Russia Reportedly Bought Thousands of Facebook Ads Sought To Stress Racial Divisions (thehill.com)

Treason by Anonymous Coward · 2017-09-25 14:07 · Score: 1, Insightful

Donald Trump's son has already admitted to committing treason and colluding with Russia's attack on America.

He was caught sending a clear as day email approving of Russian government help for the Trump campaign.

Donald Trump publicly commits treason as he praises Vladimir Putin while refusing to even aknowledge the Russian attack on our country.

Re: Treason by BeauHD+(2) · 2017-09-25 14:43 · Score: 1

Ya, you wonder who "bought" Slashdot lol. It wasnt Soros but you arent that far off.
Re: Treason by BeauHD+(2) · 2017-09-25 16:18 · Score: 1

BIZX has nothing to do with Coke. It just made it convenient to hide the guys that make the shots. Sense it is privately owned.
Re: Treason by Anonymous Coward · 2017-09-25 16:20 · Score: 1

>Everyone who disagrees with me is a Russian agent.
Someone forgot to take their thorazine.
Re:Treason by ilguido · 2017-09-25 19:17 · Score: 4, Interesting

I don't think that Russia needs to buy Facebook ads to sow hate and dissent in the USA: reading these comments, I think that you are terribly capable of sowing hate by yourself. I think that Trump is quite foolish, but the hate and belittling campaign against him is not a sign of rightful social activism, but another mean through which American institutions are weakened. This kind of social turmoil is nowadays quite common in all the Western world (anti-establishment movements are strong everywhere), no matter if you are conservative, liberal, socialist or whatever: the pretension of being some kind of sole paladin of justice is what is killing the democratic process in the USA and in Europe.
Re:Treason by burtosis · 2017-09-25 23:28 · Score: 1

Maybe if politics wasn't so terribly corrupted by a handful of large donors, and instead represented the people, discontent wouldn't be so damn easy to sow.

So by ArchieBunker · 2017-09-25 14:10 · Score: 2, Interesting

Facebook is a willing participant in election fraud?

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Only the State obtains its revenue by coercion. - Murray Rothbard

Re:So by DNS-and-BIND · 2017-09-25 14:41 · Score: 2, Informative

Guardian proudly sponsors a campaign for foreigners to interfere in the 2004 election

"I'm taking the liberty of asking you, a citizen of a country built upon the principles of democracy but whose very might is in danger of disenfranchising the rest of the world, to use your right to vote, and to vote with all your heart and your mind, in your own name but also in the name of all those millions of people who will be looking to your decision in two weeks' time."
Translation: Think of us first, and the needs of your own country last. F off foreigners, stop trying to influence our votes. Oh, but it was OK when they did it.

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Shutting down free speech with violence isn't fighting fascism. It IS fascism!
Re:So by sit1963nz · 2017-09-25 14:49 · Score: 1

No way. Adverts don't harm people, people harm people.
Re:So by msauve · 2017-09-25 14:57 · Score: 3, Insightful

Hell, the US news media does the same thing, they're no longer about informing, but about advocacy. What difference does it make if the source is foreign or domestic? They're all working to affect the vote. And, is foreign propaganda illegal? Do you think we don't do the same damn thing (Radio America as a simple example)?

The proper response is an intelligent, informed electorate.

The voter registration movements work against that. If someone can't figure out the how, and won't put the effort into registering on their own, there's no chance the'll expend the effort to make an informed choice. All those voter registration drives are simply attempts to get irrational sycophants to vote.

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"National Security is the chief cause of national insecurity." - Celine's First Law
Re: So by sound+vision · 2017-09-25 15:09 · Score: 1

Willing but maybe not knowingly. They can't use that excuse anymore. But future attacks could be different in execution if not in substance.
Re:So by poity · 2017-09-25 17:44 · Score: 1

KGB boss: Dmitry, SEO is not a skill, why you apply to KGB? You dumb son of potato, I only laugh. Go back to Siberia, come back after learn real programming.
Dmitry: CYKA BLYAT I SHOW YOU HOLD MY VODKA!
*two weeks later*
CNN: "We project Trump will win the state of Michigan"
KGB boss: Hyello everybody, this is our new department manager Dmitry.

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your thin skin doesn't make me a troll
Re:So by AmiMoJo · 2017-09-26 00:36 · Score: 1

Yeah, fuck off Trump, Brexit is nothing to do with you. Stop trying to influence our votes with fake promises of golden trade deals that we know will turn to shit the moment we fall for your trap...
Oh, wait... Fuck.

--
const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
Re:So by rtb61 · 2017-09-27 00:20 · Score: 1

Nope, the Washington post is a willing participant in fraud. Note the sneaky bit in the story, c'mon people, stop and think. Facebook delivers individual content to individual people, how that content is filtered and delivered is the Facebook system. So pay attention to that, so how does Facebook deliver ads, individually, not collectively. Each individual gets served an ad, so thousands of ads, get it, see, tricky fraudulent fuckers. They spend one hundred thousand dollars to sell some crap related to that, what where they selling, CLICK BAIT, they were advertising CLICK BAIT. Spread an inflammatory issue to get people to click it. Seriously have /.ers become that stupid. Facebook will sell any kind of crap ad for all kinds of shit and the bulk of it CLICK BAIT. For fuck sake your are letting yourself get sucked in by arts student morons, fucking hell.

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Chaos - everything, everywhere, everywhen

No, that would be rags like HuffPo and Salon... by Uberbah · 2017-09-25 14:16 · Score: 3, Insightful

...who have used race baiting against working whites in the same way white supremacists attack black and latinos. It's an inversion of LBJ's famous observation about poor southern whites:

"If you can convince the lowest white man he's better than the best colored man, he won't notice you're picking his pocket. Hell, give him somebody to look down on, and he'll empty his pockets for you."

Only instead of getting poor whites to resent minorities who have never done a thing to them, it's getting poor minorities to resent white people who have never done anything to them. And all the while, the fine folks at COINTELPRO are laughing their asses off as people ignore the deep state crony capitalists hiding behind the curtain.

Re:No, that would be rags like HuffPo and Salon... by BlueStrat · 2017-09-25 15:22 · Score: 1, Interesting

...who have used race baiting against working whites in the same way white supremacists attack black and latinos. It's an inversion of LBJ's famous observation about poor southern whites:
"If you can convince the lowest white man he's better than the best colored man, he won't notice you're picking his pocket. Hell, give him somebody to look down on, and he'll empty his pockets for you."
Only instead of getting poor whites to resent minorities who have never done a thing to them, it's getting poor minorities to resent white people who have never done anything to them. And all the while, the fine folks at COINTELPRO are laughing their asses off as people ignore the deep state crony capitalists hiding behind the curtain.
Alright, who are you and what have you done with the Uberbah that I've argued with on /. countless times over the years!? LOL!
Damn man, I find myself agreeing with your posts a lot lately! Well said. It's all about 'divide & conquer' using propaganda and disinformation while simultaneously dumbing-down the population so they are unable to think critically or possess any knowledge of history. Evil Kabuki theater.
Strat

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Progressivism (aka US 'Liberalism'): Ideas so good they need a police/surveillance-state to enforce.
Re:No, that would be rags like HuffPo and Salon... by Uberbah · 2017-09-30 16:53 · Score: 1

Look, racism is racism, no matter which way you point it; but white racism against blacks is different from black racism against whites because of the numbers involved. And white racism is relevant even when people never meet because of simple things like purchasing power. Where you spend your money is your most relevant vote (as rammed home by the story we're discussing right now) but how you actually vote is also important. And both where these racists spend their money and the way they vote are absolutely impacting black people.
Eh? This isn't some commentary based on "reverse racism" or whatever you were going with here. It's how elites manipulate the electorate to fight among themselves rather than uniting against the elite. We can look at two examples, from the same person, that cover both sides thanks to the wonderful Hillary Clinton:
When she was running around defending the draconian Clinton crime bill in the 90's, calling [minority] kids Superpredators. Playing up racist white resentment as well as any Dixiecrat. And then twenty years later on the flip side, her sycophants smeared Bernie Sanders as having a problem with minorities in the most brazen case of Swiftboating since the Bush Administration (almost entirely staffed with warmongering draft dodgers) smeared John Kerry as a coward for his Vietnam tours.
Re:No, that would be rags like HuffPo and Salon... by Uberbah · 2017-10-06 15:48 · Score: 1

Alright, who are you and what have you done with the Uberbah that I've argued with on /. countless times over the years!? LOL!
Damn man, I find myself agreeing with your posts a lot lately! Well said. It's all about 'divide & conquer' using propaganda and disinformation while simultaneously dumbing-down the population so they are unable to think critically or possess any knowledge of history. Evil Kabuki theater.
Looks like we even broke Slashdot for a few days. :) My druthers would be to send Bush and Obama to the Hague, end illegal spying & civil forfeiture, then we can go argue amongst ourselves about the merits of capitalism and workers owning the means of production. Cheers.
Re:No, that would be rags like HuffPo and Salon... by BlueStrat · 2017-10-06 19:20 · Score: 1

Looks like we even broke Slashdot for a few days. :) My druthers would be to send Bush and Obama to the Hague, end illegal spying & civil forfeiture, then we can go argue amongst ourselves about the merits of capitalism and workers owning the means of production. Cheers.
Agreed, except for sending them to the Hague. Heck, the EUrocrats might put them in charge, since some of the largest EU nations are '5-eyes' members!
Leavenworth and/or possibly a firing-squad sounds better to me. Have a good weekend.
Strat

--
Progressivism (aka US 'Liberalism'): Ideas so good they need a police/surveillance-state to enforce.

Haven't they been doing this stuff forever? by thinkwaitfast · 2017-09-25 14:16 · Score: 2

I grew up with these types of stories since the cold wars days. But were told that it was all cia propaganda and that they would never do anything like that.

Re:Haven't they been doing this stuff forever? by hyades1 · 2017-09-25 14:49 · Score: 1, Troll

Back then, you could actually find literate, well-informed conservatives who would defend their views or change them according to the facts. These days, most conservatives are a pack of proudly-ignorant morons who desperately hate anybody smarter than them (which encompasses most of the population), and who dismiss proved facts that refute their noxious views.

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I've calculated my velocity with such exquisite precision that I have no idea where I am.
Re:Haven't they been doing this stuff forever? by DNS-and-BIND · 2017-09-25 15:14 · Score: 3, Interesting

...and ridiculous beliefs like this are why the Right will be in power for the next 50 years. It's not the facts of the situation, it's the fact that to you, they are The Other. And you'd rather do anything than tolerate The Other.
The conservatives I know have a realistic understanding of human nature (i.e., it is fundamentally flawed) and set expectations accordingly; i.e., there will never be a Utopia.
It is the leftists who believe that human nature is basically good, and that people do bad things because of external forces (e.g., their living conditions); Therefore the goal of arranging those external forces so they no longer cause people to do bad things becomes the greatest moral imperative.
So, on one hand we have people who believe that Utopia is impossible, and on the other we have people who believe that creating Utopia is the highest (perhaps only) moral priority. The first group believes the second group is deluded in their belief that Utopia is possible; the second group believes the first group is immoral for opposing their efforts to create one at any cost.

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Shutting down free speech with violence isn't fighting fascism. It IS fascism!
Re: Haven't they been doing this stuff forever? by Reverend+Green · 2017-09-25 15:17 · Score: 2, Insightful

Alas, "proudly ignorant" seems to describe both sides of contemporary American political discourse.
Re:Haven't they been doing this stuff forever? by deviated_prevert · 2017-09-25 17:04 · Score: 3, Interesting

...and ridiculous beliefs like this are why the Right will be in power for the next 50 years. It's not the facts of the situation, it's the fact that to you, they are The Other. And you'd rather do anything than tolerate The Other.
The conservatives I know have a realistic understanding of human nature (i.e., it is fundamentally flawed) and set expectations accordingly; i.e., there will never be a Utopia.
It is the leftists who believe that human nature is basically good, and that people do bad things because of external forces (e.g., their living conditions); Therefore the goal of arranging those external forces so they no longer cause people to do bad things becomes the greatest moral imperative.
So, on one hand we have people who believe that Utopia is impossible, and on the other we have people who believe that creating Utopia is the highest (perhaps only) moral priority. The first group believes the second group is deluded in their belief that Utopia is possible; the second group believes the first group is immoral for opposing their efforts to create one at any cost.
Hitler very successfully made the very same arguments. He even quoted Darwin. IMO it all comes down to whether or not humans can rise above the fundamental urges that lead to tribal manifestations of these urges. A majority of the German population fell under this spell and we know it lead to WW11. It seems that America right now is undergoing the very same shift to an idiotic pseudo Darwin concept of survival of the meanest bastards, this is happening on a financial basis as well as a political one.
Tsar Putin is no dumb ass cookie. He knows that by putting small amounts of intel dollars into the already volatile American political system his sponsorship of the oligarchs and up and coming Russian elite will help him stay in power. Why you ask? Because the already established organized crime institutions in the US are ripe for take over and this is what is happening. Although Castro is dead and his brother still sorta runs the show there are still a great many who would like to have Cuba turn into a free for all of organized crime that sucks dollars from the US and this now includes the new up and coming Russian Mafia kingpins not just the native American ones.
Sadly the governments of both the US and Russia are now under the control of organized crime. What the Russians are doing in no different than the CIA secretly backing drug lord dictators while turning a blind eye to the Mafia king pin Santo Trafficane and his French connection heroine trade all the way back to Laos during the De Gaulle era in Indo China. And what is going on to this very day with the internal corruption of the so called "war on drugs". This secret economy and political actions of a key part of the US government has created a serious risk of division by corruption of the entire US political system. Left and Right, conservative and democrat in reality have nothing to do with it. We are all being taken for a ride by those who seek only to have a free ride at the public trough and rule by division and deception and could in reality, care less about the populace they have sworn to serve.

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This message was not sent from an iPhone because Peter Sellers really was a deviated prevert without a dime for the call
Re:Haven't they been doing this stuff forever? by hcs_$reboot · 2017-09-25 18:31 · Score: 1

The lesson of all this is actually "don't underestimate Russia"...

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Slashdot, fix the reply notifications... You won't get away with it...
Re:Haven't they been doing this stuff forever? by drinkypoo · 2017-09-25 23:06 · Score: 4, Insightful

Too bad you have that 100% backwards. Conservatives believe in a utopia in which charity covers all the needs of the needy, while Liberals believe that you have to legislate helping them, because history has shown that the conservatives (who are holding all the money) will not actually spend enough of their money on charity to make a noticeable difference unless forced. That's why the natural order is to keep cycling back to torches and pitchforks. Liberals know that the price of freedom is eternal vigilance, while conservatives think it's a buck-oh-five.

--
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
Re:Haven't they been doing this stuff forever? by AmiMoJo · 2017-09-26 00:41 · Score: 1, Informative

It's much simpler than that. Conservatives like the way things are, because even if they are unfair it benefits them or suits their "traditional" beliefs. The left finds that they can't get married or get an abortion, or at least cares enough that someone else can't, and see that it's because of some fairy tale or tradition or simple bigotry and wants to change it.
I'm not sure where you get the "at any cost" bit from.

--
const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
Re:Haven't they been doing this stuff forever? by Xyrus · 2017-09-26 00:45 · Score: 4, Insightful

Yeah, that's bullshit. The left doesn't believe in "Utopia". Why the fuck do you think they're supposedly the party of "evil" laws and regulations the right likes to demonize? It's the CONSERVATIVES who think we need less regulation. They're the ones who want to remove environmental protections. They're the ones that want to remove business regulations. They're the ones who want to remove the FDA. They're the ones that want to remove consumer protections. So on and so forth.
The CONSERVATIVES are the ones who believe in this ridiculous notion of Utopia. We'd all be happy if we just got rid of all these pesky rules and regulations! That's utter bullshit.

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~X~
Re:Haven't they been doing this stuff forever? by ScentCone · 2017-09-26 00:53 · Score: 1

history has shown that the conservatives (who are holding all the money)
If you're going to use suck a laughably counter-factual meme as a foundational part of your thesis, be prepared to be laughed at.

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Don't disappoint your bird dog. Go to the range.
Re:Haven't they been doing this stuff forever? by multi+io · 2017-09-26 20:38 · Score: 1

So, on one hand we have people who believe that Utopia is impossible, and on the other we have people who believe that creating Utopia is the highest (perhaps only) moral priority. The first group believes the second group is deluded in their belief that Utopia is possible; the second group believes the first group is immoral for opposing their efforts to create one at any cost.
Last time I checked, conservatives (at least those in Congress and in the WH) believed that a health care system that's twice as expensive per capita as every other civilised country's and failed to insure a large group of people was the best thing you can have, and they believed that increased defense spending and further tax cuts for the rich, starting from a historically low base, would lower the national debt.
So who is into Utopias here?
Re:Haven't they been doing this stuff forever? by hyades1 · 2017-09-26 20:47 · Score: 1

Nice straw man argument you have there. Better make sure it doesn't get wet and soggy.

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I've calculated my velocity with such exquisite precision that I have no idea where I am.
Re:Haven't they been doing this stuff forever? by hyades1 · 2017-09-26 20:50 · Score: 1

Thank you, my friend, for saying it a lot better than I would have.

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I've calculated my velocity with such exquisite precision that I have no idea where I am.
Re:Haven't they been doing this stuff forever? by drinkypoo · 2017-09-26 21:41 · Score: 1

history has shown that the conservatives (who are holding all the money)
If you're going to use suck a laughably counter-factual meme as a foundational part of your thesis, be prepared to be laughed at.
Suck my balls, you ignoranus. You literally could not be more wrong. I notice also that you failed to provide a statistic, which makes sense, since you fail at every other conversational gambit as well.

--
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
Re:Haven't they been doing this stuff forever? by tinkerton · 2017-09-26 23:14 · Score: 1

I thought 'The American Conservative' ( http://www.theamericanconserva... ) was started just because they who called themselves paleoconservatives felt they were being squeezed out of the discourse. So together with some libertarians I consider them well informed , but unfortunately in the current context , fringe.
Re:Haven't they been doing this stuff forever? by thinkwaitfast · 2017-09-28 03:28 · Score: 1

Why shouldn't unmarried people get equal rights to those that are married?

This is not what was intially reported by ebonum · 2017-09-25 14:16 · Score: 5, Interesting

The ads were initially reported to be pro Trump. It seems Facebook itself reported false information to seed decent.

Re:This is not what was intially reported by Anonymous Coward · 2017-09-25 14:59 · Score: 2, Interesting

Err.. no, they weren't. The initial report was:

Most of the ads and accounts didn't have to explicitly do with the election or either of the then-candidates, Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump. Instead, they were focused on divisive political topics, including LGBT issues, immigration and gun rights.
If you read that as "pro-Trump", that's on you. Don't go crying "false information".
Re:This is not what was intially reported by Dan+East · 2017-09-25 14:59 · Score: 2

I don't know if FB reported false information, as much as the news media presumed that anything funded by Russia must be pro-Trump. Most news organizations are searching with a microscope for anything tying Russia to Trump, and they tend to get a bit giddy when they think something has been found. According to the article, there isn't much of a smoking gun here, and in fact there may not have been anything illegal as far as the "foreign nationals can't influence elections" laws. In the past these laws were primarily investigated in relation to foreigners providing direct campaign contributions to candidates. The main problem is that laws of this sort must enforceable. If someone offers me a $100 to put a bumper sticker on my vehicle for a specific candidate, how would I be able to determine whether or not those funds came from a foreign national? I purchase ads from Facebook for various projects. How could Facebook know if my ad was attempting to influence an election, and then whether or not my funds (payed for via credit card) had originally come from some foreign government?

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Better known as 318230.
Re:This is not what was intially reported by sound+vision · 2017-09-25 15:36 · Score: 2

They were pro-Trump in that they helped his campaign. Inflaming racial tensions also keeps Americans focused on problems at home while the Russians are out pulling all kind of stunts up to and including annexing territory from sovereign states. Electing trump was just a side effect. I get the feeling most of the Russian contacts with his campaign weren't even serious attempts to collude with him. They just wanted to leave a concrete trail of contacts that would make a further circus, paralyzing the us government that much longer.

Re: So what? by Anonymous Coward · 2017-09-25 14:17 · Score: 1

Maybe just maybe a geopolitical rival sowing social discord in order to destabilize our country is something that we in the U.S. should be concerned about?

Gee they should have hired Obama by Crashmarik · 2017-09-25 14:22 · Score: 1, Troll

Just looking around they have nothing on what a true professional was able to accomplish.

Re:Gee they should have hired Obama by sit1963nz · 2017-09-25 14:51 · Score: 1

Hmmm...elsewhere in the world when they find a politician is a sexual predator they throw them out of government , in the US you elect them.

So the Russians were colluding with the Dems! by Anonymous Coward · 2017-09-25 14:22 · Score: 1, Funny

Wow! This development really flips the investigation on its head!

Timeline of Treason by Anonymous Coward · 2017-09-25 14:23 · Score: 4, Informative

Before the election

Dec. 10, 2015
Lt. Gen Michael Flynn is part of a panel discussion in Moscow for the 10th anniversary of government-backed Russia Today, for which he receives payment (The Washington Post, Aug. 15, 2016). Officials notice an increase in communication between Flynn and the Russian ambassador to the United States, Sergey Kislyak, following the Russia Today event (CNN, May 19, 2017).

Late 2015
British intelligence agencies detect suspicious interactions between Russia and Trump aides that they pass on to American intelligence agencies (The Guardian, April 13, 2017).

March 19, 2016
Hillary Clinton campaign chairman John Podesta is sent an email that encourages him to change his email password, likely precipitating the hack of his account (CBS News, Oct. 28, 2016).

March 21
During an interview with The Post, Trump lists Carter Page as part of his foreign policy team. Page had been recommended by a son-in-law of President Richard Nixon, New York Republican Party Chairman Ed Cox (WP, March 21, 2016).

March 28
Political veteran Paul Manafort is hired to help the Trump campaign manage the delegate process for the Republican National Convention. He is recommended by Trump confidante Roger Stone (New York Times, March 28, 2016). Before joining the campaign, Manafort lobbied on behalf of Oleg Deripaska, an ally of Russian President Vladimir Putin. That deal followed a memo from Manafort in which he offered a plan that could "greatly benefit the Putin Government." His relationship with Deripaska ended in 2009 (Associated Press, March 22, 2017). Manafort also worked on behalf of the Russia-friendly Party of Regions in Ukraine, helping guide the party's leader, Viktor Yanukovych, to the country's presidency. Yanukovych would later be ousted. (WP, Aug. 19, 2016)

April 27
Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-Ala.) may have met with Kislyak at a reception at the Mayflower Hotel in Washington before a foreign-policy speech given by Trump (CNN, May 31, 2017).

June
At a closed-door meeting of foreign policy experts and the prime minister of India, Page praises Putin effusively (WP, Aug. 5, 2016).

June 9
Donald Trump, Jr., Manafort and son-in-law Jared Kushner meet at Trump Tower with a Kremlin-connected attorney named Natalia Veselnitskaya. Veselnitskaya's efforts to reverse a law passed in 2012 sanctioning Russians suspected of human rights violations at some point drew the attention of the FBI. The meeting was not initially reported to the government by Kushner as required when he took a position with the administration (Times, July 8, 2017). After the meeting was originally reported, Trump, Jr. admitted that the pretext for the conversation was that he believed Veselnitskaya to have information incriminating Hillary Clinton (Times, July 9, 2017).

June 15
A hacker calling himself "Guccifer 2.0" releases the Democratic National Committee's research file on Donald Trump (Gawker, June 15, 2016). News reports already link the stolen data to Russian hackers (WP, June 14, 2016).

July
At some point this month, the FBI begins investigating possible links between the Russian government and Trump's campaign (Wired, March 20, 2017).

July 7
Page travels to Moscow to give a lecture (NYT, April 19, 2017). The Trump campaign approved the trip (USA Today, March 7, 2017). This trip was likely the catalyst for the FBI's request for a secret surveillance warrant to track Pageâs communications (WP, May 25, 2017).

July 11 or 12
Trump campaign staffers intervene with the committee developing the Republican Party's national security platform to remove language call arming Ukraine against Russian aggression. (July 18, 2016).

July 18
At an event hosted by the Heritage Foundation as part of the Republican National Convention, Sessions and Kislyak have a brief conversation (WP, March 2, 2017).

Flynn delivers a speech at the Republican convention, joining in the crowd's "Lock her up!" chant. "If I, a guy who knows this business, if I

Re:Timeline of Treason by Anonymous Coward · 2017-09-25 14:53 · Score: 4, Insightful

You do realize that the point of the actual linked article is that the Russians objective is to sow disconnect and divide Americans. Then you go on to post a bunch of loosely connected and out of context examples to help feed a very partisan and divisive narrative. Currently those on the Left are actually doing exactly what the Russians want them to do. They're creating disconnect and trying to destroy American unity and faith in our democratic process. The left, unknowingly, are the ones colluding and doing the work the Russians want done. Try some introspection and realize you've been played and are part of the problem dividing us and weakening us as a nation.
Re: Timeline of Treason by Anonymous Coward · 2017-09-25 15:45 · Score: 2, Informative

Just as I suspected, I laid out the evidence of treason right in front of you and you have simply chosen to ignore it.
June 9
Donald Trump, Jr., Manafort and son-in-law Jared Kushner meet at Trump Tower with a Kremlin-connected attorney named Natalia Veselnitskaya. Veselnitskaya's efforts to reverse a law passed in 2012 sanctioning Russians suspected of human rights violations at some point drew the attention of the FBI. The meeting was not initially reported to the government by Kushner as required when he took a position with the administration (Times, July 8, 2017). After the meeting was originally reported, Trump, Jr. admitted that the pretext for the conversation was that he believed Veselnitskaya to have information incriminating Hillary Clinton (Times, July 9, 2017).
Re:Timeline of Treason by Anonymous Coward · 2017-09-25 15:47 · Score: 3, Insightful

The left is standing up to Russia while the right wing embraces Russia's attack on our country.
Re: Timeline of Treason by Anonymous Coward · 2017-09-25 16:12 · Score: 1

Look, I know "treason" is a really fun word to say and all, but it has an actual definition. It's right there in the constitution, in fact. And meeting with random lobbyists to get political dirt or having a routine meeting with the Russian Ambassador isn't "treason".
Re:Timeline of Treason by Anonymous Coward · 2017-09-25 18:15 · Score: 1

The left is standing up to Russia while the right wing embraces Russia's attack on our country.
No kidding. The GOP's approval ratings of Putin have increased nearly 4x since the trump infection colonized their party. Saint Reagan is going to bring the fire and brimstone for you traitors.
Re: Timeline of Treason by Sultan+Of+Smut · 2017-09-25 18:49 · Score: 1

"sourced from a foreign government" Why didn't you mention which foreign government it was? Oh right because you'd look like a twat and wouldn't be able to draw the comparison between Great Britain (an ally that shares intelligence back and forth) and Russia.
Re:Timeline of Treason by admin7087 · 2017-09-25 19:56 · Score: 1

Both sides are fairly retarded, so maybe this propaganda effort was successful. Are there no reasonable, halfway educated center-right or center-left people left in the US?
Re:Timeline of Treason by Anonymous Coward · 2017-09-25 20:10 · Score: 2, Informative

The left is standing up to Russia while the right wing embraces Russia's attack on our country.
The right is mostly saying wtf are you talking about to the left. While the left is playing right in to the goal to sow division. The "standing up" is actually doing Putin's bidding. The irony is completely missed by ivory tower moral crusaders.
Re:Timeline of Treason by allcoolnameswheretak · 2017-09-25 20:29 · Score: 3, Insightful

Nice summary of the unthinkable collusion that has been going on between the Trump team and Putin's Russia.
But I'm afraid the far-right (alt-right?) Republican camp has been padded so thoroughly against investigative journalism (fake news) and real facts (with -alternative facts-) that all of this evidence of collusion and treason will simply bounce right off them. It's amazing and scary thoroughly this group of people has been shielded from reason. It seems practically like brainwashing.
All it takes is propaganda and a "great", charismatic leader that talks loudly.
Now everybody should understand how Nazi Germany could happen.
Re: Timeline of Treason by Anonymous Coward · 2017-09-25 20:30 · Score: 1

The pushed accusation is that it is illegal to get campaign opposition research from a foreign government. Last time I checked, we have not been under British rule since 1776. We're not at war with Russia. They may be a geo-political opponent, but that's the extent. There is no difference between speaking to Russians and to Britons from a legal point of view.
Re:Timeline of Treason by stealth_finger · 2017-09-25 22:58 · Score: 1

Again, but from someplace credible.
What, like the mouth of trump?

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Re: Timeline of Treason by stealth_finger · 2017-09-25 23:03 · Score: 2

You can tell which are the trolls because they never admit to the possibility of Russian interference.
Here's my problem. Who gives a shit? Of course they tried to influence it. Just like America and everywhere else tries to influence the election of other countries to get the best situation for them. It's nothing new apart from Trump whining and crying about it now it's started to work against him. Mother fucker needs to grow up and, well I would say get on with the job but has he actually started? As far as I can tell it's all golf and tweets.

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Re:Timeline of Treason by dave420 · 2017-09-25 23:51 · Score: 3, Informative

Just turning up to meet the lawyer was illegal, whether they had any information or not. It doesn't matter what happened at the meeting or afterwards - the very act of trying to get the information instead of reporting the offer is illegal. That's it. That's the only piece the wall of text needed to include, and it's damning.
I don't know how you see a Russian-government paid lawyer trying to give information on an opponent in an election as not a foreign country intervening in said election.
Re: Timeline of Treason by Maritz · 2017-09-26 00:14 · Score: 1

America may well be 'trying' to do it, but the russians are running fucking rings around you. They're good at this stuff, and you are not. Think you can influence who gets 'elected' in Russia? lol.

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Re:Timeline of Treason by Maritz · 2017-09-26 00:16 · Score: 1

The left stands for nothing. Literally.
lol. That's one of the most pathetic comebacks I've ever seen. Well done you.
Go and crawl back up Trump/Dear Leader Putin's arsehole where you belong.

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Re: Timeline of Treason by Anonymous Coward · 2017-09-26 00:39 · Score: 1

The Russians also shitted in your pants just now. They are everywhere man!
Re:Timeline of Treason by dcw3 · 2017-09-26 01:01 · Score: 1

As someone on the right who agrees with you, I'm wondering if you're not falling into the same trap they want us all to drop into. Look at the huge number of ACs here and all most of them are doing is partisan name calling. I, for one, will continue to ignore the ACs.

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Re:Timeline of Treason by dcw3 · 2017-09-26 01:11 · Score: 1

Just turning up to meet the lawyer was illegal, whether they had any information or not. It doesn't matter what happened at the meeting or afterwards - the very act of trying to get the information instead of reporting the offer is illegal. That's it. That's the only piece the wall of text needed to include, and it's damning.
I don't know how you see a Russian-government paid lawyer trying to give information on an opponent in an election as not a foreign country intervening in said election.
Can you please cite what law that breaks?
And one more question...had it been an American citizen would it have been legal? I'm asking because campaigns put a lot of effort into digging up dirt, so I'm wondering why it matters what the source of that dirt is.
FWIW, I'm a Cold War vet, I'm very much against any Russian interference. And let's remember that their goal is to divide us, and it appears to be working.

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Re: Timeline of Treason by stealth_finger · 2017-09-26 19:37 · Score: 1

Who's better at it is beside the point.

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Re:Timeline of Treason by mpercy · 2017-09-26 23:02 · Score: 1

The NY Times described it thusly: "Cash Flowed to Clinton Foundation Amid Russian Uranium Deal"
"Whether the donations played any role in the approval of the uranium deal is unknown. But the episode underscores the special ethical challenges presented by the Clinton Foundation, headed by a former president who relied heavily on foreign cash to accumulate $250 million in assets even as his wife helped steer American foreign policy as secretary of state, presiding over decisions with the potential to benefit the foundation's donors."
"Uranium investors' efforts to buy mining assets in Kazakhstan and the United States led to a takeover bid by a Russian state-owned energy company. The investors gave millions to the Clinton Foundation over the same period, while Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton's office was involved with approving the Russian bid.
SEPTEMBER 2005 Frank Giustra, a Canadian mining financier, wins a major uranium deal in Kazakhstan for his company, UrAsia, days after visiting the country with former President Bill Clinton.
2006 Mr. Giustra donates $31.3 million to the Clinton Foundation.
JUNE 2008 Negotations begin for an investment in Uranium One by the Russian atomic energy agency, Rosatom.
2008-2010 Uranium One and former UrAsia investors make $8.65 million in donations to the Clinton Foundation. Uranium One investors stand to profit on a Rosatom deal.
2010-2011 Investors give millions more in donations to the Clinton Foundation.
JUNE 2010 Rosatom seeks majority ownership of Uranium One, pending approval by the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States, of which the State Department is a member.
JUNE 29, 2010 Bill Clinton is paid $500,000 for a speech in Moscow by a Russian investment bank with ties to the Kremlin that assigned a buy rating to Uranium One stock.
OCTOBER 2010 Rosatom's majority ownership approved by Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States.
Re:Timeline of Treason by mpercy · 2017-09-26 23:11 · Score: 2

Remember when Mitt Romney sai Russia was the biggest geopolitical threat to the US? Remember how he was mocked mercilessly for his views?
President Barack Obama, among others, mocked the Republican candidate: “The 1980s are now calling to ask for their foreign policy back, because the cold war’s been over for 20 years”.
Vice President Joe Biden opined that Romney belonged to “a small group of Cold War holdovers.”
John Kerry said “Mitt Romney talks like he’s only seen Russia by watching ‘Rocky IV,’”
Rachel Maddow: “He read about Reagan’s private, outside-the-CIA cabal of team-B zealots who were telling him that Russia had all the stuff they didn’t have so he could justify a giant defense budget,”
Chris Matthews: “I don’t know what decade this guy’s living in. Is he trying to play Ronald Reagan here, or what?”
And then, of course, we have President Obama telling the Russian President that if he (Obama) was re-elected, he'd be able to cut more deals with Russia... 'I'll have more flexibility after election' President Barack Obama was caught on microphone telling Dmitry Medvedev.
The about-face by Democrats may have caused them whiplash...
Re:Timeline of Treason by hey! · 2017-09-27 01:11 · Score: 1

Then you go on to post a bunch of loosely connected and out of context examples to help feed a very partisan and divisive narrative.
You say that like it's a bad thing.
Dividing the nation along race, gender, sexual orientation, or religion is to promote irrational behavior. Dividing a nation along political lines... well that's what parties are for. Generating an alternative narrative is their function, and it's not irrational as long as you stick to facts.
That these are selected facts goes without saying. You are completely free to construct a contradictory narrative from other facts, if you have them.
If I point out there's smoke pouring out of your house windows, one possible correct response is, "Well I'm cooking a brisket and things got a little smoky." Saying, "You're constructing a narrative that construes fire from smoke," is simply stating the obvious.

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Re:Timeline of Treason by DamnOregonian · 2017-09-28 05:22 · Score: 2

Can you please cite what law that breaks?
Any citizen of the United States, wherever he may be, who, without authority of the United States, directly or indirectly commences or carries on any correspondence or intercourse with any foreign government or any officer or agent thereof, with intent to influence the measures or conduct of any foreign government or of any officer or agent thereof, in relation to any disputes or controversies with the United States, or to defeat the measures of the United States, shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than three years, or both.

And one more question...had it been an American citizen would it have been legal?
As long as that citizen was not acting as an agent of a foreign government.

I'm asking because campaigns put a lot of effort into digging up dirt, so I'm wondering why it matters what the source of that dirt is.
Because you're free to collude with any American to bring around a political shift in the United States, but the second you start doing that with agents of a foreign government, you're treading very close to what, in many countries of the world, is called treason.

Hypothetically speaking, say Hillary were going to win. Say Russian interference secured the win for Donald. The US government would have been overthrown by the Russian government. Non-violently, of course, but the end result the same.
Americans are allowed to non-violently overthrow our government. It's our job every election cycle. Foreign governments are not. That's an act of war.
Fortunately for Russia- just like all the countries we have done the same thing to, nobody can *really* physically make good on the consequences of them committing an act of war.

FWIW, I'm a Cold War vet, I'm very much against any Russian interference
Then you should fucking know better, sir.

And let's remember that their goal is to divide us, and it appears to be working.
Can't argue there. But I can say you are not helping by attempting to weasel out of the criminal element for sake of Party.
Re:Timeline of Treason by dcw3 · 2017-09-28 07:31 · Score: 1

I appreciate your answer. It was enlightening, not because I was trying to weasel out of anything, but because I didn't know, which is why I asked the question.

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Re:Timeline of Treason by DamnOregonian · 2017-09-28 09:08 · Score: 1

Then let me apologize for the accusation.

To me, not really being partisan about it, I see a bunch of people trying to defend their side's malpractice and skirting some very serious laws, that have absolutely been skirted in the past by members of every political organization in this country. That does not however justify it, and it should be condemned *wherever* it happens, regardless of who's team did it.

If that's not you- forgive my haste in calling you out.
Re:Timeline of Treason by dcw3 · 2017-09-28 11:32 · Score: 1

No problem. If you broke the law, he needs to pay the price, and that's that. While I lean conservative, I'm I'm not going to stand up for someone just because of that similar belief. Just like this HHS secretary needs to pay back his travel expenses, and be fired, and possibly more.

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Re:"According to the Washington Post." by knightghost · 2017-09-25 14:31 · Score: 1, Troll

Have you ever heard of a country named "Ukraine"? Off down the rabbit hole you go...

Propaganda by SeattleLawGuy · 2017-09-25 14:37 · Score: 3, Insightful

I grew up with these types of stories since the cold wars days. But were told that it was all cia propaganda and that they would never do anything like that.

Yes, propaganda is a very real part of everyday life, both state-sponsored and corporate-sponsored, throughout the developed world. Many newspaper articles are heavily influenced by it even when someone writing a story doesn't realize it, because fundamentally reporters have very little time to spend on each story. Most of this propaganda has political objectives.

That doesn't make it okay. It is something that causes harm and that there should be both protection from and defenses for. A foreign government that uses propaganda to destabilize a country should be treated as a kind of attack and an appropriate proportional response (although it may be of a different kind) should be employed until you are able to negotiate a de-escalation. Here, the evidence appears to show that there have been propaganda and electronic attacks on the United States and it should respond intelligently.

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Re:Propaganda by DNS-and-BIND · 2017-09-25 15:10 · Score: 1

Remember when Obama tried to alter the result of the Brexit vote? What retaliation should Britain be pursuing for that blatant foreign meddling?

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Re:Propaganda by admin7087 · 2017-09-25 20:06 · Score: 1

Anybody is entitled to their opinion, including Obama and Putin, let alone Trump who certainly doesn't hold back. Voicing your opinion as a head of state is not propaganda, it's your duty as a president. You're right that it's sometimes considered inappropriate insofar as foreign elections are concerned, but not for the reasons you suggest. It's sometimes considered unwise because it can create a diplomatic problem when the other party than the one you've supported is elected. Otherwise there is nothing wrong with voicing public opinions and endorsements and every government does that in one form or another. That's not the problem with Russia's attempts to influence the US election - these attempts where based on electronic attacks, botnets and sneaky, secret ad campaigns. There is a lot wrong with that. The difference is whether the means are overt, clearly attributable to the respective government, or covert and stealthy.
Re:Propaganda by thinkwaitfast · 2017-09-27 14:01 · Score: 1

Maybe listen to this guy?

buy votes? by js290 · 2017-09-25 14:41 · Score: 1

But, did they buy any votes? Because the easiest way to influence an election is to buy actual votes.

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United We Stand by Anonymous Coward · 2017-09-25 14:47 · Score: 1

Russia was pushing exactly the same kinds of things that the DNC is pushing. Racial and identity politics that divide the country. Look at the NFL to see how far it the division campaign has gone.

We are playing right into Russia's hands. We need to unite and stop judging people by their skin color. We need to stop calling Trump the orange one, we need to respect our country, and we need to balance the bad things in this country with all the good things and all the progress we have made to right the wrongs.

United States, we need to unite.

P.S. Why is it OK for Carlos Slim and Jeff Bezos and Rupert Murdoch to have undue influence over major news outlets? They have a lot more influence than a small Russian ad buy, and 2 of the 3 are foreigners. Russia should just buy a bank that buys a newspaper.

Re:United We Stand by deviated_prevert · 2017-09-25 20:25 · Score: 1

Why is it OK for Carlos Slim and Jeff Bezos and Rupert Murdoch to have undue influence over major news outlets? They have a lot more influence than a small Russian ad buy, and 2 of the 3 are foreigners. Russia should just buy a bank that buys a newspaper.
You can take Conrad Black from Canada if you want some real diversity in your press LOL. Funny but on several occasions when Nixon secretly ordered the bugging of reporters the US public could care less, but when the NSA did it to Angela Merkel the republican hypocrites attacking Obama had a field day. If Obama actually knew it was happening is up for debate though considering the NSA is essentially a branch of the Republican party! Fortunately largely because of today's technology national security through secrecy is becoming a bit of an oxymoron the same as military intelligence was during the Vietnam War.
Russia is using poor US info security and technology to stir up shit in the US, so what's new? The real question is why is Putin trying so hard to destabilize the US.
For one, first and foremost Putin wants to deflect criticism away from his dictatorship, for two he does not want to increase the levels of suppression of his people unless it becomes absolutely necessary to stay in power. Going back to soviet style purges is not his style and more importantly he would lose style points with his supporters. His style is more to use discrete political assassinations, a trick he learned from largely from the American mafia. He has also invested heavily in keeping the shit pot stirred in the middle east were a bunch of his friends make their money and it could still easily back fire on him with Iran and the countries just to the north of Iran. He has to keep a large part of his military on alert to deal with the southern portion of Russia and the portions that can easily turn against Moscow the same as all Russian leader have had to do for centuries.
In short destabilizing America politically plays very much into his interests in as much as it deflects the eyes of the world off his slow reconquest and suppression of the lost soviet states. He would dearly love to re-annex the Ukraine but the US would not yet stand for it. His next step no doubt will be shit disturbance and possibly assassinations of Ukraine politicians. Basically the same things he is doing in the US but to a much greater extent and much more covert.
How China might react to his antics is a different story they might not be so easy for him to deal with if he decides that Russian interests are in expansionism into more easterly fertile territory.
He is a typical dictator who wants to stir up shit and see what he can get away with, no different than Hitler, Stalin and the list goes on. No unless Trump manages to do the same shit as Putin and set up an oligarchy with him as dictator the US will prevail but again not until assholes like Putin and their ilk are finally ousted by a truly democratic Russia. However the unfortunate part is Russia seems to like to have a dictator the same as it once had a tsar and in truth is as yet incapable of real democratic elections without bloodshed. Let us just hope the expansionist assholes and dictators of this world never decide that dropping the bomb can help them stay in power. If they do the only hope we have is either divine intervention or the aliens stepping in and taking over the show. Because we as a species are simply not capable of real democratic government quite yet. #we_need_alien_intervention_now

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Re:United We Stand by hord · 2017-09-25 21:40 · Score: 1

The 1% is united. Now watch the roller coaster.

Bell-Pottinger by Anonymous Coward · 2017-09-25 14:50 · Score: 1

Russia should have hired the experts. Bell-Pottinger from the UK would have done a strapping good job, old boy.

We need some guts and a law about political ads by mattr · 2017-09-25 14:55 · Score: 2, Insightful

Net media must stop either micro-targeted ads (not likely for FB or Google) or political ads (since micro-targeted political ads are death to society). It only took big data science and social media to deliver the most hideous election in U.S. history and assist the ascendancy of white supremacism in what had been a nation of immigrants.

All FB would have to do is hire human beings to turn down political ads, and the guts to pass up the money. Though broadcast TV takes the opposite path, at least TV does not intentionally try to fool the watcher into thinking everybody on that channel sees the same ads. The next step is to get money out of elections (every candidate gets the same budget for ads and buying supporters) and out of politics (flat dead impossible unless someone other than politicians makes the law).

Re:We need some guts and a law about political ads by DNS-and-BIND · 2017-09-25 17:31 · Score: 1

It only took big data science and social media to deliver the most hideous election in U.S. history
Yeah, that and Facebook didn't cause Hillary to lose Pennsylvania, Michigan, and Wisconsin. You know what did? Ignoring the plight of real Americans who are really hurting. Telling them off and letting them know you absolutely refuse to represent their interests in the government. But continue smashing powerless people in the face with the whole "UR WHYTE SUPREMCST" thing. It feels good to speak truth to powerless, right?

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Re:We need some guts and a law about political ads by Kiuas · 2017-09-25 23:30 · Score: 4, Insightful

Yeah, that and Facebook didn't cause Hillary to lose Pennsylvania, Michigan, and Wisconsin. You know what did? Ignoring the plight of real Americans who are really hurting. Telling them off and letting them know you absolutely refuse to represent their interests in the government.
The most successful trick Trump pulled during his campaign was convincing these people that he, a millionaire cosmopolitan and a 'globalist' in every sense of the word, would represent their interests, or that he cares about them in any sense. He doesn't. He's now been in office for 8 months and done very little, and his attempts are focused on giving out tax-breaks to the wealthiest segment of the US - his co-millionaires - at the cost of the very poorest.
This is the main problem currently faced by all western democracies: there's a segment of poorly educated poorly employed people who do not understand why their jobs are gone and won't be coming back except as automated factories, and these people will vote for anyone who tells them that he'll get their jobs back and make everything better. Put another way: the people most negatively affected by the current economic development are also the ones with the least understanding of it, making them easy targets to manipulate into voting against their own interests.
Hillary's main problem has always been that she's not really a charismatic figure in any way, nor is she a great speaker, put simply: she's way too boring and unenthusiastic. Trump isn't an orator either and seems to be running on a vocabulary of a 9 year-old, but what he has over Hillary is emotion: like any good salesman, he's able to deliver an enthusiastic pitch that gets people interested, it gets them listening. He's a superior showman and knows his crowd, but it doesn't make him a competent politician, that he's clearly not.

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Re: "According to the Washington Post." by sound+vision · 2017-09-25 15:17 · Score: 1

Nobody has heard of Ukraine and they might just disappear from the map entirely before too long. Turn on the news today and you will hear about the president yelling about football on twitter. The operation was a total successk

Two questions by Okian+Warrior · 2017-09-25 15:22 · Score: 1

Remember when Obama tried to alter the result of the Brexit vote? What retaliation should Britain be pursuing for that blatant foreign meddling?

Q1: How does Facebook know with any certainty that these are Russian *government* actors. The implication being that the Russian government acted with intent to sow dissent during our elections.

How does Facebook know that these are not separate, individual Russian citizens without ties to the Russian government?

If one actor took out ads highlighting both sides of an issue, then yes... that would be intent to sow dissent.

But if the different sides were taken by different actors, a simpler explanation is that people in Russia are also divided on an issue, of American politics.

Almost as if people in Russia have, I don't know, relatives in America or something.

Q2: How does Facebook know that ads highlighting both sides of an issue were taken by the *same* actor, and not different actors with legitimate different opinions?

I'd be really interested to know how Facebook determines both of these bits of meta-information.

Re: "According to the Washington Post." by Reverend+Green · 2017-09-25 15:28 · Score: 1

Am American journalist visiting Ukraine just after the war - in the interstitial period of peace & cooperation between WW2 and the Cold War - described that land as "the Texas of Russia".

Something to think about.

Re: Did they buy the adds by Reverend+Green · 2017-09-25 15:33 · Score: 1

Thank you, Dr Pedant, for your learned and enlightening commentary.

Re: We need some guts and a law about political ad by Reverend+Green · 2017-09-25 15:37 · Score: 1

Great idea, Li Feng! Then if we could just build some sort of "great internet firewall" to keep all the badthink out...

Re: There are many Comrades here... by Reverend+Green · 2017-09-25 15:40 · Score: 1

You're just sour 'cuz the rooskies were pushing the same social destabilization propaganda that running dog "progressives" like to push. Of course there is a small difference - the rooskie were trying to ruin someone else's country...

Huh? by rsilvergun · 2017-09-25 15:44 · Score: 5, Insightful

where you and me watching different campaigns. Racial divides were a big part of it. The tough hombres & rapists comments come to mind right off the bat. One of his chief advisors, Steve Bannon, made his mark first and foremost playing to that shtick. And let's face it, there was a lot of resentment over having a black president for 8 years that brought a lot of folks to the polls.

I'm not saying it was the only that got Trump elected, I'm just saying he wouldn't have been without it. Hell, he wouldn't have made it through the primaries.

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Re:Huh? by houghi · 2017-09-25 22:05 · Score: 2

where you and me watching different campaigns.
Most likely, yes. That is what they can do. Remember when the ad companies told us it would be great to have personalized ads? This is it.
And no, you are not immune to it, neither am I. Even if you are not on Facebook, people around you will have opinions and that will also influence you. (Yes, it will.)
There are a lot of ways you could influence people. Say you tell them that candidate A is sure to win, there will be some people that won't bother to go and vote, because their candidate already won. That will not be enough, but when you to a lot of it and it is already close, then it might just be the drop that overflows the bucket.
This is not "Vote MY candidate" or "Do not vote the other candidate". This is more somebody saying he heard of a very nice pizza place during the morning meeting and pizza is ordered for the next lunch meeting.
So yes, most likely you watched different campaigns, because that is the point of personalized advertisement.

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Re:Huh? by dwillden · 2017-09-25 23:05 · Score: 2

Except that Hillary's 08 campaign created the claim.

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Re:Huh? by swb · 2017-09-25 23:30 · Score: 4, Insightful

This only works as propaganda to the extent that people already believe it enough to have it reinforce their own perceptions.
If this is a Russian "campaign", it's only a campaign to exploit the gap between the false narrative official discourse and the everyday reality of most Americans. The false narrative of official discourse is that Americans are racist -- uniformly biased against non-whites -- and the problems of African Americans are almost exclusively the result of this racism and not of any widespread social problems they contribute to.
The every day reality is that most Americans aren't uniformly racist against all races. If they were, millions of marginally literate, marginally English capable Mexicans wouldn't have had fantastic success in getting hired for jobs, millions of South Asians couldn't have been imported into Corporate American to staff IT departments, and people like Satya Nadella couldn't wind up in charge of one of the largest corporations in America and the world. The level of active "globalism" in the US just wouldn't work if the people making decisions were racist and the employees they had to work with were racist.
Americans do hold racial biases towards African Americans specifically, but this is largely not the cause it's given credit for, but an effect of their everyday interactions in most cities with the large plurality of poor and criminally inclined African Americans. And you can't talk about that reality without blaming white racism for it and freeing African Americans from most all responsibility for it.
As long as we continue to push the phony narrative of "racism" rather than "Americans don't like many African Americans", the propaganda will work. Once we acknowledge that white Americans are generally racially tolerant EXCEPT for African Americans, we will start to acknowledge the specific problems African Americans have (many of which are structural but not racist) and possibly get around to helping them. Once that happens, then the propaganda of racism won't really work.
Re:Huh? by ScentCone · 2017-09-26 00:55 · Score: 1

The tough hombres & rapists comments come to mind
Surely you're not yet another person who thinks that "MS-13" and "rapist" are races?

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Did you RTFA? by rsilvergun · 2017-09-25 15:49 · Score: 5, Informative

they targeted BLM ads to people likely to oppose the movement in order to rile them up. They did the same thing with ads showing Hilary was popular among Muslim women. They were shitposting on an epic scale. What's more they weren't just trying to divide the American people, they were trying to rile up a very specific group of voters (angry white men) in order to get them to oppose a very specific, left wing agenda. That in turn helped Trump win, which is almost certainly the intended purpose.

They were basically trying to get a whole bunch of folks who normally stay home to show up at the polls and without thinking about individual issues, vote their feelings. Worked too.

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Re:Did you RTFA? by DNS-and-BIND · 2017-09-25 17:10 · Score: 4, Interesting

TIME magazine in 1996 bragging about how we interfered in the Russian election.

The outcome was by no means inevitable. Last winter Yeltsin's approval ratings were in the single digits. There are many reasons for his change in fortune, but a crucial one has remained a secret. For four months, a group of American political consultants clandestinely participated in guiding Yeltsin's campaign.
For two days the supersecretive Yeltsin high command avoided Dresner, and none of the team ever actually met the President. "There are too many factions and too many leaks to risk your dealing with him directly," Braynin explained to Dresner. "You are our biggest secret."

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Re:Did you RTFA? by houghi · 2017-09-25 22:26 · Score: 1

And they probably also tried to keep others home by saying Clinton already had won or let them vote third party.
And people ALWAYS vote with their feelings. In Belgium we have a gazillion political parties. We have websites where you can answer questions to see what party is closest to your ideas. You can put weight on these answers. No matter the answer, people will still vote their party because reasons.
On TV there once was a politician who filled it out and his ideas where better aligned with a different party. He still decided to stay at that party, even if changing parties is not that uncommon.
The fact that the US has a "winner takes all" as well as a de facto two party system (because of it) makes it all a bit easier. You just need to fool some of the people some of the time.

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Re:Did you RTFA? by drinkypoo · 2017-09-25 23:07 · Score: 1

And I've never encountered someone claiming to even support the US in those matters, even if it did advance US interests (in practice, all of those instances I've heard of backfired spectacularly, so that certainly doesn't help).
They only backfired spectacularly if you mistakenly attribute benevolence to the decision-makers. Sure, sometimes they fuck up, but most of those times, they knew what they were doing. Chaos is the goal, not a side effect or drawback.

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"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
Re:Did you RTFA? by ScentCone · 2017-09-26 01:02 · Score: 3, Informative

And they probably also tried to keep others home by saying Clinton already had won
No, that was Clinton herself, her very rich supporters, and the vast majority of academia and the press who all supporter and considered her the presumptive winner a year before the election. Clinton was so sure she had already won that she bought the house next door for the Secret Service to use (you know, we can't have them in HER house, those peasants), and couldn't even trouble herself to set foot ONCE in states like Wisconsin, because she assumed they were going to follow her royal edicts and vote for her as demanded. She and her party fell for their own lies about her appeal as a candidate, and got exactly what they deserved.

--
Don't disappoint your bird dog. Go to the range.

Trump Jr Treason Email by Anonymous Coward · 2017-09-25 15:53 · Score: 1

citation provided

Subject: Re: Russia - Clinton - private and confidential

Good morning
Emin just called and asked me to contact you with something very interesting.
The Crown prosecutor of Russia met with his father Aras this morning and in their meeting offered to provide the Trump campaign with some official documents and information that would incriminate Hillary and her dealings with Russia and would be very useful to your father.
This is obviously very high level and sensitive information but is part of Russia and its government's support for Mr. Trump - helped along by Aras and Emin.
What do you think is the best way to handle this information and would you be able to speak to Emin about it directly?
I can also send this info to your father via Rhona, but it is ultra sensitive so wanted to send to you first.
Best
Rob Goldstone

== Donald Trump Jr's Treasonous Response ==

Subject: Re: Russia - Clinton - private and confidential

Thanks Rob I appreciate that. I am on the road at the moment but perhaps I just speak to Emin first. Seems we have some time and if it's what you say I love it especially later in the summer. Could we do a call first thing next week when I am back?
Best,
Don

Re: Trump Jr Treason Email by Anonymous Coward · 2017-09-25 22:12 · Score: 1

"Treason against the United States, shall consist only in levying War against them, or in adhering to their Enemies, giving them Aid and Comfort."
What you posted isn't even close to being treason.

So what you're really saying is... by Anonymous Coward · 2017-09-25 16:03 · Score: 1

All of this "rage" over the last 3 years is completely manufactured? That "hands up don't shoot" didn't actually happen the way that the media said it did? That LGBTXYZ isn't that pervasive, and frankly, most people don't care about who goes to the bathroom where? That racism is actually quite rare in the USA, and cop violence is actually very rare relative to the population size of 330 million?

That all this self-styled "resistance" is just a bunch of whiny babies trying to feel self-important, rather than admit that their candidate sucked? And sucked so bad that even after having the DNC throw the primary, having the FBI fake a Russian dossier to justify wiretapping the opposition campaign manager, and frankly having the election in the bag... so bad that she lost it without any interference whatsoever?

That all this anger and blame towards each other would be better off spent in introspection, asking what life choices did we make that led us to our own predicaments? Why did we spend so much on our degrees? Why do we keep complaining about gender instead of actually looking at statistics that men and women really are different?

Re:So what you're really saying is... by sysrammer · 2017-09-25 19:26 · Score: 1

Nyet nyet, tovarishch.

--
His ignorance covered the whole earth like a blanket, and there was hardly a hole in it anywhere. - Mark Twain

Impressive ultra efficient Russian propaganda by poity · 2017-09-25 16:47 · Score: 5, Insightful

Looks like a couple thousand dollars worth of foreign ads tipped the balance against a billion dollar campaign run by a powerful well-connected establishment.

... and I can't even get a 2% clickthrough rate on my adwords

--
your thin skin doesn't make me a troll

Re:Impressive ultra efficient Russian propaganda by SuricouRaven · 2017-09-25 18:12 · Score: 1

Given how close the election was, even small things might have changed the outcome.
Re:Impressive ultra efficient Russian propaganda by sysrammer · 2017-09-25 19:18 · Score: 2

From TFA, fwiw: "According to Facebook, fraudulent accounts, which have now been closed, paid $100,000 for the ads." Still, point taken. Tip of the iceberg, though.

--
His ignorance covered the whole earth like a blanket, and there was hardly a hole in it anywhere. - Mark Twain
Re:Impressive ultra efficient Russian propaganda by drinkypoo · 2017-09-25 23:03 · Score: 1

... and I can't even get a 2% clickthrough rate on my adwords
Not all goals are created equal. Getting Americans to vote against their own interests is about as difficult as making teenagers depressed.

--
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
Re:Impressive ultra efficient Russian propaganda by ScentCone · 2017-09-26 01:10 · Score: 2

Getting Americans to vote against their own interests
Putting the wildly corrupt Clintons back into the power they demanded so they could continue to enrich themselves selling access ... THAT would have been against Americans' own interests. Giving Hillary Clinton the power to nominate Supreme Court justices when she came right out and told us that she was going to use that power as a foil against a not-liking-her-agenda legislature that she knew wouldn't follow her demands ... THAT would have been voting against Americans' own interests.

--
Don't disappoint your bird dog. Go to the range.

$100,000? That is a thing now? by SlovakWakko · 2017-09-25 17:26 · Score: 3, Interesting

$100,000? Like, really? The Clinton+Trump campaigns have spent together over $200,000,000 on their campaigns. Either the Russians are absolute geniuses and light years ahead of everybody else when it comes to effective political ads, or this is just another inflated sensationalist article trying to get views for WaPo using a hot topic.
Also, I'm somehow missing the connection to Russia in the article - it's once again presented as a certainty, but it is not explained how the authors managed to do the attribution to the Russian government. If this is considered a serious article in the US, I'm not surprised that "fake news" is a thing there. How about some critical thinking?
Really, guys, to the rest of the world this histeria is beyond awkward and facepalming. Trump is your creature, born out of the swamp that is the 2-party scam, not some foreign plant. Reform your political system, and these things won't happen. Until you do so, according to the article everybody who has $100,000 to burn will be able to elect your president for you...

Re:$100,000? That is a thing now? by geekymachoman · 2017-09-25 21:51 · Score: 1

Unfortunately you're comment will be buried under load of rubbish, evil Russian comments / It's Putin's fault, because it just is not fun otherwise.
Re:$100,000? That is a thing now? by SlovakWakko · 2017-09-25 22:19 · Score: 1

I know... and I guess it's not a problem, it's all just theatre for the masses anyway. The US need a boogeyman to justify a crazy $700bln military budget, Russia needs one to justify its autocratic system of government - and we have something to argue about :)
Re:$100,000? That is a thing now? by Xyrus · 2017-09-26 00:52 · Score: 2

$100,000? Like, really? The Clinton+Trump campaigns have spent together over $200,000,000 [bloomberg.com] on their campaigns. Either the Russians are absolute geniuses and light years ahead of everybody else when it comes to effective political ads, or this is just another inflated sensationalist article trying to get views for WaPo using a hot topic.
You really haven't been paying attention, have you? Yes, the Russians are well ahead of the curve. They've been doing this for a LONG time. Our allies warned us that they've been doing for a long time. They warned us that we were going to be targeted. Putin isn't fucking stupid. He caught on to how powerful (and cheap) using social media was as a tool. You get something to go viral even just once, and it's already paid back a thousand fold.
And that's what happened. Not just here, but also in Europe. More to the point, it was extremely successful.

--
~X~
Re:$100,000? That is a thing now? by bluegutang · 2017-09-26 19:06 · Score: 1

$100k spend unethically can have a much bigger impact than $100k spent ethically (not that either Trump or Clinton are ethical people, but they have to deal with the consequences of unethical behavior being discovered and blamed on them, unlike Russia).
Also, the election just happened to be extremely close, which is how a small push to one side could put them over the edge.
Re:$100,000? That is a thing now? by SlovakWakko · 2017-09-26 19:40 · Score: 1

You really haven't been paying attention, have you? Yes, the Russians are well ahead of the curve. They've been doing this for a LONG time. Our allies warned us that they've been doing for a long time. They warned us that we were going to be targeted. Putin isn't fucking stupid. He caught on to how powerful (and cheap) using social media was as a tool. You get something to go viral even just once, and it's already paid back a thousand fold.
And that's what happened. Not just here, but also in Europe. More to the point, it was extremely successful.
I've been paying attention for a long time now, and what I see is the same old thing - using Russia as a boogeyman. Before, it was the USSR's massive tank formations, submarines and nuclear weapons which everybody had to fear. Now, since their tank formations are just an outdated shadow of their former glory, their submarine fleet is tiny compared to the US' one, and the nuclear weapons are regulated by treaties, we need to fear something else they're oh-so-good at, right?
And where exactly in Europe have they been doing it? Because I've seen frontpage articles on CNN, in NY Times and elsewhere saying how it seems that Russians are targeting French and German elections. Weeks or months later I've read reports - which somehow didn't get frontpage attention - that French security services ruled out Russian involvement in their elections, and no hacking or something similar has happened in German elections. So who is not paying attention?
Compare these two articles: The NSA Confirms It: Russia Hacked French Election ‘Infrastructure’ and The Latest: France says no trace of Russian hacking Macron. Who is lying? Is it the French themselves, or is it maybe Rogers just riding the wave to get more funding for NSA? And this one is hilarious - NY Times going existential over missing Russian hackers in German elections in an article, where they cite their previous article on how Macron's campaign got hacked by Russians (from May) even though by now it is known that no such thing has happened. Am I the only one who sees a massive number of various interests riding the very, very old wave of russophobia in order to get more money, more readers, more views, more attention? It is all a theatre, keeping us occupied and entertained so we part with our money more easily.
Re:$100,000? That is a thing now? by SlovakWakko · 2017-09-26 20:12 · Score: 1

There is nothing ethical about any political campaign - especially in an election where $200mil get spent on electing somebody as Trump. If you want to get rid of unethical conduct in US presidential elections, get rid of the electoral college as a start. But even that won't help much IMO. As an outsider, I see Trump as the candidate of the horrible income inequality that exists in the US. Fix that, and frauds like Trump won't stand a chance. Keep the people who voted for him poor, uneducated and desperate, and next time they'll give you somebody even worse (not possible? just wait). Pointing the finger to measly $100,000 in face of all this is... either irresponsible sensationalism or an outright attempt at evading the real issues that got Trump into the WH.

Re:There are many Comrades here... by poity · 2017-09-25 17:34 · Score: 1

>7 digit user accusing 6 digit users of being shills

--
your thin skin doesn't make me a troll

Trump's son support Black Lives Matter by Anonymous Coward · 2017-09-25 17:43 · Score: 1

> ... Donald Trump's son has already admitted to committing treason and colluding with Russia's attack on America

Yes, Donald Trump's son has colluded with Russia by paying Facebook for online advertisement in support of Black Lives Matter

We must charge, indict and put that traitor to jail now !!

Putin: "All your base are belong to us" by millertym · 2017-09-25 18:38 · Score: 1

I'm starting to think Putin probably dances to that classic youtube sensation every night before bed. His government spy agencies have manipulated the US population through our permeation with big tech beyond what I would have thought possible a couple of years ago.

Re: "According to the Washington Post." by sysrammer · 2017-09-25 19:23 · Score: 2

Pedant here. It's spelled "successky".

--
His ignorance covered the whole earth like a blanket, and there was hardly a hole in it anywhere. - Mark Twain

Umm by easyTree · 2017-09-25 20:56 · Score: 1

Every time I see a "Russia perpetrated X heinous act against the people", I see "We (your government) perpetrated X heinous act against the people."

--
Requiem for the American Dream

Re: There are many Comrades here... by hyades1 · 2017-09-25 21:33 · Score: 1

I'm not American. I'm looking in from the outside, and Trump's lip prints are all over Putin's dick.

--
I've calculated my velocity with such exquisite precision that I have no idea where I am.

Re:There are many Comrades here... by hyades1 · 2017-09-25 21:47 · Score: 1

Yes. Anonymous Coward has been a member here forever.

--
I've calculated my velocity with such exquisite precision that I have no idea where I am.

Zapad by hord · 2017-09-25 21:50 · Score: 1

Is this news? Or is having a week-long war game named "Zapad" or "West" news?

So? by jonr · 2017-09-26 00:00 · Score: 1

Does it matter now for what purpose whoever buys ads?

dvide et mpera by lowkeyknight · 2017-09-26 00:19 · Score: 1

Oldest trick in the book. And behold; a nation divided.

Re: There are many Comrades here... by ScentCone · 2017-09-26 00:58 · Score: 1

I'm not American. I'm looking in from the outside, and Trump's lip prints are all over Putin's dick.

No, angry-at-losing-despite-what-they-spent lefty news outlets have their prints all over the narrative you've chosen to explain why the wildly unlikable, robotically sociopathic, serially lying, fantasically corrupt Hillary Clinton lost an election despite a couple billion dollars having been spent to guarantee her coronation.

--
Don't disappoint your bird dog. Go to the range.

more anonymous evidence-less claims by Mr.+Slippery · 2017-09-26 01:05 · Score: 1

Anonymous claims published with no evidence by the Washington Post -- the same paper that gave us the "Prop or Not?" debacle.

Did some trolls buy ads during the election? Almost certainly. Were some of them Russian? Probably. Did the average Russian on the street prefer Trump to Clinton? Of course -- Clinton backed a coup in their neighboring country Ukraine, a coup that put in place a government that stepped up repression of ethnic Russians, while Trump talked about normalizing relations.

Were these ads part of a coordinated plan by Putin, acting in collusion with Trump? Extraordinary claims requirry extraordinary evidence. "Anonymous sources tell us that they think X" is not evidence for X.

--
Tom Swiss | the infamous tms | my blog
You cannot wash away blood with blood

Re: There are many Comrades here... by hyades1 · 2017-09-26 19:20 · Score: 1

Angry? ROFL! I'm sitting up here north of a border far too long to fence, and our only worry is how many Americans are crossing over to seek asylum and decent health care.

I've got the popcorn out and I'm watching real Americans trying to fight back against the slobbering, racist morons of the alt-right. It's like a hockey game...I'm pulling for one side, but if it loses, I just shrug, open another beer, and wait to welcome more American friends into the greatest country in the world. Up here in the Great White North, we're doing just fine, thanks! For example, ROSS Intelligence is opening a major R&D centre in Toronto. More are on the way, too.

One thing I don't quite understand: the woman you hate so much got far more votes than the clown in the White House, yet she lost. Please explain again how you live in "the greatest democracy in the world"? (snicker)

It's looking like at least some decent Americans have grown tired of serving as hosts for Red State parasites. Welcome, my friends! Breathe deep again in the new Land of the Free! By the way, we've got the only leader in history to go into a boxing ring (for charity) and face a heavily-favoured neo-conservative with MMA training. The PM beath the living crap out of him.

--
I've calculated my velocity with such exquisite precision that I have no idea where I am.

Re:Russia is a terrible neighbor by mpercy · 2017-09-26 23:16 · Score: 1

“The 1980s are now calling to ask for their foreign policy back becausethe Cold War’s been over for 20 years.”

Russian Trolls: Put up your keyboards! by shanen · 2017-09-26 23:52 · Score: 1

Anyone else speculating that the downtime was a Russian hacker response to the nasty topic?

Would the paid Russian trolls please raise their keyboards so we can take a count?

Actually I had a substantive response when I discovered the down-state of Slashdot. Let me see if I can recover those notes...

[...] I just stopped by [this other system] because Slashdot is down and I was looking for possible explanations. Now I'm wondering if the invalid certificate might have been part of an attack that has mostly shutdown the website (to "offline" mode, whatever that is). One possible scenario: Attackers triggered a revocation of the valid certificate to exploit a vulnerability of the obsolete one? Or perhaps to access a vulnerability using a new faked certificate? Or perhaps the fake new certificate came first, and what we are seeing now is due to Slashdot's successful revocation of the fake?

So I obviously have no real idea about means or opportunity, but I can speculate farther on motivation. One of the hot stories on Slashdot was about Russians hacking the election. (I wanted to add a comment about "Will the paid Russian trolls please raise their keyboards so we can get a count?")

Oh yeah, the real punchline. I actually found out Slashdot was down because I was trying to visit Slashdot to look up an old comment I wrote about ways to improve Slashdot. Or should I add the meta-joke that the same ancient idea is still visible on [this other system]... The tail-eating snake has reached his own neck?

--
Freedom = (Meaningful - Coerced) Choice != (Speech | Beer^2), and sad sock puppets' bad mods avail them naught.

Re: There are many Comrades here... by ScentCone · 2017-09-27 12:41 · Score: 1

Please explain again how you live in "the greatest democracy in the world"?

Yes, you DO need an explanation, since you're deliberately ignorant on the matter. We don't live in a Democracy (thank you, founding fathers and the brilliant constitution they wrote). That works fine for town councils and garden clubs. We, instead, live in a constitutional republic, made up of fifty separate states, with considerable power left to those states, on purpose. We organize the national elections that impact the things those states do together around the fact that we don't want the smug, condescending hipster residents in just two cities to be able to do things like ruling the lives of, say, the farmers that feed them even as they sneer at them and refuse (a la Clinton) to even set foot in their states to hear from them or dirty themselves talking to mere workers as they demand the office they're told they deserve. Mob rule is unacceptable in a complex, sprawling federation of fifty different states. It's why we have an electoral college and a series of checks and balances to make sure that people as uninformed as you don't run the show.

Enjoy your existence in Canada. Your economy couldn't exist without having the US people as customers for the trees you cut down and the minerals and carbon fuels you dig out. Your mischaracterization of illegal aliens relocating to avoid prosecution and deportation for their cheating as somehow being "Americans seeking asylum" is laughable. Even more amusing is how you're sugar coating your government's ACTUAL position on this. Your immigration minister, Ahmed Hussen, issued a warning to people who seem to think that Canada presents a friendlier environment as they look to relocate there having first entered the US after leaving their own countries: "It’s not something that we want people to do. We want people to claim asylum in the first country that they’re in, which in this case is the U.S.” Your own man in charge of immigration has said out loud that he doesn't want people coming in from via the US. And of course Canada doesn't consider any actual US citizens to be in any way in need of asylum in Canada - there's no mechanism for relocation to Canada on those grounds. All of which you know, but are pretending you don't so you can crank out some phony smugness. How Canadian of you.

--
Don't disappoint your bird dog. Go to the range.

Re: There are many Comrades here... by hyades1 · 2017-10-03 02:49 · Score: 1

Your quarrel is with all the Americans who describe their country in exactly the terms I used.

Yap at them, little doggie, not at your betters.

--
I've calculated my velocity with such exquisite precision that I have no idea where I am.

Slashdot Mirror

Russia Reportedly Bought Thousands of Facebook Ads Sought To Stress Racial Divisions (thehill.com)

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