Byron York’s Daily Memo: Huh? On free speech, China was right, and we were wrong? Seriously?

Huh? On free speech, China was right, and we were wrong? A stunning article in The Atlantic — by a former George W. Bush administration official — has jaws dropping around conservative circles. The former official, Jack Goldsmith, now a Harvard law professor, essentially argues that the United States response to coronavirus would have been better had Big Tech and the U.S. government, like the Chinese communist regime, been able to control speech more effectively on the internet. And in the post-virus future, Americans should accept more infringements of their First Amendment rights. “In the great debate of the past two decades about freedom versus control of the network, China was largely right and the United State was largely wrong,” Goldsmith and a co-author write. “Significant monitoring and speech control are inevitable components of a mature and flourishing internet, and governments must play a large role in these practices to ensure that the internet is compatible with a society’s norms and values.” It’s an understatement to say that suggesting China’s repressive system is better than ours is not going over well with a number of readers. Consider this from one conservative Republican Hill staffer:

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Michael Flynn update. Judge Emmet Sullivan has given the government until next Monday, May 4, to respond to Flynn’s lawyer’s move to make public what she calls “stunning evidence that proves Mr. Flynn’s allegations of having been deliberately set up and framed by corrupt agents at the top of the FBI.” Flynn’s team will then have until Wednesday, May 6 to respond. Bottom line: Something is coming, but don’t expect it tomorrow or the next day.

Strong support for Trump immigration halt. A new Washington Post poll asks, “Would you support or oppose temporarily blocking nearly all immigration into the United States during the coronavirus crisis?” The result: 65 percent support, 34 percent oppose, 1 percent no opinion.

When would Joe Biden re-open the country? Each evening the Biden campaign sends out guidance on the candidate’s schedule for the next day. This is what they sent out Sunday night for Monday:

And this is what the Biden campaign sent out Monday night for Tuesday:

Let’s just say it’s not a super-busy campaign. The 77 year-old former vice president is not running the race of his life at breakneck speed.

But more importantly: Where does Biden stand on the most critical issue of the moment, re-opening the country? It’s not at all clear.

On April 12, he published an op-ed in the New York Times in which he set three standards for re-opening. First, new cases of the disease have to be “down significantly.” Second, there needs to be “widespread, easily available, and prompt” testing. How much testing? “Multiple times” the number of tests being run now. And third, hospitals have to be ready to handle any virus flare-ups.

Interesting point: In the Times piece, Biden never said the word “states,” as in, governors can best address the situations in their states. Nor did Biden refer to mayors or other local government officials. For him, as for some top Democrats, re-opening after the virus is a national, top-down, one-size-fits-all issue.

And keep an eye on the testing requirement. With cases decreasing and hospitals ready, Biden may be setting an unattainable testing goal that would result in continued lockdowns if he were in charge. There’s still a “massive shortfall” of testing, Biden said in a Medium post Monday. “We want our country to get moving and healthy again,” Biden said, “but we must take the necessary, rational steps, grounded in science, to do so safely.”

In Biden’s government, who will determine when the “massive shortfall” has eased? And who decides what “safely” means? It would be his proposed Pandemic Testing Board — a national panel created by the president and Congress. Another top-down measure.

The bottom line: Biden has constructed a position that could be used to justify delaying re-opening virtually indefinitely. Since he is not in office, and has no decision-making authority about anything, it doesn’t really matter — for now. So far, the Democratic presidential nominee has not had to commit to a course of action on the most pressing question of the day