Exclusive: A cyber-warfare expert sees no technical evidence linking Russia to the Democratic email releases, but The New York Times presses ahead with a new hope that Ukraine can fill the void, reports Robert Parry.
By Robert Parry
The New York Times’ unrelenting anti-Russia bias would be almost comical if the possible outcome were not a nuclear conflagration and maybe the end of life on planet Earth.
New York Times building in New York City. (Photo from Wikipedia)
A classic example of the Times’ one-sided coverage was a front-page article on Thursday expressing the wistful hope that a Ukrainian hacker whose malware was linked to the release of Democratic National Committee (DNC) emails in 2016 could somehow “blow the whistle on Russian hacking.”
Though full of airy suspicions and often reading like a conspiracy theory, the article by Andrew E. Kramer and Andrew Higgins contained one important admission (buried deep inside the “jump” on page A8 in my print edition), a startling revelation especially for those Americans who have accepted the Russia-did-it groupthink as an established fact.
The article quoted Jeffrey Carr, the author of a book on cyber-warfare, referring to a different reality: that the Russia-gate “certainties” blaming the DNC “hack” on Russia’s GRU military intelligence service or Russia’s FSB security agency lack a solid evidentiary foundation.
“There is not now and never has been a single piece of technical evidence produced that connects the malware used in the DNC attack to the GRU, FSB or any agency of the Russian government,” Carr said.
Yet, before that remarkable admission had a chance to sink into the brains of Times’ readers whose thinking has been fattened up on a steady diet of treating the “Russian hack” as flat fact, Times’ editors quickly added that “United States intelligence agencies, however, have been unequivocal in pointing a finger at Russia.”
The Times’ rebuke toward any doubts about Russia-gate was inserted after Carr’s remark although the Times had already declared several times on page 1 that there was really no doubt about Russia’s guilt.
“American intelligence agencies have determined Russian hackers were behind the electronic break-in of the Democratic national Committee,” the Times reported, followed by the assertion that the hacker’s “malware apparently did” get used by Moscow and then another reminder that “Washington is convinced [that the hacking operation] was orchestrated by Moscow.”
By repeating the same point on the inside page, the Times editors seemed to be saying that any deviant views on this subject must be slapped down promptly and decisively.
A Flimsy Assessment
But that gets us back to the problem with the Jan. 6 “Intelligence Community Assessment,” which — contrary to repeated Times’ claims — was not the “consensus” view of all 17 U.S. intelligence agencies, but rather the work of a small group of “hand-picked” analysts from three agencies: the Central Intelligence Agency, Federal Bureau of Investigation and National Security Agency. And, they operated under the watchful eye of President Obama’s political appointees, CIA Director John Brennan and Director of National Intelligence James Clapper, who was the one who called them “hand-picked.”
Then-Director of National Intelligence James Clapper (right) talks with President Barack Obama in the Oval Office, with John Brennan and other national security aides present. (Photo credit: Office of Director of National Intelligence)
Those analysts presented no real evidence to support their assessment, which they acknowledged was not a determination of fact, but rather what amounted to their best guess based on what they perceived to be Russian motives and capabilities.
The Jan. 6 assessment admitted as much, saying its “judgments are not intended to imply that we have proof that shows something to be a fact. Assessments are based on collected information, which is often incomplete or fragmentary, as well as logic, argumentation, and precedents.”
Much of the unclassified version of the report lambasted Russia’s international TV network RT for such offenses as hosting a 2012 presidential debate for third-party candidates excluded from the Republican-Democratic debate, covering the Occupy Wall Street protests, and reporting on dangers from “fracking.” The assessment described those editorial decisions as assaults on American democracy.
But rather than acknowledge the thinness of the Jan. 6 report, the Times – like other mainstream news outlets – treated it as gospel and pretended that it represented a “consensus” of all 17 intelligence agencies even though it clearly never did. (Belatedly, the Times slipped in a correction to that falsehood in one article although continuing to use similar language in subsequent stories so an unsuspecting Times reader would not be aware of how shaky the Russia-gate foundation is.)
Russian President Vladimir Putin and WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange have denied repeatedly that the Russian government was the source of the two batches of Democratic emails released via WikiLeaks in 2016, a point that the Times also frequently fails to acknowledge. (This is not to say that Putin and Assange are telling the truth, but it is a journalistic principle to include relevant denials from parties facing accusations.)
Conspiracy Mongering
The rest of Thursday’s Times article veered from the incomprehensible to the bizarre, as the Times reported that the hacker, known only as “Profexer,” is cooperating with F.B.I. agents inside Ukraine.
President Barack Obama and President Petro Poroshenko of Ukraine talk after statements to the press following their bilateral meeting at the Warsaw Marriott Hotel in Warsaw, Poland, June 4, 2014. (Official White House Photo by Pete Souza)
Yet, the reliance on Ukraine to provide evidence against Russia defies any objective investigative standards. The Ukrainian government is fiercely anti-Russian and views itself as engaged in an “information war” with Putin and his government.
Ukraine’s SBU security service also has been implicated in possible torture, according to United Nations investigators who were denied access to Ukrainian government detention facilities housing ethnic Russian Ukrainians who resisted the violent coup in February 2014, which was spearheaded by neo-Nazis and other extreme nationalists and overthrew elected President Viktor Yanukovych.
The SBU also has been the driving force behind the supposedly “Dutch-led” investigation into the July 17, 2014 shooting down of Malaysia Airlines Flight 17. That inquiry has ignored evidence that a rogue Ukrainian force may have been responsible – not even addressing a Dutch/NATO intelligence report stating that all anti-aircraft missile batteries in eastern Ukraine on that day were under the control of the Ukrainian military – and instead tried to pin the atrocity on Russia, albeit with no suspects yet charged.
In Thursday’s article, the Times unintentionally reveals how fuzzy the case against “Fancy Bear” and “Cozy Bear” – the two alleged Russian government hacking operations – is.
The Times reports: “Rather than training, arming and deploying hackers to carry out a specific mission like just another military unit, Fancy Bear and its twin Cozy Bear have operated more as centers for organization and financing; much of the hard work like coding is outsourced to private and often crime-tainted vendors.”
Further, under the dramatic subhead – “A Bear’s Lair” – the Times reported that no such lair may exist: “Tracking the bear to its lair … has so far proved impossible, not least because many experts believe that no such single place exists.”
Lacking Witnesses
The Times’ article also noted the “absence of reliable witnesses” to resolve the mystery – so to the rescue came the “reliable” regime in Kiev, or as the Times wrote: “emerging from Ukraine is a sharper picture of what the United States believes is a Russian government hacking group.”
Russian President Vladimir Putin, following his address to the UN General Assembly on Sept. 28, 2015. (UN Photo)
The Times then cited various cases of exposed Ukrainian government emails, again blaming the Russians albeit without any real evidence.
The Times suggested some connection between the alleged Russian hackers and a mistaken report on Russia’s Channel 1 about a Ukrainian election, which the Times claimed “inadvertently implicated the government authorities in Moscow.”
The Times’ “proof” in this case was that some hacker dummied a phony Internet page to look like an official Ukrainian election graphic showing a victory by ultra-right candidate, Dmytro Yarosh, when in fact Yarosh polled less than 1 percent. The hacker supposedly sent this “spoof” graphic to Channel 1, which used it.
But such an embarrassing error, which would have no effect on the actual election results, suggests an effort to discredit Channel 1 rather than evidence of a cooperative relationship between the mysterious hacker and the Russian station. The Times, however, made this example a cornerstone in its case against the Russians.
Meanwhile, the Times offered its readers almost no cautionary advice that – in the case of Russia-gate – Ukraine would have every motive to send U.S. investigators in directions harmful to Russia, much as happened with the MH-17 investigation.
So, we can expect that whatever “evidence” Ukraine “uncovers” will be accepted as gospel truth by the Times and much of the U.S. government – and anyone who dares ask inconvenient questions about its reliability will be deemed a “Kremlin stooge” spreading “Russian propaganda.”
Investigative reporter Robert Parry broke many of the Iran-Contra stories for The Associated Press and Newsweek in the 1980s. You can buy his latest book, America’s Stolen Narrative, either in print here or as an e-book (from Amazon and barnesandnoble.com).
Ukraine as a source of objective analysis? The only thing I can’t figure out is: Do these people actually believe their own lies, or is it all deliberate diabolical manipulation of an intellectually disadvantaged population?
now it isn’t just the nytimes but the new yorker as well, with a many pages piece in its current issue that reads like a doctoral thesis written by a gossip columnist and is a hatchet job on assange and in great part accusing him, putin and russia of electing trump..hope you will comment on some of the specifics the writer includes which will probably be convincing to readers of political gossip columns and benefit from informed criticism such as you can provide..i don’t believe any of this crap anyway.
Correction to my post:
“(the NSA certainly wasn’t monitoring the DNC)” s/b
“(the NSA certainly was monitoring the DNC)”
I should also point out that Jeffrey Carr has been saying this exact thing since the events unfolded last summer. In fact, from an email to me, he’s said he’s tired of talking about it.
Jeffrey is absolutely right. NONE of the alleged “evidence” provided by CrowdStrike in any way connects directly back to ANYONE, let alone the Russian government.
Some of it is laughable, such as the notion that the malware compile times were “during Moscow business hours.” If you look at a time zone map, you see that Kiev, Ukraine, is one hour behind Moscow time. When it’s business hours in Moscow, it’s business hours in Ukraine – and can you imagine there are Ukraine hackers more than willing to frame Russia for a high-profile hack?
The National article and the research by The Forensicator does not PROVE that the DNC emails were leaked, because it is POSSIBLE for someone to access high-speed Internet. Unlikely, as The Forensicator states, but NOT impossible. At least 17% of the US has access to Gigabit Ethernet to the home and business. However, as The Forensicator correctly points out, it’s hard to get that kind of speed across the Internet, especially to Eastern Europe where the entity Guccifer 2.0 allegedly resides.
Further, we don’t know that the copies analyzed by The Forensicator were copied originally from the DNC. In fact, The Forensicator specially disavows that requirement. What is important to him is that the analysis proves that Guccifer 2.0 was NOT remotely hacking from Romania because 1) the speeds involved, and 2) the timestamps are all East Coast USA times (which he acknowledges could be faked but Guccifer 2.0 would have had little reason to do so or even think of doing so.)
The bottom line is that The Forensicator’s analysis, coupled with Adam Carter’s analysis of the Guccifer 2.0 entity, establishes good solid CIRCUMSTANTIAL evidence that Guccifer 2.0 is NOT a remote Romanian hacker and is NOT a Russian agent, but rather an entity inserted into the mix to provide “evidence” that the DNC leak was a Russian hack.
And finally, of course, we have Sy Hersh being caught on tape explicitly stating that he has seen or had read to him an FBI report that specifically states the murdered DNC staff Seth Rich WAS in contact with Wikileaks and had offered to sell them DNC documents. And that Wikileaks had access to Rich’s DropBox account where presumably he was stashing those documents or using it to transfer them to Wikileaks.
Hersh is preparing a full report on this matter, which if it’s anything like his earlier articles will bury the “DNC hack” story completely.
Remember that “Russiagate” essentially depends on TWO critical factors:
1) That it is a fact that Russia hacked the DNC; and
2) That it is Russia that transferred the DNC emails to Wikileaks – otherwise there is no real reason why Russia would hack the DNC and it certainly did not do so to “influence the election.”
If number one is weak, due to laughable “evidence” and number two proves to be false, the entire “Russia influencing the election” story goes away. And the rest of the “Trump collusion” “evidence” is also laughable.
Now it may well be true that even if Russia did not give Wikileaks the emails they may still have hacked the DNC at some point. I submit that if the Russian government did it, we’d never know about it. First because they wouldn’t have done it over the Internet because of the risk of the NSA detecting it (the NSA certainly wasn’t monitoring the DNC) and second, they wouldn’t have left any real evidence, especially not evidence linking directly to Russia.
Russian intelligence would have either used a physical penetration of the DNC network (easily done as demonstrated by US penetration testers all the time) or used a wireless connection into the DNC network from somewhere close to the DNC server location. That’s assuming they wouldn’t use the standard intelligence tactic of bribery or blackmail to get a DNC staffer to GIVE them the emails. In any case, the NSA would not have detected that hack, and CrowdStrike wouldn’t have found any significant forensic evidence except perhaps some evidence that forensic traces had been ERASED.
Which basically means that whoever hacked the DNC – and that is only IF the DNC was REALLY hacked, for which there is NO PROOF except the DNC’s and CrowdStrike’s word since the FBI did not investigate the alleged hack itself – might have been 1) some criminal hacker(s) from Russia or elsewhere, or 2) some other intelligence agency trying to frame Russia for a hack.
It has been suggested that Russian intelligence DOES use criminal hackers on a contract basis either to perform hacks or to buy intel from said hackers. However, I find it unlikely that Russian intelligence would use incompetent hackers – and the DNC hackers had to be incompetent to leave the traces they did – for such a “sensitive” hack on a political party in the US.
You can’t have it both ways: 1) that awesomely capable Russian hackers are hacking everything in the US connected to the election, and 2) that they are so incompetent as to leave easily followed trails right back to the Kremlin.
In general, so-called “attribution” of “Russian hackers “is nothing of the sort. It is merely attribution to a collection of hacking tools and alleged “targets”. With the sole exception of Mandiant identifying specific individuals in a specific building in China, which if accurate was an impressive display of solid attribution, ninety percent of the time no individuals or agencies can be reliably identified by attribution.
Instead, what we get is the following:
1) Someone ASSUMES that because “target X” is a government or other sensitive facility that the hacker of said target MUST BE a “nation state actor.”
2) Then some later hacker who either happens to use the same hacking tools or happens to target a similar target is ASSUMED to be either the same hacker or associated with the same hacker. (Note: the DNC hackers are actually alleged to be TWO SEPARATE entities – APT28 and APT29 – not including Guccifer 2.0.)
3) Thus a house is built on the sand of the first assumption and used to justify all the subsequent “analysis” and “assessments.”
An example of this is German intelligence believing that Russia committed a specific hack, and that is now used as justification for believing the DNC hack was done by the same group, when in fact German intelligence merely stated that because of the TARGET of the hack they “assessed” that it MIGHT have been Russian intelligence.
In reality, ANY hacker will hack ANY TARGET if he thinks 1) that it will be a challenge, and/or 2) that it will be interesting, and/or 3) that it contains PII (Personally Identifiable Information) or other data such as credit cards which he can sell on the hacker underground. Therefore the choice of target doesn’t really prove anything.
The choice of hacking tools is also irrelevant. CrowdStrike asserted that some of the tools used in the DNC hack are “exclusive”. Jeffrey Carr has proven they’re not, because he spoke to Ukrainian hackers and others who have them.
Bottom line: Without HUMINT (human intelligence) or SIGINT (signals intelligence) obtained offline that specifically identifies a given organization or individuals, attribution of a specific hack to a specific hacker(s) is almost impossible.
Most of the hackers who have been caught have been caught because they had poor operational security and allowed email addresses and other identifying information that connected directly to their offline identity to be found. Without that, most hackers get away, unless they can be lured into identifying themselves by bragging or being set up by a law-enforcement sting.
At this point, Carr is right: There is NO publicly available, non-circumstantial, non-spoofable evidence that a DNC hack even occurred, let alone that any hack that might have been done was done by Russians at all, let alone the Russian government. And all of the alleged US intelligence “assessments” have provided NO additional evidence.
Yes, it DID rely ENTIRELY on CrowdStrike.
All CrowdStrike did was send the FBI a “certified true image” of the DNC servers. This also applies to the other two infosec companies who weighed in on the evidence – Mandiant and FireEye. Neither the FBI or those two companies ever examined the DNC servers, the DNC routers or other IT infrastructure which is an absolute MUST in investigating a computer crime.
That is NOT sufficient. ALL the alleged “evidence” provided by CrowdStrike is either circumstantial or easily spoofable. Therefore the only thing the FBI can see on that “certified true image” is the “evidence” provided by CrowdStrike.
And CrowdStrike is COMPLETELY COMPROMISED by being a company run by an ex-pat Russian who hates Putin and Russia, someone who sees Russian under every PC.
There is just as much evidence that Ukraine hacked the DNC computer and releasing the information was another one of that countries ‘mistakes’. If they are capable of nothing else, Ukraine seems to produce “software experts” who are involved in EVERY dirty game attached to the internet. The latest one is about turning the Ukrainian ‘hryvnia’ into real money – ‘bitcoin’.
“If you look at Facebook, the vast majority of the news items posted were fake.
They were connected to, as we now know, the thousand Russian agents.”
– Crooked Hillary
Putin’s denial is meaningless (though he just as likely could be telling the truth) HOWEVER to my knowledge Assange has yet to be proven wrong (must less intentionally lying) about anything. IMO he’s the ONLY person in all of this who has anything resembling a record of credibility. That MSM dismisses this demonstrates they are driven by narrative & ideology, NOT pursuit of fact/truth…
Russia Gate is a Farce. If by now, the deep state has not figured out a way to make it look like a Russian hack with some “credible” evidence that at least MSM and the masses can swallow then we must seriously doubt. Post Categories: Canada
William Blum | Saturday, June 24, 2017, 20:02 Beijing
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GR Editor’s Note
This incisive list of countries by William Blum was first published in 2013, posted on Global Research in 2014.
In relation to recent developments in Latin America and the Middle East, it is worth recalling the history of US sponsored military coups and “soft coups” aka regime changes.
In a bitter irony, under the so-called “Russia probe” the US is accusing Moscow of interfering in US politics.
This article reviews the process of overthrowing sovereign governments through military coups, acts of war, support of terrorist organizations, covert ops in support of regime change.
In recent developments, the Trump administration is supportive of a US sponsored regime change in Venezuela and Cuba
Prof. Michel Chossudovsky, June 24, 2017
******************
Instances of the United States overthrowing, or attempting to overthrow, a foreign government since the Second World War.
(* indicates successful ouster of a government)
China 1949 to early 1960s
Albania 1949-53
East Germany 1950s
Iran 1953 *
Guatemala 1954 *
Costa Rica mid-1950s
Syria 1956-7
Egypt 1957
Indonesia 1957-8
British Guiana 1953-64 *
Iraq 1963 *
North Vietnam 1945-73
Cambodia 1955-70 *
Laos 1958 *, 1959 *, 1960 *
Ecuador 1960-63 *
Congo 1960 *
France 1965
Brazil 1962-64 *
Dominican Republic 1963 *
Cuba 1959 to present
Bolivia 1964 *
Indonesia 1965 *
Ghana 1966 *
Chile 1964-73 *
Greece 1967 *
Costa Rica 1970-71
Bolivia 1971 *
Australia 1973-75 *
Angola 1975, 1980s
Zaire 1975
Portugal 1974-76 *
Jamaica 1976-80 *
Seychelles 1979-81
Chad 1981-82 *
Grenada 1983 *
South Yemen 1982-84
Suriname 1982-84
Fiji 1987 *
Libya 1980s
Nicaragua 1981-90 *
Panama 1989 *
Bulgaria 1990 *
Albania 1991 *
Iraq 1991
Afghanistan 1980s *
Somalia 1993
Yugoslavia 1999-2000 *
Ecuador 2000 *
Afghanistan 2001 *
Venezuela 2002 *
Iraq 2003 *
Haiti 2004 *
Somalia 2007 to present
Libya 2011*
Syria 2012
Q: Why will there never be a coup d’état in Washington?
A: Because there’s no American embassy there.
President Trump will probably survive but the effects of his treatment by the media, politicians in both parties, and monied folks but the way he was attacked and its effects will forever leave a mark on the Office itself. It is an unnecessary reminder how mindless lynch mobs can be and how powerless the great majority of people are regarding what is happening and will likely happen to them.
Again, its probably best to ignore BobS. He is probably a paid professional disruptor…..your tax dollars at work huh? The fact he is bothering to muddy these waters is both flattering to CN and evidence of the validity of CN’s stance on many important issues.
The “Russia hacked the DNC so if you pay attention to the content of the emails leaked, you’re a Putin loving unAmerican dog!” lie used by the DNC to distract from their cheating Bernie. Really took off, practically every pretend news source on the internet repeated the evidence free accusation, as if it were a proven fact. As did all the MSM propagandist posing as news anchors. The sheer number of people pushing the lie was mind boggling. Now all of the sudden not a peep about it. I have to question the timing of the statue removal shit stirring. It seems like a convienent distraction. Why now? All of a sudden these statues must go !! I still haven’t figured out what the distraction is distracting from. But the Nation and other web sites were starting to publish truth about “Russia gate”
Good comment Billy. The timing of these events is always interesting. Like when the MSM released info on trumps son meeting with a Russian, just after trump met face to face with Putin in Europe. Presumably the MSM had this story for months, and ran it to “punish” trump for the Putin meeting.
Roy G Biv wrote: “It seems people have trouble holding disparate thoughts in their minds and require mutual exclusivity…”
Sam F wrote: “I do not exclude the possibility that intel technology whose nature and location are critical secrets might be revealed with the evidence…”
So what is being said is that the benefit to the USA of disclosing methods and sources has not yet reached the level at which the FBI or the IC will comply on their own to make public any evidence AND it also has not negatively affected the country enough to force our leaders with the levers of power in their hands to make them comply.
That’s what I hear and it sounds like typical political posturing. So we will get more dysfunction in govt and more people dying here and abroad. Mean while we wait for the magic event that will put us over the line. Or not…
Yes, it looks like political manipulation. The IC could have revealed sufficient information after a month or so at only moderate loss of intelligence asset value, both on the alleged hacking and flight MH-17. If they were unprepared to reveal evidence after this time, then they should not have publicized conclusions. By now they should accept the loss and reveal it, otherwise citizens may fairly presume that political appointees in intel are deceiving them for political purposes.
Typical sources that could be revealed by now:
1. A well-placed source in a foreign government agency: Try to claim another plausible source, email intercept, or recently dismissed employee or defector already protected; if that is impossible and the info is of great political importance in the US, the real source must defect to the US for safety. We must take the intel loss to preserve the integrity of public information.
2. A satellite or new technology: If the images or info seem to identify the source or location or capability, then modify them enough to make it look like another technology or location. Admitting alteration is better than providing nothing.
3. A snoop connection in a valuable location: move it, install another similar device, claim that the info comes from a distinct source or location, etc.
If the problem is “developing” witness credibility or forthrightness, which some may hope will improve, then the source is not yet credible and potential conclusions should not be stated with “high confidence” by anyone who cares for truth in policy making.
Let me toot my own horn again. I figured all this out last spring. But the way the false information was fed to the public, large portions were revealed after the election, indicates that the disinformation wasn’t originally to prevent Trump’s election, but rather intended as use for President Hillary Clinton’s casus belli to take the war to Russia. Everyone presumed she would win. You can read original piece here: https://caucus99percent.com/content/okeydoke-americans-were-supposed-get
But, as I suggested in April, this okeydoke was directed by the intelligence wing of the Deep State, probably the CIA, for Hillary’s warhorse to ride into battle. It not only was supported by the CIA, it was created by it. And while most Americans never consider that the powers who are the likeliest suspects for the political assassinations of the sixties would insinuate themselves into the political system and support and promote their own, I suggest that another article, another one from the New York Times, which tries to explain Hillary suspiciously bouncing from the right to the left during the troubled times of 1968. What the article doesn’t provide is that after volunteering for Gene McCarthy in early 1968 she attended the Republican convention. After that she worked as an intern in Congress that summer and wrote a speech for then-Republican congressman Robert “Bom” Laird about financing the war in Vietnam. Six months after that speech Laird was Nixon’s Secretary of Defense, sending wave after wave of B-52s over Vietnam. Then Hillary capped her summer by going to the civil war that was the Chicago Democratic convention.
Rather than looking like a confused college student, not sure whether to be a pro-war Republican or an anti-war Democrat, Hillary Rodham looks more like one of the hundreds, if not thousands, of government spies that infiltrated all progressive groups back then in operations like the FBI’s COINTELPRO. What did she do after that? She “observed” a Black Panther trial in New Haven. Then a year or so later she spent a summer interning for the law office in Oakland that represented Black Panthers in the Bay Area.
In short, she appeared to have an intelligence background before she allegedly met Bill on the Yale campus, which holds out the possibility that their marriage was actually a marriage made in Langley. And that explains why Deep State interests wanted and expected her to be leading the charge in 2017.
Here is the NY Times article on Hillary, published in September 2007 to prepare the Times’ audience for her initial run for the Presidency in 2008: http://www.nytimes.com/2007/09/05/us/politics/05clinton.html?_r=0
As usual I take away a lot from your posting comments.
A sincere congratulations to some of us who have learned to ignore the snarky but non- contributive remarks
of Bob S. . Joe and Stephen and others, it seems you have found a way to communicate with each other and the rest of us
without responding to Bob S. That’s good.
Mr Parry is simply repeating what he has said before in many articles. He even harks back to the Malaysian airliner! Whatever other evidence there may be (MacronLeaks, the criminal investigation into which is still ongoing), Trump Junior’s admissions prove Russian interference in the US election. Russians claiming to represent their government met with Junior and offered him DNC “dirt”. DNC dirt subsequently appeared on the internet via Wikileaks. That those two events are wholly unrelated coincidences is more than I am prepared to believe. At that point, it matters not one whit how the Russians obtained the information or from whom. The Russians promised, the Russians delivered. Did Charlottesville really do this much damage? Putin’s American supporters seem to be in panic! Or is it Bannon?
“Trump Junior’s admissions prove Russian interference”? Unless I am not keeping up, all that happened is that a PR flak (not in Russian government) used the promise of compromat to arrange a meeting with Junior, where they talked about something else.
That’s weak, my friend. And while it seems true that Trump’s supporters are in a panic, Trump is not Putin.
And in case you want to put me in the box with Trump supporters, know that I am actually a LGBTQ-celebrating, anti-war, dirt-worshipping tree-hugger.
Sorry, the French Intelligence agency said the Macron leaks where just garden variety hacks on wide open un-patched servers, not the work of state actors. Funny how their investigation took only a few weeks.
The DNC leak predates the “Maginsky” meeting and at rate it was the Podesta emails that had more of an embarrassing impact on the election. Who is stupid enough to open a fishing email, let alone click a link and enter their Pa$$word on a phony web page?
I wish Trump would deliver for the Russians – no more aide to Ukraine, get out of NATO, exit from Syria, and not break Obama’s nuclear agreement with Iran. The reality is he is he still supports American Empire and is just as bad as Hillary and her Harpies.
Could the quote below apply to today?
———————————————————————
“Every record has been destroyed or falsified, every book rewritten, every picture has been repainted, every statue and street building has been renamed, every date has been altered. And the process is continuing day by day and minute by minute. History has stopped. Nothing exists except an endless present in which the Party is always right.” – George Orwell, 1984
“Could the quote below apply to today?”
If one is a drama queen, apparently yes.
Stephen it doesn’t take a drama queen to recognize the true sorry state our society has evolved into. Orwell’s 1984 is disturbingly coming to life more than ever. I read 1984 back when I was a sophomore in high school, but recently a lawyer friend of mine read that book, and he said that all he kept thinking about was me. He said, that while he read the book, the many conversations which him and I had had made him think of my warnings to where our civilization is going. No we are here, the date on your calendar may read 2017, but make no mistake about it we are living in 1984.
I dread that these violent protest, will deny our civil rights to form protests, and that would be a great loss. Although, these buggers in D.C. are convinced they must seize every crisis, and milk it for all they can. Each terrible disaster brings with it new restrictions. It maybe found when boarding a plane, or opening an investment account, as each tragic event brought us to these new restrictions we must live with. We are being played, but that piece of information, is covered over with conspiracy nut paper, and there go I.
Keep the faith Stephen, and ignore the trolling critics, who no doubt are paid to annoy us with our own hard earned taxpayer money….now that’s Big Brother stuff, if ever there was any Big Brother stuff to disturb our inquiring minds. Joe
Hi Joe Tedesky, very true, 1984 is here in 2017, but some are ignorant of the fact. i believe we are “Prisoners of “Democracy”
http://graysinfo.blogspot.ca/2017/07/the-prisoners-of-democracy.html
I always enjoy your concise comments.
Reading the link you provided, all I could picture, was Senator John McCain doing a photo op session with his new found friends the terrorist. Also, I believe that if you pay your taxes you have every right to complain. That your ability to lodge a complain against your government shouldn’t depend solely on your voting, because you still pay your taxes, and that paying your taxes, is your ticket to the complaint window.
What this country’s politicians really need is a ‘low voter turnout’, so low as to delegitimize the results of any election, which would result in the world not honoring your country’s election results.
https://criminalbankingmonopoly.wordpress.com
Good conversation, and link sharing Stephen. Joe
As if on cue, to illustrate my point.
Get out the smelling salts.
Balloons full of piss. I’d say that illustrates anything remotely resembling a point you make believe you have made bobs.
Keep up the good work Joe. Thanks for all you and other’s do here.
Article of interest at link below
————————————————————-
FINIAN CUNNINGHAM | 18.08.2017 | OPINION
As Russia-Gate Story Stalls, Cue Trump Neo-Nazi Scandal
https://www.strategic-culture.org/news/2017/08/18/as-russia-gate-story-stalls-cue-trump-neo-nazi-scandal.html
Here is a post by Karl Denninger, a fellow who used to own his own Internet company in Chicago and is very knowledgeable about these things. After reading The Nation article by Patrick Lawrence, he said:
“I wouldn’t go so far as to claim impossible, but I would say “highly unlikely.” The second part of the statement, however, is utterly true — it is completely consistent with either a SD card or USB flash drive inserted into a computer.
When it comes to Internet transfer of data, remember one thing: You’re only as fast as the slowest link in the middle.
There are plenty of places on the Internet with gigabit (that’s ~100MegaBYTE per second) speeds. But you would need such pipes end to end, and in addition, they’d have to be relatively empty at the time you exfiltrated the data.
What’s worse is that there is a real bandwidth product delay problem that most “pedestrian” operating systems do not handle well at all.
In other words as latency and number of hops go up, irrespective of bandwidth, there’s an issue with the maximum realistically obtainable speed, irrespective of whether there’s sufficient available pipe space to take the data. This is a problem that can be tuned for if you know how and your system has the resources to handle it on some operating systems — specifically, server-class operating systems like FreeBSD. But the “common” Windows machine pretty-much cannot be adjusted in this way and it requires expert knowledge to do so. […]
But it sure does cast a long shade on the claims of “Russians!” in this alleged “hack.” The simple fact of the matter is that the evidence points to inside exfiltration of the data directly from the physical machines in question, which is no “hack” at all: It’s an inside job, performed by someone who had trusted, administrative access, and then doctored the documents later to make it look like Russians.
And, I might add, poorly doctored at that.
PS: Left unsaid in the linked article, but it shouldn’t have been, is that if there was an SD card or external USB device plugged into the machine there is an event log from said machine documenting the exact time that said device was attached and detached. Find that log (or the timestamp on it being erased, which is equally good in a situation like this), match it against the metadata times, and then start looking for security camera footage and/or access card logs for where that machine is and you know who did it with near-certainty, proved by the forensic evidence.
Now perhaps you can explain why the FBI didn’t raid the DNC’s offices with a warrant, take custody of said logs and go through them to perform this investigation — which would have pointed straight at the party or parties responsible…..”
Read the whole thing.
Here’s the link for the above piece:
https://market-ticker.org/akcs-www?post=232304
Neo-nazis in Ukraine = good.
Neo-nazis in the US = bad.
To be more successful, the right wing protestors should have paraded under a facade of free speech, human rights and democracy, all the while promoting Nazi policies. This is something US intelligence agencies, MSM, and Congress do every day. US politicians should wear little swastika lapel pins on their suits to avoid confusion.
Obviously, the correct answer is
neo-Nazis in Ukraine = bad.
neo-Nazis in the U S = bad.
Then there’s answers I’ve read in these comment sections, for instance
neo-Nazis in Ukraine = bad.
neo-Nazis in the U S = bad BUT….whatabout BLM?
&
neo-Nazis in Ukraine = bad
neo-Nazis in the U S = trap for Trump
as well as this classic:
neo-Nazis in Ukraine = bad.
neo-Nazis in the U S = DEEP STATE!!!
At Nuremberg, in 1946, Julius Streicher, editor of the Nazi propaganda rag Der Stuermer, was executed based on the crime of propagandizing for war. This article provides further evidence that the New York Times Russia posturing is a tissue of propaganda lies. Since the logical goal of the propaganda is war, and the crap they are publishing has similar validity to that which was published for decades in the Nazi Stuermer rag, then if the legal doctrines put forward in the Nuremberg trial could be applied to US war propagandists, their status as war criminals would be apparent.
exiled – yeah, I don’t see a difference between then and now. Lies are everywhere, and not just little ones, but huge mothers used to sway public opinion. These guys really need to be in jail.
Look at what the Governor of Virginia, Terry McAuliffe, said re Charlottesville. His remarks were quickly refuted by the Virginia State Police, but if you happened to hear what McAuliffe said, yet missed the police’s remarks, you’d be none the wiser and you probably would have believed McAuliffe.
“In an interview Monday on the Pod Save the People podcast, hosted by Black Lives Matter activist DeRay Mckesson, McAuliffe claimed the white nationalists who streamed into Charlottesville that weekend hid weapons throughout the town.
“They had battering rams and we had picked up different weapons that they had stashed around the city,” McAuliffe told Mckesson.
McAuliffe claimed in an interview with The New York Times that law enforcement arrived to find a line of militia members who “had better equipment than our State Police had.” In longer comments that were later edited out of the Times’ story, McAuliffe said that up to 80 percent of the rally attendees were carrying semi-automatic weapons. “You saw the militia walking down the street, you would have thought they were an army,” he said.”
All total bullshit! Talk about inciting people! Why is this guy still walking around?
exiled – here’s the link for the above:
http://reason.com/blog/2017/08/16/virginia-state-police-say-they-didnt-fin
LOL. You only get charged with war crimes if you lose the war. (An occasional scapegoat such as depicted in the movie “Breaker Morant” is the exception to the rule.)
We should be careful, as not to dwell strictly on memorial statues. I will admit though, that the conversation should be had, but not without looking at the type of individuals who flock towards the racist trend. So far, of what I have been able to read regarding these young white guys, who have found comfort in racism, I find these misguided youth to be angry over the rise of minority groups. Reading their words, these angered white supremacist wrote, they complain that we spend to much time worried about bathrooms over them having a decent job. I say, why can’t we do both. Someone needs to tell these racist, that it’s not the various minority’s who are getting in the way of their success in America, as much as it is themselves for not being able to overcome the many obstacles life has put in their way. They need to realize, that their future welfare doesn’t rely on a minority losing any of their rights, in order for these racist to survive comfortably. What they need to learn, is they are their own best hope….attitude is altitude.
I also hope, that what happened in Charlottesville doesn’t bring down the hammer on all public protest.
Joe – but there are too many “unskilled” workers coming into the country and it IS making a difference. Long time ago, when there was an abundance of factories churning out all sorts of products, there was a need for unskilled labor. People flooded into the country to fill these much-needed positions. You didn’t need any special training; you didn’t need to understand English.
With jobs having been offshored to Asia and with increasing automation, there is not a need for the same amount of “unskilled” labor as before, and yet they continue to pour into the country. What are the people who are on the left-hand side of the bell curve supposed to do? Innovate? Compete with the newcomers and have wages decline even more?
It’s not the immigrants these kids dislike. It’s the sheer numbers of them. Does that make any sense to you, that it’s about the “numbers”? I agree that obstacles in life often make you wiser and stronger, but there comes a point in time when you start banging your head against the wall. What is the point of putting so many unnecessary obstacles in front of people? So some corporation can maintain a cheap labor force?
Sometimes my posts come across as sounding blunt. I don’t mean them to. It’s just that when things are reduced to words, you miss the shrugs of the shoulders, the eye movement, the sincerity in a person’s voice.
Cheers, Joe.
You never come off sounding bad, or blunt, with me.
For all the reasons you mentioned, is for all the reasons we as a society should require us to pull together. You see, I don’t believe that all these problems should be remedied with racism taking over our young white mens political ideology. That’s all I’m saying. If only our country would elect leaders, instead of billionaire realtors with tv celebrity status. If only this country’s political parties were to not break the law running their gentrified Wall St hack candidate, who’s only aim is to feather her historical bio. You see backwardsevolution, we need leaders, not celebrities seeking office for their own vain gratification.
Yes, for all the hard choices, and for all the tough decisions, should be the reason for our leaders to reach out or down, which ever you prefer, and should be what pulls us together. It breaks my heart, that here we are in 2017, the most successful nation God ever put on earth, and our white young men are turning into racist. Now, what could be wrong with that? I’ll tell you what’s wrong with that. Our leaders have quit leading, and replaced this leadership we the people should be receiving, and replaced this ever distant leadership with ignorance of doing their job to represent the voters.
Thanks for your response. Joe
Joe – “…our white young men are turning into racists.” I don’t think they are, Joe. I think they get angry that they are not being allowed to speak, as if what they have to say doesn’t really matter. I think that what we hear is carefully filtered, especially in the MSM, so as to make it look like they’re racist, but I don’t think this is the case at all. No time now, Joe. Thanks.
Okay, I will admit that our media portrays many of our events in the worst possible way. You more than likely may have a point that these young white men are not racist, that for many of them this white supremacist movement is just a vehicle to carry out their concerns.
What is wrong with our country’s leadership, is how they speak to the problems, such as unemployment, with the sharpest rhetoric they can find to say how they are going to create many, many new and exciting jobs, but once in office they don’t do a darn thing, as they go on to ignore the many promises they had made on the campaign trail. What these politicians seem completely oblivious too, is the voters who voted for them ,have memories, and they don’t forget.
Opportunity only comes to those who seek it. Well that’s not completely true, but in most cases it does prove that to those who try hard, much may be achieved. So if our politicians were to really want to change our sad employment status in this country, then why don’t they do it? Would you invite 100 people over for a barbecue, and only have enough beverage and food for 25 of your guess. So, why can’t the American politicians manage to accommodate a sagging work force, who’s jobs they send off shore, with enough new jobs to fill the quota of the unemployed? Because they weren’t told too, by their corporate special interest, or maybe they just didn’t care enough to do something about it.
So, the young white, black, red, and yellow, person loses out. They lose out all because they were neglected by the very people who said they would help them. I don’t know about you, but one of life’s biggest disappointments, is when your savior turns their back on you.
I hope backwardsevolution I’m not sounding like I’m just spinning wheels, and I hope you at least get a peek of what is going on inside my head, with these important issues.
Joe
“Illegitimi non carborundum.” (Don’t let the bastards grind you down.)
Keep fighting for your principles AND civil discourse on this board, Joe. I offer the same words to backwardsevolution with whom you were conversing. You have both been stellar examples of respectful debaters.
I don’t for a minute think, like some who keep obnoxiously pushing the accusation that most Americans, especially most Southern Americans, are racist, that racism underlies most of the dysfunction in governance of modern America, and that President Trump is the king of all racists, winning office only with the support of racists (and Russian saboteurs) to carry on a racist agenda thus depriving us of a new golden age under Saint Hillary the Great. The whole racist conflict in Charlottesville seemed suspiciously contrived to me to distract from other problem areas and to facilitate the ongoing coup against Trump (like him or hate him). I am NOT going to recapitulate all that yet again.
Certainly there were bone fide haters, some predisposed to violence, recruited into both factions by professional agitators. They couldn’t have succeeded in provoking the violence if there were not. But, most working Americans are basically running scared, fearing they might lose their jobs, their houses, their medical coverage, quality education for their kids, and a viable future. Most whites, whether right or left, from the North or South, do not hate blacks, Latinos, Muslims or immigrants in general. They can see how disadvantaged those people often are and fear ending up in the same predicament. Most never say much about the situation, certainly not in strident public statements. Even the participants at political rallies are just a self-selected minority. Most who vote do so quietly, without comment. (My parents would never tell us who they voted for! Keeps the peace.) More than half the country does not even vote. They choose to shy away from the political battlefield and certainly do not want to confront agitators in the street.
Call them alienated or disconnected from society, and condemn them if it suits your world view. We contributors to this site do put a lot of blame on those we decide are willfully ignorant. But I suspect that most of the self-disenfranchised simply don’t have enough time to devote to learning the issues, choosing up sides and becoming activists, or even voters. I doubt that many of them think that tearing down a bunch of old monuments they were totally oblivious to will change their lives in any way and they certainly don’t want to devote the time or energy to fighting about them.
If either the left or the right want to improve the lot of regular Americans, they will take some kind of action to bring back jobs to this country, not just high-skill jobs that require massive re-education, but jobs for the middle and the working classes alike. I thought that’s what Dems always wanted to do, and what Trump said he would do. Why is everything still in grid-lock in Washington while both parties are trying to dump the man who opposed the TPP and said he would pressure corporations to keep jobs in and even bring back jobs to America–not that I think the latter is likely, but why has even lip-service to the idea stopped? If the Dems ostentatiously claimed THAT issue was their major bone of contention with Trump, they’d have a lot more followers than the few idiots who buy the Russia-Gate bullshit.
When Newt Gingrich swept the GOP to power in the congress during Bill Clinton’s first term, he had devised a lengthy detailed plan of action called the “Contract for America.” I was not an advocate of those policies, but they certainly resonated better with the public than today’s “elect the Democrats to power and the Russians will never steal another election, in fact, we’ll kick their asses from the Baltic Sea to the Black Sea.” “Plus we’ll tear down all the confederate monuments which should bring peace and harmony to the streets.” If the real game changers can ever be implemented (which seems near to hopeless to me), racism will not be a major issue in this country, not if most of us are physically and economically secure and optimistic about our futures. (I’ve had two black families and a Latino family living in houses right next to mine in South Florida, and I had a mixed race family as neighbors in my previous place of residence. Do I care? No. Do they care? No. Anyone else in the neighborhood ever make a comment about anyone’s race? No. Does it affect my property value? No, but the real estate bubble caused by the banks sure did.)
Yes, good to point out that economic distress is a major factor in apparent racism and immigration resistance among US workers. This is a great concern to those who advocate international development aid, who must answer objections on economic effects.
The answer on globalization may involve treaties and laws restricting trade to nations that provide a standard of living that compares well with the lower middle class of the US, and to suppliers who provide well for their employees. While that would be cheaper elsewhere, so does not remove competition with US labor, it does require that the cost in jobs to the US worker is matched by benefits in development elsewhere. So our assistance to US workers is reduced by development assistance.
It also would prevent the US heartlessly exploiting cheap labor pools of oppressed workers, without you or I being able to help them by purchasing choices, or to escape guilt in their exploitation. It would be good to know that one could make purchasing decisions without grinding others into poverty and degradation to save a few pennies.
“…economic distress is a major factor in apparent racism and immigration resistance among US workers.”
Partly, though certainly not solely, with respect to immigration.
Racism?
Nope.
Makes a nice scapegoat, though, for racists and their apologists.
Your comment Sam took my mind back to my younger days when this town had an abundance of steel mills. If you were a young apprentice sometimes on your first day on the job, no one seemed to want to teach you the ropes, because each mill worker felt threatened that you were to be trained to replace them. In time, if you didn’t screw up, you would be accepted and inducted into the group. We love cliques and groups, don’t we? I thought of this, because what you wrote reminded me of how outsiders are viewed by the existing work force. This comparison on a international level is what we are experiencing. Our leadership is to blame for this new dividing dilemma. Promises to replace your old job with a brand new better job, was the big lie. Corporate profits override human necessity, and with that we all lose. I don’t think that all these retail outlets closing their doors, is merely due to Amazons convenient purchasing, but much of this loss of retail revenue, is due to the beatdown society just cannot afford it.
Good comment as always Sam. Joe
You are very much on point, Joe, about worker pitted against worker. Who benefits from such a divide and conquer tactic? The robber baron capitalists are who. And, I use that term because the phenomenon is nothing new. It, like the bruhaha about race goes back to before the Civil War. Ever watch the movie “The Gangs of New York?” Both these conflicts, involving race (and ethnicity) and socioeconomic class, are laid out powerfully right there. And, just as in the movie, after our generations exit the stage following all the sturm und drang, all the hate and all the angst churned up because we are made pawns of greater forces, no one will even remember we personally ever existed.
Trump Tower, the Clinton Foundation, and Obama’s Library in Jackson Park (yeah, named after the racist Andrew, not Stonewall) will still persist though, just like the confederate statues do today. But would we really want our descendants to forget this era and the players who dominated it? We build monuments in DC to the holocaust in Europe which didn’t even happen here, not to honor or glorify it but so we collectively don’t forget. Maybe the purpose of some monuments actually evolves over time to serve as a lesson rather than hero worship, and when Americans a hundred years from now look upon a bronze cast of Robert E. Lee, U.S. Grant or Douglas MacArthur their take will be, “war, how could our forebears possibly have embraced something so heinous, so destructive, so insane?”
I always take away something of high value from what you write Realist. I agree with what you wrote here. I also think that our government should build right next to the Holocast museum, a fitting tribute to the suffering of the 600 indigenous nations who the U.S. had destroyed in its quest for manifest destiny. I’m serious, as a Sunday school teacher is on a Sunday teaching the word of God. If our nation’s soiled pass, is to remain hidden by the curtain of everything that’s just and right, then America’s beloved citizens will never know to what is true. How can our nation become truly great, if it keeps on continuing to lie to itself. Making stuff up, will only last so long, until the truth will finally overcome every lie you ever told yourself.
The change in attitude towards venerating our country’s historical pass, is a sign of how our American culture is changing. What got praise 100 years ago, may not be praise worthy by today’s existing society. There isn’t much to cry about, but instead we should understand that these changes will come, just as night follows day. I guess I’m a revisionist at heart, but I do believe that assumptions and conclusions, are a ever changing thing. So what we are witnessing, and experiencing, is just our own human evolution. Plus, I might add, as you know Realist, history is always being updated, and revised, and with it many truths that weren’t known then become known.
It’s always a pleasure to correspond with a reasonable, and sensible, comment poster as you. Joe
Every word you wrote Realist, is excellent. I felt the same way about Bill Clinton, but your right, at least the masses at his time in office thought the economy was what it was all about. I will save going into the reality of Clinton’s time in office, but your point is well made.
Whether it be the Democrates, or a truly changed Republican party, one of these political parties will need to accommodate the voter, if anything is to get better.
Rather than me go on, I’m just going to read once again what you wrote Realist, because I could not write what you had wrote any better. Your words are excellent to what we are talking about.
I always enjoy reading your comments Realist, never leave us. Joe
I have to chime in Joe. I read it twice for good measure. Thanks to Realist and the many here who share such understandings.
Realist – thank you for your kind words. I always appreciate your well-thought-out and intelligent posts. They provide class and depth to the conversation. I, on the other hand, do not really belong on this site.
Your posts have also been very useful and interesting, b-e.
Yours too, Sam. Always enjoy your comments!
Hey backwardsevolution your the life of this party, you never seem like you don’t belong. I personally look forward to reading your comments. So brighten up, you are needed here, and that’s no lie. Joe
Joe – you’re such a kind man. Thank you. I enjoy reading your posts too; they’re always very considerate. What I mean by “I do not really belong on this site” is that I just see things differently than a lot of others on here do, too differently. I’ll hang around a while yet, though. Thanks, Joe.
“that I just see things differently than a lot of others on here do, too differently”
With your quote that is all the more reason this sites comment board needs you backwardsevolution.
Realist – excellent post. Thank you.
This might be a tad OT but both links follow the reporting on Russia-gate hysteria:
This link is a review of a book on the Browder deception (title of review article is a tad more dire than the title of the book):
http://thesaker.is/cooperative-authors-the-killing-of-william-browder-deconstructing-bill-browders-dangerous-deception-alex-krainer-with-review-by-the-saker/
This link is to a very long article by saker on the neo con campaign to take down America and probably the world-very long but worth a read, particularly with fast moving developments in the trump white house; comments in general are also worthy of perusing:
http://thesaker.is/the-neocons-are-pushing-the-usa-and-the-rest-of-the-world-towards-a-dangerous-crisis/?
“a Ukrainian hacker whose malware was linked to the release of Democratic National Committee (DNC) emails in 2016”
Mr Parry, the malware and its developer had nothing whatsoever to do with the DNC. The New York Times erroneously made this claim and was forced to issue a correction. It has NEVER been claimed that this malware was deployed against the DNC. I think your piece would be strengthened if you mentioned that The New York Times made a big blunder about this.
Hi Sam, I regularly post here as Sam F and would appreciate your using an initlal to avoid confusion, if you will.
Mr. Pary, do you manage to send your articles to selected editors and journalists of the NYT, The Guardian, and their MSM mates? To selected politicians, including executive bureaucrats & MIC peple? It seems to me that some of them must read more than twits twittering? I think it’s very vital that you do so or that someone does it on your behalf (and ours.)
Oops, Parry.
Parry is well known on Capitol Hill and among the MSM. Long standing feud, but no doubt respected.
This is disgusting: where is the outrage?
——————————————–
Missouri Senator: ‘I Hope Trump Is Assassinated!’
12:46 PM 08/17/2017
http://dailycaller.com/2017/08/17/missouri-senator-i-hope-trump-is-assassinated/
I’m outraged.
Feel better?
I believe it is a disgusting and dangerous remark for a person in an elected position to make.
That’s why I’m outraged.
See BobS no one knows how to take your snarky remarks. Plus, I don’t believe you when you say you were outraged, because your squirrelly mind doesn’t know how to be sincere. Oh will you pay for my ESL courses? Jagoff.
Who cares? There are stupid people all over on all sides of the political spectrum.
By the way, the “Evidentiary Void” might actually look pretty filled up in private eyes of the office of special counsel. I wouldn’t expect to see the all of the evidence of a case in progress, as persons being investigated are best left unknowing and useful to flip for a leniency deal. Again, the timeline will be very informative if you take the time to read it. It’s merely the chronological presentation of factual events.
http://billmoyers.com/story/trump-russia-timeline/
That link is so full of invasive scripts that my script blocking software cannot be persuaded to show it.
I use YesScript for Firefox on a case-by-case basis. If a site has annoying animations, it gets the treatment.
Just goole billmoyers.com and look for timeline. It’s so easy.
The time-line is irrelevant to the specific claim that Trump conspired with Russia to fix the election. Point to anything in this time-line that offers evidence.
Reminder 1: evidence is what offers proof on the specific charge.
Reminder 2: the IC January 6 statement “not intended to imply that we have proof that shows something to be a fact.”
This very interesting statement suggests that a political motive was operative in these assessments, in which “what we want to believe” becomes “what we believe,” or to quote Seymour Hersh recently, 2 + 2 = 45.
Your absence of doubt, particularly given the history of lying from our official government reps over many years now, as well as your swerving aside to an irrelevant “time-line,” puts you in the camp of the propagandists.
It did not rely entirely on Crowdstrike. They are just the ones who referred it to FBI. If you don’t think the USA has powerful IT divisions who can forensically determine source and method, then your fear of deep state are immediately invalidated, a contradiction. If you believe in the awesome power of the intelligence community, then you cannot use the argument that they don’t know anymore than what the got from Crowdstrike. I understand the mistrust of the IC, but you must admit that they just might me trying to protect us in this case from enemies foreign and domestic.
No, no one can “forensically determine source and method” except in lucky cases or when tracing naive hacks. NSA got its trove of hack methods including false-flagging methods on the black market from a Ukraine hacker. So no one will buy garbage accusations of Russia from a Ukrainian hacker.
If the US IC has insider sources, they must be prepared to have them bail out and give testimony, after some reasonable period, where grave accusations must be either discredited or cause serious policy changes.
No hiding behind “trust us” after months: only fools will believe “confidence.”
The same goes for MH-17, WMD, the Gulf of Tonkin Incident, and many others.
What you are saying is true and reasonable. But consider that this is an ongoing counter espionage investigation that has been in progress for over one year, and these take years to conclude. You may not be able to trust them without seeing the info and intel, but you cannot simply conclude that the evidence simply doesn’t exist just because it’s not visible to you. There are reasons to hold cards close to the vest while leveraging suspects into witnesses.
Fine, let them investigate, but they must not announce extremely serious conclusions to the public, with immediate political implications, especially conclusions that serve immediate political ends in the US, and refuse to provide evidence to the public even after a month or so. That is either careless methodology or fraud. The history of such “revelations” on “high confidence” has been a history of fraud by political appointees to the intel agencies.
I do not exclude the possibility that intel technology whose nature and location are critical secrets might be revealed with the evidence, although it appears that the secrets could generally be kept. Such technology requires having a safe disclosure method, such as disguising/relocating informants and devices. Most likely such technology would provide clues to direct other safely-revealable technology. If it does not, it does not serve democracy well, and probably is fundamentally a tool of tyranny, a product of excessive spying, and must be discounted by the public.
Of course, as revealed by Snowden, they monitor all electronic traffic, storing it away and creating a linked database of meta data that can be searched later. That is how they unmasked and went for FISA warrants against Trump’s campaign and how they”got” Flynn.
So where is the evidence? You think if they had it they wouldn’t leak it?
As far as the timeline, I guess we should all start watching RT, since the Russians knew Trump was going to win the election and compromised him years before, while the MSM all thought he wouldn’t win the Primaries let alone the election.
BTW, I got a copy of Carr’s book “Dark Territory” and lent it to some of the IT security people where I work and they loved it!
America is walking into a well planned nightmare. Spoon fed to you by the corporate media……soon the spark of hate will become an uncontrollable wildfire……
An interesting read at link below:
—————————————————-
The Neocons Are Pushing the USA and the Rest of the World Towards a Dangerous Crisis
THE SAKER • AUGUST 18, 2017
http://www.unz.com/tsaker/the-neocons-are-pushing-the-usa-and-the-rest-of-the-world-towards-a-dangerous-crisis/
The Saker is always interesting, and even though you find some good people over there (Michael Hudson & Mike Whitney, among others), the race stuff at Unz always makes me feel like I have to wash off.
From Parry: the “certainties” blaming the DNC “hack” on Russia’s intelligence agencies “lack a solid evidentiary foundation.”
What would that evidentiary foundation be?
Would it be Donald Trump visited Russia therefore he’s guilty of conspiring with Putin to fix the election, starting with hacking the DNC.
Or Trump had real estate dealings, mafia dealings, whatever, with Russia, and leap to “I wouldn’t doubt it.”
Or, I hate Trump so much I’ll believe anything negative about him.
Or Russia was once the Soviet Union and a bunch of commie rat bastards so of course this story is true.
Or, The New York Times, that esteemed bastion of truth and investigative journalism says it’s true so it must be true.
Evidence defined: what furnishes proof.
Yet, reminded by Parry once again, here is the basis for the January 6 assessments:
Quoted from the reporting agencies themselves on January 6, their judgments–
“are not intended to imply that we have proof that shows something to be a fact. Assessments are based on collected information, which is often incomplete or fragmentary, as well as logic, argumentation, and precedents.”
Based on what evidence IS, here we have NO evidence. What we do have is speculation.
Clapper weighed in on January 6 with a “moderate” assessment. How does a moderate differ from a high assessment–was some of the logic–since the statement indicates no proof based on fact exists–somehow dubious or tendentious?
He was moderately convinced that it just might be so, maybe, possibly. Is that what this means?
Dempsey weighed in at “high” with the above statement, and perhaps somebody knows what this “high” meant, based on what?
Comey weighed in at “high” although his agency, the FBI, did not examine the DNC computers, and relied entirely on Crowdstrike, shown repeatedly as a biased anti-Russian source in the employ of Hillary Clinton.
This is the authority creating the flimsy evidentiary foundation of the NY Times et al MSM to which we citizens are now either a) skeptical or b) entirely convinced.
“Evidentiary void”–right on, Robert Parry!
Sorry, meant to say Brennan, not “Dempsey” re CIA assessment.
Given the overall context of Russiagate and the “journalistic” history of the NY Times, it would be fair to assess it and its loyal readership as spreading Washington propaganda and unwitting Washington stooges, respectively. But which gets to claim the Greatest Propaganda Rag Prize: NY Times or Washington Post?
Too close to call.
“The Times’ rebuke toward any doubts about Russia-gate was inserted after Carr’s remark although the Times had already declared several times on page 1 that there was really no doubt about Russia’s guilt.”
The NYT is now terrified of the genuine research and honest conclusions made by the VIPS. It’s almost as if the NYT’s suffering under some sort of OCD neurosis, the VIPS has them on their heels, though the NYT will never admit it. Ergo, like Rainman, they resort to repeating over and over and over to their brainwashed readers the Kremlin’s guilt and the intel agencies’ assurances. They try ever so hard to pass themselves off as the only reasonable and sane voices in the room, during these times of upheaval and uncertainty.
To use an admittedly stretched sports analogy: the VIPS have been doing, and are going to do, to the NYT what Floyd Mayweather is about to do to McGregor in their upcoming prize fight. A real authentic professional is about to dominate a huckster and charlatan who’s out of his element, just there to collect a fat paycheck (not unlike the careerism of the NYTers).
I remember as soon as the leak that the DNC tried to subvert the Sanders campaign came out, Hillary’s campaign manager Robby Mook stated the Russians did it, and obviously he had no conclusive proof. At the time I thought they already had it planned that if their misdeeds were ever revealed Russia would be blamed, and it would be a good reason to go after Trump should he win the election. It would also allow them to continue to escalate a cold war, already well underway under the Obama administration. It’s basic science that you can’t come to a valid conclusion if you have already determined what that will be. I never believed their lies from the get go. What is very disturbing is that the press is so complicit in pushing this lie while the American public, and in this case the so called liberal/progressives, are so willing to swallow it. For me, that’s the scary part. Equally scary is that the CIA, FBI and NIA are equally complicit in this deception.
Right, they are all in on this phony Russia scare gambit. There are plenty of other causes to impeach Trump. Our President is a crook, as well as a racist.
I don’t know if Trump’s a racist, maybe he is, but did you ever hear Obama, Bush, or Cheney called a racist, or if they were, did the American people buy into it the way they have with Trump? However, what would you call people who destroy whole nations which are predominantly Muslim, cross sovereign borders in Muslim countries killing thousands of innocents with drone warfare? Is Israel in it’s treatment of the Palestinians not racist? Are we not racist as a nation as well? I ask myself if these countries were predominately Christian would the American people be so laid back about our warring exploits in these countries? What about those papal bulls that gave explorers of the new world the right to conquer and exploit the indigenous people? Not to mention our sense of entitlement to practically wipe out the American Indian population. If indeed he is a racist, he fits right in. Take a look at our legal system where over 90 percent of people take a plea bargain and never get a fair trial, and most of the prison population is black although they constitute a small minority in this country.
I have a friend who berated me for not being more outraged by Trump’s racist rhetoric, but she refused to visit an elderly, and lonely aunt who lived in a black area, while I move in and out of that area quite frequently. We’re full of hypocrisy.
“I don’t know if Trump’s a racist”
Trump’s a racist.
“Is Israel in it’s treatment of the Palestinians not racist?’
Amy Goodman had on a spokesman from the Anne Frank Center this morning forcefully (and accurately, in my opinion) criticizing Trump, Bannon, & Gorka.
The interview took a somewhat comical turn when Goodman showed her guest a clip of white supremacist Richard Spencer being interviewed on Israeli television saying:
“As an Israeli citizen, someone who understands your identity, who has a sense of nationhood and peoplehood and the history and experience of the Jewish people, you should respect someone like me, who has analogous feelings about whites. I mean, you could—you could say that I am a white Zionist, in the sense that I care about my people. I want us to have a secure homeland that’s for us and ourselves, just like you want a secure homeland in Israel.”
The comical part was watching the histrionics of the guy from the Anne Frank Center as he avoided addressing Spencer’s point.
“Hail Trump!” chanted by Richard Spencer after the election. Fascists love fascists.
I usually listen to Democracy Now, but missed this one, and it makes a good point. Easy to point a finger at someone’s perceived racism, but difficult to look at your own, which is too often justified. My point exactly. People talk about Trumps immigration policies and deportation of immigrants, but are mindless of the fact that Obama deported 2 million immigrants. Many Americans don’t place what is going on now within an historical framework, not even a recent historical framework. I also believe there is an attempt to undermine the people who voted for Trump, which would make a coup more possible. I don’t like Trump, but more then anything I don’t like the idea of overturning the election of a president based on lies and innuendo. I really don’t think that’s a good thing!
Annie, your comments are always very sincere and objective.
You wrote above: “. . .What is very disturbing is that the press is so complicit in pushing this lie while the American public, and in this case the so called liberal/progressives, are so willing to swallow it. For me, that’s the scary part. Equally scary is that the CIA, FBI and NIA are equally complicit in this deception. . .”
By this time, it should be clear to any one with an open mind that there is no such thing left in the country as free and fair Media which informs public. And all these agencies you mentioned are nothing but a sewage pit of lies. And the liberal/ progressives are like most of the population, completely brainwashed and believe whatever is fed to them by the likes of Rachael Maddow.
My brother listens to her everyday, and I can’t listen to him. He’s literally hysterical over the Trump presidency, as is she. He can’t hear anything I have to say, or any other point of view. To me it is a total surprise since he is well educated, and will define himself as a liberal thinker. Bah humbug!
thank you annie
I only pick up the New York Times once or twice a year as a novelty. It has priced itself out of the market, as have many other newspapers, which used to be affordable by those eking out even the meanest of livings.
It would appear that the Russian hysteria is somehow connected with the anti-Trump hysteria in general, to which has been added the charge of his being a white nationalist Nazi, merely because he acknowledged two factions willing to exercise violence in conjunction with a politically charged demonstration. Yet, the latter charges would seem to divide so-called progressives while casting intellectually honest analyses like Parry’s as sympathetic to white supremacists by association. This may seem to be quite a challenging environment for journalists to operate in, as the actual situation is so at odds with the conventional wisdom being touted from the same regions of the universe. I do hope the very fabric of truth-telling is not ripped to shreds by these counter-currents.
So Trump is not a Nazi sympathizer? They sure think so. Ask David Duke. He tweeted thanks to Trump for defending them.
This is faulty logic.
I have said it before and I will say it again:
In our two-party system, millions of voters don’t actually have any party that represents their views. This includes what would be called in the USA “extremists” on both the left and the right.
Unlike what would be the case in a parliamentary system, where if a party gets over the 5% threshold they are represented in the legislature and may even participate in forming a government, in the USA such groups have to decide which of the two parties is closer to their own platform. IF David Duke decides that the Repugs are closer to what he wants, that doesn’t mean that Trump is therefore a Nazi or white supremacist.
It means that Duke is some kind of Republican.
Trump has received adulation from the white nationalist fringe unusual for a candidate from any party.
Even more unusual, Trump has reciprocated.
Knowing you BobS you’ll probably think that what I’m about to say, is my supporting Trump, because you are still living the 2016 presidential election. When you bring up odd alliances, how about when Hillary Clinton and Victoria Nuland (and John McCain) orchestrated the coup in Ukraine that installed a full on Nazi Party, complete with swastikas?
Let’s see if you can answer me in a decent tone. That doesn’t mean you need to agree with me, but it does mean you are an ignorant know it all, if you don’t answer me with some common respect.
Before you came here BobS, it was nice to have conversations with the many others who whether they agreed with you or not, at least the use of good manners did lead to our learning something worthwhile. You BobS, only bring out the worst in a person, with your little boy agitation. It also over shadows the good points you make, when you use ridicule the way you do. In other words BobS, I can tell your not stupid, but you sure come off that way with your words and actions when you do the silly things you do with your rude comments.
It’s very rare that I burn down bridges, for you see BobS all my life I have been a bridge builder. So, when your ready to grow up, and become mature, then who knows, maybe you and I will become friends, if not well it’s no big loss. Take care Joe
Joe, they are both professional disruptors. The Roy G Biv character is too well informed to be merely mistaken – he’s simply not honest. I’d posit he is CIA or back-room NYT employee. Or possibly a nutcase Zionist with a good US education posting from some stolen land in Israel.
Speaking of the New York Times, I’m done with them. I now have zero respect for the filthy propaganda site.
As I was reading through Mr. Parry’s piece I decided to find out for myself if they were as bad as they seem. But how to test this? Long story short, I hit on the idea to see what they’ve written about the USS Liberty on this 50th Anniversary of the attempted sinking of the ship and attempted mass murder of all aboard.
Search terms were “USS LIberty” and “nytimes.com”.
According to the Google results there were zero mentions of the USS Liberty on the NYT site within the past 12 months. Double checking, I went to the site and entered the term into the search there. Nothing.
They lie. They distort. They conceal. Mostly for Israel. These days Israel wants Syria to get the Iraq/Libya treatment. Russia is an obstacle. The lying, cheating, and distortions of the NYT and WP are focused on pressuring Russia enough to get them out of Syria. The professional newcomers here are accusing us of being Putin-Hacks, and much more. They do everything they can to disrupt discussion. I’d imagine it’s because Mr. Parry’s site is becoming one too many people around the world come to view. The deliberate chaos created by these guys is another small part of the attack on Russia for Israel.
By the way, have you noticed a single thing the BobS and Roy G Biv types have written which is notable in any way whatever? I haven’t. I’m going to try very hard to be done with them as well.
Thanks Zachary. Hearing you say that these two buttheads maybe professional disrupters is comforting. No, I’m actually honored that BobS started with me (I think first) the other day. Now I feel empowered to deal with the likes of these two clown asses.
You may have already seen this article over at the Saker, about the USS Liberty, but here it is in case you haven’t, or for the others who may find interest in it as well.
http://thesaker.is/remembering-the-liberty/
Take care Zachary Joe
I agree, Zachary and Joe. They appear to be trolls, and may use varying names for a while.
You just said: “….charge of his being a white nationalist Nazi, merely because he acknowledged two factions willing to exercise violence in conjunction with a politically charged demonstration.” Your use of the word merely is very disturbing. If it was abundantly clear from previous revelations, his performance this week should have removed all doubt about his sentiments.
Yes it was wrong for me to use “merely,” because the characterization of Trump as a white supremacist has nothing to do with reality, and the fact that Trump took a balanced approach to the demonstration was another excuse for unfounded accusations. What we have is people who want Trump out, who lost an election, who are doing everything they can to overthrow a president. Since the Russian hacking meme has been shown to be without merit (although it is still harped upon), the white supremacist angle is now being milked for everything it has. It’s a hoax completely in parallel with the Russian hacking narrative. Reality has nothing to do with this attempt to overthrow Trump. And the CIA is fully behind it. So stick with it. People may be making idiots of themselves, but for them, the ends justifies the means.
Well, I guess we’ll see. But I believe you will be the one eating crow when the facts are laid out. It seems people have trouble holding disparate thoughts in their minds and require mutual exclusivity, i.e. the past misdeeds of the CIA vs the idea that they might actually be doing public service in this Putin/Trump situation. I don’t have trouble with this and embrace both. The world and people are complex, not neatly black or white.
You support the CIA when what they do aligns with your political opinion? My, how noble and open-minded.
Yet another strained effort to distract from the actual reality of Trump’s Russian connection. Here is Bill Moyers’ timeline of factual events. Tells the story better for anyone with an open mind.
http://billmoyers.com/story/trump-russia-timeline/
Does Trump have “Russian connections?” Of course he does. He’s a billionaire oligarch and, as such, he almost certainly has corrupt connections with billionaire oligarchs from pretty much any country you can name. If the anti-Trump brigade was less hysterical, these connections could most likely be used to remove him from office. That said, is there currently any evidence that he collaborated with the Russian government to throw the election? No.
Thank you for the link. Because of my “closed mind” I’ve concluded that Bill Moyers has lost it.
I made a couple of searches of my own and found this from Moyers:
“Raked over the coals by Republican inquisitors in Congress who could never make a case that she had acted wrongly in Libya…”
Gist of the story, poor Hillary isn’t a male and everybody has been after the innocent woman on that account. Obviously nobody would have commented if it had been a MAN with the same amount of blood on his hands. In another story he dismissed Hillary’s email maneuvers.
h**p://billmoyers.com/story/hillary-hatred-revisited/
The man is an old Hillary-Bot and I’ve no use at all for that sort.
Actually, if you’d watched her testimony, they couldn’t make that case, the reason being they focused on BENGHAZEEEE!!!! as opposed to the attack on Libya itself (which all or most of the Republicans in Congress agreed with).
Also, it’s disingenuous to pretend that Clinton (and female politicians, in general) aren’t held to somewhat different standards than men.
Agree with you Bob. But CN is infected with Russian bots. Used to be main go to site for me, now it’s just the place for Trump and Putin apologists.
“Roy G Biv” is today’s name for one of the discredited trolls here lately, probably BobS himself, who pretends to be a former supporter. Thanks for letting us know that rightwingers are liars.
““Roy G Biv” is today’s name for one of the discredited trolls here lately, probably BobS himself, who pretends to be a former supporter. Thanks for letting us know that rightwingers are liars.”
Thanks for letting me know it’s so easy to fuck with your somewhat empty head.
Yeah BobS your the only smart one here. BTW You couldn’t put a patch on Anon’s ass even if you tried.
“CN infected with Russian bots and Putin apologists.” Here’s your guilt by association tool again. Anyone critical of the Official Narrative = automatically name-called to Russian bots etc etc the “commie sympathizer” BS of years ago. This kind of comment from you automatically disqualifies you as having anything worthwhile to say here.
He just finished saying that they are being held to different standards.
His implication was that they get a pass, when in fact just the opposite is true.
I was never once discredited. Just censored and shouted down. Now you plant a flag and claim to have refuted. That’s not winning an argument, it’s just being loud and intolerant.
So because of the comments, you don’t frequent CN anymore? I call BS, mr perpetual war apologist.
Actually the timeline stands on its own, and is factual. Try reading it and follow the chain of events. Very illustrative. Doesn’t really matter your personal animus against Moyers and Clinton.
And, Zachary, I bet you would not believe that the DOS IG wrote in their May 26 2016 report that rules in effect during Clinton’s tenure allowed use of personal email accounts and personal servers. Interesting how the Clinton haters never went after Colin Powell for using his personal email acct and his personal laptop.
The specific charge, emanating from the Clinton people, and used as diversion from DNC corruption and Clinton Foundation corruption, is that Russia interfered with the 2016 election. This is a separate matter from Trump has had dealings with and association with Russia since decades back. Conflating these two matters is the easy demonizing brush which you’re pushing here. There is no evidence on the specific accusation that Trump worked with Putin to fix the election. If you think there is evidence, versus guilt-by-association, give us a heads-up on where and what it is.
WhoWhatWhy & David Cay Johnston are doing and have done a much better job than consortiumnews in covering Trump’s likely connections to Russian (and Italian) organized crime.
That begs (that is, avoids) the question.
I suspect all of our presidents have had connections with organized crime.
Trump is being charged with, basically, treason for colluding with the Russians to influence the election. Two different animals.
“That begs (that is, avoids) the question.”
?
Kennedy, at least, at the wrong end of a gun.
Malcolm Nance has also chronicled the rise of Vlad and his seizure of the Russian economy from foreign vulture capitalists, only to claim all the spoils for himself and his cronies, as well as how Trump relied on Russian funding to bail out his bankrupcies. It’s shockingly ignored here.
Malcolm Nance’s book is a “best seller” because he allowed himself to become a shill for the corporate intelligence network not unlike Ann Coulter who became a “best seller” with right wing sponsorship. Such books are printed in mass by the propagandist and often advertised as best sellers before a copy is sold. Unlike, Coulter, Nance is articulate but he starts out by “poisoning the well” with the premise that Putin’s Russia is evil. He never really questions the hack theory. His book THE PLOT TO HACK AMERICA is all the rage among Demo “true believers”. It was given to me by a friend, no doubt to open my eyes to the evil Putin’s maneuvers but apart from the probability that he believed it himself his conclusion was based on a number of distorted facts(yes, I actually read it).
BobS: The organized Russian Crime mafia you are referring to had branches in Tel Aviv, New York, and London too. They were lot of people who were part of it, and must be close too Clintons too in their corrupt World in New York and elsewhere in the West. That is how our British Friends keep their economy running. The real Russians, the peasants according to the West they are, never really learnt the art you are describing.
May be, Trump had his hand in there in that pot somewhere too, when they were looting Russia in a big way. But they have not dug it out yet. I fail to understand with all these intelligence agencies, they have not shown it to the public as yet.
D5-5, I am curious as to what proof you have of DNC corruption and Clinton Foundation corruption.
If your mind is open like a sieve.
The sieve serves to filter isolate particles of significance from the soup of information. A dam on the other hand prevents the flow. Most here have built dams against anything implicating Trump and Putin, and there is extensive evidence of it, from many sources.
Good analogy.
There’s enough criticism of Trump here (although he does have his share of apologists, especially with respect to Charlottesville e.g.’whatabout BLM?’), but Putin, not so much. I’m guessing he gets a pass from many of the readers due to him being somewhat alone in standing up to the US (in Georgia, Ukraine, etc) as well as consortiumnews being relatively unique in disputing the ‘official’ narrative with respect to the Ukrainian coup, MH17, & Crimea (as well as Syria). While Putin has served as a valuable counterweight to the American empire, it doesn’t make him beyond reproach, and he may possibly have helped to put a white-nationalist authoritarian into the presidency.
Hillary put Trump in the Oval Office. Bernie would have won, but your darling Hillary made sure that he didn’t stand a chance to win the Democratic primary, because her being a Clinton means she cheats.
Why don’t you and Roy go peddle your insulting selfs to people who might buy what your selling. She loss, because she wasn’t a good candidate. In fact Hillary would have loss to almost any of the insane Republicans who ran. You BobS are one dull gem of a person….now go mimic me you clown.
“Hillary put Trump in the Oval Office.”
She helped.
“Bernie would have won”
Agreed.
“She loss, because she wasn’t a good candidate. In fact Hillary would have loss to almost..”
You should get your money back for the ESL course.
BobS why can’t you just talk sensibility with me?
Vlad does get some credit for straight-arming the West vulture capitalists from feeding on the carcass of the USSR and the state owned infrastructure, BUT he supplanted those efforts with his own. He’s become one of the richest men in the world by the most unrestrained crony capitalism and is a skilled authoritarian ruler. Why he is so defended around here makes me wonder who these people are who feel so butt hurt when he is criticized.
What garbage: find the evidence and your intellectual superiors will gladly review it.
Roy G Biv = BobS: you know as well as we that the utterly discredited Russiagate propaganda is intended solely to distract from the DNC corruption and Repub corruption. So you pretend that discrediting it is a distraction. The crook is always full of accusations of the same crookedness, like our Ukrainian hacker.
Hate to disappoint you Anon, but we are not the same person and I have no idea who BobS is. I guess you find it easier to ignore dissenting opinion by lumping it into one persona. And your dismissal of Malcolm Nance is pretty thin IMO. The Russian hacking of our election and the financial connections to DJT are well established and creating slogans and memes like “Russiagate” is a cheap parlor trick.
BS. You haven’t a single shred of evidence of any election hacking, let alone Russian, and apparently you know it. I demand your evidence, not propaganda.
“The Russian hacking of our election and the financial connections to DJT are well established”
All that’s missing is evidence.
I find it bizarre and frustrating that the anti-Trump forces insist on focusing on the flimsy Russia-gate distraction when there are so many objectively awful reasons to criticize the Trump administration.
*Resurgence of Civil-Asset Forfeiture? Check.
*Supporting the private prison industry? Check.
*Empowering federal prosecutors? Check.
*Working to sabotage the Iran nuclear deal? Check.
*Dismissing anthropogenic climate change? Check.
*Going out of his way to equate Nazis with anti-Nazi protestors? Check.
*Undermining net neutrality? Check.
*Subverting scientific independence at the EPA? Check.
*Sticking up for Wall Street and bad-mouthing Consumer Financial Protection Bureau? Check.
Trump’s being criticized for all-of-the-above by virtually all of the leftist media and NGO’s (Counterpunch, DemocracyNow, FAIR, RealNewsNetwork, Free Press, Public Citizen, etc) that criticized Obama, Bush, Clinton, et al for their many shortcomings and fuck-ups.
You need to get out more.
I get out plenty, BobS. I was talking about the MSM. Sorry, I’ll make sure I specify this in all future posts.
But it seems like the MSM is standing in for “leftish” (sic) forces, as they combine with neocons to bring Trump down.
Just because the MSM doesn’t like Trump doesn’t mean he’s a good person.
Seeing much of it covered there, too.
And doubtless you troll your whole list of “leftist media and NGO’s (Counterpunch, DemocracyNow, FAIR, RealNewsNetwork, Free Press, Public Citizen, etc)”
Yes, but the DNC has put all their ammo into the straw man argument of Russia-gate. I believe this is what Drogon was saying, and I also believe it’s a valid point.
I’ll agree that it’s the focus of the DNC.
But he wrote “anti-Trump forces”, which encompasses much more than the DNC.
Way to go BobS, you have an excuse for every stupid remark you make. Since Drogon said some pretty factual things that made sense, you had to go find something to make a negative comment as a reply, and in doing so you made yourself look awfully foolish…I’ll bet your working hard to sound smart and clever all the time, guess what you make yourself look ignorant instead.
If you are a contributor to this site, then I want my money back. You certainly don’t bring any class, or anything worthwhile to this site, with your crudeness. Although, you probably laugh at your own jokes, and think your funny. I’ve tried for the last couple of days to somehow deal with you with the hopes that you and I could have a civil conversation, but as I can see I shouldn’t take it personally, since you seem to offend everyone no matter what…what is wrong with you man.
All of this is worthy of criticism, but not likely to lead to his ouster. The fools think Russia-gate will, but it is obviously that the Repubs. in Congress are not buying it anymore than most of the population who just declines to become hysterical over Russia when they have much more immediate problems. There is that matter of Trumps financial malfeasance which is real AND impeachable, but the Dem establishment isn’t interested because it won’t deflect attention from their internal problems and many among their number are guilty of similaar crimes, if not to the same extent as Trump. And the deep state doesn’t care because it doesn’t advance their neocon agenda like Russia-gate. I think, however, that it could help mobilize popular outrage which will be necessary if he is ever going to be impeached.
That is because those are all ideas that the MSM’s benefactors actually support.
It is depressing, but not surprising given their corporate ownership, that the entire MSM is unwilling to ask the same hard questions as does Consortium News. It is also depressing that the Democratic Party is happy to jump on this risky band wagon in their desperate desire to bring down Trump.
There’s a bigger story behind all of this. John Brennan was abusing his position as CIA Director to wage a war against Trump. Comey and Clapper are also “in” on it. A conspiracy? Yes. Who told them to do it? By golly, it was President Obama.
Yes, but don’t dream of tarnishing the halo St. Barry with perfectly reasonable suppositions as to who put this mess in motion and, I reckon, continues to ride herd on it. He is “above the fray” (my a–). He is at the center of the fray. After Hillary’s ignoble loss to Obama in 2008, she ate crow and went to work for him. They must have made some kind of deal, reached some kind of accommodation.
Yeah, politics.
Weird, huh?
This is sadly reminiscent of another instance of the willingness of the New York Times to publish “evidence” of malfeasance on the part of the enemy du jour: the series of stories in 2001-02 by Judith Miller based on Ahmad Chalabi’s “evidence” of Iraq’s weapons of mass destruction.
At least it ended her career with the NYT. Judith Miller was being fed stories from the office of VP Cheney, who would later cite the NYT as evidence of his accusations of WMD, completing the circle. Similarly, Kwiatkowski went public with how DIA staff were pressured by Sec of Defense and Cheney to stovepipe cherry picked intel to support WMD. The malfeasance germinated in the mechanical heart of one Richard Cheney and the NYT and DIA were used and abused. Not faultless, but the bulk of the derision belongs with that administration.
I think your statement “Yet, the reliance on Ukraine to provide evidence against Russia defies any objective investigative standards” gets to the crux of the matter.
Note how the evidentiary question is not significantly altered when, say, expert Dutch investigators confirm a Russian-blaming narrative regarding MH-17 when, and to the extent that, the Dutch experts form their opinion based on evidence selected by (anti-Russian) Ukrainian authorities.
I’ve used the example before of salted gold-ore samples being given to experts for analysis. Those who fell for the Bre-X scam some 20 years ago apparently failed to appreciate the disclaimer by SNC-Lavalin, who reported a rich find, that they had not done an independent collection of the ore samples. There was a high reported price tag for the analysis and people may have just assumed such an independent collection had taken place.
It is absurd that an admitted hacker in Ukraine, and its militantly anti-Russian government, are considered reliable sources in the smoke-and-mirrors game of tracing international hacking. Their only “evidence” appears to be standard hacking scams of simulating sources to throw off investigators. It is amazing that they can’t even find a hacker somewhere else to make absurd claims in a plea bargain. Obviously NYT does not believe this ridiculous story themselves. It is the greatest fool who believes all others to be greater fools.
Israel controls the New York Times. Therefore this is an Israeli operation.
“What Neocons Want from Ukraine Crisis”
https://consortiumnews.com/2014/03/02/what-neocons-want-from-ukraine-crisis/
The Israelis appear afraid Trump will suddenly turn on them, just as he suddenly and totally disavowed all forms of racism, white supremacism, KKK, alt-right, etc. (And Bannon did, too.) He had needed that support to wrest the GOP nomination away from the Wall Street gang (who merely winked and nodded at the racists, a large and crucial part of their voting base.) Perhaps the glaring, blaring racist crimes and atrocities of Israel will be called out next?
“Netanyahu is silent for 3 days over neo-Nazi violence, while his son says Black Lives Matter and Antifa are the real threat”
http://mondoweiss.net/2017/08/netanyahu-violence-antifa/
“Charlottesville is moment of truth for empowered U.S. Zionists (who name their children after Israeli generals)”
http://mondoweiss.net/2017/08/charlottesville-empowered-children/
Interesting that you say that this is an Israeli operation.
I once traced malware on my PC to three sources, one with an address in Tel Aviv Israel, and two front companies in NYC run by people with Jewish names. Complete coincidence of course.
I also traced a complex web of internet copyright piracy, which included front companies, servers, and offices in Panama, Cayman Islands, Barbados, Montreal, UK, and various piracy and tax evasion venues. One company “TzarMedia” (in English) claimed to have its servers in Moscow, but it turned out that this was just one more false-flag: it was in Texas, and its servers could be anywhere. So anti-Russia false-flags are standard practice.
Because some Ukrainian oligarchs are apparently Jewish with Israeli nationality and bitter anti-Russia views on both fronts, it seems likely that they would be hiring Ukrainian hackers by the dozen to create false-flag hacks blamed on Russia. That must be a real growth industry in Ukraine and Israel by now, not to mention Washington.
Very interesting!
Can the United States, its mainstream media, and its intelligence services sink any deeper into the status of laughable but also malicious clowns?
Yes. They reach new lows with practically every edition of the NYT!
The only group maintaining any respectability within these entities is the VIPS group.
Pathetic.
Laughingstock of the world.
But don’t kick sand in these bullies’ faces.
They may nuke you!
You don’t understand. The Times Co. Chairman Arthur O. Sulzberger Jr., the publisher of the newspaper, wants the Golan Heights for his pet project by any means and he is beyond himself that the bad, bad Russians stopped the slaughter of civilians in Syria and thus stopped the dissolution of Syria. The Chairman Arthur O. Sulzberger Jr. hates, hates the idea of sovereign Syria. He wants Syria to become another Libya. Period. And he wants to see Iran obliterated (some old grievances against the noble ancient civilization that used to provide the best living place for Jews). And then, the Chairman Arthur O. Sulzberger Jr. wants to see profits, even if his profitable fake-news business could lead to a nuclear conflict with Russain Federation. Like other super-wealthy imbeciles, the Chairman Arthur O. Sulzberger Jr. is accustomed to a very special order when other people are always ready to clean his mess. He is not aware that the Mess, which he is so eagerly inviting, could end up his comfortable life and make his relatives into shades on a hard surface. Would not this planet be better without the Chairman Arthur O. Sulzberger Jr. and likes?
Well put. These people are like the “nobles” of medieval times. They care not a whit about the “peasants” they trample. They are wealth bigots, compounded by some ethnic bigotry or other, in this case Jewish supremacism. America has an oligarchy problem. At the center of that oligarchy is a Jewish mafia controlling the banks, and thereby the big corporations, and thereby the media and the government. This oligarchy sees America as a big, dumb military machine that it can manipulate to generate war profits.
“War Profiteers and the Roots of the War on Terror”.
http://warprofiteerstory.blogspot.com
Yes, the VIPS & CN have provided critical analysis of these mass media scams, often led by the biased NYT.
Those who would like to petition the NYT to make Robert Parry their senior editor may do so here:
https://www.change.org/p/new-york-times-bring-a-new-editor-to-the-new-york-times?recruiter=72650402&utm_source=share_petition&utm_medium=copylink. Mr. Parry may prefer independence, and we all know the NYT ownership makes it unlikely, and the NYT may try to ignore it, it is instructive to them that intelligent readers know better journalism when they see it. A petition demonstrates the concerns of a far larger number of potential or lost subscribers.
The “Russiagate” hoax is in big trouble. thanks in large part to the V.I.P.S. memo to President Trump, first published on this site on July 24. No surprise then that the TImes has rushed to stem the bleeding, much the way the Post did in its threatening message to The Nation editor vanden Heuvel to retract its coverage of that explosive report. So what now? Shift the tactic to playing the race card,in an effort to oust this President, the methods, and in fact many of the same names employed in the staged event in Charlottesville, being all too familiar to those who followed the coup which overthrew the elected government of Ukraine.