My New Book: Battling the Big Lie

My new book about Right Wing disinformation and propaganda comes out on June 7th.

I have some important news that I wanted to share with the Message Box community.

I spent much of the last year writing a book about the topic of my obsession for much of my career. It is a driving force behind this newsletter and what I talk about on Pod Save America: what the hell can we do about Right Wing disinformation and propaganda?

Battling the Big Lie: How Fox, Facebook, and the MAGA Media are Destroying America will be released on June 7th. While one could argue that choosing to write a book in the middle of a pandemic in the same year my son was born was not the wisest choice, I am very proud of this book. The power Trump and the Republicans wield to bend reality and drown out facts is the single biggest threat to democracy and the planet.

After watching the Republicans build up a massive media advantage, I came to the conclusion that the vast majority of Democratic leadership does not understand what we are up against and have given little thought to narrowing the gap. Battling the Big Lie lays out how the Right Wing media apparatus works, where it came from, what progressives can do about it, and how readers can fight back against disinformation.

In particular, the book looks at:

• How Republicans, from Roger Ailes to Steve Bannon and Donald Trump, exploited the media’s biases and the Democratic Party’s blind spots to build the most powerful weapon in American politics.

• How Facebook became a willing enabler of the MAGA movement.

• The failures of the traditional political media to fight back.

• What all of us can do to counter Fox, Facebook, and the trolls spreading disinformation and hate on the Internet.

If you like Message Box (and if you are receiving this email I really hope you do), I think you will love this book. And if that is not enough of an incentive, Porchlight Books is offering signed copies at a 40 percent discount for the Message Box community. Please click HERE to access the special discounted rate. This offer expires at the end of the day on March 23rd. As many of you know, preorders are really important to authors. They help ensure better placement and more attention as publication day nears. 

There is a lot of skepticism about whether progressives will still buy political books in the post-Trump era. If you look at the New York Times bestseller list on any given week it is filled with books by the likes of Ben Shapiro, Mark Levin, and Ted Cruz. Kellyanne “Alternative Facts” Conway has a book coming out around the same time as Battling the Big Lie. For all the obvious self-interested reasons, I would love your help in proving everyone wrong.

Thank you for supporting Message Box. I am so grateful to this community of activists and citizens.