Back Story Newsletter
Good Morning,
Twitter And Hate
Free speech isn’t a blank cheque to spread hatred or untruths, so unfortunately media has to weigh statements made by anyone, before spreading that information and Twitter is about to stop all that.
Elon Musk has completed his take over deal of Twitter, and will now take off the muzzle on many users, including former President Trump to access the platform.
It’s not complicated. As a journalist I can be sued for spreading disinformation and I am personally accountable for regulating the statements I quote for libel, slander, and I have a duty to try to broadcast/write truth vs fiction. It’s not always easy to know who is telling the truth, so you at least try to give balance by allowing the other side to speak too.
But on Twitter there is no mandatory balance. For example if Trump tweets some nasty comment, unlike a mainstream media platform Twitter won’t seek out the other side for balance, or under Musks ownership, it won’t remove the tweet or the person who wrote it.
Trump will return to Musks Twitter Oct 31st (Halloween - the horrors) and soon be spreading his expert disinformation claiming elections are stolen and his hateful personal messages to millions.
Other leaders too, like Irans Mullahs, or Syria’s Assad, and groups that are currently regulated soon won’t be.
“It’s a ‘back-to-the-future’ reversion to content rules circa 2010, but one that ignores the lived experience over the last decade,” said Colin Crowell, Twitter’s former head of global public policy, who left the company in 2019. “People eventually realize that the Wild West needs a sheriff, both for ensuring the safety of citizens but also for enhancing the prospects for commerce.”
Musk has tried to reassure advertisers saying “Twitter obviously cannot become a free-for-all hellscape, where anything can be said with no consequences,” he wrote. “Twitter aspires to be the most respected advertising platform in the world.”
Musk who is good at making electric cars, and rockets is not anyones poster boy editor on issues of free speech, and his first act was to fire many executives who removed Trump from the platform and tried to regulate content on Twitter.
The internet cannot be free to use for extremists, whether they be white supremacists, or ISIS terrorists, nor former Presidents looking for spread untruths and ignite attacks on Democracy.
Putin
The Kremlin touted Russian leader Putin’s appearance at the Valdai Think Tank in Moscow as a major foreign policy speech to watch.
I did and it was ‘heavy lifting’ to sort out Putin’s long winded rambling ideas on the World and Russia’s place in it.
Heavy lifting because Putin, rails against Western Liberal Democracies, and his interpretation of how sovereign nations were given land, including Ukraine and Poland, is all about fuelling the war many Russian’s don’t want to fight.
Putin still thinks Ukraine is his, even if no one else does. He claimed his war was only to free the Donbas, but he of course never mentioned how in the opening weeks of the fight he tries to take Kyiv and lost.
Kyiv is not in the Donbas! Luhansk is not the Donbas. Oh and Russia invaded Ukraine, it wasn’t attacked, so Putin’s claim to only be defending Russia is frankly ridiculous.
Putin said one thing we can all agree on, its a “dirty and bloody game” being played, and he may be right in framing whats ahead as “the most dangerous and unpredictable decade since WW2”.
Putin who has repeatedly said Russia would use all its weapons, including tactical nuclear weapons last night tried to turn it all upside and accuse the west of threatening Russia. “We never intentionally said anything about the use of nuclear weapons”.
U.S. President Biden reacted saying“If he has no intention, why does he keep talking about it? Why is he talking about the ability to use a tactical nuclear weapon?” Biden said in an interview. “He’s been very dangerous in how he’s approached this,” Biden said.
Putin is a master at trying to tap into divisions in the West. He raised the notion of banning gay sex in Russia, saying it’s all the creation of Liberal Democracies, as he plays to Conservative audiences in America and Hungary, and elsewhere.
Putin is a KGB person, who mirror images everything to confuse. He turns truth upside down to serve his purposes which is clinging to power at all costs.
-Russian was attacked instead of attacked
-The war is going to plan, instead of Russian is losing thousands of soldiers and the war
-Ukraine suffered a 2014 coup d'état, instead of a revolution where people rose up for change
-Ukraine is making a dirty bomb, instead of Russia may be ready to use one near Kherson
It goes on and on…as the war grinds on and on. And whats dark is Putin’s unwillingness to push on from his failed Soviet past and allow Russian’s and Ukrainians and Europe to live in peace.
Other News…
-Covid new variants are rampaging data to be released by the CDC today showing BQ1 and BQ11 variants were just 11% two weeks ago, and 16.6% last week. This week 27% nationwide in the U.S. These variants have vaccine escape abilities.
-Profits at the world’s biggest oil companies have soared to nearly $175 billion so far this year as Russia’s war on Ukraine pushed up energy prices. Britain’s Shell and France’s TotalEnergies on Thursday reported profits for the first nine months of 2022 of $59bn (£51bn). US rivals Chevron and ExxonMobil are expected to report year-to-date earnings approaching $70bn on Friday, while 2022 profits at Britain’s BP could break the $20bn mark on Tuesday.
-The European Union struck a deal on Thursday on a law to effectively ban the sale of new petrol and diesel cars from 2035, aiming to speed up the switch to electric vehicles and combat climate change.
-Iran appears ready to launch a major crackdown on protests, as it mobilizes the Revolutionary Guards to attack mobs. The IRGC has issued orders to stop protesters from attacking Government buildings. The protesters are demanding regime change.
Have a good day everyone.
Dana Lewis