Facebook VP of Ads Criticised For Tweeting that Russian-bought Ads Had Not Been Designed to Sway the US Election (bbc.com)

Facebook's vice-president of adverts has been criticised for tweeting that Russian-bought ads had not been designed to sway the US election. From a report: Rob Goldman's tweet was retweeted by President Donald Trump. His view contradicted special counsellor Robert Mueller's recent indictments, in which 13 Russians were charged with meddling in the election via social media and other means. Mr Goldman is reported to have apologised to Facebook staff. In a series of tweets, Mr Goldman said that Russia's misinformation activity had been designed to "divide America" but added that "the majority of the Russian ad spend [on Facebook] happened after the election." However according to the indictment, the ads were only part of Russia's activity on the social-media platform. In the document, Facebook is mentioned 35 times. According to Wired, he sent a message to staff that read: "I wanted to apologise for having tweeted my own view about Russian interference without having it reviewed by anyone internally. The tweets were my own personal view and not Facebook's. I conveyed my view poorly. The special counsel has far more information about what happened [than] I do -- so seeming to contradict his statements was a serious mistake on my part."

Comments

Clinton Lost Because of Clinton

[Kunedog]

Stop trying to make excuses for the Democrats' horrible candidate who couldn't win even though the entire establishment was behind her.

Re: Clinton Lost Because of Clinton

[Anonymous Coward]

Uh huh. Riiigghhhht.

Re:Clinton Lost Because of Clinton

[newdsfornerds]

Word.

Re: Clinton Lost Because of Clinton

[ScentCone]

So you disagree, but can't trouble yourself to explain why. Meaning, what ... you think that Russians buying a few tens of thousands of dollars of social media ads (compared to the tens of millions Hillary bought) cost her the election? Is that really what you think? Then say so.

Re:Clinton Lost Because of Clinton

[Anonymous Coward]

Having "the establishment" behind her is one of her big problems. Before the election, most people here saw the establishment as corrupt and in need of replacement. All of a sudden, people are rallying behind the establishment to remove the elected president.

You people went from being sceptical of the system, to being the useful idiots of it. This is mass programming at its finest.

Re: Clinton Lost Because of Clinton

[RedK]

The Russians actively prevented the Clinton campaign from going to Wisconssin.

Let's face it, the Clinton campaign was built around the message of "It's all about her and being a woman president". They had no message, didn't bother even bringing their no message to most of America, and basically acted like they were owed the presidency. They got rejected and now are doing what they accused Trump supporters of when Hillary tweeted this :

https://twitter.com/hillaryclinton/status/790612127996403712?lang=en

Are the Democrats a threat to democracy with their #Resist and #NotmyPresident BS ? Bunch of hypocrites.

Re: Clinton Lost Because of Clinton

[Anonymous Coward]

Oh StinkyDome, you don't realize something do you? It doesn't matter whether or not they succeeded in doing anything, or even what their intent was, the mere attempt is criminal in itself. An unlawful act by parties who surreptitiously concealed their identities, who acted in the interests of a foreign power, and you pretend that it's not important. Right. Sure. Whatever you say.

But go ahead, report back to your Russian masters that you've uselessly protested in their defense yet again, collect your shiny plastic ruble and your chocolate ration.

Re: Clinton Lost Because of Clinton

[Anonymous Coward]

Try a million+ dollars _a month_ in support money to push this misinformation campaign. Please read the WHOLE indictment document.

Re: Clinton Lost Because of Clinton

[Train0987]

Clinton spent much more than that for online trolls with David Brock's various orgs.

Re: Clinton Lost Because of Clinton

[Anonymous Coward]

Paid for fake russian dossier...

Re: Clinton Lost Because of Clinton

[ABEND]

The Russian based internet marketing company's budget was over $1 million per month. They weren't spending that on political advertising in the U.S. That was the budget for all their operations including those that had nothing to do with the U.S. election. The indictment doesn't specify who was paying the marketing company for media related to the U.S. election but it's likely that it was PACs looking for an inexpensive way to get their message out.

Re:Clinton Lost Because of Clinton

[Anonymous Coward]

Even 538, which is hilarious biased in favor of Clinton (they're one of the many sites that predicted her victory as a sure thing) says that there's no evidence Russian meddling had any effect on the election. At most they say Russia may have amplified flaws Clinton already had, but like I said, 538 is hilarious biased in her favor.

Re:Clinton Lost Because of Clinton

[Anonymous Coward]

The ads weren't designed to sway the election. They were designed to cause divisiveness and weaken future president H Clinton. Nobody dreamed Trump would win.

Re: Clinton Lost Because of Clinton

[Anonymous Coward]

Vinton lost because days prior to the actual election, Coney dropped a bomb that ended up being nothing. Except no one admitted it was nothing until after the votes were counted.

Comey's letter to Congress on Oct 28th most certainly cost Clinton votes and quite possibly the election.

Re: Clinton Lost Because of Clinton

[Train0987]

"Ended up being nothing"? Classified emails sent to her illegal server and then deleted suddenly showed up on the laptop of a pedophile? I wouldn't call that "nothing".

Re:Clinton Lost Because of Clinton

[hey!]

Here's the thing about 2016 -- it was a very close thing. Just 1/2 of 1% of the turnout in three states (Pennsylvania, Michigan, Wisconsin) would have flipped those states. That's 78,000 strategically based voters -- not even 1/10 of 1% of the total US votes cast -- and the Electoral College would have gone the other way.

The flaw in nearly every 2016 postmortem analysis I've seen is that they all look for the explanation. It's a situation tailor made for advancing pet theories: an idea that has any truth at all in it can quite plausibly be claimed to have flipped the results.

So you can't rule out Russian meddling by citing Clinton's (unquestioned) weaknesses as a candidate. They could *both* have been decisive.

Re: Clinton Lost Because of Clinton

[Anonymous Coward]

If you have information on a massive fraudulent social media operation supporting the Clinton campaign, I'm sure the FBI would like to know about it. But back in the real world, the only such campaign was being run by the Russians.

Re: Clinton Lost Because of Clinton

[Anonymous Coward]

The 'establishment??' She got more votes, she has 'we the people' behind her. Trump conspired with Russia, and whatever Fox news claims, its not OK for the President of the United States to conspire with a foreign power to attack the US elections.

However you want to spin it, he committed a major crime against the US. It makes little difference if you didn't like Clinton or Bush or any of the other candidates on all side his Russian friends attacked. Calling them 'the establishment' doesn't make it a thing.

Re: Clinton Lost Because of Clinton

[Anonymous Coward]

That's not quite what Nate Silver's article concluded. He said that it's much easier to quantify the effect of a discrete event like Comey's letter to Congress than continuous Russian meddling. He noted that the known spending by Russians to meddle in our election was quite a bit less than what was spent by the Trump and Clinton campaigns. And, as you noted, the Russian meddling used similar themes to how Trump was already attacking Hillary.

He's right about the difficulty in measuring the impact of Russian meddling. Regarding spending, it's an interesting observation, but doesn't quantify the effectiveness of the spending. For example, Hillary wasuch better funded than Trump, yet lost the election. One could easily conclude that Hillary's campaign didn't spend their money as effectively as Trump's campaign. The key point is the impact is difficult to measure because it's hard to separate it from other factors in the polls, whereas the Comey letter can be quantified based on how the polls shifted after it happened. But difficult to measure is not the same as something being negligible. That's the problem with your post, which doesn't really match up with the summary at the end of the article.

Re: Clinton Lost Because of Clinton

[Anonymous Coward]

I think you have Putin's wee cck up your loose little butthole.

Re: Clinton Lost Because of Clinton

[Anonymous Coward]

Oh StinkyDome, you don't realize something do you? It doesn't matter whether or not they succeeded in doing anything, or even what their intent was, the mere attempt is criminal in itself. An unlawful act by parties who surreptitiously concealed their identities,...

You mean just like Christopher Steele did?

Foreign entity who tried to influence an election without registering as a foreign agent nor reporting to the FEC how much he was paid?

I'm betting you don't have the balls to reply.

Re:Clinton Lost Because of Clinton

[Anonymous Coward]

You can't rule it out, but you can be sure that "a swift kick in the nuts" would have beaten Clinton and Trump, were it on the ballot. Yes, Russia MIGHT have been the straw that broke the camel's back, but Clinton is responsible for it being that close in the first place.

Re: Clinton Lost Because of Clinton

[ScentCone]

Who cares if their internal costs were a million dollars or a billions dollars a month? It's that much more hilarious if they ran a situation that inefficient and still spent most what they actually deployed in the real world AFTER the election, and what they spent during the entire election was an amount so small that Hillary's operation out-spent that amount every day. And, of course, only some portion of what they spent was aimed at her - they spent it on every front, in self-contradictory ads. Which you know. How about YOU read the whole indictment, including the part where they address the actual amount of money spent making things (hardly at all) visible to the public?

Re: Clinton Lost Because of Clinton

[Train0987]

https://www.washingtonpost.com...

https://www.politico.com/story...

Re: Clinton Lost Because of Clinton

[ScentCone]

Comey's letter to Congress on Oct 28th most certainly cost Clinton votes and quite possibly the election.

So, you're probably quite pleased that Trump fired him. Regardless, the ONLY reason that the FBI had to act again was because Clinton assured them that her staff had turned over every existing record, storage device, and copy of all such emails. Of course she'd already wiped tens of thousands of them off of her personal non-secure server, literally had mobile devices smashed with hammers after SIM cards were removed, etc. And then her staff - who had to negotiate immunity agreements before they'd even talk - promised the FBI had everything. Including Huma. Who, of course, it turns out had NOT done what she said. She had a huge trove of Clinton's mails, including more classified documents, on her personal laptop at home, shared with her reckless pedo husband.

But why did Comey tell congress about the re-opened investigation? Because some of the Clinton-supporting fans in the FBI had found those emails OVER A MONTH EARLIER and hadn't told him anything. When he finally became aware of the existence of all of that new evidence and the underlying false statements that it represents, his agency had been - for partisan reasons - sitting on that little fact for a month. He knew that if it came out later that his people had been trying to protect her for over a month before the election, he'd be rightly accused of trying to giver her political cover.

Of course you know all of this.

Re: Clinton Lost Because of Clinton

[magzteel]

Trump conspired with Russia, and whatever Fox news claims, its not OK for the President of the United States to conspire with a foreign power to attack the US elections.

This is the new McCarthyism

Re: Clinton Lost Because of Clinton

[Anonymous Coward]

I did read the indictment and they had an estimated budget of 1.2m a month in September and it is assumed it was the same amount other months. Now that is compared to Hillary's spend of roughly 66m a month, 53x what the troll factory had. Oh and please be sure to explain how that 1.2m was spread out over supporting Bernie and Jill as well. They were spending it on many things other than pro and anti Trump rallies.

Re:Clinton Lost Because of Clinton

[Anonymous Coward]

I believe Clinton also lost because the left. Are being a bunch cunts.

The side that's supposed to be for "all" and "compassion" etc are horribly indicting a lot of people every time they open their fucking mouths.

Yes, you are smart. Yes, you are probably "technically correct" about a bunch of things. However, you're being cuntbags, and as long as you continue to do so, you will lose a large percentage of the population, and the votes.

Instead of berating the man you see as a redneck, try to have a fucking dialogue, gain some understanding, and try to sway the man, or at least, show him you have understanding and compassion, and he might even let you lead him. I believe Daily Show, Colbert, Oliver, etc have done a lot more damage to the left (in terms of winning elections) than most imagine.

Re: Clinton Lost Because of Clinton

[Anonymous Coward]

" It doesn't matter whether or not they succeeded in doing anything, or even what their intent was, the mere attempt is criminal in itself. An unlawful act by parties who surreptitiously concealed their identities, who acted in the interests of a foreign power, and you pretend that it's not important. Right. Sure. Whatever you say."

The fucking rhetoric about these international issues is astounding! The USA has no right to punish anyone in the world for meddling in foreign affairs, There have been numerous times where America has meddled in the affairs of many other countries which range from overthrowing democratically elected individuals to helping warlords and drug kingpins. Every-time one of these stories comes up it always contains a bunch of people getting pissed for a foreign country meddling in their affairs but they conveniently forget to consider the imperialist moves by their own country.

Here is the only solution: EDUCATE YOUR CHILDREN PROPERLY! I get that it goes against your ideals of being able to control them by controlling the information that they have access to but it also allows for this to even be an issue. If people were taught to be independently critically thinking individuals who looked at multiple points of view and sources and then made a logical and rational analysis then the world would be a much better place. I get that would make it hard to sell people shit that they don't need or to keep them distracted long enough that they willingly give up their freedoms they so loudly covet.

Look, the world is a messy place but as long as we focus on the details instead of analyzing the larger picture, its not going to get any better. Either of your presidential candidates was nothing more than a distraction from the start, just put there so that the ruling class can continue to distance themselves from the plebes like the rest of us. It doesn't matter which side you root for because at the end of the day, they win and we lose. Education is the only answer, people are finally starting to understand that there is real value in information and data. There always has been, we were just too small minded to grasp such an ethereal concept and valued things we could physically control. Now we are in the age where people will try to physically control information and hopefully soon they will learn the truth, that one cannot control information, only create or destroy it.

Re: Clinton Lost Because of Clinton

[Anonymous Coward]

Yea because being against foreign interference is the same thing as not accepting fair election results. Good work skippy. I'm sure your life in flyover country is fun.

Re: Clinton Lost Because of Clinton

[Anonymous Coward]

What's even more bizarre is Clinton had a bunch of messages (aka web site and platform) - and simply failed to communicate that. Every time this was brought up people just said "it's on the web site!". Really, you expect the entire population to read this web site ? Hahahaha.

Even worse was her pick for VP. The VP debates sealed the deal on being a terrible person. And picking a VP like that can't say much for the candidate.

Re: Clinton Lost Because of Clinton

[Anonymous Coward]

Why do we care what emails Dennis Hastert and Mark Foley had on their laptops?

Re: Clinton Lost Because of Clinton

[Anonymous Coward]

"You only think it's rigged because you are losing."
- You, circa October 2016

Re: Clinton Lost Because of Clinton

[Anonymous Coward]

Whadaboutism, is what we'd call it.

Re: Clinton Lost Because of Clinton

[Anonymous Coward]

"Russia tricked people into voting for the wrong person."
- You

"Hillary won the popular vote!"
- Also You

Can't make this shit up! Lololol

Re: Clinton Lost Because of Clinton

[Green Mountain Bot]

The Russian based internet marketing company's budget was over $1 million per month. They weren't spending that on political advertising in the U.S. That was the budget for all their operations ...

Including paying trolls to flood social media with disinformation, and to amplify the advertising, and to amplify the divisions between US political factions. If you think advertising was/is the most important part of this operation, you haven't thought it through.

Re:Clinton Lost Because of Clinton

[iMadeGhostzilla]

Statistically speaking, this is true. But look at it psychologically: each one of those 78,000 people is not only a unique individual with their own hopes and dreams and sufferings, which ultimately determines their vote -- a vote is always a hope for a better future -- but also they were hard set on one candidate and not the other, Trump in this case. Very few if anyone were on the edge: almost certainly whoever voted for Trump hated Hillary and the other way round. So then consider having a population nearing that of a small town with people very much emotionally invested in their vote. It would take a hell lot to change their minds and there was simply no room for it.

A better statistic might be how many people would have needed to stay home in disgust for Hillary to win, I'm guessing close to double that. But likewise all has been done to at least keep the disgusted voters at home so it would have been difficult to have kept those who did cast their vote in a hope for a better future from not doing so.

Re:Clinton Lost Because of Clinton

[Green Mountain Bot]

Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence. From the conclusion of that article:

"The interference campaign could easily have had chronic, insidious effects that could be mistaken for background noise but which in the aggregate were enough to swing the election by 0.8 percentage points toward Trump — not a high hurdle to clear because 0.8 points isn’t much at all."

Re: Clinton Lost Because of Clinton

[Anonymous Coward]

False equivalence. The difference is Russia is not allowed to at all. Because Sovereignty. Are you truly that ignorant?

Re:Clinton Lost Because of Clinton

[hey!]

Yes, turnout is where the big swings happen in a country where about 40% of the electorate sit out each election; it's not always the same 40%.

Rural turnout was a big factor in 2016, and this speaks to the strengths and weaknesses of the candidates. Clinton, unlike her husband, wasn't good at projecting empathy to voters in rural districts ravaged by economic decline and the opioid crisis. Neither was Trump, but he was much better at projecting their *anger*.

This also shows why Russian meddling may have been quite effective. A lot of it is aimed at spreading disillusionment; it's primary anti-establishment. They favored Sanders in the Democratic primary.

Re: Clinton Lost Because of Clinton

[Anonymous Coward]

I do , it was called âoeCNNâ...

Re: Clinton Lost Because of Clinton

[Anonymous Coward]

How, exactly are #Resist and #NotMyPresident hashtags "against foreign influence? They are the equivalent of children throwing tantrums in the candy aisle at the store.

RedK is correct. Hypocrites. Every one of them, including yourself.

Re: Clinton Lost Because of Clinton

[Anonymous Coward]

How about not acting reflexively upon any mention of Russia, try that information.

Re:Clinton Lost Because of Clinton

[iMadeGhostzilla]

In a wider sense I agree with you, the race was razor thin and everything mattered, the whole world was really choosing Clinton or Trump, even foreigners posting their valid criticisms of one or the other on Facebook must have had an impact.

In some ways it was like the battle of Midway, the Japanese should have won but by some miracle the Americans did and that took history on a very different course.

Re:Clinton Lost Because of Clinton

[Holi]

Would it have been that close if 11 days prior to the election the FBI had not published that letter to Congress?

Re:Clinton Lost Because of Clinton

[hey!]

By the way I don't have any problem with Russians or anyone else weighing in on our election -- as long as they do it above board. If they can, as Russians, sway American opinions, more power to them. Pretending to be Americans, to the point of stealing American identities is a different matter.

Again let me reiterate, the goal of Russian efforts seem to have been to undermine Americans' faith in their own country. It's quite possible they had no *intent* of swaying the election, what they may have wanted to do is inflame opposition to a Clinton presidency. Russia has a complicated relationship to the west, because Russia is a country run by economic parasites. Those parasite need stable democratic countries as place to store the wealth they've looted from their own country. Russian oligarchs are behind the insane real estate prices in places like New York, London, Vancouver, and Miami.

Re: Clinton Lost Because of Clinton

[Anonymous Coward]

How about not acting reflexively upon any mention of Russia, try that information.

How about first dropping the "Russia! Russia! Russia! caused Hillary! to lose and Trump is not a valid President!" BULLSHIT first?

Re:Clinton Lost Because of Clinton

[Anonymous Coward]

Would it have been that close if 11 days prior to the election the FBI had not published that letter to Congress?

Would it have been that close if HIllary! hadn't set up that illegal server with classified data on it in the first place?

Quit blaming Comey for telling the truth about Hillary!.

Re: Clinton Lost Because of Clinton

[Anonymous Coward]

Pfft, Facts... You're still wrong because reasons.

Re:Clinton Lost Because of Clinton

[Anonymous Coward]

You mean the states that Clinton did not deem important to campaign in? Perhaps had she actually tried to run a competent campaign, that would have made a difference.

Re:Clinton Lost Because of Clinton

[iMadeGhostzilla]

I don't disagree. Russia is another nation, and if one nation can take advantage of another to better itself, it will. In fairness that's what Americans also do to Russians and elsewhere. The Russians probably expected Clinton to win like everyone else and were working to create chaos, not that we weren't capable of it on our own. But at the end of the day, Russia is still quite weak and is continuously looking for ways to survive, whereas the US is at the peak of its power. This is why I find the whole Russian thing more like finding an excuse and a scapegoat rather than serious reflection on how to do things better.

Re:Clinton Lost Because of Clinton

[HornWumpus]

You can't answer that question because you don't know the dirt that Hillary succeed in hiding.

I bet that keeping those emails on her private server was the right choice, given that she has skated so far.

Re:Clinton Lost Because of Clinton

[hey!]

As a numbers-oriented guy, it pains me to say this, but Clinton relied on the numbers *too* much.

All polls are adjusted by some kind of likely-voter model; all the "margin of error" figures you hear only take into account *random sampling* errors, not systematic ones. As useful as empirical numbers are, you have to keep in mind that they're only good as the assumptions under which they were collected.

This means that when Clinton got word of something happening that wasn't reflected in her internal polling, she should have taken it seriously rather than discounting it. It was incompetent, but in the opposite way that people are numerically incompetent. People usually trust their gut and discount hard data. But it's possible to trust hard data too much too.

Re: Clinton Lost Because of Clinton

[Anonymous Coward]

hardly the same thing you moron.

Re: Clinton Lost Because of Clinton

[HornWumpus]

It was called: 'Correct the Record'. They never denied it was them.

Re: Clinton Lost Because of Clinton

[Anonymous Coward]

Vinton lost because days prior to the actual election, Coney dropped a bomb that ended up being nothing. Except no one admitted it was nothing until after the votes were counted.

Comey's letter to Congress on Oct 28th most certainly cost Clinton votes and quite possibly the election.

Whaaaat? I thought the story today was "It was the Russians". Are we back to blaming Comey again?

Re: Clinton Lost Because of Clinton

[Anonymous Coward]

You mean just like Christopher Steele did?

Foreign entity who tried to influence an election without registering as a foreign agent nor reporting to the FEC how much he was paid?

Hey, if you believe that Christopher Steele committed any crime, you should see about reporting them to the appropriate authority.

Go ahead. Chuck Grassley and Lindsey Graham already did, so it'll be redundant, but here's the FBI's tip lines:

https://www.fbi.gov/tips

I'm betting you don't have the balls to reply.

You didn't bet anything, not even your own balls, so who the fuck cares? Not that you, StinkNose, have any balls, or you wouldn't be posting anonymously, or wasting all your efforts trolling for Mother Russia, but really, nobody gives a shit anyway.

Re:Clinton Lost Because of Clinton

[vell0cet]

Yes. Clinton was a terrible candidate and ran a terrible campaign. I think Trump is also a terrible candidate and terrible president (not to mention a terrible human being)

Here is the issue that concerns me the most... People on left are banking on collusion with Russia on helping Trump win. Maybe they did. But they're not paying attention to HOW they affected the election. They didn't directly influence the election by meddling with election protocols, systems, etc. They did it by affecting the electorate. There are people out there who believe stupid shit like Pizzagate. If Trump is found guilty and impeached (both of which are long shots), those people will feel disenfranchised because they were still taken in by Russian disinformation. Showing them that what they believed was Russian propoganda will just make dig their heels in harder (see backfire effect).

So what the Russians did was far more effective than simply hacking a voting system and changing votes. They changed voters' minds. And the democrats are busy chasing their hail mary and not addressing the fact that even if the pass is completed, they've still lost the game.

Re: Clinton Lost Because of Clinton

[Anonymous Coward]

The 'establishment??' She got more votes, she has 'we the people' behind her. Trump conspired with Russia, and whatever Fox news claims, its not OK for the President of the United States to conspire with a foreign power to attack the US elections.

However you want to spin it, he committed a major crime against the US. It makes little difference if you didn't like Clinton or Bush or any of the other candidates on all side his Russian friends attacked. Calling them 'the establishment' doesn't make it a thing.

Call out the medics, we have another victim of Trump Derangement Syndrome. Does anyone have a spare straight-jacket and some Thorazine?

Re: Clinton Lost Because of Clinton

[Anonymous Coward]

She lost because she was so corrupt. The real Russian scandal was the Uranium One bribes that Bubba (500K) and the Clinton Foundation (millions) took from the Ruskies.

Re: Clinton Lost Because of Clinton

[Train0987]

Denied? They were bragging about it for months.

Re:Clinton Lost Because of Clinton

[Anonymous Coward]

Bullshit.
0.8 percentage points in the 2016 Presidential election was more than 1 MILLION people. That's a lot. That's more than the population of 8 states.

There is no way in hell $200,000 in ad buys swayed 1 million voters when compared against $2,500,000,000 (that's $2.5 BILLION) in other spending by the campaigns. Plus something like $5-10 BILLION in media spending on "news" stories.

Re: Clinton Lost Because of Clinton

[Anonymous Coward]

The IRA's budget was around $1.25 million per month - for everything. The rent on their building, the electricity, the staff, the info-ops being performed in the Ukraine, the Brexit vote, the MH17 conspiracy theories... and also the US election.

Re: Clinton Lost Because of Clinton

[Anonymous Coward]

"If you have information on a massive fraudulent social media operation supporting the Clinton campaign, I'm sure the FBI would like to know about it. But back in the real world, the only such campaign was being run by the Russians."

Hey John,
      Listen, I know it was close, what with murdering Seth Rich and everyone learning about your love of pizza, but this Russia xenophobia is not the answer. Your own brother got caught up in it, when are you going to stop? Clinton just sucks, and still would have won if the electoral college didn't exist. Not a Russian problem, not a Russian solution.

P.S. STAY AWAY FROM CHILDREN, YOU SICK FUCK!

Re:Clinton Lost Because of Clinton

[Anonymous Coward]

There's reason I pointed out the bias of 538. Nate Silver is desperately looking for reasons why his model failed that aren't him. He deeply wants Russia to be "a thing" even as the data shows him it isn't.

Re: Clinton Lost Because of Clinton

[Anonymous Coward]

The fucking rhetoric about these international issues is astounding!

I'm long past being astounded by the efforts to which the apologists for corruption and malfeasance will go.

The USA has no right to punish anyone in the world for meddling in foreign affairs, There have been numerous times where America has meddled in the affairs of many other countries which range from overthrowing democratically elected individuals to helping warlords and drug kingpins.

Sorry dude, but you can't complain about those, then say the USA has no right to punish anyone.

Every-time one of these stories comes up it always contains a bunch of people getting pissed for a foreign country meddling in their affairs but they conveniently forget to consider the imperialist moves by their own country.

Yeah, just like you conveniently forget all the hand-wringing over the USA's imperialist moves, and the people getting pissed at them.

Why is that?

Here is the only solution: EDUCATE YOUR CHILDREN PROPERLY! I get that it goes against your ideals of being able to control them by controlling the information that they have access to but it also allows for this to even be an issue. If people were taught to be independently critically thinking individuals who looked at multiple points of view and sources and then made a logical and rational analysis then the world would be a much better place. I get that would make it hard to sell people shit that they don't need or to keep them distracted long enough that they willingly give up their freedoms they so loudly covet.

Blah-blah-blah, you just don't want to be held accountable for your own misdeeds, and so try to twist the issue into one about some alleged uneducated children. You'd sound less like an idiot yourself if you hadn't spent the previous paragraph trying to find an excuse to ignore unlawful and immoral behavior.

Look, the world is a messy place but as long as we focus on the details instead of analyzing the larger picture, its not going to get any better. Either of your presidential candidates was nothing more than a distraction from the start, just put there so that the ruling class can continue to distance themselves from the plebes like the rest of us. It doesn't matter which side you root for because at the end of the day, they win and we lose. Education is the only answer, people are finally starting to understand that there is real value in information and data. There always has been, we were just too small minded to grasp such an ethereal concept and valued things we could physically control. Now we are in the age where people will try to physically control information and hopefully soon they will learn the truth, that one cannot control information, only create or destroy it.

Actually, you can control information, that's the whole point of education, so you can't even stay consistent in these paragraphs either.

But hey, keep pretending you're not the fool here, shamelessly pretending to be above it all, while ignoring the reality of the problems you don't want to deal with since they're details.

Re:Clinton Lost Because of Clinton

[grcumb]

Even 538, which is hilarious biased in favor of Clinton (they're one of the many sites that predicted her victory as a sure thing) ...

They did not. All you've done here is demonstrate your inability to understand statistical models.

On the day before the election, Fivethirtyeight said there was a roughly 2:1 chance that Hillary would win. That does not mean she's going to get 2/3 of the vote every time. It means that two times out of three, when they run this scenario, Hillary wins. Equally, and just as importantly, The Donald wins one time out of three. If you don't think those are betting odds, then you should never place a bet.

And guess what? The one out of three scenario is the one that happened.

Re: Clinton Lost Because of Clinton

[Anonymous Coward]

Anything to fuck Billary azzwhole is justified. Russian ... Lithwanian ... OshKoshian ... Lubricitt $$$ . It's like bitch-slapping child molestors or progressive SJWs, but more fun.

Re:Clinton Lost Because of Clinton

[penandpaper]

That's 78,000 strategically based voters -- not even 1/10 of 1% of the total US votes cast -- and the Electoral College would have gone the other way. ...So you can't rule out Russian meddling by citing Clinton's (unquestioned) weaknesses as a candidate. They could *both* have been decisive.

Part of the issue is that knowing the strategically relevant districts before the election would be near impossible. Everyone thought Clinton would win. Everyone was basing their opinion on the matter on polls that had systemic problems in properly counting certain demographics. Russian meddling to effect those key strategic districts (only known after the election) and demographics is akin to a shotgun having the exact spread to draw a like A Sunday on La Grande Jatte. Again as you say, Clinton overly relying on those numbers and disregarding any warning signs because she was swept away in the hype surrounding her campaign.

The Russians could have swung a few votes I can accept but I don't think near enough in the strategic districts to swing the election. There were other more dramatic events that would have had much more impact than anything the Russians could do with fake American identities. Such as Comey. Such as not campaigning in those states. Such as having a lot of political baggage in the year of the Outsider (Sanders/Trump).

Re: Clinton Lost Because of Clinton

[Anonymous Coward]

It doesn't have to be either/or. Why do you Russians persist in seeing things in black and white?

Re:Clinton Lost Because of Clinton

[nonBORG]

Sorry you can rule it out, poorly targeted at the wrong time and just too small a budget.
When Rob Goldman says it had no effect, lets just say he is in a better position to know than you (or me.)
Problem is that the media want to claim that there is something there but as we know from Peter Strzok there is no big there there. (quote was for slightly different thing but still.)

Given the amount of meddling the US do in other peoples elections this is nothing and even bothering the Russians about it is a waste of time, they don't care, they wont care. We need to learn from them on that.

There are plenty of people who will painstakingly nit pick over the past and then there are those that get on with the present. Time for the media to wake up and get on with the present.

Last thing is so what, it can never be proven (even if you can accept it is not disproven) so all that can happen is hypothetical discussion to no end.

Re: Clinton Lost Because of Clinton

[Millennium]

Ooh, someone's getting all pants-wetting mad here.

Re: Clinton Lost Because of Clinton

[Anonymous Coward]

^^^ This ^^^

Re: Clinton Lost Because of Clinton

[Anonymous Coward]

You guys gotta stop dropping the Russian memes. It's getting way old. Not to mention it's especially dumb because after now we know who the Russians were really colluding with and it was Hillary Clinton not trump.

Re: Clinton Lost Because of Clinton

[Type44Q]

actively

Gotta love it when people are so quick to redefine simple words.

Re: Clinton Lost Because of Clinton

[Reverend Green]

If pants wetting is a problem for you, maybe you should try Depends?

Re: Clinton Lost Because of Clinton

[Anonymous Coward]

She only got the votes she did because of widespread election fraud. Fortunately her political commissars were over-confident, so they didn't rig as many voting machines as they really needed.

In a totally fair vote, Trump (or *anyone* who's not a Clinton or a Bush) would have beat Hillary by a landslide in the popular vote.

Re: Clinton Lost Because of Clinton

[Anonymous Coward]

what in the fuck kind of nonsense reply was that? you made no sense at all and just tried to deflect everything he said by turning it around onto him.. go back to sjw school.

Re: Clinton Lost Because of Clinton

[Millennium]

Pee-Wee Herman called. He wants his retort back.

Seriously, you need to clean up your game. I suggest a shower; I hear your God-Emperor can get you a golden one.

Re: Clinton Lost Because of Clinton

[Anonymous Coward]

Uhh...

Just because someone did something that cost someone an election doesn't mean you should be glad they were fired. They did something that had results you might not agree with, doesn't mean they should be fired.

It disappoints me you think that most people think firings should be done whenever someone does something that results in a political loss to that person. Absolute insanity.

He shouldn't have been fired for investigating Hilary Clinton, he should not have been fired for investigating Russia meddling in the election.

Re: Clinton Lost Because of Clinton

[Anonymous Coward]

Citation needed.

Re: Clinton Lost Because of Clinton

[Reverend Green]

Hillaryist trolls sure do have a lot of weird sexual fantasies about Emperor Trump.

Re: Clinton Lost Because of Clinton

[Millennium]

I was just talking about bathroom fixtures. The Guggenheim offered him a solid gold toilet, you know. I just figured he'd gotten interested in plumbing or something -reasonable enough hobby to have- and you know Trump and his love for decorative accents in 24 karats. Seemed a perfect match to me.

Why all this fuss? What, does a golden shower mean something else?

Re: Clinton Lost Because of Clinton

[Reverend Green]

Hillaryist trolls sure do have a lot of weird, repressedly-sexual fantasies about Emperor Trump's bathroom equipment.

Re: Clinton Lost Because of Clinton

[Millennium]

Man, can't a guy talk about home furnishings anymore without it getting all political? Who pissed on your parade today?

Re:Clinton Lost Because of Clinton

[Anonymous Coward]

Very well then dick sucking shit eating nazi sodomite.
Go to hell. Go straight to hell. Do not pass Go. Do not receive 200 ass poundings.

Thanks for ruining the country and giving it to all those child molesting satanites, er republikans.

Re: Clinton Lost Because of Clinton

[ABEND]

When you write "you haven't thought it through," you just underscore how little you've thought it through. Start with basic facts. The indictment is for fraud, identity theft, and working as an unregistered alien.

Flooding social media with "disinformation" is not a crime. It's not even a crime to use network news to spread propaganda. If these were crimes, you might be forced to read the facts and formulate your own opinion instead of parroting whatever "the box" tells you.

Something to bear in mind

[Anonymous Coward]

The special counsel has far more information about what happened [than] I do

This in a generalized form is something a lot of slashdotters need to accept before they post.

Re:Something to bear in mind

[Train0987]

From the indictments:

"In or around late June 2016, Defendants and their co-conspirators used the Facebook group "United Muslims of America" to promote a rally called "Support Hillary. Save American Muslims".

"Defendants and their co-conspirators, through another organization-controlled group, organized a rally in New York called
"Trump is NOT my President" held on or about November 12, 2016. Similarly, Defendants and their co-conspirators organized a rally entitled "Charlotte Against Trump" in Charlotte, North Carolina..."

They were trying to help Trump by supporting Progessive causes? Face it, they were just trying to create confusion and unrest - a trap you have fallen right into.

Re:Something to bear in mind

[ScentCone]

The left has this entire narrative either muddled and wrong, or sometimes precisely backwards. And they're hanging onto their inverted interpretation of reality because they simply cannot accept what a horrible choice they made in a candidate, and how their general take on things has cost them a thousand legislative seats, most of the governorships, both houses of congress, the White House, and indirectly the Supreme Court. To say nothing of the millions of two-time Obama voters they ran off with their unhinged vitriol. Pointing out that their self-perception as the smartest people in the room is in danger because they've turned out to be not only total suckers for the Clinton Machine's manipulations but also shown themselves willing to be led around by the nose by Russian trolls is so painful that all they can do is sputter about how much a racist you probably are for pointing it out.

Re:Something to bear in mind

[Anonymous Coward]

They did this during an election. If it's not obvious to you why they would do this during an election, then you're a moron. It's you that fell into their trap, along with the majority of the voters in the U.S.

Re:Something to bear in mind

[Train0987]

They're too stupid to realize that THEY are the Russian's useful idiots in all of this.

Re:Something to bear in mind

[Train0987]

You're just using this as a crutch and the DNC Machine is happy for you too since you aren't holding them accountable for losing the most winnable election in a century. All rival countries have been doing this stuff for a long time, it didn't sway anything.

Re:Something to bear in mind

[Anonymous Coward]

How about posting your response to a relevant post? The parent's post has nothing to do with your nonsense, you're just hijacking it, just like the Russians.

Re: Something to bear in mind

[Anonymous Coward]

They did most of this AFTER the election. Maybe it's time for you to consider facts before you insult people.

Re:Something to bear in mind

[sycodon]

It's obvious that a fucking AC isn't worth listening to unless he has the Balls to at least put even a Fake name to his comments so we can recognize an asshole when we see him.

As far as we know, you are just another Russian. How ironic.

Re:Something to bear in mind

[Hal_Porter]

Also "Trump is not my President" is fake news. Well it is if you're American, I'm not, so it's true when I say it.

Mind you it reminds me of a line from an Ozzy Osbourne song

It's been confirmed that Ozzy Osbourne is not the Antichrist. We reached the Devil at his home in Las Vegas. When asked for a comment, Satan said, "No, he's not my boy. But I love him like a son!"

http://www.dailymotion.com/vid... 3m in

And now we find that "Trump is not my President" is something the Russians were pushing. Because their goal is to delegitimize the US political institutions. Also from Dugin's Foundations of Geopolitics

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...

Russia should use its special services within the borders of the United States to fuel instability and separatism, for instance, provoke "Afro-American racists". Russia should "introduce geopolitical disorder into internal American activity, encouraging all kinds of separatism and ethnic, social and racial conflicts, actively supporting all dissident movements - extremist, racist, and sectarian groups, thus destabilizing internal political processes in the U.S. It would also make sense simultaneously to support isolationist tendencies in American politics."

African American racists = BLM. Secessionist movements are like the one in California. The left have been the ones encouraging "ethnic, social and racial conflicts". And having Richard Spencer on the news all the time is supporting "extremist, racist, and sectarian groups" too. If the media ignored him he's be in a room with half a dozen people LARPing. The media have built him up as a boogeyman who has seems to have much more influence than he really does.

White Nationalist events struggle to fill a meeting room in a hotel and even then most of the people there are journalists and FBI agents. The Right Stuff organized an event in New York and ten people turned up. I could get more than that by just saying 'Anyone fancy a pint?' on social media.

President Trump said it best when he said

https://www.whitehouse.gov/bri...

President Trump says, "it is more important than ever before to come together as Americans. We cannot allow those seeking to sow confusion, discord, and rancor to be successful. It's time we stop the outlandish partisan attacks, wild and false allegations, and far-fetched theories, which only serve to further the agendas of bad actors, like Russia, and do nothing to protect the principles of our institutions. We must unite as Americans to protect the integrity of our democracy and our elections."

Quite right too. Americans need to reject false, Russian planted narratives that try to divide them based on race and ethnicity and ignore irrelevant fringe loonies like Spencer. And all come together and unite around America's institutions like the Presidency.

Trump will be out of office in two terms. It's not that long to wait.

Re:Something to bear in mind

[Anonymous Coward]

LOL, SlinkNose complains about unhinged vitriol. That's hilarious. You're even less believable than the demented loon in the White House who spent all weekend tweeting nonsense because he couldn't afford to be seen golfing after the AR-15 he personally handed to Nikolas Cruz was used in a school shooting.

Re:Something to bear in mind

[ScentCone]

Hey, look! The coward automatically loses the non-debate he's engaged in by once again stamping his little feet and dishing out lazy ad hominem without even once addressing the subject matter. Such a cute little fanboy you are.

Re:Something to bear in mind

[Anonymous Coward]

And you seem to fail to realize you're just a different type of useful idiot.

Re:Something to bear in mind

[fredrated]

Two terms? My God, I hope you are wrong. Neither America nor the world can take two terms of this narcissistic sociopathic moron.

Re:Something to bear in mind

[Anonymous Coward]

President Trump says, "it is more important than ever before to come together as Americans. We cannot allow those seeking to sow confusion, discord, and rancor to be successful. It's time we stop the outlandish partisan attacks, wild and false allegations, and far-fetched theories, which only serve to further the agendas of bad actors, like Russia, and do nothing to protect the principles of our institutions. We must unite as Americans to protect the integrity of our democracy and our elections."

Trump says this? All of this? What incredible hypocrisy. He directly contradicts this nearly every time he opens his mouth. They're fine sentiments, but sometimes leadership should actually come from those who lead.

Re: Something to bear in mind

[Anonymous Coward]

It's going to happen. Your team pushed the insane leftist shit so far that we're forced to vote for Trump. The alternative is open borders, attacks on police, attacks on Israel, FISA abuse, NSA abuse, FBI abuse, and (literally) prison terms for anyone who misgenders a trans person.

We voted Trump to stop this, and we're going to do it again, because you haven't diverged from this suicidal path.

Re:Something to bear in mind

[greythax]

I think what they underestimated was the fact that the right will vote for anything that screams guns and abortion. Lets take a quick look at the things that we knew about your fantastic candidate at the time he was elected.

Never served in any form of governmental position.
Dodged the draft. No military history.
Long history of indictments and out of court settlements over corruption charges.
Known public association with mobsters.
So many bankruptcies that it was widely known he could not get a line of credit from U.S. banks.
Bragged on tv about selling a property to a "very nice" russian oligarch for 60 million profit. By the way, that house was never even seen by the oligarch in question and was later torn down.
Bragged about meetings with the "very top" of the russian administration on his trip to russia for the mrs. universe contest.
Had a fake university.
Gave press conferences surrounded by his friggin steaks.
Was caught on tape admitting to attempted affair, and bragged about pussygrabbing.

Can you blame us for assuming that the only reason to elect the least presidential human on earth, who's literal only public agenda was screaming "MAGA" and "Build the Wall!', was basically racist backlash to 8 years of a black president?

Re:Something to bear in mind

[Quantum gravity]

Russia was interfering in the US election for several reasons, and it is doing so in many European countries too. Here are some reasons.
1. Fuel discontent
2. Putin doesn't like the Clintons. Bill supported Yeltsin. Putin blames Hillary for starting protests against him 2011 and 2012.
3. To get Trump elected

Re:Something to bear in mind

[Anonymous Coward]

You're right, these tax cuts are killing me!

Re:Something to bear in mind

[Anonymous Coward]

And you were doing so well right up to the end.

Yes, it was a close election and a lot of people legitimately like the guy and voted for him. I don't know why, he's a clusterfuck of a president. But he IS president. Frankly though, he'll be lucky to get all the way through a single term. I'm pretty sure those fuckers are only going to hold something against him when it's convenient for them. Meaning right before the next election, so he'll simply lose and they won't actually have to convict.

Trump really can say the right thing.... when he stays on script.

Re:Something to bear in mind

[HornWumpus]

Ds pivot left...two terms for Trump.

It's all setup, but the Ds don't have to be dumb as rocks, despite the long tradition.

One big problem is Hillary sucked all the oxygen from the Ds ecosystem for so long there are no viable candidates. If the Biden from the Onion was running he'd be their best choice, but he's a fictional character.

Re:Something to bear in mind

[Anonymous Coward]

Modded insightful. Oi. Did you read the post you replied to? You are the part of the problem.

Re:Something to bear in mind

[Anonymous Coward]

Oh no, SkankyGoats thinks because he whines about being insulted because his predilection for unhinged vitriol makes him utterly uncredible when complaining about it that people don't know he's a complete and utter stooge with a tendency towards raving lunacy.

It only takes one post to see you go off the hinges. You're more demented than the fool who personally throttled six Mexicans when his tee time was cancelled after Hurricane Juan flooded the greens.

Re:Something to bear in mind

[Anonymous Coward]

Wow you could've just said you're so angry at how ineffective your Trump is that you live to sling laughably debunked vitriol at anyone left of Hitler. The rest of us all know you're an overemotional child that can't stand objectively true reality, where your president can only win an election via foreign nationals that have already admitted guilt. At least you have your fake news to succor to while the adults clean up the mess you've made :)

Re:Something to bear in mind

[Anonymous Coward]

I think we're all too stupid to realize and agree that ALL OF US are the Russian's useful idiots.

Re:Something to bear in mind

[Anonymous Coward]

You do realize we're laughing at YOU for your weak projection right? :)

Also don't forget that Trump has been accused of raping little children over twenty times, and personally admitted to being a great friend of Jeffry Epstein, and has admitted to spending "lots of time with some very, very young girls" on his Lolita Express. Even TRUMP admits this, so it's not like you can angrily shout "FAKE NEWS" and it goes away. Now hush while the adults clean up this mess you've created.

Re:Something to bear in mind

[Hal_Porter]

https://www.reddit.com/r/The_D...

Re:Something to bear in mind

[Anonymous Coward]

According to Qanon, there is a sex tape of Trump raping a 5 year old girl, and it's been authenticized. Once that gets released, it's predicted he'll be out of office within three months, and it's supposed to be released sometime next month.

So if you believe anonymous sources on 4chan (like most of the gullible folk on /. do), Trump is going down in July.

Re:Something to bear in mind

[ScentCone]

Yes indeed, a cute little fanboy, desperate for interaction. I especially like the way you use "we."

Re:Something to bear in mind

[Hal_Porter]

The interesting thing about Deep Fakes is that even if you had some horrific shit on video involving famous, people are going to argue that it's not real.

Re:Something to bear in mind

[Anonymous Coward]

Who was it who called for Russia to hack into the DNC servers to retrieve the 'missing' emails? The name escapes me.

Re: Something to bear in mind

[Anonymous Coward]

Have you stopped raping your neighbor's goats yet?

Re:Something to bear in mind

[aquacrayfish]

And all come together and unite around America's institutions like the Presidency.

Okay, let's make a deal - our President stops attack our institutions (press, federal law enforcement, courts, etc.) and we'll make a serious effort to back the institution of the Presidency.

Rightfully So...

[SwashbucklingCowboy]

He should have known better than to wade into a political debate. My guess is that he did know better, but wanted to curry favor with the Trump administration.

Re:Rightfully So...

[RedK]

Or you know, man wanted to tell the truth about get the facts out, and now he's being criticized because the truth doesn't align with the agenda one side wants to push.

People are being used as pawns and acting like tools, not even realising how they are being manipulated.

Re:Rightfully So...

[Anonymous Coward]

People are being used as pawns and acting like tools, not even realising how they are being manipulated.

Your post is the definition of irony

Re:Rightfully So...

[Anonymous Coward]

Trust OUR expert, not THEIR expert!

Re:Rightfully So...

[ScentCone]

How is telling the truth about when and how an insignificant number of Russian-bought pot-stirring social media ads were purchased "currying favor?"

If he'd remained silent and allowed the left to continue to mischaracterize the situation, THAT would have been an example of currying favor - with the politically liberal monoculture that runs his entire industry.

Re:Rightfully So...

[RedK]

Your post is the definition of irony

If you think so, you're truly living in the post-fact world. The indictment and Rosenstein were clear. The data on the ads was clear. The post by the Facebook VP was clear. Unless you're implying he was lying and that the data is forged.

You are a Russian pawn at this point if you keep pushing for division and hate towards a dully elected President.

Re: Rightfully So...

[Anonymous Coward]

Yes. Let's burn him at the stake for stating facts that are not in line with the liberal agenda. Let this be a lesson to every other potential traitor.

Re:Rightfully So...

[Anonymous Coward]

Maybe we're talking about different presidents, but Trump ISN'T dull.

Re:Rightfully So...

[AmiMoJo]

So those Russian guys... Indited for interfering with the US election... In a public statement from Mueller's office... Fake news?

Re:Rightfully So...

[RedK]

So those Russian guys... Indited for interfering with the US election... In a public statement from Mueller's office... Fake news?

I suggest you actually read my post, and then read the indictment, and understand what is actually going on before attempting to push the "Russia!" narrative some more. These 13 guys were indicted over the data we were shown by Congress (Facebook Ads and tweets) and were already known information. The indictment isn't even about the Ads and tweets, so much as about the money transfers and identity theft that occurred behind them.

Re:Rightfully So...

[Train0987]

You are fake news and the Russian pawn they are so desperately seeking out. The public statement from Mueller's office was clear that no American knowingly colluded with them, their activities crossed the entire political spectrum and it had no effect on the outcome of the election.

Re:Rightfully So...

[Anonymous Coward]

You make it seem like this is a left right thing when it should be a national security issue. We get it, you hate Hillary, but how would you react if the reverse happened? What if Hillary won and there was evidence a foreign power was involved? I'd bet you would want heads to roll.

Re: Rightfully So...

[Anonymous Coward]

You mean the Chinese government, who've been bankrolling the Clintons since Bill was President?

Re:Rightfully So...

[Anonymous Coward]

You are fake news and the Russian pawn they are so desperately seeking out. The public statement from Mueller's office was clear that no American knowingly colluded with them, their activities crossed the entire political spectrum and it had no effect on the outcome of the election.

How an a PERSON be fake news? Christ you guys are so fucking dumb and getting dumber every minute.

Fake news is Pizza Pedophile rings. A person can't be news. Fake news is a newsworthy event that didn't happen. A person cannot be a "newsworthy event".

New political consultants

[Anonymous Coward]

If a million dollars worth of Russian FB ads was able to beat HRC's 1.2 billion warchest, then every single political consultant needs to be fired and only Russian trolls should be hired at 1/1000th the cost.

Re:New political consultants

[Straif]

The million dollars was the monthly operating cost of the troll farm. The US wasn't even their main target for most of their work. From Facebook and other sources the actual money spend on ads was between 45k and 100k in total. Compare that to about 81 million spent by Trump/Hillary on their online ads.

And just to add insult to injury, most of that was spent after the election and the pre-election ads were run in the wrong places. DC and other completely Dem enclaves got the most attention (places the ads made less than 0 difference) while actual battleground areas just got a couple thousand in ads. Even their most successful rally (since most others only had single digit turnouts) was actually an anti-Trump rally after the election which had all the usual suspects in attendance (with Michael Moore front and center).

It doesn't appear this trolling ever had anything to do with the election, just try to stir stuff up so they picked the easiest places to get people to make a fuss.

Re:New political consultants

[Anonymous Coward]

So if the US wasn't their main target then who was? Also, please list your sources, I would love to know where you get this information. Speaking of Michael Moore didn't he predict Trump would win 6 months before the election?

Re:New political consultants

[Straif]

Google is your friend.
Not my original source just the 3rd result when searching for "Russian troll farm funding". A very informative article on the Troll farm including interviews with people who worked there. This was an up to 400 person operation with just 13 people indicted on poking their noses into the US election.

Essentially it was just a pro-Putin organization that like to stick their noses into everything but as the article notes:

Most of the operation focused on the separatist insurgency in eastern Ukraine and Western sanctions against Russia, not political races in the West

Discord

[randomErr]

The real goal or the Russian ads were not to sway the election. Either way the Russians were going to win. Hillary with the Uranium One deals and Trump with general of the cuff remarks. The ads were about discord. They wanted the Americans to be so angry and distracted so that Putin could get a strong foot hold with Iran and smaller former Russian state nations.

Re:Discord

[Anonymous Coward]

Which "discord"?

I don't know what these "divisive" ads were about, but if they explained that the "democratic party" and CIA were fabricating evidence in order to promote US hate campaign against Russia, then these ads were actually doing you a favour - otherwise you will soon start to believe also in elves and goblins.

Being criticized for being factually correct...

[Anonymous Coward]

Considering he's right but is being demonized for not supporting the holy-Narrative it's not surprising.

Incidentally, guess who "colluded" with the Russians? That pro-Trump Nazi Michael Moore!

Since the "new" narrative is that "unwittingly" being duped by the Russians is LITERAL TREASON according to Mueller, then Michael Moore must have committed LITERAL TREASON. Except that for some reason I'm pretty sure the same standards applied to Trump will mysteriously not be applied to somebody who drinks the koolaid and spouts the narrative. After all, only a racist Nazi believes hate-think like having a rule of law that is applied equally to all people.

Re:Being criticized for being factually correct...

[Anonymous Coward]

Since Slashdot is stuck in the 1990s (you know, when CLINTON was president!) here's the link: https://www.dailywire.com/news/23037/thousands-including-michael-moore-duped-attending-emily-zanotti#

The Russians Didn't Care Who Won

[newdsfornerds]

They didn't want Trump. They didn't want Clinton. They wanted discord and wow did they ever get it.

Re:The Russians Didn't Care Who Won

[Luckyo]

Sometimes I wonder about the chicken and the egg. Was it progressivism's pathology that came first, or was it actors interested in sowing internal discord in US that actively promote it, such as Russia and Qatar that started it? At least with Russia, it increasingly seems that their expertise lies with exploiting already existing weaknesses, not creating entirely new ones (see - geopolitics of Russia).

One does not need to look beyond Al Jazeera, and especially it's "plus" offering to see everything that is being talked about in the indictment, only taken far, FAR further. And that one has a much wider reach, and enjoys a protected status in politics due to "must not offend muslims" pathology among the same people that are driving the hysteria. Russia doesn't have the same protected status in the eyes of the same people, being predominantly white and Christian. Not to even mention socially conservative, like most states that have significant roots in Asia.

Re:The Russians Didn't Care Who Won

[ScentCone]

They didn't want Trump. They didn't want Clinton. They wanted discord and wow did they ever get it.

More importantly, they were sure (just like the Democrats, all of the media, most of the pollsters, and pretty much every foreign government) that Clinton was going to win. Their modest pot-stirring prior to the election was simply meant to chip away at any wider national support behind her when she took office, making it harder for the US to act cohesively against Russian shenanigans elsewhere in the world. When she lost, the troll operation simply realigned itself towards trying to stir up liberal haters against the incoming Trump administration.

Re:The Russians Didn't Care Who Won

[taskiss]

They didn't get it, we gave it to them.

Re:The Russians Didn't Care Who Won

[Anonymous Coward]

They didn't want to be the target of US promoted hate campaign. And they still don't.

Re:The Russians Didn't Care Who Won

[RedK]

Sometimes I wonder about the chicken and the egg. Was it progressivism's pathology that came first, or was it actors interested in sowing internal discord in US that actively promote it, such as Russia and Qatar that started it? At least with Russia, it increasingly seems that their expertise lies with exploiting already existing weaknesses, not creating entirely new ones (see - geopolitics of Russia).

Yuri Bezmenov. Was he a crazy old man after all ?

Re:The Russians Didn't Care Who Won

[Anonymous Coward]

I like this analysis.

Re:The Russians Didn't Care Who Won

[Anonymous Coward]

I think that if the Democrats keep pushing the issue, that will end up getting Trump elected twice.

Re:The Russians Didn't Care Who Won

[Anonymous Coward]

Ever considered the fact that the Russians simply don't give a shit about you and that the idea of this Russian boogeyman was sold to you by your biased and lying media (e.g., Washington Post and NY Times) to cover up the fact that they, the media, were in large part responsible for the American people rejecting Hillary Clinton in an act of protest against the status quo of corrupt American politics?

No? Putin the Hackerman "meddled in" and "hacked" the election in favor of Trump sounds more believable to you? Americans are stupid as fuck.

Re:The Russians Didn't Care Who Won

[houghi]

I also believe that many people did not vote for Trump, but against established politics. I have seen it in several countries. In Belgium they are called "Protest votes" and can stirr up a storm. Most of the time, due to the multi party system, they will get a few seats in goivernement and will trow a tantrum.

It is a way for other parties to realize something is wrong and adapt their policies. Not as extreme as the protest party wants, but enough to make a difference. The most famous party recently would be the Pirate Party.

Obviously success differs form time to time. Some grow into a serious party, like the green parties in Germany, others will disapear.

You could see it as a sort of political valve. As there was nowhere to let steam go in the minds of enough, they voted knowing they indirectly voted for Trump. So who else should they have voted for?

Re:The Russians Didn't Care Who Won

[Luckyo]

He had a clear cut motivation to overstate the problem. And history showed that in many cases, he clearly did.

Re:The Russians Didn't Care Who Won

[Anonymous Coward]

Of course you are right, why would the Russians want Trump when he said he was going to get rid of the sanctions when elected?

Re:Summary is incorrect, again

[plague911]

You are incorrect. That is not what the indictment said at all. Are you illiterate or intentionally misrepresenting the situation? Sadly both are believable for you Trumpers.

https://www.motherjones.com/po...

https://www.cnbc.com/2018/02/1...

"Some defendants, posing as U.S. persons and without revealing their Russian association, communicated with unwitting individuals associated with the Trump Campaign and with other political activists to seek to coordinate political activities."

being too stupid to know you are being used, does NOT mean that you were not involved it just means you are stupid AND a participant.

Re:Summary is incorrect, again

[RedK]

So when someone goes up to you and asks you for something and you say "No", you're being used ?

Really stretching that narrative, careful it doesn't break.

Memes tell the truth

[Tsolias]

"The Goyim Know; Shut It Down"

Re:Summary is incorrect, again

[Train0987]

Mother Jones? Why not just read the indictment itself? It says EXACTLY what I said it does: https://www.justice.gov/file/1...

Re:Summary is incorrect, again

[Train0987]

"Unwitting". What does that word mean to you?

Russians won't go to trial

[Kohath]

I predict the case about the Russians won't go to trial. It's an easy prediction because 97% of Federal charges are plea bargained.

They weren't even charged with "meddling" in the US Election(52 U.S.C. 30121), they were charged with conspiracy to defraud the US (18 U.S.C. 371) and some paperwork fraud. The feds will be eager to avoid a trial on the conspiracy to defraud charge because its weak. The defendants will plead to the paperwork stuff because that's easy to prove.

Facebook likes to pretend to do the right thing while always seeming to find a bunch of new wrong things to do instead. No doubt the next election will have similar ads with funding sources disguised enough to provide Facebook with deniability. The press won't care unless their candidate loses again.

Re:Russians won't go to trial

[Anonymous Coward]

The Russians won't go to trial because they won't be extradited.

But carry on...

Re:Russians won't go to trial

[Anonymous Coward]

The defendants won't "plead" to anything. I'll be very surprised if any one of them ever sets foot on American soil.

That's why the indictment is so detailed: Mueller knows they'll never come to trial, so this is the only public record there will ever be. He's set out as much evidence as he can, so we can all see it and have our own chance to understand what went on.

Re:Russians won't go to trial

[Anonymous Coward]

What about Donna Brasile and Debbie Wasserman Schultz colluding with Killary to fix the Democrat primary?
How about 30K emails deleted? Mishandling classified materials (illegal regardless of intent)? Lying to the FBI?

Any chance of an indictment there?
If you had even a shred of intellectual integrity, you'd admit just how stacked this entire "investigation" is.

There's your problem

[Anonymous Coward]

... been designed to "divide America" ...

Well, there's your problem, or rather, Russia's problem: The USA is already highly fractured in political terms, any effort creating divisiveness is unnecessary and wasted.

... meddling in the election via social media and other means.

There's meddling and there's causing Clinton to lose the election: The current excuse for a billion dollars of propaganda failing to buy the presidency. There's evidence the Russians didn't cause the later. No, her "sit on my arse and not piss-off any rich people" behaviour lost her the election. Winning the super-delegates and the Tv ratings couldn't compensate for that behaviour.

Yes, there was Russian Collusion

[Orne]

First, sorry for this guy getting smacked for going off message. He should have known that Facebook Ad campaigns are serious money makers for FB and Twitter, and the business of "selling influence for cash" is what keeps social media alive. If we admit that a single Russian company of maybe 90 employees can sway a US election, well, then EVERYONE will want to buy more FB ad campaigns so THEY can sway the next election.

Second, it's about time that we admit that the Democrafts colluded with the Russians to sway the election against Trump. It was the DNC that paid Perkins Coie, as a shell company to pay Fusion GPS (ex-CIA opposition researchers), who contracted Christopher Steele and Nellie Ohr to complete the "dossier". Nellie Ohr (member of the CIA Open Source Group) worked with Christopher Steele (ex-MI6 Orbis Ltd) to procure information from Russian diplomats to form the "dossier", then fed that information back through her husband Brian Ohr (DOJ) to the FBI. It was the FBI that used the "dossier" to open the FISA 702 Title 1 on Carter Page (former FBI informant against Russia Gazprom), and it was the Clinton-allied team in the FBI that spied on the Trump campaign headquarters. and we're only beginning to find out now how they used that information. That is the group that used Russian mis-information to try to sway the election, broke dozens of laws, and frankly should be in jail already.

Re:Yes, there was Russian Collusion

[Anonymous Coward]

It's funny because it's true.

Re:Yes, there was Russian Collusion

[Anonymous Coward]

Last president to spy on the opposing campaign in such manner was Nixon, and he stepped down because of it.

Re:Contradicted the indictment ?

[Anonymous Coward]

Well that just means Russians kidnapped Americans and threw them into time machines so they would vote for LE ORANGE HITLER instead of being WITH HER. :(

Re:Summary is incorrect, again

[Hal_Porter]

"Some defendants, posing as U.S. persons and without revealing their Russian association, communicated with unwitting individuals associated with the Trump Campaign and with other political activists to seek to coordinate political activities."

So the Russians didn't tell the 'unwitting individuals' they were Russians. That's not collusion. Collusion would require the Trump Campaign staffers knew they were dealing with Russians. The indictment makes it clear they did not,

This is bleeping ridiculous

[jbmartin6]

First, his statement was correct that many of the ads were bought AFTER the election. Simple logic suggests they were not aimed at affecting the election in those cases. Second, his statement does not contradict the indictment, which note multiple goals for the Russian actors, one of which was simply "sowing discord".


How long until everyone learns to ignore the Internet ignoramus mob?

Re:This is bleeping ridiculous

[Anonymous Coward]

"multiple goals for the Russian actors" - and all these "multiple goals" for a fistful of dollars...

Aren't you embarassed by your constant lying?

A whole lot of nothing

[Virtucon]

This whole "Russian Interference" paranoia is nothing new. The platforms have changed from Radio Free Europe/Voice of America to NGOs and Social Media. They do it to us, we do it to them and it's extremely cheap to do it because of social media. Take out an ad, program a few bots.. you have a disinformation campaign. The fact that this was overblown into the need for a special prosecutor is that we have a government run by idiots who were raised by TV programs and not by parents. Our new so-called leaders are caught up in endless tirades looking for anything that'll get them that 2 minute soundbite on the news but screw that, there's social media which greatly democratizes anyone's opinion no matter how ridiculous it is. Shit, 90% or more of what news puts out there is now social media generated or comes from so called journalists. Hey podcaster, blogger out there. Journalism, real journalism requires that you investigate, question and then publish not publish and hope it sticks.

Yes, I'm an older American and the way our political system, our FBI, our DOJ, Congress, the WH and especially traditional media, all of it has been thoroughly adolescent and they all need to grow the fuck up. Our peaceful transition of government has now been forever affected because regardless of what party wins or who gets to sit in the WH, the other side will resort to crybaby, seditious tactics to get their way. Instead of being constructive and working on finding common ground we're all about lunatic has-been comedians holding up beheaded effigies for shock value.

You are correct

[Anonymous Coward]

1. Failed to register as foreign agent
2. Attempted to affect a US election
3. Failed to report to the FEC who paid them to influence the US election

That is why the Russians were indicted, also shows how corrupt Muller is... Because...

Chris Steele did all of the above to a MUCH greater degree. Muller is pointing out $1.2 million total in multiple countries, about $3000 total per swing state in FB ads. Steele dossier was about $13 million, paid by a campaign that failed to report to the FEC, and used a law firm to attempt to hide what they were doing, showing intention to break FEC laws.

Worse is Muller's buddy Comey ALSO paid Steele and failed to report it to the FEC, then used what he called "unverified" information in a FISA court where under oath he testified it was factual.

If Muller were truly interested in looking for Russia Collusion, he has a long list of targets, some of which I have heard audio recordings of them colluding.
State Dept
DOJ
FBI
Comey
Adam Schiff (D) Senate
Mark Warner (D) Senate
Hillary Clinton
Chris Steele

It appears just about everyone in DC other than Trump was colluding with Russia, but Muller is refusing to look at anyone else other than Trump. He is a disgrace.

Re:You are correct

[Anonymous Coward]

It appears just about everyone in DC other than Trump was colluding with Russia, but Muller is refusing to look at anyone else other than Trump. He is a disgrace.

Who? Trump or Muller?

Re:You are correct

[Anonymous Coward]

Why not both?

Done with FB

[DogDude]

Our company has decided not to advertise on Facebook any more. It's not an organization that we want to give money to.

Re:Done with FB

[Anonymous Coward]

"Our company" or "I". You have repeatedly displayed yourself as a sole-proprietor small business owner whenever it gets you rhetorical leverage. So what is it, are you representing a company or just yourself through your control of a company?

I'd bet my company you have never paid for advertisements on facebook and you are lying, again.

Re:Done with FB

[Anonymous Coward]

cool story bro

Re:Done with FB

[Anonymous Coward]

I thought the big takeaway from all of this was the power of the Facebook advertising platform and it's ability to reach eyes and change minds... why wouldn't you want to take advantage of it?

Re:Summary is incorrect, again

[Anonymous Coward]

You see, this is an example of someone on Slashdot who is constantly touting their intelligence show themselves to be complete fucking morons.

"meddling"?

[cascadingstylesheet]

Seriously, does the relevant law (if there even is one ... law, we don't need no steenking law!) actually say "meddling"?

"And it would have worked, too, if it weren't for you meddling Russian kids!" - Scooby Hillary

Re:"meddling"?

[Anonymous Coward]

Seriously, does the relevant law (if there even is one ... law, we don't need no steenking law!) actually say "meddling"?

Of course not. (In fact, they're not even charged with anything that involves the election. The relevant laws would involve foreigners spending money as if they were a political campaign, and they aren't being charged with any of them. Instead the charges involve wire fraud, somehow.) It's part of the slow shrinking of accusations.

If you remember, just after the election, it was that Russia "hacked" the election. Then somehow that became Russia "hacked" social media. Did we say "hacked"? We meant that they colluded with Trump. Did we say colluded? Sorry, we mean they influenced the election with mass trolling campaigns. Did we say mass trolling campaigns? Sorry, we meant they bought a few Facebook ads. Did we say they bought a few Facebook ads? We meant they posted a few posts with election hashtags in them to meddle with the election.

They're slowly deflating the accusations to hope no one notices they've gone from "directly hacked voting machines to change the outcome" to "posted a bunch of memes."

That's precisely correct!

[Anonymous Coward]

But you failed to mention that behind it all was the Catholic Church and the Girl Scouts of America.

And they were being manipulated by extraterrestrials.

So, what folks should be asking is how aligned are the Clintons with the extraterrestrials?

Re:That's precisely correct!

[Anonymous Coward]

Absurd. The "conspiracy theory" thing doesn't really work anymore when we're dealing with conspiracy facts as outlined in the parent post.

Tweeted?

[110010001000]

Why is an executive at Facebook using Twitter?

Re:Tweeted?

[Anonymous Coward]

Shhh. Pitchforks are being drawn. Russia bad, Clinton good. Remember?

I fail to see the difference between Russia or any other country involving themselves in the US elections. It's quite frankly in their best interest. The US certainly has done their own share of undermining sovereign governments for exactly the same reasons.

Rather then actually addressing how foreign espionage is able to be conducted, we're continually fed the same bullshit blaming boogiemen. The same fear mongering... ENOUGH. Trump wasn't elected because he was "the best", he won because he wasn't fucking Clinton (literally or figuratively) and unless the US wants Oprah or worse next, they better get their shit together. That begins with cleaning MSM. If you're going to operate under the banner of The Press and expect the protections it provides, quit fucking lying. Quit trying to be a tabloid or get your licenses pulled.

At the end of the day this was his personal opinion. As much as I hate Facebook, I'd be pissed if this happened to me or anyone else.

Capatch: convicts. Slashdot you amaze me sometimes.

Re:Tweeted?

[Virtucon]

"Opposition Research."

Re:Summary is incorrect, again

[nospam007]

"being too stupid to know you are being used, does NOT mean that you were not involved it just means you are stupid AND a participant."

And that goes for half the country.

When is Christopher Steele going to be indicted?

[Anonymous Coward]

Christopher Steele tried to influence the US election with his dossier.

He's a Brit, who didn't register as a foreign agent.

He broke the law.

When will Meuller indict him?

Re:Summary is incorrect, again

[Anonymous Coward]

"being too stupid to know you are being used, does NOT mean that you were not involved it just means you are stupid AND a participant."

And that goes for half the country.

There is a half of the country that is doing exactly what the Russians wanted, and that is be mad at the other half and not be behind the president. That's exactly what they wanted, a weakened president. They just thought it would be Hillary. Doesn't really matter to them as long as the country is divided.

Re:Contradicted the indictment ?

[Anonymous Coward]

the goal of the operation was not to sway politics to one side in particular, but rather to divide

False. Directly from the indictment itself (Introduction section, item #6):

Defendants posted derogatory information
about a number of candidates, and by early to mid-2016, Defendants' operations included
supporting the presidential campaign of then-candidate Donald J. Trump ("Trump Campaign") and
disparaging Hillary Clinton. [emphasis added]

That's pretty clear, right? Perhaps you meant:

I need to Stop making stuff up and selectively reading things.

I really do not get why so many people are so desperate to claim that the Russians were not trying to help Trump. The fact that it was their goal doesn't prove Trump or his campaign were directly involved. Of course, it does mean that that possibility should be thoroughly investigated. Maybe that's what you're against? Because you might find out something you don't want to know? That seems very weak-minded to me.

Politically tonedeaf

[thunderclees]

What does not often get a lot of discussion is that if you are reliant on someone can be persuaded by an ad on social media maybe there is a problem with your platform?

Re:Politically tonedeaf

[Anonymous Coward]

yes an 'add' there were literally hundreds of them... oh wait there were how many? or 2?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i475yscpfNA

this is why American media is on a macarthyist whitch hunt? and cant take the US seriously and have to watch a comedian update us about russian hacking, and election interference.

America was divided...

[oh_my_080980980]

Between the haves and have-nots...might want to remember that when someone taking brides from wall street says they're not bought...

Re:America was divided...

[Anonymous Coward]

Russian mail order brides?

Re:America was divided...

[Anonymous Coward]

You can buy brides from Wall Street? Hadn't heard of that one. They must be ugly though.

He wasn't unwitting

[Anonymous Coward]

He registered MAGA in 2012, he went fund raising and had a Moscow visit in 2013. Kremlin was monitored talking about supporting his Presidential run in 2013, shortly after that visit.

This is just round 2 of the indictments, part 1 low hanging fruit, part 2, gullibles.... lots more to come. He hasn't even touched the hacking yet.

Re:He wasn't unwitting

[Curunir_wolf]

He hasn't even touched the hacking yet.

You mean "leak"

Re:He wasn't unwitting

[Train0987]

There is ZERO evidence of any hacking. ZERO.

Think about yourself first

[Anonymous Coward]

There is a lot of crap all over the internet and we call it freedom of speech.

Guys, if we say that public opinion is manupulatable then we have to admit that everybody do it. Google, Facebook, CNN, NYTimes, Fox News, Department of State, Hollywood and all other media companies work hard to distribute their ads and opinion.

People are free to make their own judgements about everything and they are free to watch and read what ever they want.

The Internet is the global network and Russia is as vulnerable to American influence as America to Russian. The problem is that in the recent 10 years America did nothing to hold its number one position in the world as a center of influence.

All the events we observe including raise of ISIS, lack of American support in western Europe, Brexit all of them are result of very weak American propaganda. It became so relaxed after collapse of USSR that it lost its ability to fight against new challenges.

It continues to say that Russia is USSR, but the fact is that Russia has nothing to do with USSR anymore. Russia is more capitalistic than USA. Its economy growing way better than American. It is building and upgrading its infrastructure, military, health systems. Russia is less regulated than American economy which suffocates any business activity, absence of taxes in Russia or very low 15% flat personal taxes are doing its job as well.

I don't mention that America lost it influence in Russia completely. From 1987 up to now. The Russian peoples opinion switched from all around praising of all American to complete disregard. Nevertheless Russians oligarch and government including Putin desperately keep themselves as close to western world as possible.

My recommendation is shut up about Russia and start working productively without blaming everybody around. Control and restrictions will call basic freedoms in America and drawn it in dept.

Always the Russian influence.

[Anonymous Coward]

Never the Israeli influence.

Yet she got more votes

[Anonymous Coward]

And the votes were more right across middle America too. You can see the loss in Trump's language too. He's not in charge, he's a valley girl bitchin about government from the outside on Twitter. Whiney loser still fighting an election.

It sucks that the people rejected him, but it sucks more that States are so gerimandered they no represent the people who vote. Democracy is solid, Trump is rejected.

Re:Yet she got more votes

[Anonymous Coward]

And the votes were more right across middle America too. You can see the loss in Trump's language too. He's not in charge, he's a valley girl bitchin about government from the outside on Twitter. Whiney loser still fighting an election.

It sucks that the people rejected him, but it sucks more that States are so gerimandered they no represent the people who vote. Democracy is solid, Trump is rejected.

I would have voted for Trump based on the issues if it was going to be decided by popular vote, but I didn't because he is also a complete ass and I live in a solidly partisan state with no chance of the Republican party candidate winning.

If the states decide to award electors to the winner of the popular vote, then you can use that as bragging rights... but the popular vote literally, legally and meaningfully does not matter until it actually does.

Re: Yet she got more votes

[Anonymous Coward]

Hillary's election fraud FTW!

Re:Contradicted the indictment ?

[Train0987]

They were throwing money at anything that would create discord. Why is that so hard to understand? From funding BlackLivesMatter, to Bernie, to Jill Stein, etc... Stop being a Russian pawn.

Re:Summary is incorrect, again

[Anonymous Coward]

Ok, now show that the election was affected and that the trump campaign was involved. Start with the actual indictment, as you have no doubt read it.

https://www.justice.gov/file/1035477/download

I'm sure you can point us in the right direction.

Re:Summary is incorrect, again

[Anonymous Coward]

Perhaps you could give a page reference, then, because I'm not seeing it. As far as I can tell, that document says they attempted to interfere with the electoral process without making any judgment on their level of success.

And, of course, there's already been one American indicted for helping the Russians with their fake identities, so the "no Americans involved" part is clearly BS.

UPDATE NEW!

[Anonymous Coward]

Looks like Muller is indicting a lawyer today. You will never guess what for....

DELETING EMAILS THAT WERE SUBPOENAED!

WTF? I guess deleting a few emails that were subpoenaed is illegal, but you delete 30,000+ subpoenaed emails and not a peep?
DC needs to be burned to the ground if this is how they think it is proper to act.

Re:UPDATE NEW!

[Train0987]

The events he lied about occurred in 2012. Odd the date isn't appearing in any of the headlines about it.

Squirm, Trumpkins, Squirm!

[GameboyRMH]

LOL your god-emperor is guilty as sin and it's just so hilarious to watch you all squirm as law enforcement slowly but surely closes in on him. The hypocrisy is staggering. Can you imagine if anyone on Team Blue had done anything remotely like Donald Jr's bald-faced influence-peddling in India? Just look at how they flipped their lids at the Clintons' charity foundations.

Re:Squirm, Trumpkins, Squirm!

[Anonymous Coward]

They just hate liberals. They don't actually care about what Trump says or does. Bitter people unhappy with their lives lashing out on those moving forward and prospering.

Re:Squirm, Trumpkins, Squirm!

[Anonymous Coward]

Keep on dreaming of that alternative universe where Gore and HRC were President while we laugh and enjoy the blessings of our god emperor, counting the days until the primarch ascends to the throne.

Americans are stupid.

[Anonymous Coward]

The only people who are surprised by this seem to be Americans themselves.

Stop polluting this website with Trump, Hillary, and Russians. No one gives a shit about your pointless American politics. Every American politician is garbage so you can argue till you're blue in the face that Trump is bad, but everyone outside your sheltered little world knows you're ALL shit.

Shut the fuck up and go away already you stupid shill.

Re:Americans are stupid.

[GameboyRMH]

The rest of the world should care. Putin is willing to use his propaganda capabilities to tear apart any and every Western democracy from the inside if he thinks it could buy him even a tiny morsel of regime survival. Forget Kim Jong-Un, Putin is the #1 threat to free societies across the world right now.

Turns out that Mitt Romney was only wrong about the nature of the threat Russia poses, not the magnitude. It's a threat that needs to be fought with improved education and regulation of advertisements rather than battleships from Romney's pal...but I sure wouldn't complain about some propaganda return-fire aimed at ousting Putin and his cronies.

Re:Americans are stupid.

[Anonymous Coward]

If you honestly think that 100 Russian trolls with 10 million USD could sway the election, you might be interested in this bridge that ShareBlue is giving out for free(*)
If you don't believe it, you must be an evil Trump Russia Hitler Nazi Fucking White Male.

* pay only shipping and handling charges; valid while supplies last;

Re:Americans are stupid.

[Anonymous Coward]

The rest of the world knows that America has been meddling in every other nations elections since the inception of the C.I.A..
It amusing to see it calling out another country for doing what it does routinely, but that's America...home of hypocrisy.
It's almost as funny as when they call out China for being currency manipulators.

Re:Summary is incorrect, again

[Kohath]

"Some defendants, posing as U.S. persons and without revealing their Russian association, communicated with unwitting individuals associated with the Trump Campaign and with other political activists to seek to coordinate political activities."

being too stupid to know you are being used, does NOT mean that you were not involved it just means you are stupid AND a participant.

"Unwitting individuals" are distinctly not conspirators. Attempts to "seek to coordinate political activities" isn't coordinating political activities. Being contacted and answering is not being "a participant".

Ministry of truth

[Anonymous Coward]

Can Trump just get down to creating the Ministry of Truth? Its what we need to combat all of this fake news we hear every day. It will also remove any doubt that people who are trying to stay in charge are using Orwell's work as a guide book. All of this is meant to distract the masses and it is working because everyone is more focused on this BS instead of the changes to the rules we use to govern ourselves.

Re:Summary is incorrect, again

[Anonymous Coward]

You can't find what you refuse to believe. Don't be lazy. Read it and believe you are wrong.

The only good Russian

[Anonymous Coward]

Is a dead Russian. They were never the US's friends

I apologize

[DCFusor]

Because the people in charge of controlling the narrative got to me and what I said wasn't their line: https://phys.org/news/2011-10-...

Please don't send me to gitmo for revealing this has all been a farce.

Re:Summary is incorrect, again

[greythax]

And would be almost impossible to prove short of a recording or multiple witnesses. However, this is ultimately going to be less about "collusion" (otherwise known as conspiracy) and more about Obstruction of Justice, which the president basically admitted to on national tv.

Yawn. Keep losing elections, blame others.

[Anonymous Coward]

Yawn. Keep losing elections, blame others.

Re:Contradicted the indictment ?

[Anonymous Coward]

Stop being a Russian pawn.

Once again, you've left off the key phrase.

I should Stop being a Russian pawn.

FTFY. Or, keep ignoring the very clear finding from the indictment: "operations included supporting the presidential campaign of then-candidate Donald J. Trump ("Trump Campaign") and disparaging Hillary Clinton." So they were doing other things, as well? Great. But the fact is, they were for Trump. Sorry if that gives you bad feelings, snowflake. But that's the way it is.

Technically true, but...

[Millennium]

According to the most recent public intelligence, this assertion is technically true as far as it goes. The goal was to call the election's legitimacy into question and undermine the Hillary presidency that basically everyone thought was inevitable. The Russians got half their wish: they did indeed call the legitimacy of the election into question. The Trump victory was an accident: unanticipated, unintended, and frankly undesired (because they spent all this effort to delegitimize an enemy, but wound up delegitimizing an asset instead).

And if you think about it, Trump's collusion with the Russians makes more sense in this light. It is a very poorly kept secret that Trump didn't want to win: he got into the election for the lulz, but didn't want the responsibility. He had no reason to collude with people who wanted him to win, because that wasn't his goal. But undermining a seemingly inevitable Hillary presidency? That's something Trump would be 100% on board for. This brings the goals of Trump and the Russians into alignment, and then collusion makes sense again.

It has another effect, too. If we look at the goals in this way, Trump wasn't a mere colluder, giving aid and comfort to someone who might or might not qualify as an "enemy" depending on legal definitions. These circumstances would make him an active participant in the operations: a centerpiece of the psyops that went along with the hacking and fake news. That means he personally committed acts of war against the US, which is treason whether or not the people helping you count as an "enemy" for legal purposes.

In other words, sure; the fake news and meddling wasn't architected to help Trump win. This is actually worse for Trump than if they had been, because it leads to a more solid argument for a treason charge: one that doesn't let him hide behind technicalities.

Re:Technically true, but...

[Anonymous Coward]

Dream on brother.

Re: Technically true, but...

[Millennium]

One, two, Mueller's coming for you...

Re:Technically true, but...

[Solandri]

Interesting line of reasoning. Unfortunately, proving it relies on proving this:

It is a very poorly kept secret that Trump didn't want to win: he got into the election for the lulz, but didn't want the responsibility.

Which would actually be harder to prove than any sort of conspiracy, since now you're talking about motivations which resided entirely inside someone's head.

Re:Technically true, but...

[Anonymous Coward]

It is truly sad to see a 4 digit Slashdotter that has gone off the deep end into the treason speculation hallucinations. The left has lost their damn minds. Make sure you remember how the left sanctioned and promoted this paranoia when the next Democrat is in the Whitehouse and the right goes on another four year Benghazi witch hunt. Don't be surprised when middle America returns some of the "Not my President" bullshit the left is so fond of wallowing in these days.

Re:Technically true, but...

[doom]

Some of the low digit accounts were auctioned off some time back. The shills are trying harder to not look like shills these days.

What I'm looking forward to out of this mess is the conclusion that we need to start using real, traceable back to meat-space IDs or else any enemy of the United States (Russian, China, Kock Brothers, etc) will be jamming the internet with unreliable garbage.

Another thing that'd be cool is the realization that as-supported sites are a bust, and in fact maybe for profit sites are pretty useless, and we all switch over to the non-profit model.

Re: Technically true, but...

[Millennium]

No one to the left of Orrin Hatch would ever mistake me for a leftist. On some issues, I'm probably further right than you. I just happen to also be a decent human being.

Truth be told, I objected to the treason charge before this latest development. Too much fuzziness on the definition of an "enemy", and thus too much chance of Trump slithering away on a technicality. I'd have preferred to see the Espionage Act used to charge him instead: same punishments, less legalese. But this angle on the T-word could very well work.

Re:Technically true, but...

[Anonymous Coward]

Well he did claim the election was rigged before the votes were cast, meaning he felt certain he wasn't going to win. Then there was that speech he made the day before the election results where he said he was ok with not winning, meaning he was preemptively accepting the results of the election to be not in his favor.

This is mud

[Kludge]

You are obviously trying to conflate very different things.
The indicted Russian agents were acting on the behest and funding of Putin.
Steele was being paid by the Republican and Democratic (US) parties to perform his research. He was being paid, not the other way. That does not require FEC reporting.

How is the weather in St. Petersburg, by the way?

Re:This is mud

[Straif]

1) Except for relations between the supposed Oligarch funding the troll farm and Putin (which has relationships with all Russian Oligarchs) there is no actual accusation of Russian Government involvement with this group. As with all things Russian I'm sure Putin had some knowledge of it but he didn't apparently use government resources to run it.

2) Steele never worked for the Republicans or Republican leaning groups. His stint at Fusion started several months after the original Free Beacon contract had ended and about a month or two after the Hillary/DNC contract started.

3) Steele probably is off the hook with the whole foreign agent thing though I do wonder about all the Illegal Immigrations rights groups who actively run ads and organize rallies with admitted foreign nationals during campaign season. Or for that matter the group of British citizens who organized with the Hillary campaign to fly over and do door to door campaigning. If Russians trolling people on Facebook is such a threat to American democracy then why aren't those other people under arrest too? Their involvement was much more direct. It's also easier to find them since they actually posted pictures of themselves partaking in those 'illegal' activities.

Face it, this whole thing was completely oversold by the Dems and the media and now they are reaching for straws looking for someone to charge.

Re:This is mud

[Anonymous Coward]

Do you have a link you can share so we can read this for ourselves? Not that I am doubting you, I just want to know the sources you used to obtain this information.

Re:This is mud

[aquacrayfish]

Face it, this whole thing was completely oversold by the Dems and the media and now they are reaching for straws looking for someone to charge.

So Mueller is a Democrat now, is that your point? Or is it the person who appointed him, Rosenstein?

Re:This is mud

[Straif]

It isn't about Mueller being a Dem or Rep, he's a special council and historically they tend to expand way beyond their actual initial reason for being. They basically keep going until they find something to try and justify their existence. That's why almost all the named indictments from the Mueller investigation have nothing to do with the 2016 election and it's why Ken Starr is best known for catching Clinton committing perjury.

Mueller is just doing his job but the fault lies in the job of special council itself. It's a government job that has effectively no limits put on it so it tends to run wild. The Dems and Media however want to keep this whole thing going to get their 'blue dress' moment. It doesn't matter to them if the initial charges seem to have almost no basis in reality, they are just waiting for something to come out of the run away train of an investigation that they can pin on Trump.

Re:This is mud

[Straif]

1) Russian Oligarch story

2) Free Beacon/Fusion/Steel Timelines I'd suggest clicking on some of the "read more" links for better breakdown of each groups involvement.

3) British volunteers working with Hillary campaign.

These were not necessarily my original sources, just ones at the top of the Google results.

Re:This is mud

[aquacrayfish]

The council was brought in to look for Russian interference in the election. While elected Democrats might be primary rooting for a collusion charge, I certainly don't have any expectations on that.

To date, we have people charged with (1) lying to investigators about their knowledge/involvement and (2) interference from Russian nationals. Maybe they'll go off track, but so far all charges are pretty darn relevant. And the fact alone that the key players being investigated keep changing their stories means there's more to come.

And as far as the media goes, they're just looking for the next story to sensationalize. Political slant simply comes from what company owns them. Paying attention to any of them is IMHO a waste of time.

Re:Summary is incorrect, again

[Curunir_wolf]

"being too stupid to know you are being used, does NOT mean that you were not involved it just means you are stupid AND a participant."

And that goes for half the country.

There is a half of the country that is doing exactly what the Russians wanted, and that is be mad at the other half and not be behind the president. That's exactly what they wanted, a weakened president. They just thought it would be Hillary. Doesn't really matter to them as long as the country is divided.

They are in Moscow laughing their asses off.

Why is this guy tweeting at all

[edi_guy]

The narcissism around Twitter and basically all social media is astounding. Every Tom, Dick, and Stacy thinks they are Elon Musk and changing the world because they have 5000 likes from ad-bots. Under what reason would any company let individuals tweet on their behalf about anything ever. And so-called executives, which based on their salary, should know better do it anyway until they eventually pull a 'Goldman.'

Wired summed it up best:

"At its core, Goldman’s mistake was a familiar one for Silicon Valley: An executive really smart at one thing seemed to think he was really smart at another thing. " --Wired 2/19/2018

It's always...

[Anonymous Coward]

... a fiddle when the Democrats lose, isn't?

One day, it may actually be a *real* one, rather than a deluded fantasy. But by then, no one will believe you any more.

Re:Summary is incorrect, again

[Anonymous Coward]

hurr durr...#HERTURN

Why is this marked funny?

[Anonymous Coward]

Everything in that second paragraph has been objectively proven to be true.

Libtards Saying

[Anonymous Coward]

"RUSSIA, RUSSIA, RUSSIA!!!".
Sorry but the only thing that has be discovered was the Democrapes corruption.

Re:Contradicted the indictment ?

[Train0987]

Why are you leaving out these parts:

"In or around late June 2016, Defendants and their co-conspirators used the Facebook group "United Muslims of America" to promote a rally called "Support Hillary. Save American Muslims".

"Defendants and their co-conspirators, through another organization-controlled group, organized a rally in New York called "Trump is NOT my President" held on or about November 12, 2016. Similarly, Defendants and their co- conspirators organized a rally entitled "Charlotte Against Trump" in Charlotte, North Carolina..."

Re:Contradicted the indictment ?

[HornWumpus]

What does the word 'included' mean to you? Look it up moron.

Re:Contradicted the indictment ?

[Anonymous Coward]

I really do not get why so many people are so desperate to prop up the straw man that Russians were trying to help Trump. The question is if Trump asked for their help or not. So far, the answer is no.

Cognitive dissonance

[Anonymous Coward]

How dare those dirty foreigners post things on OUR internets that might persuade people or influence elections.

I demand that only our own countrymen be allowed to lie to us on social media or troll Twitter!

And I plan to undermine any party they might have supported in order to thwart their plan of undermining us.

It's the only rational thing to do.

Better than Bitcoin

[captbollocks]

Judging by how much Americans are chasing each other's and their own tails, I bet the ROI on this ad campaign far exceeded the profit that was made from bitcoin even if you bought them in 2012.

Maybe the FSB or GRU can sell the CIA the compleat idiots guide on how to interfere in a foreign election without spending a fortune like the CIA usually does.

hm, how does he KNOW that?

[Anonymous Coward]

surely one can only know that if one knows the Russians and their intent

Why should they?

[Anonymous Coward]

Who interfered more in the 2016 cycle (and will in the 2018 and 2020 cycles)?

[a] 13 Russian civilians using Facebook and Twitter

[b] MILLIONS of Mexican and South American nationals who are ILLEGALLY in the USA and marching in the streets, occupying congressional offices, working on Democrat political campaigns, working in newspapers and TV studios, agitating in colleges, working within Facebook and Twitter as employees, and yes.... posting on Facebook and Twitter.

Who has been "colluding" with more foreign citizens to affect American elections?

[a] Trump with Putin (for whom no proof has appeared after a year and a half of intensive multi-agency investigations byy VERY determined investigators)

[b] Democrats and Mexicans? (see earlier point)

[c] Democrats and Putin (given Hillary's purchase of the Dossier from a Brit agent using Russian content, and then the collaboration on the post-election Russian-backed anti-Trump protests).

Please explain why anybody expects those 13 Russians to EVER actually be prosecuted. Incidentally, this is not really a legal matter anyway as it crosses an international boundry across which there are no extraditions - it's in a category that nations have traditionally treated as an espionage/counter-espionage matter where the response would not be legal nor military but rather a counter-operation. Meuller as former FBI director KNOWS this, but he needs this to be a legal matter for both political reasons (to make Democrats happy) and personal reasons (to distract from the fact that HIS underlings that HE previously trained, supervised, and promoted went amok and tried to interfere in a presidential election).

Re:Summary is incorrect, again

[nonBORG]

No this is all but over. There is no Obstruction, and lets just say obstruction of what? There is no real basis for the investigation as in no evidence at all. The whole thing boils down to few Russians wasting their own time and money. The only success they had was organizing an anti-Trump rally after the election. (Oh must have been collusion after all Trump loves those rallys.)

Only thing left is for Muller to close the thing and say we came up with nothing. Michael Flynn will be let off by the look of things, he confessed to something he did not do (going by what Comey said.)

Basically a big wind bag of a production to try and do what? Make Trump look bad, which you could say is as bad as what they are "investigating" as he is The President Elect. So it is the haters of democracy that support this whole Muller probe and all the Russian crap.

Re: Summary is incorrect, again

[Anonymous Coward]

Obstruction of an investigation is a crime, even if the investigation finds nothing.

Re: Summary is incorrect, again

[Reverend Green]

Feed the Gulag!

Just admit you are wrong

[Anonymous Coward]

Not these weasel "seeming" to contradict and "expressing my view poorly". No, you expressed it perfectly fine. It's just that your view is factually incorrect and thus, stupid. You are wrong. Say you are wrong about something.

Russia Ate My Homework!

[Anonymous Coward]

Americans crying wolf. You lost your credibility a long time ago!

Scandinavian here. Not even pro-Russian just sick and tired of Russia-did-it bullshit ad infinitum!

If you don't see retraction as a problem ...

[fygment]

... then you have lost sight of reality. This has to be one of the most blatant examples of public censorship. And the forces behind it have clearly revealed their degree of intolerance and ruthlessness. People should be frightened by this. If you are gloating then you are part of the problem. If you are shocked then you then welcome to a reality you should be very afraid of.