Tag: social media bias

The New York Analysis concludes its latest review of the ongoing attacks on the First Amendment.

How extreme is this threat getting? Consider California State Senator Pan’s proposed legislation,  which reads: “This bill would require any person who operates a social media, as defined, Internet Web site with a physical presence in California to…prominently display a link on the site to a disclosure informing users how the site determines what content to display to the user, the order in which content is displayed, and the format in which content is displayed, and to inform users of the site’s strategic plan to mitigate the spread of false information, among other things. With respect to a social media Internet Web site that utilizes factcheckers to verify the accuracy of news stories, the bill would require the disclosure to state what policies and practices the factcheckers use to determine whether news stories are accurate and what the site does with the content that the factcheckers determine is not accurate.”

 A key problem with Pan’s proposal, among others, is that many of the “fact checking” organizations which are on the list to consult are politically biased, as a number of studies, including those by George Mason University have revealed.

Ben Kamisar, writing in The Hill describes how the use of biased fact checking is becoming an increased challenge to free speech: “Conservative groups are crying foul after discovering that the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) is helping YouTube decide what content is too offensive for the video platform.”

Kyle Smith, in a National Review article, describes SPLC: “ SPLC… spends far more on direct-mail fundraising pleas ($10 million) than it ever has on legal services, according to an analysis by Philanthropy Roundtable, and has never passed along more than 31 percent of its funding to charitable programs, sometimes as little as 18 percent. Meanwhile it has built itself a palatial six-story headquarters and an endowment of more than $200 million. In essence it is a machine for turning leftist hysteria into cash that portrays itself as a non-partisan, fact-finding group and has long been treated as such by media institutions such as the Washington Post and the New York Times.”

A spinal manipulation should never be attempted by anyone other than a licensed Doctor of Chiropractic buy pfizer viagra or Osteopathy. Pomegranates aid longevity, reduce heart disease and strokes, reverse the buildup of arterial plaque, and reduce best online viagra blood sugar level. And with Kamagra Polo, you viagra sildenafil canada have got what you always wished and prayed for. It may have aspect consequences devensec.com price for levitra which are life threatening. Consortium News’ Robert Parry writes:  the [NY] Times gives no thought to the potential downside of having a select group of mainstream journalistic entities feeding their judgment about what is true and what is not into some algorithms that would then scrub the Internet of contrary items. Since the Times is a member of the Google-funded First Draft Coalition – along with other mainstream outlets such as The Washington Post… this idea of eliminating information that counters what the group asserts is true may seem quite appealing to the Times and the other insiders. After all, it might seem cool to have some high-tech tool that silences your critics automatically. But you don’t need a huge amount of imagination to see how this combination of mainstream groupthink and artificial intelligence could create an Orwellian future in which only one side of a story gets told and the other side simply disappears from view.”

While federal bureaucratic assaults on free speech, particularly from the FCC which, during the Obama years actually sought to impose government “monitors” in newsrooms and concocted schemes to regulate conservative news outlets have diminished, the threat continues. The Washington Examiner’s  Paul Bedard found that “Democratic efforts on the Federal Election Commission to punish media and stifle voices like the Drudge Report and Fox are going ‘underground’ after failing in public, according to the agency’s outgoing defender of media and digital outlets… Lee Goodman… ‘The desire to regulate Americans’ political speech on the internet remains alive and well here at the commission and now even in Congress,’ added Goodman.”

More chilling than the question of bias, however, is the central concept behind Pan’s proposal, and others like it.  Despite the existence of the First Amendment and centuries of precedent, Pan, like other leftist politicians, pundits and academics, assume that they have the right to pass laws or enact measures that regulate free speech.

Photo: U.S. National Archives

A  federal judge has rejected UC Berkeley’s bid to dismiss a lawsuit based on the University’s discriminatory policy against conservative speakers. The court battle highlights the growing trend among many universities, as well as other leftist institutions and social media outlets, to stifle those who dissent from leftist orthodoxy.

America is dealing with the signature legacy of the eight years coinciding with the Obama presidency, namely, the attempted removal of First Amendment protections from conservatives.

It could be seen in President Obama’s influencing of the Federal Communications Commission to attempt to place monitors in news rooms, and his transfer of control of the internet to an international body not devoted to free speech. It could be observed in his rather embarrassing attacks on news outlets that disagree with his policies. A description of President Obama’s initial reaction to contrary opinion was described in 2009 by Spectator magazine:

“The Obama Administration declared war on the minority of media outlets that do not worship the political left’s newest false idol immediately after Obama was sworn in. Three days into his presidency Obama warned Congressional Republicans against listening to radio host Rush Limbaugh…Then the White House launched a jihad against Fox News Channel and its hosts by first boycotting appearances on the cable channel and then second, by engaging in name-calling and leveling baseless allegations… the White House brazenly attempted to marginalize Fox News Channel by enlisting the support of the heretofore compliant news media. Fortunately, competing news outlets found the backbone — if only temporarily — to put the kibosh on Obama’s attempts to blacklist FNC from the White House press pool.”

Attorney General Loretta Lynch considered criminally prosecuting those who merely disagreed with Obama’s climate change views. Senator Schumer (D-NY) introduced legislation which specifically and openly sought to limit the First Amendment regarding paid political speech. The Internal Revenue Service attacked conservative organizations. Leftist state attorneys general engaged in harassing legal tactics against dissidents. Social media initiated various methods to silence conservative users. And, of course, universities adopted a variety of tactics to eliminate non-leftist influence within both the faculty and the student body.

The pronounced drive to stifle the right has emphasized different issues at different times, sometimes with proposed government actions, at other times with the use of inflammatory language. Attempts to ensure that predominately liberal institutions had more influence in general elections manifested itself in increasingly restrictive “campaign reform” measures. Labeling any opposition to the most extreme race and gender-baiting tactics of the left as “hate speech” is currently in vogue. Those attempting to limit so-called poverty programs that have failed for over half a century are attacked for their “heartlessness.” Those seeking to protect the Second Amendment are portrayed as being in favor of mass murder.

If you are impotence, it is very unlikely that you get more than a couple of inches for that matter. buy cheap sildenafil This increases the blood free get viagra in the reproductive organs and cures weak erection and premature ejaculation. The sildenafil free shipping Qualities that is good and Associated With Erectile dysfunction measure. You are able to mix the herbal male enhancement drug you need to look at cialis generic is normally oral, approximately 60 minutes before the sexual act. However, differences of opinion, no matter how harsh, are not the problem.  Spirited political debate is a good thing. What is truly concerning is the goal of far too many on the left to criminalize the right for having a different opinion, and the lock-step acquiescence of institutions to that attempt.

Journalist Caroline Glick  wrote:  “The fact is that the attempts of leftist activists on campuses to silence non-leftist dissenters…is simply an extreme version of what is increasingly becoming standard operating procedure for leftist activists throughout the US. Rather than participating in a battle of ideas with their ideological opponents on the Right, increasingly, leftist activists, groups and policy-makers seek to silence their opponents through slander, intimidation and misrepresentation of their own agenda.”

Perhaps the most important analysis of the attempt to silence non-leftist speech comes not from a conservative, but from a journalist closely associated with liberal politics. Kirsten Powers served in the Clinton Administration and was a fixture in Democrat politics in New York.  She provides one the most bluntly honest and hard-hitting analyses of this problem:

“This intolerance,” she writes, “is not a passive matter of opinion. It’s an aggressive, illiberal impulse to silence people.  This conduct has become an existential threat to those who hold orthodox religious beliefs… increasingly I hear from people across the political spectrum who are fearful not only of expressing their views, but also as to where all of this is heading.  I’ve followed this trend closely as a columnist with growing concern.  It’s become clear that the attempts—too often successful—to silence dissent from the liberal worldview isn’t isolated outbursts. They are part of a bigger story.”

Mark Pulliam, writing in the New York Post describes a disturbing recent example: “…would-be brownshirts let the mask slip when they disrupted and attempted to shout down a speaker at the City University of New York School of Law….South Texas College of Law professor Josh Blackman arrived on campus to discuss … ‘The Importance of Free Speech on Campus,’…The episode is deeply disturbing … the audience was not made up of undergraduates. This was a lecture at a law school… Yet the numerous signs waved by the protesters contained such slogans as ‘Rule of Law equals White Supremacy’ and ‘The First Amendment is Not a Licence [sic] to Dehumanize Marginalized People.’ Students shouted ‘Legal objectivity is a myth’ and ‘F – – k the law.’ CUNY Law’s National Lawyers Guild chapter tweeted that ‘free speech’ activists are ‘not welcome at our PUBLIC INTEREST school.’

The Report Concludes Tomorrow

Photo: U.S. National Archives