6 ms·

Everybody around the world does it. In fact, the CIA has been doing it since its inception!

AnimalMuppet 7y ago
Sure. The problem with Russia is twofold: They're doing it really effectively, and they're doing it to us. We haven't ever seen a disinformation campaign that was this effective before. At least, we haven't seen one that was this effective against countries with free media and an educated population. (Though the effectiveness of this attack might lead one to question both the freedom of the media and the educatedness of the population...) Them doing it to us may be "turnabout is fair play", but that doesn't mean that we have to like it, approve of it, or accept it.
- davidwitt415 7y ago
  The Russian Internet Research Agency activity on Facebook was miniscule compared to what was spent by the Clinton and Trump campaigns, not even including PACs. It beggars belief that somehow their 'weird tricks' were so effective and novel that US political advertising consultants -by far the largest and most sophisticated in the world- never figured them out. (Remember Willie Horton? https://www.vox.com/2018/12/1/18121221/george-hw-bush-willie-horton-dog-whistle-politics https://www.vox.com/2018/12/1/18121221/george-hw-bush-willie...) 'Without counting PACs, the top campaigns spent 1,760X more on election ads than one group of Russian meddlers puts the situation into context.' https://techcrunch.com/2017/11/01/russian-facebook-ad-spend/ https://techcrunch.com/2017/11/01/russian-facebook-ad-spend/ 'We haven't ever seen a disinformation campaign that was this effective before.' I think you're right on that one, but not in the way you think; the most effective disinformation campaign in history was waged by the DNC to blame the Russians for everything when they were a.) caught out in throwing the Democratic nomination to Hillary and b.) being so inept at electioneering that they left the door open for Trump to win.
  - lern_too_spel 7y ago
    The amount that they spent on advertising might be small, but the amount that they spent on managing troll accounts stoking conspiracy theories definitely wasn't, with hundreds of accounts removed on multiple platforms. Neither campaign is legally allowed to use that trick, which is evidently very effective by how many people are seen spouting political conspiracy theories these days.
    - lern_too_spel 7y ago
      The fact that the trolling campaign was effective can be seen in GP's erroneous claim that the DNC was "caught out in throwing the Democratic nomination to Hillary." Nobody with any sense would believe that conspiracy theory (Clinton beat Sanders by so many votes that the very idea that the DNC would feel the need to cheat in her favor is laughable) without being bombarded by trolls continuously putting forth that claim.
      - mlspr01 7y ago
        https://www.politico.com/news/2020/01/31/dnc-superdelegates-110083 https://www.politico.com/news/2020/01/31/dnc-superdelegates-... This... They literally changed the rules because people were so upset that the superdelegates went against the popular vote which was for Bernie. Now they want to change them back because he has a chance of winning...
        lern_too_spel 7y ago
        Clinton won the popular vote against Bernie (16,914,722 vs. 13,206,428) by a larger margin than she won the popular vote against Trump (65,853,514 vs. 62,984,828), despite fewer total votes due to Sanders dropping out from such a walloping. The fact that you thought otherwise is the kind of thing only a disinformation trolling campaign can achieve.
- Supermancho 7y ago
  > We haven't ever seen a disinformation campaign that was this effective before Maybe not in your lifetime. How would you know anyway? The search for WMDs in Iraq was a good one. Misinformation has been modus operandi for the political elite forever. Bill Clinton on The Jon Stewart show stating that the US had negative immigration, was as much a lie as any other Bush or Trump has claimed. Bill (and Hillary) are very careful about their misinformation, which was frustrating, admittedly.
  - AftHurrahWinch 7y ago
    https://www.politifact.com/factchecks/2015/jun/22/bill-clinton/bill-clinton-zero-net-migration-mexico-2010/ https://www.politifact.com/factchecks/2015/jun/22/bill-clint... Are you talking about something else?
  - BubRoss 7y ago
    As much of a lie as anything trump has said? He's the most prolific lier in history. He claimed the noise from windmills causes cancer.
  - mlspr01 7y ago
    Forget WMD's what about the first gulf war? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nayirah_testimony https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nayirah_testimony
- draw_down 7y ago
  The really great thing is that now, any political opinion one doesn't care for can simply be ascribed to "Russian bots".
- grandridge 7y ago
  You should be embarrassed by this comment. What metric are you using to say it's really effective. Please tell me what first hand analysis you have other than being told what you want to hear and using that to justify your position. It's almost like you are a victim of... wait for it....misinformation It's funny watching people always accuse the other side of being uneducated.
  - AnimalMuppet 7y ago
    I have no problem with you thinking I'm wrong. But I should be embarrassed? You seem to want to use emotional manipulation to silence those who disagree with you. That doesn't say anything good about your confidence that your opinion will prevail in an open debate. If you've got an argument, give it. Save the emotional manipulation for children. (In fact, don't use it on children, either. Just lose the emotional manipulation altogether.)
    - grandridge 7y ago
      Again you fail to see the irony in your statements
      - AnimalMuppet 7y ago
        Again you fail to contribute anything meaningful in your comment. Can you actually have a meaningful conversation? That's kind of the standard here. Drive-by putdowns are kind of frowned on here.
        grandridge 7y ago
        I made my point. I said you had no first hand knowledge, which you don't, you just repeat what you want to hear. I was not ambiguous. Then you say you could be wrong but then throw a temper tantrum about being accused of being wrong doing to me the very thing you say I shouldn't do. And embarrassed is absolutely appropriate. You aren't arguing something trivial like is Casper is just a glorified drop ship operation. You decided to say the best country in the world had its course forever altered by Russian misinfornation. Do you have an uncle in the gru we don't know about? Then you say we don't do put downs here while endlessly trying to put me down. People like you should be called out for peddling the actual misinformation. Have a good weekend, don't be so sensitive
SonOfKyuss 7y ago
What's your point? Bend over and take it?

Sure. The problem with Russia is twofold: They're doing it really effectively, and they're doing it to us. We haven't ever seen a disinformation campaign that was this effective before. At least, we haven't seen one that was this effective against countries with free media and an educated population. (Though the effectiveness of this attack might lead one to question both the freedom of the media and the educatedness of the population...) Them doing it to us may be "turnabout is fair play", but that doesn't mean that we have to like it, approve of it, or accept it.

davidwitt415 7y ago
The Russian Internet Research Agency activity on Facebook was miniscule compared to what was spent by the Clinton and Trump campaigns, not even including PACs. It beggars belief that somehow their 'weird tricks' were so effective and novel that US political advertising consultants -by far the largest and most sophisticated in the world- never figured them out. (Remember Willie Horton? https://www.vox.com/2018/12/1/18121221/george-hw-bush-willie-horton-dog-whistle-politics https://www.vox.com/2018/12/1/18121221/george-hw-bush-willie...) 'Without counting PACs, the top campaigns spent 1,760X more on election ads than one group of Russian meddlers puts the situation into context.' https://techcrunch.com/2017/11/01/russian-facebook-ad-spend/ https://techcrunch.com/2017/11/01/russian-facebook-ad-spend/ 'We haven't ever seen a disinformation campaign that was this effective before.' I think you're right on that one, but not in the way you think; the most effective disinformation campaign in history was waged by the DNC to blame the Russians for everything when they were a.) caught out in throwing the Democratic nomination to Hillary and b.) being so inept at electioneering that they left the door open for Trump to win.
- lern_too_spel 7y ago
  The amount that they spent on advertising might be small, but the amount that they spent on managing troll accounts stoking conspiracy theories definitely wasn't, with hundreds of accounts removed on multiple platforms. Neither campaign is legally allowed to use that trick, which is evidently very effective by how many people are seen spouting political conspiracy theories these days.
  - lern_too_spel 7y ago
    The fact that the trolling campaign was effective can be seen in GP's erroneous claim that the DNC was "caught out in throwing the Democratic nomination to Hillary." Nobody with any sense would believe that conspiracy theory (Clinton beat Sanders by so many votes that the very idea that the DNC would feel the need to cheat in her favor is laughable) without being bombarded by trolls continuously putting forth that claim.
    - mlspr01 7y ago
      https://www.politico.com/news/2020/01/31/dnc-superdelegates-110083 https://www.politico.com/news/2020/01/31/dnc-superdelegates-... This... They literally changed the rules because people were so upset that the superdelegates went against the popular vote which was for Bernie. Now they want to change them back because he has a chance of winning...
      - lern_too_spel 7y ago
        Clinton won the popular vote against Bernie (16,914,722 vs. 13,206,428) by a larger margin than she won the popular vote against Trump (65,853,514 vs. 62,984,828), despite fewer total votes due to Sanders dropping out from such a walloping. The fact that you thought otherwise is the kind of thing only a disinformation trolling campaign can achieve.
Supermancho 7y ago
> We haven't ever seen a disinformation campaign that was this effective before Maybe not in your lifetime. How would you know anyway? The search for WMDs in Iraq was a good one. Misinformation has been modus operandi for the political elite forever. Bill Clinton on The Jon Stewart show stating that the US had negative immigration, was as much a lie as any other Bush or Trump has claimed. Bill (and Hillary) are very careful about their misinformation, which was frustrating, admittedly.
- AftHurrahWinch 7y ago
  https://www.politifact.com/factchecks/2015/jun/22/bill-clinton/bill-clinton-zero-net-migration-mexico-2010/ https://www.politifact.com/factchecks/2015/jun/22/bill-clint... Are you talking about something else?
- BubRoss 7y ago
  As much of a lie as anything trump has said? He's the most prolific lier in history. He claimed the noise from windmills causes cancer.
- mlspr01 7y ago
  Forget WMD's what about the first gulf war? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nayirah_testimony https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nayirah_testimony
draw_down 7y ago
The really great thing is that now, any political opinion one doesn't care for can simply be ascribed to "Russian bots".
grandridge 7y ago
You should be embarrassed by this comment. What metric are you using to say it's really effective. Please tell me what first hand analysis you have other than being told what you want to hear and using that to justify your position. It's almost like you are a victim of... wait for it....misinformation It's funny watching people always accuse the other side of being uneducated.
- AnimalMuppet 7y ago
  I have no problem with you thinking I'm wrong. But I should be embarrassed? You seem to want to use emotional manipulation to silence those who disagree with you. That doesn't say anything good about your confidence that your opinion will prevail in an open debate. If you've got an argument, give it. Save the emotional manipulation for children. (In fact, don't use it on children, either. Just lose the emotional manipulation altogether.)
  - grandridge 7y ago
    Again you fail to see the irony in your statements
    - AnimalMuppet 7y ago
      Again you fail to contribute anything meaningful in your comment. Can you actually have a meaningful conversation? That's kind of the standard here. Drive-by putdowns are kind of frowned on here.
      - grandridge 7y ago
        I made my point. I said you had no first hand knowledge, which you don't, you just repeat what you want to hear. I was not ambiguous. Then you say you could be wrong but then throw a temper tantrum about being accused of being wrong doing to me the very thing you say I shouldn't do. And embarrassed is absolutely appropriate. You aren't arguing something trivial like is Casper is just a glorified drop ship operation. You decided to say the best country in the world had its course forever altered by Russian misinfornation. Do you have an uncle in the gru we don't know about? Then you say we don't do put downs here while endlessly trying to put me down. People like you should be called out for peddling the actual misinformation. Have a good weekend, don't be so sensitive

SonOfKyuss 7y ago

What's your point? Bend over and take it?