Last Call For The Anti-Social Networks

Clear majorities of Americans in the latest NBC News/WSJ poll see social media correctly as the fake news sinkholes and privacy-destroying monstrosities that they are, but they're not quite ready to call for the government to break them up.

Yet.

The American public holds negative views of social-media giants like Facebook and Twitter, with sizable majorities saying these sites do more to divide the country than unite it and spread falsehoods rather than news, according to results from the latest national NBC News/Wall Street Journal poll.

What’s more, six in 10 Americans say they don’t trust Facebook at all to protect their personal information, the poll finds.

But the public also believes that technology in general has more benefits than drawbacks on the economy, and respondents are split about whether the federal government should break up the largest tech companies like Apple, Amazon, Google and Facebook.

“Social media — and Facebook, in particular — have some serious issues in this poll,” said Micah Roberts, a pollster at the Republican firm Public Opinion Strategies, which conducted this survey with the Democratic firm Hart Research Associates.

“If America was giving social media a Yelp review, a majority would give it zero stars,” Roberts added.

According to the poll, 57 percent of Americans say they agree with the statement that social media sites like Facebook and Twitter do more to divide the country, while 35 percent think they do more to bring the nation together.
Fifty-five percent believe social media does more to spread lies and falsehoods, versus 31 percent who say it does more to spread news and information.

Sixty-one percent think social media does more to spread unfair attacks and rumors against public figures and corporations, compared with 32 percent who say it does more to hold those public figures and corporations accountable.

And a whopping 82 percent say social media sites do more to waste people’s time, versus 15 percent who say they do more to use Americans’ time well.

But those numbers also come as nearly seven in 10 Americans — 69 percent — say they use social media at least once a day.

As with the FCC and television, social media desperately needs regulation.  I just don't trust the Trump regime to do it properly at all.

The fact remains though trillion-dollar companies need to be broken up.

Trump Cards, Con't

Another Trump nominee for an executive branch position who is so corrupt, incompetent, and unqualified, not even Mitch McConnell's Senate will confirm him.

The White House on Thursday withdrew the nomination of a longtime border official to lead U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement as the Trump administration grapples with a massive increase in Southern border crossings that are straining the system with no easy solution, according to people with knowledge of the move.

The paperwork on Ron Vitiello was sent to members of Congress Thursday, the people said, and the decision was unexpected and met with confusion. Vitiello had been scheduled to travel with President Donald Trump to the border on Friday, but was no longer going, one official said. He will still remain acting director, they said.
One Homeland Security official insisted it was nothing but a paperwork error that had later been corrected. But other, higher-level officials said the move did not appear to be a mistake, even though they were not informed ahead of time.

The people had direct knowledge of the letter but were not authorized to speak publicly and spoke to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity.

Vitiello was nominated to lead ICE, the agency tasked with enforcing immigration law in the interior of the U.S., after more than 30 years in law enforcement, starting in 1985 with the U.S. Border Patrol. He was previously Border Patrol chief and deputy commissioner U.S. Customs and Border Protection, which oversees the patrol.

Vitiello took over during a time of unprecedented spotlight and scrutiny for the agency. Part of ICE’s mission is to arrest immigrants in the U.S. illegally, which has made it a symbol of President Donald Trump’s hardline immigration policies.

He had been acting head since June 2018, nominated in August, had a Senate confirmation hearing in November and his nomination had passed one Senate panel, the people said. But because Homeland Security touches on so many topics, a second committee also had jurisdiction and his nomination was still under discussion there. Some Democrats had concerns, and a union representing some ICE agents had opposed his nomination.

Department of Homeland Security officials referred questions to the White House, which did not respond to multiple requests for comment.

In other words, this guy had no chance at getting 50 Republican Senate votes.

Let that sink in.

Border Line Insanity, Con't

Me, last weekend, on Trump's border-closing bluff:

It's a bluff and everyone knows it.  Closing the border with Mexico would cost the country billions in trade dollars a day and Republicans in Congress aren't about to put up with that.  Trump has already blown a hole in the side of the US economy with his tariffs.  Closing the border with Mexico would only make things worse. 

Donald Trump, Thursday, reminding us "what border closing?"

President Donald Trump backpedaled on his threat to shut down the southern border, saying Thursday that now he doesn't think the US will "ever have to close the border." 

Trump, earlier Thursday, threatened to slap tariffs on automobiles made in Mexico and close the US-Mexico border if the country didn't stop "massive amounts of drugs" coming into the US within one year. 

"We're going to give them a one-year warning, and if the drugs don't stop or (are) largely stopped, we're going to put tariffs on Mexico and products, in particular, the cars ... and if that doesn't stop the drugs, we close the border," Trump told reporters. 

But by Thursday evening, Trump had shifted his position again. 

"I don't think we'll ever have to close the border because the penalty of tariffs on cars coming into the United States from Mexico, at 25%, will be massive," Trump said. 

When asked if his comments suggested that his new auto tariffs mean the southern border will remain open for at least a year, Trump responded: "No, I didn't say that." 

"We would start with the tariffs and we'll see what happens," Trump said. "Now, maybe by the end of this press conference or tomorrow that'll stop. And if that stops we're doing a big tariff deal." 

So we're back to 25% tariffs on autos and parts from Mexico, which would bankrupt US automakers overnight.  And the latest threat deadline would put that right in the 2020 campaign.  Trump is bluffing yet again, because while he is sliding the country towards autocratic fascism with small daily steps, the bigger jumps are, for now, not being made.

Trump is still Trump, a con artist who is 100% bluff when he has no cards.

StupidiNews!

• House Democrats will sue the Trump regime over Donald Trump's emergency border declaration, adding to multiple lawsuits filed by states and NGOs protesting Trump's abuse of power.
• The Mormon Church says it will no longer consider LGBTQ members in a same-sex marriage to be heretics to be excommunicated, reversing a November 2015 decree.
• Donald Trump reportedly will be nominating former GOP presidential hopeful Herman Cain to the Federal Reserve, Cain will join conservative pundit Stephen Moore on the board.
• Elon Musk's Boring Co. tunnel-digging enterprise is in talks to operate in Israel, PM Benjamin Netanyahu believes Israel would be a good fit for his proposed Hyperloop transportation technology.
• Coming to your Android-powered Smart TV: Google ads on your streaming services as customers found out this week who are part of a new "pilot program" for on-screen ads.