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"Russia Interfered!" – By Purchasing Anti-Trump Ads?

from Moon of Alabama


After the ludicrous “Russian hacking” claims have died down for lack of evidence, the attention was moved to even more ludicrous claims of “Russian ads influenced the elections”. Some readers are upset that continue to debunk the nonsense the media spreads around this. But lies should not stand without response. If only to blame the reporters and media who push this dreck.
As evidence is also lacking for any “Russian interference” claims the media outlets have started to push deceiving headlines. These make claims that are not covered at all by the content of the related pieces. The headlines are effective because less than 20% of the viewers ever read beyond them.
On the NYT Homepage today we find another one of these: Google Finds Russia Bought Ads to Interfere in Election.
Google has found no ads that “Russia”, the state or nation, has bought. There is also no evidence that the ads in question interfered in any way with the election. There is evidence that any of the ads in questions aimed to achieve that. The opener of the piece repeats the false headline claims. But now we have “Russian agents”, not “Russia”, which allegedly did something.

Google has found evidence that Russian agents bought ads on its wide-ranging networks in an effort to interfere with the 2016 presidential campaign.

The term “Russian agents” is not defined at all. Where these “secret agents” or Public Relation professionals in Washington DC hired by some Russian entity?

Using accounts believed to be connected to the Russian government, the agents purchased $4,700 worth of search ads and more traditional display ads, according to a person familiar with the company’s inquiry…

“Accounts believed to be connected to the Russian government.” Believed by whom? And how is “connected” defined? Isn’t any citizen “connected” to his or her government?
Those believed, connected accounts bought a whopping $4,700 of ads? Googles 2016 revenue was $89,000,000,000. The total campaign expenditures in 2016 were some $6,000,000,000. The Clinton campaign spent some $480,000 on social network ads alone. But something “Russian” spending $4,700 was “interference”?
But wait. There is more:

Google found a separate $53,000 worth of ads with political material that were purchased from Russian internet addresses, building addresses or with Russian currency. It is not clear whether any of those were connected to the Russian government, and they may have been purchased by Russian citizens, the person said.

So now we are on to something. A full $53,000 worth of ads. But…

The messages of those ads spanned the political spectrum. One account spent $7,000 on ads to promote a documentary called “You’ve Been Trumped,” a film about Donald J. Trump’s efforts to build a golf course in Scotland along an environmentally sensitive coastline. Another spent $36,000 on ads questioning whether President Barack Obama needed to resign. Yet another bought ads to promote political merchandise for Mr. Obama.

The film is anti-Trump. Obama not resigning would have been anti-Trump. Selling Obama merchandise may have been good business, but is certainly not pro-Trump. So at least $43,000 of a total of $53,000 mentioned above was spent by believed, connected “Russians” on ads that promoted anti-Trump material. How does that fit with the claims that “Russia” wished to get Trump elected? Putin pushed the wrong button?
The allegedly “Russian” Facebook ads were just a click-bait scheme by some people trying to make money. The allegedly “Russian” Goggle ads were of a volume that is unlikely to have made any difference in anything. They were also anti-Trump.
Clinton lost because people on all sides had learned to dislike her policies throughout the years. She was unelectable. Her party was and is acting against the interest of the common people. No claim of anything “Russian” can change those facts.


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Peter
Peter
Oct 18, 2017 10:38 AM

The story is kept running with this garbage on today’s (October 18) Graun website, signed “Shaun Walker in Moscow”:
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/oct/17/russian-troll-factory-activists-protests-us-election
Read it and weep (or laugh). You don’t seem to be able to comment. I don’t know if they actually expect anyone to believe it (except those who are already convinced), but I suppose its aim is to contribute to the background noise.

Alan
Alan
Oct 11, 2017 8:29 PM

Looking at Mr Trump in action one would never believe Mrs Clinton lost.

Dominic Pukallus
Dominic Pukallus
Oct 11, 2017 10:00 PM
Reply to  Alan

Well, no WWIII just yet. Touch wood.

JGarbo
JGarbo
Oct 16, 2017 8:09 AM
Reply to  Alan

Trump is doing his job well, distracting the public with his antics while his masters keep plugging along undermining any hope of change or even criticism. The Deep State were correct. Hillary was so loathsome that the public would have looked elsewhere than her ravings to work for change. Afghanistan drags on, Syrian invasion and occupation off the news. Everyone’s focused on the phony pivot, the phony NK threat. DS has won again.

rtj1211
rtj1211
Oct 11, 2017 7:07 PM

Clinton lost because she went politically insane, seriously thinking that saying she would nuke Russia made her a fit and proper person to be
president. It should disbar her from running her local bring-and-buy….
I would not trust Donald Trump with any daughter of mine, but I would rather an over-sexed philanderer than a genocidal psychopath having their finger on the nuclear trigger, thank you very much.
I do not approve of his approach to North Korea and I hope he exposes all the subsidies Boeing gets if US is getting uppity about Bombardier…..
And I fervently hope the Democrats realise that better never to have a woman President than a nuclear-armageddon-triggering nutcase is the best hope they have to getting elected again any time soon…..
America decided to f**k someone else, just like naughty ol’ Bill did…..

JGarbo
JGarbo
Oct 16, 2017 8:20 AM
Reply to  rtj1211

Wishful thinking. Trump will follow orders, as he has from Day 1. His more outrageous Executive decrees are ignored, the trifles amended to nothingness. Watching from the outside, it reminds one of the Honeymooners – The obese Ralph threatening Alice, “to the moon.” Yet we all knew he was just gas.
As for the “nukes”, Bannon hinted at Trump’s “Achilles heel” (I use the phrase loosely): The 25th Amendment, which Trump hadn’t heard of. “What’s that?” That’s how the Congress removes an “unfit” president without impeachment, ie without evidence. Too much nuke talk, threatening genocide at the UN, brings Trump closer to #25. Pence takes over. The gray blanket descends. All protest is silenced.

goldsteinweb
goldsteinweb
Oct 11, 2017 4:20 PM

Very good article. Thank you. The NYT is ridiculous beyond believe.

rehmat1
rehmat1
Oct 11, 2017 2:28 PM

Several of America’s close allies such as Israel, Britain and Iran have interfered in American elections.
https://rehmat1.com/2017/01/24/when-uk-and-iran-interfered-in-us-elections/

Frank
Frank
Oct 11, 2017 3:28 PM
Reply to  rehmat1

The United States also interfered in both the Scottish Independence referendum as well as the UK’s referendum on the continued presence of the UK in the Eurozone. And on both occasions, high-ranking US officials, including Obama, made it explicit that it would be the worse for Britain if both the referenda went the wrong way.
The US establishment must really have the patent on double standards, they almost invented the practice.

summitflyer
summitflyer
Oct 11, 2017 2:28 PM

And on and on it goes.It is truly getting sickening already . Retards , that pose as journalists.

Harry Stotle
Harry Stotle
Oct 11, 2017 2:19 PM

‘Clinton lost because people on all sides had learned to dislike her policies throughout the years. She was unelectable’ – if I was an American citizen I would be far more alarmed about the fact the choice of president came down to such low calibre candidates rather than media accusations about an unlikely FB campaign.
What sane person would vote for either of them, its like being asked if you would prefer to be afflicted by adanced dementia or terminal cancer.

tubularsock
tubularsock
Oct 11, 2017 4:40 PM
Reply to  Harry Stotle

That is a very good point. The U.S. already has “terminal cancer” so we went for dementia! That’s Americans for you. In the country that “thinks?” is the best the candidates came down to turd and turdess. Tubularsock flushed!

Caro
Caro
Oct 11, 2017 2:15 PM

Unfortunately this article needs proofreading.

bevin
bevin
Oct 11, 2017 3:53 PM
Reply to  Caro

That is just Bernhard doing his best in a language which he has not quite mastered.
It is a tiny price to have to pay for his honesty and analytical powers. Over more than a decade ‘b’ at Moon of Alabama has been an invaluable source of all that is best about the internet and an antidote to the lies of Imperialism’s propagandists.

tubularsock
tubularsock
Oct 11, 2017 4:42 PM
Reply to  Caro

The PROOF is within the reading!

David Simpson
David Simpson
Oct 12, 2017 8:08 AM
Reply to  Caro

everything needs proofreading (but yes I agree, several important missing words here)