charge was libelous per se because it contained the three essential elements of libel/slander—Identification, dissemination, and defamation. However, the higher one goes in politics and as a public figure the more freedom others have to attack verbally. The laws of libel and the historic cases are quite complicated and interesting. If you are interested, come back to Fortnightly in 2020 because that could be my next paper topic. Yes, in 1953 I did take a course in the laws of libel and slander, but all my notes have long since disappeared, so you’ll get a fresh take in 2020.
There are many propaganda techniques, too many to review here. Examples of the most common techniques include but are not limited to the following seven.
1. Bandwagon—get with it; everyone who is anyone is doing it, buying it, etc.
2. Testimonial—recommendations from famous individuals or users
3. Glittering Generalities—words of praise for product or individual such as patriot, best
4. Name calling—trash talking about an individual or product such crook or loser
5. Plain folks—common man, appeals to regular people such as family, health, patriotism
6. Card stacking—manipulating data to show your point/product more favorably than others
7. Ad Hominem—to the man, attack the individual not the issue
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The art of propaganda, which includes advertising, is not so much about telling lies but rather about selecting truths you require and mixing them with generally accepted truths. But propangandists,
marketing executives, and political campaign managers are not miracle workers. To persuade people to accept your point of view or buy your product, you must give them a kernel of hope.
The importance of hope is well illustrated in a new book, The Influential Mind by Tali Sharot. One example presented is a study that found people are more likely to donate to a medical fundraiser with a photo of a young woman smiling in the sunlight rather than a picture of a person suffering in a hospital bed. It may be hard to imagine a happy ending for the person in the hospital bed. The smiling picture attempting to raise money for the same fund evokes hope. Remember those emotions; we need to go along with how the brain works. (9)
Brains are designed to transmit emotions quickly to one another. Sharot explains that is why tweeting is one of the most emotion arousing activities. It raises pulse rate, can make viewers sweat, and pupils enlarge appealing to the naïve or the masses. The brief tweet message bypasses our filter of reason and critical thinking and arouses emotions. Remember this applies particularly to the masses as defined by Hitler. Emotions are contagious; they are not private. Others around us absorb our emotions instantly and unconsciously. We tend to synchronize our emotions with those around us. This contagion of emotion becomes increasingly critical as attention spans diminish in today’s electronic world of short takes. (9)
Thus hope is the primary point to sell in persuasion as evidenced by such common daily exposures as churches, businesses, and politicians all of whom seek to influence people to join their ranks. How to communicate hope when little may truly exist was a task before Dr. Joseph Goebbels during the latter years of World War two. One of his useful principles was how to present bad news. Even public relations professionals today will advise you not to hide the bad but get it out up front so it will become old news in a few days. Dr. Goebbels’ practice was as follows: Assume you have three bad things to communicate and three good ones. Put all three bad events out immediately in the same story. Then spread out the three positive events each as a separate story over several days.
An example of one who did not put out the bad first and then ask for the public’s forgiveness is the Watergate case in which President Richard M. Nixon did not adhere to Dr. Goebbels’ advice or the wisdom of public relations people—do not cover-up. Cluster the bad and get it out up front and follow with a series of positives. Had President Nixon done this, it is conceivable that his resignation could have been avoided.
Hope you may recall was the major theme of President Obama’s message during his first campaign for the Presidency in 2008. All else being equal, people have a tendency to seek out information that brings them hope and avoid information which brings devastation. Such information affects what people believe and what they believe affects their well-being. (9)
Shalot points out that it does not matter how thorough your work is or how clearly you present it; if no one wants to believe what it says. Getting folks to listen means shifting the metaphorical calculator in their minds—the one that computes the value of information and motivates them to pay attention when it shows positive numbers. Remember, we need to go along with how the brain works. If what you want to communicate helps to make things better, clarify how that is so in order to induce
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hope, not dread. For example, if you are promoting (propagandizing) genetic screening for breast cancer, do not say it is to prevent death but rather that it is about assuring a healthy life. (9)
The propagandist must always be aware of the risks and possible advantage of mass hysteria. Because emotions and feelings are contagious, one person in a group, for example, coming down with symptoms of some illness may cause panic among others in the group suddenly feeling they are having the same illness which at the outset may have been nothing at all, but as it spreads the group’s panic encourages all to come down with the same “illness” making them ineffective at accomplishing whatever their original mission may have been.
If you can induce such a reaction among, say, enemy troops or factory workers you have succeeded with low cost sabotage.
The public lives by the law of approach and avoidance. People tend to approach what they think will do them good and avoid what they think will not. Once again, following Hitler’s principles as described earlier; get your message across clearly limiting choices. Too many choices and too many options confuse people and create inaction. (9)
At the outset, I reported that propaganda and fake news are like concentric circles with a substantial overlap. One major difference is that much propaganda, although perhaps selective and focused for a purpose is at its best when factual. Whereas fake news consists of deliberate misinformation or hoaxes spread by social media and/or conventional media. It is disseminated often with the intent of doing damage to organizations and individuals or company products and, of course, for political advantage. Some fake news may be motivated by simple meanness and the desire to shake some group or individual’s cage rather than to seek financial or political advantage. Also it is not always easy to differentiate fake news from parody or obvious satire. Short takes of fake news may arouse emotions without analysis just as tweets do. There are websites and many articles one can reach to gain instructions on how to recognize fake news.
The international Federation of Library Associations and Institutions has prepared a list of eight ways about how to recognize fake news: (13)
1. Consider the source, its mission and purposes.
2. Read beyond the headlines to understand the whole story.
3. Check authors to determine if they are real and credible.
4. Assess supporting sources to assure they support the claims.
5. Check the date of publication; someone may be claiming credit today for what happened long ago
6. Ask if it is a joke to determine if it is meant to be satire (surely you’re joking)
7. Review your own biases to see if they are affecting your judgment.
8. Ask experts to confirm from independent people with knowledge of the topic.
Fake news is nothing new over the panoply of history. In the latter part of the 19th Century the label “fake news” was in use but faded during the 20th Century and returns to greet us in the 21st Century. However, long before that–more than 2,000 years ago in the 13th Century B.C. Rameses the Great caused lies and propaganda to be circulated reporting his stunning victory for the Egyptians via carved
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scenes that were placed on the walls of the temples showing him smiting his foes—fake news. The battle was a stalemate not a victory as the treaty negotiated with the Hittites factually reflects.
Another historic example of fake news achieving its goals is when the emperor Octavian initiated a campaign of misinformation against Mark Antony. He published a document said to be Mark Antony’s will showing that upon his death Mark Antony wanted to be entombed in the mausoleum of the Egyptian Ptolemaic pharaohs. It caused outrage from the Romans. It is reported that Marc Antony committed suicide after his defeat at the battle of Actium upon hearing fake news. (13)
Jumping forward to the 19th Century, one example of fake news was the Great Moon Hoax of 1835 in which the New York Sun published articles about a well-known living astronomer and a fictional colleague who reportedly had observed life on the moon. The articles served their purpose of attracting new subscribers. The paper suffered minimally after admitting a month later that it was a piece of fiction, fake news.
In the late 19th Century Joseph Pulitzer and other yellow journalists goaded the United States into the Spanish-American War—helped by the 1898 explosion of the U.S. battleship Maine in Havana Harbor Cuba which the public assumed was caused by Spain. As we now know it was caused by an explosion of the ship’s own munitions. The battle cry, “Remember the Maine; to hell with Spain” was used frequently.
During the First World War fake news circulated from Britain reported horrible atrocities being committed by the German troops. After the war it became know that the stories were false—propaganda, fake news. During WWII, Dr. Goebbels referred to Britain’s earlier fake news as typical of British history of lies when he was denying any stories from Britain about the massacre of any Jews by the Nazis. (13)
A classic example of the impact of fake news was the dramatic radio broadcast in 1938 of Orson Welles science fiction War of the Worlds. The dramatization sounded like a news broadcast because it had no commercials. Many listeners panicked as they believed the earth was under attack by Martians.
However, it was during the 2016 election in the United States that fake news reached a high point. And with it came euphemisms. One example stems from the report on the size of the audience at President Trump’s inauguration. Then white house press secretary Sean Spicer claimed erroneously that attendance at the inauguration exceed any past ones. When this report came under attack, counselor to the president Kellyanne Conway gave us an euphemism to explain it, saying Spicer used alternative facts. (13)
Reference has been made to algorithms as computerized mathematical formulas used to gather data electronically for many purposes. Some may remember algorithms from their classes in advanced algebra as an algebraic formula intended to guide them to the best solution to a problem which may have several functional answers. In marketing the programs most commonly gather data electronically about individuals, their purchasing habits, interests, memberships, and biases. This information is used to target individuals and organizations in an effort to persuade them to buy certain products or support selected issues. It is often quite effective. This past May I went to a university graduation of one of my grandsons who was a marketing major who has learned to work with algorithm driven programs. By the way, he was pleased his old grandpa knew about it.
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A recent work of fiction delves into this in an entertaining and informative novel by Robert Harris, The Fear Factor. In support of the idea that emotions, not logic and reason, are our primary drivers, “The
Greek philosopher Epictetus recognized this two thousand years ago when he wrote: ”What disturbs and alarms man are not the things but his opinions and fancies about things.” Language unleashed the power of the imagination and with it came rumor, panic, fear. But algorithms don’t have an imagination. They don’t panic. And that’s why they’re so perfectly suited to trade on the financial markets.” (5)
During a board meeting of the fictional corporation, fear as a primary guide is under discussion: the board president speaking, “Fear is the strongest emotion in economics. Remember FDR in the Great Depression? It’s the most known quote in financial history: ‘The only thing we have to fear is fear itself.’ In fact, fear is probably the strongest human emotion…”
“Our conclusion is that fear is driving the world as never before. [a member questioned] Is that because of al-Qaeda and Issis? Only partly, but why should al-Qaeda arouse more fear than the threat of mutual assured destruction did during the Cold War in the fifties and sixties—which, incidentally, were times of great market growth and stability. Our conclusion is that digitalization itself is creating an epidemic of fear, and Epictetus had it right: we live in a world not of real things but of opinion and fantasy. The rise in market volatility…is a function of digitalization, which is exaggerating human mood swings by the unprecedented dissemination of information via the internet (facebook, etc.).” (5)
“And we have found a way to make money out of it.” And we were making billions. More than just cell phones, they had a massive computer network interconnected in different buildings issuing buy and sell stock recommendations based on the algorithms search of fear words. To clarify this, I shall share one incident. A computerized recommendation said to sell immediately all their stock in a major airline. They did so, and ten minutes later there was a devastating crash of one of its largest airliners, killing hundreds, and the stock value plunged. Of course, the company came under federal investigation about how did they know the plane was going to crash? The answer: they did not know but their electronic ears picked up all the fear words being transmitted from the aircraft and individual electronic devices. (5) That probably is enough to cause us fear on how we are being tracked and influenced electronically.
Currently California’s Chief Justice Tani G. Sakauye has proposed replacing our human judgments with “risk-based assessment” computer programs—algorithms. Two states, New Jersey and New Mexico are using such systems replacing judges algorithmically although New Mexico is in the process of backing off. Be aware that algorithm control of much in our lives will continue. (10)
How sad it is I did not know of all these applications when I was in advanced algebra in the 1940’s doing algorithms without calculators. Suffering from fatigue in the process of doing them, I asked the teacher to explain to us their practical application in real life. He failed to do so meaningfully; however, that question did open a different personal door for me. A day later, the prettiest girl in that class, with whom I had never had the confidence to try to make friends, came up to me in the hallway all smiles saying, “Dick, thanks. I just want you to know how glad I am that in algebra you ask the questions I have but am afraid to ask.”
To summarize, we face an era enhanced by social media, sophisticated propaganda and fake news, algorithms focusing on our every move, post truth, rapidly advancing technology, emotion driven
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humanity, political division, and little apparent movement toward conciliation. Education that encourages critical thinking is but one positive step. Does this all mean that the sky is falling? Does it mean we are facing a world increasingly against intellectual understanding and the search for facts and truth? I think not. Late Redlands colleague Ray Robinson, a public relations (propaganda) professional often said, “The biggest danger in communication is the assumption it has occurred.” Consider all the factors including emotions and shortened attention spans that encourage differences and misunderstandings; consider the varied motives, political and otherwise, that place individuals and nations in opposition to one another, creating more and more divides. With all this in mind, the true wonder offering a glimmer of hope is NOT that we get along so poorly as we do but rather that we get along as well as we do.
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BIBLIOGRAPHY
1. Buchanan, Mark, “Fake news spreads quickly, but you can keep from being fooled” Idaho Statesman: September 7, 2017
2. Budd, Ken, “How older Americans can continue to win the battle for attention” AARP Bulletin: December 2017
3. Economist: September 10, 2016
4. Gessen, Keith, “State of Terror” The New Yorker: November 6, 2017
5. Harris, Robert, The Fear Index: Alfred A. Knoff, New York, 2012
6. Hitler, Adolph, ¬Mein Kampf: First in Sataya Books paperback, 2017 (first edition published 1925)
7. Lavine, Harold and James Wechsler, War Propaganda and the United States: Yale University Press, 1940
8. Mendoza, Arturo, Facts Do Not Prevail: University Press, 2013
9. Sharot, Tali, The Influential Mind: Henry Holt and Company, New York: 2017
10. Stirling, Lawrence and Quentin Kupp, “Bail Reform: should computer formulas replace judicial discretion?” Redlands Daily Facts: January 2, 2018
11. Tzu, Sun, The Art of War: Barnes & Noble Classics, New York, 2003
12. Webster’s Encyclopedic Unabridged Dictionary of the English Language: Gramercy Books (Random House) 1996
13. ¬Wikipedia: “The Big Lie,” “Alternative Facts,” and “Fake News”