2016 Postmortem
Related: About this forumAmericans keep looking away from the election's most alarming story
By Eric Chenoweth November 25 at 7:23 PM
Eric Chenoweth is co-director of the Institute for Democracy in Eastern Europe.
In assessing Donald Trumps presidential victory, Americans continue to look away from this elections most alarming story: the successful effort by a hostile foreign power to manipulate public opinion before the vote.
U.S. intelligence agencies determined that the Russian government actively interfered in our elections. Russian state propaganda gave little doubt that this was done to support President-elect Trump, who repeatedly praised Vladimir Putin and excused the Russian presidents foreign aggression and domestic repression. Most significantly, U.S. intelligence agencies have affirmed that the Russian government directed the illegal hacking of private email accounts of the Democratic National Committee and prominent individuals. The emails were then released by WikiLeaks, which has benefited financially from a Russian state propaganda arm, used Russian operatives for security and made clear an intent to harm the candidacy of Hillary Clinton.
From the Russian perspective, the success of this operation can hardly be overstated. News stories on the DNC emails released in July served to disrupt the Democratic National Convention, instigate political infighting and suggest for some supporters of Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) without any real proof that the Democratic primary had been rigged against their candidate. On Oct. 7, WikiLeaks began near daily dumps from Clinton campaign chairman John Podestas email account, generating a month of largely negative reporting on Clinton, her campaign staff, her husband and their foundation. With some exceptions, there was little news in the email beyond political gossip and things the media had covered before, now revisited from a seemingly hidden viewpoint.
Russian (and former communist) propaganda has traditionally worked exactly this way: The more you report something negatively, the more the negative is true. Trump and supportive media outlets adopted the technique and reveled in information gained from the illegal Russian hacking (as well as many fake news stories that evidence suggests were generated by Russian intelligence operations) to make exaggerated claims (Hillary wants to open borders to 600 million people!) or to accuse Clinton of illegality, corruption and, ironically, treasonous behavior.
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https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/americans-keep-looking-away-from-the-elections-most-alarming-story/2016/11/25/83533d3e-b0e2-11e6-8616-52b15787add0_story.html?utm_term=.a8e929905894&wpisrc=nl_az_most
ThoughtCriminal
(14,047 posts)Any support from a Russian dictator would by itself be enough to insure a loss by landslide.
anamandujano
(7,004 posts)Just as bad are the people at DU Monday morning quarterbacking Hillary and smearing the recount effort.
I have to keep reminding myself to breathe deeply.