BIG TECH or BIG BROTHER?? 1984 to Become Reality ??

[Dan Warnick + 6,100]

"Our former liberators now want to be our masters."  A VERY interesting perspective.  Have they always had these plans?  Is it a "conspiracy theory"?  Well?

 

Edited January 11, 2021 by Dan Warnick

[Tom Nolan + 2,441]

Germany And France 'Shocked' Over Twitter Decision To Ban Trump

Jan 11

https://www.zerohedge.com/political/germany-and-france-shocked-over-twitter-decision-ban-trump

Germany and France are shocked over Twitter's decision to permanently ban President Trump from the platform, with German Chancellor Angela Merkel saying through a spokesman that lawmakers should set rules governing free speech, not private technology companies.

"The chancellor sees the complete closing down of the account of an elected president as problematic," said chief spokesman Steffen Siebert during a Berlin press conference, according to Bloomberg. Siebert added that rights like freedom of speech "can be interfered with, but by law and within the framework defined by the legislature -- not according to a corporate decision."

Meanwhile, French leaders are similarly outraged - with Junior Minister for European Union Affairs, Clement Beaune, saying he was "shocked" that a private company made such an important decision.

"This should be decided by citizens, not by a CEO," Beaune told Bloomberg TV in a Monday interview, adding "There needs to be public regulation of big online platforms."

Earlier, French Finance Minister Bruno Le Maire, said that the state should be responsible for regulations, not "the digital oligarchy," adding that big tech is "one of the threats" to democracy.

Europe is increasingly pushing back against the growing influence of big technology companies. The EU is currently in the process of setting up regulation that could give the bloc power to split up platforms if they don’t comply with rules.

Twitter permanently banned Trump last week after it decided the outgoing president’s tweets breached its rules against gloriyfing violence. It cited his posts on the riots in the U.S. capital.

The move followed similar action by Facebook. Founder and Chief Executive Officer Mark Zuckerberg said Trump’s most recent posts showed he intended to use his remaining time in office to undermine a peaceful and lawful transition of power. -Bloomberg

And as journalist Glenn Greenwald pointed out on Sunday, when competing companies such as Parler can be struck down by a big tech giant like Amazon, there really is no other way to describe it as a monopoly.

 

Edited January 11, 2021 by Tom Nolan

[Tom Nolan + 2,441]

Facebook Is Purging All Content Mentioning "Stop The Steal"

https://www.zerohedge.com/markets/facebook-bans-all-content-mentioning-stop-steal

 

[Dan Warnick + 6,100]

1 hour ago, Tom Nolan said:

Germany And France 'Shocked' Over Twitter Decision To Ban Trump

Jan 11

https://www.zerohedge.com/political/germany-and-france-shocked-over-twitter-decision-ban-trump

Germany and France are shocked over Twitter's decision to permanently ban President Trump from the platform, with German Chancellor Angela Merkel saying through a spokesman that lawmakers should set rules governing free speech, not private technology companies.

"The chancellor sees the complete closing down of the account of an elected president as problematic," said chief spokesman Steffen Siebert during a Berlin press conference, according to Bloomberg. Siebert added that rights like freedom of speech "can be interfered with, but by law and within the framework defined by the legislature -- not according to a corporate decision."

Meanwhile, French leaders are similarly outraged - with Junior Minister for European Union Affairs, Clement Beaune, saying he was "shocked" that a private company made such an important decision.

"This should be decided by citizens, not by a CEO," Beaune told Bloomberg TV in a Monday interview, adding "There needs to be public regulation of big online platforms."

Earlier, French Finance Minister Bruno Le Maire, said that the state should be responsible for regulations, not "the digital oligarchy," adding that big tech is "one of the threats" to democracy.

Europe is increasingly pushing back against the growing influence of big technology companies. The EU is currently in the process of setting up regulation that could give the bloc power to split up platforms if they don’t comply with rules.

Twitter permanently banned Trump last week after it decided the outgoing president’s tweets breached its rules against gloriyfing violence. It cited his posts on the riots in the U.S. capital.

The move followed similar action by Facebook. Founder and Chief Executive Officer Mark Zuckerberg said Trump’s most recent posts showed he intended to use his remaining time in office to undermine a peaceful and lawful transition of power. -Bloomberg

And as journalist Glenn Greenwald pointed out on Sunday, when competing companies such as Parler can be struck down by a big tech giant like Amazon, there really is no other way to describe it as a monopoly.

 

Give credit where it is due: Europe has led the way in reigning in Big Tech, as much as and when possible anyway.

[Eyes Wide Open + 3,539]

It has arrived as we speak, many time i have mentioned i monitor the left news network to watch the messaging going out to the public. I can assure you they have abandoned any sense of normalities,franky it is by far worse than what is seen on this forum. They want Trump silenced and his supporters are going to be villified as well. Actually listing republicans who supported Trump during his admin and there calling for their heads...

[Ward Smith + 6,615]

This should surprise none of you. From a leftist site 

Quote

 

"The important thing to note is that,-unlike Nazi Germany where the Nazis were able to use government powers to take over all news organizations in Germany and basically turn every source of information into a Party mouthpiece-the US has robust free speech and private property protection laws that kept the propaganda machine limited to the existing Conservative bubble, rather than allowing it to be forcibly extended over the entire nation.

This entire episode has been both a huge flashing sign of the dangers of free speech, and the greatest argument in favor of it."

Mental jujitsu of what passes for the brain of a leftist. When they send you to the "reeducation camps" it will surely be for your own good! Nothing more fascist than antifa, and I've been saying that for every year of their existence

[0R0 + 6,251]

We should start with the understanding that FB Twitter Google and Amazon all had long periods of losses that inexplicably didn't matter. They were supported during this weak performance period by the CIA that saw them as easy ways to spy on everyone and review their relationships to each other with the people putting up their own lives online. FB and Twitter to collect personal info. Google to track what people are thinking and are interested in, and social movements that might threaten CIA clients. Amazon to track people's purchases and further eradicate surviving small retail that had  overcome Walmart by specialization. . 

The CIA has always been an external operation to the US government operating for private client groups that we call "the cabal" these days. The dirty little secret of monopolies is that it requires government to make them survive. It also requires a Kairetsu style bank centered industrial group of businesses to fund indefinite losses while they take over an industry and buy out competitors. It had so impressed China that it structured the entire country that way. 

The current "left" is obviously a nonsensical dead end of self defeating ideologies intended to force people apart by race and class by industry even geography, It was an invention of the CIA derived out of Marxism and intended to destroy American society since they first introduced these into universities when the Marxists of FDR's time were discredited by the revelation of what the Soviet system was like after WWII. As they needed something else to pry the US apart. It took hold in the 1960s, as you can see in the Duchovney TV series Aquarius in the outpouring of nonsense from Manson. It is the core of what passes for ideology of the left. 

Anyway, the current circumstance is that the technology companies do most of their business outside the US and rely on China sourcing to provide 1/3 or more of their product and of their market. Apple is uniquely China dependent, Amazon a close second, and FB Goog and the media rely on China for advertising revenue and business volumes off of which they can take a hefty cut (e.g. AAPL app store). On top of this dependency, is the fact that China had infiltrated the workforces of these companies, which are largely not American born.

That said, the real power is actually in the infrastructure. If there is one thing I would separate out in an antitrust action would be to peel content off of infrastructure companies. AWS off of Amazon, Azure off of MSFT, TV and cable channels off of the cable providers (Comcast, ATT), and a splintering of the media empires. .  

[JoMack + 547]

Should we actually be surprised that Big Tech and Big Business support the left and the Democrats when the left and the Democrats bow to them and give them the atta boys!   They go after 50% of the country and the other 50% can applaud, but soon Big Business may not tolerate them.  So when Biden and his leftwing policies don't abide by the Dorsey, Zuckerberg, Diamond gang ideals, what then?   I censored Twitter and FB a long time ago, and yesterday cancelled Amazon and everything associated with it.  Will it make a difference?  Who knows, but I do believe that is the only censorship they'll understand and I'm sure I'm not alone.  

You can only hope if Biden stays in office over the next 2 years (unless Pelosi's impeachment/25th Amendment train turns on him) that the Democrats won't hold together long enough to start pushing their crushing policies against energy (open borders, JCPOA, Cap tax, etc).   Then, hopefully, we will have a free and fair election in 2022 and the Republicans will overwhelm the House and throw Pelosi in jail.  

[Dan Warnick + 6,100]

2 minutes ago, JoMack said:

Then, hopefully, we will have a free and fair election in 2022 and the Republicans will overwhelm the House and throw Pelosi in jail.

Careful, @JoMack.  Those words are more than Donald Trump used the day of the Capitol mess, and look where its gotten him.

I'm only half joking.  That's where we are, apparently. 

 

[Boat + 1,315]

8 hours ago, 0R0 said:

We should start with the understanding that FB Twitter Google and Amazon all had long periods of losses that inexplicably didn't matter. They were supported during this weak performance period by the CIA that saw them as easy ways to spy on everyone and review their relationships to each other with the people putting up their own lives online. FB and Twitter to collect personal info. Google to track what people are thinking and are interested in, and social movements that might threaten CIA clients. Amazon to track people's purchases and further eradicate surviving small retail that had  overcome Walmart by specialization. . 

The CIA has always been an external operation to the US government operating for private client groups that we call "the cabal" these days. The dirty little secret of monopolies is that it requires government to make them survive. It also requires a Kairetsu style bank centered industrial group of businesses to fund indefinite losses while they take over an industry and buy out competitors. It had so impressed China that it structured the entire country that way. 

The current "left" is obviously a nonsensical dead end of self defeating ideologies intended to force people apart by race and class by industry even geography, It was an invention of the CIA derived out of Marxism and intended to destroy American society since they first introduced these into universities when the Marxists of FDR's time were discredited by the revelation of what the Soviet system was like after WWII. As they needed something else to pry the US apart. It took hold in the 1960s, as you can see in the Duchovney TV series Aquarius in the outpouring of nonsense from Manson. It is the core of what passes for ideology of the left. 

Anyway, the current circumstance is that the technology companies do most of their business outside the US and rely on China sourcing to provide 1/3 or more of their product and of their market. Apple is uniquely China dependent, Amazon a close second, and FB Goog and the media rely on China for advertising revenue and business volumes off of which they can take a hefty cut (e.g. AAPL app store). On top of this dependency, is the fact that China had infiltrated the workforces of these companies, which are largely not American born.

That said, the real power is actually in the infrastructure. If there is one thing I would separate out in an antitrust action would be to peel content off of infrastructure companies. AWS off of Amazon, Azure off of MSFT, TV and cable channels off of the cable providers (Comcast, ATT), and a splintering of the media empires. .  

In the meantime these companies thrive and pack on more profits due to tax breaks from Trump and Republicans. Meanwhile the cost of Trump politics along with deficits drive national debt. The historical debt charts will not be kind.

Let’s throw in new protections to these huge companies playing a bigger role in financing politics by the SCOTUS. Pushed by Trump and Republicans of course. 
 

It should be Congress setting free speech legislation. As one Republican period of rule comes to an end all I hear is complaints instead of debates over new legislation. To much golf perhaps? 

Edited January 12, 2021 by Boat

[Boat + 1,315]

35 minutes ago, JoMack said:

Should we actually be surprised that Big Tech and Big Business support the left and the Democrats when the left and the Democrats bow to them and give them the atta boys!   They go after 50% of the country and the other 50% can applaud, but soon Big Business may not tolerate them.  So when Biden and his leftwing policies don't abide by the Dorsey, Zuckerberg, Diamond gang ideals, what then?   I censored Twitter and FB a long time ago, and yesterday cancelled Amazon and everything associated with it.  Will it make a difference?  Who knows, but I do believe that is the only censorship they'll understand and I'm sure I'm not alone.  

You can only hope if Biden stays in office over the next 2 years (unless Pelosi's impeachment/25th Amendment train turns on him) that the Democrats won't hold together long enough to start pushing their crushing policies against energy (open borders, JCPOA, Cap tax, etc).   Then, hopefully, we will have a free and fair election in 2022 and the Republicans will overwhelm the House and throw Pelosi in jail.  

So you haven’t heard of wind power in Texas, Kansas, Oklahoma etc which will enjoy strong growth with Biden. Go red wind! 
Even Tesla is going red in Texas with another huge plant making pickups and semis. Go red electric vehicles. Subsidies by Biden for the rich.

[Ward Smith + 6,615]

[Dan Warnick + 6,100]

In case any of you guys missed it, @Tomasz posted the following comment on another thread, and it is extremely well worth getting into.  Thanks @Tomasz.

In Tomasz's comment is a link to a book, which I have since started reading, that shows how virtually all of our current day Big Tech firms were sprung out of the development of the ARPA, now called DARPA, explicitely to not only track us, but to control our behaviours.  You can go look at the book on Amazon, click on its cover and read the first part of the book without having to buy it, and you will I think have a very eye opening experience that leads all the way up to and including this election, if that is what we can call it.  Here is that link in case you can't be bothered to go look at Tomasz's comment:

https://www.amazon.com/Surveillance-Valley-Military-History-Internet/dp/1610398025

Thanks again, @Tomasz

[JoMack + 547]

2 hours ago, Boat said:

So you haven’t heard of wind power in Texas, Kansas, Oklahoma etc which will enjoy strong growth with Biden. Go red wind! 
Even Tesla is going red in Texas with another huge plant making pickups and semis. Go red electric vehicles. Subsidies by Biden for the rich.

Supporters of wind say "cats kill more birds than windmills"!  The birds migrating through wind farms that get torn apart or scorched to death  ain't the sparrows and robins in your yard!  So, get those windmill blades rotating madly and building them for miles and miles across our fruited plains with hundreds of thousands of photo-voltaic cells panels spreading as far as the eye can see and let's see how they impact wildlife and agriculture?  Will your lights stay on?  Can you drive your car?  Fly in a plane?  And when all is said and done, what are you gonna do with all the crap that doesn't work anymore?   Build huge dumps for broken blades, cells, silicon leaching into the water supply.  Like Big Tech, Big Green will not be what you expect it to be when all is said and done.

[Ward Smith + 6,615]

I'll just leave this here. Only people with an IQ over room temperature will get the joke. The rest are the joke

[turbguy + 1,397]

Is "incorrect information" still "information"?  Or is it something else?

"For your information, the planet is flat".

Some antonyms for information:

IGNORANCE

FOOLISHNESS

TRASH

CLAPTRAP

CORRUPT

INSANITY

FANTISY

RUBBISH

& lots more.

 

[Eyes Wide Open + 3,539]

3 minutes ago, turbguy said:

Is "incorrect information" still "information"?  Or is it something else?

"For your information, the planet is flat".

Some antonyms for information:

IGNORANCE

FOOLISHNESS

TRASH

CLAPTRAP

CORRUPT

INSANITY

FANTISY

RUBBISH

& lots more.

 

Netherlands on brink of ‘civil war’ as rioters strike again over COVID-19 curfew

https://nypost.com/2021/01/26/netherlands-rioters-take-to-streets-over-covid-19-curfew/

[turbguy + 1,397]

14 minutes ago, Eyes Wide Open said:

Netherlands on brink of ‘civil war’ as rioters strike again over COVID-19 curfew

https://nypost.com/2021/01/26/netherlands-rioters-take-to-streets-over-covid-19-curfew/

"Some people can't handle the truth".

 

[Dan Warnick + 6,100]

5 hours ago, turbguy said:

"Some people can't handle the truth".

 

When all credibility has been lost, questions into what our elected officials are sharing as truth are to be expected, even protested about.

[turbguy + 1,397]

14 hours ago, Dan Warnick said:

When all credibility has been lost, questions into what our elected officials are sharing as truth are to be expected, even protested about.

True.  Ask if "all credibility" been lost. 

Unfortunately, there is a rather large fraction of the population that never trusted anything "our elected officials" share.  Even if what is shared is firmly supported by demonstrable facts and peer-reviewed science.  Sometimes even "common sense" (whatever that is).  That fraction would rather think in twisted means, devising (or beleiving) alternative theories that might support some deeply held frustration with their condition.  With the simultaneity of a global pandemic overlaying these beliefs, personal frustration unavoidably increases.

"You either have what you want, or you have the the reasons why you don't".

For instance, I personally have absolutely no doubt that solar and wind generation are cheaper per MWh that fossil fueled generation, simply because they are NOT heat engines.  Then others will bring the counter-arguments concerning "non-recycleability", or intermittency, or the dilute nature of the capture.  Those are all engineering issues, that also arise with conventional generation. All while zero-fuel alternative costs CONTINUE to plummet!  Am I wrong?  Possibly, but my own life experience tells me otherwise.

Will oil or gas go away?  Absolutely not!  FAR too many current products require those resources.  Will steam coal eventually go away?  More than likely, yes.  Will nuclear fusion ever become practical?  Don't hold your breath...

Did the automobile ever replace the horse?  It displaced the horse for a host of applications, and not ALL applications. The automobile had FAR greater impact on the growth (and emergence of new applications) of our economy in other sectors, and actually the health of the entire population.  And we still have PLENTY of horses and vets, just fewer buggies and whips (not ZERO, just fewer).

The extractive industries will have to "adjust" to change, rather than drag feet, complaining into the future about "lost jobs", lost investments, and an impractical future.  There is nothing more powerful that idea who's time has come.

Edited January 27, 2021 by turbguy

[surrept33 + 609]

On 1/12/2021 at 3:56 PM, Ward Smith said:

I'll just leave this here. Only people with an IQ over room temperature will get the joke. The rest are the joke

Internet *physical layer* censorship has been used by lots of governments (keep in mind Trump would have likely banned TikTok if there wasn't public outcry - https://www.eff.org/document/brief-electronic-frontier-foundation-et-al-amici-curiae-supporting-plaintiff-ryan-v-trump). This is not really *big tech* (whatever that means, they are certainly not monoliths, but competitors) thing- whatever a private company like twitter decides to do is there their own business. Hell, the IETF, which is a *volunteer* run group, has developed a lot of relay/mixnet protocols to prevent such censorship as long as *any* part of the internet is on in a country. 

https://tools.ietf.org/dailydose/

Overall, the general attitude of people who develop internet protocols is that *information* is a fundamental human right, so they tend to be very open to free speech. Of course, this has its limits. Clearly, reasonable people can agree that things like automated disinformation networks (which are easy to fingerprint when they start posting the same stuff on multiple social networks with the same IPs), human trafficking, child pornography, etc are things that reasonable people can agree to be digitally fingerprinted and sent to the appropriate legal authorities. That isn't knowledge sharing, it's more like spamming. 

When governments attempt to censor entire sections of the internet, it usually becomes a issue with the root certificate system (this was originally owned by the US government, but has successfully been transferred to the private sector): https://www.icann.org/iana-transition-fact-sheet

In practice, this has tremendously helped the internet self-regulate (and it's a very inclusive process). 

Hell, the world wide web, was started at a international accelerator (CERN) to help people communicate about high energy physics experiments (even with what would have been the texas superconducting super collider) : https://home.cern/science/computing/birth-web

Keep in mind governments still have to coordinate on things like spectrum sharing (in practice controlled by the ITU) and removal of analog cross talk (or physical space, in the case of LEO sat internet). The FCC has a vested interest in making sure that rural areas enjoy lower latency internet: https://docs.fcc.gov/public/attachments/FCC-20-77A1.pdf

But keep in mind that the "big tech" companies have all developed "optimal compression" formats that are *much* more efficient to encode/decode things like text (in any language), pictures, videos, etc even in very slow rural areas (these are usually standards developed by the w3c). The whole goal is to reach the entire world so historical inequalities due to access to information are slowly blurred. 

 

Edited January 28, 2021 by surrept33

[Ward Smith + 6,615]

11 hours ago, surrept33 said:

Internet *physical layer* censorship has been used by lots of governments (keep in mind Trump would have likely banned TikTok if there wasn't public outcry - https://www.eff.org/document/brief-electronic-frontier-foundation-et-al-amici-curiae-supporting-plaintiff-ryan-v-trump). This is not really *big tech* (whatever that means, they are certainly not monoliths, but competitors) thing- whatever a private company like twitter decides to do is there their own business. Hell, the IETF, which is a *volunteer* run group, has developed a lot of relay/mixnet protocols to prevent such censorship as long as *any* part of the internet is on in a country. 

https://tools.ietf.org/dailydose/

Overall, the general attitude of people who develop internet protocols is that *information* is a fundamental human right, so they tend to be very open to free speech. Of course, this has its limits. Clearly, reasonable people can agree that things like automated disinformation networks (which are easy to fingerprint when they start posting the same stuff on multiple social networks with the same IPs), human trafficking, child pornography, etc are things that reasonable people can agree to be digitally fingerprinted and sent to the appropriate legal authorities. That isn't knowledge sharing, it's more like spamming. 

When governments attempt to censor entire sections of the internet, it usually becomes a issue with the root certificate system (this was originally owned by the US government, but has successfully been transferred to the private sector): https://www.icann.org/iana-transition-fact-sheet

In practice, this has tremendously helped the internet self-regulate (and it's a very inclusive process). 

Hell, the world wide web, was started at a international accelerator (CERN) to help people communicate about high energy physics experiments (even with what would have been the texas superconducting super collider) : https://home.cern/science/computing/birth-web

Keep in mind governments still have to coordinate on things like spectrum sharing (in practice controlled by the ITU) and removal of analog cross talk (or physical space, in the case of LEO sat internet). The FCC has a vested interest in making sure that rural areas enjoy lower latency internet: https://docs.fcc.gov/public/attachments/FCC-20-77A1.pdf

But keep in mind that the "big tech" companies have all developed "optimal compression" formats that are *much* more efficient to encode/decode things like text (in any language), pictures, videos, etc even in very slow rural areas (these are usually standards developed by the w3c). The whole goal is to reach the entire world so historical inequalities due to access to information are slowly blurred. 

Wow, you spilled a ton of digital ink to say not much about the topic. A little background on me. I Co founded an ISP before people even knew what the internet was, long before the world wide web had gotten off the ground. I've participated in IETF RFC committees and subcommittees along with IEEE committee standards. I'm confident I have forgotten more about how the internet functions than you'll ever know.

The fact of the matter concerning Twitter's doublespeak is they complained about Uganda censoring free speech right after they themselves censored the President of the United States. Dripping irony not your strong suit? How about I just repeat a drawing here to make things easy? As for the libertarian view, that's all well and good until Big Tech (yes that's a thing) start acting in lockstep to thwart competition. Twitter censored so Parler stepped in, only to be cancelled by every Big Tech company. Beyond irony that a US company needs to host in Russia to have free speech. But by all means respond with meaningless drivel about unrelated issues to demonstrate your lack of perspicacity. 

[Strangelovesurfing + 737]

23 hours ago, surrept33 said:

The whole goal is to reach the entire world so historical inequalities due to access to information are slowly blurred. 

Unfortunately "reach" seems more like "sink it's claws into the entire world" as time progresses. Once upon a time internet access was a symbol of wealth and status, now being able to stay off the internet is a sign of wealth and status.

They convinced all of us to get on the net, now we're trapped in it.

[surrept33 + 609]

On 1/28/2021 at 1:52 PM, Ward Smith said:

Wow, you spilled a ton of digital ink to say not much about the topic. A little background on me. I Co founded an ISP before people even knew what the internet was, long before the world wide web had gotten off the ground. I've participated in IETF RFC committees and subcommittees along with IEEE committee standards. I'm confident I have forgotten more about how the internet functions than you'll ever know.

The fact of the matter concerning Twitter's doublespeak is they complained about Uganda censoring free speech right after they themselves censored the President of the United States. Dripping irony not your strong suit? How about I just repeat a drawing here to make things easy? As for the libertarian view, that's all well and good until Big Tech (yes that's a thing) start acting in lockstep to thwart competition. Twitter censored so Parler stepped in, only to be cancelled by every Big Tech company. Beyond irony that a US company needs to host in Russia to have free speech. But by all means respond with meaningless drivel about unrelated issues to demonstrate your lack of perspicacity. 

In countries like Uganda, it's common to literally have ISPs disconnect large portions of the internet at the BGP-layer. This is what newer routing protocols like babble *prevent*. 

Twitter went through great lengths to keep Trump's account alive, despite repeatedly warning him. If he wants to start trump news network and trump.com and actually drive traffic to it, nothing is stopping him. I sure wouldn't host it nor be associated with it in any way because it's just bad business to do business with likely criminal activity. 

See also, WNYC's excellent podcasts about Trump, Inc:

https://www.wnycstudios.org/podcasts/trumpinc

Edited January 31, 2021 by surrept33

[Ward Smith + 6,615]

14 minutes ago, surrept33 said:

In countries like Uganda, it's common to literally have ISPs disconnect large portions of the internet at the BGP-layer. This is what newer routing protocols like babble *prevent*. 

Twitter went through great lengths to keep Trump's account alive, despite repeatedly warning him. If he wants to start trump news network and trump.com and actually drive traffic to it, nothing is stopping him. I sure wouldn't host it nor be associated with it in any way because it's just bad business to do business with likely criminal activity. 

See also, WNYC's excellent podcasts about Trump, Inc:

https://www.wnycstudios.org/podcasts/trumpinc

Bullshit