AMAC Exclusive by: Tammy Bruce
One of the most consequential actions in defense of free speech happened today, courtesy of libertarian entrepreneur Elon Musk.
After becoming Twitter’s biggest shareholder, being invited to the board, and then declining that position, Musk has now launched an effort to buy Twitter outright at 43 billion dollars, coming in at $54.20 per share. Mr. Musk is the richest man on the planet, with a reported worth of $300 billion.
On Tuesday, the iconoclast businessman sent a letter to the Twitter board chair making clear his intention and the reasoning behind it:
“I invested in Twitter as I believe in its potential to be the platform for free speech around the globe, and I believe free speech is a societal imperative for a functioning democracy.
However, since making my investment I now realize the company will neither thrive nor serve this societal imperative in its current form. Twitter needs to be transformed as a private company.
As a result, I am offering to buy 100 percent of Twitter for $54.20 per share in cash, a 54 percent premium over the day before I began investing in Twitter and a 38 percent premium over the day before my investment was publicly announced. My offer is my best and final offer and if it is not accepted, I would need to reconsider my position as a shareholder.
Twitter has extraordinary potential. I will unlock it.”
This situation can be easily mistaken as an important sidebar Big Tech story involving interesting personalities. But it is something much more than that. For too many years, Americans have observed one of the most promising developments in technology turn into just another woke and partisan platform. It’s been shameful to watch social media in general and Twitter in the particular shift from being an American townhall to just another woke outlet bent on censoring conservatives and pushing leftist and Democratic narratives.
The bigger problem was when it became apparent there was a deliberate transformation changing Twitter from a communication platform into a partisan weapon. The banning of politicians, stories, media outlets, and so many others because they challenged the establishment orthodoxy was worthy of a third-world banana republic. It was the manifestation of Group Think and what happens when a group of people believe they have sole possession of the truth.
The left and their water carriers the Democratic Party understand the American public does not want what they’re selling, but they don’t care. They have determined the only way they can gain and maintain power is by lying to voters about their goals and intentions. And at the very least, making their marginal extremism appear mainstream by snuffing out all genuine debate and other ideas.
At first, they took control of legacy media. But that wasn’t enough when social media platforms appeared, and those, too, were co-opted into partisan machines with the goal of removing and silencing conservative voices by defaming them as ‘hate groups’ or liars or general menaces.
Controlling the narrative is what drives the left and they were well on their way to completely consuming social communication writ large.
The reaction to Musk’s buyout offer confirms its importance and how intensely the establishment has relied on controlling the public political and cultural narratives through Big Tech.
Web magazine Axios posted panicked coverage titled, “Elon Musk Goes Into Full Goblin Mode,” with their tweet revealing the degree of their meltdown: “The world’s richest man — someone who used to be compared to Marvel’s Iron Man — is increasingly behaving like a movie supervillain, commanding seemingly unlimited resources with which to finance his mischief-making.”
So ending censorship is “mischief-making” according to Axios. Good to know.
Max Boot, a Never-Trumper Washington Post columnist, still nursing bitterness and loathing, tweeted this at the news: “I am frightened by the impact on society and politics if Elon Musk acquires Twitter. He seems to believe that on social media, anything goes. For democracy to survive, we need more content moderation, not less.”
Why so frightened of some people not being canceled, banned, and censored? America was founded on freedom and the First Amendment yet the left seems to believe it can only survive if we crush said freedom and the First Amendment. That’s sort of like explaining we had to destroy a village in order to save it.
The manic pearl-clutching by those enjoying having their boot on the necks of irritating Americans who dare to not conform or take a knee to whatever the current ‘thing’ is are indeed quite shocked by all of this. Today is finally a day when the machine may realize that we’ve all, including Elon Musk, have had enough.
Elon Musk‘s willingness to step into this arena due in large part to the censorship of the American people by a few ‘elites’ is an inspiring moment for all of us. It is a reminder that the American spirit and commitment to freedom still lives, despite so many desperate attempts by a societal bureaucracy to crush it.
No wonder the left is obsessed with annihilating “billionaires.” It must be very frustrating for those extremists to have to deal with someone who has enough money to get things done and who is immune to their threats of destruction.
There is no guarantee that Musk’s bid to buy Twitter outright will succeed. While the board has a fiduciary duty to consider the offer as serious and generous, various large shareholders are invested in what Twitter has been doing and would likely loathe losing it. They will fight. But so will Musk. This is the free speech equivalent of the moon shot. Even with the unknowns and the risk, it must be done because not doing it is even more dangerous.