<div dir="ltr"><div dir="ltr"><div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif"><span style="font-family:Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif">On Thu, Aug 20, 2020 at 3:51 PM spike jones via extropy-chat <<a href="mailto:extropy-chat@lists.extropy.org">extropy-chat@lists.extropy.org</a>> wrote:</span></div></div><div class="gmail_quote"><div><br></div><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0px 0px 0px 0.8ex;border-left:1px solid rgb(204,204,204);padding-left:1ex"><span class="gmail_default" style="font-style:italic;font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif">> </span><i>So the FBI pleading guilty to falsifying evidence</i><span class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif"><i> </i>[...]</span></blockquote><div><br></div><font size="4">I didn't know the FBI could plead anything, and any damage caused by abuse of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act is trivial compared to damage caused by Russian intelligence operatives in the 2016 presidential election; of the 120 million votes cast in 2016 if 107,000 votes in 3 states had been different we wouldn't have the president tha<span class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif">t</span> we have now, so it's not much of a stretch to say that Vladimir Putin decided who our president would be. </font><div><span class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif"><br></span></div><div><font size="4"><span class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif">Just a few days ago the <b>Republican controlled</b> Senate concluded that </span>Trump's campaign chairman Paul Manafort's "<i>high-level access and willingness to share information with individuals closely affiliated with the Russian intelligence services</i>" <span class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif"> was</span> a "<i>grave counterintelligence threat</i>," and his "<i>presence on the Campaign and proximity to Trump created opportunities for Russian intelligence services to exert influence over, and acquire confidential information on, the Trump Campaign</i>."<span class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif">  </span><b>Republican senators</b><span class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif"><b></b> concluded that </span>Manafort was working directly with Konstantin Kilimnik, a Russian intelligence officer, and tried to shar<span class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif">e</span> information with him. </font></div><div><br></div><div><font size="4">The <b>Republican<span class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif"> </span>committee</b> says it obtained "<i>some information suggesting Kilimnik may have been connected to Russia's 2016 hacking operation of Hillary Clinton's emails and the Democratic National Committee</i><span class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif">", t</span>he Republican <span class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif">agents</span> continued until at least January 2020 to spread disinformation about Russia's role in the 2016 election and Manafort and Kilimnik actively participated in this influence campaign by blaming the meddling on Ukraine.</font></div><br><font size="4">The<b> Republican committee</b> found that Vladimir Putin was personally behind the <span class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif">theft and</span> publish<span class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif">ing of</span>Democratic Party emails, and that Julian Assange<span class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif"> and </span>WikiLeaks played a <span class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif">inportant part </span>and "<i>very likely knew it was assisting a Russian intelligence influence effort</i>."<span class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif"> Republican senators also concluded that </span>Trump<span class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif">'s</span> campaign ask<span class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif">ed</span> for advance notice of the WikiLeaks disclosures<span class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif"> so they'd have more time to make a better</span> public relations <span class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif">statement and even </span>encourag<span class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif">ed</span> "<i>further theft of information and continued leaks</i>."</font></div><div class="gmail_quote"><div><br></div><div></div></div><font size="4">The <b>Republican senators</b> also concluded that<span class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif"> </span>Roger Stone was <span class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif">asked by the Trump</span> campaign <span class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif">to find all the</span> information WikiLeaks had about Clinton and <span class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif">the </span>Democrats and "<i>Trump and the Campaign believed that Stone had inside information and expressed satisfaction that Stone's information suggested more releases would be forthcoming</i>"<span class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif">. </span>The Republican senators<span class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif"> said that when Stone learned the infamous access Hollywood tape was about to be made public he told </span>WikiLeaks<span class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif"> to start publishing the stolen Emails right away, and 30 minutes later they were.</span></font><div><br></div><div><div><span class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif"></span><font size="4">The <b>Republican senators</b><span class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif"> said </span>Russia took advantage of the Trump transition team's lack of sophistication and strong opposition to Obama administration policies "<i>to pursue unofficial channels</i>." And "<i>it's likely that Russian intelligence services exploited the Trump's transition team's inexperience for Russia's advantage</i>"<span class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif">.  </span></font><div><div class="gmail_quote"><div><br></div><div><font size="4">The Republican senators also <span class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif">c</span>riticized the FBI<span class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif">,</span> they said they "didn't act aggressively enough to warn the Democratic National Committee about the hacking operation"<span class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif"> and they criticized the Democrats for being sloppy with their computer security.</span> </font><br></div><div><font size="4"><br></font></div><div><font size="4">J<span class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif">ohn K Clark</span> </font></div><br></div></div></div></div></div>