Recent Forum Topics › Forums › The Public House › get rid of the idea that Russian hack stories are about disgruntled dems
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January 5, 2017 at 3:33 pm #62432
znModeratorI could care less what the dem party says about this. Focusing exclusively on what the dems say about this, either to back it or debunk it, is just to miss the entire issue.
Some reads:
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Russia Definitely Guilty Of Hacking, Fake News
http://crooksandliars.com/2017/01/dni-chief-james-clapper-russia-involved
Those seventeen intelligence agencies that usually hate each other — but in the case of Russian interference in our election — agreed unanimously? James Clapper is the overseer for all of them. And that “unanimous” part impressed even him.
As he testified in front of the Senate Armed Services Committee hearing Thursday morning, Clapper reaffirmed that Russia was involved in trying to disrupt the US Presidential election of 2016.
Senator Jack Redd asked, “Aspects of this Russian hacking was not just disseminating information they had exploited from computers, but also the allegations of fake news sites, fake news stories that were propagated. Is that an accurate — or is that one aspect of this problem?”
Clapper replied, “This was a multifaceted campaign, so the hacking was only one part of it. And it also entailed classical propaganda, disinformation, fake news.”
Reed followed up and asked, “Does that continue?”
Clapper said, “Yes.”
Reed continued, “Do you believe that they made little attempts to cover up what they were doing as a way to make a point politically?”
James Clapper wouldn’t get into detail during this hearing because his agencies are giving Congress a report next week. But Clapper did say, “Without pre-empting the report, that’s classical trade-craft that the Russians have long, long used to — particularly when they’re promulgating so-called disinformation, they’ll often try to hide the source of that, or mask it to deliberately mask the source.”
Today’s hearing was billed as one that focused on foreign cyber threats to the United States, but in reality, it was held to expose what Russia did during the 2016 general election.
And it also served as a firm rebuke to President-elect Donald Trump’s weird claims and critiques of the intelligence community — that Russia had nothing to do with hacking the U.S. election.
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Intelligence Chief Criticizes ‘Disparagement’ of Findings on Russian HackingWASHINGTON — The nation’s top intelligence official, in a comment aimed at President-elect Donald J. Trump, said on Thursday that there was a difference between expressing “skepticism” of intelligence reports that Russia interfered with the American election and “disparagement” of the intelligence community.
The official, James R. Clapper Jr., the director of national intelligence, was testifying at a hearing of the Senate Armed Services Committee, where Republicans and Democrats defended Mr. Clapper and others just as Mr. Trump has questioned foreign involvement.
Other highlights from the hearing:
■ Intelligence officials said Julian Assange, the WikiLeaks founder, should not be given credibility.
■ Senator Lindsey Graham accused President Obama of throwing a “pebble” at the Russians. He said he would use a “rock.”
■ The Russian practice of planting “fake news” was an election-year propaganda tactic that remains in use, Mr. Clapper said.
Senator Claire McCaskill, Democrat of Missouri, was the first to take direct aim at Mr. Trump, wondering aloud “who benefits from a president-elect trashing the intelligence community.”
Mr. Clapper said pointedly that there was “a difference between healthy skepticism” — a phrase Vice President-elect Mike Pence used in defending Mr. Trump’s criticism of the intelligence agencies — and “disparagement.”
“The intelligence community is not perfect,” Mr. Clapper added. “We are an organization of human beings and we’re prone sometimes to make errors.” But he referred to the wall of stars in the C.I.A. lobby commemorating the deaths of agency officers on duty and said the agencies’ efforts to keep the country safe were not always appreciated.
Ms. McCaskill said there would be “howls from the Republican side of the aisle” if a Democrat had spoken about intelligence officials as Mr. Trump has.
“Thank you for that nonpartisan comment,” joked Senator John McCain, Republican of Arizona and chairman of the committee.
Intelligence officials say Assange deserves no credibility
Mr. McCain steered the conversation to Mr. Assange, saying, “I believe he is the one who’s responsible for publishing the names of individuals who work for us who put us in direct danger.”“Do you think there’s any credibility we should attach to this individual?” Mr. McCain asked.
“Not in my view,” Mr. Clapper replied.
Mr. McCain turned to Adm. Michael S. Rogers, a leader of the National Security Agency and United States Cyber Command. “I would second those comments,” Admiral Rogers said.
Asked by Mr. McCain whether hacking the American elections would be an attack on the United States, Mr. Clapper demurred. “Whether that constitutes an act of war is a very heavy call that I don’t think the intelligence community should make,” he said. But he called it a matter of “great gravity.”
Mr. McCain was sharply critical of what he described as the Obama administration’s failure to devise a clear-cut policy of deterrence and retaliation for cyberattacks, saying that at times the United States government appeared to be a “bystander.”
Pebbles or rocks?
Mr. Graham, Republican of South Carolina, asked Mr. Clapper if the intelligence community was prepared for “being challenged” by the president-elect at a briefing on Friday. “Are you ready for the task?” Mr. Graham asked. “I think so,” Mr. Clapper said dryly, adding that he and his colleagues were glad to be challenged and ready to explain their views.
Mr. Graham said the Obama administration had lobbed mere “pebbles” at Russia in retaliation for the interference. “When it comes to interfering with our election, we better be ready to throw rocks,” he said.
Mr. Graham also made clear that Republicans could well become the target of cyberattacks next time. “Could it be Republicans next election?” he said. “It’s not like we’re so much better at cybersecurity than Democrats.”
What about ‘fake news’?
Senator Jack Reed of Rhode Island, the ranking Democrat, asked if the dissemination of “fake news” was part of the Russian effort to influence the election. Mr. Clapper said it was, calling the attack “a multifaceted campaign.”
“The hacking was only one part of it,” Mr. Clapper said. “And it also entailed classical propaganda, disinformation, fake news.”
“Does that continue?” Mr. Reed asked. Mr. Clapper said yes.
President Obama announced sanctions against Russia for trying to influence the 2016 election through cyberattacks. Here’s what led to the sanctions.
Senator offers a defense of Trump
Perhaps the closest to a defense of Mr. Trump came from Senator Tom Cotton, Republican of Arkansas. Noting “imprecise language” stating that Russia “hacked the election,” Mr. Cotton referred to Mr. Clapper’s Oct. 7 statement on the matter and pressed him to be more specific about the agencies’ findings.
Mr. Cotton also suggested that the conventional wisdom that Mr. Putin favored Mr. Trump over Hillary Clinton might be wrong. Mr. Trump promised a stronger military and more American oil and gas production — policies Mr. Cotton suggested would not be to Russia’s advantage.
Public must wait for new information on hackings
Mr. Clapper suggested that he would not be unveiling major new inside information on the intelligence agencies’ conclusion that the Russian government had directed the interference in the election.Mr. Clapper said he knew there was “great interest” in Russian interference in the election, but he indicated that public curiosity might have to wait for the release of an unclassified report on the matter early next week. President Obama is being briefed today on the full, classified report, and Mr. Trump will get an identical briefing on Friday.
While keeping any scoops about the Russian attack for next week’s release, Mr. Clapper did promise to “push the envelope” in declassifying as much detail as possible, including the motive of President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia in carrying it out. “We’ll be as forthcoming as we can, but there are some fragile and sensitive sources and methods here,” he said.
Mr. Clapper offered no new details but said that “our assessment now is even more resolute” that the Russians carried out the attack on the election. He confirmed that there was no Russian hacking that altered the actual vote count and repeated that it was not the agencies’ job to assess the political impact of information released by Russian agents.
January 5, 2017 at 6:44 pm #62440
Billy_TParticipantAs a leftist, I’m kinda baffled when I read other leftists seemingly defending Putin and Russia. He’s the king of the oligarchs, and likely the world’s richest man, and his Russia is hard right, ideologically.
We both have capitalist empires, and I see both of them as illegitimate entities. But Russia is now what our own far right would probably want us to be. Even more anti-democratic, anti-labor, anti-environment than we already are. More capitalist-crazed as well.
I really don’t get it.
I don’t know who started this cyberwar, and it really doesn’t matter. We’re both guilty. We’re both wrong. We’re both trying to extend empire in so many ways, and we both keep swatting at each other’s beehives. But that doesn’t mean we have to automatically assume that our government is lying about the other guy, and believing them in this case isn’t an endorsement of American policies we reject.
To me, it’s just a logical progression of this game of thrones between us. Two very powerful state actors, with one having the edge economically and militarily, while the other has the edge in the cyber arena. They’re going to take advantage of that and the fact that we’re a much softer target than they are.
It has nothing to do with whiny Dems, at least from my perspective. Clinton lost primarily because she was a poor candidate, couldn’t connect with enough fence-sitters to matter, and her party, the Dems, have played the centrist card for too long. Plus, Bill Clinton’s sexual history basically cancelled out the Access Hollywood tapes for enough people to change their votes. Pretty much any other Dem would have whipped Trump just on that issue alone. It took a Clinton to snatch defeat from the mouth of victory, etc. etc.
Yeah, I think Putin wanted to put Trump in the White House, and all of his moves regarding his cabinet to be make that seem even more logical. Again, saying so doesn’t mean one buys Democratic Party excuses, or trusts American intel blindly. It just adds up. It’s just the logical progression of this game of thrones.
January 5, 2017 at 8:52 pm #62448
bnwBlockedExcept Assange has always said the emails were not from Russia or in any way connected to Russia. Oops! Sure hope Trump doesn’t get suckered by the neocons.
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bnw.
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January 5, 2017 at 10:47 pm #62454Billy_TParticipantExcept Assange has always said the emails were not from Russia or in any way connected to Russia. Oops! Sure hope Trump doesn’t get suckered by the neocons.
So we have different accounts of what happened. Who are you going to believe? The guy who decided to leak NOTHING from Republicans and ONLY from the Dems? And NOTHING from Wall Street and Corporate American and ONLY from the Dems? Or more than a dozen intel agencies, who don’t generally get along, often can’t stand the sight of each other, fight over turf constantly, but in this case agree?
I find it interesting how the same exact conservatives — especially in the media — who screamed for Assange’s head for years and years suddenly think he’s a hero.
The right: making the world safer for hypocrites since 1789.
January 6, 2017 at 3:35 am #62458znModeratorU.S. intel report identifies Russians who gave emails to WikiLeaks -officials
https://www.yahoo.com/news/u-intel-report-identifies-russians-gave-emails-wikileaks-020036818.html
The CIA has identified Russian officials who fed material hacked from the Democratic National Committee and party leaders to WikiLeaks at the direction of Russian President Vladimir Putin through third parties, according to a new U.S. intelligence report, senior U.S. officials said on Thursday.
The officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said the Central Intelligence Agency and others have concluded that the Russian government escalated its efforts from discrediting the U.S. election process to assisting President-elect Donald Trump’s campaign.
The intelligence assessment was presented to President Barack Obama on Thursday and will be briefed to Trump on Friday. Trump has rejected the broad intelligence community’s assessment that Russia staged cyber attacks during the election campaign to undermine Democratic rival Hillary Clinton.
Russia has rejected the hacking allegations.
“By October, it had become clear that the Russians were trying to help the Trump campaign,” said one official familiar with the full report speaking on the condition of anonymity because the complete version is Top Secret.
In some cases, one official said, the material followed what was called “a circuitous route” from the GRU, Russia’s military intelligence agency, to WikiLeaks in an apparent attempt to make the origins of the material harder to trace, a common practice used by all intelligence agencies, including U.S. ones.
These handoffs, the officials said, enabled WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange to say the Russian government or state agencies were not the source of the material published on his website.
In an interview with Fox News this week, Assange said he did not receive emails stolen from the DNC and Clinton aide John Podesta from “a state party.” Assange did not rule out the possibility that he got the material from a third party.
Details of the report emerged as the top U.S. intelligence official, James Clapper, said on Thursday he was “even more resolute” in his belief that Russia staged cyber attacks on Democrats during the 2016 election campaign.
Not all 17 intelligence agencies participated in preparing the assessment. An unclassified version of the report is expected to be released on Friday morning, two officials said.
The report contains some of what the officials called “minor footnotes” about open questions and other uncertainties, in part because some of the evidence supporting the conclusion is inferential.
One such example, the officials said, was that intercepted messages and conversations among senior Russian officials in Putin’s inner circle indicated they were aware of the hacking campaign and celebrated Trump’s election as a victorious end to the campaign.
The officials declined to discuss the nature of the communications, including whether they were domestic, international, or both.
“People who knew what this was about were celebrating a victory over the United States,” said one official.
Another example of inferential evidence, the officials said, was that as time passed and the early leaks attracted media attention that undermined or eclipsed Clinton’s campaign, the Russians increasingly focused their hacking “almost exclusively” on Democratic rather than Republican targets.
There was also strong resemblance — including the use of the same computer malware — the Russians have used against targets in Europe and the marriage of traditional espionage tactics used by Soviet and Russian intelligence such as bribery, blackmail and internet vulnerabilities, which they said Putin has devoted increasing resources and attention to exploiting.
For example, one official said, the Democratic databases and email servers the Russians hacked also contained personal information that WikiLeaks has not published.
Such information could be used to search for financial, medical, browsing history and other records that can be used to target individuals for recruiting efforts by Russian spies.
January 6, 2017 at 10:26 am #62489bnwBlockedExcept Assange has always said the emails were not from Russia or in any way connected to Russia. Oops! Sure hope Trump doesn’t get suckered by the neocons.
So we have different accounts of what happened. Who are you going to believe? The guy who decided to leak NOTHING from Republicans and ONLY from the Dems? And NOTHING from Wall Street and Corporate American and ONLY from the Dems? Or more than a dozen intel agencies, who don’t generally get along, often can’t stand the sight of each other, fight over turf constantly, but in this case agree?
I find it interesting how the same exact conservatives — especially in the media — who screamed for Assange’s head for years and years suddenly think he’s a hero.
The right: making the world safer for hypocrites since 1789.
Assange leaked what he had. He said he would have leaked info against the republicans and Trump too if he had it.
The upside to being a Rams fan is heartbreak.
Sprinkles are for winners.
January 6, 2017 at 10:45 am #62493Billy_TParticipantExcept Assange has always said the emails were not from Russia or in any way connected to Russia. Oops! Sure hope Trump doesn’t get suckered by the neocons.
So we have different accounts of what happened. Who are you going to believe? The guy who decided to leak NOTHING from Republicans and ONLY from the Dems? And NOTHING from Wall Street and Corporate American and ONLY from the Dems? Or more than a dozen intel agencies, who don’t generally get along, often can’t stand the sight of each other, fight over turf constantly, but in this case agree?
I find it interesting how the same exact conservatives — especially in the media — who screamed for Assange’s head for years and years suddenly think he’s a hero.
The right: making the world safer for hypocrites since 1789.
Assange leaked what he had. He said he would have leaked info against the republicans and Trump too if he had it.
We don’t know what info he has at all. We can choose to believe him or not. We can choose to believe those dozen plus intel agencies or not. Or something in between. Believe this, but not that, etc. etc. But we have no idea what info Assange has on Republicans.
But let’s go with your premise. Let’s say he ONLY had info on the Dems. That tells you something too. That tells you he and his sources selected the Dems to hack, and NOT the GOP. Right off the bat, that shows ginormous bias and radically skews everything that follows. I worked in Internet tech support for fifteen years, and I can guarantee you that his sources could have gotten info from the GOP too, if they wanted it.
So, anyway you look at it, the intent appears to be to hurt the Dems and help the GOP — including Trump.
I despise BOTH parties, so I would have loved to have seen Wikileaks shine a light on both of them. But since they didn’t do that, and they avoided shining a light on the corporate world as well, I don’t trust them in the slightest. Their motives, Assange’s motives, appear to be nothing but partisan. And they also chose to help the greater of the two evils, not even the lesser, so it makes it even worse, from my perspective.
In short, I don’t trust Assange. You do. Oh, well.
January 6, 2017 at 3:33 pm #62510bnwBlockedExcept Assange has always said the emails were not from Russia or in any way connected to Russia. Oops! Sure hope Trump doesn’t get suckered by the neocons.
So we have different accounts of what happened. Who are you going to believe? The guy who decided to leak NOTHING from Republicans and ONLY from the Dems? And NOTHING from Wall Street and Corporate American and ONLY from the Dems? Or more than a dozen intel agencies, who don’t generally get along, often can’t stand the sight of each other, fight over turf constantly, but in this case agree?
I find it interesting how the same exact conservatives — especially in the media — who screamed for Assange’s head for years and years suddenly think he’s a hero.
The right: making the world safer for hypocrites since 1789.
Assange leaked what he had. He said he would have leaked info against the republicans and Trump too if he had it.
We don’t know what info he has at all. We can choose to believe him or not. We can choose to believe those dozen plus intel agencies or not. Or something in between. Believe this, but not that, etc. etc. But we have no idea what info Assange has on Republicans.
But let’s go with your premise. Let’s say he ONLY had info on the Dems. That tells you something too. That tells you he and his sources selected the Dems to hack, and NOT the GOP. Right off the bat, that shows ginormous bias and radically skews everything that follows. I worked in Internet tech support for fifteen years, and I can guarantee you that his sources could have gotten info from the GOP too, if they wanted it.
So, anyway you look at it, the intent appears to be to hurt the Dems and help the GOP — including Trump.
I despise BOTH parties, so I would have loved to have seen Wikileaks shine a light on both of them. But since they didn’t do that, and they avoided shining a light on the corporate world as well, I don’t trust them in the slightest. Their motives, Assange’s motives, appear to be nothing but partisan. And they also chose to help the greater of the two evils, not even the lesser, so it makes it even worse, from my perspective.
In short, I don’t trust Assange. You do. Oh, well.
Podesta was hacked because he used the word “password” as his password. This is the sour grapes of the leftist liberal losers. China hacked the personal information of 20 million federal employees and nothing is made of it.
The upside to being a Rams fan is heartbreak.
Sprinkles are for winners.
January 7, 2017 at 10:36 am #62533znModeratorPutin Ordered ‘Influence Campaign’ Aimed at U.S. Election, Report Says
DAVID E. SANGERJAN
link: http://www.nytimes.com/2017/01/06/us/politics/russia-hack-report.html
WASHINGTON — American intelligence officials have concluded that the president of Russia, Vladimir V. Putin, personally “ordered an influence campaign in 2016 aimed at the U.S. presidential election,” and turned from seeking to “denigrate” Hillary Clinton to developing “a clear preference for President-elect Trump.”
The conclusions were part of a declassified intelligence report, ordered by President Obama, that was released on Friday. Its main determinations were described to Mr. Trump by the nation’s top intelligence officials earlier in the day, and he responded by acknowledging, for the first time, that Russia had sought to hack into the Democratic National Committee’s computer systems. But he insisted that the effort had no effect on the election, and he said nothing about the conclusion that Mr. Putin, at some point last year, decided to aid his candidacy.
The report, a damning and surprisingly detailed account of Russia’s efforts to undermine the American electoral system and Mrs. Clinton in particular, went on to assess that Mr. Putin had “aspired to help President-elect Trump’s election chances when possible by discrediting Secretary Clinton and publicly contrasting her unfavorably to him.”
The Office of the Director of National Intelligence released on Friday a report that detailed what it called a Russian campaign to influence the election. The report is the unclassified summary of a highly sensitive assessment from American intelligence and law enforcement agencies.
The report described a broad campaign that included covert operations, including cyberactivities and “trolling” on the internet of people who were viewed as opponents of Russia’s effort. While it accused Russian intelligence agencies of obtaining and maintaining “access to elements of multiple U.S. state or local electoral boards,” it concluded — as officials have publicly — that there was no evidence of tampering with the tallying of the vote on Nov. 8.
But the declassified report contained no information about how the agencies had collected their data or had come to their conclusions. So it is bound to be attacked by skeptics and by partisans of Mr. Trump, who see the review as a political effort to impugn the legitimacy of his election. Intelligence officials have rejected that view.
The report, reflecting the assessments of the C.I.A., the F.B.I. and the National Security Agency, stopped short of backing up Mr. Trump on his declaration that the hacking activity had no effect on the election. “We did not make an assessment of the impact that Russian activities had on the outcome of the 2016 election,” the report concluded, saying it was beyond its responsibility to analyze American “political processes” or public opinion.
The intelligence agencies also concluded “with high confidence” that Russia’s main military intelligence unit, the G.R.U., created a “persona” called Guccifer 2.0 and a website, DCLeaks.com, to release the emails of the Democratic National Committee and of the chairman of the Clinton campaign, John D. Podesta.
When those disclosures received what was seen as insufficient attention, the report said, the G.R.U. “relayed material it acquired from the D.N.C. and senior Democratic officials to WikiLeaks.” The founder of WikiLeaks, Julian Assange, has denied that Russia was the source of the emails it published.
The report makes clear that Mr. Putin favored Mr. Trump in part because he had previous success dealing with “Western political leaders whose business interests made them more disposed to deal with Russia” — it named a former Italian prime minister, Silvio Berlusconi, as an example — and in part because he viewed Mr. Trump as a more likely ally in forming Russia’s version of a counterterrorism coalition against the Islamic State. Mr. Trump described his eagerness to do so in an interview with The New York Times in March 2016.
The report also stated that Russia collected data “on some Republican-affiliated targets,” but did not disclose the contents of whatever it harvested.
The report’s introduction called the public document a summation of “a highly classified assessment.” The classified version, officials say, comes in two forms — one for Congress and another, called a “compartmentalized” report, for select members of Congress and top officials of the incoming and outgoing governments.
The compartmentalized version contains information on the sources and methods used to collect the information about Mr. Putin and his associates. Those would include intercepts of conversations and the harvesting of computer data from “implants” that the United States and its allies have put in Russian networks.
The conclusions were described to Mr. Obama on Thursday and to Mr. Trump on Friday by James R. Clapper Jr., the director of national intelligence; John O. Brennan, the director of the C.I.A.; Adm. Michael S. Rogers, the director of the National Security Agency; and James B. Comey, the director of the F.B.I.
The key to the report’s assessment is that Russia’s motives “evolved over the course of the campaign.” When it appeared that Mrs. Clinton was more likely to win, it concluded, the Russian effort focused “on undermining her future presidency.” It noted that Mr. Putin had a particular animus for Mrs. Clinton because he believed she had incited protests against him in 2011.
Yet the attacks, the report said, began long before anyone could have known that Mr. Trump, considered a dark horse, would win the Republican nomination. It said the attacks began as early as July 2015, when Russian intelligence operatives first gained access to the Democratic National Committee’s networks. Russia maintained that access for 11 months, until “at least June 2016,” the report concludes, leaving open the possibility that Russian cyberattackers may have had access even after the firm CrowdStrike believed that it had kicked them off the networks.
Intelligence officials who prepared the classified report on Russian hacking activity have concluded that British intelligence was among the first to raise an alarm that Moscow had hacked into the Democratic National Committee’s computer servers, and alerted their American counterparts, according to two people familiar with the conclusions.
Mr. Trump was briefed by senior intelligence officials for nearly two hours on Friday, describing the briefing in a statement as “a constructive meeting and conversation with the leaders of the intelligence community.”
It is unclear whether they highlighted the British role, which has been closely held, in the briefing. But it is a critical part of the timeline, because it suggests that some of the first tipoffs, in fall 2015, came from voice intercepts, computer traffic or human sources outside the United States, as emails and other data from the D.N.C. flowed out of the country.
“The British picked it up, and we may have had it at about the same time,” said one cyberexpert who has been briefed on the findings. British intelligence — especially the signals intelligence unit, GCHQ — has a major role in tracking Russian activity.
January 7, 2017 at 11:17 am #62535bnwBlockedTwo things-
Clapper lied to congress about the US government spying on its own citizens.
All those millions of dollars donated by foreign governments to the Clintons were to undermine the electoral system. Crickets on that.
The upside to being a Rams fan is heartbreak.
Sprinkles are for winners.
January 7, 2017 at 11:49 am #62538
NewMexicoRamParticipantAs a leftist, I’m kinda baffled when I read other leftists seemingly defending Putin and Russia. He’s the king of the oligarchs, and likely the world’s richest man, and his Russia is hard right, ideologically.
We both have capitalist empires, and I see both of them as illegitimate entities. But Russia is now what our own far right would probably want us to be. Even more anti-democratic, anti-labor, anti-environment than we already are. More capitalist-crazed as well.
I really don’t get it.
I don’t know who started this cyberwar, and it really doesn’t matter. We’re both guilty. We’re both wrong. We’re both trying to extend empire in so many ways, and we both keep swatting at each other’s beehives. But that doesn’t mean we have to automatically assume that our government is lying about the other guy, and believing them in this case isn’t an endorsement of American policies we reject.
To me, it’s just a logical progression of this game of thrones between us. Two very powerful state actors, with one having the edge economically and militarily, while the other has the edge in the cyber arena. They’re going to take advantage of that and the fact that we’re a much softer target than they are.
It has nothing to do with whiny Dems, at least from my perspective. Clinton lost primarily because she was a poor candidate, couldn’t connect with enough fence-sitters to matter, and her party, the Dems, have played the centrist card for too long. Plus, Bill Clinton’s sexual history basically cancelled out the Access Hollywood tapes for enough people to change their votes. Pretty much any other Dem would have whipped Trump just on that issue alone. It took a Clinton to snatch defeat from the mouth of victory, etc. etc.
Yeah, I think Putin wanted to put Trump in the White House, and all of his moves regarding his cabinet to be make that seem even more logical. Again, saying so doesn’t mean one buys Democratic Party excuses, or trusts American intel blindly. It just adds up. It’s just the logical progression of this game of thrones.
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I agree with you, Billy, on this one.
Very well put.January 7, 2017 at 4:59 pm #62592bnwBlockedOf course Putin wanted Trump in the White House. Somehow that is news? Hildabeast wanted to go to war with Russia. Trump wants to work with Russia where our national interests align. Easy maths that.
The upside to being a Rams fan is heartbreak.
Sprinkles are for winners.
January 7, 2017 at 5:13 pm #62601
TSRFParticipantWhere does the idea that HRC wanted to start a war with Russia come from?
Doesn’t everyone remember MAD? It still holds water.
Any “war” between us is going to be of the cold variety, and is still, and always has been ongoing.
My fear is Trump is going to work with Russia where his economic interests and theirs align. I feel for our allies…
January 7, 2017 at 5:29 pm #62614bnwBlockedWhere does the idea that HRC wanted to start a war with Russia come from?
Doesn’t everyone remember MAD? It still holds water.
Any “war” between us is going to be of the cold variety, and is still, and always has been ongoing.
My fear is Trump is going to work with Russia where his economic interests and theirs align. I feel for our allies…
The economic sanctions against Russia have been a hardship on Germany in particular. Hildabeast views war as a money making opportunity.
The upside to being a Rams fan is heartbreak.
Sprinkles are for winners.
January 7, 2017 at 6:25 pm #62629Billy_TParticipantTrump is going to tweet us into war, and he almost did already with China. He has a real “thing” against Iran, too, and cuz of his slavish devotion to Netanyahoo and the right-wing Israeli government, another Middle East war is just a matter of time.
He also broke with decades of precedent and installed a general to run the Defense department. He has three or four in key positions, so far, including the nutcase Floyd, who actually peddles far-right, fake news stories like Pizzagate at the drop of a hat, and is known as an Islamophobe.
Trump is so incredibly thin-skinned, narcissistic and ignorant about the way governments work, he’s gonna start more than a few wars if he lasts the full four years. He’s also got the emotional age of a spoiled three-year-old, and keeps proving that on a daily basis.
And he’s surrounded himself with a bunch of people who will profit mightily from war, like the generals and the Big Oil folks.
January 9, 2017 at 9:15 am #62879
wvParticipantWell again my own view is:
1 heck yeah the Rooskies probably did a lot of shit
because they preferred Trump (because Hillary was warmongering against them)2 Other political organizations/nations have also done exactly the same thing.
We live in a world of hacking and spying and lying. Why all the outrage about this one case involving Russia? Cause Russia went after the Neoliberals?3 wikileaks is a separate subject and no-one has proven any connection between Wikileaks and Russia. Also as far as i know, no-one has ‘ever’ in the history of wikileaks shown that ANY of their info has been WRONG. I like wikileaks, and i like that they give the public accurate info. If its ‘selective’ its selective.
Thats something to think about and consider and factor in — while we are perusing their ACCURATE info.4 And of course a related issue is — The Powers-that-are-complaining are responsible for all kinds of hacking and spying etc.
Juan Cole on NSA Hacking:http://www.truthdig.com/report/item/those_times_the_nsa_hacked_americas_allies_20170107w
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This reply was modified 7 years, 10 months ago by
wv.
January 9, 2017 at 9:57 am #62886znModeratorWhy all the outrage about this one case involving Russia? Cause Russia went after the Neoliberals?
No.
No that is not it.
Usually you’re good at listening. You have something blocking you in this case, and I can’t think of what it is. It’s causing you to not hear the other side on this. So you’re not even really responding to the real arguments.
For one thing they went after HALF of the neo-liberals. Look at Trump’s actual policies. The idea that he is free of neo-liberalism is just wrong. They are classical neo-liberal policies. It’s just that his administration will be the neoliberals who also go after social security, medicaire, planned parenthood, roe v. wade, the supreme court, the EPA, and so on. In other words, they’re the WORSE neo-liberals. But they are not NOT neo-liberals.
And if you can countenance this, you have no reason to complain about american intervention in other nation’s elections. Either that’s a principle—you don’t do that–or it’s no argument at all. You can’t suddenly countenance it because in this case you have animosity toward the target.
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January 9, 2017 at 10:03 am #62888Billy_TParticipantWell again my own view is:
1 heck yeah the Rooskies probably did a lot of shit
because they preferred Trump (because Hillary was warmongering against them)2 Other political organizations/nations have also done exactly the same thing.
We live in a world of hacking and spying and lying. Why all the outrage about this one case involving Russia? Cause Russia went after the Neoliberals?3 wikileaks is a separate subject and no-one has proven any connection between Wikileaks and Russia. Also as far as i know, no-one has ‘ever’ in the history of wikileaks shown that ANY of their info has been WRONG. I like wikileaks, and i like that they give the public accurate info. If its ‘selective’ its selective.
Thats something to think about and consider and factor in — while we are perusing their ACCURATE info.4 And of course a related issue is — The Powers-that-are-complaining are responsible for all kinds of hacking and spying etc.
Juan Cole on NSA Hacking:http://www.truthdig.com/report/item/those_times_the_nsa_hacked_americas_allies_20170107w
vWV, if stealing and then leaking “the truth” gets people killed, you’d be against it, right? If “the truth” destroyed innocent lives, you’d be against staling and leaking it, correct?
If we hold governments and corporations accountable for their actions, including “collateral damage,” and we must, shouldn’t the same hold true for outfits like Wikileaks?
And did you see the article I posted about Assange’s threat to steal personal, private info from Twitter, create a database to keep tabs on “verified users.”
I would think any and every leftist would be aghast as the criminality of this, of the potential for tremendous harm of the innocents, and of the obvious potential for abuse.
Also: Wikileaks acts in an autocratic manner, by personal fiat, with Assange at the helm. There is nothing “democratic” about them and what they do. They don’t attempt to build egalitarian, democratic, participatory foundations, or seek information others freely give to them. They either steal or receive stolen information and decide, without public debate, to use it, with zero regard to the consequences.
Exposing secret invasions, etc. etc. is one thing. Stealing and leaking indiscriminately, with zero public benefit, is another. It’s been many years since Assange and company have come close to the former.
January 9, 2017 at 10:05 am #62889Billy_TParticipantSorry, I wrote the above before ZN posted.
I don’t want it to seem like piling on. But in this case, I agree with ZN to a large extent. I think he’s done a good job of dealing with the many sides of this issue.
January 9, 2017 at 10:09 am #62890znModerator. There is nothing “democratic” about them and what they do. They don’t attempt to build egalitarian, democratic, participatory foundations, or seek information others freely give to them.
The people who have worked with him and gone public about what a dick he is cement all this. Assange is a right libertarian and he treats all people, especially those who work with him, like crap.
By way of analogy. Napoleon did not advance The Revolution. Napoleon KILLED The Revolution.
January 9, 2017 at 10:24 am #62892wvParticipantWhy all the outrage about this one case involving Russia? Cause Russia went after the Neoliberals?
No.
No that is not it.
Usually you’re good at listening. You have something blocking you in this case, and I can’t think of what it is. It’s causing you to not hear the other side on this. So you’re not even really responding to the real arguments.
For one thing they went after HALF of the neo-liberals. Look at Trump’s actual policies. The idea that he is free of neo-liberalism is just wrong. They are classical neo-liberal policies. It’s just that his administration will be the neoliberals who also go after social security, medicaire, planned parenthood, roe v. wade, the supreme court, the EPA, and so on. In other words, they’re the WORSE neo-liberals. But they are not NOT neo-liberals.
And if you can countenance this, you have no reason to complain about american intervention in other nation’s elections. Either that’s a principle—you don’t do that–or it’s no argument at all. You can’t suddenly countenance it because in this case you have animosity toward the target.
….
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Well to me, you are the one thats blocked and not hearing. So again we disagree. To me, you are “quibbling”. Yes, they went after “half” the neoliberals. Fine. Thats worth an “enh” to me.Someone asked Chomsky about the Russian issue and he basically went “enh, yeah they were probly doing stuff”
They went after half the system and supported the Trump-half of the system.
Enh.
The Russian-powers-that-be are Gangsters. The US powers-that-be are gangsters. They all spy and hack and screw the poor and weak.
I cant work up any outrage about what the Russian-gangsters did to the Dem-Gangsters. To me it’d be like focusing on how bad Al Capone treated Lucky Luciano.w
vJanuary 9, 2017 at 10:27 am #62893Billy_TParticipant. There is nothing “democratic” about them and what they do. They don’t attempt to build egalitarian, democratic, participatory foundations, or seek information others freely give to them.
The people who have worked with him and gone public about what a dick he is cement all this. Assange is a right libertarian and he treats all people, especially those who work with him, like crap.
By way of analogy. Napoleon did not advance The Revolution. Napoleon KILLED The Revolution.
Agreed. This may be a terrible generalization, but to save time and millions of lives (h/t Animal House):
Some folks on the left, and a huge number to their right, confuse right- and left-libertarianism. I know WV doesn’t. He could probably write a book on the difference. But it is pervasive, and it does cause confusion, and I’ve witnessed some prominent media figures — like Glenn Greenwald — fail to see the difference for a time. And then they unfail. But in the supposed name of “freedom and the open flow of ideas,” they’ll miss the intent to undermine systems that at least cling to a semblance of “democracy,” however tattered it may be. And they generally — those right-libertarians and their followers — don’t want to replace the tatters with the real thing; they want to replace the tatters with an all-private, all-for-profit, Ayn-Rand vision of things.
And they think playing swashbuckling pirate will help achieve this. I think Assange is that sort of pirate.
Tragically, it looks like Trump is a wannabe objectivist, too, and is filling his cabinet with Ayn Rand devotees.
January 9, 2017 at 10:36 am #62895Billy_TParticipantWell to me, you are the one thats blocked and not hearing. So again we disagree. To me, you are “quibbling”. Yes, they went after “half” the neoliberals. Fine. Thats worth an “enh” to me.
Someone asked Chomsky about the Russian issue and he basically went “enh, yeah they were probly doing stuff”
They went after half the system and supported the Trump-half of the system.
Enh.
The Russian-powers-that-be are Gangsters. The US powers-that-be are gangsters. They all spy and hack and screw the poor and weak.
I cant work up any outrage about what the Russian-gangsters did to the Dem-Gangsters. To me it’d be like focusing on how bad Al Capone treated Lucky Luciano.w
vBut what are the results? Did they leak anything that went beyond the banal? No. Did they divulge any information that advances “social justice”? No. Did they leak anything that stops a war, prevents more pollution, more destruction of the planet? No.
They just leaked a bunch of wonky nothingness that tells us nothing we couldn’t have guessed without it before the leaks. But because they only leaked one party’s banality, it gave many Americans the impression that only the Dems do stuff politicians do, or that their staff acts like political staffers typically act.
To me, it’s not about one gangster clan going after another. It’s that an unelected, highly autocratic, fiat-driven outfit chose sides to help one gangster clan rise above the other. And by doing this, they put the lives of innocent people at risk, as we’ve already seen in this case:
Man opens fire in restaurant targeted by anti-Clinton “PizzaGate” fake news conspiracy
There are far better ways to expose corruption. There are ways to do this without risking the lives of the innocent, too.
I’m for that.
January 9, 2017 at 10:41 am #62896Billy_TParticipantTrying to boil this down, cuz, well, it’s pretty obvious I have an issue with that.
;>)
When you do this kind of mass action, cast this kind of wide, indiscriminate net over just one party, you’re going to hurt the dolphins along with the sharks, too.
Better idea: Just go after the sharks.
January 9, 2017 at 10:43 am #62897znModeratorThey just leaked a bunch of wonky nothingness that tells us nothing we couldn’t have guessed without it before the leaks.
The idea that the dem party acts like a political machine? It was actually worse in the days of Mayor Daley.
But that’s not what they did. They did not “expose” party machinations.
They exposed ONE PARTY’S machinations as a means of intervening in an election.
Remember. The Russians had stuff from the republicans. You know the guys who just voted to dismantle the ethics committee. They just didn’t leak it.
That was cynical political manipulation and nothing more.
The ways in which that is indefensibly bad are pretty much too long to list.
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January 9, 2017 at 11:24 am #62904
Eternal RamnationParticipantI cannot understand why anyone even cares what countries hacked the info that Clinton hacked and stole the primary. Palast was all over Trump’s interstate (30 of them) crosscheck scam that won him the election and CNN.clinton.corp. said nothing instead pushing this bullshit that the Russians did it.
January 9, 2017 at 11:41 am #62906bnwBlockedI cannot understand why anyone even cares what countries hacked the info that Clinton hacked and stole the primary. Palast was all over Trump’s interstate (30 of them) crosscheck scam that won him the election and CNN.clinton.corp. said nothing instead pushing this bullshit that the Russians did it.
What is the “interstate crosscheck scam”?
The upside to being a Rams fan is heartbreak.
Sprinkles are for winners.
January 9, 2017 at 11:41 am #62907znModeratorI cannot understand why anyone even cares what countries hacked the info that Clinton hacked and stole the primary. Palast was all over Trump’s interstate (30 of them) crosscheck scam that won him the election and CNN.clinton.corp. said nothing instead pushing this bullshit that the Russians did it.
American intel has already made clear that among many other things the russians did, yes they hacked the dems (and the republicans too they just didn’t release that info).
They did do the hacking. That’s not all they did.
And this topic has nothing to do with who won the election. It has to do with whether it’s true there was russian involvement in the election in various ways.
And. Yes, there was.
ON TOP OF IT, this is not about dems whining. It goes way beyond that. Anyone who tries to construe it as JUST dems whining is just not engaging with the entire issue and all the info we have.
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January 9, 2017 at 11:44 am #62910Billy_TParticipantJanuary 9, 2017 at 11:52 am #62914Billy_TParticipantI cannot understand why anyone even cares what countries hacked the info that Clinton hacked and stole the primary. Palast was all over Trump’s interstate (30 of them) crosscheck scam that won him the election and CNN.clinton.corp. said nothing instead pushing this bullshit that the Russians did it.
It’s both/and. Plus a lot more.
I think a better candidate could have overcome all of that, regardless. All the shenanigans Palast talks about, plus the Russians, plus Wikileaks, plus Comey.
Trump is easily the most unpopular president-elect in our history, and the Clinton/Trump choice broke records for that as well.
Democrats tell me she lost because of several factors, but they refuse to consider the most important one: HRC and the legacy of the centrist Dems. Some say it’s because of Sanders’ voters and Stein voters and that if they had just voted for HRC, she would have won. Ironically, they make the case for a Sanders nomination, instead of Clinton, but can’t take that logical step.
If the difference truly was the disaffected Dem who wanted Sanders, or the disaffected lefty who wanted someone to his left, Sanders would have pulled in enough young voters and the disaffected, PLUS Dems who vote Dem no matter what, to win.
Trump would have been defeated by Sanders and a dozen other Dems, in my view. His support is so thin it wouldn’t have been tough. The “anti-Clinton” vote was bigger than the “pro-Trump” vote, by light years.
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