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The word factoid has now become a factoid. In an ironic, postmodern twist, most people now confuse the definition of the term, believing that it represents a small piece of statistical data. In the past week alone, writers for TheWashington Post,Houston Press and thePhiladelphia Tribunehave misused the word in the implication that a factoid is something that is true or empirically verifiable. Matt Bruenig, in a recent column, provides a typically maddening example while attempting to analyze demographic information aboutsupporters of Donald Trump: So, in addition, to the above factoid, its also true that most of Trumps voters are not white working class people.

Ignorance of the actual meaning of factoid is a perfect demonstration of Americas contemporary failure to separate the authentic from the artificial, and the demonstrable from the deceptive.

Norman Mailer coinedthe word factoid in 1973 to describe ideas or information perceived by the publicas facts but actually dubious or instruments of obfuscation. Writing in his brilliant and almost psychedelic biography of Marilyn Monroe, Mailer described an earlier book on the Hollywood starlet as a book with facts embellished by factoids, that is, facts which have no existence before appearing in a magazine or newspaper, creations which are not so much lies as a product to manipulate emotion in the Silent Majority.

During an interview shortly after the publication of Marilyn, Mailer surveyed the sociopolitical damage of factoids: A factoid is a fact which has no existence on earth other than whats appeared in the newspaper and then gets repeated for ever after. So people walk around as if it is a blooming lively fact.

As one of the pioneers of literary journalism, Mailer not only inventeda word but deployed it against his critics and as a weapon against the so-believed supremacy of traditional, objective journalism. Marilyn, as many readers pointed out immediately afterits release, is full of exaggerations, innuendos and interpretive license. The difference between Mailer and the dispensers of factoids, as he would explain, is that heembraced and advertised his subjectivity, often calling even his nonfiction books, such as his masterpiece The Executioners Song, true life novels. Mailer described his account of the 1967 anti-war march on the Pentagon, The Armies of the Night, with the subtitle History as Novel, The Novel as History.

Mailer, along with Hunter Thompson, Joan Didion and other new journalists, convincingly argued that celebrating subjectivity and personal narration, while introducing the tactics of fiction in reportage, leads to more honest journalism. Human nature renders even the most seemingly and intentionally neutral reporting as biased and narrow. Too many writers and commentators, suffering under the strain of a small imagination, pollute the atmosphere with factoids. Members of an uninformed and incurious public inhales the pollutant, then proceed to cough it up in every room thattheyenter. Public discourse soon becomes sick.

The injection of factoids into the American ecosystem is not merely the fault of reporters, but often the deliberate assault of politicians who seek to advance a dangerous agenda through the manipulation of a frightened and gullible citizenry. It is possible, for example, Mailer wrote, That Richard Nixon has spoken in nothing but factoids during his public life.

Mailers indictment of the Silent Majority as particularly vulnerable to the theatrics and theories of paranoia is illuminative, given that throughout the 2016 presidential campaign, Donald Trump the large print, abridged, childrens version of Richard Nixon continually referred to his whining constituency as the silent majority. It was one of many Nixonian phrases that Trump resurrected, but even more than the rhetoric, Trump re-engineered Nixons tactic of persuasion through factoid for an electorate with a shortened attention span and enlarged appetite for cruelty and vulgarity.

Crooked Hillary, Trumps nickname for his election opponent, former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, was nothing more than the weaponization of the factoid that Clinton was irredeemably corrupt. A large percentage of Americans believe that she is guilty of everything from murder to running the State Department as a sophisticated Mafia operation on behalf of her husband. Actual evidence that is, facts instead of factoids verifying the charges is in short supply.

The two main issues of the Trump platform, aside from misogyny and bigotry, were immigration and trade. While Trump has taken the dishonesty to new sewer-level depths, he did not create, but only took advantage of, the parochial and false perceptions about globalization among the American public. Almost entirely built from factoids, national opinion on immigration imagines masses of Mexicans invading the United States, threatening to destroy civil society. At some point the factoid naming illegal immigration as a crisis emerged, and even many Democrats feel its necessary to acknowledge the problem of porous borders before advocating for comprehensive immigration reform. The truth is that illegal immigration is at a low pointand, as many studies have proved, immigrants are less likely to commit crimes than native-born Americans.

Trump, who even worse than Nixonseems incapable of uttering a truthful sentence, launched his campaign with an insane declaration aboutstopping the so-called illegal Mexicans who are rapists bringing crime and drugs.

The factoid abouttrade is that it costs Americans millions of jobs. It is certainly true that trade has resulted in the loss of some jobs, but factual research has demonstrated that this is a mere fraction when compared withthe jobs being eliminated through technological automation. TreasurySecretary Steve Mnuchin recently boasted of the Trump administrations separation from reality, telling an interviewer curious about his response to artificial intelligences inevitable disruption of the job market that it is not even on our radar screen. It is 50-100 years away.

President Trump continually bemoans the sad state of the depleted military, allowing another dangerous factoid to thrive in political debate. The American military is the most highly funded public institution in the United States and possibly the entire world, given that the U.S.budget is roughly the size of the nextseven military budgets combined, according to NationalPriorities.org.

The United States under Donald Trumps influence is one where beliefs and policies form entirely out of factoids (Obamacare is imploding, etc.), and dramatic anecdotes. Rather than dealing with the reality of declining immigration and the lack of criminality among most immigrants, Trump and his sycophants discuss horrific stories of illegal immigrants murdering innocent citizens. The Trump administration governs with a combination of the worst persuasive tactics, creating an amalgamation of the con man, the Madison Avenue adman and the shallow newsman.

Norman Mailer once announced his modest literary goal of making a revolution in the consciousness of our time. For all of his flaws, he understood that culture is an invention and that something like a factoid is not easily erasable. Once it exists, its lifespan is long and ugly.

A revolution in consciousness requires that people rescue art from advertisement, truth from lies and facts from factoids. Getting right the meaning of the word factoid is a good place to start.

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Donald Trump: A bigger factoid president than Nixon? - Salon

Mashable

I made an exact replica of Donald Trump in 'The Sims 3' and a lot of wild things happened Mashable Donald Trump is nothing if not unpredictable. Does he love Paul Ryan? Does he want the Speaker of the House to step down? Will the whole world be a barren wasteland by the time my future children are in 8th grade? The Sims 3, on the other hand, is a ...

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I made an exact replica of Donald Trump in 'The Sims 3' and a lot of wild things happened - Mashable

Strategic bombing is an effective military strategy with the goal of weakening the enemy through the use of air, land or sea firepower. One of its main objectives is to demoralize the enemy so concessions will be made and the enemy conquered.

This battle strategy is now being used in the culture wars, as we saw last week in North Carolina prior to the repeal of House Bill 2 (the law prohibiting controversial bathroom policies from going into effect).

In his book, Rules for Radicals which many on the extreme left use as a guide for todays cultural battle plans author Saul Alinsky said: The threat is usually more terrifying than the thing itself. Imagination and ego can dream up many more consequences than any activist.

And thats exactly what we saw last week in North Carolina: Threats of economic disaster heaped upon us from media outlets across the country, all before a crucial vote to repeal HB2. It was nothing less than strategic bombing, with the use of projected economic losses instead of proven economic gains.

The facts are that our state has thrived economically since the passing of HB2, yet those facts simply got in the way of the radical left. So they firebombed us with fake news to drum up our imagination that North Carolina was headed into the toilet if we kept the law in place.

The Washington Times even noted the strength of our economy since the passing of the bill with an article 10 days prior to the vote, headlined, Tourism thriving, economy expanding in North Carolina despite bathroom bill desertions.

Check out some of the facts from the article:

But just days before the vote, the AP circulated a new report that our state was going to suffer massive financial losses over a 12 year period, upward of $4 billion in revenue. And with that little missile of guile, the strategic bombing began.

Check out the headlines that immediately ran from around the country:

The list goes on. But suffice it to say none of these reported the facts from the Washington Times article, but only the threats from the AP analysis.

It was nothing less than strategic bombing and it worked.

Many of the same legislators who took a moral stand for the safety and privacy of women and children decided it was no longer politically expedient to do so, and they switched their votes. The law was repealed, yet with it came a four-year hold on cities being able to enact new bathroom policies to allow men in womens restrooms (a twist that angered everyone the radical left).

No matter where you stand on HB2 or the new law (HB 142), the reality is that strategic media bombing will be used on any moral issue the left wants to be overturned or enacted. So moving forward, be sure to pay attention and prepare to fight back.

And the best way to fight back is to simply tell the truth.

G.K. Chesterton once said, When deceit becomes universal, truth becomes a revolutionary act. Were praying for truth revolutionaries today ones willing to stand up and not back down when the strategic bombs start falling again.

Get your copy of the Benham brothers first book, Whatever the Cost: Facing Your Fears, Dying to Your Dreams, and Living Powerfully, right now!

Media wishing to interview Jason & David Benham, please contact media@wnd.com.

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IN THE GAME - WND.com

We live in an era in which image memes are lobbed as political salvos. In which security is theater and defining who controls the narrative in a world of facts and alternative facts is the daily bread of the hot-take class. In which words are bombs, delivered in 140-character installments in the new culture war a phrase that can and has referred to all manner of cultural conflicts: The face-off between elite versus populists, urban versus rural, Hollywood versus the heartland.

Culture is a weapon a pretty effective one at that. And its a topic that New York-based curator Nato Thompson takes on in his book Culture as Weapon, which explores the ways the tools of culture are deployed to do everything from sell iPhones to wage war.

As far as timing goes, the books landing during the early days of the Trump administration couldnt have been more impeccable. Culture as Weapon provides a broad overview on how individuals, corporations and governments employ design, storytelling, imagery and art to stir emotion and mold sentiment. The prominence of the Internet and social media makes this all the more profound and far-reaching than in the past.

Thompsons book kicks off with an extensive historical primer. Over the course of the 20th century, the fields of public relations and advertising created visually resonant cultural icons such as the Marlboro Man to move merchandise. Thompson shows how political figures have employed those same techniques to sway elections and stoke fear. For example: the 1988 presidential campaign ad for George H.W. Bush about Willie Horton, the Massachusetts convict who raped a woman while on furlough an ad that ignited anxiety about crime (and African American men) and likely cost Michael Dukakis the election.

Thompson also provides a backgrounder on how visual symbols have been historically wielded socially and politically. The Nazis, for example, were famously meticulous about their aesthetics. Adolf Hitler himself devoted great care and attention to the design and look of the Nazi flag.

The Nazis loved culture, notes Thompson. They used culture. They distributed culture. Cinema, music, flags, banners, book burnings, rallies, and holidays were all deployed in a phantasmagoria of stark blood red, swastikas, and blinding white.

Interestingly, political groupshave also been perfectly happy to co-opt the symbols of those they impugn. Hitlers propaganda minister, Joseph Goebbels, decried so-called degenerate art anything Modernist or made by Jews even as he put that art on view in an extraordinarily well-attended touring exhibition titled, naturally, Degenerate Art.

A similar phenomenon occurred during the U.S. culture wars of the 1980s and 90s, when Congress attacked some of the artists funded by the National Endowment for the Arts. The NEA hubbub, writes Thompson, was an opportunity to condemn luridness and bask in it in equal measure. An artists own work weaponized against him. (The Trump administrations proposed budget cuts are part of a long-running conservative animosity toward the NEA.)

The look back is interesting, and Thompson delivers priceless instances of cultural manipulation, such as when the American Tobacco Co. used the trappings of womens liberation to encourage women to smoke in the late 1920s.

But far more vital are the chapters the author devotes to the recent past and the present to the ways in which big business and government have liberally borrowed from culture for their purposes. (He comes at these topics from the left, with a healthy skepticism of capitalism and its habit of turning everything into sellable merch.)

Thompson examines how art and architecture have been used as an implement of urban development, via so-called starchitectural development projects and family-friendly public art installations such as Cows on Parade. The commodification of bohemia, as he calls it, has led to art being viewed as an engine rather than the cultural mirror of a nation. The NEAs motto, for example, has gone from Because a great nation deserves great art to Art works a model that would no longer be focused on excellence based on taste, writes Thompson, but rather on the way that culture could make things happen.

This, interestingly, has led to an increasing mistrust toward the idea of culture itself. Los Angeles offers a vivid (but not included) case in point: The anti-gentrification efforts in Boyle Heights have specifically targeted art galleries.

Culture as Weapon covers myriad other topics: How the U.S. military employed cultural anthropologists during the conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan, how staged social relationships are as intriguing to artists as they are to corporations, and how culture informs our everyday retail experiences. (The layout of Ikea is inspired, in part, by the ramps of Frank Lloyd Wrights Guggenheim Museum in New York.)

In taking on so much disparate material, Culture as Weapon can feel scattered and often delves into topics that the reader is likely already familiar with. (Do we need to read again of the improbable rise of the personal computer from Steve Jobs garage to our back pocket?)

Thompson is at his most effective when he is dissecting what it is about culture that makes it such a potent social tool. Art, in its appeal to emotion, can override rationality. Fear, he writes, motivates faster than hope and appeals to emotion do not rely on the truth.

How the rational brain might counter the barrage of cultural string-pulling that we experience on a daily basis, and how the world of culture might save itself from becoming a mere tool, Thompson doesnt say. But Culture as Weapon provides a compelling manual for determining how the manipulation begins.

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Curator Nato Thompson shines a light on art and the culture wars in 'Culture as Weapon' - The Missoulian

Citizen reporter

Home Affairs Minister Malusi Gigaba. Picture: GCIS

South Africans on the internet are really not taking Pravin Gordhans sacking well, especially now that he has been replaced with Malusi Gigaba. Since there is nothing they can do about him being our next finance minister, they decided to focus on what they could change.

Shortly after President Jacob Zumas announcement, the keyboard warriors rushed to Wikipedia and changed Gigabas name, though it has been corrected.

A screenshot of the page has been circulating on social media, showing that his name had been changed to Ignorance Malusi Nkanyezi Gigaga, from Knowledge Malusi Nkanyezi Gigaba.

Check out the hilarious change below:

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Not to worry if youre not pleased with the Cabinet reshuffle, apparently the president miscalculated the dates and was only meant to announce the the reshuffle tomorrow on April Fools Day.

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Angry South Africans change Gigaba's name on Wikipedia - Citizen