Musk has means to thwart Twitter’s ‘poison pill’ – reports
Samizdat | April 16, 2022
Billionaire and Twitter habitué Elon Musk is considering bringing in business partners to help him buy out the social media platform, the New York Post reported on Friday, citing sources.
According to the publication, Musk has been in talks with investors who could partner with him on his bid for Twitter. A new plan that draws in partners may be announced within several days, NY Post sources said, noting that there is a chance Musk will team up with private equity firm Silver Lake Partners. He has a history of working with the company, which was planning to co-invest in Musk’s plan to take his electric vehicle company, Tesla, private in 2018. Silver Lake co-CEO Egon Durban is also a member of Twitter’s board of directors.
Both Silver Lake and Musk’s spokesperson declined to comment on the report.
Analysts say that teaming up with private equity firms could help Musk get around Twitter’s ‘poison pill’, a corporate move designed to prevent potential buyers from acquiring more than 15% of a company. It was adopted by Twitter on Friday, as some members of Twitter’s board say Musk’s bid undervalues the company.
Musk is the richest person in the world. His net worth is estimated at over $200 billion, with most of the money tied up in Tesla stock. Musk became Twitter’s largest shareholder in late March by acquiring a 9% stake in the company. On Thursday, he offered to buy Twitter at $54.20 a share in cash, valuing Twitter at roughly $43 billion.
Experts say it is unlikely Musk will raise his offer after he said it was his “best and final offer.” However, if all other options fail, he could take his bid directly to other Twitter shareholders and buy their shares through a tender offer.
Twitter’s Poison Pill and Gab’s Offer to Elon Musk
By Stephen Lendman | April 16, 2022
A previous article discussed Elon Musk’s offer to buy most outstanding Twitter shares he doesn’t already own at a significant premium to its current market value.
In response to prevent his gaining control of the company, Twitter’s board unanimously adopted a limited duration shareholder rights plan, a so-called (hard to swallow) poison pill.
It’ll remain in place until expires on April 14, 2023.
The strategy aims to prevent a firm’s hostile takeover by making it appear less attractive to a potential buyer’s so-called bear hug.
The latter involves offering a much higher price than the target company’s current market value.
As a defense against hostile takeovers, poison pills usually work.
They let current shareholders by additional shares of a targeted company’s stock at a discount.
It’s to dilute the equity value of the stock to make it less attractive to a potential buyer.
Or conversely to get a higher price than was offered from the suitor or potential others.
At the same time, poison pills discourage institutional investors from buying shares in a firm with aggressive defenses.
And by diluting market value, current shareholders are adversely affected.
Still at this time, Twitter is in play.
In after hours trading ahead of Good Friday, Twitter closed at $46.66 a share — up $3.50 after being down nearly 2% at the closing bell.
Musk’s offer may be followed by others, perhaps at a premium to what he proposed, a so-called white knight strategy.
While he called his offer “best and final,” he could raise it to compete with other takeover bids.
Saying if Twitter rejects his offer he has a Plan B in mind, he stopped short of explaining it.
In response to the above, Gab.com urged Musk to choose an alternative option.
Calling itself “a social network that champions free speech, individual liberty and the free flow of information online, it said the following:
“Twitter has legacy problems that Gab doesn’t.”
“They are fully dependent on third-party infrastructure. We are not.”
“We ‘built our own, everything…our own servers, our own email services, our own payment processor, and so much more…”
“Hosting, email services, analytics tools, ecommerce, payment processing, all of it. We built it all.”
“(B)ringing free speech to Twitter isn’t as simple as buying it.”
“Apple and Google do not allow free speech, so if you stop the censorship they will kick Twitter from both app stores.”
“We already solved that problem and overcame it.”
“Twitter operates in countries where mass censorship is required by law.”
“They have no choice but to comply with the censorship demands of those countries or risk being shut down, fines, etc.”
“Gab’s business model is not 100% dependent on advertising” like Twitter’s.
Its poison pill strategy reflects opposition to Musk’s takeover bid.
Gab made Musk a counteroffer.
Building its own “everything” fell short of its own ISP to provide internet connections and services.
According to Gab CEO Andrew Musk by letter to Musk:
“(T)o provide a free speech platform you must also have free speech internet infrastructure.”
“I fear that the next big leap of censorship is at the ISP level, with ISP’s blocking access to Gab.com.”
“You solve that problem with Starlink.”
“Together we can build infrastructure for a free speech internet.”
“I am willing to offer you a Board seat along with equity in the company in exchange for you selling your Twitter position and investing $2B into Gab.”
“My offer is my best and final offer.”
“Gab has extraordinary potential. Let’s unlock it together.”
I don’t know if Musk responded to Torba so far.
It remains to be seen if he’s interested, especially since his attempted takeover of Twitter may not succeed.
Google limits what publishers can say about the Ukraine war if they want to stay monetized
By Cindy Harper | Reclaim The Net | April 14, 2022
Google’s Adsense this week sent an email to publishers reminding them of the new policy about monetization of content related to the Russian invasion of Ukraine. Google will not allow publishers to show ads on content that condones the war.
“Due to the war in Ukraine, we will pause monetization of content that exploits, dismisses, or condones the war,” the email read.
“This pause includes, but is not limited to, claims that imply victims are responsible for their own tragedy or similar instances of victim blaming, such as claims that Ukraine is committing genocide or deliberately attacking its own citizens.”
The email was a reminder of a previous policy that stated: “Due to the war in Ukraine, we will pause monetization of content that exploits, dismisses, or condones the war.”
If a publisher insists on posting content that condones the war, Google ads will be removed from such pages, and Google has a monopoly on website advertising infrastructure.
“Google helps to enable a free and open web by helping publishers monetize their content and advertisers reach prospective customers with useful, relevant products and services,” the policy states. “Maintaining trust in the ads ecosystem requires setting limits on what we will monetize.”
Failure to comply with the policy could result in a publisher’s monetization being terminated.
“Failure to comply with these policies may result in Google blocking ads from appearing against your content, or suspending or terminating your account,” the policy says.
Western Dissent from US/NATO Policy on Ukraine is Small, Yet the Censorship Campaign is Extreme
Preventing us from asking who benefits from a protracted proxy war, and who pays the price, is paramount. A closed propaganda system achieves that.
By Glenn Greenwald | April 13, 2022
If one wishes to be exposed to news, information or perspective that contravenes the prevailing US/NATO view on the war in Ukraine, a rigorous search is required. And there is no guarantee that search will succeed. That is because the state/corporate censorship regime that has been imposed in the West with regard to this war is stunningly aggressive, rapid and comprehensive.
On a virtually daily basis, any off-key news agency, independent platform or individual citizen is liable to be banished from the internet. In early March, barely a week after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, the twenty-seven nation European Union — citing “disinformation” and “public order and security” — officially banned the Russian state-news outlets RT and Sputnik from being heard anywhere in Europe. In what Reuters called “an unprecedented move,” all television and online platforms were barred by force of law from airing content from those two outlets. Even prior to that censorship order from the state, Facebook and Google were already banning those outlets, and Twitter immediately announced they would as well, in compliance with the new EU law.
But what was “unprecedented” just six weeks ago has now become commonplace, even normalized. Any platform devoted to offering inconvenient-to-NATO news or alternative perspectives is guaranteed a very short lifespan. Less than two weeks after the EU’s decree, Google announced that it was voluntarily banning all Russian-affiliated media worldwide, meaning Americans and all other non-Europeans were now blocked from viewing those channels on YouTube if they wished to. As so often happens with Big Tech censorship, much of the pressure on Google to more aggressively censor content about the war in Ukraine came from its own workforce: “Workers across Google had been urging YouTube to take additional punitive measures against Russian channels.”
So prolific and fast-moving is this censorship regime that it is virtually impossible to count how many platforms, agencies and individuals have been banished for the crime of expressing views deemed “pro-Russian.” On Tuesday, Twitter, with no explanation as usual, suddenly banned one of the most informative, reliable and careful dissident accounts, named “Russians With Attitude.” Created in late 2020 by two English-speaking Russians, the account exploded in popularity since the start of the war, from roughly 20,000 followers before the invasion to more than 125,000 followers at the time Twitter banned it. An accompanying podcast with the same name also exploded in popularity and, at least as of now, can still be heard on Patreon.
What makes this outburst of Western censorship so notable — and what is at least partially driving it — is that there is a clear, demonstrable hunger in the West for news and information that is banished by Western news sources, ones which loyally and unquestioningly mimic claims from the U.S. government, NATO, and Ukrainian officials. As The Washington Post acknowledged when reporting Big Tech’s “unprecedented” banning of RT, Sputnik and other Russian sources of news: “In the first four days of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, viewership of more than a dozen Russian state-backed propaganda channels on YouTube spiked to unusually high levels.”
Note that this censorship regime is completely one-sided and, as usual, entirely aligned with U.S. foreign policy. Western news outlets and social media platforms have been flooded with pro-Ukrainian propaganda and outright lies from the start of the war. A New York Times article from early March put it very delicately in its headline: “Fact and Mythmaking Blend in Ukraine’s Information War.” Axios was similarly understated in recognizing this fact: “Ukraine misinformation is spreading — and not just from Russia.” Members of the U.S. Congress have gleefully spread fabrications that went viral to millions of people, with no action from censorship-happy Silicon Valley corporations. That is not a surprise: all participants in war use disinformation and propaganda to manipulate public opinion in their favor, and that certainly includes all direct and proxy-war belligerents in the war in Ukraine.
Yet there is little to no censorship — either by Western states or by Silicon Valley monopolies — of pro-Ukrainian disinformation, propaganda and lies. The censorship goes only in one direction: to silence any voices deemed “pro-Russian,” regardless of whether they spread disinformation. The “Russians With Attitude” Twitter account became popular in part because they sometimes criticized Russia, in part because they were more careful with facts and viral claims that most U.S. corporate media outlets, and in part because there is such a paucity of outlets that are willing to offer any information that undercuts what the U.S. Government and NATO want you to believe about the war.
Their crime, like the crime of so many other banished accounts, was not disinformation but skepticism about the US/NATO propaganda campaign. Put another way, it is not “disinformation” but rather viewpoint-error that is targeted for silencing. One can spread as many lies and as much disinformation as one wants provided that it is designed to advance the NATO agenda in Ukraine (just as one is free to spread disinformation provided that its purpose is to strengthen the Democratic Party, which wields its majoritarian power in Washington to demand greater censorship and commands the support of most of Silicon Valley). But what one cannot do is question the NATO/Ukrainian propaganda framework without running a very substantial risk of banishment.
It is unsurprising that Silicon Valley monopolies exercise their censorship power in full alignment with the foreign policy interests of the U.S. Government. Many of the key tech monopolies — such as Google and Amazon — routinely seek and obtain highly lucrative contracts with the U.S. security state, including both the CIA and NSA. Their top executives enjoy very close relationships with top Democratic Party officials. And Congressional Democrats have repeatedly hauled tech executives before their various Committees to explicitly threaten them with legal and regulatory reprisals if they do not censor more in accordance with the policy goals and political interests of that party.
But one question lingers: why is there so much urgency about silencing the small pockets of dissenting voices about the war in Ukraine? This war has united the establishment wings of both parties and virtually the entire corporate media with a lockstep consensus not seen since the days and weeks after the 9/11 attack. One can count on both hands the number of prominent political and media figures who have been willing to dissent even minimally from that bipartisan Washington consensus — dissent that instantly provokes vilification in the form of attacks on one’s patriotism and loyalties. Why is there such fear of allowing these isolated and demonized voices to be heard at all?
The answer seems clear. The benefits from this war for multiple key Washington power centers cannot be overstated. The billions of dollars in aid and weapons being sent by the U.S. to Ukraine are flying so fast and with such seeming randomness that it is difficult to track. “Biden approves $350 million in military aid for Ukraine,” Reuters said on February 26; “Biden announces $800 million in military aid for Ukraine,” announced The New York Times on March 16; on March 30, NBC’s headline read: “Ukraine to receive additional $500 million in aid from U.S., Biden announces”; on Tuesday, Reuters announced: “U.S. to announce $750 million more in weapons for Ukraine, officials say.” By design, these gigantic numbers have long ago lost any meaning and provoke barely a peep of questioning let alone objection.
It is not a mystery who is benefiting from this orgy of military spending. On Tuesday, Reuters reported that “the Pentagon will host leaders from the top eight U.S. weapons manufacturers on Wednesday to discuss the industry’s capacity to meet Ukraine’s weapons needs if the war with Russia lasts years.” Among those participating in this meeting about the need to increase weapons manufacturing to feed the proxy war in Ukraine is Raytheon, which is fortunate to have retired General Lloyd Austin as Defense Secretary, a position to which he ascended from the Raytheon Board of Directors. It is virtually impossible to imagine an event more favorable to the weapons manufacturer industry than this war in Ukraine:
Demand for weapons has shot up after Russia’s invasion on Feb. 24 spurred U.S. and allied weapons transfers to Ukraine. Resupplying as well as planning for a longer war is expected to be discussed at the meeting, the sources told Reuters on condition of anonymity. . .
Resupplying as well as planning for a longer war is expected to be discussed at the meeting. . . The White House said last week that it has provided more than $1.7 billion in security assistance to Ukraine since the invasion, including over 5,000 Javelins and more than 1,400 Stingers.
This permanent power faction is far from the only one to be reaping benefits from the war in Ukraine and to have its fortunes depend upon prolonging the war as long as possible. The union of the U.S. security state, Democratic Party neocons, and their media allies has not been riding this high since the glory days of 2002. One of MSNBC’s most vocal DNC boosters, Chris Hayes, gushed that the war in Ukraine has revitalized faith and trust in the CIA and intelligence community more than any event in recent memory — deservedly so, he said: “The last few weeks have been like the Iraq War in reverse for US intelligence.” One can barely read a mainstream newspaper or watch a corporate news outlet without seeing the nation’s most bloodthirsty warmongering band of neocons — David Frum, Bill Kristol, Liz Cheney, Wesley Clark, Anne Applebaum, Adam Kinzinger — being celebrated as wise experts and heroic warriors for freedom.
This war has been very good indeed for the permanent Washington political and media class. And although it was taboo for weeks to say so, it is now beyond clear that the only goal that the U.S. and its allies have when it comes to the war in Ukraine is to keep it dragging on for as long as possible. Not only are there no serious American diplomatic efforts to end the war, but the goal is to ensure that does not happen. They are now saying that explicitly, and it is not hard to understand why.
The benefits from endless quagmire in Ukraine are as immense as they are obvious. The military budget skyrockets. Punishment is imposed on the arch-nemesis of the Democratic Party — Russia and Putin — while they are bogged down in a war from which Ukrainians suffer most. The citizenry unites behind their leaders and is distracted.
UK censorship bill will impact small, independent media outlets while giving large media outlets a pass
By Tom Parker | Reclaim The Net | April 11, 2022
The UK government is currently pushing a sweeping online censorship bill, the Online Safety Bill, which will force tech giants to censor content based on the vague, subjective term “harm.”
One of the government’s main arguments when attempting to defend these controversial censorship requirements has been that “news content will be completely exempt from any regulation under the Bill.” However, the rules that govern these exemptions are written in a way that favors large media outlets and makes it difficult for small, independent outlets to qualify.
For starters, the state-funded media outlets the BBC and Sianel Pedwar Cymru (S4C) automatically qualify as “recognised news publishers” – the standard that determines whether a publisher is exempt from the bill’s regulations.
Other outlets need to either hold a license under the Broadcasting Act 1990 or 1996 or meet numerous conditions which include “publishing news-related material that is created by different persons,” having a registered office or business address in the UK, making the name and address of the outlet’s owner public, being subject to a standards code and editorial control, and having a complaints procedure.
Obtaining a license under the Broadcasting Act 1990 or 1996 creates additional costs for small outlets, such as the £2,500 ($3,300) license application fee and the minimum annual license fee of £1,000, ($1,320). It also gives Ofcom the power to decide which outlets can get a license.
The provision for news-related materials from non-license holders to be created by “different persons” also prevents individual journalists from qualifying as recognized news publishers. Furthermore, the requirement for non-license holders to make their name and address public shuts out anonymous or pseudonymous publishers from these recognized news publisher exemptions.
Additionally, these non-license holder conditions create additional compliance burdens which disproportionately impact smaller news outlets with fewer staff and resources.
The disproportionate impact this censorship bill has on small, independent media outlets is just one of the many areas of concern. The bill also includes proposals that will jail people whose posts cause “psychological harm” with “no reasonable excuse,” tasks Big Tech with deciding when something is “illegal” or “fraudulent,” and more.
…..
You can get a full overview of all the free speech and privacy threats posed by the Online Safety Bill here.
You can see a full copy of the full Online Safety Bill here.
The bill is currently making its way through Parliament and you can track its progress here.
Twitter is questioned over Hunter Biden laptop story censorship
By Christina Maas | Reclaim The Net | April 11, 2022
In October 2020, just before the election, the New York Post published a story about Hunter Biden’s potentially corrupt dealings when his father, Joe Biden, was vice president. The story was based on damning emails obtained from a laptop Hunter left at a repair shop in Delaware.
Twitter censored the story over the “origins of the material” and suspended the New York Post’s account for two weeks. The online platforms also prevented users from sharing the story.
A few weeks ago, The New York Times confirmed the authenticity of what the New York Post called the “laptop from hell.”
Now, Republican members of the House Election Integrity Caucus, led by Rep. Claudia Tenney, in a letter addressed to Twitter CEO Parag Agrawal, are asking for answers about the censorship of the story.
“Big Tech oligarchs have grown far too powerful, censoring free speech that challenges their preferred narrative and their handpicked politicians,” Tenney told FOX Business. “In 2020, this reached a new low.”
“Twitter’s actions to silence the New York Post and others undoubtedly swayed the outcome of the presidential election. The free flow of information is key to a healthy democracy and to free and fair elections. Congress must be unequivocal in its response and hold Big Tech accountable.”
The Republicans want Twitter to “provide answers to the American people.” They also want Congress to “break up big tech, take an axe to Section 230, and ensure Silicon Valley elites can no longer interfere in our elections.”
They argue that the laptop contained damning emails that could have worked in President Trump’s favor.
“The laptop reportedly contained damning emails from Hunter Biden, showing how he exploited his connections to his then-vice president father to further his own career interests, leveraged his connections for massive paychecks from foreign entities, and much more,” the lawmakers wrote.
“Twitter then suspended the New York Post’s account for more than two weeks and blocked users from sharing the article because of what it called concerns about the ‘origins of the material.”
They added that the suspension prevented people from “reading a news article that could have had serious consequences for the presidential election.”
The New York Times confirming the authenticity of the laptop has “renewed concern over Twitter’s interference in a presidential election,” according to the lawmakers.
In the letter, the legislators demand answers to several questions from Agrawal, including who “made the decision to censor the New York Post’s story on Hunter Biden’s ‘laptop from hell.’” They also want to know if Twitter collaborated “with any individuals directly or indirectly involved with the Biden campaign” when it censored the story.
Putting Big Pharma on Trial in the COVID-19 Era, Part 4
The Hypocrisy of “Misinformation”
By Rebecca Strong · February 16, 2022
I find it interesting that “misinformation” has become such a pervasive term lately, but more alarmingly, that it’s become an excuse for blatant censorship on social media and in journalism. It’s impossible not to wonder what’s driving this movement to control the narrative. In a world where we still very clearly don’t have all the answers, why shouldn’t we be open to exploring all the possibilities? And while we’re on the subject, what about all of the COVID-related untruths that have been spread by our leaders and officials? Why should they get a free pass?
Fauci, President Biden, and the CDC’s Rochelle Walensky all promised us with total confidence the vaccine would prevent us from getting or spreading COVID, something we now know is a myth. (In fact, the CDC recently had to change its very definition of “vaccine ” to promise “protection” from a disease rather than “immunity”— an important distinction). At one point, the New York State Department of Health (NYS DOH) and former Governor Andrew Cuomo prepared a social media campaign with misleading messaging that the vaccine was “approved by the FDA” and “went through the same rigorous approval process that all vaccines go through,” when in reality the FDA only authorized the vaccines under an EUA, and the vaccines were still undergoing clinical trials. While the NYS DOH eventually responded to pressures to remove these false claims, a few weeks later the Department posted on Facebook that “no serious side effects related to the vaccines have been reported,” when in actuality, roughly 16,000 reports of adverse events and over 3,000 reports of serious adverse events related to a COVID-19 vaccination had been reported in the first two months of use.
One would think we’d hold the people in power to the same level of accountability — if not more — than an average citizen. So, in the interest of avoiding hypocrisy, should we “cancel” all these experts and leaders for their “misinformation,” too?
Vaccine-hesitant people have been fired from their jobs, refused from restaurants, denied the right to travel and see their families, banned from social media channels, and blatantly shamed and villainized in the media. Some have even lost custody of their children. These people are frequently labeled “anti-vax,” which is misleading given that many (like the NBA’s Jonathan Isaac) have made it repeatedly clear they are not against all vaccines, but simply making a personal choice not to get this one. (As such, I’ll suggest switching to a more accurate label: “pro-choice.”) Fauci has repeatedly said federally mandating the vaccine would not be “appropriate” or “enforceable” and doing so would be “encroaching upon a person’s freedom to make their own choice.” So it’s remarkable that still, some individual employers and U.S. states, like my beloved Massachusetts, have taken it upon themselves to enforce some of these mandates, anyway. Meanwhile, a Feb. 7 bulletin posted by the U.S. Department of Homeland Security indicates that if you spread information that undermines public trust in a government institution (like the CDC or FDA), you could be considered a terrorist. In case you were wondering about the current state of free speech.
The definition of institutional oppression is “the systematic mistreatment of people within a social identity group, supported and enforced by the society and its institutions, solely based on the person’s membership in the social identity group.” It is defined as occurring when established laws and practices “systematically reflect and produce inequities based on one’s membership in targeted social identity groups.” Sound familiar?
As you continue to watch the persecution of the unvaccinated unfold, remember this. Historically, when society has oppressed a particular group of people whether due to their gender, race, social class, religious beliefs, or sexuality, it’s always been because they pose some kind of threat to the status quo. The same is true for today’s unvaccinated. Since we know the vaccine doesn’t prevent the spread of COVID, however, this much is clear: the unvaccinated don’t pose a threat to the health and safety of their fellow citizens — but rather, to the bottom line of powerful pharmaceutical giants and the many global organizations they finance. And with more than $100 billion on the line in 2021 alone, I can understand the motivation to silence them.
The unvaccinated have been called selfish. Stupid. Fauci has said it’s “almost inexplicable” that they are still resisting. But is it? What if these people aren’t crazy or uncaring, but rather have — unsurprisingly so — lost their faith in the agencies that are supposed to protect them? Can you blame them?
Citizens are being bullied into getting a vaccine that was created, evaluated, and authorized in under a year, with no access to the bulk of the safety data for said vaccine, and no rights whatsoever to pursue legal action if they experience adverse effects from it. What these people need right now is to know they can depend on their fellow citizens to respect their choices, not fuel the segregation by launching a full-fledged witch hunt. Instead, for some inexplicable reason I imagine stems from fear, many continue rallying around big pharma rather than each other. A 2022 Heartland Institute and Rasmussen Reports survey of Democratic voters found that 59% of respondents support a government policy requiring unvaccinated individuals to remain confined in their home at all times, 55% support handing a fine to anyone who won’t get the vaccine, and 48% think the government should flat out imprison people who publicly question the efficacy of the vaccines on social media, TV, or online in digital publications. Even Orwell couldn’t make this stuff up.
Photo credit: DJ Paine on Unsplash
Let me be very clear. While there are a lot of bad actors out there — there are also a lot of well-meaning people in the science and medical industries, too. I’m lucky enough to know some of them. There are doctors who fend off pharma reps’ influence and take an extremely cautious approach to prescribing. Medical journal authors who fiercely pursue transparency and truth — as is evident in “The Influence of Money on Medical Science,” a report by the first female editor of JAMA. Pharmacists, like Dan Schneider, who refuse to fill prescriptions they deem risky or irresponsible. Whistleblowers, like Graham and Jackson, who tenaciously call attention to safety issues for pharma products in the approval pipeline. And I’m certain there are many people in the pharmaceutical industry, like Panara and my grandfather, who pursued this field with the goal of helping others, not just earning a six- or seven-figure salary. We need more of these people. Sadly, it seems they are outliers who exist in a corrupt, deep-rooted system of quid-pro-quo relationships. They can only do so much.
I’m not here to tell you whether or not you should get the vaccine or booster doses. What you put in your body is not for me — or anyone else — to decide. It’s not a simple choice, but rather one that may depend on your physical condition, medical history, age, religious beliefs, and level of risk tolerance. My grandfather passed away in 2008, and lately, I find myself missing him more than ever, wishing I could talk to him about the pandemic and hear what he makes of all this madness. I don’t really know how he’d feel about the COVID vaccine, or whether he would have gotten it or encouraged me to. What I do know is that he’d listen to my concerns, and he’d carefully consider them. He would remind me my feelings are valid. His eyes would light up and he’d grin with amusement as I fervidly expressed my frustration. He’d tell me to keep pushing forward, digging deeper, asking questions. In his endearing Bronx accent, he used to always say: “go get ‘em, kid.” If I stop typing for a moment and listen hard enough, I can almost hear him saying it now.
People keep saying “trust the science.” But when trust is broken, it must be earned back. And as long as our legislative system, public health agencies, physicians, and research journals keep accepting pharmaceutical money (with strings attached) — and our justice system keeps letting these companies off the hook when their negligence causes harm, there’s no reason for big pharma to change. They’re holding the bag, and money is power.
I have a dream that one day, we’ll live in a world where we are armed with all the thorough, unbiased data necessary to make informed decisions about our health. Alas, we’re not even close. What that means is that it’s up to you to educate yourself as much as possible, and remain ever-vigilant in evaluating information before forming an opinion. You can start by reading clinical trials yourself, rather than relying on the media to translate them for you. Scroll to the bottom of every single study to the “conflicts of interest” section and find out who funded it. Look at how many subjects were involved. Confirm whether or not blinding was used to eliminate bias. You may also choose to follow Public Citizen’s Health Research Group’s rule whenever possible: that means avoiding a new drug until five years after an FDA approval (not an EUA, an actual approval) — when there’s enough data on the long-term safety and effectiveness to establish that the benefits outweigh the risks. When it comes to the news, you can seek out independent, nonprofit outlets, which are less likely to be biased due to pharma funding. And most importantly, when it appears an organization is making concerted efforts to conceal information from you — like the FDA recently did with the COVID vaccine — it’s time to ask yourself: why? What are they trying to hide?
In the 2019 film “Dark Waters” — which is based on the true story of one of the greatest corporate cover-ups in American history — Mark Ruffalo as attorney Rob Bilott says: “The system is rigged. They want us to think it’ll protect us, but that’s a lie. We protect us. We do. Nobody else. Not the companies. Not the scientists. Not the government. Us.”
Words to live by.
Unless FullFact.org Says So Then It’s Not True, The UK Government Advises
By Rhoda Wilson – The Exposé – April 7, 2022
Most of us are aware that it’s not only online but also things published by corporate media that aren’t always what they seem. However, a major difference between government or corporate media reports and independent or citizen reports shared online, is the latter allows for public discourse and open debate, providing they are not censored, while corporate media and their fact-checking services do not – they prefer a top-down “above all” approach.
Denying public debate negates the all-important diversity of thought in a liberal and democratic society. Silencing counterarguments that challenge their preferred storyline enables governments and corporate media to create a one-sided narrative. A narrative that, left unchallenged, moves further and further away from the truth. But here’s a fact that you will not find on either GOV.UK or Full Fact: a lie cannot become truth, no matter how often it is repeated.
The SHAREChecklist attempts to provide advice on what to share and what not to share apparently for the good of others. Information that does not originate from their sources could be “harmful to share with our friends and families,” the UK government claims.
It’s important to understand that we, the people, are in the midst of an information war. One which began in earnest at the start of 2020. A battle in the public space for complete and truthful information while governments and their advisors attempt to manipulate our perceptions and behaviours so we obey their instructions, without question, even when those instructions prove to be harmful.
Even the most trusting know that governments and politicians hide the truth, manipulate the truth and even outright lie – it’s merely the extent that varies. We know that governments use mass media – television, radio and online – as tools to roll out their narratives to the public en masse. Additional government tools include initiatives such as their SHAREChecklist campaign.
At the very least corporate media is biased but as they sink deeper into an ever-narrowing storyline it is becoming apparent that reports are being manufactured and that they are activists seeking to implement an agenda, they are not journalists.
Fact-checking services do not provide facts they provide opinions. Last year, Facebook admitted in court that its “fact checks” are nothing more than statements of opinion. Not experts’ opinions but those of the “fact-checkers.” And self-described “fact-checkers” are not independent. They are dependent on donations from large corporations, the same corporations that work to craft a narrative and silence public debate through censorship.
The SHAREChecklist
As we work through the checklist what will become apparent is that in no way does the government advise, or even so much as hint at encouraging: critical thinking, comparing a variety of sources, open dialogue or debate. The checklist leads readers along a path to following a narrative set by a centralised coterie – the government or whoever is “advising” them.
The Government’s first bit of advice is to “make sure information comes from a trusted source.” This is common sense and something we should all be doing, and most likely instinctively are. What each of us believes are “trusted sources” is decisive.
A source that has been proven to lie without remorse is not a source to be trusted. Any source that consistently and persistently promotes Covid injections as “safe and effective” and so roll up your sleeve for another shot, for example, is not to be trusted. Within these sources, the lies are pathological and systemic. Such a source – the BBC, SAGE or UK government, for example – does not suddenly and inexplicably switch from being wanton liars to being truthful.
The second bit of advice the Government has to offer is to read beyond the headline – yet more common sense. A headline cannot contain all the substantive information that an article contains.
Additionally, clickbait headlines, for example, are common practice in all forms of media. To avoid a knee jerk response to the attention-seeking text we should not take an article, or post online, at its headline. Corporate media, as with marketing agencies, are particularly adept at clickbait headlines, texts and thumbnails. And, of course, the UK government has SPI-B and the Nudge Unit to advise them on how to use psychology to maximise public “engagement” and “cooperation.” The checkmark or tick symbol incorporated into the SHAREChecklist logo is an example of typical Nudge Unit behavioural psychology.
Again, in its third bit of advice, the Government advises some additional common sense: “check the facts.” What is notable about this point is that, according to the UK government, there are a limited number of sources that provide these “facts.” Actually, there are only two: themselves, of course, and “fact-checkers,” namely Full Fact.
The BBC frequently and repeatedly tells its viewers that it is a trusted source, bringing you the all facts. Yet, SHAREChecklist does not recommend them as a source to “check the facts.” This may or may not be an indication of how the Government views BBC’s “fact-based” reporting or, possibly, recognition that the public has, by and large, lost its trust in the BBC.
Taking on board the first two bits of advice – “trusted source” and “read beyond the headline,” in this case the Government’s headline – we take a brief look at the Government recommended “fact-checker” Full Fact later in this article.
The fourth bit of the Government’s advice is as true for images and videos shared online as it is for images and videos shown on television. There have been many examples of dubious images and videos published by corporate media over the past two years that deserve to be questioned. There is no source of information, “official” or unofficial, that we should not test for accuracy and reliability. Stay sceptical. Criticism is not only legitimate, it is necessary.
The final bit of advice the Government gives is that typos could be an indication that the information is false. How are those with dyslexia or learning difficulties supposed to feel reading that? For those who find it hard to express their thoughts and ideas in writing, you’re in good company. While Albert Einstein loved mathematics and science, he disliked grammar and had problems with spelling.
After singling out typos, then comes the sneaky bit: “official guidance” – in other words, the Government’s or the centralised coterie’s guidance – has been “carefully checked” presumably for spelling and grammatical errors. So naturally, the Government’s typo-free publications must be true – of course! On that basis, if you want to avoid being censored download Grammarly now!
Who Is Full Fact?
Full Fact’s website states: “We’re developing world-leading technology and new research to spot repeated claims, and find out how bad information can be tackled at a global scale. And we campaign for change that will make bad information rarer and less harmful.”
Who are the people and organisations behind Full Fact? Who are they campaigning for? Who is determining what information is “bad”?
In 2012, UK Column published an article about Full Fact, ‘Faux Facts – The disturbing Truth About fullfact.org’, digging a little deeper into “this interesting little non-profit company, headed by Tory Party donor and Anne Freud Centre Chairman Michael Samuel.”
In 2019 Daily Mail wrote that Full Fact was at the centre of an election row with the Tories and was forced to defend its credibility after it stepped into a social media war after an election debate between Jeremy Corbyn and Boris Johnson. Daily Mail quoted Dominic Raab: “Who said Final Fact is the final arbiter of what the public gets to see as the truth? There’s no god-given right, set in law.”
“Foundations set up by eBay creator Pierre Omidyar and left-wing investor George Soros have also joined tech giants in giving six-figure sums to London-based Full Fact along with thousands of unnamed individual donors paying between £25 and £5,000 each,” Daily Mail reported.
A 2021 article published in The Critic noted the board of trustees included Labour peer Baroness Janet Royall, Lib-Dem peer Lord John Sharkey and former Conservative Party member Lord Richard Inglewood. These three peers are still trustees and Michael Samuel is still chairman.
The Critic article goes on to note that Full Fact is a charity with a small output of research compared to its size, funded primarily by big-tech and staffed to a large extent by former public sector workers or ex-reporters from left-wing media. “Full Fact’s website reports that they were paid £1.1 million by Facebook and £206,500 by Google in 2019, plus a monthly payment of £7,300 worth of free advertising by the search giant. The funding by big-tech in 2019 makes up roughly 70% of their declared funding for the year,” The Critic wrote.
As you can see for yourself in the table below Full Fact is still predominantly funded, and so their opinions are influenced, by the notorious online censor organisations – Facebook, which includes WhatsApp, and Google, which includes YouTube. In 2021, almost 40% of Full Fact’s “donations” came from Facebook and Google.
Full Fact Funders 2021
Full Fact does not pass the government’s SHAREChecklist test and, according to UK government advice, their articles may be “harmful” if shared with friends and families – do not share them.
| Full Fact Funding 2021 retrieved 6 April 2022 | ||
| £305,119.64 | Third Party Fact Checking programme | |
| £116,352.14 | Framework for collaboration during misinformation crises | |
| £59,634.83 | Health fellowship | |
| Hundreds of individual donors and gift aid | £370,148.00 | Core funding |
| Mohn Westlake Foundation | £250,000.00 | Core funding |
| Google AI for Good Impact Challenge | £235,222.77 | Automated fact checking |
| Nuffield Foundation | £100,000.00 | Fact checking and annual report |
| Luminate | £75,789.87 | Core funding |
| Esmée Fairbairn Foundation | £68,333.33 | Core funding |
| £61,809.84 | WhatsApp fact checking service | |
| International Fact Checking Network & WhatsApp | £53,737.20 | Vaccine Grant Program |
| Baillie Gifford | £50,000.00 | Core funding |
| John Ellerman Foundation | £50,000.00 | Core funding |
| Joseph Rowntree Charitable Trust | £50,000.00 | Core funding |
| The Buchanan Programme | £49,801.68 | Core funding |
| The Dulverton Trust | £35,000.00 | Core funding |
| Gill Family Foundation | £30,000.00 | Core funding |
| James Padolsey | £30,000.00 | Core funding |
| International Fact Checking Network & National Endowment for Democracy | £26,576.58 | Fact-Checkers Working Together Research Program |
| Colefax Charitable Trust | £25,000.00 | Core funding |
| The M J Samuel Charitable Trust | £17,500.00 | Core funding |
| International Fact Checking Network & YouTube | £17,064.56 | Fact Checking Development Grant |
| Highway One Trust | £10,000.00 | Policy team |
| William de Winton | £10,000.00 | Core funding |
| Reed Foundation | £9,000.00 | Core funding |
| Good Thinking Society | £8,000.00 | Core funding |
| Dorothy Bishop | £6,000.00 | Core funding |
| Cecil Pilkington Charitable Trust | £5,000.00 | Core funding |
| Tinsley Charitable Trust | £5,000.00 | Core funding |
Facebook is accused of censoring criticism of Black Lives Matter spending
By Didi Rankovic | Reclaim The Net | April 10, 2022
Facebook is being accused of censoring any information that paints the Black Lives Matter (BLM) movement in a negative light – and doing that regardless of the merit and accuracy of those reports.
BLM rose to prominence in the wake of the killing of George Floyd in 2020, when many Americans chose to donate money to this organization as a way of supporting initiatives geared towards strengthening racial justice.
The movement was raising money with that promise. But reports have in the meantime suggested that not all of the $66.5 million in donations received by October 2020 was actually used for that purpose.
On Monday, the New York Post ran a story, based on an Intelligencer report, about BLM leaders using these donation funds to buy a $6 million house in California. Facebook’s reaction was to censor the article, preventing it from being shared, and slap the “abusive” label on it.
The real estate listing said it was a 6,500-square-foot home with more than six bedrooms and bathrooms, a pool and parking for more than 20 cars, and it was purchased in October 2020 by BLM co-founder Patrisse Cullors’ consulting firm’s financial manager Dyane Pascall.
The ownership of the property was transferred to an LLC in Delaware, ensuring that “the ultimate identity of the property’s new owner was not disclosed to the public,” the report said.
The house was seen in the background of a video Cullors and two other BLM leaders posted on the anniversary of Floyd’s death last June. The video shows Cullors complaining of being “in survival mode” because of a previous report into yet more BLM real estate purchases – the Post’s April article said Cullors had bought four high-end houses worth $3.2 million.
Reason writes that it’s unclear why Facebook is trying to hide this information – “unless it sees its role as merely running interference for political allies, hiding credible journalism when it’s damning to them.”
The New York Post has been no stranger to suppression of its reporting over the years – on Facebook, and other giant social networks like Twitter. Their stories about the possibility that the Covid pandemic was the result of a lab leak, and the Hunter Biden laptop reporting both faced various forms of censorship on these platforms – only to later be vindicated.
Senator Klobuchar refuses to answer whether “misinformation” bill will ban saying “there are only two sexes”
By Tom Parker | Reclaim The Net | April 8, 2022
During her appearance at the “Disinformation and Erosion of Democracy” conference, Senator Amy Klobuchar refused to answer a question about whether her Health Misinformation Act would result in the statement “there are only two sexes, male and female” being banned from Big Tech platforms.
Klobuchar’s bill was introduced in July 2021 and would reduce the scope of the civil liability immunity online platforms receive under Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act if passed.
Currently, Section 230 gives online platforms and other “interactive computer services” immunity from civil liability if they act in “good faith” to restrict access to content that they or their users deem to be “obscene” or “objectionable.” Klobuchar’s bill would remove this immunity for platforms that use algorithms to promote “health misinformation” that’s “related to an existing public health emergency, as declared by the Secretary of Health and Human Services.”
At the Disinformation and Erosion of Democracy conference, Evita Duffy, co-founder and managing editor of The Chicago Thinker, pressed Klobuchar on how health misinformation would be defined under this bill.
“If I were to say that there are only two sexes, male and female, would that be considered misinformation that you think should be banned speech on social media platforms?” Duffy said.
Klobuchar responded by refusing to address the question.
“I’m not going to get into what misinformation,” Klobuchar said.
Klobuchar continued by insisting that the bill applies specifically to “vaccine misinformation” in a “public health crisis.”
While Klobuchar claimed that the bill is limited to so-called vaccine misinformation, the Health Misinformation Act’s proposal to amend Section 230 doesn’t actually mention vaccine misinformation. Instead, it proposes that providers of online platforms should be “treated as the publisher or speaker of health misinformation… if the provider promotes that health misinformation through an algorithm.”
Additionally, health misinformation isn’t defined in the bill; the power to define this pivotal term is handed over to the Secretary of Health and Human Services who will consult with “the heads of other relevant federal agencies and outside experts” when coming up with the definition.
The bill didn’t have the support of a single Republican when it was announced. Center-left tech policy activism group Chamber of Progress also warned that Democrats would “regret” the bill and that it would “turn future Republican Presidents into the speech police.”
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Book Review
The Voters’ Self-Induced Matrix
By Jeb Smith | The Libertarian Institute | April 20, 2026
In Collective Illusions: Conformity, Complicity, and the Science of Why We Make Bad Decisions, Professor Todd Rose explains that to belong to a group, people “keep twisting [themselves] into pretzels, trying to conform to what we falsely believe everyone else expects of us.” Seeking acceptance from the group, we conform in language, behavior, beliefs, and practices. As a result, we lose our individuality and aggregate into herds. Within our group we create an alternate reality to fit whichever collective mindset we attach ourselves to, and interpret the world through those lenses—our innate desire to belong overrides reality.
Rose says these illusions “have become a defining feature of our modern society.” In other words, the collectivist mindset is a great conduit for spreading illusions; thus, it is the politician’s favored form of governance.
Rose points to studies in psychology and neuroscience showing we delude ourselves into believing what the majority does, even if it is not what we desire or know to be accurate. … continue
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