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[smjjames]

Of course it's lacking in evidence, spies don't want to reveal their secrets of what they know.

[Baffler]

Of course it's lacking in evidence, spies don't want to reveal their secrets of what they know.

Frankly they don't have the credibility for that. They're too politicized and have shown themselves to be perfectly willing to lie to the American public for the benefit of themselves or their political masters. Remember Iraq's WMDs? or how the NSA didn't collect information on American citizens, only foreigners? Or how it was just metadata, and not content? Or how they don't illegally run wiretaps? I could go on, and that's just the last few years, saying nothing about all those people they secretly infected with syphilis, or kidnapped and dosed with LSD trying to develop a mind control drug, or the clusterfuck that was the Iran-Contra affair. I'll believe what they say when they provide ample, concrete evidence and not a picosecond sooner.

[smjjames]

Of course it's lacking in evidence, spies don't want to reveal their secrets of what they know.

Frankly they don't have the credibility for that. They're too politicized and . Remember Iraq's WMDs? or how the NSA didn't collect information on American citizens, only foreigners? Or how it was just metadata, and not content? Or how they don't illegally run wiretaps? I could go on, and that's just this particular administration's intelligence services, saying nothing about all those people they secretly infected with syphilis, or kidnapped and dosed with LSD trying to develop a mind control drug, or the clusterfuck that was the Iran-Contra affair. I'll believe what they say when they provide ample, concrete evidence and not a picosecond sooner.

Which usually involves releasing classified information.

I do agree however, that there is a WAY overfocus on RT. Maybe it's the only thing that they could talk about in detail as most of the information on it is publicly accessable.

Vox does have an explainer of sorts which tries to clarify the findings.

[origamiscienceguy]

what about a parsec sooner?

[Sergarr]

Vox does have an explainer of sorts which tries to clarify the findings.

This seems to have sprung, in part, from Putin’s paranoia concerning perceived US attempts to undermine his government.

That paranoia is quite justified in my eyes, considering how Putin is consistently portrayed as a vile tyrannical journalist-killing dictator oppressing fine upstanding free-thinking Russian citizens. I mean, would anyone in the West really object if USA tried to depose such a bad, evil person? Hell no.

The report explains that Putin was incensed about a series of scandals that embarrassed his government, such as the Panama Papers leak, which revealed (among other things) a secret $2 billion account held by Putin personally.

Uh. No. They didn't do that, they revealed his friends having a lot of large financial accounts, but nothing on Putin personally, AFAIK.

But otherwise, that article seems more or less factually correct. Though, there are suspiciously no conclusions on Republicans conspiring with Russians and assisting them in their operations, as well as legitimizing their actions through their conservative media. Maybe FBI "asked" to edit that one out, and that is why it took them so long to put it together?

[Wolfhunter107]

But otherwise, that article seems more or less factually correct. Though, there are suspiciously no conclusions on Republicans conspiring with Russians and assisting them in their operations, as well as legitimizing their actions through their conservative media. Maybe FBI "asked" to edit that one out, and that is why it took them so long to put it together?

If I had to guess, it's not there because the Republicans didn't conspire with the Russians. For starters, a good chunk of them are still very much opposed to Russia in any form. No chance there. The pro-anyone-Trump-likes group is there, and any they seem to be willing to overlook anything that puts Trump in a bad light, but I doubt that they would work with the Russians, either. Maybe one or two might do it, but as much as I dislike today's Republican Party, that's not something they would do.

[smjjames]

But otherwise, that article seems more or less factually correct. Though, there are suspiciously no conclusions on Republicans conspiring with Russians and assisting them in their operations, as well as legitimizing their actions through their conservative media. Maybe FBI "asked" to edit that one out, and that is why it took them so long to put it together?

Are you talking about the intel report or the Vox article? I don't see anything about the Republicans allegedly collaborating and being in cahoots with the Russians (other than people in Trump's circle obbviously) in the intel report. The Republican politicians were just being hyperpartisan jerkwads (to be fair though, there were jerkwads on both sides) during the election, nothing new there.

But otherwise, that article seems more or less factually correct. Though, there are suspiciously no conclusions on Republicans conspiring with Russians and assisting them in their operations, as well as legitimizing their actions through their conservative media. Maybe FBI "asked" to edit that one out, and that is why it took them so long to put it together?

If I had to guess, it's not there because the Republicans didn't conspire with the Russians. For starters, a good chunk of them are still very much opposed to Russia in any form. No chance there. The pro-anyone-Trump-likes group is there, and any they seem to be willing to overlook anything that puts Trump in a bad light, but I doubt that they would work with the Russians, either. Maybe one or two might do it, but as much as I dislike today's Republican Party, that's not something they would do.

Sergarr might be referring to the general Republican stonewalling and going 'Nuh-uh, nope, I don't see no hack' during the election campaign. Largely from Priebus and Paul Ryan trying to defend their candidate. The only ones which had any real appearances of connections to the Russians were some of those within Trumps campaign.

Though, if there WAS anything regarding investigations into Russian connections with Trump, his campaign staff, or anybody else, those were deliberately left out and nothing mentioned.

[wierd]

So far I am reading this out of their report:

1) Putin DARED to use propaganda to smear an already unelectable candidate. (Seriously, this cycle had the historically least desirable candidates out of the gate. Sec Clinton brought enough baggage to bury her just by running.)

2) we assess (but totally fail to substantiate) that the DNC leak to wikileaks was via a Russian hacking group (which we don't name) despite the spear phishing of Podesta and pals being laughable, and worthy of ridicule itself, because totally nobody but Putin would be ribald enough to try to get dirt on how the DNC was making its internal decisions, despite the then recent political turmoil of sanders' defeat in the primaries. No, a citizen of the US, or a disgruntled staffer, as Wikileaks themselves attest, just is not as likely as a secret, concerted effort by Moscow to steal Clinton's win from her, Occam's razor be damned. Malware of Russian origin was used! It MUST be Russia, since Putin benefited from it!

3) guccifer2.0 was totally a Russian and not Romanian! We have proof (that we won't reveal)!!

4) Russia was totally interested in how our elections work since 2014, long before trump declared candidacy! They were actively accessing state systems involved in that process to better understand how our elections work (evidence of which we did not act on 2 years ago if it even really exists, which you should simply trust us on like a good citizen. Pay no attention to the harsh reality that big nations like our own and Russia do these things routinely to gain the freshest possible Intel. Its only good when WE do it!) so that they could totally influence our elections!

5) the rise in popularity of RT as a US news source (clearly not due to widespread distrust of domestic news networks for failing to cover important international events, surely! Not because the domestic news is obvious propaganda either, no sir!) allowed Russia unprecedented access to the us public, a trend that shows no signs of reversal, and Moscow used this access to ... SPREAD PROPAGANDA.. How horrible! (Never mind the very obvious and much better substantiated link between the msm and 3 letter agency propaganda pieces, re snowden and pals. Again, only good when WE do it!)

6) some examples of RT's propaganda (shame on you Putin, for manipulating people with propaganda the exact same ways we do! Naughty! Don't you know our citizens are so mush brained that they can't detect obvious agendas... Even though they saw right through our own campaigns, which is why they were watching your news in the first place!?)

7) just look at how skewed the US's preferred social network (facebook) chatter is toward our domestic propaganda mouthpieces compared to less curated and more multinational audiences of YouTube and pals! This CLEARLY supports our argument!

they even used smug language!

Conclusions:

Trust us, Russia totally did it and needs to be punished! Our own repeated failures toward the us public had nothing to do with it whatsoever!

[smjjames]

The over-reliance on the RT and Sputnik media thing does make it seem too simplistic, as if the solution is to simply boot the American RT and Sputnik offices out of the country.

[martinuzz]

Trump will just ban the internet on day 1 of his presidency, to protect the American public from anti-american propaganda. The only thing he will leave available online is his personal Twitter account, and a website with a petition against Obamacare.

[Neonivek]

Trump will just ban the internet on day 1 of his presidency, to protect the American public from anti-american propaganda. The only thing he will leave available online is his personal Twitter account, and a website with a petition against Obamacare.

Yeah don't joke about that

Putting the internet into the hands of corporations has been on the docket for a while now.

[TheBiggerFish]

Trump will just ban the internet on day 1 of his presidency, to protect the American public from anti-american propaganda. The only thing he will leave available online is his personal Twitter account, and a website with a petition against Obamacare.

Yeah don't joke about that

Putting the internet into the hands of corporations has been on the docket for a while now.

Oh god what the fuck no.

[☼Another☼]

I hope Trump is actually, under those layers of stupid promises he has made, capable of thinking enough not to cause irreparable harm.

[redwallzyl]

you see America this is what happens when you don't pay attention to the bullshit the republicans have been trying to sneak past us for the last several years and give them total power. goodby internet, it was good knowing you.

[Baffler]

Didn't Obama give stewardship over the internet to some UN affiliated body? If so doesn't that mean that the best congressional Republicans can do is give control over infrastructure and service provision to private companies, which you will note is already the case, and do away with net neutrality (which I admit would suck a great deal?)