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Russia rigged the election with a couple of hundred thousand dollars in propaganda. Clinton spent more than a million dollars on CTR alone. The Koch Brothers du

by danjoc 9y ago

Russia rigged the election with a couple of hundred thousand dollars in propaganda. Clinton spent more than a million dollars on CTR alone. The Koch Brothers dumped over one billion dollars according to some articles I've seen. Either the Russians have vastly superior propaganda and probably in control of global politics or their influence in the US election is overstated.

DashRattlesnake 9y ago
The scandalous thing isn't this scale or the effects of the Russian effort, but that it occurred at all. Russia, unlike those other actors, is not permitted to get involved in US elections in this way.
- megaman22 9y ago
  It's incredibly naive to think that there aren't foreign parties involved in influencing elections and shifting public opinion; it's a tactic as old as civilization, and US intelligence agencies do it on a daily basis.
- coldtea 9y ago
  So, like the US has been meddling with local politics all around the globe since forever, including supporting political parties, "NGOs" etc in Russia?
travmatt 9y ago
Or RIS broke into state election boards to get hyper accurate data on voter and voting patterns unavailable within legal means, broke into campaigns to find information they could construe as satanic (like child sex slave rings run out of pizzeria shops), and then colluded with Republicans to distribute their propaganda to the most low information voters they could find in swing states for maximum impact.
- vim_wannabe 9y ago
  Can someone link some of these "fake news articles" from rt.com? That sounds crazy, heh.
  - travmatt 9y ago
    Just look up any regarding Putin's slaughter of the passengers of MH17, they've been quite active in trying to spread disinformation there.
    - vim_wannabe 9y ago
      I mean regarding 2016 US election, sorry.
- KGIII 9y ago
  The total number of people who believe in pizzagate is vanishingly small and I'm not actually sure they can properly mark a ballot without assistance. They overlap heavily with people who think everything is a conspiracy, probably perpetuated by Jewish people. No, I'm not kidding. You can go to voat.co and watch them in action. I'm no expert, but I'm pretty sure they are mentally ill.
  - travmatt 9y ago
    Pizzagate was only the most humorous piece of propaganda, I used it as an example that hopefully few people would argue as valid. The actual scope of propaganda was far larger and subtler.
    - KGIII 9y ago
      See, that's kind of the thing. I admit there is quite some selection bias, but I don't actually think I know a single person who had their vote changed by said propaganda. Hearing that Clinton ate babies, was nearly dead, was going to take away arms, and was going to force me to install a transgender person in my bathroom didn't actually make me vote for Trump. In fact, I'm pretty sure nothing they said could have made me vote for him. Again, I'm absolutely sure there is selection bias - but I do live in the State that elected LePage, twice. We sent an electoral vote for Trump and one for Clinton. The Trump voters that I know were probably going to vote for Trump, even if he set fire to a nativity scene while cursing baby Jesus. I wish there were some way to truly quantify how much impact it had.
      - travmatt 9y ago
        I think the way you're framing the question is quite leading and misrepresents the actual situation. The aim of modern propaganda isn't to change anyone mind from one candidate to another - the purpose of russian disinformation is to spread confusion and delegitimize the democratic process, and attack any credible source of truth.
        KGIII 9y ago
mbesto 9y ago
> Russians have vastly superior propaganda and probably in control of global politics Or maybe the nature of propaganda versus "factual news" is just that much more effective. It's not out of the realm of possibilities considering propaganda has been used effectively in all sorts of mediums for centuries now.
- dionian 9y ago
  if you recognize it as propaganda, it's not effective propaganda (on you)... if you dont notice the US's, then theirs is effective
awinder 9y ago
The truth may cost more to sell than targeted lies.
lumberjack 9y ago
Russia's propaganda was off-limits for the Clintons' and the Kochs' because it was mostly incitement of hatred against different groups of people.
- KGIII 9y ago
  Before you yell at me, I will clarify that I'm very much on the left side of the political spectrum. Didn't she call Trump supporters a 'basket of deplorables?' I don't think incitement of hate against different groups of people was off limits for either side? There was a whole lot of hate going around.
  - eradicatethots 9y ago
    Once, and she apologized
scrollaway 9y ago
A couple hundred thousand dollars that we know of. Putin isn't known for being super transparent with his money... The Twitter influence is certainly overstated, but Twitter wasn't the only source of influence (still isn't).
- deleted 9y ago
  [deleted]
coldtea 9y ago
> Either the Russians have vastly superior propaganda and probably in control of global politics or their influence in the US election is overstated. It serves two purposes: 1) Face-saving from out of touch with the population DNC/Clinton team that still can't fathom how they lost to an orange-utang 2) Keeping the lead orange-utang in a pro-war, pro-military expenses course against Russia, that everybody in the establishment loves Maybe also as an experiment about how far BS can go if promoted by all the pundits...
gaius 9y ago
Right, but that is not the thrust of the article, which is that Twitter is whining now about RT, yet previously tried to sell them a political influence package!

by danjoc 9y ago

DashRattlesnake 9y ago

The scandalous thing isn't this scale or the effects of the Russian effort, but that it occurred at all. Russia, unlike those other actors, is not permitted to get involved in US elections in this way.

megaman22 9y ago
It's incredibly naive to think that there aren't foreign parties involved in influencing elections and shifting public opinion; it's a tactic as old as civilization, and US intelligence agencies do it on a daily basis.
coldtea 9y ago
So, like the US has been meddling with local politics all around the globe since forever, including supporting political parties, "NGOs" etc in Russia?

travmatt 9y ago

Or RIS broke into state election boards to get hyper accurate data on voter and voting patterns unavailable within legal means, broke into campaigns to find information they could construe as satanic (like child sex slave rings run out of pizzeria shops), and then colluded with Republicans to distribute their propaganda to the most low information voters they could find in swing states for maximum impact.

vim_wannabe 9y ago
Can someone link some of these "fake news articles" from rt.com? That sounds crazy, heh.
- travmatt 9y ago
  Just look up any regarding Putin's slaughter of the passengers of MH17, they've been quite active in trying to spread disinformation there.
  - vim_wannabe 9y ago
    I mean regarding 2016 US election, sorry.
KGIII 9y ago
The total number of people who believe in pizzagate is vanishingly small and I'm not actually sure they can properly mark a ballot without assistance. They overlap heavily with people who think everything is a conspiracy, probably perpetuated by Jewish people. No, I'm not kidding. You can go to voat.co and watch them in action. I'm no expert, but I'm pretty sure they are mentally ill.
- travmatt 9y ago
  Pizzagate was only the most humorous piece of propaganda, I used it as an example that hopefully few people would argue as valid. The actual scope of propaganda was far larger and subtler.
  - KGIII 9y ago
    See, that's kind of the thing. I admit there is quite some selection bias, but I don't actually think I know a single person who had their vote changed by said propaganda. Hearing that Clinton ate babies, was nearly dead, was going to take away arms, and was going to force me to install a transgender person in my bathroom didn't actually make me vote for Trump. In fact, I'm pretty sure nothing they said could have made me vote for him. Again, I'm absolutely sure there is selection bias - but I do live in the State that elected LePage, twice. We sent an electoral vote for Trump and one for Clinton. The Trump voters that I know were probably going to vote for Trump, even if he set fire to a nativity scene while cursing baby Jesus. I wish there were some way to truly quantify how much impact it had.
    - travmatt 9y ago
      I think the way you're framing the question is quite leading and misrepresents the actual situation. The aim of modern propaganda isn't to change anyone mind from one candidate to another - the purpose of russian disinformation is to spread confusion and delegitimize the democratic process, and attack any credible source of truth.
      - KGIII 9y ago

mbesto 9y ago

> Russians have vastly superior propaganda and probably in control of global politics Or maybe the nature of propaganda versus "factual news" is just that much more effective. It's not out of the realm of possibilities considering propaganda has been used effectively in all sorts of mediums for centuries now.

dionian 9y ago
if you recognize it as propaganda, it's not effective propaganda (on you)... if you dont notice the US's, then theirs is effective

awinder 9y ago

The truth may cost more to sell than targeted lies.

lumberjack 9y ago

Russia's propaganda was off-limits for the Clintons' and the Kochs' because it was mostly incitement of hatred against different groups of people.

KGIII 9y ago
Before you yell at me, I will clarify that I'm very much on the left side of the political spectrum. Didn't she call Trump supporters a 'basket of deplorables?' I don't think incitement of hate against different groups of people was off limits for either side? There was a whole lot of hate going around.
- eradicatethots 9y ago
  Once, and she apologized

scrollaway 9y ago

A couple hundred thousand dollars that we know of. Putin isn't known for being super transparent with his money... The Twitter influence is certainly overstated, but Twitter wasn't the only source of influence (still isn't).

deleted 9y ago
[deleted]

coldtea 9y ago

> Either the Russians have vastly superior propaganda and probably in control of global politics or their influence in the US election is overstated. It serves two purposes: 1) Face-saving from out of touch with the population DNC/Clinton team that still can't fathom how they lost to an orange-utang 2) Keeping the lead orange-utang in a pro-war, pro-military expenses course against Russia, that everybody in the establishment loves Maybe also as an experiment about how far BS can go if promoted by all the pundits...

gaius 9y ago

Right, but that is not the thrust of the article, which is that Twitter is whining now about RT, yet previously tried to sell them a political influence package!