An Example of a Sub-Watershed Under Stress and Why I Know It

by Brian T Lynch, MSW

I'm writing a series of articles this summer about freshwater resources in the New Jersey Highlands to emphasize the role we all have in preserving the abundance and purity of the waters around us. Two-thirds of New Jersey's drinking water comes from the Highlands. This article focuses on a local level. What I can say about the quality of surface waters in my community, and why I know about it, should serve as a model of environmental awareness to which lake communities and towns throughout the Highlands should aspire. The combination of citizen volunteers, scientists, activists, and advocates organized by the Raritan Headwaters Association (RHA) creates an unprecedented public awareness of the natural habitat in the Raritan watershed that residents in other watersheds may lack. 

To begin, all of the drinking water in my hometown of Mine Hill comes from underground aquifers beneath the Succasunna plains. The quality of this water always meets or exceeds state standards. It's good water. But over time, and especially in the past few years, the quality of surface waters in our community has declined. This is a big deal because surface water from the Highlands meets the water needs of nearly half the state. It also matters because surface water infiltrates the ground to recharge aquifers below. The quality of surface waters will eventually influence the quality of the groundwater below.

Lamington tributary upstream near
Canfield Avenue in Mine Hill

Mine Hill straddles a ridge between two drainage basins, one for the Rockaway River, the other for the Raritan. I can't tell you how well we are protecting the surface water flowing into the Rockaway River's tributaries on one side of town. I just don't know. I can tell you a good deal about the surface waters flowing West from the headwaters of Lamington and Black River which originate in this sub-watershed in which I live. Together these tributaries form the North Branch of the Raritan River. 

The land area where rain falls on the Western half of my town drains into the Lamington tributary in Mine Hill between Canfield Avenue and Sunset Pond (yes, the beach) where it empties. 

Freshwater Lampreys in the Black
River near the Great Spring       

The Black River originates in a remarkably prolific area of springs at the Southern tip of the former Hercules Powder Company land in an area the Lenape natives called the "Great Spring."  The Great Spring is in the Kenvil section of Roxbury Township. This Northernmost section of the Black River also empties into Sunset Pond, which is actually the remains of a very large sandpit. The entire area, known locally as the "flats" has a deep underlayer of sand that allows water to percolate through to other abandoned sandpits, which now serve as ponds for commercial and residential development. The only natural open water is Black River Pond which receives most of its water from the Great Spring and the Lamington tributary. All of the land areas that drain down to Black River Pond constitute the sub-watershed of which I focus here. It's the watershed in which I perform most of my volunteer work for the RHA. 

To better understand the stream monitoring role that the RHA plays in the Raritan River Basin I am including a sidebar from their Website. They can explain themselves better than I can. There are two stream monitoring sites in our sub-watershed, one in Mine Hill and one in Kenvil. A third monitoring site just south of Black River Pond is the upper boundary of another sub-watershed area. The entire Raritan basin is divided up this way to help pinpoint specific areas that may need attention. Our sub-watershed is one of those areas. 

Each year, the RHA publishes its extensive stream monitoring and laboratory analysis results in an annual "report card." The scientific methodologies and jargon used to quantify factors affecting water quality can be daunting to non-scientists. The RHA Report Card assigns letter grades or pass/fail grades to these numbers so everyone can understand the findings. These findings are seldom reported in local newspapers, but they are publicly available on the RHA Website. The monitoring and testing results for our sub-watershed was given it a failing grade over the past few years. We who live and work here can and must do better. Fortunately, there are lots of simple, inexpensive things we can do as a town and as individuals to improve our water quality, but the first step is to acknowledge that there are problems to solve. 

RHA REPORT CARD

Below are a series of screenshots of the RHA Report Card data taken from their website. 

The first screenshot below is the RHA 2020 report on the overall High Gradient Macro-invertebrate Index (HGMI) for the entire Raritan basin. These are findings gleaned from collected samples of the small macroinvertebrates (insect larva, mollusks, worms, etc.) that live in stream beds. The more diversity and abundance of creatures, especially of the pollution-sensitive species, the better. An explanation is given this and all the factors being graded. The Raritan Basin as a whole scored a "C" letter grade, but each sub-watershed is separately graded. Sub-watersheds that are shaded in blue passed on this measure while those shaded in brown failed. The map depicted here has been zoomed in to show the headwaters sub-watersheds for the North Branch (right) and South Branch (left) of the Raritan River. The North Branch where I live failed. 

This next screenshot reports on the Ortho Phosphorous Indicator related to the nutrient load in the streams. This screen, and the rest of the Report Card screenshots below, are specific to the North Branch headwaters watershed in which I live. You can see that this area and the adjacent South Branch headwaters watershed failed. An explanation of the factors is below under the letter grade. 

The next factor on the Report Card pictured below is the Specific Conductance Indicator, which generally relates to the amount of road salt that washes into the streams. These are the three indicators on which my sub-watershed failed. The North Branch headwaters sub-watershed received an overall failing grade as well when all the indicators are combined. 

The next three factors are all indicators on which the local sub-watershed area passed. These indicators are Stream Temperature, Dissolved Oxygen, and Ph. 

As mentioned earlier, the overall score for this sub-watershed was an "F", but this detailed analysis suggests where efforts can be focused to correct specific problems. This in-depth analysis is not commonly available throughout the rest of the Highlands. And by monitoring these streams consistently over time, the Raritan Headwaters Association is able to analyze and report on long-term trends in water quality. 

The next screenshot is not from the Report Card, but from a draft report on long-term trends. The data is from 1999 to 2017 and it is aggregated to four large areas in the Raritan Basin. The screenshot below is for the North Branch of the Raritan River basin located within the Highland Region. 

The rising lengths of the orange bars at the bottom from left to right, and the emergence of red shaded bars on the right, reveal the steady and growing decline in surface water quality over time. It is evidence that river basins in the Highlands are increasing under stress. The local problem in my sub-watershed is part of a much larger pattern of declining habitat and water quality that must be addressed. 

BROADER VIEW

We all live in a watershed. Better knowledge and awareness of the natural environment around us is key to preserving the fresh water on which all life on land depends. What the Raritan Headwaters Association is doing to monitor and track the health of the waters and habitat in the Raritan basin can and should be duplicated elsewhere throughout the New Jersey Highlands. 

I have a special affinity for Lake Hopatcong where I grew up. I was deeply disturbed by the HAB crisis that shut down the lake a few years back. We all know that there are big projects around the lake that need to be undertaken to improve stormwater management and expand sewer service (to name a few), but there are so many smaller actions that individual homeowners and business people can take which collectively would greatly improve the lake water. 

The Lake Hopatcong Foundation is working diligently on water quality and habitat issues around the lake. It has many helpful suggestions for lake residents to consider on its Website. But, there are also eighteen freshwater inlets around the lake. I visited and photographed each of them in 2017 and learned a lot in doing so. Some of these streams flow out of extensive and beautiful wetlands. Some flow through smaller lake communities. Most of the streams and feeder lakes serve as conduits for storm drain outfalls. From my perspective, all of these streams should be continuously monitored in much the same way as are the tributaries in the Raritan basin.  Consistent scientific monitoring of the waters and habitat surrounding these tributaries before they flow into Lake Hopatcong would be an important advance towards improving the environmental health of the lake's drainage basin. 

And of course, water from Lake Hopatcong flows into the Muscanectong River, which flows into the Delaware River. It's all connected. We are all connected by the rain that falls here in the Highlands. We must be responsible partners in maintaining the health of this vital and environmentally sensitive, and beautiful region.

___________________________________________

RELATED ARTICLES ON THIS BLOG: 

 

A Drop in the Bucket - How Small Steps Can Have Big Environmental Impacts
https://aseyeseesit.blogspot.com/2021/07/a-drop-in-bucket-how-small-steps-can.html

The Waters Around Me in the New Jersey Highlands
https://aseyeseesit.blogspot.com/2021/07/the-waters-around-me-in-new-jersey.html

Water Quality vs. Lawn Care Practices - Doing Less is Best
https://aseyeseesit.blogspot.com/2021/07/when-it-comes-to-mowing-grass-less-we.html 

Our Climate has Changed, And So Must We
https://aseyeseesit.blogspot.com/2021/08/our-climate-has-changed-and-so-must-we.html 

The Waters Below Me
https://aseyeseesit.blogspot.com/2021/06/the-waters-below-me.html

We Are What We Wear

https://aseyeseesit.blogspot.com/2021/07/we-are-what-we-wear.html 

An Example of a Sub-Watershed Under Stress and Why I Know It

https://aseyeseesit.blogspot.com/2021/07/local-example-of-sub-watershed-under.html 

A Drop in the Bucket - How Small Steps Can Have Big Environmental Impacts

by Brian T. Lynch, MSW

A drop in the bucket amounts to nothing... until it rains. 

This universal truth applies to every little thing we do or fail to do as a person or a community. However, the tremendous power of small actions repeated by many people is hard to grasp when we feel we are acting alone, just one small drop in a bucket. 

We here in the Jersey Highlands live within three major river basins for the Raritan, Delaware, and Passaic rivers. The rainfall we receive provides two-thirds of the state's drinking water, so we Highlanders have a special obligation to keep this water pure and plentiful.

Some rain evaporates from lawns or fields, and some rainwater percolates deep underground to the aquifers below me. If I still lived in Lake Hopatcong, excess rainwater might wash off my roof, run down my driveway or lawn, and into the lake. Where I live now, the excess water runs down my driveway and into the street.  From there, it flows into a storm drain that empties into a nearby stream. What I can do on my own to keep that rainwater safe to drink doesn't amount to much. Collectively, however, the cumulative impact of small actions by many people can improve the quality of the water we drink.

Here is one local illustration of how small actions can make a big difference. This past Spring, twelve volunteers worked on behalf of the Raritan Headwaters Association to pick up plastic and trash along the Lamington tributary that feeds Sunset Pond (Mine Hill Beach). In three hours, they collected over 400 pounds of trash. Their effort restored the natural beauty in this forested recreation area and prevented microplastics from entering the water. Over time, plastics in the environment break down into tiny particles of plastic and release toxic chemicals in the process. The stream that feeds Sunset Pond is part of a 470 square mile river basin that provides 1.8 million people. Water from this small tributary joins with many others like it to form the mighty Raritan River. And if you think that the quality of water downstream doesn't affect us here, consider this. The water from Sunset Pond and the Black River helps irrigate New Jersey farms and waters livestock downstream. That means any pollutants or microplastics released into the environment here could end up on our breakfast table. 

Just as all the small tributaries in our river basins converge to form great rivers, so too can our small deeds add up to accomplish big things. Those 12 volunteers in Mine Hill this Spring were not acting alone. They were part of 1,242 volunteers that morning participating in the Raritan Headwater's 31st Annual Stream Cleanup. Small groups working together, yet separately, picked up 15 tons of trash and plastic in three hours. We don't have to wait around for officials in Trenton or Washington to fund a big environmental initiative. Taking steps to reduce the phosphates washing into Lake Hopatcong from the yard or diverting rainwater from running into the street can make a huge difference when we all take small steps together.  

In this spirit of doing small things collectively to make big changes, I share with you an article below on How to be a better backyard steward of the Earth. It is possible to enrich the beauty and value of our immediate surroundings while contributing to the ecosystem's health that ultimately sustains us. There is also an interactive planning tool you can use if you are considering a small DIY project around your home.

I will be focusing attention this summer on the small things we can all do to conserve water and improve water quality in the area. I hope these will be informative and encourage others to take a few small steps that collectively can make a big difference.

Water Quality vs. Lawn Care Practices - Doing Less is Best

by Brian T Lynch, MSW

Most folks know that grass clippings are harmful when they get into lakes and streams. 

I've noticed there are a few homeowners and even some lawn service companies taking shortcuts. I see places where homeowners and landscapers are disposing of yard waste in wetlands from which a brook emerges, a brook that the state DEP has classified as a “C1” protected water source. Most recently I saw a stream monitoring site in Succasunna in which copious amounts of grass clipping had just been dumped by a commercial landscaper.

Dumping anything into a lake or a stream is illegal in New Jersey and most states. It doesn’t matter if it is organic, inorganic, a living, or a non-living thing. So, dumping grass clippings into that creek beside your home, or into a lake, is illegal and reportable to the New Jersey DEP (1-877-warndep). Even when we blow or sweep grass clippings and leaves into the street, it ends up in our streams and rivers when the next big rain washes them down storm drains and into a nearby stream.

In general, lawn clippings contain around 4% nitrogen, 0.5 to 1% phosphorus, and 1 or 2 % potassium by weight. Nitrogen and phosphorus are a significant concern for water quality as they can cause explosive growth of algae and nuisance vegetation (eutrophication). In addition to this nutrient loading, grass clippings may contain toxins from herbicides and insecticides applied to a lawn. These chemicals may or may not break down during composting depending on the chemical composition of the toxins and the conditions under which they get composted. But, when grass clippings do get into a stream, any toxins they contain rushes downstream before it has a chance to decay. As a result, toxins may end up in reservoirs and the tap water we consume. Some chemical toxins can even infiltrate through the ground to aquifers below, contaminating wells.

Is this all just talk, or are lawn products and yard waste actually degrading water quality around here? 

If you live on the west side of Mine Hill or in Succasunna, I can answer that. The Raritan Headwaters Association has stream monitoring sites in those locations. It publishes an annual water quality “Report Card” on the internet. The two main tributaries that flow into Sunset Pond (Mine Hill Beach) had a failing grade last year for their "ortho phosphorous" content. In other words, both streams have a nutrient overload, most likely from fertilizer runoff or yard waste entering the streams. They failed on several other factors as well, including their "specific conductance" (too much road salt). We can and must do better. 

So, what can we do to improve the water quality? Is there a better way to deal with grass clippings?

I'm glad you asked! 

When it comes to grass clippings, the less we do, the better. Don’t pick up your grass clippings at all (unless it is to prevent the mower from shooting them into a lake or stream). Instead, mulch-cut your lawn and let the clipping fall between the blades of grass. This method will,

• Save you time spent on collecting and disposing of the clippings. 
• Help your lawn retain moisture and save on how much you have to water it.
• Add hummus to your soil which can improve its structure.
• Feed worms and beneficial microbes that help keep soil healthy (think probiotics), and
• Grass clippings will decompose and return nutrients to the soil.

If you are worried about thatch build-up, properly mulched grass clippings don’t contribute to that problem. The only downside is you may have to switch to a mulching deck mower or purchase mulching blades for the one you own. If you try mulching with your current lawnmower but see grass clippings lying on the grass after a pass, your machine isn't mulching properly. If you use a commercial lawn service, they may not have dedicated mulching deck mowers for the job. A good mulching mower should cut the grass in small enough pieces that most of them drop down between the grass to the soil below. 

The NJ DEP has a goog flyer on eco-friendly lawncare tips (see below).

Just a note on municipal compost. Don't use it if you don't know for sure that certain herbicides and pesticides are not present in the mulch. Residues of Picloram, Clopyralid or Aminopyralid Herbicide Create Killer Compost.  From the article: 

"Minute concentrations of picloram, clopyralid and aminopyralid, as low as 1 ppb (parts per billion), can be lethal to sensitive garden plants such as peas, beans, lettuce, spinach, tomatoes and potatoes. Most pesticides, including herbicides, break down quickly in the composting process. Picloram, Clopyralid and Aminopyralid do not. These chemicals are: 

• Easily absorbed by plants.
• Remain chemically stable and intact in both live and dead plants.
• Do not breakdown substantially in animal digestive tracts so contaminate manure, urine and bedding with residues.
• Breakdown very slowly in composts and soils with an estimated half-life of 1 - 2 years.
• Affect sensitive crops at very low concentrations - 1-3 ppb.  

I hope you find this information helpful.

________________________________________________________ 

Resources:

https://extension.missouri.edu/publications/g6958#:~:text=While%20grass%20clippings%20can%20be,in%20decomposition%20and%20reduce%20odors.

https://www.nj.gov/dep/dshw/recycling/Grass%20Cut%20It%20and%20Leave%20It.pdf

https://www.nj.gov/dep/healthylawnshealthywater/

https://www.raritanheadwaters.org/watershed-report/

https://edis.ifas.ufl.edu/pdf/AE/AE04800.pdf

https://www.cwp.org/mission-vision/

_________________________________


ADDENDUM:

The Waters Around Me in the New Jersey Highlands

by Brian T. Lynch, MSW

Prologue

The New Jersey Highlands is a 60-mile-long stretch of the Appalachian Mountains that angle Northeast from Phillipsburg to Oakland in the state’s northwestern corner. It contains 860 thousand acres of forested ridges, rolling hills, and fertile valleys. More than half of the region is (thankfully) still covered in forests. The entire region serves as drainage basins for the Wallkill River to the north, the Delaware River to the West, The Passaic River to the East, and the Raritan River, which flows Southwest from the Highlands before turning East towards Perth Amboy and Raritan Bay.

Beneath the Highland's many valleys are glacier-fill (or unconfined) aquifers and aquifers trapped between layers of non-porous rock. Private and commercial wells tap these aquifers for use by people living in the region. Rainfall that percolates into the soil travels down to recharge these aquifers. Rainfall that doesn't evaporate or settle underground gets collected in a natural network of streams, rivers, and lakes. The loss of rainwater due to evaporation is significant, especially from farmland, open fields, and residential lawns.

A portion of surface water in the Highland's lakes, rivers, and streams fill the many reservoirs that supply drinking water to residents living outside the region. As a result, the Highlands carry about half of all the surface water used by farmers and residents in New Jersey. In all, two-thirds of New Jersey's 8.9 million people rely on the Highlands to supplies up to 374 million gallons of clean water per day. The primary reservoir systems supplying surface waters from the Highlands include the:

• Wanaque/Monksville Reservoir System, operated by the North Jersey District Water Supply Commission;
• Pequannock Watershed, owned by the City of Newark;
• Boonton/Split Rock Reservoir System, owned by Jersey City;
• Round Valley/Spruce Run Reservoir System, managed by the New Jersey Water Supply Authority.

Rain is the source of all life above the oceans. The Highland's rainwater that doesn't evaporate off the land, recharge our aquifers or fill our reservoirs flows back to the sea down the Delaware, Raritan, or the Passaic Rivers. In that process, these rivers support vast areas of habitat and wildlife upon which all life ultimately depends. During times of drought, a balance must be struck between the water we consume and the water needed to maintain our natural habitat downstream. We are inextricably tied to the life of every other living thing, whether we realize it or not. It isn't ultimately a competition between us and nature as many imagine, but a partnership with all living things that must be understood and respected.

Everyone who lives in the highlands is responsible for the life-giving water that flows from this region. The changes we make here, the land we clear, what and how we build on it, what we carelessly discarded or spread on our farmland and lawns, what we discharge in our streams; it all matters regardless of where you live in this region. 

In a recent blog, The Waters Below Me, I wrote about the valley-fill aquifers from which many Morris County residents draw their water. Rainfall on the Highlands replaces what we take when there is sufficient time and enough open land to filter down to the aquifers. Surface waters collect in drainage basins all around us to fill our rivers, lakes, and reservoirs. River water that we don't consume continues on to the sea providing life-giving water that supports the natural ecosystems in the northern half of the state. Preserving the quality of water in the Highlands is a vital need and a major responsibility that requires everyone's participation. 

---------------------

https://njhighlandscoalition.org/highlands-resources-historical-agricultural-natural/

https://www.nj.gov/njhighlands/master/

The Waters Below Me

by Brian T. Lynch, MSW

Wetlands along the Lamington River (Black River) in Randolph, NJ, not far from the Alamatong Well Field. Photo by the author.

Smack in the middle of the New Jersey Highlands is a long glacial valley that starts at Picatinny Lake in Morris County and stretches south to Califon in Hunterdon County. The valley and drainage basin surrounding it covers nearly 100 square miles. It served as an ice channel for glaciers in the distant past. The Wisconsin glacier was the most recent, but luckily, this one didn’t extend as far south. It stopped a few miles north of Kenvil, where Rt. 46 crosses the flats from Mine Hill to Kingstown Mountain.

When the Wisconsin glacier melted, it disgorged massive amounts of water and material collected along its way. The melt-water filled the valley with boulders, rocks, gravel, sand, and silt. Some material got deposited in jumbled conglomerations. Some material settled at different rates as it flowed, generally depositing heavier material first and carrying the lightest material further away. This process created stratified layers of sediment along the valley floor, each with varying degrees of water permeability.

The particulars of deposition are complex, but suffice it to say, the way the outwash filled the valley created what geologists call valley-fill aquifers. These are essentially a series of underground glacier lakes. They are literally under everyone’s feet who lives or works in the valley. This process created the Succasunna plains as well. Today, the valley-fill aquifers below it are primary water sources for thirty-five-thousands residents who rely on the Alamatong and Flanders well fields operated by the Municipal Utilities Authority (MUA) of Morris County. In addition, thousands of more residents and businesses tap directly into the aquifers with private wells.

Note: This map and the geological information informing this article are from a 1996 U.S. Geological Survey Water-Resources Investigation Report. https://pubs.usgs.gov/wri/1993/4157/report.pdf

Imagine this, every drop of rain that falls in the valley’s basin that doesn’t reach the sea or evaporate in the ocean of air flows underground to replenish the water we pump from the aquifers below. The undeveloped land and forests in our valley’s basin are “recharge” areas where the ground is still porous. Plants and trees slow the water flow, giving it time to soak deep into the soil before it evaporates or drains away. Wetlands through which our streams pass also slow the water’s movement allowing time and space for it to seep down and refill the glacier lakes below.

Time and space! Both are essential to capture all the water we need every day. Every parcel of land we develop, every new road or driveway that we pave, and every swampy area that we drain or fill means less water reaching our aquifers. All this speaks only to the volume of water available to us, not its quality. The inescapable truth about our water quality is that everyone who drinks from the valley-fill aquifers will eventually be exposed to most of what we, the basin dwellers, spread on our lawns and roads or discharge into our streams.

Addendum:  We have turned our little streams and tributaries into giant causeways to carry away hundreds of millions of gallons of rain running off our rooftops, driveways, parking lots, and streets. Some of this excess runoff tops off our reservoirs, but much of it just rushes out to sea. We fail to capture it for human use or for environmental benefits. The water rushing below this bridge in Mendham is from 3 to 4 inches of rain in the area. The normal flow in this stream is approximately 4' wide and 16" deep. 

Republicans Muzzling the People’s Will by Suppressing Ballot Initiatives

by Brian T. Lynch, MSW

A ballot initiative process gives direct power to the voters to enact new, or change existing laws. It allows ordinary citizens to bypass their legislators by placing their proposed legislation directly on the public election ballot. These proposed initiatives first have to meet states’ qualifications regarding the number of petition signatures required and other criteria required by state laws.

This century-old fixture of American democracy allows voters to defy the wishes of their state’s representatives. In states now dominated by Republican-led legislatures, Democrats and independents have had recent success in passing broadly popular laws that are opposed by Republican legislators and governors.

The New York Times is running a story (5/22/21) about how state Republican legislators have begun passing new laws to limit or dismantle the ballot initiative in their state. This is part of a broader Republican agenda to suppress majority rule and cease permanent government control. Here is an excerpt from the article:

“But this year, Republican-led legislatures in Florida, Idaho, South Dakota, and other states have passed laws limiting the use of the practice, one piece of a broader G.O.P. attempt to lock in political control for years to come… So far in 2021, Republicans have introduced 144 bills to restrict the ballot initiative processes in 32 states… Of those bills, 19 have been signed into law by nine Republican governors. In three states, Republican lawmakers have asked voters to approve ballot initiatives that in fact limit their own right to bring and pass future ballot initiatives.”

Republicans lost the Presidency and control of the Senate in a massive voter turnout election. The people of America have spoken loudly, and they don’t like it. They pulled out all the stops and didn’t expect to lose. The manner in which they have conducted themselves before and since the election has tipped their hand to reveal their real intent. Their only goal is to suppress majority rule so they can take permanent control over the federal government. They have accomplished this in many states. These states served as models of how a federal takeover can be done. A critical piece of the plan was put in place when Mitch McConnell succeeded in packing the federal bench and the Supreme Court with sympathetic ideologues.

This was supposed to be the election to take over our republic. It was their only agenda. They literally didn’t have any party platform to run on. They offered no policy initiatives, no vision statements for how they would govern, no critical issues that might distract Trump’s carefully curated base from their cult-like trance. Now their decades-long plans for totalitarian control are out in the open, even as they try to cover their tracks. It won’t work. Everyone sees clearly what they are up to and how they are doing it.

This assault on state ballot initiatives described in the NY Times article details their attacks on the majority will of the people in their state. The “Anti-Republican” movement has opened yet another front in their battle to dismantle our democratic rule. We cannot let them win. We must not allow the United States of America to become a totalitarian country.

Securing Elections in the State of New Jersey is a Small Price for Democracy

• 
  

LET'S DEMAND SECURE VOTING MACHINES NOW! 

Picture credit: Philadelphia Inquirer 

New Jersey has the 5th least secure voting system in the country. Given the massive loss of confidence in US elections following the last election, the $60 to $80 million it would take to replace our e-machines with voting machines that produce a paper trail is essential. Let's not give conspiracy theorists or election hackers a foothold in questioning or tampering with our elections in New Jersey. 

HISTORY

N.J. was going to have paper-based voting machines more than a decade ago. Will it happen by 2020? - from The Philadelphia Inquirer from March 10, 2019. 

"New Jersey was once at the vanguard of voting security. In the mid-2000s, it became an issue thanks to a major lawsuit from voters. The state Legislature in 2005 passed a law requiring that machines allow voters to verify paper ballots by 2008, then required audits of those paper trails. It even set aside $20 million in funding to retrofit machines to print records."

"Instead, the governor took back the money as the recession struck; lawmakers suspended the requirement to buy new machines; no funding has materialized since."
"Now, as the 2020 elections draw ever nearer, a handful of counties are replacing their machines, some of them two decades old. Others will continue to rely on current systems, waiting for federal or state funding before undertaking the costly, time-consuming upgrade to protect citizens’ votes."

PRESENT-DAY 
N.J. among nation’s worst in making sure elections are secure. Why haven’t we fixed that?
Updated May 15, 2021; Posted May 15, 2021 - by Jonathan D. Salant | NJ Advance Media for NJ.com

"After President Donald Trump and his Republican allies singled out Georgia and Arizona in falsely claiming that the 2020 presidential election was stolen, both states recounted their votes and found no significant problems."

"That’s not so easy to do in New Jersey after each election. It’s one of just six states that do not require a paper trail that allows election officials to check that voting machines were not hacked and the results not tampered with." <snip>

"While New Jersey could do an audit last year because so many ballots were cast by mail, that was a one-shot deal due to the coronavirus pandemic. Going forward, the Garden State will remain an outlier unless the state comes up with the estimated $60 million to $80 million needed to replace county voting machines."

“That’s totally the problem,” said Eileen Kean, a Monmouth County elections commissioner. It’s really a very, very expensive undertaking. Voting experts said that a paper trail will do more for election security than all of the voting restrictions being enacted by Republican state legislatures, including both Georgia and Arizona."

FUNDING DEMOCRACY IN NJ

How can we fund $80 million for secure voting in NJ? The NJ annual budget is about $60 billion dollars. Funding a safe and verifiable voting process would cost 0.0013% of the annual budget. It isn't a question of not having enough money, it is a question of priorities. There are lots of no-sweat choices we can make. For example, we can pay for safe elections through a one-time dip into property tax rebate revenue.
According to the 2021/22 NJ budget, the appropriations for general revenues and property tax relief are up 9.6%, or $2.873 billion. About $1.2 billion is budgeted for property tax relief. Just 6.7% of that money could be used to buy verifiable voting machines. That would still leave $1.12 billion for property tax relief next year. 

And while we are at it, the distribution of the one-time $80 million debit could be progressively shared to make this tax rebate fairer. 

There is a "... divergence in spending on programs offering targeted help to those who need it most and on tax breaks for homeowners no matter their income is largely a function of separate policies that have been put in place over the years for each relief program. But the current trend for divvying up the more than $1.2 billion in annual funding for the relief programs comes as Murphy, a first-term Democrat, regularly talks about enacting fiscal policies that will make New Jersey “stronger and fairer.”  - New Jersey Spotlight - Sept 6, 2020 

If you believe that securing our elections during this national threat to American democracy should be a much higher priority, then: 

1. Share this FB post widely among your friends and with the FB groups to which you belong.

2. Write or call your state representatives and ask them to support Vincent Mazzeo's bill, A291) that would require counties to replace their voting machines and buy machines that produce a paper trail. 

3. CONTACT Gov. Murphy's office and demand that he makes it a priority to secure the vote in New Jersey https://www.nj.gov/governor/contact/all/

OR CALL or write the Governor's office directly: 

Governor Phil Murphy's Office
225 W State St, Trenton, NJ 08625

(609) 292-6000

Thanks.

World Democracy and the Invisible Hand Opposing It.

by Brian T. Lynch, MSW

Here's a radical idea. Let's distribute equally among every adult citizen, no matter their status or circumstance, all the power necessary to govern our country. Then let's endow each person with the right to lend their share of power to others who pledge to represent their interests for a term. And when governing questions arise, let's accept that the majority opinion should prevail so long as it doesn't infringe on a person's inalienable rights as a human being. That’s what we have. It is the democratic republic created by our founding fathers.

And isn’t it so much better than having wealthy, powerful people deciding our lives in ways that suit their self-interests and the interests of their loyal friends? This latter model has always been the default mode throughout history. It is what we will have again if we fail to defend our democracy. Keeping our republic going forward will likely be as difficult as establishing it was in the beginning. We are in the middle of an acute domestic challenge today.

Why is democracy worth fighting to preserve? Democracy is fair for everyone. It alone has the ability to distribute the greatest good to the largest share of its citizens. But democracy is also hard. It has taken most of recorded history to set up just one enduring example for the world to follow. We are that first and oldest example. A democracy, with its equal distribution of power by its citizens, challenges every other power structure ever devised before it. One obvious example would be the royal dynasties of Europe.

When the aristocracy of the mid-1500s and 1600s was forced to share power with a growing wealthy business class, they preserved their dominance by chartering corporations. These royal corporations conserved the aristocrat’s financial powers over the business class because all charters followed the principle that the more one owns the greater one’s say in making decisions. And no one was wealthier than the King. Also, the wealth a corporation generates is not distributed equally. It is distributed according to a person’s share of ownership. The more you own, the more you earn.

And so it is to this day that the corporate model of governance continues to preserve the wealth and power of the wealthy. Many of the aristocrats are still around (The English royals, for example). The wealthiest families and many undemocratic governments in the world still have controlling interests in the global economy.

Corporate governance is among the models in direct competition with democracy. It manifests itself in many ways both large and small. For example, while governments still charter corporations, business sectors have established a political lobbying industry that funnels campaign donations back to cash-starved or business-friendly politicians. This allows corporations to exert influence over politicians who make government policies that is greater than the influence of the constituents who elected them. And as always, behind the veil of every corporation are the wealthy owners of capital.

The wealth of modern international corporations rivals all but the richest countries. The same is true of the wealthiest corporate owners. The economic power of just the top eighty billionaires is staggering. Their combined wealth is greater than the bottom 46% of people on earth. When their interest become align, and they push in the same direction, they are nearly an irresistible force. 

Up until the present era, corporations have largely benefitted from the stability and predictability of western democracies in which they were chartered. In the period after World War II businesses were mostly community-based enterprises. It was in a local business owner’s best interest to use their clout to strengthen and build up their local communities. It was a source of civic pride for them as well. When corporate entities grew larger and more regional and national, business interest and national interest began to merge and local community connections declined. In recent decades, the web of pan-global international business relationships has grown exponentially. 

Today, even international corporate fealty to the host countries that charter them has weakened. In the unregulated space between nations struggle to balance the interests of their people with the international corporate interests and global competition. This has given rise to many pan-global regulatory bodies that are inter-governmental, trans-governmental, and even private (non-governmental) in structure. Some are more prominent, such as the World Trade Organization (WTO), International Monetary Fund (IMF), the World Bank, and the OECD.

There are many other international business organizations (IBOs) are seeking to globally coordinate and facilitate corporate interests. There are also scores of more regional and continental business organizations designed to promote regional interests and influence decision-making by the larger IBOs. These are collectively referred to as RCGs or Regional Consulting Groups.

Most IBOs seek to influence what they call “upstream activities of the rule-making process” in the host nations. This includes the exchange of information, data collection, and development of norms, standards, and best practices among the host nations. A few IBOs are also involved in “downstream activities” such as internal governmental rule-making processes including, “… enforcement, dispute settlement, and crisis management.”

Rogue Actors and Shadow Banking
Into this ever-expanding universe between what world governments still control and what they no longer fully control is an amorphous dark web of private wealth and power. It has become the sandbox for billionaires, oligarchs, cartels, and rogue world leaders seeking to shelter or conceal their activity. It is a wilderness in which shadow banking (unregulated by any nation) now controls nearly one-third of all global wealth. This opaque network of dark commerce connects both legitimate banking systems and international businesses with the dark lords of wealth and power. That this extra-governmental space exists is an established fact, not a conspiracy theory. It is recognized as a real threat to global financial stability. In April of 2009, on the heels of the Great Recession, a new global financial regulatory agency quietly emerged. The Financial Stability Board (FSB) was created in an attempt to modulate this new threat.

I believe it is from this stateless shadow economy that an invisible hand has emerged to weaken the world governments that still largely control the global economy. It intuitively follows that destablizing Western democracies, with their structural commitment to the welfare and interests of ordinary citizens (whose votes must be earned), would be primary targets. This isn’t just a threat to global banking and commerce. It represents a fifth column, a phantom opposition to national sovereignty worldwide. It is a vector for corruption that further taints corporate culture and poisons the well of global democracy. This is the nexus through which the interests of rogue billionaires and corrupt principalities begin to align and potentially conspire. This is a likely source through which the global disinformation warfare raging against Western democracies is being waged. And this disinformation war is the direct cause of our growing political polarization and disunion that is tearing countries apart.

Postscript: Most folks have a hard time seeing beyond the partisan political walls that have been erected to block our view of the bigger picture unfolding in the world. It is heartening to know that others who have read this are seeing what I see. Identifying a problem or a threat is always the first step in solving it, and that is the immediate purpose of my piece. I am confident that there are solutions to the challenges we face in creating a more democratic world. 

One example that another reader of this post (at Daily Kos) pointed out is that all corporations are chartered by sovereign governments, therefore the terms of those charters are subject to change to the will of the people in a democracy. People are the ultimate source of all social power. How we organize and coordinate among ourselves determines the social power structures under which we live. 

I can imagine a future in which a powerful global, grassroots democracy movement in the spirit of 1776 coalesces to confront this global threat. I also foresee a future of incredible oppression by powerful global elites wielding the full potential of emerging technologies to keep us under tight control. I know how dramatic that my sound, but the momentum seems to be moving in that direction. 

Again, the first step to confronting this threat is to get millions or billions of people to look beyond the many walls that divide us so we can see the bigger picture at play. Even the most powerful person worth 100s of millions of dollars cannot stand up to millions of people who refuse to accept their money.

How Domestic Terrorists Received Their U.S. Military Training

by Brian T. Lynch, MSW

Something worrisome has changed in the U.S. armed forces. The evidence of these changes has been out in the open for decades but received little attention until insurrectionists stormed the U.S. Capitol on January 6th. Among the chaos of rioters juiced up by the incendiary rhetoric at President Trump’s rally that day, video footage shows bands of highly coordinated participants, equipped and dressed for combat, moving single file through the crowds in a deliberate, military-style insertion into the U.S. Capitol building. Who were these guys?

AP photo - https://apnews.com/article/ex-military-cops-us-capitol-riot-a1cb17201dfddc98291edead5badc257

Now we know. “Of the nearly 380 individuals federally charged in connection with the [January 6th] riot, at least 44 are current or former members of the U.S. armed forces,” reported the Washington Post recently. That number represents about 12% of those criminally arrested so far. Almost all were retired military.

Details are still emerging as the FBI continues apace in perhaps the largest, most important investigation in its history. We already know a number of these ex-military are members of white nationalist extremist groups that participated in the insurrection. The idea that so many former members of the armed services can turn their training and experience against the country they served is disturbing, but it shouldn’t be surprising.

The military has a “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy pertaining to extremism if individuals can perform satisfactorily, without making their extremist opinion overt… they are likely to be able to complete their contract. - U.S. Department of Defense report, 2005

Prior to the terrorist attack on the World Trade Center on September 11, 2001, the all-volunteer army was able to recruit a sustainable number of well-qualified men and women to meet our military needs around the world. The Afghanistan and Iraq wars changed all that. By 2005 the stress placed on the U.S. military was becoming critical. In his 2012 book, Irregular Army, Matt Kennard wrote:

Around this time a retired army officer named Andrew F. Krepinevich, writing under a Pentagon contract released a shocking report which was scathing about the U.S. Military being able to maintain its troop levels in Iraq without breaking the military or losing the war. His diagnosis was simple: The U.S. armed forces were “confronted with a protracted deployment against irregular forces waging insurgencies,” but the ground forces required to provide stability and security in Afghanistan and Iraq “clearly exceeded those available for the mission. - Matt Kennard, 2012

The Pentagon employed multiple strategies in an effort to maintain troop levels. These included increasing retention by tolerating bad conduct among the troops that would usually result in disciplinary discharges. It increased the budget for recruitment including signing bonuses. It called up reservists and national guard troops for combat deployment, lengthening deployments, and shortened the time between deployments. The Pentagon also expanded its use of private mercenary companies, such as Blackwater, to provide logistical and security services for the war efforts. When recruitment targets still could not be met, and the military was approaching the breaking point, bringing back the draft was considered but rejected by Congress. That left the lowering of recruitment standards as the only way to meet its recruitment need.

Under Donald Rumsfeld’s watch, the Pentagon allowed, “… the dismantling of the whole regulatory structure for enlistment and retention,” as Kennard put it in his book. Some of the lowered recruitment standards were accomplished by explicit changes in policy, such as dropping the high school diploma requirement, rules on IQ levels or physical conditions, etc. Less palatable changes were made sub rosa, in plausibly deniable practices. These included loosening enlistment criteria on criminals, racist extremists, gang members, and those with questionable moral character or mental health. Some of the worst atrocities in the Afghan and Iraq wars were committed by soldiers who would not have met recruiting standards prior to these changes.

For over a decade the “don’t ask, don’t tell” practice relating to racial extremists and fringe elements in society has allowed neo-Nazis, white supremacists, and morally corrupt individuals to receive the best military training on the planet. The pressure to recruit and retain these soldiers, even when their extremist opinions spill into the open, has been great. There is some evidence that extremist organizations have taken advantage of these lower standards to gain military training, but most of these recruits have a natural affinity for military service.

In any event, a disturbing proportion of active and retired military personnel are or have become, radicalized anti-government extremists with skilled military training. Their presence and engagement in the assault on Congress and our democracy on January 6th represent a new level of domestic terrorist threats that must be confronted. With the winding down of the war in Iraq and Afghanistan recently and the Pentagon’s renewed look at extremism in the ranks, reestablishing more robust standards for recruitment and retention of our troops must be given a high priority.

The Big Lie – and the Science of Lying

By Brian T. Lynch, MSW

“… in the big lie there is always a certain force of credibility; because the broad masses of a nation are always more easily corrupted in the deeper strata of their emotional nature than consciously or voluntarily; and thus in the primitive simplicity of their minds they more readily fall victims to the big lie than the small lie… Even though the facts which prove [the lie] to be so may be brought clearly to their minds, they will still doubt and waver and will continue to think there may be some other explanation. For the grossly impudent lie always leaves traces behind it, even after it has been nailed down, a fact which is known to all expert liars in this world and to all who conspire together in the art of lying.”

— Adolf Hitler, Mein Kampf

“Propaganda is communication that is primarily used to influence an audience and further an agenda, which may not be objective and may be selectively presenting facts to encourage a particular synthesis or perception, or using loaded language to produce an emotional rather than a rational response to the information that is being presented.” — Wikipedia

Before the 20th Century, the terms propaganda and persuasion were nearly synonymous. Propaganda had no negative connotation. That changed in the 1900s. “Propaganda” has a negative meaning today and is often associated with authoritarian governments. But in practice, the persuasive arts and propaganda employ many of the same techniques and it can be difficult to discern one from the other. Propaganda now also applies equally to powerful private corporations as well as government agencies. The bright line between these concepts, to the extent they can be found, is in the intent of the speakers or authors who broadcast the messages. At the heart of persuasion is a belief in the underlying facts and good public intentions. At the heart of propaganda is intentional deception motivated by self-interest and a desire for wealth or social power. At the root of propaganda, there is always a pernicious lie.

As Hitler called it in the above quote, the art of lying has evolved since his day into a sophisticated field of science today. Mass media, especially electronic communication, is the medium to which the science of lying is being applied. This powerful new science has spawned whole new commercial perception management and “disinformational” enterprises. Discerning what is factual, accurately perceiving the unvarnished truth, is increasingly more difficult. The veracity and integrity of traditional sources of information are under attack by powerful, unscrupulous special interest groups. At the same time, a steady media stream of maliciously fake information is divergent sets of facts in segments of the population, making normal persuasion methods nearly impossible. It may soon become impossible to distinguish truth from fiction at all. For example, there is rapid progress in the development of deep-fake technologies, powered by artificial intelligence, to create synthetic video content indistinguishable from photographically generated video.

Separating fact from intentional deception has always been a major social challenge, but the recent scale and scope of this difficulty are on a whole new level. Our normal critical thinking skills are no longer up to the task. We must improve our minds' ability to expect and recognize propaganda directed at us. We must fortify ourselves from the mental manipulations constantly assaulting our senses. We need better detection skills and trustworthy methods to quickly identify falsehoods and the liars behind them. But, we also need to develop greater awareness of how human vulnerabilities lead to mental manipulation by others.

On this latter point, the post-election uprising of January 6, 2021, presents a teaching moment in how we can be subconsciously misled by intentional deception. A well-coordinated and emotionally charged campaign to promote the big lie, that the election was stolen, spawned insurrection at the Capitol. For the first time in recent memory, our national media found the temerity to call out the “Big Lie.” This is remarkable because members of the media, like all of us, have shown much susceptibility to the impacts of big, audacious lies.

While there are new and high-tech ways to propagate and amplify big lies, the phenomenon itself is not new. History is replete with examples. Big lies are often successful because really brash and forceful lies trigger a vulnerability in how our brains respond to information even when we reject the lie on a cognitive level. Lies create emotional gaps in our thinking that leave room for doubt that didn’t previously exist. Even small lies can create unreasonable doubts.

The theme and wording of big public lies are always chosen to evoke strong emotional reactions within an intended audience. Natural social fault lines or existing controversies are often the subjects of the lie. The vocabulary that is chosen always contains emotive, high-inference wording that generates interpretations or reactions well beyond the literal meaning of the words. It is this feature of the big lie that best identifies it early on.

A famous example of evocative word choice occurred during the Bush administration in the Gulf War lead-up. There was a media blitz by the White House to drum up support for the war. The relentless blitz alone should have aroused skepticism and careful listening for verifiable facts, but it did not. In a television interview, Dr. Condoleezza Rice said:

"The problem here is that there will always be some uncertainty about how quickly he [Saddam Hussain] can acquire nuclear weapons. But we don't want the smoking gun to be a mushroom cloud."

The word choice is clearly designed to evoke fear. And it did. The comment was picked up by the media and echoed everywhere for weeks. But fear can be easily evoked by facts as well. Why was the administration using loaded word choices rather than documents, photographs, or testimonial evidence to convince us that “weapons of mass destruction” existed?[i]

A counterexample of this would be the presentation of facts, with aerial reconnaissance photos, at the onset of the Cuban Missile Crisis. That presentation surely evoked a well-informed fear in this country with none of the over-heated rhetoric that accompanies the big lie. In fact, the rhetoric was toned down to minimize the panic and reassure us that the planned military interventions would work. And they did work by the thinnest margin.

The theme of the big lie is a window into what is behind it. In the case of former President Donald Trump, the lies about the “stolen election” were an obvious attempt to stay in power. The word choices in the messaging in that campaign was designed to rally supporters and evoke hostility and rage. This example, however, is still too fresh to be a useful example.

There are many other examples of the big lie in recent history from the falsely claimed Tonkin Gulf incident of April 4, 1964, which lead to greater military involvement in the Vietnam war, to the false WMD claims that lead to the Iraq war. But governments are not the only perpetrators of the big lie. Big corporations and their industry associations are practitioners in the art of the art well. The tobacco industry created a whole body of pseudo-scientific evidence in the 1970s to contradict research that proved cigarette smoking cause cancer. They created a huge public disinformation campaign to protect their industry profits. That big lie worked for years. Doubt was cast in the public mind for what was settled science. Even years after the lie was dramatically exposed in Congressional hearings, doubt remains in segments of the population. As Hitler wrote, “… grossly impudent [lies] always leaves traces behind it, even after it has been nailed down.”


ANATOMY OF THE BIG LIE

Climate change is another example where a big lie campaign created a factitious controversy. It is an instructive example because climate science started out completely devoid of politics and unaffected by public opinion. It began with a small sphere of several thousand climate researchers around the world. Discussions and vigorous debate among them were a natural part of understanding the meaning of data as it was collected. Their collective deliberations can serve as a model for how all collective opinions form in the absence of malicious intent. 

The initial chaos of ideas and theories slowly gave rise to areas of consensus and then converging theories. Gradually, as the accretion of data created coherent patterns, a consensus formed among scientists that planet Earth is quickly warming and that carbon dioxide from ancient deposits of fossil fuels is a major contributor. There was a growing awareness that the impact of these changes could be catastrophic for life on the planet.

At no point, even now, was there ever a single, monolithic understanding of the climate data. There is a range of interpretations and different emphasis placed on aspects of data in the empirical sciences. There are degrees of uncertainty and controversial claims, but before the big lie is introduced, all the participants are acting in good faith. Their data may be faulty, their interpretation of facts may be inaccurate, but no one willfully inserts wildly false information to subvert the scientific process.

This model of collective opinion-formation is normal in all of society. It isn’t confined to scientists. In fact, this opinion-formation model is naturally occurring and literally “normal” in the statistical sense. In the case of our pioneering climate scientists, if we were to plot the granular subtleties of their beliefs and concerns, and plot it on a graph, a natural continuum of their alarm and opinion would form with a bell-shaped curve centered on the mean where the consensus of their opinions would cluster. The x-axis on this continuum (and in the figures to the right) would be the level of alarm raised by the data. This is how all collective public opinions are generated. No two people have exactly the same viewpoint. There are always people who have radically different views. The frequency distribution of different viewpoints naturally falls within a normal pattern. This is why ancient wisdom tells us “the truth lies somewhere in the middle.” Time and again, when society forms opinions, our minds seek the centrality of multiple viewpoints. It is an inherent bias that is usually correct, but not always.

As alarmed climate scientists began alerting the public to what appeared to be a significant and growing threat to humanity, as they began advocating for solutions to avoid the worst consequences of what is about to happen, their consensus opinion generated alarm in the fossil energy sector. Carbon dioxide exhaust is an unavoidable consequence of burning fossil fuels. You can burn it cleaner, you can capture or offset some CO2, but you can’t eliminate most of it. The implications are clear. If science is correct, fossil fuel consumption has to be reduced. This presents a direct threat to industry profits and the whole business model. After secretly confirming the scientific findings on global warming, big energy corporations made plans to attack the science and alter public opinion trajectory. In a fair contest of ideas, energy company executives knew that public policy would quickly follow to reduce CO2 emissions and erode profits. This sets the stage for creating the big lie behind the climate controversy.

The creation of a big lie takes place in stages. It starts with some seed of truth and the recruitment of researchers and scientific opinion influences who see little cause for alarm in the data, or who have contrary opinions. These are the outliers on one fringe of the climate science continuum. Their actual numbers will be few by definition, so the goal is to disproportionately elevate their voices in the public eye. 

The next step is to lavish attention and grant money on these fringe researchers, hire PR firms and media commentators to amplify their minority opinions, and identify conspiracy theorists willing to go even further to discredit the science. This creates the framework for the big lie. Nurturing the dissenters is the next step. Establishing communications networks and opportunities for personal interactions within this growing cadre of dissidents lends credibility and deepens the group's commitment to their alternative opinion… that climate change is a “hoax”. The big lie is broadcast. The larger and more animated the dissenting group becomes, the more audacious the lie they are willing to support and the more impact it will have on public opinion.

The impact of this very loud but synthetic dissent group is amplified further by a simultaneous attack on the scientists on the opposite fringe, scientists who hold the most alarming opinions about climate

change. Normally, an attack on the scientific community would raise the strongest reaction in them. This would cancel out some of the noise generated by the big lie. Anticipating these scientists' reactions and muting them with a preemptive suppression campaign is part of the plan by the architects of the big lie. For the propagandist, it is important that the factitious continuum only extends in a single direction, away from opinions that threaten their plans.

When the big lie is launched in public it quickly generates a fictitious extension to the scientific consensus on climate change, in this example. The continuum of opinion is stretched in the direction of lowering the alarm. The bigger the lie, the longer the continuum stretches in one direction. This has the immediate effect of making the average of climate scientists’ opinions appear to be more extreme on the continuum of all opinions. The public information campaign by the scientific community to alert us to their concerns must suddenly compete with a well-funded public disinformation campaign conducted by the big energy companies. As the general public gets drawn into the apparent controversy, the centrality of opinion bias we all have skews our beliefs and distorts public opinion. We look for truth to be somewhere in the middle of these new extremes. This shift towards the big lie further encourages and energizes those who believe the lies. Polarity increases and the truth becomes distorted in the public's mind. Public consensus shifts away from the scientific consensus and towards the big lie. Politics become stalemated and public policy decisions to remediate the problems are delayed.

This example of a big lie, as it applies to climate change, serves as a template for understanding normal public opinion formation and how it can be manipulated by bad-faith actors. It fits a generalized pattern that helps us identify many other deception-based controversies such as anti-vaccinators, QAnon followers, and pandemic hoax believers. It also illuminates why our bias, that the truth must fall somewhere in the middle, prevents us from seeing the facts more clearly and why, “… the grossly impudent lie always leaves traces behind it, even after it has been nailed down.” Big lie propaganda causes lasting damage. This discussion doesn’t explain the many ways new media disinformation technologies are making it easier to create and sustain public deceptions. The art of lying has truly become a science of deception that alters our perceptions. 

There are powerful reasons why big lies are proliferating. The ability to electronically identify individuals by their biopsychosocial profile, sort through whole populations to identify people on the fringe of public issues, and then radicalize them through social media based micro-targeted messaging is having a massive effect on society. The repercussions are far-reaching, yet the publics' understanding of these new techniques lags far behind. We can't easily tell when we have been manipulated. There are also more conventional reasons why the big lie is becoming more common. It works well for those who want to manipulate public sentiment for private gain as social prohibitions against it have diminished. 

Enforcement of prohibitions against public dishonesty is collectively up to all of us as citizens, but it isn't easy. Even when we recognize and reject the intentional big lie, if we don’t also consider how it altered and shifted our own opinions then we don’t compensate for that shift... and the big lie is still a success. 

If we do compensate for the impact of a big lie on our opinions and lean into the truth, we will appear to be moving in a radical direction by those who don't recognize how much their own opinions have been altered. We need to be courageous in re-examing our own thinking after a big lie has been exposed. We must realign our opinions with the more reliably true facts and then influence others to do the same. 

---

[i] I was personally driven by this comment to carefully review all the actual public evidence I could find on the internet about Iraqi WMDs. I concluded, with some certainty, that there was no evidence that Iraq had WMDs other than some old chemical weapons which we gave them during the Iran-Iraq war. I felt that if I was able to determine that Iraq had no WMD, our politicians should be able to see that as well. I petitioned members of Congress with letters to press for a debate on a declaration of war. I was confident the evidence I found would come out. The debate happened but turned out to be perfunctory. The evidence against the need for military intervention barely surfaced. My disappointment with those who voted to authorize the war was deep and long-lasting. And among my peers, my position on the issue of war when it was being debated seemed wildly radical, as did the position of those in Congress who voted against authorizing the use of force. If you have read up to this note and still think my claim is radical, even after the war is long over and no WMDs were found, then your own opinions remain altered by that big lie.