[guest post by Dana]
After meandering through various subjects at today’s White House Social Media Summit, including The Apprentice being a big hit and doing Twitter better than anyone, President Trump moved on to the subject of free speech.. Maybe?? I’m not sure… This is from the 44:28 mark in the video linked above:
He talked about how Silicon Valley is admired for their technology and how smart they are, but that they don’t “using that brilliance” fairly. “They have to do that.”
“And we don’t want to stifle anything, we certainly don’t want to stifle free speech. But that’s no longer free speech,” said Trump. “See I don’t think that the mainstream media is free speech either, because it’s so crooked, it’s so dishonest.”
“So to me, free speech is not when you see something good and then you purposely write bad, to me that’s very dangerous speech, and you become angry at it,” said Trump. “But that’s not free speech.”
…
“We’re just not going to allow it to happen like this,” he said, returning to his commentary about what isn’t free speech. “We’re not going to be silenced.”
So, is he saying that if someone’s speech offends you, or the speaker is being dishonest or lies, then that is not protected speech? Maybe if I put myself in Trump’s shoes, with his view of the world, he might mean something like this: If someone (MSM reporter) sees something that’s actually good (Trump) and purposely writes something negative (FAKE NEWS) about the subject (Trump), then because they (MSM reporter) don’t like the subject (Trump), then what they say (MSM reporter) is not not protected speech and instead falls into another category altogether: “dangerous speech” (where all criticism of Trump belongs). Is that it?
Seriously, I don’t know what he’s trying to say. If you have your decoder ring handy, let me know what you think he’s saying. I’ve watched the video (in full) several times, and frankly, it didn’t help clarify things.
–Dana