There are very few companies on earth more powerful than Google. It reigns as near-monopoly, one that controls most search engines – an enormous responsibility And yet, Google has been able to dance such that it has effectively kept itself above politics and instead firmly entrenched in mining the world’s biggest business pockets. But today, Donald Trump delivered what can only be considered an ominous threat to the moneyed-monopoly. He wants to investigate Google and do so premised on a ridiculous presumption: They are cheating him, criminally so – he says.

Trump states that the search engine limits itself to listing good articles for Kamala Harris and negative articles about him. Yes, well – there could be other logical reasons for such blatant untruths. It could be that most Trump news appears to be negative? Just a thought. Trump seemingly lives to complain about the media but this context forces him to choose. Is it the media? Or is it Google? The two choices are virtually mutually exclusive, it has to be because Google’s searches are based on “links” to an article or “Page Rank” and not just to an article itself.

Setting all levity aside, the issue Trump puts forth is fundamental to both the freedoms endowed by the Constitution and our nation functioning as a free democracy. After all, who is Trump to accuse Google of anything illegal? It is a private company and that’s key. Trump seemingly wants to prosecute private companies because he has determined they are unfair. Fascist states bloom when founded on one man’s motivations.

Trump tweeted and a supporter posted:

“I will request their prosecution” says the man who is probably still 50-50 to be president. And why? Because he doesn’t like the way they treat him. Notice he doesn’t spell out how it is illegal. And even IF we accept that Google is tipping the scales (Which we don’t) Google is not licensed to broadcast on public airwaves and remains a private company.

By all rights, Google could play politics and reach one way or another – it would be legal. It doesn’t do so because the company’s legitimacy depends on being apolitical.

But do take note that Trump sees what Trump sees, and even without mention of which law he believes they are breaking, he will want to prosecute them if he’s unhappy with the results.

It sounds even clearer in the original Russian because he’s talking about punishing private enterprise for not conforming to the party line. This is a new take on an old strategy. Perhaps the easiest way to control the people is to control the media. Except Google isn’t the media, it’s an algorithm – perhaps the most protected on earth. Do not worry, though. Trump has also threatened the media directly in NBC and now ABC – and they do have licenses to the public airwaves, making them even more susceptible to oversight.

This is dangerous and one need only see an example of a Trump supporter’s response.

Yes, but no. Not really. Not at all, actually. Notice that Trump is really bad at linking things and he is so for a reason.

Meanwhile, the Harris campaign sees the implications with clarity:

Exactly. It is dangerous and must be called-out. Let’s see, let’s see, let’s see. Elon? Surely you have something to say? Actually, Elon might have started it with his post but it’s tough to be sure. Elon says:

I am here to serve, so I just checked it out and it came through with remarkable clarity, several articles on the latest polls including an Arizona poll that is favorable to Trump. I guess Trump and Elon bonked. Of course, the truth never mattered less.

But Trump remains dangerous in making the accusation and his willingness to carry out such a prosecution. Remember, due to Project 2025, everyone in every important office will be a tested and true Trump supporter. Get used to seeing people like Dinesh D’Souza as Secretary of Defense. And be Hoover damned sure that Trump’s attorney general will only be anointed if he or she is willing to prosecute Trump’s enemies, perhaps now Google.

Not for nothing but if someone wants to sic DOJ on Google, send the anti-Trust division and shatter the company into 25 little pieces, call them “Giggles” and watch them compete against each other toward a better world.

Meanwhile, ruminate on the possible prosecution. It is that serious. And one needn’t be one of  the richest company on earth to feel the tremors.

God Bless: I can be reached at [email protected]

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7 COMMENTS

  3. Orangebob Von Shitzinpantz is just pissed because he can’t control which stories about him people see! This is no different that his hatred of Stephen Colbert or Jimmy Kimmel. They tell the truth about him and he can’t stand that! Von Shitzinpantz makes an a$$ and laughing stock of himself without any help from anyone, and it is not illegal to comment on it! Google, Stephen Colbert and Jimmy Kimmel are not doing anything illegal.

    12

  4. This is EXACTLY like DonOld complaining about the fact-checkers only checking him through the debate, and not Kamala.

    It’s because he was the only one lying about anything.

    This is the same. There are a lot more bad news stories about his campaign, tiny crowds, people leaving rallies early, corrupt senior officials, sex and financial scandals, general corruption and tales of eye-watering fraud and crimes, some of which he HAS been convicted of. Kamala’s campaign isn’t troubled by any of this – in the same way they don’t have to be concerned with paying hundreds of millions in legal fees. And her campaign has so much good news to share that people want to hear.

    It’s like he’s complaining about an excess baggage fee when he’s the only one with fifty suitcases.

    If you surround yourself with bad news , you can hardly be surprised when people report it.

    8

  5. So, extending Trump’s “logic,” I suppose that means that President Harris could shut down and sue Fox “News” for all of the “illegal activity” in which it routinely engages.

    And, the same applies to Newsmax and all the rest of the right-wing noise machine.

    It really would be nice if some of those “lawyers” that Trump uses would vet some of the crap that Trump posts before he puts it out there. Trump’s LIES are actually actionable and I would find it particularly sweet (and I doubt I’m alone in this feeling) if Google decided to sue Trump over this latest spewing. Trump would have to PROVE his crap–in front of an impartial jury. And that would mean he’d have to hire people to “investigate” Google’s methods which aren’t a real corporate secret as most other internet search features rely on the same basic algorithms and models that Google uses. Hell, Google wasn’t even the first search engine out there; there were others like “AskJeeves” (now as “Ask.com”) and “WebCrawler” and “Lycos” and even “Yahoo Search” (though, in the early days, it only allowed searches of material accessible on Yahoo). And I’d be willing to bet that it’s not just Google that’s “only revealing and displaying bad stories about” him. (Conversely, I’ll bet that if there is some right-wing-focused search engine, it’s liable to be “only revealing and displaying bad stories about” VP Harris. And Trump didn’t seem to have a problem when a lot of “bad stories” were popping up on Google Search–because so many people were following the “bad stories” cropping up on the mainstream media about the President.)

    2

    • Well, to be honest the stories are neutral, too, some good some bad. But it’s not necessarily a lie about the threat. He may well try to prosecute companies and people if he gets into the Oval Office again. Plan for it and then hope to be pleasantly surprised if he doesn’t – in the event that he wins, something I still doubt many here are prepared for but it’s 50-50.

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