The USA under Trump tried to depose the Venezuelan leader only 5 years ago or so. Speaking of Trump, a large portion of the USA is currently striving to elect someone who tried to overthrow democracy in their own nation. Electoral scrutiny is all well and good, but is the USA really the right arbitrator given their domestic election problems and history of interfering in Central/South America? What do Venezuelans think about US involvement?

[+] jaybone@lemmy.world -11 points 8 months ago (13 children)

Then Russia interferes with US election. It’s election interference all the way down.

Except it stops at countries like Russia where the complete election is fake.

[–] freagle@lemmygrad.ml 5 points 8 months ago (10 children)

Russia had no effect on US elections. Please update your understanding, it's years old now. The Mueller report was clear on this point - Russia's connections were far deeper and more effective (in both directions) with the Democrats than the Republicans

[–] natecheese@kbin.melroy.org -2 points 8 months ago (1 children)

The point you're trying to make here isn't very clear.

Are you saying:

That Russia didn't try to interfere with the 2016 and 2020 US presidential elections?
Or are you saying that Russia did try to interfere, but they were incompetent and couldn't actually do it?
Or are you saying the Muller report clearly stated that there is a deep connection between Democrats and Russia, and only a much weaker connection between Russia and Republicans?
Something else entirely or some combination of all of these?

[+] brain_in_a_box@lemmy.ml 3 points 8 months ago* (last edited 6 months ago) (1 children)

[removed by mod]

[–] natecheese@kbin.melroy.org -3 points 8 months ago (1 children)

You're being unnecessarily hostile. There is a lot of ambiguity in the statement as I outlined my comment.

If you can clarify the point they were trying to make that would be great, if not you're proving no value to this conversation.

[–] freagle@lemmygrad.ml 3 points 8 months ago (1 children)

Read the fucking Muller report or a summary of its findings re Russia and you'll have your answer

[–] natecheese@kbin.melroy.org 1 points 8 months ago (1 children)

Also unnecessarily hostile.

I've read the Mueller report and nothing in there supports your claims, which makes your statement even more confusing.

From the Wikipedia article on the Mueller report:

The report concludes that the investigation "did not establish that members of the Trump campaign conspired or coordinated with the Russian government in its election interference activities".[4][5][6] Investigators had an incomplete picture of what happened due in part to some communications that were encrypted, deleted, or not saved, as well as testimony that was false, incomplete, or declined.[7][8][9]

More importantly:

However, the report states that Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election was illegal and occurred "in sweeping and systematic fashion"[10][11][12] but was welcomed by the Trump campaign as it expected to benefit from such efforts.[13][14][15] It also identifies myriad links between Trump associates and Russian officials and spies,[16] about which several persons connected to the campaign made false statements and obstructed investigations.[4] Mueller later stated that his investigation's conclusion on Russian interference "deserves the attention of every American".[17]

[–] freagle@lemmygrad.ml 3 points 8 months ago (1 children)

https://www.thenation.com/article/archive/questions-mueller-russiagate/

https://www.brookings.edu/articles/what-the-mueller-report-tells-us-about-russian-influence-operations/

Despite the Russian influence campaign, Trump lost the popular vote by 3 million votes.

So, despite Russian attempts at manipulating the population, Clinton lost because of the electoral college, an institution designed by the founders to ensure that minority land owners would always be able to override the popular will of the masses. Russia's political meddling is demonstrably far less effective than US meddling globally.

[–] natecheese@kbin.melroy.org -1 points 8 months ago (1 children)

So your point is that Russia does try to interfere in American and other foreign elections, they just aren't very good at it?

The electoral college makes it easier for foreign actors to influence American elections. Instead of convincing 3 million people to change their votes from Clinton to Trump in order to effectively influence the election, the entities spreading FUD only need to influence a few thousand in key swing states.

From your Brookings article:

The bottom line is that the Mueller report clearly shows that the Russian information operations were highly adaptive to the political context in the United States, followed a seemingly well-thought out strategic plan akin to a marketing or public relations campaign, involved direction from Russian intelligence, and were incredibly effective in infiltrating American media while influencing public debate around the 2016 election.

The article from the Nation is a poorly sourced opinion piece from someone who seems to have a very poor understanding of how the Russian intelligence works. The key "gotcha" in the article is that IRA is not a Russian government agency, rather a private company run by Russian individuals.

This isn't in contradiction to the Mueller report, it's common for Russian intelligence (and other intelligence agencies around the world, including CIA and other American intelligence agencies) to use private corporations to carry their agendas. As pointed out by the Brookings article Russian intelligence directed the actions of IRA, even though IRA and its employees weren't directly employed by the Russian Government on paper.

[–] freagle@lemmygrad.ml 1 points 8 months ago (1 children)

There is no evidence (that I've seen) that Russia targeted swing states and swing voters specifically as you seem to be claiming. That was the accusation levied against Trump and Cambridge Analytica and even that claim fell apart for lack of evidence.

The point is that you retorted "it's election interference all the way down" when replying to a comment about how the USA should not be involved in arbitrating elections in other countries. You then went further to say that election interference stops at countries like Russia because the elections are fake.

But A) Russian interference in the USA is not the same as USA interference in Venezuela. Evidence: Russia did not actually manage to effect the election, only some of the discourse around the fringes. Meanwhile, the USA backed a coup in Bolivia and literally sent trained mercenaries to support them, and prop up the fake president, Juan Guaido, in order to create the problems that they can then solve with violence, coups, and puppets. And B) the USA has been interfering in Russian politics for decades, including supporting Navalnhy with literal logistics, security, and financing.

So get your fake "oh you're so disrespectful in your communications" pearl clutching liberal bullshit outta here and stop trying to pivot your way into a safe space where your world view remains intact. If you want your worldview to be unchallenged, then stick to watching the tube and leave the discourse to people who are willing to be wrong for the sake of an accurate understanding of what's happening in the world.

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