US Politics Mega-thread - Page 504

On July 19 2018 21:29 Grumbels wrote:
This is like hearing David Kim talk about improving the game by tweaking some things to be more fun. It is all very bloodless and sorta fails to distinguish them from the GOP. Compare the Labour slogan from the UK: for the many, not the few. They could have just used that slogan, since it is more poetic and since it identifies both an enemy and creates a mission statement.

On July 19 2018 21:58 Jockmcplop wrote:


'For the People' is an insane slogan. It means literally nothing when analyzed. Its as meaningless and stupid as something Trump would say.

On July 19 2018 23:22 zlefin wrote:

aren't many slogans stupid and meaningless? isn't that part of the point sometimes? make a vague slogan so people can insert their own meaning into it and thus read in incompatible readings but still think they're all supporting the same thing?

I wonder if it would prove effective. Is a slogan that's insane/stupid but effective a reasonable choice?

On July 20 2018 00:02 Jockmcplop wrote:


You're right of course, all slogans are stupid and dumb down political debate, but this one strikes me as particularly useless given that we don't know which people they (their policies?) are 'for'.

On July 20 2018 00:18 zlefin wrote:

That may be the point of it.
by letting it be a blank slate people can project their own beliefs onto it.
each person can consider it to mean it's 'for' what they believe in.
thus you can get a lot of people all behind the same slogan even though they're supporting different things.

I know I've read some stuff which expressed a similar plan/concept, but I can't find any links at the moment; not sure which search termse to use to find them.

On July 20 2018 00:36 kollin wrote:
Slogans kind of have to capture some sort of zeitgeist, though probably in a way that is only identifiable retrospectively. It's interesting the most memorable ones for me (make America great again, for the many not the few) have been recycled from previous campaigns that were enormously successful, though haven't necessarily been remembered for using those particular slogans (again I associate morning imagery with the Reagan and Blair campaigns more than anything, for whatever reason). I'm sure ultimately slogans don't make any difference and it's grain prices or something equally material that will end up determining the election.

On July 19 2018 23:39 ticklishmusic wrote:
there's a PI law firm in my area that uses "for the people" as a slogan which is what sprang to mind for me.

they seem to be pretty successful, but ymmv

WASHINGTON — As Russia’s virtual war against the United States continues unabated with the midterm elections approaching, the State Department has yet to spend any of the $120 million it has been allocated since late 2016 to counter foreign efforts to meddle in elections or sow distrust in democracy.

As a result, not one of the 23 analysts working in the department’s Global Engagement Center — which has been tasked with countering Moscow’s disinformation campaign — speaks Russian, and a department hiring freeze has hindered efforts to recruit the computer experts needed to track the Russian efforts.

The delay is just one symptom of the largely passive response to the Russian interference by President Trump, who has made little if any public effort to rally the nation to confront Moscow and defend democratic institutions. More broadly, the funding lag reflects a deep lack of confidence by Secretary of State Rex W. Tillerson in his department’s ability to execute its historically wide-ranging mission and spend its money wisely.

Mr. Tillerson has voiced skepticism that the United States is even capable of doing anything to counter the Russian threat.

“If it’s their intention to interfere, they’re going to find ways to do that,” Mr. Tillerson said in an interview last month with Fox News. “And we can take steps we can take, but this is something that once they decide they are going to do it, it’s very difficult to pre-empt it.”

The United States spends billions of dollars on secret cybercapabilities, but these weapons have proved largely ineffective against Russian efforts on Facebook, Twitter and elsewhere that simply amplify or distort divisive but genuine voices in the United States and elsewhere.

On July 20 2018 02:35 ShoCkeyy wrote:


You mean John Morgan of Morgan & Morgan? Lol... Yea that's him, he uses "for the people" and is huge across the east coast.

On July 20 2018 02:55 ticklishmusic wrote:


Haha, that's the one. Wasn't quite sure how much area the firm covered, I guess they're even more successful than I thought.

On July 20 2018 03:00 ShoCkeyy wrote:


They're super successful, I worked with them as an independent contractor for some time, and they make billions, and spend multi millions on marketing. As far as I know, his reach is literally most of the East coast, from FL to NY.

On July 20 2018 03:30 IgnE wrote:


They make literally billions?

Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg is clarifying remarks he made about Holocaust deniers, saying he wasn't defending those people when he said it was hard to know their intentions. His initial remarks set off intense criticism earlier this week.

"I personally find Holocaust denial deeply offensive, and I absolutely didn't intend to defend the intent of people who deny that," Zuckerberg wrote to Kara Swisher of Recode on Wednesday, the day after the site published a lengthy interview with the billionaire.

In the original interview, Swisher asked Zuckerberg about Facebook's policy of taking down fake news – something it has combated with a variety of approaches, after fake news sources were found to have been used to manipulate voters in the 2016 presidential election.

Swisher used the Sandy Hook school massacre as an example, asking Zuckerberg why Facebook would allow an organization to post a conspiracy theory that holds the killings were all staged.

After implying that Facebook would be quicker to take down harassment directed at a Sandy Hook victim than removr a fake news story promoting the conspiracy theory, Zuckerberg offered up the example of the Holocaust.

"I'm Jewish, and there's a set of people who deny that the Holocaust happened," he said.

"I find that deeply offensive," Zuckerberg continued. "But at the end of the day, I don't believe that our platform should take that down because I think there are things that different people get wrong. I don't think that they're intentionally getting it wrong, but I think..."

Seeming to view the question as primarily one of free speech, the Facebook founder said, "I just don't think that it is the right thing to say, 'We're going to take someone off the platform if they get things wrong, even multiple times.' "

He mentioned the potential that some people who are speaking in a public forum can simply get things wrong. But his critics said denying the Holocaust was much more dangerous and problematic — and that Zuckerberg's suggestion that some of those denials weren't made to mislead people were astounding.

"This is bonkers!" wrote Cale Weissman of Fast Company, after using profanity ("holy s***").

"This position is so bizarre, it's hard to know where to begin," writes Yair Rosenberg in The Atlantic.

The Anti-Defamation League said Facebook has "an obligation not to publish" falsehoods about the Holocaust.

In the interview, Zuckerberg said that rather than taking a fake news or conspiracy post down or barring the user, the company would seek to minimize it.

"Our goal with fake news is not to prevent anyone from saying something untrue — but to stop fake news and misinformation spreading across our services," Zuckerberg said. "If something is spreading and is rated false by fact checkers, it would lose the vast majority of its distribution in News Feed."

Facebook would take a harder line, Zuckerberg said, if anyone published calls to violence or tried to organize any type of attacks.

In his clarifying email to Swisher, he concluded, "I believe that often the best way to fight offensive bad speech is with good speech."

The heated discussion over Zuckerberg's remarks is the latest in a string of debates over whether Facebook is simply a technological platform, or if it should best be seen – and see itself – as a media outlet. That question has grown more complicated as the tech giant spends more to attract and create programming.

In January, Facebook said it was changing how its influential News Feed works, giving prominence to news articles from "high quality" sources, and pushing down others, as NPR's Aarti Shahani reported.

In recent months, Facebook reached deals with journalists such as CNN's Anderson Cooper and Fox News' Shep Smith, who are creating shows specifically for the platform. Other news organizations are also involved in the deal, which is meant to draw viewers to Facebook's Watch video section.

Over the past week, Facebook's policies have also been called into question for how it handles news organizations, including their use of ads to boost their most high-profile projects.

People at two news outlets – KPBS in California and The Texas Tribune — have complained that Facebook nixed ads because they were deemed to be political. In the Tribune case, an ad asked young people what issues they care the most about, ahead of the November election. At KPBS, an attempt to promote a story about migrant children appearing in court without their parents was barred.

Replying to complaints about the KPBS decision, Facebook's Product Director Rob Leathern said that the issue "applies only to running ads on the platform, and is fixable by completing the authorization process."

Leathern added, "If you are running ads in the U.S. about electoral or political issues you will need to go through the authorizations process. This includes news organizations - who are designated separately in the ad archive where these ads are retained publicly."

The same standards apply to all advertisers, he said in another tweet. That and other tweets were post in response to a posting by Jean Guerrero, who wrote the investigative piece for KPBS. The piece, she said, was effectively being censored by Facebook.

In a separate thread centering on the Texas Tribune's attempt to place an ad, the magazine's Chief Audience Officer Amanda Zamora questioned why the ad was scrutinized so closely, when "materially false and harmful" information passes through Facebook's newsfeed.

"Too bad efforts to engage readers in our journalism needs to be verified, when so much garbage fills my feed," Zamora wrote.

Days after Facebook announced its push to promote reliable news back in January, the company acknowledged the possibility that social media can have negative ramifications for democracy.

Samidh Chakrabarti, Facebook's Civic Engagement Product Manager, said the service was being "used in unforeseen ways with social repercussions that were never anticipated."