3 ms·
I don’t think the current POTUS is smart enough to see it either way, but counterpoint: who prosecutes the offenses? FBI? DOJ? Both are lead by people abbointed
by pm90 6y ago
I don’t think the current POTUS is smart enough to see it either way, but counterpoint: who prosecutes the offenses? FBI? DOJ? Both are lead by people abbointed by the current POTUS and have been beaten down into submission to his authoritarian impulses. If a lawsuit is brought, ultimately it would end up in SCOTUS, which also has a 5-4 majority in his favor.
So IMO this is going to let him continue to abuse social media to spread conspiracy theories while incentivizing social media companies to remove or ban users that even slightly tie the line, or invent rules and accuse such users of breaking them.
American institutions are not as strong as people think. They are squishy organizations manned by humans; and thus they can be corrupted. All of this stuff is very well studied by the way, it is straight out of the authoritarian playbook.
For those who want to argue the other way, consider the simple fact that he has not divested of his private businesses and continues to profit spectacularly from them and it’s not even on the news anymore.
- Vvector 6y ago> but counterpoint: who prosecutes the offenses? CDA 230 protects Twitter against lawsuits for content their users post. Without 230, anyone who felt libeled (i.e. Joe Scarborough) could sue Twitter in civil court.