Major media outlets and members of both political parties keep saying that Russia hacked the 2016 elections, and that it’s an act of war that must not go unpunished. However, there still isn’t any solid evidence beyond the “overwhelming circumstantial evidence” cited by people who claim to have seen a classified CIA report.
Evidence?
Ted Rall
Ted Rall is a syndicated political cartoonist for Andrews McMeel Syndication and WhoWhatWhy.org and Counterpoint. He is a contributor to Centerclip and co-host of "The Final Countdown" talk show on Radio Sputnik. He is a graphic novelist and author of many books of art and prose, and an occasional war correspondent. He is, recently, the author of the graphic novel "2024: Revisited."
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Um, any evidence that Kankles would have actually been a more dangerous warmonger? Well, yes. She actually stated wanting to do regime-change in that former Soviet, nuclear stronghold where the Kremlin is at. So that last frame would have been Hillary-centric even more easily.
It’s sort of a reversal. She and Bubba were China-bitches, while demonizing the Russkies. T-rump is less critical of Russian leadership while stupidly poking at the Dragon.
Hillary was an institutional shoo-in as a tyrant, while anything and everything that DT does will be questioned and overly-monitored. Will Ferrit-head be a tyrant? Hell, It is a part of the job-description. But if he doesn’t do an honest job of kicking criminal invaders out of the U.S.and shutting down their criminal theft of the country’s financial welfare, then nobody’s going to be on his side, and the alphabet-soup bureaucracies will hide the real “football” away from him.
Nowadays, most in “America” wants an “America-First” leader. From the triangulating outset, everybody knew that Billary wasn’t going to be there for them. She was going to continue working for her .001% sponsors. DT’s sponsors are a little less extra-national. Lesser-evil politics at its prime.
DanD
You can find the declassified intelligence report here:
http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2017/01/read-us-intelligence-report-russian-hacking-2016-campaign
While it’s true that we can’t be privy to all of the information sources for fear of jeopardizing the safety of informants, more information has been made available to congress and you’d expect if these sources were bunk the Republicans (beyond Trump himself) would be saying so, and they aren’t.
There is a breakdown of publicly available information here:
https://www.secureworks.com/research/threat-group-4127-targets-google-accounts
which explains why Russian involvement is probable.
It seems like you are intentionally downplaying how much is publicly known about this.
So, your argument, in under 100 words, is “Trust Congress.”
Yes, those diligent workaholics. No one’s ever gotten anything past them before. They’re top-notch skeptics.
also, they have nothing go hide so none are vulnerable to blackmail.
Of course! I forgot that!
Should we also mention how they all floss every day?
I love a good conspiracy. I don’t believe most of them–please, no more about how jet fuel won’t melt steel beams–but I love them. But let’s stay out of the conspiracy thicket and ask the question: Are there any times in the past where the U.S. government lied?
1. Watergate. Check.
2. The Pentagon Papers. Check.
3. The Tuskegee Syphilis experiments. Checkoslovakia.
4. The Tonkin Gulf incident. Checkaroonie.
5. The SECOND Tonkin Gulf incident. Checkareckcheck.
6. The Iraq War. Checkyavik.
That’s just a half-dozen off the top of my head and with a little of the old Google. I’m leaving out the cases where proving it beyond reasonable doubt would take enormous effort. For instance, the blanket assertion that the TSA doesn’t do anything to keep us safe, and any government claims to the contrary are lies. I’m sure someone will trot out a photo of some TSA GED-wielder holding a lighter in a blue-gloved hand. “See? That lighter coulda been used to set a plane on fire! Freedom isn’t free.”
And I’m leaving out the lies like how provisional ballots are counted. I’m just sticking to the demonstrable lies.
And here’s the final question, the one that beats all the others in importance: Has ANY reporter asked a high-level official, “We all know–and here’s the list of examples–that the government has lied in the past. Why should we believe you now?”
Nanothermite….?
Hey, derlehrer – I’m with ya’ but I gave up arguing this one long ago. It does about as much good as investigating why the Ayatollah released the prisoners in coordination with Reagan’s inauguration.
Noam Chomsky summed it up rather well – it doesn’t matter because American imperialism will continue unabated regardless.
http://edition.cnn.com/2017/01/16/opinions/is-it-fake-news-dowling/
http://www.independent.co.uk/voices/donald-trump-president-russia-dossier-fake-news-sex-allegations-putin-kremlin-saddam-hussein-weapons-a7524001.html
We need a Senate Hearing on Trump’s activities in Russia. The Senate should be Hearing, “I did not havingk sexual relations vit zat voman, Monika Levinski.”
But, Michael, who needs «evidence*» ? It was demonstrated many years ago that all that is required is a man holding a sheaf of papers who says that «I have here in my hand a list …». It’s obviousthat Mr Trump is Mr Putin’s puppet, just as those nasty types in the US State Department were Josef Stalin’s. The irony, of course, is that now, instead of the Republicans, the persons leading the charge are «Democrats», i e, the «bomb-’em liberals», rather than the «bomb-’em conservatives»….
Henri
*If Mr Putin says something about the US presidential race, that is, of course, «evidence» of Russian meddling in US elections, an unfriendly act, which should, no doubt, be investigated by a US Senate committee. Alas, given the importance of dealing with those dastardly Russians, the committee will probably lack time to investigate French or Italian or German, or, for that matter European-Parliament meddling in the late elections. But one can’t have everything….
Plainly, I cannot recall another political event in my lifetime that has left me as unsettled as this. The establishment “liberals”/”progressives” have reached a new level of anti-reality and anti-life. I’m accustomed to this sort of evidence-free belligerence from neocons, but this seems to be something different. I welcome anyone to relate another post-Cold War I incident in which the US political establishment saber-rattled like this against a major power. I count all America fortunate that Mr. Putin has no interest in fighting us and has indeed demonstrated once again his maturity and willingness to mend ties by refusing to retaliate in the face of Obama’s vicious and childish attacks.
> I cannot recall …
Luckily, the rest of us can.
How about a major power sabre-rattling against us? Like China flying a nuclear bomber over disputed territory in response to not-president-yet Trump’s threats? That was about a month ago.
But if your definition of ‘sabre-rattling’ includes expelling diplomats, then you might recall that on May 14, 2013, Russia’s Foreign Ministry declared Ryan Fogle, third secretary of the Political Department of the US Embassy in Moscow, persona non grata.
Didja no that Hair Furor mit dem klienen Schwanzstucker has already been expelled from Mexico and Panama?
Or maybe you mean warning that international actions may have reprisals? We’ve been warning China about NK and and the South China Sea for years.
We threatened repercussions for China’s cyber attacks back in ’13.
Putin threatened war if Hillary was to be elected.
Bush warned Russia over Georgia back in 08. (that was after threatening the entire planet in ’01)
Face it, the big boys have *never* stopped rattling, threatening, warning, recalling ambassadors, etc. It’s all part of the big game called ‘diplomacy’.
But as of Friday we will swear in the least diplomatic boor we’ve ever had running the show – and that’s quite a feat considering Bush’s record. He’s not even president yet, and he’s got half the world pissed off at us. You’re going to be unsettled quite often in the next few years, you might as well get used to it.
You young whippersnappers weren’t kicked out of your beds in October ’62. I was.
We lived in the country, and all our rellies who lived in the cities came to stay with us (they got my bed, and I had to sleep on a pallet on the floor–‘make it soft, make it low, make it so’ that Khrushchev don’t know).
It looked to most Americans as if the dictator Khrushchev was about to nuke the US, and only our brave young president might (but probably couldn’t) save us.
“duck and cover”
I did a rough count, and I’m pretty sure a slender majority of the comments on gocomics were, ‘Who [sic] are you going to believe? Lying Russian propaganda and the liars Trump and the traitor Assange (just because he’s Australian does NOT make him innocent of treason under US law), or American sources who are sworn to tell the truth, and who have never perjured themselves (unless you’re stupid enough to believe the lying traitor Snowden)?’
Several suggested that, if Mr Rall believes the Russian propaganda, he should quit gocomics and work for RT. I strongly suspect he will follow about half of that advice.
A sizeable minority agree with Mr Rall, that the US MSM is not altogether reliable, nor are the Congress, nor are our esteemed intelligence agencies.
I, of course, always go with the majority. Even though, no especially when, every reporter who foolishly went to Syria (including Theo Padnos who got published in the New York Times Sunday Magazine) says the US is lying about Syria.
I go with the brave film-makers who were making documentaries of atrocities by the Syrian and Russian governments in the Syrian city of Cairo, until they were arrested by the Secret Police of the dictator al-Sisi for their truthful film showing dead children murdered by the Syrian and Russian regimes. The Secret Police made the dead children, covered in red paint, get up and go home, and those poor, murdered children probably weren’t even paid.
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/middle-east/aleppo-fake-footage-children-five-peopele-arrested-egyptian-police-a7486541.html