The Russians hacking the US

Washout said:
They're all at it; be naïve to think otherwise. Guess this is a case of who'd have the most to gain from the democrats dirty laundry being aired in such a way literally days before a major election?

I certainly don't think such actions are beyond Mr Putin! Although some on here seem to think the man is a Saint and beyond reproach.

I'm actually quite liking the outgoing "I don't give a ****" Obama. Giving the middle finger to all and sundry including the Israelis getting a long overdue slap at the UN.
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Yep, hopefully "he" sorts out a few more issues before he leaves. :D
 
Amp34 said:
Juicy as in "arrests", career ending info about Clinton etc. You know, the things we were promised by those so against Clinton. All we ended up with was gossip and dirty laundry, with some favouritism in there. Donors appointed to federal positions? That a well known fact of life with US elections - many ambassadorships are and have been appointed that way for several administrations for example.

The reality is they were a completely damp squib, but almost certainly formed a negative pall over Clintons election chances. The likelihood is Trumps election emails would have been just as "juicy", but they weren't leaked were they...?
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Well maybe if Clinton didn't hire useless staff and had not used a private server, wouldn't have been an issue now would it?

Regardless, she's done and hopefully can end her neverending spotlight by getting lost.
 
I think what you are seeing here is, poor me, it's your fault, you think your better than us, your not superior to us etc. It's not ununderstandable, quite commendable really in some senses but it leads to authoritarianism which is nasty and this type of authoritarianism is not even an eye for an eye anymore, it's more 2 eyes for what may have been an eye. Human nature I am afraid.

The mask is falling from the Democratic elite, the reformers are in town. Well not really, Trump & Co are no better to be honest.
 
Trump and Putin reminded me of this old cartoon.

jpLqc1Z.jpg
 
StriderX said:
Well maybe if Clinton didn't hire useless staff and had not used a private server, wouldn't have been an issue now would it?

Regardless, she's done and hopefully can end her neverending spotlight by getting lost.
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I know, the fact she just got away with it as well just shows how dodgy the system is.

If any other government employee used their own server for official emails they would be over a barrel in a second.
 
Amp34 said:
Juicy as in "arrests", career ending info about Clinton etc. You know, the things we were promised by those so against Clinton.
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Well then we have different standards because to me the staff of the DNC who are required to be neutral secretly working to put Clinton ahead of her rival is a very concerning thing. I don't like the idea that hired staff, required by their job to be non-partisan are secretly conspiring to put their favoured candidate up as the presidential nominee. That's a big thing. As to arrests, well when the head of the FBI refuses to even bring charges what can you do? There's enough evidence of wrong-doing in there to put Hillary Clinton on trial, but he wont.

Amp34 said:
All we ended up with was gossip and dirty laundry, with some favouritism in there. Donors appointed to federal positions? That a well known fact of life with US elections - many ambassadorships are and have been appointed that way for several administrations for example.
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I don't think it is a "well-known fact of life". I think if you asked many people in the USA if they thought the Democrats would give someone a federal position, e.g. that they can get an ambassadorship, because they donate money to the DNC (or in some of the cases, Obama), then many people would be upset to learn that. You say it's routine but The White House denies it happens. Now we have contrary evidence. Buying a position as a United States ambassador may be below your cynicism level but to many of us - yes, that counts as something revealing and unpleasant about the Clinton campaign.

Amp34 said:
The reality is they were a completely damp squib,
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Again, we clearly have different standards. It's one thing to be cynical in general, it's another to find out that the chair of the DNC is actively working for one candidates success (she wouldn't have resigned if nobody thought it was a big deal). It is a big deal - you're abusing your position to try and choose one of the two realistic candidates for the position of US president. I'm pretty sure that wasn't in the job specification. People care about things like learning that Hillary had been provided the questions in advance in a debate against her opponent. If when some pundit remarks how she handled questions better and you then find out she had everything the day before, yes, that really makes a difference to what people think. It's corruption. And there are still a lot of people to whom that is not "a completely damp squib".

Amp34 said:
The likelihood is Trumps election emails would have been just as "juicy", but they weren't leaked were they...?
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I doubt they would be as "juicy" and I'll say why. Firstly, Trump can't be embarrassed. Pretty much all the reprehensible things he has said he has said in public and is actually proud of. Secondly, to suggest there would have been an equivalent leak is to suggest there was an equivalent conspiracy at the heart of the RNC and we don't know that this is so. Indeed, there is reason to think there isn't. The senior Republicans who took up arms against Trump did so very publically. The division and partisanship in the upper ranks of the Republican party was conducted openly. And if you're about to insist it wasn't, I'd point out that the Republican party was openly discussing disregarding the outcome of the primaries and disregarding the democratic result. That's about as big as it gets. There wasn't the situation where some individual behind the scenes was distraught by the secret conspiring against a candidate (Trump) because his opponents were yelling their heads off about it. Whereas with the DNC there was an active and secret campaign to keep Sanders from the nomination which is in all likelihood what prompted a member of the DNC to leak those emails. Leaks occur, at least ones like this, because someone is upset and wants to expose the truth to the outside world. The Republican leadership shenanigans were already national news. Additionally, Clinton has been Secretary of State for years and has a long history in the senior ranks of the Democrats. Trump is an off the wall outsider who has just barged into the political landscape like an elephant in a toupée. So no, you're probably not going to find the same sort of evidence of pay-for-position or media complicity with him, honestly.

It's shocking to say, but I believe I can reasonably argue that Trump is less corrupt than Hillary Clintion.
 
Kaapstad said:
Rumour has it Trump will be writing a book soon, one wonders if there will be anything new in it.:D
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ALL CAPITAL LETTERS AND... YOU KNOW... I TELL YOU THERE WILL BE NO PUNCTUATION EXCEPT ELLIPSES BECAUSE...WHAT I CAN SAY IS THAT THIS BOOK WILL BE...IT IS A SMART BOOK AND I DONT MEAN BY THAT... THAT IS I DONT MEAN THE BOOK IS SMART I MEAN IM TELLING YOU YOU GOTTA BE SMART TO UNDERSTAND IT...

:rolleyes:
 
Nasher said:
I know, the fact she just got away with it as well just shows how dodgy the system is.

If any other government employee used their own server for official emails they would be over a barrel in a second.
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As dodgy as Rumsfeld or the Bush JR administration?

Rumsfeld used exactly the same set up as Hillary (Private server) whilst the Bush Jr administration may have used official servers but apparently didn't archive any of the emails like they were meant to for a number of years (the excuse being they couldn't get them to back up using the systems that the Clinton Administration had used*) despite it being legally required as they were government documents.



*It seems that no one in the GW Bush administration could work out how to do basic IT tasks required of pretty much every business, legal practice, law enforcement and government department despite having access to what were quite literally the full resources of the federal government.
 
If they're going to prosecute they'll do it after Trump takes office, if they try to do it now Obama can just give pardons.
 
It's a bit convenient that after Russia brokers a "peace deal" in Syria without the US, the US decides its a good time to kick out the Russian diplomat.

I think the US is upset about being left out.
 
Slam62 said:
The Americans interfere literally every where in the world, basically on the whim of a nutty congressman or two.

Obama's true colours are coming out now not a particularly nice man but talks a good talk like Bill.

They don't like it so it must have been the bad guys,
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There are almost certainly russian hackers but whether they're state sponsored by the Kremlin is really the question here and I've heard nothing but "they're russian so lets blame Putin"

Whereas the Chinese really do have state sponsored hackers who are actively involved in political and industrial espionage but no-one dares accuses the Chinese govt as they're too busy cosying up to them signing business deals.
 
h4rm0ny said:
Well then we have different standards because to me the staff of the DNC who are required to be neutral secretly working to put Clinton ahead of her rival is a very concerning thing. I don't like the idea that hired staff, required by their job to be non-partisan are secretly conspiring to put their favoured candidate up as the presidential nominee. That's a big thing. As to arrests, well when the head of the FBI refuses to even bring charges what can you do? There's enough evidence of wrong-doing in there to put Hillary Clinton on trial, but he wont.



I don't think it is a "well-known fact of life". I think if you asked many people in the USA if they thought the Democrats would give someone a federal position, e.g. that they can get an ambassadorship, because they donate money to the DNC (or in some of the cases, Obama), then many people would be upset to learn that. You say it's routine but The White House denies it happens. Now we have contrary evidence. Buying a position as a United States ambassador may be below your cynicism level but to many of us - yes, that counts as something revealing and unpleasant about the Clinton campaign.



Again, we clearly have different standards. It's one thing to be cynical in general, it's another to find out that the chair of the DNC is actively working for one candidates success (she wouldn't have resigned if nobody thought it was a big deal). It is a big deal - you're abusing your position to try and choose one of the two realistic candidates for the position of US president. I'm pretty sure that wasn't in the job specification. People care about things like learning that Hillary had been provided the questions in advance in a debate against her opponent. If when some pundit remarks how she handled questions better and you then find out she had everything the day before, yes, that really makes a difference to what people think. It's corruption. And there are still a lot of people to whom that is not "a completely damp squib".



I doubt they would be as "juicy" and I'll say why. Firstly, Trump can't be embarrassed. Pretty much all the reprehensible things he has said he has said in public and is actually proud of. Secondly, to suggest there would have been an equivalent leak is to suggest there was an equivalent conspiracy at the heart of the RNC and we don't know that this is so. Indeed, there is reason to think there isn't. The senior Republicans who took up arms against Trump did so very publically. The division and partisanship in the upper ranks of the Republican party was conducted openly. And if you're about to insist it wasn't, I'd point out that the Republican party was openly discussing disregarding the outcome of the primaries and disregarding the democratic result. That's about as big as it gets. There wasn't the situation where some individual behind the scenes was distraught by the secret conspiring against a candidate (Trump) because his opponents were yelling their heads off about it. Whereas with the DNC there was an active and secret campaign to keep Sanders from the nomination which is in all likelihood what prompted a member of the DNC to leak those emails. Leaks occur, at least ones like this, because someone is upset and wants to expose the truth to the outside world. The Republican leadership shenanigans were already national news. Additionally, Clinton has been Secretary of State for years and has a long history in the senior ranks of the Democrats. Trump is an off the wall outsider who has just barged into the political landscape like an elephant in a toupée. So no, you're probably not going to find the same sort of evidence of pay-for-position or media complicity with him, honestly.

It's shocking to say, but I believe I can reasonably argue that Trump is less corrupt than Hillary Clintion.
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So basically it's the "we hold Clinton to a higher standard than Trump so it's more of a shock" line? :p

The reality is appointing donors and political allies to positions is a well known and well documented situation. Just because you don't know about it, or some Americans doesn't mean it's not well known.

For example an article about Obamas Campaign bundlers from 2014

https://www.google.ca/amp/s/www.was...ssadors-were-campaign-bundlers/?client=safari

Every president rewards some major campaign contributors by appointing them as ambassadors, but it's not a practice that's considered very beneficial for U.S. foreign policy. So when President Obama put up campaign bundler George Tsunis to become the U.S. ambassador to Norway -- even though Tsunis himself conceded at confirmation hearings that he has little idea how Norway's government functions or even the names of its major political parties -- former diplomat and Lehigh University international relations professor Henri Barkey had had enough.
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And a wiki article on George bushes appointments (19 during his term in office).

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bush_Pioneer

Nineteen of the original Pioneers became ambassadors in 2001. Six Pioneers have been convicted of politics-related crimes.
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And another article from 2009

http://www.nbcnews.com/id/32268349/ns/politics-white_house/t/ambassadors-do-patronage-picks-matter/

WASHINGTON — American presidents rewarding top campaign fundraisers with plum ambassadorships has long been common practice for both Democrats and Republicans alike.

But President Obama, who has vowed to “change the ways of Washington,” has not only continued this tradition of his predecessors, he has outpaced them.

So far, 57% of Obama’s picks for ambassador positions — 34 of 60 — have been political appointees, or people not considered career Foreign Service, according to the American Foreign Service Association. Fourteen of those, or 23 percent, are bundlers. Bundlers are individuals who raise large amounts of money for a candidate by "bundling" together smaller contributions from others. For 2008, anyone who a raised more than $50,000 for candidate Obama are considered bundlers.

In the past 50 years, the average percentage for political appointees has been about 30 percent, according to AFSA. The practice increased under George W. Bush — 36 percent of his picks were political. (Jimmy Carter appointed the least at 24 percent.)
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There are dozens of articles on it.

The reality is the emails didn't show any law breaking, so the FBI aren't getting involved.

Edit: and on another note -

http://www.cbc.ca/beta/news/world/obama-russia-putin-trump-sanctions-1.3917022

Obama's actions were in response to allegations that Russia is to blame for two significant email hacks during the U.S. election campaign. The FBI and CIA claim Russia was attempting to influence the campaign to help Donald Trump win the White House.

The president's response was met by faint praise from senior Senate Republicans John McCain and Lindsey Graham, who said it was"long overdue" but a "small price for Russia to pay for its brazen attack on American democracy." The senators said they will lead the effort in the new Congress to impose stronger sanctions.
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It seems senior members of Trumps own party agree that Russia have tried to influence the elections, and it'll be interesting to see Trump try remove the sanctions if the Republicans as a whole want to impose stronger sanctions.

The infighting that may result will probably benefit the democrats and possibly Russia ironically. :D
 
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