Putin ally and Wagner founder admitting US election interference

[Broken_Erika]

The Clintons are as dirty as they come.

News at 11

[Jon Miller]

The Clintons are as dirty as they come.

Any evidence that they even reach Nixon levels?

And Trump blows Nixon out of the water.

JM

[Berzerker]

Mueller didn't find anything on Trump

[Elok]

"Russian Election Interference," while less silly than "Russiagate," remains a wimpy left-wing equivalent to "Stop the Steal." It's a grossly improbable narrative which gets breathlessly adopted wherever it happens to suit the hearer's biases.

Did Russia spend money to influence our elections? Quite possibly. Governments like spending money on stuff. I am quite confident, for example, that Russia has spent a great deal of money trying to take over Ukraine. Somehow, Ukraine remains unconquered. Similarly, it is not sensible to assume, in the absence of any evidence, that whatever fraction of their misappropriated oil money they chose to spend on paying schlubs to make foreign-language Facebook memes* actually had a significant effect. We have spent the past six months and more watching a spectacular, multifaceted display of Russian state incompetence, yet somehow you folks persist in believing that they are spookily hypercompetent in this one specific area.

*NB even the "smoking gun" in the OP is not really proof of much in this department, as it is entirely possible the guy who ostensibly started a paramilitary war-crimes unit is lying, for any number of reasons.

[Berzerker]

i dont believe much of anything about the war, i do believe it will end up as it would have if the minsk deal was in effect, except now eastern ukraine wont have to remain part of ukraine

[BeBMan]

"Russian Election Interference," while less silly than "Russiagate," remains a wimpy left-wing equivalent to "Stop the Steal." It's a grossly improbable narrative which gets breathlessly adopted wherever it happens to suit the hearer's biases.

Did Russia spend money to influence our elections? Quite possibly. Governments like spending money on stuff. I am quite confident, for example, that Russia has spent a great deal of money trying to take over Ukraine. Somehow, Ukraine remains unconquered. Similarly, it is not sensible to assume, in the absence of any evidence, that whatever fraction of their misappropriated oil money they chose to spend on paying schlubs to make foreign-language Facebook memes* actually had a significant effect. We have spent the past six months and more watching a spectacular, multifaceted display of Russian state incompetence, yet somehow you folks persist in believing that they are spookily hypercompetent in this one specific area.

*NB even the "smoking gun" in the OP is not really proof of much in this department, as it is entirely possible the guy who ostensibly started a paramilitary war-crimes unit is lying, for any number of reasons.

No.

First off, the OP article is certainly not a "smoking gun" for or against anyone particular in the US, since there's no detail in it other then "yeah we did something". Then again - who claimed it to be a smoking gun for or against anyone particular in the US?

But the Kremlin always officially denied any involvement before, so having it out there is significant. Not taking it seriously when a member of the Kremlin inner-circle says not only "we did it, but will continue" is absurd.

It's irrelevant if it was done incompetently. 8-months+ of Russian military incompetence in Ukraine (to use your example) is still quite harsh for those on the receiving end.

Impact of mis-/disinfo: a guy named Jones made millions spreadin' stuff for years, and only got stopped by the courts. People think Biden stole the election and some of them go to the capitol, Hang Mike, Pelosi is Satan. No effect of mis-/disinfo?

Or are we carefully drawing a line between totally ineffectve Ru stuff and rather effective other stuff?

Lastly, something that is now admitted was repeatedly denied or downplayed or obfuscated. Trump kinda moved back and forth on it multiple times, at some point denying it, then bringing in lotsa other possible sides (maybe it was China), hinting it might be Russia. Even at a point when his own intel folks assessed it was clearly Russia.

[PLATO]

If Russia was trying to get Democrats out of power and install MAGA Republicans, then they did a very poor job this cycle.

[Uncle Sparky]

They are busy teaching very smart Americans that all Ukrainians are Nazi Satanists (although Ukrainians do not really exist since they are really Russians, but not good Russians).

[BeBMan]

"Interference" does not have to be about installing specific guy X somewhere. Causing further conflict and division (or adding to it) may be a worthwhile goal for Moscow.

[Jon Miller]

"Russian Election Interference," while less silly than "Russiagate," remains a wimpy left-wing equivalent to "Stop the Steal." It's a grossly improbable narrative which gets breathlessly adopted wherever it happens to suit the hearer's biases.

Did Russia spend money to influence our elections? Quite possibly. Governments like spending money on stuff. I am quite confident, for example, that Russia has spent a great deal of money trying to take over Ukraine. Somehow, Ukraine remains unconquered. Similarly, it is not sensible to assume, in the absence of any evidence, that whatever fraction of their misappropriated oil money they chose to spend on paying schlubs to make foreign-language Facebook memes* actually had a significant effect. We have spent the past six months and more watching a spectacular, multifaceted display of Russian state incompetence, yet somehow you folks persist in believing that they are spookily hypercompetent in this one specific area.

*NB even the "smoking gun" in the OP is not really proof of much in this department, as it is entirely possible the guy who ostensibly started a paramilitary war-crimes unit is lying, for any number of reasons.

I was previously independent. I have voted for Republicans all over the ticket in the past.

The Republicans have mostly gone completely crazy, especially the last few years. This isn't some crazy person on YouTube or something, I mean the Republican elected officials. Space lasers, crazy conspiracies about Democratic politicians (Pelosi's husband was attacked due to a lover's spat for a recent one), the denial of democracy (not just looking for an advantage, which is true that both sides engaged in in the past, and probably both sides still do now), and so on.

I know that that there has been some crazy conspiracies about Democrats at least since Clinton... but it is all over the place now.

It does real damage, even if sane people respond and the crazies don't always win. Because sometimes they win, and a functional democracy requires there to usually be two non-crazy options (so your vote can be about policy preferences and not whether you are OK with craziness).

JM

[Jon Miller]

Trump's corruption was often done openly, but Mueller found lots of obstruction which is illegal and always a sign of deeper corruption.

JM

[PLATO]

Trump's corruption was often done openly, but Mueller found lots of obstruction which is illegal and always a sign of deeper corruption.

JM

One has to wonder why indictments did not come out on the obstruction once the new Attorney General was in place. Is it a statute of limitations issue, or a lack of evidence? Certainly it would not be a lack of political will to indict Trump

[pchang]

What are you talking about? There is definitely a lack of political will to indict Trump. Just look at what Garland says and does.

[Jon Miller]

I think it pretty clear that there is a lack of political will to indict Trump, especially for something that Trump was impeached for.

They will indict Trump on things that he wasn't impeached for (documents after leaving office, election tampering in Georgia, encouraging rioting in an attempt to disrupt the peaceful transfer of power).

The DoJ under Garland have made it clear that they are handling Trump with as gentle hands as possible. If it had been you or I with the classified papers, we would have been in jail months ago (or, more likely, last year).

JM

[Jon Miller]

I am not actually certain they will indict trump on all three.

JM

[Berzerker]

When troll farms are amplifying lies and contradicting truth, people "doing my own research" on social media are quite likely to enter an echo chamber that reinforces those same messages. A lie, repeated often enough by multiple sources, is perceived as truth. It's like self-administered brainwashing.

a poll of people by political affiliation showed Democrats were the most uninformed about covid hospitalization rates... As I recall the rate in reality was 1-2% but Democrats thought it was close to 50%

[-Jrabbit]

That sounds apocryphal AF.
Also, please note that I was very deliberate in making no left/right references in that post.

[Berzerker]

https://www.nytimes.com/2021/03/18/briefing/atlanta-shootings-kamala-harris-tax-deadline-2021.html

I didn't mention left and right and I consider the Dems and Repubs to be right wing

anyway, 1-5% hospitalization rate according to the poll but all 3 groups overestimated the odds with 41% of Dems believing the hospitalization rate was 50%+

thats almost half of Democrats believing a 50/50 or more chance of ending up in the hospital. Factor in the reality that most of the people being hospitalized were already sick and old and the actual hospitalization rates for younger healthier people was even smaller, probably well under 1%.

[Elok]

Or are we carefully drawing a line between totally ineffectve Ru stuff and rather effective other stuff?

Yes. Tell ya what: get a bunch of Americans together to post propaganda on Russian social media, with whatever budget, and see how far it budges Russian opinion. I guarantee that, even if you somehow get very talented people working for you--and I seriously doubt Putin's social-engineering endeavors, whatever they were, employed geniuses--your effect will be negligible compared to the cumulative effect of what Russians themselves are saying, both through official propaganda channels and outside, for or against the current administration. There is no particular reason why a batch of foreigners should be Machiavellian geniuses at manipulating a population in a high-stakes arena where natives and locals with skin in the game are already fighting quite fiercely. Alex Jones* himself is a very skilled provocateur who spent years building up a special brand of crazy. Likewise Marjorie Taylor Green, Dan Bongino, Curtis Yarvin, Sargon of Akkad, and various other people who rose to the tops of a wide range of raving-nut food chains following years of effort. Russia, by all accounts, has a bunch of guys making memes, unless some evidence of something more significant has come out--has it? It's possible that they're also channeling funding or otherwise giving aid to sundry actually-effective crazies, but there are already an enormous number of other people doing that. Including Democrats.

Like, seriously, people have been complaining about "Faux News" for a literal generation and more now, but now we're freaking out that maybe a bunch of poorly paid Russian college students photoshopped some crap together and put it on Facebook, like they're going to make a significant difference to the overall media environment? It's really not that easy to get and keep the internet's attention. I have tried, on the pitifully low-stakes field of serial fiction where the top dog will maybe earn the equivalent of a good-but-not-great job's wages. It's still incredibly cutthroat.

*Note that Alex Jones was punished by a civil suit for specific actionable claims against particular people, not for being a bat**** crazy liar in general. He is still perfectly free to complain about the government turning the frogs gay or whatever else, though he will be liable for further damages if he crosses the wrong lines. This is as it should be, in keeping with our robust First Amendment traditions, and I would be far more worried if the government ever acquired the power to simply gag people it decided to brand as liars.

[-Jrabbit]

To me, it's much more about targeting and amplifying content, Elok, not just "Russian kids making memes." As I understand it, the primary goal was divisiveness, not necessarily promoting a specific POV. That means a consistent push toward extreme views, likely both left and right.

Looking at Congress' seemingly complete inability to find compromise solutions (or at least approaches) to important issues, and the heels-dug-in attitude of even mainstream left and right spokesfolk and media, I might also suggest that this is an ongoing societal issue, and that the 2-party political system may bear some culpability in its growth.