Daily Check-In 03/21/2018

Wednesday March 21st.  First day of Spring.

 

 

CAMBRIDGE ANALYTICA AND FACEBOOK

• Facebook, Cambridge Analytica sued in U.S. by users over data harvesting
• The power players behind Cambridge Analytica have set up a mysterious new data company
• The Cambridge Analytica bridge is burning, and they’re shuffling over to Emerdata. Same crew, same owners, same staff, same practices, different name.

  Rebekha Mercer and her daughter became directors of Emerdata on March 16th, the same day that Facebook suspended Cambridge Analytica and this shitstorm began.

  Emerdata Ltd created by SCL/Cambridge Analytica’s Julian Wheatland, with Erik Prince’s business partner Chun Shun Ko appointed director Jan ’17 [sic 2018] – just added Rebekah Mercer & Jennifer Mercer as directors, along w/ Alexander Nix

  Remember, Kellyanne Conway worked for Cambridge Analytica back in 2016, and advised and advocated for Ted Cruz during the Republican Primary.

• Trump accidentally touts key role of Cambridge Analytica in 2016 campaign
• Cambridge Analytica’s parent company reportedly offered a $1.4 million bribe to win an election for a client
• Bannon oversaw Cambridge Analytica’s collection of Facebook data, ex-worker says

  The 2014 effort was part of a high-tech form of voter persuasion touted by the company, which under Bannon identified and tested the power of anti-establishment messages that later would emerge as central themes in President Trump’s campaign speeches, according to Chris Wylie, who left the company at the end of that year.

  Among the messages tested were “drain the swamp” and “deep state,” he said.

  …

  We had to get Bannon to approve everything at this point. Bannon was Alexander Nix’s boss,” said Wylie, who was Cambridge Analytica’s research director. “Alexander Nix didn’t have the authority to spend that much money without approval.

  …

  Wylie said that both Bannon and Rebekah Mercer, whose father, Robert Mercer, financed the company, participated in conference calls in 2014 in which plans to collect Facebook data were discussed, although Wylie acknowledged that it was not clear they knew the details of how the collection took place.

• Mark Zuckerberg and Sheryl Sandberg are quietly freaking out and pulling late nights behind the scenes
  

  They talked about topics like how to fix Facebook’s internal systems, whether Zuckerberg should testify in front of Congress or Parliament, the possibility of a lawsuit against Cambridge Analytica, and most intriguingly, what to do about a former Cambridge Analytica founding employee who now works for Facebook.

 

• No, Obama Didn’t Employ the Same Strategies as Cambridge Analytica
• Cambridge Analytica Looked to Pounce on Russian Hacks, Email Shows
• Cambridge Analytica CEO Alexander Nix called black clients ‘n*ggers’ in leaked email
• The Washington Post: Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg, in first response to Cambridge Analytica revelations, says company will audit thousands of apps
• Trump campaign firm CEO offered WikiLeaks help with Clinton emails
• Facebook Sued by Investors Over Voter-Profile Harvesting
• Silicon Valley Has Failed to Protect Our Data. Here’s How to Fix It
• Facebook data from Cambridge Analytica helped Republicans win keys seats in Colorado. And it cost them big bucks.
• Schiff: Cambridge Analytica CEO’s mocking description of GOP ‘all too accurate’
• Zuckerberg saved tens of millions of dollars by selling Facebook stock ahead of Mondays decline – MarketWatch

So, Cambridge Analytica is under so much scrutiny, the Mercer’s are trying to move everything over to a new company called Emerdata, but in the process they were caught, and their ties to Erik Prince have come forward.

This is big.

One major part of a conspiracy is getting everyone together for a common purpose.  Who’s involved, and how do they know each other?  How do they communicate?

Years ago, in an argument with someone who turned out to be a Russian Troll (I didn’t know it at the time, but is was during the ClimateGate scandal).  I posited what I call the Lunch Theorem of Conspiracies to debunk their claims of a global conspiracy of climatologists trying to rig data to cripple the oil industry.  It goes like this…

If the members of the conspiracy have not met for lunch at some point, there is not a conspiracy.

Lunch is one of the most basic tasks of existence, yet coordinating groups of people to eat together is a pain in the ass.  Something always goes wrong where one party has something that comes up, or someone doesn’t want to eat with someone else in the group, or just as everyone agrees to ribs, the vegan shows up.

A conspiracy to steal the Presidency is much more advanced than getting lunch, and one thing that’s always racked my brain was how do all of these people and parts fit together.  When did they have lunch?  Who hosted lunch?

Seeing that CA worked with parties connected to Erik Prince makes things like the Alfa Bank Server described in Daily Check-In 02/20/2018 fall into place.

 

MUELLER AND RUSSIA

• Special Counsel studies Trump campaign ties to Cambridge Analytica, sources say
• Fired FBI official authorized criminal probe of Sessions, sources say: EXCLUSIVE
• Judge tosses defamation lawsuit brought by Carter Page
• Trump Criticizes Mueller, Again, as a Former C.I.A. Director Suggests Russia ‘May Have Something’ on the President
• NY Judge Rejects Carter Page’s Defamation Lawsuit
• Senators Warn About Russian Election Meddling and Call for Paper Ballots
• Adam Schiff: Russia probe impossible thanks to GOP in Intel Committee

Mueller has been looking into Trump’s ties to CA for a while, but this story coming out now shows that he’s far ahead of the game.

Active FBI Director Andrew McCabe had investigated Attorney General Jeff Sessions for possible perjury charges and his connections to Russia.  Let me repeat that.

THE FBI DIRECTOR WAS FIRED BY THE ATTORNEY GENERAL TWO DAYS BEFORE RETIREMENT AFTER INVESTIGATING THE ATTORNEY GENERAL FOR POSSIBLE FELONIES.

 

AUSTIN

• Austin bombing suspect dies after blowing himself up, police say
• Bombing suspect Mark A. Conditt wrote political views in blog
• Austin bomber “viewed himself as conservative.” Wrote on his blog “Homosexuality is not natural” and “equated contraception to abortion.”
• The Washington Post: Austin bombing suspect dies after detonating explosive in his vehicle, police say

I mentioned yesterday in Daily Check-In 03/20/2018 about how fast the bomber could be found with the data available from a logistics company.

The terrorist was a home-schooled religious extremists who likely was radicalized further online.  The only thing missing at this point is a red cap.

 

#NEVERAGAIN

• The Right-Wing Attacks on Parkland Survivors Are Totally Unhinged
• More people view NRA negatively than positively for the first time since before 2000
• GOP Rep’s Office Got A Student Suspended For Cursing While Asking For Gun Control
• Man Who Wrote Viral Facebook Post on Gun Control Harassed, Daughter Threatened With Rape

The March For Our Lives is this Saturday.  Find a location near you.

 

STORMYWATCH, FROM THE STORMCENTER 6000 METEOROPORNOLOGICAL CENTER

• Judge denies Trump bid to get sexual accuser Summer Zervos’ defamation suit tossed: ‘No one is above the law’
• Stormy Daniels’ lawyer: 6 more women claim sexual relationships with Trump
• Stormy Daniels’ friend: She fears for her life – CNN Video

I’ve decided to include all of the sex-related issues and lawsuits under Stormywatch.

 

WHITE HOUSE CHAOS

• Kelly furious over leak of warning to Trump to not congratulate Putin
• Scott Pruitt Went To Italy, And It Only Cost Taxpayers $120,000
• Grassley on Trump calling Putin: ‘I wouldn’t have a conversation with a criminal’
• Trump doesn’t bother to hide his submissiveness to Putin anymore
• New travel costs revealed for EPA head amid ongoing scrutiny
• Trump furious over leak of warning to not congratulate Putin

Sometimes I wonder how much doesn’t get out.  Other times, I wonder how much they have to drink to make their jobs tolerable.  20 years from now there will be a spike in failing livers from the D.C. area that need replaced.

 

CONSERVATIVES, NOT NATIONALISTS; OR, HOW NOT TO GOVERN

• Republicans Start Talking Impeachment
• Arnold Schwarzenegger calls for centrist reshaping of GOP
• Millennial women leaving the Republican Party in droves: Pew
• 20,000 Republicans just voted for an actual Nazi
• Senator Bob Corker admits what we’ve known all along: For Republicans, it’s Party over country
• Breitbart’s readership plunges

“A big part of Breitbart’s success was that there was a niche to be filled that Fox News was not able to fill at that point,” said Faris, who co-authored a study on the conservative media ecosystem during the election. But now, with Fox‘s primetime hosts having fully embraced the president, he says, “The role, the importance of Breitbart is diminished.”

• Devin Nunes Probed by FEC for Possible Campaign-Finance Violations
• A new study finds more women now lean Democratic
• Pennsylvania Republican wants to impeach 5 state Supreme Court justices over gerrymandering fight

Gee, who would have thought that more women are leaving the Party that attacks a woman’s right to safe medical care, reproductive choice, belittles their opinions and endorsed a misogynist and rapist as President.

 

TRUMP ORG AND CORRUPTION, FROM THE WATER IS WET DEPARTMENT

• Republican National Committee spent $271K at Trump’s businesses last month: report
• Donald Trump Jr. Had an Affair With Aubrey O’Day During Vanessa Marriage 
• Donald Trump Jr. Pushed ‘Blatantly Illegal’ Project In India, Former Official Says — ‘Trump, Inc.’ Podcast
  

  The Trumps’ first India project, in Mumbai, was halted in early 2012 after investigators found significant “irregularities.” The investigators had been tipped off by a state lawmaker who suspected a $100 million fraud scheme and warned of “gross violations” in the project’s plans. Authorities revoked the building’s permits. A few months later, in April 2012, Trump Jr. traveled to Mumbai and, along with partners, met with a top official there to try to get the project restarted. Chief Minister Prithviraj Chavan declined.

  The Trumps were back in India in 2014, after a new government came into power, Narendra Modi’s BJP. The Trump Tower Mumbai — a gold-hued skyscraper that the Trump Organization bills as “unlike anything you have ever seen”—is now slated to finished next year. It is one of five Trump-affiliated projects currently under development in India.

   

• Kushner’s N.J. Trump Tower Got $200 Million Loan From Citigroup
  

  Trump Bay Street, a New Jersey luxury apartment tower part-owned by Kushner Cos., received a $200 million loan from Citigroup, according to two people familiar with the deal.

  It’s a coup for Kushner Cos. and their partner KABR Group, which need the funds to repay a construction loan that came due in September, as well as individual Chinese investors who put $50 million in the building through a visa-for-investment program. The companies had trouble finding lenders last year after Jared Kushner’s sister traveled to China, Bloomberg reported at the time.

 

 

 

 

• Summons Issued For Trump In Emoluments Case
  

  A lawsuit filed by D.C. and Maryland against President Trump over his alleged business conflicts has been expanded to include Trump in his personal capacity as a businessman, which means that a summons has been sent to perhaps the most famous address in Washington: 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue.

What I really like about this lawsuit is that it comes from two Local AG’s suing on behalf of hotels in their jurisdictions that are losing business to Trump Org.

 

CAN WE GET BACK TO POLITICS?

• China to Target Trump’s Base in Tariff Response
• USCIS suspends fast processing for some H-1B visas – Axios
• Saccone concedes 18th district race in phone call to Lamb
• Lawmakers in Kosovo release tear gas in parliament to prevent vote | TheHill
• The Washington Post: Fed raises interest rates to highest level in a decade, raising costs for borrowers and easing off efforts to stimulate the economy

 

 

RUMOR MILL:  NADER GETS IMMUNITY AND FACEBOOK RAGE

Dr. Dena has a very good, in-depth, and emoji-filled thread about George Nader, Elliot Broidy, and who Nader can deliver.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The knives are out for Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg and his cronies.  Each and every shitty thing he’s done, said, place he’s been to or shitty person he’s hung out with is coming to the surface.

Two of the themes going around are Zuckerberg’s money ties to Russia, which I’ve covered before, and his Presidential ambitions.

During 2017, there was a lot of talk about how he was angling for a possible Presidential campaign in either 2020 or 2024.  He was traveling around the country, hanging out with politicos, and had claimed that he “found God”.

I was always suspicious of that move myself.  Zuckerberg was an outspoken atheist for years.  Being an atheist in America is becoming a little more accepted, but they’re still one of the least trusted groups in the country.  Saying that one doesn’t believe in a diety is political suicide in America.  Meanwhile, proclaiming one’s faith is almost a prerequisite for drawing voters.  It’s not enough to quietly believe, but one has to be loud and obnoxious about it.

So, when Zuckerberg said that he “found God,” my first thought was “Fuck, is that obnoxious shit going to run for office?”  Then, he went on a tour of the Midwest states like Iowa and Kansas.  That confirmed it for me.

Now, he’s in a world of shit, and I hope it gets worse.  Facebook’s business model is selling data.  We’re not users of Facebook, we’re the commodity.

 

That’s it for today.  I’m running behind today, and a little tired.  I’ve been playing with a different format the last few days, mainly because I’m grabbing a lot of news articles about groups of subjects.  One thing that bothers me with modern reporting is the mini-story.  500 words about one sound byte from another report, then another 500 words about another sound byte, then another article, and so on and so on.  I’m over 2200 words right now, but I’m also long-winded.  I’ll see how this format works for another day or so.  I’ll keep it if I like it.  If not, I’ll use it when needed.

 

Thank you, and have a good one.

 

“Without Journalists, it’s just propaganda.”

– Katy Tur