Monday’s Forum
Steven L. Taylor
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Monday, October 19, 2020
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194 comments
About Steven L. Taylor
Steven L. Taylor is a Professor of Political Science and a College of Arts and Sciences Dean. His main areas of expertise include parties, elections, and the institutional design of democracies. His most recent book is the co-authored
A Different Democracy: American Government in a 31-Country Perspective. He earned his Ph.D. from the University of Texas and his BA from the University of California, Irvine. He has been blogging since 2003 (originally at the now defunct Poliblog).
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Keep killing the messenger!
Just like the contents of WikiLeaks emails in 2016 happened to be extremely newsworthy – the Hunter Biden story is explosive news with ramifications that will ripple. It’s a National Security concern, a corruption issue, a nepotism issue, and perhaps a criminal issue. The fact that Democrat-Leaning people in positions of power wish to focus on the messengers (instead of contents of this now-open Pandora’s box) says a lot about those who control the gates to Power in USA 2020. *This is not an endorsement of Trump, his personality, policies, or antics*. The self-righteous ‘real journalist’ sees such an evil in Trump & his children while simultaneously provides cover for Biden and his sire. The allegations now seem like it was a form of “projection” all this time. Not to sound cliché, we (all) know damned well that “had it been Trump’s children” outed by ‘Russia’, this would currently be front-page news everywhere and washed in the 24/7 news cycle. Had ‘the dumb one’ been captured in a photo with a crack pipe hanging from his mouth it would be page #1 above the fold in the Post. Had it been Ivanka making shady deals there would be no censorship of the allegations by big tech. “Russia Disinformation” is the excuse not to pursue the Watergate level story of October 2020 while the left makes a list of all those who were complicit in enabling Donald Trump and also drafting plans to ‘get revenge’ when the blue wave washes over in 2 weeks. Now who are the nihilists?!?!
The Florida headline of the day-
10 garbage trucks burned overnight in Pompano Beach; arson eyed
The headline of the day-
First commercial passenger flight from UAE lands in Israel
Misery currently has one county with a test positivity rate over 60% (Holt)
5 at 50-59.9 %.
14 at 40-49.9 % (Cole w/ the state capital at 40.5%)
25 at 30-39.9 %
41 at 20-29.9 % (Washington at 28.3 %)
29 at 10-19.9 % (KC at 16.1 %)
3 at 5-9.9 % (STL city at 9.9 %)
1 at 0.0 % (Mercer)
And our do nothing Governor is at 100%
@Bill: Hmmmm… Life imitating art? Probably a Soprano involved.
Does anyone know if the commenting/comment editing issues are browser related?
I tried to post a second time on yesterdays forum last night, it promptly vanished!
Tried re-posting, had a message “looks like you’ve already posted that” but comment still not visible, even after closing browser, reopen and refresh.
Weird.
Also, annoying.
@JohnSF: That happened to me once recently, but it has also happened a half dozen or more other times over the years so I don’t think it is anything new, just a weird little internet gremlin that shows up every now and again to remind me that he hasn’t gone away and I’d better behave.
Or that’s what I tell myself anyway.
@JohnSF: @OzarkHillbilly: WordPress does a lot of amazing things but there are also a lot of moving parts that don’t always work well together. And much of the commenting functionality (editing markup, the reply feature, up/down, etc.) is inexplicably still not part of the core and thus requires relying on external plugins. I have nearly 20 of those running and I gather it depends on which order they happen to get loaded.
New York Post Published Hunter Biden Report Amid Newsroom Doubts
@James Joyner: You do the best you can with what you’ve got James. I’m not complaining… Much. 😉
@James Joyner:
Thank you for the info.
Can’t grouch too much really, considering how much I’m paying out 🙂
I suppose one solution would be to write and check any comment locally in Notepad++ before posting.
@Scotty: Not even the messenger was comfortable with the story. Makes it hard to take the “message” too seriously.
Recommended viewing:
“The Way I See It” seen on MSNBC. The recollections of Pete Sousa, official White House photographer during Reagan and Obama administrations.
The stark contrast in the their humanity, humility and leadership (and their flaws) and Trump is jarring.
Sometimes we need to be reminded of what was just a few years ago.
Wall Street warming to the idea of a Biden presidency Long story short, if McConnell and the GOP want to withold stimulus to give Biden a recession, but Biden and the Dems will give a stimulus and boost the economy, Wall Street wants a boosted economy.
@JohnSF: This is a good opportunity to remind everyone that Outside the Beltway has a Patreon account (see the button in the upper right side of the page labeled “Become a Patron) and I encourage anyone who can to become a regular member. The funds go towards the expense of maintaining the site and (hopefully) the occasional Friday afternoon beer for the James Gang.
@Kingdaddy: Perhaps even more telling, the according to that story the actual byline was by an ex Fox News hack who had little to do with reporting the story and didn’t know she had a byline, much less the sole byline, until after the article appeared.
@James Joyner:
I can’t see the server-side code, but I can tell you that some of the comment issues are incompatible pieces of JavaScript running in the browser. Eg, for the edit link and timer to be displayed on a new comment, a page-loaded event has to occur. The JavaScript that submits the comment does so in a way that does not generate a page-loaded event. That’s simply inconsistent design across two (or more) developers’ pieces of JavaScript, and no change in loading order is going to fix them.
Election seasons always remind me of an Asimov short story called “Franchise.” I like to summarize it in one sentence as “A man gets to vote.”
Minor spoilers follow:
Asimov does a good job of misdirection, but he lets on by around the end of the first third that elections int he future rely more on statistics and polls. there’s a brief description of how polls (as in surveys) got so good and the tools to process them so sophisticated, that the preferences of a whole nation can be determined by polling one person, the Voter of the Year.
The Voter is chosen by a supercomputer called Multivac, and on election date, he votes.
How the vote happens would spoil the whole story. But I’ll let slip that the Vote determines not just the presidential election, but all elections that year, including those for the House, Senate, state legislatures, governors, mayors, city councils, judges, prosecutors, and even presumably the sanitation commissioner in Springfield.
I’m particularly reminded of the story when I hear or read that X county has predicted every election but three since 1898, or which party wins then the AFC wins the Super Bowl, and so on. Why not hold the election in just one small county in Ohio (or whatever)? Right?
@Teve: Those donors had better start making it clear to McConnell that his game-playing days are over. The more I read about how he (McConnell) is planning on making Biden’s life a living hell, the angrier I get.
McConnell needs to be made to realize that this isn’t just his playground–he’s ratf#$&ing the economy and that hurts everyone.
The Hill:
Tells you what kind of shit goblins the right wingers have turned into.
@Scotty:
I agree. We need a full investigation of how Russian propaganda is being propagated by the Republican Party and friends of the President. The national security issues are deeply concerning. There may indeed be laws being broken, and I would not be surprised to discover the president’s children are involved.
The 2016 Wikileaks reveals resulted in a variety of the presidents associates being charged, convicted and either jailed or pardoned. I expect that in the aftermath of 2020, there will be fewer pardons — unless the president preemptively pardons people on his way out the door.
@Teve: They should know that Fred Rogers was a life long Republican.
@Teve:
“Shit goblins”…I love it.
@Scotty: “*This is not an endorsement of Trump, his personality, policies, or antics*.”
At the risk of seeming rude or unwelcoming:
Fuck you.
This is an obvious forgery, and if the ludicrous story of its discovery weren’t laughable enough — so much so that the NY Post’s newsroom was up in arms over it — then the fact that Trump’s team is now claiming to have found child porn on the computer — that is, to have replicated just about every Russian intelligence bullshit accusation of the last couple of decades — is proof.
Your hyperventilating is the other big tell. You are so angry that people are choosing to see through these obvious lies, when four years ago they all went along with whatever crap Trump dished out against Hillary.
I strongly urge you you to abandon this site, where all your faux outrage will only get you laughed at, and run back to the Conservative Treehouse, where you can brag about how you made all the snowflakes over here cry.
@Scotty:
The allegations, regarding the Bidens and Ukraine, at least as presented so far, amount to a pile of piffle that have no merit whatsoever.
It’s a pathetic last gasp attempt at an “October Surprise” reprise of “but her emails!”, cooked up by Rudy Giuliani and his fellow stooges, with some indications that they were abetted by Russian agents and agencies.
Which may indeed lead to potential criminal consequences; for the authors of this nonsense.
Get back to me when you have real evidence of real wrongdoing, not Giuliani’s pathetically inept squiddy inkscreen.
@wr:
All we’re missing is a misspelled confession in trump’s own handwriting in black Sharpie.
@Scotty:
Yes it is. It’s exactly that. That’s how this thing works.
I would think you’d know that by now. At any rate, all of us commenters do.
@Michael Cain:
You know the coding better than I do but the edit function works for me probably 2/3 times. The comment markup (the b/i/link/quote box right above this one) loads maybe 4/5 times. But maybe they’re fighting one another.
EDIT: So, the edit function didn’t work immediately after posting this. But appeared as soon as I refreshed the page.
@JohnSF:
It is beyond pathetic as it is straight up just not working. Other folks may have had a different experience than mine but I knew the 2016 Press Conference held by Comey was a direct hit that pretty much destroyed Clinton’s shot at becoming President when the same day of the conference I hit up Mother Jones for Kevin Drum’s blog and he just had a meltdown saying things like FFS how could Comey hand the Presidency over to Trump, KD was beyond livid and just knew that the writing was on the wall once the news in the Presser held by Comey just consumed all of the oxygen in the room over the next 2-3 weeks…that presser was lethal with a capital L to Clinton.
The thing about the Post story is that it name drops the FBI a lot but they want nothing to do with it (and they could clearly speak to any truth in the story, interesting that no one in the FBI wants to be closely tied to such a fake news story), and where is a press conference by someone in a high level law enforcement position or someone from Congress where they hold up the Post paper and go to town on Biden…Bueller, Bueller,… .
No one but Trump, Giuliani, and a small handful of overly devoted to Trump GOP Congressmen/women want anything to do with this story.
The GOP is trying way too hard to make this a thing and it shows.
Also, this is the type of “proof” that the GOP committee was at one point considering using as evidence in their quest/”investigation” to prove that Biden is unfit to become our next President until someone whispered in their ear that this evidence reeks of BS and it would not be wise to use this info during the course of the investigation. It is telling that someone, perhaps Barr himself, got to the committee and had them pass on using Giuliani’s proof.
The GOP is still pathetic in that they are not pushing back harder against Giuliani choosing to go rogue and release this stuff in a last ditch effort to help the GOP but at least the GOP is not tripping over themselves to have their names linked to the Post story so there is that. A small handful of GOPers want to hold water for Giuliani but far from a a majority.
In fact, I think Giuliani’s staggered release of these documents actually hurts the GOP. What he has released has already started to cause the room the GOP is in to smell of BS, but not so bad that all the GOP is fleeing that room, but as more and more BS is piled up in that room as the weeks go by the smell will get so bad that the GOPers will flee the room bent over retching from the smell. Obviously, this is not a good thing to happen to the GOP but hey, if they want to let Giuliani do his thing that is okay.
One final thing, what a fall from grace Giuliani has experienced during his political career, from being considered America’s Mayor at one point to leaking planted Russian Propaganda to the NY Post in 2020. So sad.
Attempts at flippancy aside, it really is profoundly sad. Giuliani could have been a contender.
@Scotty:
Jesus Christ, dude, buy a newspaper occasionally. Or use the Google. You can’t turn your brain over to Q-anon and then imagine that normal people will pay you any mind.
@Scotty: I got some Florida beachfront property for sale if yer interested.
@inhumans99:
IMHO they screwed up the sequencing.
If they had kept the Hunter/Burisma powder dry and dropped it at the start of October (and got somebody competent to handle the computer ratf@ck LOL) then it might, just might, have had an impact or gained traction.
But no, they just couldn’t resist using them in the impeachment trial.
By October it was “meh, old news, whatever” except for the diehards.
Tactically inept.
@Scotty:
‘Watergate level story’? You mean a story that had been years in the making with proper sourcing and verifications scupulously done? Are you telling me that Rudy Giuliani and Steve Bannon are the equivalent of Woodward, Bernstein and Ben Bradlee?
Get out. Full stop.
@James Joyner: I seem to be getting very consistent results when the browser specifically refreshes the page. You have special WordPress privileges, which can — no, make that will — result in code acting differently for you than for me.
@Kathy:
Multivac?
I’ll multipass.
—
Whenever I’m asked for ID, I always hold it up and say “Multipass?” like Leeloo.
It gets a laugh ~ 40% of time. 60% of the time they think I’m a weirdo.
@JohnSF:
I am going to just blatantly steal your “squiddy inkscreen” for future use.
That is marvelous!
@JohnSF:
Yup, the story is so shoddy and riddled with factual errors that it might have still failed but yes, if Trump was not the boy who cried wolf having spent the entire year practically begging the GOP to look into Hunter Biden to help him get re-elected he might have slightly more credibility with the general public.
Now any attempts to use this story look like an amateur hour attempt to smear an opponent and
other than Scotty and few others you can count using your hands (and maybe your toes) it is doing nothing to move the needle. This story needs to be embraced by folks outside the GOP media bubble but so far the social media giants have chose not to play along and are willing to be subpoenaed by Congress to tell them face to face that hey GOP Congress, it is not 2016 but 2020, Clinton is not on the ballot, so quit acting like she is.
Credit where credit is due, the social media companies are willing to put up with Trump’s bullying and are not playing along.
Now…if someone like Scotty scampers over her from Hot Air, Lucianne, Gateway Pundit, The Daily Caller, etc., and says folks you really need to trust me…this story is the story of the century and shows how corrupt Biden is, c’mon believe me and check it out folks are all like get out of here you limey and go scamper back to your hidey hole.
@Kingdaddy:
Makes it very convenient to Sweep this story under the Rug, does it not? Who are the sources for this Red Herring? (Using anonymous sources against a source who is not anonymous, LOL).
Joe & Hunter have not denied the story. Hunter’s Attorney asked for the laptop to be returned to his client. If this story turns out to be true, will you still be voting for Joe Biden anyway?
@de stijl:
The well-known computer back in the 50s was the Univac. Asimov, in a fit of originality, named his fictional computer Multivac.
There are a bunch of stories, not mutually consistent, featuring a computer with that name. like “The Last Question,” “The Machine That Won the War,” and many others. In some the machine can talk, in others it requires a team of professional operators to enter and interpret data.
A Univac I was used by CBS news to predict the 1952 presidential election. Apparently after some early returns, and presumably other data, it predicted a landslide for Eisenhower, but the executives in Sperry, the manufacturer, thought ti was too lopsided to be credible. They did not relay the results to the network.
@Scotty:
Scotty, why would Biden and Hunter want to bring anymore attention to the story against them when they can just ignore it, two, if I (or the police) found say a laptop you had stolen from you would you not want a chance to get it back (that would be like the Police calling to say hey good news we found that laptop that was stolen from your home office and you say…uhh, Mr. Policeman sir, you can keep the laptop I do not need it back, that would just be an odd thing to say)?
Three, who are you trying to convince that this story is legit, me or yourself (honest question, not a rhetorical one)? It feels like you need folks like the non crazy members of this great blog to jump in and agree with you that the story is legit before you will really believe it yourself.
It feels like you want Biden and Hunter to do the GOPs job for them and amplify a story against them…why would they do that?
I remember a great joke from an Italian/Polish jokebook I read growing up where a bunch of folks get sent to the guillotine and the blade stops just short of their necks and the poor sods get to keep their heads on intact, then a Pollack puts his head in the guillotine and when the blade comes up short he says well, if you put a little grease in the grooves…lol!!!
I love that joke and you certainly want Biden to be the guy who says put a little grease in the grooves.
Yes, yes I will. Because, repeat after me: It. Has. Nothing. To. Do. With. JOE. BIDEN.
It’s a heaping, flaming dog-doo story that was so ill-sourced and toxic that FOX News turned it down, and the NY Post reporter refused to attach his name to it.
It’s garbage.
But, even if there was a scintilla of truth to it, it wouldn’t affect my vote at all. Because Trump is absolutely the worst, THE WORST. The US is a global laughingstock right now (see, for example, this).
@Scotty: I’ve been worried Trump had some sort of October surprise lined up. He’s only got two weeks left. You’d expect he’d have taken his best shot by now. After all, a quarter of the country has already voted. That this pathetic, transparent BS, story is his best shot is encouraging.
@Scotty:
Philosophers have pondered: Does there exist a right-wing lickspittle at an online forum capable of writing in correct English?
@wr:
True colors shown, 25,000 photos can’t be faked – you are unhinged and outraged!
@JohnSF: \
Thank you, for not resorting to name-calling like some others here. I can acknowledge that the Trump gang have fucked up the “delivery” of the Hunter Biden trove as if they were Keystone Cops. No defense of crazy eyed Guliani or crazy haired Bannon – but if the FBI had looked into this like they should have we would not be having a debate. I (hopefully) look forward to legitimate vetting of the photos, emails, and an investigation into the possible influence-peddling. Like contact tracing for Covid – the FBI needs to see where the money went and if Joe Biden is compromised by the Chinese. An investigation is warranted and should take place on the same basis as if the Trump family was involved. The messengers do not matter, it is a Red herring.
@OzarkHillbilly:..Florida beachfront property.
Probably in Florida, Missouri on Mark Twain Lake.
@Scotty:
What?
Don’t be silly.
Of course they can (depending on what you mean by “faked”).
@Jay L Gischer:
While I refuse to give the Democrat position any slack, I’m a lifelong Libertarian, and have real criticisms of the GOP and Trump. This was never about me or the GOP, this is about nepotistic financial ties that lead to the former VP – vis a vis China.
@Scotty:..I’m a lifelong Libertarian, and have real criticisms of the GOP and Trump.
Let’s hear them.
@Mister Bluster: Maybe the first one is nepotism.
@Michael Reynolds:
What’s your point, Ivanka may have some controversy, nepotistic ties to Chinese Communist Party? If she did something illegal or immoral then she should be investigated as well.
Q is a joke – but it is interesting there may be hunter Biden ‘Pedo’ videos coming. I am concerned at the level of discourse in this nation when we no one can properly Vet corrupt compromised people whether they are Trump’s Kids or the Bidens.
@Scotty:
The FBI is looking into this horseshit story exactly the way it should be looked into: as a Russian influence operation.
@Scotty:
On the one hand, truth is truth regardless of the messenger. I concur.
On the other, the fact that no one is willing to pursue this story other than the Post is quite a tell. The notion that the press, writ large, would refuse to run with a legitimate story that might hurt Biden is undercut by the entire way Clinton’s e-mails were covered in 2016 (among other things, including Weiner’s laptop). The media’s main bias is for a story. Full stop.
FNC didn’t want it.
@al Ameda:
1) Not talking about Burisma any longer – the new allegation is that China had leverage over the Bidens and they are compromised. Follow the money to see where it all went, Feds.
2) See my previous comment on the “Keystone Cops”. Had the FBI looked into the laptop (as they should have without partisanship) we would not be having this discussion today.
Honestly, I started making a list of the many, many ways in which the Hunter Biden story just does not add up and you know what? No, I’m not doing it.
Anyone who would fall for this isn’t thinking. These are really basic questions. Start with the clearly forged email that is at the center of these allegations, the involvement of Guiliani and Bannon, the ridiculous nature of all of it, etc.
This is a bad, almost laughable attempt at planting evidence. It’s ridiculous, full stop.
This is just…fucking weird. Jeffrey Toobin has been suspended by The New Yorker for exposing himself during a Zoom call.
http://www.thedailybeast.com/jeffrey-toobin-suspended-by-new-yorker-for-exposing-himself-on-zoom-call
@Kylopod:
Random capitalization is the earmark of crackpots or Germans writing in English.
PS I am not a crackpot.
@Scotty:
And there it is, the singular hallmark of Russian influence operations: the allegation of pedophilia against the target.
You assholes are just phoning it in at this point.
@Scotty:
My patience is probably greater than some others, being as I don’t have so much skin in the game.
I am generally prepared to suspend disbelief and proceed on an initial assumption of argument in good faith. This may be mistaken, but it’s mental exercise, and – who know? – may persuade
a reader passing by.
The problem is, you are assuming that the FBI should investigate something that is obviously not worth bothering with.
Much of the reported contents of the hard drive appear to be mere diversions (“crack pipe!!!” etc) that are just muddying the waters.
The key allegation appears to be that Joe Biden met an employee of Burisma.
SHOCK HORROR!
Except for key point that keeps being studiously overlooked by those pushing the story: there was no reason for Joe Biden NOT to meet a Burisma employee.
There was therefore no point in Biden’s office maintaining he had not had a meeting with Mr. Pozharskyi if actually had.
Note: possible difference between “meeting” and “met”.
@Kylopod:
In a word–no.
@Scotty: “The messengers do not matter, it is a Red herring.”
Except that the “messengers” are the only ones claiming that this laptop actually belongs to or was ever even seen by Hunter Biden. So yeah, the messengers do matter.
And I’m glad there’s at least one commenter here who’s nice enough not to resort to name-calling. Alas, that ain’t me. I think you’re a flaming asshole troll and should fuck right off.
@Steven L. Taylor:..Maybe the first one is nepotism.
With material like that you could get a bit on The Tonight Show.
@wr: And since you are forcing me to use rude language that is beneath the level discourse on this site, I will now ignore anything else you say so as to keep my decorum and not annoy the hosts or regular posters here, who deserve a better conversation than either side of this one.
@Scotty:
Aztec Camera has a really nice cover of True Colors. Slow and warm. Roddy Frame has a good, honest voice.
You are beautiful like a rainbow.
@Scotty:
Don’t know much about Hunter Biden’s emails (its not a story interesting enough to make the news much up in Canada — certainly not during Covid times), but actually its very easy to fake large numbers of photo’s with AI. Doing it by hand would take a long time, but I doubt anyone but kids making Meme’s do that.
@inhumans99:
Thanks for the assumptions, but I rarely blog like this. I’m a longtime Libertarian just tired of the dueling realities (like the 2 Town Halls the other night – all of this has become a shit show). Yeah, I agree the people mostly pushing this narrative have an agenda but I’m not a member of that tribe. I can’t fault anyone here for being stubbornly allegiant to their own agenda, but if you are really honest there are some bigtime red flags. This is going to ripple in part due to your tribe’s response, Barbara Streisand.
On a friend’s Facebook page this morning, a guy appeared to be a complete idiot, I asked if he was joking, and he started attacking me. I can’t believe it, but the following is from a guy who appears to be completely serious. Get a load of this shit:
And to make it even more bizarre, according to his profile, he graduated high school in, and continues to live in, Massachusetts.
ETA so I asked him if he lives in Massachusetts, since that’s what his profile says, and he replied
Boop for edit button
@JohnSF:
And if that allegation is what was purportedly in the “email”–that email is pretty clearly a fake AND Biden’s team has confirmed that he had no such meetings on or anywhere near the date alleged.
The whole thing is a mess!
@Scotty:
You clearly have not thought through the full implications of this phrase…
@Scotty:
So; changing horses in midstream are we?
OK.
Leverage HOW?
With WHAT?
A clear statement would be welcome here; evasiveness will not.
The China link of Hunter Biden is that he was engaged in a business partnership with a Chinese company.
As the US is at present in a normal peactime trading relationship with China there is nothing improper about that.
It will be very difficult to assert any legal basis for relatives of prominent American politicians being forbidden to have dealing with private companies of other nations that the USA is at peace with, and are not formally under sanctions.
Especially when the current administration veers repeatedly between purported confrontations and conciliations with Beijing.
@de stijl:
And English in the 1700s. All of the founding documents seem to do this.
I have no clue why Trump does it so often, or why Scotty here does. It isn’t even a standard illiterate thing. Where did they pick it up from, or is it just a trait of poorly educated narcissists?
@Scotty: Could you outline exactly what it is that the NYP story supposedly shows?
You actually haven’t said and I guarantee you it isn’t as self-evident as you appear to think it is.
@Scotty: The problem is that there is a lot of good reasons to look at the hunter biden’s laptop story skeptically, at least until new facts come to light.
First, this story was peddled to Fox News, but they passed on it because they didn’t think it was credible.
Second, the author of the story refused to put his name to it because he doubted the credibility of the story and the data.
Third, the NY Post has not allowed other media organizations to review the data to determine its legitimacy.
Fourth, the computer repair shop owner has provided more than one explanation of how he came into possession of the laptop
Fifth, it’s kinda weird that a man, living in LA, would bring his laptops to a repair shop in Delaware, and then never return to pick them up, right?
Sixth, the story about underage porn on Hunter’s computer came from a conservative radio host named Wayne Root. There has been no explanation of how he knows this or any evidence to support this allegation.
While it’s true that there could be valid explanations that answer all of these and other questions, but until then, skepticism is warranted. And I’m not holding my breath about receiving answers to these questions.
eta: changed “While it’s true that there will be explanations” to “While it’s true that there could be valid explanations”
@Scotty:
BTW, if you are pegging me as a member of any “tribe” you are expecting to find, you are making a rather large category error.
The clues are there, if you look 🙂
@inhumans99:
Yeah, they would not…. and they were likely advised by a highly paid PR group specializing in crisis management on this, LOL.
> Scotty, why would Biden and Hunter want to bring anymore attention to the story against them when they can just ignore it?
I read that Hunter’s Attorney asked for the laptop to be returned.
> two, if I (or the police) found say a laptop you had stolen from you would you not want a chance to get it back?
I have (3rd time) stated the messengers are flawed people. The photos I saw and emails I read seem to indicate financial ties from Hunter to other members of the political establishment (John Kerry’s son and even someone related to Mitt Romney). I am concerned that there is a huge legal or illegal “loophole” where foreign governments can make excessive payments to family members of our elected representatives.
> Three, who are you trying to convince that this story is legit, me or yourself (honest question, not a rhetorical one)? It feels like you need folks like the non crazy members of this great blog to jump in and agree with you that the story is legit before you will really believe it yourself.
They would not, good point, thanks for the reply.
> It feels like you want Biden and Hunter to do the GOPs job for them and amplify a story against them…why would they do that?
Ha ha ha, love the Pollocks, great joke I may steel that from you for use somewhere else.
> I remember a great joke from an Italian/Polish jokebook I read growing up where a bunch of folks get sent to the guillotine and the blade stops just short of their necks and the poor sods get to keep their heads on intact, then a Pollack puts his head in the guillotine and when the blade comes up short he says well, if you put a little grease in the grooves…lol!!! I love that joke and you certainly want Biden to be the guy who says put a little grease in the grooves.
This just in: there’s a lot of racism among Republicans.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2020/10/19/republicans-your-racism-is-showing/
@Jen:
Hence my “met”: there appears to be a (very small) chance they have been in the same location at some point with a crowd of others.
But not for a “meeting”.
I’ll believe Biden’s people on this; like I say, they have no reason to lie.
@Scotty:
Hunter Biden and Kerry’s stepson, Christopher Heinz, are known business associates. That’s not news, nor is it scandalous.
@Jen:
I can absorb that response without thinking you are evil 🙂
Certainly Hunter is not Joe, so while it is not 100% correlated it just seems like this entire idea of political Nepotism should be looked into because foreign governments could be using this to compromise our leaders. Applies equally to all parties and tribes. I’m slowing down on these responses and tiring of the flaming tribal responses so thanks for the level headed reply.
@Scotty:
You misspelled ‘fabrication’.
@Scotty: Also:
Pardon?
Seriously, stop feeding the troll.
@Kylopod:
http://www.sciencealert.com/people-who-pick-up-grammar-mistakes-jerks-scientists-find
There’s still hope. KILLER ASTEROID 2020 [Spoiler Alert]
Turns out there really isn’t hope, but we gotta have dreams, don’t we?
@Scotty:
It boggles the mind that anyone could say this with a straight face, given who Biden is running against. The level of obvious, public nepotism and corruption, and the evidence of compromise and influence by foreign governments over the Trump administration, overwhelms the significance of the case against Hunter Biden even if it weren’t a total fabrication. If Joe Biden were running against Hannibal Lecter, you would be in the position of yelling about new evidence that Biden eats foie gras.
@Scotty: If political nepotism is truly your complaint, I think you’ve got a pretty big hill to climb.
The adage “it’s not what you know but who you know” is as true in politics as business. And there’s nothing illegal at all about it.
The problem comes in when you ask where the line should be drawn. How about Elaine Chao? Her resume is absolutely riddled with conflicts. We could likely spend the better part of a month drawing charts of the BOD of major corporations and their political connections.
That politically and financially connected people are, well, connected, is “dog bites man”-level news.
I am not sure what you find interesting, or valid, about the NY Post story, but please consider Mike in Arlington’s list above.
There are a TON of holes in the story, so much so that no one is taking it seriously. As I said the other day, this isn’t even Swiss-cheese level of holes, it’s well into Lorraine cheese territory.
@JohnSF:
OK, then what may be legal should not be. These relationships seem ripe for CCP intelligence to take advantage of political kin. Joe went over to China with some political goals such as the South China Sea and what did he accomplish?
People screaming “for fairness” in our economic system (myself included) should tacitly agree that these large payouts were not commensurate with the skills & education level of Hunter.
Perhaps I’ve been focusing on this all wrong and the ripple effect will be that *in the future* the family of our political leaders is more highly scrutinized; perhaps Congress needs to pass laws related to nepotism of their own families in business dealings. (fat chance, right) So how can we make them accountable?
PS – I did not outright dismiss your entire argument because you misspelled “peactime”. LOL
>> A clear statement would be welcome here; evasiveness will not.
The China link of Hunter Biden is that he was engaged in a business partnership with a Chinese company.
As the US is at present in a normal peactime trading relationship with China there is nothing improper about that.
It will be very difficult to assert any legal basis for relatives of prominent American politicians being forbidden to have dealing with private companies of other nations that the USA is at peace with, and are not formally under sanction
@DrDaveT:
I’ve already said to look into Trump’s kids as well. If they did nothing wrong it will withstand scrutiny, right?
@Scotty:
A worrying issue, perhaps. And wider maybe than you state.
There are foreign governments, foreign companies, domestic companies (arguably even domestic government); and as well as electeds there are executive appointees, civil servants etc.
And the big question: how can one regulate practices that are not illegal; and on what grounds could one forbid relatives of such persons to engage in fully legal activities.
One way NOT to seriously pursue such an objective is to engage in an exercise of “whataboutery” that is objectively in the interests of the re-election of Donald Trump, was pushed by his partisans, and has a lot of signs of being falsified, and connected to known agents of the Russian government.
@Just nutha ignint cracker:
Oh come swiftly, sweet meteor of doom!
@Jen:
If it is proven that some selected emails were forged or modified then some people are going to jail. Maybe they (Rudy, Bannon) were already/potentially headed to jail and figured they had nothing left to lose? I doubt the 25,000 photos were forged, deep faked, so I would lean towards the majority of the emails in the trove have to be for real, but I could be wrong on this one. What was the punishment for the FBI guy who changed an email (reversed the meaning) in order to obtain a FISA warrant? Good benchmark to compare in the future.
@Scotty: he had 25,000 photos on his computer? Well that’s clearly illegal. Felony Album Storage. Send SWAT!
@Scotty: “… then some people are going to jail.”
For what?
Because Hunter and Joe are both public figures, it would be hard to sue for libel, much less a criminal charge.
Also, you keep saying that there are “25,000 photos” presumably on what you’re alleging is Hunter’s laptop. Do you have a cite for that?
@Scotty: From the link:
Which is interesting–because it is definitely not accurate that I “constantly get bothered by grammatical errors online.” You may not realize it as you’re new here, but I think everyone else her can vouch for me. I’ve been posting at this forum for 10 years, and this may in fact be the first time I’ve ever made fun of someone’s grammar at this forum (though I did it last night at another forum, so it could be the mood I’m in).
But I have noticed–and I’m hardly the only one–that most of the non-regular right-wing commenters here who just wander onto the forum simply cannot write properly. I’m not just talking about a few grammar and spelling errors here and there, failing to dot your t’s or cross your i’s. I’m talking about writing where you literally could not pass high school writing that way. It’s way too common to ignore.
The one I encountered last night was basically functionally illiterate. When I made light of it, he said it’s because he’s from Jersey.
And yes, I believe some of these commenters are indeed paid Russian trolls. I am not being paranoid, as the presence of Russian trolls spreading right-wing disinformation online is well-documented, and one I encountered even admitted he was Russian. I am making no accusations against you; there are other possible reasons for why you might write this way, including just not being well-educated, or being a sincere foreign-born person who struggles with English, which I have no bones with. The problem is that you aren’t an isolated example. Practically all the right-wing non-regulars write this way. It’s far too common to be coincidental. It demands an explanation.
@Steven L. Taylor:
Steven, I had not heard that joke before (and I love the Polish for reasons I will not state here). I may use your joke it in the future (meant to type “steal” not ‘steel’ but sometimes I use improper wording so the hardcore snobs ‘out’ themselves immediately 😉
@Kylopod:
Point taken.
I usually just go with the flow of my thinking as long as the meaning seems clear (usually got around a B+ in English).
Have you read any text messages by millennials these days? Most can’t even write in cursive.
@Kathy:
OK now someone is calling me a ‘Troll’ so it may be time to say farewell but I can’t guarantee I may pop back in for 1 more response. Unlike a Troll I do not turn to stone in the daylight.
Also, would it not be ironic if one of the ramifications of the big tech ban on this story is revocation of section 230? Would that be the political-right falling into a honey trap?
http://www.theverge.com/2020/1/17/21070403/joe-biden-president-election-section-230-communications-decency-act-revoke
@Mike in Arlington:
Oh God, I had no idea that con artist was involved. 6 months ago the attorney general of New York ordered Wayne Allyn Root to stop selling colloidal silver as a cure for coronavirus. That guy has been a con artist for years.
@Steven L. Taylor:
Blame me for that one Steven, I dropped a paraphrase of a joke I read in an Italian/Polish joke book many years back into one of my replies. That is what made Scotty chuckle.
Also, Scotty…I know you are reading this but just for once I wish you had the courage to not try and hide behind claiming you are a Libertarian so you are not a fan of Trump or Biden which we both know is poppycock. It would have been cool if you had the conviction to just stand up and said out loud and proud I am a member of the GOP who loves Trump like I love my own family.
Instead you claim that because you are a Libertarian that you do not like either candidate but if this is true why did you vote for Trump (lemme guess, you are going to say you did a write in or voted for Jill Stein, sure, sure, of course you are going to say that)?
You say you are a Libertarian and my response is and so, what is your point? That Libertarians are just as happy to vote for Trump as Republicans?
I also love how you say you are against nepotism, or a politician being owned by another country yet despite your claiming to not be a fan of Trump you seem to be quiet when it comes to criticizing him for placing his family in positions they are not qualified for, and seem to ignore that Trump is in Russia’s back pocket.
Seriously, we could have been friends who could agreed to disagree on things but you had to go and call yourself a Libertarian. Oh well, it is too late to un-ring that bell.
@Scotty:
I rarely scream for fairness; I am not that innocent.
Often the best that can be hoped for is a measure of restraint and decorum in the corruption.
Best campaign for a change in the law then.
But you’d better sit down and think it through first.
I’d say not via the route of leaping aboard a rickety bandwagon driven by Rudy Giuliani, whipped along by Steve Bannon, and witha teamof horses from the stables of Rupert Murdoch.
YMMV.
Lots of people go to places with goals.
Lots of people come away disappointed.
If you want to constrain China’s activity in the South Sea it’s going to need time (decades, not a month or two), multiple carrots and sticks, alliance building with regional states, balancing military and other strengths.
All the things the Trump administration has been utterly useless at.
That’s remarkably nice of you.
I hope to repay the compliment in kind at some point.
@Kylopod
That explains me, then 🙂
@Kylopod: ironic that he posts that today, because just this morning I deliberately ignored a frequent commenter who keeps trying to pluralize things by adding ‘s.
I’m going to quote David ☘The Establishment☘ Koch from this AM’s morning thread at BalloonJuice (comment #4) to give a little perspective on this Biden nonsense:
So keep flogging that chicken, spanking that monkey, polishing that one eyed eel, this load of coprolites ain’t never gonna shine.
@Teve: My guess–I haven’t been following the Troll feeding very closely–is that the 25000 pictures are porn, but even so, the problem is that the computer shop guy has had the laptop for however many months, so the chain of custody is broken.
I’ve been to this show before. A faculty member at a college that I worked for had child pornography on his laptop and escaped prosecution by establishing that he neither locked his office door ever nor had a password to access his computer. The DA failed to prove that it was his porn. Case closed.
@Scotty:
Okay, but “typo” is probably a more reasonable explanation than “I misspell to deliberately trap people into showing their bad intentions.” Whatever.
([Especially for Kathy: ] I promise to not taunt the troll for the remainder of this thread. )
@Just nutha ignint cracker:
It looks like its worse than that.
Computer shop guy, the details of whose story seem somewhat mutable, said he handed the hard dive over to the FBI last December, but kept a copy and handed that over to Giuliani’s lawyer Costello “after becoming frustrated by the Senate trial in January.”
Did he keep another copy? Who knows
Dyam! I just promised Kathy that I wouldn’t taunt the troll again. Now I can’t ask what “Most can’t even write in cursive” has to do with sending text messages.
Drive, dammit.
@JohnSF:
You are super agreeable.
I think you are a really good person based upon how you behave in interactions.
You are kinder to our current interlocutor than I would be. I would let my inner contempt and disdain bleed through into my response. You do not. That is commendable.
I get too salty too quick (our own history made that evident – sorry again, btw) so I have chosen to not directly engage with folks that prompt that visceral response.
“directly engage” has a loop-hole. I can snipe from the sidelines.
I commend our new commenter. Not a drive-by. Responsive. Kudos.
@Just nutha ignint cracker:
You mean you don’t use fax for your text messages?
Most strange and peculiar.
@de stijl:
*bows*
I thank you, sir.
Sometimes.
But if reincarnated as a starship I still have dibs on Culture Eccentric Offensive Unit Mistake Not My Current State Of Joshing Gentle Peevishness For The Awesome And Terrible Majesty Of The Towering Seas Of Ire That Are Themselves The Mere Milquetoast Shallows Fringing My Vast Oceans Of Wrath
@Kylopod:
What exactly did they define “less agreeable” mean anyways? Is it like “electability” where a trait in one person is acceptable but not in another?
It seems like someone who’s concerned with precision and clear communication would be very appreciated when it comes to dealing with things like your health or money but would make you feel lesser if it challenged your ego. It’s on the person attempting to communicate a thought for it to be clear and understandable; using non-standard grammar and diction makes it more like for misunderstandings to happen. That’s why you can’t submit official reports in txt speak and memes. It seems like folks who make these kinds of mistakes don’t want to be “humiliated” by having it pointed out to them and don’t want to be corrected over what they consider trivial nonsense. In other words, they’d list the corrector as “less agreeable” and would probably single out or emphasize other negative traits based on their bias.
Typos and grammar issues happen – Lord knows we’ve all done them. Getting offended by someone pointing out a mistake reflects more on the offended party than the noticer. They are point out a fact – you’re the one taking it personally. Shocker that @Scotty trotted that link out…….
@Just nutha ignint cracker: we don’t know if there are 25,000 photos, or if there are, what the photos are of, at all. The New York Post is refusing to let anybody look at the evidence.
@Just nutha ignint cracker: I like writing in cursive. I consider it an art form. But we aren’t civil war troops writing home to our dearest Adelaide. Given the choice between writing in cursive, and being able to text 60 words a minute, in the 21st-century you’d be a fool to pick cursive.
This is like somebody in the 1970s complaining that these kids nowadays can’t even hand-crank a Model T.
@Just nutha ignint cracker:
Oh come on, it’s so clear! QAnon drops in riddles and snippets using images and numbers as reference. Cursive can’t be typed – only mimicked via font or using a picture. Fonts are pictures made up of code – numbers!!! The Constitution is in cursive! You need it to read 2A and about Jesus’ special nation that the Founders wrote about!! If you can’t write in cursive, how can you follow Q’s logic on the Deep State forcing our kids to abandon ancient important knowledge that’s not compatible with their modern sinful lib life?!
Serious @ignint, how can you not see that? Go practice your cursive some more!!
@Just nutha ignint cracker: “Now I can’t ask what “Most can’t even write in cursive” has to do with sending text messages.”
I admit, that was tempting me to abandon my vow, too.
You mean he who’s name used to begin with J but now changes weekly?
@Monala: Everyone should read this article. And listen to this Reply All podcast from 2 years ago about the same fiasco. Gou, Trump’s buddy, is an interesting figure. He really did create the largest contract electronics manufacturing company in the world from a tiny little one room facility in Taiwan. Whatever happened in the intermediate years, he now comes across as a bloviating buffoon, willing to say anything but unable to deliver on it. It appears that the actual powers within the company have essentially shouldered him out, letting the divisions run themselves and leaving Gou to jet around the world making messes in other peoples backyards.
The Reply All podcast focusses more on the early days but makes it clear where this was headed. The local leaders foisted $400M of unrecoverable debt on a tiny farming community, virtually guaranteeing an eventual bankruptcy. Throughout the podcast you get that most repulsive of Libertarian/Republican vibe, the “We are masters of the universe who uniquely understand the way the world works and can bend reality by just force of will, and everyone else are just worthless idiots.” But like the modern day Republicans they are, they believe their beery night of brainstorming to come up with an idea or two is a substitute for the hard work it takes to get things done.
Maybe, but I think for most people, certainly for me, a person who goes out and finds a nice card (or as in the case of my wife, makes one), takes the time to sit down and write a nice note or a verse from an obscure poem, affixes a first class postage stamp and drives to the local PO* to drop it in the mailbox….
It means a little more than a text ripped off during lunch break. Jus’ sayin’, YMMV.
*out here, putting something in the curbside mailbox with the flag up says, “Grab ME!” to every meth head who might drive by.
@Just nutha ignint cracker:
Well, it’s not as though I can enforce these requests, you know.
Steven, can I make a request? I just came back to this thread after being away all afternoon because I wanted to follow up on Monala’s post. After doing that, I went back up to reread what I had missed and discovered that I shouldn’t have bothered because the commentariat here spent the whole afternoon arguing nonsense with some Trumper and anyone not into self-flagellation would have given up hours ago.
Here’s my request: Can you add some code that automatically labels a thread “Playground for Trolls” in big flashing letters once it goes above a certain percentage of pointlessness?
@OzarkHillbilly: Forbes says the Biden family is worth $9 million, $1 million of which is the estimated value of his government pension. If you’re a senator for 38 years, and you write two New York Times best-selling books, and after all that you’re worth $9 million, there’s one thing you ain’t, and that’s corrupt.
@OzarkHillbilly: and 50 years from now people will still be sending each other nice cards in the mail, but they’ll be printed. 😛
Apologies to George Carlin, RIP
@JohnSF: That’s much better than my tentative choice of Slightly More Gravitas than That.
@Kylopod:
The head housekeeper at the women only dorm was a native German.
She posted notes in the commons areas routinely. Taped to the commons areas entrance door frames. They were interestingly constructed and apparently randomly capitalized until I realized she very often capitalized the nouns.
The notes were terse and crabby. Scolding. Here is a person deeply invested in the concept of ordnung.
I was super fascinated and intrigued by her notes. I wanted to take them to preserve, but that would be rude. Were it now I would have taken a picture of every one of them.
This was the women only dorm, but my gf lived there and she had a single, so wink-wink rules applied. I did not live there technically although I did have a drawer.
One night the fire alarm went off at 3 am. After everybody clustered outside in the designated spot about 10% were dudes.
The head housekeeper was this mythical figure in my head. A Valkyrie super-invested in “Trash” eradication.
@Teve: Yep. Mind you, I wouldn’t mind being worth 9 million either, but I don’t have the stomach to put up with what he has over the decades. I’m quite happy owning my 12 1/2 acres free and clear with our small 1300 sq ft cabin, a prodigious garden, a smallish pension, a 5 figure savings, and my social security. I hope I live long enough to see my wife retire and be happy creating whatever strikes her fancy and enjoying our grandchildren as much as her heart desires..
@Teve: No doubt. 🙂
@MarkedMan: i’ve been the moderator on a biology website for about 15 years, and there aren’t very many good ways to deal with trolls. For instance, the problem with the Playground for Trolls suggestion is it would then become a perverse goal for trolls, “how many threads can I TILT?!”
How we handle it on the biology website would be hard to implement here, because that’s a discussion board and this is a blog. On the biology website I have a button on every comment that when clicked moves the comment to a dedicated thread called The Bathroom Wall, where anything goes. That way the troll can’t complain about being censored, because his comment is still visible, but it gets it out of the way of the serious discussion on the topical thread. That solution probably wouldn’t work here.
What would work here would be to create a dedicated thread for the particular troll and then restrict them to just posing on that thread. But Scotty is new and hasn’t made himself enough of a burden to warrant that yet.
@CSK: Can they suspend this Scotty clown for doing the same here at OTB?
@OzarkHillbilly: I don’t know wtf happened there, but
is mine and should not have been in the quote. MY KINGDOM FOR AN EDIT FUNCTION!
@MarkedMan:
@Teve:
I can’t claim certainty, but I seem to recall when the downovte option* was up, trollish comments tended to receive fewer replies.
It may be others used my method of just downvoting the obvious troll and moving on. Or it may be I’m selectively remembering.
@de stijl:
I just happen to write that way – to accentuate…. The Jesuits taught me better than this, my bad.
And I sincerely prefer being called a German to a Russian Bot (as long as you did not mean ‘Nazi’).
Federal judge thwarts Trump plan to starve 700,000 Americans during pandemic
@Teve:..create a dedicated thread for the particular troll…
So there would be a JKB Thread or a Tyrell Thread everyday like the Monday Forum and the moderators would have to intercept and move their posts to those threads?
Who would be responsible for this effort? Dr. Taylor? Dr. Joyner? Dr. Kingdaddy?
Don’t they have enough to do?
How about Dr. Teve?
@Kathy: no, I think you’re right. When I would scroll through the comments, and I saw a name I didn’t recognize, and there were like 12 down votes, I just filed the name away in the troll category and skipped them from then on.
@Mister Bluster: You don’t have to make new threads for them, we had one thread for a guy named Joe G, that went on for probably 30,000 comments, but there was a recent comments function that would always show you the threads, it wouldn’t be as easy here. I don’t know why this place doesn’t have a recent comments element, FWIW. It would be convenient.
Ugh. Just try to avoid any details of what exactly Jeffrey Toobin was doing while in range of the zoom camera. Gross.
@Teve:..What would work here would be to create a dedicated thread for the particular troll and then restrict them to just posing on that thread…You don’t have to make new threads for them…
Explain this to me like I’m a two year old…
——–
Gotta’ thank the EDIT function for making an appearance and allowing me to correct a misspelling…after I reloaded the page one time.
@Teve:
Based on your comment I tried writing in cursive. It came out pretty bad. Not a total disaster, but janky and wobbly. Looks like a 4th graders practice book. I hadn’t done it since the last mandatory class. Probably since 6th grade.
Do kids get cursive training anymore in school?
I know some folks grumbled about all the replies to Scotty but I am done, if Scotty continues to post from this point forward I will not engage as he is narrow minded and feels that it is okay if Trump gets away with murder but Biden should be nailed to the wall for non-existing ties between him and being China’s puppet, okay then. Yeah, done replying to that nonsense.
I suspect others on this site have had their fun and will no longer feed the wee little troll.
@Teve:
I’m keenly aware of biases and heuristics, and I try to fight them. I don’t always succeed, and memory biases are the worst.
About cursive, not that it bears any relation, I think the school I attended discontinued teaching it the year before I reached the third grade, which was when children learned cursive. So, no, I can’t do it. When I write anything by hand these days, though, I tend not to lift the pen, or not completely, rather often, so the result is cursive-like, and very untidy and less legible than my usual handwriting.
I also tend to make up abbreviations on the spot. Surprisingly, I remember them very well. The end result is almost like a private code: I can make sense of it, but most people can’t.
@Steven L. Taylor:
Steven, would it really matter here? I think not.
Thank you, to those like you who brought up good points to consider. I do agree these clowns are not giving the story any credibility. It does seem clear the Director of National Intelligence, Ratcliffe is on record saying “Don’t drag the intelligence community into this. Hunter Biden’s laptop is not part of some Russian disinformation campaign. And I think it’s clear that the American people know that.” I’m sorry I will not take the time to make further points ‘why the contents matter’ before we all know if they are real or not. (or why the traditional media & big tech response will matter in the future).
I have for the most part replied politely (while I have received several rude replies). I have acknowledged some of the counter-points that refute or disagree with my opinion (while being met with name calling and red herrings to focus the topic on something else).
I would agree an Up/Down vote button would be useful here.
Wow – just reading the call to ‘censor’ me from @Teve (I am sorry that the Trolls hurt you Teve).
If anyone else does not want to see any more of Scotty – all you have to do is (the same thing Joe Biden is doing on the story) _Don’t _Reply!
Among other restrictions there will be no indoor bar or restaurant service.
Two Republican State Senators in the area, Paul Schimpf and Dale Fowler are ragging on the Democratic governor for the move.
I think these State Senators should specifically call out citizens who refuse to wear masks and stay six feet apart. They won’t do it though as they are afraid that they will lose political support.
Let me be a little contrarian and make the case for why it is sometimes okay to feed the troll.
I’m not talking specifically about this particular commenter. Obviously I haven’t said anything of substance in this thread so far, and part of it’s just that the whole Burisma matter makes my eyes glaze over. I responded to “keef” the other day regarding his anti-Covid-safety propaganda because that happens to be something that triggers me. But I’ve got no problem when others take Scotty on regarding Huntergate. In fact I appreciate it.
Whenever I or other people here respond to one of these commenters, we always get pushback from some of the people here complaining that we’re “feeding the troll” and telling us it’s a waste of time because there’s no way to convince them. This strikes me as missing the point, because convincing them isn’t necessarily the goal. The goal is to make sure their propaganda doesn’t go unanswered.
What really gets me about the DFTT maxim is that it’s essentially defeatist and attributes more power to these “trolls” than they merit. It makes it sound like nothing you say in response to the “troll” can make a dent, other than ignoring it. If you lose the argument, the troll wins; but if you win the argument, the troll also wins, because he’s gotten under your skin. Heads I win, tails I win. The “troll” may see it that way, but that should be irrelevant. It depends on what the troll is saying. If he says Joe Biden is sleepy or Joe Biden is gay, I would consider that not worthy of a response. But if he says masks don’t work in reducing the spread of Covid, a response can be very helpful. Who cares if the person who posts it isn’t talking in good faith? You’ve still pushed back against dangerous propaganda. He can pretend he’s “owned the libs,” and he may even believe it–but the fact of the matter is that you’ve successfully blunted his attempt at spreading misinformation, whether he admits it or not. And I think it’s important to be prepared with these responses–it can help in offline encounters, since not everyone who hasn’t made up their mind or is ignorant about it is some hardcore cultist who won’t listen to you.
There’s a limit to this, and I understand where Kathy and others are coming from in getting annoyed that this thread gets taken over by these responses (though keep in mind it’s been a while since we’ve actually encountered a commenter like this who’s gone beyond the usual hit-and-run). And it’s not like I spend all day going on Youtube or whatever trying to push back against every commenter who drops talking points from Breitbart. But sometimes it’s pretty simple and easy, especially on a forum like this one. Giving a simple, concrete, fact-based answer to lies and misinformation is not always a waste of time. It certainly doesn’t mean you’ve fallen into the “troll’s” trap.
@MarkedMan: “Can you add some code that automatically labels a thread “Playground for Trolls” in big flashing letters once it goes above a certain percentage of pointlessness?”
Just look at the number of comments. If it’s in triple digits, stay away.
@de stijl: Common Core standards dropped cursive requirements in 2010 because priorities. But then conservatives started demonizing common core as Stalinist Obama Librul Marxism and 2 dozen states reintroduced it cuz Suck It Libtards!!!!11
nytimes
@inhumans99: yeah once Obvious Troll is obvious, it’s best to just ignore him. (It’s always a him)
@JohnSF: No, but I don’t use cursive for handwriting anymore either. I learned it in school, more or less, but as the tremor that I’ve had for most of my life became worse, it’s gotten difficult to hold the pen point (nib in your version of English, IIRC) down on the paper. Mostly, I try to avoid handwritten messages to whatever degree I can.
I stopped using cursive at the request of one of my high school teachers–English, I believe.
Looks like CNN has some randy legal analysts.
Man who wants people to consider his argument that we should care about a certain bit of reporting proves incapable of (or at least unwilling to) clearly stating what the article says and then gets upset when this problem gets pointed out and blames said failure on the people he’s trying to convince.
I am shocked things went so downhill so quickly.
@Kylopod: Responding to trolls is something that evolution supporters have been doing for decades now, and a clever innovation was made a few years ago. Creationists don’t argue in good faith, they just Gish Gallop across claim after claim after claim after claim faster than anybody can comprehensively rebut them. So a guy named Mark Isaak had a great idea. He collected, on a webpage, all ~600 arguments creationists make, the original source, and why it’s scientifically wrong, with references. So if you have a creationist troll you don’t even have to type anything new. With every argument they make, you can just give a link to the prepackaged correction. When they make another argument, you can just reply with that relevant link. And it has the benefit of showing that creationist arguments are tired.
Every creationist argument ever made, is indexed here.
I really would like to see the same thing done for supply side economics, global warming denial, and some other common bogus arguments.
@KM: On a more serious note, schools in some school districts have started teaching cursive because they discovered that at least some students who’ve not been taught cursive also cannot read it. It’s parallel to the phenomenon that schools that emphasized touch typing from first grade a decade or 3 back discovered that many students had difficulty making hand copy notes.
@wr: “too?” Are you suggesting that I broke my vow?
OH NNNOOOOOOOES!!!!!
@Scotty: DNI Ratcliffe is an entirely unqualified political hack and his statement is worth less than what I flushed down the toilet 20 minutes ago.
Since I like cursive and consider it artistic, I occasionally, not very often, get out a notepad and practice some basic words and letters. But honestly I really don’t have a lot of motivation for doing it, because literally the only time I write something by hand these days is a check to the utility company because they charge an outrageous surcharge for debit cards. I do literally everything else electronically.
The Trump campaign is demanding that all the topics that have been announced for the last presidential debate, Fighting COVID-19, Climate Change, Race in America, American Families, National Security, and Leadership, must all be scrapped and they should only talk about foreign policy.
https://www.vanityfair.com/news/2020/10/donald-trump-joe-biden-scientists
@Teve: Not always. Barb in the Boonies was pretty trollish quite a bit of the time. I suspect there’ve been others, too.
But mostly male? Ayup.
@Kylopod:
I get it, and I’m certainly one of the DFTT crowd but just want to clarify something. When I say “you aren’t going to convince them”, I believe it but that’s not why I say it. If it was an exchange that lasted a few back and forth sit would be easy enough to ignore. But feeding a troll is like feeding a fire – it will eventually consume all the air and fuel in the room. But I hear what you are saying, and “not letting it go unanswered” is certainly a legitimate concern. One way to not feed the troll but still accomplish that goal is to respond to the argument but not to the troll. Don’t hit reply, just start a new post, and don’t mention the troll by name. I’m astounded at how effective this is. I do it fairly regularly and the troll never responds and, as a bonus, it sometimes actually starts up an interesting comment.
@keef: Randy? As in Ayn or off color in a sexual manner?
@Teve: I find the whole trolling controversy and what to do interesting. I’m not inclined to ascribe motive to trolls, but that may be because I troll sometimes. When I do troll–or more likely (accurately?) troll back–it is either out of an urge to be sarcastic toward my fellow man or out of genuine malice, so I feel the need to try to police myself–and probably fail mostly, especially on the trolling out of malice thing.
Here’s what I see when I put on my outsider hat. The phenomenon I believe that I am looking is mostly repeated counter trolling on both sides. Some people are attempting to present serious arguments, but most are simply feeding an “is not/is too” cycle. I’ve played a role playing game with my students at times where I demonstrate argument in a vacuum by replying to any point that the student makes with “but that simply isn’t true.” (It works particularly well when students choose evolution (sorry, Teve) or gun control as their demonstration topic.) The point of the role play is to show that some points can’t be argued–they’re articles of faith for the holder and immune to the effects of evidence, reason, logic, pragmatism, or any other force you wish to throw against them, including absolute metaphysical truth.
So, what ever the goal might be imagined to be (and I have read Kylopod’s statements about this in the past, but am not looking to buy anything today, sorry 🙁 ) what we see in these exchanges is a pssiing contest involving respective attempted gotchas/preachings to the choir. Teve’s example is particularly noteworthy on that point. The points and counter points are all known hackneyed counterproductive balderdash or fact–depending on which side of the argument you take. (And remember that faith-based pseudo fact is the most potent weapon against the lies of Satan that the creationist has–you’ll NEVER change his/her mind.) With that being the case, the motto of anyone who wishes to not see a comment derailed is, in the words of some rando Arabian,
@Just nutha ignint cracker: so this may sound weird but I don’t actually put Barb in the Boonies in the troll category. She seemed to me utterly exasperated that anybody could believe differently than she did, and just incredibly confused and frustrated. Whereas proper Trolls act from malice, and are nearly always male.
@Teve:
Does your bank offer bill paying service? My credit union does and writes a check to the utility company, puts it in an envelope and mails it at no charge to me (or sends it electronically, but the utility doesn’t have that service with my bank 100 miles away in a different county). You might want to look into that.
I write about one or two checks a month now.
ETA: I got edit for my format error and you didn’t. I win. Neener, neener, neener!! 😛
@Just nutha ignint cracker: I’ve played a role playing game with my students at times where I demonstrate argument in a vacuum by replying to any point that the student makes with “but that simply isn’t true.” (It works particularly well when students choose evolution (sorry, Teve) Oh don’t apologize I love that shit. I can make really strong arguments against evolution, so long as I’m talking to a layperson. Give me five minutes and I can convince that layperson that the earth is standing still and the sun goes around it. According to the “scientists” here in Florida we’re spinning at 700 miles per hour! That’s insanity! Do you feel like you’re moving 700 miles an hour? Of course not! We’d all be flung into space if that were true! The sun and the moon are the same size in the sky because they’re the same size, period. It’s common sense. I could go on… 😀
Fucking edit function.
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Man, nothing I try right now is bringing that function back. Christ.
@Teve: My other big trick–to teach the definitions matter–is to claim that I can prove mathematically that the world is flat. It starts with the assumption that any slope of less than (I think, I haven’t used this in a long time) one one hundredth of a degree will be defined to have a slope of zero.
@Teve: @Just nutha ignint cracker: @CSK:
OJ on Toobin.
I don’t have much to say today, apparently.
I want the tech they have in Inception. After I vote, I’d like to partake. Someone give me the kick on January 20.
If the worst happens, I will go right back to my dreamscape. No kicks from that day forward, please.
@Teve: Okay. Fair enough. As I noted above, definitions matter.
@Teve: Most of the annoying gits who post here don’t fit the original definition of “troll”: someone with no actual stake in the argument but will say anything to get an argument going. Their purpose is to get people mad, and get them yakking.
The best non-political troll I ever came across was Ken M. Truly a legend. I suspect we have a Ken M-ish troll here, albeit one whose oeuvre is folksy down home political observations.
@Teve:
I have an extremely geeky interest in the history of letterforms, and I used to attempt calligraphy. That makes it all the more embarrassing that my cursive writing now sucks, especially if I attempt it at anything like a working speed. (I don’t know whether that makes it good news or bad news that my printing is also degenerating rapidly…)
@Scotty:
The most likely scenario is that Hunter Biden’s iCloud was hacked. Then, download 25,000 photos onto a laptop, and the emails and text messages, and then add a few fake ones.
2,500 photos aren’t fake. 30 are. And the other 2,470 true ones suggest the other 30 are real too. Same with the emails.
@Kurtz: Yeah. We thought this last month has been forrrrever long….Election results til January 2021 is gonna feel even longer!
@keef: At least he was keeping his hands to himself, unlike the President who brags about grabbing other people.
I have to wonder how often this has happened, with so many people on Zoom meetings and working from home.
@Just nutha ignint cracker:
The Small Angle Approximation agrees with you! The Earth is flat.
@MarkedMan: I follow Ken M. on Facebook. Great stuff. He told somebody a few weeks ago that he had saved up enough money to get his cat “de-pawed” and they lost their shit.
@Just nutha ignint cracker:
You may or may not have noticed that I kept putting the word “troll” in quotation marks. I was thinking of explaining why, but I didn’t want to distract from my main point.
I think the word “troll” is thrown around way too much. Sometimes it refers to relatively good-natured behavior, the sort of thing friends do to each other all the time. In online conversation, people often apply the term to practically anyone they regard as outsiders to their group or cause. You go to a Star Trek forum and bash Star Trek, you’re a troll, but the same opinion at a Star Wars forum might be perfectly acceptable. At a right-wing forum, the liberals are all trolls. And vice versa.
What’s the point of this definitional debate? It matters because the DFTT maxim is based partly on assumptions about the “troll’s” motives. I think most of us have this image in our head of a guy staring at his PC or iPad thinking “What can I say that will really get this crowd triggered?” And then laughing to himself as he watches all the indignant replies flood in.
As a matter of fact, that’s exactly what a lot of these types are doing. Usually it’s very obvious, but sometimes they’re a bit more subtle and make some effort to pretend to be arguing in good faith, just long enough to lure you in.
The fact is, though, a lot of the people we call “trolls” are just closeminded individuals who simply can’t conceptualize the notion that their views might not be correct, so they react obliviously to any rebuttals. We’ve met people like this in the real world. Is it really trolling? You can call it what you like, but the assumption that you’re “feeding” them by refuting what they say is questionable. I didn’t think EF (you know who I’m talking about, I’m just worried writing out his name will cause my comment to be thrown into the filter) was winning when he said “That’s a load of crap” or just ignored you entirely. He was just too dumb to realize he’d been destroyed. His failure to listen to us was his loss, no one else’s.
Funniest comment today on Twitter:
@Kathy: Similarly but in the opposite direction, Bell Labs pulled out of the Multics project at MIT and then built Unix (with ix pronounced the same as the ics). The rest is history.
@Michael Cain: interestingly, one of the big reasons UNIX succeeded is because of anti-trust law. AT&T/bell labs paid a bunch of money to develop UNIX and couldn’t sell it as a commercial product because of an anti-trust decree. So if you paid them a little money they’d send you the source code and so people all over the country started hacking it.
By the way from a clip I just saw on Seth Meyers, Maria Bartiromo on FoxNews on Sunday insinuated that the FBI agent investigating Hunter Biden‘s laptop is a child pornography specialist.
@Teve:
Why would the FBI assign a child to study pornography?
@Kylopod: Obviously the kid must’ve been appointed by Obama.
@Just nutha ignint cracker: ““too?” Are you suggesting that I broke my vow?”
Chalk this up to the terrible, awesome ambiguity of the English language — or perhaps my poor sentence construction. I meant that I, too, was tempted to break the vow, not that you had broken yours and I was tempted to follow suit.
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So I believe one of Scotty’s big concerns was that China has Biden held in their thrall, well Scotty, has your head exploded Scanners style over the story that Trump was trying hard to break into China’s market?
The same guy putting on a public show of insulting China was apparently desperate to do business with the Chinese…love it.