I vehemently reject any such notion. In the long term, the best counter to speech is more speech.
The piece reads like whining that the US LE apparatus is now, with the advent of the Internet, having trouble exerting total control over acceptable political discourse in the US, and using scary red-baiting to trick us into giving it back to them. If you pause for a moment and look past all the scary faux-military language like "Perception management operation", what he is saying is that the Russians are posting on the Internet and that this reality is so horrifying, so fundamentally threatening to democracy that we need to tear down the regulations that stop the FBI from controlling what is said online. That is far more terrifying than the prospect that I might have to read some posts that are pro-Russia.
> I feel like the article boils down to "the Russians have a
> big advantage influencing the US because we allow free
> speech and they don't" with a strong implication that we
> need to give law enforcement more tools to crack down on
> free speech.
Quoting from the article:
> Currently, platforms like Facebook and Twitter have little
> incentive to help counterintelligence beyond their own
> goodwill. But Congress could pass legislation that requires
> social media companies to cooperate with counterintelligence
> in the same ways they do with law enforcement.
And I mean never.
Tangentially, Asha Rangappa's (author of the linked article) suggestion makes me wonder about the timing and effect of Russia-sponsored meddling against the 2016 election.
In particular, the influence of Russia-tampering was no more evident than in the then-FBI Director's public statement that HRC's emails were still under FBI investigation mere days before the election. (Comey works for the US, but the emails were collected by Russia-sponsored agents.)
Up to that point, I knew Comey best as leader of the FBI which insisted that Apple and other smartphone OS manufacturers should provide a tool to circumvent encryption safeguards (e.g. leveraging the All Writs Act in the San Bernadino shooter case).
The US should and must protect itself against foreign threats.
However, abrogating the First and Fourth Amendments (security from unreasonable searches and seizures) does not protect the United States but critically weakens it.
I think the author is aware of that point.
Put yourself back in the days of Joseph McCarthy and the "red scare", but with today's laws (and hopefully we seek an outcome that is MORE friendly to free speech, not less). How would you feel about a law that required anyone supporting communism to register as a foreign agent? Or more precisely, one that allowed the government to arrest anyone who argued in favor of communism (a right protected by free speech) and force them to prove they do not have any ties to any foreign government at risk of imprisonment for 2 years.
I have little problem asking those actually employed by a foreign government to register. But if you stretch the definitions far enough ("you were eligible for a tax deduction, which counts as compensation so you are employed") then it can be abused.