October 17, 2020

"'Censorship!' cries the right, even as the left hollers 'Twitter’s not the government!' But... this isn’t really a great example of censorship, private or public."

"What it does represent is something the right has becom[e] keenly alive to: the left’s exercise of power over cultural spaces where right-wingers are being driven toward extinction. That power isn’t new, of course, but for a long time, its practical effect was mostly a matter of focus, or at worst, as social psychologist Jonathan Haidt puts it, asking 'Can I believe it?' about narratives that flattered left-wing views, and 'Must I believe it?' about those that favored the right.... Sure, Twitter insists that the Biden story violated prior policy about publishing potentially hacked materials, lest the platform encourage further malfeasance — but would Twitter apply that standard to the recent New York Times investigation of Trump’s tax returns, considering that whoever leaked them to the Times quite possibly committed a federal crime?... I myself am alternately enraged and grieved by our president; I aspire to expedite his exit from the national stage by every legal means. But I do wonder whether the sort of thing we saw on Wednesday actually accelerates the arrival of that happy day — or whether the left, like Streisand, might be contributing to the very outcome they most want to avoid.... [S]uch actions can only call attention to how lopsided and largely unaccountable the left’s own power is in the cultural sphere. There’s a reason that President Trump likes to spotlight that imbalance.... So if you want to hasten him out of office, a preemptive self-balancing, rather than a more muscular tilt, might be the counterweight America actually needs." 


She's telling lefties to tone it down for their own good. Eschew censorship because it might not work to get them where they want to go. That is, there's no love of freedom, no notion of freedom as an end — only a means.  I put the key line in boldface: "I aspire to expedite [Trump's] exit from the national stage by every legal means." 

ALSO: I guess WaPo is conceding that the Hunter Biden material really did come out of his computer. This line is just sitting there: "The New York Post published a story based on a trove of leaked emails allegedly found on a laptop belonging to Hunter Biden, son of Joe Biden, the Democratic presidential candidate." That's stood for a day and a half, uncorrected, even though the commenters over there are screaming about it. AND: I do see the word "allegedly." The problem is that there's no "allegedly" between "laptop" and "belonging to Hunter Biden," so it seems to concede that the laptop was Hunter's and the question is only whether the emails were found in it. I regard that as a writing problem, not an intentional concession.

180 comments:

rehajm said...

The smell of capitulation is in the air.

wendybar said...

Hunter Bidens ex business partner turned over his e-mails to Peter Schweitzer)an independent JOURNALIST). They confirm everything. It is going to come out whether the Propagandists want it to, or not. Now the choice is up to people who will vote for KNOWN crooks that were running a corruption crew, with Joe Biden himself taking half of whatever Hunter made from overseas. What a smuck. I'm sure some here will vote for him anyways, because Trump doesn't speak right. https://www.bizpacreview.com/2020/10/17/biden-ex-business-partner-provides-access-to-more-emails-documenting-hunters-trading-on-fathers-influence-985623

AllenS said...

"She's telling lefties to tone it down for their own good." -- Althouse

What does that mean? Do you mean the lefties should let the record of the Biden Corruption Family see the light of day? That isn't going to happen if the leftist journolism people have anything to say about it.

Megan McArdle needs to tone it up, and join the rest of us Americans who want criminality from the Democrats prosecuted just like you would prosecute any other criminal.

wendybar said...

https://therightscoop.com/china-inc-hunters-imprisoned-business-pal-has-goods-on-private-off-the-books-biden-meet-up-with-commies-and-investors/ Those emails are available for reading in PDF at the article link.

tim maguire said...

The twitter censorship is an interesting legal question. They shouldn’t do it, of course. But should they be allowed to do it? As is so often the case on the internet these days, Twitter has a monopoly on it’s format. If they decide a conversation won’t be on their platform, then people who prefer that platform are shut out of that conversation. Does that create an obligation on Twitter’s part? Again, morally, yes. But legally? It’s hard to see how unless Twitter has accepted government benefits or privileges related to its monopoly. Then, maybe.

As for McArdle, she’s just a less shrill Jennifer Rubin, grifting off her status as the WaPo house libertarian who somehow always winds up on the Democratic side of the issue despite the Democrats being resolutely against everything she pretends to stand for.

Marcus Bressler said...

Supposedly there are hundreds of regular, everyday-type emails on that hard drive along with the damning ones. Has anyone asked the recipients listed if they received those emails or did, as some deranged Leftists are claiming, make all those up also?

THEOLDMAN

I have never sent a damning email. I have sent many a text that I would not want published in the MSM. And while you can smoke crack out of that pipe in passed-out Hunter's mouth, it is more commonly used for meth. Crackheads use stems (known as a "rose") with Chore stuffed in the end.

Michael P said...

"This backfired, so it's not a great example of censorship" is a terribly sloppy, conclusory bit of writing on McArdle's part. She used to be such a sharp, bold thinker. Since moving to DC, I am sorry to say she has taken up many Swamp habits.

Marcus Bressler said...

Die hard Dems will vote for Biden even if evidence points to him accepting money from Hunter. They supported Bill Clinton after he was found to have had adulterous sex with an intern in the Oval Office and lied about it.

THEOLDMAN

If DJT actually would shot a man on 5th Avenue I would not vote for him -- unless it was an Antifa member.

Big Mike said...

I aspire to expedite [Trump's] exit from the national stage by every legal means.

And you too, of course. Because he’s icky

stevew said...

"The New York Post published a story based on a trove of leaked emails allegedly found on a laptop belonging to Hunter Biden, son of Joe Biden, the Democratic presidential candidate."

An entirely truthful, neutral statement. If the commenters there are screaming about that then they really do want to suppress the truth.

There was a time when McArdle was a disinterested observer and pundit that could be trusted. She asserts her virtue here, that the facts must be allowed to be reported, but I'm not buying because her advice is, as you note, based on the notion that suppression of facts and reporting will not succeed in delivering the outcome, the ouster of Trump, that she wants.

Lyle said...

The right is the pro free speech side. That is all that matters to me. Makes voting for Trump very easy.

hawkeyedjb said...

The purpose - the reason d'etre - of the vast majority of American news media, certainly including Twitter, is to protect and promote the Democratic party, and push its positions and candidates. This isn't even remotely controversial anymore, as confirmed by Twitter and all the media who refuse to touch the Hunter/Joe Biden corruption story. The American media and the Democratic party are different institutions, but joined in a way that is malignant and thoroughly dishonest. Still, the pretense of independence is allowed to continue. It is revolting and despicable.

MayBee said...

Nobody in the Biden camp has said they are not Hunter's.

What is interesting is McArdle wants to get rid of Trump by any legal means necessary----but for Biden? For a guy who has three mansions after being in government his entire life? A guy who didn't mind that his son was working on the board of a corrupt Ukrainian company? A guy who sat in the room while Gen Flynn was being set up for a Logan Act violation?


So get rid of all that is awful about Trump for what? His replacement who simply doesn't tweet?
What does she hate about Trump that Biden is better about? I will note she thought Trump was going to get us into a nuclear war....and NOTHING has been further from the truth.
People like McArdle just can't climb down from their own panic 4 years ago.

Ken B said...

It’s motte and bailey for free speech. There is more to free speech than just the first amendment.

MayBee said...

Look at the damage Hillary has done to the nation with her lie about Trump and Russia.

Hillary's people:
Cover for Bill Clinton as he molests women
Start the Valerie Plame smear/investigation/special investigator against Bush
Start the Obama birther rumors
Start the Trump Russia collusion hoax

Is there any one person more damaging to US Politics that the Clintons?

David Begley said...

So, it is okay for the Fake News to ignore this story? And it’s okay for Social Media to censor it?

Joe Biden sold his office and evaded taxes because he got paid in bitcoin by Hunter. The bitcoin is the next aspect of this story.

Joe Biden is going to jail and that’s not news?

MayBee said...

I remember how much the press sat on the John Edwards story because they just didn't believe it was true. The Edwards family was so lovely, and John and Elizabeth were such a team! Wikipedia even locked John Edwards's wiki page at the very beginning.

tim in vermont said...

Everything Standard Oil did was perfectly legal too, whether it was good for America or not. Until one day it wasn’t legal anymore.

"I guess WaPo is conceding that the Hunter Biden material really did come out of his computer.”

This story is a runaway train, and the only tactic they have left is to try to blow up the bridge before it gets across. Clearly it’s authentic. At this point the arguments that it’s faked are beyond implausible.

MayBee said...

Here's what I compare the Twitter question to:
What if AT&T just decided it would no longer send your texts because they did not like the content?
Or back in the day, what if they just wouldn't give you a phone line/land line because they did not like the things you might talk about?

I think it's an apt comparison.

John Borell said...

I used to really like Megan McArdle‘s analysis and have read her since she started in 2001.

But like so many others, she seems to have abandoned her core principles; her hatred of DJT broke her of her libertarian outlook.

Now, she plays along to fit in at the Washington Post, no longer giving thoughtful analysis from a libertarian perspective.

It’s sad to me to see someone I admired intellectually to just abandon her principles because of Trump.

Ms. McArdle, like most “never-Trumpers” has just become a typical left leaning journalist who parrots the “approved” left talking points.

I don’t care is someone hates Trump.

I care about abandoning your principles because you hate Trump.

TreeJoe said...

Monopolistic global corporations use unfettered power with no oversight to suppress the dissemination of the 5th largest national newspapers election-impacting story...which, by the story's evidence, was sourced from NAMED individuals accessing what would appear to be legally sourced records.

And people are focused on dime-a-dozen lifetime politician family corruption.

Hunter Biden's corruption has been plain for all to see. He wasn't getting paid huge salaries and stipends because he had any relevant experience. He got >$600k a year from a ukrainian energy company as soon as his dad took over ukrainian policy. Come on.

Such corruption will always be present.

But the corruption showed by twitter and facebook here - openly, because they no longer fear the impact - is a far greater threat to society.

John Borell said...

Freedom. I really wish Trump could articulate that love better.

I think he really does feel it in his DNA, but he is so poor at articulating it.

To paraphrase Biden, “here’s the deal”: Americans value freedom more than security. So we will never accept the lockdowns like some countries do.

We get the risk and accept the trade-off. But freedom is more important.

John Borell said...

Freedom. I really wish Trump could articulate that love better.

I think he really does feel it in his DNA, but he is so poor at articulating it.

To paraphrase Biden, “here’s the deal”: Americans value freedom more than security. So we will never accept the lockdowns like some countries do.

We get the risk and accept the trade-off. But freedom is more important.

rehajm said...

If the twitter twits were smart they'd censor the polling analysis that shows how biased the university+network polling is.

When the analysts parse the data Arizona looks like a blowout for Trump.

stevew said...

One problem with Twitter and this sort of behavior is that it is enabled and made worse by the fact that Twitter has no counter-balancing entity and voice. The New York Times market has The New York Post. The Boston Globe has The Boston Herald. Perhaps Parler and Gab can be that to Twitter but they aren't even close yet.

mezzrow said...

McArdle is not a "by any means necessary" individual, it seems. Glad to see it, as I've long been a reader.

This is about as much as she can do and stay in the game, I suspect. The desire to eradicate Trump is so deep that it overrides whatever sense of fairness is innate in otherwise good people.

We won't have a decent sense of what this was all really about for another twenty years. It matters intensely who wins this, though. The winners will write the official history, even if Trump wins. The losers will put out their alternate history as well, and the party organs of the DNC (and Hollywood, but I repeat myself) will promote it if Biden loses. They'll find someone to play Biden in the movie. Maybe Tom Cruise.

If Biden wins, Trump will be Hitler, forever, and his supporters will eventually be hunted down and eliminated from public life like Nazi scum. Tom Cruise will still play Biden in the movie. That's why people won't cop to Trump support today. The stakes are too high, especially if he loses. It can cost you your job and ruin you. Saying anything positive about him or his people will be equivalent to saying the n-word someday, win or lose. It just depends on the culture you live and work within. If you poll the electorate after a Trump victory, he'll still show as the loser. Privacy is a twentieth century notion, and we are hip to that, even in the corn crib.

And the beat goes on...

Greg Hlatky said...

Shorter McArdle: it's better that the government be turned over to hordes of raving totalitarians fronted by a senile, corrupt old man than we Washington insiders should have to endure this orange-haired vulgarian.

paminwi said...


Don’t you dare ask Biden a question about the NY Post stories!

https://twitter.com/boknowsnews/status/1317275294194085888?s=21

tim maguire said...

Blogger Michael P said...
"This backfired, so it's not a great example of censorship" is a terribly sloppy, conclusory bit of writing


Indeed, whether or not it’s a good example depends on what it’s an example of.

1) successful censorship—yes, it’s a bad example of that.
2) the ability of the platform to censor—not such a great example of that either. At best, it’s suggestive evidence that Twitter can’t, but it’s not dispositive either way.
3) The desire of those who run twitter to use the platform as an instrument of censorship—great example. It clearly shows who and what they are; it shows what they are trying to do. The failure (this time) takes nothing away from the warning it provides.

Mattman26 said...

What I hear Megan (whom I used to adore) saying is that we (in the club) should continue to manipulate the news to favor our preferred candidates, but we should try to be less obvious about it. We’ll be more effective that way!

tim maguire said...

MayBee said...Is there any one person more damaging to US Politics that the Clintons?

Bill’s political skills were amazing, he could have accomplished so much if he were a more substantial person. The all-around best description of the Clintons I’ve heard is “small-town grifters who hit the lottery.“

Duke Dan said...

At what point can they be sued out of existence for deceptive trade practices?

Jeff Weimer said...

The problem with McCardle is, and I have discussed this with her on Twitter, is that she'll put everything together to come to the obvious and correct realization, but if it comes close to agreeing with Trump she swerves away at the last second. Like she does here.

DanTheMan said...

>>Joe Biden is going to jail and that’s not news?

Nobody is going to jail. Not Hillary, not any Biden, not Comey or Clapper or Strzok or Page or the Ohrs any of them.

Trump was correct, but not in the way he meant.
Biden could shoot somebody on 5th Avenue and nothing would happen.

Laslo Spatula said...

Such nuanced thinking: it is a veritable penumbra of nuance.

Which is the modern white woman: the Roe v Wade penumbra has freed them from responsibility for their most serious actions, and that is now the contextual gelatin on which their thinking is built.

Frivolous. Truth is just a clump of cells when you need it to be.

I am Laslo.

Kevin said...

She's telling lefties to tone it down for their own good.

If the Left would stop their shenanigans, you’d see a different Trump. Perhaps one who doesn’t enrage and cause you to grieve because he’s not walking around rightfully enraged and grieving.

But the Left doesn’t want harmony, it wants power. And the people from left of center who are grieving and enraged are pawns more easily manipulated by the power-hungry leaders of the party.

Rick said...

She's telling lefties to tone it down for their own good. Eschew censorship because it might not work to get them where they want to go. That is, there's no love of freedom, no notion of freedom as an end — only a means.

She's trying to influence them on their own terms, she knows they have no interest in freedom.

jaydub said...

The Dems and MSM need to keep the Biden corruption tamped down until after his election and, preferably until after his inauguration. At that point he will have served his purpose in getting Kamala positioned to occupy the Oval Office through his resignation, an office to which no one would elect her on her own. He will be allowed to resign for "health reasons" with a guarantee of no prosecution of him or his family. That gets him out of the GOP firing line and removes the immediate threat to Obama and his partners in crime while providing a four year window for a Kamala administration to dismantle the republic.

If he's elected the country's fucked.

Browndog said...

You can debate the authenticity of the hard drive until you're blue in the face--the media will make sure of it.

The actual content of the hard drive will never make to the public arena for discussion--the media will make sure of it.

It is my opinion that the most important aspect of this is the fact the republican Senators investigating Burisma had the hard drive for months and kept it buried.

We know what democrats are. Enemies. What are republicans?

J Melcher said...

I miss Jane Galt and the econ/biz focus her brilliant mind brought to the blogosphere. I regret the lady now gets paid for political writing where her talents are neither unusual nor her mind sharpened.

tim in vermont said...

McCardle seems to have suffered from Stockholm Syndrome since she joined the WaPo. Nobody wants to be hated at work. Especially when you have a nice cushy job that maybe you dreamed of since you were a kid.

tim in vermont said...

“I think Twitter’s response to the actual article itself makes clear that these purported allegations are false and are not true,” Biden campaign national press secretary Jamal Brown said on Thursday.

They think you are idiots, my Democratic friends.

Birkel said...

There are trillions of dollars flowing through the federal government.
The idea that those in positions to lever their power therein is not new.
It has always been this way.

But Althouse would like to deny that the Obama Administration - unique throughout all history and unchecked by a credulous media - never took advantage of its opportunities.

The Chinese have a system dedicated to thievery and corruption.
And Biden grabbed the brass ring when he saw it.

He is thoroughly corrupted.

Dust Bunny Queen said...

The censorship that the online media in Twitter, Facebook etc is doing would be similar to Old Ma Bell listening into your conversations with other people and disconnecting you when you said things that Ma didn't agree with. Ma Bell grounds you and sends you to your room. Who would stand for that? But when Twitter does it, as long as they are censoring people that you also don't agree with it is just fine.

The "News" Media has certain privileges and protections in the expression of Free Speech and the tacit understanding is that they are reporting the news without bias. Obviously, there are Editorials and Opinion pieces which are biased. No problem as long as the media allows dissenting opinions. People can live with that.

What is egregiously wrong is the suppression of speech in a public format such as Google, Twitter, Facebook etc. They are not "Press". It might be considered that the people who are writing the articles, comments (like I am now) are the "Press". Whether Congress can do anything about that is questionable as they are private companies.

What might BE illegal and unconstitutional is that these actions by the actual "Press" media and public companies to put their thumbs on the scale and sway an election could be considered illegal in kind campaign contributions

By squashing any news or information that might damage their preferred candidate, they have given an advantage in kind, not actual money, but more valuable than money. Illegal!

Birches said...

Megan Mcardle is probably the biggest disappointment of the last four years. The WaPo ate her up and all of the principles she used to have. Oh sure, I'm sure if you asked, she'd blame Trump. The Post is corrupting. DC is corrupting. It's embarrassing to read her now.

Tina Trent said...

So now we learn (only in the foreign press) that Hunter Biden and Alexandra Forbes Kerry used the investment firm of the Whitey Bulger family (John Kerry has long ties to the Bulger clan) to quietly launder a million dollars some tycoon from Kazakhstan gave to Kerry to fund her film production studio in a deal arranged by Hunter. And that the Kazakh tycoon, Kenes Rakishev, is also involved with Prince Andrew, cutting him a curiously generous overpayment for a property.

Painfully, Hunter and Rakishev communicate in faux-black rapper slang. Hunter introduces him to his father, what's his name.

No, there's nothing for Sacha Baron Cohen and Larry David to mock here because they've already made this film, only they pretended it was fiction about American conservatives instead of fact about the adult children of the Democratic Party's most powerful political families. Nothing for the media to see here. Better to eschew reporting it.

hawkeyedjb said...

"I remember how much the press sat on the John Edwards story because they just didn't believe it was true."

More likely they sat on it because they were afraid it was true, just like the present Joe/Hunter Biden morass. Nobody's censoring this story because they think it's false - if that were the case, they'd be dragging it into the light of day and refuting it. I've heard no refutation from anybody, including the Bidens.

Breezy said...

“ I myself am alternately enraged and grieved by our president;”

Time for her to get off the web, it appears. Or to try reading other sites that illuminate all the prosperous hope Trump brings to large segments of our nation. The economic stats alone have been historically great. Isn’t she an economist by the way?

Matt Sablan said...

This is very similar to why I said the disaster of Trump was more manageable than the disaster of Clinton. With Trump, there are mechanisms that will hobble his worst impulses and all the levers of power would work to check and balance him. Can you imagine Twitter or Facebook working to undermine a president Clinton or Biden? Think of all the things we learned about the last administration's bad actions we would never have learned had we had a president Clinton.

When the choices are between a guy who says mean things about the press, but is open and transparent... and the guy who literally had armed men lock a journalist in the closet, ask yourself why anyone should take people who say the first is worse for the Free Press than the second.

Matt Sablan said...

"She's telling lefties to tone it down for their own good."

-- The "all they had to do was not be crazy" approach, I see.

Mike Sylwester said...

McArdle voted against Trump in 2016 because she was afraid he might cause a nuclear war.

I think her reason for voting against him in 2020 is that she is afraid that the Biden family's corruption might be exposed even more if Trump is re-elected.

Mike Sylwester said...

McArdle should write an article about the economics of the Biden family's rule that each family member donates 50% of his corrupt earnings to "Pop" (aka "The Big Guy").

Butkus51 said...

Be kind til you have power. Then the game changes. No Lucy I'm not kicking the football.

James K said...

“ What does that mean? Do you mean the lefties should let the record of the Biden Corruption Family see the light of day? ”

She’s worried about the ‘Streisand effect.’

As to the legalities of Twitter’s suppression of the story: yes and no. It’s legal, but they are risking their Section 230 immunity by editing and selecting what is allowed on their platform. See Ajit Pai’s statement from a couple days ago.

rhhardin said...

It's monopoly power that can't be allowed to stand, in the speech arena. Not a free speech problem but a monopoly problem.

rhhardin said...

It's a monopoly asserting self-righteousness, tying it to the left. No need to listen.

Lloyd W. Robertson said...

Free speech is probably most likely to come about as a compromise among competing groups of fanatics, with each side taking "freedom" as an unfortunate compromise. If one side feels it can win, it has much less interest in freedom. Religious wars in Britain were key, carried over in a different way in the U.S., with various political solutions to keep fanatics in their places. J.S. Mill argued that you might not know whether what you believe is true, so it's best to listen to opposing arguments. If social media means every crazy can attract a following, and in fact, the crazier the better, then no sane person really thinks it's best to sort through all this. Ultimately one might have to go back to whether the printing press was really a good idea, or the combination of printing press + Protestantism.

Trump brings some of his trouble on himself; he somehow enjoys the craziness of the internet, instead of setting some kind of example of resisting it. The unfairness with which he is treated goes far beyond his faults. He is just enough of a conservative to enrage progressives. So in a way the progressives gain new confidence in taking away freedom: whatever their internal disagreements, they can agree on trying to silence anything that might favour Trump and his views. It simply follows that they'll try to cover up anything about Joe and Hunter.

Kevin said...

The opportunity for unity came with the Mueller Report.

Like the election, the left couldn’t accept the results.

Rick said...

I remember how much the press sat on the John Edwards story because they just didn't believe it was true.

I don't think they didn't believe it, they convinced themselves it wasn't relevant. They've always hated that their unmasking of Gary Hart's affair caused him to drop out and (they believe) cost them a presidency.

Later that same cycle the NYT ran a front page story accusing McCain of having an affair with a lobbyist based solely on anonymous sources. Affairs are only relevant when Republicans are involved. Similarly they covered for Bill Clinton but gleefully reported on Trump.

Anthony said...

As for McArdle, she’s just a less shrill Jennifer Rubin, grifting off her status as the WaPo house libertarian who somehow always winds up on the Democratic side of the issue despite the Democrats being resolutely against everything she pretends to stand for.

True dat.

rcocean said...

Can we quit believing that the Press and the Liberal/Left in general believe in any principle other than their gaining and keeping power?

Yeah, I mean, who cares if Biden's son was paid millions by Chinese and Ukrainian companies in return for favors from Joe Biden VP. Corruption? who cares. He has (D) after his name, so its OK. But lets pretend to be OUTRAGED over Trump and accuse of constant corruption WITHOUT EVIDENCE. Are people stupid enough to fall for this sham?

TWitter didn't just censor the NY Post, they censored the RNC, Senate and congressional twitter accounts, and banned Trump's press secretary. They should be punished. But Mitch McConnell and Mitt Romney don't seem to upset about it, so nothing will be done.



Birkel said...

Twitter is a public forum.
There are analogous businesses that have been legally required to allow protests and the like on their property.

Further, consumer protections exist in many states.
It is illegal to discriminate against people based on political affiliation in California, where these tech companies do business.
The lawsuits should be filed this week, I expect.

Bruce Hayden said...

“The twitter censorship is an interesting legal question. They shouldn’t do it, of course. But should they be allowed to do it? As is so often the case on the internet these days, Twitter has a monopoly on it’s format. If they decide a conversation won’t be on their platform, then people who prefer that platform are shut out of that conversation. Does that create an obligation on Twitter’s part? Again, morally, yes. But legally? It’s hard to see how unless Twitter has accepted government benefits or privileges related to its monopoly. Then, maybe.”

Two places (at least) where the law could possibly intrude.

They claim safe harbor protection under §230 of the CDA. With Twitter, this is becomming a joke, as they aggressively censor the right and promote the left. I think that one reason that they have gone all in here, is that they know that they are in huge trouble now if Trump s re-elected, because several agencies will no doubt be breathing down their necks. But the civil side is maybe even more problematic. If they lose their §230 safe harbor, they become vulnerable for the accuracy of everything published on their platform. A lot of defamation and copyright infringement on Twitter, day in and day out. It doesn’t get litigated because it isn’t lucrative. It would be against Twitter with their (temporarily) deep pockets.

The Republican Party has made a formal complaint with the FEC that Twitter has made substantial in-kind political contributions to the Democrats, and against the Republicans. Chuck Schumer may be able to protect them by continuing to screw with the quorum on the oFEC. But this is probably a lot more egregious than Crooked Hillary’s illegal campaigning contribution bundling schemes.

tim in vermont said...

Apparently the proof that this is all disinformation offered up today is that “Giuliani is drunk all of the time.” You would think that we would have heard about this before, were it true. I think he is starting to look a little old in his videos, but not drunk, and he doesn’t sound drunk at all. Still that’s nothing like evidence that this hard drive, which is in possession of the government, BTW, is fake.

rcocean said...

I've never believed in censorship "backfiring". Certainly not in this case. Yes, motivated, politically active people know about the story and the controversy over twitter's censorship increased their curiosity BUT for every one of those people there are no doubt 3-4 other less active people (Low information voters) who don't even know the story EXISTS.

Censorship works. That's why its done. The great mass doesn't read or heard things the powerful don't want them to know. And it discourages others from publishing or writing things the powerful don't want written or talked about. We haven't gotten to the point where, as in France, you can get fined $200,000 for publishing a 120 year old book. Or like England, where you can be "visited" by the Police for saying the wrong word to a journalist. But we're getting there.

Tom T. said...

Agree with Michael P; McArdle has become dull and conformist. Note that "by any legal means" all but concedes that they won't be able to simply vote him out.

Howard said...

No one cares. Sound and Fury without moving the needle. Obviously makes you people feel good to wallow about in your poor me victims collective.

donald said...

They’re not “otherwise good people” Mezzrow. That has been the horrific discovery of the last four years. To me anyway.

Gunner said...

Meggy is considered "conservative" at WaPo because she wants to obey the law to get rid of a Conservative President.

BUMBLE BEE said...

Hey it is a new metric... I'M SO OLD that I remember liberals, democrats hell, even the ACLU lionized the right to free speech. Those were good times!

Joe Biden, America's Putin said...

Any real information that paints a democratic in a bad light will be called RUSSIAN DISINFORMATION.

Maillard Reactionary said...

Squid ink. Don't chase it.

daskol said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Amadeus 48 said...

This story raises important and scandalous questions about a person who was the sitting VP of the US and is running for president with a ten point lead in the polls. This is a man who was in the Senate from 1973 until 2008 and then was VP and president of the Senate from 2009-2017. He’s the guy who blurted out Logan Act when Comey was briefing Obama and him on General Flynn.

This is the man who, on a senator’s salary and while married to a teacher, saw his net worth go from close to zero to more than $9 million over the course of his career.

If the American people vote this creep into the White House, we are going to deserve what we get. He obviously has no moral compass. He fibbers and grins and the press looks the other way.

Trump may be obnoxious and eccentric and strange, but Biden isn’t strange at all. He’s a cheap crook. I know. I live in Illinois. We can’t take a walk down the street without tripping over guys like Joe Biden.

Heartless Aztec said...

@mezzrow
Concur. At times I feel like St Peter denying Jesus to the pollsters that call or ring the doorbell - if that analogy isn't one bridge to far - when in reality I will crawl across a minefield under sniper fire to vote for DT.

TJM said...

The so-called mainstream media pursued the Russian hoax with gusto, but are curiously silent on a real scandal: the Biden Crime Family

chuck said...

DC is corrupting.

Megan moved to DC and was incorporated into the Borg. She is not the first and will not be the last, resistance is futile.

Sebastian said...

"I myself am alternately enraged and grieved by our president"

Very slightly OT: I get how a prog might be "enraged" by DJT--his very existence as prez is an affront. But why "grieved"?

MayBee said...

Today it seems like *everyone* is confirming the emails are real. Reporters are talking about what a loving, caring father Joe Biden is in them.

MayBee said...

"Joe Biden is a loving caring father in these fake Russian disinformation emails"

DeepRunner said...

Madame La Professeur said:

"I guess WaPo is conceding that the Hunter Biden material really did come out of his computer. This line is just sitting there: 'The New York Post published a story based on a trove of leaked emails allegedly found on a laptop belonging to Hunter Biden, son of Joe Biden, the Democratic presidential candidate.'"

Nope, look at that word ALLEGEDLY. That's their get-out-of-jail-free card. The Washington Post concedes nothing by that word being there. Shoot, they might have even encouraged Megan McArdle to put that word in there.

FWIW, is the Hunter Biden story true? Quite possibly. Is it believable? Most definitely. The only difference between "grift" and "graft" is a vowel.

Matt Sablan said...

"Hey it is a new metric... I'M SO OLD that I remember liberals, democrats hell, even the ACLU lionized the right to free speech."

-- One of the oddest things of growing up is finding the people who used to agree with me that there should be no censorship of the legal or personal sort, start to say, "sometimes, you have to shout down assholes and punch them if they won't shut up, or pressure people hosting speakers to get them to rescind an invite. Free speech doesn't mean you have to let them have a platform."

There are people who I used to think were as free speech absolutist as I am, who have no problem silencing speakers whose "speech is violence."

brylun said...

McArdle sold out to the WaPoo for the salary, fame and security, and changed her viewpoints to match her employer.

Wouldn't you?

brylun said...

WaPoo does not have a single op-ed writer who expresses a pro-Trump viewpoint.

Doesn't that speak volumes?

daskol said...

I am trying to reconcile someone of McArdle's obvious intelligence with the total ignorance of how politics is played these days in America, of how power dynamics manifest in politics altogether, displayed in her article. She really isn't fit to write about politics. If Althouse is cruelly neutral, McArdle's trying to be sweetly engaged, and it's a bad look.

brylun said...

Talk about censorship, how about the Drudge flip - Drudge is now full-throttle anti-Trump.

Amadeus 48 said...

Howard: “No one cares.”

Speak for yourself. What you don’t care about is startling and depressing.

Do you thrill when Biden gibbers and grins? Do you think the right approach to law enforcement is to “shoot ‘em in the leg” as your brilliant paladin Biden said the other day?

But don’t worry. He’s got Kamala right behind him.

DeepRunner said...

So, here's a side note on this...if the media are REALLY all-in on Biden, it will be evident tomorrow on the Sunday shows. Will Stephanopolous pass again on the chance to talk about it? What about Chuck Todd? Will he ask about it or continue to give Savannah Guthrie her 15 minutes of shrewing? Will Margaret Brennan discuss, especially since Biden tried to shut down a CBS reporter last night? What will Tapper or Chris Wallace say?

Joe Biden, America's Putin said...

The mainstream press area also on board protecting the Biden family international pay to play grifting scheme. that includes the Biden's raping the US tax payer.

That billion dollars that went to Ukraine? That's our money, you know.

They are also on board covering for any democrat crook.

daskol said...

I have often read with interest McArdle's stuff over the years, but it's not surprising that a dedicated establishmentarian such as she is would stake this soggy ass swampy middle ground. I'm sure her words come off as concern trolling to the progressives she claims to be addressing, and as a cowardly retreat from principle by her remaining more conservative readers. These trying times are really good at revealing at just how bad at their jobs our self-styled elites actually are. James Poulos might say that this shows how digital or tech has revealed the erstwhile masters of our discourse, our narrative imagineers, to be simply beyond their sell-by date. I agree.

sterlingblue said...

The passage Althouse bolded shows how effective the media's TrumpHate brainwashing is. They even got a smart, respected journalist like McArdle to say that! It's over for normal people.

Ron Winkleheimer said...

I've come to the conclusion that the Democrat party is controlled by a bunch of crooks that cannot afford to allow an honest man to win the presidency.

DaveL said...

Twitter and Facebook only have to suppress the Biden Corruption news until after the election. The non-mainstream sites that are revealing more and more info are not read by most people. Facebook is the main news source for half the country, and Twitter is the news source for over 80% of journalists. They can keep the story underwater (or smothered by a pillow) for a few more weeks, and after that, nothing matters; the USA is done.

tim in vermont said...

I try to be cynical, but it’s so hard to keep up. I am actually kind of shocked that the New York Times encourages Silicon Valley to censor established media. Are they that convinced that the crocodile will eat them last? Or have they already accepted that their role in life is to be a mouthpiece for billionaires who want nothing more than an influence peddler like the Clintons or Biden in office. When you are overloaded with money, what you want from politicians is that they be for sale.

MayBee said...

Dust Bunny Queen said...
The censorship that the online media in Twitter, Facebook etc is doing would be similar to Old Ma Bell listening into your conversations with other people and disconnecting you when you said things that Ma didn't agree with. Ma Bell grounds you and sends you to your room. Who would stand for that? But when Twitter does it, as long as they are censoring people that you also don't agree with it is just fine.


Yes!!!

Dude1394 said...

McCardle sure did rollover for that Amazon money. She used to be pretty objective, now just another democrat propagandist.

The Tangerine Tornado said...

Biden campaign and legal team have issued no denials. Calling it a smear campaign isn't a denial.

smear campaign
A concentrated and prolonged effort to damage or ruin someone's or some group's reputation through the perpetuation of claims about their failures or faults, whether these are true, exaggerated, or falsified.

Yes it will ruin his reputation. His reputation such as it is, is unearned.
The truth can ruin your reputation. I'll await the denial. Until it arrives I'll assume these emails are legitimate.

Guildofcannonballs said...

--becom[e]-- = Repeal the 19th. If the people vote for the National Vote Total bullshit, we will get them to become empowered by voting for repeal.

Don't doubt Rush, or me.

Dude1394 said...

“ Is there any one person more damaging to US Politics that the Clintons?”
Yes, Barack Hussein Obama and Joe Biden. They weaponized every branch of government. Spied on an incoming presidential candidate, leaked those collected recordings a d THEN tried to destroy his precise character as they walked out the door.

Birkel said...

Corruption to average Americans: Bug
Corruption to Connected Deep State players: Feature

That is the reason they are playing the game. McCabe's wife got $750,000 from Clinton and now he has a CNN gig.

Comey got a book deal.
The Obamas got book deals and $100,000,000 from Netflix.
The generals get paid speaking gigs and TV appearances and corporate board seat.
And so forth.

Trump is disrupting the graft.
The cheating is harder now.

And the Barr Justice Department is crippled (like Andrew McCarthy) because he wants to believe in these (Now? Always?) corrupt government systems.

They will have to destroy the people and the systems if they want to save America.

Michael K said...

As for McArdle, she’s just a less shrill Jennifer Rubin, grifting off her status as the WaPo house libertarian who somehow always winds up on the Democratic side of the issue despite the Democrats being resolutely against everything she pretends to stand for.

And Howard loves it.

Original Mike said...

Blogger Ron Winkleheimer said..."I've come to the conclusion that the Democrat party is controlled by a bunch of crooks that cannot afford to allow an honest man to win the presidency."

Somebody awhile back opined that the reason the Democrats nominated such a weak candidate is that Biden was in on the corruption and could therefore be counted on to bury it. He was referring to the Russia hoax but it looks like old Joe had more corruption than just that in his closet.

Rick said...

rcocean said...
motivated, politically active people know about the story and the controversy over twitter's censorship increased their curiosity BUT for every one of those people there are no doubt 3-4 other less active people


More like 30 or 40.

tim in vermont said...

What hyper rich Democrats are doing here is speaking power to truth. Same as the CCP does, just like lefties have always done.

Ralph L said...

But why "grieved"?

He destroyed democratic norms! Look at what he made us do to thwart him!

Birkel said...

Howard calls us victims.
Meanwhile Trump will win re-election.
The Senate will still be led by The Murder Turtle.
And Nancy is going to be demoted (by her own party or by losing the House?).

I am a victim if you redefine that word, of course.
That's a Leftist Collectivist thing.
Run with that.
Run with scissors.

bagoh20 said...

""I aspire to expedite [Trump's] exit from the national stage by every legal means."

Knowing that, you have assume whatever she says, writes, or does is just calculated to that end. So the only question is is this opinion effective at getting Trump out?

Achilles said...

John Borell said...
I used to really like Megan McArdle‘s analysis and have read her since she started in 2001.

But like so many others, she seems to have abandoned her core principles; her hatred of DJT broke her of her libertarian outlook.


Not quite right.

None of these people ever had any different principles.

They Only had different groups of people to lie to.

They were always on the same team.

Trump just removed the masks.

Jupiter said...

What McCardle is saying is that she would prefer a paid Chinese agent over Donald Trump as President of the United States. Why is she concerned about legality?

Jupiter said...

"ALSO: I guess WaPo is conceding that the Hunter Biden material really did come out of his computer."

McArdle isn't. She calls the story "dubious". Mega McArdle has become a DFC.

Achilles said...

hawkeyedjb said...
The purpose - the reason d'etre - of the vast majority of American news media, certainly including Twitter, is to protect and promote the Democratic party, and push its positions and candidates.

They don’t serve the Democrats.

The Democrats and the media are owned by the same people.

Important distinction.

William said...

DeepRunner said at 9:04:

"… if the media are REALLY all-in on Biden, …"

Are you kidding me? If? If?

Sorry DeepRunner, that ship has sailed.

I'm Full of Soup said...

Trump loves America and his main goal has been to bring jobs and the economy back so every American has a chance to find a job.

I don't believe Dems like Obama and Horono and Harris, who spent a lot of time living outside America, truly love America. And re the economy, remember when the Obama Biden admin was pushing their "New Normal" crap of 8% unemployment and 1% GDP growth?

brylun said...

How about a fair and impartial debate moderator?

Kristen Welker, upcoming presidential debate moderator, has deep Democrat ties

NorthOfTheOneOhOne said...

MayBee said...

Nobody in the Biden camp has said they are not Hunter's.

They can't say that; because if they do and it turns it is Hunter's laptop they'll be truly fucked!

What is interesting is McArdle wants to get rid of Trump by any legal means necessary----but for Biden? For a guy who has three mansions after being in government his entire life? A guy who didn't mind that his son was working on the board of a corrupt Ukrainian company? A guy who sat in the room while Gen Flynn was being set up for a Logan Act violation??

McMegan became sort a darling of the right because she would at least bow to logic and common sense; unlike a lot of her fellow journ-o-lists. If the country swings right due to a Trump victory she's screwed career-wise! Sort of like Jonah Goldberg and Bill Kristol's Never-Trumpism is all about them keeping their spots on the Sunday morning talking-head shows.

David Begley said...

Someone needs to ask Joe if he has cryptocurrency accounts.

Lurker21 said...

I put the key line in boldface: "I aspire to expedite [Trump's] exit from the national stage by every legal means."

At first, I thought you were taking her peripheral and superfluous admission that she doesn't support Trump and wants him out to be the point of the article. That would be ignoring the point she makes in the article - that media bias and highhandedness are counterproductive and are making people more skeptical of the media and supportive of Trump - and focusing on her dislike of Trump. That would be the equivalent of responding to who someone is, rather than to what they are saying. It opens the door to ignoring the message and judging the article based on the other opinions of the author and which side they are on politically.

I see now that perhaps your concern is that she doesn't care about freedom or morality and is only concerned with the practical effect of media bias. Maybe, but absence of evidence isn't necessarily evidence of absence. If you want to persuade an audience that has already subordinated morality to practical concerns, you will put moral arguments on hold and appeal to your readers or listeners in pragmatic terms. That doesn't necessarily mean that you are without moral concerns, just that you are trying to convince an audience that doesn't share those concerns.

This does raise an interesting point though. People get tired of moralizing and often speak in purely practical terms. It gets us quicker to what we take to be the point, and we avoid preaching to people and sounding self-righteous and judgmental. Does that mean that we have lost touch with moral right and wrong?

Robert Marshall said...

I've never heard an 'innocent' explanation of why Hunter Biden, a crack-smoking, stripper-banging low life, was on the board of directors of a Ukrainian energy company, making millions of dollars. It makes no sense at all, except for the fact that Hunter's daddy was the Vice President of the US, and in charge of US-Ukrainian policy. You simply can't explain it without the concept of influence-peddling. That's why Joe Biden doesn't even try, but simply parrots the 'old news, been debunked' talking (lying) points.

Same goes for Hunter's Chinese connections, except worse in terms of US policy implications, then and now.

Robert Marshall said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
hombre said...

Sterlingblue at 9:12 nails it. I’m disappointed in McArdle.

Also, why “dubious?” It’s not like the new stuff doesn’t align perfectly with other evidence about the Biden grifters.

Brian said...

If the Left would stop their shenanigans, you’d see a different Trump. Perhaps one who doesn’t enrage and cause you to grieve because he’s not walking around rightfully enraged and grieving.

I have no doubt of this. Trump isn't a conservative at heart. He's a salesman. He'll sell what sells. Real Estate? Steaks? Business classes? Whatever works.

Chuck and Nancy could have come out with an infrastructure spending deal early on that included some sort of wall and had union trades trumpeting them, and republicans fretting about the ballooning deficit. But Trump would have had to share in that win. And they can't have that.

narciso said...


Shes very naive


https://libertyunyielding.com/2020/10/17/that-was-quick-judge-in-case-of-devon-archer-associate-cooney-who-turned-over-emails-to-journos-is-spouse-of-mueller-prosecutor/

Brian said...

I've come to the conclusion that the Democrat party is controlled by a bunch of crooks that cannot afford to allow an honest man to win the presidency.

Isn't that what happens if you lose the feedback loop of an independent media. Crooks can only belong to the party that is covered for by the media, which in turn drives more crooks.

If umpires only called strikes on national league players, bad hitters would flock to the american league.

MayBee said...

Nobody in the Biden camp has said they are not Hunter's.

They can't say that; because if they do and it turns it is Hunter's laptop they'll be truly fucked!


I agree! But if you know those are texts you (Joe Biden) never sent, or money you never asked for, then you know they're fake. If someone started publishing emails that were not mine but saying they were, I would know it! I would say it!

If I never brought my laptop to a repair place in Delaware, I would say so.

But the Biden camp isn't saying any of that. If it might be true and they've seen what they've seen....then it's true.

Jupiter said...

"Does that mean that we have lost touch with moral right and wrong?"

Not necessarily. Not being in touch is not evidence of having lost touch. It may be that you were never in touch.

MayBee said...

I can't get my head around the explanation that Biden was trying to get the Ukrainian prosecutor fired because he *wasn't* investigating Burisma.
How can it be he wanted Ukraine to investigate a company while his son sat on the board? It's not that Hunter quit as a whistleblower and then Biden supposedly pushed for an investigation. No! He wanted the prosecutor to investigate...his son????

MayBee said...


If the Left would stop their shenanigans, you’d see a different Trump. Perhaps one who doesn’t enrage and cause you to grieve because he’s not walking around rightfully enraged and grieving.


100%

Birches said...

@daksol

The American Mind podcast is my absolute favorite. I wish it was more often than once a week. Poulos was why I started listening, but I love them all now.

Yancey Ward said...

"stood there uncorrected"

It is interesting that Althouse uses "uncorrected" rather than "eliminated".

The Cracker Emcee Refulgent said...

McArdle’s just flying more cover for the goose-stepping Progs. Make the story about the censorship, rather than the actual corruption, and you’ve managed to distract a shitload of people from the fact of that corruption.

Anonymous said...

The classic monopolies, the sugar monopoly and the Standard Oil monopoly, were just economic monopolies. They had no control over elections.

Facebook is not just a monopoly, but a monopoly that is attacking free elections. The free speech clause and free elections go hand in hand. To have a media monopoly that controls what we read about an election is a big problem.

Rick said...

McMegan became sort a darling of the right because she would at least bow to logic and common sense; unlike a lot of her fellow journ-o-lists

McArdle and Althouse share an important effect in their dealings with the left. Althouse wants the left to be what it holds itself out to be. McArdle wants them to achieve their goals less wastefully. In both cases these positions cause the left to treat them as opponents rather than allies.

This is incredibly revealing of the true nature of the left.

PS, McArdle was not a Journolister.

Yancey Ward said...

"As for McArdle, she’s just a less shrill Jennifer Rubin, grifting off her status as the WaPo house libertarian who somehow always winds up on the Democratic side of the issue despite the Democrats being resolutely against everything she pretends to stand for."

I had been one of Ms. McArdle's readers and commenters back when she was Jane Galt. I made a prediction when she took the job at WaPo that she would be forced to change her political stripes to please her new employer. It wasn't a happy prediction, but it has now borne out.

DEEBEE said...

‘myself am alternately enraged and grieved....”
I hope Trump wins just because of that so we can see your Othello act for next four years.

BarrySanders20 said...

I recall hordes of journalists marshaling forces to examine each and every email in the Sarah Palin email dump before the election. They can do it again if they want to see and print the info. Instead, as in today’s Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, the story was Giuliani and Russian disinformation.

I also recall media consensus that there was not one whiff of corruption in the Obama administration. It’s a truth too good to check, and since these new revelations contradict that truth, they have to be disinformation, right? I mean C’mon man!

Yancey Ward said...

"They can't say that; because if they do and it turns it is Hunter's laptop they'll be truly fucked!"

This isn't quite accurate- it implies they don't know for sure, but they literally do have to know one way or the other by this point. It really is simple- if the laptop were a hoax, they would know that instantly and could likely prove it pretty easily. That they haven't claimed it is a hoax and proven that strongly suggests it is authentic and nothing is being fabricated about the contents. The only "dubious" thing about the story at this point is how the laptop came to Rudy Giuliani's hands, but even that aspect of the story is getting less and less dubious by the hour.

This story isn't going away- Biden might still win the election, but he is toast at some point in the future, and will be forced from the office anyway. The best outcome for him at this point is to win the election, but face an independent counsel appointed by Barr on the way out the door. Biden may have the balls to fire such a counsel the moment he takes office, but that will cause him the presidency. We are voting between Trump and Harris, not Trump and Biden.

Zach said...

Why isn't it a great example of censorship? Millions of people wanted to talk about a news story, and Twitter wouldn't let them.

Defining censorship as being practiced by the government only leads you into a bind where the same actions performed by the same company are censorship if the government officially requests it and not censorship if it is done as a favor to the government.

The historical era we're entering is looking more and more like there's going to be lots of "censorship as a favor to some people in government, with payment coming indirectly," and I don't want to concede an inch in my position that this is just as bad as "censorship at the direct request of the government."

Big Mike said...

Trump loves America and his main goal has been to bring jobs and the economy back so every American has a chance to find a job.

@Full of Soup, don’t look for tenured or retired tenured professors to care. They’ve got theirs.

Skeptical Voter said...

Hunter Biden is what he is--a sleazy coke sniffing, booty hunting, drug using bagman--who has to kick half of the swag back to the groping, hair sniffing, and now senile Head of the Family.

But without the Head of the Family--who is in a position to dispense favors, while Bagman Hunter is not, where would Hunter be?

Lord Clanfiddle said...

I used to look forward to reading McArdle, but since her arrival on the WaPo plantation she's been a huge disappointment.

As far as censorship goes, it's certainly alive and well. My local paper, the Baton Rouge Morning Advocate, has published 2 very short AP stories about Hunter & his emails--the first doubting their genuineness and the second focused on Rudy Guiliani's supposed shadiness, not addressing Biden corruption at all. And this from a paper that until recently has been considered 'conservative.'

FullMoon said...

I see the FBI is on the job, checkin' for nefarious Russian involvement. Gonna find out if the emails are real, or not.

Any FBI agent, or intrepid reporter think to simply ask Mr. Biden? What's he gonna say?

Maybe Chris Wallace or Rachel Maddow can give Hunter a call.

Heck, I'd do it but a search for his phone number comes up empty.

THIS GUY breaks down the situation as being a big fat fake scam.
https://twitter.com/dantoujours/status/1316844679783223297

The truth is gonna be a BOMBSHELL/EXPLOSIVE no matter which way it goes. Sure hope the stuff is legit, as I believe it is.

Zachinoff said...

The curious incident of the dog that didn't bark.

https://www.foxnews.com/opinion/hunter-biden-computer-facebook-trump-censorship-scandal-jonathan-turley

LilyBart said...


That's how Megan McArdle puts it in "How Twitter and Facebook’s attempt to squelch a dubious Biden story backfired" (WaPo).

Yeah, I thought the story was fake at first too. But then the Biden campaign said Biden might have met with the Burisma guy 'informally' (after first saying it wasn't on his official calendar. Then, someone on one of the more damning email chains verified it. --They not denying this - its likely true or partly true!

Tina Trent said...

Robert Marshall puts it well: Occam's razor blade simultaneously chops Hunter's meth and through democrat claims that we still don't know if the corruption is real, because any honest person already knew it was real, whether or not Giuliani did or didn't down all that imaginary Russian scotch.

Virtually everyone in both political parties succumbs to ideologically camouflaged piles of graft once they get to D.C., if not on the way there. The room with the kitten-sized cocktail shrimp is the goal. It might be hell once you get there, but by then it's the only consolation prize available to the husk of the person you have inevitably become.

I feel sorry for all the blue-collar, working-class democrats who think Biden comes from their world or gives a fig about their interests.

Owen said...

Laslo @ 7:26: "...Which is the modern white woman: the Roe v Wade penumbra has freed them from responsibility for their most serious actions, and that is now the contextual gelatin on which their thinking is built...."

Brutal.

Brilliant.

Here is a belated nomination for thread-winner.

FullMoon said...

Best thing to happen right now would be for Hunter Biden to become a Born Again Christian.

Can you imagine what an October surprise that would be? The guilt and drama and fear becomes too much and he turns himself over to God and lays out the entire story.

Cleanses his soul and frees himself. Imagine the pressure on the guy now. He knows he screwed up, again. And those pictures on the internet, with more to come, are pretty embarrassing. Who took the staged pic of him sleeping with the pipe in his mouth? Probably seemed pretty funny at the time.

Bushman of the Kohlrabi said...

What are Republicans?

I think of them as the Washington Generals. Their main purpose is to collect a paycheck for losing.

tim in vermont said...

The funny thing is that before they were told to stand down by their monied masters, the New York Times had some pretty good reporting that showed that this goes way past the Bidens, and includes large connected Democrat law firms in DC, and of course Romney’s campaign manager dipped his beak.

Fucking Romney. What a tool. If people like him think that they are going to buy up the Republican Party for pennies on the dollar like some vulture capitialist, all they are going to get is the stationary. Nobody is going to follow them anymore. They will be funded by the Democrats solely as a way to keep the opposition split, and as long as the checks clear, these Romney, Jonah Goldberg, Treacher types won’t give a flying fuck about the America that they sold out.

Francisco D said...

Big Mike said... @Full of Soup, don’t look for tenured or retired tenured professors to care. They’ve got theirs.

I don't know about that. From the media ads here in Arizona, Republicans are going to take away our Social Security and Medicare. The number of such ads is overwhelming. My 84 year old (life long Democrat) mother-in-law is very concerned about becoming destitute.

I did point out that she needn't worry because Republicans have been trying to take away Medicare and Social Security for at least the past 40 years, according to election cycle ads. They must be really incompetent if they can never quite succeed.

tim in vermont said...

Fullmoon, your guy says that Giuliani should "turn the hard drive over to forensic experts” when it is already in the possession of the FBI. He is an idiot, and those commenters just run with this nonsense. Why do you even read the shit he says? It’s so disconnected from the facts as we know them.

There is no evidence or logic presented to refute Giuliani, just smears aimed at him. The only way this doesn’t destroy Biden is if they can keep a lid on it long enough to win the election, and then bury it.

Joe Smith said...

I am a capitalist and a free speech absolutest so I get the left's argument.

But what if, let's say, a privately-owned power company has a monopoly on providing power to a certain geographical area.

And for reasons of their own (they're private and don't have to tell you), they decide to cut-back on the power they provide to households that have Democrat-registered voters.

Can't they do that?

Bushman of the Kohlrabi said...

@Full of Soup, don’t look for tenured or retired tenured professors to care. They’ve got theirs.

This applies to most public employees as well. Once they get their gig they don't need to worry about how the left's political agenda will affect people's ability to feed themselves or their families. They are above the fray and are freed from those trivial concerns. Instead they can base their votes on the big issues of the day like which candidate will legalize pot.

Yancey Ward said...

Back to McArdle- as her long time readers know, she didn't just go from her own blog, "Asymmetrical Information" to WaPoo- she first went to "The Economist", then to "The Atlantic" and then to "Bloomberg", all in the period of about 3 years. Now, I followed her through all those changes in employment until WaPoo, and stopped because of the paywall. I had often speculated that the constant switches were because each of those employers were unhappy with what she was writing under their banners- she definitely got lots of vitriolic comments at Bloomberg and The Atlantic. I now think that she just got tired of being forced out of a paying job, and decided she was going to put down roots at WaPoo. Her head is now on Bezo's wall along with Rubin and Will's. The left has learned that you can just buy off writers on the right, and probably pretty cheaply at that.

Rabel said...

I won't be totally shocked if Hunter Biden is found dead from a drug overdose in the next few days.

Moneyrunner said...

Yancy Ward said: "This story isn't going away- Biden might still win the election, but he is toast at some point in the future, and will be forced from the office anyway. The best outcome for him at this point is to win the election,..."
I disagree. The best outcome for Biden is to lose the election bigly and have Trump turn a blind eye. If he wins he will not be able to cover his tracks and will either be impeached or will have an "accident."

Narayanan said...

stevew said...
"The New York Post published a story based on a trove of leaked emails allegedly found on a laptop belonging to Hunter Biden, son of Joe Biden, the Democratic presidential candidate."
----------============
if the hd is imaged from original Hunter laptop hd ---- there was no 'leaking' of emails

Chennaul said...

Read the beginning of Woodward’s book. It really was not that long ago, it just feels like that but The Left—Impeached the leader of the free world with very badly sourced “evidence”—-during what turned out to be the outbreak of a historic world wide pandemic. One with —asymptomatic — transmission.

Now take a look back and remember the people of Ukraine. The Left wants us to have sympathy for Hunter and Joe but....reread this from The Voice of America.

Teleshetsky referred to a Biden statement at a 2018 Council on Foreign Relations event, when he talked about threatening to rescind a $1 billion U.S. government loan to Ukraine if Shokin were not fired.

Biden's campaign, Ukrainian anti-corruption activists, and former Obama administration officials have long maintained that Biden`s demand was a part of an international campaign to remove the Ukrainian law enforcement official because he wasn`t actively pursuing corruption cases.


'Means nothing'

Speaking of the new investigation, Kostiantyn Likarchuk, a managing partner in the Kyiv office of the Kinstellar law firm, told VOA, “Legally, that means nothing. If anybody reports a criminal offense, then goes to a court, and a court makes a decision that the State Bureau of Investigations has to register the probe, it would register it. It doesn`t mean that there are grounds for an investigation.”

"Ukrainian authorities have neither the capacity nor the skills required for the investigation of this kind. But in any event, to assume that Biden interfered with Shokin’s activity is absurd,” said Likarchuk.

Former U.S. ambassador to Ukraine and a witness in the Trump impeachment inquiry William Taylor told VOA that he hopes the probe against Biden will be seen as “a normal law enforcement operation” and would not jeopardize the bipartisan support of Ukraine in Washington.

"What I have told my Ukrainian friends, over and over again, is that the most valuable strategic asset Ukraine has in the U.S. is this bipartisan support. It’s golden. Most issues in this city are in conflict; they are controversial; they don’t have bipartisan support. Ukraine has bipartisan support. And actions that are taken over there should not jeopardize that. Ukrainians don’t want to be involved in our politics, and we don’t want to be involved in Ukrainian politics. That should guide the Ukrainian government to be sure they’re not interfering in our politics,” Taylor said.


https://www.voanews.com/europe/ukraine-opens-case-involving-former-prosecutor-general

Read that last part.....almost sounds like a threat. (Off to go google William Taylor.)

Rt41Rebel said...

I don't know if anyone has pointed this out, but the Dems have Wile E Coyoted themselves yet again. If they hadn't picked up this particular dildo and attempted to slay Trump with it, it wouldn't be in their ass right now.

Joe Smith said...

"I see the FBI is on the job, checkin' for nefarious Russian involvement. Gonna find out if the emails are real, or not."

From what I read the FBI has had the laptop for ten months...and they're just getting around to looking at it now?

And I'm sure it will take them until after the election to make an assessment...something that would take the average Silicon Valley IT guy/gal about an hour.

If a copy hadn't been made it would have been buried forever.

Our entire government is corrupt, along with the 'media.'

We're kind of fucked.

FullMoon said...

tim in vermont said...

Fullmoon, your guy says that Giuliani should "turn the hard drive over to forensic experts” when it is already in the possession of the FBI. He is an idiot, and those commenters just run with this nonsense. Why do you even read the shit he says? It’s so disconnected from the facts as we know them.

There is no evidence or logic presented to refute Giuliani, just smears aimed at him. The only way this doesn’t destroy Biden is if they can keep a lid on it long enough to win the election, and then bury it.


My guy? Get tested Tim, the virus got ya.
I posted the link for amusement, duh.You lost your sense of humor, how's your taste of smell?

Narayanan said...

since I am curious I propose a new sniff test :

if creepy Joe were to attempt to sniff > Melania, McCardle, Althouse > how will each react?

hstad said...

All these powerful players, like Facebook and Twitter, view that such actions as banning their lot in life. Despite their best efforts, the "NY Post" story on "Hunter Biden", spread like 'ludicrous speed' given more unwanted press to this story.

Margaret Thatcher said it best: "...being powerful is like being a lady. If you have to tell people you are, you aren't..."


tim in vermont said...

Ya got me Fullmoon

Bunkypotatohead said...

Pelosi and Schiff insisted on impeaching the president for the crimes the Biden family was committing. Someone in the fbi sat on this laptop info throughout the proceedings.
It's good to see some of the president's allies getting cold revenge.
I was expecting big media to pull off some October surprise against Trump, but he looks to have gotten ahead of them, at their own game.

Clyde said...

Rabel said...
I won't be totally shocked if Hunter Biden is found dead from a drug overdose in the next few days.


Let me get out in front on this one: Hunter Biden didn't kill himself!

Narayanan said...

Zachinoff said...
The curious incident of the dog that didn't bark.

from that article >>> Turley says … The convergence of law and politics is a common occurrence in Washington. While law is used to ascertain truth, politics is often used to obscure it.
-----------------==============
While law is used to ascertain truth ??? WTF - how can this be true (I would go limitedly for "due process may be has this goal") or is this some nuance of "law" I am not getting?

Narayanan said...

follow up

if Dimple smiled Donny were to attempt to sniff > Melania, McCardle, Althouse > how will each react?

Amadeus 48 said...

Sniff test:
Melania would puncture Joe’s foot with her four inch stilettos and then kick him in the nuts, saying, “I do really care, creep.”

McArdle would say, “I am going to pretend that didn’t happen.”

Althouse would say, “Let’s examine what just happened here,” and go off on a long and tortured analysis of why Joe might have felt that he was entitled to do that, going through several iterations regarding male-female signaling, concluding that Joe had presumed, discussing all shadings of difference between male privilege and white male privilege, asking whether there is black or Asian male privilege, and noting that Joe did not grab her by the pussy, while noting that, although there were allegations, there were no definitive, verified cases of Trump grabbing anyone by the pussy on the public record, but she, being cruelly neutral, isn’t going to vote for either of them.

tim in vermont said...

To be fair, they had to start censoring content because they wanted to make more money. But that doesn’t make them a publisher, because they had to do it... in order to make more money.

Amadeus 48 said...

Donald sniff test:

Melania: “Save it for later, but you know I love you, tiger. Grrr...”

McArdle: “I knew it! I knew it!”

Althouse: same as with Biden.

Michael K said...

The left has learned that you can just buy off writers on the right, and probably pretty cheaply at that.

Oh yes. Even Drudge but he is on a beach somewhere with his safe deposit box full. He doesn't have to sing for his supper like the other three.

stan said...

Megan used to be moderately intelligent. She's lost her way. Sad.

FullMoon said...

tim in vermont said...

Ya got me Fullmoon


The comments are hilarious, Reddit quality ignorance and denial, and they continue in same vein..
For those that missed it

https://twitter.com/dantoujours/status/1316844679783223297

wildswan said...

"Megan McArdle Garners Criticism"

PS. After close study, I think this is the correct use of the word "pre-bunk":
"Pre-Bunk McArdle Preferred"
PPS. I'm sad. Another good woman down. The Swamp emanates a vast sucking sound, belches slightly and lies still, stinking.
PPPS. But, ACB!!!

Rt41Rebel said...

Just in time for Christmas: Computer Security for Dummies, by Anthony Weiner and Hunter Biden. Order through the Althouse Amazon portal.

FullMoon said...

Amadeus 48 said...

Sniff test:
Melania would puncture Joe’s foot with her four inch stilettos and then kick him in the nuts, saying, “I do really care, creep.”

McArdle would say, “I am going to pretend that didn’t happen.”

Althouse would say, “Let’s examine what just happened here,”.....


And, find first published mention of "sniff test" ....

Michael K said...

Althouse would say, “Let’s examine what just happened here,

You left out the Oxford English Dictionary with a history of the use of the word "pussy."

Jason said...

I’ve lost count of the number of times I’ve tweeted at McMegan that she’s been in DC too long. Started a couple of years ago. Complete swamp creature now.

bacchys said...

Twitter and Facebook aren't leftists. They aren't even left.

I'm fully in agreement with encouraging social media companies to eschew censorship, but they, too, have free speech rights. Rights affirmed both by Citizens United and Sec. 230. Further, ascribing such political motivations to their speech absent foundation doesn't seem reasonable.

jim said...

Trump must be desperate if he approved this garbage smear campaign. It will backfire.