Comments by "" (@DavidJ222) on "See critical moments from the impeachment hearing" video.
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Putin's plot against America, which was to help his puppet Trump get elected began in 2014. Thousands of miles away, in a drab office building in St Petersburg, Russia, a fake newsroom was under construction with its own graphics, data analysis, search engine optimisation, IT and finance departments. Its mission: ”information warfare against the US..
We now know from the Mueller report, that what followed was a successful attack on the most powerful democracy in the world. It involved stolen identities, fake social media accounts, rallies organised from afar, US citizens (Trump cultists) duped into doing Moscow’s bidding..
In his first criminal charges related to election meddling, Mueller indicted 13 Russians and 3 Russian companies of an elaborate effort to disrupt the 2016 elections with a covert trolling campaign, aimed at helping Trump get elected.
The Russian offensive began in 2014 with an aim to “sow discord” and evolved into a concerted attempt to help Trump. Some of it relied on old-fashioned boots on the ground. Two operatives, Aleksandra Krylova and Anna Bogacheva, travelled as tourists through at least nine states over about two weeks in June 2014 to collect intelligence for their operations. They prepared “evacuation scenarios” in case their cover was blown.
This was combined with exploiting the anonymous, borderless world of social media, where agents of chaos thrive. The Internet Research Agency, a “troll farm” based in nondescript offices at 55 Savushkina Street St Petersburg, was operating through Russian shell companies, the agency employed hundreds of people, ranging from creators of fictitious personae to technical and administrative support.
Its specialists were divided into day shifts and night shifts to fit with the appropriate US time zones. The agency also circulated lists of US holidays so that specialists could be active accordingly.
Russians posed as political and social active Americans. They created social media pages and groups, and bought political adverts such as “Donald wants to defeat terrorism ... Hillary wants to sponsor it”. They relied on identity theft, using the social security numbers, home addresses and birth dates of Americans without their knowledge. They set up fake bank accounts linked to PayPal accounts.
They engaged in operations primarily intended to communicate derogatory information about Clinton, and to denigrate other candidates such as Cruz and Rubio. In June 2016, after Trump clinched the Republican nomination, the Russians began to organise pro-Trump rallies, recruiting and paying unwitting (Trump cultists) Americans. At a time when Trump supporters were chanting “Lock her up!”, one was asked to wear a costume portraying Clinton in a prison uniform at a rally in Florida, while another was asked to build a cage on a flatbed truck. On 22 September, Russians created and bought Facebook ads for a series of “Miners for Trump" rallies in Pennsylvania.
Today Trump still refuses to criticize Putin, or even acknowledge that Moscow meddled in our elections. His refusal to do so is either motivated by fear, or a conscientious and wilful betrayal of his oath of office, and the betrayal of America.
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