The important part of this story (in my opinion) is that, if you're Carlson or Maddow at a legacy news outlet, YouTube lets you fling your "not to be taken seriously" opinion far and wide, and eagerly promotes it to anyone who ever clicked on an actual news segment.
But if you're a small or independent voice, YouTube reserves the right to "fact check" you (conveniently sourced from a legacy news outlet), block your content, and issue you a strike. Three strikes and you're permanently banned, while Maddow and Carlson gleefully continue to roll up millions of views from their not serious opinions, even though they are broadcast through a serious news banner, which actually makes it far harder for a reasonable person to discern news from opinion.
Simply put, one content standard if you have massive advertising money, another standard if you're a regular schlub.
Thank you for fighting for the truth and providing us with it.
While I believe in freedom of speech, conning people is not part of it.
Con artists such as Rachel Madow, Cummo, and the like who are cashing on the people ‘s trusts vested in them , are nothing but bunch of charlatans who are invading the news world.
We need true journalists like you now more than ever.
Keep up the good job.
With tremendous respects to you and all those like you.
I don't know if Carlson's hyperbole is the same as Maddow's. The court was noting that the words Carlson used, "blackmail" and "extortion" are overloaded terms. They have precise, technical meanings for criminal law; but they also have colloquial, non-technical meanings. Most of the time, when people use those terms, I don't take it as meaning that the speaker is accusing the subject of committing the the specific crimes (and even if he or she was, that elements of the crimes will vary from jurisdiction to jurisdiction)(yes, I am a former prosecutor). And lets be honest, a lot of blackmail-like and extortion-like behavior happens all the time. It is bad, but it is not criminal.
Maddow, on the other hand, was saying that people were "literally" paid Russian operatives. There are no overloaded terms here. I think her comments were worse than Carlson's.
That said, I agree with the judges in both cases. And I also agree with Greenwald's argument. The liberals misstate what the courts said (and what Fox said about Carlson); yet they are silent regarding Maddow's worse behavior.
Right, so defamation and slander is now a thing of the past -because all anyone has to say is "My viewers KNOW I'm not being serious. I don't have to provide a disclaimer that I'm not being serious -it's ASSUMED my news show is fake by my own viewers."
No wonder the western world is falling apart at the seams. It's all scams and bullshittery perpetrated by grease wizards.
The judge is quite correct in saying that no *reasonable* viewer of Rachel Maddow's show would assume her statements have any relation to truth and facts. Note that she evades the question of whether the intersection of "reasonable" and "viewers of Rachel Maddow's show" is an empty set.
More seriously, it's clear to anyone who has spoken with a fan of Ms. Maddow that they tend to absorb whatever she says directly into their belief system (Trump's fans have a similar weakness). So one could argue that Maddow's statement was, in practice, defamatory.
Contrast this defense of Maddow with the treatment that obvious satire sites such as the Babylon Bee have received from major media outlets like the NYT and Facebook.
Embarrassing as it is to admit, I was once a Rachel Maddow fan. I knew she was including her own opinion in most of her segments, but I also thought that when she stated something as fact, it was actually a fact. Her statement, "in this case [OAN] really literally is paid Russian propaganda." would probably have made me believe she was stating a fact. About seven years ago I realized Maddow was a shameless liar and propagandist, and I stopped watching her show. I also stopped watching MSNBC entirely. My point is that I think the judge was mistaken when she ruled that Rachel Maddow's fans don't take what she says seriously. They shouldn't take her seriously, but many of them do.
Ok, both sides lie like it's their job -- which it is. But what's the basis for judges to claim their sycophantic viewers don't believe their lies? Because if they're relying on the good sense of the viewers, that's a huge mistake.
Both Carlson and Maddow are liars. Glenn, I wish you would also call out Carlson but then he wouldn't put you on his show. So how honest are you being with this?
"But whatever else is true, those who want to claim that this court ruling proves Carlson is a lying propagandist who cannot be trusted have no way out of applying the same claim to Maddow."
Haha. I wish that were true.
This implies that Rachel Maddow fans are credible, or interested in being consistent in some way. They aren't. The old saying about having 'no standards if not for double standards' comes to mind.
That's not to say that some of Tucker Carlson's fans also fit that bill. I'm not a big fan of him myself: Not because of his content but more because of his schtick in delivering it. But, folks on the right are used to being called "biased." My experience with those on the left is that they deny any bias at all. They simply can't see it.
So, those on the left who favor Rachel Maddow will distinguish this case. Remember, it was "Me Too" until it was Joe Biden and the Lieutenant Governor of Virgina. Blackface was bad until Justin Trudeau and Ralph Northam did it.
Tucker Carlson does his best to bring up the issues no one else in mainstream media is reporting, I have not heard of seen anything he's said lately that a reasonable person would classify as misinformation - but he is bound by the dictates of FOX Corp, who, if you have been following the Ivory Hecker/Project Veritas story, has no problem putting corporate interests above the viewer's interests.
On the other hand, Rachel Maddow, Keith Obermann, Trevor Noah, Stephen Colbert and similar ilk make their living off of lying to their viewers, and by extension, the world. Maddow has never once posited her batshit-crazy accusations as "opinion", and the ruling by Cynthia Bashant only underscores the fact that we have some very dangerous ideologues in high-ranking positions of power.
Glenn, why do you keep calling these people "liberals"? They're pushing a partisan political agenda that has nothing at all to do with liberalism. They aren't liberals, they're just flunkies for the Democratic party.
Liberalism is tolerant of dissenting opinions and promotes free inquiry. No self-respecting liberal would push censorship. Individual rights and civil liberties are fundamental liberal principles. Liberals stand for equality before the law, the consent of the governed, and the right of the people to question authority.
The people you refer to as "liberals" aren't liberals. They're power-mad political hacks who don't have any moral or ethical principle that they won't betray in the pursuit of power. They don't care about advancing any moral principle, they're only interested in amassing political power for their tribe. If they sometimes espouse rhetoric ostensibly resembles liberalism it's because they think there's some political advantage to be had by doing so (like promising health care, and then not delivering). They're shameless hypocrites, and they'll say anything.
We’d all be better served by the media if it were required to have a counterpoint pundit at each and every news desk (with liberal and conservative pundits chosen from their respective sides as opposed to carefully chosen shills to give the appearance). After a proper debate of the facts, then let the people decide. It would destroy the current reign of propaganda from both sides and would relieve much angst being promulgated for one sided political effect and/or ratings. In fact, the last show of it’s kind was Tucker Carlson’s “Crossfire” on of all places, CNN (2000-2005)!
Disinformation is not a problem when it is made by the Fake News Media - everybody knows what it is. The problem arises when individuals start making claims on the internet. Their credibility is presumably higher than the news media, and so there is an actual risk of people being gulled - with real world consequences. This is why Big Tech has a duty to suppress claims made by individuals, but not the claims made by the media.
The important part of this story (in my opinion) is that, if you're Carlson or Maddow at a legacy news outlet, YouTube lets you fling your "not to be taken seriously" opinion far and wide, and eagerly promotes it to anyone who ever clicked on an actual news segment.
But if you're a small or independent voice, YouTube reserves the right to "fact check" you (conveniently sourced from a legacy news outlet), block your content, and issue you a strike. Three strikes and you're permanently banned, while Maddow and Carlson gleefully continue to roll up millions of views from their not serious opinions, even though they are broadcast through a serious news banner, which actually makes it far harder for a reasonable person to discern news from opinion.
Simply put, one content standard if you have massive advertising money, another standard if you're a regular schlub.
Dear Glenn
Thank you for fighting for the truth and providing us with it.
While I believe in freedom of speech, conning people is not part of it.
Con artists such as Rachel Madow, Cummo, and the like who are cashing on the people ‘s trusts vested in them , are nothing but bunch of charlatans who are invading the news world.
We need true journalists like you now more than ever.
Keep up the good job.
With tremendous respects to you and all those like you.
I don't know if Carlson's hyperbole is the same as Maddow's. The court was noting that the words Carlson used, "blackmail" and "extortion" are overloaded terms. They have precise, technical meanings for criminal law; but they also have colloquial, non-technical meanings. Most of the time, when people use those terms, I don't take it as meaning that the speaker is accusing the subject of committing the the specific crimes (and even if he or she was, that elements of the crimes will vary from jurisdiction to jurisdiction)(yes, I am a former prosecutor). And lets be honest, a lot of blackmail-like and extortion-like behavior happens all the time. It is bad, but it is not criminal.
Maddow, on the other hand, was saying that people were "literally" paid Russian operatives. There are no overloaded terms here. I think her comments were worse than Carlson's.
That said, I agree with the judges in both cases. And I also agree with Greenwald's argument. The liberals misstate what the courts said (and what Fox said about Carlson); yet they are silent regarding Maddow's worse behavior.
Right, so defamation and slander is now a thing of the past -because all anyone has to say is "My viewers KNOW I'm not being serious. I don't have to provide a disclaimer that I'm not being serious -it's ASSUMED my news show is fake by my own viewers."
No wonder the western world is falling apart at the seams. It's all scams and bullshittery perpetrated by grease wizards.
Fuck it. Burn it all to the ground.
The judge is quite correct in saying that no *reasonable* viewer of Rachel Maddow's show would assume her statements have any relation to truth and facts. Note that she evades the question of whether the intersection of "reasonable" and "viewers of Rachel Maddow's show" is an empty set.
More seriously, it's clear to anyone who has spoken with a fan of Ms. Maddow that they tend to absorb whatever she says directly into their belief system (Trump's fans have a similar weakness). So one could argue that Maddow's statement was, in practice, defamatory.
Contrast this defense of Maddow with the treatment that obvious satire sites such as the Babylon Bee have received from major media outlets like the NYT and Facebook.
Embarrassing as it is to admit, I was once a Rachel Maddow fan. I knew she was including her own opinion in most of her segments, but I also thought that when she stated something as fact, it was actually a fact. Her statement, "in this case [OAN] really literally is paid Russian propaganda." would probably have made me believe she was stating a fact. About seven years ago I realized Maddow was a shameless liar and propagandist, and I stopped watching her show. I also stopped watching MSNBC entirely. My point is that I think the judge was mistaken when she ruled that Rachel Maddow's fans don't take what she says seriously. They shouldn't take her seriously, but many of them do.
She’s a nut case following orders from her boss...the CIA. The clips of her in full panic mode over the audits are worth a look if you need a laugh.
Ok, both sides lie like it's their job -- which it is. But what's the basis for judges to claim their sycophantic viewers don't believe their lies? Because if they're relying on the good sense of the viewers, that's a huge mistake.
Both Carlson and Maddow are liars. Glenn, I wish you would also call out Carlson but then he wouldn't put you on his show. So how honest are you being with this?
"But whatever else is true, those who want to claim that this court ruling proves Carlson is a lying propagandist who cannot be trusted have no way out of applying the same claim to Maddow."
Haha. I wish that were true.
This implies that Rachel Maddow fans are credible, or interested in being consistent in some way. They aren't. The old saying about having 'no standards if not for double standards' comes to mind.
That's not to say that some of Tucker Carlson's fans also fit that bill. I'm not a big fan of him myself: Not because of his content but more because of his schtick in delivering it. But, folks on the right are used to being called "biased." My experience with those on the left is that they deny any bias at all. They simply can't see it.
So, those on the left who favor Rachel Maddow will distinguish this case. Remember, it was "Me Too" until it was Joe Biden and the Lieutenant Governor of Virgina. Blackface was bad until Justin Trudeau and Ralph Northam did it.
So too, this.
What is really the Big Lie here is that Maddow's viewers do not believe every crackpot manufactured propaganda she spouts.
Tucker Carlson does his best to bring up the issues no one else in mainstream media is reporting, I have not heard of seen anything he's said lately that a reasonable person would classify as misinformation - but he is bound by the dictates of FOX Corp, who, if you have been following the Ivory Hecker/Project Veritas story, has no problem putting corporate interests above the viewer's interests.
On the other hand, Rachel Maddow, Keith Obermann, Trevor Noah, Stephen Colbert and similar ilk make their living off of lying to their viewers, and by extension, the world. Maddow has never once posited her batshit-crazy accusations as "opinion", and the ruling by Cynthia Bashant only underscores the fact that we have some very dangerous ideologues in high-ranking positions of power.
Glenn, why do you keep calling these people "liberals"? They're pushing a partisan political agenda that has nothing at all to do with liberalism. They aren't liberals, they're just flunkies for the Democratic party.
Liberalism is tolerant of dissenting opinions and promotes free inquiry. No self-respecting liberal would push censorship. Individual rights and civil liberties are fundamental liberal principles. Liberals stand for equality before the law, the consent of the governed, and the right of the people to question authority.
The people you refer to as "liberals" aren't liberals. They're power-mad political hacks who don't have any moral or ethical principle that they won't betray in the pursuit of power. They don't care about advancing any moral principle, they're only interested in amassing political power for their tribe. If they sometimes espouse rhetoric ostensibly resembles liberalism it's because they think there's some political advantage to be had by doing so (like promising health care, and then not delivering). They're shameless hypocrites, and they'll say anything.
We’d all be better served by the media if it were required to have a counterpoint pundit at each and every news desk (with liberal and conservative pundits chosen from their respective sides as opposed to carefully chosen shills to give the appearance). After a proper debate of the facts, then let the people decide. It would destroy the current reign of propaganda from both sides and would relieve much angst being promulgated for one sided political effect and/or ratings. In fact, the last show of it’s kind was Tucker Carlson’s “Crossfire” on of all places, CNN (2000-2005)!
Disinformation is not a problem when it is made by the Fake News Media - everybody knows what it is. The problem arises when individuals start making claims on the internet. Their credibility is presumably higher than the news media, and so there is an actual risk of people being gulled - with real world consequences. This is why Big Tech has a duty to suppress claims made by individuals, but not the claims made by the media.