In the twelfth of the Twitter Files threads Matt Taibbi documents the central of the FBI. Students of James Joyce’s Ulysses may think of it as the Omphalos Ultimatum.
The thread consists of 40 tweets that can be accessed via the first (below). The thread is unrolled here in the Thread Reader app.
1.THREAD: The Twitter Files
Twitter and the FBI “Belly Button” pic.twitter.com/nfOGQGlvUM— Matt Taibbi (@mtaibbi) January 3, 2023
The State Department got into the act that Taibbi sketched in part 11.
https://t.co/BcFhHCvjAE February, 2020, as COVID broke out, the Global Engagement Center – a fledgling analytic/intelligence arms of the State Department – went to the media with a report called, “Russian Disinformation Apparatus Taking Advantage of Coronavirus Concerns.” pic.twitter.com/KjUeE8vejt
— Matt Taibbi (@mtaibbi) January 3, 2023
You have to see this with your own eyes. This is your government at work. Twitter didn’t want the government calling them out. They wanted a chance to do the government’s work before the press put them to it.
5.State also flagged accounts that retweeted news that Twitter banned the popular U.S. ZeroHedge, claiming the episode “led to another flurry of disinformation narratives.” ZH had done reports speculating that the virus had lab origin. pic.twitter.com/JlIobPzAFE
— Matt Taibbi (@mtaibbi) January 3, 2023
Suffice it to say that Twitter wanted to please its political masters. They were concerned about “a conspiracy so immense.” Joe McCarthy’s hour had come around at last. However, Twitter was concerned about the political risk involved in executing demands from political actors. Twitter preferred to work directly with the FBI and DHS. They wanted to form a “circle of trust.”
11.The GEC report appeared based on DHS data circulated earlier that week, and included accounts that followed “two or more” Chinese diplomatic accounts. They reportedly ended up with a list “nearly 250,000” names long, and included Canadian officials and a CNN account: pic.twitter.com/GYi4YuPdyu
— Matt Taibbi (@mtaibbi) January 3, 2023
Elvis was still in the building. The FBI would be the government’s omphalos — but would remain connected to Twitter via an umbilical cord. I seriously doubt that “belly button” is an apt metaphor.
24.They eventually settled on an industry call via Signal. In an impressive display of operational security, Chan circulated private numbers of each company’s chief moderation officer in a Word Doc marked “Signal Phone Numbers,” subject-lined, “List of Numbers.” pic.twitter.com/5pTq7sfshh
— Matt Taibbi (@mtaibbi) January 3, 2023
As I say, you have to see it with your own eyes.
26.Requests arrived and were escalated from all over: from Treasury, the NSA, virtually every state, the HHS, from the FBI and DHS, and more: pic.twitter.com/QYJBjPEJZW
— Matt Taibbi (@mtaibbi) January 3, 2023
Even the lying hack Adam Schiff sought to get in on the act. He singled out Paul Sperry of RealClearPolitics. What an honor! Paul Sperry, our hats off to you.
28.“WE DON’T DO THIS” Even Twitter declined to honor Schiff’s request at the time. Sperry was later suspended, however. pic.twitter.com/9PX2Zw5Nzj
— Matt Taibbi (@mtaibbi) January 3, 2023
Twitter was accommodating government requests in bulk. It apparently took Elon Musk to cut the cord!
37.“I APOLOGIZE IN ADVANCE FOR YOUR WORK LOAD”: Requests poured in from FBI offices all over the country, day after day, hour after hour: If Twitter didn’t act quickly, questions came: “Was action taken?” “Any movement?” pic.twitter.com/KAu2YesocC
— Matt Taibbi (@mtaibbi) January 3, 2023
If you have been following along so far, please take in this thread in its entirety.
Notice: All comments are subject to moderation. Our comments are intended to be a forum for civil discourse bearing on the subject under discussion. Commenters who stray beyond the bounds of civility or employ what we deem gratuitous vulgarity in a comment — including, but not limited to, “s***,” “f***,” “a*******,” or one of their many variants — will be banned without further notice in the sole discretion of the site moderator.