The Biden administration announced two new policy initiatives to crack down on “disinformation” and menthol cigarettes.
Summary
The Biden administration announced two new policy initiatives to crack down on “disinformation” and menthol cigarettes.
- The Department of Homeland Security on Wednesday announced the formation of a Disinformation Governance Board to “counter disinformation coming from Russia” and “misinformation aimed at migrants.”
- The executive director of this new Disinformation Governance Board, Nina Jankowicz, “doubted the authenticity of Hunter Biden’s laptop and shared the assessments of others that it was Russian disinformation.”
- The Food and Drug Administration on Thursday unveiled a plan to ban menthol cigarettes and flavored cigars.
- Health and Human Services Secretary Xavier Becerra said this plan was an “important step to advance health equity” citing the relatively high rate of menthol use among African Americans and young people.
- The plan has divided black Americans, typically one of the most loyal Democratic voting blocs who “overwhelmingly prefer” menthol cigarettes.
- The proposed ban is the largest federal regulatory action to curb cigarette sales would not take effect until 2024.
- The New York Times quoted public health officials who said the menthol cigarette ban could potentially save hundreds of thousands of lives.
- Politico reported the proposed menthol ban is dividing black leaders, including the Congressional Black Caucus. Al Sharpton and prominent attorney Ben Crump oppose the rules, while the president of the NAACP supports them.
- The Daily Beast mocked conservative media’s “rage” against the Government Disinformation Board.
- Fox News covered the White House’s defense its new Disinformation Board. The White House dismissed criticism, saying, “not sure who opposes that effort.”
- The New York Post highlighted Biden’s pick to head his new information board’s extensive history of spreading disinformation.
- National Review scorned “Biden’s Ministry of Truth” and pointed out the “thermonuclear meltdown the country would be (rightly) subjected to if a Republican president assembled a government panel tasked with weeding out “disinformation.”
Author’s Take
The Department of Homeland Security’s new “Disinformation Governance Board” sounds like a paranoid fever dream cooked up by hysteric left-wing critics of the Bush Administration’s War on Terror, but it is apparently now a reality. Had this been instituted during the Obama Administration, when more journalists were jailed than any other time in recent American history and the US government assassinated an underaged US citizen without trial, this would be cause for alarm. As the Biden people like to make clear, this is not the Obama Administration.
The Department of Homeland Security’s Transportation Security Administration regularly fails to detect 80-95 percent of prohibited items. The Cabinet department responsible for immigration has completely mismanaged the massive influx of illegal immigration at the southern border. It seems unlikely the Keystone Kops-quality leadership of Biden’s DHS will be able to use this “Governance Board” to its full Orwellian potential.
The Biden administration’s menthol ban is another issue entirely. According to the CDC, African Americans are much more likely to prefer menthol cigarettes than other groups. Banning menthols won’t make them disappear overnight. Instead, they’ll go underground, increasing the likelihood of police interactions and the potential for negative police-citizen interactions and even deaths as the government enforces the ban. Think this an overreaction? In 2014 a NYPD officer killed Eric Garner with a prohibited chokehold during an arrest for selling loose cigarettes
The Biden administration made advancing a “racial equity agenda” a day-one priority. Ibram X. Kendi, the prominent “racial equity” and critical race theory advocate, argues “racial inequity is evidence of racist policy.” By this logic, the Biden administration’s menthol ban is the definition of racist policy. Play stupid games, win stupid prizes.
Return to Freespoke 
© Dominic Moore, 2022
