这就是这套把戏的运作方式。右翼宣传者不诚实地剪辑民主党人的言论，制造出一幅迫害唐纳德·特朗普支持者的黑暗阴谋的假象。一群人对此大肆炒作，并获得埃隆·马斯克算法的推波助澜。很快，单纯的喧嚣声量就将这个故事从右翼回声室推向了主流媒体报道，在那里，对双方“立场”的所谓“公平呈现”将其变成了一场“争议”。大功告成！
So here’s how the game works. Right-wing propagandists dishonestly clip a Democrat’s comments to conjure up the impression of a dark plot to persecute supporters of Donald Trump. A bunch of them post on it with an algorithmic boost from Elon Musk. Soon the sheer noise itself vaults the story out of the right-wing ecosphere and into mainstream coverage, where the evenhanded airing of both sides’ “positions” transforms it into a “controversy.”Paydirt!
典型案例：上周，参议员埃莉萨·斯洛特金在一个学术小组讨论中表示，国会必须让那些助长高层腐败的中层政府官员承担责任。MAGA 人士从这位密歇根州民主党人的发言中挑选出一句引语，断章取义地声称她呼吁不加选择地起诉年轻的特朗普支持者。
Case in point: Last week, Senator Elissa Slotkin said at an academic panel that Congress must impose accountability on mid-tier government officials who enable corruption at higher levels. MAGA personalities cherry-picked one quote from the Michigan Democrat to insist she called for the indiscriminate prosecution of young Trump supporters.
这纯粹是胡扯。但他们煽动起来的网络愤怒已经开始收获成果，出现了如下标题，来自 CNN：民主党参议员因关于调查特朗普政府的言论引发争议请注意，右翼完全被抽离了主体性：唯一“引发”“争议”的行为主体是斯洛特金！但她并没有引发任何争议，只要公正地阅读她的言论就能立刻看出来。
It’s pure bulls--t. But the online outrage they ginned up has started paying off with headlines like this one from CNN: Democratic Senator sparks controversy over comments on investigating the Trump administration Note how the right is drained of agency entirely: The only actor who sparked the “controversy” is Slotkin! But didn’t spark anything, as any fair reading of her comments immediately indicates.
你可以从这里观看斯洛特金关键发言的完整视频 斯洛特金表示，要对特朗普政府实现“问责”，要求国会挑选其“腐败”的高调案例。她补充说，这种监督“不应只关注总统，而应关注那些助纣为虐的人”，即那些“替他办事”的官员。斯洛特金表示，她希望真正的监督能劝阻年轻人加入政府，如果他们得出结论，与一个腐败政府为伍会给他们带来“一大堆麻烦”。
You can watch the key Slotkin monologue starting right here Slotkin says “accountability” for the Trump administration requires Congress to pick high-profile examples of its “corruption.”She adds that such oversight should “not just focus on the president, but on the people who enabled him,” that is, on officials “who are doing his bidding.”Slotkin says she hopes real oversight might dissuade young people from joining the administration if they conclude association with a corrupt administration will buy them “a ton of problems.”
一个默默无闻的保守派账号将其中 26 秒剪辑下来，包装成呼吁“政治起诉”、意在“吓退年轻保守派远离政治”的言论，MAGA 右翼立刻群起而攻之。
The MAGA right jumped all over this after an obscure conservative account clipped 26 seconds of it and packaged it as a call for “political prosecutions” designed to “scare young conservatives” away from politics.
Brian Beutler 追踪了随后展开的整个肮脏闹剧，当时大 MAGA 人物采用了完全相同的说辞。其中一人虚假坚称 Slotkin 威胁要进行“非法逮捕”，这将需要提醒她“我们为什么要有第二修正案”。特朗普也刚刚参与了这场骗局。
Brian Beutler tracked the whole sordid spectacle that unfolded next Big MAGA personalities adopted that exact framing. One falsely insisted that Slotkin had threatened “illegal arrests,” which will require reminding her “why we have the Second Amendment.”Trump just got in on this scam too.
在对记者讲话时，总统称 Slotkin 为“下贱之徒”，并指责她“将政府武器化”，为强调而重复了这一短语。
Speaking to reporters, the president called Slotkin a “lowlife” who “weaponized government,” repeating the phrase for emphasis.
还有过这样一段对话 记者：她说她希望对共和党人进行起诉，以吓阻年轻保守派从政。
There was also this exchange REPORTER: She says she wants there to be prosecutions of Republicans, to scare young conservatives from going into office.
特朗普：这真是个惊人的言论。Slotkin 说应该进行起诉，以吓阻人们从政。那是个民主党人。他们干的全是这事。那是他们唯一擅长的。你知道吗？这就是为什么他们正被狠狠踢屁股。
TRUMP: That’s a hell of a statement. Slotkin said that there should be prosecutions in order to scare people from going into politics. That’s a Democrat. That’s all they do. That’s all they’re good at. And you know what? That’s why they’re getting their asses kicked.
请注意，记者像 Slotkin 逐字逐句说过那样，背诵了对她言论的捏造解读，然后邀请特朗普“对此作出回应”。这位不具名记者可能是白宫精心挑选的宣传者之一，专门负责抛出此类问题。对这种废话唯一正确的回应是：我们到底在骗谁？
Note that the reporter recites the invented interpretation of Slotkin’s comments as if that’s what she’d said verbatim, then invites Trump to “respond” to that. This unnamed reporter may be one of the propagandists handpicked by the White House to deliver questions exactly like this one. The only correct response to this nonsense is: Who the f–k are we kidding here?
我们已经知道，在现实世界中，中层政府官员确实面临压力，被迫从事极端腐败和可能的违法行为。因为这已被公开记录在案，一次又一次，一次又一次。这是一份部分名单：明尼苏达州多名检察官在面临压力、被要求无端调查 Renee Good 遗孀后辞职，后者曾被一名联邦特工枪杀。
We already know that mid-tier government officials are indeed under pressure, here in the real world to engage in extreme corruption and likely lawbreaking. That’s because this has been publicly documented again and again and again Here’s a partial list: Numerous prosecutors in Minnesota quit after coming under pressure to baselessly investigate the widow of Renee Good, who was shot to death by a federal agent.
一名高级军事指挥官因私下担忧政府下令在加勒比海实施可能非法的击毙疑似贩毒者行动而辞职。
A top military commander resigned amid private concerns over the administration’s orders to carry out the likely illegal killing of suspected drug smugglers in the Caribbean.
弗吉尼亚州一名检察官在面临压力、被要求腐败起诉纽约州检察长 Letitia James（特朗普的长期政敌）后辞职。
A prosecutor in Virginia stepped down after facing pressure to corruptly prosecute New York Attorney General Letitia James, a longtime Trump foe.
特朗普公开指示检察官起诉前联邦调查局局长詹姆斯·科米，尽管职业律师认为该案证据太弱，不足以提起诉讼。
Trump openly directed prosecutors to indict former FBI Director James Comey, even though career lawyers thought the case was too weak to justify it.
特朗普解雇司法部长帕姆·邦迪，正是因为她没有充分起诉他的批评者，无视事实与法律。
Trump fired Attorney General Pam Bondi precisely because she wasn’t adequately prosecuting his critics in defiance of facts and law.
作为高级住房机构官员，特朗普盟友比尔·普尔特把翻查特朗普批评者的抵押贷款申请、捏造虚假理由起诉他们当成了业余爱好。
As a senior housing agency official, Trump ally Bill Pulte made a hobby of scouring the mortgage applications of Trump critics to gin up fake rationales for prosecuting them.
特朗普高层官员滥用职权，动用政府全部力量打击基尔马尔·阿布雷戈·加西亚，只因他被错误驱逐到国外古拉格让独裁者难堪，所以必须给他安上某种罪名。
Top Trump officials corruptly brought the full weight of the government down on Kilmar Ábrego García, all because his wrongful deportation to a foreign gulag embarrassed the despot, so he had to be found guilty of something.
对“让美国再次伟大”人士就斯洛特金言论假装愤怒，正确的回应是当面嘲笑他们。
The right retort to MAGA personalities faking outrage over Slotkin’s comments is to laugh in their faces.
至于斯洛特金关于年轻人进入政府的言论？她回答的全部背景是一个关于国会如何收回其已放弃的制衡行政部门权力的问题。这种放弃确实已大规模发生。
What about Slotkin’s remarks about young people entering government? The entire context for her answer was a question about how Congress can reclaim power it has abdicated as a check on the executive branch. This abdication has indeed happened at a large scale.
因此，斯洛特金的观点是：不希望立志从事政府工作的年轻人认为，行政部门腐败可以肆无忌惮地展开，而国会监督却沦为一纸空文。充其量这只是她措辞不当。其更大的含义非常清晰。
Slotkin’s point, then, is that it’s not desirable for young people who aspire to careers in government to come to believe that executive branch corruption can unfold even as congressional oversight is reduced to a dead letter. At worst this was inartfully worded on her part. The larger meaning is perfectly clear.
赌注很大。所有的愤怒和对第二修正案的暗示正在产生影响：斯洛特金的发言人乔什·斯图尔特告诉我，她和她的工作人员“收到的威胁大幅增加”，已向美国国会警察报案。斯图尔特补充说：“这导致斯洛特金参议员及其整个团队的安保力度增加。”显然，“让美国再次伟大”阵营任务达成。
The stakes here are considerable. All the outrage and intimations about the Second Amendment are taking their toll: Josh Stewart, a spokesperson for Slotkin, tells me that she and her staff have “received a huge uptick in threats,” which have been reported to the U.S. Capitol Police. Stewart adds: “This has resulted in an increased security presence for Senator Slotkin and her entire team.”Mission accomplished for MAGA, apparently.
民主党人现在绝对应该明确表示，如果他们夺取国会权力，中层政府官员将需要为更强有力的透明度和问责制努力做好准备。民主党人敦促他们考虑，是否愿意继续纵容特朗普的腐败行为，并冒着自身被公开曝光的风险。
Democrats absolutely should be saying right now that if they take congressional power, mid-level government officials will need to prepare for much more robust efforts at transparency and accountability. Democrats urge them to consider whether they want to continue enabling Trump’s corruption at risk of public exposure to themselves.
参议员乔恩·奥索夫之所以能在民主党政治中成为一位成功的传播者，并非偶然，他正是通过做出此类承诺而脱颖而出：与此同时，密歇根州参议员候选人阿卜杜勒·埃尔-赛义德在一名“让美国再次伟大”（MAGA）派安插的人要求他与穆斯林兄弟会划清界限后迅速走红。他没有在恶意提问上退让半步，而是将这番交锋的焦点完全集中在提问者隐晦的基督教民族主义意图上——该提问者是一名共和党政治操盘手，曾为参议员乔什·霍利工作——意在将穆斯林标记为不适合参与美国民主进程。
It’s no accident that Senator Jon Ossoff has emerged as a successful communicator in Democratic politics while making vows like this one: Meanwhile, Michigan Senate candidate Abdul El-Sayed went viral after a MAGA plant demanded he disavow the Muslim Brotherhood. He didn’t give an inch to the bad-faith question itself and made the exchange all about the veiled Christian nationalist intent of his questioner—a GOP operative who once worked for Senator Josh Hawley—to mark Muslims as unfit to participate in U.S. democracy.
这些做法的长处在于，它们不浪费时间假装“让美国再次伟大”派的愤怒有一丝合法性。它们不让媒体将这种愤怒炒作成双方对立的“争议”这一倾向，导致自己打退堂鼓、含糊道歉或模棱两可。
The virtue of these approaches is that they don’t waste time pretending there’s a shred of legitimacy to MAGA outrage. They don’t let the media tendency to elevate that outrage into double-sided “controversy” lead to pulled punches and mealymouthed apologies or equivocation.
斯洛金实际所做的，是指出显而易见的事实：特朗普腐败且可能违法的伎俩，依赖于下属愿意执行——以及一个完全放弃监督职责的国会。在一个建立在法治基础上的共和国里，不能允许“戴帽子的人”（注：指凌驾于法律之上的特权阶层）存在。
What really happened with Slotkin is that she pointed out the obvious: Trump’s corrupt and potentially criminal schemes depend on underlings being willing to carry them out—and a Congress that has dispensed with its oversight role entirely. A hat can’t be allowed to stand in a republic grounded in rule of law.
出于某种原因，“让美国再次伟大”派的人物们认定，这一建议本身构成了对其政治计划的严重威胁。
For some reason, MAGA personalities decided that this very suggestion constitutes a dire threat to their political project.
事实上，他们关于最后这一点的判断并不错。但这并不能证明他们自以为能证明的观点。
In truth, they’re not wrong about that last part. But this doesn’t make the point they think it does.