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Justice Thomas' Solution to Big Tech's Social And Financial Excommunication
Townhall.com ^ | August 13, 2021 | Ilana Mercer

Posted on 08/13/2021 8:46:28 AM PDT by Kaslin

PAYPAL HOLDINGS, Inc, is an indispensable, American, global corporation, without whose services, financially transacting online is difficult. The company is worth $16.929 billion.

The worthless Anti-Defamation League (ADL) is a meddlesome shakedown operation, in the mold of the Southern Poverty Law Center, that has taken it upon itself to decide who lives and who dies socially and financially. People like Pat Buchanan and Tucker Carlson the ADL deems to be mired in white supremacism. What next?

The ADL and PayPal have conspired to ferret out “bigotry and extremism” from the financial industry, by which they mean ban thought crimes.

"Racism—systemic or other—remains nothing but thought crime: impolite and impolitic thoughts, spoken, written or preached. Thought crimes are nobody’s business in free societies."

In response to this particular collusion against thought crimes, Fox News personality Tucker Carlson has vowed to stay chipper. This is not sufficient a solution from so powerful a persona as Mr. Carlson.

Justice Clarence Thomas’ Solution

The requisite and fitting noblesse oblige comes from Justice Clarence Thomas.

As one of the few public intellectual to grasp the gravity of social and financial excommunication by Deep Tech (to denote Big Tech’s enmeshment with The State), and for proposing a way to prohibit wicked social and financial ouster of innocents—Justice Thomas is my hero.

To blabber on about simply finding alternative outlets to Amazon, Facebook, Twitter, Google, Apple, PayPal and other banking facilities is asinine verging on the criminal. Coming from political representatives, such advice ought to guarantee loss of face, even political expulsion.

The ordinary guy or girl (check) is told to go up against economic and political entities whose revenues exceed the GDP of quite a number of G20 nations combined.

"It changes nothing that these platforms are not the sole means for distributing speech or information,” inveighs Justice Thomas:

“A person could always choose to avoid the toll bridge or train and instead swim the Charles River or hike the Oregon Trail. But in assessing whether a company exercises substantial market power, what matters is whether the alternatives are comparable. For many of today's digital platforms, nothing is."

I’d go further. It would hardly be hyperbole, in driving home Justice Thomas’s ingenious point, to put it thus:

With respect to financial de-platforming, barring someone from PayPal is like prohibiting a passenger from crossing the English Channel by high-speed train, via ferry and by means of 90 percent of airplanes.

“Sure, some options remain for you to explore, you hapless loser. Go to it!”

Thomas has argued in favor of the "two legal doctrines" that "limit the right of a private company to exclude":

The first doctrine, he explained, involves "common carriers," such as railroads and telegraphs, which have historically been required "to serve all comers." The second involves "places of public accommodation" or amusement, such as inns, restaurants, and theaters, which have generally been forbidden from denying service to certain categories of people. "The similarities between some digital platforms and common carriers or places of accommodation," Thomas wrote, "may give legislators strong arguments for similarly regulating digital platforms." (Via Reason.)

The requisite and fitting noblesse oblige comes from Justice Clarence Thomas.

As one of the few public intellectual to grasp the gravity of social and financial excommunication by Deep Tech (to denote Big Tech’s enmeshment with The State), and for proposing a way to prohibit wicked social and financial ouster of innocents—Justice Thomas is my hero.

To blabber on about simply finding alternative outlets to Amazon, Facebook, Twitter, Google, Apple, PayPal and other banking facilities is asinine verging on the criminal. Coming from political representatives, such advice ought to guarantee loss of face, even political expulsion.

The ordinary guy or girl (check) is told to go up against economic and political entities whose revenues exceed the GDP of quite a number of G20 nations combined.

"It changes nothing that these platforms are not the sole means for distributing speech or information,” inveighs Justice Thomas:

“A person could always choose to avoid the toll bridge or train and instead swim the Charles River or hike the Oregon Trail. But in assessing whether a company exercises substantial market power, what matters is whether the alternatives are comparable. For many of today's digital platforms, nothing is."

I’d go further. It would hardly be hyperbole, in driving home Justice Thomas’s ingenious point, to put it thus:

With respect to financial de-platforming, barring someone from PayPal is like prohibiting a passenger from crossing the English Channel by high-speed train, via ferry and by means of 90 percent of airplanes.

“Sure, some options remain for you to explore, you hapless loser. Go to it!”

Thomas has argued in favor of the "two legal doctrines" that "limit the right of a private company to exclude":

The first doctrine, he explained, involves "common carriers," such as railroads and telegraphs, which have historically been required "to serve all comers." The second involves "places of public accommodation" or amusement, such as inns, restaurants, and theaters, which have generally been forbidden from denying service to certain categories of people. "The similarities between some digital platforms and common carriers or places of accommodation," Thomas wrote, "may give legislators strong arguments for similarly regulating digital platforms." (Via Reason.)


TOPICS: Culture/Society; Editorial; Politics/Elections
KEYWORDS: clarencethomas; justicethomas; paypal; thoughtcrimes
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1 posted on 08/13/2021 8:46:28 AM PDT by Kaslin
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To: Kaslin

I love, love, love me some Clarence Thomas. Every time I want to fuss at Bush Sr, for which much criticism is due, I always remember that at least he gave us Justice Thomas.


2 posted on 08/13/2021 8:49:59 AM PDT by Tell It Right (1st Thessalonians 5:21 -- Put everything to the test, hold fast to that which is true.)
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To: Kaslin

Why does the author put Carlson and Buchanan in the same sentence? Hmmm...


3 posted on 08/13/2021 8:50:41 AM PDT by alstewartfan ("She looks like she's 19 years old, sitting there like a lady with her legs crossed." Creepy Joe)
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To: Kaslin

Big Tech should be allowed to censor anyone they want—as long as we get to guillotine a member of their Board of Directors whenever we want.

Fair is fair!


4 posted on 08/13/2021 8:52:38 AM PDT by cgbg (A kleptocracy--if they can keep it. Think of it as the Cantillon Effect in action.)
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To: Kaslin

That article is so intense I feel like I just read it twice.


5 posted on 08/13/2021 8:54:12 AM PDT by Jeff Chandler (THE ISSUE IS NEVER THE ISSUE. THE REVOLUTION IS THE ISSUE.)
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To: Kaslin

PAYPAL HOLDINGS, Inc, is an indispensable, American, global corporation, without whose services, financially transacting online is difficult. The company is worth $16.929 billion.

How is it indispensable and how does it make online transactions less difficult? One can purchase stuff online without using it. And many sites allow the users to provide and store their information in the same exact way PayPal does, without having to pay the fees to PayPal.


6 posted on 08/13/2021 8:59:26 AM PDT by qaz123
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To: Kaslin

Amazon and its likes could be tamed by the Commerce Clause. Facebook, Twitter and ilk could be treated like Western Union and phone companies as communication entities. Paypal like banking, but would not make lot of difference.


7 posted on 08/13/2021 9:07:19 AM PDT by amihow (It is Western Civilization that confers privilege, not whiteness. Ask Carson, MLK, Sowell.)
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To: alstewartfan
Why does the author put Carlson and Buchanan in the same sentence? Hmmm...

Because they are both people with high visibility who have been banned not for the traditional reasons of criminality or improper behavior toward the institution but because of what they say or what some think they say.

Currently the "places of public accommodation" applies to my business. I can not refuse to sell anyone something off the self.

I can refuse to take a special commission although they are trying to take that Right away even though it would require me to enter into a whole different relationship with the customer actually becoming the employer. But at the moment I can still refuse a commission but I may not refuse to treat a customer as a customer.

This is what they are doing, refusing to treat a customer as a customer.

And if I can not do it as Jane Q Public Small Business Person then they can't either.

It is only Justice.

8 posted on 08/13/2021 9:08:10 AM PDT by Harmless Teddy Bear (I refuse to be afraid. I refuse to bow. I refuse to take any job I do not wish to. So BUZZ OFF!)
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To: Tell It Right
Every time I want to fuss at Bush Sr, for which much criticism is due, I always remember that at least he gave us Justice Thomas.

And Souter, and his son gave us Roberts. Thomas is the exception of remaining a strong constitutionalist after he was elevated to the Supreme Court. Even Trumps picks are turning out to be wishy washy.

9 posted on 08/13/2021 9:08:31 AM PDT by Timocrat (Ingnorantia non excusat)
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To: Kaslin

Meanwhile, while we wait for “someone” (Congress? bwa ha ha) to DO something ... here is an alternative to PayPal ....

From Dan Bongino (8-10-21):
I can’t thank you enough for making the launch of our new payment processing platform an ENORMOUS success. I thought of the idea after the liberals at Stripe canceled President Trump.

We have onboarded hundreds of new companies just in the past few weeks and we’ll have a big announcement later this week.
THANK YOU! Sign up here if interested 👇🏻
https://alignpay.com/


10 posted on 08/13/2021 9:09:05 AM PDT by Qiviut (Faith is the antidote to fear. Mindset: be a victor, not a victim.)
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To: Kaslin

What does PayPal do that a regular bricks & mortar bank cannot do?

Is PayPal for people who do not qualify for a credit card?

Is it for people who have problematic banking issues?


11 posted on 08/13/2021 9:14:22 AM PDT by zeestephen
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To: Kaslin

So PayPal can turn away a customer because they don’t like what they think he believes but a baker can’t turn away a sexual deviate who wants him to write blasphemies on a cake. Got it!


12 posted on 08/13/2021 9:14:37 AM PDT by HalfIrish
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To: Kaslin

I never purchase from a PayPal only business. Never have never will.


13 posted on 08/13/2021 9:17:35 AM PDT by Pilated
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Thomas is a true hero and national treasure. He’s the only justice I unreservedly respect and admire. That he found his way through the fog of his earlier activities is amazing.

The only area I tend to disagree with him on is with respect to police powers (I think he sometimes construes our protections from abuse and unreasonable search and seizure too narrowly). But I love that he has for decades been direct in his opposition to many unconstitutional activities that the lesser justices ignore or escape via strawmen.


14 posted on 08/13/2021 9:23:02 AM PDT by Ibi Libertas in Veritate
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To: zeestephen
It used to be a way to keep your financial information private.

You were not giving your CC number to some unknown goober, just transferring funds from your account to his. You did not even need to have your real name attached to the account. You could also use it if you did not have a bank account for what ever reason.

There was a fee but it was in line with other banking fees so it was a wash.

And it was faster. I sold some coins and it took almost a week for the check (under $5000) to clear. I used Paypal the next time and the funds were available immediately. No muss, no fuss.

15 posted on 08/13/2021 9:26:15 AM PDT by Harmless Teddy Bear (I refuse to be afraid. I refuse to bow. I refuse to take any job I do not wish to. So BUZZ OFF!)
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To: Pilated

I never use pay pal. If a company cannot use my credit card I don’t do business with them

Recently, I had a local business try to charge me a couple hundred with pay pal. I called the guy to tell home he’d have to come up with a better plan I’m not using PayPal and should not have to

He said try it again I’ll charge you from cc. I did that and wham O what PayPal moved in right away.

Within hours my (very reputable) bank wants to know if the multi thousand charge is mine

No

I called the local business guy. “Huh, really? Duh. Pay pal charged you? Doh. I don’t know anything...”

Ok he does not want my business. A few hundred each month for a few months.

Something way wrong there.

Maybe all coincidental.

But I don’t use PayPal.


16 posted on 08/13/2021 9:35:57 AM PDT by stanne
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To: Tell It Right

Big Tech censoring and restricting individuals service based on their beliefs and political persuasion seems a lot like lunch counters in the South refusing black customers back in the 60s.


17 posted on 08/13/2021 9:36:45 AM PDT by Don@VB (Power Corrupts)
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To: Jeff Chandler

LMAO.


18 posted on 08/13/2021 9:43:01 AM PDT by Alberta's Child ("And once in a night I dreamed you were there; I canceled my flight from going nowhere.")
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To: qaz123

The author diverted from Thomas’s argument with that.

Put another way “Bake me a damned cake!!”


19 posted on 08/13/2021 9:49:47 AM PDT by Dead Dog
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To: Taxman

Ping


20 posted on 08/13/2021 9:51:11 AM PDT by Taxman (SAVE AMERICA!)
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