Gee thanks, Facebook

Does anyone understand this Cambridge Analytica / Facebook thing?  I think I've figured it out, and if it's what I think, it pegs my Stink-O-Meter!

It seems a few years ago Facebook began prohibiting companies from secretly mining information from Facebook users for commercial purposes.  They would, however, allow member mining for academic purposes.  That's when the geeks and financial backers of what became Cambridge Analytica combined efforts with a British academic who had a waiver to mine Facebook accounts and began their covert invasion of our privacy.

They offered an app to Facebook users whereby they could get a personality profile of themselves, and the offer was accepted by 270,000+/- people.  What they didn't realize was that Cam Anal (appropriate acronym) also gained access to all their friends, and their friend's friends, and their friend's friend's friends, etc.  They could then see how many "likes" and "angry" responses they left on which stories, and over time establish a profile of them all.  For example, if someone consistently "liked" stories on gun control or immigration reform, they were deemed liberal.  "Liked" views on ICE roundups or our terrible trade deficits were deemed conservative.  They eventually knew more about individual Facebook users than their spouses did, or so they claimed.

Eventually Cam Anal *snicker* developed a very good idea of what 40-50 MILLION Americans thought about various issues.  They were able to micro-analyze individual towns and even precincts. 

Here's where it gets sticky:  The major financial backer for all this was the ultra-conservative Mercer family, the same Mercer's who funded Breitbart and Steve Bannon.  They even made Bannon a VP at Cam Anal.  (Steve Bannon eventually became a senior advisor to Donald Trump.)  Cam Anal then began marketing themselves to like-minded conservative candidates such as Ted Cruz and later, Donald Trump.  Then they kicked it up a notch by trying to influence voters by putting out bogus news stories (aka Fake News) to Facebook users that were read and "liked" and "shared" by their friends, over and over.

I remember seeing one from a veteran who told of how Donald Trump's Tower Air once sent a plane to pick up stranded soldiers in the Mideast after the Gulf War, and how he will always be grateful to Trump for his kind gesture.  Knowing something about the airline biz, my BS meter shot up.  I checked it out and found it was totally false.  Trump never had an interest in Tower Air at all.  He did own the short-lived Trump Shuttle, but they never transported soldiers home from overseas.  (You can read about it for yourself here.)

By using tricks like this they were able to identify disgruntled / undecided voters in key battleground states like Pennsylvania, Michigan, and Ohio in particular, and flip (some of) these historically Democratic voters to Donald Trump in the general election.  Cam Anal determined what they wanted to hear, and then put out fake news stories to pull them in.

The plot thickens:  enter the conspiracy theorists. Remember a few months ago when Special Counsel Robert Mueller indicted 13 individuals and several companies in Russia for interfering in our 2016 election?  They were accused of planting fake stories on a micro-level, much of it aimed at the same voters in PA, MI, and OH that Cam Anal / Trump were also targeting.  How did they know which micro-level voters to target unless they were receiving guidance from Cam Anal / Trump?  If that connection can be made by Mueller, that's the collusion smoking gun he's been looking for.

Evidence suggests Facebook knew of this privacy violation several years earlier and did nothing about it.  Cam Anal says they deleted all this illegally obtained information long ago, but now a whistle blower, one of the original founders of the company, says not true.  He says that personal info WAS the company.  Without that, they would have nothing to offer to potential customers.

Gee thanks, Facebook!

S

America's Chief Incoherence Officer

"So today I'll be up here, but then tomorrow I'll be over there.  Everybody got that?"....said President Donald Trump at his first Cabinet meeting. 

You know how most organizations have a Chief Executive Officer, a Chief Financial Officer, a Chief Technical Officer, etc?  Our government apparently doesn't work like that.  Instead we have a Chief Incoherence Officer, and then a bunch of confused underlings running around the world wondering what the boss is going to say next. 

This week was a good example of that with VP Pence, Sec Defense Mattis, and Sec State Tillerson all in Europe to reassure our allies there, and NATO, that we are solidly with them, just like we have been since we all kicked Hitler to the curb back in '45.   But....DOH!....then our Chief Incoherence Officer (CIO), aka President Donald Trump, piped in by saying they'd better pay up or we're outta there.

And just yesterday our CIO told a room full of influential conservatives that he was going to whip up on those %^&^* errant Muslims, and hours later his National Security Adviser, Lt. Gen. McMaster, came along behind him and said the boss was....ummm.... just having a bad day.  *ahem*

Our CIO also told the crowd our program to expel Mexican illegals was a "military operation", but then his Sec of Homeland Security, a 4-Star Marine General (Ret), had to step up and say no, it was NOT a military operation.  Wha....what?

The only person who seems to be operating on the same wave length as the President is his Senior White House Adviser, Steve Bannon.  Not long ago I wondered aloud if Bannon was Trump's Rasputin?  (Grigori Rasputin was the glassy-eyed mystic/healer who became a favored adviser of the last Russian Czar after convincing him he could heal his seriously hemophiliac son.  He didn't, and his political advice reeked, too.)

Wanna hear an eerie coincidence?  I heard someone on TV recently say Steve Bannon's style was straight out of the playbook of Aleksandr Dugin, so I looked Dugin up and this is what I found:

Aleksandr Dugin

Aleksandr Gelyevich Dugin is a Russian political scientist known for his fascist views who calls to hasten the "end of times" with all out war.  Wikipedia

Essentially Dugin says push, coerce, intimidate, and if it takes a war in order to prevail, so be it.  A nuclear war isn't unthinkable.

And speaking of Russia, what's the deal with Trump's bro-mance with Russia / Putin?  When all our intel guys say they caught the Rooskies red handed meddling in our election, why does Trump just shuffle his feet and yell SQUIRREL?   

Why did Trump's man Flynn tell the Russian Ambassador to not worry about the sanctions we've placed on them?  First Flynn said he didn't say it, then admitted he did and was fired for it.  Now that's a scandal all by itself.  Why have Republicans so far tip-toed around investigating any of this?  (One Congressman lamely said an investigation would take up too much congressional "band width".  HUH?)  Why did Reince Priebus (Trump's Chief of Staff) ask the FBI to say it was no big deal?  Maybe it wasn't, we don't know, but there sure is a lot of smoke.  Something smells!

And just coincidentally, still speaking of Mother Russia, here are a few interesting facts:  Russians are seriously underperforming thinkers.  Russian's share of international patent applications is just two-tenth's of 1%, despite having 2% of the world's population and 5% of the world's college graduates.

Also, due to widespread excessive smoking and drinking, the life expectancy of the average Russian today is just 64, with a 15-year-old Russian boy having a life expectancy 3 years less than his counterpart in Haiti.   Haiti!  (Source: Forbes)

Yeah boy....we really should pal around more with those cool Russians.  Good guys to suck up to, Mr. Bannon.  *NOT*

S

LOOK....SQUIRREL!

...which suits Washington juuuuust fine!

I see the trend on social media these days is to swear off political posts.  "Enough already!  We only want good news for a change."  Well, I'm pretty sick of this Washington circus, too.

Only one problem:  The circus never takes any time off.  The circus is busy 24 / 7 / 365 screwing us over.  But if I take time off from posting political stuff, no one will know how bad we're getting ripped off, 'cause y'all will be too busy watching butterflies and sharing artichoke recipes.  So go ahead, watch butterflies....make a politicians day!  If we aren't watching them, they don't even have to pretend like they give a hoot about us.

We know all about the wall Mexico is going to pay for (but isn't), and the ban on immigrants from seven mid-east countries (never mind that they picked the wrong countries), and the new replacement for Obamacare (that they haven't a clue how to do), and the three million illegal voters who almost cost Donnie John Trump his election.  But that's OK, 'cause it sounds good on TV, right?  The folks back home think they're being looked after, and that's enough.

Meanwhile, Steve Mnuchin, (inmate #288356 if I had my way) is on his way to being our next Treasury Secretary, and Steve Bannon has his fat ass parked on President Trump's shoulder and is whispering sweet nothin's in his ear.

*Have you noticed that our Billionaire President is appointing other Billionaires to his cabinet and charging them with reforming the system that made them all Billionaires?*  

"Uhh, don't worry....nobody's watching.  Today why don't we gut that financial regulation thang that's gettin' in our banker buddies' way.  Oh, oh, and that Consumer Protection outfit that's protectin' consumers....consumers don't need no stinkin' protectin'!  Let's whack 'em both!"

Now don't get all smug, Democrats.  Y'all are swimming in the sewer right there with them.  You sold out to the special interests and didn't' even try to hide it!  You were afraid Lil' Bernie Sanders might muck up your Grand Plan, so you just conveniently slipped Hillary Clinton 500 free convention delegates.  "Order the confetti and balloons.  Par-tay!"

Fortunately for me I actually enjoy calling the bums out when I see them trying to put lipstick on their respective pigs.  

So read, don't read....your call.  But please, do me one favor.  Keep posting your funny memes and videos of stupid tricks gone awry.  I love that stuff.  :)

S