Mike Pence may not be the most exciting candidate running for President, but when it comes to policy, he's leading the pack with the variety of issues he's tackling in detail and not just talking points. On an interview with Bloomberg TV on September 14th, former Governor and Vice President Mike Pence said;

"We ought to be banning TikTok. TikTok is a platform for the Chinese Communist government. They are collecting data on Americans every single day. Young Americans need to know that their privacy is being compromised."

Mike Pence is, of course, correct. TikTok, like Temu, is absolutely an app developed by those loyal to the Chinese Communist Party with the sole purpose of spying on and collecting information on Americans and others around the free world.

Where Mike Pence is wrong is in assuming young Americans don't know that their data is being stolen by the Communist government in China. I'm sure the vast majority of them are fully aware of what China is doing. The problem is that they don't care! And I can't say I blame them.

Is the Chinese Communist Government evil? Absolutely. The problem is that Americans have LONG known Meta (Facebook, Instagram, etc) and Google have been spying on them, and we were told "it's not ideal, but that's capitalism for you."

Why should we expect anyone to be upset about China collecting the same data Meta and Google collect on us and proceed to sell to anyone willing to pay a high enough price?

Granted, the invasion of privacy by an antagonistic foreign government is worse, but only marginally. Honestly, Americans were conditioned to be spied on by China because they've been spied on by their own government for 22 years and spied on by multi-billion dollar corporations for at least a decade. We have absolutely no expectation of digital privacy when we download any social media app. Republicans and Democrats at best turned a blind eye to the spying and at worst encouraged it for decades. Now they're upset that someone else is trying to spy on us and collect the data only they have been privy to before.

Absolutely, the government should ban TikTok! I'm thrilled Mike Pence was so direct about this. But for Americans to care; which is essential to passing legislation through Congress; the government needs to take steps to limit the data collected on Americans by other social media companies AND the various government agencies (including the IRS, NSA, and FBI) that have accumulated the power to keep records on us.

In the meantime, START YOUR OWN WEBSITE AND UNINSTALL SOCIAL MEDIA APPS ON YOUR PHONE!

If you must use social media, use a VPN and "Private Tabs", "Incognito Mode", or Tor! Despite my problems with Brave Rewards and BAT over the years, I still strongly recommend the Brave Browser as privacy and cookie blocking is enabled by default.

But in the meantime, Mike Pence deserves credit for speaking so strong and clear on the topic. Below is an audio recording of Bloomberg TV's interview with former Vice President Mike Pence.