Melbourne, Australia is a city owned by the CCP. The Prime Minister of Australia is such a hollow man he will not address this issue at the National Cabinet. All one can say is that Victoria is a vassal state of China.
Freedom of the Press
All posts tagged Freedom of the Press
What’s happening in Hong Kong with Jimmy Lai will soon be happening in other parts of the world! The CCP has long arms and now that Sleepy Joe is in charge only time will reveal how secure you really are!
‘Hong Kong Chief Executive Carrie Lam appointed three more national security law judges to hear the appeal challenging Hong Kong media mogul Jimmy Lai’s bail. The trial will now go ahead without any overseas non-permanent judge at the Court of Final Appeal.
Lai is set to appear in court next Monday to face the government’s appeal against the decision to extend his bail. The pro-democracy media tycoon had been kept in custody since December last year pending trial for alleged violations of the national security law and fraud.
The appeal will be heard by five judges, Chief Justice Andrew Cheung, Judges Roberto Ribeiro, Joseph Fok, Patrick Chan, and Frank Stock.
Cheung and Ribeiro were confirmed to be security law judges, and the Chief Executive’s Office told HKFP that Lam had also appointed Fok, Chan, and Stock as designated judges for security law cases on Wednesday.
Lai and eight other democrats – including Margaret Ng, Leung Kwok-hung and Martin Lee – had been charged for allegedly organising and participating in an unauthorised protest in August 2019.
Perry withdrew from the case following criticism from the UK, including from British Foreign Minister Dominic Raab. Critics also questioned the government’s plan to work around the coronavirus restrictions, as travellers from the UK are banned from entering the city.
The case will go to court on February 16.’ https://hongkongfp.com/2021/01/28/hong-kong-leader-appoints-3-more-national-security-judges-for-appeal-against-media-mogul-jimmy-lais-bail/
Ann Corcoran makes the point of moving to those social media sights that still allow the conservative free speech. Here are her thoughts.
‘As I am sure you are all painfully aware, conservative voices are being silenced. BIG Tech and BIG government have colluded to make it very hard for us to communicate and disseminate news. I expect it to get even harder!
And, if you are like me— OLD!—it is a challenge to break long held habits and learn new tricks.
But, before I get to that, let me mention again that right now you can follow at least three (but there are many more) websites/blogs to fill you in on breaking news throughout the day. Gateway Pundit, Conservative Tree House, and Just the News.
(Sorry if I am missing some of your favorites.)
You don’t need me to repeat what they are reporting.
For immigration news I check the news aggregator Borderhawk News that is linked in my sidebar.
So what am I doing to distance myself from BIG TECH that is working with the Socialists to change America?
First, I am dumping Google from my life. It will take time. But, know that in a few days, I will no longer be using gmail that is linked in my sidebar at both of my blogs.
And, I have gone to Brave for all of my browsing needs. Be prepared for some additional work as you may have to make changes to passwords and get notices from say your credit card company wondering if someone other than you is accessing your account.
You can read about Brave here at The Federalist:
How To Stop Using Google Search On Your Computer And Phone
You will then most likely look to Duck Duck Go for your searches.
The Federalist also published a useful piece about the right-wing witch hunt which I will get to in a minute, but which contains this bit of information on changes you should be making.
Modify Your Online Presence. One of the most important steps you can take is to modify your online presence by jumping out of Google, Facebook, and iChat and into technologies that are less intrusive. Here are a few to use:
- Web search:Duck Duck Go
- Email:Proton Mail
- Texting:Signal
- Group and video chat: Element
These are all examples of ways that you can search and communicate on the internet without having intrusive data collectors follow you around the whole time!
I don’t know Element and am staying on Facebook as long as I am able to reach the thousands I am reaching now with my Refugee Resettlement facebook page. Or, LOL! Until they dump me. I will eventually move to MeWe.
As I reported Twitter has blocked me from reaching my account there and I refuse to give Google any more information. Why stay at Twitter as they work to diminish your reach. I am on Gab (@Refugeewatcher), but not super active and don’t have many followers yet.
Now to that Federalist article yesterday, the one with the tips above by Dan Carpenter (hat tip: Scott). Readers may remember I discussed prepping last summer, see here reposted in December.
Who knew there were so many Americans of all stripes who don’t think it is a joke to be ready to take care of themselves and their loved ones.
But, LOL! Beware the Lefties think you are planning to overthrow the government because you have a stash of canned beans in your basement!
And, God forbid, we don’t want the government coming for our toilet paper trove as Biden forbids the destruction of trees ….’https://fraudscrookscriminals.com/2021/01/28/making-the-moves-time-to-get-your-communication-house-in-order/
Is freedom in the UK completely gone? The UK and under Biden freedom is slowly being distinguished. Where does one that seeks true liberty go?
‘• London contender Brian Rose accuses No.10 of undermining democracy that leaves police in ‘impossible position’ over May elections • Rose and campaign team arrested despite ensuring fully digital campaign bus is safest in the country • Dangerously vague election guidance threatens fair vote, says Rose London Mayor candidate Brian Rose has accused the Prime Minister of undermining democracy after Rose and his campaign team were arrested while campaigning in London yesterday (Sunday 24 January). Rose is using a COVID-secure, fully digital battle bus to visit the city’s 32 boroughs ahead of the scheduled May elections, allowing the public to communicate with him via social media during lockdown but with the public kept off the bus itself. While the bus was parked legally in Southwark on Sunday morning, a large group of City of London police descended on Rose’s team, arresting them and issuing £200 fines. At the time, Rose was recording a piece to video, while social distancing. His team produced the relevant parking and filming permits, but was informed that “campaigning was not a necessary reason to be out of your homes”, despite the police being told that other political parties have continued to operate leafleting activities throughout the lockdown. The lockdown regulations include express exceptions for people to leave the house and gather in groups where engaging in voluntary work as our campaigners were or working as the production team were. WE URGENTLY DEMAND THAT POLICE FORCES ACROSS LONDON RECONSIDER HOW THEY RESPOND TO LAWFUL CAMPAIGNING.’ https://brianformayor.london/
‘“Free speech” is a term that gets thrown around quite often these days. But what is it? And why is it important?
The freedom of speech is simply the ability to say, write, or otherwise express what you truly believe without fear of punishment or retaliation from the government.
This freedom is protected by the First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution, which states that “Congress shall make no law…abridging the freedom of speech.” The authors of our Constitution believed it was very important to protect this freedom.
And for good reason.
Speaking is how you express your thoughts. So if government officials can force you to say things you don’t believe, you no longer control the content of your speech and thus lose the freedom to live consistently with the principles you treasure most.
Government officials who seek to control your speech are trying to control what you think and what you do. And that’s contrary to the very idea of freedom. Not only that, but it’s contrary to the dignity of the human person. Our thoughts not only cause our actions, they are the most personal possession we have.
While upholding human dignity is the most important reason to protect this freedom, it certainly isn’t the only reason.
If you want good ideas to have influence, you’ll support protections for the freedom of speech. The best ideas often come from the robust discussion and debate of many different ideas.
And this cannot exist without free speech.
What the freedom of speech is not.
Some might argue that the freedom of speech is just a piece of rhetoric used by those who want to say hateful things. But this is false.
Free speech is a right that every individual possesses as a human being created by God.
And this right isn’t just for those with certain beliefs. In fact, that’s the whole point. There are as many unique perspectives as there are people. Our ability to share our perspective with others is what free speech is all about.
As the Declaration of Independence says, “all men are created equal.” But this doesn’t mean that all ideas are equal. There will always be bad or even false ideas that we must address.
But the answer isn’t to shut down debate or silence the people sharing those ideas. The answer is more speech.
We can use our own speech to answer hateful statements with good and truthful ones. We can debate ideas we consider bad with those we believe are good.
No matter what, we need those with whom we disagree to be involved in the conversation.
Debate with our ideological opponents sharpens our ideas and may even allow us to see the truth in a new and unexpected way. Not only that, but our opponents’ right to free speech should be protected because they are human beings with dignity just like us. And if their right is taken away, then ours can easily be taken away too.
It has been said that “I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it.”’ https://www.adflegal.org/blog/what-is-freedom-of-speech
I would have been more surprised if the judge had gone Parler’s way. Me thinks the justice system in the USA just might lean a little to the Left in how it reads the law!
‘The judge in the Parler vs Amazon case has denied Parler’s request for a temporary restraining order against Amazon.
“Parler has failed to meet the standard set by Ninth Circuit and U.S. Supreme Court precedent for issuance of a preliminary injunction,” Judge Barbara Jacobs Rothstein wrote in her conclusion.
Although the judge did note that her order was not to say that Parler didn’t have any substantial claims, but that “Parler has fallen far short, however, of demonstrating, as it must, that it has raised serious questions going to the merits of its claims, or that the balance of hardships tips sharply in its favor.
“It has also failed to demonstrate that it is likely to prevail on the merits of any of its three claims; that the balance of equities tips in its favor, let alone strongly so; or that the public interests lie in granting the injunction,” the judge concluded.
Parler, a free speech Twitter alternative, was hosted on Amazon Web Services (AWS). On Sunday January 10th, Parler went offline after it was banned from AWS.‘ https://reclaimthenet.org/judge-denies-parlers-request-for-temporary-restraining-order-against-amazon/
‘Let us begin with this fact: The left always suppresses speech. Since Vladimir Lenin and the Bolshevik Revolution in Russia in 1917, there has been no example of the left in control and not crushing dissent.
That is one of the important differences between liberal and left: Liberalism and liberals believe in free speech. (The present leftist threat to freedom in America, the greatest threat to freedom in American history, is made possible because liberals think they have more to fear from conservatives than from the left. Liberals don’t understand that the left regards liberals as their useful idiots.)
The left controls universities. There is little or no dissent allowed at universities.
The left controls nearly every “news” medium. There is little or no dissent in the mainstream media—not in the “news” sections and not in the opinion sections.
The left controls Hollywood. No dissent is allowed in Hollywood.
That is why we have “cancel culture”—the silencing and firing of anyone who publicly dissents from the left, and even “publicly” is no longer necessary. The National Association of Realtors has just announced that if you express dissenting views (on race, especially) in private, you may be fined and lose your membership in the organization—which effectively ends your career as a realtor.
So, we return to the opening question: Why does the left need to crush all dissent? This is a question made all the more stark because there is no parallel on the right: Conservatives don’t shut down dissent or debate.
The answer, though the left will not acknowledge it, is the left fears dissent. And they do so for good reason. Leftism is essentially a giant balloon filled with nothing but hot air. Therefore, no matter how big the balloon—the Democratic Party, The New York Times, Yale University—all it takes is a mere pin to burst it.
Leftism is venerated by intellectuals. But there is little intellectual substance to leftism. It is a combination of doctrine and emotion. The proof? Those with intellectual depth don’t stifle dissent; they welcome it.
That is why universities are so opposed to conservatives coming to speak on campus. One articulate conservative can undo years of left-wing indoctrination in a one-hour talk or Q and A. I know this from personal experience on campuses. You can, too. Watch the speeches given by any conservatives allowed to speak on a campus—many of these talks are still on YouTube—and you will see large halls filled with students yearning to hear something other than left-wing pablum. Look at their faces, filled with rapt attention to ideas they never heard that are clearly having an impact. Universities are entirely right to fear our coming to speak. We come with the pin that bursts their $50,000-a-year balloon.
That is also why it is so hard to get any of them to debate any of us. In 35 years of radio, I have never mistreated or bullied a guest. I was unfailingly polite to an icon of the left, Howard Zinn, the America-hating author of the America-hating “A People’s History of the United States.” I even invited a UCLA political science professor and violinist, one of seven members of the Santa Monica Symphony Orchestra who refused to play when I conducted the orchestra in a Joseph Haydn symphony in the Disney Concert Hall—solely because I’m a conservative. Despite his public letter, in which he accused me of holding “horribly bigoted positions” and wrote, “Please urge your friends to not attend this concert, which helps normalize bigotry in our community,” I nevertheless invited him on my national radio show. He agreed. I had him in studio for an entire hour and treated him and his wife (who accompanied him) with great respect, despite my contempt for his false accusations and his advocacy of the cancel culture. Every American should hear that hour.
Unfortunately for the emotional and intellectual health of our society, he, Zinn, and a few others were anomalies. Of the 100 or so left-wing authors, professors, and columnists invited to appear on my show, almost none has responded in the affirmative. They prefer NPR, where they are never challenged.
The opposite, however, isn’t true: Every conservative intellectual I know says yes to every one of the (very few) left-wing invitations we receive. Of course, we are almost never invited. We regularly invite leftists. Leftists almost never invite us. They claim it’s because we are not up to their intellectual level and they have no desire to waste their time. One would think that the opportunity to publicly show how vapid we conservatives really are would be too good to pass up.
Leftists don’t debate us or appear as guests on our shows and prevent us from speaking whenever possible, because they (correctly) fear conservatives. Race-baiters such as Ibram X. Kendi or Ta-Nehisi Coates or “White Fragility” author Robin DiAngelo would never debate Larry Elder, for example. Why won’t they? Because they would be shown to be the intellectually shallow purveyors of hate they are. Deep down, they know it. Larry Elder is one of many conservative black intellectuals who left-wing blacks (and whites) refuse to debate.
Now you know why the left suppresses free speech: because they have to. If there is free speech, there is dissent. And if there is dissent, there is no more left.’https://www.theepochtimes.com/why-the-left-has-to-suppress-free-speech_3661634.html
The Left look at things differently than a conservative. From their perspective anything President Trump said or did was divisive and not worthy of truthful reporting. Oh, the same could be said of the Left’s feeling for Trump supporters as well. Well, anyway, what does the left think of the liberty to enjoy free speech? They ask; ‘What are the limits of free speech? For those of us who report, edit and publish the views of a wide range of people, it is a difficult question, especially in an era of extremism, terrorism and deep political division.
As Denis Muller writes in his thoughtful analysis, it is an issue that has long confronted journalists, but became more pressing in the era of Donald Trump. When news networks cut away from Trump during a speech in the aftermath of the 2020 election, they did so on the grounds he was lying and endangering civil peace. But it was a contested decision.
Many of the decisions around how to report or broadcast such speech will come down to motive, Muller reasons: for example, is it censorship to omit hate speech or incitement to violence? No. Because the reporter doesn’t agree with it? Yes.
Free speech is an indispensable civil right that is under constant assault. But it is not absolute. So, writes Muller, “while the media face some extremely difficult decisions in today’s operating environment, they do not need to burden themselves with the belief that every decision not to publish is the violation of an inviolable right”.’https://theconversation.com/to-publish-or-not-to-publish-the-medias-free-speech-dilemmas-in-a-world-of-division-violence-and-extremism-153451?utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Latest%20from%20The%20Conversation%20for%20January%2021%202021%20-%201839217900&utm_content=Latest%20from%20The%20Conversation%20for%20January%2021%202021%20-%201839217900+CID_dc9891b792e7719cd60e47621a6e1cce&utm_source=campaign_monitor&utm_term=To%20publish%20or%20not%20to%20publish%20The%20medias%20free-speech%20dilemmas%20in%20a%20world%20of%20division%20violence%20and%20extremism
The following is the way a Leftist/Socialist thinks. These people see Sleepy Joe as the saviour of America. EVERYTHING President trump did is BAD but everything Obama did and now everything Sleepy Joe will do is WONDERFUL. These people are ripe for the CCP picking. The only help for Americans after the 20th of January is the Lord God Himself! There are HARD and Harsh times ahead not only for America but the world!
‘As Joe Biden is sworn in as the 46th president of the United States tomorrow morning Australian eastern time, great hopes will be placed on his ability to heal a damaged nation. As Jennifer S Hunt writes, if the last US inauguration in 2017 introduced the phrase “alternative facts”, the four years since have shown the disastrous consequences of them. Though the recent attack on the Capitol building lasted only a few hours, the fallout from it will be felt for years to come.
Donald Trump has demonstrated conspiracy theories can drive electoral and fundraising success. These range from the “birther” conspiracy about former president Barack Obama’s birthplace to the one he’ll end his tenure on — his claim the 2020 election was “stolen”, despite there being no evidence of it.
Among Biden’s many challenges as he becomes president will be to restore faith in institutions and — particularly in the shadow of the rampaging COVID pandemic — science. It is also vital there be full accountability for the Capitol attacks, Hunt argues, as any delay in it could see more catastrophic consequences of conspiracy theories.’https://theconversation.com/au/?utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Latest%20from%20The%20Conversation%20for%20January%2020%202021%20-%201838317890&utm_content=Latest%20from%20The%20Conversation%20for%20January%2020%202021%20-%201838317890+CID_4ba3c28e2e07db0464cbcc5107188c08&utm_source=campaign_monitor&utm_term=The%20Conversation
These poor ‘saps’ are delusional!
Today Parler; tomorrow who will it be?
‘American economist and Assistant to the President, Peter Navarro, called the banning of free speech social media platform Parler “chilling” and a “very serious threat” to democracy on Thursday during an interview on “Mornings with Maria” on Fox Business.
Navarro was referring to the shutting down of a social media platform created to offer a bias-free platform that allowed all users to post their thoughts without fear of censorship. Parler was pulled from the Google and Apple app stores in the wake of the tragic events of January when a small contingent of pro-Trump protesters stormed the Capitol Building.
Apple and Google used January 6 as an excuse to pull the platform, which is one of the biggest competitors to Twitter, claiming that protesters used the platform to organize. Since then, the FBI has confirmed that multiple social media platforms – including Twitter – were used to organize and recruit people to take part in the storming of the Capitol Building.
After the app was pulled from the app stores, Amazon then stepped in to revoke access to Amazon Web Services, meaning Parler is now also no longer available through browsers.
“What we saw with this attack on Parler was chilling to me,” Navarro said. “It’s one thing to deplatform everybody for free speech. But this was a pincer move where Google and Apple, the first part of the pincer, was to not allow Parler apps to be down.”
Navarro referred to Amazon’s decision to pull server access as a “brutal kill” to Parler, a “small company.”
“Effectively, Amazon wiped out that company,” he added.
Amazon is one of the biggest providers of servers to applications and big websites that see a lot of traffic. Without access to Amazon Web Services, platforms like Parler or fellow social media alternative Gab must purchase their own servers and hope that they are sufficient to handle the traffic.
As it stands, Parler has still not been able to find a company willing to host their site and it remains offline.
Navarro indicated that there must be a “heck of a lawsuit for damages,” and suggested that Congress must look “very carefully at this collusion because there is serious trust issue.”
But with the Joe Biden administration coming in on January 20, what hope do conservatives have in passing new legislation to stop the bias any time soon? The next opportunity for Republicans will be the 2022 midterms when many predict Republicans may be able to take the House.
Navarro reminded viewers that the Chinese Communist Party and former Supreme Leader of Iran Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini are still allowed to tweet, but President Donald Trump and many other conservatives are not.
Looks like conservatives are facing a rocky few years without social media access…’https://conservativeunit.com/peter-navarro-says-parler-ban-is-chilling-for-democracy/
