We recently criticized the EI ('election integrity') movement of the moment, at least some of them, for not having a positive effect and instead for having a negative effect.What they can't be criticized for is providing soap opera quality entertainment.
Their daily delight lately is the Franken v Colman debacle in Minnesota. And we thought that Brad Blog was so Shakespearean didn't we?
The people of Minnesota are without their full compliment of senators, but that does not matter to this cadre of EI self assessed experts.
"This is the way it should be" they have opined. "Take as long as it takes" to count the votes is their empty mantra that means nothing. Like deja vu all over again.
Months after the dust has settled on all other elections, including electronic voting machine based elections, they are as happy as pigs in slop to have this one senate election lingering on and on and on and on.
While Minnesota suffers a lack of senators.
Put some popcorn in the microwave and listen to a blather of voters dredged up from the bottom of electiondom's darkest corners, deep down dregs of implausibility, and then parade them before the world so they can see the glory of paper ballot elections? That is simply pathetic.
But the cruel joke is on Minnesota and our sympathies go out to them. Minnesota has the right to two senators but are being deprived of that. That is not good ... EI dogma notwithstanding.
Will it eventually become a curse to say "May the EI movement enjoy your election"?
What's up with Gentry Lange? Why be so adamant about no vote by mail as if it is some kind of communist plot to take over the world? He was Andy Stephenson's campaign manager. Brad also ends up seeing red if anyone promotes such an idea.
ReplyDeleteWho are these people? Why did some rise to the top and others didn't? Wasn't Andy a sub restaurant manager, but then all of a sudden he became some kind of icon? Is there a chance that whole Diebold {now Premier Election Solutions} source code found by Bev Harris thing was staged? How does someone go from selling Clinton Cigars to being in possession of the alleged holy grail proof of election fraud?
It all seems very convenient, this EI Movement history. Or am I just a multipersonality troll living in the basement?
socrates,
ReplyDeleteThe EI movement leaders I complain of are in it for the money, not for the betterment of the system. If I am wrong the results are to that effect, and that is what threw me off.
They recoil at the history of the EI movement I presented, an indisputable history, because they want their followers to think they invented bread.
It is the Jim Jones thingy.
Someone posted the same sentiment at my humble blog/forum, that a lot of these so-called progressive movements are really conduits for raising revenue. While I came back with my usual tinfoil rant about a rigged zeitgeist, I now see the possibility that your explanation could be closer to the truth.
ReplyDeleteA lot of people have astroturfed that Bev Harris is a grifter. Perhaps their claims would have been stronger, if they hadn't focused all their eggs on the one EI basket. It would have shown that this isn't a Bev Harris exclusive thingy. They all seem to be raking it in.
Now I'm not saying it is necessarily evil to put up a donation box or to once in while ask for monetary help. If someone like yourself wanted to blog full-time, then it would make sense to try that. I've wondered at times if I set up such a collection box, that maybe some unknown rich donor who agrees with my ideas and goals might enable me to go full-time. I have been at this blogging thing a lot for a couple years. But I do realise that such a pace cannot last forever without some funding.
Dredd, you there? I was thinking, since I am or something like that. See Descartes.
ReplyDeleteIs it crazy of me to think maybe the money part of the EI movement is a front?
What about disinfo? Where does it come from? Who pays for it? We know about astroturfing. Maybe someone will show up here and say you gotta try the new Dentyne gum, it's bubbalicious.
But what about psy-ops. We know cointelpro was for real. Why are people so naive to think there aren't major shenanigans going on with the web?
How does a guy like Brett Kimberlin go from convict to internet success, a big player in the EI movement? The same can actually be said for a lot of them.
Unless people dig into the archives, they will not see how these people emerged. They will just say, hey I am late to the party, but BradBlog looks like a good stop for the election integrity news. Or oh yeah, I heard about Bev Harris on HBO, so I'll check that out.
I am starting to think the whole thing has been a rigged scam. What about authentic campaign finance reform so any Joe/Jane Schmoe can be elected on their merits? Why not make sure everything is in the open and verifiable, that the people who are doing the verifying can be verified?
I don't trust any of them. If some of them can't even explain Kimberlin's past, yet hush it by saying {small font}we don't discuss that or Uncle Ben Burch either{/small font}.
Dude, I'm not a hater. I'm not a conspiracy theorist. What I have gone through is for real. For once, I'd like people to go yeah, crazy stuff that ESI guy posting at the same place calling Bev Harris a CIA 9/11 ratfink. Or like you did, much appreciated too, of how I had a few good points and some success over at Kos.
Hey, that's irony for you. I get a fair shake at the place I have called CIA, and to be blunt, Zuniga is a CIA guy or very close admirer, while the Democratic Underground is wildly insane in regards to playing it fair with the posters.
As for DU, I believe there is no underground. They are Al From democrats. And I do think those guys are both promoting the rightwing of the Democratic Party along with making a buck.
But within DU, and for our purposes the EI crowd, I feel the place is a psy-op, it is rigged. Some like Lindeman appear as useful idiots. While others like Joyce McCloy seem to be paid to post and have been fully involved with all the madness.
I was checking out the Bev Harris/Allen forums from way back, like '04 or so, and there was John Gideon making his first post.He was like my name is John {I picture a pirate type voice}, and I'm from the Pacific Northwest, I's a vietnam vet....
Nothing personal to vets. Then on the other hand {not Mark Lindeman}, you have Andy Stephenson running a sub shop, then presto, both of them end up as founders or whatever of voter's unite or votetrust or something, an offshoot of the Verified Voting Foundation. It's like hold up people. This is not adding up.
I feel like the internet is easily rigged because no one wants to reinvent the wheel, so they hear certain people and simply assume they are the voice of reason.
But to me, anyone who is going to be a true leader is going to have the ability to be an open book.
It was pretty wild, those last days at BradBlog. I think it was just a coincidence we both got fed up at the same time. I'm not saying in any way, shape, or form that the two of us have been very close or friends or anything. We were just at the same blog at the same time and never seemed to have a problem with each other.
But now it has become clear that no one sincere is available to take questions. No one but me has the urge to make sense of the internet history. And to be blunt, I think it is some of the craziest stuff imagineable.
{not gonna edit, just gonna hit post, hope I didn't wander off like a fool, my heart is in the right place. Hey I just thought of a new signature to try out. See below.}
What about my prime, Mick? At least you had a prime! I had no prime, I had nothin!
I was grogin and blogin ... went to your 'all aircraft ...' link and it said I was the "10,000th visitor ... click here to claim" ... I have too much already so I passed like a contrail in the sky.
ReplyDeleteBut I noticed that your blog is substantial and wonderful. Good bloggin bro!
oops ... previous post was to socrates ...
ReplyDeletesocrates,
ReplyDeleteYou will be happy to note that yesterday I sent an email to Brad, 99, and Big Dan informing them that I was sad to have not been able to have made the class reunion.
I said if you want to find me google "dredd blog" and parse the returns to see which one is me. You know like IRS agents do ...
Hey Dredd, thanks, it took a while, but I figured out the need to take screenshots and save whole web pages. There are things at my website that can only be seen there. My mom died a few years ago. Like I said in a post of yours up top, I first wrote about chemtrails, just one thread, at a place called Fortean Times out of England. Then I was off the net until 2005 when I signed on as Broccolli at Huffington. That's where I got into troll busting. Soon after I met slu&&o.
ReplyDeleteI went from web surfing crap places like Rense, Rivero, and Alex Jones which gave the appearance of being alternative to finding Fintan Dunne. There was a definite history and slope to my internet existence.
I first learned search skills looking for cancer diets, perhaps studies. When she passed on I went to Chemtrail Central and then ended up with the chemmies who on the surface appeared to be the most normal.
Wow, gotta figure out how to not ramble.
But yeah, I am like you in that I found this internet thing feeling like an avenue to feel whole, to be an activist, to make a difference. But each time along the way, I have been jilted. The last time was with Brad and Agent99.
Anyway, here is a tidbit I have never seen from the EI crowd who cover the Spoonamore story. Have you followed any of that? Have you any opinions on it and things like Curtis? Do you smell a rat like I do. You can always pass on this. I won't take it personally either way.
But here's a nugget.
A Letter from Lori Grace
Looking at the Aftermath of the Presidential Election:An Evening of Discussion and Information Sharing
Quote: "...So, in summary, my friends, what I did that I am so proud of is the following: I assembled about three-quarters of the main team. I brought together activist Bret Kimberlin with whistleblower Steve Spoonamore. And then I brought together activist Bret Kimberlin with Cliff Arnebeck, the lawyer with a background in election law; he had the ongoing lawsuit in Ohio with a favorable judge and district attorney on the stealing of 2004. I can only call this DIVINE NETWORKING...."
There's plenty more at that web page.
Hey, I figured out who this tantric sex lady is who claims to have been so instrumental in bringing Spoonamore, Arnebeck, and Kimberlin together. We are talking big money.
ReplyDeleteCould she be the missing link to who has really been the moving force {money?} behind Raw Story, Brad Blog, and Velvet Revolution? And if so, why not just own up to it? Why has the Speedway Bomber been the one to be perceived as being the big donor?
Ms. Celebrations of Love is Lori Grace, daughter of Oliver Grace, a man who was worth at least hundreds of millions of dollars.
The mystery grows.
A quick search shows she is very much into New Age stuff.
socrates,
ReplyDeleteI have noticed, like you have, that when we expose certain things web pages and even web sites disappear.
When that happens it does two things. One is that it tells you that you nailed it. And that your work is being watched. One is uplifting the other is anything from puzzling to disconcerting.
I am still torn between saving those pages and not. At the moment I don't bother.
The reason is that the jury's eyes glaze over when you tell them the dog ate the homework ... the web page that was there isn't anymore ... because anyone can make an HTML page.
Instead of saving those pages, use a bona fide third party site somewhere (does DIGG do that) which caches pages (like wayback machine) in a place where you only have control of telling them about it ... you don't have physical control of the page yourself ... well that is better evidence. Harder evidence.
Taking a copy of an HTML page yourself and then telling others this is the way it was is going to be mostly considered self serving because HTML pages are easy to forge and fabricate. It can be reshaped. Any page.
Besides as long as the crooks exist we will find them because they are BIG and they make BIG footprints. Their stench and DNA can not be hidden from us.
But I am still open to the contrary opinion.
As to the Lori Grace page. I rest my case. Circular logic on steroids. In addition to that it sounds like "the conspiracy was there then it wasn't".
What these people do not understand, and what is quite hard to understand, is that the actual truth is not the issue one should deal with directly.
Deal with the jury instead. Preachers try to convey truth to others even though it really can not be done. It is a dubious effort.
What must be done instead is to find out the edge of the jury's belief, then stay well inside of it. Give them information that fits within their mental ability.
Taking them past the edge of the earth will only scare them.
You are a smart kid. I like to call people kid, nothing personal. At first I didn't trust you becuase of your funny way of writing the double consonants. that is the reason we must always be open to the contrary, so we don't ass u me.
ReplyDeleteI have gotten to the point where if I can't envision something making a difference in the real world, then the troll busting becomes a waste of time, as if the dark side is feeding our egos by supplying the leads that we thought we had been geniuses to find.
Being accepted at BradBlog by the BradMeister himself was intoxicating. One thinks wow, here is a nobody who did a bit of sleuthing on-line, just like Bev Harris, and he ended up with a big fish website. We start to see how himself, Tinoire of PI, Jeff Wells, even Madsen and others went big time from starting at the bottom of the netroots. Another classic case could be that of Michael Rivero who rose out of the Free Republic.
So Brad has those rotating icons at the top like Be the Media. I saw how Slu&&o had succeeded with his expose on Rob Pelletier. It all seemed so real. I had the goods on Hertzberg. I didn't know at the time what it really meant, but I knew there was something to it. That's why I ended up at BradBlog. I felt ready to share what I felt was a blockbuster.
It took me only a month at BreakForNews to know it was a garbage website. When 98% of the posters are denying anthropogenic global warming, you know that is a statistical anomaly. But I continued to lurk as my internet addiction grew.
So I was there when a funny exchange was brewing over a bunch of days between the 9/11-2012 Mayan dude DrewTerry was frustrating the heck out of Navari, who was actually Steven Hertzberg.
I happened to be the right person at the right time when Drew Terry exposed Steven. It didn't hit me at the time to save the page, and as quick as a Rajon Rondo pass to KG, the page was gone. But I found it in the google cache and right click saved it. Later on Drew Terry joined my forum and I was able to figure out exactly how that brouhaha developed.
I thought I had hit the holy grail when I found out that Robert Hertzberg had been one of the first to sponsor a bill for electronic voting technology after the 2000 Florida fiasco. But when I got no response from Brad, I got very confused. I thought here we had a chance to scoop a big story. He was in L.A., so I thought he could see if the two Hertzbergs were related.
Eventually I theorised that Hertzberg had in fact been AnonymousArmy. I can't prove it, but the circumstantial evidence could lead someone to fairly opine the possibility.
As time went on I started to realise that if something was true, it really didn't matter if it was saved. Like with Robert Hertzberg sponsoring that bill. That can be verified in real life. Thus, no need to keep digging on that one.
Recently at DU, I started to see that Hertzberg had been more involved in the Bev Harris/DU story than one would expect. I always thought Steve was a clean cut professional. It blew my mind that he was a prolific blogger for Fintan Dunne, but I never expected that he had been an associate of Bev Harris from the earliest of time periods.
I think there is a program where you can copy websites. But like you say, anyone can create a page. There is the photoshop. I guess the question becomes, what are we trying to accomplish? Are we trying to create a grassroots movement on the internet? Is that even possible?
As for the Lori Grace, it took me a bit of time to make sure she is the daughter of the rich dude. I am 99% sure she is. It does seem that the specific page has been made harder to find already. The thing about my Kos threads is troubling, but it does get me to discard any illusions that I am going to be allowed to prosper on the internet. I am not sure who these E Pluribus Media people really are, but they are zeigeist sanctioned.
You are correct that newbies and fence-sitters need to be spoonfed. Remember the Police song, Too Much Information? It's true. Even for those in of us interested in a story, like with the Sab Diego Republic Chairman hacker, it was overwhelming to look into it. One lead would lead to another. It was very troubling to me to see Brad not get involved. Be the Media is one thing, but it felt like Brad was saying he was Moses Malone and could beat the Celtics with any four guys off the street. {sorry for the goofy sports analogies, the ramblings, etc., yeah, I like to hear the sound of my own voice.}
Hey, maybe Lori Grace can teach me that tantric to shut me up. Ok, that was bad taste, my apologies to the ladies.
But yes, there's the conspiracy, and then poof, all gone. Am I missing something? If she was the key to bringing together Arnebeck, Spoonamore, and Kimberlin, why hasn't anyone ever heard of her? Who is the fourth part of the team she was referring to? Herself? The anonymous McCain tipster?
We all know Rove is corrupt. We know the last administration is guilty of war crimes, spying, torture, and plenty more. Was it really a good idea then to focus in on unsubstantiated anonymous tipsters and alleged comments made in sealed documents? If I had a dollar for every comment I saw asking whether the Connell plane crash was murder or suicide, I'd be able to make a lot of phone calls.
To debunk that type of thing is to risk appearing as a freeper, Diebold {Premier Election Solutions} infiltrator troll. There's no way I ever wanted to suspect any of these people of being hoaxsters, misinformed, manipulated, or worse. But thankfully I was able to save a lot of screenshots of Larisa calling myself and CreekSneakers2 all sorts of crazy allegations. Thankfully, I was able to keep my cool at Daily Kos. But now I realise that I am not going to be able to prosper there either. They may not ban me. But somehow the search engines are being manipulated, so there is no need to.
I'll just add one more crazy thing I found during the last couple years of trying to be an amateur, internet sleuth which is my best example to fit what you said.
Hertzberg was into promoting Ron Paul. I found him posting at Twitter, no not there, at Jaiku, posting as RonPaulOnLine, his website after he quit Election Science Institute. I saw that one of his contacts was a big cheese computer guy named Leo Laporte. Google him, and you'll probably get a million results.
One result I got googling them together was a domain called top10th.net. Yeah, top 10th? As in, the elites? So I went into that place. There were about 160,000 returns. But what I found was quite stunning. Now before I wrap this up, I in no way, shape, or form am saying Hertzberg and/or LaPorte had anything to do with that. That's the funny thing about internet sleuthing. You can start at one point, and end up in some totally different zone of warpedness. Is warpedness a word?
Anyway, at this top10th.net, there would be keywords at the beginning and end of the basic domain name. For some reason, I decided to start plugging in my own words. Most of the time, pages would work. I was like wtf? Then I decided to try a goofy one. I plugged in Desi Arnaz at top10th.net. A whole new page was started, with no examples, but it seemed to be ready to go for articles and links for Desi Arnaz. I had created a whole new page to their database.
Some of the stuff I found was mind-boggling. Code Pink? Teddy Kennedy jokes? Iran War Inevitable?????
I found one thread at a Southern Baptist forum where someone noticed their church had been linked to that domain. They were wondering what was going on. I think someone said that it looked like it had to do with google ads.
I don't mind a contrary view. In fact, academics are supposed to always be trying to debunk themselves. Reporters have to do it, etc.. But some of the stuff to me, based on my Sociology background and on my increasingly tinfoil ideas about insidious astroturfing going beyond the use of product placement, I started to think this had more to do with psychological operations. You see, I could find through the caches the same exact url, but the present ones wouls have completely different full pages of links pertaining to the topics. So not only were there 160,000 returns. There seemed to be a rotating system, an updating of sorts. I theorised that psy-op personnel, the paid trolls, were able to use this database to find whatever they needed to sound smart of message boards and in fact all over the internet where blogging takes place.
I'll find a few screenshots of that to show you what I mean. Sorry for the length of this post. Pardon my indulgence.
First, here is what seems to be astroturf in the background of Leo Laportes Jaiku homepage:
http://mynetimages.com/1b632203.jpg
Oh one last point. Remember I said there had been 160,000 google returns for the domain? Within three days to a few weeks, they were all completely gone. No more caches either. I took screenshots of google too to show that the whole domain was scrubbed. There is no other explanation for this other than that I had stumbled onto something illegal. Or maybe they didn't want their trade secrets known. But it was strange how it all disappeared. I honestly don't think this had anything to do with internet ads. The topics were just too politically slanted for me to think this. But maybe someone can show me otherwise. But oh yeah, I am a nobody, and no one has ever given my stuff a good look. I've tried. It was a good two year run for me. I tried my best.
Oh wait, here's a good one, Advantage Consultants:
http://mynetimages.com/9cd5c67b.jpg
http://mynetimages.com/7fbf47ef.jpg
Ok, here are some examples of what I found:
Global Warming Info
http://mynetimages.com/15785671.jpg
Iran War Inevitable WTF??????
http://mynetimages.com/691ec70b.jpg
http://mynetimages.com/998bf6e6.jpg
Here's the forum thread from the church
Links to make fun of chemtrails?
http://mynetimages.com/028c5f01.jpg
Code Pink Aids Terrorists?
http://mynetimages.com/71294be7.jpg
Here's what my moderator at the time wrote:
"from 163k to 1k?
I just tried a google search on Top10th.net and got 957 hits.
So a few days after googling "top10th.net" and exploring their links, the google hit count dropped by over 99%?
Do you suspect that it was a direct result of your searching around? If so, how and why?
How?
It's very strange. How can an organization remove what turns up on a google search? Or are they some kind of sub-branch of Google? And is this somehow connected to the way some organizations (like CTC) seem to have the ability to remove google cache records? Who has the power to disconnect 99% of a topic's search records at the flick of a switch?
Why?
If the links were removed because of your queries, an equally important question is WHY? Why is what was public info, no longer available?"
Me: It would be the strange for that to be a coincidence. Also, I created some new pages, desi arnaz, aubuchont, hertzberg. I am a newbie with comps, but they must have found a way to see someone was snooping.
The beat goes on. Republicans are blowing a gasket over the Franken Coleman election even as we speak.
ReplyDeleteThis may be the longest election ever.