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All governments push propaganda. Russia's miniscule ad spend on FB had no measurable effect (please provide proof if you think this is wrong). Clinton and Trum

All governments push propaganda. Russia's miniscule ad spend on FB had no measurable effect (please provide proof if you think this is wrong). Clinton and Trump spent many order of magnitude more on political advertising than any foreign nation and even that didn't assure their win. People aren't mindless robots, they vote for who they want to vote for.

peterhadlaw 7y ago
The funniest thing is, no one talks about this, but if the "goal" was to sew discord... My goodness someone "in the Kremlin" should be getting a promotion for their exceptionally well done job. I mean how many YEARS and millions of dollars has the US wasted chasing after this ghost of Russian interference? If you want to calculate the ROI from a few thousand dollars to how much hysteria followed suit, it's insane. The only question I have is, can anyone seriously take credit for it in Russia with a straight face. "No comrade, I only made meme of Hillary... The whole Mueller thing was the US all on its own."
- malvosenior 7y ago
  Correct, this never had anything to do with Russia and it has everything to do with Trump. The political and media establishment couldn't handle an outsider winning the presidency so it was they that have gone full blast on propaganda for the past 3 years.
willis936 7y ago
That is a naively optimistic statement. If marketing didn’t work then billions wouldn’t be spent on it.
- malvosenior 7y ago
  Yet it was Clinton who spent far more than anyone on marketing and Russia spent pretty much nothing. Only here we are talking about the impact "Russia" had and ignoring that the tens of millions Clinton spent didn't accomplish her goal.
  - willis936 7y ago
    And this somehow isn’t evidence of the effectiveness of undisclosed campaigns based around lies presented as truth? All Clinton did wrong was not involve foreign governments to operate guerrilla smear campaigns. Oh wait. That isn’t wrong. What are you arguing in favor of again?
    - malvosenior 7y ago
      Clinton not winning the election isn’t proof of Russian interference.
      - willis936 7y ago
        It isn’t not proof either. It seems rather strange to posit that dollars spent is the only factor dictating the effectiveness of marketing.
        repolfx 7y ago
        Your position is unfalsifiable. If there had been Russian advertising at scale, it's proof of foreign interference. If there's basically no spend at all, that's still proof of foreign interference because dollar spend doesn't matter. Look, the whole Russia angle is a hoax. When put under enormous external and internal political pressure (remember Twitter/FB are filled with Trump haters), all they could come up with was a tiny number of ads labelled "Russian" that appeared to support nobody in particular. Hardly anyone saw them, so they can't have had much impact. And was that some plot directed by Putin or just ads by people who happened to be Russian? It's never made clear. Back when Obama was in power and there was Citizen's United, he said words to the effect of "we must consider changing the constitution to limit political spending" and the Clinton wing of politics was spitting bullets about how in future Republicans would just buy elections outright. Then Trump came along and beat Clinton, despite being outspent 2:1. Clinton's campaign steamrollered Trump's financially yet still lost. The whole theory of elections that had been pushed until that point, that marketing spend determines victory, it was just completely invalidated overnight. Democrats who couldn't psychologically explain voter disagreement via policy arguments could no longer explain rejection as a function of ad spend either, so had to come up something new - hence, this spectre of "foreign interference", as if Putin has some kind of mind control rays.
- DuskStar 7y ago
  Billions are spent on it, which makes it silly to say that the millions spent by Russia were a significant factor. Either Russian ad spend is magically hundreds of times more effective than domestic, or it didn't matter.
loceng 7y ago
"No measurable effect" is a weak argument - especially considering we're talking about it, and it massively influenced the narrative - amplified by the mainstream media, just like Trump used effectively. "They vote for who they want to vote for" - you understand manipulation is a thing, right? And that people will believe lies, and that people are often irrational - and therefore when they "decide" who to vote for it might not be logical and based on whatever manipulative messaging, propaganda, they've heard over and over again?
- malvosenior 7y ago
  If someone wants to claim that Russia made a measurable impact on the 2016 election with $100k ad spend, then they're going to have to provide proof.
  - loceng 7y ago
    I just pointed to proof - the fact that you're ignoring or dismissing it doesn't change that.
    - malvosenior 7y ago
      I must have missed your link to proof? I don't see it in your comment.
      - loceng 7y ago
        First how about you define what you mean by measurable, then we can see how you're gatekeeping the use of that term. Then define what you mean by impact to see how you're gatekeeping that quantification. Then maybe there can be a conversation.
        malvosenior 7y ago
        It's actually on the people claiming that Russia had a measurable impact on the election to provide some sort of proof of that claim.

peterhadlaw 7y ago

The funniest thing is, no one talks about this, but if the "goal" was to sew discord... My goodness someone "in the Kremlin" should be getting a promotion for their exceptionally well done job. I mean how many YEARS and millions of dollars has the US wasted chasing after this ghost of Russian interference? If you want to calculate the ROI from a few thousand dollars to how much hysteria followed suit, it's insane. The only question I have is, can anyone seriously take credit for it in Russia with a straight face. "No comrade, I only made meme of Hillary... The whole Mueller thing was the US all on its own."

malvosenior 7y ago
Correct, this never had anything to do with Russia and it has everything to do with Trump. The political and media establishment couldn't handle an outsider winning the presidency so it was they that have gone full blast on propaganda for the past 3 years.

willis936 7y ago

That is a naively optimistic statement. If marketing didn’t work then billions wouldn’t be spent on it.

malvosenior 7y ago
Yet it was Clinton who spent far more than anyone on marketing and Russia spent pretty much nothing. Only here we are talking about the impact "Russia" had and ignoring that the tens of millions Clinton spent didn't accomplish her goal.
- willis936 7y ago
  And this somehow isn’t evidence of the effectiveness of undisclosed campaigns based around lies presented as truth? All Clinton did wrong was not involve foreign governments to operate guerrilla smear campaigns. Oh wait. That isn’t wrong. What are you arguing in favor of again?
  - malvosenior 7y ago
    Clinton not winning the election isn’t proof of Russian interference.
    - willis936 7y ago
      It isn’t not proof either. It seems rather strange to posit that dollars spent is the only factor dictating the effectiveness of marketing.
      - repolfx 7y ago
        Your position is unfalsifiable. If there had been Russian advertising at scale, it's proof of foreign interference. If there's basically no spend at all, that's still proof of foreign interference because dollar spend doesn't matter. Look, the whole Russia angle is a hoax. When put under enormous external and internal political pressure (remember Twitter/FB are filled with Trump haters), all they could come up with was a tiny number of ads labelled "Russian" that appeared to support nobody in particular. Hardly anyone saw them, so they can't have had much impact. And was that some plot directed by Putin or just ads by people who happened to be Russian? It's never made clear. Back when Obama was in power and there was Citizen's United, he said words to the effect of "we must consider changing the constitution to limit political spending" and the Clinton wing of politics was spitting bullets about how in future Republicans would just buy elections outright. Then Trump came along and beat Clinton, despite being outspent 2:1. Clinton's campaign steamrollered Trump's financially yet still lost. The whole theory of elections that had been pushed until that point, that marketing spend determines victory, it was just completely invalidated overnight. Democrats who couldn't psychologically explain voter disagreement via policy arguments could no longer explain rejection as a function of ad spend either, so had to come up something new - hence, this spectre of "foreign interference", as if Putin has some kind of mind control rays.
DuskStar 7y ago
Billions are spent on it, which makes it silly to say that the millions spent by Russia were a significant factor. Either Russian ad spend is magically hundreds of times more effective than domestic, or it didn't matter.

loceng 7y ago

"No measurable effect" is a weak argument - especially considering we're talking about it, and it massively influenced the narrative - amplified by the mainstream media, just like Trump used effectively. "They vote for who they want to vote for" - you understand manipulation is a thing, right? And that people will believe lies, and that people are often irrational - and therefore when they "decide" who to vote for it might not be logical and based on whatever manipulative messaging, propaganda, they've heard over and over again?

malvosenior 7y ago
If someone wants to claim that Russia made a measurable impact on the 2016 election with $100k ad spend, then they're going to have to provide proof.
- loceng 7y ago
  I just pointed to proof - the fact that you're ignoring or dismissing it doesn't change that.
  - malvosenior 7y ago
    I must have missed your link to proof? I don't see it in your comment.
    - loceng 7y ago
      First how about you define what you mean by measurable, then we can see how you're gatekeeping the use of that term. Then define what you mean by impact to see how you're gatekeeping that quantification. Then maybe there can be a conversation.
      - malvosenior 7y ago
        It's actually on the people claiming that Russia had a measurable impact on the election to provide some sort of proof of that claim.