The Rolling Stone published a story based on an interview on local Oklahoma TV where a doctor claimed that gunshot victims couldn’t get treatment because ER’s are so overwhelmed with ivermectin overdoses they can’t take new patients.

There was only one thing wrong about the story: it was a fabrication from start to finish. The doctor who made the claim didn’t even work at the hospital in question and the hospital says they haven’t admitted anyone for ivermectin overdose.

This is a classic Soviet disinformation op. They did this sort of thing all the time: plant a story in some out of the way place and then ensure that someone big picked up on it: before you knew it, the story was around the world. And here’s the thing: it doesn’t matter if later the truth comes out. Corrections never have as much impact as the initial, shocking claim. The Tweet of the article got the Rolling Stone more than 17,000 retweets and 19,000 likes. Rolling Stone’s follow up pointing out that the hospital denied everything? About 300 retweets. Most people who saw the lie float through their TL will never find out it was a lie. What does Rolling Stone care they were caught in a lie? The Cause was served. The Narrative advanced. Because the story wasn’t for you and me: we know the MSM is nothing but despicable liars. The story was for Blue State voters – it told them that those racist, hick MAGAts are so stupid they are OD’ing on “horse dewormer” (which is another lie: apparently there is a human use version of the drug and has been for years). It told, that is, upper class, urban liberals that they are oh, so smart to stick with the Democrats and keep masked up and locked down. And the purpose of that is defense: the Democrats know full well that, all else being equal, they are going to take losses next year. Making things entirely tribal means there’s a good chance their tribe won’t go off the ranch over trivial things like inflation and surrender to the Taliban.

The problem here is that nothing will happen to the liars. Even if a particular MSMer is caught so obviously in a lie that he gets fired, there is no real sanction. And if you check back after a while, you’ll find that the fired liar has been given a new gig in the industry. There is no cost for the most egregious and wicked lies – and so egregious and wicked lies have become the norm.

Here’s the question I now put to you: can a Republic of free people endure if people, under the protection of the First Amendment, are allowed to lie without sanction?

It is a serious question, and it requires a serious answer. I am no longer of the position that people must be allowed to saw whatever they want. I used to believe that because I believed it protected my ability to say what I wished. But now I know that it doesn’t: the liars who demand full protection of the First Amendment do not accord such protection to me. If I say something absolutely true but opposed to the Party Line, I am to be destroyed. A man named John Gibson, founder of a gaming development company, was fired for pointing out on Twitter that he is pro life. That’s it: he merely stated his opinion. And an opinion shared by many tens of millions of Americans. But that was enough to ruin him. Statement made at 1:04pm on September 4th, fired at 6:01pm, September 6th. Little less than 53 hours from words to unemployment. And the only reason they haven’t done this to you is because they haven’t got around to it, yet. You do not have First Amendment protection in any practical sense. It is nothing to say that you can say what you want, but you’ll lose your job if you say the wrong thing. Everyone who has to work for someone else now takes great care in what they say in public.

The Constitution is not a suicide pact. I will not agree that I must let those who wish to destroy me in spite of Constitutional protections hide behind those protections against retaliation. The rule – established by the liars – is that if someone disagrees with you, then can be socially and economically destroyed. I disagree with the liars in the MSM.

In my view, there are two things we should do:

1. A law prohibiting sanctions against an employee for speech made outside the work environment. I’ve said this before and got a lot of push back on it. I believe I have been proved correct. If they can’t take away our employment, then we will have taken away their primary means of forcing us to comply.
2. Laws must be crafted to provide criminal and civil sanction to anyone who states something factually false in public. I know it is fraught with hazard: but the impervious defense here is to simply never say anything in public unless you are 100% certain it is factually correct. A jury will ultimately decide if you lied and you only need one in twelve to see a fact. Additionally, if we sanction those who falsely accuse others of lying (in other words, someone accuses you of lying in public, but you didn’t) then that will take away the incentive the liars will have to make false charges.

What we can’t afford is to do nothing. We can’t allow liars and tyrants to proliferate and hope that we can survive by arguing a liar out of his lie. He’s lying: he knows he can’t win an argument. The liar isn’t trying to win an argument: he’s trying to destroy you. The liar must be punished, and quite severely. If we don’t do this, then everything else we do becomes ultimately pointless.