User Edits Gaetz Speech to totally misrepresent the message
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Started by TimNew - May 28, 2021, 9:25 a.m.

Gaetz was talking about Silicon Valley and the first amendment, then went on to talk about the 2nd amendment.  A user edited it to completely change the message to Gaetz urging people to use the 2nd amendment on Silicon Valley employees.  This led to an outcry, including members of the US congress.

Now,  Twiiter has pulled down several of Gaetz speeches that they felt promoted violence,  or for any reason they chose.  You'd think they'd pull this one as soon as they knew it was a bald faced lie.   right?   Well,  Not yet.

But this is fine,  right? They're a private firm.  They are under no legal obligation to fairly enforce standards,   right?


Did Matt Gaetz Call for Use of 'Second Amendment' Against Silicon Valley? (msn.com)


A number of verified Twitter users shared the misleading clip of Gaetz's speech, which implied that he was calling on his supporters to bear arms against Silicon Valley staff.

The clip cut out Gaetz's reference to the First Amendment, which makes it clear he is not calling on supporters to shoot Silicon Valley employees, but instead to simply exercise their rights to freedom of speech and assembly.

The video has gone viral and been viewed more than 1 million times after being shared by users, lawmakers and media outlets including the MailOnline and Mediaite.


Comments
By metmike - May 28, 2021, 11:37 a.m.
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Thanks Tim!

I don't have time right now to see what's going on with this latest tabloid scandal. Keep us posted please.

Our country has turned into 2 sides that go to their biased sources to read/hear about bad things that the other side did or might have done or meant to do, while receiving more positive, one sided feedback to bolster stratospheric over confidence  about their sides infallibility.

Manufactured realities using subjective facts de jour on the daily political menu for both the right and left who have become pschologically addicted to getting their fix of the  news told exactly how they like it. 

While the MSM and other sources THRIVE on this environment, boosting ratings, circulation and internet hits, it continues to rip our country apart because we are being taught to intensely HATE people that have a different ideology than ours.

And it all starts with our politicians that provide the breeding grounds/sources and to intentionally manipulate people's minds with dishonest scheme's.............for power.

By TimNew - May 29, 2021, 6:05 a.m.
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This, IMO, goes well beyond "Tabloid Scandal"...     And MSN is hardly a tabloid.

I've very concerned that a few liberal run corporations have the keys to a major portion of our information exchange network and appear to be arbitrarily enforcing alleged "community standards" to effectively silence opinions with which they disagree.  

That's pretty scarey stuff.

By mcfarmer - May 29, 2021, 9:16 a.m.
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I listened to the uncut speech, as much as I could stand anyway.


It was either a very poorly constructed portion of the speech and interpreted incorrectly or very well constructed and was interpreted as he expected.

Possibly it was the latter, meant to inflame and have plausible deniability. But then he’s not the brightest bulb so maybe Hanlon’s razor applies here.


By metmike - May 29, 2021, 10:15 p.m.
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"Tabloid Scandal"

My reference was meant in a figurative sense based on the way political scandals are  covered to go after people in opposing parties like they were in the old days in magazines like The Enquirer.

This one could be legit, I haven't bothered to look at the details but you can bet that its only being investigated by the opposing party.

Thats how we do things in todays world.

We are taught to hate people in the opposing party and take them down anyway possible, while defending people in our own party............no matter what they did.



By TimNew - May 30, 2021, 6:46 a.m.
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We are taught to hate people in the opposing party and take them down anyway possible

I suppose this is essentiaLLY true, altho I think the left has taken it to new levels over the last few decades.

Personally,  I don't hate anyone tho I sincerly question the judgment and intellect of people who support most of the leftist agenda of today.


By WxFollower - May 30, 2021, 10:37 a.m.
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1. The extreme hate for the other side goes back to at least GWB and Clinton. I think GWB was worse than Clinton but maybe that was an over-reaction to  the Clinton hatred. GWB hatred was largely due to Iraq.

2. The hatred for Obama was worse than that for GWB as it included a lot of racism, which is absolutely disgusting. I’m saying this as someone who never even considered voting for Obama and thought Obama was very divisive on issues related to the police as well as encouraging economic class warfare. Despite this, I never hated Obama and actually did like the fact that he was the first Black POTUS.

3. The hatred for Trump probably was even worse than that for Obama. But let’s examine why. Trump, unlike anyone before him, treated the other side like an enemy as opposed to just a political opponent. He never tried to be Potus over the entire US. Instead, he tried to be the greatest potus over the “Red Nation” only. He was not only easily the most divisive POTUS of my lifetime and probably ever, he himself fostered hatred for at least half of the country!! In my eyes, that made him an awful potus and the cause of the widespread hatred for him. I’m proud to say I didn’t vote for him either time because of his divisiveness and nasty personality.

 And as bad as he was on the divisiveness scale, he got even worse with his “Big Lie”, encouraging 1/6/21, and never even supporting the transition to Biden. I still sometimes pinch myself to make sure I’m not having a very long nightmare.

 4. There’s plenty of hatred for Biden as the cycle continues but maybe not quite as bad as that for Trump probably because Biden isn’t treating the other side as an enemy.

By TimNew - May 30, 2021, 11:48 a.m.
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With the exception of Ford, the left has launched impeacment efforts against every pub president following Ike.  The massive  misinformation orginiating from the left and mirrored by many of their supporters in the MSM, which is, for the  most part,  really nothing more than wing of the democrat party has been unrelenting.   Even when confronted with irrefulatable evidence of such, when they actually acknowledge it, which is rare, many on the left will justify it since their motto now appears to be "By any means necassary".

Yes, there is disdain on the right for the left,  but their tactics and tenacity pale in honest comparison.

By metmike - May 30, 2021, 1:17 p.m.
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Much agreed on the increasing hatred with time.

We all see things a bit differently on this though. I felt like it really spiked up during the Clinton years.........note the impeachment and was coming from the right.  I was one of those that felt hatred for Bill Clinton in the 1990's because of things that I knew relating to his ethics, honesty and treatment of women. 

It didn't seem as bad for Bush, who had impeccable behavior, better ethics and more honestly about most things.

 Then after the disastrous  Iraq war, that changed. 

Obama started out on a good note but went downhill, especially during his 2nd term, which ironically, featured the biggest setback in race relations in the previous century(when slow but sustained progress from a very bad starting point had been a notable feature in most years).

Hate was already accelerating higher during Obama's 2nd term but it was more right wing hatred. 

Trump was many peoples knee jerk reaction to Obama and corruption/deception in government. H. Clinton represented that corruption/deception and got Trump elected.

The amount of hatred during Trump's reign,, sky rocketed higher into the stratosphere fueled exactly by his personality/character. I never imagined that  tens of millions of people could hate a person so much that didn't kill one of their children (-:

Along with that hatred came the rejecting of everything and anything that Trump did, no matter what it was........because it came from Trump. This is when our political divisiveness LEAPED into uncharted territory by a wide margin. 

One side supported EVERYTHING Trump stood for, no matter what. The other side rejected all of it. 

Here's the thing now on trying to reduce that extreme divisiveness for Biden because of the new reality that politics was launched into during the Trump era. 

It's based on something called cognitive bias. 

Humans, once we think that we know something, will store all new information to support what we think we already know.........or reject it if it doesn't line up with what we think that we know. It doesn't matter if its the objective truth or a lie. What matters most to our brains, is whether it lines up with what we think that we know or not. Our brains sort out new information based on the belief system that's been programmed into it.

Right side/Republican brains have been programmed to interpret information about the same exact thing, completely the opposite as Left side/Democrat brains and that programming/conditioning during the Trump era was all that mattered. Trump=bad for everything on the left.  Trump=good for everything on the right. The MSM and politicians designed it that way too.

Trump may be out of office but the impression of everything good for my political side and everything is bad from the other political side had been permanently etched in most people's brains........forever because of cognitive bias that is almost IMPOSSIBLE to remove, once you have it............which everybody does to some extent. 

Add in a good dose of now acceptable hatred for our political opposition, which was made fashionable by one side during the Trump era and continues to be encouraged by some sources(more from the right this time because they are the wounded animals) and you have the recipe for NEVER coming together under any circumstances that I can imagine.

I am open to ideas on how things, that are getting MORE divisive, will ever reverse..............and as you know from coming to MarketForum, this site is all about positive messages to help reverse it.

There is a small chance that Biden could morph into somebody that makes a commitment to reverse this but his words will only carry weight for the other side when his actions are consistent with transparency and he is not stamping out agenda of the right as fast as possible. 

This administrations agenda is just not going to win over any from the right....based on anybody looking at what's coming for sure.  So coming together is going to be impossible. 

What will happen, actually is the the right will be ramping up the attacks on Biden and his liberal agenda ahead of the 2022 and 2024 elections. (even while they attack each other because of Trump....and the left loves it, while trying to keep the insurrection fresh in everyones minds and doesn't want Trump to go away)

This just spells a continuation of feeding the growing divisiveness applied with hatred. 

Even divisiveness within the republican party.

The only group that is coming together are the liberal democrats............and you will notice that their hate has also diminished(with Trump not only out of office, but helping them obliterate the republicans)

By TimNew - May 31, 2021, 7:18 a.m.
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The hatred for Bush existed well before Iraq.  Being that I was alive at the time,  I am well aware of that.  From the totally fake AWOL stories, to the insults on his IQ, all before he was even elected. Remember that cute meme that went around before the election, showing the downs syndrome version of Bush in a footrace captioned with "Voting for Bush is like competing in the spedial olympics.  You might win,  but you'll still be retarded".  Charming.  

Altho Reagan was probably the most popular presidents of my life time, the shots the left took at him, constantly, were beneath contempt.

Anytime anyone on the right comes even close to that level of contemtable behaviour, the "Dogs of war" are released and the press, for the most part, circles the wagons in full character assasination mode and we learn how the perpetrator cheated on a spelling quiz in 3rd grade, calling his credibility on anything into question.. 

By mcfarmer - May 31, 2021, 11:55 a.m.
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Lots of good points Mike, and none so more than this:


”Humans, once we think that we know something, will store all new information to support what we think we already know.........or reject it if it doesn't line up with what we think that we know. It doesn't matter if its the objective truth or a lie. What matters most to our brains, is whether it lines up with what we think that we know or not. Our brains sort out new information based on the belief system that's been programmed into it.”


Folks also want simple. Simple explanations and  actions they understand are much more appealing than the complexities most problems have.


And Trump gave them that in spades. Demonize one group as the source of your problems. 

Illegal Immigration ? Build a wall. How are we going to pay for it ? Mexico will. Lost factory jobs ? Tariffs on China. Won’t that result in higher costs ? China will pay for it.  Police and race problems ? BLM and ANTIFA. Police killing minorities ? Just obey the officer and everything will be fine. Loose the election ? It was stolen.


But hatred is nothing new, again we also think the times of our lives are the most important, the best or the worst.

From the election of 1796 and 1800 politicians have slung mud. 


Simple search reveals   this :


”Things got ugly fast. Jefferson's camp accused President Adams of having a "hideous hermaphroditical character, which has neither the force and firmness of a man, nor the gentleness and sensibility of a woman." In return, Adams' men called Vice President Jefferson "a mean-spirited, low-lived fellow, the son of a half-breed Indian squaw, sired by a Virginia mulatto father." As the slurs piled on, Adams was labeled a fool, a hypocrite, a criminal, and a tyrant, while Jefferson was branded a weakling, an atheist, a libertine, and a coward. Even Martha Washington succumbed to the propaganda, telling a clergyman that Jefferson was "one of the most detestable of mankind."

And that was back when the second place guy became the vice president. 


Another :

Other Adams supporters warned that Jefferson’s election “would result in a civil war and a national orgy of rape, incest, and adultery,” and that his supporters were “cut-throats who walk in rags and sleep amid filth and vermin[!].”


Of course the candidates themselves wouldn’t say such things, they stayed above the fray.


The other good point you make is the participation of the press. I think after Wood/Bernstein many in the press saw the route to success being one of making the big splash expose’. Dig the dirt, bring someone down. The right and left are equally guilty.

Look at the treatment of FDR, JFK AND LBJ. Had the press treated them as they do presidents today think of the great things that couldn’t have been done.

One thing that is new however is the litmus test the republicans have instituted within their ranks. From Reagan’s credo of “Never speak ill of a fellow republican” To the widespread use of the RHINO moniker things have changed. Trump never made an attempt at forming a “big tent” coalition. He never tried moving towards the middle after the election. Results would have been different had he tried to widen his base.