Yup, a little hacking, a lot of social media spamming, a bit of Party over country by the GOP (who could have helped bring this to the public’s attention before the election, but NO), et voilà.
Mitch is the worst of them all, Trump included.
If Pence’s ‘but China is doing it for the Dems’ narrative holds, I don’t see a way out. Goodbye to all that!
Josh Marshall’s take on the China thing:
https://talkingpointsmemo.com/edblog/white-house-begins-the-china-counter-narrative
To be clear, China is a major player in international espionage aimed at the United States. And much of the back and forth trade hard ball is happening. American businesses are deeply embedded in China, both literally and figuratively. The Chinese are thus able to exert a deep and profound influence in the US private economy and in politics. Just recently China has been successfully pressuring airlines to stop referring to Taiwan as a separate country, as opposed to part of China, using the threat of pulling licenses to run commercial flights in and out of the country. That’s not really relevant to the issues here. But it’s a good example of the pull.
So the point here isn’t that China is getting a bad rap. But what is being discussed here is different in kind from what Russia was involved with in 2016 – not least because Russia appears to have been conspiring with now-President Trump’s entourage to get the help. But the bigger point is that this real issue is now clearly being used to diminish the Russia issue and specifically to delegitimize the Russia investigation.
Call me paranoid but this China rhetoric has me concerned. It feels like they are setting up a context within which they can decry the mid-term election results as illegitimate. And then there’s the potential to label anyone who is critical of the administration as being in cahoots with China and thus enemies of the state.
I’m not saying they’re planning to go full authoritarian and nullify the election results or start arresting political enemies but they are creating an alternate reality for their supporters to exist (and vote) in. And if they ever do go full authoritarian, this has the potential to be even more dangerous
A minority party controls all the levers of power and are fully responsible for safeguarding the nation’s elections. This same minority party has shown that they will put party before country every single time, no matter what. I don’t know what you’re worried about!
This is true, but the goal is simply to save face for Trump and the GOP and avoid demoralizing their base before 2020. They are all so tied to Trump now that they fear the backlash if he crumbles. This is similar to why Trump was claiming the 2016 election would be rigged - they want the other side to tell everyone how safe and unrigged the election is, then they have cover for a shady victory if Russia manages to pull one off for them, and cover for a massive defeat if they don’t.
Then I’m paranoid too. It kept me up last night worrying.
Also, the GOP with this narrative will basically be actively contributing to Russia’s program of delegitimizing our electoral system. How can you possibly have a democracy when nobody on either side trusts the outcome of votes?
You can’t! That’s why a strongman like Donald Trump will need to step in and “save” the Republic. And since he’s old, he’ll need to pass on that authority to a trusted scion, like Eric.
That should help Nunes’ with his base. That fact that he’s willing to go to such lengths in loyalty to our dear leader.
It’s sad that I agree with you. This kind of thing probably doesn’t hurt him with his base.
“See - all gone! No more troll factory in Russia!”
Whew, that’s a relief!
That’s a bold prediction.
Wait, is this another one of those fear the lizard/the lizard is coming/ride the snake predictions?
At first I thought it said DT, which would be crazy. DTJ is more plausible.