Octopus Overlords

The Meal wrote:

El Guapo wrote:

Defiant wrote:
The two positive things about the electoral college, that I can think of: It's very hard to do widespread rigging of the vote counts when you have 50 different elections going on than when you have one national election. And doing a recount is much easier when you only have to limit it to individual states (and if you were looking for fraud, you could limit it to those very close states where independent polling suggested that the other candidate had a good chance of winning. You don't need to worry about voter fraud in Alabama or Vermont)

It makes it vastly more plausible to change the outcome of a presidential election via fraud, though. In a close presidential election, you could change the outcome by switching a small number of votes in one state, especially if you have a large swing state that's close that year. For example, Bush won Florida in 2000 by ~ 500 votes (while losing the national popular vote by ~ 500,000). It would be vastly easier to change ~ 500 votes in one state (could do that in one precinct) without being detected, than it would be to change 500,000 or more votes nationally.

You really think it'd be easier to do that than for a locality to "run up the score" when 90%+ of the locality is already rooting for a particular candidate? I think fraud would be MUCH easier for a national vote.

El Guapo wrote:

The Meal wrote:In the EC system, swing state jurisdictions tend to be well-watched by observers from both sides.

I don't see a national system having that same protection in all jurisdictions. Nor do I have confidence in each side equally padding their totals in ways that cancel each other out.

Which do you think would have been easier to do in this election, without detection:

(1) Change about ~100,000 votes in one direction across three states; OR

(2) Change about ~ 3,000,000 votes in one direction nationally.

I'm inclined to think that #1 is much easier, even factoring in election monitoring efforts.

But to seriously address this question I think would require a comparative analysis of different countries' voter integrity / elections systems - how is a national popular vote handled in other countries, what issues have they had, etc. Right now we're mostly speculating.

noxiousdog wrote: I thought we decided was there's no voter fraud.

Fireball wrote: Both would be basically impossible. Without massive complicity by election officials, as well as election monitors by both parties, large scale voter fraud like is vanishingly unachievable.

Fireball wrote:The scale of the fraudulent vote you would need to swing a national election would be staggering. You could probably fake a couple thousand votes in a modern American election if you had either very asleep-at-the-wheel electoral officers or actual corruption amongst those charged to count votes locally, provided there was no audit. It would be basically impossible to fake hundreds of thousands or millions of votes nationwide.

Chaz wrote:I'm pretty ignorant, but isn't the real problem with Russia influencing the election not that they potentially directly tampered with the votes, and more that they influenced everything leading up to the vote? It seems like that's very likely what they did lots of, and that's both way harder to stop, and way easier to do. Yes, we're pretty sure that they didn't hack the voting machines, but they very likely stole and leaked data damaging to the DNC to wikileaks, and definitely aided in the dissemination of fake news that was biased against Clinton.

The brilliant part is that those kinds of things likely had a large effect that is really difficult to measure or prove.

Chaz wrote:I'm pretty ignorant, but isn't the real problem with Russia influencing the election not that they potentially directly tampered with the votes, and more that they influenced everything leading up to the vote? It seems like that's very likely what they did lots of, and that's both way harder to stop, and way easier to do. Yes, we're pretty sure that they didn't hack the voting machines, but they very likely stole and leaked data damaging to the DNC to wikileaks, and definitely aided in the dissemination of fake news that was biased against Clinton.

The brilliant part is that those kinds of things likely had a large effect that is really difficult to measure or prove.

Defiant wrote:Yep. They hacked people instead of machines.

Ralph-Wiggum wrote:Well this is horrifying:

The Trump transition team has issued a list of 74 questions for the Energy Department, asking officials there to identify which department employees and contractors have worked on forging an international climate pact as well as domestic efforts to cut the nation’s carbon output.

The questionnaire requests a list of those individuals who have taken part in international climate talks over the past five years and “which programs within DOE are essential to meeting the goals of President Obama’s Climate Action Plan.”

One question zeroed in on the issue of the “social cost of carbon,” a way of calculating the consequences of greenhouse gas emissions. The transition team asked for a list of department employees or contractors who attended interagency meetings, the dates of the meetings, and emails and other materials associated with them.

The questionnaire also appeared to take aim at the national laboratories, which operate with a high degree of independence but which are part of the Energy Department. The questionnaire asked for a list of the top 20 salaried employees of the labs, the labs’ peer-reviewed publications over the past three years, a list of their professional society memberships, affiliations, and the websites they maintain or contribute to “during work hours.”

The Department of Energy said Tuesday it will reject the request by President-elect Donald Trump’s transition team to name staffers who worked on climate change programs.

Energy spokesman Eben Burnhan-Snyder said the agency received “significant feedback” from workers regarding a questionnaire from the transition team that leaked last week.

“Some of the questions asked left many in our workforce unsettled,” Snyder said.

Rip wrote:Likely the hacked the RNC? Been reading fake news again?

No one has show a shred of evidence to support that.

Holman wrote:

Rip wrote:Likely the hacked the RNC? Been reading fake news again?

No one has show a shred of evidence to support that.

Are serious claims by the CIA "fake news" in Trumpistan?

CIA says RNC was hacked. FBI says they can't confirm it, but they haven't reviewed the CIA's evidence and rejected it. Senators and others who've had the briefings are taking it all very seriously.

But, sure, Trump and Priebus and Putin say there's nothing to see here, so...

Russian hackers attacked email accounts linked to the Republican National Committee (RNC), according to a report late Sunday by ABC News.

Neither federal authorities nor RNC officials reportedly were concerned, however, because the email systems in question were outdated.

RNC spokesman Sean Spicer told the network that one of the emails belonged to an employee who departed from the RNC several years ago. A cybersecurity firm hired by the RNC to investigate the issue found that the employee’s email account was still on his personal computer, but the investigation found that the device had not been linked to an RNC server in several years.

The news that Russians attempted to hack the RNC comes several months after the Obama administration formally accused Russia of trying to meddle in the United States election. Following a hack of Democratic National Committee emails, the administration made the announcement in October.

“The DNC [hack] was the crown jewels. The RNC not as much,” an official briefed on the information, who is affiliated with Republicans, told ABC.

According to another official who spoke to ABC, federal authorities were not as worried about the hack on the RNC because “the extent of the compromises were completely different.”

Reince Priebus, the chairman of the RNC and the incoming White House chief of staff for President-elect Donald Trump, insisted Sunday on ABC’s “This Week” that the organization was not hacked.

“I know of no instance that you’re describing involving the RNC or the RNC’s data,” he told host George Stephanopoulos.

“We know where our data is stored. We do,” he added.

Holman wrote:Your quoted 260-word text is literally the whole story published at The Hill. It says nothing about the CIA's investigation, not even to reject it. It makes no claim to being a definitive account.

Presumably there's some reason the CIA is treating this as a serious threat, and we don't know it all yet. Why are you so quick to dismiss their concerns?

Rip wrote:Let's not forget that leaks about what the FBI was doing or was going to do vis~a~vi the Clinton investigation.

Rip wrote:Likely the hacked the RNC? Been reading fake news again?

No one has show a shred of evidence to support that.

Max Peck wrote:

Rip wrote:Let's not forget that leaks about what the FBI was doing or was going to do vis~a~vi the Clinton investigation.

So, are you saying that there was no substance to the allegations against Clinton, or that there totally is substance to the CIA leaks/rumors?

Pyperkub wrote:

Rip wrote:Likely the hacked the RNC? Been reading fake news again?

No one has show a shred of evidence to support that.

here you go

Zarathud wrote:I eagerly await Rip to accept the evidence instead of the cover-up.

Rip wrote:

Pyperkub wrote:

Rip wrote:Likely the hacked the RNC? Been reading fake news again?

No one has show a shred of evidence to support that.

here you go

A leak by "senior administration officials" is fake until they go on the record and specify what they mean. Do they mean some RNC officials got their G-mail accounts hacked or something. That I can believe, but the party e-mail server was looked at and nothing was found. If they have something that says otherwise there is no reason to be so vague and secretive about it.

Skinypupy wrote:I can't help but wonder what the outcome would have been if Rip (and others like him) applied the same level of energy, skepticism, and criticism to the "Crooked Hillary" claims as they have in examining the potential of Russian influence in this election.

Remus West wrote:

Skinypupy wrote:I can't help but wonder what the outcome would have been if Rip (and others like him) applied the same level of energy, skepticism, and criticism to the "Crooked Hillary" claims as they have in examining the potential of Russian influence in this election.

You mean like ignoring anything that does not meet their view of the situation and reinforce the opinion they formed well before any facts were revealed? It would have been exactly as it was because they did.

Zarathud wrote:The media dropped the ball...

The Commander, United States Central Command (CENTCOM), initiated an Army Regulation
(AR) 15-6 investigation upon receipt of a complaint from a Navy Intelligence Specialist that
MG Flynn inappropriately shared United States classified information with various foreign
military officers and/or officials in Afghanistan. The inquiry was conducted by a properly
appointed official and was thorough. The AR 15-6 found that some inappropriate sharing of
United States classified information with various foreign military officers and/or officials
occurred as a result of MG Flynn guidance and actions. The AR 15-6 further found that the
sharing of classified information was not done knowingly and that there was no actual or
potential damage to national security as a result of MG Flynn actions. The AR 15-6
investigation is classified SECRET.

El Guapo wrote:Flynn does not require confirmation for his position, right?

Sepiche wrote:

El Guapo wrote:Flynn does not require confirmation for his position, right?

Correct.

President-elect Donald Trump’s team is struggling so hard to book A-list performers for his inaugural festivities that it offered ambassadorships to at least two talent bookers if they could deliver marquee names, the bookers told TheWrap.

The bookers, who spoke on the condition of anonymity, said they were approached by members of Trump’s Presidential Inaugural Committee in recent weeks with offers of cash or even plush diplomatic posts in exchange for locking in singers.

Trump’s team has struggled to find talent outside of the low-wattage stars who endorsed him during the campaign. A meeting between Trump and Kanye West spurred speculation Tuesday that the the troubled rapper might perform. On Wednesday, news broke that Trump’s team had managed to enlist 16-year-old former “America’s Got Talent” star Jackie Evancho.

In a statement to TheWrap, Trump’s team denied offering any ambassadorships. “There is no truth to this insinuation,” said committee spokesman Boris Epshteyn. “First-class entertainers are eager to participate in the inaugural events. The inauguration as a whole will be an exciting and uniting celebration of freedom and democracy. We will be releasing further details at the appropriate time.”