Relevant Tangent posted:

Hitler didn't gently caress

A sample of a Web Bot ALTA report posted:

These areas also indicate that [revenge assassinations] will be taking place over the latter third of
2010 and throughout most of 2011 at a planetary level as those [thought/presumed (to be) guilty]
of ['murdering' terra] are themselves [punished] by some very {ed note: probably justified}
[unbalanced persons]. Note that there are pointers for a [wave of assassinations] that seemingly
are being [engineered], and whose target will be [Jesuits] and other [jewish/zionists minions] of the
[church (of the sorcerers - aka roman catholic papists)]. That this area is buried within the [oil
volcano] side effects is unusual. There are extensive cross links over to TPTB entity. Within the
termination points here, there are many pointers to [attempts (some successful, some not)] against
the [gangs] of the [banksters (aka -rose protected, and stone buddy boys)]. At least one of the
successful [executions] is indicated to be [within sight/smell of] the [oil volcano].
The [oil volcano] sub set continues to gain data in support of the [ill winds] area, and still is gaining
support for those sub sets indicating that 1.289+ billion people will [perish] as a direct result of the
[ill winds] and the [oil volcano]. This area also continues to be tied into the [israeli mistake] sub set
in the Terra entity, the Populace/USofA entity, and the GlobalPop entity.
Noting that the [oil volcano] was created by the [zionist funded, crown owned British Petroleum
(same group that paid the CIA to put the Shah of Iran into power in 1953 among other crimes
against humanity)], it remains to be seen whether more of the [sticky dirt] of the [planetary
poisoning] will yet come to rest on the [shoulders] of the [israelis] as events progress through the
[torments of Summer] and into the [tortures of Fall, 2010].
Against the [officialdom claims] of a [cleaned well, ready for use] to be [available/accomplished in
August], the data suggests that this [claim] will also be [exposed] as [hollow] and [duplicitous] by
mid August as [nefarious (geologic) manipulation] comes [to the surface] of the [public
consciousness]. {ed note: this area is tied into the Populace/USofA entity and SpaceGoatFarts
entity by cross links that terminate in the 'big gains' of public awareness for the woo-woo
community starting in July.}
In the [ill winds] sub set newly acquired supporting layers are several indicating that in at least one
instance the [ill winds] will be so [dense/heavy] that they will be [stopped (at the) base] of a
[mountain range]. This is indicated to create a [lake of death air] at the [base of the mountains] in
what is also described as a [v-shaped (half vesica) depression]. This is not a box canyon as there
is egress to and from this area, but for the [heavy winds] the [depression/hollow] will form an
[atmospheric-lake bed].
This [lake of death air] has a major [road way] that comes over or through the [mountains], and
descends into an area that is currently [lush] with [plants]. The data shows that the [plant and
animal life] of the [region] will also die, along with [many humans] who will either be [trapped] in
the [lake of death air] or will unwittingly [travel into it]. Further the data shows the [heavy death air]
is so [toxic] that [even worms] will perish under it. This is but a single instance of thousands of
detail layers about the [ill winds] and their effects on the planet.

OwlFancier posted:

That isn't a Russian thing though, the US's political landscape includes plenty of people who want to dismantle people's belief in the ability of the government to do anything.

chitoryu12 posted:

Would a Russian have used "Matlock" as a password or something actually in Russian?

DangerousDan posted:

It might be Discordians doing this, maybe.

Luigi's Discount Porn Bin posted:

Aside from Matlock, Q also disappears for weeks at a time, which seems to go against the idea that it's a professional.

It's possible that Q is a Russian psyop or targeted gangstalking or whatever, but it wouldn't require billionaire-level resources. You just need a hard-right true believer or two with a decent amount of time on their hands and not a lot of scruples. There's no shortage of people who have MAGA'd their brains into a place where they'd fake insider info for the greater good of redpilling the normies, financial incentives or not. Could be a couple of PJW's lackeys from the Infowars supplement marketing department - there are many ways to profit off radicalization and rising paranoia among right-populists that don't involve either being Vladimir Putin or setting up a Patreon for your bullshit.

Also, an interview with RT doesn't mean much. They feed off whatever batshit conspiracy-mongering is going on at the moment, and are all that much happier if it undermines the US. They've done bits on chemtrails and HAARP as well.

Prester Jane posted:

These are all very fair points. My contention with the RT interview is that it demonstrates that both Q and Russian propaganda are at least on the exact same page with regards to both each other and the general narrative they are pushing about Trump being in a covert war against the Deep State. It could certainly be just opportunism on the part of our RT, but that wouldn't necessarily explain why Q seems to parrot the Russian line on pretty much everything without fail. To me it seems very likely that the Narrative's that Q and Russian psyops are pushing are identical because they are acting more or less in coordination. It could be just crass opportunism on both sides, but I personally doubt it at this point

LORD OF BOOTY posted:

This would be sort of uncharacteristic of them, Discordians tend to be pretty benevolent.

Ratoslov posted:

I think all you need to do to be Qanon is be someone who's good at writing nonsense and cold-reading /pol/ jerks, and who also reads a lot of politics. The suckers want to believe.

OwlFancier posted:

It could as easily be a product of monkeys on typewriters, lots of people on the internet try to make memes and go viral, that one eventually succeeds doesn't suggest a cunning plan as much as an inevitability of sufficient attempts.

Prester Jane posted:

Personally I don't think you need any more than a small team of perhaps 10 individuals to create the Q Anon phenomenon and to create false consensus around it on the chans, but I do feel that it would require a pretty specialized set of talents in order to do so, to say nothing of the in-depth knowledge of American politics and culture that are on display. What I'm saying is it would mostly require some specialized know-how that doesn't come cheap, but but beyond that it doesn't require anything particularly special or resource intensive.

TapTheForwardAssist posted:

OwlFancier posted:

But right wing hysteria and conspiracy nuttery is self perpetuating though. The major change over the last decade or so is it migrating from the fringe radio to the main narrative, but that's a fairly logical progression if you consistently campaign on lies and religious fundamentalism though.

There has been a consistent effort to detach the voting public from reality by a significant section of the right, but once that is achieved, not every effective push on the conspiracy front needs to originate from them or be consciously directed by some central authority. What has been created is a bunch of detached people prone to believing in the bizarre and fanciful and hopped up on right wing talking points,

quote:

that they then regurgitate and create their own stories on those themes which serve as the talking point du jour doesn't indicate a conscious direction, it's right wing fanfiction, formed out of a morass of satanic panic and store brand religious imagery and age old racism and nationalism with a side of too many videogames and tom clancy novels, and the fact that all it achieves is chaos suggests that it isn't under anybody's control.

quote:

Festinger and his colleagues infiltrated Keech's group and reported the following sequence of events:

Before December 20. The group shuns publicity. Interviews are given only grudgingly. Access to Keech's house is only provided to those who can convince the group that they are true believers. The group evolves a belief system—provided by the automatic writing from the planet Clarion—to explain the details of the cataclysm, the reason for its occurrence, and the manner in which the group would be saved from the disaster.
December 20. The group expects a visitor from outer space to call upon them at midnight and to escort them to a waiting spacecraft. As instructed, the group goes to great lengths to remove all metallic items from their persons. As midnight approaches, zippers, bra straps, and other objects are discarded. The group waits.
12:05 am, December 21. No visitor. Someone in the group notices that another clock in the room shows 11:55. The group agrees that it is not yet midnight.
12:10 am. The second clock strikes midnight. Still no visitor. The group sits in stunned silence. The cataclysm itself is no more than seven hours away.
4:00 am. The group has been sitting in stunned silence. A few attempts at finding explanations have failed. Keech begins to cry.
4:45 am. Another message by automatic writing is sent to Keech. It states, in effect, that the God of Earth has decided to spare the planet from destruction. The cataclysm has been called off: "The little group, sitting all night long, had spread so much light that God had saved the world from destruction."
Afternoon, December 21. Newspapers are called; interviews are sought. In a reversal of its previous distaste for publicity, the group begins an urgent campaign to spread its message to as broad an audience as possible.

OwlFancier posted:

It's not the person throwing the matches that's responsible for the fire, as you say, when the fuel's been stacked up for decades. Though I would argue this is more like someone throwing petrol bombs into an ongoing forest fire. Sure technically it's contributing but really what's already there is pretty horrible to begin with.

The Observer posted:

The Russian state-sponsored website Russia Today (RT), the self-proclaimed “first Russian 24/7 English-language news channel which brings the Russian view on global news” provides a fascinating window into what pro-Russian news looks like. Currently boasting headlines like “Putin: US wants to disrupt upcoming Russian election” and “US Congress to spend $4.6 bn for ‘reassuring NATO allies’ as anti-Russia hysteria mounts,” the site spins information (or misinformation), drawing self-described “paleoconservative” InfoWars’ Alex Jones. As it turns, Jones’s far-right fandom may have gone a step too far.

As reported by Buzzfeed News, InfoWars re-published over 1,000 RT articles within the past three years without the Kremlin-backed outlet’s permission. InfoWars’ plagiarism is evidenced by data from Buzzsumo, a social tracking website that monitors content as it is shared online. Although InfoWars included credits in the articles’ bylines, a representative from RT told Buzzfeed that they did not receive permission to perpetuate such content.

McClatchy D.C. Bureau posted:

Operatives for Russia appear to have strategically timed the computer commands, known as “bots,” to blitz social media with links to the pro-Trump stories at times when the billionaire businessman was on the defensive in his race against Democrat Hillary Clinton, these sources said.

The bots’ end products were largely millions of Twitter and Facebook posts carrying links to stories on conservative internet sites such as Breitbart News and InfoWars, as well as on the Kremlin-backed RT News and Sputnik News, the sources said. Some of the stories were false or mixed fact and fiction, said the sources, who spoke on condition of anonymity because the bot attacks are part of an FBI-led investigation into a multifaceted Russian operation to influence last year’s elections.

Prester Jane posted:

For example here is Alex Jones telling you very plainly that he is a self-aware Russian stooge:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9qX5ZbZJrY4

Luigi's Discount Porn Bin posted:

He certainly flies into a roid rage about Schiff calling him a Russian stooge, but I don't see how you're getting "yes, I'm a Russian stooge" from this.

quote:

It's certainly possible that Russia's behind Q or that, per Uglycat, it's some kind of targeted gangstalking operation. But I'm not sure this is a necessary explanation. I don't think there's much question that the Russians benefit from destabilizing narratives and right-wing radicalization in the US, but the "cui bono" question isn't enough. You have to go further than that, and further than the general impression of hidden agency, or you're falling into the same bias-governed conspiracy trap as QAnon's target audience. The question should be, what's the best explanation given the available phenomena? What's the balance of probabilities of "Q is a weaponized Russian-backed internet prophecy sockpuppet cult" versus "one of a thousand fly-by-night 4chan insider LARPers developed a following and decided to run with it"? I think the latter sounds totally plausible. A large effect doesn't always mean a proportionately large cause - this is a cognitive bias as well. Meanwhile, Q seems to have a much better command of the English language than the usual confirmed Russian propaganda efforts. Maybe you can chalk this up to his usual stilted writing style, but he definitely seems to be a few cuts above "Woke Blacks" and the like.

Uglycat posted:

There was a day when the facebook discordian group lost 20,000 accounts overnight. It was a few months back. There was a large network of facebook sockpuppets that used that group to build their credibility as 'real actual humans.'

Renaissance Spam posted:

PJ you described how when you were in your otherkin cult the group would reaffirm certain concepts or ideas in order to establish their own stories and I think something like that is happening here; someone with a tenuous hold on reality (or perhaps a desire for attention) started the Q posts, possibly in hopes of eliciting some kind of action from the audience and as people bought in they evolved the concept, leaning into the theories in order to reaffirm their role as a mysterious deep operative.

quote:

the fact Q posts promote reverse engineering and passive activity ("oh this is what Q meant" or "don't worry everyone, Trump is gonna fix it") it feels less like an active operation and more someone playing into a fantasy.

Politico: Russia pushes more "Deep State" hashtags. posted:

The Hamilton 68 dashboard launched in August to track activity in a network of 600 Twitter accounts identified as being Russian-influenced. Some of those accounts are official Russian state propaganda, like RT or Sputnik; others are bots; and still others are independent voices consistently sympathetic to the Kremlin. While these 600 accounts represent just a fraction of Russian-influenced activity on Twitter, the idea is that they can provide insight into larger Kremlin efforts.

Typically, Schafer said, activity within the network of accounts has two purposes: first, to promote divisive social issues — whether around race or religion or abortion — and, second, to then hook followers onto accounts tweeting about them. That way, messages about issues important to the Kremlin, like Syria or Ukraine, can be mixed in.


........


Going forward, Morgan said he would be particularly watching the #qanon hashtag, also called “The Storm,” which refers to a wild “deep state” conspiracy theory that has grown popular in the far reaches of 4chan’s message boards. The theory, apparently originally posted by an anonymous commenter called “Q,” is a reference to an October 2017 reference Trump made about the “calm before the storm,” and posits, among other things, that the president has set in motion a plan designed to take out the deep state forces currently arrayed against him and arrest Obama, former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and Sen. John McCain.

Reddit thread about Russian bots pushing the Q Anon hashtag posted:

So.

Brand new sub appears and grows by around 800-1k members per day. Many of the accounts were started at the same time, are brand new, and they're posting well over 200 new threads per day and thousands of comments. I have never seen a sub grow this quickly.

Within a couple of weeks of this sub beginning, the moderators of this sub (that claim to be in direct contact with "Q") land an interview on Infowars. The moderators have brand new accounts when this interview occurs. A couple of days after the Infowars interview, Alex Jones shills for the sub and the moderators on his personal Twitter feed.

And now a week later, Russian government shill accounts are pushing ""Q" hard.

What an odd series of coincidence.

Same thread posted:

A lot of the posters on the cbts subreddit seem to be older (50s and 60s) and very religious. They seem to be new to Reddit and are not technologically savvy and constantly make religious references.

I definitely think that Russians are pushing the Q narrative (evidenced by the securing democracy data) but I think that we are seeing the demographic that is being reached by this conspiracy mongering

Same thread. posted:

I'm still not convinced that those are real people behind those accounts to be honest. Real in the sense that they're posting, but not real in that I think the vast majority are bots and/or paid trolls.

I think you're right on target though regarding the demographic that's being targeted, which is older people and Baby Boomers. That's a theme that they're pushing really, really hard along with the religious bullshit. There's an apocalyptic, end of times, take up arms tone that I'm seeing too....... It's a nasty combination, really dangerous rhetoric.

quote:

It would have to be an alt right supporter that has a ton of free time, programming ability, in depth experience in social media manipulation, and connections to Alex Jones and Infowars. And that's not taking in the possibility that these are trolls, not bots. If those are trolls someone is compensating them, and that takes money. And even then, how much manpower does it take to create 800 bots per day? Is that something a single person can do in their parents basement?

And then there's the issue of Russian government shill accounts picking it up and making it their number one hashtag. At the very least that indicates that the Russian government is aware of the "Q" conspiracy, and has taken steps to amplify it using their shill accounts.

Media Matters posted:

A fake news website that has been classified as a Russian proxy by European Union officials is claiming that a 4chan user who purports to be from the White House was its source for a story.

On January 31, following a collision between a train carrying Republican members of Congress and a garbage truck in Virginia, YourNewsWire published a fake story headlined “White House: GOP Train Crash Was ‘Deep State’ Assassination Attempt” that claimed “White House sources” had told it that the incident “was a false flag orchestrated by the Deep State in an attempt to avoid the release of the FISA Abuse memo.” The article added, “According to QAnon, the White House staffer who has predicted the future with remarkable accuracy in the last two months, the Deep State is running scared and attempting to cover its tracks.” And on Twitter, in response to a user who questioned the accuracy of the article, the website’s Twitter account responded, “QAnon is the White House source.”

........


“QAnon” refers to a conspiracy theory known as “The Storm” that started making rounds on 4chan and 8chan message boards late last year. The conspiracy theory claims that a person known as “Q” who claims to be a “high-level government insider” has been writing posts, or “crumbs,” to “covertly inform the public about POTUS’s master plan to stage a countercoup against members of the deep state.” The scope of the conspiracy theory has now expanded to include all kinds of events, such as the fire at Trump Tower in early January, and has even been invoked to accuse model Chrissy Teigen and her husband, singer John Legend, of pedophilia.

This is at least the second time the website has cited QAnon for a fake story. On January 4, it claimed in a fake story that according to QAnon, “Trump’s recent announcement that he is going after high profile child traffickers is directly linked to” a fire on the estate of Bill and Hillary Clinton (Trump has also made no such announcement). YourNewsWire has also claimed that certain events were “predicted by QAnon,” has promoted conspiracy theory website Infowars’ hyping “The Storm,” and has embedded tweets pushing the conspiracy theory in its articles.

YourNewsWire, which was founded in 2014 and is based in Los Angeles, has come under fire for repeatedly publishing fake stories such as the Centers for Disease Control claiming that the flu shot was causing a “deadly flu epidemic,” a dying former MI5 agent confessing to killing Princess Diana, and actor Keanu Reeves claiming that Hollywood uses babies’ blood to get high. Some of YourNewsWire’s fake stories were some of the most viral fake stories of 2017, according to a BuzzFeed study. The website has also been classified as a Russian proxy by the European Union's East StratCom Task Force, a task force established to fight Russian propaganda.

Cactus posted:

It's Snowden

quote:

976
Mar 28 2018 22:14:46
Q
!xowAT4Z3VQ
825890
http://www.foxnews.com/politics/201...estigators.html
Wonder who leaked this.
Fire in the hole.
Q

977
Mar 28 2018 22:16:18
Anonymous
825909
>>825890

Seeing a lot of your leaks lately friend!

Good to have a friend leaker for once!
Mar 28 2018 22:17:17
Q
!xowAT4Z3VQ
825929
>>825909
HRC 2.12.09
Very BAD!
Q

978
Mar 28 2018 22:20:40
Anonymous
825987
>>825929
>>824969
Did you see codemonkeys message?
Mar 28 2018 22:22:25
Q
!xowAT4Z3VQ
826012
>>825987
/GA/ is dead.
Q

TapTheForwardAssist posted:

More crumbs!

quote:

HRC 2.12.09
Very BAD!

quote:

Alison Des Forges, a human rights investigator and an expert on the Rwandan genocide. ...
...she worked as a researcher on Rwanda for Human Rights Watch in the years before 1994; when the genocide began, she alerted the world to the danger that threatened Rwandans like her friend Monique Mujawamariya, who managed to escape Hutu killers partly through Des Forges’ efforts on her behalf; in the early weeks of the genocide she lobbied the Clinton White House, unsuccessfully, to intervene (according to Samantha Power’s “A Problem from Hell,” Clinton’s national security advisor, Anthony Lake, replied to Des Forges’ urgings, “Make more noise!”); she later documented the genocide as extensively as any other writer, in her 1999 book Leave None to Tell the Story

TapTheForwardAssist posted:

The QTards are trying to figure out what happened on either 2 December 2009 or 12 February 2009.

One popular guess is that there was a plane crash in New York state on 12 February 2009 that killed a human rights activist who worked on Rwanda:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Colgan_Air_Flight_3407


To hear the right wing go on about it, you'd think that Hillary Clinton is the third-leading cause of death in the US, slightly behind heart disease and cancer.