Tell Me You Don’t Understand The First Amendment…

2. The #TwitterFiles have revealed a lot: thousands of moderation requests from every corner of government, Feds mistaking both conservatives and leftists for fictional Russians, even Twitter deciding on paper to cede moderation authority to the “U.S. intelligence community”: pic.twitter.com/njklzvX0n1

— Matt Taibbi (@mtaibbi) February 19, 2023

None of this is what he thinks it is. To begin with, “moderation” is not tantamount to censorship, and “request” is not the same thing as “or else.”

4. Then House hearings were held last week, at which one witness told a story about Donald Trump asking to remove a mean tweet by Chrissy Teigen.

The press went bananas. Now THAT was big news! pic.twitter.com/8ynYaD0lBb

— Matt Taibbi (@mtaibbi) February 19, 2023

"Pussy ass bitch" and Donald Trump and you DON’T expect that to be a news story? You know you just blew up your analytical cred (not all that strong to begin with), right?

6. If a president freaking out about one tweeter is news, surely a U.S. Senator finking on three hundred-plus of his constituents also must be? pic.twitter.com/dUtLV8TlmV

— Matt Taibbi (@mtaibbi) February 19, 2023

Wait, identifying suspicious accounts is the same thing as nuking his constituents from orbit? Twitter is an international platform, right? You are aware that non-citizens and non-residents of Maine are on Twitter, right? And that sharing those concerns with Twitter is not tantamount to shutting down Twitter, right?

Are you really this stupid?

8. King’s office declined comment. If Dick Nixon sniffed glue, this is what his enemies list might have looked like: https://t.co/GuH4v7EnoQ

— Matt Taibbi (@mtaibbi) February 19, 2023

So Sen. King authorized a break-in, tried to access somebody’s medical files, or tried to get the FBI to open a criminal investigation into someone because of their Twitter account?

I ask again: are you really this stupid?

11.A government official, writing from a State department email, asks to “delete” 14 accounts that are engaged in legit speech and for which no evidence is shown they're Russian controlled or bots (in fact, we at Racket know some of these people). A clear First Amendment issue.

— Matt Taibbi (@mtaibbi) February 19, 2023

And was there any threat against Twitter if they didn’t comply with this request? Any pressure on Twitter aside from this request? Any attempt to punish Twitter for not removing these accounts? Here’s another surprise: government officials get to vote, too! Which has more effect on government than this request had on Twitter.

Governments make requests of private businesses all the time. It arises to coercion only if government power is put behind it. You do understand that much, don’t you?

Oh, why do I ask?