U.S. Politics

[villaglint]

40 minutes ago, Awol said:

 

A fair point. 

Without doubt a fair point when it comes to a global or even moral view but surely it is a ridiculous point for someone to make when they are talking about the integrity of their own democracy. 

 

[Awol]

2 minutes ago, villaglint said:

Without doubt a fair point when it comes to a global or even moral view but surely it is a ridiculous point for someone to make when they are talking about the integrity of their own democracy. 

 

He went to slate the Russians and offer further support in the recruitment of America's new "cyber warriors". 

I just snipped the quote I needed! 

[LondonLax]

[Villaphan04]

not sure if any of y'all have heard about this.

Quote

A day after Chicago police said they were questioning four people about a “sickening” video showing the torture of a mentally disabled teen, a second video has surfaced showing the suspects forcing the young man to drink out of a toilet.

Police have said the 18-year-old victimized in the videos is a northwest suburban resident with special needs who had been reported missing.

In the first 30-minute video, which apparently was posted live on Facebook on Tuesday, the victim is backed into a corner, his mouth duct-taped shut. The victim’s clothes were cut, he was peppered with cigarette ashes, and then his hair cut with a knife until his scalp bled. 

Several people can be seen laughing and eating during the attack, in addition to making disparaging remarks about President-elect Donald Trump and using racially charged language. At one point, while the victim is backed into a corner, someone is heard shouting “F*** Donald Trump. F*** white people.”

Thursday morning, Chicago police confirmed they are investigating a second video, which surfaced on Twitter, and appears to show the suspects grabbing the victim’s head, shoving it into a toilet, and forcing him to drink.

Someone can be heard yelling “Drink that s*** right f***ing now. … Drink the toilet water, b****! Say f*** Trump! Say f*** Trump!”

Chicago police said four people were in custody.

“It’s sickening,” Chicago Police Supt. Eddie Johnson told reporters Wednesday evening about the first video. “It’s makes you wonder what would make individuals treat somebody like that. I’ve been a cop for 28 years, and I’ve seen things that you shouldn’t see in a lifetime, but it still amazes me how you still see things that you just shouldn’t.

“I’m not going to say it shocked me, but it was sickening.”

The incident took place Tuesday in an apartment on the 3400 block of West Lexington on Chicago’s West Side, police said. Officers found the victim wandering the neighborhood in an obvious state of trauma, and soon authorities drew the connection with the disturbing Facebook video.

Police said two men and two women were in custody, and criminal charges were expected. Authorities said the suspects might be charged with kidnapping and/or a hate crime.

Investigators have said the victim knew at least one of the suspects. Police said the victim’s parents had dropped him off at a McDonald’s in Streamwood, and then the suspects brought the victim to Chicago in a stolen van, and tortured him for possibly up to 48 hours.

After the incident, the victim was treated at the hospital, and then went home with his parents in Crystal Lake.

http://chicago.cbslocal.com/2017/01/05/second-torture-video-shows-teen-forced-to-drink-from-toilet/

[tonyh29]

I had but I'm not sure that it's in the right thread ?

i mean I get that these perpetrators were shouting derogatory stuff  about Trump but that's about where the parallels end

this appears to be a race attack rather than anything political ? 

[Villaphan04]

i mean i was not quite sure as to where to post it. Though i think it will be severely politicized by Trump and conservative media soon enough. 

[StefanAVFC]

Still waiting on the pivot from childish narcissist to acting presidential.

Any day now...

Arnie's response...

 

Classy and shows Trump as the child he is.

Edited January 6, 2017 by StefanAVFC

[Davkaus]

Less than 3 weeks until he's president, and he's spending his time picking fights with celebrities who endorsed his opponent, in the election that's already over.

He's good for a laugh.

[maqroll]

1 minute ago, Davkaus said:

Less than 3 weeks until he's president, and he's spending his time picking fights with celebrities who endorsed his opponent, in the election that's already over.

He's good for a laugh.

He's good for a couple of other things too

[StefanAVFC]

Conway is an evil genius but the mask is starting to slip.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-38538002?ns_mchannel=social&ns_campaign=bbc_breaking&ns_source=twitter&ns_linkname=news_central

Quote

Russian President Vladimir Putin sought to help Donald Trump in presidential election, US intelligence report says

This breaking news story is being updated and more details will be published shortly. Please refresh the page for the fullest version.

Oh, what a surprise. I wonder what Trump does now.

Edited January 6, 2017 by StefanAVFC

[StefanAVFC]

The report (Joint effort from CIA/FBI/NSA)

And key points:

• Vladimir Putin ordered an campaign aimed at influencing the outcome of the 2016 election, with a preference for Donald Trump. Their main goals were to reduce faith in American democracy and harm the electability/potential presidency of Hillary Clinton. CIA, FBI, NSA express "high degree of confidence" in this fact.

• Putin and the Russian govt. aspired to help Trump when possible by discrediting Clinton and comparing her to him unfavourably. CIA and FBI have 'high' degree of confidence, NSA is moderately confident.

• The influence campaign evolved its tactics over time, such as changing the focus to undermining Hillary's future presidency when it was presumed she would win.

• Report is based off of information gathered both before and after November 8th.

• The influence campaign followed a strategy that blended covert activities - such as cyber attacks - with more overt efforts by the Russian govt., state-run media, third parties, and paid trolls on social media.

• The influence campaign used cyber attacks against entities and individual members of BOTH political parties.

• CIA, FBI, NSA have high degree of confidence that Russian military intelligence used the 'Guccifer 2.0' persona and DCLeaks website to release information illegally gained via these cyber attacks.

• Russian intelligence obtained and access to elements of multiple local and state electoral boards. DHS has confirmed that the systems compromised by the Russians WERE NOT involved in vote tallying.

• Russian state-run media contributed to the influence campaign by serving as their mouthpiece and disseminating propaganda from the Kremlin.

The report goes on to detail Russia's motivations for the attacks: to undermine US democracy, to "advance its long-standing agenda against the US-led liberal democratic order" that they believe is a threat to the Russian regime, they believe Trump would be favourable to an international counterterrorism coalition against ISIS, and Putin wanted payback against Clinton because he believes her criticism of him incited the protests in 2011 and 2012.

For the record, this report DOES NOT talk about the possibility of collusion between the Trump campaign and the Russian influence campaign.

The bolded is interesting considering this from his last press conference.

 

[Awol]

While I don't doubt these reports on the Russians, it is distracting very nicely from the content of the leaks themselves. 

They wouldn't have been able to use the information to weaken Hillary if she and the Democrats had been playing with a straight bat. Clearly they were not, both in the integrity of the nomination process and the subsequent election campaign.

The collusion between the Hilary camp and media to try and swing the TV debates should be especially troubling to Americans, given what an important role they play in the election. 

When you have journalists from major US titles sending their copy to her campaign for their approval prior to publication, that's a big problem.

Add that to the investigative journalism that exposed the recruitment and payment of agitators (including the mentally ill) to start trouble at Trump rallies and it all adds up to something quite sinister.

So when the agencies accuse the Russians of trying to undermine the integrity of free and fair elections the real question is, what integrity? 

[villaglint]

Yeah pretty fair point I guess the counter argument would be that a light was directed at DNC which showed bad things but it wasn't directed at the Trump campaign which may have been equally damaging. 

Though now I say it out loud it's difficult to imagine what secrets could have been worse than all the stuff Trump said publicly.

[blandy]

6 hours ago, Awol said:

So when the agencies accuse the Russians of trying to undermine the integrity of free and fair elections the real question is, what integrity? 

Absolutely. There is little or no integrity or accountability. It's all money and shenanigans. What Russia did was expose some of that on the Democrat side, only, whilst ignoring that on the Republican side, to manipulate, or influence the outcome.

Had they for example hacked trumps tax returns, or the similar dirty tricks in the Republicans own efforts to rig things the world and the US would have been better informed about the whole rotten system.

[OutByEaster?]

12 hours ago, StefanAVFC said:

The report goes on to detail Russia's motivations for the attacks: to undermine US democracy, to "advance its long-standing agenda against the US-led liberal democratic order" that they believe is a threat to the Russian regime, they believe Trump would be favourable to an international counterterrorism coalition against ISIS, and Putin wanted payback against Clinton because he believes her criticism of him incited the protests in 2011 and 2012.

 

So, I guess this is the crux of it - and to understand this sentence we'd need to define what US Agencies mean by the following terms:

• US Democracy
• The US-led liberal democratic order
• The Russian regime
• An international counterterrorism coalition against ISIS

For the record, for me, these phrases mean 

• US Global hegemony for US corporate interest
• US corporate interest
• Russian corporate interest through oligarchs
• Enabling a slice of the middle east cash pie for both US corporate interest and Russian business interest

The US elections have been rigged by US corporate interest for decades, I guess it was only a matter of time before global interests decided they wanted some say in it to. When you sell your democracy to the market, don't be surprised if the market applies it's regular doctrines to the process.

As motivations to do it go, those are good ones - in terms of Trumps protectionist agenda, I'm not clear on how it helps him, but his plans are so confusing, it's not entirely clear what he's up to.

 

[Awol]

39 minutes ago, blandy said:

Had they for example hacked trumps tax returns, or the similar dirty tricks in the Republicans own efforts to rig things the world and the US would have been better informed about the whole rotten system.

Allegedly they tried and failed to get into the RNC, but it wouldn't be a surprise if they had the goods on Trump (I think we covered the possibilities a few pages ago).  

If things don't progress to Mr Putin's liking there could still be another data dump at a time chosen for maximum effect.

It will be interesting to see whether NSA et al now propose taking control of RNC and DNC cyber security, conveniently giving them even more power over the system. 

 

[Awol]

39 minutes ago, OutByEaster? said:

So, I guess this is the crux of it - and to understand this sentence we'd need to define what US Agencies mean by the following terms:

• US Democracy
• The US-led liberal democratic order
• The Russian regime
• An international counterterrorism coalition against ISIS

For the record, for me, these phrases mean 

• US Global hegemony for US corporate interest
• US corporate interest
• Russian corporate interest through oligarchs
• Enabling a slice of the middle east cash pie for both US corporate interest and Russian business interest

The US elections have been rigged by US corporate interest for decades, I guess it was only a matter of time before global interests decided they wanted some say in it to. When you sell your democracy to the market, don't be surprised if the market applies it's regular doctrines to the process.

As motivations to do it go, those are good ones - in terms of Trumps protectionist agenda, I'm not clear on how it helps him, but his plans are so confusing, it's not entirely clear what he's up to.

 

A wonderfully cynical analysis! 

[blandy]

2 hours ago, Awol said:

It will be interesting to see whether NSA et al now propose taking control of RNC and DNC cyber security, conveniently giving them even more power over the system. 

I suspect that would be unconstitutional, or whatever the terms is. The whole DNC leaks etc. and half of Trump's claims about Clinton emanate from the numpties not using secure systems and being fairly foolish wrt security. Maybe they'll learn a few lessons.

[Awol]

31 minutes ago, blandy said:

I suspect that would be unconstitutional, or whatever the terms is. The whole DNC leaks etc. and half of Trump's claims about Clinton emanate from the numpties not using secure systems and being fairly foolish wrt security. Maybe they'll learn a few lessons.

The Constitution has morphed more into guidelines in recent years and as the saying goes, never look a gift horse in the mouth..

It would also be a convenient way to further reduce public  scrutiny. 'Sorry Mr Journo, you're not cleared to ask those questions..'

Classify both Party's comms as CNI and place under the remit of Homeland Security. All they need to do then is burn down the Reichstag, I mean Congress. 

[blandy]

@Awol  very good.