Mike Benz Describes the Challenges of Dismantling Joe Biden’s Censorship-Industrial Complex

Because they cling to corporate media as their main source of “the news,” many of the most vocal people online don’t realize that the Biden Administration poured billions of tax dollars into censoring and propagandizing Americans. Nor do they know the details. This secret operation was so vast and so ghastly that the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals concluded:

[T]he Supreme Court has rarely been faced with a coordinated campaign of this magnitude orchestrated by federal officials that jeopardized a fundamental aspect of American life. Therefore, the district court was correct in its assessment—“unrelenting pressure” from certain government officials likely “had the intended result of suppressing millions of protected free speech postings by American citizens.” We see no error or abuse of discretion in that finding.

Who were the recipients of this tax money? Answer: Numerous government agencies, including DHS and USAID (and many others), who funneled the money out to dozens and dozens of NGO and non-profits with disarmingly patriotic names (e.g., Global Engagement Center and the National Science Foundation) who did the dirty work, often in close coordination with prestigious American universities. They worked in tandem with each other and with the CIA, which continued to make good use of all of its favorite Project Mockingbird techniques to convince you to be someone else. Many of the doubters don’t know CIA history. They don’t know that the CIA has topple dozens of governments Or they assume that the CIA used to be bad but they somehow got to be the good guys when after they displayed animus against Trump.

This censorship-industrial complex (also sometimes referred to as “the Blob”) has convinced you that you were well-informed and that you were thinking your own thoughts. They made sure you only heard one version of every story so that you voted only for the “correct” candidate. They were so good at their jobs that you believed that virus particles couldn’t pour through cloth masks. They made sure that you slurped up every government-approved position and that you deep-down hated those who disagreed with you, including your friends and family members.

[More below, including the transcript of Mike Benz' entire talk at NatCon

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Jokes and Fragility

Ricky Gervais:

How arrogant are you to think that you deserve to go through life with no one ever saying anything that you don't agree with or like? I want people to stop saying "That joke's offensive." I want them to start saying "I found it offensive" because you've got to own your emotion, because that's all it is. You're just telling me how you feel about it. Yeah, there's nothing intrinsically offensive about this joke. We shouldn't hurt people's feelings. Well, you can if their feelings are wrong, If you don't like the facts, don't change the facts. Change the feelings.

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Long Winded Conversations by the numbers

All of us have been in some intolerable conversations with long-winded people. Some people don't know how to give and take. In my mind, good conversation is like a game of catch. Lots of people don't know how to get to the point and then let others talk.

I asked Grok for the research on this. How long can a person talk in a small group before others feel left out and get frustrated?

Grok's response:

Research on conversation dynamics, particularly in small groups (typically 2-5 people), highlights the importance of equitable turn-taking for maintaining engagement and satisfaction. Studies in linguistics and psychology show that natural conversations rely on rapid exchanges, with average utterance lengths around 2-4 seconds per speaker in dyads (one-on-one) and slightly longer in triads (three people), at about 2.7 seconds and 3.7 seconds respectively.

These short turns, separated by minimal gaps of about 200 milliseconds, create a rhythmic flow that allows everyone to contribute without feeling sidelined. When one person extends their turn significantly—holding the "floor" for much longer—it disrupts this balance, leading to perceptions of dominance.Conversational dominance occurs when a single speaker monopolizes airtime, often through extended monologues or repeated interruptions, and research links it directly to frustration among listeners.

For instance, nonverbal cues like prolonged speaking time and higher vocal energy signal dominance, which group members perceive subconsciously; in meeting simulations, dominant speakers were accurately identified 85-91% of the time based on such cues alone. This imbalance can make quieter participants feel excluded, prompting them to withdraw entirely—creating tension where others remain silent to avoid conflict. In extreme cases, it drives group members away, turning potentially enjoyable interactions into ones people dread.

Psychological studies quantify the emotional toll: A survey by the American Psychological Association found that 60% of people feel anxious and overwhelmed during encounters with long-winded speakers, viewing it as a subtle form of social control that heightens stress. Similarly, research from the University of California, Berkeley, showed that one-sided conversations reduce relationship enjoyment by 50%, eroding trust and overall satisfaction.

Over-talkers often prioritize personal anecdotes over group themes, leading to redundancy and boredom, which further alienates listeners by breaking the expected "just enough information" rhythm. While no study pinpoints an exact universal threshold (as it varies by group familiarity, culture, and context), frustration typically emerges when a speaker's turn exceeds 10-20 seconds or when they claim more than 30-40% of total airtime in a discussion—far beyond the 2-3 second norm.

In small groups, this dominance is amplified because cognitive limits (e.g., mentalizing multiple perspectives) cap effective conversations at around 4 people; larger imbalances exacerbate feelings of being left out. Strategies from communication research, like gentle interruptions or thematic redirection, can mitigate this, but the core issue is restoring reciprocity to keep everyone engaged.

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The Gymnastics many “News” Providers Do with Verifiable Facts

Journalism is not merely about providing the facts. There are so many ways to manipulate, censor and palter even though one is using verifiable facts. This is an excellent post by Michael Nayna:

There are three information filters that allow journalists to bend reality using verifiable facts.

#1 – Story selection. Each day offers thousands of stories, and editors typically highlight those that align with an ideological perspective. Politically inconvenient events can be ignored or buried with minimal coverage.

#2 – Fact selection within stories. The amount of details within a particular event is massive, and a journalist needs to choose which ones are relevant. I once worked with a journalist who had been covering a series of attacks on Indian students on public transport. The outlet’s interest was in the racial angle, but an interviewee mentioned other victims. She asked about their nationality, then chose not to pursue those attacks in detail because the victims were Australian. A single vague line made the final cut, and the piece implied racial motive when it couldn’t have been.

#3 – Framing facts with emotive conjugation. For instance, if I’m covering someone I don’t like, he’s cheap; if I’m neutral, he’s frugal; if I like him, he’s thrifty. Someone can be passionate, emotional, or hysterical; careful, hesitant, or cowardly; they can glisten, perspire, or sweat. This is subtle, but once you notice it, you’ll find that even though there’s better and worse news, none of it is purely objective.

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Jeffrey Tucker Describes the Bleak State of the World

Jeffrey Tucker has ambitiously taken the temperature of the political, economic and social world with an article titled: "The Coup, the Calamity, and the Conspiracy." I highly recommend a full read.

Tucker begins with this graphic:

Here is an excerpt:

[Y]ou could be more realistic and see that this was not a mistake at all. It was entirely intentional, the unfolding of a dark scheme hatched by an indescribably sadistic ruling class. Indeed, if this had all been an accident, we surely would have heard someone apologize by now.

There is also the planning involved. There was Event 201, the lesser-known Crimson Contagion, and many others. They are usually described in the mainstream press as rehearsals for unplanned contingencies, like resiliency training. Absurd. This was plotted far in advance. We have all the receipts. To realize this and connect the dots does not make you a conspiracy theorist. It makes you a person with the capacity to think.

To deny nefarious motives and schemes makes you impossibly naive to the point of sedation. At best, it makes you ill-read in history.

After five years, what can we say was the plan and purpose of this calamity? We all have our views. Certainly within Brownstone ranks, there are many opinions. We argue among ourselves all the time. Coming up with a clean and clear explanation is not easy because there are so many moving parts and so many industrial opportunists who took advantage of the crisis to cash out.

This is such an expansive article that resonated with me over and over.

I have many of the same concerns, but I won't say much here. I will say (as Tucker mentions in the early paragraphs) that I'm sure how well coordinated all of the powerful players are. Just because they are well-entrenched, monied and politically connected doesn't mean that they necessarily agree with each other day to day, much less year to year. But in my mind, there is definitely a hell of a lot of coordination.

The best solution to this horrific anti-Democratic mess is a vigorous, courageous and free press, but the powers-that-be know this deeply and they've got the formerly half-respectable "journalism" industry 95% locked down.

So in the meantime, it's Jeffrey Tucker, independent media and people like you and me doing what we can. It feels like a David and Goliath battle, especially when you see Trump kowtowing to Pfizer, just like Biden did and harris would have

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