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Author | Topic: The Trump Presidency | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Phat Member Posts: 18345 From: Denver,Colorado USA Joined: Member Rating: 1.0 |
NN writes: Would you be surprised if they did? I would not be surprised if they failed to find a single person from the campaigns who was involved in those kinds of things.Chance as a real force is a myth. It has no basis in reality and no place in scientific inquiry. For science and philosophy to continue to advance in knowledge, chance must be demythologized once and for all. —RC Sproul "A lie can travel half way around the world while the truth is putting on its shoes." —Mark Twain " ~"If that's not sufficient for you go soak your head."~Faith Paul was probably SO soaked in prayer nobody else has ever equaled him.~Faith
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Percy Member Posts: 22500 From: New Hampshire Joined: Member Rating: 4.9 |
NoNukes writes: As I read it, these folks had some very sinister goals, but apparently spreading lies, discord in an attempt to affect democracy isn't a crime. Heck, there is nothing about their campaign that would not be legal for any US citizen to do. Did these guys do anything any worse than the "Swift-boating" of John Kerry? I don't think so. You say, "As I read it." Are you referring to the BBC article PaulK linked to (Russians charged over US 2016 election tampering)? If so then what you say seems at odds with it:
quote: Some of these sound pretty serious, constituting "conspiracy to commit wire fraud and...aggravated identity theft."
Apparently what the charges in the indictment currently consist of is incidental crimes and rule flaunting necessary only because these folks were hiding their identities as Russians. "Only"???!!! Isn't "hiding their identities as Russians" what spies would do? Sounds pretty serious. Or by "As I read it" do you mean you've read the indictment, which no one has posted a link to yet, so here it is: The Indictment The indictment reads much more damning than what you say. Here are what I thought were the most significant parts:
And I only got as the top of page 5. Looks pretty bad.
I would not be surprised if they failed to find a single person from the campaigns who was involved in those kinds of things. Wouldn't a meeting about Hillary Clinton emails with Russians with connections to the effort to subvert the 2016 election process, however indirect, constitute conspiracy? --Percy
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NoNukes Inactive Member |
Some of these sound pretty serious, constituting "conspiracy to commit wire fraud and...aggravated identity theft." I did not mean that they were not important. What I said was that items in the indictment were incidental to the goals and were primarily the result of folks disguising their identities. Yes, those folks did that stuff on the way to spreading discord and lies and deceiving voters. But apparently, spreading discord, lies, and deceit is perfectly legal. My point is, and still remains, that the stuff they pulled off was totally legal[1] and totally evil.
Wouldn't a meeting about Hillary Clinton emails with Russians with connections to the effort to subvert the 2016 election process, however indirect, constitute conspiracy? It would be assuming that subverting the election process is criminal. Now, let's talk about what constitutes subversion to the degree that it constitutes a crime. Certainly, something more than swiftboating in my opinion. [1] Totally legal if Americans did it. But foreign influence is illegal. Edited by NoNukes, : No reason given. Edited by NoNukes, : No reason given. Edited by NoNukes, : No reason given. Under a government which imprisons any unjustly, the true place for a just man is also in prison. Thoreau: Civil Disobedience (1846) "Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free, the wretched refuse of your teeming shore. Send these, the homeless, tempest-tossed to me, I lift my lamp beside the golden door! We got a thousand points of light for the homeless man. We've got a kinder, gentler, machine gun hand. Neil Young, Rockin' in the Free World. Worrying about the "browning of America" is not racism. -- Faith I hate you all, you hate me -- Faith
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Percy Member Posts: 22500 From: New Hampshire Joined: Member Rating: 4.9
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I've read further down The Indictment. They're being charged with conspiracy (comments I make about items appear in italicized parentheses like this):
quote: Here's a section on identity theft:
quote: I've posted enough of the indictment, it goes on like that, although here's a couple particularly insidious items:
Count 2, wire fraud and bank fraud, begins on page 30. I won't quote anything from that section as I've quoted too much already, except for this summary on page 31:
quote: Count 3 about aggravated identify theft begins on page 34. --Percy
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Percy Member Posts: 22500 From: New Hampshire Joined: Member Rating: 4.9 |
Here's a better version of the indictment from the Washington Post that has a text version that can be cut-n-pasted: Special counsel's indictment of Russian Internet Research Agency, 13 suspects
--Percy
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NoNukes Inactive Member |
After the election of Donald Trump in or around November 2016, Defendants and their co-conspirators used false U.S. personas to organize and coordinate U.S. political rallies in support of then president-elect Trump, while simultaneously using other false U.S. personas to organize and coordinate U.S. political rallies protesting the results of the 2016 U.S. presidential election. Does "false US personas" mean something more than logging onto Quora or Facebook with a fake name and details? Under a government which imprisons any unjustly, the true place for a just man is also in prison. Thoreau: Civil Disobedience (1846) "Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free, the wretched refuse of your teeming shore. Send these, the homeless, tempest-tossed to me, I lift my lamp beside the golden door! We got a thousand points of light for the homeless man. We've got a kinder, gentler, machine gun hand. Neil Young, Rockin' in the Free World. Worrying about the "browning of America" is not racism. -- Faith I hate you all, you hate me -- Faith
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jar Member (Idle past 422 days) Posts: 34026 From: Texas!! Joined:
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It is beyond belief that a Nation would interfere in the internal politics and elections of a foreign nation, particularly as State sponsored and funded secret efforts and disinformation campaigns.
What if the US did anything like that in say, Iran or Syria or Iraq or Lebanon or Egypt or Guatemala or Panama or Chile or Vietnam or Hawaii or Japan or China or the Dominican Republic or Haiti or Nicaragua or Greece or ...
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NoNukes Inactive Member
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The conspiracy had as its object the opening of accounts under false names at U.S. financial institutions and a digital payments company in order to receive and send moeny into and out of the United States to support the ORGANIZATION's operations in the United STates and for self-enrichment. I have some difficulty with the reasoning here. I hope my remarks are not taking as trivializing the illegal activity described here. But let's assume that some unnamed person in Trump's campaign was working with the Russians. Would they be involved in this particular conspiracy, or even need to know that the Russians were going to commit any of those acts? Weren't those unnamed other folks probably conspiring to swing the election rather making money off the internet? Would they even know or care about those details. Yes, I do have a tendency to look at things through a strict legal lens, but that's because I would like the charges to stick. Along those lines, I point to the vacating of the bribery charges against the former governor of Virginia, by Supreme Court justices who all acknowledged that former governor McDonnell was crooked as hell. Edited by NoNukes, : No reason given. Under a government which imprisons any unjustly, the true place for a just man is also in prison. Thoreau: Civil Disobedience (1846) "Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free, the wretched refuse of your teeming shore. Send these, the homeless, tempest-tossed to me, I lift my lamp beside the golden door! We got a thousand points of light for the homeless man. We've got a kinder, gentler, machine gun hand. Neil Young, Rockin' in the Free World. Worrying about the "browning of America" is not racism. -- Faith I hate you all, you hate me -- Faith
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Percy Member Posts: 22500 From: New Hampshire Joined: Member Rating: 4.9 |
NoNukes writes: After the election of Donald Trump in or around November 2016, Defendants and their co-conspirators used false U.S. personas to organize and coordinate U.S. political rallies in support of then president-elect Trump, while simultaneously using other false U.S. personas to organize and coordinate U.S. political rallies protesting the results of the 2016 U.S. presidential election.
Does "false US personas" mean something more than logging onto Quora or Facebook with a fake name and details? My understanding of the indictment is that indicted Russians were on American soil only in 2014, so "false US personas" means they logged in to social media, bank accounts and PayPal using fake and stolen IDs. --Percy
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NoNukes Inactive Member |
My understanding of the indictment is that indicted Russians were on American soil only in 2014, so "false US personas" means they logged in to social media, bank accounts and PayPal using fake and stolen IDs. Without going too deeply into this, in my opinion, the details are important and are unlikely to be covered in the indictment. Stolen IDs and fake IDs are distinguishable. And for me, it would matter whether which of those activities in the list (banking vs logging in to social media) were done with fake IDs. Such distinctions don't get the perpetrators off the hook, but convicting folks on that basis is not something that easily translates to indicting others who wanted help with steering public opinion. Anonymity is not a crime, nor is spreading false rumors about presidential candidates a crime. Maybe it is possible to wrap up all of that stuff into a criminal enterprise with the stuff that is illegal and to charge folks associated with any part of that as participants in the enterprise, but I'm very skeptical that a prosecution on that basis is constitutional even if it is facially viable under the law. Here is something from an editorial I found on the Huffington Post. I don't swear to its accuracy, but until I get some time to read the statutes, or hear another argument this at least seems to be correct. Foreigners Can Tweet About U.S. Politics. They Just Can't Buy Ads To Promote A Candidate. | HuffPost Latest News
quote: I had thought that our laws were more strict than that, but according to this, it is the paid advertisements, and not the posts, that are the problem.
quote: In short, this is all about the money and who was involved with the use of Russian money to influence the election. This part of the indictment is not about the dirt on Hilary or its source. If this were all that Mueller had, then Trump would have something to celebrate, if it were not for his ego. Trump is not going to admit any possibility that his win last November was potential a favor for Russia. That might mean that he is unlikely to be onboard with tightening up the administration of elections until he is absolutely forced to do so. But there is the possibility that there is more to things than this. If there is more, then releasing this part of things would be a masterful way of handling the investigation. Let's see what happens. Under a government which imprisons any unjustly, the true place for a just man is also in prison. Thoreau: Civil Disobedience (1846) "Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free, the wretched refuse of your teeming shore. Send these, the homeless, tempest-tossed to me, I lift my lamp beside the golden door! We got a thousand points of light for the homeless man. We've got a kinder, gentler, machine gun hand. Neil Young, Rockin' in the Free World. Worrying about the "browning of America" is not racism. -- Faith I hate you all, you hate me -- Faith
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Percy Member Posts: 22500 From: New Hampshire Joined: Member Rating: 4.9 |
NoNukes writes: But let's assume that some unnamed person in Trump's campaign was working with the Russians. Would they be involved in this particular conspiracy, or even need to know that the Russians were going to commit any of those acts? We can only go by what is publicly known of Trump campaign contacts with the Russians. The indictment makes clear how little idea we had of how much Mueller knows, and it seems unlikely, at least to me, that the indictment represents the extent of his knowledge, especially given that Papadopoulos, Flynn and Gates have already reached pleas deals with Mueller (and also Californian Richard Pinedo concerning helping the Russians commit identity theft), which means they're cooperating by providing information. But at this time there is no publicly known information connecting the Trump campaign to this Russian conspiracy, so we can only speculate about whether it exists or will exist at some point. For those who like to speculate about sinister brilliance, what a coup it would be for the Russians to drag us through the chaos of a couple years of a Trump presidency, and then dragging us through a couple more years of a Trump impeachment and trial. But returning to what we know now, the most problematic publicly known connection between the Trump campaign and Russian representatives involved Donald Trump Jr.'s meeting purportedly about Clinton emails. If Mueller has evidence that the Russians attempted to hack Clinton emails, or that Russia was responsible for the hacking of DNC emails, then Donald Jr. may be in a great deal of trouble. If Donald Sr. knew the true subject of the meeting when he composed Donald Jr.'s description for the press, then he may be in an equal amount of trouble. It means they're part of the Russian conspiracy, and their actions represent not mere crimes but treason. And regardless of any conspiring with Russia, obstruction of justice charges are looking increasingly likely. --Percy
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Phat Member Posts: 18345 From: Denver,Colorado USA Joined: Member Rating: 1.0 |
It is beyond belief that a Nation would interfere in the internal politics and elections of a foreign nation, particularly as State sponsored and funded secret efforts and disinformation campaigns. When we do it to them, its to make the world safe for democracy. When they do it to us, it is a war against our way of life.
As An American Tragedy Unfolds, Russian Agents Sow Discord Online quote:Now that the shoe is on the other foot, it becomes an issue. Nobody cared when the US tried to influence other governments because it was assumed we were simply paving the way for a better way of life in those oppressed countries. In contrast, there is no way Russia is going to improve our way of life...except perhaps to expose the hypocrisy of our wealthy elite...Chance as a real force is a myth. It has no basis in reality and no place in scientific inquiry. For science and philosophy to continue to advance in knowledge, chance must be demythologized once and for all. —RC Sproul "A lie can travel half way around the world while the truth is putting on its shoes." —Mark Twain " ~"If that's not sufficient for you go soak your head."~Faith Paul was probably SO soaked in prayer nobody else has ever equaled him.~Faith
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NoNukes Inactive Member
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Nobody cared when the US tried to influence other governments because it was assumed we were simply paving the way for a better way of life in those oppressed countries. In contrast, there is no way Russia is going to improve our way of life However popular this view might be, even if it is correct, it is completely Americ-centric. We should not expect this view to be what other countries, including the ones friendly to the US, hold as true. It certainly is not the view that our adversaries and competitors would logically hold. Edited by NoNukes, : No reason given. Under a government which imprisons any unjustly, the true place for a just man is also in prison. Thoreau: Civil Disobedience (1846) "Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free, the wretched refuse of your teeming shore. Send these, the homeless, tempest-tossed to me, I lift my lamp beside the golden door! We got a thousand points of light for the homeless man. We've got a kinder, gentler, machine gun hand. Neil Young, Rockin' in the Free World. Worrying about the "browning of America" is not racism. -- Faith I hate you all, you hate me -- Faith
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Percy Member Posts: 22500 From: New Hampshire Joined: Member Rating: 4.9 |
NoNukes writes: Here is something from an editorial I found on the Huffington Post. I don't swear to its accuracy,... I've read the indictment, and I think a significant portion of the Huffington Post editorial by Paul Blementhal is misleading (Foreigners Can Tweet About U.S. Politics. They Just Can’t Buy Ads To Promote A Candidate.). Both the headline and the first couple paragraphs make it seem like the only thing the Russians did wrong was pay for ads:
quote: While true, that's only part of the story. From a top level view, the reasons the Russians were charged were:
The editorial continues on to mention some of these things, but then at the end it returns to the point about paying for ads, lending a false impression that that's the key illegal activity, which is untrue. For example, here the indictment describes use of a false persona to send a message to a Facebook group supporting Trump:
quote: Since they didn't register as foreign agents, and since they're misrepresenting themselves as an American, this is a crime and obviously not a paid ad. --Percy
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NoNukes Inactive Member |
Admittedly this is a detractor's post, and I imagine it can be attacked on that basis. I am sure that Trump's fans would let something like this go, but the optics are terrible.
Trump visits Florida after the latest school shooting. That was the right thing to do, but will Trump once again be photographed throwing paper towels to flood victims across the room. Of course!! How does Trump show solidarity with shooting survivors? With a big "Thumbs UP mission accomplished" photo. Because that's how the most presidential man since Abraham Lincoln rolls.
Edited by Admin, : Fix image. Under a government which imprisons any unjustly, the true place for a just man is also in prison. Thoreau: Civil Disobedience (1846) "Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free, the wretched refuse of your teeming shore. Send these, the homeless, tempest-tossed to me, I lift my lamp beside the golden door! We got a thousand points of light for the homeless man. We've got a kinder, gentler, machine gun hand. Neil Young, Rockin' in the Free World. Worrying about the "browning of America" is not racism. -- Faith I hate you all, you hate me -- Faith |
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