That is an interesting take which I never considered.
What I find truly concerning about the present circumstances is that there are attempts to frame it is something other than government censorship and should thus undergo less or even no scrutiny. And on the other side that these organizations should be compelled to carry speech as if that were "protecting freedom" rather than just another form of government abridgement of speech and thus should undergo less or even no scrutiny. In my opinion, it is our duty as a society to not be wishy-washy about this and recognize that any attempts by the government to influence speech, either directly or indirectly, are government censorship and we must tackle this head on and come to decision whether we think the harm to society is worse than the sacrifice of our freedoms.
Greenwald may be opposed to censorship on principle, and doesn't think the government should be interfering in any way with Facebook's operations. But it seems like he's let that color his understanding of how government actually works.
“You don’t have a right to profit from speech” would be a convenient pretext to, for instance, shut down the New York Times.
But what about reach? Could we theoretically tax businesses based on the volume of people their content reaches, thus bringing in public revenue and/or disincentivizing:
- virality for the sake of ad impressions
- too-large (social) media networks
I'm sure it'd be phenomenally difficult to measure, but easier to pin down than arbitrary speech.
Personally, I’d be suspicious of a rule like that. In the end, it has to be enforced by the executive and it sounds a lot like “all speech will be tolerated except speech that spreads widely enough to be a threat to existing power.”
However, I do think that knowingly lying to obtain something of value is in many instances fraud.
I am not a lawyer.
First five words of the First Amendment: “Congress shall make no law...”
It’s pretty unambiguous. The United States doesn’t make laws without Congress[1], and if Congress can’t make a law, the President’s Office can’t enforce it.
That however is not as big a limit on Congress as it seems. Congress can make other difficult and tedious laws, and difficult and tedious describes most of the body of Federal law. Congressmen can also threaten to remove statutes which shield people and organizations from liability as a coercive tactic, e.g. Section 230, or write into law that they will withhold Federal funds to States that don’t pass certain laws.
Why can they do this? Two reasons really. A legal body like SCOTUS is in no position to tell a political body like Congress that they cannot. If Congress passes a law that violates the Constitution, Article III courts can strike it down or gut it in court proceedings, but with no law in play and no harmed party there is nothing for the courts to do. Nor can an Article III court stop Congress from passing a law nor remedy a harm by forcing Congress to reinstate a repealed law. The process of lawmaking is impervious to the Courts.
Also, and more importantly: Article I. The House and Senate make their own rules and are charged with enforcing them on their members. The First Amendment prohibits Congress from making certain laws, laws they arguably didn’t have the power to make in Article I in the first place. It doesn’t say a damn thing about the political process of lawmaking, or the conduct of House members and Senators nor prohibit them from using hardball tactics for their own interests or the perceived interests of their constituents and political allies. There are people that would actually like to see Section 230 burn, and if that’s the case, gutting and removing it makes it fair game for politicking.
If the House and Senate as a body are making an attempt to coerce large companies to political ends, there is no one to tell them “No.” except voters, and only through elections. If they had any inkling at all that they were going to receive sufficient pushback from voters as to threaten their seats, these meetings wouldn’t be happening.
The Federal government is the most powerful organization in the United States by far and second place ain’t even close. Congress legally sits atop the governmental hierarchy even when politically they like to play second fiddle to the President. Congress can coerce a lot of people with little to no pushback so long as the targets of coercion are also unpopular, or at the very least, voters are ambivalent towards them.
[1] Another important point. A State is not the United States. Congress is the legislative branch of the United States. Don’t comment to incorrect me on this point.