Johnstone on govt/big tech alliance to censor

Ok on her first point, that given the cozy relationship between govt. and big tech it's not defensible that the latter is in the private v. the public sphere. But I disagree with her that any speech is permissible; it is not per the free speech exceptions to the 1st Amendment. One of those exceptions is false statements of fact, the issue at hand in her argument. In particular, the lies being propagated on social media about the pandemic, which has a huge public interest impact on the health of the nation. And I'm in agreement that such misinformation or down right lies need to be called out, refuted and kicked off public platforms for public safety.

The other issue though is that the White House had admitted that they sent a list of accounts to the social media companies of those who tend to be the biggest liars on the issue. Yes, I see the problem with that. The government should stay out of it and let the companies use independent fact checkers to determine the truth or falsity of information to decide what to allow or not on their platforms. 

However I'm not sure that these companies obey what the government says about those on the list and just ban those accounts out of hand. That's how it's presented in the linked article and by Greenwald therein. If that's the case then sure, that's unacceptable. But do the companies take that list and then do their own fact checking and decide what to allow or not? The article assumes that there's quid pro quo between them without providing the proof that there is. Which is not saying there isn't, but the anti-government types need to prove it rather than just assuming the worst here.

And make no mistake whatsoever: I am and always have been a constant critic of the government/business oligarchic fascism. If the allegations are true count me in. But we need to prove it first. There's plenty of proof of it elsewhere that I write about daily, including and especially in both Parties being captive to it. 

PS: Pox Views of course ran with this story too and framed it as govt. spying to Press Secretary Psaki. She had a good response in that she reframed it as people are getting sick and dying because of the misinformation and the the government has a responsibility to protect the public from such harm. It is especially so since the misinformation (outfight lies) are leading people to fear the vaccine which is indeed causing the Delta spike with more death and disease.