I permanently deleted my Facebook account a month ago, and have only missed it a little because of some of the authors I used to follow there. Alas, there's no escaping modern surveillance. But there are browser add-ons (cookie managers and such) that can help to make it harder on them.
A week or so ago, I looked at a credit card bill and I realized that I had authorized an annual subscription to Greg in the amount of $150. I was wondering if it was worth it.
This one piece of yours, Greg, is worth the entire subscription, and then some. With the emphasis on “and then some.”
Greg is my brother from another mother who does a job that is so vital, the job of investigating, and bringing light to, nefarious aspects of society. We are like team players who have different assignments, all in the support of humanity’s evolution to a higher and better place.
I have been keeping this next quote in my email InBasket, from summer 2020, because until this work of yours, Greg, it was the best thing I had on the subject of the horror show that is Facebook.
I report it here because it was the seed, for me, that has sprouted into this work of yours.
Facebook quote from 2020:
The hellscape that is Facebook is the most meaningful tool of political manipulation ever devised in the history of all mankind.
Thanks for the Rick Wilson link, Roland, I hadn't seen that interview. The best line for me was, "Bernie is an ancient communist who scares the shit out of people," because THAT is true whether people support Bernie or not. There was no way that 2020 (or probably any other year) was going to give us a Sanders administration. I think he's right about A LOT of what he says, but he DOES scare people, and T**** would have won. At least now, we have a respite until 2024.
I love Bernie Sanders. As a person, as a politician. I voted for him, twice, and I was pissed four years earlier when Debbie Wasserman-Schultz pushed him aside.
I do understand what Obama and Clyburn were trying to accomplish, and I forgive them for their decision. But the honest truth is that no one knows what a Sanders-Trump campaign would have produced. But I can’t fault Rick Wilson, Obama, and Clyburn for their choices. I defer to their expertise, because I respect them and their good intentions. Anything but Trump for a second term. Anything.
I would have voted for a ham sandwich over the Mango. I always look at the electorate from the famous "will it play in Peoria?" Bernie was too radical for Peoria and he wouldn't have won against T****. Maybe in a different year against a different candidate, but not this past poisonous year with the ULTIMATE poisonous candidate. If Bernie's up to it, 2024 is just around the corner-ish!
I would’ve taken the ham sandwich too. And I don’t even eat that stuff. I would’ve gladly eaten that ham sandwich.
One of the best things about the 2020 election: the choice of candidates. Elizabeth Warren. Bernie Sanders. Even Pete Buttigieg. For years and years and years, I am voting for the least worst choice. The lesser of the evils. When Obama ran, I had an actual choice I liked and trusted. In 2020, for the first time in my life, there are MULTIPLE excellent choices. Even people I didn’t know like Hickenlooper and Klobuchar and Yang, they would’ve worked for me. Biden was the choice that fit the moment, but you wouldn’t hear me complaining with any of those others, or Kamala Harris, as President. Especially Elizabeth or Kamala. Or Bernie. The very best thing about this decade: Bernie Sanders is now a national name. We loved him from a far before he was renowned. Now everybody else gets to love him too.
Don't get me started on Bernie. He's extremely magnetic, and has that quality where when he talks, you sit back and listen. I understand his appeal. But he's a scold, not a visionary, and had, and has, no plan in place to get his (admittedly very attractive) ideas to work. More importantly, he knew in 2016 that Russia was helping him; why on earth would he run again four years later, knowing the same thing would happen? I was very glad when he lost, and even more glad when he toed the party line and endorsed Biden, and seemed to mean it. Because there is no reality in which he'd have won the general...which is why the Russians were helping him. I think Bernie has become sort of a metonym for what progressives want...but it's doers like HRC, Joe, and Kamala who will actually implement that vision. One of the many things we lost in 2016 was HRC getting stuff done.
Also, the Bernie trolls on Twitter are even worse than the Trump ones.
I have heard mention of Bernie Bros and Bernie trolls. Since I am not on Twitter or FB, they are only rumors to me. I do not count myself as one of them, and I certainly don’t condone people being jerks.
Until this post of yours, Greg, I have not seriously considered that Bernie would be a poor choice. You called him a “scold” and not a visionary or legislator or doer. Being an outsider to politics and a complete neophyte in this arena, I defer to your judgment as well.
I didn’t realize the Russians wanted Bernie to run. I knew that the Republicans were hoping for Bernie, so I should’ve connected the dots. I do know that Vladimir Putin despises HRC from the time she was Secretary of State, and perhaps additionally from before or after as well.
Well, I would’ve been just as happy voting for Kamala or Elizabeth Warren for president. We are long, long overdue for a president who is a woman.
Greg, maybe this isn’t your cup of tea, but I would be delighted to read your endorsements, and the reasoning for those endorsements, in upcoming elections.
Since no one has pointed it out, I will: that is the creepiest godamned picture I've seen in QUITE a while up there at the top. Good job, Greg, as I think I know that was the intention. Shiver!
I have a Facebook account because there are times, for work, that I have to consult it for client information. Other than that, everything is locked down tight with as many "Only me" selections as I can make in the settings. I know it doesn't fully inoculate me from the hazards of having an account, but apparently one doesn't even need an account to be tracked by them.
The Instagram thing of late REALLY pisses me off. Who, anywhere, anytime, thought it was a good idea to allow Instagram accounts for "kids?" And Zuck's big claim for it is that kids need to interact too, and they won't have ADS on the kids' version. As if THAT'S the problem! We aren't quite to the generation of parents that know as much as their kids about how computers and the internet work, so all of this nonsense about "parents have to APPOVE any followers on the kids' accounts" is smokescreen for the absolute inability to monitor this at all. The important thing is to get the kids online and used to it before they turn 13 and they get to see the ads -- it's a long game, like Republicans are famous for. They might as well just name it Pedogram, and be honest about it. KIDS posting PICTURES of themselves in an all but non-monitored web space. What an insanely stupid idea! But, you know, NO ADS!!!
Re: kids, it's not just images. That's how they all communicate. You can't take away a kid's Insta without crippling their social life. It's really bad.
Well, now I know I'm OLD! My first thought to your post was, "Why can't they go outside and meet up and talk? Why can't they use the PHONE (preferably a landline) and talk to each other?" And then going full boomer: "What's the matter with these kids today? And stay off my lawn!!"
This was so eye opening and interesting. It helped explain why I dislike FB so much, although I keep my account and just check it a few times for messages from friends. I took a great deal of pleasure SHARING this on my page today. I wonder if I'll go to FB jail now? LOL!
Fb is a pariah & I welcome the possible tech wars waged against it perhaps by a TikTok of the future. I’ve been hacked & smacked down so many times on there; that I only tepidly enter it’s unattractive, cluttered & intrusive venue to check on local musical events of which there are many in my city. Unfortunately, I sometimes miss out on local shindigs if I don’t check it. Occasionally I post music videos but was so viciously attacked by trolls masquerading as ppl I knew or mentally ill Q anons from high school, that politics isn’t even a topic on my page. When my 25 yr old daughter deleted her account 3 yrs, I had to scramble to preserve her pre pubescent postings some of which I was unable to retrieve, but I bet Zuck & mother Russia still have them.
Heehee
I permanently deleted my Facebook account a month ago, and have only missed it a little because of some of the authors I used to follow there. Alas, there's no escaping modern surveillance. But there are browser add-ons (cookie managers and such) that can help to make it harder on them.
When I read your posts I realize how little I know about everything. 😱
Ditto here. Thanks again Greg. I think.
P. S. I re-posted this on Facebook
Sardonic irony though it be
October is Sardonic Irony Month. In even years it stretches into November.
🤣
Me too. Wonder if any of those "algorithms" will have a stroke?
Every time I read a post of yours Ellen I like you even more
Same here! And BTW, you have been missed. Welcome back!
Ditto Roland!
😘
A week or so ago, I looked at a credit card bill and I realized that I had authorized an annual subscription to Greg in the amount of $150. I was wondering if it was worth it.
This one piece of yours, Greg, is worth the entire subscription, and then some. With the emphasis on “and then some.”
Greg is my brother from another mother who does a job that is so vital, the job of investigating, and bringing light to, nefarious aspects of society. We are like team players who have different assignments, all in the support of humanity’s evolution to a higher and better place.
I have been keeping this next quote in my email InBasket, from summer 2020, because until this work of yours, Greg, it was the best thing I had on the subject of the horror show that is Facebook.
I report it here because it was the seed, for me, that has sprouted into this work of yours.
Facebook quote from 2020:
The hellscape that is Facebook is the most meaningful tool of political manipulation ever devised in the history of all mankind.
Rick Wilson of The Lincoln Project
https://nymag.com/intelligencer/2020/07/rick-wilson-on-how-the-lincoln-project-gets-in-trumps-head.html
Thanks for the Rick Wilson link, Roland, I hadn't seen that interview. The best line for me was, "Bernie is an ancient communist who scares the shit out of people," because THAT is true whether people support Bernie or not. There was no way that 2020 (or probably any other year) was going to give us a Sanders administration. I think he's right about A LOT of what he says, but he DOES scare people, and T**** would have won. At least now, we have a respite until 2024.
I love Bernie Sanders. As a person, as a politician. I voted for him, twice, and I was pissed four years earlier when Debbie Wasserman-Schultz pushed him aside.
I do understand what Obama and Clyburn were trying to accomplish, and I forgive them for their decision. But the honest truth is that no one knows what a Sanders-Trump campaign would have produced. But I can’t fault Rick Wilson, Obama, and Clyburn for their choices. I defer to their expertise, because I respect them and their good intentions. Anything but Trump for a second term. Anything.
I would have voted for a ham sandwich over the Mango. I always look at the electorate from the famous "will it play in Peoria?" Bernie was too radical for Peoria and he wouldn't have won against T****. Maybe in a different year against a different candidate, but not this past poisonous year with the ULTIMATE poisonous candidate. If Bernie's up to it, 2024 is just around the corner-ish!
I would’ve taken the ham sandwich too. And I don’t even eat that stuff. I would’ve gladly eaten that ham sandwich.
One of the best things about the 2020 election: the choice of candidates. Elizabeth Warren. Bernie Sanders. Even Pete Buttigieg. For years and years and years, I am voting for the least worst choice. The lesser of the evils. When Obama ran, I had an actual choice I liked and trusted. In 2020, for the first time in my life, there are MULTIPLE excellent choices. Even people I didn’t know like Hickenlooper and Klobuchar and Yang, they would’ve worked for me. Biden was the choice that fit the moment, but you wouldn’t hear me complaining with any of those others, or Kamala Harris, as President. Especially Elizabeth or Kamala. Or Bernie. The very best thing about this decade: Bernie Sanders is now a national name. We loved him from a far before he was renowned. Now everybody else gets to love him too.
Don't get me started on Bernie. He's extremely magnetic, and has that quality where when he talks, you sit back and listen. I understand his appeal. But he's a scold, not a visionary, and had, and has, no plan in place to get his (admittedly very attractive) ideas to work. More importantly, he knew in 2016 that Russia was helping him; why on earth would he run again four years later, knowing the same thing would happen? I was very glad when he lost, and even more glad when he toed the party line and endorsed Biden, and seemed to mean it. Because there is no reality in which he'd have won the general...which is why the Russians were helping him. I think Bernie has become sort of a metonym for what progressives want...but it's doers like HRC, Joe, and Kamala who will actually implement that vision. One of the many things we lost in 2016 was HRC getting stuff done.
Also, the Bernie trolls on Twitter are even worse than the Trump ones.
I have heard mention of Bernie Bros and Bernie trolls. Since I am not on Twitter or FB, they are only rumors to me. I do not count myself as one of them, and I certainly don’t condone people being jerks.
Until this post of yours, Greg, I have not seriously considered that Bernie would be a poor choice. You called him a “scold” and not a visionary or legislator or doer. Being an outsider to politics and a complete neophyte in this arena, I defer to your judgment as well.
I didn’t realize the Russians wanted Bernie to run. I knew that the Republicans were hoping for Bernie, so I should’ve connected the dots. I do know that Vladimir Putin despises HRC from the time she was Secretary of State, and perhaps additionally from before or after as well.
Well, I would’ve been just as happy voting for Kamala or Elizabeth Warren for president. We are long, long overdue for a president who is a woman.
Greg, maybe this isn’t your cup of tea, but I would be delighted to read your endorsements, and the reasoning for those endorsements, in upcoming elections.
Roland, thanks so much for your support, both with your subscription and with your comments on the board here.
It is my pleasure. When you produce such magnificent high-quality investigative material, it is my joy to respond with praise.
Since no one has pointed it out, I will: that is the creepiest godamned picture I've seen in QUITE a while up there at the top. Good job, Greg, as I think I know that was the intention. Shiver!
I have a Facebook account because there are times, for work, that I have to consult it for client information. Other than that, everything is locked down tight with as many "Only me" selections as I can make in the settings. I know it doesn't fully inoculate me from the hazards of having an account, but apparently one doesn't even need an account to be tracked by them.
The Instagram thing of late REALLY pisses me off. Who, anywhere, anytime, thought it was a good idea to allow Instagram accounts for "kids?" And Zuck's big claim for it is that kids need to interact too, and they won't have ADS on the kids' version. As if THAT'S the problem! We aren't quite to the generation of parents that know as much as their kids about how computers and the internet work, so all of this nonsense about "parents have to APPOVE any followers on the kids' accounts" is smokescreen for the absolute inability to monitor this at all. The important thing is to get the kids online and used to it before they turn 13 and they get to see the ads -- it's a long game, like Republicans are famous for. They might as well just name it Pedogram, and be honest about it. KIDS posting PICTURES of themselves in an all but non-monitored web space. What an insanely stupid idea! But, you know, NO ADS!!!
Pedophile magnet.
Thanks. That was a fun graphic to make!
Re: kids, it's not just images. That's how they all communicate. You can't take away a kid's Insta without crippling their social life. It's really bad.
Well, now I know I'm OLD! My first thought to your post was, "Why can't they go outside and meet up and talk? Why can't they use the PHONE (preferably a landline) and talk to each other?" And then going full boomer: "What's the matter with these kids today? And stay off my lawn!!"
This was so eye opening and interesting. It helped explain why I dislike FB so much, although I keep my account and just check it a few times for messages from friends. I took a great deal of pleasure SHARING this on my page today. I wonder if I'll go to FB jail now? LOL!
Fb is a pariah & I welcome the possible tech wars waged against it perhaps by a TikTok of the future. I’ve been hacked & smacked down so many times on there; that I only tepidly enter it’s unattractive, cluttered & intrusive venue to check on local musical events of which there are many in my city. Unfortunately, I sometimes miss out on local shindigs if I don’t check it. Occasionally I post music videos but was so viciously attacked by trolls masquerading as ppl I knew or mentally ill Q anons from high school, that politics isn’t even a topic on my page. When my 25 yr old daughter deleted her account 3 yrs, I had to scramble to preserve her pre pubescent postings some of which I was unable to retrieve, but I bet Zuck & mother Russia still have them.
I bet any data on there will outlast all of us...