Even if he doesn’t wind up buying another share of Twitter stock, he has forced the spotlight on Big Tech censorship in a way that nothing else has, not even the defenestration of Donald Trump.
He has also highlighted the hypocrisy of the bluechecks in two crucial ways: first, they had nothing to say when Jeff Bezos bought the Washington Post but are now screaming how unfair allowing a wealthy person to control a major journalism platform would be.
Second, they have defended Twitter’s censorship on the grounds that it’s a private platform. Okay, so a private person wants to buy it. He’s got the money, and he can do whatever he wants with it, according to what you have been yelling at me for years. Right? It’s a private platform?
Or is it? Maybe it’s quasi-public under California law because it’s so large and such an important venue for speech and journalism.
Or does that theory only apply when someone you DON’T like wants to run it?
"It's a private company!" was obviously never a serious argument. Parler was a private company, too, and they were still attacked and deplatformed. Lefties will say anything they have to in order to gain more power.
The scary thing is - these people truly believe that free speech means only liberal speech. They truly believe that something as simple as an opposing viewpoint, is a threat to democracy.
They've literally lost the true definition of freedom, free speech, capitalism... all the things that have made America the best country on the planet
Like I said earlier, no matter what happens, seeing these pathetic petulant children lose their minds at the possibility they might not be able to censor everything they don't like is absolutely priceless.
I do enjoy your posts Alex - and appreciated your books. I am not on any “social media”(unless this counts?!) and live in an obnoxiously, so called, liberal community on an island on the west coast of Canada. Know that you are touching many elements of society. Thanks for what you are contributing.
When one side stops caring that they spew blatant hypocrisy, it is time to stop believing that there is a conversation to be had and start realizing that there is a war that Musk be won.
Got my fingers crossed he pulls this off. He might be saving the world. You can tell when he wouldn't censor Russia he won't censor anyone. Including the idiot liberals. I will never understand why they think silencing people is ever right. If you have truth on your side, it will be obvious. (Well, I guess that's why, eh?)
Some of the entertainment value of this pageant is watching the second-guessing, the people who are trying to figure out what he's up to...because he's Elon Musk, he's always up to something.
His brain operates 1,000x faster than the average person. He's 75 moves ahead in every chess game.
Personally, because I'm no where near as smart as Musk, I'm enjoying the hysterics of the Twitter-scape along with the tantalizing idea that Musk could tank the company.
I like your take Alex, but here's what I think it's missing: As soon as the leftists-with-money saw Musk's offer, it put the idea in their head to buy it out from under him. Blackrock/Vanguard is purportedly already trying to outbid him, and Blackrock's CEO Larry Fink brags about how he has the power to "force behaviors" and how he is in fact "forcing behaviors" on the population. If he is successful and takes over Twitter, things will get far worse than they are right now and the digital ID/social credit score nightmare scenario will become an almost certainty faster than we can imagine. And of course there are those who regularly point out Musk's penchant for the Luciferian hand signs of the upper level Freemasons, and say he is controlled opposition and his public offer was done on purpose to hand Twitter over to Blackrock. If he truly intends to buy it he wouldn't have said his opening bid was his "best and final offer." And if he pulls out now, things don't stay the same as they were; they get worse when Blackrock takes over.
They are admitting it’s a journalist/ media platform......... if true U look forward to the defamation lawsuits as thousands are slam dunks. Defamation by algorithm....
The funniest part (to me, anyway) of all the sturm and drang today has been watching all the Blueanon types simping for Saudi Arabia after the Kingdom (a major Twitter shareholder, as it turns out) announced that they were rejecting Elon's offer.
Saudi f'ing Arabia!
You know. The guys who send goon squads to murder journalists. That Saudi Arabia.
There is a certain amusement to be had in watching the blue checks that spent the last 2 years shilling about COVID and then Ukraine while pretending to be pro-democracy squealing that if Musk buys Twitter it will become a platform for “right wing Nazis”. Idiots, just don’t realise how stupid they sound outside of their echo chamber. “Sure Musk has built fantastic cars and rockets but he can’t be trusted with our social media platform, it’s literal rocket science, oh…”. Morons, utter morons.
Here is another way Elon has won. If they don't sell to him, then they are really not a capitalistic enterprise--not out to make money. Rather they are an information controller for the left. That is what they are screaming about. Can you imagine if Twitter now has to give equal time to differing viewpoint and those viewpoints won't be censored? It would drive the left nuts. This whole process will help to reveal their hypocrisy.
Your play by play / blow by blow is so entertaining - like a heckler with intelligence or a bemused sportscaster - I’m a fan. Waiting for the house of cards to come tumbling down.
Amen to that Alex. My husband and I were discussing all the options (this would have been a great drinking game, except it was in the morning) and we decided at least he would expose the great dirty underbelly of titter! (oops! I mean twitter!)
The only way Twitter works is as a Utility. Congress carved out this status for them and the other Social Media platforms with the effect that they can't be sued as a Publisher, and this is of course the only way Twitter can work as the Town Square. Elon has not been emphasizing allowing all back on the platform as the most important thing that it is. So I'm hoping, for the sake of the free world, that this will be part of the story and that Elon is successful.
Love it! The problem is usually the same, people simply are not willing to give up what is popular, thus they are willing to take abuse and even falsify their preferences / statements to keep playing the game.
The sad truth is 70M users should have simply stopped using Twitter the moment they deplatformed a President. Not left the platform (though alternatives are needed), but rather, simply stopped for however long it took for the twitter board to wake up and reassess (plus that would drive the share price down for some investor activist to pick it up).
If We the People willfully take abuse, why would our abusers choose to change their ways?
Thank you for using the word "defenestration". I had heard it before but didn't know what it meant untill now, when I looked it up. I guess it's better than the overused deplatforming of Donald Trump, or ejection of Donald Trump from Twitter
How can it be private when it's open for the entire global population? If it is private owned but operated for anyone and everyone to use, that would negate its private function because it is no longer private but worldwide and all inclusive. They don't make you apply and wait until you receive acceptance to join like a private club. It's either run with exclusive private membership or it's open to everyone and thus you cannot change the rules for just few. I've never understood the pick-and-choose Twitter nonsense.
What the elites don’t want us to know is that the backbone of Twitter is the US Gov and the Intelligence Community. If MUSK takes Twitter private this will all be revealed.
No matter who owns Twitter it will remain a place where mostly angry leftists will try to convince you that a man can “transform” into being a woman. Or that communism is a wonderful idea and capitalism doesn’t work. Or that America is racist. Or that cops are racist thugs. Or that AOC is really, really smart. Or that a balding man can look really great in a ponytail or manbun. Or that women look great covered in tattoos. Or that illegal aliens “contribute to our wonderful diversity”
Twitter's woke employees may have just realized that their publicly held private employer is up for sale every morning when the stock market opens. Their jobs are only as secure as the next majority shareholder says they are.
As usual, it`s the insult even to sub par intelligence that's so jarring, like a page right out of Animal Farm. In the absence of any conceivable logic & reason, the Fascist elites have long abandoned any such attempts and now just tell us that we cannot trust our own eyes; yet again, we did not really see what just happened right in front of us. This IS the systematic process of incremental totalitarianism. If we allow it, we get what we accept, just like always in history. The process is just about complete in Canada, where an orderly civil resistance, inspired by the instincts of freedom in some (many, immigrants who fled fascist regimes & know exactly what is happening), was swiftly crushed by the fascist Trudeau regime WITH MAJORITY ACQUIESCENCE/SUPPORT OF ITS OWN CITIZENS. Au Revoir, free Canada. You laid down.
No, that's not a male swimmer you just watched dominate a field of women. You are (offensively) mistaken. It`s in full swing here. Do we have the resolve to squash it in its tracks? We once did. I pray we still do.
Buried lede in the entire story: Twitter, and likely other major SM platforms are backed and funded by the US govt. probably using taxpayer funded server platforms and technology. Just one of the ways they spy on you. Note that the US govt immediately announced an “investigation” into Musk and Tesla as soon as Musk announced his offer. Twitter reported revenue of 5.1 billion in 2021. The cost of running the platform is likely 2-3 times that amount. Where does the rest of the funding come from. I think we know the answer.
If the Twitter Board of Directors, contrary to its fiduciary duty to do what is best for their shareholders, rejects EM's embrace, a liquidation of EM's shares that will coincide with massive short selling of Twitter stock will devastate the share price and that will provide tangible proof of what the BOD thinks of its fiduciary duty.
I am tentatively ecstatic.. feels like there is always another shoe to drop. But I do agree that regardless of outcome the mask is off and they hypocrisy has exposed the Emperor's (lack of) clothes. They are playing checkers with someone playing 3-dimensional chess and they don't even realize it.
One thing I have always been astonished at is the argument that people like Trump or you are "DANGEROUS!!!" These are largely people who would fight tooth and nail to have the right to say whatever they wanted, and yet see no problem putting a gag on anyone else. And as they like to say about content others complain of on any platform, they are free to turn the channel or mute the tweeter. Easy-peasy.
All of them were ecstatic and had nothing but praise for the article in Time Magazine about how a "cabal" of powerful people in tech and government came together to "fortify" the 2020 election, ensuring the "right" outcome. It's nauseating.
What I think it really exposes, though, is the very real contempt the "elites" have for the rest of the population. They feel entitled to control what everyone else sees and hears and knows because they know best. But if they really did have confidence in their positions they would not be bothered by people challenging them, because the best ideas win out in the end. They think that those not in their bubble are not intelligent enough to understand the complexities of issues or situations, so they must be fed only what they deem them worthy of knowing, expecting a compliant population to accept it uncritically. Unfortunately for a lot of the population they are absolutely right. It's those pesky outliers that must be silenced at any cost. People like us.
It’s almost like they’re against equal tweetment. 🤷🏻♀️
It's not enough for Elon to win.
The Left has to also lose. Lose badly. Lose badly enough that they are destroyed in the process. The Left needs to be destroyed.
"It's a private company!" was obviously never a serious argument. Parler was a private company, too, and they were still attacked and deplatformed. Lefties will say anything they have to in order to gain more power.
The scary thing is - these people truly believe that free speech means only liberal speech. They truly believe that something as simple as an opposing viewpoint, is a threat to democracy.
They've literally lost the true definition of freedom, free speech, capitalism... all the things that have made America the best country on the planet
Like I said earlier, no matter what happens, seeing these pathetic petulant children lose their minds at the possibility they might not be able to censor everything they don't like is absolutely priceless.
I do enjoy your posts Alex - and appreciated your books. I am not on any “social media”(unless this counts?!) and live in an obnoxiously, so called, liberal community on an island on the west coast of Canada. Know that you are touching many elements of society. Thanks for what you are contributing.
Don't celebrate just yet. I doubt the GLOBALISTS will give up easily on censorship
I'm not as optimistic as you, Alex. Until I see real change, censorship is winning.
Yes, Elon Musk has got everyone talking.
Meanwhile, a former president and one of the best reporters ever (hint: the author of this Substack) are still banned from Twitter.
Absolutely love what he is doing!! Exposes all the jackasses in one fell swoop.
When one side stops caring that they spew blatant hypocrisy, it is time to stop believing that there is a conversation to be had and start realizing that there is a war that Musk be won.
Got my fingers crossed he pulls this off. He might be saving the world. You can tell when he wouldn't censor Russia he won't censor anyone. Including the idiot liberals. I will never understand why they think silencing people is ever right. If you have truth on your side, it will be obvious. (Well, I guess that's why, eh?)
Elon put free speech in check on the chessboard.
We rooks, pawns, and other pieces on the board are glad for it.
Elon gonna Elon
Elon Musk is crazy like a fox.
Some of the entertainment value of this pageant is watching the second-guessing, the people who are trying to figure out what he's up to...because he's Elon Musk, he's always up to something.
His brain operates 1,000x faster than the average person. He's 75 moves ahead in every chess game.
Personally, because I'm no where near as smart as Musk, I'm enjoying the hysterics of the Twitter-scape along with the tantalizing idea that Musk could tank the company.
Rule #1 for liberals: must be a hypocrite.
I like your take Alex, but here's what I think it's missing: As soon as the leftists-with-money saw Musk's offer, it put the idea in their head to buy it out from under him. Blackrock/Vanguard is purportedly already trying to outbid him, and Blackrock's CEO Larry Fink brags about how he has the power to "force behaviors" and how he is in fact "forcing behaviors" on the population. If he is successful and takes over Twitter, things will get far worse than they are right now and the digital ID/social credit score nightmare scenario will become an almost certainty faster than we can imagine. And of course there are those who regularly point out Musk's penchant for the Luciferian hand signs of the upper level Freemasons, and say he is controlled opposition and his public offer was done on purpose to hand Twitter over to Blackrock. If he truly intends to buy it he wouldn't have said his opening bid was his "best and final offer." And if he pulls out now, things don't stay the same as they were; they get worse when Blackrock takes over.
Woke ideology is really Tyranny
They are admitting it’s a journalist/ media platform......... if true U look forward to the defamation lawsuits as thousands are slam dunks. Defamation by algorithm....
Aside from the important issue, love the use of defenestration. Did you know there is no opposite of that word? Thanks for the great work!
The funniest part (to me, anyway) of all the sturm and drang today has been watching all the Blueanon types simping for Saudi Arabia after the Kingdom (a major Twitter shareholder, as it turns out) announced that they were rejecting Elon's offer.
Saudi f'ing Arabia!
You know. The guys who send goon squads to murder journalists. That Saudi Arabia.
Alex, your flashlight of truth is making all the cockroaches squirm and run for cover!
We must leave Twitter if the American Mafia of cia, doj, dnc, etc., steps in to prevent this sale. If we stay, we deserve what we get.
Ehh I believe all liberals would leave Twitter if Elon truly makes it a haven for free speech.
equity requires unequal treatment...remember that!
Don't know how it will turn out, but sure fun to watch. Wished the CDC was a stock company.
There is a certain amusement to be had in watching the blue checks that spent the last 2 years shilling about COVID and then Ukraine while pretending to be pro-democracy squealing that if Musk buys Twitter it will become a platform for “right wing Nazis”. Idiots, just don’t realise how stupid they sound outside of their echo chamber. “Sure Musk has built fantastic cars and rockets but he can’t be trusted with our social media platform, it’s literal rocket science, oh…”. Morons, utter morons.
Here is another way Elon has won. If they don't sell to him, then they are really not a capitalistic enterprise--not out to make money. Rather they are an information controller for the left. That is what they are screaming about. Can you imagine if Twitter now has to give equal time to differing viewpoint and those viewpoints won't be censored? It would drive the left nuts. This whole process will help to reveal their hypocrisy.
Your play by play / blow by blow is so entertaining - like a heckler with intelligence or a bemused sportscaster - I’m a fan. Waiting for the house of cards to come tumbling down.
The twitter response reminds me of a great song from the 1960s "Two faces have I".
Amen to that Alex. My husband and I were discussing all the options (this would have been a great drinking game, except it was in the morning) and we decided at least he would expose the great dirty underbelly of titter! (oops! I mean twitter!)
The only way Twitter works is as a Utility. Congress carved out this status for them and the other Social Media platforms with the effect that they can't be sued as a Publisher, and this is of course the only way Twitter can work as the Town Square. Elon has not been emphasizing allowing all back on the platform as the most important thing that it is. So I'm hoping, for the sake of the free world, that this will be part of the story and that Elon is successful.
Love it! The problem is usually the same, people simply are not willing to give up what is popular, thus they are willing to take abuse and even falsify their preferences / statements to keep playing the game.
The sad truth is 70M users should have simply stopped using Twitter the moment they deplatformed a President. Not left the platform (though alternatives are needed), but rather, simply stopped for however long it took for the twitter board to wake up and reassess (plus that would drive the share price down for some investor activist to pick it up).
If We the People willfully take abuse, why would our abusers choose to change their ways?
Thank you for using the word "defenestration". I had heard it before but didn't know what it meant untill now, when I looked it up. I guess it's better than the overused deplatforming of Donald Trump, or ejection of Donald Trump from Twitter
You go Alex!!
How can it be private when it's open for the entire global population? If it is private owned but operated for anyone and everyone to use, that would negate its private function because it is no longer private but worldwide and all inclusive. They don't make you apply and wait until you receive acceptance to join like a private club. It's either run with exclusive private membership or it's open to everyone and thus you cannot change the rules for just few. I've never understood the pick-and-choose Twitter nonsense.
Fuck Max with his own Boot.
What the elites don’t want us to know is that the backbone of Twitter is the US Gov and the Intelligence Community. If MUSK takes Twitter private this will all be revealed.
No matter who owns Twitter it will remain a place where mostly angry leftists will try to convince you that a man can “transform” into being a woman. Or that communism is a wonderful idea and capitalism doesn’t work. Or that America is racist. Or that cops are racist thugs. Or that AOC is really, really smart. Or that a balding man can look really great in a ponytail or manbun. Or that women look great covered in tattoos. Or that illegal aliens “contribute to our wonderful diversity”
Twitter's woke employees may have just realized that their publicly held private employer is up for sale every morning when the stock market opens. Their jobs are only as secure as the next majority shareholder says they are.
I am thoroughly enjoying every minute of this. Of course, I’ve got my money on Elon. I heard that the Saudi’s have rejected Elon’s offer. 😟
Touché 🤺
As usual, it`s the insult even to sub par intelligence that's so jarring, like a page right out of Animal Farm. In the absence of any conceivable logic & reason, the Fascist elites have long abandoned any such attempts and now just tell us that we cannot trust our own eyes; yet again, we did not really see what just happened right in front of us. This IS the systematic process of incremental totalitarianism. If we allow it, we get what we accept, just like always in history. The process is just about complete in Canada, where an orderly civil resistance, inspired by the instincts of freedom in some (many, immigrants who fled fascist regimes & know exactly what is happening), was swiftly crushed by the fascist Trudeau regime WITH MAJORITY ACQUIESCENCE/SUPPORT OF ITS OWN CITIZENS. Au Revoir, free Canada. You laid down.
No, that's not a male swimmer you just watched dominate a field of women. You are (offensively) mistaken. It`s in full swing here. Do we have the resolve to squash it in its tracks? We once did. I pray we still do.
Defenestration? I had to look that up. Who are you, William F Buckley?
Buried lede in the entire story: Twitter, and likely other major SM platforms are backed and funded by the US govt. probably using taxpayer funded server platforms and technology. Just one of the ways they spy on you. Note that the US govt immediately announced an “investigation” into Musk and Tesla as soon as Musk announced his offer. Twitter reported revenue of 5.1 billion in 2021. The cost of running the platform is likely 2-3 times that amount. Where does the rest of the funding come from. I think we know the answer.
Richard Pan drops opposition to Personal Belief Exemption for children's vaccine in California! Celebrate fellow Californians! Though he will be back to try to destroy our children tomorrow. https://www.sfchronicle.com/bayarea/article/California-legislator-drops-bill-to-eliminate-17081993.php
If the Twitter Board of Directors, contrary to its fiduciary duty to do what is best for their shareholders, rejects EM's embrace, a liquidation of EM's shares that will coincide with massive short selling of Twitter stock will devastate the share price and that will provide tangible proof of what the BOD thinks of its fiduciary duty.
I am tentatively ecstatic.. feels like there is always another shoe to drop. But I do agree that regardless of outcome the mask is off and they hypocrisy has exposed the Emperor's (lack of) clothes. They are playing checkers with someone playing 3-dimensional chess and they don't even realize it.
One thing I have always been astonished at is the argument that people like Trump or you are "DANGEROUS!!!" These are largely people who would fight tooth and nail to have the right to say whatever they wanted, and yet see no problem putting a gag on anyone else. And as they like to say about content others complain of on any platform, they are free to turn the channel or mute the tweeter. Easy-peasy.
All of them were ecstatic and had nothing but praise for the article in Time Magazine about how a "cabal" of powerful people in tech and government came together to "fortify" the 2020 election, ensuring the "right" outcome. It's nauseating.
What I think it really exposes, though, is the very real contempt the "elites" have for the rest of the population. They feel entitled to control what everyone else sees and hears and knows because they know best. But if they really did have confidence in their positions they would not be bothered by people challenging them, because the best ideas win out in the end. They think that those not in their bubble are not intelligent enough to understand the complexities of issues or situations, so they must be fed only what they deem them worthy of knowing, expecting a compliant population to accept it uncritically. Unfortunately for a lot of the population they are absolutely right. It's those pesky outliers that must be silenced at any cost. People like us.
They are hypocrites.
Everyone knows that.
Trying to make them admit it is a fool's errand.
They will never be anything but fascist sociopaths.
The only answer is to finally remove what sustains them: that you care about their approbation in the first place.
And that is entirely in your hands.
Shit just got real.
🇺🇸Elon Musk makes their lefty heads hurt bc he also makes the expensive electric cars they’re so proud to own. Brilliant, brave and smart!