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Parler’s de-platforming shows the exceptional power of cloud providers

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Re: Parler’s de-platforming shows the exceptional power of cloud providers

#681

Post by edgyquant »

zanmat0 wrote: post #572
sdenton4 wrote: post #463

Earlier quoted context omitted.

First: Perhaps you'd be willing to agree that this was an explicit attempt at a soft coup: The explicit goal was to disrupt congressional proceedings as part of a plan to overturn election results. Second: As others have observed, we got extremely lucky that the rioters didn't actually come in contact with any congress-people or the vice president. What do you think would have happened if, say the crowd has come in c…

>The explicit goal was to disrupt congressional proceedings as part of a plan to overturn election results. And then what? Once the mob was cleared out, they would have resumed. There's a chasm between disrupting proceedings and actually taking over a country. The latter also almost always involved having control of the military by the way.

They were a few feet away from having the entirety of this nations legislative branch at their mercy (which they made clear they didn’t have much of) and the Vice President. People downplaying this aren’t just doing a dangerous thing, they clearly have ulterior motives.

Re: Parler’s de-platforming shows the exceptional power of cloud providers

#682

Post by jacquesm »

rayiner wrote: post #662
jacquesm wrote: post #641

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think you mistook my reply. Politics is all about facts and rationality, if it isn't then it will quickly cause your country of choice to slide down into the gutter of irrelevance. The essence of politics in democratic countries is people trying to self-govern with some kind of optimum outcome for the largest number of people involved. And the Israel/Palestine conflict would improve lots if people started using fac…

The parts of the world you’re talking about are mostly ethnostates, tied together by deep cultural, linguistic, and historical bonds. Those things create the basic framework from which people can have rational, fact-based discussions. The US doesn’t have that. My wife says we’re a “credo country” but it’s not clear to me we share much in the way of credo anymore either. Senator Ed Markey says the constitution, the cl…

Where I live is not exactly a country tied together in that way. And yet, we have plenty of immigrants, first and second generation in politics. We also have the backlash against that, roughly equivalent to the position the Republican party in the USA takes.

But that doesn't mean that the USA needs to have a fact-free Republican party, it could easily change if it really wanted to, at the expense of not being in power for a couple of decades. It's the difference between John McCain and Donald Trump, the one a principled politician who believed lots of things that I would not subscribe to but who was fundamentally a decent human being. Trump is not a decent human being, never was and never will be and his legacy has the power to utterly divide and destroy the United States.

Coalition governments are a lot safer in that that respect because they take away the insane power of the small fraction that decides who is king in the USA. There also is a real problem with the president having as much power as they do.

I see the USA - as one of the oldest democracies - as deeply flawed, with a thin critical path to fixing itself. If it doesn't then one day maybe sooner, maybe later, it will fall apart in either two or maybe even three countries (2x coastal, mid). That will cause a lot of grief so better to avoid that fate, which will require some major overhauling of the constitution and some power removed from the states. Time will tell, for all my friends alive in the USA right now I sincerely hope that this can be postponed long enough that the country can first heal from the last attempt at splitting it.

Re: Parler’s de-platforming shows the exceptional power of cloud providers

#683

Post by ddxxdd »

vharuck wrote: post #583
imgabe wrote: post #493

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Some members of the mob were actively looking to kill the people who were 2nd and 3rd in line for the presidency. Let's not pretend that there was zero danger to democracy. Do you realize that numerous times throughout history people have successfully killed the actual president and it didn't end democracy? What these people did was a serious crime and it should absolutely be prosecuted to the full extent of the la…

>Do you realize that numerous times throughout history people have successfully killed the actual president and it didn't end democracy? I'm no historian, so was there ever a time the killing was instigated by a sitting politician who then was not punished? (Yes, the Senate has yet to decide, but chances are they won't vote for removal or banning from office). Because politicians trying to have their political oppone…

The president's full speech before the protest is here: https://apnews.com/article/election-2020-joe-biden-donald-tr...

Can you point to a place where he specifically encouraged trespassing or violence in a way that is more egregious than the ways in which various Congresspeople encouraged violence in Kenosha or Minneapolis?

Re: Parler’s de-platforming shows the exceptional power of cloud providers

#684

Post by tomp »

abakker wrote: post #521
DudeInBasement wrote: post #487

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do you remember the shooter who shoot congressmen at a congressal ball game? The difference, he had a gun these people didn't

Someone brought pipe bombs that he made himself...

To the Capitol? Or are you spewing fake news?

Re: Parler’s de-platforming shows the exceptional power of cloud providers

#685

Post by sdenton4 »

zanmat0 wrote: post #572
sdenton4 wrote: post #463

Earlier quoted context omitted.

First: Perhaps you'd be willing to agree that this was an explicit attempt at a soft coup: The explicit goal was to disrupt congressional proceedings as part of a plan to overturn election results. Second: As others have observed, we got extremely lucky that the rioters didn't actually come in contact with any congress-people or the vice president. What do you think would have happened if, say the crowd has come in c…

>The explicit goal was to disrupt congressional proceedings as part of a plan to overturn election results. And then what? Once the mob was cleared out, they would have resumed. There's a chasm between disrupting proceedings and actually taking over a country. The latter also almost always involved having control of the military by the way.

The plan is to continue creating escalating chaos, and grasp whatever advantage is available in the aftermath while people who care about things like laws and constitutions throw their hands on the air and declare their shock and dismay. This is how autocrats work. Actually responding effectively and shutting this shit down is how you keep a constitutional government from sliding directly into an autocracy. Hemming and hawing about did he or didn't he mean to be smart enough to circumvent the constitution, while the situation continues to escalate, is how you end up in, say, Pinochet's Chile.

Remember Trump is already commander in chief, so has power 'by default.' He just needs to create a situation where that status quo remains, either by creating a situation whereby the right people are willing to disregard the election results /or/ the constitution directly.

Re: Parler’s de-platforming shows the exceptional power of cloud providers

#686

Post by ReflectedImage »

emphatizer2000 wrote: post #495
Lazare wrote: post #394

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I agree with almost everything you say except... > a bunch of talking heads on TV and Twitter that told them there was an "insurrection" (nothing of the sort happened of course) It didn't succeed, and in retrospect, it didn't look very effective. Many (but by no means all) of the participants were clowns. However, it was absolutely an attempt. People died in an attempt to storm a seat of government and install a diff…

"attempt to install a different regime" How can anybody believe such nonsense? Sorry, but simply taking over the capitol doesn't automatically make you the ruler of a new regime. It's not a video game were you get made king when you conquer the target zone.

It's not the protesters that made it a coup, it's the fact the security forces of the country allowed it to happen.

Angry protesters are a dime a dozen, it's the letting them into the main government building that makes it a coup.

Re: Parler’s de-platforming shows the exceptional power of cloud providers

#687

Post by ogre_codes »

foolinaround wrote: post #615
ogre_codes wrote: post #526

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Can you point to where in AWS TOS this is defined? It's laid out in the court documents. https://deadline.com/2021/01/amazon-court-filing-parler-for-... > We need to agree first that this is a subjective decision on AWS part, regardless of which side of the aisle we fall on. I'm not sure what you are talking about here? We need to agree that Amazon's Terms of Service are subjective? Or are we going to start digging…

let me step back 1 more time... forget court cases, Parler - what its doing etc. -- lets focus on tech perspective take a tech CTO, who looks at AWS TOS. Do you find any terms that provide details on the moderation needed? There can be any number of apps and business models -- so when his company gets such a notice, what can be done? there was also the case of a baker who disagreed to serve gay people with their wedd…

Apologies for a second reply.

> forget court cases, Parler - what its doing etc.

So we'll just pretend we can rewind to back prior to the Capitol riot & clown show. Got it.

> So far, one looked as AWS as infrastructure just like your electric, phone or gas company - going forward, there will be a re-think here.

If we "forget about Parler", why would a tech CTO think any differently this week than they did the prior week?

Take away Parler and all of your hypothetical CTO's concerns about Amazon melt away.

Re: Parler’s de-platforming shows the exceptional power of cloud providers

#688

Post by caseysoftware »

dragonwriter wrote: post #645
jariel wrote: post #622

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Answer the question: 'Who would be President on Jan 20?' - if the vote to approve the electoral results on Jan 6th were not completed - or - if the results provided by the states were 'rejected' by a congressional vote. ? Bonus points if you can tell us how the 20th Amendment clarifies that for us. Also, irrespective of what the legal outcome might be, what would most US citizens actually believe? Would the losing fa…

> Who would be President on Jan 20?' - if the vote to approve the electoral results on Jan 6th were not completed [...] Bonus points if you can tell us how the 20th Amendment clarifies that for us. Nancy Pelosi. Amendment XX: “The terms of the President and Vice President shall end at noon on the 20th day of January [...] If a President shall not have been chosen before the time fixed for the beginning of his term, o…

^ Exactly. There are lots of unclear and open to interpretation areas of law but this isn't one of them.

We have a well-established process with clear steps which apply in good times and bad times, whether any of the players like them at the moment or not.

It's not tough but people have to discard their conspiracy theories in favor of facts, laws, and reason.

Re: Parler’s de-platforming shows the exceptional power of cloud providers

#689

Post by smsm42 »

newacct583 wrote: post #450
smsm42 wrote: post #404

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The very foundation of your democracy has been eroded. That would be a crappy democracy if it could be eroded by a bunch of idiots taking an unauthorized Whitehouse tour. Fortunately, absolutely nothing happened to the democracy and it proceeded on its course. What could actually erode the democracy is nation giving up on free speech. That'd be a real sign of nation in severe distress. > I don't listen to your news…

> unauthorized Whitehouse tour. This is awful, and I can't imagine the thought process that leads to this kind of rationalization. MANY members of the crowd are known to have been armed. Five people are dead. Congress had to be evacuated. Had an escape route not existed (many nations don't have cold war fortifications in their legislative buildings!) we could very easily have been looking at a hostage situation. This…

If you mention the Beer Hall Putsch, let's consider how Weimar Republic actually had fallen. Read about the Reichstag Fire and the Reichstag Fire Decree. It started with a stupid and pointless act of violence - a communist (Marinus van der Lubbe) setting a fire in the Reichstag. But that fire didn't kill Weimar. That has been used by the Nazis to claim the communists are preparing a violent coup (which they in theory might not mind - violent revolution was the part of the Communist theory - but in practice hadn't been preparing any) and prosecute Communist leadership. It wasn't a violent putsch - despite considerable support and frequently using violence as tactics, they never felt strong enough to just take over the government by a violent strike. Instead, they combined occasional violence with massive propaganda, scaring the public about possible communist uprising, and presenting themselves as guardians of order, and slow takeover of government institutions, while suppressing their opposition (especially communists) under the mantle of preserving law and order. That's one of the reasons why they got handed considerable power without having to seize it violently - and were in position to pass such decrees as Reichstag Fire decree and the Enabling Act - that ended the Weimar Republic.

Re: Parler’s de-platforming shows the exceptional power of cloud providers

#690

Post by j16sdiz »

vharuck wrote: post #583
imgabe wrote: post #493

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Some members of the mob were actively looking to kill the people who were 2nd and 3rd in line for the presidency. Let's not pretend that there was zero danger to democracy. Do you realize that numerous times throughout history people have successfully killed the actual president and it didn't end democracy? What these people did was a serious crime and it should absolutely be prosecuted to the full extent of the la…

>Do you realize that numerous times throughout history people have successfully killed the actual president and it didn't end democracy? I'm no historian, so was there ever a time the killing was instigated by a sitting politician who then was not punished? (Yes, the Senate has yet to decide, but chances are they won't vote for removal or banning from office). Because politicians trying to have their political oppone…

My question is... where is the due process?
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