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President Trump's appalling tweets have real world consequences.
Take his reckless posts about MSNBC host Joe Scarborough. For the past few weeks, Trump has been insinuating that Scarborough was responsible for the 2001 death of Lori Klausutis, who worked in his Florida office when he was a GOP congressman.
This conspiracy theory, ironically, fueled left-wing attacks against Scarborough in 2001. It was debunked back then, but it's been revived now, by right-wing attackers, because Scarborough and his show "Morning Joe" are vociferous critics of Trump. Trump claimed on Sunday that there's "a lot of interest in this story about Psycho Joe."
Three tweets from the right
-- Fox's Brit Hume reacting to one of Trump's shameful posts: "30K retweets for this discredited tale, based on a three-year old post from some wing-ding website. This is why even his critics should want DJT to play a lot of golf, because when he does, he's not tweeting crap like this."
-- NRO's Jay Nordlinger: "What Trump is engaged in here is sick beyond belief. All people of good will -- and even some with less than good will -- should reckon with it."
-- David Frum: "Yesterday, the president accused a prominent citizen of murder. Surely the attorney general wants to get right on this important news? The US Attorneys? The crack investigative crew at Fox News? Judge Jeanine? Or do they all tacitly agree: Trump's words are just empty craziness?"
"Attempts to intimidate..."
This is what an MSNBC spokesman said earlier in the month when Trump started this insane crusade: "Attempts to intimidate and bully the free press, including through the bizarre peddling of fringe conspiracy theories, will not prevent Joe Scarborough, Mika Brzezinski or any of MSNBC's journalists or analysts from holding power to account. We'll continue to accurately and thoroughly report on the White House's handling of the Coronavirus pandemic."
Over to you, Twitter...
I inquired about the accusatory tweets, and Twitter declined to comment: "We have nothing to share at this time," a spokeswoman said...
Donie's take
In that sense, I don't think the people who join the chorus of calling for social media companies to muzzle Trump have really thought through what they are suggesting and the precedent they are suggesting be set. BUT... Twitter has laid out its rules clearly here -- it did a whole PR push on how it was going to label tweets from world leaders that broke its rules. In that sense, it very much needs to be held to account...
Imagine if...
Oliver Darcy writes: As Trump continues in his attempts to smear Scarborough with this conspiracy theory, it's worth doing this thought experiment: Imagine how the President's allies would behave if the tables were turned and Scarborough were using his powerful platform to suggest Trump committed murder. They'd be (rightfully) outraged and calling for his firing. So why the silence from them now? Why are the standards higher for a cable news host than the President of the United States?