It's off the hook. 
We're back after two weeks. 
And we are doing a one-hour show tonight, no overtime, because we are in the middle of deadlines and all sorts of other fun activities that are pretty much taking all of our time. 
And we're not entirely sure we're on the air. 
Rob, you're going to occasionally have to give us a thumbs up to tell us that, because we're having some trouble with our app that we don't usually have. 
But, yes, Rob T. Firefly over there in Skypeland. 
Good evening. 
Say hi to the folks. 
And is Gila not here tonight? 
I don't see her. 
She is away on assignment today. 
Oh, okay. 
All right. 
I was not informed. 
Kyle is over here in Master Control patching things together that insist on becoming unpatched. 
Yes, I think there's some voltage, actually, that I'm connecting with each arm. 
I've noticed that you're shaking up and down. 
The current is going through me. 
I assume that's a pleasant sensation. 
But we're holding it together, yeah. 
If you need to be pushed aside, let me know. 
And, Alex, you are in a different place. 
Where are you? 
I am indeed, and good evening and good morning from Tel Aviv. 
I am in Israel this week, so hello, everybody. 
Well, that's different. 
Usually, you're in Pennsylvania, and now you're over in Tel Aviv. 
Yes. 
That's quite a good thing. 
Yeah, usually in Pennsylvania or New York, but Tel Aviv, you know, all wonderful places. 
Uh-huh. 
And what time of the day is it there now? 
It is 2.05 in the morning. 
Oh, mercy me. 
Wow. 
Yeah. 
Yeah, it's pretty late here. 
I'm not going to be able to stay on the entire show. 
I apologize, guys. 
I'm probably going to drop off in 15, 20 minutes or so because I got a very early morning, and I just wanted to join. 
I don't think we've ever had anybody on from Israel, right? 
I'm sure we've had callers, but I don't think any of our actual correspondents have been on live from Israel. 
No. 
So that's unique. 
Tell us. 
You know, I've never been, but I know that it can be rather, how shall I say it, confrontational, visiting Israel. 
They ask you all sorts of questions and sometimes interrogate you. 
Did you have to go through that? 
It wasn't too bad at all. 
I mean, I flew in via London, and I'll tell you this. 
I had a much worse time with the security people at Heathrow because you have to deplane and then go through security again before I switch planes to get on to another four-hour flight to Tel Aviv, and that was actually much, much worse. 
In fact, I even made an official complaint about how badly I was treated by the security personnel at Heathrow when I got to Tel Aviv. 
I mean, it was a little bit of an interrogation as I was showing my passport to the border control. 
Apparently, I was supposed to have some other card with me that I was supposed to get, you know, like half a mile earlier in when I was walking from the plane, and I had no idea. 
So they asked me all kinds of questions and said, no, it's not a big deal. 
It's not your fault. 
Don't worry about it. 
You know, and then is this your first time in Israel? 
And I said, yes, it is. 
And I said, well, you know, welcome to Israel. 
And I have to say, it's been an absolute delight to be here. 
I'm here for work, not for pleasure, but it is a pleasure to be here for work. 
And it's been really, really great. 
I've been meeting with lots of tech companies, lots of clients, lots of fellow lawyers, and Tel Aviv is a really awesome, vibrant city. 
And as you can imagine, they've been very attentive to the World Cup over the last couple of days. 
Well, yes, not because of Israel, but probably because of Morocco and the great support that Morocco has in the Arab world, including the Palestinian territories. 
So, yeah, there's quite a bunch of celebration over there for the remarkable achievement that Morocco has achieved this year. 
And there was an update today, but we're not going to get into that in case people haven't seen the game yet. 
So I don't want to give away anything for those people. 
Rob, looks like you have something. 
No, I don't actually. 
I'm not in Israel, and I'm not doing anything that interesting, but I'm just glad to hear that it's really nice over there. 
Very punny, very punny. 
Is this going to be happening all hour? 
That's, yeah. 
Okay, well, you know, on the subject of air travel, I saw this story come by this week that I thought was interesting, and something that we've talked about way in the past. 
Headline being, the TSA, this is from the Washington Post, the TSA now wants to scan your face at security. 
Yeah. 
Next time you're at airport security, get ready to look straight into a camera that TSA wants to analyze your face. 
They've been quietly testing controversial facial recognition technology for passenger screening at 16 major domestic airports from Washington to Los Angeles, and they hope to expand it across the United States as soon as next year. 
Kiosks with cameras are doing a job that used to be completed by humans, which is checking the photos on travelers' IDs to make sure they're not imposters. 
Now, you know, we'd warned about this years ago. 
I don't know if people remember, but the situation was when you enter the country from other places, U.S. citizens were not required to have their picture taken or to look into a camera or anything like that. 
People from other countries, though, were. 
And we were very clear in saying that, you know, one day they're going to try and change that and make it so that U.S. citizens also have to stare into a camera. 
I mean, they're not going to be able to resist this. 
Now, it's not in the same place. 
It's not as you're entering the country. 
It's actually as you are boarding planes with TSA. 
But the idea is certainly the same. 
And what they are basically trying to do is use that facial recognition, the same facial recognition, by the way, that has been banned by cities such as San Francisco. 
They claim it helps improve security, possibly also efficiency. 
I mean, what couldn't improve efficiency with the TSA? 
It's also bringing an unproven tech with civil rights ramifications we still just don't understand to one of the most stressful parts of travel. 
I'm not sure what The Washington Post means by that. 
I think we understand it pretty well, you know, civil rights ramifications, having your picture taken every time you get on an airplane. 
Now, they say they're not going to keep this information. 
They say they're going to purge it after a short period of time. 
But I don't think anybody really believes that. 
Thoughts? 
Yeah, well, facial recognition is it's it's a trivial matter these days to from any picture of somebody's face, just quickly identify them, match it to social media, match it to pictures floating around anywhere. 
So it's it's well and truly the implications to your privacy are there. 
It is not imaginary. 
And yeah, it's I think it was an inevitability once they started doing this for their own citizens, that they would do it for for the citizens of other countries. 
One thing I think. 
Sorry, excuse me. 
Sorry, I hit the wrong button. 
Sorry. 
It's a bad day for me. 
I understand. 
The thing that occurred to me is that as soon as it's deemed a success, how many other things will this be an attractive solution for? 
Right. 
Like it's packaged nicely with all these caveats of, oh, yeah, we'll get rid of this. 
I mean, that's just something easy to say. 
But as you said, not necessarily how it might play out if it becomes profitable, maybe to offload this photo data and stuff. 
And and with what interest would it be over time, like tracking how people's features change? 
I do think that one of the things that you should read in between the lines there also with the way it's described as very accurate, read that it's very accurate for what it's been tuned for, which is, you know, white males and so forth or, you know, a very narrow range. 
And it's deemed successful. 
But, you know, across the board, that's a pretty tall that's a grand claim. 
And there's been examples of how this this type of technology has fallen short, identifying different people of color, et cetera. 
So examples like that should be front of mind when you hear, oh, it's super successful. 
And then, you know, extend out to whatever those error rates will be times however many people are subjected to it. 
And you've got a lot of people that are misidentified or or lost to this system in some way or flagged unnecessarily, causing all kinds of costs and time. 
So the package in the PR is always meant to be appealing. 
But the implementation, the stuff that, you know, deeper than the surface is is where we're we're really needing to get more details and keep on as a story goes. 
Alex, go ahead. 
As usual, I will play a bit of devil's advocate here because but but let me preface it by saying that, look, I don't believe that this is a good idea. 
I think it's of questionable efficiency and efficacy in terms of what it's going to do. 
So but I don't see it as being all that intrusive other, you know, over and above what already happens at borders and airports. 
Anyhow, I mean, you know that if it's if you're traveling on a plane, you're going through some kind of border, you're dealing with TSA. 
They've already got your boarding ticket. 
They've already they already know your destination. 
They already know where you're coming from. 
You're already on CCTV throughout the entire airport, you know, up until the very moment when you get onto that plane. 
And so, I mean, your face is going to be captured one way or another. 
So in in one sense, however, you could say, all right, well, then this is some kind of de minimis privacy intrusion. 
But on the other hand, you could say, well, then what's the point? 
You're already on CCTV throughout an entire airport and can be tracked entirely through it. 
I mean, the other thing to think about as well is any time you go through the Holland Tunnel or enter Manhattan from pay a toll, your photo is being taken by some kind of camera that's being operated by the government. 
It may not be TSA, but it's somebody else. 
So it doesn't sound like a great idea, but relative to everything else that's happening and the massive surveillance dragnet in which we already live, I don't know if it's such a big deal. 
Well, I mean, you can stick a paper bag over your head as you drive through the Holland Tunnel, but they take a dim view of that at the airport. 
I'm just pointing it out. 
Yeah, that's true. 
That's true. 
I guess you need to poke holes for your eyes if you're driving. 
Something like that. 
Yeah. 
Go ahead, Rob, then, Kyle. 
Yeah. 
I think a problem with this is, you know, beyond the personal privacy issues, which I agree, when you're traveling by air, your documents are out there and they're scanned every step of the way anyway. 
But the technology, as we've often talked about in this program, and Kyle, you touched on this, is that the technology isn't great for everyone. 
It doesn't work as well on everybody. 
And when it comes to people being misidentified by this, that's a concern. 
What if you look too much like somebody they're looking for for some reason? 
What if you're from a culture who wears head coverings, face coverings, whatever? 
This has the danger of becoming one of those technical things that the authorities put a bunch of faith in and insist must be correct and haul you away when you're not supposed to be hauled away. 
Again, I would go to my first point that, you know, once it's deemed a success and commercialized, who then is selling it and what kind of controls and what kind of scrutiny and what kind of say does the public have? 
Because when it becomes the assassin app and it's being trained and used by individuals to kill people and they hit the wrong person and then they don't get paid for the job. 
Wait, wait, assassination app? 
Yeah. 
I thought that's where this was going. 
I don't have that. 
Hold on. 
What are you, is it Android or is it? 
It's a Flappy Bird upgrade. 
Oh, okay. 
We'll talk about this after the show. 
But wow. 
Yeah, no, you've raised a good point. 
It's awfully embarrassing when they hit the wrong people. 
They have a reputation to keep. 
They do that quite a bit. 
But, you know, there's one aspect to this story that I don't think anybody really caught. 
I sort of made reference to it, but it slipped by very quickly. 
This is being tested out at 16 major domestic airports. 
Domestic airports. 
We're not talking about international flights. 
We're talking about domestic flights. 
We're not talking about borders. 
We're talking about just waiting in line at the TSA. 
Do you remember a few years ago, not that long ago, you didn't need to have picture ID to take a domestic flight. 
But now not only do you need picture ID to take a domestic flight, but now you're being pressured to have your image scanned and compared and entered into a big database. 
So, yeah, it's changed. 
Things have certainly changed quite a bit. 
And this is a step up from what you might encounter entering a different country. 
This is literally a commuter flight from one place to another being tracked. 
You know, yeah, you're on CCTV, but all of your information isn't on CCTV. 
You know, your driver's license number or the exact time that you were at this particular place, what flight you were on. 
Look, some people are good with that. 
Some people have no problem being tracked everything they do. 
Maybe it helps them keep track of what they were doing. 
But we should at least know when we're being tracked. 
And here's another example of people being tracked and the tracking system expanding. 
Are you guys surprised at all by this? 
Not so much. 
I'm wondering if this is connected to the fact that here in New York we were looking at new requirements for real ID, even when flying domestically, that you would have to show a license that was basically the extended dance remix of a driver's license or state ID. 
And that deadline kept getting pushed forward and forward, and it's just recently been pushed forward again. 
Yeah. 
Yeah. 
Well, the way the system works, basically, you step up to the travel document checker kiosk, stick your ID into a machine, then you look into a camera for up to five seconds, and the machine compares your live photo to the one it sees on your ID. 
They call this a one-to-one verification system, comparing one face to one ID. 
Even though the software is judging if you're an imposter, there's still a human agent there to make the final call, at least for now. 
They say it's pretty accurate. 
They say it doesn't matter if you change your hairstyle. 
But there are certainly concerns. 
Albert Fox Khan is the founder of Surveillance Technology Oversight Project. 
That spells stop, by the way. 
It's really cool. 
I am worried that the TSA will give a green light to technology that is more likely to falsely accuse black and brown and non-binary travelers and other groups that have historically faced more facial recognition errors, speaking to Kyle's point. 
Research has shown facial recognition algorithms can be less accurate at identifying people of color. 
A study published by the Federal National Institute of Science and Technology in 2019 found that Asian and African-American people were up to 100 times more likely to be misidentified than white men, depending on the particular algorithm and type of search. 
So nothing changes, you know. 
The racism just gets digitized, and we have to live with that. 
This is a voluntary system, though. 
This is something that you can opt out of. 
If you are someone who opts out of it, of course, then you have to go through an alternative way of being checked. 
So, yeah, it's another step. 
Yes, Alex? 
I just realized that the point of this was to match it with the idea. 
I'm sorry if I missed that earlier, but given that's the stated purpose of this, I think two comments that I would have. 
Number one, I have less of a problem with it because this is a human function that's already being done whenever you are about to enter the portion of the airport where you need a ticket. 
Somebody looks at your ticket, looks at your ID, looks at your face, tells you to take off your mask, tells you to take off your hat, tries to match your face to the ID. 
And what they're doing is it's essentially making this some kind of automated process. 
It might have errors associated with it because these things aren't perfect, but if it speeds up that process, then I'm all for it. 
Well, let me ask you this. 
Let me ask you a question, Alex. 
You've been to bars, right? 
And you've had to show your ID to get into a bar. 
Are you the type of person that would cry foul if the bartender, not bartender, the bouncer at the door took your license and read it through some kind of card reader? 
Would you have a problem with that? 
Well, okay. 
Most people do have a problem with that. 
I found somebody who doesn't have a problem, but most people say, no, that's where I draw the line. 
You can see my ID, you can prove that I'm over 21, but if you're going to start taking my name and my information and saving it someplace without my knowledge, that is too much. 
Well, you anticipated my on-the-other-hand comment, though. 
So, on the other hand, if the purpose, the stated purpose of this is to match a person with their ID, it is no... 
I'm sorry, you've got to take that, Alex, take that line again. 
You got kind of garbled there. 
Oh, if the stated purpose is to match a face with an ID, then there's absolutely no reason why TSA should be holding on to this data for more than 24 hours, or maybe even less than that. 
And, you know, that's what I would like to see happen. 
If they're going to try to automate a process, they have to do it in a way that really respects the privacy of the citizens here. 
And by destroying that data, we can be assured that it's not going to be misused. 
That's what the original kiosks were like, I believe. 
They just printed it on the receipt, you know? 
And from what I read about how that worked, it just... 
It was on the machine, and then that was it. 
And then they would compare the data with the receipt and then the ID. 
So this is kind of putting the ID against the algorithm, and then they compare it at the end. 
Yeah, I mean, it's... 
It's an evolution. 
Well, the TSA says they're not going to use this facial recognition. 
It may affect Asian people. 
Hang on, you're going to have to take that again, Alex, if you are delayed and garbled. 
Oh, sorry. 
I don't know what's going on here, but in any event, I probably should go to bed soon. 
But, you know, I think there are going to be errors here, and they'll probably fall more on Asian people and brown people. 
But, you know, hopefully that's, you know, this is a technical problem that can be solved by technical solutions. 
If this makes the security lines move a little bit faster, you know, I think it's not a terrible thing. 
But there have to be safeguards built in to protect the privacy of the citizens. 
It's, you know, it's not an altogether crazy thing, in my mind. 
Well, the TSA claims they will not be using this facial recognition for law enforcement purposes. 
So I guess you can breathe a sigh of relief if you believe them. 
They also say they'll minimize holding on to the face data, so they won't be using the scans to build out a new national database of face IDs. 
But, again, do you believe them, or do you believe that they won't lose the data and it will pop up someplace else? 
Well, first, TSA is not a law enforcement agency in the sense that they, you know, investigate crimes and things like that. 
You know, they're airport security, right? 
And maybe they could say they're some sort of executive branch agency. 
That's another argument for another day. 
So TSA can say, sure, we're not going to use this for law enforcement purposes, but they really don't have a say as to whether any other law enforcement agency would want to use that information for law enforcement purposes. 
All it takes is some kind of legal process or a subpoena to be sent to them, and they will have to turn that information over to a law enforcement agency that will use it for law enforcement purposes. 
Yeah, information sharing is established, right, Alex? 
I mean... 
It is. 
I mean, it absolutely can be used for law enforcement purposes. 
And if a face does not match an ID and there is somebody fraudulently trying to enter an airport on somebody else's ID, then I would suspect that law enforcement would be called and they would use that evidence for law enforcement purposes. 
Yeah, can you imagine how that conversation would go? 
There's somebody here traveling on a fake ID. 
They call law enforcement. 
Law enforcement says, let's see the evidence. 
And TSA says, oh, we can't show it to law enforcement. 
No, that's not going to happen. 
Obviously, they're going to share it. 
Yeah, I mean, I can't stand statements like that from federal agencies when, you know, I feel like that's deliberately misleading. 
Well, good on you for, like, for catching that in your legal strategy there, because that is exactly how they fool people, by saying things like that. 
Yeah, it's a little ridiculous. 
Anyway, that's what's going on in the airports. 
We mentioned San Francisco banning facial ID, and, of course, people don't have to do this for domestic flights. 
It is just an option right now. 
I'm sure it'll become mandatory at some point. 
But San Francisco has also banned something else. 
They've banned killer police robots. 
Or at least they've decided that right now it's not a great idea. 
You might have heard a bit of coverage of this over the last few weeks, where it was somebody's bright idea to say, yeah, we're going to have these robots, and we're going to give them the power to kill people if it saves other lives. 
There's no good way of saying that, and obviously the idea of a bunch of robots going around killing people, whether it's their decision or somebody programming them, it's every science fiction nightmare come true, and it just didn't play well. 
So it's an abrupt reversal amid public outcry, quite predictable on all counts. 
San Francisco's Board of Supervisors has temporarily changed its decision to permit the city's police department to kill people with robots. 
That's probably the silliest sentence I've ever read, but it's 100% true. 
There have been more killings at the hands of police than any other year on record nationwide, said District Supervisor Dean Preston in a statement. 
We should be working on ways to decrease the use of force by local law enforcement, not giving them new tools to kill people. 
Yeah, that sounds reasonable. 
Last week, the Board voted 8-3 to approve a slate of policies regarding the San Francisco Police Department's use of military-grade equipment, including using bomb disposal robots to kill people like the Dallas Police did in 2016 with a cornered shooting suspect. 
Initially, the Board did not want to include language allowing the police to kill people with robots, but the San Francisco Police Department really, really wanted it, so they amended the language to explicitly allow it. 
You've got to wonder about these people, you know? 
They had to have that. 
Wow. 
It's not clear precisely why the Board changed its vote over the course of a week. 
Really? 
Really? 
You don't know why they changed their mind in the wake of all this universal bad publicity? 
This story comes from Vice, and I think they know why. 
Public outcry on the local, national, international level has played a major part. 
Yeah, that's exactly what happened. 
The Board's vote was highly criticized by news outlets from around the world and from local privacy and civil rights groups that had already organized around. 
Another Board of Supervisors wrote to permit the San Francisco Police Department to access live video surveillance of private cameras. 
On Monday, the Electronic Frontier Foundation and 44 community groups signed a letter opposing the policy, which argued there is no basis to believe that robots toting explosives might be an exception to police overuse of deadly force. 
Using robots that are designed to disarm bombs to instead deliver them is a perfect example of this pattern of escalation and of the militarization of the police force that concerns so many across the city. 
It concerns so many across the country, because militarization of police forces has become one of the biggest threats to our lives. 
Tanks and armored vehicles and all sorts of weapons. 
And all the mentality that comes with all that. 
You're in Afghanistan or something. 
You're in some kind of a war where the people that you're serving somehow are the enemy. 
And if they make a single motion that you don't like, you can end them. 
No, that's not right. 
That's not what local police are supposed to be. 
And we need to we need to go back on that big time. 
Reassess it. 
Absolutely. 
Re-evaluate priorities with policing wholesale and, you know, bolster what there is. 
But with, you know, intelligence and coordination and resources other than just hardware, dropping it on these places with no culture, no other things to sort of augment change and create a safer community. 
Go ahead, Rob. 
Yeah. 
And above and beyond the issue of should the police be killing people with robots, because I don't think they should. 
I think they kill far too many people with the toys they have. 
They don't need more. 
But also right now, where we are in our technological context, robots still aren't always very good. 
I can't get Alexa to always play the song I want. 
We have robot cars crashing into walls. 
And I don't want to be at the mercy of a police robot that, you know, decides to glitch at some point and go to the killing subroutines. 
Speaking of robots, we're going to talk about Elon Musk in just a moment concerning what's been going on with Twitter. 
But I wanted to ask Alex, I know you have to go pretty soon because it's very, very late over there. 
In traveling, in entering a foreign country, entering Israel in particular, have there been any COVID-19 steps that you had to take or tests that you had to pass? 
Is he asleep? 
He's not moving. 
I think he might be frozen. 
Is that like being asleep or, Alex, wake up. 
He's just there. 
He's got glasses on, so I can't see if he's blinking. 
I think his connection might have froze. 
Okay. 
Can we reestablish the connection? 
I will attempt. 
It shouldn't end like this. 
Okay. 
We're trying to get Alex back. 
I do want to know if there are any COVID-19 restrictions or - is that him? 
That's his picture. 
Okay. 
Well, in any event, let me just say that COVID-19 is still a thing. 
You might not know it from what you hear in the media these days because, you know, it's flu season as well and all kinds of other things are going on. 
It is still something to take seriously. 
If you've gotten your booster, great. 
You're in good shape and you can consider yourself somewhat protected and doing everything that you can to stay safe. 
I'm also proud that WBAI is basically embracing science and logic and encouraging people to get that booster. 
Not enough people have gotten the booster. 
If more people got the booster, there would be less deaths every day, and there are still many, many deaths every day from COVID-19. 
So, please, don't listen to people that tell you otherwise. 
In fact, don't listen to people on the radio who tell you what to do regarding vaccines. 
No, that includes me. 
Don't listen to me. 
Listen to the medical community. 
Listen to the scientific community. 
If you hear somebody on the radio saying that COVID-19 vaccines are hazardous, they're either lying, they're either stupid, or they are just completely wrong. 
So, by all means, investigate, but listen to the people who know what they're talking about. 
I can only advise you to do that. 
I'm not a scientist, and you should not just take my word for it. 
But if you actually pay attention to the people who know what they're talking about, who have devoted their lives to this sort of thing, it's clear. 
And there's just been so much idiocy out there on all sides, too. 
I see this on the left as well as on the right of people saying that it's some kind of conspiracy. 
It's nuts because for it to be a conspiracy, you would have to have the entire world involved. 
I'm not even going to get into that because, you know, like many of these elaborate conspiracy theories, it just boggles the mind how people believe that we could pull something like that off. 
Anybody can. 
And the final thing I'll say about this is that, you know, we get accused of towing the line, of doing what the government tells us to do. 
Look, you can agree with people you don't trust on certain things. 
You can agree that the sky is blue. 
You can agree that the earth is round. 
At least most of us can. 
And if you come to the same conclusion based on the evidence that you have in front of you, it doesn't mean that you're working for them. 
It doesn't mean that you agree with them on anything else. 
It means that you reached a conclusion based on the evidence. 
And that's all we can ask people to do. 
And consider where the evidence you look at comes from. 
And consider the evidence that the people that are disparaging what has been found by experts and health specialists, consider their motives. 
Consider what they're reading and why they're saying what they're saying. 
It's disgusting what I'm saying. 
You know, Elon Musk is one of these people now because did you see what he tweeted a few days ago? 
I assume we're not getting Alex back? 
No, I'm afraid. 
We are not. 
It looks like he's left for the evening. 
I think he hung up on us. 
I think he hung up on us and went to bed. 
That's what I think happened. 
We'll address this next week. 
Basically, Elon Musk said his pronouns are prosecute slash Fauci. 
Now, first of all, you big moron, those aren't pronouns. 
That's not how pronouns work. 
You even understand what a pronoun is. 
You know, before we even get into the ignorance of the statement itself, you prosecute a scientist, somebody who is basically presenting the scientific facts so that people can stay alive. 
And, yeah, it was unpleasant. 
We all know it was unpleasant. 
We're still doing remote shows as a result of COVID-19. 
You think that Dr. 
Fauci is sitting in a corner somewhere rubbing his hands with glee saying, yes, everyone played into my evil plot. 
What exactly is the end game here? 
It makes no sense. 
It's stupid. 
It's ridiculous. 
And it literally is killing people when you make this into something that is an actual talking point. 
So by claiming that somehow every time somebody dies, it's because of the vaccine. 
I've seen this happen. 
I've seen locally where, you know, suicides, you know, of kids are being misreported by people with an agenda to say, oh, it's because of the vaccine. 
And it's disgusting. 
It is absolutely disgusting. 
I think died suddenly is a trending topic on Twitter right now. 
And when you click on that, you just get all these stories. 
And that's what they are. 
They're fables of people who have died because they were vaccinated, not because of the actual reason they died. 
And what that does, it sows mistrust and makes people not get the booster or the vaccine. 
And then you have more sickness, more death. 
And for what purpose? 
Why are we doing this? 
Why is this happening? 
Yeah. 
What do you get when you prosecute Fauci? 
What exactly is the atonement? 
What will he atone for? 
What will that fix? 
It's a political strike, you know, because someone prosecuted Trump. 
Now you've got to prosecute the other people, even though the other people were making sense. 
Alex, are you back? 
Well, it looks like he's frozen again. 
He's there. 
And you want to ask him? 
Well, I wanted to ask you a while ago. 
I think we woke him up. 
We went into a tirade here about COVID-19 steps that you had to take to get into Israel. 
Oh, I didn't have to take any COVID-19 steps to get into Israel. 
And I'm back. 
I lost connectivity there for a bit. 
It's okay. 
I went on a tirade, and now I've returned from it. 
So I guess, you know, unless you have something to add to that particular subject, you can say your goodnights at this point. 
Yeah. 
That's basically what I wanted to come back on and say, because it is time for me to go to bed. 
I have to be up in a couple of hours. 
And if you have anything to say about Elon Musk, this is the time to say it. 
Oh, I... 
And we're on radio. 
Just remember, we're on radio, so there's a bunch of words you can't use. 
There aren't enough hours before I have my first meeting to get off my chest what I would like to say about Elon Musk. 
But Twitter is just this dumpster fire. 
The COVID issues that you brought up are a perfect example of this logical fallacy, post hoc, ergo proctor hoc. 
You know, after something, therefore, an account of it. 
Just because somebody had the vaccine and then became ill doesn't mean it was because of the vaccine. 
It's a mistake of causation. 
It's lunacy. 
It's idiocy. 
And I will leave you guys with that. 
I can't wait to see you and get back to New York next week. 
So, as we say in Tel Aviv, I will just say to everybody, Lila Tov. 
Okay. 
We assume that's what people do say over there. 
Bring us back something. 
Take a picture of a pay phone or whatever. 
I don't know what that means. 
You got it. 
Can you say shalom? 
Yeah, shalom. 
That's a greeting and a goodbye. 
I think that works. 
Yeah. 
That's it. 
Shalom. 
Yep. 
And Lila Tov is goodnight. 
So, goodnight everybody from Tel Aviv. 
I'll see you all next week. 
All right. 
I think. 
And goodnight to Alex there. 
Now, moving on to what's been happening over at Twitter. 
Yeah. 
From this NPR story, Elon Musk is using the Twitter files to discredit foes and push conspiracy theories. 
Pulling back the curtain, is what he says, on how the social network has handled high-profile content moderation decisions. 
Including banning then-president Donald Trump after his supporters attacked the Capitol on January 6th. 
Uh, so basically, um, what he has been doing is releasing internal documents to a hand-picked group of quote-unquote journalists who are digging through them and posting excerpts on Twitter. 
Um, Musk and his allies promote these tweet threads, dubbed the Twitter files, as bombshell revelations proving that Twitter intentionally muzzled conservatives because of their political views. 
You know, it's, it's funny. 
It's like he wasn't paying attention. 
You know, uh, uh, Trump basically led the, um, uh, the invasion of the Capitol on January 6th. 
And shortly afterwards, he was thrown off of Twitter. 
And the big reveal here is that they intentionally threw him off Twitter. 
Yeah, it was intentional. 
And it was for a good reason. 
And now Elon Musk has invited him right back on. 
Um, it's, it's, it's absolutely awful. 
And, um, you know, we're seeing the, the, um, we're seeing the change already. 
We're seeing a rise in hate speech. 
We're seeing a rise in harassment. 
We're seeing a rise in overall ignorance. 
Um, and, and, you know, I saw these, uh, these Twitter files going around a couple of weeks ago. 
Um, as I mentioned, he gave, uh, exclusive access to a small group of independent journalists, uh, including, uh, Matt Taibbi of, uh, Rolling Stone, Barry Weiss, former New York Times opinion columnist. 
Um, they're not sharing it. 
They're not sharing the documents. 
They're posting, they're, they're posting select things, but, uh, you can't look at them yourself. 
And also what they are posting is highly misleading. 
And I'm really surprised anyone would call themselves a journalist and do something like this. 
For instance, saying that, um, uh, Joe Biden was trying to get things taken off the, um, um, uh, taken off Twitter. 
Uh, yeah, that's accurate. 
It makes it sound a whole lot more evil, but they don't mention that it was pornographic material, you know, involving his son. 
Little details like that. 
Just, it's, it's, it's, it's put out there to get a desired effect. 
So you can twist words and, and, and post selected examples of something to make it seem like the conclusion you've already reached is happening. 
The way to actually do this, let's look at all the documentation. 
Let's decide for ourselves. 
Let's see what was going on there. 
I, so far from what I've heard, many, many different reporters, there's no real story here. 
You know, and on Fox, of course, you'll see the headline being that mass media is ignoring the story. 
No, there's not much of a story. 
That's why you're not seeing it in the mass media. 
This is what they call a nothing burger. 
So I don't know. 
Rob, any, any thoughts? 
I don't know. 
I mean, it's, uh, it's really been amazing watching him take this, uh, this turn and, uh, do it all under the name of like, oh, free speech. 
We want free speech on this platform. 
Um, while he's still suspending things, which are inconvenient for him, there was a bot account that, uh, tweeted where his, uh, private planes were taking off and landing from. 
Um, and, uh, long ago, he, he sort of shook his head and said, well, I guess they're allowed to do that. 
And, um, only recently he, uh, he suspended that account. 
Um, they moved to Mastodon. 
Um, and it's, it's just been, it's just been amazing watching him basically go full nutcase and, um, side with the people who are spreading, uh, all sorts of, uh, conspiracy theories and all sorts of misinformation. 
Um, Twitter, uh, since the end of last month has stopped enforcing its policy against COVID misinformation, um, under Elon Musk. 
So, you know, that's, that, that's fun. 
Um, he's, he's basically running it, running it into the ground, I think, from my point of view, as someone who has enjoyed Twitter for a long time, has, uh, counted it as, I've counted it as, like, a main part of my social media for a long time. 
Um, and, uh, it's pretty much everything that I liked about the site, um, is, is taking a turn for the crappy. 
And it, it's by direct result of decisions he's making. 
You know, there's a really naive way you can look at the concept of free speech. 
You know, um, obviously there are, uh, things that if you say and if you spread can cause tremendous harm. 
And that's why you're seeing, uh, outlets like Facebook and formerly Twitter, uh, do content moderation to a degree so that if somebody said something that is liable to cause massive harm, they put a restriction on there. 
And, and I supported that when that happened because it was based on actual facts. 
And, you know, it, it, it doesn't take away your right to say something, but a company can say, yeah, you're not going to say it here on our private servers because we do run them. 
Also, if you say something that is, um, uh, false and, and leads to all kinds of bad things, yeah, you have the right to say it. 
But, um, society has the right to act against that, you know, consequences for your actions, for saying things that aren't true, for, for causing a panic, for spreading lies, for defaming innocent people. 
I think it's called slander. 
Yeah. 
All sorts of things like that. 
So, yeah, you know, you could say all, all speech should be allowed. 
Everybody should say all, all thoughts are equal. 
First of all, they're not. 
There's ignorant people and there's informed people. 
And when you treat them all with the same amount of, um, of access and, and, uh, everybody hears everybody, there's a huge signal to noise ratio that you're going to be dealing with. 
And, uh, it's just naive to say that, um, it's all going to sort itself out. 
No, it never does. 
Yes, Rob. 
Absolutely. 
Um, Gila, actually, there's an expression that, uh, she taught me, um, which is that your right to swing your fist ends at my face. 
Like you, you can't just haul off and punch somebody. 
You can swing your arms around all you like, but the instant you're doing direct harm to someone, uh, you've, you've, you've, uh, transgressed past the point of your rights. 
Can I say, in my case, I say four inches from my face. 
I don't want to swing their fist four inches from my face either. 
So, yeah, I'm claiming that territory. 
Just territorial space. 
Uh-huh. 
I'll remember that next time we get to hang out in person. 
So, uh, yeah, please. 
It's a problem. 
It really is. 
Uh, so, um, Jack Dorsey, a former, uh, CEO of Twitter, um, has, has weighed in on all this. 
Um, he, um, he basically said the company made errors in how it approached content moderation, which, yeah, I think we all can agree they made errors. 
He said, I continue to believe there was no ill intent or hidden agendas, and everyone acted according to the best information we had at the time. 
Of course, mistakes were made. 
He said, though, he wished these internal files that are being spread around now had been released WikiLeaks-style. 
I'm sorry, I misspoke. 
The internal files are not being spread around. 
The, um, hand-picked, uh, reporters, uh, their interpretation of them is what's being spread around. 
Um, so it's, it's, it's like, you know, it's like Pravda or something like that. 
It's like screen grabs and shit. 
Yeah, and, and without context, it's, it's meaningless. 
But he says he wished they had been released WikiLeaks-style, with many more eyes and interpretations to consider. 
There's nothing to hide, only a lot to learn from. 
And boy, I sure wish Jack Dorsey was running the show, because, uh, he at least has a clue. 
You know? 
And what we're seeing right now is just, it's awful. 
It's terrible. 
It's mayhem. 
It's, um, it's just bad. 
And it's not like, you know, all the conspiracy theory people didn't have a place to go already. 
There's all, you know, the flavor of the week with the Trump social media sites. 
You know, Truth Social or whatever the other ones were. 
But now it's all a big mess. 
But I do, you know, I have to take exception, Rob, to all the people who are fleeing to Mastodon. 
I mean, it's great to have Mastodon. 
Um, but I think leaving when things get bad, that's what we, um, um, we criticize people who leave the country when things got bad, you know, for doing. 
I think we have to stay and fight. 
I think we have to basically challenge everything. 
I think we have to make it as difficult as possible for this particular environment to, um, uh, turn into the cesspool that apparently Elon Musk wants. 
Yeah, I want their reporting system just glowing red, like molten red, like with, with, uh, people's, uh, uh, commitment to, to flagging stuff that bugs them. 
I mean, it's just such a waste of drive space and energy to allow half this stuff. 
The discourse doesn't get any better. 
Definitely, you know, set up a Mastodon account somewhere. 
It is a high learning curve, but, um, you know, I think if we help people and, and that's, I mentioned this before. 
It's disturbing when, when, uh, uh, people talk down to those who don't get it right away. 
Not everyone's going to get it right away. 
And when you do that, you drive them away, period, and they don't come back. 
So if, if Mastodon is the thing that people are going to be using, let's make it easy. 
Let's make it welcoming. 
And, uh, let's, um, let's, let's, you know, try it out. 
Let's, um, try and break it and see what happens and make it better. 
Go ahead, Rob. 
Absolutely. 
There's, there's been a lot of discourse about this very thing is, as you might imagine on Mastodon and on Twitter, where, uh, you know, is, are you, are you sort of letting the side down if you leave Twitter? 
Um, and I think, uh, there is no easy answer to that. 
There's no answer that applies to everybody. 
So, uh, there, there's been a lot of, uh, sort of people getting, uh, all excited about it and people, uh, sort of talking down to other people for leaving or for not leaving. 
And, uh, we all have to make our own decisions with this. 
And I personally think as long as some of it, uh, starts being, you know, it continues to be fun enough to, um, still use, continues to be useful. 
Um, there's value in staying, but also if it puts you in a position where you're put at increased risk, um, because there's been so much more, uh, uh, homophobia, transphobia, anti-Semitism, racism, um, all people of all sorts of marginalized groups are finding themselves much less welcome on the platform than they have been. 
And if your, if your Twitter experience is, you know, more misery than it is fun, I think there's no shame in going. 
No, of course not. 
Yeah. 
Look out for yourself. 
But if, if you want to fight, you know, or if you want to bring other people in to fight for, for justice, by all means, don't be intimidated into not doing that. 
If, if you're up for the fight, because I, I, I do believe challenging these things is the answer. 
I think Rob's latter point is totally like the preponderance of, of, uh, the risk. 
I mean, it's a really, it's a serious calculation because it's becoming outright dangerous to be yourself there. 
Um, and, and we'll probably not get better. 
So, but I do believe in what you're saying that knowing the risks, people should be all in and, you know, be someone else in, yeah, create a persona, be that person. 
You don't have to give you real information anyway, reserve the right to confuse service, but have that, have that fictitious persona fight for the things you believe in as well. 
And, uh, who knows, they may become an influencer on Twitter, which is everyone's dream. 
Wow. 
Um, all right. 
We're in our last minute here. 
I, I, I, on the subject of a Macedon, I understand our, our Macedon account was suspended. 
Do we know why that happened? 
Uh, we're looking into it. 
Uh, we are a hacker radio show at Macedon dot social and, uh, the admins over there seem to have, uh, hidden our account. 
And, uh, so we're looking into why that is, this is exactly it. 
You know, things like this will happen no matter where you go, but, uh, okay, well, we're going to make it public when it does. 
So it was a Macedon dot social. 
That's, that's that one. 
Okay. 
So those folks, whoever they are, and, and, you know, not that these people are jerks, but what's to stop jerks from running a Macedon instance and causing all kinds of problems for their users. 
What, how does the, how does the community fight back against that? 
Cause it will happen at some point. 
But the joy of Macedon versus Twitter is if, if you come up against admins who are behaving unfairly, you could always go to another instance. 
Your experience of Macedon as a greater thing, um, is not beholden to the attitude of just one person as, uh, Twitter is now. 
All right. 
Well, please remind them that, uh, they're no match for our Sysops. 
Sysops? 
That's how you say it? 
I mean, Sysops. 
No, you said Sysops. 
I mean, admin, admin, admin. 
Wow. 
I thought I knew you. 
No, man. 
Sysops. 
Oh boy. 
We're going to talk after the show. 
No, no. 
Honest. 
I can't. 
No, it was a. 
It's been said, Kyle. 
It's been said. 
All right. 
We are out of time. 
Please write to us. 
O-T-H at 2600.com. 
We'd love to hear from you. 
Again, no overtime this week because we are on deadline, but next week, hopefully, and next week we'll be back for another exciting edition of Off the Hook here on WBAI. 
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