Trump threatens to 'close' down social media platforms

I feel like we are slowly reaching the state the movie “Idiocracy” describes. I feel very torn about this. On the one hand I don’t think we should leave it up to companies like Twitter to censor things. On the other hand I find it hard to believe that the president is constantly claiming things without any evidence backing up. It started with the claims of millions of illegal voters in 2016 and the commission they started disbanding quietly after finding nothing. And now publicly spreading rumors about killing somebody.

It’s insane how little respect the US has for the integrity of its political system. As long as it may hurt the “other” side everything is ok without regard to the damage they are constantly doing the health of the system.

> On the one hand I don’t think we should leave it up to companies like Twitter to censor things.

True, but the think is Twitter did not censor his post. They added a "fact-check" hint that just pointed out that he was speaking made up thinks containing a link to an informative article.

This is very different to censorship. People can still freely decided to believe him, or read the facts and don't or read the facts and still believe him.

It's comparable with threaten to shutdown or control printed press when a specific new letter complained that what he says is complete makeup and wrong.

Trump's claim was that there _will be_ fraud if we have mail in ballots.

Unless Jack Dorsey knows the future, I'm not sure you can fact check something that hasn't happened yet.

Did you read the entire thing first?

https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/mail-in-ballot-voter-fraud...

What's True

While no U.S. government agency officially compiles state-by-state data on voter fraud, and requirements for mail-in voting vary by state, analysis by elections experts shows that fraud is slightly more common with mail-in voting than in-person voting at polling places.

What's False All types of voter fraud in U.S. elections is minuscule in comparison to the number of ballots cast, according to elections experts. Taking that into consideration, it is problematic to make comparisons between types of ballot-casting systems and erroneous to claim mail-in voting "substantially" increases the risk of fraud.

Interesting thing to consider..

If fraud is more common with mail in voting and some states (or everyone?) converts entirely to mail in voting, how much will fraud increase overall?

Will it increase enough to change the overall results? With Michigan and Wisconsin being decided in 2016 by less than 1% of the vote, there's not much margin for error, fraud, or mistakes.

another issue I don't see brought up in generalist areas is electronic voting machines. closed source / unaudited / unauditable software in voting machines - what % of fraud exists in those, and how would we even tell? lots of posturing about 'mail in' stuff right now, but compared to electronic machines used in many districts, I'd still prefer mail-in paper ballots.