What is Russia being blamed for now?
According to what I've been reading, there is no minutia in America today that Russia can't be blamed.
George Takei is blaming all the attention being given to the sexual assault allegations against him on Russian bots.
On Friday, former model Scott R. Brunton accused the “Star Trek” legend of sexually assaulting him in 1981.
Instead, on Monday, Takei suggested via two tweets that Russian bots were responsible for amplifying the story.
The reason? Takei thinks it’s because he has criticized Vladimir Putin’s anti-LGBT policies, according to Towleroad.com.
One tweet that showed a chart of Russian bot activity read:“A friend sent me this. It is a chart of what Russian bots have been doing to amplify stories containing the allegations against me. It’s clear they want to cow me into silence, but do not fear friends. I won’t succumb to that.”
I've got nothing against Takei, but this is just silly.
But let's not stop there.
Do you care about the end of Net Neutrality? Blame Russia.
The FCC said the majority of suspicious activity on its comment process were from those supporting the Obama-era rules, including 7.5 million copies of another form message it said came from a fake email generator and 400,000 comments in support of net neutrality came from one address in Russia. A conservative group, the National Legal and Policy Center, found 1.3 million came from addresses in France, Russia and Germany and suspicious Internet domains after it analyzed the public comments, according to Fortune.
So what does Russia want here? What Verison wants.
But Internet providers have also spent significant time and money lobbying for the regulations to be reversed. And some of the public comments, critics say, bear a striking resemblance to industry talking points.
“It was particularly chilling to see these spam comments all in one place, as they are exactly the type of policy arguments and language you expect to see in industry comments on the proposed repeal,” said Jeff Kao, a data scientist who published a study of the pro-repeal comments Thursday, in a blog post.
What a coincidence!
Russia is everywhere.
HAVING a bad day? Things not working out the way you expected? Everything getting on top of you?
I’ll tell you who’s to blame for that — it’s the bloody Russians. They’re to blame for everything.
This seems to be the view of our Prime Minister, Theresa May. In a speech where she pretended, unsuccessfully, to sound a bit like Margaret Thatcher.
She told Russian leader Vladimir Putin: “We know what you’re up to.”
I bet that made him quake.
According to May, the Russians are “sowing discord” in our country.
It isn't just Britain.
In a remarkable one-two punch aimed at Russian hackers, bots and trolls, the prime ministers of Britain and Spain have separately accused Russian entities — including some allegedly supported by the state — of meddling in European elections and have vowed to foil them.
Spanish Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy said Tuesday that an “avalanche” of bots spread “fake news” about Spain during Catalonia’s independence referendum last month and that Spanish authorities think that more than half of the originating accounts are in Russian territory.
Brexit? Russia.
Catalonia? Russia.
Someone plugged up the toilet? Russia.
Capitalism Collapsing from Inequality... Blame Russia!
It doesn't stop there. Venezuela was involved too.
They believe that Russian interests were involved in pro-Catalonian independence efforts in the weeks prior to the referendum. They stated that “’Propaganda campaigns’ intended to destabilize Spain came from Russian territory and Venezuela.” The Spanish admitted that they were not certain if the troll accounts operating within Russian and Venezuelan borders were agents of either government, though they still suspect a level of foul play. These propaganda efforts seem to have been directed against pro-unity interests, spreading false information that the Spanish government and the European Union were preparing to go to war in the region.
... More recently, President Obama intervened in at least 6 foreign elections to some degree. Election meddling isn’t new, while it might not be morally sound, it’s politics as usual.
I think I'm going to get out ahead of this trend.
From now on I'm blaming everything on Russia too.
Heartburn? Over-weight? Tired? Poor? Unhappy?
It's all Russia's doing.
Comments
*thhhpht*
I don't suppose those "suspicious domains" were anomymizers by any chance? That people concerned enough with net neutrality to comment might routinely take basic precautions?
"The greatest shortcoming of the human race is our inability to understand the exponential function." -- Albert Bartlett
"A species that is hurtling toward extinction has no business promoting slow incremental change." -- Caitlin Johnstone
It's impossible
for a spammer to fake his/her origin.
Therefore you must be a Putin Puppet.
/s
And before the comments
arrived from France Russia etc where were they?
Isn't what a Proxy setting in a browser or email is for is to hide your location? And aren't most set up to use proxies as a default? I'm asking, but I think that's the case.
Whatever, certainly people in authority would lie their ass off, er I mean, NEVER lie about things affecting how we do things.
Orwell: Where's the omelette?
Most people don't use proxies
However, that doesn't mean much.
I personally have an email address in Switzerland. That must mean I'm Swiss.
I just signed up with Protnmail.ch
and I'm shopping for a domain as well.
May as well be russiandupe.eu .
I want a Pony!
Really!
Hope NY AG gets some traction...
A truth of the nuclear age/climate change: we can no longer have endless war and survive on this planet. Oh sh*t.
Great point!
As soon as net neutrality is crushed, anonymizers are next. I bet I get a bonus. (They don't pay much for hanging out around here. The big bucks go to the thread hijackers, and you can't start fights here by flagging people. I asked for TOP but there was a waiting list.)
Or would it be smarter for the gov't to set up a couple of anonymizers that look good (open source and located in Latvia etc.) one for an average monthly rate and one free, and have people come to them. They could sell the info to Google. It might even turn a profit.
Anonymizers are next
Won't happen, because they are a surveillance tool. I don't trust any of them, the server logs contain the actual IP you used (they have to, eventually the traffic needs to make it back to your machine). I bet 99% of them are honey pots. The only way to work it is to use one that whoever is watching you doesn't have access to - for someone in the US it might be, oh I don't know, Russia. Russian law enforcement can certainly get the logs, but are less likely to share with western agencies. If you bounce back and forth a few times there's a good chance they won't take the trouble to match them up. Not unless you are actually a bandito. Even then, jumping to another jurisdiction can break the chain.
So things in the US seem to be coming from Russia, I suppose things in Russia seem to be coming from the US.
"The greatest shortcoming of the human race is our inability to understand the exponential function." -- Albert Bartlett
"A species that is hurtling toward extinction has no business promoting slow incremental change." -- Caitlin Johnstone
Alcoholism?
Remember when Putin started importing vodka to the US?
Orwell: Where's the omelette?
Good point
I plan on drinking tonight. It's Putin's fault.
The allegations against Franken?
Yep, Russia. The way you laid this out just makes me wonder again how people can be this stupid?
BTW, those of us who were either banned or left on our own were probably Russian bots too during the primary.
One of the old timers on DK asked kos if he checked to see if DK had been infiltrated by them. Guess how many recs he got on this comment? Over 100.
Which AIPAC/MIC/pharma/bank bought politician are you going to vote for? Don’t be surprised when nothing changes.
Voting is like driving with a toy steering wheel.
Actually Morgan Freeman
was that MFing stupid.
[video:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Uz9PNoecNxU]
"You can't just leave those who created the problem in charge of the solution."---Tyree Scott
I liked Obama until he was elected.
I liked the characters played by Freeman, loved that voice. Too bad he pissed all over his memory with this.
A truth of the nuclear age/climate change: we can no longer have endless war and survive on this planet. Oh sh*t.
Morgan Freeman has a fantastic voice
Which gives you the misleading impression that he's smart.
Sort of like how Obama was a fantastic speaker, leaving you with the impression that he wasn't full of sh*t.
This is why I use his picture
for this saying. Another one bites the dust.
Which AIPAC/MIC/pharma/bank bought politician are you going to vote for? Don’t be surprised when nothing changes.
Voting is like driving with a toy steering wheel.
@Steven D I am not stupid. I
I am not stupid. I just haven't found time to clean the corn-pipes and cob-webs out!
why it's so funny! (+++)
h/t at snoopydawg
I did the "wait a minute" doubletake.
They're Everywhere!!
The toilet seat was left up the other day and my wife started yelling at me until I pointed out it was all part of Putin's plot to sow discord in American powder rooms.
Did it work? n/t
I don't even get the theory.
I don't even get the theory. Since they've said that no voting machines were hacked, is the theory that Russian propaganda was so powerful that it hypnotized people into not voting for Hillary?
There's not even a solid theory on how Russia could have affected the outcome of the election.
They think the American people are stupid (and the stupid does burn), but I still have hope that they're not THAT stupid.
Mike Taylor
Many people don't know that no voting machines were hacked
they saw a headline that said unequivocally that Russia hacked 21 states voting machines and other headlines that accused Russia of doing, but inside the articles there's a statement saying that Russia attempted, but none were.
Obama himself said that there was no evidence that Russia hacked into voting machines, but people have already made up their minds.
Remember that Hillary stated over and over that all 17 intelligence agencies agree that Russia interfered with the election, while it's really only Brennan and Clapper that are saying that.
Then there's the Facebook ads that congress has made a big stink over. Obama had to help Zuck find the ads that made people vote for Trump instead of Hillary, even though most of them came out after the election was over.
I think it's that people believe what they want to believe, facts be damned.
Which AIPAC/MIC/pharma/bank bought politician are you going to vote for? Don’t be surprised when nothing changes.
Voting is like driving with a toy steering wheel.
Concerted effort to push hacking of machines theme
Exactly right. Obama declared the election valid. And then the deep state actors began pushing anon leaks implying that the voting machines were directly hacked. Only problem there was state election commissioners said bullshit. And then, that is when the themes of creating discord came onto the propaganda table as it were. It is an evolving and reactive set of themes and counter-themes.
This article totally debunks the Russian propaganda
and the most interesting thing is about this is that Obama started pushing this 5 months before the election took place!!
This happened after the military buildup around Russia. This is being spread for various reasons. One is to censor alternative websites.
The Washington Post called 10 popular leftist websites propaganda sites. This article is long because it takes apart this Russian narrative that the PTB have been pushing on us for over two years. It talks about how people used to think that the media was not trustworthy as well as the intelligence agencies. But for some reason, people are believing both.
Hope people will read this. Send it to your friends and family that have drunk the koolaid.
Why we need independent media..to protect us from the fake mainstream media
The real purpose of the Russian scare..to restrict free speech
Which AIPAC/MIC/pharma/bank bought politician are you going to vote for? Don’t be surprised when nothing changes.
Voting is like driving with a toy steering wheel.
@MrWebster In amongst those
In amongst those claims of hacking was one, little regarded, that said that the purported hacking was done through a DHS server.
It's interesting that that particular claim hasn't been pushed like the others.
"More for Gore or the son of a drug lord--None of the above, fuck it, cut the cord."
--Zack de la Rocha
"I tell you I'll have nothing to do with the place...The roof of that hall is made of bones."
-- Fiver
@Cant Stop the Macedonian Signal
I also do recall that several State Secretaries of State said that scans of electoral computers were traced back to Department of Homeland Security after their turning down DHS requests for them to run State voting infrastructure, but seem to recall that other States agreed to this and claimed scanning attempts from 'other causes'.
https://sfcmac.wordpress.com/2017/01/13/hacking-of-georgia-secretary-of-...
http://wbaa.org/post/secretary-state-department-homeland-security-hacked...
http://thefreethoughtproject.com/russia-department-homeland-security/
There's no article on the page but it links to (emphasis mine):
http://dailycaller.com/2017/02/21/exclusive-obamas-feds-tried-to-hack-in...
(Emphasis mine.)
https://www.dhs.gov/news/2016/08/15/readout-secretary-johnsons-call-stat...
It's taken me all evening (longer, actually, to wait for pages to load after often multiple attempts (with 'high-speed' internet providing apparently 0.35 MPBS according to a speed test finally loaded after multiple attempts and well worth my roommate's money, I'm sure) so what I've managed to get to will have to do, lol - but obviously, 'the
DevilRussians!!! made him do it', so It's All Their Fault.Going to hope that this didn't go through over the past... half hour? since I first tried to post this, but sorry if it duplicates...
Edit: and of course I didn't notice that I'd failed to press a letter hard enough in my addendum above until after pressing Save again - but on the other hand, that would have been why it went through. Probably thought I was an im-poster without some form of traditional typo being present... and I must have used up my bolding allowance as none of that line of options is showing?
Now to see if this will go through, lol.
Psychopathy is not a political position, whether labeled 'conservatism', 'centrism' or 'left'.
A tin labeled 'coffee' may be a can of worms or pathology identified by a lack of empathy/willingness to harm others to achieve personal desires.
@Ellen North This is amazing,
This is amazing, Ellen! You did what I, in my laziness, failed to do, and greatly to my benefit.
I feel I should start keeping a digital commonplace book of instances like this, because I'm always scratching my head and saying to myself "Didn't this thing happen and wasn't it reported somewhere some time ago...?"
Thank you so much for your hard work.
"More for Gore or the son of a drug lord--None of the above, fuck it, cut the cord."
--Zack de la Rocha
"I tell you I'll have nothing to do with the place...The roof of that hall is made of bones."
-- Fiver
bless your heart.
@Mike Taylor The serious part of this
The serious part of this is that they are attempting to criminalize, or turn into treason, political campaigning (at least campaigning against an establishment-backed candidate).
"More for Gore or the son of a drug lord--None of the above, fuck it, cut the cord."
--Zack de la Rocha
"I tell you I'll have nothing to do with the place...The roof of that hall is made of bones."
-- Fiver
"Russia" has become a cultural tick in US and Europe.
No turning back to rationality for awhile. Brazile even got the treatment as she fell for Russian propaganda according to Clinton loyalists. But what propaganda as Brazile said alot of shit? That Hillary's staff was arrogant and utterly incompetent? The Russian shit will probably do more political damage to democrats than republicans. The early signs are that establishment democrats will use the Russian dupe charge against progressives going into the primaries.
George's comments really show up the utter arrogance in believing that Putin would actually give a personally fuck about what George said about gay rights in Russia. But this egotistic view is American exceptionalism.
The only problem course is this joke can turn into a serious military confrontation which is where it seems to be going.
It has in my mind
In my mind, RussiaGate is what labels the Democratic party as the party willing to court global thermonuclear annihilation in order to score some cheap political points. Unless and until they come up with some actual evidence, I have them as the party of utter lunatics. They've placed a lot of political capital on the RussiaGate bet. I'm wondering how they think it'll pay out.
A lot of wanderers in the U.S. political desert recognize that all the duopoly has to offer is a choice of mirages. Come, let us trudge towards empty expanse of sand #1, littered with the bleached bones of Deaniacs and Hope and Changers.
-- lotlizard
Just ask them, and they'll say
that it's already been proven that Russia stole the election, just like it's been proven that Saddam had WMDs apparently.
"Obama promised transparency, but Assange is the one who brought it."
TPTB love them lies and who taught them to lie
I never knew that the term "Never Again" only pertained to
those born Jewish
"Antisemite used to be someone who didn't like Jews
now it's someone who Jews don't like"
Heard from Margaret Kimberley
spot on quote
But it seems as time goes on the russian plot is getting too complicated with too many moving parts to sustain a political propaganda campaign aimed at the mass of people.
Too many moving parts?
So far I haven't been able to discern ANY moving parts. What, exactly, is the charge being leveled in #RussiaGate? It started out as hacking the DNC and it's morphed into... something. To my eye it's a nebulous cloud of fear. There are no moving parts because there is nothing inside of it.
A lot of wanderers in the U.S. political desert recognize that all the duopoly has to offer is a choice of mirages. Come, let us trudge towards empty expanse of sand #1, littered with the bleached bones of Deaniacs and Hope and Changers.
-- lotlizard
just think if the Russians had spent as much as the DNC!
it probably would have been a shutout. Even Hillary would have voted for Trump.
I've long suspected that Bill did. n/t
"Obama promised transparency, but Assange is the one who brought it."
@dervish No way. Can you imagine
No way. Can you imagine what it's like to live with her after losing?
"More for Gore or the son of a drug lord--None of the above, fuck it, cut the cord."
--Zack de la Rocha
"I tell you I'll have nothing to do with the place...The roof of that hall is made of bones."
-- Fiver
just think if the Russians had spent as much as the DNC!
it probably would have been a shutout. Even Hillary would have voted for Trump.
ok, gjohnsit, I blame Russia for you writing about
Russia's bull shits and American's dumb shits all the time.
Sorry ... but can we get something different for breakfast on Sunday mornings? How about ...
[video:www.youtube.com/watch?v=gb-B3lsgEfA&list=RDotAu5twqDpk&index=3]
[video:https://youtu.be/ZAam1kDx1ow]
Italian Amore
[video:https://youtu.be/g-gh2hIRhkc]
French savoir vivre
[video:https://youtu.be/Tdg-DT8rTUQ]
German Passions ...
With apologies to the music connaisseurs on this site, I blame my Russian curs
eor for the picks ...@gjohnsit - this comment was not meant as a critique or
complaint of your essay. I value your work here a lot. Sometimes I need to distract myself to not get all "down" and then comes out some more silly comment.
No offense to you and yes, let's have peace and love.
You'll have to try a LOT harder for me to take offense ;-)
Don't sweat it
Where's Macedonia in all this?
We want credit for our work, dammit!
"More for Gore or the son of a drug lord--None of the above, fuck it, cut the cord."
--Zack de la Rocha
"I tell you I'll have nothing to do with the place...The roof of that hall is made of bones."
-- Fiver