Consequences for Veterans and/or retirees in the 2021 DC Riots

[Treetop Flyer]

Remember when Trump blocking people on his Twitter account was an infringement on those people’s speech? Pepperidge Farm remembers.

Trump Can’t Block Critics From His Twitter Account, Appeals Court Rules (Published 2019)

The decision may have broader implications for how the First Amendment applies to officials’ accounts in the social-media era.

www.nytimes.com

 

[wink]

And there is such a thing as guilt by association. And doing nothing, as the other officers involved in the George Floyd killing are all too aware, can be criminal.

Quilt by association is not a legal doctrine and to the extent it does exist, it shouldn't. The "other officers" in the Floyd case were not charged with "doing nothing". They were charged with aiding and abetting. Not the same thing. That said, in most any law enforcement agency sworn officers have a "duty to intervene", by policy. That isn't criminal and will get you disciplined or fired, not arrested.

Parties have become so powerful in this country that they've lost touch with John Q. Citizen. People don't feel well represented in government, because, quite frankly, they aren't. The vast majority of politicians are out of touch, and those that are tend not to get elected, arguably due to party politics. There's a deep well of frustration across the country and the political spectrum about that.

Identity politics, authoritarianism, and reactionary/radical policies are all signs of that frustration.

It is the decades of lack of satisfaction many Americans have in their representation in Congress that has led to this frustration. The political elites promise and don't deliver. They will claim that they just need the House to fulfill their promises. Then when the party has WH, Senate and House and accomplishes little, voters feel disrespected. This isn't a left right thing. It has just boiled over first on the right. The left's time is coming if they don't respond to what the loudest most powerful constituents want. If you think some of the more radical proposal will not be adopted by the DEMs, I think you are wrong. Biden may be a garden variety democrat, and The Squad is just a handful of votes, but the leftwing voters of the larger DEM party is stronger and louder then ever before. If the democrats do not feed that beast, they will regret it. Just like the GOP has paid for ignoring a sizable percentage of their voters for too long. And I don't mean the Alt Right or Q Anon or any of that. I mean ordinary people that rightly or wrongly see their views on real ordinary issues being ignored. You are already hearing loud criticism of some of Biden's picks.

Wasn't political affiliation held very close to the chest several decades ago? Now political affiliation is worn on your sleeve and it's splitting America down the middle

Yeah, so was what you had for breakfast, photos of your junk, your criticism of religion and details of your sex life. We can thank the internet, and specifically social media for that. Social media is the root of all our recent evils. Fringe and otherwise irrelevant opinions are amplified by social media algorithms that reinforce information by endlessly feeding a person what they click on. In other words, what they want to hear. And Americans are too lazy or courageous to apply critical analysis and be found wrong or in the fringe with kooks. The same technology that makes shopping on Amazon easy is destroying the country. There have always been fringe elements. But until big tech, they would be told by their buds down at the pub to shut the fvck up enough times or had too many dates go awry, they would go quite and just harmlessly stew at home.

 

[FrankTheTank]

Find me a tweet calling for his followers to stop the violence, during the violence. After directing them to march down to the capitol. Crickets. There were none. Instead, there were tweets upping the pressure on his VP during the violence. Did you know Pence’s family was with him?

He celebrated them. He tweeted this...about the “great patriot” rioters who killed a policeman with a fire extinguisher while on the hunt for hostages, based on lies about the election.

“These are the things and events that happen when a sacred landslide election victory is so unceremoniously & viciously stripped away from great patriots who have been badly & unfairly treated for so long, Go home with love & in peace. Remember this day forever!”

That’s the best you could come up with Professor? You‘re reply is that the idiots that acted like idiots didn’t tweet telling their fellow idiots to stop being idiots.

 

[SlickAg]

The left doesn’t “need” Trump. The entire country doesn’t need Trump. The last thing is we need more division and arguing over who is worse. The media might need him but I couldn’t fucking care less about cable news. The left has clearly stated objectives and plans that I usually do not agree with. But they are actual plans. I didn’t like the ACA. Trump still hasn’t, despite bitching about it, actually rolled out a substantially different plan other than removing the individual mandate (which I agreed with the principle of). It’d be nice for the GOP to offer something substantive of their own that conservatives could actually get behind other than “Democrats are evil” for a change.

A private company is not the thought police or state sponsored censorship no matter how many times you say it. That is Big Business influencing the people who choose our leaders in our system of government, which is a valid concern, but a similar yet also very different problem from what you are scared of.
You still haven’t offered any actual comprehensive solution other than a knee jerk reaction to change one thing that actually goes against traditional conservative values just because it’s something you want.
Do I think they should ban Trump? I think they shouldn’t get involved in the POTUS account because that is a third rail for industry to fuck with anything government, especially Federal, but it’s entirely their prerogative to ban his private citizen account and that part of it is NOT a First Amendment issue. I’d prefer that if they felt they had to do it, temporarily suspend all social media accounts for all politicians and force them to use traditional press releases for a while.

CNN and MSNBC, the Democrats, Joe Biden, all of them, "the Left", they all needed Trump to keep their viewership tuned in. They needed an enemy. They needed someone to blame COVID on. They needed a 24/7 reminder that Orange Man Bad. A dude who didn't really campaign or even have much of a position on anything other than "I'm not Donald Trump" won the Presidency. An 80 year-old man who spent his adult life in politics and still doesn't even have a real notable legacy other than a crime bill he had to desperately back pedal on during his own campaign. He generated more votes than any man in any election EVER. Because he is the anti-Trump. You can't have a hero without a villain. Trump was the villain the Left needed. If you can't see that than I don't know how to make it any more clear.

A private company that chose to BLOCK the New York Post and subsequently blackmail them by preventing them from using its Twitter account to share ANYTHING until they agreed to take down an article which negatively impacted "their" candidate's election chances is no longer a private company. I view it as modern-day "yellow journalism". This is but one example.

My solution has been clear this whole time: STOP CENSORSHIP. If no one is breaking the law by posting their thoughts or opinions (much less facts), than let it be said. If it stands up to the marketplace of ideas and you don't like it, introduce your own thoughts to that same exchange.

 

[DanMa1156]

I’m actually not a fan of shutting him down, but to cite just those two tweets in isolation and not the history leading up to it is disengenuous. Like the previous 10 tweets were about the coronavirus response or something.

I’m still on repub email lists from before Trump, and constantly get asked to STOP THE STEAL...CONTRIBUTE NOW TO THE TRUMP ARMY AND YOUR CONTRIBUTION WILL HAVE A 1000% EFFECT.

I don’t even know what a 1000% effect means. I do know he has made a lot of money grifting off of this. He can communicate that way.

Ha, I got that one. I asked what it means... got no response. No surprise.

Wait, I thought a business couldn’t refuse service based on ideology of the customer? Or is that just for bakeries of wedding cakes?

For the record, I’m pro equality. I support consenting adults of any gender/number if they want to get married and have a cake made, but for Apple-Google-Facebook-Amazon-Twitter, you can’t have your cake and eat it too. Pun intended. Waiting for SCOTUS to weigh in on this one.

I'll be shocked if SCOTUS takes up a case.

I'm not sure how it's wildly different from a "no shoes, no shirt, no service" rule by restaurants. Politics aside, the base argument is a user violated the TOS and they got rid of that user. Just happens that user is the sitting POTUS. In the bakery case, it was a refusal of service based on a difference in ideologies and ultimately, he won that case on a technicality. I think it's equally hypocritical for the left to say the baker must make the cake but Twitter can kick him off as it is for the right to say "businesses can pick and choose who they serve based on religious/ideological exemptions except for private businesses that pretend to be bastions of free speech!" Ultimately though, I think that as a user, he broke the TOS and they can refuse him service as a result.

 

[Brett327]

Quilt by association is not a legal doctrine

I think conspiracy is the word you're looking for.

 

[SlickAg]

Quilt by association is not a legal doctrine and to the extent it does exist, it shouldn't.

Did you mean "Guilt"?

Because if you start replacing letters with Q's around here, certain people are going to get very fired up...

 

[FrankTheTank]

Did you mean "Guilt"?

Because if you start replacing letters with Q's around here, certain people are going to get very fired up...

Maybe his intent involved a quilt.. I mean just look at his previous posts; it’s obvious...

 

[Ghost SWO]

I bet people in this thread already fall under the "inciting violence" category as defined by the left lol. I guess we should just remove any public forum and have the government decide for us which internet sites we can visit... Maybe that will solve our problems. Welcome to the birth pains of, "The People's Republic of North America", coming soon to a small town near you, Summer 2040... (Said with multiple layers of sarcasm).

In response to calls to stop the violence on social media: We don't all need to swarm to social media in opposition to something we don't like every time we see something we don't like. We don't need more "activists" in our country, we need people that can sit at a table across from each other and discuss different viewpoints with tact and sincerity. This all get's better when we all are able to bring our opinion to the table, but when people can't voice their opinion because they're removed from a platform (which IMO is a violation of free speech), given an amount of time - violence will probably follow.

If we can't define and adequately defend the 1st amendment across multiple platforms, America is going to have a tough time. The pendulum swings every four or eight years, but it seems when it does swing, the pendulum swings further and further to the extremes.

 

[BigRed389]

CNN and MSNBC, the Democrats, Joe Biden, all of them, "the Left", they all needed Trump to keep their viewership tuned in. They needed an enemy. They needed someone to blame COVID on. They needed a 24/7 reminder that Orange Man Bad. A dude who didn't really campaign or even have much of a position on anything other than "I'm not Donald Trump" won the Presidency. An 80 year-old man who spent his adult life in politics and still doesn't even have a real notable legacy other than a crime bill he had to desperately back pedal on during his own campaign. He generated more votes than any man in any election EVER. Because he is the anti-Trump. You can't have a hero without a villain. Trump was the villain the Left needed. If you can't see that than I don't know how to make it any more clear.

A private company that chose to BLOCK the New York Post and subsequently blackmail them by preventing them from using its Twitter account to share ANYTHING until they agreed to take down an article which negatively impacted "their" candidate's election chances is no longer a private company. I view it as modern-day "yellow journalism". This is but one example.

My solution has been clear this whole time: STOP CENSORSHIP. If no one is breaking the law by posting their thoughts or opinions (much less facts), than let it be said. If it stands up to the marketplace of ideas and you don't like it, introduce your own thoughts to that same exchange.

OK - Let’s say you take this approach and I’d agree it is a consistent standard which could be fairly applied . How do you address:

1) Analogous cases like the gay wedding cake or anything where someone doesn’t want to provide service? As a rule then do we have everybody serve everyone who is a paying customer at fair and equitable prices?

2) Harmful stuff that is bad but not necessarily breaking a law?
Examples:
A) Russian or Chinese troll farms/bot accounts (the point is you don’t know they are - you can only see they behave like it) engaging an IW campaign?
B) Extremist groups using it for coded communications - eg ISIL, Hamas or domestic terror ground using it for comms - you suspect it is and that it’s them but can’t prove it. So it stays up until proven to the satisfaction of a judge?

3) Harmful stuff that is slander - but takes time to prove?
An example would be conspiracy theory stuff - you might know it’s bullshit but proving it in court would take forever, and while you’re waiting you’ve got it going viral in certain circles leading to death threats against the victim.

 

[Pags]

I bet people in this thread already fall under the "inciting violence" category as defined by the left lol. I guess we should just remove any public forum and have the government decide for us which internet sites we can visit... Maybe that will solve our problems. Welcome to the birth pains of, "The People's Republic of North America", coming soon to a small town near you, Summer 2040... (Said with multiple layers of sarcasm).

In response to calls to stop the violence on social media: We don't all need to swarm to social media in opposition to something we don't like every time we see something we don't like. We don't need more "activists" in our country, we need people that can sit at a table across from each other and discuss different viewpoints with tact and sincerity. This all get's better when we all are able to bring our opinion to the table, but when people can't voice their opinion because they're removed from a platform (which IMO is a violation of free speech), given an amount of time - violence will probably follow.

If we can't define and adequately defend the 1st amendment across multiple platforms, America is going to have a tough time. The pendulum swings every four or eight years, but it seems when it does swing, the pendulum swings further and further to the extremes.

I've been to PRONA. Not a fun bunch up there.

 

[SlickAg]

OK - Let’s say you take this approach and I’d agree it is a consistent standard which could be fairly applied . How do you address:

1) Analogous cases like the gay wedding cake or anything where someone doesn’t want to provide service? As a rule then do we have everybody serve everyone who is a paying customer at fair and equitable prices?

2) Harmful stuff that is bad but not necessarily breaking a law?
Examples:
A) Russian or Chinese troll farms/bot accounts (the point is you don’t know they are - you can only see they behave like it) engaging an IW campaign?
B) Extremist groups using it for coded communications - eg ISIL, Hamas or domestic terror ground using it for comms - you suspect it is and that it’s them but can’t prove it. So it stays up until proven to the satisfaction of a judge?

3) Harmful stuff that is slander - but takes time to prove?
An example would be conspiracy theory stuff - you might know it’s bullshit but proving it in court would take forever, and while you’re waiting you’ve got it going viral in certain circles leading to death threats against the victim.

All of this stuff already happens across all social media platforms every day. It's the "new normal" if you will.

1) Private company doing business with private individuals. Legally they'd be fine. In this day and age of social media, they'd be cancelled. HARD. Onus is on the company to stick to their guns or give in to the woke mob.

2) We know that both of those things are already happening. And yet the show must go on. Just because cars crash sometimes doesn't mean the world has stopped driving. The following excerpt is from 2005. I still use gmail. So do millions of other people.

"One terrorist drafts a Web-based e-mail and instead of sending it, saves it to the draft folder, accessible online from anywhere in the world. The other terrorist can open the same account, read the message, and delete it. The e-mail has never been sent, and cannot be tracked.

Many e-mails are sent on public computers, for example in libraries or cyber cafés, making them even more difficult to trace."

Special Reports - The Terrorist's Tricks And Counter-Measures | Al Qaeda's New Front | FRONTLINE | PBS

3) Again, happens every. single. day. across. the. world. Look at the couple in St. Louis who stood in front of their property with firearms. What happened to them? What about the officers accused of killing George Floyd? No googling, what happened with the charges against them. America has a short attention span nowadays. The internet has a long memory. If you're afraid of the latter, it's your right to minimize your digital footprint as much as possible. There's a good reason most of us use handles here rather than our real names.

 

[Hair Warrior]

There's a good reason most of us use handles here rather than our real names.

Shit, we weren’t supposed to use our real names?

 

[Pags]

CNN and MSNBC, the Democrats, Joe Biden, all of them, "the Left", they all needed Trump to keep their viewership tuned in. They needed an enemy. They needed someone to blame COVID on. They needed a 24/7 reminder that Orange Man Bad. A dude who didn't really campaign or even have much of a position on anything other than "I'm not Donald Trump" won the Presidency. An 80 year-old man who spent his adult life in politics and still doesn't even have a real notable legacy other than a crime bill he had to desperately back pedal on during his own campaign. He generated more votes than any man in any election EVER. Because he is the anti-Trump. You can't have a hero without a villain. Trump was the villain the Left needed. If you can't see that than I don't know how to make it any more clear.

A private company that chose to BLOCK the New York Post and subsequently blackmail them by preventing them from using its Twitter account to share ANYTHING until they agreed to take down an article which negatively impacted "their" candidate's election chances is no longer a private company. I view it as modern-day "yellow journalism". This is but one example.

My solution has been clear this whole time: STOP CENSORSHIP. If no one is breaking the law by posting their thoughts or opinions (much less facts), than let it be said. If it stands up to the marketplace of ideas and you don't like it, introduce your own thoughts to that same exchange.

If you think of Twitter as analogous to a newspaper (which isn't that much a stretch) what's the difference between a newspaper not printing every letter to the editor or advertisement they don't want to and twitter not allowing every post? The media having a ton of control over what does and doesn't get passed to the public and how that message gets passed is nothing new. The media is a primarily a business and therefore is primarily focused on making money. Turns out lots of people have used the power of media to advance their own goals, see a guy named Hearst. The media has no obligation to provide everyone an equal voice. In the prologue to the excellent "twilight of the gods" toll has a bit on how FDR hated the media and was convinced that the four media families in power then were out to get him.

The media not printing your post/editorial isn't censorship, that's a business decision. Censorship would be if you opened your own social media platform or printing press and the government came in and shut you down because of what you were printing. Trump hasn't been censored, the paper just stopped running his column. He can still pass his message via his own White House Press Office.

 

[Pags]

I'd be curious to know how much the decision to remove Trump from Twitter or to remove Parler from storefronts and AWS were made based on potential exposure to legal risk due to the messages that were being carried on those services. I'd imagine the legal decisions weighed heavily in the decision making process.