Tech Companies Apple, Twitter, Google, and Instagram Collude to Defeat Trump

[MikeWB]

Tech Companies Apple, Twitter, Google, and Instagram Collude to Defeat Trump
There is no such thing as Pro-Trump free speech as Clinton corporate allies serve up a carefully curated view of the campaign
By Liz Crokin • 08/12/16 8:30am

My dad always told me that conservative candidates have to work twice as hard as their liberal opponents to win elections because they're fighting two opponents: the Democratic Party and the media.

The usual suspects from left-leaning major media outlets like The New York Times, MSNBC, CNN and even entertainment networks are doing everything in their power to ensure a Clinton victory. Look no further than to Wolf Blitzer mincing around and drinking wine at the Democratic convention, celebrating Hillary's nomination. But the propaganda skewing this election runs much deeper than just the media: our iPhones, iPads, social media networks, Google and even video games are all in the tank for Hillary Clinton—and it's chilling.

I began looking into how strong the bias and censorship runs in these forums after I did an interview on the pro-Trump podcast, MAGA. The show's host, Mark Hammond, was disappointed Apple wouldn't run his show without an "explicit" warning. Hammond's podcast didn't contain content that would be deemed explicit under Apple's policy, and most other shows in the News & Politics category aren't labeled as such.

On June 18, Hammond talked to Sandra, a representative from Apple. She explained that, since the description of his show is pro-Trump, his show is explicit in nature—because the subject matter is Donald Trump. So, an Apple employee concluded the Republican presidential candidate is explicit.

iTunes has dozens of podcasts discussing Osama Bin Laden and Adolf Hitler—none of which is marked explicit. I encouraged Hammond to contact Apple again, via email to their podcast support team. Within 48 hours he received a response from "Tim," who informed Hammond that his podcast would be updated to "clean" within 24 hours.

Further digging on Apple revealed more evidence that the computer giant is feeding users pro-Hillary and anti-Trump propaganda.

Over the past year, Apple twice refused to publish a satirical Clinton Emailgate game, "Capitol HillAwry," claiming it was "offensive" and "mean spirited" even though the game's developer, John Matze, cited in communications with Apple that the game fits the standards of Apple's own satire policy. Apple has, however, approved dozens of games poking fun at Donald Trump—including a game called "Dump Trump," which depicts the GOP nominee as a giant turd.

On July 25, Breitbart exposed this blatant double standard and favoritism toward Clinton. A few days after the article was released, Apple caved and published Capitol HillAwry, 15 months after Matze's first attempt to go live.

While it's commendable that Apple resolved both situations, Trump supporters and conservative users should never have faced such biased treatment in the first place.

Around the same time I was a guest on MAGA, a friend complained to me about how biased his Apple News feed is against Trump. I set up an Apple News account on my iPhone.

First step: select an outlet. Fox News. Conservative. But my news feed? Liberal.

And if there are articles above the fold from more right-leaning sites? They paint Trump in a negative light and Hillary in a positive light. Of all the channels listed in the Apple News politics section, only two of the 16 arguably lean right—the rest are reliably left-wing.

This has, of course, been pointed out before, and anyone with an iPhone or iPad can go to Apple News to determine on his or her own if Apple is pushing leftist propaganda. Apple claims not to endorse candidates, but their actions suggest otherwise, and some of their executives—including CEO Tim Cook—actively support Clinton's campaign. Buzzfeed recently obtained an invitation to a private $50,000-per-plate fundraiser Cook is hosting for Clinton with his Apple colleague, Lisa Jackson, at the end of this month.

Apple isn't the only corporation doing Clinton's bidding. Wikileaks founder Julian Assange said Clinton made a deal with Google and that the tech giant is "directly engaged" in her campaign. It's been widely reported Clinton hired Eric Schmidt—chairman of Alphabet, the parent company of Google—to set up a tech company called The Groundwork. Assange claims this was to ensure Clinton had the "engineering talent to win the election." He also pointed out that many members of Clinton's staff have worked for Google, and some of her former employees now work at Google.

So it should come as no surprise that there have been multiple reports accusing Google of manipulating searches to bury negative stories about Clinton. SourceFed details how Google alters its auto-complete functions to paint Clinton in a positive light.

For example, when you type "Hillary Clinton cri" into other engines like Yahoo! or Bing, the most popular autofills are "Hillary Clinton criminal charges" but in Google it's "Hillary Clinton crime reform." Google denies they changed their algorithm to help Clinton, and insists the company does not favor any candidate. They also claim their algorithms don't show predicted queries that are offensive or disparaging.

But Google has gotten into hot water on multiple occasions for connecting Trump to Adolf Hitler. In June, when users searched "when Hitler was born" it generated the expected information on Hitler but also an image of Trump. In July, searches for Trump's book, Crippled America, returned images of Adolf Hitler's manifesto Mein Kempf. Google has since fixed both—but again, why do these issues always conveniently disparage Trump and help Clinton?

Twitter is another culprit. The company has gotten a lot of slack for banning conservatives and Trump supporters such as Breitbart's Milo Yiannopoulos and, most recently, rapper Azealia Banks after she came out in support of Trump. Twitter has provided vague answers as to why conservative voices have been banned while they've allowed other users to call for the killing of cops.

Just yesterday, Buzzfeed revealed that the social media giant's top executive personally protected the President from seeing critical messages last year. "In 2015, then-Twitter CEO Dick Costolo secretly ordered employees to filter out abusive and hateful replies to President Barack Obama."

This year, Twitter isn't just banning conservatives—the platform also changed its algorithms to promote Clinton while giving negative exposure to Trump.

The founders of some of the most popular pro-Trump Twitter handles—including @USAforTrump2016 and @WeNeedTrump—insist Twitter is censoring their content. They've pointed out that Twitter changes trending hashtags associated with negative tweets about Clinton (which has been reported before). On August 4, shortly after the hashtag "HillaryAccomplishment" began trending, it was taken over by anti-Clinton users, who used it to mention Benghazi or Emailgate. Eric Spracklen, @USAforTrump2016 founder, noticed the hashtag was quickly changed—pluralized to #HillarysAccomplishments.

"They take away the hashtag that has negative tweets for Clinton and replace it with something that doesn't so the average person doesn't see what was really trending," Spracklen said. "This happens every day."

Jack Murphy, founder of @WeNeedTrump, says followers complain they often aren't able to retweet his pro-Trump tweets.

Instagram has also banned accounts that depict Clinton in a negative light. In June, a conservative comedy group called Toughen Up America was banned with no warning or explanation. Last week, the popular Australian-based graffiti artist, Lushsux, was banned from Instagram after he posted photos of a bikini-clad Clinton mural he painted.

"I don't want to sound like a conspiracy theorist with a tin foil hat, but the timing of the Hillary Clinton mural posting and the deletion that ensued can't just be a coincidence," he told the Daily Mail Australia. Lushsux has posted photos of way more graphic murals, including a topless Melania Trump and a naked Donald with his package in full sight. These images did not trigger any censorship from Instagram.

Facebook has a long history of shutting down pages and blocking conservative users while promoting progressive voices like Black Lives Matter activists. The problem became so transparent that Sen. John Thune sent a letter to Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg asking him to explain their practices.

Facebook denies it discriminates against "any sources of ideological origin" and Zuckerberg did meet with conservatives in an attempt to resolve this issue. While some walked away from the meeting encouraged that Zuckerberg wants to repair their relationship, other prominent conservatives rejected the invitation as a publicity stunt. It should be noted that Facebook employees have donated more to Clinton than to any other candidate.

Many conservatives have come to expect this kind of thing from the mainstream media. CNN, which paints itself as the centrist antidote to right-leaning Fox News and left-leaning MSNBC, has actually been among the most disingenuous offenders during this cycle, fully earning its derisive nickname "Clinton News Network." For example, as NewsBusters pointed out for just one day, "CNN set aside nearly half of its air time on Wednesday's New Day to various recent controversies involving the Trump campaign — 1 hour, 24 minutes, and 18 seconds over three hours. By contrast, the program clearly didn't think much of the Wall Street Journal's revelation that the Obama administration secretly airlifted $400 million in cash to Iran. John Berman gave a 27-second news brief to the report, but didn't mention that the payment was sent on "an unmarked cargo plane." New Day, therefore, devoted over 187 times more coverage to Trump than to the millions to Iran."

Another favored CNN trick is to present a "balanced" panel comprised of two Republicans, two Democrats and a host, as they did on the afternoon of July 29, just to name one instance of a hundred. However, the Republican side always features one Trump supporter and one "Never Trump" Republican, with the host grilling the Trump Supporter—often a beleaguered Jeffrey Lord—in what amounts to a 4-on-1. So much for balance.

Right now, CNN has a story on its site called "Which Republicans oppose Trump and why?" There's no corresponding story about Democrats who oppose Clinton, even though her underdog challenger in the primary lasted far longer and received far more votes than any of Trump's Republican challengers.

No Republican willing to criticize Trump is too insignificant to merit coverage on CNN. When a minor Christie staffer announced on her personal Facebook that she'd be backing Hillary, she somehow merited a 1200 word story on CNN's website and euphoric coverage on the air by Brooke Baldwin for "splitting with her party."

So that's the traditional media. But this new strand, where one cannot even search for alternative viewpoints amid technology companies who stand to benefit from the free-trade policies and eased immigration regulations of a Clinton presidence, represents a dangerous sea change. There's absolutely no question the digital forums we use every day are censoring conservatives and favoring Clinton. You can't simply scroll through photos on Instagram, look for a video game in the App Store or do a quick Google search without being fed anti-Trump and pro-Clinton propaganda.

These companies are engaging in activity that can quickly lead down a very dangerous slippery slope and this should concern all freedom-loving Americans—not just conservatives. If you don't know when the election is, no problem! Just Google it and see for yourself what comes up...
Google

Google, before adjustments were made to the 'when is the election' search. (Screenshot: Google)

Disclosure: Donald Trump is the father-in-law of Jared Kushner, the publisher of Observer Media.

Liz Crokin is an award-winning author, journalist, political pundit and an advocate for sex crime victims. Her work has appeared in the RedEye Edition of the Chicago Tribune, the Chicago Sun-Times: Splash, Townhall, Elite Daily, Marie Claire and Us Weekly. Follower her on Twitter and Instagram @LizCrokin.
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Filed under: 2016 elections, Apple, Black Lives Matter, democrats, Donald Trump, Facebook, Google, GOP, Hillary Clinton, instagram, Mark Zuckerberg, Twitter, Wolf Blitzer   
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TV NEWS ANTENNA: WEEKLY WRAP-UP • Opinion
Sean 'Lumpy' Hannity Pumps Trump Up
Guest Laura Ingraham, with her usual gold cross, joins to say something about how the media crucifies Trump
By Joe Lapointe • 08/12/16 7:35am   
Hannity

Hannity assures his audience 'so-called reporters, so-called journalists' are 'blatantly trying to discredit and malign Donald Trump.' (Photo: Hannity/Fox News)

Poor Bret Baier. Everybody's out of step except him and his right-wing network, Fox News Channel.

On Special Report Thursday evening in the 6 p.m. hour, Baier introduced several stories about the scandalous scandals of Hillary Clinton that have scandalized her scandal-filled presidential campaign.

Those emails! The influence-peddling between her State Department and the Clinton Foundation! Why doesn't somebody investigate?

"What you don't know apparently is just fine with the Obama Justice Department when it comes to the Clinton Foundation," Baier said, beginning his "fair-and-balanced" lead story Thursday.

"It is refusing to look into a story we reported Wednesday on Fox about emails suggesting an inappropriate relation between the Clinton Foundation and the State Department when Hillary Clinton was in charge."

Baier later turned for support to A.B. Stoddard on his pundit panel. He referenced MSNBC and CNN, without using their call letters.

"Very little time on this today, A.B., on other channels," Baier said. "A lot of time about President Obama and Hillary Clinton, the founders and co-founders of ISIS."

Stoddard showed little sympathy.

"I think Donald Trump has himself to thank for that," Stoddard said of failing and flailing Republican candidate.

She was referring to Trump's recent rantings that have accused the president and the Democratic candidate of founding—founding!—a barbaric terrorist outfit of religious fanatics who torture and hideously murder people in the Middle East and in other places, in many ways.

Despite pleas from friendly right-wing interviewers to clarify and tone down his statements, Trump simply pumped them up. Stoddard was not pleased.

"I can't find the words to say how offensive I think it is," she said.

Trump's ISIS tirades have replaced those of earlier in the week when he wondered if "Second Amendment people" (those with guns) could do something to stop Clinton from naming Supreme Court judges if she becomes president. (What could they possibly do?)

While ginning up Clinton scandals Thursday, Fox missed the best story of the night.

According to a Politico report—read by Lawrence O'Donnell in the 10 p.m hour on The Last Word on MSNBC—officials of the Republican National Committee will meet in Orlando, Fla., Friday with officials of the Trump campaign to work on a crisis.

O'Donnell interviewed Ken Vogel, one of the Politico reporters on the story, who said this is a "Come to Jesus" moment between the two groups amid growing panic in the party that a landslide against Trump in November could take away Republican majorities in the Senate and maybe even the House of Representatives.

"Donald Trump is going to be so disappointed when Jesus doesn't show up," O'Donnell said of Friday's meeting.

Lumpy even showed a list of Trump's fine attributes, leading with 'build a wall' on the Mexican border.
Great Scott He Found ISIS!

Great Scott He Found ISIS! (Illustration: Clay Jones)

In a more serious vein, he turned to Peter Wehner, a conservative who is a senior fellow at the Ethics and Public Policy Center. Wehner said it is futile to try to change Trump's incendiary rhetoric or to stop his malicious lies.

"Look, this guy is a political black hole," Wehner said. "He's going down and he's dragging a lot of Republicans with him. The campaign is awful. The Republican National Committee is mishandling things. But this is fundamentally a problem of the candidate, Donald Trump."

Wehner said Trump is a "chaos candidate"—something others have said—but he added a psychiatric dimension.

"He is a person who has a disordered personality," Wehner said. "If you understand that, all of these distorted and disturbing pieces begin to fall into place . . . I'm an evangelical Christian and I'm not sure Jesus could pull this campaign out of the tailspin that it's in now . . . He's a pathological liar . .. . This is just a catastrophe for the Republican party . . . He's just an amateur. He's erratic. He's cruel. He's crude. He's unprincipled. And he's a bomb and he explodes every other day and there's no stopping him."

In the election, Wehner said, "Trump is going to get blown to bits."

In addition, all the networks also reported Thursday that about 75 Republican apparatchiks have signed an open letter to party chairman Reince Priebus urging the party to spend its campaign dollars on the down-ticket races and not waste them on Trump's demagogic and often incoherent crusade.

Trump spoke Thursday night (by phone) to only one network—Fox—when substitute host Eric Bolling opened The O'Reilly Factor at 8 p.m. Trump wasn't backing down on anything, even though Politico reported the RNC staff to be on the verge of mutiny.

Of ISIS and Obama, Trump said: "He founded ISIS. The co-founder was crooked Hillary Clinton . . . I'll say it to anybody who wants to listen. He is a founder of ISIS. They must love him."

Before too long, Bolling changed the subject to get Trump to attack what Bolling called the "socialist manifesto" offered by Clinton Thursday in a rally at a factory in Warren, Michigan. Free college tuition! A public option for government health care!

"It goes on and on!" Bolling said.

When Bolling got around to the Republican rebellion, Trump denied it was happening and said Priebus backed his view.

"He just put out a press release, he just put out a tweet, saying it's untrue," Trump said. "If it is true, that's OK, too."

That would be good, Trump said, because he would not have to waste time going to Republican fundraisers to urge financial support for other Republican candidates, especially those who have denounced him.

Another of O'Donnell's guests was Malcolm Nance, a counter-terrorism expert who took offense at Trump's blaming Obama and Clinton for founding ISIS. It was formed in 2006, he said, as al-Qaeda in Iraq. That was when George W. Bush was president.

"It's beyond insulting," Nance said of Trump's ISIS claims. "You're accusing the President of the United States of treason."

On CNN, John Berman was the substitute host for Anderson Cooper on AC-360 and he spoke with correspondent Jim Acosta, who reported that a large Confederate flag bearing "Trump 2016" appeared at a Trump rally Thursday night. They showed it, briefly.

Officials asked its owners to take it down. They did but they put it up again. Finally, they were persuaded to keep it down. (As Trump no doubt learned in military school, the most common Confederate flag—technically, the battle flag of Robert E. Lee's Army of Northern Virginia—is a symbol of the rebellious Southern states who started a long and hideous Civil War in 1861 to defend their "states' rights" to enslave other human beings).

In the panel portion, Democratic operative Maria Cardona—a Clinton supporter—was asked about the "dog whistle" signals Trump sends to his most reactionary supporters.

"It's not a dog whistle, it's a friggin' megaphone," she said. "This is political crack for his supporters."

Referring to Trump's since disproven insinuation that Obama was not born in the United States and is a secret sympathizer to fanatical Muslim terrorists, Cardona said: "How outrageous this is. How jaw-dropping this is. How irresponsible this is. This man cannot be our commander-in-chief." (Lately, Trump has referred to the president as "Barack HUSSEIN Obama").

Fellow panelist Maggie Haberman of The New York Times, speaking of things Trump says, asked "Does he really mean this? Does he really believe this? Does he really think this? It doesn't actually matter. What matters is what he is saying . . . words matter."

And there were plenty of them in the 10 p.m. hour on Hannity on Fox, where low-brow host Sean Hannity assured his audience that "so-called reporters, so-called journalists" were "blatantly trying to discredit and malign Donald Trump."

Hannity—recently nicknamed "Lumpy" by Jon Stewart—went to his overused theme of "We're the real victims here" in his opening segment.

"The mainstream media, they're on the warpath," Lumpy said. "What do they want to do? Take down the Republican nominee, Donald Trump . . . they have now revealed their true colors."

What followed was a rapidly-cut series of media figures shouting down Trump supporters. Hannity showed the father of mass killer Omar Mateen sitting behind Clinton at a Clinton rally in Orlando, but failed to show disgraced former Republican Florida Congressman Mark Foley (young page boys and sex talk) sitting behind Trump at a Trump rally.

Laura Ingraham, wearing her usual gold crucifix, said something about how the media would crucify Trump. Lumpy (and just about everyone else) showed the Time magazine cover with a cartoon of Trump's yellow face melting down. This spurred Lumpy to growl about "all these Republicans, arrogant, sanctimonious, self-righteous, sabotaging Trump, not supporting Trump."

Lumpy even showed a list of Trump's fine attributes, leading with "build a wall" on the Mexican border. He ended a segment by promising that he, himself, Lumpy, would accompany Trump for an event in Milwaukee Tuesday at 10 p.m. "We will be with him for the entire hour," Lumpy said.

Later came a long discussion with his pundit panel about how Clinton had tripped and fallen down while boarding an airplane and about how she "twitches." (Look at this video! Just LOOK at it! Look at it several times! Doesn't she look spastic? Huh? Huh?)

Lumpy said she should show her medical records to prove that she isn't mentally impaired by a concussion in 2012 and a blood clot.

It all sounded sort of sinister but, hey, it came from Drudge Report, Lumpy said, so you know it had to be true. Trump mouthpiece Dr. Ben Carson, who once connected Clinton to Lucifer and used to be a brain surgeon, chose his words carefully, for a pleasant change.

That was probably smart. Maybe he should tell the rest of Team Trump—especially the captain—that sometimes it's O.K. to just bite your tongue and shut your mouth.

http://observer.com/2016/08/tech-companies-apple-twitter-google-and-instagram-collude-to-defeat-trump/