WEDNESDAY UPDATE: Colorado Democratic Party chair Morgan Carroll takes Cynthia Coffman to task for “investigating the locksmith” instead of going after the real culprit–which just so happens to have helped Colorado Republicans win elections:
“Imagine someone broke into your house, but instead of investigating the burglar, Attorney General Cynthia Coffman is only investigating the locksmith,” said Morgan Carroll, Colorado Democratic Party Chair. “In this case, it’s even worse, given that the burglar — Cambridge Analytica — shared the loot with Coffman’s political party.”
“Colorado is ground zero for the Cambridge Analytica scandal. We were the guinea pig in their experiment. Voters deserve a full investigation and a full accounting of the scope of this GOP scandal and its impact on Colorado elections.”
“Attorney General Cynthia Coffman must put partisanship aside and conduct a thorough investigation of these groups, regardless of whether or not it hurts her political party or her campaign for the Republican gubernatorial nomination.”
Perhaps AG Coffman should have thought this through a little more.
—–
As the Denver Post’s Jesse Paul reports:
Colorado Attorney General Cynthia Coffman on Monday joined 36 of her colleagues from across the U.S. in a letter demanding answers from Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg amid reports that user information from the social media site was provided to third parties without consent.
“As the chief law enforcement officers of our respective states, we place a priority on protecting user privacy, which has been repeatedly placed at risk because of businesses’ failure to properly ensure those protections,” the attorneys general wrote. “… Early reports indicate that user data of at least 50 million Facebook profiles may have been misused and misappropriated by third-party software developers.”
The letter comes in the wake of the revelation that the data analytics firm Cambridge Analytica improperly used Facebook user data to target voters, including for President Donald Trump’s campaign. The firm says it helped Republicans win the state Senate majority in Colorado and may have helped Cory Gardner in his 2014 U.S. Senate victory over incumbent Democrat Mark Udall.
Attorney General Cynthia Coffman is in a pickle here, like every other Republican in America trying to keep the cognitively dissonant notions of backing their party’s President while being honest about the methods and foreign influence that helped him win from annihilating their consciences like matter vs. antimatter. The violations of law–not to mention consumer good faith–underlying the scandal of Cambridge Analytica’s psychoanalytic campaign to persuade American voters generally and Colorado voters proximally are absolutely something that state attorneys general should be vigorously investigating.
Except for one big problem for Cynthia Coffman. What Cambridge Analytica did to goose Republican turnout in 2014, helping give Colorado Republicans a majority in the state Senate, helping catapult Cory Gardner into the U.S. Senate, and yes, even helping elect Cynthia Coffman as the state’s attorney general–well, it worked. How do you investigate in good faith something you have to thank for your own success?
The likely answer: “investigate” just enough to keep up appearances. Way to sign that form letter! The next step is to call all the Colorado Republicans who have been named in the stories about Cambridge’s work in Colorado and find out what they know about the data used in those campaigns. Hint: she already has their number.
Fat chance, we know.
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I think now would be a good time for Nutteranus to prove his assertions that Democrats ILLEGALLY obtained confidential information on voters like Cambridge Analytica did.
Also, Nutlid, did you watch 60 Minutes last Sunday?
Are you kidding? Not only did he watch it but went through so many Kleenexes that the box went empty and he needed to start using paper towels.
Dearest Cindy,
Don’t listen to the boo hiss of the liberal blog. There’s nothing wrong with any of what Cambridge Analytica or Facebook did. You surely know better, huh?
Liberals are just sore losers at being outsmarted by real Republicans like you and me.
Gooooooo Trump!!!
Love ya’,
Moderatus (“Fluffy”)
PS. I really hope this time that you will send me some tickets to your Governor’s Inauguration Gala! I promise I’ll bring my photo album.
Moderatus:
Fixed a little something. Now it fits nutteranus to a T
Ridiculous. Do you think this one instance is the only time your data on Facebook has been compromised? OBAMA DID IT TOO. Tons of companies do it. Cynthia Coffman is looking at the REAL problem not just your political version.
Liberals are so clueless.
So, today this is now a problem to be solved, huh, Fluffy? . . .
PS. BTW, I know, fact certain, that this one time isn’t the first time my Facebook data was compromised . . .
. . . mostly because I’ve never been on Facebook, Dildus.
ALL CAPS. MUST BE TRUE.
Like that time Obama was trying to address a real problem (re: Russian interference) with McConnell and he told him to pound sand?
“Must be true,” huh? I don’t know . . .
Whodathunk?
. . . maybe Fluffy Nutlid’s all caps just mean his keyboard has become a bit overstimulated and temporarily engorged?
Occam’s razor.
KLEENEX BOY NEEDS MORE KLEENEX!!!!
Tee hee, during the Stormy Daniels broadcast, I snuck a piece of sandpaper in Moldyanus' Kleenex box.
Ruined his whole evening.
Was it 40-grit sandpaper?
So nice to see what passes for debate around here these days. Democrats are perverts.
Says the guy who supports a popular vote loser who compares his mistresses with his daughter.
Fluffy, the only debate you’ve ever demonstrated any likely claim for legitimate participation here is, Puffs Plus vs Kleenex Ultra Soft.
Keyboard stimulation and over engorgement for more than 4 hours may require IT attention.
Prove it nutlid. Don't just make that claim. Show your work.
He hasn't backed it up the last few times…
I will keep calling him out. He keeps showing he is a coward who is way out of his depth.
There were data breaches between the Clinton and Sanders primary campaigns. Each blamed the other. Facebook was not involved.
There is plenty of evidence that the Russian hackers, with Cambridge Analytica and other outfits, amplified these divisions by spreading targeted propaganda. As a Sanders supporter, I started getting crap that was so vile I knew it was fake, and reported it to FB. Some of it was pornographic or violent. It was used both to tear down HRC and to spread rumors that the "Bernie Bros" were all sexist assholes.
Some Dems were duped by that Russian propaganda, probably…but since 85% of Sanders supporters voted for HRC in the end, it's a safe bet that most saw through it.
There is no evidence that "Obama did it too". Obama's staff did use facebook and social media to connect campaign volunteers, and promote his own message, and Obama was a pioneer in that. The original OFA platform was its own social media site. Nothing like it had existed before.
But there is no evidence at all that the Obama campaign was using social media to tear down his opponent or spread deliberate falsehoods about her.
That, we got from Trump and Comrades, Cambridge Analytica, Guccifer, et al. And your party gleefully spread it and amplified it.
Does Moderatus EVER provide a cite for his claims of equivalence? Does he EVER reply?
"No" to the first question. "Occasionally" to the second one. Usually with blather and/or nonsense. But he wants to keep trying to throw shit out there, I'm going to call him out. If he doesn't reply coherently, I say he is a coward and/or he doesn't know what he's talking about. I am happy to shine a light on that.
Besides, annoying him is fun.