Senate Report Shows Russia Used Social Media To Support Trump In 2016 (bbc.co.uk) 388
AmiMoJo shares a report from the BBC: Russia used every major social media platform to influence the 2016 US election, the report claims. New research says YouTube, Tumblr, Instagram and PayPal -- as well as Facebook and Twitter -- were leveraged to spread propaganda. Its authors criticize the "belated and uncoordinated response" by tech firms. It is the first analysis of millions of social media posts provided by Twitter, Google and Facebook to the Senate Intelligence Committee. Russia adapted techniques from digital marketing to target audiences across multiple channels, with a particular focus on targeting conservatives with posts on immigration, race, and gun rights. There were also efforts to undermine the voting power of left-leaning African-American citizens, by spreading misinformation about the electoral process.
"What is clear is that all of the messaging clearly sought to benefit the Republican Party -- and specifically Donald Trump," the report says. "Trump is mentioned most in campaigns targeting conservatives and right-wing voters, where the messaging encouraged these groups to support his campaign. The main groups that could challenge Trump were then provided messaging that sought to confuse, distract and ultimately discourage members from voting."
"What is clear is that all of the messaging clearly sought to benefit the Republican Party -- and specifically Donald Trump," the report says. "Trump is mentioned most in campaigns targeting conservatives and right-wing voters, where the messaging encouraged these groups to support his campaign. The main groups that could challenge Trump were then provided messaging that sought to confuse, distract and ultimately discourage members from voting."
Clinton Lost Because of Clinton (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Clinton Lost Because of Clinton (Score:4, Insightful)
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It's clearly a false equivalence to suggest the Russians equally attacked both sides.
They did not.
They sowed dissension, but they knew the core republicans would vote for whoever the republican candidate was, regardless.
They also knew that they could discourage and disenfranchise voters in the center and on the left by creating division among their ranks.
And that's exactly what they did.
A lot of people didn't vote because they were disgusted by the infighting and the mud-slinging and felt there wasn't a cle
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Yep, she's running again. Without a doubt. The astroturfing is already starting.
Seriously? Jeez.
I'm as anti-trump as anybody but I actually want him to win again:
a) To give his economic polices time to implode, and:
b) Because I think the world needs a completely different sort of leader than "politician"
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So instead of a "politician", you place a "criminal" at the top.
We've had criminals at the top before. We're accustomed to a certain panache in our criminals. And a certain competence. We like criminals smart enough not to get caught at most of what they do.
This guy.... he involved himself with the highest law of the land while knowing nothing of law, while knowing so little about law that he was unable to hire a lawyer who could stand up to him and tell him what he can and can not do on the way to accomplishing his goals. There's often a weasel path to get what you
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Nobody sane wants another four years of Trump. If Hillary runs, it will happen though.
I they put up Hillary again then I hope Trump wins. The world needs change, not the same old lobbyist-and-rich-people-running-the-show schtick as before.
Re:Clinton Lost Because of Clinton (Score:4, Interesting)
Russia attacked both sides, they had meme's that attack Both Clinton and Trump.
Yes they did. It has been reported on and was detailed in the Cambridge Analytica investigation.
They targeted not just "both" side but many sides and found out that they got the most bang for the buck by riling up the right-wingers against Clinton.
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Yep, new confirmation Russia ran BLM ads (Score:4, Insightful)
> Russia funded every divisive movement they could. Black Lives Matter, Muslims for Hillary, etc. Their purpose is psy ops to sow derision in the populace - the same purpose they've had when they've done the exact same thing for the past 75 years. We do the same.
Exactly. Russia is trying to beat the US, not Clinton. They want us fighting with each other instead of beating them at whatever. We just got new confirmation that Russia was running Black Lives Matter ads. Whatever gets Americans fighting Americans, whatever divides us.
> It had zero impact in the election's outcome though. This is all about providing an excuse for Clinton's loss to make her 2020 run more palatable.
Clinton was a really bad candidate, with terrible poll numbers. Of the six "finalists" for the Republican nomination, five of the six beat Clinton in the polls. Only one, Donald Trump, could lose to Clinton, according to polling during the primaries. Trump was also a pretty crappy candidate - the only one who didn't poll better than Clinton during the primaries.
I think the Russian ads probably did what they were designed to do and not much else - they made the election period more partisan, encouraged us to be even less unified, and probably didn't materially affect the election, but there's no way to be 100% sure of what would have happened if things had been different. Wen might have even had a more moderate, less polarizing candidate win. Doubtful though.
Re: Yep, new confirmation Russia ran BLM ads (Score:5, Insightful)
The NRA owns the Republicans and apparently the Russians own the NRA thanks to the efforts of people like the Red Sparrow Butina.
It is disingenuous to say that they did not favor Trump. Yes the primary goal was to sow discord however they favored Trump because they wanted sanctions eased.
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Re: Yep, new confirmation Russia ran BLM ads (Score:5, Insightful)
Wow, the Russians even traveled through time and got us to enact a second amendment. They are powerful!
At this moment, on Slashdot, a comment that completely misses the entire point of the prior comment is at labelled "(Score:4, Insightful)". The problem with America is that there are people who are just content to be wrong. And proud of it. And they cheer each other on. They support Trump not because they believe a damn thing he says -- but because he pisses off half the country. They have given up on fixing anything and are waiting for supply side Jesus to take them to Heaven during the Rapture and meanwhile they just want someone who can piss off Liberals. The important thing is pissing of Liberals.
There was absolutely nothing in the prior comment about guns, gun rights, or anything about your rights. It was about a foreign country influencing a private group to influence our politics. But again, some people are OK with that because the Russians are better than the Liberals. These are people who have given up on solving problems after all and just want to stick it to those know-it-alls.
Slashdot has been infected by cancer because your comment was labelled as insightful when they damn well know it wasn't. You didn't come for a discussion or friendship.
Re:Yep, new confirmation Russia ran BLM ads (Score:5, Informative)
Clinton was a really bad candidate, with terrible poll numbers. .. derp derp derp.
Where does this horseshit keep coming from? You guys keep repeating it to each other so much that you think it is true. It has absolutely no basis in fact.
At the time the famous Comey letter was released Clintion was 6-8 points ahead in the polls. (source: 538) That isn't even close. That's a blowout election similar to the one we just went through in the midterms.
After the Comey letter and the media had a week or two to scream from every orifice about Weiner's laptop she took a hit of 4-5 points. That made it close enough for the Electoral College to work its magic. I have no idea what part the Russian media efforts had in that but whatever effect it has wasn't positive for Clinton. They were totally in it for Trump.
And she STILL got 3M more votes. The most terrible candidate in history.
I know this was totally useless but still..
Reading comprehension much? 7.4% lead (Score:5, Interesting)
Maybe you can read it the third and fourth time I say it:
>> Only one, Donald Trump, could lose to Clinton, according to polling during the primaries. Trump was also a pretty crappy candidate - the only one who didn't poll better than Clinton during the primaries.
"Oh that's bullshit, Clinton polled better than Trump", you say. Which is exactly what I said - twice. Derp derp indeed.
As I said, during the primary season (February and March), Ted Cruz beat into by 3-5% in the RCP average.
Marco Rubio had her beat 47% to 43%
https://www.realclearpolitics.... [realclearpolitics.com]
Kasich beat Clinton 48% to 41% - a whopping 7.4% lead
https://www.realclearpolitics.... [realclearpolitics.com]
Again, (for the fifth time) Republicans chose the only candidate who had a shot at losing to Clinton.
Ray Morris, lying piece of shit folks. (Score:3, Informative)
https://www.politico.com/story/2018/07/16/putin-trump-win-election-2016-722486
07/16/2018 12:07 PM EDT Updated 07/16/2018 03:08 PM EDT
Russian President Vladimir Putin said Monday he wanted President Donald Trump to win the 2016 election because he believed Trump's policies would be more friendly to the Kremlin.
"Yes, I did. Yes, I did. Because he talked about bringing the U.S.-Russia relationship back to normal,” Putin said, standing alongside Trump at a joint news conference.
Putin was asked whether he
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The people who you think are "Black Lives Matter" were probably Russian trolls. They weren't supporting Clinton, they were making you think that "sjws", "leftists" and other people you don't like supported her.
The report cites the example of "Black Matters", an fake organization created by the Internet Research Agency and popular across multiple social media platforms.
Re:Yep, new confirmation Russia ran BLM ads (Score:5, Insightful)
Exactly. Russia is trying to beat the US, not Clinton. They want us fighting with each other instead of beating them at whatever. We just got new confirmation that Russia was running Black Lives Matter ads. Whatever gets Americans fighting Americans, whatever divides us.
Well this really is the issue. Whether there are Clinton people using it as an excuse for the election or not doesn't really matter and it's beside the point if it was SIGNIFICANT enough to change the election (really, it was just 70,000 votes in 3 midwest states that tipped the electoral college). The issue is that Trump is accused of colluding with Russian agents for their help (whether it was good or not) to effect the election and they were offering help with the Magninsky act and perhaps other things. We also have money traveling from Russia to the NRA to the Republican party. While Putin is trying to divide the nation -- he is getting aided by the Republicans and that's where the problem lies.
And that's not getting to all the other crimes of the administration. Whether his machinations to pay off porn stars or get help from Chinese or Russian agents or if he made a profit on renting his hotels to people buying influence -- do we really need to allow this? It was poor judgement and a lack of ethics regardless on whether it was beneficial or not. We shouldn't have to go to trial to get tax returns or to get a President to divest themselves of conflicts of interests. This guy didn't have to be President. Why do we have to prove crimes beyond a reasonable doubt when we can't find any LEGAL way he covered billions of dollars in debts without any US banks loaning him the money and we can't PROVE that he's a Russian agent but we have little reason to suspect otherwise.
We can't even prove that Trump knows how to read. Why do we have to put up with this as a people? The divisiveness in this nation is because a sizeable percentage want to troll the rest of us.
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"just 70,000 votes in 3 midwest states" is a ridiculous statistic. How do you change 70,000 minds and hearts? Russians? With laser precision, exactly those 70,000 you need and no others? It's hard to imagine that 2 years of media propaganda managed actually to change ONE living soul's vision of their and the country's future, let alone 70 thousands of those living souls, chosen with laser precision.
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For your next assignment, think about which popular regime was able to hold together after they lost all semblance of a common philosophy. Through the Obama years we learned that "innocent until proven guilty" was not even a thing if the accuser happened to be of a particular victim group. Recently the press has decided that open debate and freedom of speech can be violently squelched if a group dressed in black decides that they don't like what you're are saying. How long can a society hold together onc
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Perfect example of disinfo from someone who doubtless posted lots of "SHE'LL START A WAR WITH RUSIIA" trolls in October/November 2016.
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Can you explain why else a Russian bank would give Bill a cool half mil for a 20 minute speech?
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Either that or Chelsea Clinton.
It's more complicated than that (Score:5, Insightful)
But all that said:
1. She still won the popular vote.
2. She lost by a razor thin margin. So thin that all she needed was to focus a bit more on the rust belt but...
3. By the same token that razor thin margin means that stuff that ordinarily shouldn't have mattered, mattered.
TL;DR; I think Clinton could have won if she tried harder, but I don't think she'd have lost without Russian interference and that last minute Oct surprise from Comey pushing Trump over the edge.
Re:It's more complicated than that (Score:4, Insightful)
I don't think she'd have lost without Russian interference and that last minute Oct surprise from Comey pushing Trump over the edge.
Isn't that a bit like saying "I don't think he would have died without that hangnail and the bullet piercing his heart." One seems slightly more likely to have affected the outcome in question than the other.
People keep talking about "Russian interference", but if it was that easy to sway votes with a few anonymously-placed ads or astroturfing bots, it seems the campaigns are awfully incompetent with the $2.4 BILLION spent on the presidential race. I mean, surely the next presidential candidate who hires a Russian strategist is a shoo-in, since they apparently have some untapped genius for getting candidates elected without anyone even noticing.
No, (Score:3)
"I wouldn't have died from the hangnail if my immune system wasn't weakened by lead poisoning and constant illness from the bullet wound I got 30 years ago"
Like I said, Hillary had a _lot_ of baggage, much of it manufactured by a multi-million dollar right wing apparatus that saw she was getting ready to run for president and so came at her like a ton of bricks. Now, as a presidential candidate it was her responsibility to defuse those attacks (as opposed to throwing fire on th
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Grow the fuck up you fucking infant.
This is the delusional garbage people end up spewing when they sit around in a informational echo chamber on social media instead of having a good cry in their pillow on election night because their candidate didn't win waking up and acting like a fucking adult.
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Politically, I think it is worse than this. That idiot is run what used to be the intelligent part of the Republican party out of the party. Now all that is left are Republicans who do not believe in founding American values and would be just as happy with a dictator.
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Which American value would that be? It couldn't be the concept of "innocent until proven guilty" or the right to face your accuser in a court of law, because you seem to be ok with Obama tearing those apart.
Uhhh, what? (Score:3, Insightful)
1. She still won the popular vote.
There is no "popular vote" for the US President. Please refer to the Constitution if you are confused about the process the US uses to elect the President. I'm sure there is a Wikipedia page about it if the old words are hard.
2. She lost by a razor thin margin.
"She won ... she lost ...". What?
Trump won the electoral college 304-227. That's not "razor thin".
I think Clinton could have won if she tried harder, but I don't think she'd have lost without Russian interference
Do you have evidence that any Russians voted illegally in the 2016 Presidential election? That would be a good argument for voter ID, you know.
You do realize that lots of non-US people
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Go obfuscate yourself with extreme prejudice, jackass.
Re:Uhhh, what? (Score:5, Informative)
1. Yes, there is. It's the total number of votes. It has no legal bearing, but it does exist.
Not only does it not have any legal meaning, it has no practical meaning. Nobody campaigns based on mythical "popular vote" results. If they did, then the "popular vote" results would be different.
No, the only time "popular vote" comes up is when someone LOSES and tries to justify how good they did because a meaningless sum total of the individual votes of all the states proved they should have WON! It's like a college student who flunks a 100 question test because he got only 50 questions right claiming that if the test had only 50 questions he would have gotten an A+. Yeah, if the election was different, the result would be different. So what?
Again, the electoral college is designed to dampen the effects of Democracy in order to protect the power of a landed owning ruling class.
Saying it again doesn't make it true. The electoral college was designed because the founders knew that both the people AND THE STATES had a vested interest in selecting the executive officer of the UNITED STATES. You forget -- we are not one big group of a few hundred million people, we are a confederation of fifty states and a few protectorates. That's why you are confused into thinking you can just add up all the individual votes and think it means something.
2. Yes, it is.
No, I'm sorry, but 304 to 232 is winning with 57% of the vote. That's a 14% difference. Not "razor thin" at all. Any state-level election with that kind of result would be a "landslide" or "a mandate".
Trump won a lot of electoral votes,
Yes, a lot more than Hillary did. He won. Get over it.
If you're a Russian yourself
Yes, if you cannot win an argument using facts, then claim you're being trolled by the Russians and look, come see the repression inherent in the system.
And the rest of your post demonstrates exactly that kind of nonsense. It was funny when Monty Python did it, it's just sad when real people do it.
You can stop it.
Sorry, you don't get a free pass to post nonsense just because you tell me to stop correcting you or try to claim "Russian oppression."
Re:Uhhh, what? (Score:5, Insightful)
Yeah, if the election was different, the result would be different. So what?
So what, you ask? If the popular vote result and the electoral college vote result are wildly different, then people may choose to infer that the electoral college vote is no longer fair. That is what is happening. Obviously. Disagree away with their inference, but it's stupid not to acknowledge the importance of questions about whether the voting system is fair and can be improved.
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It is the states that elect the president, not the people. They, however, did try to make the electoral college somewhat representative of every member of congress. The electoral votes each state gets is based on the number of congressman and senators in that state. Therefore states with more population get more electoral votes. If it was merely each state getting a vote it would be even more offset from popular vote. Here is something you should be complaining to your state about, not to the federal govern
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You pompous ignorant twerp. The phrase "free and fair elections" is *the* term used to describe legitimate elections, and has been ever since the first post-apartheid elections in South Africa in 1994. "Fairness" has always been a legitimate goal of an electoral system. It's why democracies have laws regulating election spending; vote counting; who can and cannot vote; etc etc.
Here's some help for you:
http://www.civicsacademy.co.za... [civicsacademy.co.za]
https://www.usaid.gov/what-we-... [usaid.gov]
http://archive.ipu.org/cnl-e/1... [ipu.org]
I'm well
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I understand the rationale for the electoral college. I disputed the OP's implication that it was illegitimate to discuss whether the current voting system was still fit for purpose. By asserting that it still is fit for purpose, you're joining in with a discussion that the OP has implied should not happen.
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Maybe. You're more generous-minded than me.
Re:Uhhh, what? (Score:5, Interesting)
You are not a member of the elite.
Most of the people who vote (R) aren't doing so because they believe themselves to be part of the privileged few. They believe the Democrats are going to take more of what little they do earn, and give it to people who (in their view) don't deserve it.
Even though I support the lesser of the evils in our two party system, I'm not blind to the idiocy which frequently comes from the left almost as often as it does from the right. A few examples:
Cash for clunkers - Didn't benefit me at all, because the vehicle I wanted to trade in was 1 MPG too efficient to qualify, even though the vehicle I wanted to purchase (a compact economy car) would've resulted in a larger net benefit to the environment, versus the hypothetical situation of someone trading in a vehicle which did qualify, towards the purchase of another gas guzzling SUV. The program didn't take into account fuel efficiency gains of what you intended to purchase, only the inefficiency of your trade-in.
Solar tax rebates - A nice handout to the rich who could afford to have photovoltaics installed on their home.
EV tax rebates - Another handout to the rich. The average hard working American can't afford this shit, with or without the rebate.
The ACA (Obamacare) - Crony capitalism meets healthcare. It is absolutely abhorrent to use taxpayer dollars to subsidize the cost of private insurance, and penalizing people on their taxes if they refused to purchase what is essentially a commercial product truly is unconstitutional. This would be like the RIAA getting a law passed requiring a penalty be paid if you're not subscribed to Spotify/Apple Music/Pandora/etc., because their business model can only work if everyone pays!
Now here's the part where I say despite all this, I still hold my nose and vote (D), because the Republican party's disregard for the environment, moronic trade policies, and pandering to the "religious right" bothers me much more than misuse of my tax dollars (which the Republican party is presently doing in true "hold my beer!" style, anyway).
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maybe we should stop holding our noses and vote libertarian and i dont mean the stolen tea-party use of the word. When the D's in california decided to wage war against the average law-abiding gun owner and treat them as if they were criminals they drove many centrist out of the party and left only the fringe special interest groups. Treating the average law-abiding gun owner as a criminal in waiting is no different than wearing a shirt that says "Arrest black babies before they grow up to be criminals". Th
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you do realize that /. is a conglomerate of more than just US citizens and therefore any and all political discussion on here is, technically speaking, coming from foreigners trying to influence political opinion. Its a very thin line where one draws a distinction between illegal and legal when first amendment rights are in question. Even fewer have the ability to see such a distinct line. If you react too broadly, you risk opening the door to suppression of free speech, if you do nothing you risk foreign-s
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yes, Clinton could have won if she'd just taken Trump seriously.
Whether she won or lost is largely irrelevant. An attack on our country's sovereignty occurred and our current leader supports those actions, going so far to do everything he can get by with to weaken and destroy key pillars of our democracy to save his own ass. He fosters tribalism because it benefits him, the same way Putin foster'd it in America because it benefits him. They both are perfectly fine with watching America burn if it helps them.
"Also if she took notice of how badly beaten up the working
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Her solution to everything was more education.
Which is fine if you're 18 and living at your parents place. If you're pushing 40 and feel like an old dog who doesn't want to learn any new tricks, it comes across as condescending.
Granted, Trump's "MAGA" was a bullshit snake oil pitch, but some people would just rather hear the fairy tale where you go back to work in the coal mine, rather than the one where you get to star in your own remake of Billy Madison.
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TL;DR; I think Clinton could have won if she tried harder,
I don't know if "try harder" is the way to put it. She basically put all her resources into it. You might say she should have allocated resources differently, visited different states, but I don't know if she could have tried any harder.
Re:It's more complicated than that (Score:4, Insightful)
The left is focused on basics like education and healthcare because those are the things that tend to keep people poor. Education opens up more opportunities, and that includes learning trades as well as purely academic study.
Clinton's real problem was that she had too much baggage. Nothing was wrong with her policies really. She was an easy target for a populist promising to "drain the swamp" and offer a bunch of simplistic solutions to complex problems that in reality take many years of sustain effort to fix.
Clinton did NOT win "the popular vote" (Score:2)
> 1. She still won the popular vote.
Clinton did not win "the popular vote", because there was no popular vote.
There was only an electoral vote. And people may or may not vote differently based on the type of vote.
Some people lived in a very "red" or "blue" state, so perhaps they stayed home, because it did not make a difference. Or perhaps they voted for Johnson because they knew it did not make a difference in said red or blue state.
Or perhaps they lived in a "swing state" and were unsure, so they vote
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Clinton might also have won if she hadn't put that fake, wide grin on her face every time a camera was pointed at her. Really, not a single one of her PR advisers was able to tell her how creepy that felt, and that she could earn sympathy points -easily- by just looking serious for a second?
Re: It's more complicated than that (Score:2)
How the hell can you say its not an issue. If you had done it you would most certsinly have gone to jail. Its a classic case of those in power held to a lesser standard. People go to jail for mishandling classified information ALL THE TIME. Sending classified messages over the internet in PLAIN TEXT over SMTP port 25 is the very fucking definition of mishandling classified documents. You might as well print it on the back of postcards and drop them in the mail.
She admitted to doing it. She said âoebut
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You don't even realize that the Clinton foundation is still under investigation by the DoJ, do you?
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Obvious turnabout troll is obvious.
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How is he such a good liar when everything he says is chewed over and exposed? Half the so-called lies he tells are opinions, but the media calls them lies anyway. Meanwhile, Hillary gets away with boxes of FBI files magically appearing in the White House, or getting lucky turning $1000 into $100,000 on her first attempt with futures trading.
Who cares about Clinton? (Score:5, Insightful)
The only people I hear bring her up are Republicans who keep going "Lock Her Up". Whether Trump worked Russia seems important because, you know, if he keeps working with Russia, that's really bad.
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This is what happens when you raise someone to the status of your own personal deity. It kind of sucks, hard, when you find out she isn't. I doubt they will run her again. Already the democrats are tossing her, and the rest of her family, under the bus. Their brand is to heavily damaged.
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*That's* your sole measure of success for a Presidency? Taxes? Here are some other things other people care about: the rule of law; racism; climate change policy; education; clean water, air and land; health and healthcare; pensions; income levels; equity of opportunity; equity of outcome; gun ownership; abortion policy. None of that matters to you?
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Locking up a 7 year child isn't wrong for you? The head of Homeland Security saying that's what these people get for coming here? Let me guess, you are an Evangelical Christian.
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The father of the child who died [cnn.com] has no complaints about the treatment she received. Revived multiple times, air-lifted to a hospital. I guess that is murder to you? You're sick.
Well, if Trump hadn't very publicly sent troops to the border, talked about allowing the US troops to use live ammunition against unarmed civilians (and no, a rock is notequivalent to a gun), and generally made conditions at the border so hostile that it is driving people to cross illegally at the most inhospitable and dangerous areas of the border she wouldn't have needed medical treatment in the first place. Yes, I know the troops had logistical roles only, but most people would not see it that way (I al
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WT is not even wrong. Feel free to try again, though.
Too bad... (Score:3)
...we can't just drop the Soviet Union, err Russia from routing tables.
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Trump's poll numbers don't drop (Score:4, Informative)
To me the Russian interference is like a vial of blood in a shark pool. It didn't take much, but without the vial there wouldn't have been a frenzy. And we shouldn't be surprised. Vlad Putin's specialty was information warfare for Christ's sake. It's not like we weren't warned. He saw a weakness (Hilary) and exploited it to weaken us further.
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The obvious problem being that this support was bipartisan, as several pieces of evidence now clearly showed. The "social media ads"?
They supported both Clinton and Trump. The aim was clearly polarisation of the extremes of the supporting bases of each candidate, not supporting either of the candidates. You can see this in pretty much everything publicly released so far, from the facebook ads to the various reports.
Trump's popularity on the other hand doesn't drop for a very simple reason. Political smear j
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The obvious problem being that this support was bipartisan, as several pieces of evidence now clearly showed. The "social media ads"?
They supported both Clinton and Trump. The aim was clearly polarisation of the extremes of the supporting bases of each candidate, not supporting either of the candidates.
Polarization was an objective, but so was Trump. To say the Russian interference "supported both Clinton and Trump" is to ignore overwhelming evidence to contrary.
Trump's popularity on the other hand doesn't drop for a very simple reason. Political smear jobs based on misunderstandings, misrepresentations and lies have to take out their target quickly. If they don't, the audience of the target sees one lie, than another lie, and then they simply assume that everything else coming out of those sources is probably a lie.
Virtually none of the attacks against Trump are "smear jobs", "misunderstandings", "misrepresentations", or "lies". The reason they don't hurt Trump's popularity is that virtually everyone except his base has abandoned him. And his base doesn't care about the attacks because they don't care if he's a corrupt businessman who colluded with Russia. T
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> Globalism is just robust international trade and institutions.
The simplicity of this statement is misleading. It's relevant to recognize the distasteful relevant practical relationship between these terms. "Robust" encompasses the economically supported exploitation of labor by totalitarian states (eg Chinese Manufacturing, African Diamond Mines, Venezuela oil) empowering these organizations. "Globalism" is a soft term that encompasses the humanitarian/political forces across the "globe" that result i
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Virtually none of the attacks against Trump are "smear jobs", "misunderstandings", "misrepresentations", or "lies".
The ones that matter are.
The idea that he's some sort of "white supremacist" is precisely a smear job, a lie. And it's really all you have.
It's also ludicrous, as he's been in the public eye all his life. No, we really didn't just discover in 2016 that he's secretly a Nazi, lol. And people not blinded by partisanship know that.
The reason they don't hurt Trump's popularity is that virtually everyone except his base has abandoned him.
You kept saying that during his campaign too.
Who knows, you might be right at some point, if you keep saying it. It's not a really great prediction record so far though.
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And yet, France had protests that literally showed that Trump's paradigm shift clearly happened in France too,
Yeah, no, that's just stupid. Trump is putting industry titans in charge of everything and getting rid of safety and environmental standards might make coal slightly cheaper but at the cost of the health of the people involved in it. He's too damn corrupt to represent anyone but the elite. And though China needs to be brought into line -- his hamfisted approach and alienation of allies who might have been engaged in forcing China to respect IP are going to work against him.
Trump is just a dumpster fire and
Re:Trump's poll numbers don't drop (Score:4, Interesting)
I don't live in nor vote in the United States, and I have to say I find much more objective coverage of Trump in my country. We still definitely have some of those same foaming-mouth outlets, but they are generally easier to spot for their heavy left-leaning bias. I think every politician and their policies should be heavily scrutinized, but I can't understand how people still live this "Russia hacked the election and colluded with Trump" given the actual evidence that has come out. If there was any "Trump support" from these online trolls, it was because they clearly hated Hillary vs. liking Trump. But the Senate wants you to believe some online trolls posting memes stole an entire election. Ridiculous.
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the usual foaming-mouth anti-Trump sources/quote
Like the BBC?
The coverage was a little muted because this is just the warm up. The Senate will now act on this report somehow, which is when the fun really starts.
Re:Trump's poll numbers don't drop (Score:5, Interesting)
> They supported both Clinton and Trump.
The summary states the exact opposite. I'm not sure where you got this from. At best there were a handful of example supporting Hilary to create division compared to hundreds of thousands in support of Trump.
> Trump's popularity on the other hand doesn't drop for a very simple reason. Political smear jobs based on misunderstandings, misrepresentations and lies have to take out their target quickly.
This doesn't make sense as most of the attacks on Trump (such as his rapey comments) were factual, whilst the attacks on Hillary and the Dems (PizzaGate) were lies, so it doesn't explain how Trump survives, but Hillary didn't. If what you said was true then Hillary would be in the whitehouse because the smears against her were often lies, whereas those against Trump were factual (and continuously prove to be so).
> it's genuinely hard at this point to take any critique of Trump without reacting "ok, show me the full context of this claim you have".
Right, but that's not because of the reason you give, that's simply because you're a well known Trump supporter on Slashdot and are incredibly partisan. You won't believe negative news about Trump because you'll support him regardless. You're one of those supporters that would support him if, in his own words "I could shoot somebody and I wouldnâ(TM)t lose any voters".
> Which is why you should be genuinely afraid of Trump if you're against his agenda. Not because of the contents of his agenda, or because of any of the smears. You should be afraid of him because there's one thing on which Bannon was completely correct in that Munk debate. Trump is the paradigm shift, where disenfranchised people actually found franchise, and where there are now too many people who have been disenfranchised by the globalist trend. To the point where it's not limited to the continent - Yellow Jackets was a part of the exact same paradigm shift in a country that is about as different as a country could be to US while still remaining a part of "Western" umbrella. Utterly different court system, literal codification of anti-theism into all government functions, very socialist policies. And yet, France had protests that literally showed that Trump's paradigm shift clearly happened in France too, and it reached a point where it cannot be simply dismissed as "those deplorable people that are beneath us that we will call names and dismiss as if they're irrelevant".
An alternative world view is that we should be scared of Putin, because we thought we'd won the cold war in the early 90s and turned our backs and started to focus on sideshows like the Taliban and ISIS. Meanwhile, Putin spent 20+ years building up his intelligence apparatus to infiltrate Western society left and right, hence why people like Arron Banks in the UK have a wife who was exposed as a Russian spy, and who is also the person who illegally funded Brexit way beyond campaign spending laws with money that can't be traced back to his actual business because it comes from Russia. We saw the St Petersberg convention, where Russia hosted all of Europe's far right, and they all came away with millions of pounds in funding, some of it overt (France's NF) and some of it covert but now exposed (UKIP). In the UK we're seeing the same pattern repeat now with Tommy Robinson having Russian propaganda support on social media, and we've seen it across Europe with Hungary's Jobbik, Italy's Five Star, Greece's Golden Dawn, Germany's AfD, and so on. That's not to say it's restricted to the far right, though that's Russia's preference as it's the orthodoxy it now follows at home, but if no convenient far right actor exists, or is unlikely to succeed Russia will support the far left too (Podemos in Spain and Syriza in Greece for example).
It's not some weird coincidence that Russia hosted all these parties and/or their key figures, and that clear links to Russia keep getting exposed to their financing and online propaganda support. It's not some conspi
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They supported both Clinton and Trump.
They did not. The report clearly says that the "support" for Clinton was only to the extent that it pushed her supporters to be more extreme and make her and the Democrats look bad, e.g. by attacking Sanders.
In fact they did a lot of sabotage Clinton. Releasing those emails just before the vote, spreading misinformation to discourage or prevent her supporters from voting.
"populism" is now considered a bad word
It always was. It refers to politics that offers seemingly simple solutions to often largely invented problems for the sake of gaining pow
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They supported both Clinton and Trump. The aim was clearly polarisation of the extremes of the supporting bases of each candidate, not supporting either of the candidates.
"They" what? Ads in general or what the Russians were targeting? The entire report is covering them using sophisticated data and supporting Trump directly by targeting people who were susceptible to their messages -- usually based with fear and xenophobia.
And we have seen so many lies about Trump and his purported actions that were just patently false on the face of it, it's genuinely hard at this point to take any critique of Trump without reacting "ok, show me the full context of this claim you have".
The most damning critiques about Trump are based on his own quotes. I find "they" (the media) are cruelly representing him and his bullshit quite accurately. They still give most of the BS a pass that politicians spread seemingly still oblivious of the fer
Targetting voters (Score:2)
When Obama started using data mining to target voters with tailored messages, it was smart.
When Trump did the same, it was unfair.
When Russia played that game, it was unacceptable.
And when Israel our Saudi Arabia pour money to influence elections, it is not worth a paper.
Self inflicted? (Score:3)
The americans created a software environment that allows people to influence the views and votes of others. Then they complain when someone else uses it for that purpose.
What have I missed? Was it just that it was being used by the wrong sort of people?
Motivation (Score:2)
It's embarrassing to Trump that the Russians very clearly considered him to be worse for the US national interest than Clinton (which is really saying a lot), but that's a long way from a crime.
Though actual crimes wouldn't surprise me in any way.
this (Score:2)
How to win US election (Score:3)
Make sure they can give a speech that is filled with election winning ideas.
Have experts map out the actual "states" needed to win an election.
Got in person each state needed and give a great speech that is well liked by people in that state.
Talk about jobs, local issues, some past connection with that state. Be happy and smile.
Dont bring the same negative speech to each state and then go full negative about the state you are in.
The locals who have to "vote" later kind of notice what is been said about them in person. They like happy words and political leaders who can give a "great" speech.
A healthy, charming person with a winning message with new ideas and something "good" to say. In every state they have to win.
Stamina, charm and the ability to have real time local knowledge.
Have the "winning" political team ready to support the events in each and every state.
People in that state who can get people out to vote in that state.
Lots of people on each side of the USA do not will US election count. Many other states are needed to add up to "win".
No "Russians" needed.
A much better quality of political advice and the ability to stay "healthy" and "talk" to normal people will be noticed by all voters all over the USA.
Carry this out to its logical conclusion (Score:5, Insightful)
But by that same reasoning, isn't it also wrong for the two political parties to influence elections for Senators and Congresscritters by shifting money to candidate's campaign that has been raised outside the state or district the candidate is running in? After all, that's money donated by someone who can't vote in that election being used to try to influence it.
So if you carry this outrage over Russian interference to its logical conclusion, you end up with a ban on political parties' unrestricted use of donations. No using money raised in New York to try to influence a Congressional race in Arizona. Money raised in New York has to be used in New York. Only money raised in that Arizona congressional district can be used to influence the race there.
Somehow I suspect the political parties aren't going to see it that way. And their stance is going to be that it's wrong for other people to try to influence races they can't vote in, but it's OK for them to do it.
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Why was it wrong for Russia to try to influence the election in 2016? The reason I arrive at is because Russians aren't allowed to vote in our election, so it's wrong for them to try to influence it.
Good to know!
So it's wrong for illegal aliens who aren't allowed to vote to try to influence our elections too, right? They (supposedly) can't vote in them.
It's wrong for the president of Mexico to try to influence our elections too, right? He can't vote in them.
It's wrong for the "opinions of the world" (adjust monocles, sip brandy, look askance over eyebrows) to try to influence our elections too, right? They can't vote in them.
A wider problem (Score:5, Insightful)
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The scale of what Russia has been up to is incredible. They even trolled against movies like The Last Jedi, knowing that it would create division and feed the "sjws are taking over" meme. And somehow it's taken us this long to even understand it.
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Who can blame them? (Score:2, Insightful)
Everyone not retarded was scared shitless of Hillary ending up in the White house!
Hacking voters, not machines (Score:2)
The strategy only has to be sufficient to tilt the scales by a few % to significant impact on the outcome. And clearly it worked.
Funnily enough I suspect it worked TOO well as far as Trump was concerned. He was using the campaign
Let's see here... (Score:2, Insightful)
Hillary Clinton spent nearly 2 billion dollars to Trump's approx $600 Million, and some of the money she spent was laundered through the Democrat-hack lawfirm Perkins Coie as "legal fees" to a British spy named Steele who bought anti-Trump propaganda from Russia in the form of the so-called "Steele dossier" which was funneled into the FBI and used without validation to get warrants to spy on Trump's campaign, effectively bringing the CIA and FBI into the election on Hillary's side...... but we're supposed t
So the Russians and Hillary agreed? (Score:3)
The Clinton campaign admitted that early in the top primary process, they had identified Trump as the candidate they most wanted to run against, so where they were able they promoted him too.
Are we considering that as pernicious as "Russian interference".
Trump still lost (Score:2)
All this crap about Russia distracts from the fact that the US President is elected by an antiquated system of electoral collage voting which is free to - and does - ignore the voting pattern of the actual people. THAT'S what got Trump in, not some ineffective echo-chamber adverts from some Russians aimed at half-wits.
No one who got less votes than their opponent is a legitimate president.
And they did a piss-poor job of it. (Score:2)
Laughably bad.
uh huh (Score:2)
Maybe the Russians believed the American leftists (after all, they have such a long, long love relationship with each other) about how supposedly ineffective and awful Trump would be.
So tired of the Russia nonsense (Score:3, Insightful)
Russia tried to influence a US election. So what? This is standard stuff. Every country tries to protect its interests, and part of this is trying to influence other countries and their governments. News at 11:00.
The US not only meddles in elections; they go farther: the US goes in and overthrows governments they don't like [williamblum.org] (that's a list of 57 publicly known incidents).
If people want to get upset about something, how about prosecuting Bush and Obama for attacking sovereign countries without a declaration of war? While Trump hasn't ended any wars, at least he hasn't added any new entries to the list...
Is this a conspiracy theory? (Score:2)
They supported Trump, who was expected to lose. Even in the primaries? Why would they support a bad candidate in the primaries? With all the ties that have been uncovered between the Clintons and the Russians, could it be that the Hillary team was coordinating with them to promote Trump over the more traditional candidates?
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Wouldn't he need some Red Bull first to get his energy up?
#RedBullGivesYouWings
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Calm down!
Now, what "crazy behavior" are you referring to?
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Have you not seen the idiotic behavior from the Left in the last 2 years?
Screaming at the sky.
Talking about blowing up the White House.
The Scalise Shooting
Antifa
Google yourself college campus craziness
Attacking government officials in public.
Trying to claw down the doors of of the Supreme Court.
Come on.
They also supported Hillary (Score:2)
But apparently everyone forgets the Russian trolls were trolling both sides.
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Did the Russians interfere?
Yes? DUH?
Now. Did they connive WITH Trump to do it?
Evidence (or lack thereof) says "no".
No, the evidence says "maybe". There's definitely lots of evidence of Trump campaign officials and Russians feeling each other out. What's unclear is whether they actually made some sort of agreement -- which could have been implicit, note. It's possible to reach a mutual understanding without anyone actually saying the words. That would make it harder to prove, though.
So, to all of those who've welded their asses to the "Impeach Impeach Impeach" train that's going "Trump woke up this morning! IMPEACH HIM NOW!" "Trump tweeted something I don't like! IMPEACH HIM NOW!" "Trump exists! IMPEACH HIM NOW!"?
Take a fucking chill pill. Because your crazy fucking behavior is destroying the Democratic Party and is going to keep the man in office until 2024.
While the Democratic party is perpetually self-destructing, I don't think there's much chance that Trump will win in 2020. He only barely
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But, in the most charitable gimme to the Never-Trumpers, the answer is "we don't know (AND NEITHER DO YOU!)"
Mostly because he refuses to testify or show his taxes. Say what you want about HRC, but she testified every time she was asked to. 16 times for Benghazi alone.
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Ah.
You assume I voted for Trump.
You assume I'm somehow dependent on Trump for my sense of self-worth.
You assume I have the same religious zealotry for my politics that you do.
That's lots of assumptions. And all totally incorrect.
Why exactly do you allow the man to live rent-free in your head this way?
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At this rate, the only way you're going to be able to vote for Trump in 2020 is if you're on his parole board.
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Russian support was explicitly pretending to be homegrown American support. So naturally, you wouldn't expect to see much from Russia, nor recognize it as such.
Indeed, examples abound in this very discussion.
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than logically, undermining a sitting president that has done nothing that is proven beyond attacking Russian interests and allies once they assumed office is playing right in Russia's hands.
Well he's hardly been secret about wanting to lift sanctions, or about not enacting the sanctions that congress passed. And the number of "weird links" and "oops we forgot to mention that" between Trump and Russia are unnerving.
The US President isn't a dictator, his ability to ease up on Russia is limited, and it's still not clear just how close the relationship was so we don't really know how hard he's trying.
Even if you dislike the President, having so little that you have to resort to linking him banging an American hooker to your Russian collusion investigation is pretty thin as far as evidence goes and precisely the type of chaos a foreign agent would love.
It's not our fault he broke campaign finance laws. Besides, that's not really part of the Russian