Pandemic
My god. Watch Joe Biden do somersaults over his claim that Facebook is killing people[1] after, really, having gotten it right. The simple fact is that Facebook, not alone but nonetheless, has been enabling all sorts of right-wing misinformation.[2] And yes, some of that misinformation, about vaccines and masking, is indeed at least putting people in the hospital (with deaths surely to follow).[3] So-called “free speech” isn’t “free” when people die from it and, yes, Facebook, but again, not only Facebook, is culpable in those deaths, even if not legally so.
What we are surely seeing is a craven capitulation for campaign money.[4] But if Joe Biden really wants a Democratic Congress and if he really wants to be re-elected himself, then he really should do something about voting rights[5] instead of just yammering about it.[6]
Libby Cathey, “Biden tries to clarify comment that Facebook is ‘killing people,’ ABC News, July 19, 2021, https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/biden-clarify-comment-facebook-killing-people/story?id=78927017
Brianna Abbott, “Delta Variant Accounts for 83% of Known U.S. Covid-19 Cases,” Wall Street Journal, July 20, 2021, https://www.wsj.com/articles/delta-variant-accounts-for-83-of-known-covid-19-cases-11626807019
Bryan Pietsch, “Twitter suspends Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene for spreading covid-19 misinformation,” Washington Post, July 20, 2021, https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2021/07/20/marjorie-taylor-green-twitter-suspended-covid/
Philadelphia
Philadelphia Inquirer, “Evicted without warning, again: As lockouts resume, tenants are left scrambling for homes,” July 19, 2021, https://www.inquirer.com/opinion/editorials/eviction-philadelphia-tenants-landlord-housing-20210719.html
Billionaire space race
Adam Gabbatt, “Bezos blasted for traveling to space while Amazon workers toil on planet Earth,” Guardian, July 20, 2021, https://www.theguardian.com/science/2021/jul/20/bezos-space-travel-blue-origin-amazon-criticism
Samantha Masunaga and Andrew Mendez, “Jeff Bezos launches new era of space travel with Blue Origin ride,” Los Angeles Times, July 20, 2021, https://www.latimes.com/business/story/2021-07-20/jeff-bezos-launches-blue-origin-new-shepard
Labor
Michael Sainato, “Companies claim there’s a labor shortage. Their solution? Prisoners,” Guardian, July 20, 2021, https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2021/jul/20/companies-claim-theres-a-labor-shortage-their-solution-prisoners
- [1]Libby Cathey, “Biden tries to clarify comment that Facebook is ‘killing people,’ ABC News, July 19, 2021, https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/biden-clarify-comment-facebook-killing-people/story?id=78927017↩
- [2]Jason Togyer, “How Facebook has undermined communal conversation in McKeesport,” Columbia Journalism Review, June 18, 2020, https://www.cjr.org/special_report/year-of-fear-chapter-19-facebook-undermined-conversation-in-mckeesport.php↩
- [3]Joel Achenbach, “In this summer of covid freedom, disease experts warn: ‘The world needs a reality check,’” Washington Post, July 17, 2021, https://www.washingtonpost.com/health/in-this-summer-of-covid-freedom-disease-experts-warn-the-world-needs-a-reality-check/2021/07/17/895be6e8-e58c-11eb-b722-89ea0dde7771_story.html; Dan Diamond, Hannah Knowles, and Tyler Pager, “Vaccine hesitancy morphs into hostility, as opposition to shots hardens,” Washington Post, July 15, 2021, https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/covid-vaccines-biden-trump/2021/07/15/adaf6c7e-e4bd-11eb-a41e-c8442c213fa8_story.html; Melanie Evans and Julie Wernau, “Unvaccinated Americans Are Behind Rising Covid-19 Hospitalizations,” Wall Street Journal, July 18, 2021, https://www.wsj.com/articles/unvaccinated-covid-19-hospitalizations-11626528110; Hannah Knowles, “DeSantis sells ‘Don’t Fauci My Florida’ merch as new coronavirus cases near highest in nation,” Washington Post, July 14, 2021, https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2021/07/13/desantis-fauci-florida/; Luke Money and Rong-Gong Lin, II, “Tougher tactics targeting the unvaccinated needed to stop new COVID-19 spike, experts say,” Los Angeles Times, July 14, 2021, https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2021-07-14/to-slow-covid-19-rise-door-to-door-vaccine-outreach-and-workplace-requirements-could-help; Ed Pilkington and Lauren Aratani, “US seeing ‘pandemic of the unvaccinated’ as cases rise in every state,” Guardian, July 16, 2021, https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/jul/16/covid-19-us-delta-variant-unvaccinated↩
- [4]Julia Ioffe, “Zuckerberg, Biden, and the End of an Obama-Era Romance,” Tomorrow Will be Worse, July 19, 2021, https://ckarchive.com/b/zlughnh2l3ze↩
- [5]Matt Ford, “The Democrats’ Voting Rights Bill Is Dead,” New Republic, July 13, 2021, https://newrepublic.com/article/162974/democrats-voting-rights-bill-dead↩
- [6]Philip Bump, “Biden warns that American democracy is under threat — a message targeting many in his own party,” Washington Post, July 13, 2021, https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2021/07/13/biden-warns-that-american-democracy-is-under-threat-a-message-targeting-many-his-own-party/↩