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Yesterday’s post on the ‘aftermath of Trump’ seems to have caused some thought amongst my readers (small as the numbers are), so 24 hours later, delivering my follow up. Keep the comments flowing - I know that won’t be on this site - but you know where to find me.
Gizmodo on Facebook
In the hours since Hillary Clinton conceded the race to Donald Trump, some have faulted Facebook for its role in disseminating false stories that may have affected the election, but the website’s founder urged Americans to take a much longer view of history.
Mashable on Facebook
has a different view:
Every employee at Facebook should be ashamed of what their product became this year: a tangled mess of bizarre falsehoods and outdated information used as ammo to help people scream at one another.
It has failed our bitterly divided country through its News Feed, which has weighed legitimate, reported information from good news organizations against propagandistic junk written by trolls and found there is no difference. Posted to your News Feed, a Pulitzer-winning _New York Times _report looks just the same as a blog post from The Right Stuff, an anti-Semitic content factory of the so-called “alt-right.”
I agree with Mashable - then again - I left Facebook years ago.
Brent Simmons @inessential
on leaving Twitter
The company has not dealt with harassment. It has treated its third-party developers shabbily. And, at best, it was just quips and outrages — a diet of candy.
And then it was part of the system that helped elect a fascist President. This tipped it over for me: it’s no longer worth my participation. The shitheads can have it.
That’s kinda why I am ‘paused’.
On Losing World War Two [Link]
Our electorate just repudiated the American dream — the real dream, the idea that we can build a nation dedicated to liberty where all people are created equal.
Instead we decided that we’re a nation like any other. A nation with a ruling ethnic tribe. Nothing special anymore.
It feels like finally, in the end, we lost World War II.
Michael Moore @ Alternet
Any Democratic member of Congress who didn’t wake up this morning ready to fight, resist and obstruct in the way Republicans did against President Obama every day for eight full years must step out of the way and let those of us who know the score lead the way in stopping the meanness and the madness that’s about to begin.
An Open Letter From Moby
as a life long progressive i’m supposed to be diplomatic and understanding, but america, what the fuck is wrong with you? > but then i ask myself, very sadly, why am i surprised? > this is the same america that eats at burger king and is baffled as to why it ends up obese and cancerous and dying. > this is the same america who thinks that granting health care to 20,000,000 people is somehow treasonous. > and this is the america who has now elected a dim-witted, racist, misogynist.
a dim-witted, racist, misogynist who has ruined businesses and has no policy proposals other than ‘build a wall’. i guess there will be some cold, bitter schadenfreude in spending the next 4 years watching middle america wake up to the fact that donald trump is an incompetent con-man.
the rust belt jobs won’t come back. the wall won’t get built. and hillary won’t get locked up.
On Gun Control
… don’t hold your breath.
According to an analysis of FEC records by the Center for Responsive Politics and The Trace, the [NRA] poured some $50 million into supporting Trump and six Senate candidates—only one of whom, Nevada hopeful Joe Heck, lost.
Rewriting History
Reince Priebus trying to rewrite history.
He said that it wasn’t a matter of banning a particular religion from the United States but it was making sure that if immigration was coming from countries that were harboring terrorism, that we were going to look at the country and perhaps suspend temporarily immigration from that country,” Priebus continued. “He’s not calling for mass deportation. He said, no, only people who have committed crimes and only until all of that has been taken care of do we look at what we do next.
but actually - he DID say that, here : Donald Trump: Ban all Muslim travel to U.S. (CNN December 8th, 2015 and here:
“Donald J. Trump is calling for a total and complete shutdown of Muslims entering the United States until our country’s representatives can figure out what is going on,” said his campaign, which Trump himself reiterated on camera, stressing the “complete shutdown of Muslims entering the United States.”
Meanwhile - Over at The Huffpost
The Huffington Post is removing its editor’s note that called Trump a ‘racist,’ ‘misogynist,’ and ‘serial liar’
apparently
The thinking is that he’s now president and we’re going to start with a clean slate,” Grim wrote, according to Politico. “If he governs in a racist, misogynistic way, we reserve the right to add it back on. This would be giving respect to the office of the presidency which Trump and his backers never did.
… my take is that ’Trump has demonstrated that he is a ‘racist,’ ‘misogynist,’ and ‘serial liar’. The onus is on him to prove that he isn’t. Oh - and because he doesn’t govern as a ‘racist,’ ‘misogynist,’ and ‘serial liar’ - doesn’t mean that he isn’t a ‘racist,’ ‘misogynist,’ and ‘serial liar’.
I thought Robert De Niro’s take was much more logical (on punching Trump in the face )
“I can’t do that now he’s president,” the actor replied. “And I have to respect that position … I just have to see what he’s going to do and how he’s going to follow through on certain things. And as we even see now in a lot of cities, there’s a lot of people getting very upset and protesting.”
In other words separating the man from the position. The man needs to be held accountable. After-all - hasn’t he said he would be - in a way that everyone before him isn’t?
Wondering About Tech ?
a self-described “law and order” president will attempt to expand surveillance programs and rejoin a long-running battle over government access to encrypted information.
and
Trump has also threatened antitrust action against Amazon and demanded that tech companies such as Apple build their products in the United States.
and
Trump is going to be a guy who is probably going to mandate back doors,” said Hank Thomas, chief operating officer at Strategic Cyber Ventures and a veteran of the National Security Agency. ”I don’t think he’s ultimately going to be a friend to privacy, and the fearful side of me says he will get intelligence agencies more involved in domestic law enforcement.”
However, Trump has garnered support from operatives in the Federal Bureau of Investigations, who used their positions to influence the election by teasing the prospect of an ongoing investigation into Clinton’s email use.
Last winter, when the FBI sought to force Apple to write code exploiting the security features of its own software, Apple pushed back while Trump, on the campaign trail, built a case for government interference in encryption tools. FBI director James Comey has a vast public record of desperately wanting to break encryption
and
Trump’s plan to add a 35 percent tariff on imported goods “would sink this country into a recession,” - Meg Whitman (Republican)
Trump doesn’t exactly have a stellar record on internet privacy so far. He has proposed reauthorizing the Patriot Act and the previous, less restrained NSA mass surveillance that took place while the Act was in force. He tends to “err on the side of security” over privacy, even if he’s not especially fond of it.
Engadget again - Under Trump the future of Net Neutrality and broadband is uncertain
it’s pretty safe to assume that the rules instituted by the FCC in 2015 will be gutted by a Trump administration. In 2014, he described the concept as a “top down power grab” that “will target the conservative media,” and compared it to the Fairness Doctrine – referring to the FCC rule eliminated in 1987 that required broadcasters to present contrasting views on topics of public interest.
The movement that catapulted Donald Trump into the presidency Tuesday was heavily rooted in concerns that immigration and trade was hurting the U.S. job market. But a future version of Mr. Trump will rail against robots rather than immigrants, according to Andrew McAfee, the co-director of the MIT Initiative on the Digital Economy.
and we need to do nip that in the bud because If you’re upset with the election results, Canada is making it easy to move there if you work in tech … we have already been left behind in tech, training and education … which is why so much tech work is outside of the US. Trump could add making it impossible for Tech business to even work here.
Other Interesting Reads On The Topic of Trump
Despite the fact that Roger Ailes helped pave the way for Donald Trump’s victory - I personally haven’t hears Aisles’ name come up as part of the new world of Trump - maybe this is why? More Women Accuse Fox News CEO of Sexual Harassment
It’s not so much that Trump won - as much as Hilary lost
Hate Crimes In America on the very first day after the announcement.