Biden firmly denounces calls to step aside from fellow Democrats: 'The voters have spoken'

The president said the voters have chosen him and dared Democratic “elites” who want him out to challenge him at the party’s convention next month.

July 8, 2024, 10:20 AM EDT By Sahil Kapur, Mike Memoli and Gabe Gutierrez

WASHINGTON — President Joe Biden began a crucial week for his candidacy by seeking to stamp out growing criticism by fellow Democrats who want him to step aside in the race.

Phoning into MSNBC’s “Morning Joe” on Monday, the president said the voters have chosen him and dared his Democratic critics who want him out to challenge him at the party’s August convention.

“I’m getting so frustrated by the elites in the party. … They know so much more,” Biden said, mockingly. “If any of these guys don’t think I should run, run against me. Go ahead. Announce for president — challenge me at the convention!”

And in a letter Monday to Democrats in Congress, Biden said he’s “not blind to” the concerns within his party about his re-election bid, some of which he allowed were in “good faith.”

“I wouldn’t be running again if I did not absolutely believe I was the best person to beat Donald Trump in 2024,” Biden wrote. “We had a Democratic nomination process and the voters have spoken clearly and decisively.”

“The voters — and the voters alone — decide the nominee of the Democratic Party,” he added.

“The question of how to move forward has been well-aired for over a week now. And it’s time for it to end. We have one job. And that is to beat Donald Trump,” Biden wrote. “Any weakening of resolve or lack of clarity about the task head only helps Trump and hurts us.”

One senior Democratic aide confirmed Monday that offices had received the letter, which comes as both chambers of Congress return from recess for the first time since the Biden-Trump debate in Atlanta on June 27. Biden also published the full letter on Instagram.

Biden is expected to call more lawmakers this week after connecting with 20 last week — including Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, D-N.Y., and Reps. Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., and James E. Clyburn, D-S.C., — to reassure Democrats that their concerns are being heard by him, according to a campaign official.

On "Morning Joe," Biden said he’s not concerned when given a list of prominent Democrats who are calling on him to leave the race.

“I don’t think what those big names think,” Biden said. “They were wrong in 2020. They were wrong in 2022 about the red wave. They’re wrong in 2024.” (Cheating plan is now initiated.)

“I am not letting up,” Biden said.

Biden also made his case against Trump, saying that the U.S. will defeat the far right just as France did in its recent election.

“This is a guy who’s an extreme candidate. I can’t think of a candidate in my lifetime who’s been more extreme," the president said. "He makes George Wallace look like a patriot.”

https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/2024-election/biden-firmly-denounces-calls-step-fellow-democrats-voters-spoken-rcna160683

The Digital Services Act: A Brief Guide to The EU’s Censorship Superweapon

• by FFO Staff

• July 2, 2024

SUMMARY

The Digital Services Act (DSA) creates a unified framework for government-directed content moderation across the European Union.

• Each EU member state now has a “digital services coordinator,” with the power to penalize online platforms if they fail to adequately address “systemic risks,” including hate speech and misinformation.

• These official speech commissars can deputize third party entities to act as “trusted flaggers,” empowering the global network of NGOs, research institutes, and private companies that make up the censorship industry.

• Elon Musk’s X became the first platform to be investigated after the DSA took effect, after months of threats from EU officials over Musk’s attempts to restore free speech to the platform.

__________

The Digital Services Act (DSA), which went into effect at the start of 2024, is the European Union’s flagship online censorship law.

Other than China’s Great Firewall, it is arguably themost elaborate and wide-reaching instrument of government control of online content in the world.

The law creates censorship obligations for what it terms Very Large Online Platforms (VLOPs) and Very Large Online Search Engines (VLOEs). This category, which includes any platform or search engine with over 45 million users in the EU, is subject to the law’s most stringent censorship requirements, with a hefty fine of 6% of a provider’s global annual turnover levied in the event of non-compliance.

What is required of the online platforms? The core requirement is that they develop tools to “identify, analyse, and assess systemic risks” related to their service, and then “put measures in place to mitigate these risks,” including “adapting the design or functioning of their services or changing their [recommendation] systems.” In other words, the EU wants platforms to identify and suppress content proactively — something that, realistically, can only be accomplished at scale using AI censorship tools.

The EU’s requirements for the type of content that ought to be suppressed are similarly far-reaching. The EU identifies several types of “systemic risks,” including anything that threatens “public security and electoral processes,” “gender-based violence,” “discrimination,” or “illegal content.”

Under EU law and the laws of many EU member states, “illegal content” includes so-called hate speech, which has been used as a pretext to criminally penalize political candidates and members of the public for political expression in a number of European countries.

Informational threats to “public security and electoral processes” are also a tried-and-true pretext for censoring political opposition. Indeed, “election integrity” was the main pretext used by U.S. government-tied groups to censor American political speech during the 2020 election.

To ensure compliance, the DSA establishes an official censorship bureaucracy that stretches across the EU, consisting of “digital service coordinators” in each of the EU’s 27 member states, are empowered to ensure compliance with the law. Each coordinator has the power to request data from and impose fines on online platforms in the event of non-compliance.

Additionally, the digital service coordinator can certify outside organizations as “trusted flaggers” who are “experts in detecting, identifying and removing illegal content,” a massive win for the vast international network of NGOs, university “disinformation monitoring” hubs, and private companies that make up the censorship-industrial complex.

The DSA’s second gift to thecensorship industry consists of requirements for online platforms to allow “vetted researchers” to access their data, once again allowing pro-censorship “disinformation research” institutes free access to data that would require a commercial API license costing tens of thousands of dollars a year.

As the DSA’s effective date approached at the end of 2023, the EU’s ruling commission of unelected bureaucrats immediately used its new powers to investigate Elon Musk’s X, after months of saber-rattling from European officials that began shortly after Musk’s takeover of the company and concurrent promise to roll back its censorship regime.

https://foundationforfreedomonline.com/the-digital-services-act-a-brief-guide-to-the-eus-censorship-superweapon/

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"Rural Vs Urban" - Blackwater's Erik Prince Explains What Civil War Looks Like in 2024, with Ben-David(A very good listen and some warnings on what happens if civil war, Urban areas will be a real disaster, the ones in rural areas will be maintain)

18:03 Short Clip

https://youtu.be/QicPM_2atqE

(FULL VIDEO "Rural Vs Urban" - Blackwater's Erik Prince Explains What Civil War Looks Like in 2024, with Ben-David 2:04:50 https://www.youtube.com/live/qBfyyLLM3pc)

Censorship Profile: NewsGuard

by FFO Staff May 31, 2024

Overview:

NewsGuard is a private company offering various products that purport to combat “misinformation.” Their leading product is a browser extension that attaches a “reliability” score to virtually every news website on the internet, with scores ranging from 1-100.A 2021 study by the Media Research Center found a 27-point difference in NewsGuard scores between liberal and conservative news sites. Mainstream conservative websites that receive a low NewsGuard rating include Breitbart News, The Federalist, and TuckerCarlson.com

The company is on record calling for ad revenue to be stripped from disfavored websites. Its “BrandGuard” product provides advertisers with inclusion and exclusion lists, blacklisting sites on the latter from receiving ad revenue.

With support from Microsoft, NewsGuard also markets “media literacy” services to schools and public libraries guiding users on which news sources they ought to avoid. NewsGuard claims that more than 800 public libraries around the world use its browser extension, which displays warning labels next to websites with a low “reliability” score.

Key individuals: Gordon Crovitz, Steven Brill (co-founders), former NSA and CIA director Michael Hayden, former NATO secretary general and Danish prime minister Anders Fogh Rasmussen, Wikipedia founder Jimmy Wales (advisors).

Key moments:

• 2017: NewsGuard raises $6 million in seed funding, with “big four” advertising agency Publicis Groupe leading the round.

• 2018: NewsGuard launches its first product with support from tech giant Microsoft. Co-founders Steven Brill and Gordon Crovitzpublicly announce their goal of financially throttling disfavored news websites by selling blacklists to advertisers.

• 2020: Shortly before the 2020 presidential election, Brill appears on national TV claiming the New York Post’s story on the Hunter Biden laptop is most likely a “Russian Hoax.”

• 2020: Former NSA and CIA director and NewsGuard advisory board member Michael Hayden signs an open letter denouncing the Hunter Biden story as Russian disinformation.

•2021: NewsGuard’s “misinformation fingerprints” projectreceivs $750,000 in U.S. taxpayer dollars via the Department of Defense.

• 2022: The American Federation of Teachers (AFT), the nation’s largest teachers’ union, partners with NewsGuard, promising to roll out its news rating product to “tens of millions of U.S. students and families.”

• 2023: Rep. Rich McCormick (R-GA) adds an amendment to the annual National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) banning the military from working with NewsGuard and any other organizations involved with media blacklisting.

https://foundationforfreedomonline.com/censorship-profile-newsguard/

Baker and Anons, this site it important to keep, they have a ton of information on the Censorship Industry is doing and planning.Please post this as a research link if possible:

https://foundationforfreedomonline.com/the-digital-services-act-a-brief-guide-to-the-eus-censorship-superweapon/

>>21160708

Good News, the Executive Director and Founder of Foundation for Freedom Online is Mike BenzKeep this link and website for Research:

Our Mission

Through educational reports, legal assistance, and public policy analysis concerning developing threats to digital liberties, we seek to provide nonpartisan insights and assistance to all peoples taking a stand for freedom of speech, freedom of expression, and the free exchange of ideas online.

If that sounds like you, spread the word and come join us too.

Meet Our Founder

Mike Benz

Executive Director

Our Executive Director, Mike Benz, is a former State Department official with responsibilities in formulating and negotiating US foreign policy on international communications and information technology matters. Mr. Benz founded FFO as a civil society institution building on his experience in the role of championing digital freedom around the world in the public sector.

https://foundationforfreedomonline.com/category/news/