• The Cycling News forum is looking to add some volunteer moderators with Red Rick's recent retirement. If you're interested in helping keep our discussions on track, send a direct message to @SHaines here on the forum, or use the Contact Us form to message the Community Team.

    In the meanwhile, please use the Report option if you see a post that doesn't fit within the forum rules.

    Thanks!

Truth Suppression aka Fabiani's Playbook

Nov 20, 2010
786
0
0
Visit site
1. Dummy up. If it's not reported, if it's not news, it didn't happen.

2. Wax indignant. This is also known as the "how dare you?" gambit.

3. Characterize the charges as "rumors" or, better yet, "wild rumors." If, in spite of the news blackout, the public is still able to learn about the suspicious facts, it can only be through "rumors."

4. Knock down straw men. Deal only with the weakest aspect of the weakest charges. Even better, create your own straw men. Make up wild rumors and give them lead play when you appear to debunk all the charges, real and fanciful alike.

5. Call the skeptics names like "conspiracy theorist," "nut," "ranter," "kook," "crackpot," and of course, "rumor monger." You must then carefully avoid fair and open debate with any of the people you have thus maligned.

6. Impugn motives. Attempt to marginalize the critics by suggesting strongly that they are not really interested in the truth but are simply pursuing a partisan political agenda or are out to make money.

7. Invoke authority. Here the controlled press and the sham opposition can be very useful.

8. Dismiss the charges as "old news."

9. Come half-clean. This is also known as "confession and avoidance" or "taking the limited hang-out route." This way, you create the impression of candor and honesty while you admit only to relatively harmless, less-than-criminal "mistakes." This stratagem often requires the embrace of a fall-back position quite different from the one originally taken.

10. Characterize the crimes as impossibly complex and the truth as ultimately unknowable.

11. Reason backward, using the deductive method with a vengeance. With thoroughly rigorous deduction, troublesome evidence is irrelevant. For example: We have a completely free press. If they know of evidence that the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms (BATF) had prior knowledge of the Oklahoma City bombing they would have reported it. They haven't reported it, so there was no prior knowledge by the BATF. Another variation on this theme involves the likelihood of a conspiracy leaker and a press that would report it.

12. Require the skeptics to solve the crime completely.

13. Change the subject. This technique includes creating and/or reporting a distraction.

http://www.brasscheck.com/martin.html
 
May 25, 2009
332
0
0
Visit site
Benotti69 said:
yeah that's pretty much what public stratalies have been trying so hard and failing to do on here.


I don't know, judging from the similarity of comments in the "comments sections" of websites where the most incriminating articles have appeared, the interns have been very busy. If I had nickel for every, " I prefer to wait for a court of law to decide whether Lance is guilty" or " I prefer to look at the good a person does". These two quotes are all over the place - short, sweet, easily absorbed.

Here's one from the hard-hitting Men's Journal Article:
"I like to see the good that comes from people like Lance, not the passion that others have to destroy great stars. Sadly your Proof is still un-proven or tested in a court or sporting tribunal. Go Lance"
 
Jan 15, 2011
52
0
0
Visit site
Anderson on Armstrong and "Andro"

Benotti69 said:
yeah that's pretty much what public strategies have been trying so hard and failing to do on here.

Mike Anderson piece in the NZ Sunday Star: http://www.stuff.co.nz/sunday-star-times/sport/4571280/Lance-Armstrong-faces-tough-ride-ex-mechanic

Hawaii's version w/ added Fabiani: http://www.smh.com.au/sport/armstro...tions-made-by-exassistant-20110123-1a1aa.html

Despite the title "Armstrong denies further doping allegations made by ex-assistant", everybody's favourite Hawaiian shirt notes: "Armstrong did not comment on the story"...but Fabiani did
 
May 26, 2010
28,143
5
0
Visit site
oldschoolnik said:
I don't know, judging from the similarity of comments in the "comments sections" of websites where the most incriminating articles have appeared, the interns have been very busy. If I had nickel for every, " I prefer to wait for a court of law to decide whether Lance is guilty" or " I prefer to look at the good a person does". These two quotes are all over the place - short, sweet, easily absorbed.

Here's one from the hard-hitting Men's Journal Article:
"I like to see the good that comes from people like Lance, not the passion that others have to destroy great stars. Sadly your Proof is still un-proven or tested in a court or sporting tribunal. Go Lance"

for sure they are commenting everywhere they can, but on here it's failing miserably and CN here is popular and a lot of people check in here.
 
Apr 9, 2009
976
0
0
Visit site
Benotti69 said:
for sure they are commenting everywhere they can, but on here it's failing miserably and CN here is popular and a lot of people check in here.

They're not trying to win over the hard core cycling fans, like those who are on these forums. That's a losing proposition given all the info that's out there. They know they'll get more bang for their buck in the mainstream media, where the majority of people only have a thin knowledge of the sport and its history.
 

TRENDING THREADS