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 cuda1179 wrote:

So you don't think anyone has ever taken a guilty plea under current US law because an uncertain jury verdict might be worse? (once again, I do think they're likely guilty, but still).

If we were talking some jumped up goomba in a pin striped suit, maybe. Most of these guys are either lawyers themselves or have enough money to let the dice roll.

The only guy that has fought it got out on bail and went directly to committing more crimes, like witness tampering and mortgage fraud. As any street corner drug dealer can tell you, if you meet bail, either get out of town or lay low. Do not get arrested again while out on bail.

 cuda1179 wrote:

 Wolfblade wrote:

 NinthMusketeer wrote:
I believe what he is saying is that it is foolish to discount Russian interference as a factor. No one is absolving the Dems/Clinton of the crap they pulled, it just isn't as relevant anymore. In fact, that's been so well established that unless someone actually says they aren't at fault the only reason to bring it up at this point is whataboutism.

That's basically what I'm saying. Russia most likely swung the election between polarizing groups (i.e. organizing opposing rallies on the same day), a massive ad campaign (126 million people reached or so from facebook alone, and who knows how many more from youtube, twitter, etc?), and actual hacking of the election. 80,000 people is not a large number of votes to win by, and if Russia's ad campaign had a 0.001% effectiveness it still would have been over a 120,000 votes from facebook alone.

Your numbers are a little off. only 119 million people voted in the election. If the Russians did sway 80,000 voters in key states, that means (if they ended up not swaying any towards Hillary) they had a .067% sway rate. And that is among the entire country. If you only count the key swing states as is being discussed (Michigan, Nevada, New Hampshire, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Wisconsin) that's less than 20 million voters, so that means Russians would need a .34% sway rate in those key states. Once again, that's over the ENTIRE voting base. The only ones that really mattered were the ones sitting on the fence, and 75-80% of voters were dead set on their voting months before hand, heck some would vote party lines before knowing who the candidates were going to be. So we are looking at undecided voters, and that 80,000 represents about 1.5% of them. But then again, that's assuming all of them would have voted for Hillary anyway. We'd have to assume that at least SOME of the undecided voters would have had to vote for Trump even without Russian involvement.

So, realistically Russia would have had to have had at least a 2% influence rate among undecided voters in those key states to make a difference. Is it feasible that Russia changed the minds of 1 in 50 people? I'm not sure. Maybe?

And that's why Russia didn't rely on just one method to swing the election. They didn't just sway voters, they also stopped potential voters from voting, which was done once they hacked into the election system. All it took was just changing an address so the ID of the voter (i.e. driver's license) didn't match up when they went to vote in person. It's also not just about undecided voters, it was also about making sure the republicans voted republican, instead of deciding that trump was simply to bad to vote for even if he was the republican candidate, so they organized opposing rallies on the same day and location. Nothing drives people towards extremes like "Us vs Them" after all. The ad campaign might not have done it by itself, but between stopping votes. polarizing the base, and giving trump voters something to gather behind, they most certainly affected the election. Also, I'm not saying it's just Russia's fault, America has a lot of problems, like how polarized the parties are and how voters will go along with whatever happens while singing the praises of the president so long as it's their guy in charge no matter what terrible gak they do.

 cuda1179 wrote:

 BaronIveagh wrote:

 cuda1179 wrote:

Let's be honest here. Not saying these guys are innocent, as they likely are guilty. But the guilty pleas aren't absolute proof. Even the actual Salem Witch Hunt had many guilty pleas, yet no actual witches.

No, guilty pleas are not proof, they're an admission of guilt. The major difference here is, much as I'd like to crush Trump's cabinet with hundreds of pounds of rock until they plead guilty, like they did at witch trials, we have modern systems that disallow that sort of coercion. Ironically, the same systems that Trump apparently despises until he can slant the courts his way.

So you don't think anyone has ever taken a guilty plea under current US law because an uncertain jury verdict might be worse? (once again, I do think they're likely guilty, but still).

I think you're missing that their guilty pleas are all related to Russia. It's not "minor" gak like lying to a federal agent, it's lying to a federal agent about their russian connections or money they were paid. Everything anyone who has plead guilty has been charged either with lying about accepting money from Russia, lying about Russian connections, or conspiracy against the US, and that they were caught red handed (i.e. Manafort's most recent witness tampering attempt)

(Also there's been 5 guilty pleas)

 cuda1179 wrote:

 NinthMusketeer wrote:
[ it has already found quite a lot of wrongdoing and even what, four guilty pleas already? It's the exact opposite of a witch hunt, regardless of whatever lies Fox is selling.

Let's be honest here. Not saying these guys are innocent, as they likely are guilty. But the guilty pleas aren't absolute proof. Even the actual Salem Witch Hunt had many guilty pleas, yet no actual witches.

Irrelevant. In the legal sense it means they are guilty. So legally speaking, no witch hunt. In the practical sense they are obviously guilty. So practically speaking no witch hunt.

Like, that isn't even a counter argument; it's tangential at best.

 NinthMusketeer wrote:

 cuda1179 wrote:

 NinthMusketeer wrote:
[ it has already found quite a lot of wrongdoing and even what, four guilty pleas already? It's the exact opposite of a witch hunt, regardless of whatever lies Fox is selling.

Let's be honest here. Not saying these guys are innocent, as they likely are guilty. But the guilty pleas aren't absolute proof. Even the actual Salem Witch Hunt had many guilty pleas, yet no actual witches.

Irrelevant. In the legal sense it means they are guilty. So legally speaking, no witch hunt. In the practical sense they are obviously guilty. So practically speaking no witch hunt.

Like, that isn't even a counter argument; it's tangential at best.

And legally speaking those people in the 1600's were witches. Practically speaking though, yes these guys were guilty and get what's coming to them. I just don't like to rely on the premise that "a couple guys plead guilty, the whole house is corrupt".

 cuda1179 wrote:
Practically speaking though, yes these guys were guilty and get what's coming to them. I just don't like to rely on the premise that "a couple guys plead guilty, the whole house is corrupt".

But no one is saying the only evidence that the Russian interference in the elections is that a few guys pled out. I feel like you keep saying that you know Russia interfered in the election but are going through all these intellectual contortions to justify or at least downplay it for reasons I don't know and won't speculate on.

I personally think the Russian interference did contribute to swinging the election, but it was only one factor among quite a few.

In any event, I don't think it matters whether it was successful or not. I think it's now been established pretty definitively that the election interference was state-sanctioned, and as such requires a robust response instead of functionally nothing. If Russia wants to go back to the cold war, then we should act like it: intensive sanctions, cut all the oligarchs off from banking system, increased military aid to Ukraine, the whole nine. Instead, we're doing pretty much nothing because of... well, you know.

 cuda1179 wrote:

I just don't like to rely on the premise that "a couple guys plead guilty, the whole house is corrupt".

Why not? It certainly seems to be the case if you ask Fox News about FBI agent Peter Strzok*.



*Despite there being no evidence of a conspiracy against then-candidate Trump, and the fact that FBI agent Peter Strzok was removed from the investigation immediately

 cuda1179 wrote:

 NinthMusketeer wrote:

 cuda1179 wrote:

 NinthMusketeer wrote:
[ it has already found quite a lot of wrongdoing and even what, four guilty pleas already? It's the exact opposite of a witch hunt, regardless of whatever lies Fox is selling.

Let's be honest here. Not saying these guys are innocent, as they likely are guilty. But the guilty pleas aren't absolute proof. Even the actual Salem Witch Hunt had many guilty pleas, yet no actual witches.

Irrelevant. In the legal sense it means they are guilty. So legally speaking, no witch hunt. In the practical sense they are obviously guilty. So practically speaking no witch hunt.

Like, that isn't even a counter argument; it's tangential at best.

And legally speaking those people in the 1600's were witches. Practically speaking though, yes these guys were guilty and get what's coming to them. I just don't like to rely on the premise that "a couple guys plead guilty, the whole house is corrupt".

No one is suggesting that premise.


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 Ouze wrote:

 cuda1179 wrote:
Practically speaking though, yes these guys were guilty and get what's coming to them. I just don't like to rely on the premise that "a couple guys plead guilty, the whole house is corrupt".

But no one is saying the only evidence that the Russian interference in the elections is that a few guys pled out. I feel like you keep saying that you know Russia interfered in the election but are going through all these intellectual contortions to justify or at least downplay it for reasons I don't know and won't speculate on.

Seems like that to me too.

I personally think the Russian interference did contribute to swinging the election, but it was only one factor among quite a few.

In any event, I don't think it matters whether it was successful or not. I think it's now been established pretty definitively that the election interference was state-sanctioned, and as such requires a robust response instead of functionally nothing. If Russia wants to go back to the cold war, then we should act like it: intensive sanctions, cut all the oligarchs off from banking system, increased military aid to Ukraine, the whole nine. Instead, we're doing pretty much nothing because of... well, you know.

Entirely agreed. It's ludicrous that the response is a 'meh' and downright hilarious to think of how the GOP would have responded were Trump a Democrat.

I know he's not everybody's cup of tea because of some of his 9/11 conspiracy theories, but when Jesse Ventura sticks to the bread and butter issues of US politics, he's a textbook example of common sense.

In his immortal words, there's more Americans being struck by lightning bolts than there are cases of voter fraud. It's a red herring. I know this from my time as governor. Voter fraud is nothing.

Hard to disagree with that, and it's further proof that the GOP is a shadow, a mockery of what it used to be.

When you read about Eisenhower's election victory in the 1950s, and the confident GOP, with an active and energised base, and the millions queuing round the block to vote for Ike,

nobody is talking about voter fraud, because they don't have too. They know who they are, where they're going, and what they believe in = easy win for the GOP.

Fast forward to 2016, the hollowed out GOP, no policies beyond Obama is bad, a dwindling base, and 'approved' candidates being picked off one by one by an outsider


then screaming about voter fraud makes sense for the GOP because they have nothing else.


They are desperate, they are wretched, and it's high time the American people put them out of their misery. It would be good for the USA if the GOP collapsed and a true Conservative party replaced them.

 Ouze wrote:
In any event, I don't think it matters whether it was successful or not. I think it's now been established pretty definitively that the election interference was state-sanctioned, and as such requires a robust response instead of functionally nothing. If Russia wants to go back to the cold war, then we should act like it: intensive sanctions, cut all the oligarchs off from banking system, increased military aid to Ukraine, the whole nine. Instead, we're doing pretty much nothing because of... well, you know.

Well if interfering with elections is enough for that pretty much every country will be subjected to sanctions etc. US included. Maybe some greenland or tiny african country doesn't bother but especially bigger countries like hell they don't.

 Ouze wrote:


If Russia wants to go back to the cold war, then we should act like it: intensive sanctions, cut all the oligarchs off from banking system, increased military aid to Ukraine, the whole nine. Instead, we're doing pretty much nothing because of... well, you know.

Well... isn't the US doing all those things already?

Yeah, the US complaining about interference in elections is a little hypocritical. But, that's whataboutism too. What Russia did was bad, what we've done it bad, and it all needs to stop.

Yeah, pretty much. I think we need to respond to Russia for what they did, but I also think the US shouldn't screw with other countries elections, either.

 Do_I_Not_Like_That wrote:


They are desperate, they are wretched, and it's high time the American people put them out of their misery. It would be good for the USA if the GOP collapsed and a true Conservative party replaced them.

That is the problem. Many of the American people love them for the very reason you say they are hollowed out.

If you believe in Deomcracy, that is part of the price you pay. The Greeks felt that Deomcracy had two forms, the first was positive and represented the people voting on behalf of their own enlightened self-interests. The bad side was people voting emotion filled mod mentality.The problem is, when you re in the belly of the Democraatic beast, it is not easy to tell which side of the line you are standing on; the good or the bad.

The question is, what institutions are in place to lead tot he end of "Hollowed Out" parties? I do not know the answer to this question.

Are any of you under the belief the Russians/Soviets have not been interfering in our elections for decades (with various amounts of success/failure)?

Any of you read up on Venona?

 CptJake wrote:
Are any of you under the belief the Russians/Soviets have not been interfering in our elections for decades (with various amounts of success/failure)?

Any of you read up on Venona?

Does that excuse how widespread and blatant this interference was? Did Venona use social media in new ways to target certain demographics? Is this another "wake up sheeple" post?

 CptJake wrote:
Are any of you under the belief the Russians/Soviets have not been interfering in our elections for decades (with various amounts of success/failure)?

Any of you read up on Venona?

Of course they have. And us has been meddling elsewhere. Saying any decent sized country is meddling with other countries is about as big news as sun rises from east.

 Dreadwinter wrote:

 CptJake wrote:
Are any of you under the belief the Russians/Soviets have not been interfering in our elections for decades (with various amounts of success/failure)?

Any of you read up on Venona?

Does that excuse how widespread and blatant this interference was? Did Venona use social media in new ways to target certain demographics? Is this another "wake up sheeple" post?

Believe it's a 'more of the same, nothing to see here, good so long as I got mine' post. *shrug*

 Dreadwinter wrote:

 CptJake wrote:
Are any of you under the belief the Russians/Soviets have not been interfering in our elections for decades (with various amounts of success/failure)?

Any of you read up on Venona?

Does that excuse how widespread and blatant this interference was? Did Venona use social media in new ways to target certain demographics? Is this another "wake up sheeple" post?

I think the point he's trying to make (correct me if I'm wrong, CptJake), is that the old saying "fool me once, shame on you, fool me twice, shame on me" needs to be applied here. At one point do we start holding the people who fall for these tactics accountable? I mean, I don't like the interference, either, but whose fault is it that it actually worked?

 gorgon wrote:

 Dreadwinter wrote:

 CptJake wrote:
Are any of you under the belief the Russians/Soviets have not been interfering in our elections for decades (with various amounts of success/failure)?

Any of you read up on Venona?

Does that excuse how widespread and blatant this interference was? Did Venona use social media in new ways to target certain demographics? Is this another "wake up sheeple" post?

Believe it's a 'more of the same, nothing to see here, good so long as I got mine' post. *shrug*

but this thing 40 years ago!

 CptJake wrote:
Are any of you under the belief the Russians/Soviets have not been interfering in our elections for decades (with various amounts of success/failure)?

Any of you read up on Venona?

Which part, it ran for 40 odd years?

I think that the part that's shocking is how open the whole thing was. Or that a candidate for POTUS was apparently in on it. It's like in the space of a single election, the US political system threw itself back in time to the bad old days of Tammany Hall and mob bosses manipulating elections.

The fact that it happened and then Trump has done everything he can to undermine the US government and it's institutions, makes this a clear and present danger to the United States and it's people.

Regardless of what those people might think of the EPA and other organizations, they do exist to protect the public.

@Vaktathi
It's really hard for me to respond to exact lines as you did so I am just going to sum up my responses together.

Calling the Mueller Investigation a 'witch hunt' is not accurate. Generally speaking, a 'witch' in the old days was a skilled woman who could think for herself.

A more accurate term for the Mueller Investigation is a 'village idiot hunt', and looks like they are going to catch a lot of village idiots. We are only 14 months in and we have 5 village idiots already.


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 Xenomancers wrote:

If Sanders would have won (he would have). Dems shunting Sanders is a direct cause of their defeat.

That math doesn't fly.

HRC won the noms handily, even without the super delegates. But Sanders would have won the general??

The number of laughably uninformed reactionary voters in the US is not that high, is it?

 Xenomancers wrote:
What would be illegal is the trump campaign taking money from the Russian government (if there was evidence of this - Trump would already be impeached and probably in jail - this evidence does not exist).

Yeah, it's not like they'd have tried to hide the money trail or anything, and that following the money trail takes a lot of time and resources.

Seriously, just because they have not announced the discovery of the smoking gun of an envelope of cash handed directly from Putin to Trump does not mean that there is not evidence they are pursuing which could lead to a solid case in which Trump is shown to have accepted illegal russian money and help.

 BaronIveagh wrote:

 CptJake wrote:
Are any of you under the belief the Russians/Soviets have not been interfering in our elections for decades (with various amounts of success/failure)?

Any of you read up on Venona?

Which part, it ran for 40 odd years?

I think that the part that's shocking is how open the whole thing was. Or that a candidate for POTUS was apparently in on it. It's like in the space of a single election, the US political system threw itself back in time to the bad old days of Tammany Hall and mob bosses manipulating elections.

The fact that it happened and then Trump has done everything he can to undermine the US government and it's institutions, makes this a clear and present danger to the United States and it's people.

Regardless of what those people might think of the EPA and other organizations, they do exist to protect the public.

It's not in the space of single election. The Russians and Chinese have been doing all they can to mess with the elections since the cold war was a thing. The Russians tend to throw their support behind conservatives and the Chinese behind liberals as the heavyweights, (with a bunch of middleweight middle-eastern and Asian interests). The new thing is the Russians have trumped all the foreign interests by seizing upon online news as an attack avenue. This edge isn't going aware either.

I don't get people who call the investigation a witch hunt. It is by and far very necessary. Mueller will turn something up, and we act on it, impeaching/prosecuting those that are guilty. Or he doesn't find anything, and the subject gets dropped once and for all.

Really, Trump supporters should be supporting a proper investigation, because it will clear Trump's name.

 Inquisitor Lord Bane wrote:
I don't get people who call the investigation a witch hunt. It is by and far very necessary. Mueller will turn something up, and we act on it, impeaching/prosecuting those that are guilty. Or he doesn't find anything, and the subject gets dropped once and for all.

Really, Trump supporters should be supporting a proper investigation, because it will clear Trump's name.

They have to know the possibility of something very crooked coming to light, because of everything Trump says and does, and also because of everything he has said and done.

They don't care, because he's 'strong' and 'winning' and they project all their prosperity gospel hopes and dreams onto him. He is their avatar of success.

 feeder wrote:
Calling the Mueller Investigation a 'witch hunt' is not accurate. Generally speaking, a 'witch' in the old days was a skilled woman who could think for herself.

A more accurate term for the Mueller Investigation is a 'village idiot hunt', and looks like they are going to catch a lot of village idiots. We are only 14 months in and we have 5 village idiots already.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Xenomancers wrote:

If Sanders would have won (he would have). Dems shunting Sanders is a direct cause of their defeat.

That math doesn't fly.

HRC won the noms handily, even without the super delegates. But Sanders would have won the general??

The number of laughably uninformed reactionary voters in the US is not that high, is it?

Let it go. There is little reason to believe that Republicans wouldn't have still falling in line behind Trump regardless of who the Democratic candidate was. Especially considering all the support our president continues to have. And for every person who would have been fired up for Bernie, others would have upset that a non Democrat took over the party. Bernie is not a Democrat and immediately went back to being Independent after losing the nomination.

 Inquisitor Lord Bane wrote:
I don't get people who call the investigation a witch hunt. It is by and far very necessary. Mueller will turn something up, and we act on it, impeaching/prosecuting those that are guilty. Or he doesn't find anything, and the subject gets dropped once and for all.

Really, Trump supporters should be supporting a proper investigation, because it will clear Trump's name.

Well yeah, this.

And in light of that... Hypothetically, if one were innocent of all wrongdoing, surely one would sit back and wait for the thorough investigation to reveal exactly that? Instead of, say, continuously criticising, demeaning the validity of, and attempting to impede said investigation?

 feeder wrote:
Calling the Mueller Investigation a 'witch hunt' is not accurate. Generally speaking, a 'witch' in the old days was a skilled woman who could think for herself.

A more accurate term for the Mueller Investigation is a 'village idiot hunt', and looks like they are going to catch a lot of village idiots. We are only 14 months in and we have 5 village idiots already.


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 Xenomancers wrote:

If Sanders would have won (he would have). Dems shunting Sanders is a direct cause of their defeat.

That math doesn't fly.

HRC won the noms handily, even without the super delegates. But Sanders would have won the general??

The number of laughably uninformed reactionary voters in the US is not that high, is it?

Well we can thank the Russians for one thing. They exposed the crooked DNC bias against sanders. That is the point I am making. Can we really trust the results of that primary?

Also - another point to be made. Winning the democratic primary does not make you more electable to people on the fence mid/right mid/left kinds of people. Sanders was obviously more attractive to these kinds of people. It's pretty clear that Americans did not want a "more of the same" type candidate - that is what sanders wasn't / nether was trump.


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 AdeptSister wrote:

 feeder wrote:
Calling the Mueller Investigation a 'witch hunt' is not accurate. Generally speaking, a 'witch' in the old days was a skilled woman who could think for herself.

A more accurate term for the Mueller Investigation is a 'village idiot hunt', and looks like they are going to catch a lot of village idiots. We are only 14 months in and we have 5 village idiots already.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Xenomancers wrote:

If Sanders would have won (he would have). Dems shunting Sanders is a direct cause of their defeat.

That math doesn't fly.

HRC won the noms handily, even without the super delegates. But Sanders would have won the general??

The number of laughably uninformed reactionary voters in the US is not that high, is it?

Let it go. There is little reason to believe that Republicans wouldn't have still falling in line behind Trump regardless of who the Democratic candidate was. Especially considering all the support our president continues to have. And for every person who would have been fired up for Bernie, others would have upset that a non Democrat took over the party. Bernie is not a Democrat and immediately went back to being Independent after losing the nomination.

Why should he not have support? He's doing a good job. LOL. Look at the economy / unemployment rates / growth / ect. By every measure of what previous presidents have been measured. He is doing a good job.


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 Inquisitor Lord Bane wrote:
I don't get people who call the investigation a witch hunt. It is by and far very necessary. Mueller will turn something up, and we act on it, impeaching/prosecuting those that are guilty. Or he doesn't find anything, and the subject gets dropped once and for all.

Really, Trump supporters should be supporting a proper investigation, because it will clear Trump's name.

LOL - it's a secondary investigation after the first investigation turned up nothing. It's an investigation that never even should have been started at the government level. How long can it possibly take to find evidence of collusion prosecutable in court - when you have these kinds of resources at your disposal?

Now I am not saying that an investigation shouldn't exist in the interest of making the nation less susceptible to foreign cyber manipulation on social media. That is not what this is though. It's primary focus in the first couple of months should have been to clear Trump as he is the POTUS. It is extremely unhealthy to conduct an investigation like this with the looming assumption by huge numbers of the population that Trump is going to be found guilty.

 feeder wrote:

 Xenomancers wrote:

If Sanders would have won (he would have). Dems shunting Sanders is a direct cause of their defeat.

That math doesn't fly.

HRC won the noms handily, even without the super delegates. But Sanders would have won the general??

The number of laughably uninformed reactionary voters in the US is not that high, is it?

While Sanders may have had some gains in some areas, they probably would have been offset by losses in others, like wealthy moderate suburbs. Clinton won counties like mine because she came off as the moderate, sane candidate. Bernie would not have had that contrast...he simply would have been the crazy guy on the other side who wants to raise your taxes, not cut them.

Swapping Clinton for Sanders is *NOT* a case of addition without subtraction.