Guest Post by Ron Paul
Supporters of expanding the federal police state have found a new boogeyman to scare the people into surrendering their liberty: TikTok. TikTok is a social media platform that allows users to upload their own videos. It is used by tens of millions of Americans and is one of the most popular websites in the world.
TikTok’s popularity and the fact that is owned by a Beijing-based company — ByteDance — has led to the spread of a claim that the site is controlled by the Chinese government. Thus the claim the Chinese government is using TikTok to collect data on US citizens.
Senate Intelligence Committee Chairman Mark Warner introduced last month the Restricting the Emergence of Security Threats that Risk Information and Communications Technology Act (RESTRICT Act). The bill is being marketed as a way to protect Americans from foreign governments that use social media to spy on Americans.
The RESTRICT Act makes no mention of TikTok or ByteDance. The Chinese government is mentioned only once in the bill, when it is designated as a “foreign adversary” along with five other governments. What the bill does do is give the Secretary of Commerce power to “identify, deter, disrupt, prevent, prohibit, investigate, or otherwise mitigate … any risk arising from any covered transaction by any person, or with respect to any property” that the Secretary of Commerce determines “poses an undue or unacceptable risk” in a laundry list of areas. Among those areas are “coercive or criminal activities by a foreign adversary that are designed to undermine democratic processes and institutions or steer policy and regulatory decisions in favor of the strategic objectives of a foreign adversary to the detriment of the national security of the United States.” So the US could shut down an American social media company based on the Secretary of Commerce’s determination that a website, while not actually doing anything to weaken America, poses an unacceptable risk that it will?
The TikTok controversy has taken attention away from the disturbing Twitter Files, a release of communication between Twitter employees and governmental agencies. The communication shows how much government “influenced” big tech companies’ decisions regarding suppressing stories and deplatforming users. If the RESTRICT Act becomes the RESTRICT law, any site that refuses to cooperate with future efforts by the US government to suppress certain stories and individuals on social media could find itself accused of working to advance the “strategic objectives of a foreign adversary.”
Those who doubt this should consider how people who question US foreign policy are smeared as Russian agents. The RESTRICT Act’s potential victims are sites like Rumble. Rumble is a censorship-free alternative to YouTube. Rumble’s commitment to free speech is so strong that it chose to block access to its site in France instead of complying with a new French law banning Russia Today and other Russian news sources from French social media.
Like the PATRIOT Act, the RESTRICT Act plays on people’s fears to make them silent while Congress takes away more of their liberty. This bill is a blatant violation of the First Amendment that the Founders intended to protect our right to engage in political speech and share political information and opinions with others. We should stop Congress from violating our right to discuss and share ideas on TikTok and elsewhere that challenge the political class.
It is my sincere desire to provide readers of this site with the best unbiased information available, and a forum where it can be discussed openly, as our Founders intended. But it is not easy nor inexpensive to do so, especially when those who wish to prevent us from making the truth known, attack us without mercy on all fronts on a daily basis. So each time you visit the site, I would ask that you consider the value that you receive and have received from The Burning Platform and the community of which you are a vital part. I can't do it all alone, and I need your help and support to keep it alive. Please consider contributing an amount commensurate to the value that you receive from this site and community, or even by becoming a sustaining supporter through periodic contributions. [Burning Platform LLC - PO Box 1520 Kulpsville, PA 19443] or Paypal
-----------------------------------------------------
To donate via Stripe, click here.
-----------------------------------------------------
Use promo code ILMF2, and save up to 66% on all MyPillow purchases. (The Burning Platform benefits when you use this promo code.)
The US Government doesn’t like competition as they want the monopoly to eves drop on its citizens. Can’t tolerate having someone else getting into the espionage business. When both Demonicrats and Republicrats join forces to propose a solution to an alleged problem, it can only mean one thing, absolute and total control over us all.
This is bigger than that. It opens the door to unchecked political persecutions and purges.
Lindsey Graham busted.
https://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2023/04/who_is_pulling_the_puppet_strings_in_washington_dc.html
Kansas Senator Moran (R) crossed the aisle and was one of the few RINO votes that helped advance the Fascist Bill. I immediately emailed the Senator to inform him that I thought he was a POS and a traitor… waiting for the Fascist response to come knocking on my door…lol
The other traitorous Arkansas Senator did the same. I was surprised Cotton isn’t in on it (publicly). Cotton does know his base, and since they are evangelical heretics his treason for Israel is accepted.
Kansas politics has always been an enigma to me. I do understand that there are 100 corrupt criminals in the US Senate.
The Patriot act was used to target patriots, why would the Restrict act be any different?