The 45th POTUS - Donald J. Trump

[bune]

I do government travel frequently for various people and we are required to always pick the cheapest flight.

I'm reminded of a sample from a Beastie Boys song:

Shit, if this is gonna be that kind of party, I'm gonna stick my dick in the mashed potatoes

[dimejinky99]

[Bi_3]

Russia paid for Facebook ads promoting Jill Stein: ‘Trust me, it’s not a wasted vote’
https://www.rawstory.com/2017/09/russia ... -vote/amp/

We're all shocked, I'm sure.

Russian-funded Facebook ads purchased during the 2016 presidential election promoted Green Party candidate Jill Stein as well as then-candidate Donald Trump and Democratic primary candidate Bernie Sanders, said Politico on Wednesday.

“Other advertisements paid for by shadowy Russian buyers criticized Hillary Clinton and promoted Donald Trump. Some backed Bernie Sanders and his platform even after his presidential campaign had ended, according to a person with knowledge of the ads,” wrote Politico’s Josh Dawsey.

Dawsey reported that the Stein ad he saw was placed late in the campaign and played upon some liberals’ belief that Clinton is too hawkish and would lead the U.S. into war with Iran.

“Choose peace and vote for Jill Stein,” said the ad. “Trust me. It’s not a wasted vote. … The only way to take our country back is to stop voting for the corporations and banks that own us. #GrowaSpineVoteJillStein.”

I haven’t really been following this story but I do have a question I haven’t seen answered anywhere... does anyone believe that only Russia was engaged in this?

First of all, by definition Americans were the key assets/actors used to detonate this bomb. So there's that.

Beyond that, it depends on if you are referring to:

1. Spending decades developing assets among the wealthy and influential in another country.
2. Using controlled human assets to funnel money directly into a rival nation’s election.
3. Creating volumes of fake “local” accounts in order to sow distrust and promote nationalism.
4. Utilizing hacking as a method of information acquisition and on-site propagandizing.
5. Hosting, creating, and/or directly influencing media organizations in order to prevent a candidate you dislike from winning an election.
6. Using the above platforms, and others, to incite violence.

Because I’d say the answer is “some of those things are used by some actors some of the time, and a few of them are used by most or all influential nations.” But few nations have the combination of totally centralized authoritarian control, wealth of technical talent, financial malleability, cultural enmity, and existential paranoia that was necessary for Russia to dig this far into both American and European politics.

I'm sure China, NK, and all manner of other places engage in some of this. I'm sure we do, too. Just not all of it and not full on.

We've all been playing the floor is lava with 21st century information manipulation, and Russia brought in actual lava.

#5?

It seems like would have been smart for the RNC to have created targeted ads using platforms like Facebook to sow discord amongst the warring factions on the blue team (and vice-versa). Covertly of course.

[Electromatic]

I do government travel frequently for various people and we are required to always pick the cheapest flight.

I'm reminded of a sample from a Beastie Boys song:

Shit, if this is gonna be that kind of party, I'm gonna stick my dick in the mashed potatoes

Ha ha! Classic.

I know how it is at the lower levels, all the more reason it's nonsense the upper level appointees who are already ridiculously wealthy can't buy their own flights. I don't mind paying for travel... it's necessary, but don't treat Bune one way while bypassing security and actually having pleasant air travel.

[McParadigm]

Russia paid for Facebook ads promoting Jill Stein: ‘Trust me, it’s not a wasted vote’
https://www.rawstory.com/2017/09/russia ... -vote/amp/

We're all shocked, I'm sure.

Russian-funded Facebook ads purchased during the 2016 presidential election promoted Green Party candidate Jill Stein as well as then-candidate Donald Trump and Democratic primary candidate Bernie Sanders, said Politico on Wednesday.

“Other advertisements paid for by shadowy Russian buyers criticized Hillary Clinton and promoted Donald Trump. Some backed Bernie Sanders and his platform even after his presidential campaign had ended, according to a person with knowledge of the ads,” wrote Politico’s Josh Dawsey.

Dawsey reported that the Stein ad he saw was placed late in the campaign and played upon some liberals’ belief that Clinton is too hawkish and would lead the U.S. into war with Iran.

“Choose peace and vote for Jill Stein,” said the ad. “Trust me. It’s not a wasted vote. … The only way to take our country back is to stop voting for the corporations and banks that own us. #GrowaSpineVoteJillStein.”

I haven’t really been following this story but I do have a question I haven’t seen answered anywhere... does anyone believe that only Russia was engaged in this?

First of all, by definition Americans were the key assets/actors used to detonate this bomb. So there's that.

Beyond that, it depends on if you are referring to:

1. Spending decades developing assets among the wealthy and influential in another country.
2. Using controlled human assets to funnel money directly into a rival nation’s election.
3. Creating volumes of fake “local” accounts in order to sow distrust and promote nationalism.
4. Utilizing hacking as a method of information acquisition and on-site propagandizing.
5. Hosting, creating, and/or directly influencing media organizations in order to prevent a candidate you dislike from winning an election.
6. Using the above platforms, and others, to incite violence.

Because I’d say the answer is “some of those things are used by some actors some of the time, and a few of them are used by most or all influential nations.” But few nations have the combination of totally centralized authoritarian control, wealth of technical talent, financial malleability, cultural enmity, and existential paranoia that was necessary for Russia to dig this far into both American and European politics.

I'm sure China, NK, and all manner of other places engage in some of this. I'm sure we do, too. Just not all of it and not full on.

We've all been playing the floor is lava with 21st century information manipulation, and Russia brought in actual lava.

#5?

Are you asking what I'm referring to?

Spoiler: show

https://www.salon.com/2017/09/22/how-ma ... a_partner/

Drudge has for years used his site as a web traffic pipeline for Russian propaganda sites, directing his massive audience to nearly 400 stories from RT.com and fellow Russian-government-run English-language news sites SputnikNews.com and TASS.com since the beginning of 2012, according to a Media Matters review. Those numbers spiked in 2016, when Drudge collectively linked to the three sites 122 times.

RT and Sputnik News are part of what the Times' Jim Rutenberg has termed “the most effective propaganda operation of the 21st century so far,” a coordinated network of state-controlled TV and online media outlets and social media accounts that take advantage of the traditional protections of Western liberal democracies to undermine public confidence in the governments of those nations.

http://www.motherjones.com/politics/201 ... -theories/

Key to this equation have been RT and Sputnik international, two Russian state-sponsored news outlets. Both reach only relatively small audiences in the US (RT is estimated to reach about 8 million people via cable television), but their impact has been magnified greatly online, with their stories reposted on what Watts calls “gray” conspiracy sites like Breitbart News and InfoWars. Twitter bots and other social media accounts further amplify the stories. And in several cases, Trump or his associates have directly cited phony Russian propaganda in a speech or interview.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/business ... 32608860bb

The flood of “fake news” this election season got support from a sophisticated Russian propaganda campaign that created and spread misleading articles online with the goal of punishing Democrat Hillary Clinton, helping Republican Donald Trump and undermining faith in American democracy, say independent researchers who tracked the operation.

Russia’s increasingly sophisticated propaganda machinery — including thousands of botnets, teams of paid human “trolls,” and networks of websites and social-media accounts — echoed and amplified right-wing sites across the Internet as they portrayed Clinton as a criminal hiding potentially fatal health problems and preparing to hand control of the nation to a shadowy cabal of global financiers. The effort also sought to heighten the appearance of international tensions and promote fear of looming hostilities with nuclear-armed Russia.

Some players in this online echo chamber were knowingly part of the propaganda campaign, the researchers concluded, while others were “useful idiots” — a term born of the Cold War to describe people or institutions that unknowingly assisted Soviet Union propaganda efforts.

The Russian campaign during this election season, researchers from both groups say, worked by harnessing the online world’s fascination with “buzzy” content that is surprising and emotionally potent, and tracks with popular conspiracy theories about how secret forces dictate world events.

Some of these stories originated with RT and Sputnik, state-funded Russian information services that mimic the style and tone of independent news organizations yet sometimes include false and misleading stories in their reports, the researchers say. On other occasions, RT, Sputnik and other Russian sites used social-media accounts to amplify misleading stories already circulating online, causing news algorithms to identify them as “trending” topics that sometimes prompted coverage from mainstream American news organizations.

[McParadigm]

Increased chatter about Price getting fired.

[wease]

Increased chatter about Price getting fired.

Price possibly fired for using taxpayer dollars on a charter plane while Trump uses taxpayer dollars to pay himself thru his hotels.

[Strat]

Increased chatter about Price getting fired.

Well yea, you gotta drain that swamp!

[McParadigm]

Also looks like opening the ANWR to oil drilling is being prepped by the senate budget.

[McParadigm]

You can't fire me I quit

[McParadigm]

I'm sure he will be deeply missed.

[Strat]

Absolute fucking chaos. Its beautiful.

[Hatfield]

Increased chatter about Price getting fired.

What a skeevy motherf*%#er. He looks like a televangelist.

I feel naive saying this, but this tax bill might be the issue democrats can define themselves with. Trump putting the estate tax on this plan really opens the door for the group of voters in the middle that aren't brainwashed or stupid.

[B]

He resigned.

[B]

Man, I took a non-stop flight for work once almost a decade ago, and I still get shit for it.

How the fuck did the White House let this asshat rack up a million bucks in flights in under a year?

[wease]

Man, I took a non-stop flight for work once almost a decade ago, and I still get shit for it.

How the fuck did the White House let this asshat rack up a million bucks in flights in under a year?

And he's only paying back $52,000

[96583UP]

where is my tax cut

[McParadigm]

Officials Expressed Concerns White House Counsel Would Quit Over Donald Trump-Jared Kushner Meetings

https://www.wsj.com/amp/articles/white- ... 1506727150

WASHINGTON—White House Counsel Don McGahn this summer was so frustrated about the lack of protocols surrounding meetings between President Donald Trump and Jared Kushner, his son-in-law whose activities are under scrutiny in the Russia probe, that West Wing officials expressed concerns the top lawyer would quit, according to people familiar with the conversations.

Mr. McGahn expressed concern that meetings between Mr. Kushner and Mr. Trump could be construed by investigators as an effort to coordinate their stories, three people familiar the matter said.

Two senior White House officials—then-Chief of Staff Reince Priebus and former chief strategist Steve Bannon —urged Mr. McGahn not to resign, according to people familiar with the conversations. One person characterized Mr. McGahn’s frustration as, “Fine, you’re not taking my advice? Why stay?”

[tragabigzanda]

Officials Expressed Concerns White House Counsel Would Quit Over Donald Trump-Jared Kushner Meetings

https://www.wsj.com/amp/articles/white- ... 1506727150

WASHINGTON—White House Counsel Don McGahn this summer was so frustrated about the lack of protocols surrounding meetings between President Donald Trump and Jared Kushner, his son-in-law whose activities are under scrutiny in the Russia probe, that West Wing officials expressed concerns the top lawyer would quit, according to people familiar with the conversations.

Mr. McGahn expressed concern that meetings between Mr. Kushner and Mr. Trump could be construed by investigators as an effort to coordinate their stories, three people familiar the matter said.

Two senior White House officials—then-Chief of Staff Reince Priebus and former chief strategist Steve Bannon —urged Mr. McGahn not to resign, according to people familiar with the conversations. One person characterized Mr. McGahn’s frustration as, “Fine, you’re not taking my advice? Why stay?”

[bune]

The lawyers have lawyers in this White House. WTF.