A top Republican in the House of Representatives on Sunday called for a racketeering probe into large technology companies who over the weekend took action against Parler, a social media website.
“This is clearly a violation of antitrust, civil rights, the RICO statute. There should be a racketeering investigation on all the people that coordinated this attack on not only a company but on all of those like us, like me, like you, Maria,” Rep. Devin Nunes (R-Calif.), the ranking member on the House Intelligence Committee, told Fox News “Sunday Morning Futures” host Maria Bartiromo.
After Twitter banned President Donald Trump and some other users, Parler saw its traffic explode. Soon, though, Google announced it had removed Parler from its online store, a move followed by Apple. Then, Amazon announced it was suspending Parler from its web hosting services.
Parler CEO John Matze told The Epoch Times his company is prepared to take legal action. In the meantime authorities should investigate the possibly-coordinated actions, Nunes argued.
“The effect of this is that there is no longer a free and open social media company or site for any American to get on any longer,” he said, because Amazon, Google, and Apple, “have just destroyed” Parler.
“It’s preposterous. So I don’t know where the hell the Department of Justice is at right now, or the FBI,” he added.
Nunes also said the CEOs of the companies should be prosecuted criminally. He also said he has been talking to fellow members of Congress and that they’re exploring their legal options. And he also called on the Supreme Court and federal judges to step in and intervene.
Parler CEO John Matze said on Fox’s “Sunday Morning Futures” that he believed Apple, Google, and Amazon colluded “to make sure that at the same time we would lose access to not only our apps, but they’re shutting all of our servers off tonight, off the Internet.” The Parler website was unavailable on Jan. 11.
The Department of Justice, Apple, and Google didn’t respond to requests for comment.
An Amazon spokeswoman said Amazon did not coordinate with Apple or Google. She pointed to the letter Amazon Web Services (AWS) sent to Parler, in which it said “we’ve seen a steady increase in this violent content on your website, all of which violates our terms.”
“AWS provides technology and services to customers across the political spectrum, and we continue to respect Parler’s right to determine for itself what content it will allow on its site. However, we cannot provide services to a customer that is unable to effectively identify and remove content that encourages or incites violence against others,” the letter added.
Reprinted with Permission from - Epoch Times by - Zachary Stieber
Nunes Please!!!
STOP with the photo ops, interviews and sound bites and arrest these M#$#%er F&^%$ers!
He’s a member od Congress, not a cop. Members of Congress have ZERO ability to arrest anyone. Al they can do is hold dog and pony committee meetings, which are glorified photo ops. The job of DOJ and the FBI is to arrest and prosecute those they break the law. Unfortunately, both organizations are fully aligned with the Democrat party at the senior management levels. So no one in the Democrat party or aligned with the Democrat party is ever going to face arrest on serious charges. That should be more than evident by now.
I hope AMAC will close it’s facebook account due to the censorship. AMAC shouldn’t support a company that believes in censorship.
I agree, I have closed my FB, Instagram and will
No longer buy from amazon. To fight back we all need to stop depending on Amazon, Apple, Microsoft and of course the fake media. If every republican did this we would be that much more stronger.
AMAC needs to worry that the left doesn’t notice that they exist and then decides to shut them down as well.
“Sshhh…keep your voice down.”
That’s the point, isn’t it? They win again!
The left already knows we exist and AMAC is on the list. We have several Democrat trolls on this site each and every week.
I know. They advertise in all the media, so it’s no secret.
does AMAC have their own servers?
We are in the consolidating power phase of the socialist playbook. All socialist regimes follow the same playbook, so it is very predictable as to what is coming down the road here in America. Part of consolidating power under socialism or communism is the silencing, by any means necessary, any and all dissenting voices that oppose or may supply a means to distribute information or ideas, that in any way, conflict with the regime’s ideology.
Parler’s so-called sin (please no endless references to God as this is NOT a spiritual issue) was not conforming to the prevailing left’s view of supporting all socialist views, no matter how extreme, and suppressing all things deemed conservative in nature. Thus with control of the federal government now firmly in the hands of the left, we will be seeing the wholesale shutdown of any and all opposing ideology in the name of either ensuring “peace” (creating a conformity of thought within the population) or simply “cleansing” (forcibly removing, silencing or deleting) all views counter to the left’s ideology.
For those who have a decent understanding of world history, you can look at the shutting down of Parler as the 21st century equivalent of the start of the NAZI Germany book burnings following the NAZI’s own staged fire at the Reichstag in 1933. Last week’s Capitol Hill event is being used as the justification to empower Amazon, Alphabet, Apple and a string of other left-aligned companies to unilaterally begin pulling the plug on anyone not aligned with them. Parler is merely the first. More companies will follow.
While it is nice that Representative Nunes wants to have an Congressional investigation, given the fact that the Republicans now control neither house of Congress, the odds of Nancy Pelosi agreeing to it is about as likely as her not moving forward with her second ludicrous impeachment of Trump this week. Besides, we have seen how effective Congressional investigations generally are. Yes, they get some information out to the generally apathetic and uninformed public, but no is usually held accountable by our justice system. Especially if they are aligned with the Democrats in any way and all the companies names in this shutdown of Parler are major campaign contributors.
Hi PaulE-
I’m wondering if this site and other conservative forums are at risk of being shut off by google. I’m not a techie, so tell me– are the two (or all) search engines “joined at the root”, where no one can be completely independent of google? Is there any way Parler can be carried by a site that is safe from getting the ax? If not, I can’t see any solution than either everyone giving up social media or the FCC stepping in.
And I thought 2020 was a crazy year…
I spent almost 40 years designing and building national and global computer infrastructure projects, so I can answer your questions. I’ll try to make this as non-technical as possible. Most companies today, outside the military, national security federal agencies (NSA, CIA, etc.) and maybe 20 to 25 percent of the Fortune 500 companies, have all opted to host (meaning locate) their servers (where all their data and business operations software resides) in the so-called cloud. The cloud is nothing more than massive data centers built all around the country and the world, that are owned by maybe a total of 10 to 15 corporations today. AWS (Amazon) is one such owner of these data centers. Alphabet (Google) is another, as is Apple with their own huge on-line data server presence. See the concentration of power? All in the hands on very left leaning owners.
Now to answer your questions. No, not all search engines are “joined at the root”. Each has its own code base and DuckDuckGo does NOT mine your search request for personal information about you that it can then monetize like Amazon, Google, Microsoft and most others do.
Does DuckDuckGo have its servers in the cloud or do they have them secured and maintained in-house by their own technical personnel? That I don’t know as none of my contacts still in the industry do work for them. If DuckDuckGo’s servers are hosted in the cloud, then they can be unplugged the same way Parler was. The left can make up any excuse to justify their actions and it is highly unlikely the Democrat controlled government would intercede. The same goes for any other web site that the left wants to go after now. The FCC, which will be controlled by the Democrats now, will NOT intercede to save Parler. They will simply stand aside and watch.
As I pointed out in my original post above, what is happening with Parler was to be expected. In the consolidating of power phase of the socialist playbook, any dissenting voices are silenced by any means necessary. Look at Hong Kong for a current example of the same socialist policies being carried out in real-time. After they removed the last impediments to total control, the Hong Kong Legislature, China has been consolidating its power in the exact same manner. Our MSM will of course show none of it and the subject of Hong Kong has actually been completely dropped by our MSM for fear enough of the public might notice the striking similarities. China is just a bit father along in the process with Hong Kong, than where we are right now. However, we will quickly catch up once Biden is sworn in.
Think of this as having been a game of grand-master chess. Where on one side a lot of our players have been either carefully distracted by a series of “look at the latest shining ball” nonsense or praying to God to save them from their own decades of inaction and apathy. Anything but being focused on the actual game being played out right in front of them. On the other side, the left has been consistently advancing their agenda in carefully planned and executed incremental steps over decades to reach this current point. Making very few mistakes along the way. On the few mistakes the left has made, our side has either not taken advantage to effectively restore balance.
Both Presidents Reagan and Trump understood the game of chess being played by the left and each sought to restore the country in his own way. Unfortunately in both cases, the vast majority of the Republican Party in Washington, wasn’t on board. Both presidents found themselves repeatedly trying to not only counter the Democrats’ moves, but also the establishment Republican party that largely was in lock-step with most of the Democrat agenda.
Sorry for the length of the reply, but you asked good questions so I thought you deserved thorough answers. Soon all sites that contain anything other than pro-Democrat ideology will be shut down by one means or another.
Thank you so much for the explanation! So we’re, pardon me, screwed…unless DDG lays its own lines underground or waves some other magic wand. What if the internet is reclassified as a utility? If google, microsoft, and amazon were considered monopolies, would that open them up to anti-trust regulation? I‘d love to see a mass exodus; maybe a sizable decline (not likely to happen, though) in their revenues will force them to revisit their policies. As long as they have their finger on the button, which they do as private enterprises, they’re in control. They can determine whether or not content is acceptable or violates policy.
On this old desktop, I have to go through google chrome to get to DDG, and with the one-year-plus-one-month-old (farmer in the …) laptop, which died, DDG was reached through Microsoft Edge. I use DDG because they keep information private. Or is it, really?
It doesn’t look good for free speech. Individuals who cherish such a notion are not in the habit of joining together as the liberal democrats and socialists do. But it seems the only way to turn the tide is to stop using social media, clicking links, and buying stuff from amazon. Rhetorical questions, but if we can’t slay the giants, …..
Lets talk reality here.
What if the internet is reclassified as a utility?
The Democrat’s push under Obama for so-called Net Neutrality was to do just that and thus give the federal government complete and total control of what happens on the Internet. The goal was and is, when Biden / Harris reactivate it, to monitor and censor all non-socialist speech and content from the Internet. Much in the same way that China policies it’s domestic Internet. Companies such as Amazon, Google and Apple, who will still control large sections of the cloud and if anything become more powerful as long as they continue to shovel hundreds of millions a year in xampaign donations to the Democrat party, will be given free reign to continue censoring anything that they deem “offensive”. NOT THE SOLUTION YOU THINK IT IS.
DDG or any other company being allowed to run their own fiber optic cables to create a separate sub-Internet?
You need state, local and federal approval to dig up new trenches to run underground cables or anything else in this country. EPA impact reports. All sorts of sign-offs from literally dozens of bureaucratic offices, at all levels, before you can even move one shovel of dirt. A process that takes several years under the best of circumstances. With your proposed creation of a separate Internet to bypass the existing Internet, you stand ZERO chance of getting past even one government agency. You’re asking to create an infrastructure that is being designed to specifically bypass the very control and restrictions that the government is using to suppress the very speech they want to destroy. NOT HAPPENING.
Can we still slay or at least get the giants that are in league with the socialist movement to back down? NO! That ship sailed years and years ago. Today all three major companies being discussed are multi-national behemoths. The United States is but one of several dozen countries where they generate revenue from. To them, they view us as merely a market segment to be exploited and controlled. Nothing more. When the heads of these companies appear before Congress, you can readily see the overt contempt the CEO’s of these companies have for even being asked to answer a few questions. China and Southeast Asia are more important to them than we are. Bigger, fresher markets with more upside revenue to exploit. Even if you could get all Americans to boycott all three companies, which you can’t because most Americans are unfortunately lazy sheep (sorry that is the truth), you wouldn’t be able to inflict enough economic damage onto these behemoths to do any lasting harm.
Bottom line: The days of free speech are coming to an end. We will quickly move towards the European versions of regulated speech where criticism of government officials and their policies, along with uttering ideas that run counter to the ideology of the left, are all met with fines and even jail time. Look for the Democrats to start rolling out that legislation to encompass that within the next few months. Dozens of American companies have already announced they will no longer give financial contributions to anyone to dared to question Biden’s victory in any way. Many are actually demanding these politicians immediately resign. These are the same companies that funneled billions into BLM and ANTIFA over the summer.
The left does indeed intend to crush any and all opposition to the socialist agenda, by any means necessary, as part of their consolidating total power in their hands. I’ve seen how this plays out in other countries and Americans are in for a massive change in lifestyle and circumstances. My original analogy of a chess game is quite valid. All of this could have avoided, if only our side had paid attention and focused on the game being played out right in front of them and responded accordingly. Instead too many on our side were pre-occupied by the latest shiny objects the left dangled in front of us for decades or looked for someone or something else to “save us from ourselves”. That’s not how you stop either socialism or communism once it has a foot in the door.
Utility—no, it isn’t the answer! I was thinking, like water, and other things that come through pipes. Silly.
So…that doesn’t leave us many options, does it? How long do we wait before the country goes to war again? I’m hearing on the radio that groups are planning “rallies” in all 50 state capitals. And I also heard–sitting down?–that the FBI knew a day ahead of time that extremists were preparing to attack the Capitol building!
P.s., AMAC has deleted comments to which I replied, so my replies, which remain, are ridiculously out of context. Their tech person must know as much as I do…
Thanks again, PaulE.
War again? Not sure what you mean. Our side hasn’t seriously engaged the left in any way. Of you mean a repeat of last week at the Capitol, I don’t classify that as war. That was a small group of Trump supporters that were stupid enough to be egged on by a few ANTIFA folks to do some idiotic vandalism and take selfies in offices. All while the few ANTIFA folks concentrated on the more violent stuff like assaulting the Capitol police officer and firing off tear gas canisters and such.
Yeah, I expect there will be some small gatherings in states on the day Biden is sworn in. But those will likely be standard fare Trump supporters doing peaceful protests. I’m also sure the Mayors and Governors, especially in the blue states, will have a massive police presence surrounding the protestors.
Yes, I read that both the FBI and the Washington, D.C. police department knew 24 to 48 hours ahead of time about chatter involving the Capitol Building from an ANTIFA affiliated web site, but that Mayor Bowser told both the FBI and the city’s police to not provide additional personnel at the Capitol Building that day. That everything would be under control.
As to censoring by AMAC, my sense is AMAC is over-reacting for gear they will be shutdown next. From a meaningful opposition site, I would think AMAC is way, way down on the list of organizations the socialists are concerned about.
By “war”, I mean another civil war, as many others here have implied and some welcome. I fully support the right of any American to protest “peaceably”; I’ve done it dozens of times. But we grow more impatient with government agencies that don’t do what they’re supposed to do, and as our representatives fail to listen to their constituents. People are not going to tolerate another election going awry, as did the one in November.
Has the expectation of a fair election now become a pipe dream? That’s enough to get masses of people to revolt in a big way. If our elected officials refuse to acknowledge “a redress of grievances”, what recourse do we have? At what point will we no longer tolerate injustices of the government, as when the courts refused to hear any of the cases of elections fraud? The basic right of every voter to participate in this republic has been dismissed by the left and by those agencies that are supposed to protect it.
No, what happened in D.C. last week was an outpouring of support for the president and a signal to all that we’re tired of the corruption, tired of getting screwed by swamp creatures and outside instigators. Hardly a war.
I blame those outside instigators, for the most part, for the Capitol break-in and destruction. I heard that someone made off with Pelosi’s gavel. Sure, as mobs tend to behave, a few Republicans might have acted with their hormones instead of with their heads. Lack of any show of security from the D.C. police or Capitol Hill security, when some knew this was going to happen, is inexcusable. And so is any display of violence or destruction. But I think most of the venal behavior was planted by the left.
As this country seethes with discontent over injustices perpetrated against its own people, I fear that, in our lifetime, we will see another civil war. I hope this was clean enough for the AMAC bots.
Hi Kim,
Actually TWO elections were stolen, not just the one in November. Why are you assuming the Georgia run-offs were done differently than on November 3rd? The Georgia January 5th election was just far easier to do and the Dems had two months to prep for it. Remember, all the same voting machines, poll workers, vote counting systems, lax voter ID regs that allowed essentially anyone to vote whether they were entitled to or not were all still in place from November 3rd. The Georgia Governor and
Secretary of State did NOTHING to change anything. They just promised more people would be watching the vote count, which is not where most the manipulation was done in November. The manipulation was done by adding tens of thousands of illegal ballots to the stacks of ballots to be counted in November.
All the Democrats had to do to win in January was add up the total number of registered Republican and 20 percent of Independent voters (normal split of Independent voters is 80 percent dem and 20 percent Rep on a nationwide basis) in each county in Georgia. That voter information, by voting district, is readily available to any politician these days, so you wouldn’t generate more ballots than actual voters in voting districts like what happened in PA. That is because in PA the Dems were in a rush to over-compensate for the stronger Trump voter totals and got sloppy in the rush to just flood the system with newly minted Biden ballots.
Anyway in Georgia, all the Stacy Abrams group had to do for January 5th was ensure they collected sufficient mail-in ballots from Democrat voters plus then generate a few thousand extra illegal ballots to mix in with existing collected ballots before ballot counting started to guarantee a close win for the two Democrat challengers. Run-off races outside of the big elections don’t generate anywhere near high voter turnout, so you generally don;t have to be as concerned with more ballots than voters in the district. Easier to cheat is what I’m saying. So watching the counting process itself on January 5th was virtually meaningless. Both legal and illegal ballots were already moved together and the Dems achieved the razor thin wins they were looking for.
Lesson to be learned: If you expect future elections to actually be honest, this whole mass mail-in balloting and relaxed or eliminated voter ID standard has to be be completely repealed in all states before 2022. If not, then don’t expect any sort of Republican wave to recapture either house of Congress. The same goes for 2024 as well and all other future elections.
As for a future civil war, if I’m right based on past history of how various socialist governments have moved to ensure permanent power, the Dems will create an “mass casualty incident” that will be blamed on the right, which allows them to call for and quickly pass, with enough RINO support in Congress, sweeping anti-gun laws in this country to effectively disarm the vast majority of Americans before any such civil war breaks out. The Supreme Court, under Roberts’ control, will back-down like they did with the Texas challenge, which was a perfectly legitimate avenue for a state vs. state issue to be resolved. Our side is very good at talk, but in general our side absolutely stinks at both strategic planning and actual action.
Ah, yes, the GA election. I’m beginning to sense a trend here. Which leads me to ask, how realistic is it to expect state legislatures to improve the election process?
With 10 R congressman voting for Trump’s impeachment, there’s a very steep hill to climb. Many of our fellow members here at AMAC continue to beg for a plan of action. Other than what we’ve seen recommended (letters, rallies, convincing friends and relatives, contribute money…), do you have some suggestions?
How realistic is it to expect state legislatures to improve the election process?
Answer: Not very realistic at all. The states that went about weakening the voter validation processes did so with the clear intent that it would facilitate easier and more wide-spread voter fraud in their state. No other possible reason to do so. That only benefits one party, which is the Democrats who have a long, documented history of committing voter fraud. If they were to change the process back or tighten up the regs, that would be admitting that they, the state legislatures, messed things up in the first place in these elections. We all know that politicians in general don’t accept personal responsibility for failures or bad judgement.
Besides the Dems have now shown they can win any election with this new process in place. So why on earth would they have any incentive to change things back?
Regarding the 10 Repub. congressmen that voted for Trump’s impeachment in the House. They are all what I describe as establishment Repubs or Never Trumpers. All 10 have made it no secret that they always hated Trump since he won the primaries in 2016 and prevented one of the RINO candidates from getting the nomination. For them, this was just payback for that and they could care less about anything that transpired last week.
Yeah, I have a few different options that I think people should be doing other than the largely ineffective options you’ve listed. The problem is most people won’t do them, because it involves more work and effort on their part. Which is why we have the mess in Washington that we do. I’m pretty realistic when it comes to what the average person is willing and unwilling to do when it comes to politics in general. So no sense mentioning those options, as most people won’t even do the list of things you wrote.
Well I just responded to you, but I just got censored.
Since AMAC censored my last response to you answer your questions, lets see if this gets through. Hopefully AMAC will opt to restore my last post, as it goes far beyond this.
WASHINGTON, Jan 11 (Reuters) – Republicans in the U.S. Congress faced growing blowback on Monday from businesses that said they would cut off campaign contributions to those who voted last week to challenge President-elect Joe Biden’s victory.
The announcements by Amazon.com Inc, General Electric Co, Dow Inc, AT&T Inc, Comcast Corp, Verizon Communications Inc, American Express Co, Airbnb Inc, Cisco Systems Inc , Best Buy Co Inc and Mastercard Inc, among others, threaten to throttle fundraising resources for Republicans who will soon be out of power in the White House and both chambers of Congress.
AT&T and Comcast, for example, are among the biggest corporate donors in Washington.
Greeting-card giant Hallmark Company Ltd said it had asked senators Josh Hawley and Roger Marshall to return its contributions. Representatives for the two Republicans, who both objected to Biden’s certification, did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
The announcements are a sign that some corporate donors, which typically spread their money widely around Capitol Hill, are re-assessing their strategy after supporters of President Donald Trump attacked the Capitol last week in an effort to prevent Congress from formalizing Biden’s victory.
It is unclear whether their decisions will have a lasting impact. Fundraising activity is currently at a post-election lull in Washington, giving businesses and trade groups some time to figure out their approach.
Few companies have gone as far as Dow Inc, which said it would withhold donations for the Republican lawmakers’ entire terms in office – up to six years for those in the Senate. Others said they would withhold donations temporarily, or suspend giving to Republicans and Democrats alike.
GE’s suspension will last through the end of 2022 and then the employee board that oversees its political action committee will consider requests for support for those lawmakers who opposed certification “on a case-by-case basis.”
At least five people died in last week’s attack, which also forced lawmakers into hiding for several hours.
When they reconvened, 147 Republicans in the House of Representatives and the Senate voted to challenge Biden’s victory in Pennsylvania or Arizona, even though both states already formally certified the results and election officials say there were no significant problems with the vote.
Those voting yes included the top two House Republicans, Kevin McCarthy and Steve Scalise, and Senator Rick Scott, who as incoming head of the National Republican Senatorial Committee will head efforts to win back the Senate in the 2022 elections. All of their jobs require extensive fundraising. McCarthy and Scalise’s offices did not respond to a request for comment. Representatives for Scott declined to comment.
Amazon said it would discuss concerns “directly with those members we have previously supported” before deciding whether to resume contributions.
This is incredible. So, the number of congressmen challenging the vote in certain states is growing. Is this merely so they can be recorded as having objected, even though it’s after-the-fact and not likely to make any difference? Did they do it so they won’t lose many R votes in their next election? How brave.
As far as corporate donations go, I assume most companies give to both sides, maybe more to one than to the other. Even Walmart gave to BLM (not sure about Antifa), so I go there less often. But if we quit patronizing stores that donated to the dems or to unsavory groups, we’s have to stop shopping altogether.
No. This involves any congressmen who dared to even say they would challenge Biden’s Electoral College vote last week before or immediately after Congress re-convened. Much less follow through with actually voting to do so. Only 100 members of Congress were on board before the Capitol incident. So now they are ALL targeted for removal. This is how the Democrats intend to use their corporate donors to eliminate anyone in Congress that dared even mention challenging the Democrat steal of the election. As I said earlier, the left will use any means at its disposal to eliminate any voice of opposition going forward.
Most of the companies on the list normally split their donations 80 / 20 based on what they have publicly disclosed in the past. With 80 percent going to the Democrats and 20 percent to the Republicans. All so they can say they are “bi-partisan” when it comes to donations.
And rightfully so! … Yet it will NEVER HAPPEN as long as the Progressively Communist Democrats hold the majority in both Houses of Congress. The brazen audacity of the Far Left is so outrageous yet very predictable. And to think that OUR Republican so-called Congressional Legislators won’t do anything but talk big and have tantrums. It’s going to be up to We the People to fight and overcome evil! … So pray and prepare to fight ti SAVE AMERICA from Communist servitude!