They say history repeats itself…

The gang is getting back together.  No, not what’s left of the Beatles, but Trump and some of his old associates (Hope “former model/well connected rich girl/Trump Whisperer” Hicks; Sean “the biggest crowds in history” Spicer; and Reince “I am NOT drunk!” Priebus).

MSNBC legal analyst and former 30-year federal prosecutor, Glenn Kirschner, suspects that this upcoming reunion could have something to do with John Bolton’s still pending book, now being reviewed by the White House for containing possible “classified information.”

Kirschner tweets: “Why are Hope Hicks/Sean Spicer/Reince Priebus being pulled back in the White House by Trump? Maybe Bolton’s book proves those 3 could provide incriminating info against Trump, so Trump will try to stop them from testifying, claiming executive privilege/absolute immunity?”

At first, I just suspected the old “Hope Hicks was to Trump, as Monica Lewinsky was to Clinton” logic analogy.  Now I think Kirschner is probably right.  ‘Course, the former doesn’t preclude the latter, by any means. 😉

Why do you think these individuals are being called back for "service?" 

Thanks for recommending and commenting.

The Internet and the Death of Truth

The Internet is the breeding ground of all of the conspiracy theories that are taking over the public zeitgeist.

The Internet is the source for most of the yellow journalism put out by today's 24 hour "news" cycle.

The Internet is where the dregs of humanity congregate and reinforce each other.

Bad news travels faster than good, and lies travel further than the truth.

We could have known better.

We could have seen this coming.

We were too busy falling all over ourselves with how ingenious we were. Shop online! Keep in touch! Publish your rants! Argue about politics with strangers! Woo! If nothing else, the avalanche of Internet porn should have clued us into what grade of content we could come to expect from it.

If people aren't capable of handling this technology, what now?

It's not like we can put the genie back in the bottle.

Even China can't keep their Internet entirely locked down - all they've done by censoring it is create super-hackers.

This is Pandora's box, and regulations don't work on it.

Evidence the Russians Won the 2016 Election for Trump

Over time as evidence dribbled out before and after the 2016 election, it seemed increasingly likely that Russian interference was a necessary factor in the president’s election by the electoral college. To be clear, the hypothesis is that Russian dark free speech (propaganda) efforts were necessary, but alone, they were not sufficient. There were multiple other factors, including Clinton herself and her arguably bad campaign, and Comey shafting Clinton twice just before the election by announcing investigations while not announcing the ongoing FBI investigation of the president’s campaign contacts with the Russians.

Also, the evidence cannot conclusively prove that Russian interference tipped the electoral college to the president. That is because the social and personal effects of dark free speech are impossible to quantify in a situation like this, and maybe in all situations. The unconscious human mind can be manipulated with no conscious awareness it happened. That isn't mostly a matter of stupidity or gullibility. It is mostly a matter of evolutionary biology. The human mind is susceptible to dark free speech and there are a some good reasons for that based on what we are from human evolution.[1]

Yeah, whatev, where’s the beef?

It isn’t just one piece of evidence, but a series of things that collectively lead to the conclusion that Russian interference probably gave the president the electoral college. Here’s the beef.

First, Trump is a chronic liar. There is thus no rational reason whatever to give any of his defenses any credibility whatsoever. All of his denials, and all the denials of his family members and felon friends and associates, are set aside as self-serving lies.

Second, there were coincidences compatible with Russian efforts to help the president. For example, the same day the ‘Hollywood Access’ tape where Trump discussed sexually assaulting women came out, Wikileaks dumped a bunch of emails the Russians stole to deflect public attention away from the president’s sex predator history. That was not a coincidence.

Third, Russian mobsters and kleptocrats had bailed the president’s failing businesses out over the years. The president was in debt to Russian crooks and goons. US banks would not loan money to the president because he was a business failure on his own. And, to this day, the president fights tooth, fang and claw to hide as much of his business dealings from congress, investigators and the American people. If there’s nothing to hide, why fight so hard to hide nothing? Why not turn over his tax returns?

Fourth, Mueller indicted 12 Russian agents for interfering with the 2016 election: “The 29-page indictment is the most detailed accusation by the American government to date of the Russian government’s interference in the 2016 election, and it includes a litany of brazen Russian subterfuge operations meant to foment chaos in the months before Election Day.” At least one source saw the evidence that Mueller laid out as strongly suggestive of actual Russian influence on votes: “And this information makes it increasingly difficult to say that the Kremlin's effort to impact the American mind did not succeed. .... We are no longer talking about approximately $100,000 (paid in rubles, no less) of advertising grudgingly disclosed by Facebook, but tens of millions of dollars spent over several years to build a broad, sophisticated system that can influence American opinion.”

Fifth, three states, MI, WI and PA voted for the president by a total of about 70,000 - 90,000 votes between the three of them. Available data shows that (i) Russia targeted MI and WI with ads designed to discourage potential Clinton voters, including blacks, and (ii) black voter turnout dropped compared to the previous election. Paul Manafort shared 2016 polling data with a Russian associate, according to court filing in January of 2019. One source commented: “A number of Russian-linked Facebook ads specifically targeted Michigan and Wisconsin, two states crucial to Donald Trump’s victory last November, according to four sources with direct knowledge of the situation. Some of the Russian ads appeared highly sophisticated in their targeting of key demographic groups in areas of the states that turned out to be pivotal, two of the sources said. The ads employed a series of divisive messages aimed at breaking through the clutter of campaign ads online, including promoting anti-Muslim messages, sources said.”

Sixth, some wonk believes that the effects of Russian interference can be assessed with reasonable accuracy, but Facebook and Twitter won't release the data: “But Sinan Aral, a professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, says that’s misguided. ‘When I read in the newspaper that it’s impossible to know that the Russians changed the results of the election, I vehemently disagree. It is possible to know, with a certain degree of statistical confidence, the likelihood that Russian interference changed the results.’” The matter may not be completely unknowable.

Seventh, Director of National Intelligence James Clapper had access to all available US intelligence agency data and he came to this conclusion: “To me, it just exceeds logic and credulity that they didn’t affect the election, and it’s my belief they actually turned it.”

Eighth, Russian Facebook ads were emotion-provoking and reason-destroying, for example:

“Many of the ads, placed by Russians posing as Americans, didn't endorse a specific candidate but spread inflammatory messages on sensitive subjects such as immigration and race to amplify fault lines in American life, targeting users from specific backgrounds and tight races in key states such as Pennsylvania, Wisconsin and Virginia.”

Ninth, the Russian effort was multi-pronged: “Facebook says the Internet Research Agency may have reached as many as 126 million people. Separately, Twitter announced that about 1.4 million people may have been in contact with IRA-controlled accounts. The social media aspect of the interference was just one dimension. Cyberattackers also went after political victims in the United States — whose emails and other data were released publicly to embarrass them — and state elections officials and other targets. And there may have been other avenues of interference as well.”

Tenth, even the hyper-partisan GOP-controlled US Senate concluded the Russian interfered with the 2016 election. The evidence of interference had to be bigly overwhelming for republicans to actually admit that. ‘The Russian effort was extensive and sophisticated, and its goals were to undermine public faith in the democratic process, to hurt Secretary Clinton (Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton) and to help Donald Trump,’ Warner (D-VA) said.”

“WASHINGTON — The Senate Intelligence Committee concluded Thursday that election systems in all 50 states were targeted by Russia in 2016, an effort more far-reaching than previously acknowledged and one largely undetected by the states and federal officials at the time. But while the bipartisan report’s warning that the United States remains vulnerable in the next election is clear, its findings were so heavily redacted at the insistence of American intelligence agencies that even some key recommendations for 2020 were blacked out.”

Conclusion

If the kind of evidence that one needs to believe that the Russians threw the electoral college to the president requires something like this from Putin, “Oh, yeah, us Russkies done it. You caught us. We be bad.”, then the president wasn't helped by Russian interference.

But, if one pieces all the evidence together, one can reasonably believe that the Russian threw the electoral college to the president, making him America’s first truly illegitimate president. In my opinion, the chance that the Russian threw the 2016 electoral college to the president is about 95%. Obviously, conclusive proof will never be available. One has to look at the overall evidence and then decide.


Footnote:
1. One reason is that humans need to default into trust to cooperate. Without it, modern civilization would not exist. Another is that the human mind needed only a severely limited data processing bandwidth capacity to survive and eventually build modern civilization. After all, we only needed to out think non-human animals, not be Einsteins as the bare minimum A third is that, because of our severely limited data processing bandwidth, we have no choice in dealing with politics but to use imperfect, usually reality-distorting, shortcuts to try to make sense of a political world that’s far too complicated for conscious comprehension. The problem is greatly exacerbated when demagogues, tyrants and kleptocrats rely on dark free speech to deceive, distract, divide, discourage and stupify (irrationalize) the people.

For millennia, intuitive leaders have recognized the strengths, weaknesses, mode of operation and limits of the human mind. Modern science has come to just begin to explain that stuff with empirical data only in the last 70 years or so, mostly in the last ~30 years. Plato and Aristotle debated the demagogue vs human mind issue in their time (~390 BC). Historical intuitive leaders, e.g., Hitler, Stalin, etc., knew how to exploit the human mind. Apparently most did so with a vengeance. Unless I misunderstand history, most (~97% ?) left a legacy of blood 'n guts 'n misery in their wake.

MY MORNING ROUTINE IN THE YEAR 2050

Disclaimer: No roaches were harmed in the making of this video.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UG1I3MOXm90

The Failing Rule of Law

The threat to democracy and the rule of law that the president and his administration poses is clear to many people, but not to the president’s administration or most rank and file supporters. The exceptions among those people are ones who want to see democracy and the rule of law dismantled. The president himself clearly wants to see that outcome.

The latest sign of the erosion of the rule of law came yesterday from US Attorney General William Barr. The Washington Post reports that Barr said this about the president Tweets and statements: “To have public statements and Tweets made about the department, about the people in the department, our men and women here, about cases pending in the department, and about judges before whom we have cases, make it impossible for me to do my job and to assure the courts and the prosecutors in the department that we’re doing our work with integrity.  .... I cannot do my job here at the department with constant background commentary that undercuts me. .... I’m not going to be bullied or influenced by anybody.”

Is that rational or believable?

In essence, Barr intended to give an appearance of standing up for the rule of law and the independence and integrity of the Department of Justice. Did he really do that? The media called Barr’s comments things like a public rebuke of the president. But was it really that? What exactly did Barr try to do yesterday?

It helps to recall some points about how both the president and Barr have conducted themselves from the beginning.

1. The president made it clear that in view of his power, the job of the US Attorney General was to protect the president from the rule of law: “I don't want to get into loyalty, but I will tell you that, I will say this: Holder protected President Obama. Totally protected him. When you look at the things that they did, and Holder protected the president. And I have great respect for that, I'll be honest.” The president’s attitude toward the rule of law is clear, i.e., the president is above the law.

2. Barr wrote an unsolicited memo to the president months before he was nominated to be Attorney General: “The memo questions the scope of Mueller’s investigation, and it argues that Mueller should not be permitted to demand answers from the president about possible obstruction of justice based on attempts by Trump to pressure former FBI Director James Comey to drop his investigation of Trump’s ex-National Security Advisor Michael Flynn.” Barr’s memo was interpreted by many as an assertion that he would protect the president from the rule of law.

3. Barr has both lied and acted to protect the president by constantly withholding information that is potentially damaging to the president. For example, the American people have never see the entire Mueller report. Reuters reported this last October: “WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A U.S. appeals court on Tuesday issued a stay that blocks the release to a congressional committee of an unredacted copy of former Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s report detailing Russian meddling in the 2016 U.S. election.” Barr's fight to keep the full Mueller report hidden form the public continues.  Also, before the Mueller report came out, Barr provided the public with a summary that lied about what Mueller found. Barr has made other false public assertions in defense of the president. Barr has also interfered with some DoJ investigations of both the president and his allies, even ending some of them.

In view of that, several things stand out about what Barr said and did not say yesterday. Most importantly, he did not say that the president did not influence his decision to try to protect Roger Stone. He also did not say why he intervened to protect Roger Stone to reduce the recommended jail term for that felon ally of the president. He did not even say that the president made the DoJ’s job impossible -- he said it made his job impossible. He also did not say why the president’s Tweets made his job impossible, despite saying he is not going to be bullied or influenced by anybody. Barr’s act to protect Stone looks exactly like a subordinate taking orders from his boss because that is exactly what it was. All Barr had to do was ignore the president’s Tweet in defense of a convicted felon-ally, or provide some rationale for why the felon Stone should be given leniency. There is nothing impossible about that.

Finally, Barr said that he could not assure the courts and the prosecutors in the department that the Department of Justice is doing its work with integrity. That's entirely on him. He has two basic options, resign in protest or explain himself to the public. He isn't doing either. Instead, he deploys more lies to distract and deceive the public. He is acting exactly as both he and the president see the role of the Attorney General, i.e., protector of the president from the rule of law. This is how the rule of law falls to liars, authoritarians and crooks.

Book Review: On Tyranny

'People Would Revolt' if Trump is Impeached is Not His Opinion, it's an Instruction to commit violence

Historian Timothy Snyder's 2017 book, On Tyranny: Twenty Lessons From The Twentieth Century, is a warning aimed directly at President Trump and his now obvious political goal of establishing anti-democratic, right wing tyranny in America. There's nothing subtle about this short, easy to read book (126 pages). It gets right to the point by comparing the tactics, rhetoric and mindset of 20th century tyrants like Hitler and Stalin to what Trump is doing today in America. Each of the twenty lessons constitute a short chapter. It can be read in a several hours. What Snyder is arguing here is generally in accord with how some others, e.g., Hannah Arendt in The Origins of Totalitarianism, have described the 20th century's political monsters.

Unilateral surrender: Snyder's first lesson, do not obey in advance, makes the point that in the face of the tyrant or tyrant wannabe, many people simply let their own freedom go. Power flows from the people to the tyrant. Snyder writes: "Most of the power of authoritarianism is freely given. . . . . A citizen who adapts in this way is teaching power what it can do." Examples include a willing transfer of power by the people to Hitler in Germany in 1932 and to the communist tyrants in Czechoslovakia in 1946.

Institutional defense: Snyder argues that democratic institutions do not defend themselves, people defend them: "We tend to assume that institutions will automatically maintain themselves against even the most direct attacks. This was the very mistake that some German Jews made about Hitler and the Nazis after they had formed a government." Snyder asserts that many Americans are making this same mistake again today. He suggests people pick an institution such as a pro-democracy law, a court, a newspaper or a labor union and defend it publicly.

It is worth noting that a court or labor union would need to be defended. Courts strike many as a rock solid and unassailable institution. However, Trump and senate republicans are packing the federal courts with radical authoritarian ideologue judges. The time is coming when more temperate courts and court decisions will be attacked and the tyrant will foment both public and executive branch resistance to those courts, judges and decisions. We are seeing the beginnings of that right now.

Also consider the proposition that, unless they are co-opted and/or corrupted, labor unions are pro-democratic institutions. Powerful, persuasive arguments by other careful observers make this case. Both Nancy MacLean in her 2017 book, Democracy In Chains: The Deep History Of The Radical Right's Stealth Plan For America, and Jane Mayer in her 2016 book, Dark Money: The Hidden History of the Billionaires Behind the Rise of the Radical Right, make it clear that a key target of anti-democratic authoritarians is labor unions. Powerful billionaires exemplified by the radical right political movement built and still funded by the Koch brothers have a raging, visceral hate of labor unions. Labor unions allow collective action, which is pro-democratic in that they represent some collective power and wealth. That literally enrages the radical libertarian, authoritarian right. Before reading Snyder on this point, the idea of labor unions being a democratic institution seemed out of synch with reality for me at least. But on reflection, Snyder makes an excellent point. He's right.

Resist toleration of violence: Some of Snyder's lessons seem far-fetched. But on consideration, maybe they are not far fetched at all. His lesson six, be wary of paramilitaries, brings this point home: "When the men with guns who have always claimed to be against the system start wearing uniforms and marching with torches and pictures of a leader, the end is nigh. When the pro-leader paramilitary and the official police and military intermingle, the end has come. . . . . For just this reason, people and parties who wish to undermine democracy and the rule of law create and fund violent organizations that involve themselves in politics." Snyder points out that non-authoritarian governments try to hold a monopoly on violence mediated by official police, secret services and sometimes the military, but always constrained by the rule of law. Snyder defines a paramilitary broadly, and it can include an authoritarian leader's personal bodyguard. People in Germany and Austria made the grave mistake of tolerating paramilitary intimidation and violence, and many of the survivors among them came to regret it.

Snyder points to Trump as an example: "As a candidate, the president ordered a private security detail to clear opponents from rallies, but also encouraged the audience itself to remove people who expressed different opinions. . . . . . At one campaign rally [Trump] said, 'There's a remnant left over. Maybe get the remnant out. Get the remnant out." When the pro-Trump mob tried to do that, Trump was pleased, saying: "Isn't this more fun than a regular boring rally? To me, it's fun." Other recent events have made it clear that Trump is actively fomenting violence by his supporters against political opposition.

So, after announcing his candidacy for president in 2020, Joe Biden's opening attack on Trump led with "Charlottesville", referring to the fascist, white nationalist rally in Charlottesville, South Carolina, he was directly attacking a core tyrant tactic. Trump had defended the fascists by calling them 'good people'. Biden threw that directly back in Trump's face as he should have.

Snyder's book is useful to help put tyranny and Trump in better historical and current context. It makes Trump look even more threatening than viewing him without the context.


Originally posted 5/2/19