Russian and alt-right Interference in democracies.

Peregrinus · 11-01-2017 7:00am

Hank Scorpio wrote: »

I agree it's impossible to know for sure but I think it's highly unlikely to be true if Wikileaks says it's bogus. The report is full of slander.

From what I gather - I haven't followed this story too closely - it's based on a report compiled by a private security consultant commissioned by political opponents of Trump. The security consultant is supposed to have some credibility, but no doubt there is more than one view as to exactly how much credibility he has.

The report runs to 35 pages and almost certainly contains a variety of allegations about different events and circumstances which are drawn from a variety of sources.

This raises the possiblity that some of the allegations are true, some of them are somewhat true or have some foundation, and some have little or no truth. The truth of each of the allegations is likely to be independent of the truth of other allegations drawn from different sources. I think this is more likely than all of the allegations being gospel truth, or all of them being complete fabrications.

Being the pessimist that I am, I work on the principle that the more I would like a particular allegation to be true, the less likely it is that it is actually true.

Hank Scorpio · 11-01-2017 7:10am

Here's what the guy wrote from buzzfeed who gave the go ahead to publish it. That's a legit link.

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/C13V2sCWQAA9EYo.jpg:large

Hank Scorpio · 11-01-2017 7:17am

https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2017/01/michael-cohen-it-is-fake-news-meant-to-malign-mr-trump/512762/

Reached by telephone on Tuesday night, Cohen denied the dossier’s allegations.

The story is “totally fake, totally inaccurate,” Cohen said.

“I’m telling you emphatically that I’ve not been to Prague, I’ve never been to Czech [Republic], I’ve not been to Russia,” Cohen said. “The story is completely inaccurate, it is fake news meant to malign Mr. Trump.”

Cohen said that during the time the report places him in Prague, he was actually with his son visiting USC and meeting with the baseball coach. A USC baseball source confirmed Tuesday night that Cohen and his son had visited USC on August 29th. Cohen said that he was in Los Angeles from the 23rd through the 29th of August, and that the rest of the month he was in New York.

ligerdub · 11-01-2017 10:24am

CNN and Buzzfeed...

Hmmmmm....convincing! I'm surprised they are still in business. That whole story is obviously total bollox.

johnp001 · 11-01-2017 11:43am

Alex Christoforou writes this morning on Comey's testimony to Congress yesterday:

The Duran wrote:

FBI Director James Comey admits that the FBI was refused access to DNC servers, “multiple times”
FBI Director James Comey sat in the hot seat to testify to congress about the “fake news” Russian hacks.
In his testimony Comey had to admit that “Russian hackers” did not break into the servers of the Trump campaign or the RNC.
Comey then said that when the FBI wanted to check DNC servers (Hillary Clinton campaign servers) regarding “Russia hacking”, the FBI was denied access, not once, but multiple times.
Comey testified that the FBI had to rely on a “private company” to decide whether the DNC servers where hacked. That private company is Crowdstrike…
It should be noted that Crowdstrike had three funders: 1) Warburg Pincus. Tim Geithner, is president of Warburg Pincus, former Secretary of Treasury under Obama, and formerly worked in the Clinton administration… Uh-oh. Warburg Pincus was a contributor to the DNC and Clinton campaign. 2) Accel Partners is also a Crowdstrike funder. According to the Clinton Foundation website, Accel is a venture capitalist partner in the Endeavor Investor Network created by the Foundation. Uh-oh. 3) And the last funder of Crowdstrike is Google Capital, now CapitalG, managed under David Drummond of Google who was instrumental in ‘realigning’ Google search engines to favor Hillary’s campaign. Big uh-oh!
So what we actually have is the authority of one company, Crowdstrike, which derived all of its funding from venture capitalists linked to Hillary Clinton and the Clinton Foundation. Funny, they didn’t hide their tracks very well for a high powered security breach company.
More...

demfad · 11-01-2017 1:33pm

Here is the Guardian report into the ongoing FISA FBI investigation about the leaked report.https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2017/jan/10/fbi-chief-given-dossier-by-john-mccain-alleging-secret-trump-russia-contacts#img-1
Here is the leaked report. https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/3259984-Trump-Intelligence-Allegations.html
Here is the original Mother Jones Article way back in October:
http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2016/10/veteran-spy-gave-fbi-info-alleging-russian-operation-cultivate-donald-trump

demfad · 11-01-2017 4:32pm

https://www.neweurope.eu/article/sweden-pm-warns-russian-interference-swedish-elections/

Sweden PM warns of Russian interference in Swedish elections.

ligerdub · 11-01-2017 6:11pm

Anything bad that happens now: blame the Russians.

It's bonkers at this stage.

BabyCheeses · 11-01-2017 6:41pm

ligerdub wrote: »

Anything bad that happens now: blame the Russians.

It's bonkers at this stage.

Even Trump has joined in.

KingBrian2 · 11-01-2017 6:46pm

ligerdub wrote: »

Anything bad that happens now: blame the Russians.

It's bonkers at this stage.

Plenty of world leader to blame from the Americans not just the Russians. Anyone that gets in their way is deemed a potential hacker like China, Iran all countries Trump himself said could have hacked his country.

ligerdub · 11-01-2017 6:51pm

Billy86 wrote: »

So, this just happened... https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/3259984-Trump-Intelligence-Allegations.html

I'm assuming that you've had the necessary time to reflect on this that you've now caught on with the rest of us that the story is a complete pile of horse****e?

Count Dooku · 11-01-2017 6:58pm

Good reply from Trump to liberal liars
https://twitter.com/FoxNews/status/819232076478091265
Looks like CIA needs a big purge

demfad · 11-01-2017 7:15pm

Count Dooku wrote: »

Good reply from Trump to liberal liars
https://twitter.com/FoxNews/status/819232076478091265
Looks like CIA needs a big purge

Liberal Liars? What exactly do you mean by that. I am liberal. Am i a Liar?

BuilderPlumber · 11-01-2017 8:07pm

KingBrian2 wrote: »

Plenty of world leader to blame from the Americans not just the Russians. Anyone that gets in their way is deemed a potential hacker like China, Iran all countries Trump himself said could have hacked his country.

It all does not add up. I don't know who is maddest: the anti-Trump crowd or Trump himself. It's all a mess.

Then one reads about an event where supposedly 'Iranian' navy boats speed at an American warship in the Persian gulf and the Americans fire warning shots. This is like something out of James Bond: someone tampered with the satellites to give the Iranians an illusion the Americans were in Iran's waters or else someone bribed underpaid Iranian navy personnel to do a job for anti-Iran forces. One thing for certain is Ali Khamenei was not behind this as it is against his interests. It would be too risky to invite a war he cannot win. On the other hand Trump and/or Saudi Arabia could arrange it as a warning to impose a new deal where Iran has to contract with Trump enterprises by showing force but getting 'Iran' to initiate either by tricking them or bribing navy personnel. I have a feeling Trump and Putin could divide up a country like Iran between them.

KingBrian2 · 11-01-2017 8:17pm

BuilderPlumber wrote: »

It all does not add up. I don't know who is maddest: the anti-Trump crowd or Trump himself. It's all a mess.

Then one reads about an event where supposedly 'Iranian' navy boats speed at an American warship in the Persian gulf and the Americans fire warning shots. This is like something out of James Bond: someone tampered with the satellites to give the Iranians an illusion the Americans were in Iran's waters or else someone bribed underpaid Iranian navy personnel to do a job for anti-Iran forces. One thing for certain is Ali Khamenei was not behind this as it is against his interests. It would be too risky to invite a war he cannot win. On the other hand Trump and/or Saudi Arabia could arrange it as a warning to impose a new deal where Iran has to contract with Trump enterprises by showing force but getting 'Iran' to initiate either by tricking them or bribing navy personnel. I have a feeling Trump and Putin could divide up a country like Iran between them.

It is eerily similar to the incident when the Iranians took hostages a few years back. British i believe. I don't reckon that will happen again since we have the Iran deal so like you say it goes against Iran to be flexing its prowess in the region. They need the international trade.

BuilderPlumber · 11-01-2017 8:29pm

KingBrian2 wrote: »

It is eerily similar to the incident when the Iranians took hostages a few years back. British i believe. I don't reckon that will happen again since we have the Iran deal so like you say it goes against Iran to be flexing its prowess in the region. They need the international trade.

There's always other actors at play in all these things. It is anti-Iran forces posing as working for Iran. America, Israel and Saudi Arabia could arrange pretty much anything they like between them.

PopePalpatine · 11-01-2017 8:51pm

demfad wrote: »

Liberal Liars? What exactly do you mean by that. I am liberal. Am i a Liar?

Well obviously, because you won't submit to Trump or his Russian master. :rolleyes:

demfad · 11-01-2017 8:57pm

ligerdub wrote: »

I'm assuming that you've had the necessary time to reflect on this that you've now caught on with the rest of us that the story is a complete pile of horse****e?

The story that the American Intelligence agencies had information serious enough to pass to the President and President elect is clearly true. Here is how this report got there from a trusted ex M16 operator.

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2017/jan/11/trump-russia-report-opposition-research-john-mccain

As you will read the lenght of time the FBI had this from the operative with no apparent movement led him to believe that a possible cover up was involved. Via intermediaries John McCain was then involved and he brought the report to the FBI. The British secret service also have one.

CNN were correct to report this as it is extremely newsworthy.
The leaked document is raw Intel. So what happens is that it would get verified and some parts of it can be corroborated others cant. The fact that the Intel agencies showed the report means that they believe in the strenght of the sources, meaning much of it may be true.
There is a media debate now as to whether Buzzfeed should have released this.

Trump has still questions to answer. Most of them could be answered by him simply releasing his tax returns. He still refuses, and still refuses to outright condemn Russia.......

ligerdub · 11-01-2017 11:04pm

If you're standing over this story as true then I think you need to ask yourself serious questions.

Jimoslimos · 12-01-2017 2:22am

ligerdub wrote: »

If you're standing over this story as true then I think you need to ask yourself serious questions.

So we've gone from the dossier itself being a fake (invented by 4chan apparently) to it being real but the story is untrue?

What next, the story is correct but the minutiae being wrong, e.g. it was three prostitutes instead of two...in a different hotel?

12-01-2017 4:46am

I'm sure it was reported to Trump and Obama because 1. McCain submitted it and 2. It was going to turn into a media sensation no matter what.

If Wikileaks released this, their reputation would be shot forever. And right now, it looks far more like 4chan that anything else. Just look at the report..

Pissing on hookers in the bed Obama stayed in. Do you know why we're not hearing the Obama administration denouncing Russia for having cameras in his room? Because it's BS.

Anyone who thinks it real is being ridiculous at this point. It's either all true or it's not. You can't just decide the most believable parts are true when we have no idea where it came from.

ligerdub · 12-01-2017 10:01am

Jimoslimos wrote:

So we've gone from the dossier itself being a fake (invented by 4chan apparently) to it being real but the story is untrue?

Jimoslimos wrote:

What next, the story is correct but the minutiae being wrong, e.g. it was three prostitutes instead of two...in a different hotel?

It was always absolute bollox.

Gatling · 12-01-2017 10:11am

ligerdub wrote: »

It was always absolute bollox.

Based of what exactly your opinion or the facts

ligerdub · 12-01-2017 10:57am

Gatling wrote: »

Based of what exactly your opinion or the facts

How many red flags do you want? It was smothered in them. Sloppy spelling, sources about sources, so and so claimed, the rather slapstick nature of the actual claims made.

Gatling · 12-01-2017 11:02am

ligerdub wrote: »

How many red flags do you want? It was smothered in them. Sloppy spelling, sources about sources, so and so claimed, the rather slapstick nature of the actual claims made.

So it's only your opinion then ,
I get the feelings there's more to come either with more documents and or audio visually ,
Trump can claim it's fake news but surely he would want his own state agencies to investigate and clear his name publicly,

seamus · 12-01-2017 11:14am

Count Dooku wrote: »

Good reply from Trump to liberal liars
Looks like CIA needs a big purge

Because clearing out government agencies to ensure that everyone was a pro-leader automaton is something that Nazi Germany wouldn't have done?

There should always be some level of tension and conflict between the leaders and the organs of state. This is essential to protect democracy by ensuring that nobody at any level of government believes that they're beyond reproach.

Of course, nobody should act negligently or intentionally to undermine the authority of the government, but there should be no question of state agencies collecting information and monitoring a high-ranking government official if it appears to be necessary. It's essential.

I would hope the Gardai have rather extensive intelligence files on most of our government TDs.

ligerdub · 12-01-2017 11:16am

The ones who are believing it are also basing it on opinion. The burden of proof is with the accuser.

There is however a bit of a smell test you can do with these things. If you're relying on clickbait sites such as Buzzfeed for accurate reporting then I suggest that's a red flag, as well as several other factors I've noted. This story was known to be sitting in the trenches but nobody touched it because it wasn't seen as credible. It's no surprise to me that the ones that cracked were CNN.

Investigating this would be a waste of time and/resources.

seamus · 12-01-2017 12:10pm

ligerdub wrote: »

There is however a bit of a smell test you can do with these things. If you're relying on clickbait sites such as Buzzfeed for accurate reporting then I suggest that's a red flag

Ah, but they're not the original source.

Yes, the veracity of these claims is very suspect, and the source documentation is unverified.

But it would be a mistake to say, "these allegations are false because buzzfeed reported them" - you need to go back to the original source.

It's also important, as others have pointed out, that we don't dismiss an entire dossier because one stupid site decided to print the most salacious parts.

This kind of information gathering exercise gathers absolutely everything, from hard photos and documents, to something some guy said in a bar that was overheard. It's up to the intelligence agents to sift through it and pull out the most useful information.

Buzzfeed have unintentionally thrown Trump a gimme with this one. That dossier may be chocked full of useful information, but they've managed to call the whole thing into question by jumping the gun.

BuilderPlumber · 12-01-2017 2:25pm

Deleted User wrote: »

I'm sure it was reported to Trump and Obama because 1. McCain submitted it and 2. It was going to turn into a media sensation no matter what.

If Wikileaks released this, their reputation would be shot forever. And right now, it looks far more like 4chan that anything else. Just look at the report..

Pissing on hookers in the bed Obama stayed in. Do you know why we're not hearing the Obama administration denouncing Russia for having cameras in his room? Because it's BS.

Anyone who thinks it real is being ridiculous at this point. It's either all true or it's not. You can't just decide the most believable parts are true when we have no idea where it came from.

A lot of this seems to come out of a feud between John McCain and Donald Truimp. The media will go with anything they get and do not care if it is true or not. Exaggerated, biased and outrageous 'news' is what gets reported. The media have way too much power and a too free press is the other extreme of a non-free press.

Mr.Micro · 12-01-2017 2:33pm

One minute the dossier is fact, the next it's fake. It matters not IMO, as anything Trump says means little with regards to the truth, which of course matters little anymore.

As an aside, the irony of the US outrage at the alleged interference by Russia in its affairs. What has the US done/ does in dozens of countries around the globe, interfere often against democracy, in South America, Middle East etc. Oh the irony.

Russian and alt-right Interference in democracies.

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