“The 4d’s”

The Washington Post reports on Naomi Seibt, a conservative think tank’s answer to Greta Thunberg. The article quotes Graham Brookie of the Atlantic Council’s Digital Forensic Research Lab, dedicating to exposing disinformation:

While the campaign “is not outright disinformation,” Brookie said in an email, it “does bear resemblance to a model we use called the 4d’s — dismiss the message, distort the facts, distract the audience, and express dismay at the whole thing.”

Brookie added: “The tactic is intended to create an equivalency in spokespeople and message. In this case, it is a false equivalency between a message based in climate science that went viral organically and a message based in climate skepticism trying to catch up using paid promotion.”

The 4d’s could be considered a playbook for the sitting president. But Donald Trump* has other tricks. Among them, the 4p’s: purges, pardons, the persecution of refugees, and the prosecution of political enemies.