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US official: Russia using social media to divide Americans

TU Curmudgeon

TU Curmudgeon

B.A. (Sarc), LLb. (Lex Sarcasus), PhD (Sarc.)
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From the Associated Press

US official: Russia using social media to divide Americans
​

PHILADELPHIA (AP) — The U.S. homeland security secretary said on Saturday there are no signs that Russia is targeting this year’s midterm elections with the same “scale or scope” it targeted the 2016 presidential election.

Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen spoke at a convention of state secretaries of state, an event that’s usually a low-key affair highlighting voter registration, balloting devices and election security issues that don’t get much public attention. But coming amid fresh allegations into Russia’s attempts to sway the 2016 election, the sessions on election security have a higher level of urgency and interest.


Nielsen said her agency will help state and local election officials prepare their systems for cyberattacks from Russia or elsewhere. She said U.S. intelligence officials are seeing “persistent Russian efforts using social media, sympathetic spokespeople and other fronts to sow discord and divisiveness amongst the American people, though not necessarily focused on specific politicians or political campaigns.”

COMMENT:-

Two points:

  1. "They are just now finding this out?"; and
  2. "This differs from what the US government does in countries like Iran? How?".

​
 
TU Curmudgeon said:
From the Associated Press

US official: Russia using social media to divide Americans
​

PHILADELPHIA (AP) — The U.S. homeland security secretary said on Saturday there are no signs that Russia is targeting this year’s midterm elections with the same “scale or scope” it targeted the 2016 presidential election.

Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen spoke at a convention of state secretaries of state, an event that’s usually a low-key affair highlighting voter registration, balloting devices and election security issues that don’t get much public attention. But coming amid fresh allegations into Russia’s attempts to sway the 2016 election, the sessions on election security have a higher level of urgency and interest.


Nielsen said her agency will help state and local election officials prepare their systems for cyberattacks from Russia or elsewhere. She said U.S. intelligence officials are seeing “persistent Russian efforts using social media, sympathetic spokespeople and other fronts to sow discord and divisiveness amongst the American people, though not necessarily focused on specific politicians or political campaigns.”

COMMENT:-

Two points:

  1. "They are just now finding this out?"; and
  2. "This differs from what the US government does in countries like Iran? How?".

​
Click to expand...

Well, its drones when we think it's muskets now.

Propaganda is a science now. The call it "persuasion" because that sounded better to focus groups.

I am a union stagehands. I am a fly on the wall in a bunch of conventions.

Marketing groups talk about what the Russians did in the last election, in the marketing context.

But all the profiling from Facebook data is a common practice HERE.

I think our government hasn't been too vocal on the issue because of the fact that all the techniques the Russians used are used against us by American companies all the time.

The media keeps it on the downlow because ads are created using these tools. Politicians because speeches and campaigns are designed using these tools.
 
US official: Russia using social media to divide Americans


to anyone with half a brain this should have been pretty obvious for quite some time ........
 
"US official: Russia using social media to divide Americans"

They're a day late and a $ short - Obama did it for them. :lamo
 
cuban smokes said:
US official: Russia using social media to divide Americans


to anyone with half a brain this should have been pretty obvious for quite some time ........
Click to expand...

Anyone with half a brain should know russia has divided people by trolling since they had access to free internet. Seriously porn is actually banned in russia, since they can not spend all day fapping they spend their days trolling everyone everywhere in any way the can.
 
TU Curmudgeon said:
From the Associated Press

US official: Russia using social media to divide Americans
​

PHILADELPHIA (AP) — The U.S. homeland security secretary said on Saturday there are no signs that Russia is targeting this year’s midterm elections with the same “scale or scope” it targeted the 2016 presidential election.

Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen spoke at a convention of state secretaries of state, an event that’s usually a low-key affair highlighting voter registration, balloting devices and election security issues that don’t get much public attention. But coming amid fresh allegations into Russia’s attempts to sway the 2016 election, the sessions on election security have a higher level of urgency and interest.


Nielsen said her agency will help state and local election officials prepare their systems for cyberattacks from Russia or elsewhere. She said U.S. intelligence officials are seeing “persistent Russian efforts using social media, sympathetic spokespeople and other fronts to sow discord and divisiveness amongst the American people, though not necessarily focused on specific politicians or political campaigns.”

COMMENT:-

Two points:

  1. "They are just now finding this out?"; and
  2. "This differs from what the US government does in countries like Iran? How?".

​
Click to expand...

We were a united nation during the cold war, when it came to east vs. west. Both major political parties were also united in that, even though they differed on domestic issues. With the breakup of the old USSR and the disbanding of the Warsaw Pact, that boogieman man disappeared for awhile. We actually became fairly friendly with Russia under Gorbachev and Yeltsin. Putin's first term in office 2000-2008 we maintain friendly relations. It wasn't until his second term which began in 2012,that we began to have problems with him. Our mindset changed as apparently did Russia's.

There are plenty of reasons why we went from friendly to adversarial. Probably the biggest is the expansion of NATO pretty much up to Russia's borders. This after we agreed with Gorbachev not to expand NATO past Germany's border if Russia allowed the peaceful German unification between East and West Germany.

As for dividing America, our major political parties have done a great job at that without any need of help from the outside. Both have employed a divide and conquer strategy in search for votes. Both have pitted one voting group or block against another. The idea being to get those target blocks of voters to hate the other guy more than they hate you. We're about as divided as a nation because of this since before the civil war.

As for effecting our foreign policy, Trump withdrawing from the Iran deal is probably not what Russia wanted. As for Syria, that has been largely forgotten. As for NATO, trying to get other members to pay their fair share, that has been a goal of every president since at least Nixon. That went under the radar as long as it was east vs. west, but it was a major complaint.

Divisiveness has been our own doings. We don't have to look any farther than our own two major parties and our own elected leaders.
 
Perotista said:
As for NATO, trying to get other members to pay their fair share, that has been a goal of every president since at least Nixon. That went under the radar as long as it was east vs. west, but it was a major complaint.
Click to expand...

Other than half of that statement, I agree with what you have said.

It's the "pay their fair share" bit that is problematic.


Did you know that the NON-US members of NATO actually spend (on defence) a shade over 400% of what the Russians spend?

Did you know that the actual amount that the US spends on the European Defence Initiative amounts to approximately US$4,777,300,000?

Did you know that the actual amount that the NON-US members of NATO spend on defence is approximately US$276,000,000,000?

Did you know that the amount that the US spend on the EDI amounts approximately 1.73% of the amount that the NON-US members of NATO spend on defence?

If NATO is mutually beneficial to both the US and the collective of all the NON-US members of NATO, wouldn't you think that the US should be contributing just a tad more than 1.73% of the total cost to the EDI?

Did you know that, to completely replace the amount that the US pays towards the EDI, the NON-US members of NATO would have to up their defence spending by an average of US$170,617,857.14 each?

Did you know that Canada is upping its defence spending by approximately US$5,000,000,000?

Did you know that 5,000,000,000 is approximately 29.31 times 170,617,857.14?

Did you know that the Canadian increase in defence spending is actually MORE than the total amount that the US spends on the EDI?

​

Who is getting a "free ride" here?

On the other hand, as a Canadian, I am highly appreciative of the fact that the United States of America is protecting Canada from both the only country in the world that has ever attempted to invade and conquer it AND the bogyman who is hiding in the closet AND the boojums from South Snark. Ever since the US started "protecting Canada" the United States of America has not attempted a single invasion, the bogymen have stayed in the closet and the South Snarkanese Boojums have restricted their activity to South Snark.

Possibly the old story about the fellow who went for a daily walk through Central Park, during which walk he would stop every ten paces and snap his fingers three times. When asked why he was doing that, he said that it was to prevent the elephants digging up all the tulips AND he said that it worked 100% since there hadn't been a single case of elephants digging up tulips in Central Park ever since he has started his daily walks might ring a bell.

Possibly the names of Porfirio Díaz, Maximiliano Hernández Martínez, Tiburcio Carías Andino, Marcos Pérez Jiménez, Juan Vicente Gómez, Manuel Estrada Cabrera, Jorge Ubico, Manuel Odria, Fulgencio Batista, Rafael Trujillo, Efraín Ríos Montt, Oswaldo López Arellano, Hugo Banzer, the Somoza family, François Duvalier, Jean-Claude Duvalier, Omar Torrijos, Manuel Noriega, Alfredo Stroessner, Augusto Pinochet , Alberto Fujimori, Syngman Rhee,
Ayub Khan, Park Chung-hee, Chun Doo-hwan, Ngo Dinh Diem, Lon Nol, Yahya Khan, Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, Ferdinand Marcos, Muhammad Zia-ul-Haq, Abdul Salam Arif, Abdul Rahman Arif, Saddam Hussein, Suharto, the al-Za'im-Shishkali-al-Hinnawi Junta, Pervez Musharraf, Islam Karimov,
Askar Akayev, Ali Abdullah Saleh, Gaafar Nimeiry, Siad Barre, Samuel Doe, Meles Zenawi, Mobutu Sese Seko, Hissène Habré, Hosni Mubarak, Mohamed Morsi, Zine El Abidine Ben Ali, Francisco Franco, António de Oliveira Salazar, Joseph Stalin, Josip Broz Tito, Nicolae Ceaușescu, Chiang Kai-shek, Plaek Phibunsongkhram, Thanom Kittikachorn, and Sarit Thanarat will strike a ringing chord of freedom for the way that they all upheld the American ideal in their countries while supported by the governments of the United States of America.

Maybe the names of some of the freely elected outspoken supporters of democracy and freedom in their countries that the USA currently supports - Heydar Aliyev; Ilham Aliyev, Nursultan Nazarbayev, the People's Action Party, Hassanal Bolkiah, Trương Tấn Sang, Prayut Chan-o-cha, Emomali Rahmon, Gurbanguly Berdimuhamedow, the House of Saud, Hamad bin Isa Al Khalifa, the House of Thani, Qaboos bin Said al Said, the Hashemite Dynasty, the United Arab Emirates, Abdel Fattah el-Sisi, the Alaouite dynasty, Ismaïl Omar Guelleh, Teodoro Obiang Nguema Mbasogo, Paul Biya,
Idriss Déby, Yoweri Museveni, and Paul Kagame - will give you a warm fuzzy feeling over how the US governments have been spreading the ideals of freedom and democracy that everyone is taught the Founding Fathers invented.
 
Our tax dollars at work.. all this money spent so that some government bureaucrat can state the blatantly obvious.
 
TU Curmudgeon said:
Other than half of that statement, I agree with what you have said.

It's the "pay their fair share" bit that is problematic.


Did you know that the NON-US members of NATO actually spend (on defence) a shade over 400% of what the Russians spend?

Did you know that the actual amount that the US spends on the European Defence Initiative amounts to approximately US$4,777,300,000?



Possibly the old story about the fellow who went for a daily walk through Central Park, during which walk he would stop every ten paces and snap his fingers three times. When asked why he was doing that, he said that it was to prevent the elephants digging up all the tulips AND he said that it worked 100% since there hadn't been a single case of elephants digging up tulips in Central Park ever since he has started his daily walks might ring a bell.

Possibly the names of Porfirio Díaz, Maximiliano Hernández Martínez, Tiburcio Carías Andino, Marcos Pérez Jiménez, Juan Vicente Gómez, Manuel Estrada Cabrera, Jorge Ubico, Manuel Odria, Fulgencio Batista, Rafael Trujillo, Efraín Ríos Montt, Oswaldo López Arellano, Hugo Banzer, the Somoza family, François Duvalier, Jean-Claude Duvalier, Omar Torrijos, Manuel Noriega, Alfredo Stroessner, Augusto Pinochet , Alberto Fujimori, Syngman Rhee,
Ayub Khan, Park Chung-hee, Chun Doo-hwan, Ngo Dinh Diem, Lon Nol, Yahya Khan, Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, Ferdinand Marcos, Muhammad Zia-ul-Haq, Abdul Salam Arif, Abdul Rahman Arif, Saddam Hussein, Suharto, the al-Za'im-Shishkali-al-Hinnawi Junta, Pervez Musharraf, Islam Karimov,
Askar Akayev, Ali Abdullah Saleh, Gaafar Nimeiry, Siad Barre, Samuel Doe, Meles Zenawi, Mobutu Sese Seko, Hissène Habré, Hosni Mubarak, Mohamed Morsi, Zine El Abidine Ben Ali, Francisco Franco, António de Oliveira Salazar, Joseph Stalin, Josip Broz Tito, Nicolae Ceaușescu, Chiang Kai-shek, Plaek Phibunsongkhram, Thanom Kittikachorn, and Sarit Thanarat will strike a ringing chord of freedom for the way that they all upheld the American ideal in their countries while supported by the governments of the United States of America.

Maybe the names of some of the freely elected outspoken supporters of democracy and freedom in their countries that the USA currently supports - Heydar Aliyev; Ilham Aliyev, Nursultan Nazarbayev, the People's Action Party, Hassanal Bolkiah, Trương Tấn Sang, Prayut Chan-o-cha, Emomali Rahmon, Gurbanguly Berdimuhamedow, the House of Saud, Hamad bin Isa Al Khalifa, the House of Thani, Qaboos bin Said al Said, the Hashemite Dynasty, the United Arab Emirates, Abdel Fattah el-Sisi, the Alaouite dynasty, Ismaïl Omar Guelleh, Teodoro Obiang Nguema Mbasogo, Paul Biya,
Idriss Déby, Yoweri Museveni, and Paul Kagame - will give you a warm fuzzy feeling over how the US governments have been spreading the ideals of freedom and democracy that everyone is taught the Founding Fathers invented.​
Click to expand...


When it comes to NATO, I have always been of the opinion that once the USSR broke apart and the Warsaw Pact disbanded, NATO's mission was accomplished. Finished, over with. NATO is a cold war relic that should have gone the same way as CENTO and SEATO.

Even if NATO was to continue, then it should have abided by the Bush/Gorbachev agreement of not expanding beyond a unified Germany. It was that agreement that allowed the peaceful unification of East and West Germany.

As for not paying their fair share, that has been a complaint of every president going back to at least Nixon. Eisenhower, JFK and LBJ looked upon NATO as a must even if we, the U.S. had to fund all of it. That began to change with Detente.​
 
TU Curmudgeon said:
From the Associated Press

US official: Russia using social media to divide Americans
​

PHILADELPHIA (AP) — The U.S. homeland security secretary said on Saturday there are no signs that Russia is targeting this year’s midterm elections with the same “scale or scope” it targeted the 2016 presidential election.

Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen spoke at a convention of state secretaries of state, an event that’s usually a low-key affair highlighting voter registration, balloting devices and election security issues that don’t get much public attention. But coming amid fresh allegations into Russia’s attempts to sway the 2016 election, the sessions on election security have a higher level of urgency and interest.


Nielsen said her agency will help state and local election officials prepare their systems for cyberattacks from Russia or elsewhere. She said U.S. intelligence officials are seeing “persistent Russian efforts using social media, sympathetic spokespeople and other fronts to sow discord and divisiveness amongst the American people, though not necessarily focused on specific politicians or political campaigns.”

COMMENT:-

Two points:

  1. "They are just now finding this out?"; and
  2. "This differs from what the US government does in countries like Iran? How?".

​
Click to expand...

Damn near everyone in the country "no ****, you're just realizing this now?".

Social media is designed such that it not only allows but supports this.
 
cuban smokes said:
US official: Russia using social media to divide Americans


to anyone with half a brain this should have been pretty obvious for quite some time ........
Click to expand...

To anyone easily indoctrinated, this HAS BEEN obvious since the dems first got the ball rolling. MSM is pushing it harder today than it was a year ago. I suspect there is a reason for their effort.
 
Perotista said:
As for not paying their fair share, that has been a complaint of every president going back to at least Nixon. Eisenhower, JFK and LBJ looked upon NATO as a must even if we, the U.S. had to fund all of it. That began to change with Detente.
Click to expand...

Just because someone complains about something that does not mean that the complaint if correct.

Once the combined NON-US defence spending of the NATO Members reached parity with the amount that Russia was spending on defence, the "not paying their fair share" argument rang hollow.

What the US government means when it claims that the NON-US members of NATO are not "paying their fair share" is that the NON-US members of NATO are not keeping up militaries with global presences equivalent to that of the US - even though those countries have absolutely no need for such a global presence.

As it is, the US (which comprises approximately 3.45% of NATO's membership) pays for less than 1.7% of the "defence of Europe" costs. On a "per capita" basis the US should be paying double what it already pays for the "defence of Europe". On a GDP basis, the amount that US spending on the "defence of Europe" should go up by several thousand percent. Until the US government AT LEAST doubles the amount that it spends on the "defence of Europe" (through the EDI) the only conclusion is that the "someone" that isn't "pulling their weight" for the "defence of Europe" is the United States of America.
 
The sad fact isn't so much that Russia is doing it, it's that we're buying into it.
 
Ikari said:
The sad fact isn't so much that Russia is doing it, it's that we're buying into it.
Click to expand...

Yep.

Pretty much up there with "The sad fact isn't so much that Russia is doing it, it's that we're in denial about it.".
 
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