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+ Show Spoiler +On October 16 2020 05:25 JimmiC wrote:Show nested quote +On October 16 2020 05:09 GreenHorizons wrote:On October 16 2020 04:55 Mohdoo wrote:On October 16 2020 04:44 GreenHorizons wrote:
So between labeling/censoring it for being untrue or censoring it because it was true and obtained against their policies, they went with the latter...? I don't think that's going to have the desired impact. When these things move so fast, they were right to give them undue credibility. Better to say it might be true but clearly an October surprise than to say "shits fake" before the whole thing is even understood. At this point, it is clearly disinformation. This appears to be entirely fabricated, unlike the Clinton email stuff. I haven't read anything about this laptop thing, but based on Nev's description, Hunter leaving a laptop with a "repairman" during a crack/alcohol binge and also leaving it logged into an email account with incriminating information sounds totally plausible to me. So does it being some hairbrained scheme by Rudy and co though just to be clear. @JimmiC I was saying that Hunter would have been locked up long ago under Biden's draconian drug policies, not for run of the mill nepotistic stuff. Really doubtful Biden kept him out, being wealthy did there are tons and tons of of rich people who do drugs who never see jail. However, if you have a source on Biden using his power to keep him out that would be a much better story. Also to you saying this is credible, is the exact same bar that you held the Tara Reid accusation too. Is it bad for the dems? Yes it is true. There is no critical thinking involved which is a sign of some major biases.
I honestly don't understand how you can do this so constantly and people don't bother to speak up about it.
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Norway28797 Posts
jimmy GH is saying if the guy was a black guy with the drug problems he had, then because of the policies championed by Biden (amongst others, it's not like the war on drugs is Biden's fault) would have resulted in him spending life-ish in jail. He's not saying there's a clear connection between Hunter not being jailed and Hunter being Joe's son (or that Joe used his power to keep Hunter from harm's way), but that there is a clear connection between Hunter not being black and not being incarcerated.
This seems like a very fair statement. One of the really indisputable ways black people are discriminated against by the american penal system is that white people and black people take equal amounts of drugs but black people being much more likely to serve harsh punishments due to drug use.
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Even if this scandal were true (and it sure looks like it isn't), what weight does it deserve in the election calculus at all? If we were to wipe away all the massive shits Trump has done that are on public record, there's still the current situation where he's holding giant rallies for people who won't wear masks following his example. Who knows how many infections and deaths are going to directly result from these rallies, and this is AFTER he already caused a well publicized super spreader event. Combined with his bringing up the idea of herd immunity by intentional mass infection, I think we should keep in the forefront of our minds that one candidate is actively trying to kill us for his own benefit, despite whatever "but Hilary, but Hunter Biden" comes up.
Also that small matter of Republicans operating at record speed to confirm a justice while for 7 months they've done nothing to provide aid for the American people. Funny way to show you care about the economy by letting countless business die and citizens lose their livelihoods and homes in droves.
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On October 16 2020 06:11 Starlightsun wrote:
Even if this scandal were true (and it sure looks like it isn't), what weight does it deserve in the election calculus at all? If we were to wipe away all the massive shits Trump has done that are on public record, there's still the current situation where he's holding giant rallies for people who won't wear masks following his example. Who knows how many infections and deaths are going to directly result from these rallies, and this is AFTER he already caused a well publicized super spreader event. Combined with his bringing up the idea of herd immunity by intentional mass infection, I think we should keep in the forefront of our minds that one candidate is actively trying to kill us for his own benefit, despite whatever "but Hilary, but Hunter Biden" comes up.
Also that small matter of Republicans operating a record speed to confirm a justice while for 7 months they've done nothing to provide aid for the American people. Funny way to show you care about the economy by letting countless business die and citizens lose their livelihoods and homes.
It would mean nothing. The best they have is "met with him" lol. Honestly, this is great news if this is the full extent of their op research. But I still think they have an ace to play. This can't possibly be the most the state department and CIA can come up with.
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On October 16 2020 06:20 Mohdoo wrote:Show nested quote +On October 16 2020 06:11 Starlightsun wrote:
Even if this scandal were true (and it sure looks like it isn't), what weight does it deserve in the election calculus at all? If we were to wipe away all the massive shits Trump has done that are on public record, there's still the current situation where he's holding giant rallies for people who won't wear masks following his example. Who knows how many infections and deaths are going to directly result from these rallies, and this is AFTER he already caused a well publicized super spreader event. Combined with his bringing up the idea of herd immunity by intentional mass infection, I think we should keep in the forefront of our minds that one candidate is actively trying to kill us for his own benefit, despite whatever "but Hilary, but Hunter Biden" comes up.
Also that small matter of Republicans operating a record speed to confirm a justice while for 7 months they've done nothing to provide aid for the American people. Funny way to show you care about the economy by letting countless business die and citizens lose their livelihoods and homes. It would mean nothing. The best they have is "met with him" lol. Honestly, this is great news if this is the full extent of their op research. But I still think they have an ace to play. This can't possibly be the most the state department and CIA can come up with.
You're right I guess that is good news if this is their big bombshell. I'd be surprised if they're still withholding stuff considering that mail in and early voting is already well underway. Did my ballot yesterday... was a little cathartic even though my vote means jack shit for the presidential race.
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On October 16 2020 06:25 Starlightsun wrote:Show nested quote +On October 16 2020 06:20 Mohdoo wrote:On October 16 2020 06:11 Starlightsun wrote:
Even if this scandal were true (and it sure looks like it isn't), what weight does it deserve in the election calculus at all? If we were to wipe away all the massive shits Trump has done that are on public record, there's still the current situation where he's holding giant rallies for people who won't wear masks following his example. Who knows how many infections and deaths are going to directly result from these rallies, and this is AFTER he already caused a well publicized super spreader event. Combined with his bringing up the idea of herd immunity by intentional mass infection, I think we should keep in the forefront of our minds that one candidate is actively trying to kill us for his own benefit, despite whatever "but Hilary, but Hunter Biden" comes up.
Also that small matter of Republicans operating a record speed to confirm a justice while for 7 months they've done nothing to provide aid for the American people. Funny way to show you care about the economy by letting countless business die and citizens lose their livelihoods and homes. It would mean nothing. The best they have is "met with him" lol. Honestly, this is great news if this is the full extent of their op research. But I still think they have an ace to play. This can't possibly be the most the state department and CIA can come up with. You're right I guess that is good news if this is their big bombshell. I'd be surprised if they're still withholding stuff considering that mail in and early voting is already well underway. Did my ballot yesterday... was a little cathartic even though my vote means jack shit for the presidential race.
In some ways, a lot of early voting doesn't matter if it is in states that, if Trump lost, he was toast anyway.
For example:
Florida voters can also vote before Election Day. The early voting period runs from Monday, October 19, 2020 to Sunday, November 1, 2020, but dates and hours may vary based on where you live.
Ohio:
Ohio voters can also vote before Election Day. The early voting period runs from Tuesday, October 6, 2020 to Monday, November 2, 2020, but dates and hours may vary based on where you live.
I think people will always assume the worst rather than best of a candidate, so giving the opponent less time to react is better. It takes like 5 days for information to make its way through online networks. I think if they don't drop anything by Friday of next week, they are likely simply out of dirt.
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On October 16 2020 04:19 Nevuk wrote:The hunter biden story is getting uh, dumber the more I read into it. (The one that's supposedly being censored). Hunter forgets to pick up a laptop that he dropped off for repair. Ok, that's not THAT weird, especailly for a crack cocaine addict. Said repairshop is not only in a different state, it's across the country from where he lives (delaware instead of LA). Getting weirder. Said forgotten laptop has emails on the hard drive that "prove" a sketchy connection between Ukraine and Joe Biden. Makes him forgetting about it a lot stranger. Repairman at laptop place waits 12 months before contacting Rudy Giuliani (of all people) with the dirt, after having made a copy of it in a... less than legal manner. If the repair person wanted to be believed, he should have gone to someone else. The info comes out 2 weeks before the election. Giuliani keeps changing his story on where he got the laptop. (He's now claiming it was totally legal since Hunter was drunk and signed a contract saying if he forgot it for 90 days the repairshop owned it https://www.mediaite.com/radio/rudy-giuliani-changes-laptop-story-now-claims-hunter-biden-left-it-at-store/ ) A user on a far right message board (specifically, the r/thedonald replacement site) with names like “Freedom_USA_88" was bragging about it before it even dropped. This timeline of events is so stupid I'm not sure I'd buy it if even if it was Don Jr. doing it. Crack can make you do stupid, crazy stuff. I doubt it can make your opponents act like idiots too. The reason it was being censored is that twitter and facebook have policies that ban stories based on hacked info, apparently, and the basic assumption is that the info (if true) was almost certainly hacked, not just ... handed over by Hunter Biden and forgotten about.
Banned from sharing on Twitter. Rehost from a senate judiciary committee was banned from being shared on twitter. Second story from same outlet (New York Post) regarding Chinese allegations, banned from being shared.
Facebook higher-up says that they'll be limiting its distribution.
Yeah, the censorship is a way bigger story now. They're inventing standards to try to arrive at one they can hold both sides to, but nobody's buying it (well, except for a few extremely partisan or gullible people). They're better off pulling a TeamLiquid and saying their actions will be done in a subjective manner at the discretion of the moderators.
In other news, Scully has admitted to lying about being hacked and has been suspended. He was formerly chosen to be a debate moderator.
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On October 16 2020 06:48 Danglars wrote:Show nested quote +On October 16 2020 04:19 Nevuk wrote:The hunter biden story is getting uh, dumber the more I read into it. (The one that's supposedly being censored). Hunter forgets to pick up a laptop that he dropped off for repair. Ok, that's not THAT weird, especailly for a crack cocaine addict. Said repairshop is not only in a different state, it's across the country from where he lives (delaware instead of LA). Getting weirder. Said forgotten laptop has emails on the hard drive that "prove" a sketchy connection between Ukraine and Joe Biden. Makes him forgetting about it a lot stranger. Repairman at laptop place waits 12 months before contacting Rudy Giuliani (of all people) with the dirt, after having made a copy of it in a... less than legal manner. If the repair person wanted to be believed, he should have gone to someone else. The info comes out 2 weeks before the election. Giuliani keeps changing his story on where he got the laptop. (He's now claiming it was totally legal since Hunter was drunk and signed a contract saying if he forgot it for 90 days the repairshop owned it https://www.mediaite.com/radio/rudy-giuliani-changes-laptop-story-now-claims-hunter-biden-left-it-at-store/ ) A user on a far right message board (specifically, the r/thedonald replacement site) with names like “Freedom_USA_88" was bragging about it before it even dropped. This timeline of events is so stupid I'm not sure I'd buy it if even if it was Don Jr. doing it. Crack can make you do stupid, crazy stuff. I doubt it can make your opponents act like idiots too. The reason it was being censored is that twitter and facebook have policies that ban stories based on hacked info, apparently, and the basic assumption is that the info (if true) was almost certainly hacked, not just ... handed over by Hunter Biden and forgotten about. Banned from sharing on Twitter. Rehost from a senate judiciary committee was banned from being shared on twitter. Second story from same outlet (New York Post) regarding Chinese allegations, banned from being shared. Facebook higher-up says that they'll be limiting its distribution. Yeah, the censorship is a way bigger story now. They're inventing standards to try to arrive at one they can hold both sides to, but nobody's buying it (well, except for a few extremely partisan or gullible people). They're better off pulling a TeamLiquid and saying their actions will be done in a subjective manner at the discretion of the moderators. In other news, Scully has admitted to lying about being hacked and has been suspended. He was formerly chosen to be a debate moderator.
It was such a stupid thing to lie about too. Just be honest and say you wanted to reach out to people who know trump to find the best way to ask him questions.
It was dumb as fuck to do over twitter, but even dumber to lie about it. Him getting booted from the debate/ leave from his job is a good punishment
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The censorship angle is definitely the bigger story, but it currently feels like they did the right thing, though for the wrong reasons.
Preventing an unproven, unverified story from a partisan political source with a very publicly known history of misinformation on the subject (Giuliani) from spreading on their platform looks sensible. The reasons they gave for blocking are total nonsense, however, and I don't think people immediately knew it was Giuliani.
I can give an example of a liberal who shouldn't be trusted on at least one topic, if Cenk Uyger was the source the NYT used as to why the armenian genocide didn't happen, I would also want that censored.
If it winds up being proven that the underlying story was at all fabricated, then a lot of conservatives are going to have egg on their face over the matter and their hearings will instead wind up giving ammo for future censorship efforts.
And I mentioned the Scully thing earlier btw. I don't see how he can keep his job as a political editor or journalist with that big of a misstep. CSPAN earned some more respect for me by forcing him to publicly admit it, unlike msnbc and joy reid
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On October 16 2020 06:48 Danglars wrote:Show nested quote +On October 16 2020 04:19 Nevuk wrote:The hunter biden story is getting uh, dumber the more I read into it. (The one that's supposedly being censored). Hunter forgets to pick up a laptop that he dropped off for repair. Ok, that's not THAT weird, especailly for a crack cocaine addict. Said repairshop is not only in a different state, it's across the country from where he lives (delaware instead of LA). Getting weirder. Said forgotten laptop has emails on the hard drive that "prove" a sketchy connection between Ukraine and Joe Biden. Makes him forgetting about it a lot stranger. Repairman at laptop place waits 12 months before contacting Rudy Giuliani (of all people) with the dirt, after having made a copy of it in a... less than legal manner. If the repair person wanted to be believed, he should have gone to someone else. The info comes out 2 weeks before the election. Giuliani keeps changing his story on where he got the laptop. (He's now claiming it was totally legal since Hunter was drunk and signed a contract saying if he forgot it for 90 days the repairshop owned it https://www.mediaite.com/radio/rudy-giuliani-changes-laptop-story-now-claims-hunter-biden-left-it-at-store/ ) A user on a far right message board (specifically, the r/thedonald replacement site) with names like “Freedom_USA_88" was bragging about it before it even dropped. This timeline of events is so stupid I'm not sure I'd buy it if even if it was Don Jr. doing it. Crack can make you do stupid, crazy stuff. I doubt it can make your opponents act like idiots too. The reason it was being censored is that twitter and facebook have policies that ban stories based on hacked info, apparently, and the basic assumption is that the info (if true) was almost certainly hacked, not just ... handed over by Hunter Biden and forgotten about. Banned from sharing on Twitter. Rehost from a senate judiciary committee was banned from being shared on twitter. Second story from same outlet (New York Post) regarding Chinese allegations, banned from being shared. Facebook higher-up says that they'll be limiting its distribution. Yeah, the censorship is a way bigger story now. They're inventing standards to try to arrive at one they can hold both sides to, but nobody's buying it (well, except for a few extremely partisan or gullible people). They're better off pulling a TeamLiquid and saying their actions will be done in a subjective manner at the discretion of the moderators. In other news, Scully has admitted to lying about being hacked and has been suspended. He was formerly chosen to be a debate moderator.
Don't you find it weird to hold higher standards for a newspaper than for the POTUS ?
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On October 16 2020 06:48 Danglars wrote:Show nested quote +On October 16 2020 04:19 Nevuk wrote:The hunter biden story is getting uh, dumber the more I read into it. (The one that's supposedly being censored). Hunter forgets to pick up a laptop that he dropped off for repair. Ok, that's not THAT weird, especailly for a crack cocaine addict. Said repairshop is not only in a different state, it's across the country from where he lives (delaware instead of LA). Getting weirder. Said forgotten laptop has emails on the hard drive that "prove" a sketchy connection between Ukraine and Joe Biden. Makes him forgetting about it a lot stranger. Repairman at laptop place waits 12 months before contacting Rudy Giuliani (of all people) with the dirt, after having made a copy of it in a... less than legal manner. If the repair person wanted to be believed, he should have gone to someone else. The info comes out 2 weeks before the election. Giuliani keeps changing his story on where he got the laptop. (He's now claiming it was totally legal since Hunter was drunk and signed a contract saying if he forgot it for 90 days the repairshop owned it https://www.mediaite.com/radio/rudy-giuliani-changes-laptop-story-now-claims-hunter-biden-left-it-at-store/ ) A user on a far right message board (specifically, the r/thedonald replacement site) with names like “Freedom_USA_88" was bragging about it before it even dropped. This timeline of events is so stupid I'm not sure I'd buy it if even if it was Don Jr. doing it. Crack can make you do stupid, crazy stuff. I doubt it can make your opponents act like idiots too. The reason it was being censored is that twitter and facebook have policies that ban stories based on hacked info, apparently, and the basic assumption is that the info (if true) was almost certainly hacked, not just ... handed over by Hunter Biden and forgotten about. Banned from sharing on Twitter. Rehost from a senate judiciary committee was banned from being shared on twitter. Second story from same outlet (New York Post) regarding Chinese allegations, banned from being shared. Facebook higher-up says that they'll be limiting its distribution. Yeah, the censorship is a way bigger story now. They're inventing standards to try to arrive at one they can hold both sides to, but nobody's buying it (well, except for a few extremely partisan or gullible people). They're better off pulling a TeamLiquid and saying their actions will be done in a subjective manner at the discretion of the moderators. In other news, Scully has admitted to lying about being hacked and has been suspended. He was formerly chosen to be a debate moderator.
If it is disinformation, which it really, really is, then private companies deciding to toss it in the dumpster sounds great to me. They have a lot of guilt regarding disinformation, whether anti-vax, anti-mask or other bullshit they have fostered. The internet is uniquely bad about allowing disinformation to spread. If they have reason to think this isn't some Russian plot to stir shit up, then they shouldn't censor it. But this is all too familiar.
If they believe Russia in any way targeted Hunter to get dirt, it is their ethical duty to do everything they can to limit Russia's plot.
Edit: And to be clear, the 2 following things completely justify censorship in my opinion:
1. Russian hacking digging up truthful information and using it to influence our election
2. Disinformation
All efforts to keep our elections free of foreign interference are 100% justified, no matter what, based on what history has shown us.
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Norway28797 Posts
On October 16 2020 06:17 JimmiC wrote:Show nested quote +On October 16 2020 05:40 Liquid`Drone wrote:
jimmy GH is saying if the guy was a black guy with the drug problems he had, then because of the policies championed by Biden (amongst others, it's not like the war on drugs is Biden's fault) would have resulted in him spending life-ish in jail. He's not saying there's a clear connection between Hunter not being jailed and Hunter being Joe's son (or that Joe used his power to keep Hunter from harm's way), but that there is a clear connection between Hunter not being black and not being incarcerated.
This seems like a very fair statement. One of the really indisputable ways black people are discriminated against by the american penal system is that white people and black people take equal amounts of drugs but black people being much more likely to serve harsh punishments due to drug use. What I'm saying is that it is not a race issue but rather one of power and prestige. If Biden was Black he would likely still have not been arrested. I am also saying that it is completely unrelated to the rest of the conversation and thrown in their to muddy the water. It is also silly to think that someone can't evolve from the 90's, the current policy is to decriminalize pot which is big change of direction. Now that you are back, would you mind going into why you think Cuba sending doctors to war torn areas is Benevolent? I see them taking 90% of the salary of the doctor, giving the doctors no choice, putting them in harms way to bring 11 billion dollars into Cuba to fund their lavish lifestyles and oppressive dictatorship. I see western democracies who doctors go by choice and is funded by themselves and the their own governments as Benevolent. What Cuba does I see as not as awful as making money off the weapons trade, or selling their citizens as sex slaves but far from out of the goodness of their hearts. I can't see any world where people on this thread would think the US was great if it was going into the Ghettos, training the best and brightest to be doctors, then forcibly sending them wherever they wanted, taking away their passports and sending armed people with them to make sure they comply (with threats against their families at home), and taking over 90% of their salaries paid by foreign governments as a good thing. Why do you not hold these dictorship's to the same fire as you do a democracy? Cuba might be "less bad" than many dictatorships, but putting communism/socialism in the title of their ruling party has not changed the outcomes to the people in any meaningful way.
There are two crucial elements from my post/discussion that you feel like bringing up, that you seem to have missed entirely.
Firstly, I said 'as benevolent as it gets'. Not 'benevolent' as an absolute quality, but a degree of benevolence that survives comparison with any other country. I specifically mention the Marshall plan as a comparison. No country on earth, and that certainly includes Norway, has a foreign policy more benevolent than 'sending mass doctors to conflict areas', regardless of whether this is entirely a PR move or whatever. If the US's sole motivation behind helping rebuild Europe was to create new markets for them to export goods to / ensure it didn't turn communist, even if there was 0 degrees of altruism involved, it was still a piece of really good piece of foreign policy. If you look at the berlin blockade airlift and the marshall plan and the vietnam war, you can say that both of these policies had the intention of hindering the spread of communism, but the former two are still clearly much more benevolent pieces of foreign policy than the latter.
Secondly, I specify 'foreign' policy, as in, not relating to Cuba's treatment of Cuba's citizens. If you feel this is a silly distinction to make, I don't really care - I did however make the distinction.
For further reference, what I do when I think a discussion has run its course, is to stop replying. I've found it the best way to counteract the 'now we're just talking in circles' thing which tends to happen on forums and threads like these.
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On October 16 2020 06:58 Nevuk wrote:
The censorship angle is definitely the bigger story, but it currently feels like they did the right thing, though for the wrong reasons.
Preventing an unproven, unverified story from a partisan political source with a very publicly known history of misinformation on the subject (Giuliani) from spreading on their platform looks sensible. The reasons they gave for blocking are total nonsense, however, and I don't think people immediately knew it was Giuliani.
I can give an example of a liberal who shouldn't be trusted on at least one topic, if Cenk Uyger was the source the NYT used as to why the armenian genocide didn't happen, I would also want that censored.
If it winds up being proven that the underlying story was at all fabricated, then a lot of conservatives are going to have egg on their face over the matter and their hearings will instead wind up giving ammo for future censorship efforts.
And I mentioned the Scully thing earlier btw. I don't see how he can keep his job as a political editor or journalist with that big of a misstep. CSPAN earned some more respect for me by forcing him to publicly admit it, unlike msnbc and joy reid
Hunter and Biden haven't denied the authenticity of the emails in released statements. Biden only disputed the meeting (and has since backed off from the claim a little)
The story itself does not attempt to hide who made the claims and how they were brought to wider attention. The shop owner is telling a story. Rudy Giuliani's lawyer and Steve Bannon are responsible for the spread. That's enough for an informed reader to have doubts and want responses and further investigation. They can post whatever warnings they want on shares like this close to an election, but don't censor the stories that make no special, false claim about their provenance. The New York Post is not Eagle_Freedom_69 dot net. The things that make the story quizzical are faithfully printed in the story itself. It's above whatever line you want to draw about election disinformation.
If they've got some noble goal about how information sharing is supposed to be, then highlight any corrections and print critical stories in their topic aggregation section. Just don't censor legitimate users sharing links from major publications. The behavior is inseparable from what might happen if they wanted Biden to win and got an email from the Biden team asking for the story to be censored on their platform. Twitter is begging for action directed against them, either in the form of regulations such as those against monopolies abusing their power, or whether this kind of action is an in-kind contribution to the Biden campaign, or amendments to section 230 that withdraw protections extended to social media companies from lawsuit since they're striking editorial positions.
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Diane Feinstein deemed the Amy Coney Barrett hearings as "one of the best set of hearings that I've participated in". Seems she'll be confirmed before the election, maybe with Dem votes?
Also gave Graham a maskless hug, which is pretty questionable on several levels.
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Norway28797 Posts
Can anybody really be swayed by any scandals at this point? Like a genuinely credible allegation that he's a serial child rapist, sure, but like, nothing mentioned anywhere about Joe or Hunter Biden, even if I accept on face value that everything is true (short of serial child rape, I assume he's been accused of that too), then I'd still think 'lol still way better than Trump' and happily go about voting.
Like I basically think a big difference between now and 2016 was in 2016, there was a reasonably large group of people who thought 'damn, there is at least a chance that president Trump will be more presidential than candidate Trump'. The maybe/indifferent group is the one you can sway, either towards not voting or changing their candidate, through showcasing cases of mild corruption or abuse of power. But I don't think that group really exists anymore.
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On October 16 2020 07:20 Danglars wrote:Show nested quote +On October 16 2020 06:58 Nevuk wrote:
The censorship angle is definitely the bigger story, but it currently feels like they did the right thing, though for the wrong reasons.
Preventing an unproven, unverified story from a partisan political source with a very publicly known history of misinformation on the subject (Giuliani) from spreading on their platform looks sensible. The reasons they gave for blocking are total nonsense, however, and I don't think people immediately knew it was Giuliani.
I can give an example of a liberal who shouldn't be trusted on at least one topic, if Cenk Uyger was the source the NYT used as to why the armenian genocide didn't happen, I would also want that censored.
If it winds up being proven that the underlying story was at all fabricated, then a lot of conservatives are going to have egg on their face over the matter and their hearings will instead wind up giving ammo for future censorship efforts.
And I mentioned the Scully thing earlier btw. I don't see how he can keep his job as a political editor or journalist with that big of a misstep. CSPAN earned some more respect for me by forcing him to publicly admit it, unlike msnbc and joy reid
Hunter and Biden haven't denied the authenticity of the emails in released statements. Biden only disputed the meeting (and has since backed off from the claim a little) The story itself does not attempt to hide who made the claims and how they were brought to wider attention. The shop owner is telling a story. Rudy Giuliani's lawyer and Steve Bannon are responsible for the spread. That's enough for an informed reader to have doubts and want responses and further investigation. They can post whatever warnings they want on shares like this close to an election, but don't censor the stories that make no special, false claim about their provenance. The New York Post is not Eagle_Freedom_69 dot net. The things that make the story quizzical are faithfully printed in the story itself. It's above whatever line you want to draw about election disinformation. If they've got some noble goal about how information sharing is supposed to be, then highlight any corrections and print critical stories in their topic aggregation section. Just don't censor legitimate users sharing links from major publications. The behavior is inseparable from what might happen if they wanted Biden to win and got an email from the Biden team asking for the story to be censored on their platform. Twitter is begging for action directed against them, either in the form of regulations such as those against monopolies abusing their power, or whether this kind of action is an in-kind contribution to the Biden campaign, or amendments to section 230 that withdraw protections extended to social media companies from lawsuit since they're striking editorial positions.
I strongly agree with this and feel it's an action which should have been taken back in 2014 or earlier.
Facebook has a larger than monopoly level hold on many people's news sources.
They're media companies and serve as newspapers for many : if they don't censor straight up disinformation, then they're instead tacitly endorsing it, as they inarguably did in 2016 (and not just for Trump specifically - we had all sorts of wildfire spreads of very misleading stories during the 2016 primaries for both Clinton and Sanders).
If they don't take this action, then they're presenting themselves as wanting Trump to win and acting the exact same as if Trump's campaign had emailed them and told them it was important for people to hear the story. That's the catch 22 of these giant conglomerates like Facebook and Twitter. Inaction is the same as aiding the one of the sides most willing to deal in misinformation on a large scale (which is currently the GOP, but could be others in the future, or one side in nasty primary).
Also, forcing these people to justify their editorial mistakes and positions would help prevent some of the massive bleeding by real news orgs in the past decade - Facebook and Twitter can skate by without entire departments that are needed by real news.
On October 16 2020 07:22 GreenHorizons wrote:Diane Feinstein deemed the Amy Coney Barrett hearings as "one of the best set of hearings that I've participated in". Seems she'll be confirmed before the election, maybe with Dem votes? https://twitter.com/sahilkapur/status/1316808230278963200Also gave Graham a maskless hug, which is pretty questionable on several levels.
Simply disgusting. Feinstein has long been my least favorite Senator. She's like Aaron Burr, but with fewer beliefs other than increasing mass surveillance of citizens.
edit:
Personally, I would be for literally ejecting her from the chamber for the maskless hug of a man who has refused to get a fucking COVID TEST. Shows such a staggering fail of judgement that she shouldn't be trusted with being her own coffee person.
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On October 16 2020 07:12 Mohdoo wrote:Show nested quote +On October 16 2020 06:48 Danglars wrote:On October 16 2020 04:19 Nevuk wrote:The hunter biden story is getting uh, dumber the more I read into it. (The one that's supposedly being censored). Hunter forgets to pick up a laptop that he dropped off for repair. Ok, that's not THAT weird, especailly for a crack cocaine addict. Said repairshop is not only in a different state, it's across the country from where he lives (delaware instead of LA). Getting weirder. Said forgotten laptop has emails on the hard drive that "prove" a sketchy connection between Ukraine and Joe Biden. Makes him forgetting about it a lot stranger. Repairman at laptop place waits 12 months before contacting Rudy Giuliani (of all people) with the dirt, after having made a copy of it in a... less than legal manner. If the repair person wanted to be believed, he should have gone to someone else. The info comes out 2 weeks before the election. Giuliani keeps changing his story on where he got the laptop. (He's now claiming it was totally legal since Hunter was drunk and signed a contract saying if he forgot it for 90 days the repairshop owned it https://www.mediaite.com/radio/rudy-giuliani-changes-laptop-story-now-claims-hunter-biden-left-it-at-store/ ) A user on a far right message board (specifically, the r/thedonald replacement site) with names like “Freedom_USA_88" was bragging about it before it even dropped. This timeline of events is so stupid I'm not sure I'd buy it if even if it was Don Jr. doing it. Crack can make you do stupid, crazy stuff. I doubt it can make your opponents act like idiots too. The reason it was being censored is that twitter and facebook have policies that ban stories based on hacked info, apparently, and the basic assumption is that the info (if true) was almost certainly hacked, not just ... handed over by Hunter Biden and forgotten about. Banned from sharing on Twitter. Rehost from a senate judiciary committee was banned from being shared on twitter. Second story from same outlet (New York Post) regarding Chinese allegations, banned from being shared. Facebook higher-up says that they'll be limiting its distribution. Yeah, the censorship is a way bigger story now. They're inventing standards to try to arrive at one they can hold both sides to, but nobody's buying it (well, except for a few extremely partisan or gullible people). They're better off pulling a TeamLiquid and saying their actions will be done in a subjective manner at the discretion of the moderators. In other news, Scully has admitted to lying about being hacked and has been suspended. He was formerly chosen to be a debate moderator. If it is disinformation, which it really, really is, then private companies deciding to toss it in the dumpster sounds great to me. They have a lot of guilt regarding disinformation, whether anti-vax, anti-mask or other bullshit they have fostered. The internet is uniquely bad about allowing disinformation to spread. If they have reason to think this isn't some Russian plot to stir shit up, then they shouldn't censor it. But this is all too familiar. If they believe Russia in any way targeted Hunter to get dirt, it is their ethical duty to do everything they can to limit Russia's plot. Edit: And to be clear, the 2 following things completely justify censorship in my opinion: 1. Russian hacking digging up truthful information and using it to influence our election 2. Disinformation All efforts to keep our elections free of foreign interference are 100% justified, no matter what, based on what history has shown us.
What's the evidence that hacking was involved or that Russians are involved?
What if the Chinese are involved in the NYT's acquisition of Trump's tax returns? After all the intelligence community has assessed that China favors Biden and is working in his favor. Shouldn't we presume that illegal leaks in the final weeks of an election like this are suspect?
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On October 16 2020 07:28 Liquid`Drone wrote:
Can anybody really be swayed by any scandals at this point? Like a genuinely credible allegation that he's a serial child rapist, sure, but like, nothing mentioned anywhere about Joe or Hunter Biden, even if I accept on face value that everything is true (short of serial child rape, I assume he's been accused of that too), then I'd still think 'lol still way better than Trump' and happily go about voting.
Like I basically think a big difference between now and 2016 was in 2016, there was a reasonably large group of people who thought 'damn, there is at least a chance that president Trump will be more presidential than candidate Trump'. The maybe/indifferent group is the one you can sway, either towards not voting or changing their candidate, through showcasing cases of mild corruption or abuse of power. But I don't think that group really exists anymore.
I think there's a large group of potential Biden voters who could choose to abstain from voting if presented with a sufficiently damning material. "Yeah, Trump's terrible but I'm not spending an hour in a line to help elect someone like Biden. I'll keep my conscience clean".
Imagine someone releases recordings of Biden ridiculing or even speaking bluntly about "common people" and their problems/inability to solve those problems. It's far from serial-child-rapist level material but it could hit Biden harder than Clinton hit herself with the basket of deplorables.
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Norway28797 Posts
Yea something like that I could see have an effect, if he does something that blatantly showcases his contempt for the voter base then sure. But nepotism or corruption? I can't see anyone going from biden to trump because of that, and I can't see a whole lot of would-be bideners abstaining either for that reason - because nepotism or corruption aren't areas where Trump is looking any better regardless of what the findings are.
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EPT
