Background Briefing: September 5, 2024
Russia Interferes in Our Elections Underway Via Pro-Trump Influencers Now Running Away From Their Kremlin Paymasters
We begin with yesterday’s indictments by the DOJ of two Russians who financed a right wing influence operation in Tennessee run by two Americans who were lavishly paid to produce videos for TikTok and other social media platforms pushing right wing pro-Trump themes and Russian propaganda. We will discuss how the right wing “personalities,” Dave Rubin, Benny Johnson, Tim Pool, and Lauren Southern, they hired are now running away from their Russian paymasters as Glenn Beck’s company Blaze TV, quickly fired the two content providers of right wing and Russian propaganda. Joining us is Jared Holt, a senior research manager at the Institute for Strategic Dialogue where he researches hate and extremist movements in the United States and their relationships to the internet. He specializes in Alt-Right and so-called “New Right” media, in addition to the larger culture and influence of right-wing social media. We discuss his latest article at his Substack, Posting Through It, “Russia Made Useful Idiots Out of MAGA’s Top Influencers: It Was Nearly Effortless. “
But For Police Failures, The Gun Culture and No Red Flag Laws, the Latest School Shooting Would Never Have Happened
Then we look into yesterday’s tragic school shooting that should never have happened if Red Flag laws were in place and the police, who were tipped off by the FBI, had acted on threats to shoot up his school by 14 year-old Colt Gray who acted on his threats killing 2 teachers and two students at his school in Georgia. Joining us is Jonathan Metzl, the Frederick B. Rentschler II professor of sociology and psychiatry at Vanderbilt University in Nashville, Tennessee and director of its Center for Medicine, Health, and Society. A prominent expert on gun violence and mental illness, he is the author of several books including Dying of Whiteness: How the Politics of Racial Resentment Is Killing America’s Heartland, and his latest book is What We’ve Become: Living and Dying in a Country of Arms.
The Shakeup In the Government of Zelensky Who is Pleading For Patriot Missiles in Warehouses as Russian Missiles Kill His Civilians
Then finally we speak with Natalie Melnyczuk about the shakeup inside of Zelenky’s government in Ukraine as the embattled leader pleads for Patriot missile batteries sitting in warehouses while Russian missiles kill scores of Ukrainian civilians. She is a consultant on Euro-Atlantic security and a professor of political science at Wayne State University. She has served as NATO Representative to Ukraine as the Head of the NATO Information and Documentation Center in Kyiv, as a Political Officer in the Political Affairs and Security Policy Division at the Euro-Atlantic Partnership Section at NATO HQ in Brussels, as Manager of U.S.A.I.D.’s Parliamentary Development Project at the U.S. – Ukraine Foundation and in various other academic and policy positions.