US Politics Thread 2016-2020

[Rockstar]

Originally Posted by Skybird

But I - anmd others - talk of religously fueled authoritarianism for sure. Militant abortion activists and crazy evangelicals there already are.

And look how many of them support Trump just because he poses with closed eyes and has a hum on his lips.

Name three.

[Buddahaid]

Giuliani apparently has Covid-19.

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-55210243

[Dowly]

Originally Posted by Buddahaid

Giuliani apparently has Covid-19.

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-55210243

Oh no.

Anyways...

[Catfish]

Dangerously viral: How Trump, supporters spread false claims

https://apnews.com/article/how-trump...a471e99ee81459

[u crank]

Originally Posted by Catfish

Dangerously viral: How Trump, supporters spread false claims

https://apnews.com/article/how-trump...a471e99ee81459

Yes, you know false information is a big problem these days. I know people, close friends, who still believe that Donald Trump was elected because of Russian interference in the 2016 election. No amount of persuasion on my part can convince them otherwise. And it should be noted that they are avid watchers of CNN.

The cure for this of course is to gain as much knowledge as possible from all sources and then come to a rational conclusion.

[Catfish]

Your problem is that you weigh the information from a Fox News source as the same as one of CNN, or even AP, or Reuters. So you take 5 articles here and 5 there and build your mean percent of truth, but it does not work this way. The difference is that one is a credible source, and the other is not.

https://eu.usatoday.com/story/news/f...ed/6237115002/

Apart from this
"The Russian web brigades, including Internet Research Agency, became known in the late 2010s for the Russian interference in the 2016 United States elections.[1] The Internet Research Agency has employed troll armies to spread propaganda, command Twitter trends, and sow fear and erode trust in American political and media institutions.[20]"

Of course one cannot excatly measure how successfull they were or are. But try they did.
And if you look at how fast the wildest accusations go viral (see my link above if you bothered to read) among the believers who want to believe this, it certainly had a bit of an effect.


What surprises me that it seems to have had not enough effect this time, but maybe
US watchdogs have been a bit more aggressive in deflecting foreign interference,
or this time Putin held back to evade a general uproar,
or Putin only held a grudge against the Clintons,
or Trump has not proved as lenient as Putin expected,
or the campaign was a failure, or last:
nothing of this has ever been true. Whatever.

What can be observed is:
Erosion of trust in American (and english and european) political and media institutions,
division within the people of a lot of democratic nations is higher than before, weakening them.

[u crank]

Originally Posted by Catfish

Your problem is that you weigh the information from a Fox News source as the same as one of CNN, or even AP, or Reuters. So you take 5 articles here and 5 there and build your mean percent of truth, but it does not work this way. The difference is that one is a credible source, and the other is not.

Sorry but I would have to disagree with that statement. I would have to ask a question. What shapes your opinion? Do you actually believe that CNN is a credible, unbiased source of news and political opinion? I don't and I don't believe that Fox News is either. Can you name a single on air personality at CNN who is a conservative? A single one who is not a anti-Trump, anti GOP progressive activist? It is not a news source but a propaganda outlet. And so is Fox.

And you will now see a 180 degree turn at that outlet from criticizing a president to praising every thing he does.

Of course one cannot excatly measure how successfull they were or are. But try they did.

Yes they did try. I'm not disputing that. How successful were they? The Russians paid for less than a half million dollars on Facebook ads. Hillary Clinton and her super-PACs raised a total of 1.2 billion dollars. Logic says we can measure how succsessfull the Russian interference was. It was negligible. Or do you believe that Clinton's campaign was that incompetent with that amount of money?

And if you look at how fast the wildest accusations go viral (see my link above if you bothered to read) among the believers who want to believe this, it certainly had a bit of an effect.

I did read the article and I don't think I said I disagree with it. Quite the opposite. My point is that there are people on both sides of the political divide who don't rely on facts but believe what they want to believe. And news outlets like CNN and Fox are there to help them with that belief.

I stopped watching cable news years ago. In fact we don't have a cable hookup in our house. The internet is a wonderful thing.

What can be observed is:
Erosion of trust in American (and english and european) political and media institutions,
division within the people of a lot of democratic nations is higher than before, weakening them.

In my opinion news outlets like Fox and CNN and the NYT will become more and more irrelevant. They are as the saying goes "preaching to the choir". People have a choice. Search the internet to find a least a semblance of the truth or rely on outlets like Vox or Breitbart to confirm their bias.

[Cybermat47]

Originally Posted by u crank

Search the internet to find a least a semblance of the truth or rely on outlets like Vox or Breitbart to confirm their bias.

Probably the latter.

While I am looking in from the outside, it seems that a lot of Americans are in an echo chamber that turns them against each other to the point that Republicans and Democrats view each other as the ultimate enemy.

I mean, there’s plenty of media coverage of Democrats vandalising Trump signs and saying that Trump has small hands while Republicans accuse medical professionals of being part of some evil conspiracy for giving medical advice.

But I don’t recall seeing the American public react in any way to the fact that communist China is steadily growing into a new superpower with worldwide economic and military influence (including a military-run “space” base in South America: https://www.reuters.com/article/us-s...-idUSKCN1PP0I2) while remaining an oppressive and authoritarian police state.

I think effective proof of the echo chamber’s severity is the fact that so many conspiracy theorists blame the Democrats for the deadly virus that originated from China and has ravaged China’s biggest economic and military rival and its allies while China continues to expand its power (I don’t think China actually made it on purpose, but that would make a whole lot more sense).

[mapuc]

If a person disagree in what s/he hear or read...it's fake news

Markus

[Cybermat47]

Originally Posted by mapuc

If a person disagree in what s/he hear or read...it's fake news

Markus

That’s fake news

[Buddahaid]

https://www.bbc.com/news/election-us-2020-55220570

Nice going Trump. You are fomenting this kind of crap with your inflated ego and inflammatory twit storms. Who will get murdered first? Will you be held accountable then?

[Rockstar]

Michigan State Police Lt. Mike Shaw said state troopers and Detroit police responded shortly before 10 p.m. and found a couple dozen people had gathered on the sidewalk and were protesting outside of Benson's home. He said he believed there were some individuals openly carrying firearms.


The protesters eventually departed, he said.

"couple dozen" out of 332,000,000 people. Ferchrissakes can that even be counted as a statistic?



A non event, which only made it up to 'clickondetroit' local news. Most likely because it was 'believed' someone may have open carried. Of course headlines in major Europe outlets doing their damnedest to portray the idea this is some wide spread issue. Go figure.

[Buddahaid]

https://www.bbc.com/news/election-us-2020-55224511

Third strike. Trump loses Georgia again. Time to act like an adult Mr. President.

[Skybird]

Originally Posted by Buddahaid

https://www.bbc.com/news/election-us-2020-55224511

Third strike. Trump loses Georgia again. Time to act like an adult Mr. President.

But they cheated, didn't you know? Everybody knows.

[eddie]

Maybe Trump should stop tweeting and start packing,lol