☕️ HIGH WIRES ☙ Wednesday, August 14, 2024 ☙ C&C NEWS 🦠

Politico notices Musk wins vs EU; Tucker interview reframes Watergate; AP makes accidental observation of Biblical proportions; pressured Olympic Committee pulls the plug on controversial sport; more.

Good morning, C&C, it’s Wednesday! Today’s essential news roundup includes: Politico covers Elon Musk-European Union dustup over historic Trump live stream, for its own reasons, of course; dramatic Tucker Carlson interview corrects Nixonian history and demonstrates its contemporary relevance; AP accidentally makes a Biblical point about the Middle East situation; and under pressure, the Olympics pulls the plug on a controversial category.

🗞💬 WORLD NEWS AND COMMENTARY 💬🗞

🔥🔥 Surprisingly yesterday, Politico ran what at first looked like a rare pro-Musk story, sort of, headlined, “EU takes shot at Musk over Trump interview — and misses.” The sub-headline added, “Europe’s chief digital official faces fire for ‘interfering’ in U.S. election.”

In the hours before Elon interviewed President Trump on Monday night’s live stream, birdlike European Union bureaucrat Thierry Breton* (* as if that’s his real name) fired off a snooty, grandiloquent, multi-syllabic letter warning Elon Musk in paternalistic legalese that, and I quote,:

…all proportionate and effective mitigation measures must be put in place regarding the amplification of harmful content in connection with relevant events, including live streaming, which, if unaddressed, might increase the risk profile of X and generate detrimental effects on civic discourse and public security. This is important against the background of recent examples of public unrest brought about by the amplification of content that promotes hatred, disorder, incitement to violence, or certain instances of disinformation.

Thierry warmed to his theme, squawking more shrilly, verbosely urging Mr. Musk to remember that, if he didn’t pull the plug on President Trump, the EU could, if it wants, stomp its fascistic boot on X and crush the platform flatter than a love bug on a SWAT Truck bumper:

As you know, formal proceedings are already ongoing against X under the Digital Services Act in areas linked to the dissemination of disinformation. Any negative effect of illegal content on X in the EU, attributed to the ineffectiveness of how X applies the relevant provisions of the DSA, may be relevant in the context of the ongoing proceedings and of the overall assessment of X's compliance with EU law. This has already been done in the recent past, in relation to the repercussions and amplification of terrorist content or content that incites violence, hate and racism in the EU, such as in the context of the recent riots in the United Kingdom.

I therefore urge you to promptly ensure the effectiveness of your systems and to report measures taken to my team.

I’ll translate the European dialect for you: Thierry wanted Musk to give his “team” a time-delayed off-switch, letting them shut Trump down in Europe the instant the President said something they didn’t like. Otherwise, things would go badly for X in the EU’s ongoing disinformation “investigation.”

Grandma Thierry probably knits with Grandma Garland.

Even more plainly: That’s a nice social media platform you have there, it would be a shame if anything happened to it.

Thierry, who is French, published his letter on Twitter/X (of course), so after due consideration and careful consultation with X’s lawyers, Elon Musk also responded on X, politely, in measured tones, but much more succinctly, with a meme:

Politico’s article linked —but didn’t show— Musk’s tart meme. The story was not meant to praise Musk. It quickly became obvious it was meant to run damage control for the EU. Frenchman Thierry appears now to be retreating into the arms of his cowardly Commission comrades, who were all too chicken to go on record:

The Europeans are hilarious. It never stops with those people. Talk about two-faced! European constitutions and charters are packed with virtue-signaling language about the fundamental value of free speech. For example, in 1948 the United Nations adopted its Universal Declaration of Human Rights, which provides in Article 19 that:

"Everyone has the right to freedom of opinion and expression; this right includes freedom to hold opinions without interference and to seek, receive and impart information and ideas through any media and regardless of frontiers."

Seems pretty clear. “Any media.” “Without interference.”

The Europeans adopted that rock-solid definition of free speech into their 1950 European Convention on Human Rights and have been chipping away at it ever since.

Many have complained about the deplorable erosion of free speech rights in Europe under the authoritarian banners of “hate speech” and “disinformation.” But who decides what is hateful or disinforming? Theirry Breton? What qualifies someone as an “expert” in such matters? Is there a test? Why should self-interested people be allowed anywhere near the levers of such untrammeled power? What recourse do citizens have when those powers are abused, especially given the legal immunity government agents enjoy? How can such nebulous standards possibly be consistent with the noble-minded free speech ideals scribbled into the various European charters, conventions, and constitutions?

Across the pond in the United States, the Constitutional standard for legally violating citizens’ fundamental speech rights when absolutely necessary is a standard called “strict scrutiny,” a standard that nebulous labels like “hate speech” and “disinformation” could not possibly meet. Challenged laws almost never survive strict scrutiny.

But the EU uses a “flexible” proportionality standard when evaluating restrictions on laws infringing fundamental rights. All I can say is, Thank God for the Constitution.

Supreme Court Justice Louis Brandeis once wrote, “The remedy to be applied (to bad speech) is more speech, not enforced silence.” What happened this week is Elon Musk gave the Europeans a little more speech.

And look at that! It worked. Justice Brandeis would be proud. The election-interfering Frenchman is in full retreat.

🔥🔥 Last Thursday, Tucker Carlson released a fascinating interview with Geoff Shepard, a retired lawyer who, back in the day, helped defend President Richard Nixon’s impeachment trial. Among the many little-known facts revealed in the interview, you probably won’t be surprised to learn that the sticky fingerprints of the U.S. security state were all over Watergate. All but one of the Watergate burglars had CIA connections. And celebrity investigative reporter Bob Woodward, who “broke” the story, had just started at the WaPo — coming from Naval Intelligence, with zero journalism experience. He couldn’t write a limerick. That’s why he needed Bernstein.

SHOW: Tucker interviews former White House lawyer Geoff Shepard about the remarkable similarities between what happened to Nixon and what happened to Trump (2:21:55).

Over the two-hour interview, Shepard explained that both Nixon and Trump were politically undermined in the exact same way. But he also described a profound and encouraging distinction between the two cases: things are different nowadays.

Mr. Shepard noted that, back when Nixon was desperately trying to defend himself, there were no publicly recognized terms like “deep state,” “fake news,” “false narrative,” or “lawfare.” There was no Twitter and no Tucker Carlson. There were only three alphabet networks (ABC, NBC, and CBS) and two liberal newspapers (the Washington Post and the New York Times).

Nixon, in other words, never had a chance.

In short, the sadistic seeds of political color revolution in America were planted when the deep state rooted out President Nixon and made his name into an adjectival epithet and a byword. (Think psyop.) All the tools we see used now against Trump, Shepard claimed, including stolen elections, were developed to overthrow anti-communist Nixon, who at the time —prepare to be shocked— was working on reducing the CIA’s powers.

The episode has 3.9 million views, but it seems like that number should be much larger. It’s on the longer side, but if you have time, you won’t regret the listen.

🚀🚀 Over in the Middle East, the good news yesterday was that war did not break out and Iran did not attack Israel. The AP ran a curiously suggestive headline on the mounting pressure headlined, “Analysis: High-wire diplomacy on possible Iran retaliation in the Israel-Hamas war draws in world.” In Biblical terms, you might say Jerusalem has become a stumbling stone for the world.

The catalog of countries involved in what the AP called a “high-wire act of diplomacy” is too long to list. All the major powers have been sucked into a vortex of looming disaster hovering over Israel: China, Russia, the United States, Great Britain, France, and Germany. And, of course, all the neighboring regional countries are (necessarily) involved, like Turkey, Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Syria, Lebanon, Iraq, Egypt, Yemen, and all the rest. And because of those countries’ other alliances, most of the rest of the world is either directly or indirectly involved, too.

The dispute is not localized to the area around the Red Sea and the Straights of Hormuz. On Monday, the Washington Post ran a story revealing the conflict’s astonishing reach across the ocean, landing right on the Democrats’ own doorstep, like a paper bag filled with something nasty:

It’s giving the Democrats a migraine. Everyone is waiting breathlessly to see how they handle this potentially explosive intra-party conflict between the supporters of Israel (the party platform) and the supporters of Palestine. The issue could easily affect the U.S election, if it leads to a party rift.

In other words, the Iran-Israel dispute really has become a global conflict. It’s ubiquitous. It’s affecting everyone. And it’s super hard to deal with.

This morning, I’m not as interested in the conflict’s potential to provoke a World War, which obviously remains a clear and everpresent danger. Nor am I looking (or qualified) to place blame, a mystifying and confusing exercise at best.

What has impressed me most about this story is the historic nature of events.

The nature of this conflict, with its far-reaching effects on international diplomacy, energy markets, and global security, makes it an unprecedented historic moment. Unlike past conflicts, the current clash could reconfigure alliances and influence geopolitics in profound and unexpected ways, making it far more than some regional issue, but an issue of serious global concern.

Thousands of years ago, the Book of Zechariah predicted Jerusalem would climactically become a "cup of trembling" (or "stumbling”) for the nations. Zechariah forecast the Jewish nation would become an ultimate focal point of global conflict, and a heavy burden for all those who seek to control it.

It could be just a coincidence. Three thousand years ago, Zechariah might just have been riffing in religious fervor, or maybe he was high on his own supply of fermented figs. But consider that, until 1948, Israel didn’t even exist as a nation, or even an idea of a nation. Israel had been wiped off the map for two thousand years. If Zechariah was guessing, that was a pretty good guess.

Or maybe I’m just seeing things, applying a modern, post-hoc rationale to the ancient text. Either way, it’s interesting. Let me know what you think in the comments.

🔥🔥 More Olympics news! As the 2024 Games dragged itself across the finish line, through packs of unfortunate Seine swimmers vomiting buckets, Unilad ran this eye-opening story: “Popular sport has been removed from next Olympics for the first time in over 100 years.” The article didn’t say it had anything to do with the brouhaha over women’s boxing, but the article did include this picture:

In a lopsided story under-reported by corporate media but widely mocked on social platforms, the 2024 Olympic women’s boxing championship reduced to these two lovely ladies:

Scrappy Lin Yu-ting (above, left), 5’9”, delivered Taiwan its first Olympic gold medal in boxing in the featherweight division. Algerian boxer Imane Khelif (above, right), 5’10”, grabbed the gold in the women's welterweight division, and then carried ‘her’ country's flag in the Olympics closing ceremony.

Both athletes failed genetic gender tests with the International Boxing Association and were banned from fighting in the IBA womens’ division. But the Olympic gender standard is “identification” (if the bevy of drag-queen beauties in the Opening Ceremonies weren’t enough of a clue.)

Sadly, on Monday the Olympic Committee announced that the 2028 games in Las Angeles will not include any boxing category, a historic cancellation. The Committee blamed the International Boxing Association, slyly hinting at financial problems, not mentioning gender, and ruled that the sport may not return until it is “organized by a credible, well-governed International Federation.”

A credible organization. Don’t make me laugh.

So, it’s a good news—bad news situation. The good news was that in the next Olympics we won’t have to watch more skinny boys beating up girls. Probably.

It was an odd, petulant kind of progress. But it is progress all the same. Popular backlash beat the Olympic Committee into retreat, fleeing from the ring.

Have a wonderful Wednesday! We’ll beat our way back here tomorrow morning for another jam-packed roundup of essential news and sarcasm, I mean commentary.

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