Olbermann suspends Twitter page after angry tweets

[FreakinDJ]

Olbermann suspends Twitter page after angry tweets

LOS ANGELES (Hollywood Reporter) – Keith Olbermann suspended his Twitter account on Thursday after receiving a barrage of angry tweets in the wake of an interview with Michael Moore two days earlier.

The MSNBC host of "Countdown With Keith Olbermann" was speaking to Moore about the filmmaker's decision to contribute $20,000 to bail out Julian Assange, the WikiLeaks founder accused of sex crimes.

Moore told Olbermann that Assange is a "pioneer of free speech" for posting thousands of secret Pentagon documents about the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq onto the Internet.

Then Moore suggested that Assange's arrest was a government plot to smear him. "This whole thing stinks to the high heavens," Moore said.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20101217/tv_nm/us_olbermann

[HopeHoops]

1. What the fuck is up with the whole "twit" thing anyway?

Stupidity in 140 characters. Yawn.

[stevenleser]

30. It's more than that. The strength of twitter lies in the hashmarked keywords and links

It's not really about most of the text included in the tweet.

[DCKit]

2. Snooze from Dec 17th posted on Dec 23rd....

As I said the first time around, he doesn't have time to deal with FReepers.

[earthside]

3. Good.

For all the cool, neat, helpful things that have arisen out of the internet -- Twitter has got to be one of the most inane.

It encourages idiotic reactions, whether they be positive or negative ... it has never been easier to communicate, yet Twitter's straitjacket can turn intelligent folks into one sentence morons.

Let's just hope this web fad fades.

And, by the way, Michael Moore is correct about WikiLeaks.

[stevenleser]

31. See my #30 n/t

[Name removed]

4. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[highplainsdem]

5. Old news, no longer true. But as of this morning he's discontinued posting replies on Twitter

for the reasons explained here:

http://twitter.com/KeithOlbermann/statuses/17896946597367809

He's apparently still going to post messages that aren't replies.

Twitter has its uses. It's a good way to share links to interesting articles and websites -- though if you see a shortened link there (which you usually will with the 140 character limit), DON'T click on it unless you're familiar with and trust the person who posted it. If you have a Twitter account and you're logged in, a mouse over of shortened links should show you what the real web page is, the full link instead of the shortened one.

Twitter ISN'T good for any sort of debate, because of the limit on messages.

And as Keith is discovering, unfortunately -- since I think the attacks on him and on Michael Moore for their defense of Assange have been unfair -- a Twitter account can open you up to lots of attacks from foolish people. And this has been organized harassment.

[Erose999]

6. What is going on here, did someone hack Keith's twitter and post messages as him or something?

[Nuclear Unicorn]

7. No. Michael Moore was rather cavalier about the allegations of rape

When Olbermann accepted the statements with all credulity several rape victim's rights advocates lodged their protests.

Rather than discuss the merits of whether rape allegations should be dismissed out-of-hand Mr. Olbermann suspended his account.

[NYCGirl]

8. I believe Keith also posted a link on Twitter that revealed

the women's names.

[Nuclear Unicorn]

10. Please tell me that is misreported

[GoCubsGo]

13. It was.

Bianca Jagger posted the names. He just "retweeted" what she posted, and has since apologized for doing so.

[NYCGirl]

16. I love Keith, but he was wrong to retweet that. NT

[NYCGirl]

15. From the Hollywood Reporter:

http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/keith-olbermann-suspends-twitter-account-60943

The exchange between Moore and Olbermann caused a firestorm of angry tweets suggesting Olbermann and Moore were too flippant when discussing the accusations that Assange raped two women.
Many of the tweets were no doubt courtesy of Tigerbeatdown.com, which started an online campaign to shame Moore for his "rape apologism." It also takes Olbermann to task for re-tweeting a link to a story that identifies the women who accuse Assange of raping them.

From Salon:

http://www.salon.com/news/politics/war_room/2010/12/17/sady_doyle_olbermann_twitter

Late Wednesday night, long after I'd promised myself that I would sign off the Internet, I found myself Googling Keith Olbermann's Twitter feed. He had retweeted a link to an article alleging that one of the women accusing Julian Assange of rape had "ties" to the CIA. That article also gave the name of the accuser. This, I understood to be a universally acknowledged no-no, when it came to subjects of an ongoing sexual assault investigation. So Keith Olbermann, one of the biggest names in left-wing journalism, was publishing unsubstantiated claims that smeared the subject of a rape investigation, and he was failing to uphold basic standards. I thought this was worth sharing. I found the link to the tweet, and I clicked through, and that's when I saw it: the big yellow box with the padlock.

[FreakinDJ]

17. As they should be revealed - They slept together for over 1 week

and then she decides to scream rape - because he didn't wear a condom = this is a Very Bogus Rape claim

What are the sex crimes Assange is accused of?

Two women in Sweden have separately accused Assange of misconduct this summer while he apparently stayed with each of them separately as a guest. The Guardian newspaper obtained a police report that provided a detailed account of his actions. During a period of 10 days in August, two women engaged in consensual sex acts with Assange that later became sexual assault-y. One woman accused him of pulling off her clothes, snapping her necklace and then pinning her arms and legs down while refusing to let her get a condom. She said Assange eventually unrestrained her and put on a condom, but did something to the condom to rip it. Days later, that same woman claimed he touched her in a manner “designed to violate her sexual integrity”; she apparently kept him as a guest in her home during this time and even threw a party for him.

The second woman claims Assange had sex with her while she was sleeping, without wearing a condom, when he was a guest at her home in Stockholm. Both women reported the incidents back in August after they happened. Assange has denied the allegations and called them a “smear campaign.” As of this writing, he has not been charged. The two alleged victims have been receiving death threats and one has even fled to Palestine.

http://www.thefrisky.com/post/246-wikileaks-julian-assange-rape-michael-moore-and-keith-olbermann/

[Nuclear Unicorn]

20. No means no.

According to accounts the women gave to the police and friends, they each had consensual sexual encounters with Mr. Assange that became nonconsensual. One woman said that Mr. Assange had ignored her appeals to stop after a condom broke. The other woman said that she and Mr. Assange had begun a sexual encounter using a condom, but that Mr. Assange did not comply with her appeals to stop when it was no longer in use. Mr. Assange has questioned the veracity of those accounts.

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/11/19/world/europe/19assange.html?_r=2

[FreakinDJ]

21. "Don't Stop, Don't Stop Don't Stop" - is that the jest of these charges

But chief prosecutor Eva Finne withdrew the warrant within 24 hours.

"I don't think there is reason to suspect that he has committed rape," Finne said in a brief statement.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/08/21/julian-assange-rape-case-_n_690009.html

at least 1 woman has an uncorrupted sense of morality in this scenario

[NYCGirl]

22. Yes, the women are always to blame.

:eyes:

[FreakinDJ]

23. Your words not mine

But chief prosecutor Eva Finne withdrew the warrant within 24 hours.

"I don't think there is reason to suspect that he has committed rape," Finne said in a brief statement.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/08/21/julian-assange-rape-case-_n_690009.html

at least 1 woman has an uncorrupted sense of morality in this scenario

[NYCGirl]

24. Just because there isn't enough evidence doesn't mean he's

innocent. Just that it can't be proven.

Edited to add: You've posted an article from August?

[Bjorn Against]

28. Actually the standard is that people are considered innocent until proven guilty

[NYCGirl]

29. And that also includes the accusers. NT

[Bjorn Against]

32. True, but the accusers don't face international warrants for their arrests

I am not aware of a single other case in which an international arrest warrant was issued for someone because they did not stop having sex when a condom broke, if you can find me another case I am all ears but when it seems one person is being treated differently and they just happen to be a person that governments hold a political grudge against I am very suspicious. If this case had been handled in a way that was consistent with the way other cases of this nature are handled then I would be a lot more willing to take the accusations against Assange seriously, but when it is so glaringly obvious that his case is being treated differently for political reasons then I am convinced that these accusations are part of a smear campaign and I am not going to fall for it.

[NashVegas]

26. By Their Own Testimonies, Neither Said "No" To Sex

According to the statement, Miss A then realised he was trying to have unprotected sex with her. She told police that she had tried a number of times to reach for a condom but Assange had stopped her by holding her arms and pinning her legs. The statement records Miss A describing how Assange then released her arms and agreed to use a condom, but she told the police that at some stage Assange had "done something" with the condom that resulted in it becoming ripped, and ejaculated without withdrawing.
...

On Sunday 15 August, Monica told police, Miss A told her that she thought Assange had torn the condom on purpose. According to Monica, Miss A said Assange was still staying in her flat but they were not having sex because he had "exceeded the limits of what she felt she could accept" and she did not feel safe.

See what happened when she did say "no"? He didn't have sex with her.

The following day, Miss W phoned Assange and arranged to meet him late in the evening, according to her statement. The pair went back to her flat in Enkoping, near Stockholm. Miss W told police that though they started to have sex, Assange had not wanted to wear a condom, and she had moved away because she had not wanted unprotected sex. Assange had then lost interest, she said, and fallen asleep. However, during the night, they had both woken up and had sex at least once when "he agreed unwillingly to use a condom".

Early the next morning, Miss W told police, she had gone to buy breakfast before getting back into bed and falling asleep beside Assange. She had awoken to find him having sex with her, she said, but when she asked whether he was wearing a condom he said no. "According to her statement, she said: 'You better not have HIV' and he answered: 'Of course not,' "

Neither of these cases would hold up as rape charges in a court of law in the US or anywhere else. Because Sweden has its law about unprotected sex, they *might* hold up there.


http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2010/dec/17/julian-assange-sweden

[stranger81]

18. Their names are out in the press and have been for some time.

It's certainly not new information.

[EFerrari]

19. Their names have been in the press for weeks. n/t

[Motown_Johnny]

9. I hope K.O. does "todays tweet of the day" and then

follows it with about 15 seconds of a blank screen and total silence.


Every Day


For A Month

[Nuclear Unicorn]

11. If he actually revealed the victim's name as is alleged in post #8 he can stay silent forever

But I do not know for certain so...

[Motown_Johnny]

25. did you read post #13?

I don't know for sure either but it seems to be a reasonable explanation.

[GoCubsGo]

12. He's back to twittering, and has been doing so all week. n/t

This is old, old news.

[apex nerd]

14. KO was getting twitchslapped pretty hard

[treestar]

27. Keith, Michael and Julian!

All starring into today's high suspense drama! :rofl: