Category Archives: Politically Incorrect

Supporters of populist parties are often portrayed as politically nave or misinformed, but to what extent does this image reflect reality? Drawing on a new study, Stijn van Kessel, Javier Sajuria and Steven M. Van Hauwaert present evidence that populist party supporters are not less informed than supporters of other parties. However, supporters of right-wing populist parties had a greater tendency to give incorrect answers to political knowledge questions, suggesting there are key differences between the characteristics of left-wing and right-wing populist voters.

Extant research shows that supporters of populist radical left-wing and right-wing parties make conscious choices: they generally support these parties because they agree with their positions. Yet, populist party supporters are still often portrayed as ill-informed and susceptible to a charismatic leaders evocative, yet misleading rhetoric. This is not least due to a widespread negative interpretation of populism as a stand-alone concept. Populism is regularly associated with political opportunism (saying what people want to hear), navet (simple solutions to complex problems) and demagogy (responding to societys underbelly), or confused with adjacent but fundamentally different concepts, such as xenophobia or nationalism.

To what extent is this image of populist party supporters as being politically nave or misinformed accurate? In the contemporary context of fake news, this question is perhaps more relevant than ever. Are populist party supporters more susceptible than their non-populist counterparts to misleading or incorrect information disseminated by politicians and (social) media? In a recently published study, we provide an initial answer to these questions.

We use a commonly accepted definition of populism, and consider it to be a set of ideas that make a moral distinction between the corrupt elite and the virtuous citizens. Accordingly, populist parties accuse the (political) elite of power abuse and, often consciously, ignoring the wishes of ordinary citizens. They are self-proclaimed champions of so-called popular sovereignty.

For our study, we rely on an existing cross-national survey with data from nine European countries (Germany, France, Greece, Italy, Poland, Spain, United Kingdom, Sweden and Switzerland) to distinguish between respondents who indicated they would, in the next elections, vote for a populist party (left or right), those who would cast a vote for a non-populist party, and those who had no intention of voting.

The main aim of our study was to investigate whether there is a connection between political support (populist choice/non-populist choice/abstaining) and political information, but also political misinformation. After all, being informed is not only a matter of possessing or lacking information; the accuracy of this information should also be considered.

With that in mind, we estimated the extent to which individuals were politically informed, uninformed or misinformed, based on three multiple choice questions that were included in the survey. Respondents were asked to recognise an EU politician, answer the question of what budget deficit means, and identify who sets the interest rate in their country.

Respondents who gave correct answers received a high score on a political information variable; those who gave incorrect answers or admitted they did not know the answers scored low, and were considered politically uninformed. We then also compiled an indicator for the correctness of political information, i.e. a political misinformation variable. Respondents who gave correct answers or admitted they did not know the answers received a low score, while respondents who gave incorrect answers received a high score, and were deemed politically misinformed.

Figure 1: Multinomial logistic coefficients for the regression models (Model 1)

What did we observe when relating the extent of (correct) information to intended voting behaviour? Model 1 shows that populist party supporters are not demonstrably worse informed than supporters of other parties. There is only a clear difference between those who intend to turn out and those who do not. On average, the latter are less informed than more politically active citizens. We thus find a positive relationship between possessing correct political information and the intention to support a political party, regardless of whether that party is populist or not.

As previous research shows, populist voters are also characterised by a high degree of political interest (compared to non-voters) and strong populist attitudes. That is, they share an aversion towards the political elite, and believe that politicians should follow the will of the people. These findings suggest that support for a populist party should not simply be interpreted as an uninformed protest vote or a sign of political ignorance. Instead, it is often a conscious expression of dissatisfaction with the functioning of representative democracy (see previous EUROPP article here), and the electorate of populist parties consists at least partly of politically aware, informed and interested citizens.

Figure 2: Logistic coefficients for regression using left- or right-wing populist parties as dependent variable (Model 2)

In terms of political misinformation, we find a difference between supporters of populist and non-populist parties, but only when we further distinguish supporters of populist radical right parties from the rest (see Model 2). Individuals in this latter category were, on average, characterised by a higher degree of political misinformation compared with all other respondents: they had a greater tendency to give incorrect answers to political knowledge questions, instead of admitting to not knowing the answers. This seems to be in line with previous studies that link the populist radical right ideology with distorted representations of reality, such as conspiracy theories. It is safe to say that such interpretations of reality are often based on incorrect information.

What can we conclude from this last finding? The results highlight that left- and right-wing populist parties (and their voters) cannot be considered a homogeneous group. There are major ideological differences between left-wing populist parties (which mainly focus on socio-economic themes) and right-wing populist parties (which are primarily characterised by their cultural conservatism and often xenophobic views). Populism is an important common denominator, also as an attitude amongst various populist party supporters. However, it is clear that there are major differences between the views and general characteristics of left- and right-wing populist supporters.

Do our results indicate that populist radical right supporters are particularly susceptible to conspiracy theories and fake news? Unfortunately, our research does not provide a direct answer to this pertinent question. Hopefully, follow-up studies can investigate the more specific link between the deliberate dissemination of incorrect information (disinformation) and voting behaviour.

For more information, see the authors accompanying paper in West European Politics. This blog was first published in Dutch on the website Stuk Rood Vlees.

Please read our comments policy before commenting.

Note: This article gives the views of theauthors, not the position of EUROPP European Politics and Policy or the London School of Economics.

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About the authors

Stijn van Kessel Queen Mary University of LondonStijn van Kessel is Senior Lecturer in European Politics at Queen Mary University of London.

Javier Sajuria Queen Mary University of LondonJavier Sajuria is Senior Lecturer in Politics at Queen Mary University of London.

Steven M. Van Hauwaert University of SurreySteven M. Van Hauwaert is Lecturer in Comparative Politics at the University of Surrey.

See original here:
Populist party supporters: Informed, uninformed or misinformed? - EUROPP - European Politics and Policy

Cornwall had never seen the like and arguably still hasnt over 100 years later.

William F Cody better known as Buffalo Bill after allegedly killing 4,280 buffalo in 18 months was one of the legends of Americas Wild West.

He founded the town of Cody in Wyoming and was one of the most colourful figures of the American Old West, becoming a rider for the Pony Express at just 15.

During the American Civil War, he served the Union from 1863 to the end of the war in 1865 and was later a civilian scout for the US Army during the Indian Wars, receiving the Medal of Honor in 1872.

But it was as a showman that Buffalo Bills legend grew and Cornwall didnt know what hit it when he brought his Wild West Show to four venues in May and June 1904.

The sensation of the late Victorian age, the shows featured real-life cowboys and Native Americans - or 'Red Indians' as they were known in politically incorrect times - re-enacting famous battles from Americas recent frontier history, many of which had featured the stars of the show themselves.

Sitting Bull appeared with a band of 20 of his braves while other famous performers included Calamity Jane and sharpshooter Annie Oakley.

Buffalo Bill's Wild West and Congress of Rough Riders of the World to give the extravaganza its full title had proved a huge smash across the United States, from 1883, and Europe, four years later.

The cavalcade of cowboys and Indians first arrived in Britain for that 1887 tour, as part of the Golden Jubilee celebrations for Queen Victoria.

Audiences would sit open-mouthed in their crinoline dresses and finest suits as stagecoaches were attacked, buffalos hunted, indians attacked cowboys as rodeos and gun fights filled the air with smoke and noise.

The Wild West show opened in London on May 9, 1887, before a crowd of 28,000 in a huge outdoor arena.

The Queen wrote to Cody to request a private performance 'by royal command' at Windsor Palace later that same year.

Queen Victoria and an entourage of 25 comprised the audience, sitting in the royal box in grandstands that could hold 40,000.

Buffalo Bill and his exotic entourage returned to Britain several times, finally heading to our own Wild West in 1904.

The lavish shows took place on Monday, May 30, at the Recreation Grounds, Penzance, Tuesday, May 31, in Camborne, Wednesday, June 1, at St Pauls United Football Ground in Truro and Thursday, June 2, in Bodmin.

The show began with a parade on horseback, with participants from horse-riding groups which included US and other military, cowboys, Native Americans and performers from all over the world in their best attire.

Turks, gauchos, Arabs, Mongols and Georgians displayed their distinctive horses and colourful costumes. As well as the main events there were feats of skill, staged races and sideshows.

The show would always feature the Native Americans attacking a woman who the great hero Buffalo Bill would rescue.

The legends arrival in Cornwall was such big news that Herbert Thomas, the editor of our sister paper, The Cornishman, penned a greeting in verse.

From the far Wild West to the Western Wilds

You come like a freshening breeze;

Cowboys and Cossacks and Indian braves,

From the wide plains over the seas;

And towering above you, as towers a hill,

The King of Rough Riders Buffalo Bill.

Penwith Local History Group reports that the Wild West show arrived in Penzance on two trains on Sunday, May 29, with the performers' disembarkation proving a show in itself.

A parade of rough riders, Indians and Cossacks through Penzances Market Jew Street was a major attraction, with cowboys, Mexicans, Indians, Japanese and Cossacks all arriving at Long Rock at about 5.30am.

The afternoon saw a party of indians take a GWR motor ride to Land's End where they were photographed pointing to the west, in the direction of their home.

The big day was Monday, May 30, when all Penzance and his wife turned up to see the show in all its glory at the Recreation Ground.

Most popular was the evening performance when there was a larger crowd gathered together under cover in one place than was ever seen in Penzance before. The displays of marksmanship and horse riding skills put the achievements of the previous years pedestrian racers firmly in the shade.

However, it was Buffalo Bill theyd all come to see. This hero of a thousand tales, the man of iron nerve, dauntless courage, and unfaltering spirit, that son of the prairie, that marvellous scout and warrior.

A few extraordinary photographs survive of the visit. One shows Buffalo Bill himself with a young child on St Michaels Mount, while in another a young local man looks on as a family of Native Americans walk past a Cornish hedge.

There is also a picture of a group of Indian braves wearing their impressive headdress at Lands End.

In an interview the great man professed himself surprised to be making a living as a showman and described how, back home in Nebraska, he was building a new community in a valley of three million acres irrigated by mountain streams.

At heart I am a pioneer, he said, as he set off to take tea with Lady St Levan on St Michael's Mount.

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When Buffalo Bills Wild West shows thrilled thousands across Cornwall - Cornwall Live

For a guy who once made a film about the inside of his own head, its surprising just how difficult it is to work out who John Malkovich really is. Speaking to NME from a remote French chateau to discuss his new Netflix sitcom, Space Force, his voice drifts through a crackly phone line in a soft monotone. Questions are answered with questions. Tangents spiral off into intellectual dead ends. Long silences are given over to quiet contemplation. You can almost hear the PR on the other line sweating.

How are you holding up in lockdown? we ask, not expecting a quick burst of laughter as if the question itself is faintly ridiculous. Infuriating, sure, but its hard to imagine much else from Hollywoods most mysterious A-lister. In fact its hard to imagine anything at all.

Credit: MJ Kim / Getty

Since the mid 90s Malkovich has been more myth than man. Spike Jonzes landmark indie comedy, Being John Malkovich, fuelled a cult of personality that blurred the lines between the roles he played and the actor inside them. Hes been French Viscounts, Austrian painters and Italian adventurers. Libertines, doctors, revolutionaries, serial killers, The Duke Of Wellington, Charles VII and Pope John Paul III. Hes also been in Transformers, Jonah Hex and Zoolander 2.

Old interviews are full of his obsession with weird details drifting off to look at clouds, randomly asking journalists if they like the shape of his skull. At one point he told someone that he doesnt like having multiple stripes of colour in his toothpaste. Whether its all part of the act or not, its difficult to know what to make of a man whos commanded so many different roles yet still managed to make most of them look and sound exactly like himself. A guy who lives in the shadow of a castle once owned by the Marquis de Sade, works his own vineyard and refuses to watch action movies but who once did a voice in The Penguins Of Madagascar Who the hell is John Malkovich?

If I was ever insane enough to write an autobiography, it would be titled Some Things They Say I Did

For the next few weeks at least, hes Dr Adrian Mallory a deadpan foil to Steve Carrells blustery general in Space Force, a new smart-edged sitcom from Greg Daniels (creator of the US remake of The Office) about the most inept new branch of the American military. Hes a very bright, funny scientist, but hes not necessarily an outwardly comic figure, says Malkovich, before adding a lot of backstory that never actually comes out in the show. Hes very well educated, he grew up overseas, obviously very well-versed in science someone very dapper, who is quite vain and cares about clothing and the way that clothing looks and the quality and of it all

He could, of course, just be describing himself. As well as being a highly-intelligent actor and director, Malkovich also grew up overseas and is most definitely a dapper dude having run his own mens fashion line since 2002 (according to his website, he often spends several days focusing purely on fabric selection). So where does the character stop and the actor begin? Digging into his own backstory, things dont get any clearer.

As Dr Adrian Mallory in new Netflix sitcom Space Force. Credit: Netflix

Back in 1984, John Malkovich was the hottest thing in Hollywood. Fresh from the Chicago stage but commanding roles like he was already a veteran, the young thespian made his debut in Places In The Heart and The Killing Fields instantly picking up an Oscar nomination and getting his name on every audition list in town.

It was a significant event in terms of my life, he says now, remembering what it felt like to launch his career at the very top. Just in terms of being in these huge undertakings that gave me an outlook of what the work was of what the work could be. I thought they were both good films, but I also thought they were two good films to be involved with.

The Glass Menagerie, Death Of A Salesman and Steven Spielbergs Empire Of The Sun quickly followed, but it was Stephen Frears swoony 1988 literary adaption of Dangerous Liaisons that allowed him to refashion his image again as Hollywoods favourite well-spoken bad guy.

In Dangerous Liaisons alongside Glenn Close and Michelle Pfeiffer. Credit: Alamy

Those were just the roles I was offered, he says, ignoring a remark that hes always looked like he has more fun playing the villain than the hero. For Liaisons I was quite surprised to be offered that role at all. I wasnt offered the Clint Eastwood role for In The Line Of Fire because why would I? To be honest I dont think of any of them as villains per se anyway more as studies in talent gone awry, or at least in potential gone awry.

With the early 90s came the kind of fame that Malkovich has never felt comfortable with, then only emerging from his French chateau to make things worse for himself taking ever quirkier roles in ever bigger films. Reading back some of the celebrity profiles of the time, its hard to know which stories are actually true. Well who can say? he says. If I was ever insane enough to write an autobiography it would be titled Some Things They Say I Did.

I was in my yard in France and [a stranger] handed me a script that was written in what could have been red ink

Did he really threaten a homeless guy with a Bowie knife? Did he wreck a tailors shop when his shirts turned up late, or smash in the window of bus when it didnt stop for him? Apparently he once ate nothing but jelly for six months to try and lose weight. One time, a crazy woman jumped over his garden fence and handed him a script handwritten in blood.

That did happen, yes, he says softly, neither angry nor glad that weve bought it up. I was in my yard in France and she handed me a script that was all written in what could have been red ink. It was more like it was scrawled with maybe a very sharp knitting needle. It was about a female character who murders an American actor and it really wasnt very good. So he read it? I read some of it. I read enough to understand the plot, but it didnt seem like one I wanted to finish reading really oh yes it was quite terrifying at the time.

In Spike Jonzes 1999 indie classic Being John Malkovich. Credit: Alamy

Who else then would Charlie Kaufman pick to play himself in a film about the interior of a real American actors head? Who else would have such a quality of unknowabilty, as he put it at the time telling press that he had only ever had one person in mind for Being John Malkovich.

A quality of unknowabilty? says Malkovich, turning the phrase over in his mind. I dont know what that means. [Long, awkward pause]. I dont think anybody is a fixed, knowable thing. I get what Charlie is saying, and I think Charlie is incredibly clever, but I dont really think anyone is knowable if Im unknowable.

I never actually thought that Being John Malkovich would get made

I never met Charlie before he wrote the screenplay, so any impression he could have gotten from me would have been a kind of third-party impression. I dont think I had a conversation with him until right before I did the film, when we had breakfast with Spike Jonze. Afterwards Charlie came up to me and said, I want you to know that Im a big fan, and I said, Charlie you dont have to do that I already read the script.

Malkovichs first thought when he read a comedy about his own psyche was that he wanted to direct it himself, and that it needed to be about someone else. Why not Being Tom Cruise I asked? Charlie told me quite clearly that he had no desire to change it, and that he was going to direct, so I said OK. To be honest, I never actually thought that it would get made. I remember those years when it remained un-produced. Whenever I got to Hollywood for some press thing or whatever, invariably Id be in some hotel lobby or in some restaurant or at some vintage lamp store, and somebody would come up to me and say, hey, why arent you making Being John Malkovich? Eventually we did it, and honestly I was just happy to be a part of it.

He might have missed out on directing Kaufmanns debut masterpiece, but the cult of Malkovich exploded after the film came out letting him direct The Dancer Upstairs instead, a moody revolutionary thriller starring Javier Bardem that picked up a few nods on the festival circuit back in 2002.

One of Malkovichs most memorable villain roles Cyrus the Virus Grissom in Con Air. Credit: Alamy

I had some other offers at the time but nothing that really appealed to me, he says, suddenly much more excited to talk about directing. I worked with my producing partners on a French film for a number of years that was a kind of mockumentary about a war between a group of environmentalists and a group of vaccination NGOs. But it never got funded. It was pretty politically incorrect.

There are things that I produced that I would have loved to have directed too. I would have loved to have directed The Perks Of Being A Wallflower but Steven Chbosky, who wrote it, wanted to direct it and why shouldnt he. And I would have loved to have directed Ghost World, Juno, and also Art School Confidential. We had a script for a time that I loved called The Coolest Girl In The World, but the writer wanted to direct that too [eventually becoming 2018s Eighth Grade, by Bo Burnham]. I direct a lot in the theatre though and that wastes a lot less time.

Theatre, it seems, has always been Malkovichs true love with character roles in big Hollywood comedies and action movies bookending foreign arthouse projects and long stints directing for the European stage. How else to explain roles like Cyrus The Virus Grissom in the Nicolas Cage classic, Con Air? Or Trump-esque baddie Pascal Sauvage in Johnny English?

Con Air was like living outside with a pack of wild animals

I dont so enjoy watching those films, he muses. I dont mean to specifically point out those films in particular, but in terms of the action genre, I just dont watch it. But Con Air I loved doing because it was all those men it was kind of like living outside with a pack of wild animals. I can enjoy doing it without it being something that I would choose to actually watch. For Johnny English, the opportunity came with the bonus of being able to drop in a few obscure digs at disgraced French businessman Jean-Marie Messier (who briefly made the financial newspapers back in 2002 for misusing company funds) something that was almost definitely not picked up by anyone who saw it. For me it was also all about doing this idiotic voice [goes into a ridiculous French accent] Oh my family av ad a ouse ere for centuries blah blah blah Of course, if you live in France thats the kind of language you hear every time you hear English tourists speaking. We wound up with a silly cartoon version of a man, which I think is why so many children from a certain generation love that.

As Pascal Sauvage in Johnny English. Credit: Alamy

Settling into a comfortable older age looking more like Sigmund Freud than Michael Stipe as he enters his late 60s Malkovich seems to be picking slightly more projects that speak to both sides of his personality. Arty but successful shows like Paolo Sorrentinos The New Pope. Blockbusters with decent directors like Peter Bergs Mile 22. And comedy with something to say like his latest show, Space Force.

I just thought it sounded a very funny, very timely idea, and a pretty target-rich environment really, says Malkovich, before trying to steer the conversation to ancient Greek aesthetics, Brutalist design and Soviet collectivism.

Dragged back to try and explain the plot of the show, he manages to keep things abstract. The best laid plans of mice and men often go astray, he says. Something I think most people can relate to on a day-to-day basis, even people who are successful or even very successful in their field, is that you just may not be qualified to do whats being asked of you. There is a lot of comedy in that because theres also a lot of pain in that. Pain and comedy tend to go hand in hand, or at least hand in glove.

Wandering off topic again to talk about the future of cinema after the lockdown (Ive said for a long time that I dont know how long movie theatres would last. This could be the final toll of that mournful bell) and how it once took him five years to watch Sexy Beast on DVD (but thats okay, because everything changed the moment you could watch a film whenever you wanted to on VHS or CD), things take a bleaker turn as he describes his last few months spent cancelling productions around Europe when theatres closed down, postponing planned film roles and holing up in his chateau to wait for lockdown to end.

I dont know how long movie theatres can last

So wheres the silver lining? What does Malkovich do to lighten the mood when things look bad? What makes him laugh?

Lots of things make me laugh, he says, putting on a weird high-pitched voice. Behaviour. Sometimes childishness. Extremes of emotion can be funny. A chimp in a space suit hurtling towards the sun.

Credit: Getty

Theres a scene in Space Force when they solicit a monkey to repair a space craft. You see him in his little chimp-stronaut suit, with his little helmet on, then hes hurled in a trajectory towards the sun and everything falls to pieces. It just reveals the sort of pathetic-ness of people. Even in outer space big dreams dont often come true. I know according to Disney some dreams can come true, it can happen to you, but they can also not come true. Thats pretty hilarious to me

So who the hell is John Malkovich? We still have no idea.

Space Force arrives on Netflix on May 29

The rest is here:
John Malkovich: What makes me laugh? A chimp in a space suit hurtling towards the sun - NME.com

The Office almost included a cameo by Dwight Schrutes UK counterpart, but the moment never played out on screen, unfortunately. During the May 27 Office Ladies podcast, Jenna Fischer revealed the details of how that meeting was supposed to happen but a scheduling conflict prevented the cameo from becoming a reality.

In The Office Season 3, Episode 2, titled The Convention, Dunder Mifflin branches collide as Michael and Dwight from Scranton, Josh and Jim from Stamford, and Jan from corporate meet up at the Northeastern Mid-Market Office Supply convention in Philadelphia. Michael attempts to throw a party in his hotel room as he struggles with wondering why Jim left Scranton. Jim seems to have bonded with his new boss Josh and that doesnt sit well with Michael.

Back in Scranton, Pam is now single so Kelly sets her up on a date but she doesnt have a love connection when she goes on a double date with Ryan and Kelly. Jim reveals to Michael that he didnt leave the Scranton branch because of him but because Pam rejected him.

The Convention episode could have been even more entertaining if a cameo had worked out. The plan was that the UK Offices Dwight character Gareth Keenan, played by Mackenzie Crook, would be at the convention in a booth and he and Dwight would have a run-in.

Alas, there were scheduling issues, so fans never got to seethis epic idea play out. Can you imagine the exchange between Dwight andGareth?

Crook was in town doing a press junket for Pirates of the Caribbean so they hoped they could get him for the episode. Unfortunately, that didnt work out, Fischer explained on Office Ladies. The scheduling did not work out, he couldnt come, Fischer shared. He couldnt come. He wanted to hes the nicest guy, Ive met him, hes awesome.

RELATED: The Office: This Dwight and Jim Scene Was So Funny, the Stars Couldnt Stop Laughing and Production Had to Shut Down

While Dwight and Gareth never shared the screen on The Office, the two actors did eventually meet in person. In November 2018, actor Rainn Wilson, who played Dwight, met Crook backstage when Crook appeared in the play The Seagull.

The Office did get a bit of a crossover with the British version in season 7 episode 14, titled The Seminar. In the episode, Michael bumps into David Brent from the original Office, in a brief cameo played by Ricky Gervais.

In the brief scene, David exits the elevator and he has an exchange with Michael, who says hes working on a British character. The two then exchange impersonations of a politically incorrect character and discuss how people dont accept those kinds of impressions. David drops a thats what she says line and Michael, thoroughly appreciating the reference, gives him a hug. David asks Michael if the company is currently hiring and Michael says not right now.

View post:
'The Office': Dwight Almost Met His British Counterpart on 1 Episode but They Couldn't Pull Off the Epic Cameo - Showbiz Cheat Sheet

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On Thursday, May 28, US President Donald Trump signed an executive order calling for the narrowing of legal immunity enjoyed by online platforms like Twitter, Facebook and YouTube with respect to liability arising from user-generated content. Calling such platforms 21st century public squares that are key enablers of free and open debate, the order expressed concern over several instances of selective censorship conducted by politically biased corporations, and instructed US regulators to take action, including by proposing federal legislation to clarify the scope of immunity and to protect free expression online.

This is a significant development in global Internet jurisprudence as it is expected to reanimate some key questions surrounding platform accountability, and warrants a closer examination of its implications for the digital world.

At the heart of the debate lies Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act of 1996, whereby online platforms are broadly protected from being held liable on account of the content posted by their users. Platforms are also prevented under the provision from incurring civil liability for censoring offensive content, whether or not the content is constitutionally protected. In other words, Section 230 allows American platform providers to offer their services without being made to answer for illegal content posted by users, and makes them responsible for developing internal mechanisms to keep their platforms free from offensive material within the boundaries of US law.

The safe harbour protection offered by Section 230 is believed to have played a crucial role in allowing the Internet to become a forum for open discourse over the past years. In the absence of safe harbour protection, platforms would have been unable to operate at scale without mass censorship and vetting (highly impractical), retarding their growth and proliferation. Section 230 served as a way to address these concerns, treating platforms as mere intermediaries between content creators and consumers, with limited content moderation functions on their own terms.

This approach gained favour amongst regulators in other jurisdictions as well, prompting many of them to adopt similar legislations to allow online platforms to flourish. Articles 12 to 15 of the European e-Commerce Directive, for instance, exempts platform providers from a general obligation to monitor content or verify its legality. In India, Section 79 of the Information Technology Act, 2000 exempts platform providers from being held liable for any third-party content, so long as certain baseline conditions are satisfied.

However, the moderation role that many platforms are increasingly dispensing, is now becoming the bone of contention in the US and in other geographies.

Though strong safe harbour protection for online platforms was considered a good practice in Internet regulation for many years, we are now witnessing a gradual shift in this narrative, driven largely by the evolving roles played by platforms in contemporary societies. Gone are the days when social media websites were used primarily by small clusters of individuals to keep abreast of one anothers lives. Instead, they have matured into powerful, omnipresent vehicles of public debate that are as valuable to governments and institutions as they are to individuals, businesses and communities. Billions of users now turn to these platforms each day to engage with the world around them in all manner of ways, ranging from trading in news to participating in democratic processes. It is no stretch then to say that the norms and frameworks used by platform providers to shape conversations on their networks also shape larger public discourses. And this creates a new dynamic.

Cognisant of the enhanced relevance of online platforms in modern society, governments around the world have begun to seek greater control over the form and substance of digital information flows, including by holding platform providers to higher standards of accountability with respect to the content they host. China and Russia represent one end of the spectrum on this front, both having introduced numerous laws and regulations over the years imposing the strictest of legal sanctions on platforms that allow national and public interests to be undermined in any way. Indias draft amendments to its intermediary liability laws, while more modest than the aforementioned, demonstrate a clear intent to tighten platform accountability through expedited content take-downs and proactive monitoring of networks among other things. Calls for elevated accountability can be seen even in western liberal democracies like the European Union, where legislative intervention is being passively explored to tackle issues such as online disinformation.

Seen against this backdrop, President Trumps executive order to clarify the scope of legal immunity under Section 230, irrespective of its underlying motivations, is just the latest in a series of global developments related to the introduction of stricter accountability frameworks governing online platforms.

Despite its scathing indictment of selective censorship by online platforms and unambiguous call for narrower immunity provisions, President Trumps order is unlikely to significantly change American law in the short term and will almost certainly fail to withstand judicial scrutiny. As the US Chamber of Commerce pointed out, an executive order cannot be deployed as the vehicle to change federal law, which means the order is at best, a very vocal declaration of intent by the Trump administration. However, this is not to say that it is an insignificant one, for if nothing else, it will add more vigour to such propositions elsewhere in the world by virtue of originating in a jurisdiction that is seen as a legislative trendsetter so to speak.

Furthermore, the order raises several key questions that will now feature more prominently in global policy circles. Should private corporations be allowed to dictate the terms of engagement in public spheres? At what point do the actions of corporations turn into active interference with governance and political functions? Should statements made by world leaders and politicians remain accessible to the public, no matter how factually incorrect or otherwise objectionable they might be? How can nation states prevent domestic discourses from being influenced by external values and considerations? How will grey-flagging of a political statement by a ruling party or opposition leader on Twitter during animated elections in any country go down? Add to that the fact that these platforms are essentially foreign corporations (in all but one or two countries) moderating local political content.

What transpires in the Trump Versus Jack saga over the US election cycle will be as interesting as what other jurisdictions do with their existing efforts to tame the platform nation that resides within national boundaries but speaks free of territorial encumbrances.

Originally posted here:
No safe harbour? Platform wars in the US - Observer Research Foundation

By Walter E. Block, American economist and libertarian theorist who holds the Harold E. Wirth Eminent Scholar Endowed Chair in Economics at the J. A. Butt School of Business atLoyola University New Orleans, and is a senior fellow of theLudwig von Mises InstituteinAuburn, Alabama, and is the author of two dozen books, including his most famous, Defending the Undefendable.

Despite all the efforts of equalization, women in high-ranking corporate positions are still exceedingly rare. But they are almost as rare in the dredges of society and the reasons for both run deeper than sexism.

It is more than passing curious that at a time when women constitute roughly half the workforce, and are in the actual majority in terms of earning college degrees, there are still so few female CEOs. The distaff side accounts for CEOs in only 167 out of 3,000 large companies, which translates into a rather modest 5.5 percent of the total.

Various explanations have been put forth to account for this fact. Women do a disproportionate share of household tasks, such as cooking, cleaning, childcare, shopping. This accounts for some of the gap, but not all of it. Females are less ambitious; they do not as readily seek promotions as do males.

Why not? They are more attached to home and hearth, and realize that the higher up you go in the work hierarchy, the more on the job responsibility there is, which will detract from their family obligations. This, too accounts for their greater reluctance to seek greener pastures in more lucrative employment elsewhere; the wife is more likely to be the trailing spouse, who has to accept whatever is available in another city or state, than her husband.

Recently, a new elucidation has been added to these more traditional accounts. It is that men are more likely to occupy positions that feed into CEO jobs than women. For example, more males than females take on line roles which are directly responsible for profits and losses, such as heading up a division of a large firm. In contrast, women specialize in areas that do not as readily account for the bottom line, such as heading up human resources, the legal team, or administration.

This phenomenon, too, could possibly explain part of the divergence in CEO representation, but is unlikely, even along with the other accounts, to do the entire job. One difficulty with it is that one can easily push back, and ask why this divergence occurs in the first place?

The preceding is all politically correct; or, at least, not too politically incorrect. Blatant facts are blatant facts, and it is difficult to hurl the charge of sexism at social scientists supporting these explanations.

Dare we consider an explanation that does not pass muster in this regard? We must, if we really want to unearth the cause of this situation. Here we go.

CEOs, along with presidents and prime ministers of countries, chess grandmasters, Nobel Prize winners in STEM pursuits such as physics, medicine, chemistry, economics, the Fields Medal in math, occupy the extreme right tail of the normal distribution of intelligence. But, due to the fact that the standard deviation of men is much larger than that of women, there simply are very, very few of the latter to be found at three or four standard deviations above the mean. Larry Summers lost his job as president of Harvard for merely musing about this, but if we want to fully understand the CEO divergence (along with all these other glass ceilings) we cannot ignore it.

According to one study, the standard deviation of boys IQ was around 15 and for girls, around 14. This translates to roughly double the amount of the former with scores about 130, and a whopping six times greater than 160, where CEOs, and other highly accomplished people tend to roam.

At the other end of the normal curve, women are also almost as scarce as hens teeth. There are virtually no females who are homeless, or are in jail, or are on death row, or are in mental institutions, or who die as a result of committing violent crimes. Men dominate this tail of the distribution, as they do the other. Females are Gods, or natures, insurance policy. They are to a greater degree clumped into the middle. Males are Gods, or natures, crap shoot. When they are brilliant, they are very, very gifted. When they are not, they veer to a relatively stupendous degree in the opposite direction.

The statements, views and opinions expressed in this column are solely those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of RT.

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Why are there so few female CEOs? Its for the same reason there are so few women on death row - RT

Saudi Arabia this spring sent shockwaves through the world when it embarked on an economically disastrous game of chicken with its petro-rival Russia. After walking away from an oil-production conference, the kingdom opened its spigots to drive down prices in protest of what it saw as a lack of Russian support, sending global markets plunging right as Covid-19 began shutting down economies. Not long before that, the Saudi government itself had undergone a dramatic purge led by Mohammad bin Salman, the young prince who appears to have rapidly consolidated power in the past three years, and who enjoys the favor of the Trump administration.

What happened? Who saw all this coming? And what does this behavior say about the person the Trump White House has chosen as an ally?

If Americans assume their intelligence apparatus has a handle on these questions, they should listen more closely to what Riedel and others have been saying.

Expert watchers such as Riedel point out that the Trump administration has embraced Mohammad bin Salman (or MbS, in diplomatic shorthand) in much the same way that the Obama administration embraced his predecessor, Mohammad bin Nayaf: with a highly politicized intelligence apparatus that likely leaves significant holes in what the president knows. Already, the results are bleak: In his time in power, MbS has plunged America into his Yemen quagmire, cavalierly murdered a U.S.-based journalist, destabilized the energy market and courted U.S. rivals Russia, China and Iran.

When it comes to the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, American policy has long relied on intelligence-gathering to help determine its true motives and internal dynamics. Saudi Arabia is an opaque country, with rulers subject to no internal transparency and minimal outside accountability. The country is now ruled by the enfeebled 84-year-old King Salman, whose reign is likely to be short and is already largely serving as cover for the actual governing by his son. So trustworthy intelligence on whats happening there a country with which the U.S. has a multibillion-dollar military, diplomatic and business relationshipis more important than ever.

However, informed critics such as Riedel, as well as former operatives and others who have spoken out in the media, have been pointing out that the US intelligence community, and particularly its last three CIA directors, have taken a very politicized approach to Saudi intelligence gathering. Rather than asking difficult questions and then empowering collection efforts, intelligence leaders have been choosing their conclusions and then steering away from any inconvenient facts about them.

This trend appears to be continuing: According to recent media reports, Secretary of State (and former CIA director) Mike Pompeo pushed State Department officials to find an after-the-fact justification for an emergency declaration he issued last year, bypassing Congress and allowing an $8 billion arms sale to Saudi Arabia.

Riedel's comments, and the recently mounting critiques, point to a worrisome turn in Americas approach to Saudi Arabia: Faced with a complex and perhaps dangerous diplomatic partner, successive White Houses have instead sought to look the other way concerning Saudi behavior, allowing themselves to be steered by intelligence chiefs with their own motives, and comfortably basking in feigned ignorance regarding the truth beneath the Kingdoms pervasive veil.

Politicization of intelligence need not always be heavy-handed to undermine the truth. Often, the decision not to ask certain questions has the same impact as manipulating or discrediting what you already know. There's no evidence, for example, that the George W. Bush, Obama or Trump White Houses ever sought a National Intelligence Estimate on Saudi Arabia, a thorough and forward-looking analytical document that integrates the knowledge of the entire intelligence community. Such an initiative would have generated the questions and ensuing body of evidence to provide the kind of thorough assessment that might have exposed understanding of Saudi Arabias leadership, politics, human rights record and internal stability, generating insights that would be shared far and wide across the government.

Though critics have levied similar charges against both the Obama and the Trump approaches to the intelligence community, the Trump administrations current behavior is unprecedented in my own nearly four decades of service. Never have I witnessed the National Security Council and CIA so focused on controlling information that might expose, contradict or offend the president. The two most recent CIA directors, Pompeo and Gina Haspel, have prioritized control over the narrative of any public reflections concerning the CIAs thinking, and more importantly, their own positions and comments, to shape their image with the president.

(The CIAs objection to this article validated these observations. Despite the absence of any classified information, a CIA board, to whose review my 34 years in the clandestine service obliges me for anything I publish, pushed to redact much of the most critical prose. My ensuing depiction is therefore more vague than the reality warrants.)

For both economic or security reasons, what transpires in the Kingdom directly affects all Americans. So what went wrong with our Saudi intelligence operationand how can we fix it?

During a visit to Saudi Arabia in the not so distant past by then CIA Director John Brennan, I found myself standing in line for a lunch being hosted by Salman bin Abdul Aziz al-Saud.

At the time Salman was the kingdom's crown prince, second in command to his brother, then-King Abdullah, but Salman himself was already an elderly man. He was courteous and polite, greeting each of his guests with a handshake that was warm but notably weak. Prince Salmans hand trembled violently; his engagement with his guests was short, perfunctory and limited to the brief period for which he could remain standing. He did not engage in anything more than an exchange or well scripted platitudes; he took a seat and ultimately exited after but a brief period. (Riedel has speculated in the press that the elderly royal even then was suffering from at least pre-dementia.)

Another character was also present at that lunch, one whose importance was not yet clear. All the while, Prince Salman remained under the watchful eyes of not only his protocol aides, but a serious looking young Saudi male assistant. After greetings, we were ushered to another tent where a traditional Saudi meal had been prepared. The same young Saudi assistant passed a plate with a kind smile and encouraged me to feel welcome. He was deferential with the guests and struck me as a bit unsure about his own English language skills. Still, he was nothing but proper. Intrigued by the young mans access to the crown prince, I was surprised when protocol aides identified him as Salmans son, Mohammad bin Salman.

This was not a person that the intelligence community would have expected to be there. In fact, the intelligence community knew practically nothing about MbS beyond where his name placed in the House of Sauds family tree. I watched as Director Brennan spoke in hushed tones with the young prince in a corner of the tent after his father had retired for the day. There was little animation in this exchange, in part because the United States had already picked its favorite among the Saudi princes.

That person was Mohammad bin Nayef, or MbN for short, then the Saudi interior minister. Appropriately referred to as the darling of Americas counterterrorism and intelligence services, MbN had by then become the CIAs best friend in Saudi Arabia, if not Americas. Riedel depicted MbN as a legitimate hero in the Kingdoms fight against terrorism, a royal who survived a nearly successful assassination attempt in 2009 by an al-Qaeda suicide bomber.

Directors of the CIA lavished praise on MbN. Former director George Tenet, who served under Bill Clinton and George W. Bush, called the minister my most important interlocutor; Obamas first CIA director, Leon Panetta, dubbed him the smartest [Saudi] of his generation.

Brennan, who Obama appointed as director of the CIA in March, 2013, was all in on MbN, selling President Obama on the value of backing this horse. But Brennan also micromanaged the CIAs Saudi enterprise, limiting the agency's agility to report on vibrations within the House of Saud that might reflect poorly on MbN and his prospects, and thus limiting the president's visibility into his potential weaknesses.

In micromanaging CIAs Saudi portfolio, and the vision of Saudi Arabia on which the president relied, Brennan effectively crossed the Rubicon: He became MbNs active advocate with the Obama White House, with the goal of helping install him on the Saudi throne.

Brennan convinced President Obama to invest US interests with MbN that extended well beyond the Kingdom itself. The CIA director sought to leverage Saudi influence and affluence to support US initiatives that spanned the globe. Such objectives were both broad and critical, on issues ranging from Iran, Syria and Middle East peace, to Africa, Russia and even East Asia.

While Brennan could use his powers to assure that MbN was seen in the best light at the White House, he could do nothing to spare his partners vulnerabilities at home. And MbN, we now know, was not lacking for vulnerabilitiesnor enemies within his own family. He was an intimate of King Abdullah, the ailing monarch who died in 2015, but any Saudi with whom I have ever spoken appreciated royal family dynamics enough to know there wasnt a great deal of love lost between MbN and Crown Prince Salman and Salman's branch of the royal family. (Although Salman was Abdullahs brother, and thus MbNs paternal uncle, his and Abdullahs marriages created distinct bloodlines that resulted in friction among their respective heirs.)

It was known that the assassination attempt by Al Qaeda had left MbN dependent on narcotics. Riedel observed that the weight of the evidence I have seen is that he was more injured in the assassination attempt than was admitted, and that he then got onto a painkiller routine that was very addictive. I think that problem got progressively worse. In Saudi Arabia, this weakness proved his undoing: According to New York Times reporting, members of the Allegiance Council, a body of princes who approve changes to the line of succession, were told of MbNs drug problem in justifying what was, in practicality, a palace coup in June 2017, in which Mohammad bin Salman had his cousin placed under house arrest.

So within two years, the horses that the US had bet on were suddenly sidelined. The ailing Salman became king when Abdullah died in January, 2015; in June 2017, MbS engineered his palace coup, leaving the U.S. dealing not with the ally it had cultivated, but with an ascendant star it had known little about.

How did the intelligence community get it so wrong? Despite being himself a self-professed Saudi expert and career CIA analyst, trained to inform decision making with unbiased, intelligence-driven assessments, Brennan had politicized his role, and certainly the CIAs. As he told NPR in 2015, we dont steal secrets. Rather, he said we solicit. To his proud espionage service, trained to uncork information, this was a demoralizing sentiment, but it was deeply reflective of how Brennan fancied himself more policymaker and emissary than spymaster. Implicitly Brennan was not only redefining the Agencys mission, but grading its analytical homework. The facts, after all, had to align with Brennans recommendations to the president. Conveying too much about how the sausage was made could have jeopardized Brennans vision of American partnership with the Kingdom concerning Syria, Iran and Yemenissues all publicly placed within MbNs official portfolio.

Brennans recipe of half-measures, micromanagement and unreliability in delivering on his promises to MbN and other Middle East partners would wind up doing far more harm than good. Ultimately, his conduct torpedoed MbN, whose advisors were savvy enough to see the writing on the wall apparent in MbNs vulnerabilities and MbSs ambition, and turned their support to MbS. It could do little to spare their patron from the coming catastrophe to which he had long made himself vulnerable. With MbN out of power and a young, little-known prince in the ascendant, the United States now found itself out of the loop when it came to an important but troublesome ally.

Some seven years after backing the wrong horse, it's not clear if the US intelligence community has learned its lessons. And in Trump, it has a leader with another problem: an instinctive style in foreign policy, and an unwillingness to hear contradictory information from his own experts.

In Pompeo, during his tenure at both CIA and State, the president has a security and foreign policy adviser who lacks curiosity, depth or a willingness to introduce possibilities and reasoning that do not already align with his bosss point of view. Moreover, theres risk in stealing secrets, and Pompeo has shown no appetite to rock the boat and enrage the president for the sake of providing him with better information.

Unlike Brennan, current CIA director Gina Haspel has made no pretense of developing or leveraging engagement with MbS or any other Saudi star. Thats not necessarily a bad approach, so long as one empowers and enables those whose job it is to develop allies. But despite being a career operations officer and former Chief of Station herself, her approach is more suited to Europes stately capitals than the frontier. Haspel is no Near East hand, and not the type who can cultivate and leverage the personal relationships so critical in Saudi society. Sitting in a tent and affecting a smile, telling stories and swapping politically incorrect jokes over ceaseless cups of green Saudi coffee at hours well past bedtime is not Haspels style.

To her credit, Haspel has been more forthright in carrying the CIAs mail to the president concerning the Kingdoms realities. She did not divorce herself publicly from what the press reported to have been the CIAs confidence that MbS was culpable in the despicable 2018 murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi. Unfortunately, much like her predecessor, shes reluctant to look hard for bad news that might contradict or embarrass her boss. Indeed, Trump, who holds a rather positive personal impression of MbS, publicly derided his own CIAs assessment of the young crown prince. Were Haspel to support greater collection against the Kingdom, shed have to answer to Trump for opening a Pandora's box he preferred kept shut.

As president, Trump has been both boon and source of worry for MbS. Trump has backed him in some areas where another president would hold him accountableespecially the Khashoggi murder and Saudi conduct in Yemen. But at the same time, Trumps policies with regard to Syria, the Arab-Israeli conflict and Iran have been more problematic for the young Saudi ruler. The presidents deployment of US military personnel and material following the Iranian facilitated September 2019 attack on Saudi Arabias refineries was little assurance that American forces would come to the rescue if the Kingdom faced direct hostilities. Indeed, they have since been redeployed to support our own forces in Iraq and address North Koreas more threatening posture in East Asia.

Saudi Arabia is a complex and fascinating country with all manner of permutations among the various tribes, sub-tribes, cliques and regional bases of power. The House of Saud itself is hardly homogenous, with assorted blocs, bloodlines and drama that influences decision making but known best to insiders. It would behoove President Trump and the US to hedge their bets at least to some degree. After all, MbS currently operates under the protection of his elderly and weakened father. Upon King Salmans passing, MbS could, like his cousin, face the night of the long knives, as Riedel observes, if he is unable to comprehensively check each and every possible internal threat. And MBS is taking no chances.

In actions that reflected MbSs growing uncertainty over how long King Salman will be able to provide top cover, he ordered the March 2020 arrest of his fathers brother, former Crown Prince Ahmad bin Abdulaziz, along with his son Nayif Bin Ahmad. Former rival MbN was also detained, as was his brother Nawaf bin Nayif. All were accused of treason.

The U.S., which had eased Prince Ahmads return from self-imposed exile in London with security assurances, did nothing. It likewise offered no resistance to the detention of stalwart one-time partner MbN, in whom the U.S. had long invested. MbS followed by pressuring former Saudi intelligence official Dr. Saad Bin Khalid Bin Saad Allah Al Jabri to return to the Kingdom by arresting his two youngest children remaining in the country.

As a senior intelligence official and long-time MbN adviser, Jabri was a key Western partner. He got things done that advanced his countrys interests, as well as Americas, without gamesmanship or pretense. A man who the press correctly suggests knows where the bodies are buried, he prudently fled the Kingdom following MbNs removal and his own sacking. Despite his close U.S. ties, Jabri is hiding out in Canada, fearful that the Trump administration would deport him to Saudi Arabia.

By arresting those considered close to the U.S. or who otherwise believed themselves safe based on past American security assurances, MbS has shown his ruthlessness, and has sent an unmistakable message about the risks of cooperation with the U.S., the price of dissent and the powerlessness of America to protect its interests within the Kingdom. Meanwhile, the last thing Trump wants is illumination of such dynamics from the intelligence community, which could threaten his unconditional support to the Kingdom and its young prince.

MbS has his own domestic challenges. He needs to contend with the powerful Al-Shaykh family, which includes Saudi Arabias Grand Mufti, Abdulaziz bin Abdullah Al-Shaykh. Descendants of Muhammad bin Abd al-Wahhab, the 18th-century Wahhabi founder, the family formed a power-sharing arrangement nearly 300 years ago with the House of Saud, in which the Al-Shaykh family retains authority in religious matters in exchange for supporting the House of Saud's political authority. The families are also integrated by marriage. One must wonder how supportive the al-Shaykhs are of the social reforms MbS has imposed, allowing women to drive, music to play in restaurants and men and women to mix in public. All that now occurs without the watchful eyes of the since defanged Mutawa, Saudi Arabias once pervasive and intimidating religious police.

As in Iran prior to the Shahs fall, its not that CIA cant learn the realities that foreshadow Saudi Arabias future, or assess its decisionmaking today. Rather, its a deliberate choice. Knowledge incurs a level of responsibility, and the CIA steals only those secrets and produces assessments that its political leaders request. That the agencys 2019 Worldwide Threat Assessment reported optimistically on the Kingdoms stability, reforms and economic progress reflects the reality that little was based on anything but public information, and that information usually comes from palace-controlled media and messaging.

Saudi Arabias 34 million people, resources, and military capabilities cant be ignored or wished away. The Kingdom has for years been spending between 9 and 13 percent of its annual GDP on military procurements, making it one of the best-equipped forces on the globe. The Stockholm International Peace Research Institute and the International Institute for Strategic Studies regularly place Saudi Arabian military spending third after only the US and China.

Saudis economic gamesmanship as reflected by the oil machinations of this spring also demonstrates its ability to inflict economic pain on the U.S. as well, when it chooses. Without the foresight of the Covid pandemics forthcoming economic impact, MbSs measures were, like Russias, aimed at the competition felt from the U.S. energy sector, with collateral damage more broadly ensuing across the entire American economy.

See no evil, hear no evil, speak no evil, is a dangerous business model for the US to embrace concerning this important country, one that likewise reportedly has nuclear ambitions. Whatever the reality is in Saudi Arabia, US interests are best served with a cold look at the facts and more calculated leveraging of its influence. While its the presidents prerogative to chart US foreign policy, Americans have the right to see that their duly elected representatives have the opportunity to provide advice, consent and oversight.

Trump should be able to make the case for his positive relationship with the Crown Prince, but based on the facts our intelligence services are charged to provide, and which can withstand scrutiny. Not doing so risks the kinds of failures that have caused Americas greatest embarrassments in the Middle Eastfailing to see the coming of Irans 1979 revolution, and the manipulation of intelligence to justify the 2002 invasion of Iraqbut with perhaps even more frightening consequences yet to come.

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How John Brennan and Mike Pompeo Left the U.S. Blind to Saudi Problems - POLITICO

Michigan Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson doesnt follow the President of the United States on Twitter.

She was sitting in her basement office eating breakfast May 20 when her staff called to inform her that Donald Trump had called Benson a rogue Secretary of State, accusing her of mailing ballots to Michigan voters (in fact, they were ballot applications) and suggesting (incorrectly) that vote by mail would lead to fraud. Oh, and he threatened to withhold funding from Michigan over the issue. (Its unclear what funding he was referring to; the White House did not respond to a request for comment.)

What stood out about the episode to Benson, a Democrat, wasnt just how Trump had addressed her, the factual inaccuracies, or the threat tucked into his tweet. It was that she was hardly the only Secretary of State to take a step like this. States like Iowa, Georgia, Nebraska, and West Virginiawhich Trump won in 2016, and which have Republican Secretaries of Statehave taken similar actions in sending out applications for absentee ballots in the midst of the coronavirus pandemic, at least for their primaries.

This is nothing other than me doing my job. And its the same policy, vote by mail, that voters on both sides of the aisle embrace, Benson says. To me it was just disingenuous that while you have Republican colleagues of mine doing the same thing, that I get singled out, in part Im sure because Im a Democrat. Im sure its relevant that Michigans playing an important, prominent role in this years election. It helps feed into a national narrative that there are shenanigans happening in states that are critical to the election. A false narrative.

Before the pandemic, five states (Washington, Utah, Hawaii, Oregon and Colorado) conducted all-mail elections, and three (California, North Dakota, and Nebraska, the latter with some exceptions) gave counties the ability to determine their rules, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures. Twenty-nine states plus Washington, D.C. have no-excuse absentee voting, which means voters do not need to provide a reason to request an absentee ballot.

But with the prospect of the coronavirus disrupting elections looming, others have moved to make vote-by-mail more easily accessible, with some taking action for primaries and others for the general election. Three states (Michigan, New Hampshire and California) have made changes to enhance vote-by-mail availability in November. Michigan announced it will send out absentee ballot applications for the general election. New Hampshire, which typically is not a no-excuse absentee voting state, decided to allow absentee voting in November if the pandemic is still a factor, a decision announced by the states Republican governor. And California will distribute vote-by-mail ballots to all of its registered voters.

In recent weeks, Trump has seized on these changes, turning a process designed to safeguard voters health and ballot access into a political wedge, arguing falsely that it will lead to widespread voter fraud and creating fear among election experts that the President is undermining the legitimacy of the contest. The irony in this goes beyond the fact that Trump often votes by mail himself. There is little evidence, experts say, that either party benefits politically from allowing citizens to vote by mail, while places that use it see increased voter turnout overall. And its not just Democrats pushing the idea: Republican Secretaries of State and other executives in red states have also employed it.

Im bumfuzzled by the Presidents objections to vote by mail. Republicans historically have done fine if not better in heavy-mail scenarios, says Michael Steel, a Republican strategist. They disproportionately tend to be used by older voters who disproportionately tend to vote Republican.

Its kind of a mystery why hes picked this particular fight to have at this particular time with a pandemic raging and a very tight election, Steel adds. If I were the President, I would be encouraging the Republican Party nationally and across the country to invest in the infrastructure to make sure that we can vote by mail successfully.

You dont need to reach back very far to find an example of vote-by-mail helping Republicans. The May special election in Californias 25th congressional district was mostly conducted by mail. Democratic Governor Gavin Newsom had ballots and prepaid postage-return envelopes sent to every registered voter. An analysis by Political Data Inc., a voter data firm, showed that of the approximately 425,000 ballots sent to all voters, 34% were mailed back in. Though more ballots went out to Democrats, Republicans returned them at a higher rate. The seat, previously held by a Democrat, was won by the Republican candidate, Mike Garcia.

Which isnt to say vote-by-mail favors Republicans, either. A study published earlier this spring by Stanford University examined counties in a handful of states that implemented vote-by-mail programs and concluded vote by mail does not appear to increase either partys vote share. The researchers noted its difficult to extrapolate their findings to wider use during a pandemic. But generally, vote by mail doesnt overwhelmingly advantage one party over the other, says Daniel Thompson, a PhD candidate at Stanford and the papers lead author.

In Michigans May 5 county and municipal elections, turnout was double past May contests, coming in at 25% of eligible voters, with 99% of those who cast a ballot doing so by mail. Vote-by-mail was equally popular in Republican and Democratic communties, Benson said. The ability to vote by mail actually significantly increased turnout across the board.

Despite this, many of Trumps allies have followed suit in attacking the process. The Republican National Committee, the National Republican Campaign Committee, and the California GOP this week filed a lawsuit against Newsom and Secretary of State Alex Padilla over expanding vote-by-mail in California, arguing it would invite fraud, coercion, theft, and otherwise illegitimate voting. Lawsuits over voting rights are playing out in several states, including Texas, where Democrats also sought to expand vote by mail.

Sam Reed, an advocate for vote-by-mail who served from 2001 to 2013 as a Republican Secretary of State in Washington, says suggesting that vote by mail will lead to voter fraud is totally incorrect. He pointed to checks in place to avoid it, like election staff taking training from the state police on how to verify signatures. We have really tight systems, Reed says.

Yet Trump has a history of pushing false narratives about voter fraud. He has long propagated conspiracy theories of widespread voter fraud despite the fact that studies have found it to be rare. A voter fraud commission the President put in place was disbanded by January 2018 with nothing to show for it.

The Presidents tweets on voter fraud even led to Twitter attempting to fact check him for the first time on Tuesday. In response to a tweet claiming in part that Mail boxes will be robbed, ballots will be forged & even illegally printed out & fraudulently signed, the social media platform added a label directing users to Get the facts about mail-in ballots.

Asked on Thursday by TIME whether the Presidents comments on vote-by-mail were an effort to lay groundwork to cast doubt on November election results, White House Press Secretary Kayleigh McEnany responded: No, hes certainly not doing that.

With reporting by Brian Bennett.

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President Trump has finally goaded Twitter into starting the fight that Trump has been itching to have. Unfortunately for the social media giant, its a fight Twitter cannot win anymore and one that Trump and his allies do not want to end.

Over the course of his term, the president has flouted Twitters terms of service countless times with impunity as hes used the platform to launch personal attacks and wildly mislead the public (often with bold but false assertions that he eventually deletes). On Tuesday, Twitter whose leadership moves with tectonic speed finally called him on it, flagging two of his posts about vote-by-mail fraud in California as potentially misleading.

Naturally, Trump responded with outrage, accusing Twitter of trying to sway voters:

On Wednesday, Trump showed more of his cards. By pushing back against his tweets on voter fraud, Trump argued, Twitter was confirming its bias against conservatives:

The rhetorical jujitsu on display is, you have to admit, masterful. As is the case with so many of those who defy Trump, Twitter is playing checkers and Trump is playing Warzone.

For starters, Twitter singled out the wrong tweets. As distorted and factually wrong as Trumps tweets about Californias mail-in voting system were, they werent the ones that had provoked a groundswell of public outrage. Those would be the smear campaign Trump was simultaneously waging against MSNBCs Joe Scarborough, vaguely accusing the former congressman of having been involved in the death of a staffer 20 years ago. The staffers widower asked Twitter to take those tweets down, and Twitter refused.

More important, though, was the timing. Twitter has ignored Trumps line-crossing for so long that any move it makes now invites an accusation that its trying to influence voters. Had it taken action the first time the president abused its platform, it would have set a precedent that no one was above Twitter rules. By waiting until now, it has delivered exactly the opposite message.

Some readers might argue that the public has an interest in hearing whatever the president wants to say, on any platform. Thats nonsense. The president has a unique platform of his own that he can use at any hour of any day. When he ventures onto Twitter, Facebook or any other nongovernmental space, he is leveraging someone elses resources to broadcast his thoughts. He has no entitlement to do so no one does.

Under a provision of federal communications law known as Section 230, Twitter has a clear right to enforce its terms of service against any user who violates them. And given that its a private company,and not an arm of government, there are no 1st Amendment issues in play. In fact, Twitter has its own 1st Amendment speech right to mark offending tweets as it sees fit.

But conservatives have campaigned steadily in recent years to turn those rights into liabilities, arguing that Twitter, Facebook, YouTube and other online powerhouses have been biased against their tribe. Never mind that the supposed targets of this alleged bias have been extremists like Alex Jones of Infowars (and Nation of Islam Minister Louis Farrakhan, not exactly a Republican). The point is to play the victim card over and over, so that Twitter and company will hesitate to act even against obviously improper posts.

The fact that it took Twitter until Tuesday to act and that it used the blandest possible language in flagging Trumps tweets shows how well conservatives have worked the refs.

So what might Trumps big action be? He cant simply create a new watchdog to oversee the tech giants because, again, they are protected by Section 230. But there may be a legislative play; some Republicans (and some Democrats) are trying to weaken or even undo that shield because they believe it protects too much bad behavior. Thats why Congress carved a hole in Section 230 two years ago in the name of fighting sex trafficking.

Sen. Josh Hawley (R-Mo.) has been in the vanguard of the effort to neuter Section 230, pushing a bill that would force tech companies to earn the laws liability shield by proving to a supermajority of the Federal Trade Commission every two years that their algorithms and content removal practices are politically neutral. Its a ridiculous idea that would defeat the whole purpose of Section 230, which was to enable companies to enforce their terms of service. Not only do we not want a political body to decide what is and isnt politically neutral, but any objective measure could be easily gamed. If Twitter removes 100 tweets by neo-Nazis but only 10 by communists, does that mean that Twitter is biased against the far right? Or that neo-Nazis simply spew more hate on the platform?

The bill would put so much power into the hands of a minority of the members of the FTC that it seems unlikely to obtain the bipartisan support needed to make it through the Senate. But as Trump shows, the point here isnt to change the law. Its to be able to complain, continually, that the deck is stacked against Republicans and by doing so, making sure that few if any cards get played.

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Twitter waited too long to enforce its rules on Trump - Los Angeles Times