Liberals are aghast at Elon Musk’s movement to free Twitter: how can we get along without censorship? People might say bad things about Saint Fauci!
But Americans are squarely in Musk’s corner. Rasmussen finds an extraordinary level of concern about censorship on social media sites. Almost everyone believes that political censorship is going on:
The latest Rasmussen Reports national telephone and online survey finds that 77% of Likely U.S. voters believe it’s likely that social media companies like Facebook censor news and commentary because of political bias, including 52% who think it is Very Likely. Only 14% say it’s unlikely social media sites are engaging in political censorship.
And a large majority don’t like it:
Seventy-two percent (72%) think censorship by social media companies is a serious problem, including 49% who say it’s a Very Serious problem. Twenty percent (20%) don’t think it’s a serious problem.
Understandably, then, 66% of voters approve of GOP plans to investigate social media censorship, while only 26% disapprove.
The same survey shows that Republicans think censorship is a bigger problem than “misinformation,” while Democrats think “misinformation” is a bigger problem than censorship. The confounding fact is that most Democrats seem to think that anything they disagree with is misinformation. While, on the other hand, I don’t believe I have ever seen a single Democrat cite the Russia collusion hoax–the great disinformation campaign of our time–as an instance of misinformation.
In any event, while he may be enraging liberals, Elon Musk has the large majority of Americans on his side.
The Hunter Biden scandal lies at the intersection of the great reporting of the New York Post on Hunter Biden’s laptop and the Biden family business, the 2020 presidential election, the deep state, the suppression of the scandal by Twitter and other social media platforms, Elon Musk, and the Twitter Files. It is an incredibly important story.
Daniel Oliver shares my assessment. He places the scandal in the context of “Donald Trump’s mad pursuit” in an interesting American Greatness column:
Trump’s recent actions show terrible judgment: having to dinner known antisemites and suggesting that the Constitution needs to be—it’s not clear what—amended? Abolished? Whatever. All because of the suppression of the Hunter Biden laptop story by social media companies.
But here’s what Trump doesn’t seem to realize: he is fighting, and he has been fighting, the wrong battle, the battle of the ballots. Meanwhile, the real enemy lies elsewhere but in plain sight: the suppression of information that was essential to voters, the Hunter Biden laptop story.
That story is the scandal. It’s so scandalous that the media won’t—can’t—cover it. Yet, inexplicably, Trump has not made it his cause. That is a huge political blunder and shows more bad judgment. But then so many of Trump’s actions as president also showed bad judgment, from the way he selected people to be members of his administration to the way he fired them. And a lot more besides.
Now comes word that the friends of Hunter Biden are advising him to go on offense by suing various prominent parties for defamation (or something). Byron York pursues my train of thought in “The coming war over Hunter Biden.” He adds that some possibly sane Democrats see a problem with the advice Biden is reportedly receiving:
Some Democrats disagree strongly with the aggressive strategy. After all, Hunter Biden is a former drunk and crackhead who made a huge amount of money through questionable business deals in which he sought to cash in on his father’s name and influence. He then blew the money on booze, crack, and prostitutes, after which he sought new, and even shadier, ways to further cash in on his father’s name and influence. This was no youthful indiscretion; Hunter Biden is 52 years old and has only been off drugs for a couple of years.
The advice sounds like something of a joke to me, but maybe not. Maybe it’s the next logical stop in the crazy world of Joe Biden.
The opinions expressed by columnists are their own and do not necessarily represent the views of Townhall.com.
AP Photo/John Locher
Most Americans aren’t paying attention yet to the 2024 Presidential race; only political junkies need to get their “fix” every day. Donald Trump wants to be President again, and there is absolutely nothing wrong with that desire. He did a great job for four years, and it is a shame that he, for whatever reasons, couldn’t parlay that success into four more years in office. The country has certainly suffered because of it.
The last few weeks—again, for whatever reasons, some his fault, some not—have not been kind to Mr. Trump. Since we are in a political “off-season,” it might be a good idea for him to sit back and take stock of what a good campaign in 2024 would look like. He isn’t dead, politically, but he needs some resuscitation. If I were his political campaign manager, here are some suggestions I would make.
1. Disappear for a while, or at least, don’t try to hog the limelight. One recent Townhall writer spoke of “Trump Exhaustion Syndrome”—too much is too much. Plus, the more any human is in the public eye, the more chances there are to make mistakes, especially when his myriad enemies are scrutinizing his every word and deed. And Mr. Trump has made plenty (of mistakes and enemies). Take a vacation for a few months, Mr. Trump, and give the rest of us some time away from you. We’d appreciate it. And come back a new man. For examples….
2. Quit talking about 2020. Nobody wants to hear that anymore. You aren’t going to be President before 2025. Shut up about 2020. I’m in Thailand and I don’t want to hear it; I can imagine how the people in America feel. The future is what concerns us, not the past. If some reporter asks you about 2020 (and they will), cut them off—immediately. “We’re going to talk about 2024 and beyond. Period. Next question.” The past can’t be changed; the future can. Help Republicans learn how to win in 2024, not that you were cheated in 2020.
3. Conquer yourself, Mr. Trump. We like you, but we have lives, too, and we want to know what you are going to do for the country, not what your latest personal grievance is. Barack Obama became legendary for starting every sentence in the first person (“I” or “My”). Don’t talk about yourself, or the injustices to you that cannot be corrected. Frankly, we don’t care.
3. Quit endlessly berating Republicans you don’t like. If you rant about how stupid and gutless Mitch McConnell is—something we already know anyway—the only thing you are going to do is alienate people whom you need to help you back into the White House. There are rotten Republicans; that’s just the way it is and it isn’t going to change. Have the wisdom to use them and get them on your side. Sadly, there are not enough conservatives in the country to put you over the top. Get elected first, then do what is necessary to save the country.
4. Let Congress handle Hunter Biden, the Twitter revelations, etc. They aren’t going to, of course, but there is absolutely nothing you can do about that except make it worse by constantly harping on it. Griping is only going to show pettiness. Be above it, Mr. Trump. We need a statesman now, and statesmen must pick their fights carefully. Joe Biden isn’t going anywhere in the next two years. The Democrats and the media will see to that, so quit trying to remove him from office, and start planning what you will do when you get back to Washington.
5. And then tell us, positively and upliftingly, what you plan to accomplish. It is certainly acceptable to expose, clearly, the disasters of the Biden administration. But the negativity is not enough. Ok, Biden screwed up A (and B, and C, ad infinitum). What are you going to do to fix those things? Give us something to look forward to, not just to complain about.
6. Point to your previous record, but don’t dwell on it. Remind people they were paying less than $2 a gallon for gas and that the country was energy independent. Don’t let Americans forget that black and Hispanic unemployment was the lowest they had ever been in your administration. That’s all fine. But then, we need to know how you intend to return the country to those “good ol’ days.” Give us your blueprint, not just your critique. Be positive, inspiring, and enriching.
7. And will you please get out into minority communities and talk to those people? Rightly or wrongly, Republicans are seen as the party of white people, and they care little to nothing about blacks and other minorities. Go to Harlem, Detroit, Baltimore, Philadelphia, Atlanta, and other Democratic hell-holes and talk—but mainly LISTEN—to what the black and Hispanic people are saying. Show that you intend to be President for ALL Americans. Now, you will never please everybody; the country is too diverse. But perceptions ARE important, and by showing a true interest in the problems faced by inner-city dwellers, you will be doing something Democrats certainly never do. Go to the cities that the Democrats are destroying and find out what you can do to rebuild them. Care what is happening to those tragic places and show it; the Democrats do neither. If you don’t care, either, please go home.
Donald Trump in 2016 was brilliant. And he won because of it. Since then, not so much. Build, Mr. Trump. “Make America Great Again” is a fine motto. Now, tell all Americans again what it means. Show some humanity, compassion, humility, wisdom, fortitude, and positiveness. America needs help, not a sledgehammer.
Have you started your Christmas shopping? Don’t forget to include some good reading material, especially for the cold winter months. My western novels, Whitewater and River Bend are available at Amazon, Barnes and Noble, and Eliva.com. A third western, Allie’s Dilemma, is available for Kindle only. And read some different posts on my blog at thailandlewis.blogspot.com.
The fact that people are steadily moving away from blue states and into red states is well known. Still, I thought these figures from New York were shocking:
A new city analysis shows that a huge chunk of high-income earners fled in 2020. …
The study by the city’s Independent Budget Office shows a 10% plunge in taxpayers who made over $750,000, and 6% of those with incomes between $150,000 and $750,000.
That is stunning: 10 percent of New York City’s highest income earners fled the state in a single year, as did 6 percent of those with moderately high incomes. In one year! New York’s tax policies are obviously not sustainable. Sure, the 2020 exodus was covid-driven in part, but is there any chance that many of these tax refugees will return? No.
How do liberals react to the fact that their tax base is walking away?
[T]he radicals who increasingly dominate local politics want to slam those who haven’t left even more: Last Monday, a group of advocates and elected officials launched a campaign for a ludicrous $40 billion in new taxes on the rich.
New York can hardly afford to drive away even more high-income taxpayers:
[T]he top 1% of taxpayers accounted for 45% of the city’s total income tax liability in 2020; they’re the ones most sensitive to high taxes. (The bottom 50% accounted for less than 4%.)
That pattern holds everywhere: the “rich” pay taxes for the rest of us. And the 2020 numbers, bad as they are, are probably a harbinger of worse to come:
[T]he mass exodus came before progressives in Albany spiked state taxes by $4 billion in 2021, punishing mostly top-income New Yorkers with the highest state and local tax rate in the nation. How many more high earners have left since, or will soon?
So, yeah, bring on those new taxes. There are still some lots for sale in Florida.
MN Prager Discussion Group 