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The Mueller Report
Mar. 28th, 2019 08:01 amThe AG’s summary of Mueller’s report didn’t surprise me in the least.
I never assumed Russian interference was a big factor in the 2016 election.
That was a Clinton campaign talking point, right? The campaign's dying gasp. In the Clinton campaign’s view, the only way she could have lost is if working-class voters were too ignorant to understand they were pawns of the Kremlin! It couldn’t have been that they were rejecting Clinton because she was—as the Clinton campaign never tired of reminding us—the single most qualified human being ever to run for the presidency!
###
Of course, “interference” can be defined in many ways.
I have no doubt that Russki counterintelligence bought lots of Facebook ads.
I have no doubt that the Russki-bought Facebook ads were filled with dubious innuendo, misleading nuance, outright lies.
But to me, this was capitalism biting itself on the ass.
Entities like Facebook rather obviously ought to be regulated like utilities.
You don’t wanna regulate them? Well then, you reap the consequences. Money is global! In this day and age, you really can’t tell unfettered corporations where their money supply is supposed to flow from.
###
No. Unless the Mueller report unearthed evidence that the Russkis were actually hacking their way into polling machines—there was actually some evidence of hacking although the news stories I read never had enough dots to connect that into a Bob Ross-style illustration of the Kremlin—there was no way to blame the hideous phenomenon that is Donald Trump on Russia.
Personally, I blame the Democratic Party. For systematically strong-arming all resistance to the Hillary Clinton juggernaut.
###
I supported Bernie Sanders in 2016. In part because his agenda rather neatly mirrors my own thoughts. The real issue, in my view, is wage stagnation. Identity politics is hot air. If you sit a white worker and a black worker down together and do an analysis of their paychecks—“See? You both make $17 an hour! And you have—adjusting for inflation—since 1980!”—the white worker and the black worker will realize they have more in common with one another than either has with Donald Trump or JayZ.
But mostly, I supported Sanders because he wasn't Hillary Clinton.
But I also thought that Sanders was unelectable. He has a kind of “I’m on the spectrum” vibe. I would rather have been supporting Joe Biden, whom I thought had a very good chance of being elected in 2016. EXCEPT that the Hillary Clinton machine a/k/a the Democratic National Committee had done its bad voodoo on him. I don’t doubt for a moment that Biden was absolutely crushed by the death of his son. But I didn’t believe for a minute that was why he wasn’t running for President.
###
The purpose of the Mueller report was to keep the Democratic faithful in lockstep behind the “Hillary Was Robbed” meme.
It succeeded in that.
I don’t know what my dozens and dozens of self-styled "liberal" friends are gonna use for bedtime stories now.
Or how Rachel Maddow is ever gonna resurrect her career.
I never assumed Russian interference was a big factor in the 2016 election.
That was a Clinton campaign talking point, right? The campaign's dying gasp. In the Clinton campaign’s view, the only way she could have lost is if working-class voters were too ignorant to understand they were pawns of the Kremlin! It couldn’t have been that they were rejecting Clinton because she was—as the Clinton campaign never tired of reminding us—the single most qualified human being ever to run for the presidency!
###
Of course, “interference” can be defined in many ways.
I have no doubt that Russki counterintelligence bought lots of Facebook ads.
I have no doubt that the Russki-bought Facebook ads were filled with dubious innuendo, misleading nuance, outright lies.
But to me, this was capitalism biting itself on the ass.
Entities like Facebook rather obviously ought to be regulated like utilities.
You don’t wanna regulate them? Well then, you reap the consequences. Money is global! In this day and age, you really can’t tell unfettered corporations where their money supply is supposed to flow from.
###
No. Unless the Mueller report unearthed evidence that the Russkis were actually hacking their way into polling machines—there was actually some evidence of hacking although the news stories I read never had enough dots to connect that into a Bob Ross-style illustration of the Kremlin—there was no way to blame the hideous phenomenon that is Donald Trump on Russia.
Personally, I blame the Democratic Party. For systematically strong-arming all resistance to the Hillary Clinton juggernaut.
###
I supported Bernie Sanders in 2016. In part because his agenda rather neatly mirrors my own thoughts. The real issue, in my view, is wage stagnation. Identity politics is hot air. If you sit a white worker and a black worker down together and do an analysis of their paychecks—“See? You both make $17 an hour! And you have—adjusting for inflation—since 1980!”—the white worker and the black worker will realize they have more in common with one another than either has with Donald Trump or JayZ.
But mostly, I supported Sanders because he wasn't Hillary Clinton.
But I also thought that Sanders was unelectable. He has a kind of “I’m on the spectrum” vibe. I would rather have been supporting Joe Biden, whom I thought had a very good chance of being elected in 2016. EXCEPT that the Hillary Clinton machine a/k/a the Democratic National Committee had done its bad voodoo on him. I don’t doubt for a moment that Biden was absolutely crushed by the death of his son. But I didn’t believe for a minute that was why he wasn’t running for President.
###
The purpose of the Mueller report was to keep the Democratic faithful in lockstep behind the “Hillary Was Robbed” meme.
It succeeded in that.
I don’t know what my dozens and dozens of self-styled "liberal" friends are gonna use for bedtime stories now.
Or how Rachel Maddow is ever gonna resurrect her career.
