The FBI is investigating whether Alexander Torshin, a top Russian banker (known as the "Russian godfather"), illegally funneled money to the NRA to help Trump win.
(The NRA spent $30 million to support Trump — 3X what they gave to Romney's 2012 campaign)
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A bit of background info on Alexander Torshin, the Russian bank exec and suspected mobster/organized crime boss who is now being investigated for potentially funneling $ through the NRA to help Trump's campaign. (That's him at the 2016 NRA convention👇).
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According to intel assessments, Torshin is part of a years-long "aggressive Kremlin effort to forge alliances" w/top GOP figures, including those close to the WH. The NRA is a major conduit of influence here... and possibly also a cash conduit.
Trump was set to meet with Alexander Torshin in February before the National Prayer Breakfast. The meeting was canceled the night before when an NSC staffer blew the whistle and flagged Torshin as a potential Russian mobster...
In Nov., @NBCNews reported that Jared Kushner failed to disclose what lawmakers called a "Russian backdoor overture & dinner invite" from Alexander Torshin.
Torshin wanted Trump to attend an event at the NRA's May 2016 convention in Louisville, KY.
The undisclosed email chain suggested that Torshin "was seeking to meet with a high-level Trump campaign official during the NRA convention, and that he may have had a message for Trump from Putin."
Also in Nov., Don Jr admitted that he met with Torshin at a private dinner at the NRA's 2016 convention — just as Torshin requested in the (undisclosed) emails to Kushner (in which he said he wanted to meet with a high-level Trump campaign official).
Torshin and Trump have reportedly known each other since at least 2012. According to Bloomberg, the two "had a jovial exchange at the NRA convention in Tennessee in 2015."
...interesting how this keeps circling back to the NRA, isn't it?
Another key figure in the Torshin-NRA-Trump nexus: Torshin's "special assistant" Maria Butina, who attended one of Trump's first campaign events in April 2015 — during which Trump signaled his willingness to lift sanctions on Russia.
The “controversy” over Sydney Sweeney is absurd and largely fake, but there’s one thing worth paying attention to — the tried and tested formula used by the right-wing outrage machine to manufacture liberal fury and then bait the left into making it a reality.
Here’s how it works:
First, invent the outrage. This usually involves picking a neutral or mildly provocative event and finding something about it to frame as being offensive to the left. In this case, the slogan (“Sydney Sweeney has great jeans”).
Second, flood the zone. Carry out a social media blitz and manufacture the appearance of outrage by gaming the algorithm with repetitive content, which will then get pushed into trending feeds and recommended videos — creating the perception that people actually care about it.
I just published the 2nd major piece in my series about algorithmic tyranny — this time, revealing how Trump & the right-wing outrage machine are not just gaming algorithms, but rewriting the rules so they can keep gaming them indefinitely. I call it the Feedback Loop Coup.
Last week, I introduced the concept of Reverse Algorithmic Capture, a tactic used to force platforms to rewrite their rules through political & legal pressure. Feedback Loop Coups are similar, except they exploit *existing* rules to rewire algorithms & seize control of your feed.
We all know by now that platforms operate on the same fundamental principle: the more engagement a post receives, the more the algorithm pushes it into other people's feeds. The faster this engagement occurs, the more "urgent" the algorithm considers it, and the wider it spreads.
I have reported on and studied some incredibly dark topics, but there’s a rabbit hole underneath the practice of AI resurrections (ie, trying to recreate dead people through AI personas) that makes QAnon look like a fun walk through the park. And no one is paying attention.
The practice of creating AI personas to represent dead people — including using their likeness, image, voice, and words — is disturbing enough on its face, and of course very rarely involves consent. But it’s also totally unregulated. Because no one is paying attention.
There are researchers out here, warning that they have seen AI resurrections stalk their family members online beyond the point that their family members want to interact with them. Imagine an AI persona of your dead loved one begging to talk to you… and having to say no.
You’ve probably heard by now that Jim Acosta interviewed an AI depiction of a dead school shooting victim on Monday. Beyond the uncanny valley stuff, there are actual harms associated with so-called griefbots — some researchers even warn of “digital hauntings” that prolong grief.
Beyond the implications for individuals, there are also profound societal implications that are not being addressed, as tech companies push these disturbing creations out there with no policies to regulate them or deal with accompanying harms.
There are also serious questions about how these AI creations are being used. For example, the father of Joaquin Oliver said he plans to create social media accounts for his AI son so he can use his voice to advocate for gun control. This is a totally new form of influence.
To follow up on my recent article about Trump’s covert manipulation of the algorithms that curate our reality, I published a 10-step guide for resisting the tyranny of the algorithm.
You have a lot of power here, but you have to learn to use it.
This is the first piece of advice I offer in the survival guide for resisting algorithmic tyranny. Until you learn the difference between entertainment and education vs covert psychological manipulation, you will remain a slave to the algorithm.
Learn the difference. Act on it.
Algorithms serve up content you like b/c they know that’s how they can hook you and get you to keep clicking, keep scrolling, and keep making them more money. They’re like digital drug dealers — and I’d argue that the effects are more insidious and corrosive than actual drugs.
Just to put a fine point on it, remember that Trump dismantled our entire cybersecurity workforce so there’s no one around to stop his algorithmic manipulation — and those who are around and might consider doing know that their job is on the line if they do.
As a reminder, within 2 months of taking office, Trump had fired over half of the government’s AI workforce. The ones who were there to put up guardrails.
And then there’s DOGE. They were given essentially unrestricted access government systems, including artificial intelligence systems. The way they used those systems was conceptually indistinguishable from the way a AI system would behave. It’s a worst case scenario.