I et år op til valget 2020 advarer FBI, uden skyggen af bevis, Twitter om, at der til Oktober vil ske et ‘hack-and-leak’ angreb, der ville vedrøre Hunter Biden, søn af nuværende præsident Joe Biden. Det er en bemærkelsesværdig evne til at se ind i fremtiden, noterede høringens formand Jim Jordan, som måske kun kunne lade sig gøre, hvis FBI allerede vidste at Hunter Bidens computer, som var i deres besiddelse, var ægte. Sociale platforme skulle censurere på statens vegne.

Og censureret blev der, som journalisterne Matt Taibbi, Michael Shellenberger og andre har dokumenteret efter at have fået adgang til Twitters interne kommunikation. Centralt stod efterretningsvæsenet, især FBI, der under hensyn til landets og udsatte individers sikkerhed, bad Twitters medarbejdere om at revurdere dette og hint opslags eksistensberettigelse. Som en stok og en gulerod, var FBIs autoritet lige så intimiderende, som deres politiske slagsside var lokkende.

Så selvføgelig skulle man have en høring for at forstå, hvorledes nogen kunne have mere ytringsfrihed, Jonathan Turley gengiver Høringens højdepunkter

Last week’s hearing showed definitively that we live in a post-decency era.

The latest attacks came as journalists Matt Taibbi and Michael Shellenberger testified about breaking the “Twitter Files” story, detailing how the FBI and other agencies secretly sought to censor or ban citizens from social media. In her opening statement, Delegate Stacey Plaskett (D-Virgin Islands), the ranking member of the House Judiciary subcommittee, attacked them as “so-called journalists” and said they were “a direct threat” to the safety of others by reporting the censorship story.

Taibbi pushed back, saying that “I’m not a ‘so-called’ journalist” and giving a brief description of his award-winning career at Rolling Stone magazine and other publications. Yet other committee members also attacked the honesty of the two journalists. And after failed efforts to claim they were Elon Musk’s corrupt “scribes,” or limited by him in their investigations, the committee members attacked their ethics.

The witnesses were attacked on everything but their choice of socks. Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz (D-Fla.) even claimed that “being a Republican witness today certainly casts a cloud over your objectivity.” When Wasserman Schultz impugned the two journalists’ honesty and ethics, she immediately “reclaimed (her) time” to prevent them from defending themselves. When the subcommittee chair gave them a chance to answer her claims, Wasserman Schultz and her Democratic colleagues objected that a witness was allowed to defend himself after being blocked from doing so.

In an earlier attack, Rep. Stephen Lynch (D-Mass.) prevented Taibbi from answering a question and dismissed his effort to defend his position, saying: “This is how it works now. I’ll ask the question and you try to provide an answer if you can.”

After attacking the very notion of investigating the government for possible censorship efforts, the attacks then took a particularly menacing turn as some members began to demand confidential information on the journalists’ sources. Taibbi pushed back and said he could not reveal information on his sources, but that only seemed to make the Democrats more irate.

Rep. Sylvia Garcia (D-Texas) pressed Taibbi to say that Musk was a source. Taibbi again replied, “I can’t give it to you, unfortunately, because this is a question of sourcing, and I’m a journalist. I don’t reveal my sources.”

And that’s when it got ugly.

Garcia effectively declared that she had trapped Taibbi because the “only logical conclusion” was that Musk was his source. When House Judiciary Committee chairman Rep. Jim Jordan (R-Ohio) objected to badgering a reporter for his sources, Democrats piled on. Plaskett declared that if Taibbi wouldn’t comment on Musk, it must mean the Twitter owner was the source in question.

It was a chilling but defining moment.

Matt Taibbi giver sit indtryk på Racket, hvor især Repræsentant for Demokraterne Debbie Wasserman Schultz har bemærket sig. Hun er også et bemærkelsesværdig fælt bekendtskab, der betragter dissens som hustruvold og indvendinger imod hendes position i partiet som ‘kvindefjendsk og antisemitisk’. (Hun var dog også en stor profet og jokede ‘at tage på ferie ville måske gavne i en fremtidig præsidentvalgkamp’)

Så fæl er hun, at det kan føles helt ind i Demokraternes egne rækker, som den Demokratiske senator Bernie Sanders udtrykte, da han krævede hende fyret, hvilket hun også blev, fra sit job som formand for det Demokratiske partis hovedbestyrelse. Årsagen var, at det kom frem efter Wikileaks afsløringer at hun havde manipuleret primærvalget til fordel for Hillary Clinton på bekostning af netop Sanders. Sanders tilhængere råbte “Lock her up” på det efterfølgende konvent.

Hendes og Demokraternes ondskab er kun rivaliseret af deres inkompetence. Den grove behandling af vidnerne Taibbi og Shellenberger kan opleves i sin rå psykofantisme her.