Twitter CEO Let’s ‘Cat Out of the Bag’ on Censorship

The NY Post was censored when led by former Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey. Since new CEO Elon Musk took over his policy against censorship has created a much more friendly environment including a drop in “hate speech” by 75% from 10 million impressions to just over 2 million! Musk released figures showing that “hate speech” is less than 0.1% of all speech impressions.

 

There was a lot of hooting, hollering and hoopla taking place, and a lot of dancing and bouncing around as of last night when Twitter CEO Elon Musk let the proverbial ‘cat out of the bag’ when he released the ‘banned tweets’ from the Twitter archive. Those Tweets primarily concerned Hunter Biden’s laptop, which ironically was just acknowledged by some in the dominant media this past week, over two years after the NY Post exposed it!

That news exposure by the media would most likely have had devastating consequences to the election plans of Joe Biden in 2020. The public would have howled at the “big guy” even with all the election shenanigans that were already pulled and the fraud that has been proved by competent experts to have taken place in every state in the union during the 2020 election and following. That too has been “banned” by big media and social media outlets.

Those Tweets contained the whole basis for why they were kept out of the public eye in the first place. It was not so much about Hunter Biden’s private and scandalous drug habit or his delinquent and perverted sex life as much as it was about the “big guy” Joe Biden and him ‘climbing in bed’ with enemies of the US.

A private company can probably censor certain speech but for governmental entities to get involved is another story and a blatant violation of the 1st Amendment. Claims of the FBI and the Department of Homeland Security involvement won’t wash, that’s a problem. We’ll see how this comes out in the coming weeks.

At this point, I am certain that there will be charges brought and lawsuits filed of at least election tampering and interference, censoring, and maybe other claims against the Democrat Party, Joe Biden, and maybe others, that will come out of this release because it shows point blank the “big guy” influence peddled his position as Vice-President of the United States in violation of the law. In fact, those favors were with known enemies of this country including China, Russia and the Ukraine! So, before it’s over could a sitting US President named Joe Biden be held for charges of Treason against the United States? I wouldn’t bet against it!

Censored actor James Woods was on Tucker Carlson Friday evening and said he is going to sue the Democrat Party. Woods later Tweeted Friday evening: “How is the Twitter Files chicanery any different from Watergate in sum and substance? Nixon resigned when his henchmen tried to subvert free speech. Your turn, Mr. Biden.”

 

Never forget the old adage that “knowledge is power”! And big media holds lots of power! Their power to influence and propagandize the country like a pied piper has been taking place but it appears many are awakening from their slumber and dropping out of the queue. Watch and see, but I’d bet a dollar to a donut that over the weekend we will see lots of spinning and contorting by big media trying to further trash Elon Musk and find some scandalous dirt or worse on the billionaire mogul to draw attention away from the Biden expose.

Former newspaper editor and news media textbook author James Pinson wrote, speaking of the Twitter Tweet revelations:

As a former news editor in some capacity at three newspapers, and the coauthor of two now classic journalism textbooks, to me that’s huge news regardless of the party of the politician.

In fact, one study found, as I recall, 79% of the public thought that censorship of the story in social and mainstream media had affected the 2020 election, and another found 17% of Biden voters would have changed their vote had they known about it.
Friday night, it was the main story on Fox News Channel all evening, not surprisingly, but in a check after 10 p.m. Eastern, I found not a word about it on MSNBC’s website, CNN’s nor The New York Times’.

It’s an example of why it’s a bad idea only to trust partisan news outlets and get just one side of the story rather than searching out the other side.
That’s why I spend time most days monitoring both conservative and liberal news outlets. I’m basically an independent who has switched party registration to vote in primaries of my choice, but philosophically I’m a libertarian, or old-style liberal who still supports free speech. — James Pinson

 

The well researched NY Post story about Hunter Biden, his laptop and the “big guy” influence peddling was censored by Twitter even though it was a bombshell article and one that would have enough evidence to sway an election. Twitter censored it anyway.

 

 

John Symank contributed commentary on much of the following:

Although Matt Taibbi reputedly leans left politically, he is said to be an honest independent journalist, and since the Tweet release Taibbi has come under attack from leftists on Twitter. All anybody asks in journalism is honesty.

Musk released the following Tweets December 2nd, from their archives exposing that the past Twitter leadership had been in cahoots with candidate Joe Biden’s Democrat machine. Their liaison included working to remove Tweets and sensitive information Joe Biden wanted removed concerning his son, Hunter Biden.

The Twitter CEO said he thought the release of the materials in their archives was “necessary to restore public trust”. This became increasingly important especially considering that Twitter censored everybody from President Trump to the NY Post when they ran the Hunter Biden reveal on the platform censoring important and timely information about Hunter Biden’s laptop which would have certainly made an impact just prior to the 2020 presidential election.

Musk began by tweeting Taibbi’s multi-tweet thread on Twitter, referred to as “The Twitter Files,” writing: “Here we go!!”

Taibbi began by stating “What you’re about to read is the first installment in a series, based upon thousands of internal documents obtained by sources at Twitter.” He added in another Tweet that the beauty of Twitter was “the power to create and share ideas and information instantly, without barriers.”

He said that the company was “forced to add barriers” to protect against “fraudsters”.

The problem arose that “Slowly, over time, Twitter staff and executives began to find more and more uses for these tools. Outsiders began petitioning the company to manipulate speech as well: first a little, then more often, then constantly,” Taibbi said. He continued that “By 2020, requests from connected actors to delete tweets were routine. One executive would write to another: ‘More to review from the Biden team.’ The reply would come back: ‘Handled.’”

“Celebrities and unknowns alike could be removed or reviewed at the behest of a political party,” Taibbi continued. “Both parties had access to these tools. For instance, in 2020 requests from both the Trump White House and the Biden campaign were received and honored. However: This system wasn’t balanced. It was based on contacts. Because Twitter was and is overwhelmingly staffed by people of one political orientation, there were more channels, more ways to complain, open to the left (well, Democrats) than the right.”

 

With the background explained, Taibbi began discussing the New York Post’s article, “BIDEN SECRET EMAILS,” published on October 14, 2020, a report about the laptop belonging to Biden’s son.

“Twitter took extraordinary steps to suppress the story, removing links and posting warnings that it may be ‘unsafe,’” Taibbi continued. “They even blocked its transmission via direct message, a tool hitherto reserved for extreme cases, e.g. child pornography.”

“White House spokeswoman Kaleigh McEnany was locked out of her account for Tweeting about the story, prompting a furious letter from Trump campaign staffer Mike Hahn, who seethed: ‘At least pretend to care for the next 20 days,’” Taibbi continued. “This led public policy executive Caroline Strom to send out a polite WTF query. Several employees noted that there was tension between the comms/policy teams, who had little/less control over moderation, and the safety/trust teams.”

“Strom’s note returned the answer that the laptop story had been removed for violation of the company’s ‘hacked materials’ policy,” he continued. “Although several sources recalled hearing about a ‘general’ warning from federal law enforcement that summer about possible foreign hacks, there’s no evidence – that I’ve seen – of any government involvement in the laptop story. In fact, that might have been the problem…”

“The decision was made at the highest levels of the company, but without the knowledge of CEO Jack Dorsey, with former head of legal, policy and trust Vijaya Gadde playing a key role,” he continued. “‘They just freelanced it,’ is how one former employee characterized the decision. ‘Hacking was the excuse, but within a few hours, pretty much everyone realized that wasn’t going to hold. But no one had the guts to reverse it.’”

“You can see the confusion in the following lengthy exchange, which ends up including Gadde and former Trust and Safety chief Yoel Roth. Comms official Trenton Kennedy writes, ‘I’m struggling to understand the policy basis for marking this as unsafe’,” Taibbi continued. “By this point ‘everyone knew this was f***ed,’ said one former employee, but the response was essentially to err on the side of… continuing to err.”

“Former VP of Global Comms Brandon Borrman asks, ‘Can we truthfully claim that this is part of the policy?’” Taibbi continued. “To which former Deputy General Counsel Jim Baker again seems to advise staying the non-course, because ‘caution is warranted.’”

“A fundamental problem with tech companies and content moderation: many people in charge of speech know/care little about speech, and have to be told the basics by outsiders,” Taibbi continued. “In one humorous exchange on day 1, Democratic congressman Ro Khanna reaches out to Gadde to gently suggest she hop on the phone to talk about the ‘backlash re speech.’ Khanna was the only Democratic official I could find in the files who expressed concern.”

“Gadde replies quickly, immediately diving into the weeds of Twitter policy, unaware Khanna is more worried about the Bill of Rights,” Taibbi continued. “Khanna tries to reroute the conversation to the First Amendment, mention of which is generally hard to find in the files.”

“Within a day, head of Public Policy Lauren Culbertson receives a ghastly letter/report from Carl Szabo of the research firm NetChoice, which had already polled 12 members of congress – 9 Rs and 3 Democrats, from ‘the House Judiciary Committee to Rep. Judy Chu’s office,’” the thread continued. “NetChoice lets Twitter know a ‘blood bath’ awaits in upcoming Hill hearings, with members saying it’s a ‘tipping point,’ complaining tech has ‘grown so big that they can’t even regulate themselves, so government may need to intervene.’”

“Szabo reports to Twitter that some Hill figures are characterizing the laptop story as ‘tech’s Access Hollywood moment’,” the thread continued. “THE FIRST AMENDMENT ISN’T ABSOLUTE’ Szabo’s letter contains chilling passages relaying Democratic lawmakers’ attitudes. They want ‘more’ moderation, and as for the Bill of Rights, it’s ‘not absolute.’”

“An amazing subplot of the Twitter/Hunter Biden laptop affair was how much was done without the knowledge of CEO Jack Dorsey, and how long it took for the situation to get ‘unf***ed’ (as one ex-employee put it) even after Dorsey jumped in,” Taibbi continued. “There are multiple instances in the files of Dorsey intervening to question suspensions and other moderation actions, for accounts across the political spectrum.”

“The problem with the ‘hacked materials’ ruling, several sources said, was that this normally required an official/law enforcement finding of a hack. But such a finding never appears throughout what one executive describes as a ‘whirlwind’ 24-hour, company-wide mess,” the thread continued. “There is much more to come, including answers to questions about issues like shadow-banning, boosting, follower counts, the fate of various individual accounts, and more. These issues are not limited to the political right.”

 

Taibbi promises much more revelation of censorship is coming in a series of Tweets he will provide. Censorship is a growing menace in this country today by people who want to control the dialog and the political culture of this country. When citizens feel like their voice is not being heard then they become agitated and if it continues they will make their voice heard one way or another. Americans across this country are watching how this plays out. We are certain many lawsuits will be filed beginning next week. Some are calling for resignations of Joe Biden and Kamala Harris.

If censorship has led to an illegitimate presidential election due to interference, then did the candidate who was in opposition to Biden the winner? We all know who that was, and Trump already said he was coming back with a vengeance.

 

Michael Reed is Publisher of The Standard newspaper, print and online, and TheStandardSC YouTube channel where many video reports may be found. Please “like”, comment, share with a friend, and donate to support The Standard on this page to assure the continued availability of news that is ignored too often by the dominant media.