Talk:US presidential elections

Why Trump can't win

 * ''I originally wrote this as comment to Andrew Korybko's Facebook post. When the Washington Post published this I shared these points in a Facebook post.

Even if Trump gets a majority of the votes the chances of him actually becoming President are slim. Here are some of the tactics and tricks the Hillary camp could use to block his election. I cannot say what is the probability of these options, but they have all been tested in previous US sponsored color revolutions.
 * 1) Massive propaganda campaign will pressure the electorate to vote against their favorite candidate.
 * 2) If Trump still gets over 50% of the vote, the vote count will be falsified. (Something similar seems to have happened in the Austrian presidential election.)
 * 3) If the election results actually show a victory for Trump, the results will be annulled. DNC will claim that "Putin" hacked the voting machines. The Supreme Court will declare Hillary the winner.
 * 4) If all else fails, Hillary will call for a Maidan-style occupation of Washington DC. The revolutionaries will take over the Capitol and the White House -- with the support of pro-Hillary officials.

As of October 19th all of this is looking more and more likely. -- Petri Krohn (talk) 03:42, 19 October 2016 (UTC)

Discussion

 * Why Vladimir Putin's Russia Is Backing Donald Trump - Kurt Eichenwald, Newsweek‎, November 4, 2016
 * ''Operations have also been conducted in the United States, primarily out of New York City, Washington, D.C., and Miami. Those involved include a large number of Russian émigrés, as well as Americans and other foreign nationals. Intelligence operations in Europe and the U.S. have determined that the money these émigrés receive for their work is disguised as payments from a Russian pension system.
 * This looks potentially seriously phony, Russians receiving their pensions from the Russian government and posting their own views on social networks, happened to be pro-Trump, are cast as acting on the behalf of the Russian government. (Does he really believe that say little Odessa on Brighton Beach can be recruited by the Russian government??? What a schmack.) This makes about as much sense as claiming that Hungary is interfering on the side of Democrats in Soros disguise, and Czech and Slovak republics interfering in Madeline Albright disguise (while Ariel Sharon is British of Russian origin, etc). Maybe Bill Clinton is then Irish, or whatever one may say. If there is real content here, he should have provided real details, not just accuse with a broad brush; and all this looks especially bad taken into account reported details of his previous clash with Sputnik--he should really address those reported details.--Resup (talk) 09:11, 8 November 2016 (UTC)

"Enemy Combatants"

 * Russia’s cyberwar against America isn’t over — and the real target is democracy - Bob Cesca, Salon, March 28, 2017
 * ''Trump was placed in office by Putin. But it only happened because millions of Americans unknowingly volunteered to serve as enemy combatants, undermining and betraying their own country and their own democratic elections.
 * I know it's kind of sarcasm section, but still. This is usual trick of trying to cast domestic political opponents as foreign agents. Same old trick is used in Russia, where anybody receiving foreign funding and participating in politics or public discourse has to self-report as a foreign agent and possibly banned (+condemned abroad as undermining democracy). Effect of this, here and there, is stifling legitimate domestic political opposition. As far as I could observe, overwhelming bulk of support for Trump was coming from common folk worried about their jobs, economy, etc; and Trump was effective in connecting with those feelings in his 'make America great again' hat. Whatever else was going on (even if it was), was not making much difference, like a few drops in a river. This goes beyond humor, as sensible relations between the West and Russia could enable to solve a number of pressing problems, economic, reducing conflicts and violence levels, etc. With this empty talk, this is being made rather implausible politically, and steer the overall course along the lines advocated by the loosing side in the elections.  --Resup (talk) 10:21, 29 March 2017 (UTC)

APT28
'FireEye speculates that behind the hack of France’s TV5Monde television channel there is the popular APT28 that used the pseudonymous ISIS Cyber Caliphate' ,which they say 'is Fancy Bear'. --This sounds really weak. Say if there is a 'bad' IP in Chechnya or Dagestan, you cannot be really sure is it IS of Fancy Bear; could be using same IP domain or could be actually working for whoever pays more, too --Resup (talk) 17:11, 16 December 2016 (UTC)

Some history
In 1996, Yeltsin won his reelection campaign against communists (Ziuganov) with a lot of help from USA (under Bill Clinton presidency at the time). Yeltsin started his campaign with very low rating. Yeltsin used foreign advisers, US designed campaign methods, as well as indirect funding from IMF to solve pressing economic issues and increase his support. In the end, he won. Eventually, Yeltsin appointed Putin as his successor, and in effect he stayed to this day. All that indirectly makes Putin part of Clinton team --perhaps.
 * Moscow Journal;The Americans Who Saved Yeltsin (Or Did They?) -NY Times, 9 July 1996
 * ''The consultants -- George Gorton and Joseph Shumate, two former aides to Gov. Pete Wilson of California, and Richard Dresner, another adviser in Governor Wilson's failed Presidential campaign -- were hired as Yeltsin campaign consultants by Oleg D. Soskovets, a former Deputy Prime Minister, in February. He was dismissed as campaign manager by Mr. Yeltsin in March.
 * --Resup (talk) 11:00, 8 November 2016 (UTC)

Media coverage

 * CNN looks into April, 1' Russian FM voice message menu, 'to order services of Russian hackers press 2, etc', April 1, 2017

On polls
See also

In Russia, level of support of pres. Putin stays stably around 80 percent, according to all the three (essentially similar) pollster groups in Russia. What does this number signify? No Putin but Putin? Grigoriy Yudin has a succinct answer: it means nothing. Explanation? Domineering majority staying silent, or being afraid of the domineering majority. How that works? When a pollster comes, majority will not great him with 'I support Putin!'. Rather, -pollster, just go away! Those responding are doing a sort of social bargaining, hoping to have something sorted out (so cannot reject), or are afraid of others; or do not want to be or to feel isolated, or choosing the simplest ending to the situation and getting on with their day. In summary, the number of critically thinking-and doing it decisively - independents in Russia is under 20 %. Another sociologist/pollster is telling that this number at present is not at play, unlike other numbers it poorly correlates with other numbers or reacts to unfolding events, moving other numbers around.

In USA, number of people called independents is increasing and is around 43 percent. What does that mean? Not as much as it appears. In 2016 elections, using wikipedia numbers, only 5.73 % of votes voted outside of the Republican or Democrat choices. Can it be that a silent (or not so silent) majority essentially accepting things as they are, though in a 2 party duality way, is 94 % ? (Well, I am not a sociologist).

Another curious number, in May 2016 Gallup poll, Russians' Approval of U.S. Leadership Drops to Record 1%, the worst rating in the world and the lowest approval Gallup has measured for the U.S. in the past decade; (some 45% in the rest of the world). Well, it does not have to be that way, so something was clearly going very seriously wrong in that relationship. --Resup (talk) 02:59, 14 May 2017 (UTC)