The Media's Portrayal of Trump and His Presidency

[3rdnlng]

6 minutes ago, BeginnersMind said:

 

Humor is “funny.” 

 

I already used the dark horse reference. Copying my line doesn’t make you funny. Just unoriginal. 

I didn't see you used it but regardless you must have thought it funny. Anyway I've got to go now, the bottom of my shoe still has a little bit of you left on it and the stench is sickening.

[reddogblitz]

38 minutes ago, Deranged Rhino said:

 

The ONLY way to combat information warfare is to learn how to hone your own individual discernment. It's hard, laborious work. It requires time that most of us just do not have in our day to day lives with work, family, and other responsibilities -- but it's the ONLY way to move forward in a free society. 

 

If we are forced to rely upon censorship or algorithms to do our heavy lifting, we are helping the enemies of free thought and liberty. Doubly so with tech giants (who are to a company tied directly to the USIC). We just survived (barely) a three year period where our own intelligence services were waging a disinformation war against its own people. Do we really think the wise move is to say to the very same people who just tried to deceive the public at large, "here, tell us what's good and bad information because we're too lazy to do the homework ourselves"? 

 

That's a recipe for tyranny.  

 

Good luck with that.

 

for the most part, people are not getting better at discernment but are getting worse at it.  And will continue to. Social media makes people dumber, not smarter.

 

the real problem IMHO is that a majority of people on earth have decided to voluntarily sign up and participate in the greatest population control device ever invented (so far).

 

Russia is doing this to countries all over the world. Brexit, France, Ukraine. We can sit back, and as you suggest, hope people are smarter this time, or do as I suggest, fight fire with fire.  Block everything that comes from there for six months so we can at least try to have a more sane less disinformed election cycle.  2016 seemed pretty tyrannical to me.  2020 is gonna be even worse for the same reasons IMHO.

Edited May 6, 2019 by reddogblitz

[Hedge]

2 minutes ago, reddogblitz said:

 

Good luck with that.

 

for the most part, people are not getting better at discernment but are getting worse at it.  And will continue to. Social media makes people dumber, not smarter.

 

the real problem IMHO is that a majority of people on earth have decided to voluntarily sign up and participate in the greatest population control device eve invented (so far).

 

Russia is doing this to countries all over the world. Brexit, France, Ukraine. We can sit back, and as you suggest, hope people are smarter this time, or do as I suggest, fight fire with fire.  Block everything that comes from there for six months so we can at least try to have a more sane less disinformed election cycle.  2016 seemed pretty tyrannical to me.  2020 is gonna be even worse for the same reasons IMHO.

 

So what about all of the foreigners that are *inside* our borders already and getting their marching orders from other governments/special interest groups? 

[Deranged Rhino]

10 minutes ago, reddogblitz said:

 

Good luck with that.

 

for the most part, people are not getting better at discernment but are getting worse at it.  And will continue to. Social media makes people dumber, not smarter.

 

the real problem IMHO is that a majority of people on earth have decided to voluntarily sign up and participate in the greatest population control device ever invented (so far).

 

The solution isn't to go backwards, that's giving up not finding a solution. And favoring censorship "because people are dumber" is giving up. 

 

10 minutes ago, reddogblitz said:

Russia is doing this to countries all over the world. Brexit, France, Ukraine. We can sit back, and as you suggest, hope people are smarter this time, or do as I suggest, fight fire with fire. 

 

Russia was not even the worst actor in the 2016 election or Brexit. Western intelligence agencies sowed more disinformation and division than Russia could muster. If you have come out of the last three years thinking Russia "attacked our democracy" then you've learned the wrong lesson. 

 

The last two years of lies (which used Russian disinformation) were created, pushed, and reinforced by our own intelligence agencies, media, and members of government. Some are enemies of this country and everything it stands for -- giving them more power to do harm is not a sane solution. 

 

12 minutes ago, reddogblitz said:

Block everything that comes from there for six months so we can at least try to have a more sane less disinformed election cycle.  2016 seemed pretty tyrannical to me.  2020 is gonna be even worse for the same reasons IMHO.

 

Again, this is just wrong. Russia did less than our own intelligence agencies to ***** with the election. Cutting Russia out does nothing to fix the problem, and in fact makes the bad actors inside our government/media/congress stronger.

 

 

[reddogblitz]

2 minutes ago, Hedge said:

 

So what about all of the foreigners that are *inside* our borders already and getting their marching orders from other governments/special interest groups? 

 

Sure, it wouldn't stop them.  Nothing is 100%, especially in this game.  But it would cut out a lot of it.  Sure there are things like IP spoofing and so forth etc, but they could also be detected and squashed.  Information Warfare is a game of whack a mole no doubt.

 

But we gotta do something.  Just hoping people on social media will get smarter is a fools errand and recipe for tyranny, a race war, and blood in the streets IMHO.  We saw it last time and are seeing it again already.

 

We gotta fight back in the Information Warfare space to have any chance IMHO.

 

 

[Deranged Rhino]

Just now, reddogblitz said:

 

Sure, it wouldn't stop them.  Nothing is 100%, especially in this game.  But it would cut out a lot of it.  Sure there are things like IP spoofing and so forth etc, but they could also be detected and squashed.  Information Warfare is a game of whack a mole no doubt.

 

But we gotta do something.  Just hoping people on social media will get smarter is a fools errand and recipe for tyranny, a race war, and blood in the streets IMHO.  We saw it last time and are seeing it again already.

 

We gotta fight back in the Information Warfare space to have any chance IMHO.

 

 

 

You can't fight back in an information war by depriving people of information. That's helping the enemies of free thought and liberty, not protecting them.

[row_33]

facebook and it's ilk fully encourage criminal plots on its media paths, only banning quotes from the Declaration of Independence or banal conservative comments, so that should help

 

 

 

 

[reddogblitz]

1 minute ago, Deranged Rhino said:

Again, this is just wrong. Russia did less than our own intelligence agencies to ***** with the election. Cutting Russia out does nothing to fix the problem, and in fact makes the bad actors inside our government/media/congress stronger.

 

You got a good point there. 

 

Got a better idea?  People being smarter.  Like I said, good luck with that.  Serious question:  What do you think are the odds of that happening?

 

I do agree that this would be THE BEST way to fight it.

 

Instead of the time and energy spent trying to get Trump which will do NOTHING to help the 2020 election, we should be ramping up a public relations campaign with commercials with Bill Clinton, W, Jimmy Carter, Jimmy Kimmel, etc. telling people to be smarter this time. Like you say, it's our best chance.  But no, impeach Trump!  Blue vs Red.

[TakeYouToTasker]

1 hour ago, reddogblitz said:

 

I agree in principle. In a perfect world without foreign governments and other bad actors trying to manipulate our citizens to sow division and perhaps even sway the outcome of or elections.  This is information warfare. I've read of it for years and it has been around, but it has now been bumped to a whole new level.  We must react accordingly. 

 

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Information_warfare

 

Sounds like the 2016 election to me.

 

I don't think we can depend on Mark Zuckerberg and Twitter and Google to weed out all the offending stuff and protect us from foreign disinformation.

 

Until we can come up with a better way to fight this, just shut it all down 6 months before the election.  Let us Americans have an internal discussion about our own election.  I know Zuckeberg can do this because he censors things in countries like China and not elsewhere. 

 

https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2016/nov/23/facebook-secret-software-censor-user-posts-china

 

You could still read foreign news sources and email with your rooskie friends and relatives.  They just can't push to us.

 

I could do it in 100 lines of code or less:

 

if(ipAddress not in usListOfIPs)
{
 tweet >> /dev/null;
}

 

The appropriate action is never to suspend freedoms, and violate the rights of citizens in the name of security.

 

If you remember correctly, the suspension of the right to privacy, and giving the government the authority to conduct broad based spying on American citizens; all in the name of security, is exactly how we wound up here.

 

Freedom is dangerous, but Americans have the right to consume information from around the globe.

 

The alternative is entrusting the government to tell you what you’re allowed to know, and not know; and I’m not willing to live in that dystopia.

Edited May 6, 2019 by TakeYouToTasker

[reddogblitz]

6 minutes ago, Deranged Rhino said:

 

You can't fight back in an information war by depriving people of information. That's helping the enemies of free thought and liberty, not protecting them.

 

Looks to me like letting it all don't work worth a darn.  In 2016, Letting it in and getting people all freaked out and having our legit news organizations using it as sources helped our external Information Warfare enemies immensely.  It's a new world, we may need to change our tactics.

[Deranged Rhino]

Just now, reddogblitz said:

 

You got a good point there. 

 

Got a better idea?  People being smarter.  Like I said, good luck with that.  Serious question:  What do you think are the odds of that happening?

 

It's not an easy solution, but it's the only one that will effectively combat disinformation while preserving our free speech/free thought ideals. People (plural) are dumb, a person is smart. This is a one on one conversation/discussion that needs to happen person by person, family by family, friend to friend. 

 

Learning how to properly source materials, vet information, and think for oneself are arguably the most important skills someone can possess in today's climate. They're crucial life skills which can be learned -- regardless of one's IQ. 

 

But there are hurdles: partisanship, denial, and the (decades) of conditioning/programming we've all been subjected to. 

 

2 minutes ago, reddogblitz said:

I do agree that this would be THE BEST way to fight it.

 

 

 

 

1 minute ago, reddogblitz said:

 

Looks to me like letting it all don't work worth a darn.  In 2016, Letting it in and getting people all freaked out and having our legit news organizations using it as sources helped our external Information Warfare enemies immensely.  It's a new world, we may need to change our tactics.

 

But the people who "let it in" didn't. They authored it, at home here in the US, and lied about its origin. They pointed at Russia as the culprit, while they themselves were the actual perpetrators. 

[reddogblitz]

2 minutes ago, TakeYouToTasker said:

 

The appropriate action is never to suspend freedoms, and violate the rights of citizens in the name of security.

 

If you remember correctly, the suspension of the right to privacy, and giving the government the authority to conduct broad based spying on American citizens; all in the name of security, is exactly how we wound up here.

 

Freedom is dangerous, but Americans have the right to consume information from around the globe.

 

The alternative is entrusting the government to tell you what you’re allowed to know, and not know; and I’m not willing to live in that distopia.

 

If people want to find out what Russia thinks about our election during that 6 month period, they can google or if they're smart DuckduckGo it.  Just don't let 'em push it to us, ,that's all.  No one's being censored or deprived of information. Think of this way, Americans have the right to go anywhere and do anything, should we also allow foreign troops to do the same?

 

This is INFORMATION WARFARE.  I just don't think we can sit back and hope it doesn't work this time because people will be smarter.

[TakeYouToTasker]

4 minutes ago, reddogblitz said:

 

If people want to find out what Russia thinks about our election during that 6 month period, they can google or if they're smart DuckduckGo it.  Just don't let 'em push it to us, ,that's all.  No one's being censored or deprived of information. Think of this way, Americans have the right to go anywhere and do anything, should we also allow foreign troops to do the same?

 

This is INFORMATION WARFARE.  I just don't think we can sit back and hope it doesn't work this time because people will be smarter.

 

People are required to be smarter if they want to be free.

 

There is no alternative.

 

If we’re going to eliminate freedoms in order to protect people’s willingness to be stupid and lazy, then we may as well surrender, because we’ve already lost.

 

I refuse to live in a society designed to cater to the lowest common denominator.

 

You want a solution that makes actual sense?  Do away with the concept of universal suffrage.  If someone can’t be bothered to earn the franchise, then they don’t deserve it, and it would encourage an educated, informed, and involved electorate.

Edited May 6, 2019 by TakeYouToTasker

[reddogblitz]

5 minutes ago, Deranged Rhino said:

 

It's not an easy solution, but it's the only one that will effectively combat disinformation while preserving our free speech/free thought ideals. People (plural) are dumb, a person is smart. This is a one on one conversation/discussion that needs to happen person by person, family by family, friend to friend. 

 

Learning how to properly source materials, vet information, and think for oneself are arguably the most important skills someone can possess in today's climate. They're crucial life skills which can be learned -- regardless of one's IQ. 

 

But there are hurdles: partisanship, denial, and the (decades) of conditioning/programming we've all been subjected to. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

But the people who "let it in" didn't. They authored it, at home here in the US, and lied about its origin. They pointed at Russia as the culprit, while they themselves were the actual perpetrators. 

 

Yes, but a lot of it did come from there in the form of tweet bots etc..  My friend is an avid social media person and she knew it was going on at the time.  It was that obvious to those smart enough.  The Mueller Report talks about it.  Since we don't have Obama in the White House this time perhaps not nearly as much of the internal stuff will happen.

 

Quote

Many of those social media posts “”disparaged” Hillary Clinton or promoted Trump, Mueller found.

 

“By the end of the 2016 U.S. election, the IRA had the ability to reach millions of U.S. persons through their social media accounts,” the report concluded.

The social media campaign Mueller described has been outlined in an indictment his team filed against alleged Russian operatives and in congressional testimony by leaders of social media companies. Mueller’s 448-page report underscores his findings that Russian agents had been attempting to influence opinion on social media as far back as 2014.

 

Through the IRA, Russian intelligence agents created pages and accounts on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and YouTube that had millions of followers between them. It also bought ads to expand their reach, spending as much as $100,000 at Facebook, according to the report.

 

One advertisement showed an image of Clinton. It read, “If one day God lets this liar enter the White House as president - that day would be a real national tragedy.”

Read more here: https://www.sacbee.com/news/business/technology/article229433499.html#storylink=cpy

 

https://www.sacbee.com/news/business/technology/article229433499.html

 

Unless you don't believe the Mueller report?

[Deranged Rhino]

1 minute ago, reddogblitz said:

 

Yes, but a lot of it did come from there in the form of tweet bots etc..  My friend is an avid social media person and she knew it was going on at the time.  It was that obvious to those smart enough.  The Mueller Report talks about it.  Since we don't have Obama in the White House this time perhaps not nearly as much of the internal stuff will happen.

 

 

https://www.sacbee.com/news/business/technology/article229433499.html

 

Unless you don't believe the Mueller report?

 

When it comes to the IRA sections of the Mueller report, and its reach, there's every reason to doubt its accuracy. 

 

There was no hack. 

 

There was an army of Russian bots but those numbers are not anywhere close to as large as the media and USIC wanted us to believe -- not even close. 

[reddogblitz]

6 minutes ago, TakeYouToTasker said:

If we’re going to eliminate freedoms in order to protect people’s willingness to be stupid and lazy, then we may as well surrender, because we’ve already lost.

 

Prepare to lose. We're well on the way.

 

6 minutes ago, TakeYouToTasker said:

 

I refuse to live in a society designed to cater to the lowest common denominator.

 

You already do.

 

the other side is heavily weaponizing information and using it against us, so we'll just sit back and hope people get smarter.  Sounds like a plan.

[Deranged Rhino]

1 minute ago, reddogblitz said:

 

Prepare to lose. We're well on the way.

 

 

You already do.

 

the other side is heavily weaponizing information and using it against us, so we'll just sit back and hope people get smarter.  Sounds like a plan.

 

Again, it's not the "other side" doing this. 

 

It's our own IC. 

 

You want to combat it, you need to first recognize who the actual enemies are. They're not in Russia. They're here. At home. 

[reddogblitz]

3 minutes ago, Deranged Rhino said:

 

Again, it's not the "other side" doing this. 

 

It's our own IC. 

 

You want to combat it, you need to first recognize who the actual enemies are. They're not in Russia. They're here. At home. 

 

It was both.

[Deranged Rhino]

Just now, reddogblitz said:

It was both.

 

Russia bought 10k worth of Facebook ads. 

 

Our IC created disinformation about a Russian/Trump conspiracy, fed it to the media and the people of our country, then lit a fire under anyone who dared question it, all in order to commit fraud on the FISC and (eventually) execute a backdoor coup. 

 

One is not like the other. 

 

One is a real threat to our country. The other has been going on since the nineteenth century.

[TakeYouToTasker]

15 minutes ago, Deranged Rhino said:

 

Russia bought 10k worth of Facebook ads. 

 

Our IC created disinformation about a Russian/Trump conspiracy, fed it to the media and the people of our country, then lit a fire under anyone who dared question it, all in order to commit fraud on the FISC and (eventually) execute a backdoor coup. 

 

One is not like the other. 

 

One is a real threat to our country. The other has been going on since the nineteenth century.

 

This is exactly correct.