Trump�s election consultants filmed saying they use bribes and sex workers to entrap

[Zymologist]

Madison Avenue and Hollywood need to take lessons from them. According to the left at least they can spend what amounts to chump change (less than what a local restaurant might spend advertising) and have this supposed profound effect whereas our people can spend tens of millions of dollars or more and have little to no effect whatsoever.

On a related note, I've wondered about all the hatred and blame for the NRA from the left, when what they spend on politics, as far as I have ever seen, is peanuts. (and considering that they represent a large number of like-minded Americans, the complaint about their lobbying power or whatever seems stupid anyway)

[Mountain Man]

There's every good reason to think that votes were influenced given the massive interference of the St Petersburg troll factory and Cambridge Analytica on social media. They were not interfering just for the fun of it, they undoubtedly expected results...and got them.

The vast majority of ads were purchased after the election, Facebook has said that less then 5-million people even saw the ads before the election, and those same "troll factories" promoted militant liberal groups like Black Lives Matter and organized anti-Trump rallies (one of which was famously headlined by Michael Moron).

But I'm sure they had a significant impact on the election in Trump's favor. No, really.

[Sparko]

The vast majority of ads were purchased after the election, Facebook has said that less then 5-million people even saw the ads before the election, and those same "troll factories" promoted militant liberal groups like Black Lives Matter and organized anti-Trump rallies (one of which was famously headlined by Michael Moron).

But I'm sure they had a significant impact on the election in Trump's favor. No, really.

Don't for get Soros, paying to instigate riots.

[EvoUK]

Hopefully this instance will be the kick governments need to properly regulate the industry.

[shunyadragon]

EVERYONE influences elections... heck, a commercial influences it. Big freakin deal! If you vote for a candidate because a hooker told you to, you're an idiot.

Name calling gets you nowhere when you fail to respond with substance, and the problem is IF people try to influence elections by illegal methods, and that is what is being investigated, and not whether the illegal attempts to influence the elections were successful.

[Tassman]

Speculation at VERY best.

As far as Cambridge Analytica and the St Petersburg Troll Factory are concerned they had a decisive impact on the election and provided Trump with his victory. And they are probably right.

So what? Advertising is legal. Manipulation is even legal.

This was not advertising and secretly steering millions of Facebook users against Hillary and for Trump is not ethical OR legal.

Heck, seeing the source of the dossier and who paid for it, downright lies are legal.Unless someone paid someone else to vote a certain way, information is perfectly legal. That it happened to be exploited in that legal manner is inconsequential. If you are stupid enough to have your vote swayed by advertisements, you are an idiot.

http://uk.businessinsider.com/cambri...ia-ties-2018-3

[Mountain Man]

But of course when Obama did the exact same thing, the media praised him for his technological savvy. Compare the following glowing story fom US News & Works Report which describes Obama's leveraging of social media as "masterful":

https://www.usnews.com/opinion/artic...ebook-election

Or this Guardian story from 2012 which praises Obama for assembling "a unified database on millions of Americans with the power of Facebook to target individual voters to a degree never achieved before":

https://www.theguardian.com/world/20...ebook-electionhttp://thehill.com/opinion/technolog...comes-to-trump

[Bill the Cat]

As far as Cambridge Analytica and the St Petersburg Troll Factory are concerned they had a decisive impact on the election and provided Trump with his victory. And they are probably right.

No they didn't.

This was not advertising and secretly steering millions of Facebook users against Hillary and for Trump is not ethical OR legal.

A) Who cares if it was ethical? Politics is not ethical
B) It is absolutely legal to advertise.
C) It was advertising

This was not advertising, it was straight-out dirty tricks.

Dirty advertising.

Steve Bannon, the former White House chief strategist and Trump campaign CEO, sat on the data firm's board of directors, which is largely backed by Republican mega-donor Robert Mercer.

So what?

It was the likes of you who were stupid enough to be swayed by such cynical exploitation.

I wasn't swayed by anything. I would have voted for Donald Duck in order to keep the Hildabeast out of office. That Trump is an immoral ass is not as big a problem as the utter devastation that Hillary planned for this nation.

A slogan... ooooohhh... scary!!!


Who cares?

Messages. We should be petrified!!

How scary!!!! "Shadowy"!!! Booga booga booga!!!!

[Mountain Man]

This is much-ado about nothing. When Obama does it, he's a genius. When Trump does it, he's the devil.

It's like calling Putin to congratulate him on an election win. Obama does it, and the media slavishly praises him as a statesman. Trump does it, and the media denigrates him as a dupe.

Although I suspect Tass and others will continue to ignore this blatant hypocrisy on their part.

[Zymologist]

This is much-ado about nothing. When Obama does it, he's a genius. When Trump does it, he's the devil.

It's like calling Putin to congratulate him on an election win. Obama does it, and the media slavishly praises him as a statesman. Trump does it, and the media denigrates him as a dupe.

Although I suspect Tass and others will continue to ignore this blatant hypocrisy on their part.

Totally different, man; totally different. Obama waited four days.

[Mountain Man]

And when Obama told the Russians that he would have more "flexibility" after the election, that was just him being neighborly.

[Zymologist]

And when Obama told the Russians that he would have more "flexibility" after the election, that was just him being neighborly.

He was talking about yoga.

[Sparko]

Totally different, man; totally different. Obama waited four days.

Right! FOUR days! Totally different!

[Mountain Man]

He was talking about yoga.

I would love to know what "yoga" was a codename for in Hillary's emails.

[rogue06]

And when Obama told the Russians that he would have more "flexibility" after the election, that was just him being neighborly.

Naw. He was talking about the hoped for results that he would gain from taking yoga with Hillary.

ETA: Even the sumophile unicyclist figured that one out