05-09-2022, 08:18 PM
(05-09-2022, 07:44 PM)Dill Wrote: Look at the sudden jump in your post from "guidance...on how to handle disinformation regarding national security" to the power to "silence . . . the ability to expose any of his illicit dealings" and "to quash Ukrainian and Russia-gate stories in their infancies."
I can easily imagine Trump or whatever Repub wins in 2024 canceling Biden's DoDis as easy as he pulled us out of the Iran Deal, the Paris Agreement, and the TPP.
What I cannot imagine is such a dept. being able to "quash Ukrainian and /Russia-gate stories." That would require very tight control of Congress and the Judiciary too, not to mention the DOJ--all enlisted in directly muzzling the press.
We the people have ALREADY given those three institutions that worrisome power to "potentially" silence and "quash," but you think a little DHS department would somehow overwhelm them? That's possible only if you have a regime party in control of all three branches of government, which we have never had yet, but certainly could if people don't start recognizing disinformation as itself a threat to speech and many other freedoms. THAT is the worry; not some toothless dept.
No. I don't think it best to ask myself how I'd react if “my guy” wasn't in charge. By which I mean that at the current juncture, the question offers at best no analytic guidance/value, and at worst it invites diversion from a really existing as opposed to fictional threat. A DoDis is not like a law or Senate rule, which requires majorities of elected representatives to put in place or undo, and which both sides must live with beyond momentary advantage for one. Trump or whoever the “other guy” is in 2024, can scrap Biden’s DoDis the moment he gets in office, or swap it out for his own. But the “other side” cannot scrap the DOJ, Congress, or the Supreme Court, or conjure something equally powerful into existence by fiat.
Yet y’all imagine one little DoDis “quashing” all that representative government, checks and balances, and an adversarial press because someone said “Ministry of Truth.”
All my life I have been fine with, or at least tolerated, that in democracies the "other side" gets its turn in office, from local mayor and sheriff all the way up to Congress and president--so long as they obey the same laws and democratic norms my side does. But is that the case right now?
On this thread, #35, I have already answered the question of how I'd react if the other side were in charge of posts with real power. Trump regaining control of the DOJ and DOD*, which he already had for four years, concerns me much more than any DoDis. And his power to "silence" and "quash" has been a function of party refusal to hold him accountable, a party whose power is linked to the maintenance and amplification of disinformation—unless you suppose Biden really did steal the election.
So really, seriously, I cannot get all spun up because Biden is making efforts to address the security threat posed by that disinformation, the far greater threat to free speech if left unchallenged.
*Esper was on MSBC today discussion how Trump wanted to shoot BLM protestors. The DOD staff who pushed back on that, contained him, won't be appointed the next time around, should Trump be re-elected. There's your threat to free speech.
Your position on this is surprisingly short sighted. You don't have to "quash" anything, you just have to officially label it disinformation. Then you get thrown in with the crackpots and conspiracy theorists, for all intents and purposes rendered a side show attraction. You don't have to "quash" anything when you effectively render it an extremist position. This is especially true when you get into the realm of labeling "dis, mis and mal" information as terrorism, with all the government powers to deal with it that this word entails. You're an obviously well educated person who clearly puts a lot of time and effort into forming their opinions. And while I frequently think your opinions are wrong they aren't conjured out of thin air. But you also have a glaring, and for me quite baffling, ability to ignore wrong doing in those who you agree with ideologically. This may be the most glaring example of this to date.
