SocraticGadfly: Assange and the whataboutism credibility gap

July 05, 2019

Assange and the whataboutism credibility gap

Not that that many people are listening, as the twosiderism and whataboutism related to Julian Assange has ramped up since his new indictment.

But, I'm still typing.

Should Mueller be faulted if his Internet 12 indictments are based only, as far as computer evidence, on Crowdstrike mirrors of DNC servers? I'd argue yes.

Update, Nov. 22, 2019, related to that and Crowdstrike:
Back to the original.
 
Update, Dec. 9, 2020:
 
The fact that RNC computers as well as DNC ones were hacked undercuts the Seth Rich leaker thing right there. Unfortunately, for a while, I listened too much to bullshit artists like Aaron Maté (you ARE, on this, Aaron, shut up!) who said "cloud computing" and "mirrors" etc. were no substitute for the real thing. Well, when you use cloud servers, Aaron, that IS the real thing. If you're that much of a gasligher, you too can go fuck yourself along with Clevenger. If you're that much of an idiot, again, shut up. Ditto for anybody else repeating that nonsense.

NOW back to the original.

But, that doesn't mean that the case is flimsy, let alone that by default, Seth Rich (or even a non-Seth Richer at DNC) stole the initial set of emails.

(Breaking update, July 9: A new Yahoo News bombshell says Russian intelligence, specifically its foreign intelligence agency, the SVR, was behind the Seth Rich conspiracy theories.

The piece is by Michael Isikoff, who's had a fairly deep dive into Russiagate stuff, I know. But, as I've seen elsewhere, the timelines align with Google Trends information on when Seth Rich information started trending.

But, twosiderism folks of the absolute DNC establishment hater wing, I can accept the likely reality of this while continuing to reject the idea that Vladimir Putin directly colluded with Donald Trump to elect Trump president. Ditto for wingnut twosiderism delvers. AND, ditto for Russiagate twosiders. This proves nothing about collusion.)

Update, July 15: The delusional wing "more credulous precincts" of the left is delusional indeed if they're citing Ty Clevenger, and saying that Isikoff was trying to get out in front of him. But they are:
To which, I quoted from the Tweeting of Jeff St. Clair I had done earlier in the day, starting with the background of and link to what St. Clair said:
Followed by this quote, which I later sent to the "more credulous precincts of the Left":
Followed by the other half of the quote:
There you go.
 
(Sadly, St. Clair, along with managing editor Joshua Frank, have crappy editorial control in general over free[lance] submissions that they publish, as he's let his own site fuel this bullshit.)

And, if just 1/10th of this CNN exclusive about Assange in the Ecuadorean embassy is true, even though it doesn't mention Seth Rich, the "more credulous precincts" will have to double or triple down on that.

In fact, this needs to be unpacked a BUNCH more.

Just because Mueller may only have looked at mirrors to talk to a grand jury does not mean that's all the evidence he had on the IRA 12. That is like claiming the Steele dossier was the only basis for other parts of his investigation.

Second, it's a moot point because anybody with brains knows the IRA 12 will never actually be tried. Were they to face a US court, a defense attorney with any skill would of course insist that mirrors aren't evidence, nor are they a constitutionally confrontable witness. Presumably Mueller would be ready at that point by looking at mirrors.

But, that's small beer.

The big guns are the twosiderism and whataboutism behind this. And, that starts with the Internet Research Agency.

Refuting both Trump Train smokescreen spreaders AND certain strains of left-liberals and leftists, with different types of "whataboutism" from both, Symantec reports that the Internet Research Agency's work was more painstaking and more hands-on (in terms of human intervention on many social media accounts that weren't totally "bots") than previously believed.

Let's say Mueller has nothing but Crowdstrike's mirrors of the DNC servers AND those mirrors are wrong, or even tampered with.

Does that mean that ergo and ipso facto, Seth Rich did it?

No, no, and NO.

That's a Logic 101 logical fallacy of a false dichotomy.

Other options are:
The IRA 12 did it, even though Mueller doesn't have all the goods.
Other Russkies did it
Non-Russkies not at the DNC did it
Dems not named Seth Rich did it.

It ignores the counterevidence that the RNC, as well as the DNC, said Russkies attempted a hack, to boot. Circumstantial evidence, yes, but evidence.

I've covered ALL of this in depth before. I'm sure Consortium News and others are still going to peddle the Patrick Lawrence BS, since Ray McGovern is a chief peddler. AND, the two-siders should stop trying to claim that a burden of proof exists with the VIPS minority plus Ritter et al. Beyond that, I specifically commented on this related to Assange's arrest six weeks ago.

AND, if you're going to criticize Mueller, you need to criticize this Forensicator in spades. Or, Adam Carter, I should say. If you want Mueller to interview someone, toady Craig Murray, it's "interesting" how you want him to interview Bill Binney from VIPS, but not Thomas Drake, the man who said Binney and McGovern found their own "Curveball." (And, I think that of plenty of other people who believe the DNC emails were leaked not hacked, whether or not they believe in Seth Rich conspiracy theories — they went looking for a "Curveball" and so they found one.)

Toady Craig Murray has said he's OK with that, in response to a Tweet by me. In my response to him, I said that, even if Mueller had incomplete evidence, or worse, re Crowdstrike and the IRA 12, that in no way meant "Seth Rich did it." And, I specifically mentioned about half of what I did above above false dichotomies.

Murray's response?

Crickets.

And, sorry ... going down conspiracy theory lane in general?

Some mutes or blocks might be coming up. It's who I am.

And, that's as I shake my head at a growing list of generally intelligent people known online, and in a few cases, IRL, who accept conspiracy theories without any real evidence, let alone good evidence.

As for why Crowdstrike resists people who might know what to look at getting to look at the actual DNC servers?

Follow the dollars, not the conspiracy theories.

Such peaks would show even more of its ineptitude and thus dry up its business.

Let's forget the issue goes beyond Crowdstrike. Remember the Bernie staffer who was able to get into the DNC donor files? Remember how everybody then pointed at the lax security of NGP-VAN, but how it continued in this role because of its DNC connections?

Follow the dollars, not the conspiracy theories.

Beyond the dollars?

The fact that the Russians attempted to hack, but with a few exceptions, failed to hack, GOP computers is good indirect support for the idea that the Democratic emails Assange had before the Russian spearphishing were hacked, not leaked. It's good evidence that wingnuts on the right and a motley crew of left-liberal and leftist wingnuts on the other side both don't like to talk about.

The paper Reality Winner leaked is good indirect evidence of Russia's overall plan for meddling. Unfortunately, as one of those #TheResistance types, Winner misread Russian general meddling into Putin-Trump collusion.

It's why I continue to call myself a skeptical leftist.

And, it's not the only reason.

Leftist and left-liberal attempted justification of anti-First Amendment violence is enough to make me think about adding "cynical" to "skeptical" in the header. I'll never weird out like Justin Raimondo's strange political shifts, but, per a piece the Morning Snooze had about 15 years ago, a "where are they now" on Dallas-local 1960s civil rights activists, there's always the possibility of dropping more and more out of organized politics in general.
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at Friday, July 05, 2019 Posted by Gadfly

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