Facebook's New Censorship "War Room"

Today The New York Times features another "The Russians Stole My Election!" wrap-up. The "newspaper of record" does these about every other month, if not monthly. The ruling elite are absolutely committed to this neo-McCarthyite narrative. The message is clear: We're back to the Cold War, and, absent a political revolution in the United States, it'll be with us for the rest of our lives.

Accompanying "The Russians Stole My Election!" piece is a laughable story ("Inside Facebook’s Election ‘War Room’" by Sheera Frenkel and Mike Ives) about the new election war room being constructed at Facebook's Menlo Park headquarters.

The key passage -- the one most highlighted in the comments section appended to the story -- is as follows:

Already, foreign operatives have evolved their online influence campaigns to skirt the measures Facebook has put in place ahead of the midterms, said Priscilla Moriuchi, director of strategic threat development at the cybersecurity firm Recorded Future.

“If you look at the way that foreign influence operations have changed these last two years, their focus isn’t really on propagating fake news anymore,” Ms. Moriuchi said. “It’s on augmenting stories already out there which speak to hyperpartisan audiences.”

In other words, "fake news" is not the concern, communication itself is. Filtering of communication is the goal, which is going to be a problem because the tech giants have monetized communication. The more clicks the better. The more divisive the more clicks.

The whole neo-McCarthyite narrative is like slapping a 1950s Red Menace comic book horror story over our postmodern neoliberal reality. It's a perversion, a monstrosity. A horrible price will no doubt be paid.