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>it is much easier to co-opt the corrupt Russian government than it is to co-opt the less corrupt American government. Can you give a cold war example of Ameri

by lsc 8y ago

>it is much easier to co-opt the corrupt Russian government than it is to co-opt the less corrupt American government. Can you give a cold war example of America effecting who ran russia that is as dramatic as the Trump story in the other direction?

pessimizer 8y ago
There's no evidence that Russia had any significant effect on who runs the US, even if you accept all of the claimed attempts as true, whereas it's universally accepted and documented that the US got Yeltsin elected: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/aug/03/spinning-hillary-a-history-of-america-and-russias-mutual-meddling https://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/aug/03/spinning-hilla...
- adventured 8y ago
  I'm fairly certain the thousands of dollars Russia spent on Google and Facebook ads, overwhelmed the $1.2 billion that was spent in total on the Clinton election campaign.
  - polkapolka 8y ago
    The ads are a red herring (and uncomfortably visible for both parties). The real activity was on Facebook groups, viralizing anti-immigration and far-left news, controling the narritive on 4chan pol and /r/the_donald, and botted up - and downvote brigades. It was so blatant it was visible to a non-expert on information warfare like me. The people doing this probably got paid about as much as a paid advertisement.
    - lsc 8y ago
      https://www.nytimes.com/2018/12/13/us/politics/butina-guilty.html https://www.nytimes.com/2018/12/13/us/politics/butina-guilty... https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2018/11/wikileaks-trump-mueller-roger-stone-jerome-corsi/576940/ https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2018/11/wikilea... I suspect we will see more of this sort of thing as the investigation continues, but of course, the investigation isn't over yet. My point is just that it was a lot more than 4chan and facebook.
    - willholloway 8y ago
      More than 62 million Americans voted for Donald Trump, maybe they were the ones up voting stories on 4chan and Reddit because they agree with him.
- lsc 8y ago
  Hey, thanks for the link, I wasn't aware of the US involvement with the election of Yeltsin. That's especially interesting, as Yeltsin essentially dissolved the USSR. There is a long history of foreign interventions in elections being catastrophic; I recently read Herman's "1917: Lenin, Wilson, and the Birth of the New World Disorder" - and he claims that there is pretty solid evidence that Lenin was bankrolled by Germany in very impactful ways.
scottlocklin 8y ago
Yelzin. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1996_Russian_presidential_election#US_interference_in_elections https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1996_Russian_presidential_elec... It ain't even close.
- lsc 8y ago
  So, I don't really mind getting downvoted for asking questions that make me look ignorant, as I was in this case. But when someone else answers the question, (read the rest of the thread) there's no need to answer it again.
- dragonwriter 8y ago
  > > Can you give a cold war example of America effecting who ran russia that is as dramatic as the Trump story in the other direction? > Yelzin. That's...not a Cold War example.
  - scottlocklin 8y ago
    And it wasn't called "Russia" during the cold war; I interpolated. The US interfering in the 1996 Russian election to install 'our guy' stands as a preposterous, ridiculous overt interference with Russian politics on a scale which the Russians can never hope to achieve.
    - lsc 8y ago
      What I find super interesting is that some people in the USA seem to think that evidence that the US has attacked the elections of the USSR and Russia in the past means that we somehow shouldn't fight when the reverse happens. I mean, if you accept that we got Yeltsin elected, well, in a real way, we dissolved the USSR, making Russia dramatically less powerful. (And yes, I agree that's dramatically more severe than anything Trump has done so far.) I am not going to vote for any politician who thinks allowing the same sort of thing to happen to the USA is in any way okay. (I mean, from a completely neutral sense, I get what they are saying... but I'm not completely neutral; I don't think any of us are. Leaving aside that I think you can make a reasonable argument that the USSR was, even for those who lived there, a bad thing, (though I'm obviously biased on that point.) I do think it's reasonable to expect your political leaders to take steps to prevent your country from being taken over by a foreign power.) Edit: neutrality and clarity

by lsc 8y ago

pessimizer 8y ago

There's no evidence that Russia had any significant effect on who runs the US, even if you accept all of the claimed attempts as true, whereas it's universally accepted and documented that the US got Yeltsin elected: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/aug/03/spinning-hillary-a-history-of-america-and-russias-mutual-meddling https://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/aug/03/spinning-hilla...

adventured 8y ago
I'm fairly certain the thousands of dollars Russia spent on Google and Facebook ads, overwhelmed the $1.2 billion that was spent in total on the Clinton election campaign.
- polkapolka 8y ago
  The ads are a red herring (and uncomfortably visible for both parties). The real activity was on Facebook groups, viralizing anti-immigration and far-left news, controling the narritive on 4chan pol and /r/the_donald, and botted up - and downvote brigades. It was so blatant it was visible to a non-expert on information warfare like me. The people doing this probably got paid about as much as a paid advertisement.
  - lsc 8y ago
    https://www.nytimes.com/2018/12/13/us/politics/butina-guilty.html https://www.nytimes.com/2018/12/13/us/politics/butina-guilty... https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2018/11/wikileaks-trump-mueller-roger-stone-jerome-corsi/576940/ https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2018/11/wikilea... I suspect we will see more of this sort of thing as the investigation continues, but of course, the investigation isn't over yet. My point is just that it was a lot more than 4chan and facebook.
  - willholloway 8y ago
    More than 62 million Americans voted for Donald Trump, maybe they were the ones up voting stories on 4chan and Reddit because they agree with him.
lsc 8y ago
Hey, thanks for the link, I wasn't aware of the US involvement with the election of Yeltsin. That's especially interesting, as Yeltsin essentially dissolved the USSR. There is a long history of foreign interventions in elections being catastrophic; I recently read Herman's "1917: Lenin, Wilson, and the Birth of the New World Disorder" - and he claims that there is pretty solid evidence that Lenin was bankrolled by Germany in very impactful ways.

scottlocklin 8y ago

Yelzin. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1996_Russian_presidential_election#US_interference_in_elections https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1996_Russian_presidential_elec... It ain't even close.

lsc 8y ago
So, I don't really mind getting downvoted for asking questions that make me look ignorant, as I was in this case. But when someone else answers the question, (read the rest of the thread) there's no need to answer it again.
dragonwriter 8y ago
> > Can you give a cold war example of America effecting who ran russia that is as dramatic as the Trump story in the other direction? > Yelzin. That's...not a Cold War example.
- scottlocklin 8y ago
  And it wasn't called "Russia" during the cold war; I interpolated. The US interfering in the 1996 Russian election to install 'our guy' stands as a preposterous, ridiculous overt interference with Russian politics on a scale which the Russians can never hope to achieve.
  - lsc 8y ago
    What I find super interesting is that some people in the USA seem to think that evidence that the US has attacked the elections of the USSR and Russia in the past means that we somehow shouldn't fight when the reverse happens. I mean, if you accept that we got Yeltsin elected, well, in a real way, we dissolved the USSR, making Russia dramatically less powerful. (And yes, I agree that's dramatically more severe than anything Trump has done so far.) I am not going to vote for any politician who thinks allowing the same sort of thing to happen to the USA is in any way okay. (I mean, from a completely neutral sense, I get what they are saying... but I'm not completely neutral; I don't think any of us are. Leaving aside that I think you can make a reasonable argument that the USSR was, even for those who lived there, a bad thing, (though I'm obviously biased on that point.) I do think it's reasonable to expect your political leaders to take steps to prevent your country from being taken over by a foreign power.) Edit: neutrality and clarity