Where’s our “independent” outrage about Fox News and Trump lies?

[AG_PhamD]

Can you expand on that? Reading the Mueller Report, along with trump campaign involvement, I find that hard to believe.

Opinion | Study: Russia's influence campaign on Twitter in 2016 failed

A study deals a big blow to the narrative that Russia may have thrown the election for Trump.

www.msnbc.com

I’m surprised MSNBC reported on this study. The referenced study was published in Nature, so not an insignificant publication. So credit where credit is due.

We also know Russia spent something like $160k on Facebook ads, many of which probably weren’t very influential judging by their content. The KGB would have to be pretty sophisticated to have that money outdo the influence of the hundreds of millions spent by the two campaigns and their pacs and zillions of hours of free promotion by news outlets.

And between the race between Clinton and Trump, the Comey probe is likely what shifted the outcome. But Clinton was also a highly flawed candidate who made some significant missteps in her campaigning. But I think it’s fair to assume Trump won the Republican primary because of the media who gave him all the airtime in the world.

Again, I’m not saying Russia didn’t attempt to influence the election. My point is that it was not successful- or there is no evidence of being successful and logically speaking it doesn’t make sense based on the scale of their campaigning. And there were Democrats who predicted Trump could win.

And there was no conclusion in the Mueller Probe that Russia changed the results of the 2016 election. Despite this, a majority of Democrats still believe Russia changed the outcome of the election. And that’s not surprising based on the media coverage.

 

[mac_in_tosh]

I think generally MSNBC’s biggest issue in recent memory is how far they went with the claims of Russian influence in the 2016 election. You would have thought Russia determined the outcome of the election through social media manipulation and that Trump was a Manchurian candidate.

Manafort acknowledged that he shared confidential polling data from the Trump campaign with Konstantin Kilimnik, a business associate with suspected ties to Russian intelligence. In 2021, the Treasury Department found that Kilimnik then shared data deemed as "sensitive information on polling and campaign strategy" with Russian spies.

I don't know how to estimate the impact of Russian interference in the 2016 election. Trump won by flipping a handful of states by the slimmest of margins. It's like asking why the Eagles lost the Super Bowl. Was it Hurt's fumble, the long punt return or the defense allowing two walk-in touchdowns? Each could be considered the deciding factor, as could the Russian interference.

 

[AG_PhamD]

Manafort acknowledged that he shared confidential polling data from the Trump campaign with Konstantin Kilimnik, a business associate with suspected ties to Russian intelligence. In 2021, the Treasury Department found that Kilimnik then shared data deemed as "sensitive information on polling and campaign strategy" with Russian spies.

I don't know how to estimate the impact of Russian interference in the 2016 election. Trump won by flipping a handful of states by the slimmest of margins. It's like asking why the Eagles lost the Super Bowl. Was it Hurt's fumble, the long punt return or the defense allowing two walk-in touchdowns? Each could be considered the deciding factor, as could the Russian interference.

Sure, no one’s disputing that.

By that standard there is no way to prove anything ever about anything.

I encourage you to consider the scale of Russia’s efforts versus the scale of American political machine including ads, spending, airtime, media content, etc. And also the quality of the content Russia was pushing.

 

[Citysnaps]

I don't know how to estimate the impact of Russian interference in the 2016 election. Trump won by flipping a handful of states by the slimmest of margins. It's like asking why the Eagles lost the Super Bowl. Was it Hurt's fumble, the long punt return or the defense allowing two walk-in touchdowns? Each could be considered the deciding factor, as could the Russian interference.

Same here and I agree with your assessment. In my view it was a factor, as were others. To what extent, I don't know and can only speculate as to how much. For example, in the MSNBC opinion piece, it appears only twitter was referenced. Though I haven't used twitter in a dozen years and therefore can't speak about its contribution (and would not be in a position to do so, anyway), from using Facebook regularly since 2010, it was clear to me (from anecdotal observation) there was a significant Russian disinformation campaign during the 2016 election. I can only speculate as to how much a factor it was.

Rather than speculate, I'll just say it should be extremely concerning to all Americans that there's any involvement. There's no doubt in my mind there will be similar meddling in future presidential elections, except it will likely be much better orchestrated (learning from the past).

 

[Chew Toy McCoy]

Opinion | Study: Russia's influence campaign on Twitter in 2016 failed

A study deals a big blow to the narrative that Russia may have thrown the election for Trump.

www.msnbc.com

I’m surprised MSNBC reported on this study. The referenced study was published in Nature, so not an insignificant publication. So credit where credit is due.

We also know Russia spent something like $160k on Facebook ads, many of which probably weren’t very influential judging by their content. The KGB would have to be pretty sophisticated to have that money outdo the influence of the hundreds of millions spent by the two campaigns and their pacs and zillions of hours of free promotion by news outlets.

And between the race between Clinton and Trump, the Comey probe is likely what shifted the outcome. But Clinton was also a highly flawed candidate who made some significant missteps in her campaigning. But I think it’s fair to assume Trump won the Republican primary because of the media who gave him all the airtime in the world.

Again, I’m not saying Russia didn’t attempt to influence the election. My point is that it was not successful- or there is no evidence of being successful and logically speaking it doesn’t make sense based on the scale of their campaigning. And there were Democrats who predicted Trump could win.

And there was no conclusion in the Mueller Probe that Russia changed the results of the 2016 election. Despite this, a majority of Democrats still believe Russia changed the outcome of the election. And that’s not surprising based on the media coverage.

People of all political persuasions felt (feel) the system is extremely broken and we needed a shake-up and major change. Unfortunately that opportunity came in the form of Trump and to compound that misfortune he and the media quickly turned it back into Republicans vs Democrats instead of citizens vs a highly broken, corrupt, and unjust system.

 

[mac_in_tosh]

I encourage you to consider the scale of Russia’s efforts versus the scale of American political machine including ads, spending, airtime, media content, etc. And also the quality of the content Russia was pushing.

Since we can't do the experiment of repeating he 2016 election while eliminating each influence one by one, it's hard to prove how much influence Russian meddling had. But Trump won some states by tiny margins so a small influence could have a large effect since a majority of the popular vote gives you all of the state's electoral votes. In other words, Russia's small incremental effort compared to the others could have made the difference. It's just math.

As for the quality of the Russian content, there are millions of people who believe the utter nonsense and falsehoods pushed by the likes of Rudy G, the pillow guy and MT Green. In fact, lower quality content appears to be what Trump supporters want.

 

[AG_PhamD]

Since we can't do the experiment of repeating he 2016 election while eliminating each influence one by one, it's hard to prove how much influence Russian meddling had. But Trump won some states by tiny margins so a small influence could have a large effect since a majority of the popular vote gives you all of the state's electoral votes. In other words, Russia's small incremental effort compared to the others could have made the difference. It's just math.

As for the quality of the Russian content, there are millions of people who believe the utter nonsense and falsehoods pushed by the likes of Rudy G, the pillow guy and MT Green. In fact, lower quality content appears to be what Trump supporters want.

Sure, there’s plenty of people that believe stupid things, but that’s usually because they have some regard for that individual of actual status. Some unknown account with 4 followers posting a meme of Jesus saying he won’t let Clinton win probably is probably not the determining factor. But do you think the people that fell in love with Mr. MyPillow of the arbiter of scientific knowledge were going to be voting for Clinton to begin with. Unlikely.

By your standard I could say some objectively false comment about Clinton your hypothetical Trump-loving Uncle posted online actually determined the outcome of the election. Is it possible- I suppose, but it’s not the most logical speculation. Or that what you personally ate for breakfast on Election Day determined the outcome by some butterfly-effect series of events.

Also worth noting, it recently came to light that Twitter and FB shut down I believe it was the Pentagon from covertly spreading pro-American propaganda on social media in foreign countries to influence them. The various campaigns were found to be overwhelmingly unsuccessful.

I think people underestimate the difficulty of spreading disinformation in foreign countries because the the cultural differences that are not well understood enough to be relatable to the target demographics. At least this is the case historically speaking. This was the case on both sides of the Vietnam War- to the point both sides found each others propaganda targeting soldiers hilariously out of touch, undermining any efforts. The same thing during the Cold War. The Soviet tactic became to just throw out tons of conspiracies until one stuck- two of the most notable being the US developed AIDS and that J. Edgar Hoover was a transvestite. In the latter case it was apparently an off the cuff thing and never predicted that would garner traction.

Anyways, don’t think this election stuff is worth discussing any further because we both have our minds made up on this, at least for the time being. It’s exactly why I didn’t want to start rattling off examples haha.

 

[mac_in_tosh]

Anyways, don’t think this election stuff is worth discussing any further because we both have our minds made up on this, at least for the time being. It’s exactly why I didn’t want to start rattling off examples haha.

Well, I'll end with some examples. Trump won the following states by the margins shown:

Michigan 0.3 %
Wisconsin 1.0 %
Florida 1.2 %
North Carolina 3.8 %
Arizona 3.9 %

These five states have 81 electoral votes total, enough to give Clinton the win. So the question is how much of a factor did Russian interference have to be to affect the results by just these small amounts?

 

[Chew Toy McCoy]

Fox insiders admit even Fox viewers don’t trust Fox

Emails reveal hosts and executives admitting their own viewers wouldn't believe Fox if it reported the truth.

www.salon.com

More damning of Fox News viewers than even Fox News. They don't want to be told the truth and when told that they'll just go to another fantasy network. Either way, not good for conservatives who want honest reality based news. You shouldn't have to decide which "facts" are just there as red meat for the nutters.

 

[Edd]

Fox insiders admit even Fox viewers don’t trust Fox

Emails reveal hosts and executives admitting their own viewers wouldn't believe Fox if it reported the truth.

www.salon.com

More damning of Fox News viewers than even Fox News. They don't want to be told the truth and when told that they'll just go to another fantasy network. Either way, not good for conservatives who want honest reality based news. You shouldn't have to decide which "facts" are just there as red meat for the nutters.

What a bunch of cunts.