TL/DR [UPDATED]
Okay, so there’s this new book coming out that explains …
In two hundred and twenty-four pages of extremely dry prose, with four appendixes of charts and graphs and fifty-four pages of footnotes, Jamieson makes a strong case that, in 2016, “Russian masterminds” pulled off a technological and political coup. Moreover, she concludes, the American media “inadvertently helped them achieve their goals.”
I spent the whole damn morning reading this article in the New Yorker. Yeah, I read the whole thing and it scares the beejesus out of me. I know the term “Russian masterminds” sounds like something you’d hear on shortwave radio, but damn, y’all, this is the science part of political science.
You might want to at least skim over it and see that the Russians didn’t have to hack the voter files. They hacked voter minds. And they did it the way we teach people to canvass voters. Nothing helps get out voters better than being contacted by someone people identify with or know personally.
Remember how weird it was when Mark Zuckerberg suddenly started touring the country and dropping hints that he’s running for president last summer? Zuckerberg has the keys to the kingdom and is likely to have proof of any coordination between the White House and the Russians. My theory: Zuckerberg knows how it works and had a sudden brief thought that he could get elected president by using Facebook.
I need to go read something funny because I am creeped-out by this.
UPDATE:
Okay, I found it.
It made me laugh. Russian teevee is defending the size of Trump’s … uh, little hands.
Linky no worky! I’m guessing it’s the Ronan Farrow article?
1The term ‘sheeple’ comes to mind…
2Thank you! I think I fixed it.
3I haven’t read the article yet — I’m pretty apprehensive about doing so at all, but I will. Better to know. I guess.
But still, I’ve had this related theory for a while now:
I don’t believe the Russians started their shenanigans in 2015 or whatever. I think they started long before that.
1] When did computers start showing up in almost every household and the internet really take off? I’d say the early 1990’s.
2] When did this country really begin splitting apart — this time, anyway? Iirc, it was sometime around the mid-1990s.
3] How is Russia managing the feat? Computers / internet.
I believe Putin put his plan into motion at the very instant he had the means to do so. It just took us this long to figure it out.
How many members of Congress have, unwittingly or not, received Russia’s help? How many governors, attorneys general, mayors, members of the electoral college?
I certainly do not rule out the idea that Rick Snyder of Michigan received its help and was even complicit.
41] After what he has been doing to his state, he got voted in a SECOND time?
2] He sure does seem to like him some authoritarian methods.
. . 2a] Stomp on the poor and promote the rich. That sure sounds like Michigan these days — and Russia — and DC.
Two Crows, like I said before, the Russians think very, very, very long term. Think back before Yelsin and even Gorbachov. Yeah. I know. That would be the end of the Second World War when Russia was down to nothing due to invasions et al. The fact that such events did not stop them should make us all look under our beds at night.
5two crows says: “2] When did this country really begin splitting apart — this time, anyway? Iirc, it was sometime around the mid-1990s.”
That is the time period when Flush Limpballs and FuxNooz really got started on their traitorous path of brainwashing a huge segment of the ‘Murikkkan public.
FuxNooz-FNC began in Oct 1996, Limpballs radio show started in the 1980’s, but really hit it after WJClinton became President and presented a large target for the RWNJ’s.
Remember that a young Brett Kavanaugh was already established enough in those circles to have been selected as one of Rethug SI Ken Starr’s prime staff members for the Clinton witch hunt. Kavanaugh was actually mostly in charge of pursuing the sexual scandal issues. He was apparently already a recognized highly qualified expert in the field…
6Meant to conclude with: “a self-taught sexual escapade expert.”
7@ Maggie: Yep, Putin and many before him think very long term. It’s certain they were up to their tricks BEFORE the 1990’s but it got a lot easier and, in fact, able to be faster moving at that point.
And @ Sandridge: one has to wonder how many of those folks knew exactly on whose behalf they were working. Hey, if they can count on a high-ranking position in the New Order — why not?
8It worked for Trump didn’t it? And Snyder? And Scott Walker? How the hell do these guys keep getting elected if they’re not taking a page from Russia’s book — even getting direct help from them?
Remember when the size of the president’s junk didn’t need to be defended by the Russians, or anyone else? Come on, folks, it was only TWO YEARS AGO.
9The Russians would know about that. They do have the pee tapes.
10I thought the US started splitting and going to hell (metaphorically speaking) in 1980, when the “religious” right wing got their boy Ronnie, the divorced ex-actor, elected over the actual religious Jimmy Carter. I didn’t think the Soviets had anything to do with that, but I’m open to rational correction.
11two crows:
12Lakoff has said that repugnantcans started investing in conservative infrastructure before we ever heard of Vlad the Donnie Impaler. But your timeline seems to me to be the same as the timeline when electronic voting machines started gaining popularity. Maybe paranoid. But I don’t think so.