时间:2025-04-03 18:00:04 来源:网络整理编辑:探索
UPDATEDAug. 24, 2017 3:45 pm ET: Updated to include comments by Plame and new fundraiser totals.Ever
UPDATEDAug. 24, 2017 3:45 pm ET: Updated to include comments by Plame and new fundraiser totals.
Every day brings us a new wrinkle that continues to push the Donald Trump presidency further and further into Twilight Zone territory, and Wednesday is no different.
SEE ALSO:All the best memes about Trump's choice to look directly at the eclipseWith tear gas still lifting from the streets of Phoenix after Trump's blustery Tuesday night rally, word comes that former CIA agent Valerie Plame Wilson is crowdfunding an effort to buy Twitter for the sole purpose of banning Trump.
Yes, thatValerie Plame, the former undercover CIA agent who was outed in 2003 by the White House via columnist Robert Novak after her husband, diplomat Joseph Wilson, dared to call bull on the Bush administration's assertion that Iraq had tried to buy uranium for building weapons.
The campaign launched late last week but is just now starting to garner attention and momentum. The account, as of Thursday afternoon, had accrued a little over $43,000 of its $1 billion goal.
Tweet may have been deleted
Speaking to Mashable, Plame spoke about how she was inspired to start the campaign.
Referencing a joke John Oliver recently made about Twitter possibly being the tool that could trigger armageddon, Plame said, "The people who understand how crises proliferate -- I worked on counter-proliferation at the CIA, my colleagues that are there now -- this is really scary. He's inciting violence using Twitter."
So about that effort to stop him by buying Twitter (or at least part of it): In 2016, when there was a lot of chatter about someone — Google? Disney? — buying Twitter, the numbers being thrown around ranged from $16 to $30 billion (LOL), and its current market cap is $12.3 billion.
Plame's plan, though, isn't to buy the whole shebang but, rather, buying up shares. According to the campaign's page:
Twitter is a publicly traded company. Shares = power. This GoFundMe will fund the purchase of a controlling interest in Twitter. At the current market rate that would require over a billion dollars — but that's a small price to pay to take away Trump's most powerful megaphone and prevent a horrific nuclear war.
She elaborates a bit more further down the page.
Proceeds from this campaign will be used to buy a controlling share of Twitter. If we can't get a majority interest, we'll explore options for buying a significant stake in the company and champion this proposal at the annual shareholder meeting. If that's impossible for any reason or if there is a surplus from this campaign, 100% of the balance of proceeds will be donated to Global Zero, a nonprofit organization leading the resistance to nuclear war.
Okay, so that's a tall task. As the Associated Press notes, while $1 billion would still be well short of giving her a controlling interest, it'd be enough to make her the largest shareholder.
Plame admitted the goal was "ambitious" and noted that, just as she does on the fundraiser page, if the campaign falls short of the goal, every cent will be donated to Global Zero, a group Plame said is "leading the resistance to prevent nuclear war and eliminate nuclear weapons."
"My real hope in launching the campaign was to shine a spotlight on just how dangerous Trump's use of Twitter really is," she told me. "I want to show people they don't have to sit by while Trump uses this huge global platform to undermine our national security."
And Plame seems to be 100% into the idea, echoing other critics in claiming Trump's tweets threatening war violate Twitter's terms of service.
Plame was critical of Twitter's leadership, noting, "Their executives are turning a blind eye to their own rules."
This effort, she said, aims to "hold their feet to the fire and enforce their own rules."
Tweet may have been deleted
It's true that Trump's account has become a weapon for what's been a volatile presidency, being used to announce military policy without the military's approval, retweet bots, cost companies billions of dollars, and even potentially reveal CIA secrets (which, admittedly, probably hits pretty close to home for Plame.)
"It is deadly serious," Plame said of Trump's Twitter use. "Whether you like Trump or not, I think most people would be agree that he is impulsive and, using the global platform of Twitter in the casual way that he has, particularly regarding the nuclear issue and North Korea, I'm deeply concerned that we'll stumble into a nuclear war."
For their part, Twitter has no comment on the matter and probably isn't sweating the effort too much, as they've had very little (nothing, really) to say about Trump's potential violations. The last time we asked, we got the usual response: "We do not comment on individual accounts, for privacy and security reasons."
"The fact is," Plame worries, "if you don't get this nuclear issue right, none of the other ones matter."
And Trump isn't slowing down, either, as he continues to rally against the mainstream media, attack opponents even if they're within his own party, and say other generally unpleasant things.
Regardless of how the effort turns out, Plame is upbeat about her role in leading the fundraiser and trying to highlight the reason behind it: "I think we all have to contribute where we can on things we care about so this is my little value added."
TopicsSocial MediaTwitterDonald TrumpPolitics
More than half of women in advertising have faced sexual harassment, report says2025-04-03 17:08
告別足球 ?意甲名將嗑藥禁賽12年 46歲複出接著踢2025-04-03 16:50
迪巴拉+達尼洛!尤文大心髒先生 2度製造補時進球2025-04-03 16:34
買房救紅魔?兩王者攪渾曼聯選帥 羅傑斯曲線救國2025-04-03 16:28
The U.S. will no longer have the final say on internet domain names2025-04-03 16:24
韓媒 :中國從小學習足球的人寥寥無幾 這是致命弱點2025-04-03 16:08
記者談戴偉浚轉會海港:未交涉 深足不可能讓人免費摘桃子2025-04-03 15:57
水慶霞澄清:在上海有房子 隻是暫住拆遷過渡房2025-04-03 15:47
This German startup wants to be your bank (without being a bank)2025-04-03 15:26
上海東華患病女足球員發文感謝籌款:一定戰勝病魔重回賽場2025-04-03 15:13
How Hyperloop One went off the rails2025-04-03 17:47
買房救紅魔?兩王者攪渾曼聯選帥 羅傑斯曲線救國2025-04-03 17:14
媒體人:一新晉國腳表示 贏了吃啥都沒問題輸了喝水都錯2025-04-03 17:13
曼聯前瞻:C羅欲破12年最長球荒 618再擦出火花?2025-04-03 17:07
Old lady swatting at a cat ends up in Photoshop battle2025-04-03 16:45
深足俱樂部官宣李章洙出任主帥 期待提升戰鬥力勇創佳績2025-04-03 16:12
意大利記者 :裏皮親口告訴我 中國足協曾想在2035年前贏得世界杯2025-04-03 16:03
尤文前瞻 :爭四生死戰不容有失 弗拉霍維奇三連殺?2025-04-03 15:47
Metallica to seek and destroy your eardrums with new album this fall2025-04-03 15:42
官宣!巴西阿根廷重賽 阿根廷4人遭追加停賽已上訴2025-04-03 15:22