House GOP rejects bill to make Trump turn over docs from Putin meeting

Republicans on the House Foreign Affairs Committee rejected a request Thursday from Democratic lawmakers to access details about the one-on-one meeting in July that even Trump’s own intelligence chiefs weren’t briefed on afterward.

The procedural resolution would have compelled the executive branch to turn over “copies of all documents, records, communications, transcripts, summaries, notes, memoranda, and read-aheads” that may shed light on Trump’s discussions with Putin, including whether he made any agreements or promises to the Russian president.

In a party-line vote, Republicans rejected the measure and opted to keep details about the talks a secret.

The White House still hasn’t revealed what exactly was discussed between the two leaders. Shortly after the meeting, Director of National Intelligence Dan Coats said even he didn’t know the full details of what happened.

Related: Former Attorney General – Trump Putin Summit Was “Collusion in Plain Sight” | Reverb TV

The meeting was met with swift backlash, particularly when Trump appeared to side with Putin over his own intelligence community.

Trump’s behavior in public prompted many to question what went on in private, which is why Democrats are still trying to get access to more details.

“When they went into a room together — no staff, no advisors — just the two of them and interpreters — alarm bells went off all over Washington, DC and around the world,” said New York Rep. Eliot Engel, ranking Democrat on the Foreign Affairs Committee.

Related: Twitter Explodes With Anger After Trump Commits Treason on Live TV

“Now,” he continued, “two months later, the alarm is still going off because the American people still have no idea what was discussed in that meeting. We need to know.”

Earlier this summer, Democrats on the House Intelligence Committee put forward a motion to subpoena the interpreter in the room with Trump and Putin in an effort to find out if Trump made any secret promises to the Russian president.

Republicans blocked that measure, too.

At some point, one must begin to wonder what Republicans are so scared to find out about.

This article first appeared on the American Independent Institute blog. Republished with permission (CC-BY-ND-4.0). Featured image courtesy of Getty Embeds. 

The post Aiding and Abetting: House GOP Blocks Bill to Reveal Trump, Putin Documents appeared first on ReverbPress.

‘Unprecedented’: Trump weaponizes FBI documents to sabotage Russia probe

In a move described as “stunning,” “unprecedented,” and “corrupt,” the White House announced on Monday that Trump had ordered the declassification of highly sensitive materials from the Russia probe so they can be weaponized and used in the ongoing effort by Trump and his allies to undermine a national security investigation for political purposes.

According to a White House statement, Trump directed the Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI), the Department of Justice, and the FBI to release selective portions of the classified Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) application that allowed the FBI to monitor former Trump campaign adviser Carter Page.

Trump also ordered “all FBI reports” prepared in connection with the FISA warrant application to be declassified and released.

Related: “Firehosing”: The Russian Lying Technique Trump Uses Like Crazy, Explained | Reverb TV

In addition, Trump’s order calls for the unredacted release of “all text messages relating to the Russia investigation” from former FBI Director James Comey, former FBI Deputy Director Andrew McCabe, former FBI agent Peter Strzok, former FBI lawyer Lisa Page, and DOJ official Bruce Ohr.

All of those people have been targeted by Trump and his allies over the past year because of their roles in the Russia investigation.

The release of personal text messages from the named individuals appears to be yet another abuse of power by Trump aimed at exacting revenge against anyone in a position to hold him accountable, and sending a message to anyone who may try to hold him accountable in the future.

Related: Want to Avoid Becoming a Victim of Russian Information Warfare? – Read This

The order by Trump to declassify and release highly sensitive documents is just the latest attempt by Trump and his allies to weaponize the tools of America’s intelligence agencies for the purpose of undermining an active national security investigation to shield Trump from potential legal jeopardy.

Republicans in Congress have been pushing for the release of these documents for months, asserting — without any evidence — that they contain some sort of proof of wrongdoing and bias within the FBI.

Federal officials have granted access to many of the documents, but in other instances they have opted to keep the materials secret to avoid compromising an open investigation or, worse, risking the lives of informants involved in the investigation.

Sen. Mark Warner, ranking Democrat on the Senate Intelligence Committee, warned Monday that Trump “shouldn’t be declassifying documents in order to undermine an investigation into his campaign or pursue vendettas against political enemies. He especially shouldn’t be releasing documents with the potential to reveal intelligence sources.”

As NBC News pointed out, Trump’s order essentially throws these concerns aside and bypasses the standard safeguards in order to give his Republican allies access to the classified information they’ve been seeking in their quest to undermine the credibility of U.S. intelligence agencies.

“The documents Trump is releasing reflect a specific request, down to the page numbers, made by the Republican members of the House judiciary and intelligence committees this summer. Justice and intelligence officials had resisted releasing the information on the grounds that it was too sensitive,” NBC noted.

While Trump and his accomplices in Congress claim they are acting in the interest of transparency, nothing could be further from the truth.

In his order, Trump cherry-picked specific information to release while opting to keep much of it hidden — not out of concern for national security, but out of concern that releasing all of the information would prove that the FBI was, in fact, acting entirely appropriately when it sought a surveillance warrant on Page.

For example, as USA Today investigative reporter Brad Heath noted, Trump ordered the declassification of parts of the FISA application in which the FBI restates Page’s own denials, and other parts in which the FBI describes information they obtained from Christopher Steele, the author of the so-called “Steele Dossier.”

But, Trump chose not to declassify or release sections of the application that “most directly lay out the government’s (and the court’s) basis for believing there was probable cause to find that Page was an agent of a foreign power,” Heath added.

In other words, Trump is demanding that federal officials only release information that can be spun to prop up the false narrative he and his allies have been peddling for well over a year, while refusing to release any information that might reveal the truth.

As former federal prosecutor Renato Mariotti put it, “Trump ordered the release of sensitive information relating to the investigation of himself and his friends for his own political gain. That is corrupt, period.”

This is not the first time Trump and his GOP allies have pushed for the release of sensitive intelligence in their ongoing effort to sabotage the Russia investigation by falsely smearing the U.S. intelligence community.

In fact, Trump’s demand for declassification follows a familiar pattern that started shortly after he took office, when Rep. Devin Nunes (R-CA) secretly coordinated with the White House to fabricate “evidence” of improper unmasking to support Trump’s lie about the Obama administration “wiretapping” Trump Tower.

Instead, it showed that Trump’s wiretapping story was a lie and that the unmasking of Trump associates was not only done properly, but that it was unquestionably warranted due to the risk posed by incoming national security adviser Michael Flynn’s secret meetings with Russian officials.

This same pattern emerged again when Nunes and his GOP colleagues demanded the release of a memo that they claimed would provide bombshell evidence about the FBI harboring a bias against Trump that tainted the agency’s decision to launch the Russia probe. When the memo was finally released, it proved to be a complete flop that actually debunked the GOP’s own anti-FBI talking points.

Still, Trump’s accomplices in Congress have continued to demand access to more classified information in what can only be described as a desperate attempt to find something — anything — that can be twisted and spun into a false narrative to undermine the Russia investigation and everyone involved with it.

This tactic has failed at every turn. Each time classified information about the Russia probe has been released, the GOP’s disinformation campaign has been further debunked. Moreover, instead of discrediting the FBI and DOJ, all of the classified materials that have been released have proven that the agencies conducted a scrupulous and fair investigation that was sparked by the Trump campaign’s unscrupulous ties to Russia.

Already, the efforts by Trump and his allies to sabotage the ongoing Russia probe have endangered the lives of crucial informants and forced sources in Russia to go dark due to fears of being outed. This will have severe repercussions for national security that may last for years or even decades — but apparently that’s a price Trump is willing to pay to protect himself.

However, it still remains unclear if Trump’s demands will be met — and if they are, it may break the law.

Legal experts have raised concerns that Trump’s order may violate the federal Privacy Act, which protects against the public disclosure of personal information contained in government records.

Furthermore, House Intelligence Committee ranking member Adam Schiff said he was informed by the FBI and DOJ that they would consider the release of these materials “a red line that must not be crossed as they may compromise sources and methods.”

All of this comes at a bad time for Trump, as public opinion is turning sharply against him and in favor of special counsel Robert Mueller. At the same time, the Russia investigation only appears to be gaining steam with a new plea deal from former Trump campaign manager Paul Manafort, who agreed to cooperate fully with investigators.

Clearly, Trump’s efforts to sabotage the investigation aren’t having their intended effect. He’s fighting a losing battle, and he likely knows it — which explains why he’s lashing out in such a desperate attempt to destroy the notion of truth before the truth destroys him.

This article first appeared on the American Independent Institute blog. Republished with permission (CC-BY-ND-4.0). Featured image by Gage Skidmore/Flickr

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After summit Russians like Trump more, Americans less

Erik C. Nisbet, The Ohio State University and Olga Kamenchuk, The Ohio State University

President Donald Trump has garnered a great deal of criticism in the United States for his performance at the summit with Russian Vladimir Putin. But how was Trump’s performance viewed by the Russian public?

Our analysis of Russian polling data collected before and after the summit suggests one outcome of this meeting was a significant rise in Trump’s personal favorability and image. However, the number of Russians with a favorable opinion of Americans significantly declined as a result of the summit.

Our study

The Russian Public Opinion Research Center, or VCIOM, asked a series of questions about Trump, the U.S. and U.S.-Russian relations on their weekly poll a few days before the summit. VCIOM repeated the same questions on a subsequent telephone poll of 1,600 respondents on July 18, two days after the summit. The poll had a margin of error of plus or minus 2.5 percent.

This repetition of questions on a second random sample of Russians allows us to carefully analyze the impact of the summit on Russian public opinion as if it was a “natural experiment.” In other words, the Russian respondents randomly surveyed prior to the summit are a “control group” against which we can compare the impact of the summit on the “treatment group,” or the Russians randomly surveyed after the summit. Our analysis tested for significant differences on poll questions and controlled for important demographic characteristics.

A safer, more caring Trump?

Just two days after the meeting, our analysis shows a statistically significant improvement in Trump’s image among the Russian public. For instance, the number of Russians who said they “really” or “rather” like Trump significantly increased from 10 percent to 14 percent.

In addition, prior to the summit, large percentages of Russians viewed the American president as “self-centered” and “dangerous.” Although these negative numbers remained high, there was a significant decline in Trump’s negativity ratings after the summit with the percentage of Russians labeling Trump as dangerous dropping from 58 percent to 51 percent. The percentage of Russians describing Trump as “self-centered” also significantly decreased while the percentage of Russians who viewed him as “strong” significantly increased by 3 percentage points.

Better relations ahead?

Trump’s overtures to Russia and dismissal of Russia’s active interference in the U.S. election appear to have impacted how Russians see the U.S.-Russia relationship. Prior to the summit, 39 percent of Russians believed the relationship would either “significantly” or “somewhat” improve after the meeting. This number significantly rose to 43 percent of Russians post-summit. Likewise, the percentage of Russians describing the relationship with the United States as “good” significantly rose from 34 percent to 37 percent post-summit.

Leaving the US behind?

But what about attitudes toward Americans and the image of the U.S. more broadly?

What we found was surprising. The percentage of Russians who had a favorable opinion of Americans significantly declined after the summit – dropping 5 percentage points from 30 percent to 25 percent just two days after the meeting.

In addition, prior to the summit VCIOM had also asked Russians what traits they associated with the U.S. The vast majority of Russians viewed the U.S. as “interfering with other countries,” “aggressive” and not “trustworthy.” On these and other traits that Russians were asked about there was no change after the Helsinki meeting. In other words, the Russians maintained their highly negative image of the United States.

Trump vs. the United States?

Why did Trump’s favorability and image improve, while opinion of Americans declined and the negative image of the United States remain unchanged?

The answer lies in two parts.

The first part is the widespread criticism Trump has received in American media and political discourse for his dismissal of election interference and American security agencies’ assessments of Russian culpability. Multiple polls conducted in the wake of the summit show that a majority of Americans disapprove of how Trump handled the meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin. A plurality of Americans (45 percent) also believe Trump’s relationship with Putin is too friendly and not appropriate.

We suspected that how the summit impacted Russian public opinion would be largely determined by how the Russian media framed the outcome. As a result of the near universal American criticism of Trump’s overtures to Russia and apparent friendly relationship with Putin, the Russian media framed the American people as unfairly attacking Trump because he wanted to normalize relations with Russia. This most likely contributed to some deterioration in attitudes toward the U.S. and Americans among Russians.

The second part was the indictment of the Russian national Mariia Butina as a secret Russian agent attempting to infiltrate American policymaking circles. She was arrested on the same day as the summit. The Russian foreign ministry and the Russian media are calling the indictment “a political put-up job” aimed at “whipping up anti-Russia hysteria in the U.S.” The dominant narrative inside Russia is that this indictment is another example of Russophobia among the American people. They see it as an attempt by parties inside the U.S. government to sabotage Trump’s overtures to Russia.

Moving forward, it will be interesting to see whether a possible future visit by President Putin to the White House would result in further divergence in opinions about Trump and the U.S. among Russians. If Putin is met with antipathy and protest by the American people while Trump plays the gracious host, then Russian opinion about Trump may further improve. At the same time, a strongly negative reaction by the American public to Putin’s visit may further worsen the image of the United States and Americans in eyes of the Russian public.

Erik C. Nisbet, Associate Professor of Communication, Political Science, and Environmental Policy and Faculty Associate with the Mershon Center for International Security Studies, The Ohio State University and Olga Kamenchuk, Associate Professor (clinical) & Research Associate at the OSU Mershon Center for International Security Studies, The Ohio State University

This article was originally published on The Conversation. Read the original article.

Featured image from Kremlin.ru/Wikimedia Commons

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Negotiations about an interview between President Trump and special counsel Robert Mueller seem to be “down near the end,” Rudy Giuliani told The Hill on Tuesday afternoon.

The president’s lawyer did not slam the door on the idea of such an interview, insisting that “we’re not giving them a straight turndown.”

He said that the Trump team was not going to agree to everything Mueller’s team wanted but stressed, “I hope it is in the realm of debatable and negotiable.”

Asked about a letter that the Trump team was reportedly preparing…

READ THE FULL STORY AT THE HILL

Featured image courtesy of Getty Embeds.

The post Giuliani: Trump Team “Near the End” in Mueller Interview Negotiations appeared first on ReverbPress.

Negotiations about an interview between President Trump and special counsel Robert Mueller seem to be “down near the end,” Rudy Giuliani told The Hill on Tuesday afternoon.

The president’s lawyer did not slam the door on the idea of such an interview, insisting that “we’re not giving them a straight turndown.”

He said that the Trump team was not going to agree to everything Mueller’s team wanted but stressed, “I hope it is in the realm of debatable and negotiable.”

Asked about a letter that the Trump team was reportedly preparing…

READ THE FULL STORY AT THE HILL

Featured image courtesy of Getty Embeds.

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Vladimir Putin’s lying game

Keith Brown, Arizona State University

At the now infamous Helsinki press conference held after the summit meeting between Presidents Trump and Putin, Trump indicated he was impressed with Putin’s denial of Russian interference in the 2016 U.S. election.

“I have great confidence in my intelligence people,” Trump said, “but I will tell you that President Putin was extremely strong and powerful in his denial.”

That answer must have pleased Vladimir Putin.

Strength and power have been key to Putin’s political brand ever since August 1999, when he was appointed as Russia’s prime minister by President Boris Yeltsin.

Related: “Hybrid Warfare” – New Russian Propaganda Tactic Seeks to Change American Hearts and Minds

Putin led the country to victory in the second Chechen War, and as the virtual incumbent following Yeltsin’s resignation, he rode that wave of patriotism to victory in the presidential election of March 2000, with 53 percent of the national vote.

Putin makes strongman politics look effortless, and President Trump could not be clearer in his expressions of admiration and trust for his more experienced counterpart. From over two decades studying communist and post-communist politics, I believe there is value in looking past Putin’s confident self-projection and examining the machinery behind it.Eighteen years later, following a brief hiatus from 2008 to 2012 during which he served as prime minister, Putin remains president, winning 77 percent of the vote in May 2018.

Related: Former Attorney General – Trump Putin Summit Was “Collusion in Plain Sight” | Reverb TV

As a former KGB officer and head of FSB, Russia’s national security agency, President Putin has professional roots in deception, disinformation and violence beyond the imagination and experience of most Americans outside the intelligence community. His 18-year record in public life provides high-profile cases where he has been equally “strong and powerful” in undermining truth – and targeting those who expose him.

Truth, lies and consequences

Here is a short catalog of Putin’s most glaring lies, as well as his actions against those who challenged him.

1. In 1999, bombs exploded in a number of apartment buildings in Russia, killing 293 civilians.

The bombings were attributed to Chechen terrorism, driving up patriotic support for Russia’s military in invading Chechnya. When one bomb was detected and defused in the city of Ryazan before it went off, new Prime Minister Putin praised the people of Ryazan for their vigilance.

His subsequent strong leadership during the Chechen War was key to his election as president in March 2000.

Yet forensics, eyewitness accounts and whistleblower revelations all indicated that Russia’s security service, the FSB, planted the Ryazan bomb.

The commission established to investigate the FSB’s role in all the bombings discontinued its work in 2003 when two key members died violent deaths. Deputy Sergei Yushenkov was gunned down, and investigative journalist Yuri Shchekochikhin died in a hospital from an “unknown allergen” that shut down all his vital organs. FSB whistleblower Alexander Litvinenko, who directly accused Vladimir Putin of involvement in the apartment bombings, was poisoned in London in 2006.

2. In 2004, Chechen terrorists took hostage hundreds of schoolchildren and their teachers in a school in Beslan in North Ossetia.

Russian authorities refused to negotiate and instead deployed military forces to storm the school. More than 330 people died and another 550 were wounded. Among the dead were 184 children.

Putin was adamant that the use of force was justified and necessary in the face of terrorism, and used Beslan to increase centralized Kremlin power. He rejected a European Court of Human Rights judgment that Russian authorities used excessive force against their own citizens.

Journalist, human rights activist and Putin critic Ana Politkovskaya was poisoned when traveling to Beslan to cover the siege. She survived, and continued to research and publish on Putin’s assault on democracy until she was shot and killed outside her Moscow apartment in 2006.

3. In 2005, the American-born British CEO of Moscow-based investment fund Hermitage Capital, Bill Browder, was denied re-entry to Russia, and declared a threat to national security.

Browder’s tax attorney Sergei Magnitsky then uncovered a US$230 million tax fraud scheme against Hermitage Capital. Magnitsky’s work revealed high-level government collusion in the criminal looting of public assets.

After taking the allegations public, Magnitsky was arrested in Moscow on fabricated charges and detained for 11 months prior to trial. He was repeatedly abused in jail, including denial of treatment for chronic health conditions. Eventually he was beaten to death.

The Russian state’s punishment did not stop then. Magnitsky was posthumously tried and convicted for tax evasion.

Browder has subsequently pursued justice for Magnitsky, advocating for the worldwide adoption of the Magnitsky Act. The act was passed by the U.S. Congress in 2012 to sanction individual Russians involved in human rights abuses.

Putin held a December 2012 press conference following the Magnitsky act’s passage and the Russian Duma’s subsequent retaliatory ban on American adoptions of Russian orphans. Putin said, “Magnitksy … was not tortured — he died of a heart attack.”

4. On July 17, 2014, Malaysia Airlines Flight MH17 was shot down over Ukraine, killing all 298 people aboard.

In May 2018, a U.N.-backed Joint Investigation Team concluded that the Russian 53rd Anti-Aircraft Missile Brigade, based in Kursk, had fired a missile and brought down the plane.

In direct contradiction of the forensic evidence, Putin flatly denied any Russian involvement in shooting down MH17.

That denial comports with Putin’s long-time denial that Russian forces invaded Ukraine in 2014 – one of 10 false Russian claims about Ukraine identified and debunked by the U.S. State Department. That report is no longer available on the U.S. government website.

5. In February 2015, Russian opposition leader Boris Nemtsov was assassinated in Moscow. Just before his death, Nemtsov had taped a television interview in which he discussed his investigations into Russian war crimes in Ukraine, and called President Putin “our expert in lying. He is a pathological liar.”

After Nemtsov’s death, President Putin assured Nemtsov’s mother, “We will do everything to ensure that the perpetrators of this vile and cynical crime and those who stand behind them are properly punished.”

Nemtsov’s relatives and allies insist on Putin’s complicity and have called the investigation and prosecution of five killers a cover-up. Video evidence and the journalistic investigation into the details of Nemtsov’s murder, likewise, see the highly organized hit involving multiple gunmen and vehicles as the work of a professional intelligence organization like the FSB.

Connecting the dots

The risks for individual Russians challenging Putin’s lies are clear. One journalist has listed 34 suspicious deaths since 2014.

Those killed have nonetheless left an evidentiary trail for a host of contemporary writers like Masha Gessen, David Satter and Peter Pomerantsev. Those writers, and others, detail how Putin has built enormous wealth and power by deploying violence and deception to control the political narrative and disable or eliminate meaningful opposition.

President Trump respects that strength and at times, seems even to envy it. How, then, does he interpret this array of evidence of serial lying and complicity in multiple critics’ violent deaths?

He might conclude that all of these independently produced, empirically-grounded investigations are somehow part of a grand deep-state conspiracy to defame or discredit a man of integrity who can and should be taken at his word.

That conclusion, though, would dishonor the ordinary and extraordinary Russians who have stood up to the deception and violence of President Putin’s regime, risking or losing their lives as a result. It’s the responsibility of the American president to acknowledge this. By virtue of the office he holds, President Trump has the ability to stop being played by Putin, and speak truth to power.

Keith Brown, Professor of Politics and Global Studies, Arizona State University

This article was originally published on The Conversation. Read the original article.

Featured image by Press Service of the President of the Russian Federation/Wikimedia Commons

The post Trump’s Closeness to Putin Should Scare You Even if You Don’t Believe he’s a Traitor appeared first on ReverbPress.

Vladimir Putin’s lying game

Keith Brown, Arizona State University

At the now infamous Helsinki press conference held after the summit meeting between Presidents Trump and Putin, Trump indicated he was impressed with Putin’s denial of Russian interference in the 2016 U.S. election.

“I have great confidence in my intelligence people,” Trump said, “but I will tell you that President Putin was extremely strong and powerful in his denial.”

That answer must have pleased Vladimir Putin.

Strength and power have been key to Putin’s political brand ever since August 1999, when he was appointed as Russia’s prime minister by President Boris Yeltsin.

Related: “Hybrid Warfare” – New Russian Propaganda Tactic Seeks to Change American Hearts and Minds

Putin led the country to victory in the second Chechen War, and as the virtual incumbent following Yeltsin’s resignation, he rode that wave of patriotism to victory in the presidential election of March 2000, with 53 percent of the national vote.

Putin makes strongman politics look effortless, and President Trump could not be clearer in his expressions of admiration and trust for his more experienced counterpart. From over two decades studying communist and post-communist politics, I believe there is value in looking past Putin’s confident self-projection and examining the machinery behind it.Eighteen years later, following a brief hiatus from 2008 to 2012 during which he served as prime minister, Putin remains president, winning 77 percent of the vote in May 2018.

Related: Former Attorney General – Trump Putin Summit Was “Collusion in Plain Sight” | Reverb TV

As a former KGB officer and head of FSB, Russia’s national security agency, President Putin has professional roots in deception, disinformation and violence beyond the imagination and experience of most Americans outside the intelligence community. His 18-year record in public life provides high-profile cases where he has been equally “strong and powerful” in undermining truth – and targeting those who expose him.

Truth, lies and consequences

Here is a short catalog of Putin’s most glaring lies, as well as his actions against those who challenged him.

1. In 1999, bombs exploded in a number of apartment buildings in Russia, killing 293 civilians.

The bombings were attributed to Chechen terrorism, driving up patriotic support for Russia’s military in invading Chechnya. When one bomb was detected and defused in the city of Ryazan before it went off, new Prime Minister Putin praised the people of Ryazan for their vigilance.

His subsequent strong leadership during the Chechen War was key to his election as president in March 2000.

Yet forensics, eyewitness accounts and whistleblower revelations all indicated that Russia’s security service, the FSB, planted the Ryazan bomb.

The commission established to investigate the FSB’s role in all the bombings discontinued its work in 2003 when two key members died violent deaths. Deputy Sergei Yushenkov was gunned down, and investigative journalist Yuri Shchekochikhin died in a hospital from an “unknown allergen” that shut down all his vital organs. FSB whistleblower Alexander Litvinenko, who directly accused Vladimir Putin of involvement in the apartment bombings, was poisoned in London in 2006.

2. In 2004, Chechen terrorists took hostage hundreds of schoolchildren and their teachers in a school in Beslan in North Ossetia.

Russian authorities refused to negotiate and instead deployed military forces to storm the school. More than 330 people died and another 550 were wounded. Among the dead were 184 children.

Putin was adamant that the use of force was justified and necessary in the face of terrorism, and used Beslan to increase centralized Kremlin power. He rejected a European Court of Human Rights judgment that Russian authorities used excessive force against their own citizens.

Journalist, human rights activist and Putin critic Ana Politkovskaya was poisoned when traveling to Beslan to cover the siege. She survived, and continued to research and publish on Putin’s assault on democracy until she was shot and killed outside her Moscow apartment in 2006.

3. In 2005, the American-born British CEO of Moscow-based investment fund Hermitage Capital, Bill Browder, was denied re-entry to Russia, and declared a threat to national security.

Browder’s tax attorney Sergei Magnitsky then uncovered a US$230 million tax fraud scheme against Hermitage Capital. Magnitsky’s work revealed high-level government collusion in the criminal looting of public assets.

After taking the allegations public, Magnitsky was arrested in Moscow on fabricated charges and detained for 11 months prior to trial. He was repeatedly abused in jail, including denial of treatment for chronic health conditions. Eventually he was beaten to death.

The Russian state’s punishment did not stop then. Magnitsky was posthumously tried and convicted for tax evasion.

Browder has subsequently pursued justice for Magnitsky, advocating for the worldwide adoption of the Magnitsky Act. The act was passed by the U.S. Congress in 2012 to sanction individual Russians involved in human rights abuses.

Putin held a December 2012 press conference following the Magnitsky act’s passage and the Russian Duma’s subsequent retaliatory ban on American adoptions of Russian orphans. Putin said, “Magnitksy … was not tortured — he died of a heart attack.”

4. On July 17, 2014, Malaysia Airlines Flight MH17 was shot down over Ukraine, killing all 298 people aboard.

In May 2018, a U.N.-backed Joint Investigation Team concluded that the Russian 53rd Anti-Aircraft Missile Brigade, based in Kursk, had fired a missile and brought down the plane.

In direct contradiction of the forensic evidence, Putin flatly denied any Russian involvement in shooting down MH17.

That denial comports with Putin’s long-time denial that Russian forces invaded Ukraine in 2014 – one of 10 false Russian claims about Ukraine identified and debunked by the U.S. State Department. That report is no longer available on the U.S. government website.

5. In February 2015, Russian opposition leader Boris Nemtsov was assassinated in Moscow. Just before his death, Nemtsov had taped a television interview in which he discussed his investigations into Russian war crimes in Ukraine, and called President Putin “our expert in lying. He is a pathological liar.”

After Nemtsov’s death, President Putin assured Nemtsov’s mother, “We will do everything to ensure that the perpetrators of this vile and cynical crime and those who stand behind them are properly punished.”

Nemtsov’s relatives and allies insist on Putin’s complicity and have called the investigation and prosecution of five killers a cover-up. Video evidence and the journalistic investigation into the details of Nemtsov’s murder, likewise, see the highly organized hit involving multiple gunmen and vehicles as the work of a professional intelligence organization like the FSB.

Connecting the dots

The risks for individual Russians challenging Putin’s lies are clear. One journalist has listed 34 suspicious deaths since 2014.

Those killed have nonetheless left an evidentiary trail for a host of contemporary writers like Masha Gessen, David Satter and Peter Pomerantsev. Those writers, and others, detail how Putin has built enormous wealth and power by deploying violence and deception to control the political narrative and disable or eliminate meaningful opposition.

President Trump respects that strength and at times, seems even to envy it. How, then, does he interpret this array of evidence of serial lying and complicity in multiple critics’ violent deaths?

He might conclude that all of these independently produced, empirically-grounded investigations are somehow part of a grand deep-state conspiracy to defame or discredit a man of integrity who can and should be taken at his word.

That conclusion, though, would dishonor the ordinary and extraordinary Russians who have stood up to the deception and violence of President Putin’s regime, risking or losing their lives as a result. It’s the responsibility of the American president to acknowledge this. By virtue of the office he holds, President Trump has the ability to stop being played by Putin, and speak truth to power.

Keith Brown, Professor of Politics and Global Studies, Arizona State University

This article was originally published on The Conversation. Read the original article.

Featured image by Press Service of the President of the Russian Federation/Wikimedia Commons

The post Trump’s Closeness to Putin Should Scare You Even if You Don’t Believe he’s a Traitor appeared first on ReverbPress.

Programmers need ethics when designing the technologies that influence people’s lives

Cherri M. Pancake, Oregon State University

Computing professionals are on the front lines of almost every aspect of the modern world. They’re involved in the response when hackers steal the personal information of hundreds of thousands of people from a large corporation. Their work can protect – or jeopardize – critical infrastructure like electrical grids and transportation lines. And the algorithms they write may determine who gets a job, who is approved for a bank loan or who gets released on bail.

Technological professionals are the first, and last, lines of defense against the misuse of technology. Nobody else understands the systems as well, and nobody else is in a position to protect specific data elements or ensure the connections between one component and another are appropriate, safe and reliable. As the role of computing continues its decades-long expansion in society, computer scientists are central to what happens next.

Related: 6 Top Republicans Linked to ‘Completely Idiotic’ Insider Trading Scandal

That’s why the world’s largest organization of computer scientists and engineers, the Association for Computing Machinery, of which I am president, has issued a new code of ethics for computing professionals. And it’s why ACM is taking other steps to help technologists engage with ethical questions.

Serving the public interest

A code of ethics is more than just a document on paper. There are hundreds of examples of the core values and standards to which every member of a field is held – including for organist guilds and outdoor advertising associations. The world’s oldest code of ethics is also its most famous: the Hippocratic oath medical doctors take, promising to care responsibly for their patients.

I suspect that one reason for the Hippocratic oath’s fame is how personal medical treatment can be, with people’s lives hanging in the balance. It’s important for patients to feel confident their medical caregivers have their interests firmly in mind.

Related: Trump’s Mar-a-Lago Cronies Exposed Secretly Running — And Ca$hing In On — The VA

Technology is, in many ways, similarly personal. In modern society computers, software and digital data are everywhere. They’re visible in laptops and smartphones, social media and video conferencing, but they’re also hidden inside the devices that help manage people’s daily lives, from thermostats to timers on coffee makers. New developments in autonomous vehicles, sensor networks and machine learning mean computing will play an even more central role in everyday life in coming years.

A changing profession

As the creators of these technologies, computing professionals have helped usher in the new and richly vibrant rhythms of modern life. But as computers become increasingly interwoven into the fabric of life, we in the profession must personally recommit to serving society through ethical conduct.

ACM’s last code of ethics was adopted in 1992, when many people saw computing work as purely technical. The internet was in its infancy and people were just beginning to understand the value of being able to aggregate and distribute information widely. It would still be years before artificial intelligence and machine learning had applications outside research labs.

Today, technologists’ work can affect the lives and livelihoods of people in ways that may be unintended, even unpredictable. I’m not an ethicist by training, but it’s clear to me that anyone in today’s computing field can benefit from guidance on ethical thinking and behavior.

Updates to the code

ACM’s new ethics code has several important differences from the 1992 version. One has to do with unintended consequences. In the 1970s and 1980s, technologists built software or systems whose effects were limited to specific locations or circumstances. But over the past two decades, it has become clear that as technologies evolve, they can be applied in contexts very different from the original intent.

For example, computer vision research has led to ways of creating 3D models of objects – and people – based on 2D images, but it was never intended to be used in conjunction with machine learning in surveillance or drone applications. The old ethics code asked software developers to be sure a program would actually do what they said it would. The new version also exhorts developers to explicitly evaluate their work to identify potentially harmful side effects or potential for misuse.

Another example has to do with human interaction. In 1992, most software was being developed by trained programmers to run operating systems, databases and other basic computing functions. Today, many applications rely on user interfaces to interact directly with a potentially vast number of people. The updated code of ethics includes more detailed considerations about the needs and sensitivities of very diverse potential users – including discussing discrimination, exclusion and harassment.

More and more software is being developed to run with little or no input or human understanding, producing analytical results to guide decision-making, such as when to approve bank loans. The outputs can have completely unintended social effects, skewed against whole classes of people – like recent cases where data-mining predictions of who would default on a loan showed biases against people who seek longer-term loans or live in particular areas. There are also dangers of what are called “false positives,” when a computer links two things that shouldn’t be connected – as when facial recognition software recently matched members of Congress to criminals’ mug shots. The revised code exhorts technologists to take special care to avoid creating systems with the potential to oppress or disenfranchise whole groups of people.

Living ethics in technology

The code was revised over the course of more than two years, including ACM members and people outside the organization and even outside the computing and technological professions. All these perspectives made the code better. For example, a government-employed weapons designer asked whether that job inherently required violating the code; the wording was changed to clarify that systems must be “consistent with the public good.”

Now that the code is out, there’s more to do. ACM has created a repository for case studies showing how ethical thinking and the guidelines can be applied in a variety of real-world situations. The group’s “Ask An Ethicist” blog and video series invites the public to submit scenarios or quandaries as they arise in practice. Word is also underway to develop teaching modules so the concepts can be integrated into computing education from primary school through university.

Feedback has been overwhelmingly positive. My personal favorite was the comment from a young programmer after reading the code: “Now I know what to tell my boss if he asks me to do something like that again.”

The ACM Code of Ethics and Professional Conduct begins with the statement, “Computing professionals’ actions change the world.” We don’t know if our code will last as long as the Hippocratic oath. But it highlights how important it is that the global computing community understands the impact our work has – and takes seriously our obligation to the public good.

Cherri M. Pancake, Professor Emeritus of Electrical Engineering & Computer Science, Oregon State University

This article was originally published on The Conversation. Read the original article.

Featured image by JavadR/Pixabay

The post Hackings, Russia, Credit Card Info Leaks – What’s Going on in the Technology Sector? appeared first on ReverbPress.

Programmers need ethics when designing the technologies that influence people’s lives

Cherri M. Pancake, Oregon State University

Computing professionals are on the front lines of almost every aspect of the modern world. They’re involved in the response when hackers steal the personal information of hundreds of thousands of people from a large corporation. Their work can protect – or jeopardize – critical infrastructure like electrical grids and transportation lines. And the algorithms they write may determine who gets a job, who is approved for a bank loan or who gets released on bail.

Technological professionals are the first, and last, lines of defense against the misuse of technology. Nobody else understands the systems as well, and nobody else is in a position to protect specific data elements or ensure the connections between one component and another are appropriate, safe and reliable. As the role of computing continues its decades-long expansion in society, computer scientists are central to what happens next.

Related: 6 Top Republicans Linked to ‘Completely Idiotic’ Insider Trading Scandal

That’s why the world’s largest organization of computer scientists and engineers, the Association for Computing Machinery, of which I am president, has issued a new code of ethics for computing professionals. And it’s why ACM is taking other steps to help technologists engage with ethical questions.

Serving the public interest

A code of ethics is more than just a document on paper. There are hundreds of examples of the core values and standards to which every member of a field is held – including for organist guilds and outdoor advertising associations. The world’s oldest code of ethics is also its most famous: the Hippocratic oath medical doctors take, promising to care responsibly for their patients.

I suspect that one reason for the Hippocratic oath’s fame is how personal medical treatment can be, with people’s lives hanging in the balance. It’s important for patients to feel confident their medical caregivers have their interests firmly in mind.

Related: Trump’s Mar-a-Lago Cronies Exposed Secretly Running — And Ca$hing In On — The VA

Technology is, in many ways, similarly personal. In modern society computers, software and digital data are everywhere. They’re visible in laptops and smartphones, social media and video conferencing, but they’re also hidden inside the devices that help manage people’s daily lives, from thermostats to timers on coffee makers. New developments in autonomous vehicles, sensor networks and machine learning mean computing will play an even more central role in everyday life in coming years.

A changing profession

As the creators of these technologies, computing professionals have helped usher in the new and richly vibrant rhythms of modern life. But as computers become increasingly interwoven into the fabric of life, we in the profession must personally recommit to serving society through ethical conduct.

ACM’s last code of ethics was adopted in 1992, when many people saw computing work as purely technical. The internet was in its infancy and people were just beginning to understand the value of being able to aggregate and distribute information widely. It would still be years before artificial intelligence and machine learning had applications outside research labs.

Today, technologists’ work can affect the lives and livelihoods of people in ways that may be unintended, even unpredictable. I’m not an ethicist by training, but it’s clear to me that anyone in today’s computing field can benefit from guidance on ethical thinking and behavior.

Updates to the code

ACM’s new ethics code has several important differences from the 1992 version. One has to do with unintended consequences. In the 1970s and 1980s, technologists built software or systems whose effects were limited to specific locations or circumstances. But over the past two decades, it has become clear that as technologies evolve, they can be applied in contexts very different from the original intent.

For example, computer vision research has led to ways of creating 3D models of objects – and people – based on 2D images, but it was never intended to be used in conjunction with machine learning in surveillance or drone applications. The old ethics code asked software developers to be sure a program would actually do what they said it would. The new version also exhorts developers to explicitly evaluate their work to identify potentially harmful side effects or potential for misuse.

Another example has to do with human interaction. In 1992, most software was being developed by trained programmers to run operating systems, databases and other basic computing functions. Today, many applications rely on user interfaces to interact directly with a potentially vast number of people. The updated code of ethics includes more detailed considerations about the needs and sensitivities of very diverse potential users – including discussing discrimination, exclusion and harassment.

More and more software is being developed to run with little or no input or human understanding, producing analytical results to guide decision-making, such as when to approve bank loans. The outputs can have completely unintended social effects, skewed against whole classes of people – like recent cases where data-mining predictions of who would default on a loan showed biases against people who seek longer-term loans or live in particular areas. There are also dangers of what are called “false positives,” when a computer links two things that shouldn’t be connected – as when facial recognition software recently matched members of Congress to criminals’ mug shots. The revised code exhorts technologists to take special care to avoid creating systems with the potential to oppress or disenfranchise whole groups of people.

Living ethics in technology

The code was revised over the course of more than two years, including ACM members and people outside the organization and even outside the computing and technological professions. All these perspectives made the code better. For example, a government-employed weapons designer asked whether that job inherently required violating the code; the wording was changed to clarify that systems must be “consistent with the public good.”

Now that the code is out, there’s more to do. ACM has created a repository for case studies showing how ethical thinking and the guidelines can be applied in a variety of real-world situations. The group’s “Ask An Ethicist” blog and video series invites the public to submit scenarios or quandaries as they arise in practice. Word is also underway to develop teaching modules so the concepts can be integrated into computing education from primary school through university.

Feedback has been overwhelmingly positive. My personal favorite was the comment from a young programmer after reading the code: “Now I know what to tell my boss if he asks me to do something like that again.”

The ACM Code of Ethics and Professional Conduct begins with the statement, “Computing professionals’ actions change the world.” We don’t know if our code will last as long as the Hippocratic oath. But it highlights how important it is that the global computing community understands the impact our work has – and takes seriously our obligation to the public good.

Cherri M. Pancake, Professor Emeritus of Electrical Engineering & Computer Science, Oregon State University

This article was originally published on The Conversation. Read the original article.

Featured image by JavadR/Pixabay

The post Hackings, Russia, Credit Card Info Leaks – What’s Going on in the Technology Sector? appeared first on ReverbPress.

House GOP rejects bill to make Trump turn over docs from Putin meeting

Republicans on the House Foreign Affairs Committee rejected a request Thursday from Democratic lawmakers to access details about the one-on-one meeting in July that even Trump’s own intelligence chiefs weren’t briefed on afterward.

The procedural resolution would have compelled the executive branch to turn over “copies of all documents, records, communications, transcripts, summaries, notes, memoranda, and read-aheads” that may shed light on Trump’s discussions with Putin, including whether he made any agreements or promises to the Russian president.

In a party-line vote, Republicans rejected the measure and opted to keep details about the talks a secret.

The White House still hasn’t revealed what exactly was discussed between the two leaders. Shortly after the meeting, Director of National Intelligence Dan Coats said even he didn’t know the full details of what happened.

Related: Former Attorney General – Trump Putin Summit Was “Collusion in Plain Sight” | Reverb TV

The meeting was met with swift backlash, particularly when Trump appeared to side with Putin over his own intelligence community.

Trump’s behavior in public prompted many to question what went on in private, which is why Democrats are still trying to get access to more details.

“When they went into a room together — no staff, no advisors — just the two of them and interpreters — alarm bells went off all over Washington, DC and around the world,” said New York Rep. Eliot Engel, ranking Democrat on the Foreign Affairs Committee.

Related: Twitter Explodes With Anger After Trump Commits Treason on Live TV

“Now,” he continued, “two months later, the alarm is still going off because the American people still have no idea what was discussed in that meeting. We need to know.”

Earlier this summer, Democrats on the House Intelligence Committee put forward a motion to subpoena the interpreter in the room with Trump and Putin in an effort to find out if Trump made any secret promises to the Russian president.

Republicans blocked that measure, too.

At some point, one must begin to wonder what Republicans are so scared to find out about.

This article first appeared on the American Independent Institute blog. Republished with permission (CC-BY-ND-4.0). Featured image courtesy of Getty Embeds. 

The post Aiding and Abetting: House GOP Blocks Bill to Reveal Trump, Putin Documents appeared first on ReverbPress.