The Next President is...

[Swamp Yankee]

37 minutes ago, FLEA said:

There's a lot of moderates like myself that find the democratic party running away from them. 

Understood.  However, since Weinsteins' content is consistently 95%+ complaining about democrats and agreeing with conservative positions then perhaps they aren't democrats as they claim.  My cynical side thinks that Brett and Eric, as well as Tulsi and Rogan are not liberal (classical or otherwise). They may say so to help maximize their audience, but then why are they always sympathetic to the right?  They should just state that they are conservatives and own it.

Out of curiosity, as a moderate, what DO you support on the democratic side?  How about the republican side?  I hate that there are "sides" but it's just a reality under the current political structure. 

I consider myself a left-leaning moderate, working in tech for the past 20 yrs after transitioning to the Guard.  By Massachusetts standards, I'm a conservative.  By USAF standards, I'm a raging liberal. Individual liberty (including 2nd Amendment), strong military/diplomacy ("...provide for the common defense..."), broad individual liberty, limited-use safety net ("...promote the general welfare...").  As a developed country, we should be able to provide healthcare not tied to employment.  Investment in public education as it is a key means to beat China with whom we are at economic war.   

Edited January 20, 2021 by Swamp Yankee

[FLEA]

26 minutes ago, Swamp Yankee said:

Understood.  However, since Weinsteins' content is consistently 95%+ complaining about democrats and agreeing with conservative positions then perhaps they aren't democrats as they claim.  My cynical side thinks that Brett and Eric, as well as Tulsi and Rogan are not liberal (classical or otherwise). They may say so to help maximize their audience, but then why are they always sympathetic to the right?  They should just state that they are conservatives and own it.

Out of curiosity, as a moderate, what DO you support on the democratic side?  How about the republican side?  I hate that there are "sides" but it's just a reality under the current political structure. 

I consider myself a left-leaning moderate, working in tech for the past 20 yrs after transitioning to the Guard.  By Massachusetts standards, I'm a conservative.  By USAF standards, I'm a raging liberal. Individual liberty (including 2nd Amendment), strong military/diplomacy ("...provide for the common defense..."), broad individual liberty, limited-use safety net ("...promote the general welfare...").  As a developed country, we should be able to provide healthcare not tied to employment.  Investment in public education as it is a key means to beat China with whom we are at economic war.   

You and I are probably really similar. On the left right spectrum I'm -2 and on the authoritarian / libertarian spectrum I'm -1 (slightly more libertarian). 

Yet I generally vote Republican. One reason is, is because like you, I'm very strong on the 2A and the democratic party is literally willing to do nothing to defend it or even recognize it's purposes. 

But as you know, both parties carry a moving goal post. And everytime they move it the 50 yard line changes. That is going to cause some people to have a hard time deciding. 

 

Edited January 20, 2021 by FLEA

[Swamp Yankee]

1 hour ago, FLEA said:

You and I are probably really similar. On the left right spectrum I'm -2 and on the authoritarian / libertarian spectrum I'm -1 (slightly more libertarian). 

Yet I generally vote Republican. One reason is, is because like you, I'm very strong on the 2A and the democratic party is literally willing to do nothing to defend it or even recognize it's purposes. 

But as you know, both parties carry a moving goal post. And everytime they move it the 50 yard line changes. That is going to cause some people to have a hard time deciding. 

 

Good point.  To some extent, I think the right uses the 2nd Amendment and the left uses abortion as scare tactics.  For example, the left used the newly right-leaning SCOTUS to scare their base that the Roe v Wade will be overturned. Gorsuch, Kavanaugh, and Barrett were nominated more for their pro-large business support than morality perspectives. Abortion is probably #19 on Gorsuch's priorities, after "lunch at Occidental".   On the 2A, any democrat outside a big northeast or west coast city knows that it is a reality.  In fact, I was even able to get a carry permit in (the people's republic of) Boston.  I did have to interview with a city detective, shoot at the police range, and then wait four weeks. The latter was a PITA but the interview and shooting didn't bother me too much.   In fact, the police were pretty cool about it - let me try a Glock and AR. 

Edited January 20, 2021 by Swamp Yankee

[ClearedHot]

6 hours ago, jazzdude said:

If far right conservatives want to have a social media outlet, maybe they should try harder and not just whine. Especially if they don't want government limiting their speech. And if there's demand for that service, it shouldn't be hard to get a business started around providing that service.

End 230...period DOT.

[SocialD]

Remember when news stations used sound off at the end of the night with a waving American flag and the National Anthem?  We need more of that and less 24 hours entertainment "news."

[slackline]

20 minutes ago, SocialD said:

Remember when news stations used sound off at the end of the night with a waving American flag and the National Anthem?  We need more of that and less 24 hours entertainment "news."

I so wish we could close that Pandora's box...

[jazzdude]

Remember when news stations used sound off at the end of the night with a waving American flag and the National Anthem?  We need more of that and less 24 hours entertainment "news."

But the latter makes more money...

Plus the old away you remember nestled the news in between entertainment, with fewer network/channel competitors. News and entertainment shows have both managed to break apart from each other and sustain themselves separately, and theirs a lot more competition. This makes that older model harder to do, outside of local channels/networks, with their news being locally focused.

[kaputt]

I liked most of Biden’s speech. Only dislike was it seems like the democrats are already setting up the white supremacist/domestic terror line as their distraction crutch if some of their other policy moves don’t play out as successfully as they hope. Otherwise, I think he genuinely wishes to lower the temperature and try and make the country more united. 
 

That being said, I am highly skeptical that others in his party wish the same and I’m also skeptical of his ability to manage those same people. There are a few republicans that worry me as well who will likely not play ball simply because the other team is in power.  
 

The next two years are going to be really interesting. Probably the most challenging period we’ve had for a new President in a long while. I truly wish him the best and hope he succeeds, but I would be lying if I said I wasn’t worried about where the country may head. 

[busdriver]

11 hours ago, slackline said:

 My big gripe is the reinforcement of executive power that tacitly happens when he does all this.  Congress basically allows it to continue by never saying/doing anything.  It's a problem. 

I was naively hoping Trump in the white house would piss off the Democrats enough for them to strip powers from the executive.  Joke's on me, the hate kabuki got him out and set them up to ramp up the EO party.

[ViperMan]

12 hours ago, jazzdude said:

Congress doesn't really directly let it continue-the political parties allow it to continue. Either because they: a. support the action (maybe not personally, but to retain good standing and support from the party for continued reelection), b. because they can't get enough traction to do anything because option a., or c. They don't want to challenge the power so it's there when they can take control of that power because option a.

It's because it's their turn now. That's all it is. Next time, it'll be someone else's turn.

[ViperMan]

6 hours ago, ClearedHot said:

End 230...period DOT.

I think that's a mistake - it would destroy the internet as we know it. This message board, and others like it would likely be collateral damage, as now the owners, administrators would be liable for whatever gets posted up here - legal or illegal.

A much cleaner kill, and IMO the right move, would be to regulate portions of Amazon's business (i.e. AWS, etc)...ala AT&T and their phone business.

[ViperMan]

8 hours ago, Swamp Yankee said:

Understood.  However, since Weinsteins' content is consistently 95%+ complaining about democrats and agreeing with conservative positions then perhaps they aren't democrats as they claim.  My cynical side thinks that Brett and Eric, as well as Tulsi and Rogan are not liberal (classical or otherwise). They may say so to help maximize their audience, but then why are they always sympathetic to the right?  They should just state that they are conservatives and own it.

The only reason any of us know Bret Weinstein's name is because he had the temerity to call a spade a spade when he stood up to the extreme, racist, left wing mob that attempted to enact a "day without white people" on his campus. He (rightfully) took a stand against that effort and has been in the limelight ever since. Probably because he's not woke enough. So most of his exposure on the internet is derivative of that one-off event, hence why 95% of it is complaining about democrats...since it was a reaction to democrats.

It's the same fundamental story behind Jordan Petersen. These are "normal" guys (professors, scientists, etc.) who wake up one morning and go "WTF is going on around here?" and they call it out. Call me crazy, but we need more of that. For goodness sakes, he's an evolutionary biologist at Evergreen State College...none of that suggests secret conservative mastermind.

And the only reason we hear about him via Joe Rogan (left, right, centerish) and Sam Harris (leftish) is because no one on the true "left" wants to engage in an honest way with what he's saying. That says way more about the left than it does about Bret Weinstein and it certainly doesn't implicate him as a (gasp) conservative.

[Negatory]

I don't see how ending 230 is actually going to help. In my eyes, ending 230 protections would have one of two effects:

1) Companies are more wary of being sued, and they actually censor a lot more stuff based on their opinions of what is right and wrong

2) Companies try to maintain neutrality by allowing literally anything and everything, turning the whole internet into 4chan

[Pooter]

15 hours ago, Swamp Yankee said:

That is very true.  Anyone can develop a social media platform.  If you have the financial means, technical acumen, and business savvy to build a great platform, you'll succeed. If not, well, thems the breaks in the free-market innovation economy.   

The free market is amazing (for businesses I personally agree with.) For example: I fully support businesses' constitutional right to not bake gay wedding cakes or refuse service to certain minorities.

But the idea a business could deny internet service to a seditious mob actively inciting violence is simply a bridge too far.  

[pbar]

On 1/17/2021 at 12:11 PM, nsplayr said:

I actual have a personal jihad against self checkout at stores, especially grocery stores when I always seem to have a ton of items in the cart. I do not work at the grocery store, nor do I want to!

 

Who the hell at Walmart decided that was a good idea?  I mean seriously, have they ever been to a buffet line!?!  Same fools that are loading their plate one kernel of corn at a time now are gonna self-checkout in an expeditious manner?  YGBSM.  Now going to Walmart takes 3 times as long.   <rant switch off>

 

[ClearedHot]

6 hours ago, ViperMan said:

I think that's a mistake - it would destroy the internet as we know it. This message board, and others like it would likely be collateral damage, as now the owners, administrators would be liable for whatever gets posted up here - legal or illegal.

A much cleaner kill, and IMO the right move, would be to regulate portions of Amazon's business (i.e. AWS, etc)...ala AT&T and their phone business.

Maybe the internet as we know it should be destroyed.  As it stands there are a few tech conglomerates that control EVERYTHING and they have shown they are willing to silence free speech.  Many are troubled by them banning Trump (complete overkill as they respond to the mob), but i am more concerned about the double standard because they are picking sides.  The did nothing when Madonna said "I want to burn down the White House, the did nothing when Kathy Girffin stood there with the severed head of Trump, they did nothing when BLM rolled out their "Fry police like bacon" chat, they did nothing when BLM and other extreme groups burned cities and attacked Government property this summer....all of these acts inciting violence but it happened on the other side of the political aisle.  MOST concerning is they silenced the NY Post when they published the story about Hunter Biden's laptop...calling it fake news when in fact it is true and there is an active federal investigation.  If these few companies that control our access to information can choose sides and determine what we are allowed to see then our system is done.  I am stunned that more people on here are not shocked...you took and oath to the Constitution, not a political party...you should be appalled that we have abdicated control of the free press to Jack Dorsey, Mark Zuckerberg, Jeff Bezos, and Tim Cook.

[FLEA]

1 hour ago, pbar said:

Who the hell at Walmart decided that was a good idea?  I mean seriously, have they ever been to a buffet line!?!  Same fools that are loading their plate one kernel of corn at a time now are gonna self-checkout in an expeditious manner?  YGBSM.  Now going to Walmart takes 3 times as long.   <rant switch off>

 

I really like it for running into a grocery story to just buy 1-3 things. It is a great option over having to wait in line behind families with cart fulls of groceries. They probably need to put an item limit on it, but grocery stores are probably unlikely to do that. 

[FLEA]

55 minutes ago, ClearedHot said:

Maybe the internet as we know it should be destroyed.  As it stands there are a few tech conglomerates that control EVERYTHING and they have shown they are willing to silence free speech.  Many are troubled by them banning Trump (complete overkill as they respond to the mob), but i am more concerned about the double standard because they are picking sides.  The did nothing when Madonna said "I want to burn down the White House, the did nothing when Kathy Girffin stood there with the severed head of Trump, they did nothing when BLM rolled out their "Fry police like bacon" chat, they did nothing when BLM and other extreme groups burned cities and attacked Government property this summer....all of these acts inciting violence but it happened on the other side of the political aisle.  MOST concerning is they silenced the NY Post when they published the story about Hunter Biden's laptop...calling it fake news when in fact it is true and there is an active federal investigation.  If these few companies that control our access to information can choose sides and determine what we are allowed to see then our system is done.  I am stunned that more people on here are not shocked...you took and oath to the Constitution, not a political party...you should be appalled that we have abdicated control of the free press to Jack Dorsey, Mark Zuckerberg, Jeff Bezos, and Tim Cook.

I think this is my issue. It's not neccessarily that they are censoring, but the FCC has special rules and provisions that giveany tech and telecom companies de facto monopolies. Telling conservatives to build their own social network is near impossible, as they need all the infrastructure and cloud behind it as well, plus a search engine and everything else that brings traffic. 

[jazzdude]

The free market is amazing (for businesses I personally agree with.) For example: I fully support businesses' constitutional right to not bake gay wedding cakes or refuse service to certain minorities.
But the idea a business could deny internet service to a seditious mob actively inciting violence is simply a bridge too far.  

Not sure if you're being sarcastic or not...

Getting kicked off Facebook or twitter is not being kicked off the internet. You still have options to express yourself-build a website, forums, etc. Using a phone example, someone or some business blocking your number in their phone because they think you're annoying does not mean your ability to communicate by phone has been restricted.

Getting kicked off AWS or Azure because Amazon or Microsoft do not support your business is not the same as being kicked off the internet. You can use your own computer to host your website, and then scale up to bigger and better servers if it becomes popular. It's like losing phone voicemail hosted by a third party-you can still make and receive calls, but you lost a service you wanted that makes your ability to communicate with incoming calls easier. You can always buy an answering machine if you want that voicemail service.

Comcast or Verizon blocking your internet service based on the the traffic they see on your home network, or your opinions expressed elsewhere, is what being kicked off the internet means. This would be getting cut off from using the phone.

[Swamp Yankee]

5 hours ago, Pooter said:

The free market is amazing (for businesses I personally agree with.) For example: I fully support businesses' constitutional right to not bake gay wedding cakes or refuse service to certain minorities.

But the idea a business could deny internet service to a seditious mob actively inciting violence is simply a bridge too far.  

Well stated.  That's the rub that it seems like no one can get past.  'Free speech only applies to things I agree with'.   Many of those complaining about Twitter's decision with Trump likely supported removal of artwork considered offensive to Christianity. In fact, I know two people with this perspective, who can't (or aren't willing) to note the inconsistency.  And there are equal examples from the opposite political perspective. 

You also bring up a good point. For years, and maybe still now, minorities were refused mortgages to keep them out of the suburbs.  All those nice moms didn't want their little darlings sharing classrooms with brown people.  So the reality is free speech has its limits, particularly where it impedes someone else's liberty. 

[Swamp Yankee]

1 hour ago, ClearedHot said:

Maybe the internet as we know it should be destroyed.  As it stands there are a few tech conglomerates that control EVERYTHING and they have shown they are willing to silence free speech.  Many are troubled by them banning Trump (complete overkill as they respond to the mob), but i am more concerned about the double standard because they are picking sides.  The did nothing when Madonna said "I want to burn down the White House, the did nothing when Kathy Girffin stood there with the severed head of Trump, they did nothing when BLM rolled out their "Fry police like bacon" chat, they did nothing when BLM and other extreme groups burned cities and attacked Government property this summer....all of these acts inciting violence but it happened on the other side of the political aisle.  MOST concerning is they silenced the NY Post when they published the story about Hunter Biden's laptop...calling it fake news when in fact it is true and there is an active federal investigation.  If these few companies that control our access to information can choose sides and determine what we are allowed to see then our system is done.  I am stunned that more people on here are not shocked...you took and oath to the Constitution, not a political party...you should be appalled that we have abdicated control of the free press to Jack Dorsey, Mark Zuckerberg, Jeff Bezos, and Tim Cook.

I seem to remember a great deal of social media and news coverage regarding complaints about BLM, Kathy Griffin, and Hunter Biden.  Lots of coverage of the details and the reaction from the right.  Not sure what media you consume.  

Even if social media exerts bias on what does and doesn't get posted on their platforms, there are many other currently-available avenues to communicate via the internet.  Also, I mentioned in another post that if you have the financial means, technical acumen, and business savvy you can start your own social media platform.  You're not beholden to anyone. Go for it! 

You are absolutely right! My oath was to defend the constitution, not a flag, political party or specific person.  It is a really complicated situation. You've got the issue of a private company having the ability to control its destiny. You've got public accommodation laws to prevent things like minorities not being able to get mortgages. Then you've got the issue of very partisan people like a Hawley, Schumer, McConnell, or Pelosi having a direct say in what a private company can or can't discuss.  If I had the answers, I wouldn't be doing this. 

On a related topic: Fox, Newsmax, talk radio and other right leaning news outlets ARE part of mainstream media.  They have global reach and huge, growing viewer/readership. The tired old "liberal mainstream media" whining is obsolete.  

Edited January 21, 2021 by Swamp Yankee

[Negatory]

1 hour ago, ClearedHot said:

Maybe the internet as we know it should be destroyed.  As it stands there are a few tech conglomerates that control EVERYTHING and they have shown they are willing to silence free speech.  Many are troubled by them banning Trump (complete overkill as they respond to the mob), but i am more concerned about the double standard because they are picking sides.  The did nothing when Madonna said "I want to burn down the White House, the did nothing when Kathy Girffin stood there with the severed head of Trump, they did nothing when BLM rolled out their "Fry police like bacon" chat, they did nothing when BLM and other extreme groups burned cities and attacked Government property this summer....all of these acts inciting violence but it happened on the other side of the political aisle.  MOST concerning is they silenced the NY Post when they published the story about Hunter Biden's laptop...calling it fake news when in fact it is true and there is an active federal investigation.  If these few companies that control our access to information can choose sides and determine what we are allowed to see then our system is done.  I am stunned that more people on here are not shocked...you took and oath to the Constitution, not a political party...you should be appalled that we have abdicated control of the free press to Jack Dorsey, Mark Zuckerberg, Jeff Bezos, and Tim Cook.

Disagree here, I think your point is extremely overblown. You could replace “they” and “them” in your post with Twitter and Facebook. Twitter and Facebook are not the internet. Let me repeat. Twitter and Facebook are not “the internet.”

Now if you’re talking about the sensible regulation of over reaching, monopolistic large tech companies, I’m all ears. But that’s not your post. Instead, you’re mad that a company has a political leaning. Newsflash: all companies do. Find a different company.

The internet in its current form is a worldwide international marvel, not just an American free speech machine. And if you go on it and actually look outside Twitter and Facebook, you can find literally every group of people still has their place and their voice. I’m not keen to make the American internet into the Chinese version anytime soon.

Also, they don’t control your access to information. YOU control your access to information, and, sure, the fact that a bunch of dumbasses get their news from Facebook is a huge contributing factor to the problem. But that’s not facebooks fault. That’s your great Aunt Kay being an idiot who doesn’t look at multiple sources.

I don’t see Twitter or Facebook limiting the ability for Fox or MSNBC or CNN or the Washington Post to put out their own stories. I don’t see Facebook shutting down 4chan. It’s not like Twitter took Parler off the web.

My rub with a lot of this is you could just as easily argue that former president Trump getting online and spouting lies and misinformation is as destructive or even more destructive to the country. Yet there’s no discussion there? Hell, I think you’d be hard pressed to argue against that. Here’s just a few of the gems of falsehood and disinformation Trump has produced and spread using Twitter and Facebook that have helped us get to where we are today:

1) President Obama isn’t born in the US and isn’t a US citizen. YGBSM.

2) “Just stay calm, it will go away” in reference to COVID. Turned out his plan isn’t working so great, maybe should have followed science/his own advisors.

3) “VOTER FRAUD IS NOT A CONSPIRACY THEORY, IT IS FACT” - thousands of bipartisan government workers have argued that there is no meaningful amount of fraud. The other side has failed to prevent any actual evidence. Yet this is the speech you are trying to protect?

4) “Republicans will always protect people with pre-existing conditions” while stripping away protections

5) “Tarrifs are making us rich” in 2018 as economic experts showed that we were and still are the people who pay the lions share of the costs

6) Single payer healthcare is a “radical left socialist” movement that Dems are using to turn America into Venezuela. When 90% of first world democratic nations have something like it.

7) “We’ve pulled off an economic turnaround of historic proportions” in 2018 when the economy was doing just fine coming out of Obama’s second term.

8: “There was no crime” in the Mueller probe, which resulted in charges brought down on nearly 50 people close to Trump. Oh, and it still has the words in there about “individual #1,” if you ever actually read it

9) “We’re building the wall as we speak” in 2018, as they were not in fact doing so

10) Hell, choose between the 30,000 false or misleading claims that the Washington post found. https://www.washingtonpost.com/graphics/politics/trump-claims-database/?itid=lk_inline_manual_4

At what point do straight lies and misinformation from the president no longer deserve coverage? At what point does lying lose its “press protections?” At what point can a sitting US presidents misinformation cause a threat to America. Because there is a point. And there is not a good political way to reign it in.

And I’ll use your overblown oath example. You’re an officer who swore an oath to the constitution to defend from all enemies, including domestic. This bro tore our country apart and made enough people think that the election results were deliberately and simultaneously faked across 6 different states that he got a mob to legitimately invade the legislative branch of our government. And you think that should be protected? He’s off his rocker, and why should companies be required to host his lies?

What I got out of this is, actually, those in office should have to be held accountable for anything they say. If they say things that are provably false at the time they say them, then that should be illegal. Free speech and free press doesn’t equal politicians getting to lie to our faces on every platform that exists.

Edited January 21, 2021 by Negatory

[jazzdude]

Maybe the internet as we know it should be destroyed.  As it stands there are a few tech conglomerates that control EVERYTHING and they have shown they are willing to silence free speech. 
...you should be appalled that we have abdicated control of the free press to Jack Dorsey, Mark Zuckerberg, Jeff Bezos, and Tim Cook.

We haven't abdicated control of the press to a few tech giants-it's never been easier for an individual to express themselves and communicate (or publish) with wider audiences, even if you're blocked from using Facebook/Twitter/Google/AWS. I mean, the fact that we're having this conversation on BaseOps.net and not Facebook shows that Facebook doesn't control everything. But I do agree that there may be a problem, though I don't think it's a free speech problem, rather a business monopoly problem.

A lot of the problems you point to are really problems with monopolies; maybe the big tech companies should be broken apart for being anti competitive (Facebook's strategy after all was to buy up any potential competitors such as instagram, whatsapp, and a while host of small startups). Hard to say twitter is a monopoly though, because other options exist, just not as popular (namely, the open source mastodon). Fortunately, we're starting to see some legal action on this front (FTC Sues Facebook for Illegal Monopolization: https://www.ftc.gov/news-events/press-releases/2020/12/ftc-sues-facebook-illegal-monopolization)

Apple brings up other interesting conversations. What rights do you have on a device you purchased? Should you be able to repair your own devices instead of having to use an Apple approved repair company and some approved parts (though this argument is being hard fought, primarily farmers against John Deere https://www.thetruthaboutcars.com/2020/03/its-payback-time-right-to-repair-movement-targets-john-deere/ )?

Apple always had a walled garden in their ecosystem, and heavily curate what they allow in. The apple app store has never been a free market-it's a captive market that they fully control in a closed environment. You can't even side load apps onto apple devices without jailbreaking the device first, which comes with consequences and lost features. So if that's what you want to do, their are other phone brands you can buy. Even being kicked off Google Play store is not a problem; you can side load apps on Android, because it's built on an open architecture.

This leads to the following questions: does apple have a right to block a competitive app store from being installed on their phone (keep their walled garden), or is that a anti-competitive, monopolistic action? Free market would point to the former. I believe it's the latter (and why I haven't made the jump to iPhone)

That being said, apple doesn't really make money selling iPhones, they make their money taking a large cut off revenue from every app that runs on iPhone. An iphone app developer can get kicked off the app store if apple feels like they aren't getting their cut. This one is going to court (Epic Games vs Apple https://www.theverge.com/2020/10/24/21531873/epic-apple-fortnite-app-store-lawsuit ), so we'll see how it'll pan out. If apple loses that case, good chance their stock will take a hit, since that case attacks their core money maker.

Unfortunately, Republicans generally have been soft on breaking up monopolies (FTC suing Facebook last year was surprising), so we'll see how the new administration moves on these issues.

[ClearedHot]

37 minutes ago, Negatory said:

And I’ll use your overblown oath example. You’re an officer who swore an oath to the constitution to defend from all enemies, including domestic. This bro tore our country apart and made enough people think that the election results were deliberately and simultaneously faked across 6 different states that he got a mob to legitimately invade the legislative branch of our government. And you think that should be protected? He’s off his rocker, and why should companies be required to host his lies?

Overblown...thanks for proving my point...there is no longer civil discussion.  Free speech is free only when you agree with it.  I don't care for Trump, but who decides what is truth or a lie?  You have completely walked past the fact that Twitter locked the account of the NY Post because they deemed the story to be false information when in fact it has proven to be 100% true...the laptop is Hunter's.  Facebook then attempted to purge the story as well.  That should be frightening to everyone...this has nothing to do with Trump.  Two of the major controllers of information to the American public stepped in to silence negative information that proved to be true about the Biden family and used the cloak of 230 as protection.  Previous to this event these things only happen in places like Russia and North Korea.

[ClearedHot]

47 minutes ago, Swamp Yankee said:

I seem to remember a great deal of social media and news coverage regarding complaints about BLM, Kathy Griffin, and Hunter Biden.  Lots of coverage of the details and the reaction from the right.  Not sure what media you consume.  

Even if social media exerts bias on what does and doesn't get posted on their platforms, there are many other currently-available avenues to communicate via the internet.  Also, I mentioned in another post that if you have the financial means, technical acumen, and business savvy you can start your own social media platform.  You're not beholden to anyone. Go for it! 

You are absolutely right! My oath was to defend the constitution, not a flag, political party or specific person.  It is a really complicated situation. You've got the issue of a private company having the ability to control its destiny. You've got public accommodation laws to prevent things like minorities not being able to get mortgages. Then you've got the issue of very partisan people like a Hawley, Schumer, McConnell, or Pelosi having a direct say in what a private company can or can't discuss.  If I had the answers, I wouldn't be doing this. 

On a related topic: Fox, Newsmax, talk radio and other right leaning news outlets ARE part of mainstream media.  They have global reach and huge, growing viewer/readership. The tired old "liberal mainstream media" whining is obsolete.  

Yes, there was a lot of coverage about those events and organizations, thanks for pointing that out...and they all still have active social media accounts...even the leader of Iran has an active Twitter account which he uses to call for the destruction of Israel and the United States...how is that possible using the logic employed against Trump?

The "go start your own company" argument is trash, the monopolies given by 230 serve to block any real competition and when a company (Parler), does try to offer an alternative the tech monopolies immediately shut them down (Amazon and Apple), using the they don't police content argument...a double standard that says we get 230 protections but they don't.

Interesting you bring up Fox and Newsmax...the cancel culture is so strong that other outlets like CNN are ACTIVELY calling for both of these networks to be shutdown.