Now Is Not The Time To Go After Google - And Response

  • Tuesday, October 20, 2020

COVID-19 has taken a significant toll on the physical health of Tennessee men and women, but the pandemic has also taken a heavy financial toll. At the height of the pandemic, more than 15 percent of Tennessee workers found themselves without a job. Tech provides important, high- skilled, well-paying jobs for many Americans during a time when the economy is struggling to get back on its feet.

This week, the Department of Justice filed a poorly timed lawsuit against Google, claiming that it violated federal antitrust law and must be broken up. American technology companies like Google are keeping Tennessee workers employed, and we must in turn fight to protect against the break-up of these tech companies. We should not attack the very companies that are helping us survive this difficult time.

Now is simply not the right time to go after big tech. We need our attorneys general to step up and protect American jobs and that is why I am urging Attorney General Herbert Slatery to prioritize the economic recovery of Tennessee and its hardworking families, not pursue a costly lawsuit against Google over baseless antitrust allegations.

William A. Guffee 

* * * 

I am guessing that this letter from Mr. Guffee has got to be satire.  I cannot believe that anyone can reasonably connect a DOJ lawsuit against a giant tech monopoly based in California with COVID-19 and the welfare of workers in Tennessee.  This comes on the heels of Big Tech companies, Facebook and Twitter, suppressing a legitimate news story about corruption in the Biden family which makes Mr. Guffee's commentary all the more absurd.  

I am certainly not against tech companies in general, but I sure am curious as to how many folks Google employs in Tennessee.  I do know that tech monopolies like Google with the power to manipulate their search engine (and/or allowable content) algorithms and thus manipulate the flow of information are a greater danger to all Americans, in the long run, than COVID-19.

James Nelson

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