Society's ChildS


Yoda

Babylon Bee takes fight for free speech all the way to the Supreme Court

babylon bee Seth dillon supreme court free speech
© Modified Fox News Digital/Joseph WulfsohnBabylon Bee CEO Seth Dillon urges the Supreme Court to make social media companies stop using vague policies to censor conservatives and Christians.
On February 28, the Supreme Court will hear arguments in two cases involving state laws in Texas and Florida that increase transparency and accountability for Big Tech companies. The laws would require social media giants to publish their user standards and then apply them fairly.

The Babylon Bee filed a friend of the court (amicus) brief to explain to the court that, when left to their own devices, Big Tech often abuses these vague policies to silence voices that challenge its orthodoxy — too often at the expense of conservative and religious viewpoints.

Social media titans seem to have unlimited, unilateral authority to censor, deplatform or shadow-ban disfavored users, content and viewpoints. The companies claim to be "content-neutral" and "open platforms," and they reserve the right to censor content that violates their "community guidelines" and rules against "hate" and "misinformation."

Gavel

Assange's final appeal - Your man in the public gallery

The Royal Courts of Justice in London
© Aaron Chown/PAThe Royal Courts of Justice in London.
Reporting on Julian Assange's extradition hearings has become a vocation that has now stretched over five years. From the very first hearing, when Justice Snow called Assange "a narcissist" before Julian had said anything whatsoever other than to confirm his name, to the last, when Judge Swift had simply in 2.5 pages of glib double-spaced A4 dismissed a tightly worded 152-page appeal from some of the best lawyers on earth, it has been a travesty and charade marked by undisguised institutional hostility.

We were now on last orders in the last chance saloon, as we waited outside the Royal Courts of Justice for the appeal for a right of final appeal.

The architecture of the Royal Courts of Justice was the great last gasp of the Gothic revival; having exhausted the exuberance that gave us the beauty of St Pancras Station and the Palace of Westminster, the movement played out its dreary last efforts at whimsy in shades of gray and brown, valuing scale over proportion and mistaking massive for medieval. As intended, the buildings are a manifestation of the power of the state; as not intended, they are also an indication of the stupidity of large scale power.

Comment: It is a miracle that Mr. Murray was able to be present at all. TwitterX has litany of major news organizations who were denied access, even by video feed.


Reporters Without Borders was denied:


Sadly, this has been the pattern from the very beginning:




Arrow Down

Green Movement is failing...Now they're trying to force citizens to love them

Like an abusive husband, who beats his wife to make her love him.
Abusive Husband
© Freepik

Today, especially in Germany, the socialist-green movement is failing miserably and plummeting in the polls - to record low levels. Desperate, socialist-green governments in Europe are now resorting to heavy-handed tactics to force citizens to "like" them again.

Growing censorship, opposition bans

For example, the EU has just enacted the Digital Services Act (Regulation (EU), which is a regulation regarding "illegal content, transparent advertising, and disinformation".

Meanwhile, Germany is pushing to enact a draconian Democracy Security Act, designed to seriously curb online speech and obliterate opposition.

Will backfire

As well-intentioned as these new laws may sound, they are all designed to distract for the huge problems the green movement is causing and to stifle opposition and free speech. It's an abusive relationship that's never going to work.

Like a husband who beats his wife, the beatings will probably just get worse the more he gets rejected by her. That's how things are getting in Germany. Industry is headed to the intensive care unit and the green movement is failing.

Some examples follow:

Post-It Note

Border Patrol Union unleashes on Biden in short but hard-hitting open letter: 'Dear Joe...'

migrants border
Sometimes less says more. The Border Patrol Union proved it Monday with a social media post on X.

The union shared a very concise letter to President Joe Biden.

Fewer than 50 words, the message was short but sweet and to the point.

"Dear Joe, You OWN this catastrophic disaster at the border - lock, stock and barrel," the union wrote on the National Border Patrol Council account. "You created it. You nursed it along. You encouraged it. You facilitated it. It's all yours. Don't run from it now like a coward. Signed, The BP agents you've thrown under the bus."

Comment: As complicit and enabling as the Biden administration has been in facilitating this invasion, the White House has certainly not been the only group that bears responsibility for it:


Grapes

Saboteur caught on camera dumping £2 million of wine on floor at winery in Spain

grape sabotage
Grapes of wrath: Moment £2million worth of luxury wine goes down the drain when hooded vandal releases 13,000 gallon tank of booze over factory floor in Spain
This is the shocking moment a vandal used the cover of night to empty 60,000 litres of luxury wine worth over £2 million at a Spanish winery.

The wasteful crime is not only bad news for the winemaker, Jose Moro, but also for lovers of the beverage worldwide, as one of his brand's entire vintages was lost.

The footage shows the suspect running up to one of the giant wine tanks and opening it, causing streams of the pricey booze to gush out onto the floor.

Comment: Considering the surge in sabotage incidents of late, it's notable that this one has footage (or at least footage that has been released). Whether this is directly related to the other industrial sabotage occurring or, as per the speculation, this is more to do with a rivalry (no doubt exacerbated by the rapidly deteriorating economic conditions in Europe), remains to be seen. One also recalls the rise in wildfires found they have been caused by arsonists.

Although, indeed, it's also true that during former times of collapse, cattle theft, adulteration, price gouging,, fraudulent insurance claims, and so forth, spike:


Chart Bar

70% of New York voters say Biden not fit to serve another term: poll

President Joe Biden
© Getty Images/Chip SomodevillaPresident Joe Biden's lead in New York is underwhelming, given the enrollment edge Democrats have over Republicans, the pollster noted.
They want someone else!

A vast majority — 70% — of voters in New York believe President Biden is unfit to serve another four years in the White House, according to a poll released Tuesday.

Meanwhile, more than half of the Empire State voters said the same of former President Donald Trump, the Siena College survey found.

Only 7% of voters surveyed consider both Biden, 81, and Trump, 77, fit to be president.
Another 23% of respondents said Biden is fit and Trump is not.

Comment: See also:


Newspaper

Jailed ex-PM Khan's party claims it won 177 seats in Pakistan elections

Khan's PTI-backed independent candidates accuse election commission of tampering with results of Feb. 8 polls
Pakistan
The party of jailed former Pakistan Prime Minister Imran Khan on Friday claimed it won 177 seats of the lower house of parliament in the Feb. 8 general elections, accusing the election commission of tampering with the results.

Over 100 Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI)-backed independent candidates gathered in Islamabad and accused officers of the election body of "snatching" public mandate by turning their win into a defeat. They were led by lawyer Salman Akram Raja, who also contested the elections but lost.

"I won the National Assembly seat of NA-128 from Lahore with a lead of over 100,000 votes, but the returning officer notified my rival as winner," Raja told reporters.

Comment: Pakistan election: Imran Khan's party wins majority, despite American puppet regime throwing him in jail


Cow

Polish farmers blocking defense aid from reaching Kiev

Ukrainian trucks
© CopyrightThousands of trucks are parked on the border between Ukraine and Poland.
Agriculturalists have been staging protests at the border for months, decrying the flow of cheap Ukrainian produce into the country.

Polish farmers demanding an end to the inflow of cheaper produce are blocking trucks carrying Kiev-bound military aid, a Ukrainian activist has claimed. The protesters had earlier vowed to disrupt the transportation of goods not only through vehicle checkpoints, but also via rail.

Polish truckers and farmers began staging regular blockades on the border with Ukraine in October 2023, protesting against the EU's decision to exempt Ukrainian haulers from having to seek permits to enter the bloc. The activists insist that the measures introduced since the conflict between Moscow and Kiev erupted in early 2022 have led to unfair competition and driven down the price of agricultural produce.

Comment: The Polish farmers are protecting their livelihood as cheap produce from Ukraine is being dumped in Poland and thus crashing the prices for the local produce too. Yet, the farmers are now being called pro-Russian for daring to fight for the ability to farm.

See also:


Yoda

'Stalinist' $370M judgment against Trump should be vacated immediately

Donald Trump Arthur Engoron
© Fox NewsNew York Judge Arthur Engoron ruled that former President Trump must pay over $350 million in damages to the state of New York as the result of his civil fraud trial.
This past week Judge Arthur Engoron of New York State Supreme Court, the lowest level of courts of general jurisdiction, levied a mammoth fine of some $370 million, including interest, against Donald Trump for purported fraud under a New York statute.

The term fraud is used loosely since no one was defrauded, an element of a cause of action under common law fraud, and no one was harmed, also an element, and there was no proof of reliance, another element. This is fraud "in the air," as the saying goes: no harm by no one against no one for no loss by anyone.

No one testified that they lost a penny from the purported fraud, or that they would not have wanted to deal with Trump as a customer. No one came forward to complain, except Attorney General Letitia James. But more about this modern-day Torquemada later in this column.

V

Report of underground fighters burning down UAV producing plant In Lviv, Ukraine

uav factory burned down Ukraine
View of the burning UAV manufacturing plant purportedly sabotaged on February 18, 2024, in Lviv, Ukraine
On the night of February 18, an enterprise in the city of Lviv in Western Ukraine burned down. The local authorities of the city and the region confirmed the fire without giving any comments. It turned out that there was a secret the Ukrainian authorities attempted to hide.

The locals reported that an explosion thundered in the industrial facility located on Antonovich 116 in Lviv. After the explosion thundered at the facility, a large fire on the area of about 400 square meters broke out at the building, which reportedly burned down. The head of the regional administration claimed that the investigation of the incident was launched by the special services and the police.