Friends,

I want to show you how the outrage cycle works in politics, because there’s a clear pattern.

Step 1: Political leaders and their media allies pick an issue that isn’t in the news yet but with enough effort could be pushed into the headlines.

Step 2: Once the issue is selected, political leaders and their allies use cable news to generate as much outrage as possible about the issue. Social media follows suit.

Step 3: Eventually — and sometimes very quickly — the outrage effect wears off and they move on, looking for the next issue to restart the cycle.

See for yourself.

The graphs below show the level of interest in a certain subject by tracking Google searches related to that subject.

You can see just how quickly and dramatically the outrage cycle can smash into the news cycle — and just how quickly it can evaporate.

Here are some examples you might remember:

When Hasbro went from “Mr. Potato Head” to “Potato Head,” the far-right fired up the outrage machine and suddenly interest in the subject soared - before dying right back down. Here’s the Google interest in “Mr. Potato Head” over the last five years.

When Sesame Street did an episode in which Big Bird discusses getting the Covid vaccine, Ted Cruz and Fox News made a quick outrage cycle out of it, as you can see from searches of “Big Bird.” (We also saw a similar spike when Sesame Street introduced an Asian-American muppet.)

Remember the caravan? You probably do. It was a big outrage cycle generated in the run up to the 2018 midterm election. It was about migrants headed to our border, and shortly after the election season ended so did the outrage cycle.

I know you remember critical race theory. That particular outrage cycle just ended, as you can see. It was a big one, and one a lot of politicians thought they would be able to use in this midterm election. But despite their best efforts to keep it alive there just wasn’t enough there and now you probably won’t hear about it much in campaign ads this year.

Which brings us to the big question:

What’s the next outrage? I have no idea. But the election is just 56 days away — they have to pick something. And now that gas prices have come down, that one won’t work.

Here’s my ask of you: Help us be ready. We’ve got a Nonsense Defense Fund up and running for just this purpose. If you could chip in to make sure we’ve got the resources to beat whatever wild stuff they throw, I’d really appreciate it.

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