Free Republic

Earlier today I talked about how this trade deal might be the best we could hope to achieve while still having serious flaws that left me with misgivings. Now let’s take a look at a couple of those flaws if only to establish some signposts to keep an eye out for as we move forward. Ed already covered some of the key developments of the US-Mexico-Canada (USMCA) trade agreement, particularly the fact that Nancy Pelosi called it the “Easiest Trade Deal That We’ve Ever Done.” Strangely, she still didn’t seem capable of moving it forward for quite a while...

December 9, 2019 (LifeSiteNews) – LifeSite has been locked out of Twitter for “violating” its “rules” after tweeting an article about Jonathan “Jessica” Yaniv, a transgender activist who recently complained that gynecologists wouldn’t see him as a patient. Yaniv is famous for taking 15 beauticians to the British Columbia Human Rights Tribunal over their refusal to wax his genitals, a battle he ultimately lost. Twitter gave LifeSiteNews the option to delete the tweet and reactivate our account immediately. But instead we have launched an appeal of the decision. Twitter claimed that the tweet violated its rules, but didn’t specify which...

Fox and Friends host Pete Hegseth said Sunday that he was banned from Twitter for sharing a screenshot of a manifesto that appeared to be from the Saudi gunman who killed three sailors at Naval Air Station Pensacola Friday morning. Mohammed Alshamrani, a Royal Saudi Air Force officer, was killed by police, but his extreme anti-American views were visible in a Twitter account under his name. A tweet was posted before the shooting suggesting the attack was inspired by al Qaeda and its founder, Osama bin Laden. “America as a whole has turned into a nation of evil,” the message...

We live in an age when technology is worshipped. Entrepreneurs who create technologies that transform our lives become billionaires, seemingly overnight. Companies that do not adopt new technologies or adapt to their use quickly enough are put out of business. The term "disruptive innovation" has been added to the lexicon of business CEOs everywhere, an ominous warning for some, a thrilling opportunity for others. As individuals, we've rapidly grown accustomed to the benefits and ease that the most modern technologies have brought to our lives: Smartphones incorporate features as disparate as cameras; video; fitness and sleep monitors; instant texting; maps...

Despite what Google describes as a “shift towards censorship” from big tech companies over the past three years, Democrat presidential candidates have said that they will use the power of the law to force even more censorship from Silicon Valley. Responding to a query from the far-left website Vox, Democrat candidates including Bernie Sanders, Elizabeth Warren, and Pete Buttigieg all pledged to force big tech companies to crack down on “hate” even further.

SHANGHAI — The video app TikTok on Wednesday reversed its decision to block an American teenager who posted a clip in which she discussed the mass internment of minority Muslims in China, and acknowledged that its moderation system had overreached in shutting her out of her account. The incident raised fresh concerns about whether TikTok, which is owned by the Chinese tech giant ByteDance, muzzles its users in line with censorship directives from Beijing — an accusation the company has denied. TikTok said the teenager, Feroza Aziz, 17, had been barred from using her personal device to access the app,...

Social media is trying to prop up the deep state witch hunt against the President. Share Tweet Flip The alleged deep state “whistleblower” who filed a complaint against President Donald Trump over his correspondence with Ukraine – now widely believed to be 33-year-old CIA officer Eric Ciaramella – is being protected by a political establishment desperate to keep the impeachment circus going. Social media is taking cues from the fake news, which steadfastly refuses to disclose Ciaramella’s name. Twitter is even restricting and temporarily banning accounts that mention Ciaramella as the Big Tech giant grows desperate to prevent the truth...

There is growing and bipartisan alarm among Americans about the “bad acts” of Big Tech companies. For far too long, Big Tech has gotten away with profiting from human trafficking, revenge-porn, the opioid epidemic and drug addiction, terrorism, and other forms of human misery, while engaging in egregious business practices like snooping, spying, political bias against conservatives, employee abuses, and anticompetitive conduct. Big Tech has engaged in this deplorable conduct largely free from any real oversight from Republicans or Democrats in Washington. That’s not surprising, especially if you understand the ways of the DC Swamp. Big Tech is “feeding chickens”...

Includes setting to turn ads off – stop hissing at the back, Google Alternative search engine DuckDuckGo has announced improvements to its search options and an enhanced dark theme, but its tiny market share shows that most people are content to stick with Google, despite privacy issues.DuckDuckGo says it offers search without any user profiling, in contrast to the trend towards personalisation and targeted advertising favoured by its competitors. Founder Gabriel Weinberg says that profiling and tracking is unnecessary since simply presenting ads based on the keywords you type is sufficient for a business model. "If you type in 'dishwasher',...

The US has approved a higher number of H-1B applications (both for initial visas and visa extensions for continued employment) this year, showing that the demand for these work visas continues unabated. This is a relief to Indians, who are the dominant holders of H-1B visas, especially after processing regulations got more stringent post-2015 . While in 2015, 288,000 applications were approved (95.7%) by the United States Citizenship and Immigration Services , for fiscal 2019, the figure touched 389K (84.8%), up from last year's 335K (84.5%).

Free speech is under attack by the Big Tech monopolies that dominate the internet. The flogging that Beto O’Rourke received during his Reddit “ask me anything” session this month perfectly underscored the distinction between a mainstream media and a genuinely free press. He gave Americans a chance to grill him about his pivot from a centrist Senate candidate to a radical presidential hopeful, and in contrast to the handling he has gotten from the media, they treated him like hamburger meat. No surprise there. Free expression can be edgy, brutal, irreverent, and sometimes downright offensive. I should know. My father...

State attorneys general will launch one of the largest bipartisan, multi-state antitrust investigations into Facebook and Google on Monday. State attorneys general spanning across dozens of states will announce an antitrust investigation into Google and Facebook, and other technology companies at the Supreme Court at 2:00 p.m. ET Monday. The investigation will investigate whether America’s largest technology companies have stifled competition, restricted access, and harmed consumers. A Wall Street Journal report suggested that New York Attorney General Letitia James will lead the investigation into Facebook, while Texas Attorney General Attorneys Ken Paxton will lead the investigation into Google. James said...

Ditching credit cards for facial recognition will remove the last physical barrier between our bodies and Corporate America Aram Sinnreich recently went grocery shopping at a Whole Foods Market in his hometown of Washington, D.C., and realized he had left his wallet at home. He had no cards and no cash, but he had no reason to worry — at least, not about paying for his food. “I used my iPhone to pay, and I unlocked it with my face,” he said. That’s when it struck him: We are just one small step away from paying with our bodily features...

SAN FRANCISCO, September 5, 2019 (LifeSiteNews) – As the preliminary hearing for charges against pro-life investigators David Daleiden and Sandra Merritt continues, Twitter temporarily barred the pro-life Center for Medical Progress (CMP) from live-tweeting the proceedings – based on a misrepresentation of the tweets from Planned Parenthood’s attorneys, CMP claims. CMP has been locked in legal battles with Planned Parenthood and the National Abortion Federation (NAF) since the summer of 2015, when their undercover videos revealed abortion industry insiders expressing interest in profiting off organs from aborted babies, which is illegal. The abortion groups accuse the pro-life investigators of breaking...

The Trump administration is considering a proposal that would use Google, Amazon and Apple to collect data on users who exhibit characteristics of mental illness that could lead to violent behavior, The Washington Post reported Thursday. The proposal is part of an initiative to create a Health Advanced Research Projects Agency (HARPA), which would be located inside the Health and Human Services Department, the report notes, citing sources inside the administration. The new agency would have a separate budget and the president would be responsible for appointing its director. HARPA would take after Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, or DARPA,...

How, working in the shadows of the internet, researchers developed a passive monitoring system that might soon make Big Tech companies accountable to the public — and even save democracy. What if, early in the morning on Election Day in 2016, Mark Zuckerberg had used Facebook to broadcast “go-out-and-vote” reminders just to supporters of Hillary Clinton? Extrapolating from Facebook’s own published data, that might have given Mrs. Clinton a boost of 450,000 votes or more, with no one but Mr. Zuckerberg and a few cronies knowing about the manipulation. Because, like most Democrats, Mr. Zuckerberg was overconfident that day, I don’t believe...

Video interview by Sen Cruz of Dr. Robert Epstein.

U.S. tech giants and an array of their trade groups slammed France over its new digital taxes law during a public hearing on Monday, arguing the legislation unfairly targets U.S. technology companies and could hobble their operations. Representatives from Google, Facebook, and Amazon testified before a group of government officials investigating the digital services tax, laying out their arguments to a largely sympathetic panel that referred to the French law as unprecedented. The United States Trade Representative (USTR) launched a probe into France's digital taxes last month, using the same aggressive process that previously resulted in the Trump administration's implementation...

YouTube has just banned a 14-year-old girl for a video in which she spoke truth and reason about the LGBT agenda and its activists. The video was swiftly removed and her channel banned under the guise of “hate speech violations.” NewsBusters reports: "Soph, known on Twitter as @sewernugget, has been penalized by YouTube previously with suspension for 'dangerous' humor and poking fun at leftist orthodoxy. With approximately 1 million subscribers before she was shut down, she rose to fame for poking fun at topics such as radical Islam, climate change, and pedophilia among Hollywood elites." How can YouTube justify shutting...

What do the French digital services tax, the employers' share of payroll taxes, and the corporate income tax all have in common? They are rarely shouldered by those entities and individuals targeted by legislators. In fact, one of the most important things to know about taxes is that the people who actually write the checks to the Internal Revenue Service (or to its French equivalent) are seldom the ones who actually shoulder its burden. In 2004, economist Stephen Entin wrote, "The economic burden of a tax frequently does not rest with the person or business who has the statutory liability...