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Since it’s election denialism day. Let’s talk strategy on the Hunter laptop. I believe this is an accepted fact now: The FBI had possession of the laptop a year prior to the election and had verified it while being aware Guiliani and others had a copy. Hunter and Joe also knew he had a copy.
Guiliani’s behavior makes sense to me. You have a bombshell on the opposition so you release it last minute for maximum effect.
But what about the lefts/fbi play? The play they ended up choosing was do nothing until it’s released then claim it’s a Russian plant. Now the fbi ran with something going to happen from Russia that is misinformation to their media and social media partners. Those who did that I guess have plausible deniability they just meant a “general threat” and weren’t aware it was “Hunters verified laptop”. I have my doubts those people hadn’t been read in on the laptop.
My question is why wasn’t this leaked earlier? Prevent the October surprise by getting it out earlier? Ideally even perhaps the primaries so you just didn’t have to deal with Joe. All it would have taken is telling Warren or Sanders about it and then they go get a copy from Isaacs.
Instead the path chosen seems to have been let’s run a psy-op to protect Biden. It just seems like frequently when given choices people seem to be choosing let’s just lie to them.
I guess the conclusion I can come up with is the people with access to the laptop were not fans of a lot of the Democratic Party and weren’t fans of Trump.
I know the Sanders people have long thought the official DNC was against them. And I’m no Sanders fan. But the fact no one tipped them off to the laptop when it could have been used seems interesting. Along with what felt like a successful media-op which I guess was organized by the FBI.
Alternative strategy Guiliani actually have played it wrong and should have released it earlier to let it get digested instead of late to swing a few voters. And Isaac perhaps was more partisan since he didn’t get a copy to the left.
The FBI's behavior makes perfect sense if you assume a couple of things that I think are pretty evidently true:
Part 3 means that the corrupt actors know they can only communicate through "the blob". Via selective leaks to each other to indicate when to coordinate a thing. The perfect timing of a release of an "October surprise" is not something these things are good at. Deputy director of Delaware field office, no matter his/her partisanship, does not have confidence in his choice of perfect timing to leak obviously harmful information on his preferred presidential candidate. Thus, you default to not leaking, and hope it all stays under wraps till midnight on the 2nd Tuesday of November.
Then it leaks. But now the path forward is obvious to all the corrupt actors: Use your previously cultivated corrupt media fences to spread a cover up, as it only need last a few weeks, this is something intel agency leakers know they are good at coordinating.
So that is all you really need to think.
I largely agree with these type of takes. Honestly wish we had a Bernie bro or normie Dem to comment.
One thing interesting for these scenerios is it means normie Dems don’t think they have any bench of electable Dems at the national level. If they did they could have used this to push Biden aside.
The other interesting thought for these type of views is it means a large part of the beuracracy believes this is true:
Electing Trump is worse than lying to the American people and having a large part of America lose faith in Institutions.
A part of the reason for asking these questions is I would like a different explanation than a large part of our government is down with lying to Americans. Kristen Anderson is another person who from my view seems like he chose lie to Americans over honesty. It just seems like a lot of people are choosing this.
A part of me would be absolutely fine if these guys just ran with Biden is super corrupt but well Trump is uniquely bad. I might vote for that. But I’m voting against those who lie to me.
Hi.
I guess I’m what passes for a garden-variety Democrat, and I think you’re assuming some conclusions.
The FBI had spent four years losing credibility by investigating people too hard, not hard enough, or at all. Longer if you count the Clinton “re-opening” nonsense. When faced with yet another kingmaking opportunity, are you surprised they decided not to take the initiative?
More generally, I think you’re too inclined to view your enemies as monolithic. The continuum looks more like this:
Notice that only the last one requires lying! Combine that with some unthinking solidarity, and you will see people parrot a party line without any malice. Go team.
There are far more people as you go up the continuum. I’m personally in the third or fourth camp.
Edit for clarity:
I don't find it hard to believe that the last couple groups are overrepresented in the Intelligence Community™. I also think it's a mistake to draw conclusions about the Democratic Party, general bureaucracy, prospects for the country, etc. based on those guys.
No rigorous definition of any of these terms seems possible, and the questions they exist to address are unavoidably important. The mechanisms we built to address such questions appear to have collapsed, and there does not seem to be a way to replace them.
I got called out for "doing a bit" yesterday, but I'm honestly not sure how anyone here or elsewhere thinks the conversation is supposed to go. There is no common ground sufficient to build a productive conversation on. You see a ton of people in this thread freewheeling because they can't get that through their heads; they still think we Americans are a "we", that the factual or philosophical or political or tribal markers they're trying to cash in still have something approximating an exchange rate. They think there's still ground under the feet, something firm, a source of traction, something other than empty air and a pavement rapidly approaching.
I understand the feeling; even now, reading your description of the situation, I want to start laying down the facts, because I know you're a reasonable person, and surely you can be reached... But reason isn't enough. I could claim it's because you aren't reasonable enough, unlike virtuous people like me, but the slightest amount of self-awareness shows that to be a clown's argument. You have facts of your own, those facts are assessed by worldview and axioms just as mine are, and that's that.
The concept of actually reaching some productive level of agreement on the problems at hand is, at this point, completely laughable. If it's not possible at our current level of escalation, it's not going to get easier two or ten or a hundred escalations further down the line. The very concept of reconciliation has passed beyond the bounds of plausibility.
Sorry, I might not have been clear with that.
What I was trying to say is: the FBI managed to piss off most everyone in the preceding years. General Republicans by soft-balling Hillary. Hillary supporters by going after her at all. Every other Democrat by failing to bury Trump. Diehard Trumpers by going after him at all.
Yes, this is stupid and contradictory. It's also sufficient to explain why the FBI might try to avoid commenting on the veracity of a source.
Anyway. I'm not sure I follow you, regarding the fruitlessness of discussion.
Maybe I just feel like the pavement has always been there, always approaching. Each child born around eighty years from splattering across an alarming area. Might as well have some fun while we're at it, no?
If you're like me, you get some satisfaction from writing. You struggle, sometimes, to arrange the words just so--but it is the right kind of struggle. Other humans on the screen trigger interest, confusion, perhaps even disgust or righteousness. You desire to express those emotions. Here we have a forum that tells you to do so, by all means, so long as you can follow certain constraints. This selects for certain emotions more than others. You come to the Motte when you want to experience that cluster of thoughts and feelings.
If this doesn't resonate with you, then why are you here? What drives you to come and prognosticate? When people accuse you of "doing a bit," they are confused at the mismatch between your sentiment and your actions.
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