After Musk’s blockbuster deal to buy Twitter, the next obvious question was “What happens next?” Was Musk going to come in and completely clean house, kicking out all the woke staffers and leftwing leadership? Or was he going to take a more hands-off approach to the transition, allowing some of the worst offenders to remain in their roles? I think we are starting to get an answer to that.
In the last 24 hours, Musk has offered criticism of Vijaya Gadde, who is currently the top lawyer and head of the content moderation division at Twitter. She was responsible for not only banning Donald Trump but also censoring the Hunter Biden laptop story. She also responded less than maturely to Musk’s takeover.
Now, in a move that intertwines multiple big stories, Musk has also responded to the fact that Russian collusion hoaxer Jim Baker, former FBI and now at Twitter, set up the meeting that Michael Sussmann used to spread the false Alfa Bank story. Sussmann is now under indictment via the John Durham special counsel.
Here are both those exchanges brought to you by a “journalist” from The Washington Post who apparently finds it really bad that Musk would call out obvious corruption regarding Twitter employees.
Elon Musk has now publicly agreed with and amplified criticisms from the right of two individual Twitter employees today— one accusing its top policy exec of “censorship” and the other accusing a company lawyer of facilitating fraud. pic.twitter.com/NNWyNj03pB
— Will Oremus (@WillOremus) April 27, 2022
Can I start by noting that the double standard in response to Musk calling out bad actors is just amazing? These are the same journos who cheered on the doxxing of Libs of TikTok. They didn’t once suggest that Taylor Lorenz had gone too far nor did they express concern about the online harassment Libs of TikTok received. Yet, the moment that Musk simply says “Yes, bad things are bad,” the same journos get really concerned about online harassment. Weird, right? It’s almost as if journalists only care about things that reinforce their political viewpoints.
Regardless, I think Musk responding to both those stories is important. It points to big changes coming at Twitter. Some on the right who are more cynical speculated that he’d come in and maintain the status quo. If that were true, he wouldn’t be publicly calling out figures like Gadde and Baker, both of whom currently hold major leadership roles within the company.
Clearly, Musk didn’t spend $44 billion to let Twitter keep operating as a leftwing mouthpiece, banning speech that doesn’t fit the narrative. And while he’s not officially in charge yet, when the keys are handed over, you can expect him to burn the place down in regards to personnel. Jim Baker absolutely has to go. Vijaya Gadde, the brains behind Twitter’s censorship, has to go.
Yes, there will be pushback and hair set on fire, mostly from the mainstream media. But seeing Musk’s recent comments has given me confidence he can handle it. The left knows that it is losing. They feel their grip on power slipping away, both electorally and in regards to free speech. Musk is just the man to keep that train rolling.
Story cited here.
