澳彩开奖

We should all be outraged 鈥� and more than a little unnerved.

We all know that conservative politicians have been trying to delegitimize the mainstream press for decades. And, indeed, conservatives have created a constellation of alternative media more to their liking 鈥� Fox News and Rush Limbaugh, to name the most obvious.

But with Trump, we鈥檙e witnessing something different, something more insidious. Something that seems pathological.

It was disturbing enough a week ago to see the president鈥檚 press secretary blatantly lie about the size of the crowd at Trump鈥檚 inauguration, reportedly because Trump was outraged by the television coverage.

It got worse when Trump operative Kellyanne Conway described the lies as 鈥渁lternative facts,鈥� a phrase that drew instant ridicule.

Then, Trump told a gigantic, more consequential lie when he insisted that as many as 5 million voted illegally, costing him the popular vote.

That led to yesterday, when Stephen K. Bannon told The New York Times that the media had been 鈥渉umiliated鈥� by Trump鈥檚 victory and should 鈥渒eep its mouth shut and just listen for a while.鈥�

In other words, stop reporting the facts because they put the lie to Trump鈥檚 alternative reality. Just listen to Trump.

Meanwhile, the pesky journalists have reported that the administration is that routinely comes from government agencies.

This is what dictators, tyrants and totalitarian governments do.

To maintain their propaganda, they must muzzle the institutions that reveal the facts, the objective information that informs policy decisions. Without this information, a democracy simply cannot function.

Without a vigilant press and without the free flow of government information, Trump can lie with impunity. He can govern based on the 鈥渁lternative facts鈥� he gets from the far-right extremists and conspiracy theorists he apparently follows quite closely.

Voters, meanwhile, will have no way to get the truth.

This is a perilous situation, one made worse by the people who have Trump鈥檚 ear 鈥� specifically Bannon.

During the campaign, Trump repeatedly said he was 鈥渏ust the messenger鈥� for the angry movement he was leading. He repeated the claim on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial the day before the inauguration.

Based on the lies, fear-mongering and xenophobia-based policies that we鈥檙e already seeing, it appears that the president really is channeling a movement, one embodied by the person whispering in Trump鈥檚 ear 鈥� Bannon.

It鈥檚 important that we all never forget who and what Bannon is.

He is the media executive who, in his own words, turned the Breitbart News website into 鈥渢he platform for the alt-right.鈥� The alt-right is simply a rebranding of white nationalism for the digital age. At an alt-right gathering held shortly after the election just a few blocks from the White House, Richard Spencer 鈥� a man who has been as one of the movement鈥檚 leading intellectuals 鈥� from the audience.

During his campaign, Trump shared links to Breitbart鈥檚 racially charged content with his Twitter followers more often than he linked to any other media outlet. Another outlet that linked to Breitbart more than any other: the neo-Nazi website Daily Stormer, whose proprietor on election night exulted that 鈥淸o]ur Glorious Leader has ascended to God Emperor.鈥�

Now, Bannon sits at the right hand of the president and wants to silence the legitimate news media. He wants Americans to get their 鈥渘ews鈥� from the website favored by neo-Nazis.

We should all be very alarmed.