TWTR <-- Dead Meat

[ph1l]

So first off, there is no question that Russia manipulated the 2016 election in a massive way. It was in fact hijacked.

They certainly tried, but ...
https://www.usatoday.com/story/news...russians-changed-vote-tallies-2016/592978002/

Senate report: No evidence that Russians changed vote tallies in 2016
Erin Kelly
USA TODAY

Mark Warner of Virginia, the committee's senior Democrat, said he's "concerned that we as a country are still not fully prepared for the 2018 midterm elections."

"That’s one reason why we, as a Committee, have decided that it is important to get out as much information as possible about the threat, so that governments at every level take it seriously and take the necessary steps to defend ourselves," Warner said.

Among the report's findings:

• At least 18 states, and possibly 21, had election systems targeted by Russian-affiliated hackers in some way. Other states saw "suspicious or malicious behavior" that the U.S. Intelligence Community was not able to definitively tie to Russia.

• In a small number of states, the hackers were in a position to change or delete voter registration data, but they did not appear to have the power to manipulate individual votes or vote totals.

working with states now, the report says.

"Although early interactions between state election officials and DHS were strained, states now largely give DHS credit for making tremendous progress over the last six months," the committee concludes.

However, the nation's aging voting system remain vulnerable to attack, the report says.

"Voting systems across the United States are outdated, and many do not have a paper record of votes as a backup counting system that can be reliably audited, should there be allegations of machine manipulation," the committee concluded. "In addition, the number of vendors selling machines is shrinking, raising concerns about supply chain vulnerability."

The committee also updated election security recommendations that it first released in March. Among them:

security clearances so they can be told what's happening.

• States should rapidly replace old voting systems. At a minimum, any new machine should have a voter-verified paper trail and no WiFi capability that can be hacked.

 

[ET180]

I'm looking at it from a broader boycott perspective, for example "I don't buy Goya products because I don't like the fact that Trump violated federal ethics rules to advertise them in the Oval Office".

I've never heard of Goya or the incident you described, but was that Goya's fault? Did Goya ask him for a public endorsement?

There are plenty of folks who either stopped using Twitter or never started using it because they disapproved of the voice it gave to Trump. Not because they were worried about seeing a Trump tweet while they were using the service. Heck its pretty unavoidable to see a Trump tweet even if you've never been on Twitter.

Speculation. Was it 15%, 25%, 35%? What's the number? I only use Twitter to follow a few people in the financial world. I rarely saw any tweet about Trump unless it was related to policy.

Any argument about "silencing" moves into attribution of political agenda to a corporation. They may have that or they may not, but Occams Razor is easily able to explain this as simply a company caught between a rock and a hard place and having to reluctantly cut off what was once a big driver of traffic to their site because they believe it now represents more of a liability (to the brand not legal) than a benefit.

Occam's Razor would be they silenced him because it was the popular thing to do and they don't want to seem him get power because he would likely use it against them.

So first off, there is no question that Russia manipulated the 2016 election in a massive way. It was in fact hijacked.

Even if you believe everything in the Mueller Report, to state as Nancy Pelosi did that it changed the outcome of the election is total speculation and therefore by definition, a disputed claim. Even if you believe the accusations, there's no way to prove that it influenced enough people to change the result. I assume Russia, China, Iran, and several other countries are doing everything they can to interfere with US elections and will continue to do so in the future. That should be no surprise. But it certainly would not have been enough to change the outcome of the election...certainly not enough to overpower the relentless attacks (really campaign contributions) from MSM, FB, and Twitter including shadow-banning and de-platforming. And if you think about it, if Russia could change the result of a US election...what does that say about the US voter? How much faith could you possibly have in Democracy if some nation with a small GDP can change the outcome of a US election. Although, to be honest, I don't have a high opinion of Democracy anyway...to quote someone else here, it's like asking two wolves and a sheep to vote on what to have for dinner.

 

[Sig]

They certainly tried, but ...
https://www.usatoday.com/story/news...russians-changed-vote-tallies-2016/592978002/

So I know you understand that changing vote tallies is only one of dozens of ways a foreign power can attempt to manipulate an election. There was pretty much never a serious assertion that Russia changed vote tallies. There was pretty definitive proof that they manipulated the election through disinformation, hacking and releasing confidential information, and providing information directly to the Trump campaign. And you know this. Again, why would you think that being purposely obtuse is a good look?

 

[Sig]

I've never heard of Goya or the incident you described, but was that Goya's fault? Did Goya ask him for a public endorsement?

Speculation. Was it 15%, 25%, 35%? What's the number? I only use Twitter to follow a few people in the financial world. I rarely saw any tweet about Trump unless it was related to policy.

Occam's Razor would be they silenced him because it was the popular thing to do and they don't want to seem him get power because he would likely use it against them.

Your (probably purposely) missing my point entirely, which is that people stop using or don't start using companies if they feel they are supporting something egregious. It's the whole concept of branding, something those of us who own businesses spend a lot of time on.

How many people does that represent? Like most things in business there's ambiguity in that but certainly Twitter has a better idea than we would. Given that companies spend millions to build and maintain their brand, something that damages it is pretty important. Prior to kicking Trump off the number of subscribers, and more importantly as I've kept saying the amount of revenue, they'll lose from that move is also unknown versus the damage from keeping him on. Big boy business world, you work with a bunch of unknowns, do your best to predict outcomes knowing your predictions are going to be inexact and often wrong.

This might turn out to be the wrong decision, but is an eminently reasonable decision based on purely a business view of the world, which is all I'm pointing out. If you refuse to even acknowledge that there's a legitimate business reason for them doing what they did, then you're not being rational and are clearly seeing the world through a hyper partisan lense where no matter what it's all about this massive persecution complex.

Even if you believe everything in the Mueller Report, to state as Nancy Pelosi did that it changed the outcome of the election is total speculation and therefore by definition, a disputed claim. Even if you believe the accusations, there's no way to prove that it influenced enough people to change the result. I assume Russia, China, Iran, and several other countries are doing everything they can to interfere with US elections and will continue to do so in the future. That should be no surprise. But it certainly would not have been enough to change the outcome of the election...certainly not enough to overpower the relentless attacks (really campaign contributions) from MSM, FB, and Twitter including shadow-banning and de-platforming. And if you think about it, if Russia could change the result of a US election...what does that say about the US voter? How much faith could you possibly have in Democracy if some nation with a small GDP can change the outcome of a US election. Although, to be honest, I don't have a high opinion of Democracy anyway...to quote someone else here, it's like asking two wolves and a sheep to vote on what to have for dinner.

Wait, you don't believe substantive parts of the Mueller report? What parts would those be and on what basis?

Frankly I was surprised that the highest levels of the Trump campaign met with known Russian agents in order to get dirt on their opponent....and you should be too! Before Trump, that would have been unthinkable. I see you trying out this idea that "Russia has a small GDP and U.S. adversaries try to interfere with elections anyway, so it's no big deal that Trump embraced it". Sorry, that's just monumentally stupid.

Let's be clear, you're equating Pelosi accurately stating that Russia interfered in the 2016 election after a federal investigation confirmed it, with Trump claiming there was massive voter fraud in the 2020 election after his own attorney general investigated and said there wasn't and more than 60 courts rejected the assertion...which then led to right wing terrorists attacking the capitol while the actual electoral votes were being counted in an attempt to overthrow the results! If that's not whataboutism at its finest I don't know what is!

 

[Sig]

As you criticize me for projecting...where did I criticize Obama for being too young? I never did. Funny how you criticize me for projection based on something I never said...therefore that makes you the one projecting!

Regarding average age of congress...

Democratic leaders in the House are two decades older than Republican leaders.

The average age of the Democratic House leadership is 72 years old, whereas the average age of Republican House leadership is 48 years old. This trend continues in House committee leadership with Republican chairmen averaging 59 years old and ranking Democrats averaging 68 years old.

https://www.quorum.us/data-driven-insights/the-115th-congress-is-among-the-oldest-in-history/

You seem to have a reading comprehension problem. First I asked you for the average age of the senators of both parties. You knew that would show that they're all a bunch of old fucks so you cherry picked not just the house but a subset of the house. So, still waiting for you to respond to the question I actually posed rather than the question you decided to answer instead.

I'd also be interested in seeing where I specifically said you criticized Obama for being young? It's highly likely you weren't old enough to vote when Obama was elected, heck there's a decent chance that you're still not old enough to vote. That doesn't mean you can't contribute to this conversation. But sadly unless you've studied it extensively (and it's clear you haven't), you really need to stay out of discussion about the zeitgeist at a time before you were really aware of politics. You really just can't get it.

 

[zghorner]

Glock and CZ are both better than Sig.

 

[Sig]

Glock and CZ are both better than Sig.

Not them's fight'n words

Actually the nick comes from something else, but my P220 is my favorite.

 

[kmiklas]

Big SO post on this here:
https://politics.stackexchange.com/...y-6-speech-call-for-insurrection-and-violence

 

[Overnight]

...for example "I don't buy Goya products because I don't like the fact that Trump violated federal ethics rules to advertise them in the Oval Office"...

Bad analogy for Twitter. The Goya thing was started by AOC mostly, after Ivanka's pic, and it backfired on her.

https://www.newsweek.com/after-aoc-...kyrocket-ceo-names-her-employee-month-1553018

 

[ph1l]

There was pretty definitive proof that they manipulated the election through disinformation, hacking and releasing confidential information, and providing information directly to the Trump campaign. And you know this. Again, why would you think that being purposely obtuse is a good look?

Yes, the Russian government, other governments (U.S. included), and of course political parties continually put out misinformation. But with an election featuring two extremely polarizing people (Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump), political lies are unlikely to change who voters chose.