Disinformation Governance Board: Transparency vs Political Nepotism?

How can we not consider the problem of transparency at all levels of government to not be based on political nepotism?  Numerous instances illustrate it is - especially at the more local levels where all oversight, if any is claimed to exist, often is determined by a network of family nepotism that expands to become political nepotism.  Does the Department of Homeland Security's new misinformation board, verify the political corruption that has long been in play, has now institutionalized corrupt political nepotism?  It would behoove us to concern ourselves with the possibility.  This article: "DHS secretary says disinformation board won’t infringe on free speech: We’re not opinion police" expresses concern about free speech.  Perhaps it is more pressing to be concerned about the board institutionalizing an increased lack of government transparency.

Will the Disinformation Governance Board infringe on free speech?  I don't know. I agree that propaganda disinformation is used to create conflict, that it originates with a self-declared enemy we must consider to at least be a threat in specific ways.  However, it has been proven many times over that we can learn facts about our own government from outside sources when transparency is lacking in our own media. I am not referring to the myriad of Russian propaganda internet sites that have become so prolific online in the past years.  I am referring primarily to facts that we can sometimes verify as accurate when people file Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests about information from sources outside our nation - and/or Pulitzer worthy investigative journalism.  It seems that a practical concern is more about the possibility of government efforts to institute less transparency rather than curtail our personal freedom of speech.
 
This does no mean freedom of speech is not always under attack in some way or another.  However, it is difficult to understand why disinformation is considered a freedom of speech issue when it is a libel and/or slander legal problem.  Banning what people and processes of a misinformation board might consider to be damaging misleading disinformation harmful to supposed public naiveté, likely could interfere with prosecuting those who originate disinformation for their libel and/or slander.  When we consider any information to be  propaganda we don't look further but instead make a choice to believe or not believe what could be ill-intended libel and/or slander that needs to be prosecuted at any level - from personal to international.

Of course the board is concerned with disinformation about our government.  But overreach into interfering with exercising our freedoms is easy especially when there is a lack of transparency about such a board. What is perplexing is that misinformation is not being responded to with prosecution for libel and/or slander - or at least not denied when government at any level is the target.  Instead it is ignored by government.  Yet, we see social sites cracking the whip with one-sided "fact checking" designed to set us straight by telling what to think, about what is or is not accurate.  It is  probably at their advertisers' bidding, and to some extent government's too - when government threatens to lower the boom based on the small print in the ways applicable regulations are interpreted.  Also, our media offers too much useless "news" coverage that instead focuses on anything about which conflict can be encouraged, since conflict seems to be what is assumed will draw the interest of viewers and readers.  But libel and slander are legal issues and when prosecuted are usually not broadcast about, during the process.  So the focus of news programs and publications on what is often deemed to be disinformation, suggests prosecuting for libel and/or slander is not occurring.  What does that suggest to us about supposed disinformation? 

Those who investigate through FOIA what may or may not be misinformation, in the event that actual sources are provided, sometimes are able to verify whether or not the information is factual.  However, we also need to keep in mind that our news has been controlled for a very long time.  This does not refer to what is broadcast obsessively instead of news, which may be more driven by corporate advertising than by government.  In this case the concern about control is what government does not want on the news.  Corporate advertisers have likely been government's hand-maidens in that way by driving what news reports obsess about to redirect interest as a way to avoid reporting actual news.  A misinformation governance board seems destined, on the surface at least, to be direct manipulation of news from government - social media fact checking style  on a larger scale.  In effect that would be little different than the way dictatorships control what is not allowed to be broadcast and published. 

Considering the problem of a lack of transparency because of political nepotism, is advisable.  There are many instances indicating exactly that. Many of us recall coming to this abrupt realization about controlled news when news of Viet-Nam was not being broadcast honestly because of a lack of transparency.  The American public needed to know because we were and continue to be a collectively self-governing citizenry whose responsibility is to educate ourselves enough about issues to be able to do our jobs of advising those who are elected and appointed government officials.  I also want to mention one particular personal experience that illustrates transparency based on political nepotism which I encountered within the past decade when asking about "real id".

The only information available about real id is what is needed to apply for it.  Try asking exactly what information is conveyed via "real id" and see what happens.  Stonewalled.  Try telling the "powers that be" you need to verify the accuracy of the information being conveyed via real id,- and see what happens!  Again - stonewalled.  As individual we should never be prevented from the right to verify and/or correct information used by real id to profile us - which, denied, becomes unacceptable overreach on an individual basis that is an unacceptable lack of government transparency.  Credit Bureaus exemplify the serious problems that can occur because of financial profiling errors.  Any collection of data about us, to profile us financially or any other way, needs to be freely subject to our perusal so we are able to correct what is not accurate. Try telling that to information dealers online, used for background checking. Stonewalled.  No doubt not only info gathered from online social sites, but also official records about us actually need to actually be fact-checked by us for errors!

I asked about real id years ago via e-mail - about the information that is provided through real id, and how we can access it to be sure it is accurate.  A response was not forthcoming. Is it only coincidental that unwarranted, harassment has increased exponentially since that time in my own life - prior to covid since there is more occurring because of covid?  I finally requested a birth certificate last year to use for my real id drivers license, and received a notarized piece of paper with a few facts.  Then covid happened so I still have not applied for my real id drivers license.  I had a problem with the limits of what was sent, and the only way possible to acquire it.  When I had requested a copy of my birth certificate in summer 1970, I was sent a faxed copy of my birth record - which is exactly what I needed. Was that considered to be a "birth certificate" at the time, or was the notarized copy in use today considered the birth certificate then too?  Of course that is also considered a pesky question to ask people who should know the answer.  Uh huh - stonewalled.

Of course the photosensitive paper used in fax machines in the early 70s eventually became a blank sheet of worthless photosensitive fax paper. Once again I need a copy of my birth record which is what I expected the birth certificate to be. One need not be a genius to realize that a notarized stable copy of the actual birth record is far more trustworthy for real id than a notarized copy that extracts a few facts.  I found nowhere online to ask for my birth record which I still need.  What comes up in a search is ONLY the option to pay a company to serve as a middle man to request and sends the birth certificate, which I reluctantly did having no other choice.  No search produces anything other than middle-man services which says states use that service for birth certificate requests. Looking at state websites, only the costly middle-man service is used for birth certificate requests.  I have enjoyed doing genealogy research for decades and know it has been possible to request birth records.  I still need my own birth record - the same document genealogists request and are sent. As verification for real id - I repeat - a notarized stable copy of the actual birth record as a birth certificate, is far more trustworthy for real id than a notarized copy that extracts a few facts.

The point being?  Without transparency about who is serving on the board, how the board is selected, and the processes that govern what the board actually does and how. we would do well to be concerned about what otherwise seems to be further institutionalization of  corrupt political nepotism that has already been increasingly limiting transparency in government - possibly as long as governments have existed.  No doubt the extent of corrupt political nepotism has always vacillated - dependent on the governed and the use of the freedoms with which they are empowered to maintain their freedoms.  Knowing all that does not insure the misinformation governance board is not already rife with the problems of political nepotism.  The extent of resistance to transparency about requests for details and clarity - needed information about the disinformation board, will suggest in what ways we need to productively direct our concern.

Acceptable Candidates and Supportable Party Platforms

Biden’s approval rating hits its lowest with 33 per cent in new poll by Eric Garcia in UK's Independent.

Although the message I take away from this article is likely not the primary message most people will take away from it, the message being conveyed which I consider to be most important, is that we need to do a much better job of offering up qualified acceptable candidates and party platform policy recommendations so that we are not electing people through the process of voting against "the lesser of the evils".

I wish numerous people would write articles that actually state this clearly and plainly, to hammer home a message it is vital for all to understand. Not everyone is willing to become an expat for however long it may be necessary, otherwise, when they do not consider either candidate to be acceptable.  And of course not everyone can afford the luxury of choosing to be an expat for an extended time.

Many consider the lack of acceptable candidates, and supportable party platforms, to be due to a lack of participation.  However,the lack of participation problem at the grassroots level is not necessarily reflective of what people want to do, or prefer to do.  I have made a successful effort to participate in other places I have lived.  That is not how it is where I currently live.  If inquiries about attending a local meeting do generate a response, they are met only with a response  about "pay to play" meetings and cost requirements for party membership.  What!?  I was astounded to be presented with "pay to play".  I honestly thought it was illegal.

It has never been mandatory, elsewhere, to pay dues to be a party member before being participating in discussions at local caucus meetings.  I do wonder how widespread the problem is, nationwide.  Not only can I not afford the "required" cost, more importantly, in principle, I am unwilling to pay a required cost to participate!  Of course a pay to play response discourages many people - and is obviously intended to do so.  It is no wonder people increasingly truly believe that elections and election processes are being bought.

Note that I use the term "caucus" to indicate local meetings, although other folks may use other terms.  I use "caucus" according to the inclusive definition (rather than the limited exclusive definition), that being: "any political group or meeting organized to further a special interest or cause"

Participating in local caucus meetings where platform policies and potential candidates are discussed and eventually agreed upon, should be freely open to everyone who selects a party when registering to vote, and wants to attend local meetings.  In other places I have lived caucus meetings are organized at the local community level, like the the radius of a neighborhood of many blocks.  The grassroots participation I refer to here, is not city, sector, county, or state wide - but on a much smaller neighborhood scale .  Each of the smaller local meetings then sends representative to the less frequent next larger consolidated meeting -  be it sector, city, county, or state wide.  And no one registered for  the party of the meeting they wish to attend and participate in, is prevented from attending those either - even though each local area selects representatives to speak for the group.

Local neighborhood caucus meetings really are the way for grassroots participation to be as diverse and as representative in all ways as the local areas in which folks live.  As such it is a way to develop a more acceptable slate of candidates and policy recommendations.  That is why "pay to play", in every form, should be illegal.  

Allow me to once more emphasize that in too many elections, too many people have no other choice than to vote against candidates instead of for candidates.  And this is simply an unacceptable situation. 

Ultimately, taken to the extreme, when there are no acceptable choices - and this holds true universally, not only with political candidates and party platforms - then no matter the situation it precipitates insurmountable problems.  Worse, when there are repeatedly no acceptable choices and instead only damaging choices - then depending on the scale of the collusion that limits choices to all being unacceptable (and it will always be a collusion limiting choices in that way), the repetitive problem of unacceptable choices eventually leads to conflict, armed combat - the atrocities of war.