The divide and conquer posts are out full force

[CousinIT]

5. Something worth reading...TROLLING FOR TRUMP: HOW RUSSIA IS TRYING TO DESTROY OUR DEMOCRACY

We know this was going on during and before the election. Now that Russia has Trump installed in the WH, their objective is to further weaken our Democratic Republic and exert continued influence on both the Trump admin and American citizens using the same tactics - no doubt.

There are likely just bamboozled and gullible people who swallowed whole the bullshit and are posting a lot of the divisive crap here. Maybe that's even most of it.

But I don't believe for a minute that Russia's tactics and attempt at influencing our people and our government stopped when the election was over. Whether it's the alt-right, Russian influencers, or just divisive American idiots who bought the bullshit over the years about Hillary, it's good to have an outline of how the influence shit operates.

And bytheway if you're on Twitter, Clint Watt is a good person to follow. He's @selectedwisdom - and the excerpt below is from his website: https://warontherocks.com/2016/11/trolling-for-trump-how-russia-is-trying-to-destroy-our-democracy/

Russia’s social media campaigns seek five complementary objectives to strengthen Russia’s position over Western democracies:

Undermine citizen confidence in democratic governance;
Foment and exacerbate divisive political fractures;
Erode trust between citizens and elected officials and democratic institutions;
Popularize Russian policy agendas within foreign populations;
Create general distrust or confusion over information sources by blurring the lines between fact and fiction
In sum, these influence efforts weaken Russia’s enemies without the use of force. Russian social media propaganda pushes four general themes to advance Moscow’s influence objectives and connect with foreign populations they target.

Political messages are designed to tarnish democratic leaders or undermine institutions. Examples include allegations of voter fraud, election rigging, and political corruption. Leaders can be specifically targeted, for instance by promoting unsubstantiated claims about Hillary Clinton’s health, or more obviously by leaking hacked emails.

Financial propaganda weakens citizen and investor confidence in foreign markets and posits the failure of capitalist economies. Stoking fears over the national debt, attacking institutions such as the Federal Reserve, and attempts to discredit Western financial experts and business leaders are all part of this arsenal.

In one example from August, Disneyland Paris was the site of a reported bomb scare. Social media accounts on Twitter reported that the park had been evacuated, and several news outlets — including Russian propaganda stations RT and Sputnik — published alarming stories based on the tweets, which escalated in hysteria as the afternoon stretched on. In fact, the park had not been evacuated. But that didn’t stop Disney’s stock from taking a temporary hit. This fluctuation could be exploited by someone who knew the fake scare was coming, but we do not have access to the data that would allow us to know whether this happened.

https://warontherocks.com/2016/11/trolling-for-trump-how-russia-is-trying-to-destroy-our-democracy/