Russian President Vladimir Putin 'ordered' Campaign to Influence Presidential Election - Polidicks

How much did the emails affect the election anyway? I mean she won the popular vote by quite a lot it seemed.

[QUOTE=Swebonny;51633695]How much did the emails affect the election anyway? I mean she won the popular vote by quite a lot it seemed.[/QUOTE] Enough states went Trump by around a percent or less to have swung it Hillary's way, so I'd say the potential impact they might have had is "a lot."

Some more info here: [url]http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2017/01/06/us/politics/document-russia-hacking-report-intelligence-agencies.html?hp&action=click&pgtype=Homepage&clickSource=story-heading&module=a-lede-package-region&region=top-news&WT.nav=top-news[/url] I don't think anyone legit is saying Trump only won because of Putin, what they're saying is that Putin had an active campaign of trying to manipulate and influence our elections. Trump seems to be siding against the intelligence community cause he's probably afraid it'll make him look illegitimate (and hurt his ego), but by denying it and being a Putin apologist he's doing just that.

[QUOTE=TheDrunkenOne;51633428]Welcome to cold war 2.0 ladies and gents[/QUOTE] Given that small groups and even singular entities working independently can influence things on such a larger scale now, I'd say it's a wholly different Cold War.

Farage probably had more influence than Putin :v:

[QUOTE=UK Bohemian;51633755]Farage probably had more influence than Putin :v:[/QUOTE] I really don't believe this is a reasonable statement.

[QUOTE=HumanAbyss;51633811]I really don't believe this is a reasonable statement.[/QUOTE] Prove it!

[QUOTE=Shindiggs;51633493]To what extent? Dummy accounts to shill on social media? RT hit pieces? Actual hacking of voting machines? Why aren't they being extremely specific if they're already willing to be this indicting?[/QUOTE] The specifics are as you might expect in the article, from the big obvious talking points like Wikileaks... [quote]Intelligence officials say in their new public report on Russian hacking that they believe with high confidence that Moscow's intelligence services relayed to WikiLeaks material it hacked from the Democratic National Committee and senior Democratic officials.[/quote] ...to Twitter campaigns I've never even heard about. [quote]The report says that based on Moscow's social media activity, pro-Kremlin bloggers had prepared a Twitter campaign — called (hashtag) DemocracyRIP, or Rest in Peace — on election night because they anticipated that Hillary Clinton would beat Donald Trump.[/quote] Tho there does seem to be a lot of "according to a report" if you were hoping for some primary sources.

[QUOTE=UK Bohemian;51633819]Prove it![/QUOTE] Not really my job. The intelligence community has largely proven they did something. The idea it had no effect though? That's not something there's going to be stats on that one can just point to and go "ah ha!" the way you actually are. You made the statement, you back it up. Can you prove it had no effect? The weekend of the hack saw her numbers go from 10 points above Trump to being tied with him, so I believe the answer is "It effected it a lot more than you are realizing".

[QUOTE=HumanAbyss;51633894]Not really my job. The intelligence community has largely proven they did something. The idea it had no effect though? That's not something there's going to be stats on that one can just point to and go "ah ha!" the way you actually are. You made the statement, you back it up. Can you prove it had no effect? The weekend of the hack saw her numbers go from 10 points above Trump to being tied with him, so I believe the answer is "It effected it a lot more than you are realizing".[/QUOTE] I never suggested that it had no effect, you made that bit up. I suggested that Farage probably had more influence. I believe that Brexit whether you agree with it or not had an effect on the US election, to what degree, who knows but probably more than the [I]something[/I] that Russia did. [url]http://edition.cnn.com/2016/06/24/politics/us-election-brexit-donald-trump-hillary-clinton/[/url]

I believe that UK Bohemians opinion is probably wrong.

Did Russia try to influence the election for Trump? Probably. I don't even see why this is controversial. Most countries influence in one way or another. There were plenty of European politicians who supported Clinton or attacked Trump throughout the election. Were they not trying to influence the election? To the question of whether it played a big role: based on the numbers, it doesn't seem like it. Clinton's unfavorables were ~55% before the leaks and sat at around 55% until the election. ([url]https://elections.huffingtonpost.com/pollster/hillary-clinton-favorable-rating/edit#!minpct=0&maxpct=100&mindate=2016-01-01&maxdate=2017-01-06&smoothing=less&showpoints=yes&showsplines=yes&hiddenpollsters=&hiddensubpops=&partisanship=S,P,N&parties=D,R,I,N&selected=favorable,unfavorable&fudge=1[/url])

[QUOTE=UK Bohemian;51633755]Farage probably had more influence than Putin :v:[/QUOTE] Comey probably had more of an effect than Putin

[QUOTE=JohnnyMo1;51633714]Enough states went Trump by around a percent or less to have swung it Hillary's way, so I'd say the potential impact they might have had is "a lot."[/QUOTE] Let me strengthen this statement a little bit with a fun fact: According to the Cook Political Report's data, last updated 3 days ago, Michigan, Wisconsin, and Pennsylvania (all states in which Trump won by less than one percent of the popular vote) could have won Hillary the election. 38,875 voters in these states could have gone from Trump to Hillary to give Hillary the election. That is less than 1.4% of the number of votes by which Hillary won the national popular vote count. :eng101:

[QUOTE=HumanAbyss;51633811]I really don't believe this is a reasonable statement.[/QUOTE] belief does not stem from evidence though, it is rooted in emotion rather than logic

[QUOTE=Quark:;51634048]belief does not stem from evidence though, it is rooted in emotion rather than logic[/QUOTE] There's no evidence it's a reasonable statement so my "belief" that it isn't reasonable is just as reasonable

The way I see it, we were going to get someone corrupt into office whether it be Trump or Clinton. Had the Republicans not taken the majority in the Congress and eventually SCOTUS, I would have once said that I would much rather fight Trump in the White House than Clinton, as at least he's flagrant. Now I'm not so sure. As was said by others, the same intelligence communities that reported about Hussein and bin Laden are the ones now reporting about Russian influence in the election. I don't distrust them because "they go against our Lord and savior Trump," but for what I feel are legitimate grievances. I'll admit with all honesty that I don't know what to believe. I also don't know if things would honestly be much different if Clinton had won the White House, and now there's no way to find that out. I just hope that our congressmen are able to hold Trump accountable, but I doubt that as well.

[QUOTE=bilbasio;51633670]This video has been proven to be wrong.[/QUOTE] Stop this please. If you are going to say it was proven wrong, or say anything is wrong, link us to places and give us sources on the information. I'm not defending that video, but I'm tired of seeing multiple people in this section just say "no that's wrong" and do nothing to back up their claims. It just makes whatever else they say seem unbelievable.

[QUOTE=Overhauser;51633956]I believe that UK Bohemians opinion is probably wrong.[/QUOTE] on what basis?

[QUOTE=Quark:;51634048]belief does not stem from evidence though, it is rooted in emotion rather than logic[/QUOTE] uh you can believe in something you've deduced based on logic and other, non-conclusive evidence. what a pointless thing to bring down to semantics though

[QUOTE=Killer900;51633440]Didn't the US do the same back in Soviet-Era times?[/QUOTE] Yes but they are the good guys so it's cool.

[QUOTE=DMGaina;51634161]Yes but they are the good guys so it's cool.[/QUOTE] it certainly is, even if it is hypocritical and wrong, I can't imagine how terribly worse the world would be under soviet dominance instead of the USA's

[QUOTE=Killer900;51633440]Didn't the US do the same back in Soviet-Era times?[/QUOTE] The US has been doing this since between the World Wars at least.

What goes around comes around.

A couple of new(ish) tweets ranting about the report: [media]https://twitter.com/abbymartin/status/817497773704671236[/media] Twitter rant on the above profile, won't link the full. And WikiLeaks (also, what is up with their aggression lately?) [media]https://twitter.com/wikileaks/status/817500610442522625[/media]

[QUOTE=Shindiggs;51633493]To what extent? Dummy accounts to shill on social media? RT hit pieces? Actual hacking of voting machines? Why aren't they being extremely specific if they're already willing to be this indicting? These are the same intelligence agencies who brought us "Saddam has WMDs" and "Osama is in Afghanistan" and "The Gulf of Tonkin was the NVA". I don't know about this yet...[/QUOTE] Nope Dont get confused Those were politicians nit picking reports and facts

[QUOTE=Shindiggs;51633493]These are the same intelligence agencies who brought us "Saddam has WMDs" and "Osama is in Afghanistan" and "The Gulf of Tonkin was the NVA". I don't know about this yet...[/QUOTE] Saddam Hussein [i]did[/i] have WMDs (he used chemical weapons against the Iranians during the Iran-Iraq War and against the Kurdish in Iraq when they started "rebelling" against him), even though they were found to be in poor condition (leftovers from the 1980s; see [url=https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Avarice]Operation Avarice[/url]) at the time of our invasion in 2003. Osama bin Laden [i]was[/i] in Afghanistan before he relocated to Pakistan (these same intelligence agencies are also the ones who found him in Abbottabad before we moved in to kill him, need I remind you). The Gulf of Tonkin [i]was[/i] perpetrated by North Vietnamese naval forces. There's not actually a problem here. The intelligence community has been a reliable source of information for us, and there's no reason to doubt it here either. The only ones I've seen doubting it on social media are Trump supporters who have obvious motivations for downplaying such reports and who apparently aren't intelligent enough themselves to understand the implications of having a foreign power/nemesis like Russia tampering in our elections...

I wonder if it's in relitation for what Clinton did to the russian election in the 90's that resulted in Putin's lost?

[QUOTE=DMGaina;51634161]Yes but they are the good guys so it's cool.[/QUOTE] Hey do you have any remote idea what it felt like to live in the Soviet Union? US were the good guys, you may not like it, but Soviet citizens who weren't braindead zombies dreamt of living in the US.