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Bully Bobby Is No Friend Of Free Speech

Bully Bobby Is No Friend Of Free Speech

With every day that Robert F. Kennedy Jr. runs his peculiar presidential campaign, he offers a display of delusional narcissism and feckless duplicity. Aside from drawing attention to himself, Kennedy seems to be trying to ensure the reelection of Donald Trump, provoking the suspicion that he shares Trump's toxic politics despite his own liberal heritage.

Whatever murky and destructive ideology Kennedy may espouse, however, everyone should understand by now that this aging nepo baby is definitely not what he has lately pretended to be: an implacable defender of free speech.

On April 1, he told CNN anchor Erin Burnett that Joe Biden is arguably "a much worse threat to democracy" than Trump, supposedly because the president has "used federal agencies to censor political speech." This muddled accusation stems from Kennedy's nefarious role during the pandemic, when social media platforms tried to mute his relentless promotion of anti-vaccination propaganda.

While Kennedy blames the Biden administration for "censoring" him, the private efforts of companies like Google and Facebook to block the deadly anti-vax disinformation — which earned heavy profits for Kennedy — didn't violate his First Amendment rights. At this point it's darkly comical to hear a candidate who appears nightly on television, while raking in huge subsidies from Trump's billionaire backers, whine about suppression of his message.

But there was a real attack on free speech that grew out of the pandemic. It was initiated by Kennedy himself and revealed deep flaws in his judgment and character.

In August 2020, a Daily Kos blogger writing under the name "Downeast Dem" posted an item about Kennedy's appearance at a rally in Berlin against the German government's COVID-19 restrictions. Both the article and the highly unflattering headline — "Anti-vaxxer RFK Jr. joins neo-Nazis in massive Berlin 'Anti-Corona' Protest" — accurately described the event, which was sponsored by an antisemitic and Nazi-adjacent organization called Querdenken.

The Berlin protest, its dubious sponsors and supporters, and Kennedy's role as a speaker were all reported in large media outlets, including CBS News, The New York Times, and the big German daily Der Tagesspiegel, whose story was linked by Downeast Dem.

While Kennedy didn't go after any of those media outlets, he angrily threatened Daily Kos and the anonymous blogger, seeking to force them to pull down the post. He demanded a million-dollar payoff to go away. He filed a defamation lawsuit against the blogger and another action aiming to force Daily Kos to disclose the blogger's identity.

Major civil liberties and news organizations pushed back, aiming to protect a fundamental First Amendment principle that defends anonymous commentary — unless and until that anonymity is found to cloak a violation of law or an actual defamation."

Kennedy "went after someone he thought couldn't defend himself," says Markos Moulitsas, the Daily Kos founder and proprietor. In response, Moulitsas tried to bait Kennedy into suing him, posting a headline mocking the anti-vax attorney for "cavorting with Nazis," and daring him to pick on someone his own size. But Kennedy didn't bite, and his lawsuit, filed in the wrong jurisdiction and bereft of merit, ultimately failed. His latest move is an attempt to escape paying the court costs borne by victims of his harassing litigation.

Much like Trump, whom he pretends to oppose, Bobby is a bully. He demands absolute free speech for himself, even when he is defaming his betters and endangering public health. But he tried mightily to curtail the free speech of a private citizen who dared to criticize him — and might be small enough to push around.

The irony of Kennedy's costly intimidation campaign was that many more people learned about his obnoxious alliance with the German far right. The Daily Kos community rallied to support its embattled member and the principle he embodied. Nobody, including Moulitsas, believes the law should protect lawbreakers or defamers. (His staff takes down defamatory and illegal posts all the time.) Yet he still sees anonymous speech as a fundamental liberty and spent a lot of money defending it.

As for Kennedy, he is certainly no friend of freedom. He has become an ally of far-right authoritarians here and abroad, from Mar-a-Lago to the Kremlin, who will be thrilled if his spoiler campaign helps return Trump to the White House.

Reprinted with permission from Creators Syndicate

Joe Conason is founder and editor-in-chief of The National Memo.He is also editor-at-large of Type Investigations, a nonprofit investigative reporting newsroom formerly known as The Investigative Fund, and a senior fellow at Type Media Center. His forthcoming book, The Longest Con: How Grifters, Swindlers and Frauds Hijacked American Conservatism, will be published by St. Martin's Press in July.

How RFK Junior's Farcical Campaign Betrays The Kennedy Legacy

How RFK Junior's Farcical Campaign Betrays The Kennedy Legacy

When a neophyte named Edward Moore Kennedy first ran for the Senate in 1962 at barely 30 years old, his primary opponent delivered a debate quip that still echoes.

"If your name were Edward Moore," cracked Ed McCormack, then Massachusetts attorney general, "your candidacy would be a joke." Ted Kennedy won that primary, ascended to the Senate, and then spent a lifetime winning over skeptics with hard work and liberal commitment.

But that harsh zinger could score a bullseye on a different target now: Uncle Teddy's errant nephew Robert Francis Kennedy Jr., the grifting anti-vax lawyer and conspiracy monger whose campaign for president of the United States should be a joke — and certainly would be if his name were merely Robert Francis.

The difference is that RFK Jr., seeking public office for the first time, isn't 30. He is 70, a senior citizen, with a long and checkered record whose bright spots are overshadowed by menacing darkness. Far from upholding the values his family represents or the legacy of his martyred father and uncle, Bobby Jr. is an opportunist whose ambition, greed, dishonesty and arrogance have led him far astray.

There was a time many years ago when, as an environmental lawyer, Kennedy did useful work — usually under the tutelage of wiser heads — after he emerged from the drug addiction that followed his father's murder. At one point, I even wrote an admiring magazine profile of him.

But not too many years later, Bobby began the deceptive anti-vaccine campaign that has marked his moral and intellectual decline ever since. Having authored articles claiming childhood vaccines cause autism, he clung to their refuted arguments and falsified data long after the magazines were forced to withdraw them. He insists those lies are true to this day — and the anti-vax propaganda from which he profits is leaving American kids vulnerable to disease.

How would his late uncle John F. Kennedy, whose memory he so often invokes in his current campaign, react to what Bobby has done? In 1961, President Kennedy worried that resistance to the polio vaccine, which was still rather new, meant millions of schoolchildren might contract that deadly and crippling virus.

At a press conference that April, the president said: "I hope that the renewed drive this spring and summer to provide vaccination for all Americans, and particularly those who are young, will have the wholehearted support of every parent in America."

The following year, JFK pushed through the Vaccination Assistance Act, which financed immunization drives in every state for polio, diphtheria, pertussis and tetanus. That massive campaign established the federal government as the central authority in establishing and coordinating immunization policy for the nation — a role Robert Kennedy Jr. has persistently sought to undermine or even abolish, at potentially enormous cost.

Bobby's betrayal of his family goes further with every step he takes in this campaign, and in every direction. JFK and RFK were both known for surrounding themselves with advisers whose intelligence and experience drew admiration; Bobby is drawn to intellectually null sycophants and boobs, including a large contingent of crooks like Steve Bannon and Roger Stone, as well as the anti-vax scammers, some of whom are outright fascists. These are people his father and uncle would have privately mocked and publicly shunned.

Even worse, Bobby has become a shill for Russian propaganda and an opponent of American military aid to Ukraine's besieged democracy. We don't have to wonder what his uncle would have said, because history tells us.

In his inaugural address, JFK uttered this indelible sentence: "Let every nation know, whether it wishes us well or ill, that we shall pay any price, bear any burden, meet any hardship, support any friend, oppose any foe to assure the survival and the success of liberty." Liberty doesn't mean surrendering to Putin and abandoning our allies.

Lately, Bobby has been sucking up to the Libertarian Party, whose platform would tear down all the achievements of his father and both of his uncles in civil rights, education, health care, environmental protection, food security and a score of essential programs. He wants their ballot line, and he is willing to promote their destructive ideology for his own benefit.

In this campaign, he has reversed the old epigram about history and its personages. In the first act, he presents a farce — and in the second act, should he help to elect Donald Trump, he will bring forth a tragedy.

Joe Conason is founder and editor-in-chief of The National Memo. He is also editor-at-large of Type Investigations, a nonprofit investigative reporting newsroom formerly known as The Investigative Fund, and a senior fellow at Type Media Center.


Robert F. Kennedy Jr.

New Polls Shows Growing Voter Distrust Of 'Nutjob' Robert F. Kennedy Jr

Robert F. Kennedy Jr's 2024 White House bid was always a long shot. But the more voters get to know the anti-vax conspiracy theorist, the less they like him, The Washington Post's Aaron Blake reports.

The Kennedy conundrum came to a head on Thursday when, despite warnings that it would backfire, the sixty-nine-year-old environmental lawyer accepted Republicans' invitation to testify before the United States House of Representatives Judiciary Select Subcommittee on the Weaponization of the Federal Government.

The spectacle, Blake notes, was "impossible to separate from conservative media's own effort to play up Kennedy's campaign. Fox News has devoted extensive attention to Kennedy on the air and its website, publishing more than 80 articles and videos about him since his campaign launch in April."

The impacts of Kennedy's fringe platform, explains Blake, are evident in the latest rounds of polling, including those that were conducted prior to Kennedy's congressional appearance.

"Quinnipiac University released a poll Wednesday showing Republicans continue to like Kennedy — by more than a 2-to-1 margin, in fact. But among Democrats, Kennedy's image was more than 2-to-1 negative. While 21 percent had a favorable opinion, 47 percent had an unfavorable one. That’s 26 points 'underwater,' up from 15 points underwater a month ago," Blake writes.

"A new poll out of New Hampshire is even worse for Kennedy," Blake continues. "The University of New Hampshire Survey Center in April showed him 22 points underwater among likely Democratic primary voters; its latest poll now shows him 60 points underwater." UNH found that "just 9 percent had a favorable opinion of Kennedy, compared with 69 percent who had an unfavorable one. The survey also asked people to use one word to describe Kennedy, and the most popular words were 'crazy,' 'dangerous,' 'insane,' 'nutjob,' 'conspiracy,' and 'crackpot.'"

Blake concludes that "these are not the numbers of someone who is seriously competing for the nomination."

Reprinted with permission from Alternet.

RFK Jr.

Kennedy's Anti-Vax Group Solicited Neo-Nazi Users Of Far-Right Gab Site

Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s group Children’s Health Defense sought support from users of the far-right social media platform Gab in 2021, including white supremacists, QAnon conspiracy theorists, and an open neo-Nazi.

Those users have written things including “White people are kings. F--- jews. n--s are animals”; “Against Jewish Control”; and, regarding Nazi Germany: “This is what the Jewish controlled system does not want us to see. When we kick them out and place our value on our own people, we thrive.”

Kennedy is the founder, chair, and chief litigation counsel for Children’s Health Defense, one of the key spreaders of misinformation about vaccines and COVID-19. He is on leave from the group during his presidential campaign. Kennedy has frequently attempted to appeal to right-wing audiences during his run, as evidenced by his campaign site featuring interviews with Elon Musk, Laura Ingraham, Megyn Kelly, and Breitbart News.

Children’s Health Defense has been using Gab to recruit followers since January 2021. Its profile says it is part of Gab Pro, which is a subscription-based program. CHD has posted to the site over 1,500 times and has touted its account as a way to “fight censorship.”

Gab is a social media platform that caters to those deemed too extreme for Twitter and Facebook. Its user base is populated with numerous antisemites, neo-Nazis, and white nationalists. Many of them express hatred toward and issue violent threats against Jewish people. In 2018, a Gab user allegedly killed 11 people at Pittsburgh’s Tree of Life synagogue.

The Stanford Internet Observatory analyzed content on Gab and concluded in a June 2022 report that “extreme anti-Semitic, racist and homophobic content is rife, with open praise of Nazism, encouragement of violence against minorities, and ‘Great Replacement’ narratives.”

Andrew Torba is the site’s founder and CEO. He is a virulent antisemite who has said that Jewish people have too much political power and are not welcome in his preferred political movement: “We don't want people who are Jewish.” He has also reposted praise of Gab as a place where people can find “differing opinions” on the Holocaust.

Media outlets have scrutinized Gab’s links to antisemitism and white supremacy, especially after failed Pennsylvania gubernatorial candidate Doug Mastriano paid Torba for campaign “consulting.” But Kennedy’s ties to Gab through his organization have previously gone unreported.

CHD’s pointed engagement with the antisemitic platform comes as observers have noted a general increase in antisemitism in the U.S., especially online. Misinformation about the COVID-19 pandemic has also worsened the problem. Kennedy received criticism in January 2022 after he said during an anti-vaccine rally: “Even in Hitler’s Germany, you could cross the Alps to Switzerland. You could hide in an attic like Anne Frank did.”

In addition to maintaining an active Gab account, CHD has repeatedly engaged with users who are antisemites and white supremacists. The group also conducted outreach to a neo-Nazi account. Below are numerous examples from 2021:

CHD asked Gab founder and virulent antisemite Andrew Torba to “follow + support” Kennedy and his group. CHD has reached out to Torba (username “a”) to appeal for support, writing on Gab: “@a Please follow + support Children's Health Defense and Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. #Freespeech is yet again under attack.” The organization also promoted an event in Torba’s replies and repeatedly sent him links to its website.

CHD reached out to a former Gab officer who has expressed hatred of Jewish people (“They gotta go. Now”) and support for enslaving Black people. CHD posted a link to its website to “shadowknight412.” The group also tagged that account, along with Gab’s Help account, in asking for “help with analytics for our account.” The shadowknight412 account belongs to Gab’s former chief technology officer Rob Colbert. In more recent posts, he has made clear his hatred for Jewish and Black people. He’s written: “I don't have any questions about why my ancestors kept these retarded man-like creatures locked in sheds with metal collars on their necks that had bells on them. #N-----Bells”; and “N-----s. If only there was a whole continent they could go live on and not have to worry about fitting in with western civilization and our traditions/laws.”

He is also an antisemite who has written, “I don't want to be around ridiculous jews”; “The jew is basically parasitic drag. And engineering has ways of mitigating that”; and “It's always some rat-faced jew. They are schizophrenic and violent. They gotta go. Now. The jew needs to be removed from American education, media, government, finance, and law.”

CHD shared a link to its website with someone whose account states: “F--- jews. n--s are animals.” CHD responded to an anti-vaccine post by “Ytram” by sharing a link to its website. That account states in its “about” page: “White people are kings. F--- jews. n--s are animals.”

CHD reached out to a neo-Nazi account. CHD responded to an anti-vaccine post by “WesternChauvinist1” by posting a link to its website. That account features two SS bolts as its header image with the “14 words,” a white supremacist slogan.

It posts pro-Nazi propaganda, including praising Hitler for being “the only world leader to ever arrest a Rothschild”; claiming that “National Socialism took the German economy from a debt based depression, to a country with the highest standard of living in the world” and “National Socialists valued their own people and Nation as their most prized possession”; and concluding of Jewish people: “This is what the Jewish controlled system does not want us to see. When we kick them out and place our value on our own people, we thrive. When we allow their central banks and debt systems in our homelands, we are reduced to consumers and tax cattle.”

CHD shared a link to its website with an account that’s “against Jewish control.” CHD responded to an anti-vaccine post by “Stevevvs,” which states in its about page that it is “Against Jewish Control.”

CHD posted a link in the comments section of a white supremacist account. CHD responded to an anti-vaccine post by “PoisonDartPepe” by sharing a link to its website. That account’s pinned post is a screenshot of a social media post defending white supremacy; it states: “What they call White supremacy is really just White dignity. The dignity of a homeland. The dignity of cultural integrity. The dignity of communal pride. When they say they want to smash White supremacy it means they want to destroy your dignity as a people and humiliate you.” The account recently stated of Jewish people: “They should stay here in prison forever. A handful might have execution worthy crimes. But the rest - just throw them in gen pop with the n-----s.” Pepe is a common meme name used by the alt-right and white nationalist movement.

CHD also shared links to its website to QAnon influencer Neon Revolt; far-right cartoonist Ben Garrison, who has a history of promoting QAnon, “Pizzagate,” and antisemitism; and far-right bigot Milo Yiannopoulos.

Reprinted with permission from Media Matters.