Social Media's Role in Democracy: More Harmful Than Helpful?

Submitted by Kalev Leetaru, senior fellow at the George Washington University Center for Cyber & Homeland Security. His past roles include fellow in residence at Georgetown University’s Edmund A. Walsh School of Foreign Service and member of the World Economic Forum’s Global Agenda Council on the Future of Government. Via RealClearPolitics.

Last week something extraordinary happened: Twitter briefly suspended the official account of the president of the United States, preventing him from posting until he deleted a tweet it said violated its rules. From merely hiding the president’s tweets, as it had done before, the company briefly stopped him from tweeting altogether.

Then, three days later, Yelp announced it would start formally flagging businesses accused of racism based solely on media reports.

Those two developments crystallized once again a key question that increasingly shadows our age: How can the growing power of social media companies coexist with the foundations of democracy? A democratic society rests upon an informed citizenry free to openly debate their shared future. The First Amendment guarantees this, enshrining both the right of the press to cover the unvarnished reality of daily events and the right of the public to consider all ideas, even those possibly deemed harmful by the majority of society. Pundits who laud social-media censorship would do well to remember that calls for the rights we hold dear today, including universal suffrage and civil rights, were once deemed the same kind of “harmful” speech that in today’s world would likely be banned by social media.

Social platforms were once viewed as a way to promote democracy to the world, granting unfettered freedom of expression and unfiltered access to information. Today they enforce ever-changing opaque rules of “acceptable speech” and define “truth.” Even more troubling, the journalism world is increasingly embracing Silicon Valley’s new role as Ministry of Truth rather than condemning it.

Emboldened by the media’s support for muzzling a president many news outlets despise, Silicon Valley companies have ramped up their censorship of elected officials. It was just five months ago that Twitter first visibly flagged an official statement of the U.S. government as “misleading.” With such censoring becoming almost routine now, it becomes front page news only when a social platform doesn’t censor the president.

Yet Twitter’s suspension of President Trump’s Twitter account last week crossed a new line. What would have happened if a national emergency such as an earthquake or coordinated terrorist or cyberattack had struck during this period, with the president ability to communicate with the American public compromised? Such disasters could have impaired Twitter’s ability to quickly restore his access, and it is unclear if they would have done so even in a national disaster.

https://www.zerohedge.com/political/social-medias-role-democracy-more-harmful-helpful

Cost of Lockdown: Heart Charity Claims Hundreds of Excess Deaths Due to Lockdown

The British Heart Foundation has said that delays in care caused by the coronavirus lockdown resulted in more than 800 “excess” deaths of under-65s by conditions like strokes and cardiac arrests.

Mortality data since March found that in England and Wales, there were 2,800 deaths of those under 65 where the underlying cause was pulmonary or heart disease. This was around 450 more than expected. The charity said that between May and July, there were 3,100 such deaths, 350 more than expected for that time of year.

There were no excess deaths in this age range between January and March, according to The Telegraph, suggesting the March lockdown and heavy social distancing rules resulting in Britons not seeking or receiving the healthcare they needed. In late March, admissions to accident and emergency services for suspected heart attacks had dropped by half.

The BHF’s associate medical director, Dr Sonya Babu-Narayan, said: “We know there are tragic consequences of the pandemic for patients with heart and circulatory diseases, and these figures further highlight that delays in care are likely contributing to more deaths than we would expect to see otherwise.”

Dr Babu-Narayan added that it was “particularly concerning” that this trend was continuing even after the peak of the pandemic had passed. Thousands are still believed to be waiting for examinations related to heart and pulmonary conditions.

UK Begins Investigation into Blanket ‘Do Not Resuscitate’ Orders After Claims Elderly Targeted https://t.co/iYDRR6wVYe

— Breitbart London (@BreitbartLondon) October 13, 2020

Research from DATA-CAN in July predicted that there might be 35,000 excess deaths from cancer within a year due to the backlog of screenings and treatment appointments. It is believed that nearly one million women missed out on breast cancer screening because of the lockdown, according to a report from last month.

The National Health Service (NHS) and care homes are currently under scrutiny after the Care Quality Commission (CQC) watchdog launched an investigation at the beginning of this week into allegations that ‘do not resuscitate’ orders were being placed on groups of individuals simply because of their age or preexisting medical conditions, such as if they have serious diseases, in case they caught the coronavirus.

Reports have been circulating since the beginning of the March lockdown that general practitioners were either enforcing or encouraging patients, care homes, and other social and care service providers to put blanket DNR orders on the elderly, sick children, and even autistic people.

A report from last month revealed that the National Health Service (NHS) had ordered around ten per cent of care homes to put DNRs in their residents’ files, as well as telling them that there was a strict “no admissions” to hospital policy if their elderly charges caught the virus.

Socialised Medicine: UK Care Homes Were Given ‘Do Not Resuscitate’ Orders at Height of #Coronavirus Pandemic https://t.co/WCg4awEEmH

— Breitbart London (@BreitbartLondon) August 24, 2020

https://www.breitbart.com/europe/2020/10/15/cost-lockdown-heart-charity-claims-hundreds-excess-deaths-lockdown/

“Trump Kisses Dictators’ Butts” – Dirtbag Senator Ben Sasse Trashes President Trump on Phone Call After Trump Gives Him Endorsement

Back in September 2019 President Donald Trump endorsed dirt-bag Ben Sasse.

Ben Sasse is Never-Trump scum who has attacked President Trump his entire time as US Senator.

This was one of President Trump’s worst tweets on record.

On Wednesday Ben Sasse trashed President Trump on a phone call with constituents.

This guy is bad news.

Sasse said that President Donald Trump has “flirted” with white supremacists, “kisses dictators’ butts” and also criticized the way that the president treats women.

https://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2020/10/trump-kisses-dictators-butts-dirtbag-senator-ben-sasse-trashes-president-trump-phone-call-trump-gives-endorsement-video/

Biden Would Unravel Some Trump Tax Cuts If Elected, Plan Shows

Top income earners would face higher taxes while the rest would get relief under a plan proposed by Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden.

Lower taxes enshrined in the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act of 2017 would be rolled back, increasing the tax bill on those making more than $400,000 per year.

A critique suggests the increase in the corporate tax rate, from 21% to 28%, would trickle down in the form of a decrease in after-tax earnings for the middle class.

Top earners would pay more taxes, while the rest would get relief under a plan proposed by Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden, a Tax Policy Center report released Thursday found.

Parts of his plan, the review found, would undo the cuts introduced in President Donald Trump’s first term in office. Lower taxes enshrined in the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act of 2017 would be rolled back, increasing the bill on those making more than $400,000 per year. No taxpayer making less than that will see taxes rise, the analysis concluded.

Other parts of the proposal would expand aid to post-secondary students, forgive some student loan debt and increase subsidies under the Affordable Care Act, known otherwise as Obamacare.

The critique suggests the increase in the corporate tax rate, from 21% to 28%, would trickle down in the form of a decrease in after-tax earnings for the middle class. Republicans, meanwhile, contend that 82% of U.S. taxpayers would wind up paying more in taxes under the Biden plan.

An op-ed written by Michael Strain at the conservative American Enterprise Institute and published by Bloomberg argues Biden’s hoped-for economic boost would face an uphill battle because of the pandemic.

“If elected, a Biden White House would only have so much political capital,” he argued. “Tax increases would slow growth or leave it relatively unchanged.”

The not-so-rich would indeed see their taxes go up eventually because some cuts, like a child tax credit, would be temporary. And due to revisions since March, the boost for federal revenue is far below the $4 trillion estimate from earlier this year, which in part prompted the TPC’s review.

The report added it’s unlikely that Biden’s tax plan, if he’s elected, would take effect before January 2022.

“This delay reflects the uncertain legislative environment caused by the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic and related economic disruptions,” the report read.

https://www.ibtimes.com/biden-would-unravel-some-trump-tax-cuts-if-elected-plan-shows-3062829

Deep State Mechanisms of Control

The Great Plan was designed by the luciferian elite rulers of the earth and was to eventually bring The NWO into fruition. A plan that has now been derailed. The Father's righteous sons and daughters on the earth will now take full and complete dominion of the earth and all of creation. The Luciferian Reign is over.

Europe Commits Suicide by Importing Barbarians - Russia Watches With Great Sadness

"A large chunk of human history is about to get trampled and despoiled. Having spent the last several decades resurrecting Eastern Christendom after the damage caused to it by the Bolshevik barbarians, they watch with dismay as the relics and ruins of Western Christendom are becoming submerged by a new barbarian wave."

Orlov is one of our favorite essayists on Russia and all sorts of other things. He moved to the US as a child, and lives in the Boston area.

He is one of the better-known thinkers The New Yorker has dubbed 'The Dystopians' in an excellent 2009 profile, along with James Howard Kunstler, another regular contributor to RI (archive). These theorists believe that modern society is headed for a jarring and painful crack-up.

He is best known for his 2011 book comparing Soviet and American collapse (he thinks America's will be worse). He is a prolific author on a wide array of subjects, and you can see his work by searching him on Amazon.

He has a large following on the web, and on Patreon, and we urge you to support him there, as Russia Insider does.

His current project is organizing the production of affordable house boats for living on. He lives on a boat himself.

If you haven't discovered his work yet, please take a look at his archive of articles on RI. They are a real treasure, full of invaluable insight into both the US and Russia and how they are related.

Around the world, very few people are capable of wrapping their heads around the European reaction to the migrant crisis. On the side of the migrants, we have avid displays of barbarism, fanaticism and aggression; on the side of the Europeans, we have abject fear of appearing… intolerant.

In an out-of-control situation where we would expect people to organize, protest, put up road blocks and vote en masse for nationalist parties, we are instead subjected to the ridiculous spectacle of meek, effeminate Europeans dressed up in unisex outfits chalking “No to terrorism!” on sidewalks.

Most people around the world see in this an orchidaceous display of anthropological nullity. “Is Europe dead?” they wonder aloud.

Lest you think that this impression is politically incorrect or undiplomatic or somehow marginal rather than mainstream, Russia's FM Sergei Lavrov, a senior Russian statesman and a diplomat’s diplomat, is on the record saying that the European Union is “committing suicide” by letting in the invading hordes from the Middle East and North Africa.

Here we have a flood of people coming in, the majority of them young adult males shirking military service back home, and relatively few of them are qualified to seek asylum. Most of them are unqualified to do any sort of work within the EU due to lack of literacy, education or work ethic. Many of them would not be trainable in any case, coming as they are from populations bred for physical stamina and disease tolerance rather than intelligence.

https://russia-insider.com/en/politics/europe-commits-suicide-importing-barbarians-russia-watches-great-sadness/ri23942

Far Left Iowa Senate Candidate Theresa Greenfield Admits to Support For Black Lives Matter Radicals — UNDERCOVER VIDEO

Like many other conservative states, any democrat candidate in Iowa needs to come off looking like a moderate, carefully walking the tightrope between appeasing the leftist mobs while also not coming off as a wacked out lunatic to the average voter.

This often means that the candidates need to put on a moderate face in public, while taking more extreme positions in private. We’ve seen this happen time and time again in states such as Kentucky, Arkansas, and Louisiana, as many of them are caught revealing their true feelings on hidden video.

Theresa Greenfield is the latest one to learn that lesson. Greenfield is running against Joni Ernst for US Senate. In public, she’s had to disguise her support for violent, far left organizations, but on hidden video, she’s more than happy to voice her support for Black Lives Matter rioters.

In a video released by Accuracy In Media, the O’Keefe-style sting catches Greenfield brazenly declaring her support for Black Lives Matter as an organization. As the video explains, one of the BLM leaders in Des Moines has recently been charged with a variety of counts for assaulting officers and he allegedly planned a fake hostage situation to distract police to prevent law enforcement from interfering during one of the protests.

“Now what does Greenfield do?” asks Adam Guillette in the video, president of AIM. “She can’t publicly support such an unpopular organization in Iowa if she wants to win. But privately, she has to appease her progressive base.”

The video then shows Greenfield’s husband talking to the undercover operative, explaining how they support the BLM movement. “Of course the Republicans are using that ‘law and order’ thing and we know all about that bulls***,” her husband says.

Then Greenfield herself plays dumb as to why “Black Lives Matter” doesn’t appear on her website. The undercover op gets Greenfield herself to voice her support for the Black Lives Matter organization, and she touts how she’s given shout outs to these far left organizations.

It’s just another example of another two-faced politician who says one thing in public, but a different thing in private.

https://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2020/10/devastating-far-left-iowa-senate-candidate-theresa-greenfield-admits-support-black-lives-matter-radicals-undercover-video/

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