White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki told the world yesterday that the Biden Administration has been hand in hand with Facebook to flag "problematic" posts that "spread disinformation" on the Rona.

The Administration has been asking social media companies to get more "aggressive" with people who post what it calls "misinformation".

"We are in regular touch with the social media platforms and those engagements typically happen through members of our senior staff and also members of our COVID-19 team — given, as Dr. Murthy conveyed, this is a big issue, of misinformation, specifically on the pandemic," she said.

"Within the Surgeon General's Office, we're flagging posts for Facebook that spread disinformation," Psaki said. "We're working with doctors and medical professionals to connect medical experts with people, who are popular with their audiences with accurate information and boost trusted content. So, we're helping get trusted content out there. We also created the COVID Community Corps to get factual information into the hands of local messengers."

Reaction was swift and Katie Pavlich was typical on Twitter: "Psaki says the White House has been flagging ‘problematic posts’ on Facebook they believe are misinformation about Wuhan coronavirus. Reminder: Fauci worked with Facebook to ban the lab leak theory, which is factual, for more than a year."

Independent journalist Glen Greenwald, wrote a very long Twitter thread which included "There is no circumstance - none - in which it's acceptable for the White House or any other agency of the government to be providing lists to Facebook of "problematic" content it wants removed, yet's that exactly what Psaki says they're doing."

Are we so far through the looking glass that no one is genuinely shocked by this? How about you? Are you shocked?

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Simon Conway

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