Whataboutism is a Soviet Propaganda and USA Republican tactic

Just watched Bill Maher interview a Republican and I kept shouting, Man, answer the question, stop the Whataboutism. Then I thought, didn't someone say Whataboutism is a Russian (KGB / Soviet) propaganda technique? So I went to Google and-

Whataboutism | The Economist

www.economist.com/node/10598774

Jan 31, 2008 - SOVIET propagandists during the cold war were trained in a tactic that their western interlocutors nicknamed “whataboutism”. Any criticism of ...

The Slippery Slope of Trump's Dangerous 'Whataboutism' | Foreign ...

foreignpolicy.com/.../the-slippery-slope-of-trumps-dangerous-whataboutism-russia-p...

Feb 7, 2017 - The Slippery Slope of Trump's Dangerous 'Whataboutism' « | Foreign Policy | the Global Magazine of News and Ideas.

Urban Dictionary: whataboutism

www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=whataboutism

whataboutism. When you deflect criticism by pointing out flaws in your opponent, specifically using the phrase "what about x?" This is an attempt to excuse you ...

Russian journalist has advice for Americans covering Trump

www.usatoday.com/story/news/world/2017/01/24/russian-journalist.../96986008/

Jan 24, 2017 - Whataboutism, Kovalev explains, is an old Soviet trick. If Putin is pressed by a Russian journalist about an allegation of serious human rights ...

whataboutism - definition of whataboutism in English | Oxford ...

https://en.oxforddictionaries.com/definition/whataboutism

1990s: from the way in which counter-accusations may take the form of questions introduced by 'What about ——?'. Pronunciation. whataboutism.

A guide to Russian propaganda. Part 2: Whataboutism ...

euromaidanpress.com/2016/08/.../a-guide-to-russian-propaganda-part-2-whataboutis...

Aug 31, 2016 - The Soviet propaganda tactic of whataboutism is alive and well in today's Russia. Find out how it works and what to do in our guide.

election - How can I respond to Whataboutism? - Politics Stack ...

politics.stackexchange.com/questions/16001/how-can-i-respond-to-whataboutism

5 days ago - Note: this is a pretty long answer; and the specific points regarding whataboutism are at the last section, so you may want to skip there first if ...

So what about 'whataboutism'? - Latterly

https://latterly.org/so-what-about-whataboutism-497b08213b8

Feb 6, 2017 - In a clip released Saturday of an interview between Fox News' Bill O'Reilly and President Donald Trump that aired Sunday, the two had the ...

posted by Kay
Sighing in the City of Angels

Fox News dezinformatsiya is at root of Trump election, how long will it take for the world to figure it out

Hmm, my theories confirmed years later again:

 New Yorker March 6 article confirms my theory that Russia put disinformation in USA in decades before Trump election through media sites such as Fox News. 

The American political landscape also offered a particularly soft target for dezinformatsiya, false information intended to discredit the official version of events, or the very notion of reliable truth. Americans [in 2016] were more divided along ideological lines than at any point in two decades, according to the Pew Research Center. American trust in the mainstream media had fallen to a historic low. The fractured media environment seemed to spawn conspiracy theories about everything from Barack Obama’s place of birth (supposedly Kenya) to the origins of climate change (a Chinese hoax). Trump, in building his political identity, promoted such theories. “Free societies are often split because people have their own views, and that’s what former Soviet and current Russian intelligence tries to take advantage of,” Oleg Kalugin, a former K.G.B. general, who has lived in the United States since 1995, said. “The goal is to deepen the splits.”

Re this post from earlier this year with copies of LTE's I wrote on this subject back in 2012-13. My theory since then is Fox News was a political arm of Putin getting false information out into America for 20 years before the Trump election. The false news on Fox and then repeated on AM talk radio and other sites was blatant anti-American propaganda from Russia, designed to turn a nation's population to turns against each other.

and it worked.

Links in post:
http://cityofangels25.blogspot.com/2017/02/fox-news-is-attack-on-usa-through.html
and
http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2017/03/06/trump-putin-and-the-new-cold-war
-ke

You gotta hand it to Putin, he's good

We are basically under attack using nonconventional weapons and have been since last summer maybe longer, and part of their strategy is the Non Response of american officials bk this has never happened before and we really don't even know how to fight back, plus somehow they got Republican leaders to go along with it. You gotta hand it to Putin, he's good. 

US voters believed Trump when he said he was a businessman not a politician at the same time he was running for political office. I mean...

-ke

Hey, wasn't that a great speech T gave the other night?

We are six weeks into the presidency. Kennedy on March 1 his first year created the Peace Corps. In March of Obama's first year he began the bailout of the auto industry. Trump by March 1 got a Navy SEAL and an 8 year old American girl killed in Yemen, alienated almost all our global allies from past 100 years, discredited the CIA when we really need them, and socked aside a few million dollars for himself and his family. But hey, wasn't that a great speech our Pres made the other night?

Today there is no mention of Hillary’s emails in the news, as a “private server controversy” is no longer needed as a propaganda tool to manipulate voters.

No one who ever did business with Trump supported him in the election, he didn't win his home city and state of New York. In L.A. people like me who work in TV production know what a con artist and thief he is, a pioneer in the field of wage theft. How many people did he con out of paying for their work to get as rich as he is, if he even really is rich, we really don’t know. He could and likely is in debt to the same foreign powers that are now taking over the U.S. government.
But, hey, wasn’t that a beautiful speech Trump made the other night?

Kay Ebeling and Carolyn Zezima shared Dan Rather's post.

Dan Rather

1 hr · 

Every once in a while in Washington, the fuse is lit for what seems to be a big scandal. Much more rarely does that fuse lead to an explosion of the magnitude we are seeing with Russia and the new Administration, and frankly the Republicans in Congress. How can anybody say, with all this billowing smoke and sights of actual flames, that there is no need to at least independently investigate whether a fire is burning down the very pillars of our democracy?

The pressure is obviously starting to mount as leading Republicans are now calling for Attorney General Jeff Sessions to recuse himself from the Russia investigation. This comes in the wake of serious and credible evidence reported by a vigilant press that the Attorney General, mind you the top law enforcement man in the United States, perjured himself in testimony to the Senate about meeting the Russian ambassador during the election. Sessions is but the latest person close to President Trump who seems to be ensnared in a story that is more worthy of Hollywood melodrama than the reality of the governance of our country. Democrats are calling for Sessions to resign, and this story could move very quickly.

We are well past the time for any political niceties or benefits of the doubt. We need an independent and thorough investigation of Russia's meddling in our democracy and its ties to the President and his allies. We don't know what we don't know. Perhaps there are perfectly innocuous reasons for why Mr Trump won't release his tax returns, why he has continued to speak admirably about President Putin and why his aides and advisors seem to be so close to Russia. That's why we need an investigation. If the air is to be cleared, it needs to be cleared. And if there is deep rot, it needs to be exposed. And quickly.

The press is doing an admirable job. But there is only so much it can do without such things as subpoena powers. Let's just make this clear. This is about a foreign and hostile power trying to influence our election while being in contact with close aides to the presidential campaign that the Kremlin wanted to win. Furthermore, there are serious questions about Mr Trump's longstanding ties to Russian money and influence peddlers. We don't know where this might go, but it isn't going away.

• 

  
  

  Kay Ebeling shared Dan Rather's post.

  1 min · 

  slowly slowly the truth wins out, always, I have to remember. As much as truthsayers may be stoned in the public square, in the end, history always proves them right.
• 

  
  

  Carolyn Zezima shared Dan Rather's post.

  27 mins · 

  "This comes in the wake of serious and credible evidence reported by a vigilant press that the Attorney General, mind you the top law enforcement man in the United States, perjured himself in testimony to the Senate about meeting the Russian ambassador during the election. Sessions is but the latest person close to President Trump who seems to be ensnared in a story that is more worthy of Hollywood melodrama than the reality of the governance of our country. Democrats are calling for Sessions to resign, and this story could move very quickly.

Kay Ebeling

13 hrs · 

the only thing USA will spend cash on next four years is Military Hardware that our Occupiers will then own. And probably use against us. But hey wasn't that a great speech T made?

Dear USA: The Serpent delivered his speech perfectly and really looked great when he enticed Eve to take the apple.

Posted by Kay

Asking, what city of angels?

What city in the World is today like L.A. was in the 1950s?

What is most appalling about all this for me is that I give a fuck about the USA anymore anyway.  I have this weird sense memory of patriotism but, face it, loving America is a lot like loving L.A. even after it's become the hellhole it is today.  America has become a hellhole much like Southern California just spread out everywhere and covered everything with concrete and smothering carbon fumes. The USA I love doesn't exist today any more than Los Angeles of the 1950s exists today.  

What city in the World is today like L.A. was in the 1950s?

Vancouver BC Gastown. Somehow every time I start this search for the next place to go, I end up in Gastown Vancouver BC. There are no rentals easy to find there online, it's Expen$ive and cold and wet, not a climate I do well in. But it's a Big City with what seem like Smart People. And so I wonder ... a big city east of Vancouver, maybe it's not as cold dark and wet there as I'm anticipating? Best way to find out is to go and find out...

Kay Ebeling

2 hrs · 

Montreal looks most interesting but it's all the way on the other side of the continent and ... I have boxes ...

There's No Place To Go!!!!

n

Comments

Jo Miller Nope. Must shelter in place.

Like · Reply · 1 hr

There are people walking around Mesmerized by trump right now, going, wow wasn't that the greatest speech last night and A Great Speech Is Not What I Heard At All. This is so fricking weird, it's like being a scientist in a nation taken over by fundamentalists. Well actually, that's what it is.

where can I go and find sophisticated intelligent residents and a life that is Not Dominated by the united states so I will stop hearing about what is happening here and so I can eventually stop caring?

Kay Ebeling
3 hrs · 
tyranny of the fools and arrogance of the idiots dominate America right now as Trump's con sinks in
What bothers me most is they are celebrating a victory that was won on sheer Hatred. They hated Hillary so much they voted in this treasonous con artist and the Trumpinistas are now greeting the rest of us with that Frigging Arrogant Grin bk they think they won. They did not win, they turned the country over to a con artist and we are ALL LOSING and they still don't see it. They don't see it. I can't be around them. I Have to Go somewhere that is not dominated by hate filled victors.
The only thing USA will spend cash on next four years is Military Hardware that our Occupiers will then own. And probably use against us. But hey wasn't that a great speech last night
aargh where Can I Go to get away from Trumpinistas ?

The Ugly American looks good compared to today

More I learn about spies and traitors in USA, it's always about money and greed. Our values, where he who has most cash is most revered, makes it easy for foreign agents to find Americans to turn. It's easy to buy us, as we are forever grasping at easy riches. Seems to have started in 1980s with guys like Aldrich Ames and Robert Hanssen, and it's gotten to where now many Americans will sell out their nation for a condo in trump tower and a chance to be on TV. 
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mdVNcAUMzp4 

Kay Ebeling

As the slow moving coup continues, one by one USA leaders begin to realize something is going on, but time goes on as they call for hearings of what they are not yet sure. And as the days click on in this presidency, I wonder how much American intelligence and resources are flying out of the White House while Humpty Trumpty dances on his imaginary wall

I am a world traveler now. On Google maps. You click on the little yellow man and walk around in any city in the world, and never lose your wallet, or even have to open it. Along the way little ads pop up to tell you that all these hotels are totally out of your budget reach anyway, the people Google images found walking around are mostly homeless pushing grocery carts, you realize there's no place like home, turn off the computer, and go outside. Walk around the block and you've been to Paris London or Rome in one afternoon, and no one held you up in an airport for looking too American. sigh

More coming soon