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The Onion buys Infowars

nytimes.com

351–360 of 1001 posts

Re: The Onion buys Infowars

#351

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I doubt that the SH families will receive the kind of money they could have had if they accepted Jones' original offer. Their lawyers made it clear they were in it not for their clients' interest but for their own political agenda.

Did the original offer include shutting down Infowars? Of not I expect many of them feel they got plenty more that whatever cash Jones was offering. There is more to this life than money.

> Did the original offer include shutting down Infowars?

That was part of the SH families' lawyer final argument to the jury.

> There is more to this life than money.

Sure. But there's not much a civil lawsuit can ask outside of damages and reparations.

Re: The Onion buys Infowars

#352
post #74
post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Now if we want to get into dirty details, no bureaucrat is ever elected. You elect the representatives, and they nominate in turn whoever bureaucrats they feel comfy to work with. Or is this in the UK different?

Yes, but that is not the point. The point is it was a favorite attack point used by Brexit supporters. A whole lot of the accusations against the EU applied just as much - sometimes much more - to the UK itself.

We have people who frothed at the mouth over the role played by unelected bureaucrats now frothing at the mouth at proposals to remove the last hereditary Lords from our legislature...

(in fairness, those people tend to hate the Civil Service in the UK too. And they're elected hereditary Lords, albeit via a franchise consisting entirely of other hereditary Lords)

Re: The Onion buys Infowars

#353
post #74
post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Now if we want to get into dirty details, no bureaucrat is ever elected. You elect the representatives, and they nominate in turn whoever bureaucrats they feel comfy to work with. Or is this in the UK different?

Yes, but that is not the point. The point is it was a favorite attack point used by Brexit supporters. A whole lot of the accusations against the EU applied just as much - sometimes much more - to the UK itself.

Indeed. That pattern was obvious even before the referendum. The UK is know for its strong civil servant body that can keep the ship afloat when the old chaps in the government have no clue which way is up. And its first past the post system. It is admirable on a lot of levels but certainly not any more democratic than the EU.

Re: The Onion buys Infowars

#354
post #116

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

Discovery isn't just giving over random documents. It's about giving over the documents that are requested by the other side. So giving more documents than they ask for is actually a hinderence. And the case was not about specific documents, it was the overall actions. Because of the "consistent pattern of discovery abuse" (quoting the decision), the parents could not see that evidence. As for the larger point, in pu…

> It's about giving over the documents that are requested by the other side.

Right, 100%. The point of contention is that documents that don't exist were demanded and those documents that don't exist are what the court claimed a default judgement over. This is per the court's own records.

> the parents could not see that evidence.

What evidence do we believe we are talking about here? If this evidence was never entered into the trial, why should us spectators believe it existed?

> the "consistent pattern of discovery abuse" (quoting the decision)

This here is what gives Alex ground to say "the court was on trial", in the greater context that an undercover journalist caught someone who works for the CIA on video admitting that the suits against Jones are lawfare. If you have not seen this video, you may not know how much information you are missing on this topic. If you dismiss the video because a particular group filmed the video, then we're not playing a game of mutually pursuing the truth here.

Throughout the entire process, Alex alleged a consistent pattern of discovery abuse on the part of the court. Deprivation of rights under color of law is a very serious crime that carries a 10+ year prison sentence. And yes, judges do sometimes have federal lawsuits filed against them for it.

> caused harm to many families

The other major point of contention, is this was never demonstrated in court, let alone meaningfully argued in court.

> He did this while knowing he was lying.

This also was never demonstrated. The court records don't show anything like this ; perhaps they show something like this on a procedural matter around discovery, but not anywhere on the topic of the supposed substance of the case.

> and is now getting punished for it

The other so-called echo chambers, the ones that don't have a shadowbanning and censorship problem, the one one the side that won the majority vote in the recent election, don't see it this way at all.

Re: The Onion buys Infowars

#356

Tim Onion's (Ben Collins) statement on Bluesky: [0] > Hi everyone. > The Onion, with the help of the Sandy Hook families, has purchased InfoWars. > We are planning on making it a very funny, very stupid website. > We have retained the services of some Onion and Clickhole Hall of Famers to pull this off. > I can't wait to show you what we have cooked up. Next post: [1] > Does anybody need millions of dollars worth of…

They don't have to do much, it's already very funny and very stupid.

Yeah, my first thought was "the Sandy Hook parents chipped in for you to leave it as it is?"

Re: The Onion buys Infowars

#357
post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If Brexit taught me anything it was that the correct phrase is pesky unelected EU bureaucrats!

Now if we want to get into dirty details, no bureaucrat is ever elected. You elect the representatives, and they nominate in turn whoever bureaucrats they feel comfy to work with. Or is this in the UK different?

The EU is governed by the European Commission, which is not elected. Say what you will about reactionary British conservatives, the fact remains that the EU is not a particularly democratic organisation.

Re: The Onion buys Infowars

#360

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> This seems like an incredible opportunity to see if it's possible to reprogram InfoWars readers away from the hate and the conspiracy theories. Not a chance; they just flee to other outlets. Even Fox News saw huge numbers of people jump to NewsMax and OANN and whatnot.

The trick is to do it without the readers noticing .

Not terribly hard as Info warriors aren't known for being detail oriented. Credulity is somewhat of a requirement to be sincere.
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