It’s important to understand they’ve had the capabilities as long as anyone else. In the past they would’ve just kept the information to themselves, sort of “For Internal Use Only.” What is different is now they weaponized it.
What’s critical here is that, much to their delight, not only did it work, it has sown chaos within the U.S. Moreover, they have also turned the GOP: Special Victims Unit into a de facto protector of the FSB’s sources and methods.
In short, they couldn’t have asked for anything more.
The flip side of all of this, however, is that when Comrade Chaos and his Cabal of Curs (I include Congress in this) are relegated to the dust bins and jail cells of history, the Russians can expect a concerted tit for tat, not only from us, but from all of the Western and some Asian intelligence agencies. I suspect this is already going on and will be revealed in a rather spectacular fashion when the Russian oligarchs and their worldwide banking compatriots come crashing to earth.
Or, at least, I hope that’s the case. Regardless, they are not going to get a free ride in the long run. Nor are the treasonous bastards currently in Congress/government.
Most of the time I feel the same way, even though I’m fascinated by how much power they can wield for all the wrong reasons. I picture all of those 400 billionaires in the country (or is it around the world?) that live in exclusive gated neighborhoods on multi-acre estates in several locations, with private security, fire houses, full compliment of staff, servants, yard people, private housing for those staff, separate water supply from surrounding communities, helipads that jaunt them off from one locale to another, usually to their private plane at a private airport…without ever having to deal with anyone below their “station” in life or much below what’s in their own bank account…I could go on, but why? You and I know that’s not how 99% of us live and yet, that’s who is making the rules for the rest of us, just so they can continue to avoid dealing with everyone they don’t want to associate with and continue to enrich themselves at everyone else’s expense. They are as unconnected to society by and large as the most mentally ill people suffering from psychosis. They are also as delusional in their small privileged world where they believe they are entitled to everything and everyone else is a leech.
You know, the way small pox made the Indians stronger. And the way the ingestion of lead made people both smarter and healthier. And the way the introduction of the nerve agent VX once made sheep ranching in Utah so profitable back in the '60s. And the way releases of radiation from the Hanford Nuclear Reservation made the “Downwinders” healthier. Well, maybe that last one is a bad example.
no. she was well up 11 days b4 election. her numbers crashed after comey’s announcement of re-starting the e-mail investigation. the same trend was seen in the senate elections in missouri, wisconsin, indiana, pennsylvania, and new hampshire. it was coordinated. rudy g even blabbed on fox before the comey announcement of what was coming. it was obvious if you look at nate silver’s running polling figures. KAC, when asked 2 days before the election, what would the effect be of comey shutting down the “investigation”, cackled that it didn’t matter, the damage had already been done.
However most of what we know now comes from a series of leaks in 2013 and 2014, most concerning a St Petersburg company called Internet Research Agency, then just “Internet Research”. It is believed to be one of several firms where trolls are trained and paid to smear Putin’s opponents both at home and internationally.
According to internal documents released by a group of hackers in 2013, Internet Research Agency employed more than 600 people across Russia, and had an implied annual budget of $10m – half of which was paid out in cash. Employees were expected to post on news articles 50 times a day. Those who wrote blogs had to maintain six
Facebook accounts and publish at least three posts daily. On Twitter, they had to have at least 10 accounts, on which they would tweet 50 times. All had targets for the number of followers and the level of engagement they had to reach.
It covers troll armies from other countries like N Korea, Turkey, Israel, and others. There are many links to their sources embedded in the article.
These rich miscreants are working toward dealing a death blow to democracy and the establishment of The United States of America as a “Feudal State” complete with “serfs”
Yes–interesting. The Guardian has cut right back on the comments sections now, presumably in response to this problem, but to the best of my knowledge it has never acknowledged or reported on the influence of this trolling on its own readers.
And the saddest thing for me is that you could watch this taking off from the days of Raygun until today, but mostly in the last couple of decades where we went from millionaires to billionaires…with most billionaires having made there money off of other money on Wall Street…and the starter cash was usually family money handed down to begin with. They never really did invent anything monumental for society or give back unless it was to their own named foundation or privately owned and run cancer center or gene splicing initiative as a hobby. The days of the rich, like those at the turn of the 20th century, where at least the barons gave back some to society, are gone. Those huge federal buildings that many of those old oligarchs purchased for the government would never happen today. These rich pricks of today are wholly full of themselves and their own avarice. To hell with everyone else. If they want to fly in an airplane, today they’ll build themselves their own private airport no one else can use. Its sick.
And most of them are criminals too…having escaped paying any taxes by having Congress in their back pockets manipulating the tax code for them or being able to offshore their money without consequences.
Uh-oh…I need to quit. I can feel my blood pressure rising…
John Kasich is a total shitheel. I have contributed to his opponents in Ohio elections. I wish to God he would have been the GOP nominee instead of Trump or any of the other clowns that ran, especially since one of them actually won.
Barney Frank was on Real Time last night, and he kept trying to make this point - Trump is failing spectacularly on all fronts. Barney does think the GOP is turning on him and they will continue to.
