United States vs Russia capability questions

[Sgt.Squarehead]

That's generally pretty fair comment, I guess.....One could argue that this:

1 minute ago, IanL said:

There are no corrections or retractions (unless by chance that is what the government wants).

Is little different to the corporate media's tendency to publish their retractions of false stories on page 29, in very small print. 

3 minutes ago, IanL said:

So, while we in the west can get differing view points and competition to get the fact straight people in Russia and China cannot.

Don't know about the Chinese, but the Russians here seem to be doing OK.....Maybe they are all Putin's elite FSB agents? 

[Sgt.Squarehead]

7 minutes ago, sburke said:

We will review next week and check your progress.

Here's some revision for you:

Governmental interference:  https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-26079957

Corporate malfeasance & governmental interference:  https://www.vanityfair.com/news/2019/05/biden-ukrainian-gas-company

Those two should keep you going for a while, but I can find many, many more to allow you to further your education. 

 

Edited July 9, 2019 by Sgt.Squarehead

[sburke]

2 hours ago, Sgt.Squarehead said:

Here's some revision for you:

Governmental interference:  https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-26079957

Corporate malfeasance & governmental interference:  https://www.vanityfair.com/news/2019/05/biden-ukrainian-gas-company

Those two should keep you going for a while, but I can find many, many more to allow you to further your education. 

 

Dude I turned 60 I am too old to work on furthering my education. My goal now is to try not to forget too much!

[A Canadian Cat]

2 hours ago, Sgt.Squarehead said:

2 hours ago, IanL said:

So, while we in the west can get differing view points and competition to get the fact straight people in Russia and China cannot.

Don't know about the Chinese, but the Russians here seem to be doing OK.....Maybe they are all Putin's elite FSB agents?  

In general I was referring to citizens with no external exposure - typically because of language barriers. However my previous comments:

2 hours ago, IanL said:

Oh and I should add that the distrusting of news sources is a trap that dictators like us to fall into too. How many times have you heard someone say "I don't trust any of that lying media" and then turn around and repeat the government talking points nearly word for word - which they got from the state media.

This apply to a lot that goes on here. So, no I don't think they are doing so great because they seem to believe your line that the Western Media is just the same as theirs but controlled by other governments and therefore even though they seem to be aware that their state media is propaganda they don't actually act like the realize that and instead just parrot the same stuff here.

The uncomfortable truth is that despite the Western Medias various problems and our governments' various flaws they are not at all the equivalent to the State controlled media of the Putin Regime or the Putin Regime itself.

[A Canadian Cat]

Just now, sburke said:

Dude I turned 60 I am too old to work on furthering my education. My goal now is to try not to forget too much!

Hey my dad went back to University at 56, finished his degree and has been taking a course per semester ever since - He's 82 now. You are never too old to learn.

[sburke]

1 minute ago, IanL said:

In general I was referring to citizens with no external exposure - typically because of language barriers. However my previous comments:

This apply to a lot that goes on here. So, no I don't think they are doing so great because they seem to believe your line that the Western Media is just the same as theirs but controlled by other governments and therefore even though they seem to be aware that their state media is propaganda they don't actually act like the realize that and instead just parrot the same stuff here.

The uncomfortable truth is that despite the Western Medias various problems and our governments' various flaws they are not at all the equivalent to the State controlled media of the Putin Regime or the Putin Regime itself.

And we generally don’t kill our journalists. Not usually anyway. 

[A Canadian Cat]

3 minutes ago, sburke said:

And we generally don’t kill our journalists. Not usually anyway. 

I certainly don't go for that type of activity . I am certain that none of our Russian forum mates are in the habit of doing this either. The people are not the same as their government.

It is a problem in some parts of the world though and at the hands of dictators.

[sburke]

9 minutes ago, IanL said:

I certainly don't go for that type of activity . I am certain that none of our Russian forum mates are in the habit of doing this either. The people are not the same as their government.

It is a problem in some parts of the world though and at the hands of dictators.

What dictators?

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_journalists_killed_in_Russia

[MikeyD]

Post-Soviet Russia and the West were getting along just dandy up until about 2006 when Putin's proxy president Medevev invaded Georgia. Russian 'ethnic nationalism' then came to the fore, with the Russian-speaking ethic enclaves of other nations finding themselves in danger of being 'saved' by their neighbor to the east. This is where the so-called 'NATO threat' comes into play. Neighboring countries associating themselves with NATO disrupts Putin's hegemonic dreams of control over ail Slavic peoples under a 'greater Russia' umbrella.

[Sgt.Squarehead]

1 hour ago, sburke said:

And we generally don’t kill our journalists. Not usually anyway.

You have allies for that. 

18 minutes ago, MikeyD said:

Post-Soviet Russia and the West were getting along just dandy up until about 2006 when Putin's proxy president Medevev invaded Georgia.

That whole business of shelling the Russian peacekeepers couldn't have been a deliberate provocation by the Georgians, just an unfortunate accident I guess? 

[sburke]

1 hour ago, Sgt.Squarehead said:

You have allies for that. 

That whole business of shelling the Russian peacekeepers couldn't have been a deliberate provocation by the Georgians, just an unfortunate accident I guess? 

peacekeepers?  rotflmao  you mean piecekeepers as in we'll keep a piece.

and tell me exactly how many US journalists have been killed for stories the US gov't might not want told?  C'mon after that little comment you must have a number right?  Cite a source?  c'mon man this is your big moment to show how Russia being one of the most dangerous places on earth for journalists is no different than the west.  Oh boy where is the popcorn? `

Edited July 9, 2019 by sburke

[Sgt.Squarehead]

Actually that was a sideways dig at the Saudis, but I'm up for the challenge.....We could always start with the travails of Julian Assange, but they haven't actually killed him yet, so let's move on. 

Let's go for Danny Casolaro for starters:

 

14 minutes ago, sburke said:

peacekeepers?  rotflmao  you mean piecekeepers as in we'll keep a piece.

No, you're getting confused with those NATO ones from Yugoslavia.....These guys were attempting to prevent the Georgians (under that delightful Mr Saakashvili**) from murdering their Russian speaking neighbours. 

With a bit of egging on from NATO the Georgians shelled them and then got handed their arse on a plate.

http://www.cast.ru/files/The_Tanks_of_August_sm_eng.pdf

**  NATO does love him so.....People who've lived under his rule, not so much. 

Edited July 9, 2019 by Sgt.Squarehead

[Sgt.Squarehead]

Michael Hastings would be another very good candidate:

Good NYT article here:  http://nymag.com/news/features/michael-hastings-2013-11/

Edited July 9, 2019 by Sgt.Squarehead

[IMHO]

Oh, propaganda... How many dare to voice a doubt against metoo?

[Sgt.Squarehead]

TBH guys, I'm sick of this ****.....I come here to talk about CM, not pussyfoot around subjects that are best left elsewhere. 

No government is saintly, nor any nation.....All of them resort to the expedient as required and we all know this. 

[sburke]

29 minutes ago, Sgt.Squarehead said:

Actually that was a sideways dig at the Saudis, but I'm up for the challenge.....We could always start with the travails of Julian Assange, but they haven't actually killed him yet, so let's move on. 

Let's go for Danny Casolaro for starters:

ooh sweet.  from back in the 90s so you get credit for digging - Okay let's chew on this one.  Let's start here

 

 

A conspiracy theory developed around the case, with allegations that "back doors" had been inserted into the software so that whomever the Justice Department had sold it to could be spied upon. The major source on the conspiracy-theory aspect of the case, both for Hamilton and, later, for Casolaro, was Michael Riconosciuto, described by Rosenbaum as a "rogue scientist/weapons designer/platinum miner/alleged crystal-meth manufacturer... ."[6] Riconoscuito had been introduced to a friend of Casolaro's by Jeff Steinberg, a longtime top aide in the LaRouche organization.[8]

 

 

 

 

 

Excellent source!!!!

 

And then there is this really insightful comment I guess you missed below the video.

 

M.I.A. 4 years ago

I'm hiding in fear of losing my life, buuutt, however will show myself on national TV... Come on people, think logically.

 

 

[sburke]

 

5 minutes ago, Sgt.Squarehead said:

TBH guys, I'm sick of this ****.....I come here to talk about CM, not pussyfoot around subjects that are best left elsewhere. 

No government is saintly, nor any nation.....All of them resort to the expedient as required and we all know this. 

and for some expedience is required more often than others...…….especially of the fatal kind.

[Sgt.Squarehead]

FFS you are a citizen of the most lethal society in human history.....You are in absolutely no position to preach. 

[sburke]

2 minutes ago, Sgt.Squarehead said:

FFS you are a citizen of the most lethal society in human history.....You are in absolutely no position to preach. 

ahh but you are. 

I contest that the US is the most lethal in history, that sounds like a bit of hyperbole, though the US certainly has enough blood on it's hands there are other very serious contenders for that title.  Your extreme antipathy for the US is noted however.  Bias some would call it. A little googling though may shed some different perspective - for example the An Lushan rebellion.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/An_Lushan_Rebellion

Certainly the genocide of Native Americans by the United States is one of the greater blights on our history, but if you consider the total number of Native people's killed since Europeans first landed in the new world, the lion's share goes to Spain.  So how exactly did you conclude the US is the most lethal?  Any specific criteria?

 

Nice attempt to sidestep, but let's get back to the journalism stuff. You started down this path making a claim so let's just stay focused here and see if your position has any merit.   Onto michael hastings  let's start with his family

In an interview with writer Ray Sawhill, Hasting’s older brother, Jonathan Hastings, recounts how he had flown to L.A. to help his brother shortly before the accident because he had “got the impression that he was having a manic episode, similar to one he had had 15 years ago…”, at which time “drugs had been involved…” After failing to convince his brother to check voluntarily into a drug re-habilitation program, or fly back to Vermont to stay with family, he started making plans with his other brother to attempt to “force Mike into checking himself into a hospital or detox center.” However before that could be arranged, “he snuck out [of the apartment] on me when I was sleeping.” and had crashed shortly afterward. When asked directly whether his brother might have died from some sort of foul play, Jonathan responded “I really rule out foul play entirely. I might have been suspicious if I hadn’t been with him the day before he died. After all, he definitely was investigating and writing about a lot of sensitive subjects. But based on being with him and talking to people who were worried about him in the weeks leading up to his death, and being around him when he had had similar problems when he was younger, I was pretty much convinced that he wasn’t in danger from any outside agency.”

nope nothing at all there that might alter the conspiracy minded.

And that is not a NYT article - it is the New Yorker just to be clear.  And if you read it to the end it looks very similar to what the brother said above.... yeah I don't see an assassination move here either.

so you came up with two. I am surprised you didn't go for Seth Rich, that little conspiracy keeps popping up with the alt right.  

my turn.

On October 7, 2006, Anna Politkovskaya, a vocal critic of Russian President Vladimir Putin was shot five times in the lobby of her apartment building.

In March 2007, Ivan Safronov, who was investigating the sale of Russian arms to Iran and Syria, died after falling from a fifth-floor window. It was ruled a suicide.

In November 2009, independent broadcaster Olga Kotovskaya fell to her death from a 14th-floor window. She had been battling for control of her station with a member of the government. Her death was also ruled a suicide.

In February 2012, Victor Aphanasenko, editor of a newspaper that had been investigating paramilitary raids in southern Russia, died after slipping in his home.

In November 2015, Mikhail Lesin, who was often described as President Vladimir Putin's state media czar but who had fallen out of favor with him, was found dead after a fall in his hotel room in Washington, D.C. The FBI says he fell from extreme drinking and had "blunt force trauma to the head" and injuries to his neck, arms, legs and torso. That must have been some fall.

In March 2017, Nikolai Gorokhov, the lawyer for Sergei Magnitsky, who was the source of reporting on Russia's largest tax fraud, fell from a fourth-story window while trying to move a bathtub. Russian authorities made that explanation with a straight face. 

Maybe Maxim Borodin was depressed in ways his friends just didn't recognize and threw himself off of his fifth-floor balcony this week in Yekaterinburg, Russia.
Maxim Borodin was 32 and a reporter for the local Novy Den website, for which he had done tough stories about crime and political corruption, including Yevgeny Prigozhin, an oligarch indicted by the United States for running the "troll factory" that helped Russia try to influence the 2016 U.S. presidential election. Maxim Borodin wasn't just reporting on the latest craze in spa treatments.

Reporters in Russia should always get 1st floor apartments.  Preferably with more secure lobbys.
 

[Sgt.Squarehead]

Yeah nice try with the drugs angle.....Did you see the video of the car exploding? 

Mercedes Benz were very, very unhappy about the claims made about the safety of their cars.

10 minutes ago, sburke said:

I am surprised you didn't go for Seth Rich, that little conspiracy keeps popping up with the alt right.

Seth Rich wasn't a journalist, he was a DNC staffer and the probable source for the so called DNC hack.....But yes, another inconvenient American who suddenly got dead.

10 minutes ago, sburke said:

Your extreme antipathy for the US is noted however.  Bias some would call it. A little googling though may shed some different perspective - for example the An Lushan rebellion.

Again you are utterly mistaken.....I just don't give the US a free pass, we have the entire western media for that. 

I really am done with this crap now.....I'm in the middle of building a massive and rather complex map and I would like to concentrate on that if it's all the same to you. 

Edited July 9, 2019 by Sgt.Squarehead

[sburke]

Just now, Sgt.Squarehead said:

Yeah nice try with the drugs angle.....Did you see the video of the car exploding? 

Mercedes Benz were very, very unhappy about the claims made about the safety of their cars.

Seth Rich wasn't a journalist, he was a DNC staffer and the probable source for the so called DNC hack.....But yes, another inconvenient American who suddenly got dead.

I really am done with this crap now.....I'm in the middle of building a massive and rather complex map and I would like to concentrate on that if it's all the same to you. 

ahh so you did fall for that conspiracy crap.  nah he was not and an simple perusal without bias would show that, but Roger Stone and Steve Bannon would like you to think otherwise as it certainly conveniently leaves the Assange Russia connection moot.  You are free to stop responding but as long as this BS conspiracy crap keeps getting posted to support this BS line that somehow Russia murdering journalists is equated in the west, then I am gonna keep calling it.  All we have to do is stop and let the thread go back to the OP.

[Sgt.Squarehead]

You are aware that a rather large number of former US Intelligence professionals fully support that position? 

If not, you should be. 

 

[sburke]

2 minutes ago, Sgt.Squarehead said:

You are aware that a rather large number of former US Intelligence professionals fully support that position? 

If not, you should be. 

 

you should read more current news.  You keep interesting company - though consistent.

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/exclusive-the-true-origins-of-the-seth-rich-conspiracy-theory-a-yahoo-news-investigation/ar-AAE4x4n?ocid=spartanntp

Stone, Bannon

Fox news

Hannity....

 

Edited July 9, 2019 by sburke

[Sgt.Squarehead]

ROFL! 

Pull the other one.....It's got big brass bells on! 

PS - That page has active malware BTW.....Great source!  I really am done with this now. 

Edited July 9, 2019 by Sgt.Squarehead

[sburke]

3 minutes ago, Sgt.Squarehead said:

ROFL! 

Pull the other one.....It's got big brass bells on! 

Care to name the intelligence officers you cited or is that from another of those conspiracy sites.  You really have no grounds to comment on JKs stuff.

Among Hannity’s guests that week who echoed his version of events was conservative lawyer Jay Sekulow. Although neither he nor Hannity mentioned it, Sekulow had just been hired as one of Trump’s lead lawyers in the Russia investigation. “It sure doesn’t look like a robbery,” said Sekulow on Hannity’s show on May 18, 2017, during a segment devoted to the Rich case. “There’s one thing this thing undercuts is this whole Russia argument, [which] is such subterfuge,” he added.

In fact, the Fox story was a “complete fabrication,” said Sines, who consulted with the FBI about the Fox News claims. There was “no connection between Seth and WikiLeaks. And there was no evidence on his work computer of him downloading and disseminating things from the DNC.” (A spokeswoman for the FBI’s Washington field office said the office had never opened an investigation into Rich’s murder, considering it a local crime for which the Washington Metropolitan Police Department had jurisdiction. Andrew McCabe, the FBI’s acting director at the time, said in an interview that he reached out to his agents after he heard about the conspiracy stories about Rich and was told, “There’s no there there.”)

After eight days of controversy, Fox News was forced to retract the story after one of its two key sources, former Washington, D.C., homicide detective Rod Wheeler, backed away from comments he had given the Fox News website reporter Malia Zimmerman and a local Fox affiliate reporter confirming the account. The article, the network said in a statement at the time, “was not initially subjected to the high degree of editorial scrutiny we require for all our reporting.” Fox News later announced it was conducting an internal investigation into how the story came to be posted on its website. The results have never been disclosed, and a spokeswoman for Fox News declined to comment, citing ongoing litigation against the news network brought by the Rich family.

Edited July 9, 2019 by sburke