>There is very little speech and it excessively rewards the most unreasonable speech.
never going to change--the most intolerant win as taleb has demonstrated formally. If anything is to change Twitter must go to the limit of constitutionally protected speech (dont @ me with `twitter is a private company`)
it's honestly irrelevant about the credibility of the emails and other data at this point, its the blanket censorship of this article that's now the real story.
Is it? Because the factuality of the story seems like a pretty big deal here. If it's completely bogus, how is it different from any of those Russian trollfarm posts that the US government was worried about?
Of course the factuality is a big deal. But Twitter didn’t discover the story was false and then remove it. Rather they decided that because the information came from a hack that it couldn’t be posted on their site. If anything they confirmed it was true by doing this.
There are two possibilities: Either it's really a hack or it's a felonious attempt to manipulate an election. Or it's both -- a hack of personal private photos and also fake emails feloniously manipulating an election. Either way, a ban is appropriate.
Saying "if it's true, it's ban able for X" without out bothering to say that obviously it's bannable if it's false, isn't saying it's true. How could Twitter even know?
I’m not sure what you’re arguing for. If we had ignored everyone claiming there were WMDs then a million people would still be alive, not to mention the trillions of dollars saved.
they did learn from their mistakes.
they learned that there's zero consequence in trafficking the right lies for the right people and were professionally rewarded for doing so. it should be no surprise that the exact same people latched so heavily onto the steele dossier and the cult of mueller-ism
WMD information was provided by government officials and it was official government position on it, the news were reporting what officials said and provided.
The factuality is what we should be debating. When Twitter bans its dissemination that becomes as big a story and - like it or not - makes folks believe there’s more truth to the story than they perhaps would have in absence of such blatant, double-standard censorship.
The New York Post is not a serious newspaper; it is a sensationalist tabloid. Sometimes the NYPost will report on real news, but I believe absolutely nothing they report until it is verified by the New York Times, Washington Post, LA Times, or other major broadcast outlet with actual journalistic standards.
> New York Times, Washington Post, LA Times, or other major broadcast outlet with actual journalistic standards.
"Actual journalistic standards" yeah right! They literally carried out a fake news story about Nick Sandmann without any sort of verification. CNN settled 250 million $ lawsuit followed by Washington Post. Other publications are in the line next. They have zero credibility... especially after causing irreparable damage to a child's reputation by labelling him a racist when he was anything but. The real racists at the rally were those who accused this kid of racism. For full video of the actual altercation you can watch here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QwNyOD8FIQk and decide for yourself.
The instinct some people have to preserve themselves from cognitive dissonance is extremely powerful. Rather than re-examine their own beliefs, it's easier to find reasons to dismiss that which is creating the conflict.
Calling all the downvoters assholes isn't especially productive.
I'll explain mine.
The New York Post has produced valid journalism. The Washington Post has produced bad journalism. Individual examples of these are not useful for making broad claims about the merits of these organizations because they produce such a huge volume of journalism. Continuing to complain about the Covington case until the end of time is not a productive way of arguing that all media outlets are garbage and doubling down by insisting that people who disagree are just sheep crushes any possibility of useful discussion here.
> The New York Post has produced valid journalism. The Washington Post has produced bad journalism. Individual examples of these are not useful for making broad claims about the merits of these organizations because they produce such a huge volume of journalism. Continuing to complain about the Covington case until the end of time is not a productive way of arguing that all media outlets are garbage and doubling down by insisting that people who disagree are just sheep crushes any possibility of useful discussion here.
I would 100% agree with you if the same feeling is accorded to outlets like New York Post or any other right leaning media organization. I am not saying that the right leaning organizations are epitome of journalistic credibility. I am just like you calling bullshit as bullshit. But when you start standing on a high pedestal and start claiming "journalistic credibility" as some sort of differentiating factor while at the same time peddle in blatantly false news I will call you out. No matter if it hurts sentiments. I am not saying that New York Times or Washington Post did not produce valid journalism. They perhaps did a good 60% of the time. I will give them that. But to say they follow "actual journalistic standards" is straight out false. "Actual journalistic standards" entails that you verify your source of information before putting it out. That is for every story. No exceptions. If you have some stories that are going out being fact checked and some not then where is the "journalistic standard"? You set a standard to ensure that you never waver from it nor do you apply it selectively.
You fact check any information you put out. Not pull it down after others have fact checked you. Then what is the reason for your existence? I can get unverified news from social media directly! Why do I need a media organization then? I want to rely on media because it is a publisher which verifies stuff it puts out. That is the main job for media. If media is itself indulging in propaganda then what is the need for media? Especially in this social media age?
In that all organizations have failed. Not just left wing but right wing too. Sensationalism always triumphs. But there are some who take it too far: calling a kid racist without verification of facts. This is where I draw the line. You want to do politics do so between yourselves. Fight it out as adults. Don't involve children in your fights. This is a big red line that I don't want anyone crossing. I hope we both can agree on that. Anytime I see children being used as props for propaganda it turns me the F-off. Even if the Covington case was racial in nature it should not have been shown on TV let alone live TV. This is something that must have been dealt with at the school level. This is an age where the child is still growing. And while growing you make stupid decisions too. You have to give that benefit of doubt. To make him a media spectacle for your own benefits is not the way. You are causing mental trauma to the child. And in this case it is far worse because the kid was not racist at all! I have watched the 1.5 hours video in full length and couldn't find even 1 place where the Covington kids were racist. In fact, the kid actually stops his friend from arguing with the Native American and asks his friend to shut up while the Native American speaks. And we have media which turns around and makes this innocent kid into a racist and we should all be okay with it? No effing ways! I'll speak up even if I am in the minority!
Btw, Covington case is not an isolated one. We all know too well what happened to the Russian collusion hoax. None of it could be proved conclusively and moreover it ultimately resulted in the opposite: now we have evidence being unearthed that it was literally a planted story. Look up on what is happening with the Steele Dossier. Why is no one talking about it now? Because it was complete fabricated nonsense that was peddled by the media. A proper witch-hunt not based on any fact. Only innuendos.
True. But I am happy the mod un-flagged and brought your comment back. At least the mod here is unbiased. It just saddens me that people are so blind. Sitting here in India I can see the fake stories for what they are but so many American citizens are unable to see it. It is unbelievable really.
They settled the lawsuits but there is no indication it was anything like $250M (more like $25K!). And notably none of the organisations was required to retract or apologize as part of the settlement.
> And notably none of the organisations was required to retract or apologize as part of the settlement.
Because that is the settlement. To save themselves from embarrassment and having to admit they faked the entire thing. I give credit to Nick Sandmann for being the bigger man here and settling instead of taking it all the way and making sure these media houses get crippled.
Anyways, the point here is not the amount of money settled. The point is that they faked the news and labelled an innocent boy a racist. You still haven't given a reply on that. Not that you are required to, but that is what is the crux of the matter here, not the money.
Do not dismiss tabloid journalism. There's a long and happy history of Democrats being undone by lurid tabloids. Think Drudge Report breaking the (Bill) Clinton-Lewinsky scandal, or National Enquirer breaking the John Edwards affair, or NYPost breaking the Anthony Weiner sexting. This is tabloid journalism at its best.
The difference is those stories had supporting details, with the reporters attempting to follow up.
None of them are serious. NY Times made a big deal out of trumps taxes when everyone knows depreciation offsets revenue in real estate, its 101 stuff. You get taxed when you sell the asset which happens infrequently but in large magnitude. Most people in the industry were laughing at the gaslighting they did on that story but they fooled their little pawn readers. Just one example out of many. Every news source is full of shit even the ones that are supposed to be reputable.
I feel sorry for you for getting downvoted, anyone with a basic understanding of accounting and tax should know this. Also the issue picked on in later comments, yes you absolutely can report different valuations to different entities, in the US, UK, and probably everywhere else too.
Tax accounting is completely different to accounting you show to a bank for a loan. This is normal because they are used for different things, and are accounting for different things. For example - the tax rate and taxes paid have a real impact on cashflows which would impact your eligibility for a loan. In tax returns taxes paid are not included in profit and loss, because that would lower the tax paid by businesses.
No it is not. Inventory, for example, can have two basis values, taxable inventory, and fixed asset inventory value. One is what the IRS requires via GAAP reporting, and the other is used to secure lines of credit.
Yeah, that’s not true, though you may wish it were. Many industries operate essentially three sets of books - one for the IRS, one for regulators, and one for the street. The requirements for valuation and burdening can be different based on audience. I don’t know whether it applies in trumps case but the headlines and righteous talking points got pretty silly. “Trump offset gains by losses” - yep. Meanwhile let’s talk about how many of these senators (particularly some of the most self-righteous) after decades of only federal employment have somehow become multimillionaires.
We have no information on this except what the NYT's reports in half truth. For instance if there was a time gap between reporting that could cause a mismatch as finances change over time. You can also have retroactive amendments as almost every major company has which are reported in different years. I havent dug deep into this as its not an important topic for me but I just wouldnt take the around the edges reporting at face value from a source as biased as the times.
One way to get a more complete picture of the tax situations would be for Trump to release his tax returns, as he had promised repeatedly in 2016, and as every other president since Nixon has done.
You realize the real story re: Trump's asset depreciation is that he reported one valuation to the govt and one to his banks when seeking loans, right?
In my tax report I think my house is valued at 400 000 NOK.
When I talk to the bank it will probably be worth 4 200 000 NOK.
Tax authorities here know as banks update them every year.
Also in accounting it is common. I remember asking my teacher about it when we had basic accounting and it is simple: if you depreciate (?) an item to less than it is worth you just have to report a profit when you sell a "worthless" asset. (I'm not an accountant and English is not my first language but I think it should be possible to understand.)
I am fairly sure that is tax fraud lol. I don't think I could take out a loan on a property by giving one valuation and in the same year give a vastly different one for my taxes.
No, it is even the tax office who came up with the much lower number in my case.
It is like this for everyone!
Same with depreciation rules, when I learned the rules here my teacher was actually working with the tax authorities.
Depreciation in accounting is a technicality. And if you happen to sell a thing that is technically worth 0 in the books that just becomes an extra inflow of money to the company, which is taxable and so the tax authorities get their money.
Unless you have learned accounting, be careful :-)
The story headline that was coordinated and gaslight was "trump didnt pay any tax". Everything else was anecdotal, I didnt look into this specific matter because I was rolling my eyes from the start. If they cant be honest about the main story I'm not following them for the rest of the allegations.
The three outlets you cited lean left and regularly avoid articles inconvenient to the left (and paint much of the remainder as "Republicans pounce on reports that..."). Consider balancing with centre-right outlets like National Review.
Centre-right, National Review.... You made me spit out my tea when I read that. I'd ask you to go to the op-ed section, and tell me it's even close to "centre-right" and not fully right.
They lost an editor for posting a mainstream opinion by an elected Republican... Note that they then shared the same sentiment about supporting police cracking down on protests in Hong Kong and received no internal pushback whatsoever.
The op-ed section isn't the news section. NYT is centre-left, NR is centre-right.
Anyway it won't hurt you to read things from the other perspective. The truth is often "in the middle" or only something you can triangulate after reading both sides.
If you look at the NYT op-ed section, there are right wingers on there too, see Ross Douthat, et. al, as well as plenty of centrists, and lefties. National Review does not have the same diversity, and only features prominent right wingers.
Maybe I'm getting too bogged down in the op-ed section, like you say; but, it does make you think about the effect an op-ed section has on the news content as well.
It could be easily argued while they are not rewriting the story they selectively choose the facts they present as "fact checked" information. In the recent past both FB and Twitter have linked to "fact checked" articles/sources that represented only the narrative they wanted you to read. If they wanted to show neutral behavior they could have linked to articles that represented both sides of an argument which would keep their independence and educate their audience better since rarely is one side 100% correct.
Democrats base their arguments on some bombshell mistruths. Like trillion dollar mistruths. The idea that America underinvests in schools and social welfare, for example, when we spend more than European countries per person on both metrics.
Democrats argue we need to spend more and pay teachers more. The argument that we need to do a better job making sure the money we spend actually benefits kids, that’s a different argument, and will get you branded a Republican.
Yes, and it might be very reasonable that some areas of those are underfunded while other are wasteful. The reasons for this discrepancy might very well be policies that are upheld by republicans, like inflated healthcare costs, who knows? You're just providing a generalization. The meager output with the same input suggests that there's too many middle men and I wouldn't just assume that Republicans are more willing to stop the siphoning of taxes into private pockets.
Problem is that both sides see the other as exactly this. I’m sure I can argue the point on behalf of either side selected by a coin toss. In today’s example though we have the side that dominates academia, media, big labor, healthcare, public sector workers, and big tech using that dominance to censor a story harmful to their candidate with very disingenuous reasoning.
I know a dozen people who would agree with you and thirteen who would argue the opposite and cite sources. You might not be as objective as you think here.
What's even the point of this "one should be more balanced, both sides!" etc etc. From my EU/Nordic perspective the US right-wing are more or less "crazy-right" (I mean just look at the Trump administration?!). I can't see why one should need to be somewhere in-between just because there are two parties.
It's one of those papers in the strange intersection of "mainstream tabloid". It's clearly not serious, as you can see from a quick glance at their typical cover pages, but it's also not one of the papers everyone knows is untrustworthy schlock.
Is information being gated by private universities, that only the elite have access to? This may have had validity in the pre-internet era, but information is everywhere now. There's nothing wrong with "public education".
Limiting distribution to filter out what you don't want to rise to the top has the same effect as explicitly picking winners.
Think of it like shooting the tires of all the cars you want to lose in a race. Sure you didn't push the winner across the finish line, but you made it damn near impossible for anyone else to even get there.
Yeah, but that's still not editorial control. And maybe we do actually want Twitter to pick some winners. I don't think the platform needs any more death threats, Russian-backed misinformation campaigns or other bullshit.
And this is exactly what social media does all the time, or rather their recommendation algorithms. Which, for some reason, is no problem at all. Now that the bias of these algorithms is changing, also by directly intervening, it is a big problem.
I don't think so. You could perhaps make an argument that banning all NY Post articles would be distribution control, although even then I'm skeptical. But if I picked up a physical copy of the New York Post, and found that the newsstand had snipped just this one article out with a pair of scissors, I'd call that an unambiguous act of editorial control and censorship.
Both are important. Censoring something important without knowing whether it's true or not is pretty worrisome. If it does turn out to be true then it's much worse. If it turns out to be false, the censor got lucky or knows something we don't.
One thing I'm wondering is how can they censor it without getting either some evidence that it's fake or at least a clear denial? (Biden's campaign released a statement refuting it, but that's not the same as Biden himself publicly denying the claims.)
Thin evidence (someone found some damaging-looking emails) can be dismissed with thin counter-evidence (a denial). But it can't be dismissed with nothing.
twitter and the journo sphere launder misinformation every single day with no consequence. the russian bounty story had little relation to factuality but it was still widespread with no objections or even much if any in the way of post facto correction. it's entirely permissible to write complete fiction just as long as you preface it with 'intelligence sources indicate...'
Can't people do their own research and choose whether or not they believe the contents of a story before they retweet it and lose their own credibility?
The problem here that this "bombshell" article did not provide enough information to do any kind of verification.
The main evidence is a PDF file of a print of an e-mail (without even providing a header information).
- we don't know if it's Hunter's laptop as claimed (kind of odd that somebody bothers with laptop repair (let's be honest, a lot people here probably buy a new one) and then leaves it there?
- we don't know if this is a real e-mail (headers could be used to prove that)
- we don't know that the sender e-mail is an e-mail connected to the person Hunter is accused talking to (the ".ukraine" in e-mail is very odd, who would put their country in an e-mail address, it's long and is not like he has a super common name)
- we don't know Hunter responded to it (since they have his laptop, you would think they would have his e-mails as well)
- we don't know the meeting actually happened
- this story is obviously an October surprise (the time is picked exactly to impact voting, there's also not enough time to prove it is false)
I agree with all of your points but why is it Twitter or Facebook's responsibility to check all of those things for every article posted to their platform? Why is the onus not on you as the reader to do your own fact checking?
Because the timing of this piece (if you look at the PDF was created a year ago, but published just in middle of October). It is clear that it is timed to affect election results.
They are not responsible, to check all things. But it's mostly ethics and self preservation. I don't think anyone will deny that they actually have real impact now (even greater than MSM now) and I believe if Democrats win, there will be some laws passed adding some checks. I also believe trump with executive order about section 230 also probably contributed.
In a normal situation, publication would be followed by scrutiny, possibly correction, more information. Incorrect information isn’t such a big problem then.
One major problem right now is that it’s 3 weeks from an election. Scrutiny and fact checks would risking being only after the election. I’m happy to see the requirements for credibility tightened right now, for issues related to the election.
Considering many people have already voted and probably do not care about this issue it would be unlikely to affect the outcome of the election anyway.
Oh, i definitely agree that as a private company Twitter is well within its rights to censor what it believes is "misinformation" but an important line has been crossed today by Twitter and Facebook.
A story about potential corruption of a candidate for the US president has been censored by two of the largest information brokers in the world. Also interestingly, no denial from Joe Biden about the authenticity of these emails. Wouldnt that be the first thing you'd do if this wasnt true? lol
>Wouldnt that be the first thing you'd do if this wasnt true?
If i was Joe Biden and the yellow press came after me honestly I'd do exactly what Joe Biden does and ignore them rather than giving them oxygen.
If people like Biden or Clinton responded every time someone tries to capitalise on some bullshit attached to their name they'd not be doing anything else
> I'd do exactly what Joe Biden does and ignore them rather than giving them oxygen.
Joe Biden ignored the reports? The article says Joe Biden responded, saying the meeting didn't take place:
> In a Thursday afternoon statement, the Biden campaign said the paper “never asked . . . about the critical elements of this story,” and that a review of “Joe Biden’s official schedules from the time” show that “no meeting, as alleged by the New York Post, ever took place.” The Biden campaign did not dispute the veracity of the emails, though no other media outlet has confirmed the Post’s story so far.
That reply seems eerily similar to their response to Tara Reid’s allegations - “we have no official record of that in our boxes of records that we looked through”
In his official statement[0], the campaign stated that the meeting didn’t happen as the second clause of a sentence that began with the contextual announcement that they had reviewed his official schedule. There is an implicit dependency in those two halves of the same sentence. If you think that is just a casual wordsmithing mistake you have no idea how PR works. I guarantee that is carefully crafted. The release went on to say that they do not exclude the possibility that some informal meeting may have taken place.
[0] “Moreover, we have reviewed Joe Biden’s official schedules from the time and no meeting, as alleged by the New York Post, ever took place.”
> Also interestingly, no denial from Joe Biden about the authenticity of these emails. Wouldnt that be the first thing you'd do if this wasnt true?
I assume most politicians at the presidential candidate level have some sort of PR team that works to come up with some official response to these sorts of controversies
"JOE BIDEN SPOKESMAN ANDREW BATES hits back at the N.Y. POST STORY, via NATASHA BERTRAND and KYLE CHENEY: “Investigations by the press, during impeachment, and even by two Republican-led Senate committees whose work was decried as ‘not legitimate’ and political by a GOP colleague have all reached the same conclusion: that Joe Biden carried out official U.S. policy toward Ukraine and engaged in no wrongdoing. Trump Administration officials have attested to these facts under oath.
“The New York Post never asked the Biden campaign about the critical elements of this story. They certainly never raised that Rudy Giuliani - whose discredited conspiracy theories and alliance with figures connected to Russian intelligence have been widely reported - claimed to have such materials. Moreover, we have reviewed Joe Biden’s official schedules from the time and no meeting, as alleged by the New York Post, ever took place.”
Why would they have documented illegal/potentially illegal activity in the "official schedule" anyway? The claim that the official schedule somehow supports the rebuttal is pretty flimsy.
yeah exactly, that's what I was trying to convey. Like why include this qualifying language about "checking the official schedule" but for some funny business being afoot?
It's just a kinda legalistic answer, you'd give in a deposition but is kind of besides the point now.
I mean I don't particularly have much stake in whether its true or not, I'm just saying I'm not shocked he's not responding to it immediately for vaguely similar reasons to why people tell you not to talk to the police without a lawyer, whether you're innocent or not.
that's a fair point, just if its not true its pretty easy to say "not true, fake news" instead, what the answer that's provided is "we checked the schedule and didn't see it there" which is kinda suspicious.
Like the censorship of "misinformation" would be more persuasive then I think.
> we checked the schedule and didn't see it there"
That's not what Biden said.
Biden said "and no meeting, as alleged by the New York Post, ever took place." That clearly is a denial that a meeting took place. It's not conditioned on a calendar entry. It's not saying "the calendar says no meeting took place", or "according to the calendar no meeting took place".
When a politician is ambushed with a question like "when did you stop beating your wife" the politician can't respond to the allegations because that ads to the story ("politician denies beating his wife").
Isn't some press person for Biden speaking on his behalf basically the same as Biden saying it himself?
>And you'll note they didn't engage in discussing the specific allegations.
He addressed some parts of the specific allegations (whether a meeting took place), without addressing other parts (whether the emails are real). This immediately makes people think the email is real, which is what throwawa3495 was pointing out.
The official statement predicates the denial on their search for an official record of it. “Moreover, we have reviewed Joe Biden’s official schedules from the time and no meeting, as alleged by the New York Post, ever took place.”
There’s an implicit dependency between these two clauses - we looked at the official schedule (there was no record, so,) no meeting took place.
Sentence construction in crisis management publications like this is poured over and very deliberate. Do not imagine this is just sloppy sentence construction.
> just if its not true its pretty easy to say "not true, fake news" instead, what the answer that's provided is "we checked the schedule and didn't see it there" which is kinda suspicious.
Wait, so you're saying that providing an alibi as to why the claim is impossible is more suspicious than dismissing it as fake news without a defense? I'm not sure how else to interpret what you're saying, so please correct me if I'm wrong, but that position is mindboggling to me.
Just because it wasn't on Biden's "official" schedule, doesn't mean it didn't happen. My point is that saying "the meeting didnt happen" is less suspicious than saying "We checked the official schedule and find no record that the meeting happened"
Bc, of course, light bribery probably does not go down when you're on the official schedule
Meeting with someone isn't illegal in anyway - it's normally a good thing! And there's probably a good chance that Joe Biden did meet Pozharskyi at some point.
But they didn't have some kind of scheduled meeting, so it seems unlikely that any business was done.
The Post story included a screenshot of what the paper said was a 2015 email from Burisma adviser Vadym Pozharskyi to Hunter Biden, thanking him for “the opportunity to meet your father.” But the email doesn’t indicate whether Pozharskyi was describing a meeting that had already occurred or one intended to occur in the future. Nevertheless, the Post reported that the existence of such a meeting undercut Biden’s long-held assertions that he had no involvement with his son’s business dealings.
Biden’s campaign would not rule out the possibility that the former VP had some kind of informal interaction with Pozharskyi, which wouldn’t appear on Biden’s official schedule. But they said any encounter would have been cursory.
Notably:
Burisma’s website lists at least some of Pozharskyi’s meetings with U.S. officials, including a meeting in November 2017 with then-ambassador Marie Yovanovitch and a series of meetings with members of Congress, though the company lists only Reps. Gus Bilirakis (R-Fla.) and Bobby Rush (D-Ill.) by name. It lists no meetings with Joe Biden. Pozharskyi also reportedly met in 2018 with Kurt Volker
weird that there is actually no mention of these materials being hacked from anywhere though, or did I miss that?
It seems like this computer shop fellow voluntarily gave over this hard drive only after the computer in question became his property (as a result of someone not collecting the computer and not paying the bill)
>It seems like this computer shop fellow voluntarily gave over this hard drive only after the computer in question became his property (as a result of someone not collecting the computer and not paying the bill)
To say this strains credulity would be be a massive understatement.
Also, people routinely abuse their privileges to snoop on others, and computer repair shops copying disks and having a looksie is no exception.
On the email remark, are you aware of any mainstream news org (wikileaks doesn't count) who has posted a full raw email with DKIMs as part of their story's evidence? I'd honestly be surprised if you can show me one, double so if it's commonplace, since it's one of those things I just sort of consider nearly impossible for the media to actually do.
It's worth noting that HN flags are user-sourced, so unlike on Twitter that doesn't necessarily reflect administrators stepping in to kill the discussion.
I dont care about the cost or any of the pysops from you google and apple employees. I want to see and support more free software mobile operating systems period.
never going to change--the most intolerant win as taleb has demonstrated formally. If anything is to change Twitter must go to the limit of constitutionally protected speech (dont @ me with `twitter is a private company`)