Surprised you didn't spend more time on the Biden laptop aspect of the FBI scandal.
Seems pretty clear the FBI knew the laptop was authentic (they had it for a year) and knew it'd be reported on. So in advance they bombarded Twitter (and other platforms) with advance warnings about possible Russian hack-and-dump operations (despite Twitter's claims that they'd seen no such activity) such that the laptop news would fit that fact pattern when it was released.
This is nothing short of attempting to alter the outcome of a presidential election. That's enormous news, no?
Brilliant essay. I agree that the problem is that only a few people seem to care. i heard Pat Buchanan talk about the deep shame people that worked in the Nixon whitehouse that weren't involved in Watergate felt after the revalation of Watergate. i don't see any shame from the people weren;'t involved in the twitter files, but benifited from the actions. The rot runs deep. Sorry for the bad grammer, too angry.
Agree with you accountability comments. One has to remember that the FBI HQ is still named after J. Edgar Hoover.
David French has a good explainer today about the difference between government persuasion and coercion. It's unclear from the information released so far where the FBI lands in the Twitter case. The FBI has legitimate reasons to have regular contact with Twitter.
"I think that the connection between Twitter and the FBI is news." Yes;
But the point was censor conservatives, which has long been known by conservatives and those willing to look. It was pretty clear that ex-FBI liars who knowingly lied about "Russian dis-information" to support censorship were rigging the election.
The files provide smoking gun evidence that the FBI stole the election.
As Trump sort of knew - and Barr (DOJ) should have known, and Wray (FBI) was responsible for, likely NOT informing Trump of the extent.
The successful demonization of Trump is why so many folks accept the Machiavellian "rigging the election is OK if it stops Trump" -- which is basically what rational atheist Sam Harris claimed.
We probably need two offices, one explicitly run by Republicans and the other by Democrats, who job is purely to investigate wrongdoing by gov't intelligence agencies. With the power to fire any bureaucrat for unprofessional conduct in wrongly using force or prosecution power, or wrongly NOT using. James Comey should have been fired by Republicans for not indicting HR Clinton for her crimes.
I understand the desire for criminal charges - but I'd far prefer 1,000 or 10,000 fired top gov't bozos, rather than 7 or even 80 being indicted, with unlikely serious punishment (like Sussman, or Kline). Neo was writing about this Oct. 29, 2020, before the election with 51 liars, and reviews what was known then, and what is new now: https://www.thenewneo.com/2022/12/20/twitter-files-7-the-fbi-sets-up-the-scam/ (She does the best comprehensive, accurate analysis of such issues, when she blogs them.)
I hate that so many Americans think the FBI rigging an election is OK.
There is no reforming or restraining these agencies- they will only continue to increase their power and control over the population. They need to be dismantled, and even that would probably fail- they would simply morph into something else with the same purpose and personnel inside the executive branch.
The first area of reform needed is to strip the agencies of the power to define exactly what their own employees are allowed to talk about with the public without going to jail. The second reform needed is the ability for some number of normal voters to sit in judgement over all sensitive matters. Nowhere in the Constitution does it state that only government employees should be allowed to know what is going on inside.
I'm not really terribly worried about this. I don't think the lack of sharing of stories about the Biden laptop on Twitter significantly affected the result of the election. In any case, they shouldn't have affected the results. Would we anticipate they will affect the 2024 election?
I do hope the transparency introduced by Mr. Musk will make it more resistant to this kind of influence, but they still seem completely unable to deal with rent-a-bots and Chinese hashtag bombardment. The hashtags for the Chinese names of major Chinese cities have been flooded with spam posts every few seconds since the anti-lockdown protests began nearly a month ago.
If they can't stop that, how they trust things like the polls he runs?
I guess I'm more cynical by half: I assumed the FBI calls Twitter (or Zuckerberg) not to tell Twitter, Zuckerberg what to do - but to ask Twitter, Zuckerberg - what do you want us to do?
Surprised you didn't spend more time on the Biden laptop aspect of the FBI scandal.
Seems pretty clear the FBI knew the laptop was authentic (they had it for a year) and knew it'd be reported on. So in advance they bombarded Twitter (and other platforms) with advance warnings about possible Russian hack-and-dump operations (despite Twitter's claims that they'd seen no such activity) such that the laptop news would fit that fact pattern when it was released.
This is nothing short of attempting to alter the outcome of a presidential election. That's enormous news, no?
The Yanks should never have thrown billions at the intell agencies after 9/11
Too many people, having to 'invent' jobs
Good luck in winding that back.
Brilliant essay. I agree that the problem is that only a few people seem to care. i heard Pat Buchanan talk about the deep shame people that worked in the Nixon whitehouse that weren't involved in Watergate felt after the revalation of Watergate. i don't see any shame from the people weren;'t involved in the twitter files, but benifited from the actions. The rot runs deep. Sorry for the bad grammer, too angry.
Agree with you accountability comments. One has to remember that the FBI HQ is still named after J. Edgar Hoover.
David French has a good explainer today about the difference between government persuasion and coercion. It's unclear from the information released so far where the FBI lands in the Twitter case. The FBI has legitimate reasons to have regular contact with Twitter.
https://thedispatch.com/newsletter/frenchpress/did-the-fbis-involvement-with-twitter-violate-the-first-amendment/
"I think that the connection between Twitter and the FBI is news." Yes;
But the point was censor conservatives, which has long been known by conservatives and those willing to look. It was pretty clear that ex-FBI liars who knowingly lied about "Russian dis-information" to support censorship were rigging the election.
The files provide smoking gun evidence that the FBI stole the election.
As Trump sort of knew - and Barr (DOJ) should have known, and Wray (FBI) was responsible for, likely NOT informing Trump of the extent.
The successful demonization of Trump is why so many folks accept the Machiavellian "rigging the election is OK if it stops Trump" -- which is basically what rational atheist Sam Harris claimed.
We probably need two offices, one explicitly run by Republicans and the other by Democrats, who job is purely to investigate wrongdoing by gov't intelligence agencies. With the power to fire any bureaucrat for unprofessional conduct in wrongly using force or prosecution power, or wrongly NOT using. James Comey should have been fired by Republicans for not indicting HR Clinton for her crimes.
I understand the desire for criminal charges - but I'd far prefer 1,000 or 10,000 fired top gov't bozos, rather than 7 or even 80 being indicted, with unlikely serious punishment (like Sussman, or Kline). Neo was writing about this Oct. 29, 2020, before the election with 51 liars, and reviews what was known then, and what is new now: https://www.thenewneo.com/2022/12/20/twitter-files-7-the-fbi-sets-up-the-scam/ (She does the best comprehensive, accurate analysis of such issues, when she blogs them.)
I hate that so many Americans think the FBI rigging an election is OK.
There is no reforming or restraining these agencies- they will only continue to increase their power and control over the population. They need to be dismantled, and even that would probably fail- they would simply morph into something else with the same purpose and personnel inside the executive branch.
The first area of reform needed is to strip the agencies of the power to define exactly what their own employees are allowed to talk about with the public without going to jail. The second reform needed is the ability for some number of normal voters to sit in judgement over all sensitive matters. Nowhere in the Constitution does it state that only government employees should be allowed to know what is going on inside.
I'm not really terribly worried about this. I don't think the lack of sharing of stories about the Biden laptop on Twitter significantly affected the result of the election. In any case, they shouldn't have affected the results. Would we anticipate they will affect the 2024 election?
I do hope the transparency introduced by Mr. Musk will make it more resistant to this kind of influence, but they still seem completely unable to deal with rent-a-bots and Chinese hashtag bombardment. The hashtags for the Chinese names of major Chinese cities have been flooded with spam posts every few seconds since the anti-lockdown protests began nearly a month ago.
If they can't stop that, how they trust things like the polls he runs?
I guess I'm more cynical by half: I assumed the FBI calls Twitter (or Zuckerberg) not to tell Twitter, Zuckerberg what to do - but to ask Twitter, Zuckerberg - what do you want us to do?