Maybe Bernie wasn't a Putin Puppet after all

We've all been told that anyone who didn't support Hillary in 2016 was a treasonous Putin Puppet, and that goes double for those sexist, racist Bernie supporters.
Yet deep, deep down in a new Senate report, it turns out that Russian trolls weren't all that fond of Bernie supporters after all.

A new report has found that the 2016 election influence campaign carried out by Russia particularly targeted African-American voters, as well as supporters of Senator Bernie Sanders in an effort to suppress the votes of those who'd likely support than Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton.

You have to go nearly to the bottom of the NY Times article to find this conclusion. The WashPost article doesn't mention it at all.

Let's compare that to headlines that we've been seeing for the last two years.

Politico: Sanders silent on claim that Russians backed him in 2016
Politico: Bernie Sanders promoted false story on reporting Russian trolls
USAToday: Indictment: Russians also tried to help Bernie Sanders, Jill Stein presidential campaigns
PeoplesView: Not Just Trump: How Bernie Sanders' Campaign Also Had Deeply Imbedded Russian Connections

With fake news like this, is it any wonder that liberals have gone bonkers?

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not socialism after all

Hospital and health insurer stocks plunged Monday after a federal judge in Texas ruled former President Barack Obama’s signature health law, the Affordable Care Act, unconstitutional.

Shares of HCA Healthcare, the largest for-profit U.S. hospital operator, fell more than 4.5 percent early Monday. Shares of insurers Cigna and Humana were both down 4 percent each. Health-care service company Centene slid 7.9 percent and managed health company Molina Healthcare plunged more than 8 percent.

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SnappleBC's picture

@gjohnsit

Well, to quote one of the favorite phrases of neoliberals, be they Republican or Democrat, "The markets have spoken and they like the ACA... A LOT".

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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

The Aspie Corner's picture

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Modern education is little more than toeing the line for the capitalist pigs.

Guerrilla Liberalism won't liberate the US or the world from the iron fist of capital.

WindDancer13's picture

there is room for doubt.

Sanders' haters will latch on to that rather than anything that points to him NOT being a Russian puppet. Given how many of them still condemn him for honoring the agreement he had to sign to support the Democrat nominee in 2016 (the RNC had a similar agreement for their candidates that Trump said he would not honor), they will just ignore this. They tend to be as blind as the MSM and some independent outlets. Sanders certainly his his faults, but they tend not to be the ones that people shout from the rooftops.

Otherwise, thanks for pointing out that MSM continues to do its job for the state.

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We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an act, but a habit.--Aristotle
If there is no struggle there is no progress.--Frederick Douglass

snoopydawg's picture

Japan’s best-selling calendar star revealed… as Putin

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Which AIPAC/MIC/pharma/bank bought politician are you going to vote for? Don’t be surprised when nothing changes.

@snoopydawg
Just looked on Amazon. There are dozens of choices.
And this picture is in at least 3 of them.

putin_0.PNG

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WindDancer13's picture

@gjohnsit

LOL, can you imagine the holiday tree at the White House buried in these calendar gifts to him.

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We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an act, but a habit.--Aristotle
If there is no struggle there is no progress.--Frederick Douglass

Pluto's Republic's picture

@WindDancer13

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____________________

The political system is what it is because the People are who they are. — Plato
snoopydawg's picture

@WindDancer13

send one to Hillary and every democrat who has signed on to Russia Gate. Signed with love, Vlad.

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WindDancer13's picture

@snoopydawg

Shouldn't leave out the press though. Might need a GoFundMe to cover everyone who is deserving of these.

Need to find another out as I do not recommend buying anything from Bezos.

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We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an act, but a habit.--Aristotle
If there is no struggle there is no progress.--Frederick Douglass

snoopydawg's picture

@WindDancer13

Let's pitch in and send one to Rachel Rachel Rachel.

Smile

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WindDancer13's picture

@snoopydawg

Someone will have to tell me how she reacts as I never watch her.

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We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an act, but a habit.--Aristotle
If there is no struggle there is no progress.--Frederick Douglass

...(once you read the fine print) is that it's as much--if not MUCH more--about Russian Internet activity AFTER the 2016 election than it is about pre-November 2016 efforts. And, statistically, it really does NOT tell us much more about the lead-up to the 2016 election than has already been grossly distorted (propagandized) and over-exagerrated to date.

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"Freedom is something that dies unless it's used." --Hunter S. Thompson

Pluto's Republic's picture

@bobswern

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____________________

The political system is what it is because the People are who they are. — Plato

I looked at the report and what an onslaught of graphs. They have a lot of data on occurrences which I can't off hand see if they shaped the data to get the results they wanted. They essentially did a lot of counting.

However, the stats do not prove if IRA campaign actually worked. For example, I found no attempt to look at polls during the most intense periods of IRA activity. Surely, if the IRA were successful, poll numbers should have moved. There seems to be no attempt to objectively measure if all of this social media efforts resulted in changing election results. They try to squirm out of this by stating:

However, understanding precisely how social media platforms impact public life is difficult (Bradshaw & Howard, 2018a). In many democracies it is not even clear that spreading computational propaganda contravenes election laws

I may have missed their attempts to prove the onslaught had an effect, but I saw none. I did not see any statement that said "yes, we have proven that the IRA did change voters in WI so that Trump won the state." They look to assume that the numbers they generated must have had an effect.

Another thing. The IRA must have had a level of understanding of American demographics and voting trends and patterns that even eludes the most sophisticated American born and raised experts. The guy running IRA was mocked as a hot dog vendor. Everything I read about the IRA does not in any way indicate that Russians who never studied or visited America could have figured out which swing states were in play which even Americans missed. IRA and the hot dog guy were in effect media and social geniuses.

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WindDancer13's picture

@MrWebster

Look at all those leaders they kidnapped or assassinated. Look at all those regimes they set out to change. Look at all of their support for far-right dictators. Oh, wait . . . that is the US. Nevermind.

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We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an act, but a habit.--Aristotle
If there is no struggle there is no progress.--Frederick Douglass

snoopydawg's picture

@MrWebster

60% I believe and the ones that were placed before were so silly and not even directed at either candidate or even voting for one or the other.

People are adding Mueller's indictment to his list of accomplishments, but it doesn't mean squat. The ham sandwich thing is true. And what is happening with his charges against one Russian company where the lawyer showed up? Last I heard about it was that Mueller's response was that giving it to them endangered national security.

Nea

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snoopydawg's picture

Naturally, even Pokémon Go was eventually targeted by Moscow.

“The popular game Pokémon Go was incorporated into the operation,” specifically as part of an effort to exploit racial tensions in American society, New Knowledge wrote. The report pointed to a Tumblr post that “advocated that players of Pokémon Go name their Pokémon with a police brutality victim’s name.”

Anyone who could write this should have their journalism license revoked. Anyone who believes it should have their brains scanned to see if they have one.

On a side note .. has anyone else noticed that just about every news website is talking about the Facebook ads that Russia placed? The election was two years ago so why are they back in the news all of a sudden? DK is also talking about them. The news is not new so are we being set up for something?

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Pluto's Republic's picture

@snoopydawg

...as Mueller moves on.

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____________________

The political system is what it is because the People are who they are. — Plato
snoopydawg's picture

@Pluto's Republic

As gulfgal points out in another essay here Mueller's original job was to find evidence of Trump's collusion with Vlad that swayed the election his way. The numerous articles posted everywhere are about how Russian ads got people to vote for Trump. I'm not adverse to him looking into other countries that have influenced our elections, but if he's only going to be focusing on what they did during the last one and pinning it on Trump that shouldn't fly with anyone even if they believe in Russia Gate.

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