Nobody needs Twitter to be the 'national hall monitor’ of politics: Kurtz
Big Tech testifies before the Senate as Section 230 hangs in the balance. 'Media Buzz' host and Fox News media analyst Howard Kurtz weighs in on 'America's Newsroom.
In a hybrid in-person/virtual hearing, the Senate Commerce Committee Wednesday asked urgent questions of Big Tech moguls Jack Dorsey of Twitter, Sundar Pichai of Alphabet (Google’s parent company), and Mark Zuckerberg of Facebook.
Under scrutiny: Are these tech giants muting conservative voices just before the November 3 election?
The Media Research Center confirms this problem: Between May 31, 2018, and October 16, 2020, Facebook and Twitter censored President Donald J. Trump’s accounts 65 times. And Joe Biden? Zero.
Central to this discussion is Section 230 of the Communication Decency Act. Big Tech is eager to keep this measure’s protections against litigation. If so, they need to behave like platforms, much as AT&T evenhandedly carries phone calls from liberals, Democrats, Republicans, conservatives, and even monarchists.
Under this approach, Big Tech account holders would enjoy full free speech, unless they advocate violence, plot to maim innocent people, peddle child pornography, or otherwise promote lawlessness. If Big Tech so acted, they could keep their anti-lawsuit immunity, and deservedly so.
Alternatively, Big Tech could decide to be publishers — think Mother Jones on the Left and National Review on the Right. Then they could proliferate ideas with which they agree and block those with which they differ. As private entities, this would be perfectly appropriate, as the First Amendment applies only to government.
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But if Big Tech firms pick this latter path, then they must surrender Section 230’s protections and face serious consequences when they injure organizations and individuals, as the Cable News Network (CNN) did when it defamed Nick Sandmann and his fellow students in the Covington High School fiasco.
CNN, and others, falsely called them a pack of teen racists who mocked and physically intimidated an American Indian elder at the Lincoln Memorial in January 2019.
They did no such thing. In fact, Omaha tribe activist Nathan Phillips (AKA Sky Man) approached Sandmann and then banged a drum slowly in his face.
After facing severe, media-fueled character assaults, for no reason whatsoever, Sandmann sued several major news outlets. Among others, CNN paid him an undisclosed settlement — as it should have.
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At the hearing, Senator Ted Cruz, R-Texas, addressed Twitter’s clampdown on the account of the New York Post — America’s oldest and fourth most-widely circulated newspaper, founded by Alexander Hamilton in 1801.
Twitter blocked posts from the Post after its game-changing October 15 expose on Hunter Biden, the contents of his highly incriminating laptop, and disturbing details about Joe Biden and his family’s apparent global, pay-to-play empire.
Committee Democrats uniformly dismissed the Post’s exclusive as “Russian disinformation.”
If it is, then Democrats should explain why Hunter Biden’s attorney George Mesires contacted a Wilmington, Delaware computer-repair shop and inquired about his client’s laptop.
If you were innocent of homicide, would you dispatch your lawyer to a crime scene to seek a murder weapon you never wielded?
On this matter, Cruz subjected Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey to a Weber-like grilling: “Mr. Dorsey, who the hell elected you and put you in charge of what the media are allowed to report and what the American people are allowed to hear, and why do you persist in behaving as a Democratic super PAC silencing views to the contrary of your political beliefs?”
“We’re not doing that,” Dorsey meekly replied, his listless voice muffled by a beard that far exceeded any standard of human decency. Dorsey conceded: “We realize, we need to earn trust more.”
Like Cruz, Senator Josh Hawley, R - Mo., has provided thoughtful, energetic leadership on this matter. He has sponsored S. 3983, the Limiting Section 230 Immunity to Good Samaritans Act.
His bill would expose Big Tech companies to lawsuits filed by those whom they have harmed, as the New York Post’s legal department easily could prove that it was. While Hawley’s instincts are correct, he proposes a fine of just $5,000 or actual damages, if higher, plus attorney’s fees.
Alas, $5,000 is probably a fraction of the daily sashimi budget in Twitter’s commissary.
Big Tech will not change its evil ways until they feel far more pain than biting into a little too much wasabi. Hawley should boost his paltry fine to a number that would pry open the eyes of even mega-billionaires like Zuckerberg: $1 million per offense.
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Much like President Trump’s tariffs against China, such blunt-instrument trauma might seize Big Tech’s attention and teach them some manners.
There is a less-intrusive remedy. Washington simply should require Big Tech to make a Big Choice.
Each company that Section 230 now shields must decide: Are you a platform or a publisher?
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Platforms would continue to enjoy the safe harbor of Section 230. Publishers would ride the high seas without it.
The choice should be free and open to these techno-behemoths. But they need to make it, and they need to make it now.