How much affection does the ruling class have for the First Amendment? Not very much if any. Consider the mainstream media’s response to Tucker Carlson’s extended release of Jan. 6, 2021, footage that reveals that the simple-minded story told by the Democrats is false.
The picture we get is very different from what we’ve been told, but fits much better with my memory from that day when we were watching live streams. This wasn’t a “violent insurrection” but a pro-Trump demonstration that took a very odd turn for reasons that are still unknown.
There was outrage in the Beltway and not at Carlson’s opinions, but that he showed the frames that ended up on the cutting room floor. Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer openly demanded that Carlson be silenced by Fox News. Why? The footage reveals that they’ve been trying to manipulate the public for two solid years. Whatever the truth is about that day, it seems like the investigation conducted over two years wasn’t about finding it but rather weaving an elaborate tale in order to crack down on dissent.
If that was the response to merely showing footage, what must they think about Twitter these days? Here we have the only major social media platform that tries to grant free-speech rights. Day after day, there’s debate and information sharing. Contrary points of view aren’t throttled, and Twitter CEO Elon Musk apparently fired most of the FBI agents that were embedded there in the COVID years to push the government line.
It just so happens now that the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) has initiated an investigation. According to the Wall Street Journal:
Identify all journalists? What in the world is going on? These people given access to old files were there to investigate the extent of the censorship and cooperation with federal authorities. What these Twitter files reveal is that every conspiracy theory turns out to be true.
For the FTC suddenly to launch this very aggressive probe smacks of open partisanship and intimidation, particularly of independent journalists, to say nothing of free enterprise.
What excuse do the regulators give?
As for the urgency of protecting consumers’ information, Facebook and Google put not protecting consumer information at the very core of their business models. Billions of users believed that they were signing on to share updates with friends, only to find as the years have gone on that the data we willingly provided them has been traded and shared globally and this happens daily.
The very idea that the FTC is looking to protect your data is preposterous. What’s really at issue is the regulators’ extreme annoyance that three-quarters of the employees were tossed out, and these firings, in particular, targeted employees who weren’t creating value for shareholders and customers.
Elon did this to save the company from bankruptcy. But the FTC would rather see a bankrupt company than one that the government doesn’t control entirely.
Oh, yes, and speaking of customers here, anyone on the non-woke side of political discussions had their accounts throttled hard before Musk took over. Many of these accounts of various influencers depend on reach for their business models or branding. Where was the FTC then? How come the regulators didn’t come to the rescue when people’s livelihoods were being ruined by policies dictated by government priorities?
The thing about this consumer protection excuse is that everyone knows it’s fake. They know it’s fake. We know they know it’s fake. But it continues anyway, which is typical of the operations of government these days. Its aggressive partisanship is out in the open and destructive.
Serious question: Are they trying to shut down the one major platform that permits a modicum of free speech? You don’t have to be a tech genius to figure this one out.
And get this: “The FTC is also seeking to depose Mr. Musk in connection with the probe.”
This is the kind of thing that’s designed to make Elon rue the day he bought Twitter. As he said, he was doing it for the principle of fairness, not profits. That should be obvious now. Maybe it will eventually turn a profit but it will be a long time. Meanwhile, regulators seem determined to make that as difficult as possible.
Every few nights, I like to hop on a Twitter Space and see what everyone is talking about. It’s glorious. You almost can’t believe how wonderful it is, just people speaking their minds freely about every topic. Clearly, people in D.C. absolutely don’t like it this way.
I’ve written variously that what happened over the past three years amounts to a kind of coup d'état by the administrative state against elected representatives. I’m ever more convinced of this.
The FTC is at the heart of this machinery. They aren’t acting for themselves. They’re acting for their fellow junta members, who are determined to keep the power they have grabbed over the past several years.
It would be a ghastly tragedy if the slivers of light we get from Tucker Carlson and Twitter turn out to be like Mao’s “thousand flowers,” a brief moment in time to ferret out political enemies before the real crackdown occurs. If we are to prevent that, we need to shout from the rooftops about the principle of free speech. Without it—and plenty of people hate it—we’re truly doomed.
Consider, too, that the FTC has never been a nonpartisan regulator of industry. It has always been captured by some or another industrial interest that uses government power to achieve its anticompetitive ends. The FTC claims to be protecting competition while shoring up industrial cartels. That’s a pretty good description of its whole history.
In this case, it could be acting on behalf of Big Tech that resents the heck out of what Musk has done. He freed the bird and became a hero to multitudes even while Mark Zuckerberg’s Meta is a famous flop.
Nothing annoys Washington as much as an entrepreneur who makes the regulators and their captured industrial interests look like fools. Now, they’re determined to make him pay the price.
