Out of all the political speeches given in the past five years, this one is by far the most insidious, the most dangerous, and the most concerning.
And it came from former President Barack Hussein Obama.
On Thursday, Obama called for a major crackdown on social media content in order to rid the world of what he deemed “disinformation,” which he later claimed was responsible for the deaths of unvaccinated.
He described himself as “pretty close to a First Amendment absolutist” but immediately clarified that it did not apply to social media companies.
[source: Breitbart]
“The First Amendment is a check on the power of the state. It doesn’t apply to private companies like Facebook and Twitter,” he said, calling for more “value judgments” on content moderation and censorship on social media.
“While content moderation can limit the distribution of clearly dangerous content, it doesn’t go far enough,” Obama added.
Holy S***…
Obama warned that dangerous people were using social media to distract the public.
“People like Putin and Steve Bannon for that matter understand it’s not necessary for people to believe disinformation in order to weaken democratic institutions, you just have to flood the public square with enough raw sewage,” he complained.
Steve Bannon apparently is on par with Vladimir Putin?
The wide variety of content on the coronavirus and vaccines, Obama said, was concerning, as some people chose not to get vaccinated.
“People are dying because of misinformation,” he said.
Obama: "People are dying because of misinformation." pic.twitter.com/1ittJDYEGT
— Greg Price (@greg_price11) April 21, 2022
Obama noted that content moderation by tech companies already exists, but argued for more moderation, even though disinformation is difficult to identify.
“Regulation has to be part of the answer,” Obama said, calling for ways to start “slowing the spread of harmful content” online.
Obama expressed regret that he believed, prior to the 2016 election, that the public could still distinguish fact from fiction on social media, even though he suffered personally and politically from disinformation.
“What does still nag at me was my failure to fully appreciate at the time just how susceptible we had become to lies and conspiracy theories,” he said.
The former president cited the principles in the “Fairness Doctrine,” widely criticized by the conservative movement, to help control what kind of information was allowed in broadcasting. He also called for social media algorithms to be regulated by government inspectors and regulators, just like other industries.
This is by far the most radical speech any politician has given in a very long time.
Essentially, a former President of the United States has just advocated for total government control of the online public square — truly a communist initiative already accomplished by nations like China and North Korea.
Author: Ivan Mnatskenov