OK. So near as I can get, the big issue for Trump is that Clinton opposition research wasn't dismissed out of hand but that the press (and the FBI?) ran with it for a while.

How is that different than Swiftboat - a "scandal" that hit Kerry from guys that served AFTER him and when the guys in his boat vouched for his heroism? And yet the press spent MONTHS giving credibility to what has become clear was the work of a republican operative hack.

This isn't "whataboutism" but I am having a hard time trying to understand how Russiagate isn't just standard dirty politics. Am not defending it but I am confused about the outrage.

MAGAs think it is quaint that Democrats think MAGAs actually care when they get caught being hypocrites.

socaltownie said:

---

OK. So near as I can get, the big issue for Trump is that Clinton opposition research wasn't dismissed out of hand but that the press (and the FBI?) ran with it for a while.

How is that different than Swiftboat - a "scandal" that hit Kerry from guys that served AFTER him and when the guys in his boat vouched for his heroism? And yet the press spent MONTHS giving credibility to what has become clear was the work of a republican operative hack.

This isn't "whataboutism" but I am having a hard time trying to understand how Russiagate isn't just standard dirty politics. Am not defending it but I am confused about the outrage.

---

The difference is that the Clintons wanted to bait the FBI into opening an investigation into Trump during the election to finish off his candidacy. The FBI wasn't going to investigate anything Swift boat related.

Then, when unlike Bush, the smear campaign failed and the smearing side lost, the butthurt losers decided that they were going to manufacture an investigation with the cooperation of the intelligence agencies. So they created a bunch of fake probable cause to warrant launching an investigation that they had zero evidence for, found some minor stuff with the Trump election campaign officials (because Trump surrounds himself with whit-collar criminals predisposed to lying when telling the truth would serve them better), but they never find the collusion that they are sure must have existed because it never did.

And when Mueller tells them there was no evidence of collusion, they go bonkers and start lawyering up in every friendly jurisdiction with some pretty weak cases for the most part (we never saw the Georgia case, which was the only one that might have had some actual meat).

All because democracy happened and they didn't like the result.

You're going to deny all that and the usual sycophants will try to pretend that isn't what happened, but it was.

The first 3 paragraphs from the @CJR review of the press's extreme mishandling of Russiagate, by Jeff Gerth, Pulitzer winner for NYT, now retired.

In sum, the press was shocked Mueller found "no evidence" to support their core conspiracy theory, but did no self-examination: pic.twitter.com/bfdjvqcMk5

— Glenn Greenwald (@ggreenwald) January 31, 2023

All right here, friendo.
https://www.cjr.org/special_report/trumped-up-press-versus-president-part-1.php

Aunburdened said:

---

socaltownie said:

---

OK. So near as I can get, the big issue for Trump is that Clinton opposition research wasn't dismissed out of hand but that the press (and the FBI?) ran with it for a while.

How is that different than Swiftboat - a "scandal" that hit Kerry from guys that served AFTER him and when the guys in his boat vouched for his heroism? And yet the press spent MONTHS giving credibility to what has become clear was the work of a republican operative hack.

This isn't "whataboutism" but I am having a hard time trying to understand how Russiagate isn't just standard dirty politics. Am not defending it but I am confused about the outrage.

---

The difference is that the Clintons wanted to bait the FBI into opening an investigation into Trump during the election to finish off his candidacy. The FBI wasn't going to investigate anything Swift boat related.

Then, when unlike Bush, the smear campaign failed and the smearing side lost, the butthurt losers decided that they were going to manufacture an investigation with the cooperation of the intelligence agencies. So they created a bunch of fake probable cause to warrant launching an investigation that they had zero evidence for, found some minor stuff with the Trump election campaign officials (because Trump surrounds himself with whit-collar criminals predisposed to lying when telling the truth would serve them better), but they never find the collusion that they are sure must have existed because it never did.

And when Mueller tells them there was no evidence of collusion, they go bonkers and start lawyering up in every friendly jurisdiction with some pretty weak cases for the most part (we never saw the Georgia case, which was the only one that might have had some actual meat).

All because democracy happened and they didn't like the result.

You're going to deny all that and the usual sycophants will try to pretend that isn't what happened, but it was.

The first 3 paragraphs from the @CJR review of the press's extreme mishandling of Russiagate, by Jeff Gerth, Pulitzer winner for NYT, now retired.

In sum, the press was shocked Mueller found "no evidence" to support their core conspiracy theory, but did no self-examination: pic.twitter.com/bfdjvqcMk5

— Glenn Greenwald (@ggreenwald) January 31, 2023

All right here, friendo.
https://www.cjr.org/special_report/trumped-up-press-versus-president-part-1.php

---

Got it!! Thanks. So rephrasing it wasnt' that it was dirty tricks it was that in 2017 the efforts continue.

I would say I think it reasonable to investigate Russian interference not only in our elections but in many other Western Democracies. Maybe find a different word than interreference. But the rise of bot farms and fake social media accounts designed to foster contflict and make running a democracy harder is something worth having BI PARTISAN (and indeed non-partisan) work. I think where Trump (cause Trump) screwed up is not framing it as thus:

"The so called Steel Dossier was a fabrication that was promoted by disgraced opponent. Dirty tricks and they should be ashamed of themselves. Like all of you I am concerned that our adversaries are taking advantage of our free and open socieity and look forward to working together with everyone in congress to address and combat".

socaltownie said:

---

Aunburdened said:

---

socaltownie said:

---

OK. So near as I can get, the big issue for Trump is that Clinton opposition research wasn't dismissed out of hand but that the press (and the FBI?) ran with it for a while.

How is that different than Swiftboat - a "scandal" that hit Kerry from guys that served AFTER him and when the guys in his boat vouched for his heroism? And yet the press spent MONTHS giving credibility to what has become clear was the work of a republican operative hack.

This isn't "whataboutism" but I am having a hard time trying to understand how Russiagate isn't just standard dirty politics. Am not defending it but I am confused about the outrage.

---

The difference is that the Clintons wanted to bait the FBI into opening an investigation into Trump during the election to finish off his candidacy. The FBI wasn't going to investigate anything Swift boat related.

Then, when unlike Bush, the smear campaign failed and the smearing side lost, the butthurt losers decided that they were going to manufacture an investigation with the cooperation of the intelligence agencies. So they created a bunch of fake probable cause to warrant launching an investigation that they had zero evidence for, found some minor stuff with the Trump election campaign officials (because Trump surrounds himself with whit-collar criminals predisposed to lying when telling the truth would serve them better), but they never find the collusion that they are sure must have existed because it never did.

And when Mueller tells them there was no evidence of collusion, they go bonkers and start lawyering up in every friendly jurisdiction with some pretty weak cases for the most part (we never saw the Georgia case, which was the only one that might have had some actual meat).

All because democracy happened and they didn't like the result.

You're going to deny all that and the usual sycophants will try to pretend that isn't what happened, but it was.

The first 3 paragraphs from the @CJR review of the press's extreme mishandling of Russiagate, by Jeff Gerth, Pulitzer winner for NYT, now retired.

In sum, the press was shocked Mueller found "no evidence" to support their core conspiracy theory, but did no self-examination: pic.twitter.com/bfdjvqcMk5

— Glenn Greenwald (@ggreenwald) January 31, 2023

All right here, friendo.
https://www.cjr.org/special_report/trumped-up-press-versus-president-part-1.php

---

Got it!! Thanks. So rephrasing it wasnt' that it was dirty tricks it was that in 2017 the efforts continue.

I would say I think it reasonable to investigate Russian interference not only in our elections but in many other Western Democracies. Maybe find a different word than interreference. But the rise of bot farms and fake social media accounts designed to foster contflict and make running a democracy harder is something worth having BI PARTISAN (and indeed non-partisan) work. I think where Trump (cause Trump) screwed up is not framing it as thus:

"The so called Steel Dossier was a fabrication that was promoted by disgraced opponent. Dirty tricks and they should be ashamed of themselves. Like all of you I am concerned that our adversaries are taking advantage of our free and open socieity and look forward to working together with everyone in congress to address and combat".

---

The Steele Dossier wasn't released to the public until after the election so it can't really be considered an electoral "dirty tricks" campaign. The Dossier was a research document - not a finding of fact. Much of it was found to be true, for example that Putin was working to help Trump and hurt Hillary and that Team Trump had many secretive contacts with Russians.

Frequently center-left people take the lies from the right as factual, since their messaging is relentless. It is important to always go back to real information and start from there - not from the misinformation being peddled by people like Gerth, who goes all the way back to Whitewater misinformation. Or people like Glenn Greenwald who have run consistent misinformation on these topics - for example with the claim above that Mueller said he found "no evidence", which is an outright lie.

dajo9 said:

---

socaltownie said:

---

Aunburdened said:

---

socaltownie said:

---

OK. So near as I can get, the big issue for Trump is that Clinton opposition research wasn't dismissed out of hand but that the press (and the FBI?) ran with it for a while.

How is that different than Swiftboat - a "scandal" that hit Kerry from guys that served AFTER him and when the guys in his boat vouched for his heroism? And yet the press spent MONTHS giving credibility to what has become clear was the work of a republican operative hack.

This isn't "whataboutism" but I am having a hard time trying to understand how Russiagate isn't just standard dirty politics. Am not defending it but I am confused about the outrage.

---

The difference is that the Clintons wanted to bait the FBI into opening an investigation into Trump during the election to finish off his candidacy. The FBI wasn't going to investigate anything Swift boat related.

Then, when unlike Bush, the smear campaign failed and the smearing side lost, the butthurt losers decided that they were going to manufacture an investigation with the cooperation of the intelligence agencies. So they created a bunch of fake probable cause to warrant launching an investigation that they had zero evidence for, found some minor stuff with the Trump election campaign officials (because Trump surrounds himself with whit-collar criminals predisposed to lying when telling the truth would serve them better), but they never find the collusion that they are sure must have existed because it never did.

And when Mueller tells them there was no evidence of collusion, they go bonkers and start lawyering up in every friendly jurisdiction with some pretty weak cases for the most part (we never saw the Georgia case, which was the only one that might have had some actual meat).

All because democracy happened and they didn't like the result.

You're going to deny all that and the usual sycophants will try to pretend that isn't what happened, but it was.

The first 3 paragraphs from the @CJR review of the press's extreme mishandling of Russiagate, by Jeff Gerth, Pulitzer winner for NYT, now retired.

In sum, the press was shocked Mueller found "no evidence" to support their core conspiracy theory, but did no self-examination: pic.twitter.com/bfdjvqcMk5

— Glenn Greenwald (@ggreenwald) January 31, 2023

All right here, friendo.
https://www.cjr.org/special_report/trumped-up-press-versus-president-part-1.php

---

Got it!! Thanks. So rephrasing it wasnt' that it was dirty tricks it was that in 2017 the efforts continue.

I would say I think it reasonable to investigate Russian interference not only in our elections but in many other Western Democracies. Maybe find a different word than interreference. But the rise of bot farms and fake social media accounts designed to foster contflict and make running a democracy harder is something worth having BI PARTISAN (and indeed non-partisan) work. I think where Trump (cause Trump) screwed up is not framing it as thus:

"The so called Steel Dossier was a fabrication that was promoted by disgraced opponent. Dirty tricks and they should be ashamed of themselves. Like all of you I am concerned that our adversaries are taking advantage of our free and open socieity and look forward to working together with everyone in congress to address and combat".

---

The Steele Dossier wasn't released to the public until after the election so it can't really be considered an electoral "dirty tricks" campaign. The Dossier was a research document - not a finding of fact. Much of it was found to be true, for example that Putin was working to help Trump and hurt Hillary and that Team Trump had many secretive contacts with Russians.

Frequently center-left people take the lies from the right as factual, since their messaging is relentless. It is important to always go back to real information and start from there - not from the misinformation being peddled by people like Gerth, who goes all the way back to Whitewater misinformation. Or people like Glenn Greenwald who have run consistent misinformation on these topics - for example with the claim above that Mueller said he found "no evidence", which is an outright lie.

---

Steele linked to journalists and Obama's FBI investigated the Trump campaign prior to the election. In October 2016, Mother Jones magazine reported the existence of a memo containing allegations of a Russian effort to cultivate and influence Donald Trump. The Election was the following month.

oski003 said:

---

dajo9 said:

---

socaltownie said:

---

Aunburdened said:

---

socaltownie said:

---

OK. So near as I can get, the big issue for Trump is that Clinton opposition research wasn't dismissed out of hand but that the press (and the FBI?) ran with it for a while.

How is that different than Swiftboat - a "scandal" that hit Kerry from guys that served AFTER him and when the guys in his boat vouched for his heroism? And yet the press spent MONTHS giving credibility to what has become clear was the work of a republican operative hack.

This isn't "whataboutism" but I am having a hard time trying to understand how Russiagate isn't just standard dirty politics. Am not defending it but I am confused about the outrage.

---

The difference is that the Clintons wanted to bait the FBI into opening an investigation into Trump during the election to finish off his candidacy. The FBI wasn't going to investigate anything Swift boat related.

Then, when unlike Bush, the smear campaign failed and the smearing side lost, the butthurt losers decided that they were going to manufacture an investigation with the cooperation of the intelligence agencies. So they created a bunch of fake probable cause to warrant launching an investigation that they had zero evidence for, found some minor stuff with the Trump election campaign officials (because Trump surrounds himself with whit-collar criminals predisposed to lying when telling the truth would serve them better), but they never find the collusion that they are sure must have existed because it never did.

And when Mueller tells them there was no evidence of collusion, they go bonkers and start lawyering up in every friendly jurisdiction with some pretty weak cases for the most part (we never saw the Georgia case, which was the only one that might have had some actual meat).

All because democracy happened and they didn't like the result.

You're going to deny all that and the usual sycophants will try to pretend that isn't what happened, but it was.

The first 3 paragraphs from the @CJR review of the press's extreme mishandling of Russiagate, by Jeff Gerth, Pulitzer winner for NYT, now retired.

In sum, the press was shocked Mueller found "no evidence" to support their core conspiracy theory, but did no self-examination: pic.twitter.com/bfdjvqcMk5

— Glenn Greenwald (@ggreenwald) January 31, 2023

All right here, friendo.
https://www.cjr.org/special_report/trumped-up-press-versus-president-part-1.php

---

Got it!! Thanks. So rephrasing it wasnt' that it was dirty tricks it was that in 2017 the efforts continue.

I would say I think it reasonable to investigate Russian interference not only in our elections but in many other Western Democracies. Maybe find a different word than interreference. But the rise of bot farms and fake social media accounts designed to foster contflict and make running a democracy harder is something worth having BI PARTISAN (and indeed non-partisan) work. I think where Trump (cause Trump) screwed up is not framing it as thus:

"The so called Steel Dossier was a fabrication that was promoted by disgraced opponent. Dirty tricks and they should be ashamed of themselves. Like all of you I am concerned that our adversaries are taking advantage of our free and open socieity and look forward to working together with everyone in congress to address and combat".

---

The Steele Dossier wasn't released to the public until after the election so it can't really be considered an electoral "dirty tricks" campaign. The Dossier was a research document - not a finding of fact. Much of it was found to be true, for example that Putin was working to help Trump and hurt Hillary and that Team Trump had many secretive contacts with Russians.

Frequently center-left people take the lies from the right as factual, since their messaging is relentless. It is important to always go back to real information and start from there - not from the misinformation being peddled by people like Gerth, who goes all the way back to Whitewater misinformation. Or people like Glenn Greenwald who have run consistent misinformation on these topics - for example with the claim above that Mueller said he found "no evidence", which is an outright lie.

---

Steele linked to journalists and Obama's FBI investigated the Trump campaign prior to the election. In October 2016, Mother Jones magazine reported the existence of a memo containing allegations of a Russian effort to cultivate and influence Donald Trump. The Election was the following month.

---

What you say Mother Jones reported turned out to be true, so still not a "dirty tricks" campaign

Also, the FBI investigation was warranted by events outside the Dossier. The FBI investigation then went on to highly publicize a bogus investigation into Hillary while downplaying the fully warranted Trump investigation. So, the FBI did a "dirty tricks" campaign against Hillary.

dajo9 said:

---

oski003 said:

---

dajo9 said:

---

socaltownie said:

---

Aunburdened said:

---

socaltownie said:

---

OK. So near as I can get, the big issue for Trump is that Clinton opposition research wasn't dismissed out of hand but that the press (and the FBI?) ran with it for a while.

How is that different than Swiftboat - a "scandal" that hit Kerry from guys that served AFTER him and when the guys in his boat vouched for his heroism? And yet the press spent MONTHS giving credibility to what has become clear was the work of a republican operative hack.

This isn't "whataboutism" but I am having a hard time trying to understand how Russiagate isn't just standard dirty politics. Am not defending it but I am confused about the outrage.

---

The difference is that the Clintons wanted to bait the FBI into opening an investigation into Trump during the election to finish off his candidacy. The FBI wasn't going to investigate anything Swift boat related.

Then, when unlike Bush, the smear campaign failed and the smearing side lost, the butthurt losers decided that they were going to manufacture an investigation with the cooperation of the intelligence agencies. So they created a bunch of fake probable cause to warrant launching an investigation that they had zero evidence for, found some minor stuff with the Trump election campaign officials (because Trump surrounds himself with whit-collar criminals predisposed to lying when telling the truth would serve them better), but they never find the collusion that they are sure must have existed because it never did.

And when Mueller tells them there was no evidence of collusion, they go bonkers and start lawyering up in every friendly jurisdiction with some pretty weak cases for the most part (we never saw the Georgia case, which was the only one that might have had some actual meat).

All because democracy happened and they didn't like the result.

You're going to deny all that and the usual sycophants will try to pretend that isn't what happened, but it was.

The first 3 paragraphs from the @CJR review of the press's extreme mishandling of Russiagate, by Jeff Gerth, Pulitzer winner for NYT, now retired.

In sum, the press was shocked Mueller found "no evidence" to support their core conspiracy theory, but did no self-examination: pic.twitter.com/bfdjvqcMk5

— Glenn Greenwald (@ggreenwald) January 31, 2023

All right here, friendo.
https://www.cjr.org/special_report/trumped-up-press-versus-president-part-1.php

---

Got it!! Thanks. So rephrasing it wasnt' that it was dirty tricks it was that in 2017 the efforts continue.

I would say I think it reasonable to investigate Russian interference not only in our elections but in many other Western Democracies. Maybe find a different word than interreference. But the rise of bot farms and fake social media accounts designed to foster contflict and make running a democracy harder is something worth having BI PARTISAN (and indeed non-partisan) work. I think where Trump (cause Trump) screwed up is not framing it as thus:

"The so called Steel Dossier was a fabrication that was promoted by disgraced opponent. Dirty tricks and they should be ashamed of themselves. Like all of you I am concerned that our adversaries are taking advantage of our free and open socieity and look forward to working together with everyone in congress to address and combat".

---

The Steele Dossier wasn't released to the public until after the election so it can't really be considered an electoral "dirty tricks" campaign. The Dossier was a research document - not a finding of fact. Much of it was found to be true, for example that Putin was working to help Trump and hurt Hillary and that Team Trump had many secretive contacts with Russians.

Frequently center-left people take the lies from the right as factual, since their messaging is relentless. It is important to always go back to real information and start from there - not from the misinformation being peddled by people like Gerth, who goes all the way back to Whitewater misinformation. Or people like Glenn Greenwald who have run consistent misinformation on these topics - for example with the claim above that Mueller said he found "no evidence", which is an outright lie.

---

Steele linked to journalists and Obama's FBI investigated the Trump campaign prior to the election. In October 2016, Mother Jones magazine reported the existence of a memo containing allegations of a Russian effort to cultivate and influence Donald Trump. The Election was the following month.

---

What you say Mother Jones reported turned out to be true, so still not a "dirty tricks" campaign

Also, the FBI investigation was warranted by events outside the Dossier. The FBI investigation then went on to highly publicize a bogus investigation into Hillary while downplaying the fully warranted Trump investigation. So, the FBI did a "dirty tricks" campaign against Hillary.

---

Imagine the following:

1) You run against me for office
2) I hire a spy to investigate to you to see if you beat your wife.
3) The spy leaks to the media that he has found information indicating you may beat your wife and is investigating it.
4) Right before the election, the media reports that a credible detective, with decades of experience investigating spousal abuse, is investigating allegations that you beat your wife.

...

Nothing wrong with the above, right?

Hillary clearly used the Dossier investigation to attack Trump right before the election and deflect from her own skeletons.

socaltownie said:

---

OK. So near as I can get, the big issue for Trump is that Clinton opposition research wasn't dismissed out of hand but that the press (and the FBI?) ran with it for a while.

How is that different than Swiftboat - a "scandal" that hit Kerry from guys that served AFTER him and when the guys in his boat vouched for his heroism? And yet the press spent MONTHS giving credibility to what has become clear was the work of a republican operative hack.

This isn't "whataboutism" but I am having a hard time trying to understand how Russiagate isn't just standard dirty politics. Am not defending it but I am confused about the outrage.

---

socaltownie, as you can see, they've got nothing. Even less than "dirty politics". Just a campaign of lies to hide what they support, which is a Russia supported fascist movement to make global authoritarian crony capitalism rule.