Billy Long: The era of censorship

(From Seventh District Congressman Billy Long)

Misinformation usually refers to false or out-of-context information presented as fact regardless of an intent to deceive. Or anything Big Tech or the looney left disagrees with. 

Disinformation is a type of misinformation that is intentionally false and intended to deceive or mislead. Or anything Big Tech or the looney left disagrees with. Both involve the sharing of bad or debunked information, with varying intents and purposes. Or anything Big Tech or the looney left wants to label either.

The term misinformation is applied willy-nilly these days, even to information that sometimes turns out to be true only months after it was labeled misleading by the “experts.” The left uses this term to try and censor speech by browbeating social media companies to suppress information they don’t like. 

This has been a key part of the media’s playbook for several years, and now even senior officials in the United States government are getting in on the action. 

Just last week, Dr. Vivek Murthy, the US Surgeon General, argued that the government has to do something about misinformation on social media, and particularly the Joe Rogan podcast. This blatant assault on the First Amendment cannot be ignored.

Dr. Murphy has made claims about “COVID misinformation” before. Last summer, he said that tech companies need to be aggressive in fighting this “urgent threat.” 

What are some examples of this dangerous threat to public health? They include mentioning that vaccines don’t prevent the transmission of COVID, or that cloth masks really aren’t effective at stopping the spread. 

And don’t forget the most dangerous falsehood, that COVID may have escaped from a lab run by the communist Chinese government. Since being labeled “misinformation” all of these claims were later proven to be credible, and some have even been repeated on CNN. 

It turns out the government has a tendency to get it wrong, so why should they be the arbiters of truth? Our Founding Fathers didn’t think they should, that’s why we have a First Amendment. Apparently, this is inconvenient to the Biden Administration.

So what did Joe Rogan do to get everyone riled up? In recent weeks, he has had on his podcast two doctors who are immensely qualified in their specific fields. 

Dr. Peter McCullough is a well published cardiologist, and Dr. Robert Malone helped to create the MRNA vaccine technology. They are clearly experts, so Joe Rogan had them on his show to talk about the COVID vaccines. They talked about the example of “misinformation” that I mentioned above, and this did not sit well with the left. 

Not only did Dr. Murthy call for “misinformation” to be suppressed, Neil Young said that Spotify should choose between his music and Joe Rogan’s podcast. Spotify quickly said farewell to Neil Young, because they would be insane to take down the most popular podcast in the country. 

This is the real issue with Joe Rogan. The left can’t stand that he has more listeners than CNN or MSNBC. 

Not long ago, these mainstream media outlets had a monopoly on information coming out, there simply weren’t as many media companies as there are today. Now they can’t control all of the information that you get, and this drives them crazy. They want to be the sole source of information. Maybe more people would tune in if they hadn’t spent four years destroying their credibility by creating lies and fantasies about President Trump.

The media’s obvious power grab goes beyond COVID. During the 2020 Presidential election, they collectively said lie after lie about President Trump, most of which have since been proven false. They also collaborated with Big Tech companies like Twitter to suppress damaging information about then candidate Joe Biden’s son Hunter, the world renowned artist. 

Again, the media got it wrong, and the Hunter Biden laptop story turned out to be true. This was all an attempt to get President Trump out of the White House. It’s not just the media who have destroyed their credibility, but also government agencies like the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. They have gotten it wrong time and time again on COVID, and then act surprised that people would rather listen to Joe Rogan. 

If they want to restore their credibility, maybe they should stop suppressing views that don’t toe the government’s line and start being honest with the American people.