Hacker News Reader

Comment by babymetal | Hacker News Reader

In the spirit of HN I will only point out here this fact: RFK Jr's attack book on Fauci was extremely poorly produced. Specifically, the text rolled up to the top and bottom edges of the pages as well as the sides. As a bookseller this was a big red flag for me: either the book was poorly self-published, or no-one big (and sometimes reputable) wanted to publish it, and it looked like they were trying to save paper and ink. Also, it has an inordinate amount of footnotes which makes it very difficult to imagine a person following them all. I didn't read the book. https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/58063409-the-real-anthon... 4.49/5.0 on Goodreads with 8.5K reviews.

[edit]: misspelled "imagine"

View on HN

Remember when a slew of SV execs lined up behind his presidential campaign? That was way back when he was a Democrat.

No, I don't remember that. When was this? Link?

https://www.axios.com/2023/06/08/robert-f-kennedy-jr-tech-20...

https://unherd.com/2024/04/why-rfk-jr-is-the-silicon-valley-...

https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/silicon-valley-sh...

It's not meant to be read. The people who produced it don't care what's inside, only that the book exists. The book existing is enough for the target audience to accept that there are valid arguments within. The target audience does not need to read the book, they've already been told what they need to know.

The producers and the audience prefer it that way. It's less effort for everyone involved.

not just that, it provides an easy vector of corruption - random rich people or think tanks / lobby groups funded by rich people can just buy (or say they buy) pallets of said book, directly transferring cash to the "author".

> In the spirit of HN I will only point out here this fact: RFK Jr's attack book on Fauci was extremely poorly produced.

It's in the spirit of hn to attack the person rather than the specific proposal?

1. babymetal didn't attack any person; they criticized a book's production.

2. babymetal claims to be a bookseller and, if true, they offered a specialist's insight into the quality of the information disseminated by a person being discussed at HN. (Though, their observation was off topic -- like most comments in most HN discussions.)

3. You want HN users, who are mostly code monkeys, to criticize a proposal to address viral diseases?

babymetal states "the text rolled up to the top and bottom edges of the pages as well as the sides. As a bookseller this was a big red flag for me: either the book was poorly self-published, or no-one big (and sometimes reputable) wanted to publish it, and it looked like they were trying to save paper and ink."

Also babymetal admits he didn't read the book. How can anything he says of the book be trusted?

I read the book. Actually there are two stories in the book, the first mostly about Fauci and COVID-19 and the second about Fauci and AIDS. FWIW I'm glad RFK is in power now.

They said they're a bookseller and spoke only about the physical aspects of the book.

I thought their fairly brief comment was pretty clear.

“I trust the guy who published a paper on White House letterhead with hallucinated citations in some instances, and conclusions in complete contradiction of the cited paper in other instances, and who expressed no remorse for such errors.”

It’s just so incredibly dumb to listen to recurrent (and especially unrepentant) liars. Even if you know they’re lying, your brain subjected to that will break down. Propagandists and conmen through all of history have discovered it. All you’ve gotta do is say it over and over again and hope there are people dumb enough not to stop listening the first 15 lies.

Indeed, the power of McLuhan's "We become what we behold" is not to be underestimated.

It's why Fox News works, it's why "flood the zone" is a shrewd tactic, and why "alternative facts" was Yet Another Milepost along our journey to the full-blown post-truth America of today.

"I'm glad (RFK) is (in power) now"

"I'm glad (the guy who drove to the beach to cut of a stranded whale's head with a chainsaw) is (in charge of our health) now"

"I'm glad (the guy who dumped a dead bear cub in Central Park and threw a bicycle on top to put the blame on those pesky bikers after doing a photo-op with his hand in the dead cub's open mouth) is (responsible for medical research programs) now"

"I'm glad (someone who has been thriving financially on bogus claims to disparage vaccines) is (overseeing vaccination policies in the US) now"

"I'm glad (another incompetent creep) is (joining the gang of criminals known as The Trump Admin) now"

Reply on news.ycombinator.com