Russia-ing to Judgement

Russia-ing to Judgement ...

and why it's deja vu all over again!

CBC: Russian Twitter trolls tested out multiple techniques to disrupt U.S. election

• Russian agents tweeted about everyday topics like sports or trending hashtags to build followers, before switching to more divisive topics as part of a campaign to disrupt the 2016 U.S. presidential election, a new analysis has found.

Omigawd, not this again!  Does anybody ever think to have a look at where these so-called analyses originate?  The company that did this exists to support NATO.

"NATO is Peace", goes the modern Newspeak that, in practice, means: "War is Peace". Without enemies, NATO would shrivel up and die. They are like the Triffids* that, although a source of oil hegemony for America, think nothing of devouring the very hands that feed them -- in other words those who are convinced (or desperately hope) that NATO exists to maintain peace and end up losing their lives in wars of aggression.

Does it ever occur to the so-called analysts that the Russians on Twitter are just ordinary citizens, the same as the shallow bored of the West who flock there to avoid reading a book, forming and propagating half-baked ideas in short, pithy bites because that's all their barely-used grey matter can absorb?

Of course they will want to talk about sports, and jeer at other teams, and spout off all sorts of other brash and shallow opinions, including, and sometimes especially, what little they really know about politics.

Is it so hard to believe that Russian Tweeters are just easily-bored PEOPLE?

As for the delusions of Americans, in the words of Dr. Gabor Maté, loosely quoted by me, "if you heard somebody saying I'm the greatest in the world, what would you think about them? That they are narcissists hiding an inferiority complex".

Good gawd, nobody tries to manipulate minds like politicians of all stripes, using repetitive mantras like "grow the economy" -- meaning you need to pay more taxes and, above all, buy stuff you can't afford, max out your cards, and take out consolidation loans.

According to Maclean's "growing the economy" is an illusion, and:

• It’s all downhill from here.

We don't need Russians to mess with our minds; we can hear lies and catch phrases by the bushel right here at home by reading or watching the daily so-called news. Nobody tries to influence an election more insistently than our own politicians. After all, they are the "leaders"; they lead, you follow -- and don't you forget it.

​​NewYorkPost: Finally, science shows that politicians are lying liars who lie

• For more than two decades, researchers of different stripes have examined humanity’s less-than-truthful underbelly. This is what they have found: We all stretch the truth. We learned to deceive as toddlers. We rationalize our fabrications that benefit us. We tell little white lies daily that make others feel good.
• Now magnify that. Politicians distort the truth more often, use more self-justifications and deceive in larger ways, and with more consequences, experts in psychology and political science say.

Granted, the New York Post is an American publication, but America is not nearly as unique as it thinks it is, and we all might welcome a future of televised political debate with:

• ... a camera trained on the candidates showing their heart rates and breathing levels – “an index of lying.”

How do they disarm our thinking processes? By first talking about mundane things like their families, their patriotism, sports, fishing, pets, things that make us smile (not to mention their closeness to God), and then moving into issues that render us nervous and worried, so they can comfort us into imagining they alone have the power to improve our sorry lot.

Their own lot is much more likely the case, and that requires as much secrecy as possible. What these "scientific" analyses of social media are attempting to accomplish is a crackdown on information; in other words: freedom of speech. Do we really want to go down that road?

It's also a way of informing you that you are weak-minded, easily influenced, unable to think logically, and therefore in need of learning only from government-approved sources. 

Spouting differences of opinion about one state, one regime, one Party over another has always been the essence of political discussion, more noticeable now that so many people have access to the Internet.  It needs to remain fully visible if "freedom" is going to have at least a chance to survive.

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* "The Day of the Triffids": recommended by my cousin and kindred spirit, Dan, who hardly ever answers my emails, but phones me long-distance from time to time so we can reconnect and share our latest experiences of the joys and mysteries of life, death, ageing and our mutual sense of the ridiculous, with barely an actual mention of politics. Thanks, Dan'o (alias "Saul Fernau").

Triffids Image: Boingboing