June 3, 2023

"In a reversal of its election integrity policy, YouTube will leave up content that says fraud, errors or glitches occurred in the 2020 presidential election and other U.S. elections...."


I'm guessing the key words are "other U.S. elections." Too hard to treat 2020 as different from 2016 and 2004 and 2000 and whatever may be about to happen in 2024. It's crazy to say people can't talk about it, but that is what YouTube has been doing.

Let's read on:
"The rest of our election misinformation policies remain in place, including... those disputing the validity of voting by mail...." YouTube said. 
The big picture.... Finding the right balance has so far proven difficult. Former President Donald Trump and other elected officials have made election denialism a key tenet of their political platforms ahead of the 2024 election....

I suspect "the right balance" is the way that restricts Republicans without limiting Democrats.

63 comments:

Enigma said...

Google/Youtube/Amazon/Microsoft and others are beholden to federal lobbying and federal contracts. They seek to pressure foreign governments to accept USA companies, and to also win mega $$$$$$$ federal contracts. You might call it the Technology-Industrial Complex. Our entire economy is now based on a corrupt federal-private hybrid with bed-hopping employees.

Youtube's election coverage standards resemble the "CDC and WHO" issue of the COVID era -- the facts were rarely on the side of the establishment but China-Biden-Fauci-BigPharma wanted to keep the propaganda messaging pure.


Side Topic: With Amazon just now opening its new headquarters across the river from DC, they are surely unwilling to fight establishment censorship and messaging. This is where your COVID spending at Amazon went, and Amazon cancelled/postponed the phase two flagship "glass Christmas tree" for now.

https://www.washingtonian.com/2023/06/01/look-inside-metpark-the-first-phase-of-amazons-arlington-hq2/
https://wtop.com/business-finance/2023/05/amazons-hq2-towers-are-open-theyre-named-jasper-and-merlin/

Amazon's plan for its Phase 2 glass Christmas tree is on hold. This location is literally next to the freeway going from Virginia into DC across the Potomac river, one block from the Pentagon, and in line-of-sight of the Washington Monument and Capital Dome:

https://www.arlnow.com/2021/10/28/amazon-unveils-fresh-designs-for-phase-2-of-its-hq2-in-response-to-community-concerns/

GPS location: 38.86410303627414, -77.0557174868583

Joe Biden, America's Putin said...

Considering the Groomer-left Antifa-Left Joy Behar left want to throw people in jail over speech crimes and thought crimes... the FBI and the mob-left are in one it... and the hack-D One-party press are all in line.


ivermectin
2020 Biden cheat machine
Don't you dare question the covid vaccines
pro-nouns
Trans worship... and lies about what the groomer movement really is.

Joe Biden, America's Putin said...

Hiccup

gilbar said...

it's Important, for People to Understand..
If a democrat wins; by definition the election was free and fair.
If a democrat loses; by definition the election was RIGGED! and VOTER SUPPRESSION!!

Sounds like, they're concerned that the next election might be past the margin of fraud..
So they'll need to be able to say: RIGGED! and VOTER SUPPRESSION!!

gilbar said...

i don't think really think the dems need worry though.
The margin of fraud gets Bigger, every time

Kevin said...

election denialism

No one is denying an election took place.

Kevin said...

I suspect "the right balance" is the way that restricts Republicans without limiting Democrats.

The idea that there is a "right balance" is to maintain the illusion that some content has to be restricted for the good of the country.

Zensur Macht Frei.

Roger Sweeny said...

"election integrity policy"

We are protecting the integrity of elections by preventing you from complaining about it.

Owen said...

"...I suspect 'the right balance' is the way that restricts Republicans without limiting Democrats."

Pretty bold surmise there!

Spiros said...

Big Tech will figure out a way to use AI to get the Dems elected. They can design an AI system that “pretends” to be real people, specifically people the AI knows will not vote (retards, people with Alzheimers, etc.). The AI will then cast votes via mail.

tim in vermont said...

Remember when Youtube and Twitter claimed that "Voting by Mail" was very secure because signatures were validated? Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha! Remember when an Arizona court found that not actually validating signatures did no matter?

It's wrongthink to remember that.

"How many fingers am I holding up?" Holds up four fingers.

"Four!"

BZZZTZZZZZTZZTZ!

Dude1394 said...

I will be very glad when the only free-speech social media outlet Twitter, begins hosting videos.

Bob Boyd said...

To adherents of the Prog religion, a free speech platform is an occasion of sin.

traditionalguy said...

To thinking lawyer types the sudden over reaction and authoritarian edicts from CDC and WHO to Covid deaths timed for EMERGENCY voting via mailing out hundreds of millions of un requested Mail in ballots that became the opening to count any fake paper fed into machines the next morning meant one thing. That the CPC released virus working with the Soros and Zuckerberg owned locals in swing states had a way to create 30 million votes for the Delaware Vegetable who had never campaigned.

Allowing reports on the corrupt system now is way too late. On YouTube only?

One might guess the great Financial Collapse and world famine set up for the near future may have the Color Revolution rigging forces wanting a GOP winner to take the blame a la Hoover.

Socialism is a continuous struggle.

Jason said...

When media companies decide that they need to suppress anyone saying an election is corrupted, they leave us completely unable to deal with the contingency of an election actually being corrupted.

And they make it more likely, because bad actors can see that vulnerability as easily as I can.

Jason said...

Libtards are fond of imagining that they would have been bold dissenters in 1930s Germany.

No , they would not have been bold dissenters. They would have been the useful idiots and minor Party officials actively quelling dissent.

Sebastian said...

"I suspect "the right balance" is the way that restricts Republicans without limiting Democrats."

So cynical!

Anyway, the niftiest aspect of Dem election shenanigans (mail-in ballots, harvesting etc.) is that fraud and "glitches" are nearly impossible to prove.

Leland said...

"Validity of voting by mail" Does that mean generally voting by mail (such that the topic is completely off limits), or suggesting it is illegal when it is not? I don't agree with suppressing either, but certainly if you disallow the debate of the issues regarding voting by mail (validation of the vote, vote harvesting, delays in counting results, etc.) then yeah, this is about limiting one opinion in support of another.

Pianoman said...

"Other elected officials". Like Hillary Clinton, for example.

tim in vermont said...

In sports there is a saying: "hearing footsteps." It means that, for example a QB makes a decision based on the belief that he's about to get hit from his blind side. Maybe those "footsteps" belong to Twitter, which has become a video platform, or TickTock, or Rumble. IDK, but "isn't it pretty to think so."

Personally, I firmly believe that YouTube and Google, all of Alphabet, is so tied in with The Party, that it's lost as a source of information.

hpudding said...

2020 was an unusual election because no other candidate had made lying about it and fighting so violently to contest it such a key tenet of their reaction and overall strategy. But the guy’s image is all about being a tough winner and not a “loser” and obviously that’s what matters to him and his fans - much moreso than truth.

By “right balance” they probably mean something between passionately distorted (potentially violent) political expression and honest information. Those of us who value critical objectivity agree. It’s more important than a “cruel neutrality” promoted by people like Tim Russert who sat impotently as two politicians screamed opposing talking points at each other and no one learned anything.

Anyway, the 2020 election litigation speaks for itself. Do you have no respect for those rulings, value the hurt feelings of your conservative commentariat more (enough to leave their lies unchallenged) or have some other motive? If you think evidence, truth and honesty are less important than promoting politicized feelings or even violent demagoguery I could see why you might want to stay silent about that, given Google’s ownership of Blogger as well as YouTube.

All of this ultimately falls under the concept of basic civic values - your stance on which has also never been at least to my knowledge clarified. Care to elaborate?

minnesota farm guy said...

Musk's approach at Twitter begins to have an impact throughout the social media world. That and the fact that people now know these sites cooperated with the government and the DNC to censor information they did not agree with and people find that abhorrent.

rcocean said...

All hail our masters at Google (who own youtube and made the decision). Thank you Lord and Ladies of Silicon Valley. I hope you will continue to be generous to your subjects.

Mr Wibble said...

My suspicion is that this is trying to get ahead of all the information coming out about the extent that social media was censoring based on instructions from government officials.

PM said...

All Trump needs to do is convince the trans community the 2020 count was rigged - then anyone who disputes it will be a hater.

Bill Harshaw said...

Of course fraud and errors happened. The issue is whether they were organized and significant, or not. They weren't.

0_0 said...

But mail is easy to manipulate and leaves no trail. Ballot harvesting? Yes, but only from where you have an advantage.
Postmarked after or on Election Day? If the preferred candidate is behind, publicize it so dullards will go vote.
Mail-in also generally is easier for those with no valid ID.

Joe Biden, America's Putin said...

"Election denialism"

Mob MSM cover BS for allowing leftist mob cheat machine cover for basement Crook Biden.

mikee said...

I, for one, like my elections to have voting rules and vote counts ambiguously rigorous enough to produce the winner I want, and at the same time manipulatable enough that if my candidate loses I can legitimately complain. Heads I win, tails you didn't really win.

Rusty said...

I don't know, Bill. If one nursing home has 100% turnout for Biden it just may be a blip. But when dozens of nursing homes have a 100% turnout for Biden I begin to suspect foul play.
Vote by male was invented to cheat.

Gahrie said...

Anyway, the 2020 election litigation speaks for itself.

So did Plessy and Scott. But eventually the truth won out anyway.

Gahrie said...

"Validity of voting by mail"

Why was this issue excluded? I personally oppose all forms of voting by mail except for those serving the United States overseas and their dependents.

Michael K said...

Puddinghead: Anyway, the 2020 election litigation speaks for itself. Do you have no respect for those rulings, value the hurt feelings of your conservative commentariat more (enough to leave their lies unchallenged) or have some other motive?

Speaking of lying. Please list the number of election fraud cases that were heard on their merits instead of "standing."

Dude1394 said...

Well so glad that Bill Henshaw is omniscient. Shutting down counting with Biden. Shine and restarting it with Biden ahead is very suspicious. And having democrat courts shutting down all inquiry does not engender trust. Furthermore seeing the absolute cluster**** that went on in Arizona tells me that you are very closed minded and blinded by your democrat partisanship.

Josephbleau said...

“2020 was an unusual election because no other candidate had made lying about it and fighting so violently to contest it such a key tenet of their reaction and overall strategy.”

Yes Hillaries creation of the Russia hoax and its implementation by government officers will stand as a bizarre example for a long time.

Jim at said...

The issue is whether they were organized and significant, or not. They weren't.

Well, if you say so it must be true.

Thanks.

n.n said...

The fraud, irregularity, and tampering were proven in courts of law where citizens where granted standing. The publication of disinformation, misinformation, and handmade tales, foreign and domestic, have been confirmed through witch hunts in progress, selective prosecution/persecution to spread libel, two impeachments through Congressional projection, steering and censurs in search engine etc., ChatBot functions of the Fourth Leg, and special investigations.

Politicians’ hypocrisy: when one side is afraid they'll lose an election they cast doubt on the integrity of voting machines, but these same folks will defend the integrity of voting machines if they win or look like they'll win.

Mason G said...

"They weren't."

Democrats across the country fought tooth and nail efforts at audits or investigations into reported fraud. If such fraud wasn't organized or significant, why wouldn't Democrats be more than happy to have that demonstrated by shining a bright public light on the processes involved?

Anna Keppa said...

hpudding: "Anyway, the 2020 election litigation speaks for itself. Do you have no respect for those rulings , value the hurt feelings of your conservative commentariat more (enough to leave their lies unchallenged) or have some other motive? If you think evidence, truth and honesty are less important than promoting politicized feelings or even violent demagoguery I could see why you might want to stay silent about that, given Google’s ownership of Blogger as well as YouTube."

Almost all the cases challenging the 2020 election were dismissed for supposedly not stating a valid cause of action, or the parties filing them were deemed to lack "standing" to bring the suits. So there were no "rulings" in those cases "on the merits".

Jamie said...

Oh, pudd'n...

Let's start with the bold type below:

2020 was an unusual election because no other candidate had made lying about it and fighting so violently to contest it such a key tenet of their reaction and overall strategy...

By “right balance” they probably mean something between passionately distorted (potentially violent) political expression and honest information. Those of us who value critical objectivity agree.


Care to square those two statements? In the first, you read Trump's mind, claim he had ill intent (intentional "lying" versus "not believing the result"), and ascribe "violence" to him. In the second, you blow your own "critical objectivity" horn.

[...]
Anyway, the 2020 election litigation speaks for itself.


Funnily enough, I tend to agree: when, what was it, something like 90% of the cases brought were dismissed on procedural grounds before any evidence was allowed to be heard, I do think that kind of speaks for itself. Or at least it's suggestive.

Do you have no respect for those rulings,

Those procedural rulings? I'm sure that our host, with her extensive background and expertise in the law, has great respect for those rulings. But when something happens procedurally in court that - for instance - causes a probably guilty person to go free because our system properly tilts toward letting that happen rather than imprisoning the innocent (though you'd never know it from the Jan. 6 situation), you can respect the ruling but still realize that a guilty person is walking around free. In this case, just to spell it out for you, I am likening the guilty person to the hinky election-night-and-surrounding happenings in certain key districts. And yes, I know civil procedures and standards are not the same as criminal ones; it's a metaphor.

value the hurt feelings of your conservative commentariat more (enough to leave their lies unchallenged)

More mind-reading. 1. Or feelings aren't hurt. Were angry, and concerned about whether constitutional and legal norms will apply going forward. 2. Why on Earth would those here who argue that the 2020 election had enough fraud or (as in my case) enough one-sided help from news media, popular media, social media, certain state lawmakers, and certain state non-lawmakers who made laws anyway, to tip it for Biden - why would we be lying about it, here?

This must be more of your "critical objectivity."

And then the rest was just ad hominems to try to get Althouse to defend herself on ground you choose. Standard playbook.

Mason G said...

The Democrats are the party of "The ends justify the means" ("They can call it whatever they want. Romney didn't win did he?" H. Reid). Anybody who takes them at their word without confirming their claims is a simpleton or an idiot.

hpudding said...

1. Anyone who objects to cases being dismissed for reasons of standing is basically objecting to due process. Which means they do not respect rule of law.

2. Standing or not (including rulings by Trump-appointed judges), no credible evidence was ever put forward for significant or widespread fraud. Rudy Giuliani even admitted in court that his public statements were either lies or political and that he did not have the legal evidence he’d reference when making them. His NY law license was suspended for those lies and his DC license hangs in the balance. When even fellow lawyers think a lawyer’s lies have gone too far that’s when you know they’re not worth listening to.

Sidney Powell said that a long-dead Venezuelan dictator coordinated the electronic fraud that she could not prove. FOX lost nearly a billion dollars for defaming the voting machine manufacturers in order to uphold the lies their fascist audience wanted to hear. Arizona recounted their state ballots twice - the second time by a partisan company focusing on the most contested county, commiting its own irregularities during the recount. The official canvassing was still confirmed.

Trumpsters confirm that fascists simply need someone in whom to swear absolute loyalty and belief. If there is anything Trump could say to them that they wouldn’t believe, no evidence exists for that. As he himself said about shooting people on 5th Avenue and not losing supporters, he knows you marks all too well.

Normal people stop listening to proven liars and the cowards who are ridiculous enough to believe them. Your faith in Trump and his lies are strong enough to overpower your interest in reality (if it ever existed), but you can’t dismiss the normals for liking reality more and dismissing all your (I.e. his) BS.

3. Anyone who says it’s impossible to know what’s in the mind of a simple narcissist as extremely disordered as Trump, is too naive to take seriously. They need to get out more and gain more life experience.

The guy said windmills cause cancer. He wanted to look “smart” in front of doctors by advocating research into putting “disinfectant” in the body, “by injection,” among other things. Then some people died of such poisoning. He doesn’t care about them. He doesn’t care about you, either.

But he thanks you for your political service to him.

LOL.

Leland said...

2020 was an unusual election because the guy that won barely ran a campaign, couldn't draw a crowd, yet beat a sitting President that received 5 million more votes than any previous Presidential winner by gaining another 7 million votes. Further, despite winning with the most votes ever, Biden failed to bring in as many down ballot Congressional races compared to his margin of victory. That's a statistical anomaly that is handwaved away by "but people really hated Trump", while ignoring Trump gained 12 million more votes in 2020 than in 2016, nearly 20% more votes.

Narr said...

I think that history will record what happened in November 2020 as The Immaculate Election.

hpudding said...

What a shame that Leland doesn’t seem to understand the importance of gerrymandering in Congressional districting, seeing how important that is for his unpopular Republic party to maintain its stranglehold on congressional races.

What a further shame that he doesn’t realize how unimportant crowds are to votes. Hitler got big crowds, too. Still only won 33% of the vote. But that was before the age of the radio, let alone the internet. No need to rally people during a bungled pandemic response that killed such notables as Herman Cain while spreading it (personally, by Trump) to Chris Christie and putting him in the ICU. Conservatives really do live in old media. Attracting loud and fanatical followers even in public doesn’t make someone popular. It just means their followers are loud and fanatical.

At least he’s raising interest in the popular vote - which no Republic presidential candidate has won more than once in the last 8 elections. Too bad populist doesn’t equate to being popular. Too bad that rising national population can raise any side’s vote count compared to the past without saying a thing about its performance against the other candidate.

Republicans are strange people.

Static Ping said...

YouTube, along with the other social media companies, were complicit with censoring information at the request of the federal government. This is illegal and obviously so. This bone is a desperate attempt to avoid civil suits and possibly criminal charges.

Considering that voting by mail has been considered an easy way to perform vote fraud and once was agreed to be a terrible idea by both sides of the political aisle, to make that the hill you want to die on shows you how corrupt YouTube is. Furthermore, when vote by mail is instituted in violation of state law, it is de facto corrupt and there is no debate on the matter and it is black letter illegal. Just another part of the establishment lying to our faces.

Leland said...

Yeah, this pudding troll is a moron. His response to statistically absurd vote totals is… gerrymandering. Did Republicans gerrymander the state borders, puddy? Is that why Democrats just broke even in the Senate?

Cappy said...

It's easy to treat 2020 as different if you're a liar.

Narr said...

hpudding says "Hitler . . . was before the age of the radio."

Run along now, little fella.

FTR, and because we like to educate and inform as well as entertain here at Althouse, Hitler and Goebbels were masters of radio communication, and Hitler was the first major political figure in the world to barnstorm in an airplane.

They were cutting edge modernists that way.

boatbuilder said...

Roger Sweeney said

"election integrity policy"

We are protecting the integrity of elections by preventing you from complaining about it.

6/3/23, 9:39 AM

Perfect. Well done.

Ancient Mariner said...

Jason said...
"Libtards are fond of imagining that they would have been bold dissenters in 1930s Germany."

It is instructive to note that among the earliest and most fervent of Nazi supporters were university faculty and students.

Ancient Mariner said...

There is ample evidence, albeit much of it circumstantial, that massive and coordinated voter fraud occurred in the 2020 election, that it mostly benefited Biden, and that it almost certainly swung the election.

On its face, the fact that Trump received a historical record vote for a sitting president, yet the challenger, Biden, barely campaigned, and when he did could barely draw flies, seems dispositive to me, but, of course, YMMV.

hpudding said...

They were cutting edge modernists that way.

Yes, their imitators Limbaugh, Carlson, Murdoch, Trump and the others are not up to anything new. Just repeating the same fascist projects in different media forms.

FTR, and because we like to educate and inform as well as entertain here at Althouse, Hitler and Goebbels were masters of radio communication,

Then maybe you can inform the USHMM of your revisionist make-believe. Radio ownership only became widespread in Germany AFTER Hitler’s one-time election win, so there’s no evidence that distributing the Volksempfaenger AFTER it went into production in 1933 enabled those right-wing fascists to communicate anything persuasively apart from their projection of fear and fascist power. Radio was for them a propaganda device, not a campaign tool.

”During the Weimar Republic, Germany had lagged many other industrially advanced nations in radio ownership. There were many barriers to radio use in Germany. Radios tended to be quite expensive. Their cost put them outside the reach of many German workers and farmers. Ownership was limited to upper and middle classes. German radio transmissions did not reach all of the country. Urban areas had the most reception. Many homes, particularly in rural areas, also had no electricity.

To overcome these problems, Goebbels’s ministry negotiated with German radio manufacturers to produce a relatively inexpensive radio for Germans. It was called the Volksempfaenger, or People’s Receiver. It quickly went into production in the spring of 1933.”


https://exhibitions.ushmm.org/propaganda/german-radio-the-peoples-receiver

Jim at said...

He wanted to look “smart” in front of doctors by advocating research into putting “disinfectant” in the body, “by injection,” among other things.

It makes me laugh every time I read this shit from you. Because you actually believe that's what he said.

Dumbass nutbar.

Laughing Fox said...

hpudding: All of this ultimately falls under the concept of basic civic values - your stance on which has also never been at least to my knowledge clarified. Care to elaborate?

One of my basic civic values is that government officials with important tasks to do should follow the laws as they carry out the tasks.

We all saw plainly in 2020 that in Atlanta, Philadelphia, Milwaukee and Detroit, the officials responsible for counting ballots shut down the procedure for the election observers who were detailed by law to observe the counting, and then started up the counting again, without observers. Why would these officials break the law, and one would think make themselves liable to punishment (though somehow that didn't happen) if they were planning to simply count the ballots following the rest of the legal procedures?

I don't see how a reasonable person can conclude that "of course they were following the rest of the legal procedures."

Pudding, don't you consider that counting ballots should be done following all the laws that apply? Or isn't following the law a civic value of yours?

Rusty said...

It's a republic, little puddin', If it were a democracy like you want we'd all be standing in line for bread.

Mason G said...

"Pudding, don't you consider that counting ballots should be done following all the laws that apply? Or isn't following the law a civic value of yours?"

The ends justify the means.

Narr said...

Nice goalpost move, hpudding, but nothing more than I would expect.

Your clear statement was that Hitler was before radio, and your cite proves only that you were wrong and that I was right--they mastered (quite literally) the basics quickly when the chance came.


hpudding said...

“Because you actually believe that's what he said.“

The quotes are there so you can roll the tape if your memory needs refreshing. Also, he said he was “sarcastic” so feel free to provide the Trumpian interpretation of the guy you supposedly don’t take literally, despite poison control center calls spiking after he said that. Or tell us how cautious he actually MEANT to be, despite giving COVID to Chris Christie, putting him in the ICU and then calling to ask him not to tell anyone he gave it to him. Of course, this was around the same time when he put himself in the hospital by catching it, too.

“ It's a republic,”

It’s funny how clever authoritarians think they are by spouting off this little line. As with “woke,” they can’t really define it but like to say it.

Republic can be anything that’s not a monarchy, including “The People’s Republic of China.” Or “The Democratic People’s Republic of (North) Korea.” The leaders of those countries share your hatred of democracy.

Maybe you can think of even more unpopular policies to shove down the people’s throats than those countries have - it’s easy when you make good on your contempt for them by removing their power.

hpudding said...

“If it were a democracy we’d all be standing in line for bread.”

The owners of Walmart are big advocates for voting the way you do and have the largest number of employees on food stamps - ahead of the next four large employers: McDonalds, Amazon, Kroger and Dollar General. How proud you must be of pushing your country to have such low wages and government dependency. How much of Jeff Bezos and the Waltons’ income is taxed, BTW?

King Rusty of Impoverished America. No bread lines for him, just plenty of food stamps. It’s a Republican speciality and way of life that he supports wholeheartedly.

Do you ever get out from the machinist’s workbench? Pull up that silly hat brim and look around you, for Christ’s sake.

Sabrina Davis said...

I thought this comment on Instapundit was pretty much on target.

Mutaman said...



Blogger Michael K said...

"Speaking of lying. Please list the number of election fraud cases that were heard on their merits instead of "standing.""

https://campaignlegal.org/results-lawsuits-regarding-2020-elections

Michael K: "Daaaa I went to bed and Trump was ahead and when I woke up he was behind . Daaaaa it was obviously rigged".

Rusty said...

hpuddin'
Did it ever occur to you that those people are misusing the term, "republic"?
Your education has failed you.