We have often discussed the hypocrisy of leaders and social media companies proclaiming their faith in free speech while promoting unprecedented levels of censorship. However, the layers of hypocrisy in a story out of London is breathtaking. Gen. To Lam was shown recently on a trip to visit the grave of Karl Marx. That is hardly surprising for a Communist leader. What followed was a tad surprising. To Lam is shown eating a steak covered in 24-karat gold flakes at a restaurant owned by the social media star and restaurateur known as Salt Bae. It costs $1,150 per steak. Facebook later suspended Salt Bae’s hashtag as the scandal exploded in Vietnam. It is not the first time social media has intervened to assist foreign authoritarian or government interests. This story may prove Marx’s prediction that “history repeats itself, first as tragedy, second as farce.”
General Lam, Vietnam’s minister of public security, was visiting Britain for a global summit on climate change in Glasgow, and then led a group on Nov. 2 to the grave of Karl Marx where they “paid respect to those … on whose theories the Vietnamese people overthrew systems of oppression ruled by colonialists and imperialists.” He then incongruously went to the London restaurant run by Nusret Gokce, who is known as Salt Bae for his dramatic way to put salt on food.
In one video on YouTube, Mr. Gokce serves three gold-covered steaks to a table of three men, including the general, as various people stand around them in rapt excitement.
Vietnam quickly moved to block the video and the widely used hashtag #saltbae was temporarily blocked on Facebook.
Facebook later expressed a total lack of knowledge on why the hashtag was suspended. However, this is not the first such intervention by social media companies in support of foreign governments. These companies, which routinely censor many in the United States in the name of protecting democracy, have intervened in support of some of the most anti-Democatic figures on Earth.
We have previously discussed Twitter’s robust censorship program that repeatedly has been denounced for bias in taking sides on scientific, social, and political controversies. Twitter admitted to censoring criticism of India’s government and the company later flagged a critic of the Chinese government. YouTube later censored material from pro-Democracy opponents to Russia’s Vladimir Putin.
As for General Lam, he is unlikely deterred by the image of a communist eating gold-encrusted steak. After all, as Marx observed, “for the bureaucrat, the world is a mere object to be manipulated by him.”
Why in the world would anyone want to eat gold?
Each social media platform must be “taken for public use” by Congress and operated, in adherence to constitutional rights and freedoms, as a state-regulated monopoly utility under the 5th Amendment.
Freedom of speech should be enjoyed, without qualification, by consumers and visitors to social media platforms, one way or another.
Private social media platforms are private property, of which only the owners may “claim and exercise dominion.”
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5th Amendment
No person shall be…deprived of…property, without due process of law; nor shall private property be taken for public use, without just compensation.
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“[Private property is] that dominion which one man claims and exercises over the external things of the world, in exclusion of every other individual.”
– James Madison
OT
DOES JOHN “DUDLEY WILL-HE-DO-RIGHT” DURHAM KNOW THE FBI HAS SETH RICH’S DOCUMENTS AND COMPUTER?
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ANOTHER LIE: After Insisting They Had No Information on Seth Rich for Years, FBI Admits Interviewing a Third Party in 2018 Related to Seth Rich Murder
Attorney Ty Clevenger received another batch of documents from the FBI. This time the FBI provided an index of records from the FBI, and #19 is particularly interesting:
“FD-302 documenting the interview of a third party regarding the homicide of Seth Rich, dated March 26, 2018.”
Ty’s request was for records from the FBI regarding the Russian collusion investigation. He says this is the first time the FBI has admitted that it investigated the Seth Rich murder as part of the Russian collusion investigation. We knew that the FBI took custody of his computers and interviewed witnesses, but this is an admission that the murder was under investigation by the Russian collusion team.
After several years of investigative reporting we now know there is no evidence Russia hacked the DNC and sent the hacked emails to WikiLeaks.
Attorney Ty Clevenger has been asserting for years that the FBI and/or DNI has been covering up the fact that they have communications between Seth Rich and WikiLeaks they finally notify Clevenger that they basically lied and have thousands of pages of documents and Seth Rich’s laptop. And now they admit interviewing someone in March 2018, related to this case.
– Joe Hoft
58,000 American innocent boys dead in Vietnam and this clown, General Lam, Minister of Public Security, Communist Vietnam, eats gold on steak in London when he would have eked out an existence on chicken embryos, dog meat and infested rice on a good day in the armpit of the world in the 60-70’s. How apt was “Apocalypse Now”? The whole debacle was just plain weird and, apparently, continues to be so.
The plan by Facebook is to ban their enemies and cover up for their friends. It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out who the friends of Facebook are. Facebook is improperly named, it should be Socialistbook.
I should add that when I was in Vietnam at the DMZ zone I stayed at one of the best hotels, if not the best. It was inexpensive by our standards. I asked about the hotels we were passing and the translator said they were very expensive, at least $3,000 a night. I asked who was able to afford and stay there? He said that is where the socialist leaders stay though he excluded the term socialists. N Vietnam was quite poor. Socialism doesn’t pay off. It’s an excuse for some people to benefit at the expense of everyone else.
“ I asked who was able to afford and stay there? He said that is where the socialist leaders stay though he excluded the term socialists. ”
So if he excluded the term why did you say he said that is where socialist leaders stay? Why are you making stuff up?
You are really Stupid. It was for the leaders of Vietnam and their friends. They consider themselves socialists.
He was licensed by the state and could only say what the state permitted. I don’t think he wanted to be silenced. When we talked about N Vietnam’s economy, he had few answers, but seemed to grasp things that would slip by you.
Anonymous,
YOU said the that the guy SAID “that’s where the socialist leaders stay”. You’re stating that’s what he said, but in the same sentence YOU state he excluded the term socialists. If he excluded the term as you say then he couldn’t have said “that’s where the socialist leaders stay”.
You’re making stuff up.
The leaders of Vietnam consider themselves socialists. I didn’t quote the translator even though some might assume you are trying to make it appear that way. If the leaders are the only ones who can afford those $3,000 hotels and they consider themselves socialists then socialist leaders are the ones that get to stay in those super expensive hotels.
I don’t know what your problem is, but your statements point to a psychiatric one.
Anonymous,
“ I didn’t quote the translator even though some might assume you are trying to make it appear that way.”
You stated what he said. You quoted what the guy said when YOU stated that “HE said that’s where socialist leaders stay BUT he excluded the word socialists”. Now you’re trying to avoid the obvious BS of your statement.
Firstly I paraphrased what he said. Secondly the translator was a socialist and said he was while he put down capitalism. The leaders of the nation call themselves socialists.
That makes them socialist leaders, but you don’t get it, do you? Its it too hard for you to understand? Do you think the translator was advocating capitalism?
Do you think that the leaders of Vietnam do not stay at that $3,000 hotel paid for by the state? Do you think the leaders of Vietnam believe in robust capitalism?
The biggest question is do you think. The answer to that is no.
S. Meyer,
“ Firstly I paraphrased what he said. Secondly the translator was a socialist and said he was while he put down capitalism. The leaders of the nation call themselves socialists.
That makes them socialist leaders, but you don’t get it, do you? Its it too hard for you to understand?”
LOL!!! S. Meyer. Well if you’re going to be paraphrasing you have to mention that you’re paraphrasing when you first mention the statement. I thought you were smarter than that, but I suspect it’s more likely you were just making stuff up. You phrased that statement as if you were quoting the guy verbatim. It’s the only way to take what you said. I challenged your statement twice and in subsequent responses you didn’t state that you were paraphrasing. Only after not being able to extricate yourself from your badly made up statement did you resort to the paraphrasing excuse. For someone who accuses others of not thinking things through you sure don’t think things through.
You didn’t know I was paraphrasing? What dummy. These are the words I said:
* I asked about the hotels we were passing and the translator said they were very expensive, at least $3,000 a night. I asked who was able to afford and stay there? He said that is where the socialist leaders stay though he excluded the term socialists. *
There were no quotation marks and to anyone reasonably intelligent, the comment is quickly recognized as recounting what another said. This was made even more obvious, when I stated “he excluded the term socialists.”
Almost all of your comments are wrong or banal. If you ever become a bit smarter, you should reread what you write on this blog. I think you will feel very foolish.
“. . . as if you were quoting the guy verbatim.”
No. That’s your lame attempt to smear SM.
A verbatim quote is marked by quotation marks around the speaker’s words. No quotation marks means paraphrase.
“To Lam is shown eating a steak covered in 24-karat gold flakes at a restaurant owned by the social media star and restaurateur known as Salt Bae. It costs $1,150 per steak.”
Maybe they all had arthritis and couldn’t get gold shots.
Years ago some high class Indian restaurants covered the dinner with flakes of silver and sometimes gold. Both can be so thin that they can start floating in the air around the table. I’ve eaten both, but wouldn’t pay for the addition if I had a choice.
Social Media like Facebook , Twitter et al. have become the dictators of the message.
Turley is either being deliberately disingenuous or completely ignorant here. He complains about the hypocrisy of Facebook censorship….in other countries where the constitution’s free speech guarantees are useless. Furthermore Turley claims the hypocrisy of social media “censoring” conservatives here or removing misinformation as censorship HERE where they have every right to do so if they deem such instances as violating their terms and conditions.
You never see Turley actually discus the problem of terms and conditions that everyone agree to when signing up. That’s literally the much bigger issue that allows social media to “censor” what it wants. Even this very blog has its own TOS which allows Turley to “censor” anyone who violates it.
The way Facebook operates in other countries may not be the same as in this country. Facebook after all has to operate in their countries by THEIR rules. Google does the same thing. In China Google censors a lot of content that Chinese nationals are not allowed to search for.
Svelaz, what are your thoughts about a COMMUNIST flying to a CLIMATE SUMMIT and eating a THOUSAND DOLLAR STEAK? Any thoughts or do you only care to be critical of the Professor who hosts a site you are not obligated to visit?
Hullbobby,
“ Svelaz, what are your thoughts about a COMMUNIST flying to a CLIMATE SUMMIT and eating a THOUSAND DOLLAR STEAK?”
I think it’s hilarious. You have a very good example of two kinds of extremes meeting at an interesting juncture. Capitalism’s excesses vs. communism’s excesses.
As for criticizing Turley, he’s fair game and pointing out the fallacies of his arguments are well within the bounds of this issue. He criticized Facebook for its hypocrisy. He has noted here before that Facebook has every right to censor content it deems in violation of its policies. Just like Turley. What Turley is complaining about is how in OTHER COUNTRIES Facebook doesn’t censor certain content while here it does. The obvious detail would be that the constitution’s powers or prohibitions only apply within our own borders.
How about Biden’s 85 care motorcade.
Gee, why would dear leader want his glorious actions censored? Your whataboutism is boring, trite, and entirely transparent. jeff silberstein is better at it, and he’s lame.
Anonymous, the fact that many here really don’t understand how our constitutional rights and its limitations work. Makes it easy to point out why a private company’s, any private company CAN engage in censorship because the constitution’s prohibitions on censoring speech or anything else is a prohibition on the government. The constitution says nothing about private entities.
You talk about Constitutional rights but you don’t know the difference between the constitutional republic that existed here and the fascism presently being introduced.
You seem to ignore anything that requires thought and concentration.
Anonymous,
“ You talk about Constitutional rights but you don’t know the difference between the constitutional republic that existed here and the fascism presently being introduced.”
You just made my point beautifully about the sheer ignorance on the limits of the constitution.
The “constitutional republic” is alive and well. Nowhere in the constitution does it say that private entities cannot engage in censorship. Private entities can censor anything they wish or not censor.
Turley has made multiple comments asserting that Facebook or any other social media companies have every right to engage in censorship of content. Even Trump’s own upcoming platform is perfectly able to do it.
Turley complains that these companies shouldn’t be censoring content because it’s wrong. However as Turley admits they are not bound by constitutional prohibitions like government is.
If a private company wants to act like a fascist it certainly can.
If communists, fascists, or socialists want to create their own political parties in this country they have every right to. There is no prohibitions in the constitution about political parties. In fact the concept of political parties is nowhere in the constitution.
It seems it’s you who is not thinking it through when you post comments.
I think it is widely accepted that the first amendment only prohibits government censorship, not that perpetrated by a private entity. But there is a wide and growing “grey area” in our increasingly socialistic form of government as to where government behavior ends and private behavior begins. The more government controls and regulates a private entity, much less provides forms of financial support through grants and loans, the more likely that the “penumbra” of government will cover the nominally private entity doing the censoring. I would expect to see more and more lawyers arguing, with some success, that the government is “aiding and abetting”, or outright conspiring with, those private censors which suffocate conservative speech and thus the conduct of the private entity can be legally seen as merged with the responsibilities of the government. One cannot enable or promote someone else to commit an act that he himself is prohibited from doing without having that other person deemed as your agent and legally assumed to bear the responsibilities of the principal.
If that is ever argued in the Supreme Court I will make every effort to be in attendance, silently cheering on the advocates of this position. Professor—-are you listening?
You seem to be thinking in a similar fashion as Philip Hamburger. If you have any additional thoughts please mention them. I do not understand why these tech companies were permitted to act against the American people in the fashion we have seen.
The Constitution Can Crack Section 230
Tech companies think the statute allows them to censor with impunity. The law is seldom so simple.
By Philip Hamburger
Jan. 29, 2021 2:00 pm ET
https://www.wsj.com/articles/the-constitution-can-crack-section-230-11611946851
If you don’t have access I will try copying the article.
Your point was not made. One can take a horse to water, but cannot make him drink.
Private companies have private property rights, but when government uses them to engage in things government is not supposed to engage in, then suddenly we are not dealing with private property rights. There is also the notion of the public square, public communication and the airways and a multiplicity of other things that you disregard. There is also bad faith and social harm. All these things become important.
We are not a libertarian society and the Constitution is not a libertarian document. It is a compromise of ideas so that the nation can survive, but you wish to pull up its anchor to weaken it and destroy it. and our nation.
I am the anonymous above.
Your characterization of the rights of businesses to censor is enshrined in the constitution is similar to the argument that businesses had prior to the CRA of 1964 where they believed they were on constitutional grounds in restricting people from coming into their businesses based on their race/creed/etc.
This censorship must be stopped, just as racist rights to assemblage were.
Google and Facebook could decide not to do business in countries that restrict speech so much. The hypocrisy lies in their claim to have high ethical standards, which they use to censure speech they don’t like in the US, while accepting government dictates from oppressive regimes regardless of their ethical standards. If profits are more important than principles, stop claiming you have principles.
“ Google and Facebook could decide not to do business in countries that restrict speech so much.”
Yes they could, but given that they need to make money just like every other business they choose making money and accepting certain limitations in operating on another country. American companies operate in communist China all the time. They too abide by their rules.
Companies dealing in China don’t generally bring back parts of the CCP with them so that Americans can be mistreated like the Chinese. These companies are helping the CCP to incarcerate the minds of China’s citizens and they are taking those same methods they use with the Chinese to America, so that Americans can be mistreated in the very same way.
Gold crusted steak?
Seriously?
I like me a good steak, but that is just plain dumb!
Commies live in dumb caves.
Commies aren’t the ones selling steaks flaked with gold to consume. That’s the capitalist salt bae offering it.
The driver is demand.
Svelaz, doesn’t know what demand is. He also doesn’t realize that in Socialist states the demand is created by its leaders and so is the supply. I don’t think Svelaz has the capacity to understand Econ101 For Dummies.
S. Meyer,
“ Svelaz, doesn’t know what demand is. He also doesn’t realize that in Socialist states the demand is created by its leaders and so is the supply. I don’t think Svelaz has the capacity to understand Econ101 For Dummies.”
Leave it to S. Meyer to make the dumbest comments. Those Vietnamese leaders didn’t go to that restaurant because there was a demand for gold flaked steaks. They went there because it was a gimmick offered at a very expensive tourist trap. Being socialists or communists had nothing to do with demand. All they did was satisfied their curiosity on eating a $1000 gold flaked steak by a guy whose claims to fame is spreading salt on meat in the most obnoxious way. Sheesh.
” They went there because it was a gimmick offered at a very expensive tourist trap. Being socialists or communists had nothing to do with demand.”
This explains your comments that demonstrate ignorance. Before I demonstrated that you didn’t know what socialism, nazism, and fascism were. You also don’t know how these governments have universally worked. You are too ignorant to have an intelligent discussion with. How much money did Castro die with? How much money has been taken from China by members of the CCP? Same with the oligarchs of Russia? What do you think is one of the reasons NYC’s most expensive housing is so expensive? Where did all these servants of the state get that type of money?
Enough. Others are right. You are too ridiculous to talk to.
Svelaz–
The question isn’t who is selling gold sprinkled steaks but who is buying them.
Commies in this case.
BLM would approve, as would Svelaz’s employer, ActBlue
….
– Inside BLM co-founder Patrisse Khan-Cullors’ million-dollar real estate buying binge –
“As protests broke out across the country in the name of Black Lives Matter, the group’s co-founder went on a real estate buying binge, snagging four high-end homes for $3.2 million in the US alone, according to property records.
Patrisse Khan-Cullors, 37, also eyed property in the Bahamas at an ultra-exclusive resort where Justin Timberlake and Tiger Woods both have homes, The Post has learned. Luxury apartments and townhouses at the beachfront Albany resort outside Nassau are priced between $5 million and $20 million, according to a local agent.
The self-described Marxist last month purchased a $1.4 million home on a secluded road a short drive from Malibu in Los Angeles, according to a report. The 2,370-square-foot property features “soaring ceilings, skylights and plenty of windows” with canyon views. The Topanga Canyon homestead, which includes two houses on a quarter-acre, is just one of three homes Khan-Cullors owns in the Los Angeles area, public records show.”
– NYPost
Young, they wouldn’t be buying them if they didn’t know they were selling gold flaked steaks. Commies went to that specific restaurant BECAUSE they were known to sell gold flaked steaks. They were selling them as a gimmick to rationalize $1,000 steak.
You don’t know what you are talking about. If it is the leaders getting the gold covered steaks it is paid for by the state. If it is the mega-rich, one can’t be sure but that is a way of paying for others.
In China one of the restaurants I was at had different areas. One of the tiny areas was extremely expensive, but once again, either the government or mega-rich were paying. When I went to an outdoor show all the seats were crowded together outdoors with thousands of people. I sat in the boxes reserved for the most elite and paid an amount exceeding what the Chinese can afford. By American standards it wasn’t that high a price, but we stayed in a booth much larger than our seats, with service, heaters and tea.
Money talks….Democracy walks.
When you have a communist at a climate conference visiting the grave of Karl Marx and then eating an $1,150 steak it is just so damaging that the leftist censors had to kill it. They want us to stop flying, they flew to Great Britain, they want us to stop eating beef, they had a golden steak and they want to be portrayed as working for the poor, flying private and eating steak at over a THOUSAND DOLLARS.
Stories that will greatly damage the left will be banned from the public, see Biden, Hunter-laptop. See covid cause, Wuhan-WHO. See therapeutics-cures for covid.
Of course when the proof is inconvertible, like when people see what they are now paying for food, gas and heating oil the media will portray inflation as a good thing, as we saw recently in many MSNBC stories and tweets. Or they will lie and say it is because things are too good right now, as if 2019 wasn’t a great economic year. Or they will just blame the people for buying too much because being young morons they have no idea what is meant by the Jimmy Carter malaise speech and what it did to him.
The truth will out
What’s the big deal? Its just an algorithm that needs a tweak. “gold encrusted” is racist, so there’s that.
You know who controls you by who you cannot criticize. The fans of Karl Marx, socialism, and the murder of people by the millions, controls Facebook
facebook is disgusitng, but not surprising.
We all know the Twitter/Hunter Biden story.
The evidence suggests that the social media companies are anti democratic.
Yes, they are private companies.
But do we allow them to subvert democracy?
I think that our laws have not evolved fast enough.
The $350 million dollars from Zuckerberg to swing state cities, paid off of better than Zuckerberg dreamed