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At the federal level, efforts to rein in Big Tech have gone nowhere with the big boys spreading a lot of money around, not only to politicians, but activists and organizations on both sides, turning them into unregistered lobbyists. TikTok learned from the best, buying up not only politicians like AOC and much of the Squad, but activists on the Left and the Right, who suddenly began denouncing any attempt to stop TikTok.
While buying up most of the political class and social media influencers, China forgot to buy Montana.
Montana became the first state in the nation Friday to pass a bill banning TikTok from operating in the state, a move that’s bound to face legal challenges but also serve as a testing ground for the TikTok-free America that many national lawmakers have envisioned.
The Montana House voted 54-43 to send the bill to Republican Gov. Greg Gianforte for his signature.
Previous efforts to rein in app stores and other Big Tech abuses gained traction in state legislatures even as companies like Google and Apple had bought much of D.C. I’ve said it before, don’t count on the federal government to enforce even its own laws, unless there are political reasons to do so, but states can and should take on that role where the feds have failed. We’re the ‘United States’, not a monarchy run out of the White House.
But TikTok’s response shows how craftily the Chinese company leans on trying to mimic and manipulate whichever electorate it’s trying to brainwash.
In response to the bill’s passage, a TikTok spokesperson said in a statement to CBS News on Friday afternoon, “The bill’s champions have admitted that they have no feasible plan for operationalizing this attempt to censor American voices and that the bill’s constitutionality will be decided by the courts. We will continue to fight for TikTok users and creators in Montana whose livelihoods and First Amendment rights are threatened by this egregious government overreach.”
The ChiComs have thoughts on “egregious government overreach”.
But the ChiComs have the cash to hire plenty of Americans, including Republicans and conservatives, who will start talking about “First Amendment rights are threatened by this egregious government overreach” as if their Chinese Communist overlords care about such things.
Beijing thinks that we’re easy to manipulate and considering how effectively TikTok has bought half of our political class which is busy vocally defending it, either affirmatively or by going on the attack, our enemies have a point.
We’re distracted, easily pliable, jump from one thing to another, and we’re led by corrupt politicians and social media grifters who always have one hand out and can be bought for a song no matter how incorruptible and principled they pretend to be.
Maybe Montana can do what D.C. won’t.
You can thank Richard Nixon, Republican, for opening the door of the hen house to the CCP fox. You can thank G.W. Bush, Judeo-Christian Republican conservative, for opening the door of the hen house to the Muslim fox, “Islam is a religion of peace”. You can thank John Sherman, Republican, for the Sherman Antitrust Act of 1890, the first major blow against American capitalism. The Republicans have always been the major destroyers of America.
“In the 1930s, Isabel Patterson (author of The God of the Machine) used to say to me: If you hear some bad collectivst notions, chances are that they came from liberals. But if you hear or read something outrageously, god-awfully collectivistic, you may be sure that the author is a conservative.” – Ayn Rand
Interesting. Patterson’s important book is out of print (of course) but I have a copy somewhere online on my computer; I really ought to read it. Perhaps we all ought to read it before it disappears from CyberLand.
While an app like TikTok is a danger to youth, the biggest part of the problem is the “Smart” phone itself. It is the enabling technology. I suggest that until you are 18–an adult–a person cannot have a smart phone. Allow youths to have a minimal phone that allows on the talk, text and take pictures which cannot be sent. I know this will never happen. The same arguments about gun control (I’m against) will be raised about “phone control”.
Those arguments ought to be raised, but they probably won’t. I agree and further suggest that there ought to be “children’s” and “youth” versions of basic cell phones so that kids can call their parents to tell them where they are, or call emergency services if need arises (and they are carefully told what constitutes “need”), but not much more. Nothing that can be used a tool that allows young mobs to form and remove the contents of major luxury stores or to exhibit themselves (or anyone else) in obscene dancing videos, or even for good kids to sit up all night watching science videos or reading FrontPage Magazine and depriving themselves of the sleep they need.
In the PRC the young people are well protected from the seductions of smart phones. The phones can only be used during certain hours, such as a few hours between finishing homework and going to bed (at a reasonable time). They cannot be used at all during the night because it is understood that growing minds need adequate sleep, and of course they cannot be used during school time. And they can only receive and transmit certain carefully censored information, obviously.
I am not in favor of anything that smacks of PRC-style laws governing what adults can see or write, but we might learn something from both them and the Russians about protecting our children from things that they should not see.
Here’s what’s banned: people using VPN’s who are trying to log onto FPM. Good try, but I can always get around it, no matter how many “access denied” attempts you make.
Blazing Cat Fur does the same thing. I just pause it long enough to get on, then I’m fine.
If Biden were a moth, corruption would be a street light.
No name recognition without representation. Trump is very flush with name recognition sans the recognition to realise his abject failure on domestic policy. Drain the swamp indeed? The swamp is almost as flush as Trump is with name recognition. Almost exactly as flush because he’s Pinocchio. The swamp is flush with Trump funding too.
On foreign policy he’s been sort of alright. I don’t doubt Putin loves his WWIII stuff though.
I suppose Putin is supposed to love it because actually Putin doesn’t really want to be forming an Axis Alliance with China and Iran.
When it comes to quick witted morons the UK are undisputed world leaders. The UK of course does not even like to imagine that quick witted morons can even exist
We have bigger problems than just TikTok. “True The Vote” is the organization that brought us the data behind “2000 Mules”: “Today we bring you a complete and accurate account of how we discovered Konnech, a company that provides elections systems software to many of the largest counties in our country; its incontrovertible creation of open-door systems that send massive amounts of confidential election data and information to China; and its leadership’s work with, and loyalty to, the Chinese Communist Party. ” Also included was this: “Almost a year ago, we started talking about ‘Pulling the Ripcord,’ posting research and video from all True the Vote has collected, including material used in the movie ‘2000 Mules’. The challenge was where to host it all without fear of being hacked, canceled, censored, or shadow-banned. We needed a user-friendly platform for everyone from novices to expert researchers; that was secure; could scale quickly; was not cluttered by ads; and was unwaveringly reliable. Such a site didn’t exist. So, in early 2022, a talented team started building one. Soon enough, the name “Open.Ink” leaked out and led to relentless attacks from global operators. … [Now] Open.Ink is ready. We will post our other research and video soon, but decided to start with releasing Konnech information because time is of the essence.” CHECK OUT Open.lnk AND PLEASE CONTRIBUTE TO ‘TRUE THE VOTE’ IF YOU CAN. THANKS! https://open.ink/konnech
Obviously this a joke but it’s a joke that tells the truth about people that don’t want to comply with obstinate conformity even Europe is apparently questioning for now. Probably only temporarily.