Breitbart News |
Report: FBI Using 'Peeing Russian Prostitutes' Dossier as 'Roadmap' for 2016 Investigation
Breitbart News He also raised questions about the dossier written by a former British intelligence officer, which alleged a conspiracy between the Trump campaign and Russia. … Morell pointed out that former Director of National Intelligence James Clapper said on ... Russian diplomat under U.S. scrutiny in election meddling speaksMcClatchy Washington Bureau Trump Russia dossier key claim 'verified'BBC News all 23 news articles » |
Washington Post (blog) |
How Donald Trump is already creating a world of chaos
Washington Post (blog) But now Donald Trump is president, and the whole world knows that they'd better watch themselves. Or maybe not. Maybe Trump's “America first” foreign policy is a signal to the world that as long as you don't directly threaten whatever Trump happens to ... A Western leader showed class and clarity in the face of Assad's chemical attack, but it wasn'tDonald TrumpQuartz President Trump on Syrian Chemical Weapons Attack: 'It Crossed A Lot of Lines For Me'TIME Donald Trump: I'm Not Going to Tell You What I'll Do in SyriaBreitbart News NBCNews.com -Whitehouse.gov (press release) -The Independent all 2,066 news articles » |
Raw Story |
Mike Flynn's son lashes out after Bannon's demotion — and questions Trump's desire to fight 'radical Islam'
Raw Story Michael Flynn Jr., the son of former Trump National Security Adviser Michael Flynn, lashed out at his father's successor on Twitter Tuesday. Reacting to the news that top Trump political strategist Steve Bannon had been removed from the National ... Flynn's Son Lashes Out At Trump Adviser Who Replaced His Dad: 'Is WH Serious?'TPM all 4 news articles » |
The Hill (blog) |
Michael Flynn Jr. blasts Bannon's removal from National Security Council
The Hill (blog) Michael Flynn Jr., the son of President Trump's former national security adviser, Michael Flynn, is taking aim at the White House's decision to remove Stephen Bannon from the National Security Council (NSC), suggesting on Wednesday that the ... Bannon removed from National Security Council roleCNN Bannon Taken Off Trump National Security Council in Shake-UpBloomberg White House official offers baffling explanation: Bannon added to security council to watch overFlynnRaw Story NBC Bay Area -NBCNews.com all 424 news articles » |
Russian banker convicted in US spy ring deported to Moscow
euronews U.S. prosecutors said they had worked with the Russian intelligence service and conspired to gather economic intelligence on behalf of Russia, including information about U.S. sanctions against Russia, and to recruit New York City residents as ... and more » |
Steve Bannon removed from National Security Council
Fox News-3 hours ago
President Trump's controversial chief strategist, Stephen Bannon, was removed from the National Security Council on Wednesday, Fox News ...
Trump Removes Stephen Bannon From National Security Council ...
Highly Cited-New York Times-6 hours ago
Highly Cited-New York Times-6 hours ago
Bannon gone from National Security Council, more questions come up
Opinion-The San Diego Union-Tribune-2 hours ago
Opinion-The San Diego Union-Tribune-2 hours ago
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WASHINGTON — President Trump reshuffled his national security organization on Wednesday, removing his chief strategist, Stephen K. Bannon, from a top policy-making committee and restoring senior military and intelligence officials who had been downgraded when he first came into office.
The shift was orchestrated by Lt. Gen. H.R. McMaster, who was tapped as Mr. Trump’s national security adviser after the resignation of Michael T. Flynn, who stepped down in February after being caught misleading Vice President Mike Pence and other White House officials about his contacts with Russia’s ambassador.
General McMaster inherited an organizational scheme for the National Security Council that stirred protests because of Mr. Bannon’s role. The original setup made Mr. Bannon, the former chairman of Breitbart News, a member of the principals committee that typically includes cabinet-level officials like the vice president, secretary of state and defense secretary. The original order also made the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and the director of national intelligence only occasional participants as issues demanded.
Critics said Mr. Bannon’s presence in a national security policy-making structure risked politicizing foreign policy.
A new order issued by Mr. Trump, dated Tuesday and made public on Wednesday, removes Mr. Bannon from the principals committee, restores the chairman of the Joint Chiefs and intelligence director and also adds the energy secretary, C.I.A. director and United Nations ambassador.
A senior White House official presented the move as a logical evolution, not a setback for Mr. Bannon. He had originally been put on the principals committee to keep an eye on Mr. Flynn and to “de-operationalize” the National Security Council after the Obama administration, this official said on condition of anonymity to discuss internal dynamics. This official said that process had been completed.
Another official close to Mr. Bannon insisted the move was not in any way a sign that the president had lost confidence in him or wanted to reduce his portfolio. And as evidence he will still play a role in national security decisions, the aide said that Mr. Bannon still maintains the highest level of security clearance in the West Wing.
But the reorganization seemed a clear victory for General McMaster as he struggles to assert control over national security. In addition to the changing membership of the principals committee, the new order also puts the Homeland Security Council under General McMaster rather than making it a separate entity, as Mr. Trump’s original order had done.
General McMaster had envisioned making these changes shortly after taking the job in February, but proceeded slowly to avoid inflaming an already volatile situation. Mr. Bannon and his allies initially insisted his position would not change under any reorganization by General McMaster, but eventually the president was convinced that it was wiser to take him off the principals committee.
The principals committee, led by the national security adviser, is the primary policy-making body for national security, and decides questions that do not rise to the level of the president himself. The committee also debates issues that will get sent to the president, and frames the choices for him.
Political advisers traditionally have not served on the committee. President George W. Bush kept his senior adviser, Karl Rove, out of sensitive national security meetings. President Barack Obama permitted his senior adviser, David Axelrod, to sit in on some, but he was not given formal status and he has said he merely observed and did not participate.
In addition to giving Mr. Bannon formal membership, the original national security organization reduced the role of the chairman of the Joint Chiefs and national intelligence director, stipulating that they would attend only “where issues pertaining to their responsibilities are to be discussed.”
Members of Mr. Trump’s team said they did not mean to downgrade them; they simply took Mr. Bush’s original order and cut and pasted language into theirs, not realizing that the two officials had been upgraded under Mr. Obama.
Continue reading the main story
Read the whole story
· · ·
Jennifer Jacobs, Bloomberg
Published 12:06 pm, Wednesday, April 5, 2017
Bannon, the former executive chairman of Breitbart News, was elevated to the National Security Council’s principals committee at the beginning of Trump’s presidency.
Bannon, the former executive chairman of Breitbart News, was elevated to the National Security Council’s principals committee at the beginning of Trump’s presidency.
Photo: Evan Vucci, AP
Who is Steve Bannon?
Bannon is a counselor to the president and Chief Strategist in the Donald Trump administration. His powerful role in the White House has been criticized due to his controversial past.
Click through to see things you should know about Steve Bannon.
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Who is Steve Bannon?
Photo: Win McNamee/Getty Images
Bannon is a counselor to the president and Chief Strategist in the Donald Trump administration. His powerful role in the White House has been criticized due to his controversial
... more
He was the head honcho for the Trump campaign
On August 17, 2016, Bannon left Breitbart News to become Chief Executive of Donald Trump's campaign.
On August 17, 2016, Bannon left Breitbart News to become Chief Executive of Donald Trump's campaign.
He was the head honcho for the Trump campaign
On August 17, 2016, Bannon left Breitbart News to become Chief Executive of Donald Trump's campaign.
Photo: Chip Somodevilla/Getty ImagesOn August 17, 2016, Bannon left Breitbart News to become Chief Executive of Donald Trump's campaign.
He was executive chair of Breitbart News
less
Before working for the Trump campaign, Bannon ran Breitbart News, a far-right news-site criticized for it racist and sexist reporting. The Southern Poverty Law Center, an organization that identifies and raises awareness about hate groups, said Breitbart News had "undergone a noticeable shift toward embracing ideas on the extremist fringe of the conservative right. Racist ideas. Anti-Muslim and anti-immigrant ideas –– all key tenets making up an emerging racist ideology known as the 'Alt-Right.'"
He was executive chair of Breitbart News
... more
Photo: MANDEL NGAN/AFP/Getty Images
Before working for the Trump campaign, Bannon ran Breitbart News, a far-right news-site criticized for it racist and sexist reporting. The Southern Poverty Law
He called Breitbart “the platform for the alt-right"
Bannon once said Breitbart News was the platform for the alt-right, a white-nationalist, openly racist, anti-immigration movement. At one point, Brietbart published a lengthy article defending the alt-right, referring to white nationalists leaders like Richard Spencer as the movement’s “intellectuals."
Source: Politico, Southern Poverty Law Center
less
He called Breitbart “the platform for the alt-right"
Bannon once said Breitbart News was the platform for the alt-right, a white-nationalist, openly racist, anti-immigration movement. At one point, Brietbart
... more
He thinks the media should "keep its mouth shut and just listen"
“The media should be embarrassed and humiliated and keep its mouth shut and just listen for a while,” Bannon told The New York Times. “I want you to quote this. The media here is the opposition party. They don’t understand this country. They still do not understand why Donald Trump is the president of the United States.”
Source: The New York Times
less
He thinks the media should "keep its mouth shut and just listen"
“The media should be embarrassed and humiliated and keep its mouth shut and just listen for a while,” Bannon told The New York
... more
Bannon once called himself a "Leninist"
During a conversation in which Bannon later said he cannot recall, he told a writer for The Daily Beast, “I’m a Leninist. Lenin, wanted to destroy the state, and that’s my goal too. I want to bring everything crashing down, and destroy all of today’s establishment.”
Source: The Daily Beast
less
Bannon once called himself a "Leninist"
During a conversation in which Bannon later said he cannot recall, he told a writer for The Daily Beast, “I’m a Leninist. Lenin, wanted to destroy the state,
... more
He is not a fan of the Republican party (at least in its current state)
In a 2010 radio interview with Political Vindication Radio, Bannon said, “What we need to do is bitch-slap the Republican Party." In addition, he also said, "We don’t believe there is a functional conservative party in this country, and we certainly don’t think the Republican Party is that."
Source: The New York Times
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He is not a fan of the Republican party (at least in its current state)
In a 2010 radio interview with Political Vindication Radio, Bannon said, “What we need to do is bitch-slap the Republican Party." In
... more
Alma mater
Bannon attended Virginia Tech for his bachelor's degree in urban planning, Georgetown University for his master's degree in National Security Studies, and Harvard for his Master of Business Administration.
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Alma mater
Photo: Darren McCollester/Getty Images
Bannon attended Virginia Tech for his bachelor's degree in urban planning, Georgetown University for his master's degree in National Security Studies, and Harvard for his Master of Business
... more
He was a naval officer
Bannon served seven years as a Navy surface warfare officer, between 1976–1983.
Source: Military Times
He was a naval officer
Bannon served seven years as a Navy surface warfare officer, between 1976–1983.
Source: Military Times
He used to work for Goldman Sachs
After completing his military career and receiving an MBA, Bannon worked for Goldman Sachs doing mergers and acquisitions.
He used to work for Goldman Sachs
Photo: Chris Hondros/Getty Images
After completing his military career and receiving an MBA, Bannon worked for Goldman Sachs doing mergers and acquisitions.
He helped spearhead the immigration ban
Along with Stephen Miller, a senior advisor to Trump, Bannon helped push through the most controversial initiative of Trump presidency so far.
Source: CNN
He helped spearhead the immigration ban
Along with Stephen Miller, a senior advisor to Trump, Bannon helped push through the most controversial initiative of Trump presidency so far.
Source: CNN
He thinks leftist feminists are a "bunch of dykes"
During an interview with Political Vindication Radio, Bannon said: “That’s why there are some unintended consequences of the women’s liberation movement. That, in fact, the women that would lead this country would be pro-family, they would have husbands, they would love their children. They wouldn’t be a bunch of dykes that came from the Seven Sisters schools up in New England. That drives the left insane and that’s why they hate these women."
Source: BuzzFeed News
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He thinks leftist feminists are a "bunch of dykes"
During an interview with Political Vindication Radio, Bannon said: “That’s why there are some unintended consequences of the women’s liberation
... more
Bannon also wrote Trump's "American carnage" speech
According to The Wall Street Journal, Steve Bannon and senior advisor Stephen Miller wrote Trump's inauguration address.
Source: The Wall Street Journal
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Bannon also wrote Trump's "American carnage" speech
According to The Wall Street Journal, Steve Bannon and senior advisor Stephen Miller wrote Trump's inauguration address.
Source: The
... more
He is encouraging Trump to be bolder
According to Time magazine, "while other advisers have tried to change Trump, Bannon has urged him to step on the gas."
Source: Time
He is encouraging Trump to be bolder
According to Time magazine, "while other advisers have tried to change Trump, Bannon has urged him to step on the gas."
Source: Time
He produced multiple documentary films
During the 1990's Bannon worked as a producer for Hollywood, producing a total of 18 films, many of them documentaries. His films focused on the rise of the Tea Party, a take-down of the "Occupy Wall Street" movement, and a film about Sarah Palin vs. the establishment.
Source: Politico
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He produced multiple documentary films
During the 1990's Bannon worked as a producer for Hollywood, producing a total of 18 films, many of them documentaries. His films focused on the rise of the Tea Party, a
... more
He made a killing off "Seinfeld"
Bannon owns a stake in Seinfeld's reruns, earning money each time an episode is aired. His investment banking firm "Bannon & Co," negotiated the sale of Castle Rock Entertainment, which produced Seinfeld.
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He made a killing off "Seinfeld"
Photo: NBC/NBC Via Getty Images
Bannon owns a stake in Seinfeld's reruns, earning money each time an episode is aired. His investment banking firm "Bannon & Co," negotiated the sale of Castle Rock
... more
Bannon Taken Off Trump National Security Council in Shake-Up (2)
(Bloomberg) -- President Donald Trump reorganized his National Security Council on Wednesday, removing chief strategist Stephen Bannon from a key committee and restoring the roles of top intelligence and defense officials, according to a person familiar with the decision and a notice published in the Federal Register.
The realignment increases the influence of National Security Adviser H.R. McMaster, whose public stances were sometimes at odds with those of Bannon. In addition to gaining greater control over the NSC, McMaster will have the Homeland Security Council under his authority.
Surprising new poll reveals who voters think influences Trump the most. Aaron Dickens reports.
Media: Buzz60
The change downgrades the role of Homeland Security Adviser Tom Bossert, who had been given authority to convene or chair the NSC’s principals committee under Trump’s original structure. He’ll serve those roles now as delegated by McMaster, according to a presidential memorandum dated Tuesday.
The national intelligence director, Dan Coats, and the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Marine Corps General Joseph Dunford, are again “regular attendees” of the principals committee, as in the Obama administration. Trump downgraded their roles and put Bannon on the committee in a Jan. 28 memorandum.
The secretary of energy, the Central Intelligence Agency director and the United Nations ambassador also were added to the principals committee under Wednesday’s revisions.
Trusted Adviser
Bannon, the former executive chairman of Breitbart News, is one of Trump’s most trusted and controversial advisers. He has channeled the populist and nationalist sentiment that propelled Trump’s presidential campaign, and his placement on the NSC committee drew criticism from some members of Congress and Washington’s foreign policy establishment who said it risked politicizing the security advice provided to the president.
A White House official portrayed the change as a natural progression rather than a demotion for Bannon. The official, who spoke on condition of anonymity, contended that Bannon was placed on the committee in part to monitor Trump’s first national security adviser, Michael Flynn, and never attended a meeting. He’s no longer needed with McMaster in charge of the council, the official said.
It isn’t clear why Bannon would be needed on the committee under Flynn but not under McMaster. A second White House official said that Trump was never comfortable with Bannon on the panel, but that his removal didn’t indicate any erosion of his influence within the White House.
Bannon will retain his security clearance, the first official said.
Still, his departure from the NSC role was applauded by some Republicans as well as Democrats. Republican Representative Ileana Ros-Lehtinen of Florida called it “welcome news” in a tweet.
Flynn’s Firing
Trump fired Flynn on Feb. 13 for not disclosing to the president or to Vice President Mike Pence the extent of his conversations with Russia’s ambassador to the U.S., Sergey Kislyak, before Trump’s inauguration. He now is enmeshed in the multiple investigations of Russian meddling in the 2016 election and whether any Trump associates had improper contacts with Russian government agents.
Trump’s selection of McMaster reassured some administration critics. A decorated officer, McMaster has a reputation for speaking truth to authority. In his 1997 book “Dereliction of Duty,” he criticized military officers for failing to challenge former President Lyndon B. Johnson and then-Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara over their handling of the Vietnam War. He wrote that the U.S. lost that war in the political corridors of Washington, not the battlefield.
(Updates with additional comment on Bannon beginning in eighth paragraph.)
--With assistance from Justin Sink
To contact the reporter on this story: Jennifer Jacobs in Washington at <a href="mailto:jjacobs68@bloomberg.net">jjacobs68@bloomberg.net</a>.
To contact the editors responsible for this story: Alex Wayne at <a href="mailto:awayne3@bloomberg.net">awayne3@bloomberg.net</a>, Justin Blum
©2017 Bloomberg L.P.
Read the whole story
· · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · ·
SFGate |
Bannon Taken Off Trump National Security Council in Shake-Up (2)
SFGate The realignment increases the influence of National Security Adviser H.R. McMaster, whose public stances were sometimes at odds with those of Bannon. In addition to gaining greater control over the NSC, McMaster will have the Homeland Security Council ... and more » |
Roll Call |
Senators to Trump: Stand Up to Assad, Putin
Roll Call Senators from both parties want to know if President Donald Trump has the gumption to stand up to Syrian leader Bashar al-Assad — and by extension Russian President Vladimir Putin. That question was raised after Assad's forces reportedly carried out a ... Trump, Putin On Collision Course After Moscow Denies Syria Behind Chemical AttackMintpress News (blog) all 1,881 news articles » |
New York Magazine |
How China's Leader is Playing Donald Trump
New York Magazine In the middle of January, while Donald Trump and his aides were devising a tale of American Carnage to be delivered a few days later to a modestly sized inauguration crowd in Washington, Chinese leader Xi Jinping was addressing a more rarefied ... Why President Trump Could Never Go It Alone on North KoreaTIME These Are the Dealmakers Behind Trump and XiBloomberg Donald Trump, Xi Jinping and the Mao factorCNN MSNBC -The Independent -Quartz -Financial Times all 2,326 news articles » |
CNN |
One week, three more Trump-Russia connections
CNN Three revelations in the past week have raised new questions from lawmakers about the Trumpteam's relations with Russian leaders and broadened Congress's inquiries into whether Trumpassociates colluded with Russia in its effort to sway the 2016 ... Russian Spies Tried to Recruit Carter Page Before He Advised TrumpNew York Times Trump campaign adviser says info provided to Russian spies was 'immaterial'ABC News Russian Spy Met Trump Adviser Carter Page and Thought He Was…Foreign Policy (blog) MarketWatch -PoliticusUSA -The Hill all 128 news articles » |
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I suspected Trump’s surprise electoral victory was Russia’s doing, until I discovered an important puzzle piece I knew nothing about. Now I believe the meddler extraordinaire was more complicated, sinister, and insidious than Kremlin hacking alone. Have you ever heard of “psychometrics?” I hadn’t until I happened upon an article called “The Data That Turned the World Upside Down” (Das Magazin).
Psychometrics or psychographics measures the “Big Five” personality traits: openness, conscientiousness, extroversion, agreeableness, and neuroticism. Originally developed in the 1980s through long and complex questionnaires, personality analysis catapulted into the future when Polish psychology student Michal Kosinski arrived on the scene at Cambridge University. He and fellow doctoral candidate David Stillwell developed the immensely popular MyPersonality app based on the Big Five, which was “shared” and “liked” exponentially. The psychometric scores, combined with Facebook profiles, soon became the largest database ever collected.
I decided to be a guinea pig and take Kosinski’s Big Five Personality test based on my Facebook profile. The result of the test showed that my five personality traits are: 1. Openness: 81 percent liberal and artistic vs. conservative and traditional; 2. Conscientious: 46 percent impulsive and spontaneous vs. organized and hardworking; 3. Extraversion: 27 percent contemplative vs. engaged with outside world; 4. Agreeableness: 51 percent team working and trusting vs. competitive; and 5. Neuroticism: 29 percent laid back and relaxed vs. easily stressed and emotional. Further explanations are provided at the end of the test results. You can take the University of Cambridge Psychometrics Centre personality test at <a href="http://applymagicsauce.com" rel="nofollow">applymagicsauce.com</a> based on your Facebook history or text that you’ve written. But user beware.
If you are concerned about your personal privacy and how likely you are to be strategically targeted, you might care to know that with fewer than 100 Facebook “likes,” data companies know a person’s skin color, intelligence, family status, religious, sexual, and political preferences. With 300 “likes,” they know a person better than their partner does, some studies claim. Combined with Messenger, Google searches, purchases, and whereabouts with or without phones in our pockets, our lives are open books. We benefit from certain rewards, but are easy targets, unaware of how vulnerable we are to manipulation from sites that collect personal information on our personality traits, consumer, and political preferences. Artificial intelligence is a formidable foe.
The plot thickened when I learned that a company called Cambridge Analytica secretly registered in 2013 to influence U.S. elections. They sent a psych student named Aleksandr Kogan to buy Kosinski’s and Stillwell’s information gathering techniques. But when Kogan was turned down, he moved to Singapore and changed his name to Dr. Spectre, while Cambridge Analytica copied the inventors’ highly efficient people search engine model and used it for sinister use. Instead of blanket advertising, Cambridge Analytica individually and covertly targeted voters of a precise age, opinion, preference, and voting district with “dark post” newsfeed messages specifically designed to sway their votes, according to an article titled “The Secret Agenda of a Facebook Quiz,” which appeared in the New York Times. Its mother company, Strategic Communication Laboratories (SCL), was the foremost election management agency. They conducted “psyops,” psychological operations of mass propaganda aimed at people’s emotions, to “manage” elections and refine their operations in Nigeria, Nepal, the Ukraine, Eastern Europe, Afghanistan, and Pakistan.
Then I read on Wikipedia that in 2014, Cambridge Analytica played a role in boosting republican candidates in 44 political races across the U.S. They worked for Ted Cruz’s presidential run in 2015. In 2016 Marco Rubio spent $3 million for CA’s services and Ben Carlson spent $220,000 for their “data management” and “web service.” With each campaign, they refined their edge. Even Donald Trump, who paid Cambridge Analytica $15 million, was surprised by their effectiveness in strategically influencing his electoral win.
Cambridge Analytica CEO Alexander James Ashburner Nix boasted on <a href="http://telegram.com" rel="nofollow">telegram.com</a>, “We are thrilled that our revolutionary approach to data-driven communication has played such an integral part in President-elect Trump’s extraordinary win.” He’d made the same speech before when his company helped the UK’s pro-Brexit election in Leave.EU. No wonder Trump then tweeted he’d be called “Mr. Brexit.” Of course, Nix, Trump, and other GOP White House staff later denied that Cambridge Analytica’s personalized political propaganda played a pivotal role in the election results.
Why in the world would Cambridge Analytica be interested in Trump’s victory? Who owns the company? What would they gain? Robert and Rebekah Mercer, the extreme right wing hedge fund billionaire father and daughter who heavily funded Cambridge Analytica and the Republican Super PAC. Deborah served on the Executive Committee of Trump’s transition team and is “the most powerful woman in GOP politics” according to Politico. Guess who was, until recently, a VP on their board? Trump’s chief strategist Steve Bannon.
Whoa! I thought. This is huge!!! This goes way beyond fake news and makes calls to the Russian Ambassador look like child’s play. I followed leads to try to unravel the mystery. Cambridge Analytica has psychological profiles on 220-230 million Americans based on 5,000 different bits of data. Cambridge Analytica has 175,000 different versions of political ads to laser-target voters and influence elections. In 2016, the Mercer Foundation was the top sole donor to Trump and to federal candidates with a sum of $32 million. Cambridge Analytica offices are not located in Europe where privacy is protected, but in the U.S. because of our lax laws. Our near sighted Senate just voted to further undo privacy legislation!
But it doesn’t stop there. Robert Mercer donated Cambridge Analytica’s services to UK Independence Party’s Nigel Farage, his good friend, for the Brexit Leave.eu campaign. When Mercer met Breitbart, it was a match made in heaven (or hell!). Mercer funded <a href="http://Breitbart.com" rel="nofollow">Breitbart.com</a> to “take back the culture” according to Bannon who took over Breitbart when its founded died. Bannon launched the London Breitbart in time to influence the UK’s election, and plans to do the same in France and Germany, according to <a href="http://theguardian.com" rel="nofollow">theguardian.com</a>.
Mercer doesn’t believe in government and thinks it should be shrinked to near non-existence. He doesn’t believe in any social services. Mercer supported Bannon’s and Kellyanne Conway’s appointments to senior positions in the Trump campaign and White House. Rebekah Mercer worked with Bannon on creating the anti-Hillary propaganda film, “Clinton Cash.” The FEC Federal Election Commission and FBI have been asked to look into the highly suspicious Mercer-Super PAC-Trump connections, according to Newsweek. Oh my!
For those of us who are already addicted to Facebook and have “liked” and “shared” our way across cyberspace, it’s too late. For those who are too old or too young, save yourselves! Big brother is indeed watching and only God knows how this will affect our present and future lives. I am trying very hard to envision a future where our society is in sync with our souls, where our “better angels” sit on our shoulders and call forth our greatest good. . . I envision a society where all people are valued and treated with kindness and tolerance, where government serves the people with compassion and respect. I envision programs that raise each citizen to their true potential.
In looking critically at what is transpiring in our nation now, I hope that we are growing stronger by recognizing the dissonance of our values and new reality. We as individuals are reading between the lines, listening attentively for the distractions and comments that could put us off balance. Instead, we see them for what they are. In the nature of the cycles of a capitalist society, we’ve swung from the Era of the New Deal to the Era of the Alt. Right, led by the Good Old Boy Billionaires’ Club. But through our power, we will arise, look around and find our center, to recreate and regenerate a great society that meets all of its peoples’ needs.
Marguerite Jill Dye is an author, artist, and activist who lives in the Green Mountains and on Florida’s Gulf Coast. She is the illustrator of a children’s book, “Where is Sam?” and wrote and illustrated a yet-to-be-released book on walking the Camino de Santiago pilgrimage across Spain: “Treasures Along the Camino: An Artist’s Empowering Journey Across Spain.” Jill and her husband Duane will walk the most challenging Camino del Norte this fall.
Psychometrics or psychographics measures the “Big Five” personality traits: openness, conscientiousness, extroversion, agreeableness, and neuroticism. Originally developed in the 1980s through long and complex questionnaires, personality analysis catapulted into the future when Polish psychology student Michal Kosinski arrived on the scene at Cambridge University. He and fellow doctoral candidate David Stillwell developed the immensely popular MyPersonality app based on the Big Five, which was “shared” and “liked” exponentially. The psychometric scores, combined with Facebook profiles, soon became the largest database ever collected.
I decided to be a guinea pig and take Kosinski’s Big Five Personality test based on my Facebook profile. The result of the test showed that my five personality traits are: 1. Openness: 81 percent liberal and artistic vs. conservative and traditional; 2. Conscientious: 46 percent impulsive and spontaneous vs. organized and hardworking; 3. Extraversion: 27 percent contemplative vs. engaged with outside world; 4. Agreeableness: 51 percent team working and trusting vs. competitive; and 5. Neuroticism: 29 percent laid back and relaxed vs. easily stressed and emotional. Further explanations are provided at the end of the test results. You can take the University of Cambridge Psychometrics Centre personality test at <a href="http://applymagicsauce.com" rel="nofollow">applymagicsauce.com</a> based on your Facebook history or text that you’ve written. But user beware.
If you are concerned about your personal privacy and how likely you are to be strategically targeted, you might care to know that with fewer than 100 Facebook “likes,” data companies know a person’s skin color, intelligence, family status, religious, sexual, and political preferences. With 300 “likes,” they know a person better than their partner does, some studies claim. Combined with Messenger, Google searches, purchases, and whereabouts with or without phones in our pockets, our lives are open books. We benefit from certain rewards, but are easy targets, unaware of how vulnerable we are to manipulation from sites that collect personal information on our personality traits, consumer, and political preferences. Artificial intelligence is a formidable foe.
The plot thickened when I learned that a company called Cambridge Analytica secretly registered in 2013 to influence U.S. elections. They sent a psych student named Aleksandr Kogan to buy Kosinski’s and Stillwell’s information gathering techniques. But when Kogan was turned down, he moved to Singapore and changed his name to Dr. Spectre, while Cambridge Analytica copied the inventors’ highly efficient people search engine model and used it for sinister use. Instead of blanket advertising, Cambridge Analytica individually and covertly targeted voters of a precise age, opinion, preference, and voting district with “dark post” newsfeed messages specifically designed to sway their votes, according to an article titled “The Secret Agenda of a Facebook Quiz,” which appeared in the New York Times. Its mother company, Strategic Communication Laboratories (SCL), was the foremost election management agency. They conducted “psyops,” psychological operations of mass propaganda aimed at people’s emotions, to “manage” elections and refine their operations in Nigeria, Nepal, the Ukraine, Eastern Europe, Afghanistan, and Pakistan.
Then I read on Wikipedia that in 2014, Cambridge Analytica played a role in boosting republican candidates in 44 political races across the U.S. They worked for Ted Cruz’s presidential run in 2015. In 2016 Marco Rubio spent $3 million for CA’s services and Ben Carlson spent $220,000 for their “data management” and “web service.” With each campaign, they refined their edge. Even Donald Trump, who paid Cambridge Analytica $15 million, was surprised by their effectiveness in strategically influencing his electoral win.
Cambridge Analytica CEO Alexander James Ashburner Nix boasted on <a href="http://telegram.com" rel="nofollow">telegram.com</a>, “We are thrilled that our revolutionary approach to data-driven communication has played such an integral part in President-elect Trump’s extraordinary win.” He’d made the same speech before when his company helped the UK’s pro-Brexit election in Leave.EU. No wonder Trump then tweeted he’d be called “Mr. Brexit.” Of course, Nix, Trump, and other GOP White House staff later denied that Cambridge Analytica’s personalized political propaganda played a pivotal role in the election results.
Why in the world would Cambridge Analytica be interested in Trump’s victory? Who owns the company? What would they gain? Robert and Rebekah Mercer, the extreme right wing hedge fund billionaire father and daughter who heavily funded Cambridge Analytica and the Republican Super PAC. Deborah served on the Executive Committee of Trump’s transition team and is “the most powerful woman in GOP politics” according to Politico. Guess who was, until recently, a VP on their board? Trump’s chief strategist Steve Bannon.
Whoa! I thought. This is huge!!! This goes way beyond fake news and makes calls to the Russian Ambassador look like child’s play. I followed leads to try to unravel the mystery. Cambridge Analytica has psychological profiles on 220-230 million Americans based on 5,000 different bits of data. Cambridge Analytica has 175,000 different versions of political ads to laser-target voters and influence elections. In 2016, the Mercer Foundation was the top sole donor to Trump and to federal candidates with a sum of $32 million. Cambridge Analytica offices are not located in Europe where privacy is protected, but in the U.S. because of our lax laws. Our near sighted Senate just voted to further undo privacy legislation!
But it doesn’t stop there. Robert Mercer donated Cambridge Analytica’s services to UK Independence Party’s Nigel Farage, his good friend, for the Brexit Leave.eu campaign. When Mercer met Breitbart, it was a match made in heaven (or hell!). Mercer funded <a href="http://Breitbart.com" rel="nofollow">Breitbart.com</a> to “take back the culture” according to Bannon who took over Breitbart when its founded died. Bannon launched the London Breitbart in time to influence the UK’s election, and plans to do the same in France and Germany, according to <a href="http://theguardian.com" rel="nofollow">theguardian.com</a>.
Mercer doesn’t believe in government and thinks it should be shrinked to near non-existence. He doesn’t believe in any social services. Mercer supported Bannon’s and Kellyanne Conway’s appointments to senior positions in the Trump campaign and White House. Rebekah Mercer worked with Bannon on creating the anti-Hillary propaganda film, “Clinton Cash.” The FEC Federal Election Commission and FBI have been asked to look into the highly suspicious Mercer-Super PAC-Trump connections, according to Newsweek. Oh my!
For those of us who are already addicted to Facebook and have “liked” and “shared” our way across cyberspace, it’s too late. For those who are too old or too young, save yourselves! Big brother is indeed watching and only God knows how this will affect our present and future lives. I am trying very hard to envision a future where our society is in sync with our souls, where our “better angels” sit on our shoulders and call forth our greatest good. . . I envision a society where all people are valued and treated with kindness and tolerance, where government serves the people with compassion and respect. I envision programs that raise each citizen to their true potential.
In looking critically at what is transpiring in our nation now, I hope that we are growing stronger by recognizing the dissonance of our values and new reality. We as individuals are reading between the lines, listening attentively for the distractions and comments that could put us off balance. Instead, we see them for what they are. In the nature of the cycles of a capitalist society, we’ve swung from the Era of the New Deal to the Era of the Alt. Right, led by the Good Old Boy Billionaires’ Club. But through our power, we will arise, look around and find our center, to recreate and regenerate a great society that meets all of its peoples’ needs.
Marguerite Jill Dye is an author, artist, and activist who lives in the Green Mountains and on Florida’s Gulf Coast. She is the illustrator of a children’s book, “Where is Sam?” and wrote and illustrated a yet-to-be-released book on walking the Camino de Santiago pilgrimage across Spain: “Treasures Along the Camino: An Artist’s Empowering Journey Across Spain.” Jill and her husband Duane will walk the most challenging Camino del Norte this fall.
Photo by Jill Dye
“Mind Manipulation 101,” a paper cut assemblage created for this week’s column.
“Mind Manipulation 101,” a paper cut assemblage created for this week’s column.
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