One explanation I’ve heard for the Biden admin’s alarmist rhetoric on Ukraine (over Ukrainian objections) is that the U.S. is trying to throw Putin off balance by revealing that it knows a lot more about his plans than he expected. I don’t know if that’s true. But if so, here’s another manifestation of that same strategy:
WASHINGTON (AP) — U.S. intelligence officials on Tuesday accused a conservative financial news website with a significant American readership of amplifying Kremlin propaganda and alleged five media outlets targeting Ukrainians have taken direction from Russian spies.
The officials said Zero Hedge, which has 1.2 million Twitter followers, published articles created by Moscow-controlled media that were then shared by outlets and people unaware of their nexus to Russian intelligence. The officials did not say whether they thought Zero Hedge knew of any links to spy agencies and did not allege direct links between the website and Russia.
Zero Hedge denied the claims and said it tries to “publish a wide spectrum of views that cover both sides of a given story.” In a response posted online Tuesday morning, the website said it has “has never worked, collaborated or cooperated with Russia, nor are there any links to spy agencies.”
U.S. intelligence officials briefed the AP, which reported the story. The cries of neo-McCarthyism will be deafening from some quarters, but this strikes me as a good thing for two reasons.
The first is that pro-authoritarian Americans should at least have to produce their own fucking content. The second is that we’re several years into a democracy-threatening disinformation crisis that is fomented and/or abetted by foreign actors, so it’s time to try new tactics to fight back.
Will it work? I don’t know. But it’s past time to aggressively push back on this bullshit. I’d be in favor of going on offense too and hope that is also happening.
Open thread.
PJ
First! How’s that for original thought?
Urza
Problem with Russia injecting issues into the American body politic, they’ve been doing it since at least the 50s. Whether they are the original cause of some issues may never be known. But they certainly fomented anything they thought would weaken the American position. And back then it was by pushing what we now consider to be liberal ideology. Today it makes more sense for them to push the rightwing crap to sow chaos. In another 20 years who knows.
I would bet they were heavily behind the BernieBros mindset of not cooperating with Democrats.
PJ
I don’t know that’s there any way to reach the people who watch Fox or OAN. But I think misinformation and foreign interference in our politics have to be called out anyway. It’s just that it’s such a constant shitstream that no progress ever seems to be made. All this is aided and abetted by mainstream media determined to “both sides” everything and to treat Republicans as serious Daddys regardless of their unethical, immoral, or incompetent behavior.
The only idea I have, and not an original one, is to cut off the funding for these outlets and groups. That means taxing the would-be oligarchs (Kochs, Mercers, etc.) out the wazoo. And somehow shaming major corporations who advertise on Fox.
germy
Dog Dawg Damn
I’m longing for the days of “good news for John McCain” instead of media cheerleading authoritarian enemies.
SiubhanDuinne
@germy:
I just wanted to see that again so I could laugh some more.
Scout211
This is yet another reason why I am glad that I don’t do social media. The only tweets I read are those posted here and at times, I have to ignore them because they are often just so dramatic and over the top just to get the attention the sender seeks. If being noticed and retweeted is the goal, then accuracy and facts are just not all that important. Maybe Zero Hedge “has never worked, collaborated or cooperated with Russia, nor are there any links to spy agencies” but, they have absolutely no problem spreading anything and everything that just happens to drop into their inbox. Sheesh.
Oh, and get off my lawn! ?
germy
@SiubhanDuinne:
Maybe some of them wear prosthetics while they preach?
HumboldtBlue
Maybe we can get whoever these guys are fucking over the anti-mandate dipshits to do the same for FOX and OAN.
The entire thread is full of gold.
Betty Cracker
@Urza: Injecting propaganda isn’t new, but the ability to instantly and efficiently broadcast it to target audiences is.
JCJ
@HumboldtBlue: I dare not search, but may I assume “Ram Ranch” is not an agricultural facility raising male sheep?
catclub
@SiubhanDuinne:
apparently Meghan does not have a real leg to stand on in an argument.
HumboldtBlue
@JCJ:
Not in the slightest!
It’s far raunchier than you even suspect.
Baud
Why do you think their propaganda is more enticing to people than our propaganda?
Cermet
Russia is very much our enemy – we have many ICBM’s pointed at them and they at us – yes, this is a ‘duh’ statement. NATO is our military alliance – the worlds greatest military – the largest and most advanced air force, surface air defense systems, artillery forces and highly trained/elite divisions of land soldiers feared world wide for their strength, fighting ability and command structure as well as naval forces bar none – all of this is directly oriented at Russia. They, strangely (god only knows why) have an army/air force also oriented towards this force (ignoring the forces they keep in Asia for similar reasons against China.) Hope people here follow this.
They in turn have no real allies, are a joke economically compared to any of its significant opponents – so asymmetric cold warfare is certainly their best option – surprise, surprise amerikans.
That their entire and wide open southern border in Europe might turn hostile and host NATO – a fact that just might concern them to a level (and bear with me here) that they’d consider it a very significant and dangerous development. But I know – putin is a bad guy (raised in the cold war as KGB and thinks nothing of murdering opponents) and we are always the good guys! NATO is no threat to Russia … our thousands of ICBM’s, the dozens of UK & French ICBM’s (and all three of us have boomers, too) are solely not a threat just like their’s aren’t a threat … . So why can’t putin just accept this and roll over and let us and Europe enable any country on Russia’s border to join NATO … I mean, freedom is the right to join a military alliance that threatens anyone they want and tough sh$t to the country that it is geared to fight. Am I right?
Baud
@germy:
Reminds me of MTG’s recent gaspacho police thing. I do wonder how many right-wingers do it on purpose to get retweeted by liberals.
MattF
@Baud: Maybe because RW propaganda requires a suspension of disbelief. Rationality can be very tiresome.
Omnes Omnibus
No.
Urza
@Baud: American propaganda, through the decades, looks like propaganda, at least inside the country. Theirs tends to be things people agree with but don’t see much of in society, or things they think are hidden like UFOs or lizard people. What if all the Area 51 crap was Russia trying to get us to admit whats being tested there. Or just our own propaganda to hide something that got loose.
RandomMonster
I’ve come across Zero Hedge before, because it would publish anti-vax nonsense that would be banned from other platforms. The anti-vax BS could’ve been fed from Russian sources for all I know. I suppose they don’t have to be knowing agents of Russia, though I would hardly be surprised if they were.
Brachiator
@Cermet:
No. But thanks for playing.
Roger Moore
@Baud:
I can think of two reasons:
I’ve made point 2 for a while. One of the things that makes the Republican party so dangerous is that it’s basically turned into the club for people willing to believe anything. This also explains why right wing media is so much more profitable than left wing media: advertisers, especially advertisers who want to sell bullshit with a massive markup, desperately want that audience.
MikefromArlington
Used to read zero hedge back during the Obama years then it all kinda got weird there.
OldDave
P. J. O’Rourke has passed at age 74.
Dorothy A. Winsor
Biden was just on my car radio speaking about Ukraine. He said Russia claims to be withdrawing but US intelligence hasn’t verified it yet. He sounded willing to negotiate but not willing to capitulate. He took no questions from reporters.
Omnes Omnibus
@OldDave: A Bachelor’s Home Companion was a brilliant book.
germy
@OldDave:
Old School
@Cermet: How would taking over Ukraine lessen Russia’s exposure to NATO?
Brachiator
@Roger Moore:
Is it possible also that there are people who want to be fooled? People whose lives are built around an ideology or delusion.
And it is easy to sell simple lies to people who want to believe.
On a trivial, almost harmless level, I would see this in people who deeply believed in astrology. And no matter what you did to disprove it, people would nod their head and continue to believe.
It is easy to remember 12 star signs and the positive and negative attributes. And like Wordle, reading your horoscope is Fun! and easy to find this stuff all over the place.
People watch Fox News because it makes them feel good and happy. Even serves them up people to hate.
And people are not forced to watch Fox News. It’s there, waiting for them. Waiting with lots of goodies that they can fill up on.
PJ
@germy: Yeah, he was an unfunny right wing dick, but within normal parameters.
Philbert
@Baud: We are idealistic amatuers. We think the truth will out on its own. Their propaganda is coordinated reinforcement of simple messages designed to be attractive.
Old School
@Baud: Out of curiosity, what are you considering to be “our propaganda”?
PJ
@Cermet: Yeah, I don’t know why those former Soviet and Warsaw Pact countries would want to join NATO, not after the Soviet Union swallowing up the Baltics and half of Poland at the start of WWII, the Cold War invasions of Hungary and Czechoslovakia, and the more recent Russian invasions of Ukraine (twice in the past decade). Must be a NATO mind-control plot.
Scout211
@Philbert:
Yes, and we value the content of the message. They don’t have any concerns about the content of the message as long as the message triggers divisiveness and chaos.
Mallard Filmore
@Cermet: The East European countries were abused by Russia, starting (I am not a historian, maybe it goes back much farther) when the Soviet armies chased the Nazis back to Berlin.
It should not be a surprise that these same countries want to protect themselves from falling into yet another foul relationship with Russia.
MattF
@Baud: Also, e.g., Fox is very smart about appealing to people’s needs. Calling their morning show ‘Fox and Friends’ is just brilliant- who doesn’t want a friend?
Bill Arnold
Saw that news and immediately read it as (among a few other things) a warning shot at Fox News/Newsmax/OAN/etc.
Zerohedge has always been into tactical use of disinformation/misinformation, though usually it is selfish personal gain.
Betty Cracker
@Cermet: I don’t think Putin is irrational to fear the potential influence of the EU or NATO on his border — he’s a corrupt authoritarian, and he’s afraid Western democracy, such as it is, might be contagious given the shitty alternative he’s offering.
But the thing is, it’s not up to the U.S. to dictate what Ukraine does or what NATO does. Ukraine is a sovereign nation. NATO is an alliance between sovereign nations. You either accept that, or, like Putin, you don’t.
Roger Moore
@Mallard Filmore:
It goes back further. There’s no love lost between, say, Poland and Russia. And if you want to understand why Ukraine might not want Russians in charge, read about the Holodomor.
a thousand flouncing lurkers was fidelio
Welp. I just got an email at work telling me to be especially aware of emails that are potential Russian cyberattack attempts. I’m glad the Social Security Administration is on their toes and I do hope things like the TVA are as well.
MattF
@Betty Cracker: As Timothy Snyder notes here.
PJ
@Old School: Foolish American, can’t you see? A Russian invasion of Ukraine is the one thing that will cause NATO to not consider Russia a threat anymore. I mean, I wouldn’t be surprised if NATO just decides to dissolve after Russia invades a neighboring nation and kills and wounds tens of thousands of people in the process.
HinTN
@Brachiator:
H.L. Mencken and P.T. Barnum would endorse this in the affirmative.
dmsilev
@Cermet: You persist in reversing the causal direction. Nobody was seriously talking about even the possibility of Ukraine joining NATO sometime in the far and indefinite future until Putin started with the saber-rattling and the threats. Once he did that, nobody should be surprised that Ukraine reacted by looking around for allies.
geg6
@Cermet:
WTF is wrong with you, posting this bullshit pro-Putin propaganda here? No one agrees. Go post this shit at Tucker Carlson’s place or something.
Miss Bianca
@Cermet: So, when did you turn into a Russian propagandist, anyway? And, are you getting paid for your services? I would hate to think you were doing it for free.
Ksmiami
@Brachiator: 1 word; 3 syllables rhymes with pigeon. The rightwingers are the religiously deluded so of course they fall for Fox et al. If you believe that a magical sky god wants kids to go hungry, you will believe anything
Bill Arnold
@Cermet:
Read the wikipedia pages on the process of accession to full NATO membership (including one specific to Ukraine), and on territorial integrity, and observe how the Russians have invaded pieces of Georgia and Ukraine to put a blocker in the path towards such accession. Yeah, there is dispute on this, but the arguments on the side of “territorial disputes don’t matter” kinda suck. So Russia basically has what it wants already, especially after issuing Russian passports to a large number of Ukrainians in the East.
(So why is Putin doing this buildup of offensive forces near Ukraine? There are no significant maneuvers, just placement.)
Cacti
Remember, Bernie’s chief consultant in 2016 was Tad Devine.
A guy who spent time in Ukraine working with Paul Manafort for Kremlin flunky Viktor Yanukovych.
Doug R
@MikefromArlington: I remember Zero Hedge got linked from Calculated Risk back in the day. Which was a bit more balanced when the late Tanta (Doris Dungee) was there. Even back then it was infested with Ron Paul acolytes.
CaseyL
@OldDave: He has said two correct things in his entire life.
1. That the GOP says govt doesn’t work, then gets elected and proves it
2. Admitted his “anti war” stance during the Viet Nam era was done just to get laid, and had nothing to do with his actual philosophy.
Other than that, a nasty piece of work.
Steeplejack (phone)
@JCJ:
You may.
Doug R
@Old School:
It would give them more Lebensraum?
germy
Dan B
Has anyone seen the reports that there are multiple cyber attacks in Ukraine today? The report comes to me from my partner who has been listening to Thom Hartman. I haven’t found reports from Huffpost or The Guardian.
The Pale Scot
Serious ??, Can dildo ads be rejected by a TV station if they are done “tastefully” a la no pics? Can a TV station reject an ad of a non existent leather bar done “tastefully” There would seem to be a 1st Amendment thing here. Get the Clowns Against Fascism squad to do ads “White Flower! White Flower!
The next phase of guerrilla theater.
Jeffro
@OldDave:
wow
@Omnes Omnibus: yes it was! It’s the only one of his books I’ve kept over the years…he signed it at a bookstore back in ’95, just after I got engaged to the future Mrs. Fro.
(inscription: “To Jeffro: kiss it goodbye!”)
LOL
I might just have to pour one out for ol’ PJ
Jeffro
@germy: omg I’m dying, that’s awesome
The Pale Scot
OMG, a cracker version of Miss Cleo. Sucking the crackers dry, that’s a business opportunity it is
JustRuss
Shame. He was certainly problematic, but I saw him speak once and he was pretty entertaining. And Parliament of Whores is worth a read.
Doug R
@Roger Moore: My father was born in 1922. My grandfather took his young family and fled Ukraine just before the Holodomor. Fortunately Canada took them in.
Peale
@Betty Cracker: I think Russia does want the US out of Europe just like China wants us out of East Asia, but neither country is going to be capable or willing to keep the peace. They want things, and while the alliance prevents those things from happening, it also prevents other things from happening.
If you were born after WWII, you really don’t have much memory of Europeans at war with each other. Both NATO and the Warsaw Pact were good at forcing European countries into two large alliances. So we didn’t have Greece, Turkey, Bulgaria, Hungary, Poland and Romania at war with each other. Which they were almost constantly in the 20 years before WWI and the 10 years after WWI and would have been after WWII if that could be prevented. NATO and the EU has managed to pull in pretty much every country that might want to redraw its borders except Serbia. Its simply not necessary, say, for Romania to drive out its Hungarians or Poland to wonder if some sections of Ukraine shouldn’t belong to it. And with the US there, there isn’t a worry that maybe Germany might use the alliance for expansion, which would flip out everyone.
Roger Moore
@The Pale Scot:
AFAIK, TV stations that broadcast ads have a legal requirement to accept political ads, but they have no obligation to accept any other ad. They don’t even have to provide a reason why they aren’t broadcasting it.
debbie
@Peale:
Seriously? They haven’t abolished history classes, at least to my knowledge. I had all kinds of history classes and I am very clear on European history.
P.S. I was born after WWII.
Doug R
@Cacti: Here’s BFFs Tad Devine, Paul Manafort and GRU agent Konstantin Kilimnik together in Ukraine working to elect the pro-Russian candidate back in 2006:
https://twitter.com/puestoloco/status/1099752913763778560?lang=eu
debbie
@OldDave:
Hated his politics, esp. pre-Trump, but he was definitely funny.
Roger Moore
@Peale:
One thing NATO has certainly done is reduce the need for nuclear proliferation in Europe. If disbanded, just about every country near Russia would be considering if nuclear weapons would be a good idea as a deterrent.
Baud
@Old School:
Whatever we refer to when using the more genteel term “messaging.”
Including things like “democracy is good” and “vaccines are safe and effective.”
Burnspbesq
@The Pale Scot:
Absolutely. Where’s the state action?
mrmoshpotato
How does the Kremlin’s cock taste, Zero Hedge?
Is the zero for zero brains?
Oh, and BOTH SIDES! DRINK!
Betty Cracker
@Peale: Good points. I’ve sometimes wondered if NATO should have been dissolved after the USSR folded, but like you said, its existence constrains a whole bunch of bad impulses. I do worry about the changing character of member nations like Hungary and Turkey.
debbie
@germy:
She makes me dizzy the way she keeps changing from one side to the other and back again. ?
Jeffro
@mrmoshpotato: triple win here
Gin & Tonic
@Dan B: Yes.
mrmoshpotato
@Jeffro: They really hit the trifecta of stupid.
ETA – the name reeks of “We’re not taking sides.” and the No Labels asshats.
tybee
@OldDave:
damn. he was a funny guy back in the day.
Cameron
@Cermet: You’re sounding as out of touch as this guy….and what would he know, anyway?
https://asiatimes.com/2022/02/is-the-ukraine-crisis-just-another-us-charade/
laura
@Doug R: Tanta, blessed be her memory.
Same with me, wandered over to ZH from Calcukated Risk and its was way wierd bro-y before I knew that was a thing. Skeeked out and skaddled away from that and any Reason type nonsense.
Another Scott
@Brachiator: I think it’s all that and more. Many of us were brought up on the Disney version of American history. Give Me Liberty or Give Me Death. God and Country. Lone Virtuous Man Against the Corrupt Society. Etc.
When people buy into that, it’s very disturbing when they find out that history is actually much more complicated. That the US invaded Canada in the War of 1812 and we got our butts kicked. That we actually haven’t kept our word to native Americans. That slavery actually was very, very bad and 12 US presidents owned slaves at some point (including Grant).
When you tell people that their foundational stories are wrong, you’re inviting pushback.
And that’s a big reason why the RWNJs work so hard to control public education.
‘Give me a child till he is seven years old,’ said St Ignatius Loyola, ‘ and I will show you the man.’
The GQP and Fox have hijacked the foundational stories because they know they are so powerful for many Americans.
Lots and lots of things are connected…
Cheers,
Scott.
Another Scott
@Dan B: The KyivIndependent has a story on it, here:
More at the link.
HTH.
Cheers,
Scott.
Benw
@germy: hahaha “convicted arsonist’ haha!
Gin & Tonic
@Cameron: A couple of thousand words there without any of them positing that Ukraine is a sovereign nation, entitled to make its own decisions.
Baud
@Another Scott:
We would have won if it weren’t for the hippies.
The Pale Scot
@Roger Moore:
HHmmmm……
Politcal dildo ads, I can work with that
Senator X is a dildo…. explain how a dildo stimulates certain neurological processes that are similar to political propaganda.
Yeh, that will work.
mrmoshpotato
@Benw:
@germy: Points off for not mentioning her moose lover.
trollhattan
@Baud:
And Walter Cronkite. “Verily, having traveled to the distant northern lands to witness for my own self their battlefield travails, I forsee no path to victory for our brave militias.”
“Yew, bastard, have at you!”
sdhays
@Bill Arnold: Russia is “concerned” about NATO because it is run by a crime cartel. A government without a crime-cartel perspective would be interested in joining and dominating the EU.
different-church-lady
Zero Hedge? Aren’t they the ones who used to get amplified by some of the most gullible Kossacks back in the day?
Subsole
@HumboldtBlue:
I seriously wonder what would happen if the entire country just started mailing Tucker Carlson dildos, like they did to those yahoos at Malheur Preserve.
Just day after day after day. Dildos.
I give it a week before he cracks.
Subsole
@Baud:
Because our propaganda is fact based and speaks to the mind, largely.
Theirs is utter horseshit that is designed from the ground up to get emotional responses – basically, it gets them strung out on adrenalin and fear hormones.
Omnes Omnibus
@Subsole: He might enjoy them. Not that there anything wrong with that.
Brachiator
@Another Scott:
This is true, but it goes beyond politics. Still I take your point here. I remember reading somewhere that the founding of the United States was inter-twined with the founding of the government, and along with this came feverish dreams of Manifest Destiny and the idea of a unique and exceptional American Experiment. This makes it hard for some people to recognize problems that may need to be fixed, even though that is also part of the country’s history.
So, when I was a teen, there were America, love it or leave it types. And people who just did not want to hear bad news about the country. This leads up in modern time to “Make America Great Again,” which includes the scummy idea that bad people have prevented the country from being as great as it once was, in the old days when people shut up and obeyed.
When I was in school I learned about Andrew Jackson and the Battle of New Orleans, but not much else about the War of 1812. I am still unclear how Canada views it. But I have read British history where the war is barely even mentioned, because the Brits were still dealing with that Bonaparte fellow.
But yeah, Andrew Jackson’s “victory” was used to imply that the US had won overall.
And the US entered WW1 and WW2 because we were also great and pure and good.
jackmac
@OldDave:
O’Rourke was a very rare combination: a conservative who was also often funny.
Subsole
@Omnes Omnibus:
Yeah. He might laugh about it.
Now, Bill’o the Clown? THAT dude’d drop from apoplexy in 48 hours…
persistentillusion
@debbie: Think of the time you and Germy could save by never considering her at all. Bonus, it would make Megan McArglebargle unhappy!
sab
@Dan B: Heard that also on NPR All Things Consideredl
sab
@Brachiator: Canadians remember that a bunch of Kentuckians burned Toronto and a lot of the Ontario peninsula in February, leaving all those homeless people to freeze and starve. That’s why the Brits later burned the White House.
I didn’t learn that until college history, even though American soldiers were stationed a quarter mile from where my house is in Ohio, waiting for British soldiers.
pajaro
@Cermet:
Russia, one of the constituent republics of the USSR, specifically signed an agreement to respect the territorial integrity of Ukraine when the USSR dissolved as a partial result of which Ukraine decommissioned its nuclear arsenal.
I understand the differences between Putin and Hitler, but one thing that unites them is the belief that they have the right to redress the wrongs of an unfair ending of a war and, in particular, to act to change facts on the ground in aid of members of their respective etnicities located outside of the mother country. For better or worse, one of the pillars of the post World War II legal order and one of the foundations of the UN Charter is the prohibition of acquiring territory of another country by force, and it was written to forestall a repetition of what Germany had done in places like the Sudentenland.
Russia has violated that principle on four occasions since the breakup of the USSR–by incursions into Abhzia and South Osettia in Georgia, by its incursion into Eastern Ukraine and by its invasion and annexation of Crimea.
The turn toward NATO by Ukraine follows, not precedes, these Russian actions. The Russian demands of Ukraine include demands concerning the treatment of Russian speakers in the Donbass area of Eastern Ukraine, which seem to have much to do with what it sees as its rights with respect to Russian speaking individuals, rather than as a result of fears of any military alliance. Some of the press from Russia I have read specifically refers to Russian-speaking Eastern Ukrainians as Russians, a signal that they believe they have the right to absorb yet another portion of a sovereign country.
I believe to the extent Russia has desires with respect to Ukraine, it has to do with an effort to reconstitute the Russian or Soviet empires, a point which Putin as more or less made himself. To the extent Putin has fears, I believe they have much more to do with economic ties than with any military alliance. For if there is one thing that nuclear power Russia does not really have to fear from us, (and even less from Ukraine) it’s a military takeover.
@debbie:
Well, there was that Serbia, Croatia Bosnia thing, with ethnic cleansing and massacres of prisoners, followed by the International criminal tribunal for the former Yugoslavia, and the Kosovo thing, with US troops in a peacekeeping role, but other than those two (or three) bloody events, not so much.
Dopey-o
Europe has always seen petty, endless wars. Pope Innocent ginned up the Crusades to stop the bloodletting on the home court. Who knows what Saladin would have accomplished in Palestine, had the Vatican not picked up a small country and slammed them against the wall?