This was not a target that was selected purely arbitrarily
A striking piece of news that will probably get lost in the breathless coverage of Trump’s deranged tweets:
The leaks and disclosures published by WikiLeaks in the run-up to the US presidential election this year were a “conscious effort by a nation-state to attempt to achieve a specific effect”, according to the director of the National Security Agency (NSA).
US intelligence chief Michael Rogers, who has managed the secretive agency since 2014, said during a Wall Street Journal conference on 15 November that Hillary Clinton’s presidential bid was hampered by state-sponsored hackers who worked to influence the outcome of the 2016 election.
“There shouldn’t be any doubt in anybody’s mind – this was not something that was done casually,” he said when asked about WikiLeaks’ publications. “This was not something that was done by chance. This was not a target that was selected purely arbitrarily.”
The director did not name the nation-state in question, however he is on-record as saying that “Russians were behind the penetrations” while previously discussing intrusions at the Democratic National Committee (DNC) and the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee.
It was a close election, to put it mildly. Clinton won the popular vote. Even if the highly selective Wikileaks “disclosures” moved only a relatively small number of people, that would be enough. They came in a rush after the “grab them by the pussy” tape and the third debate, when it looked as if Trump were toast. So if Rogers is right, Russia and Putin and Julian Assange saddled us all with that evil piece of shit.
Don’t forget the FBI director. His “we got more emails” announcement was perfectly timed to suppress interest in early voting, where Clinton had had a significant lead.
I haven’t forgotten Comey. And the Wikileaks leaks aren’t news…But the fact that the NSA chief is so unequivocal is still striking.
” Russia and Putin and Julian Assange saddled us with that piece of shit”
As far as I understand, Clinton received a majority of the popular vote, so it was the ridiculous electoral college system that saddled the US, and the world, with that ‘piece of shit’.
Here’s Assanges’s version of events.
https://newmatilda.com/2016/11/05/more-explosive-hillary-clinton-revelations-julian-assange-talks-to-john-pilger/
RJW:
Every four years Americans ask what the electoral college is…and then they go back to sleep.
The system can be worked by targeting important states. Voter suppression, disinformation, gutted public education etc. all contribute to the thwarting of the election process.
John the Drunkard,
I’ve noticed in discussions with Americans is that they generally lack interest in learning about other countries’ electoral systems, some of the problems that still plague US democracy have been remedied, at least partially, long ago, in other Western countries. I’m certainly not claiming that apathy and ignorance are confined to US voters, it’s universal. For example, the British actually voted in a plebiscite to retain the undemocratic first-past-the-post system.