Jane Mayer in The New Yorker …
The Reclusive Hedge-Fund Tycoon Behind the Trump Presidency
How Robert Mercer exploited America’s populist insurgency.
Potter, a Republican, sees Mercer as emblematic of a major shift in American politics that has occurred since 2010, when the Supreme Court made a controversial ruling in Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission.
…
On top of this nonprofit spending, Mercer invested in private businesses. He put ten million dollars into Breitbart News, which was conceived as a conservative counterweight to the Huffington Post. The Web site freely mixes right-wing political commentary with juvenile rants and racist innuendo; under Bannon’s direction, the editors introduced a rubric called Black Crime. The site played a key role in undermining Hillary Clinton; by tracking which negative stories about her got the most clicks and “likes,” the editors helped identify which story lines and phrases were the most potent weapons against her. Breitbart News has been a remarkable success: according to ComScore, a company that measures online traffic, the site attracted 19.2 million unique visitors in October.Mercer also invested some five million dollars in Cambridge Analytica, a firm that mines online data to reach and influence potential voters. The company has said that it uses secret psychological methods to pinpoint which messages are the most persuasive to individual online viewers. The firm, which is the American affiliate of Strategic Communication Laboratories, in London, has worked for candidates whom Mercer has backed, including Trump. It also reportedly worked on the Brexit campaign, in the United Kingdom.
It’s in front of you in plain sight! Blaming Putin for election woes in America and Italy?
Comments by TarheelDem – fjallstrom – Phil Perspective – Frank Schnittger. Speaking up at last at the “progressive” Pond.
On the Italian election perspective, excellent insight posted by melo @EuroTrib.
Just saying all along …
○ Brexit Proxy War
○ Brexit: Putin Did It
○ Role Mercer in Brexit campaign of Nigel Farage
○ Cambridge Analytica (Mercer) the Real Election Cycle Culprit
More below the fold …
Just posted @EuroTrib by ARGeezer – SCOTUS AND CORPORATE CITIZENSHIP
‘Corporations Are People’ Is Built on an Incredible 19th-Century Lie | The Atlantic |
How exactly did corporations come to be understood as “people” bestowed with the most fundamental constitutional rights? The answer can be found in a bizarre–even farcical–series of lawsuits over 130 years ago involving a lawyer who lied to the Supreme Court, an ethically challenged justice, and one of the most powerful corporations of the day. That corporation was the Southern Pacific Railroad Company, owned by the robber baron Leland Stanford. In 1881, after California lawmakers imposed a special tax on railroad property, Southern Pacific pushed back, making the bold argument that the law was an act of unconstitutional discrimination under the Fourteenth Amendment.
[Read on …]