Russia Funding the Far Right? Did Nazi That Coming!
Russia accused of funding far-right video "journalists" in the U.S.
Sept. 5: “Journalists” had no idea of obvious thing … Russia-funded outlet pushed Carlson video … Harris balks at Biden capital-gains tax … GOP Senate candidate jokes about Native American drinking …
The Justice Department yesterday alleged the existence of a Russian scheme to fund right-wing online commentary because Russia understands how damaging that commentary is to America.
The indictment alleges that Russian-led media company RT, formerly Russia Today, funneled almost $10 million to a Tennessee “media” company (not named, but reportedly identified as Tenet Media), which worked with and insanely overpaid right-wing online “journalists.”
Russia’s goal, according to Attorney General Merrick Garland, was to “create and distribute content to U.S. audiences with hidden Russian government messaging” that was totally obvious and not hidden.
The messaging included undermining American support for Russia’s war against Ukraine but also building support for Donald Trump’s war against Vice Pres. Kamala Harris.
Because RT got squeezed by western governments after Russia invade Ukraine, its leaders decided to get the word out by less obviously obvious means.
Recently, Tenet’s right-wing partners and videos have been targeting Harris, Mother Jones magazine notes.
Prosecutors say Tenet’s founders knew about the scheme. Those founders are YouTuber Lauren Chen — who’s affiliated with Turning Point CCCP USA and is a proud veteran of Blaze TV — and her husband, Tenet Media President Liam Donovan, who’s affiliated with Lauren Chen.
Apparently oblivious to the scheme were a number of online “journalists” and truth-seekers who pull in audiences by revealing deep, buried truths about America except why tf they were getting enormaous checks from Tenet Media.
The indictment says RT, Chen, and Donovan somehow managed to trick these “journalists,” whose literal entire existence consists of believing stupidly obvious bullshit.
But the gullibility of these duped “journalists” has been well established, given that they built their careers on believing obviously dumb things. And it’s not as if these veteran “jouranlists” could have somehow compared their viewer numbers with their Tenet checks and used some sort of calculating machine to figure out that 2 + 2 = nyet.
These are people whose livelihoods depend on them not being able to figure stuff out! Even if they sensed something was wrong, there’s no way they were putin their finger on it.
How bad are these “journalists” at journalism? Benny Johnson responded to the nonleaked indictment by saying it was leaked. Dave Rubin forcefully asserted he “knew absolutely nothing” about this thing going on under his nose and into his wallet.
Tim Pool had already unjournalismed his Twitter response by last night.
One of them, reportedly Johnson or Rubin, was allegedly victimized to the tune of cashing checks for $400,000 per month. Another got $100,000 per video.
Do you know how much I would believe and not uncover for $400,000 per month? Even a 31-day month?
The Russians involved in this didn’t just send Tenet checks, they were hands-on about the content.
When RT asked Tenet to crank out a video blaming the Moscow concert massacre — which Islamic State took credit for — on Ukraine and the U.S., one of Tenet’s right-wing “journalists” responded, “[H]appy to cover it.” At least they’re finally happy!
At one point, one of the Russians directed a Tenet employee to distribute a specific video…which the indictment describes coyly this way:
“a video of a well-known U.S. political commentator visiting a grocery store in Russia.”
Unless I missed Rachel Maddow squeezing the avocados at the Novosibirsk Perekrestok, that’s Tucker Carlson they’re talking about disseminating, attention-paying Newsfuckers!
The producer told one of Tenet’s founders — who, remember, allegedly knew about the Moscow mission and money — that the Carlson totally unidentified video “just feels like overt shilling.”
And overt wasn’t the goal! Still, Carlson Mystery Video Guy wasn’t too overt for Moscow, so the producer was told that one of the founders “thinks we should put it out there.” And out there it went.
The news of Carlson’s Mystery Video Guy’s Moscow-approved level of overtness came on the same day that some deeply naive right-wing Republicans were just figuring out that Carlson had just hosted an actual Hitler apologist — specifically, an Adolf Hitler apologist — on his show.
Carlson’s guest was Darryl Cooper, a self-professed historian whose main thesis is that Nazis were Nazo bad. Cooper explained that Hitler and his Nazi friends were just misunderstood, making Cooper more of a mistorian.
Cooper appears to have gotten his information about the Nazi concentration camps from documentaries such as “Hogan’s Heroes.”
That whole Holocaust thing? Bad planning, Cooper explains! Because if there’s one thing Nazis are famous for it’s not having detailed plans and not making death trains run on time.
Bad planning might explain why Nazi guest facilities had really bad showers but then how does Cooper account for unique, well-planned amenities including firing squads and mass graves and recreational activities such as forced labor?
As a hard-hitting “journalist,” Carlson obviously confronted his guest with documented facts totally contradicting virtually every claim said of his guest’s claims, “I assume they’re all right. They’re consistent with what I think I know to be true.”
Carlson, of course, got a prime speaking slot at the Republican National Convention and is scheduled to interview vice presidential candidate Sen. JD Vance (R-OH), according to The Jerusalem Post, which is apparently paying attention to this stuff because yikes.
The (Republican) mainstreaming of Nazi apologia and/or cultural appropriation isn’t limited to well-mysteriously paid video “journalists.” The Arizona Republic reports that state Sen. Wendy Rogers responded to far-right election victories in Germany with Hitler’s Song of the Thousand-Year Summer, “Deutschland, Deutschland, Über Alles.” At least they’re singing!
The Anti-Defamation League, however, called Carlson’s praise of Cooper “an insult to the memory of the 6,000,000 Jews who were murdered by Hitler’s Nazi regime,” as well as, of course, an insult to the entire concept of group Airbnbs.
This wouldn’t be the first time Russia allied with Nazis, but apparently Pres. Joe Biden is the only person old enough to remember how that worked out for all concerned parties.
Of course, it wasn’t just the “journalists” who were victimized. So was Russia! After all, they shelled out $10 million to support work that was already being backed for free by someone with more money than Putin: Elon Musk!
In fact, Musk had shared Carlson’s Intro to Nazism 101 on his own Twitter account, calling it “Very interesting. Worth watching,” like a genius might. He then deleted it like a genius with a communications team might. And forgot to call his Tweet deletion censorship because Free Speech Über Alles!
BUT WHY? A separate indictment cited Russia’s intent to sow America’s fears about its border, and exacerbate U.S. racial and economic tensions. Which is, of course, an outrageous infringement, because all of that is Fox’s job.
But why would America’s enemies want us to think that the greatest threat we face is undocumented immigrants? Well, given that we took in millions of them, and given that they have a lower crime rate than Americans do, and given that America’s crime rate fell as its immigrant population swelled, obviously America’s enemies would want our crime rate back up where it belongs, in the bullet-filled heavens!
SO HOW DO WE FIGHT IT? The real answer isn’t indicting Russians that the U.S. will never capture or even censoring our billionaire tech overlords. The real answer is not being dumb.
The vast majority of this stuff is EASILY refutable and/or overtly dumb. But as long as people are told their unexamined feelings are awesome and that every opinion deserves respect, there’ll be no reason for them to do the work of filtering out the dumb.
So all we need to do is radically change the way our culture treats thinking!
And Now, a Joy-Free Story About Harris
Vice Pres. Kamala Harris on Wednesday made her first real break from Pres. Joe Biden, and not in a good way.
Biden has pushed to tax capital gains — money one earns gets without working — at a rate of 39.6% for anyone earning getting more than $1 million per year. In her new economic-policy rollout yesterday, Harris reversed her previous support for Biden’s plan and revealed her own preferred rate: 28%.
As the New York Times reported last month, rich Democratic donors have been pressuring Harris to let them keep more of the money they extract from the vast majority of Americans thanks to rules that they and their forebears heavily edited over the past half-century.
Yesterday, Harris said, “[W]hen the government encourages investment, it leads to broad-based economic growth and it creates jobs.” Thing is, not so much? That’s basically trickle-down economics in a Wall Street suit.
Narrowly limited investment “encouragement” can boost job creation, but that’s almost always only if it’s limited to tax breaks for actual jobs created. Throw unrestricted tax breaks at rich people and they’re more likely to use the windfall to buy robots programmed to destroy jobs.
Which would be awesome if we had universal basic income and free health care so we could ALL enjoy the fruits of robot labor. Now that would be joy!
14-Year-Old Charged in Killing Four at Georgia School
It’s Back-to-School time, and in America that means back to school shootings. A 14-year-old boy was charged with killing four people at a high school in an Atlanta, GA, suburb yesterday.
Two students and two teachers were killed. Nine others were wounded.
Local police interviewed the boy and his father last year after the FBI was tipped about online threats. The boy’s father reportedly said he kept guns in the house. But, y’know, for slaughtering non-human animals. And Dad said that his son didn’t have unsupervised access to the guns. Which, maybe?
The boy will be charged as an adult, meaning he’s responsible enough to let kids have unsupervised access to his guns.
Campaign Watch
DEBATE Lip-readers around the world, rejoice. The campaigns of Vice Pres. Kamala Harris and former Pres. Donald Trump have agreed to debate next Tuesday with their microphones turned off when it’s not their turn to speak.
Harris’s team — and hundreds of millions of people around the globe — had hoped for open mics, which would allow voters to experience for themselves Trump’s rudeness, infantility, and lack of impulse control.
Trump’s team, desperate to avoid having their candidate speak when he wants to, pushed hard against open mics at the ABCNews debate. And now Harris’s team has agreed to the original debate terms: No open mics.
The debate terms were originally set by Trump and Pres. Joe Biden. The Biden campaign had wanted the mics closed, which meant there was no Trump audio to distract viewers from Biden’s shockingly halting and jumbled performance. In other words, closing Trump’s mic back in June may have saved the planet. Closing it next week might doom the planet.
Butterfly Effect in action, Newsfuckers!
MONTANA Republican Senate candidate Tim Sheehy said at a fundraiser last year that roping and branding cattle is “a great way to bond with all the Indians while they’re drunk at 8 am.”
Sheehy also said that when riding in the Crow Fair Parade, “They’ll let you know when they like you or not, if Coors Light cans flying by your head.”
The statements were made in audio obtained by the Flathead Indian Reservation’s Char-Koosta News. Sheehy did not respond to their requests for comment.
Indigenous people make up about six percent of Montana’s population. Sheehy’s rival, incumbent Sen. Jon Tester (D-MT), didn’t respond when the New York Times asked him for comment. Tribal leaders told the Times that neither party can take their votes for granted.
TCB
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