They Doth Not Protest Enough, Methinks

Last night after I was done writing I learned that someone had leaked documents to The Intercept showing that the NSA knew about a Russian attempt to hack election officials and an election software company before the November 2016 election.

I found a discussion of this on social media, and apparently knowledgeable people in it said that what The Intercept published didn’t indicate that the Russians had succeeded in changing election results. What I’ve said all along: Whatever the Russians might have done, even if they hadn’t done it Hillary Clinton probably would have lost, anyway.

But this morning I fully expected to find media erupting in news about What Did the NSA Know, and When Did They Know It? Instead, it’s mostly subdued news stories about the NSA leaker.

If I were a suspicious sort of person, I would find this odd.

9 thoughts on “They Doth Not Protest Enough, Methinks

  1. What’s scary is, I heard that the election turned on a relatively tiny number of votes. Something like, if Hillary could have flipped 100,000 votes in 3 states, she would have eked out a victory. It wouldn’t take a lot!

    It could be that there’s some restraint being shown – there’s no sense in ginning up a panic over voting integrity until you know things are real problems. Damn shame that couldn’t be used when people are ginning up a casus belli, for example.

  2. Reality Leigh Winner. Someone named a kid Reality Leigh Winner?

    I have ocean front property for sale. Cheap. Cash only, in small bills.

  3. “What I’ve said all along: Whatever the Russians might have done, even if they hadn’t done it Hillary Clinton probably would have lost, anyway.”

    Maybe but who can be sure? Me thinks eventually we will find the the ruskies were using Trumpsters and a company called “Cambridge Analytica” (the mercer klan) to micro target precincts in MI, WI, and PA with fake news, exaggerated DNC leak info, etc. I really can’t believe that minus the hack and the targeted misinformation and the added Comey business Hill would have lost, but that’s the thing about reality there are no do-overs so who can really say? One thing is for sure we’d be better off with Hillz!

    • “Maybe but who can be sure?” We can’t be sure; with so many variables there’s no way to know for sure. However, by itself it wasn’t the decisive factor. That Clinton was an unappealing candidate who ran an out of touch campaign set up a situation in which all kinds of factors could do her in, and did.

  4. I don’t believe, as many have been saying, that regardless of any of these events, Clinton would have lost anyway. Some have even resorted to putting an even more impossible spin on it, i.e. there was nothing she could have done to win in 2016. IMO its an excuse for Clinton not having run a more strategic and tactically effective campaign. This was her campaign to lose, and unfortunately she did.

    Clinton herself just a few days ago said she was on her way to winning and would have had Comey not intervened with his own version of Fake News a week before the election. This ignores that fact that MI and WI were certainly winnable, but the campaign made too many incorrect assumptions about these states that led them to not invest the level of resources they should have. Many democratic activists on the ground in MI and WI complained about this at the time, unfortunately to no avail.

    That the media isn’t focusing on what they NSA may have known is yet another fail for them. Instead, they will focus the story on one of the “leakers” Trump has tried to make the Russia investigation about so as to take the focus off him and his campaign. Regardless of the fact that leaking is a crime, there is more substance in what was revealed that cries out for more digging and follow up that is much more important to the issue at hand, potential treasonous collusion with Russia

  5. In the swing states that Clinton lost by narrow margins, GOP state legislatures and election officials had eliminated hundreds of thousands of voters from registration lists, disenfranchising mostly minorities who could be considered reliable D voters. If not for this blatant denial of the right to vote, Clinton would have one at least a couple of those states handily and with them, the Electoral vote count and the Presidency.

    And yet, nobody at DNC or her campaign ever mentions this as a reason for her loss. They failed to contest the disenfranchisement when it was happening, failed to challenge the election results in these states where so many of their own voters were prevented from voting, and they don’t mention it now.

    • “In the swing states that Clinton lost by narrow margins, GOP state legislatures and election officials had eliminated hundreds of thousands of voters from registration lists, disenfranchising mostly minorities who could be considered reliable D voters.”

      Sorry, but most close analysis of the vote says that excuse doesn’t fly, either. See Vox, Voter suppression didn’t cost Hillary Clinton the election.

  6. It’s a bit early, but let’s game this out. Suppose that investigation proves that Russian hacking did, arguably, swing the election towards Trump, with Trump’s and R agreement and assistance. Let’s say that the argument isn’t 100% sure about the swing, but it’s more than 50%, and it is 100% sure that Trump and the R’s cooperated.

    What then? We cry treason and usurpation, Trump’s base shrugs, the R’s put their fingers in their ears and hum real loud, and even more independents abandon him. What after that?

    Roadside signs? Demonstrations? Marches? Protests? Write your congressperson, demand impeachment? All of the above, of course, but I feel that something creative is called for. Concerts? Symbolic funerals for Democracy? Sit-ins around the White House? Flag washings?

    Any suggestions?

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