Keeping Track (of some things), Staying Outraged (it is possible), and Resisting (it’s essential)
Passages in bold in the body of the texts below are my emphasis. This is an ongoing project, and I update the site frequently. I hope readers will peruse the articles in full for a better understanding of the issues and their context; our democracy and our future depend on citizens who can distinguish between facts and falsehoods and who are engaged in the political process.
Friday, 7 July 2017, Day 169:
Russian President Vladimir Putin denies election hacking after Trump pressed him, Secretary of State Rex Tillerson says, The Washington Post, Damian Paletta, David Filipov, and Abby Phillip, Friday, 7 July 2017: “Eight months after an unprecedented U.S election — one that U.S. intelligence agencies say the Russian government tried to sway — President Trump and President Vladimir Putin sat for their first meeting on Friday, a friendly encounter that ended in confusion over whether Trump accepted assurances that the Kremlin was innocent of any wrongdoing during the campaign. Trump, believed to be the intended beneficiary of the Russian meddling, emerged from the extraordinary meeting — which dragged so long that Trump’s wife tried once to break it up — with a deal including Russia and Jordan on a partial Syrian cease-fire. The agreement would mark the first time Washington and Moscow had operated together in Syria to try to reduce the violence. But there were no grand bargains on U.S. sanctions on Russia, the Ukraine crisis or the other issues that have divided the nations for years. The meeting, on the sidelines of the Group of 20 summit, opened with Trump telling Putin it was an ‘honor to be with you.’ In the closed-door discussion, Trump pressed Putin ‘on more than one occasion’ on Russia’s interference in the 2016 presidential elections, Secretary of State Rex Tillerson, who attended the two-hour-and-16-minute meeting, told reporters. Tillerson said ‘President Putin denied such involvement’ but agreed to organize talks ‘regarding commitments of noninterference in the affairs of the United States and our democratic process.’ But Tillerson’s counterpart, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, said that Trump had heard out Putin’s assurances that Moscow did not run a hacking and disinformation effort, and dismissed the entire investigation into the Russian role. ‘President Trump said that this campaign has taken on a rather strange character, because after many months, whenever these accusations are made, no facts are brought,’ Lavrov told Russian reporters. ‘The U.S. president said that he heard clear statements from President Putin about this being untrue, and that he accepted these statements.'” See also, Russia Disputes U.S. Claim Trump ‘Pressed’ Putin on Hacking of the Presidential Election, The Intercept, Robert Mackey, Friday, 7 July 2017: “According to two widely divergent witness accounts, Donald Trump either ‘pressed’ Vladimir Putin repeatedly on Friday to admit that Russia helped him get elected president of the United States — by stealing and releasing embarrassing emails from Democrats — or told the Russian leader that he accepted his claim that Russia had nothing to do with the hacking and called concern over the issue ‘exaggerated.’ Those two very different accounts of what was said in the meeting between Trump and Putin in Hamburg, Germany, came in dueling press briefings given after it by the only other senior officials in the room when the conversation took place: Rex Tillerson, the U.S. secretary of state, and Sergey Lavrov, Russia’s foreign minister.”
Trump says Mexico should ‘absolutely’ pay for border wall, Politico, Jake Lahut, Friday, 7 July 2017: “Mexico should ‘absolutely’ pay for the border wall between the United States and its southern neighbor, President Donald Trump said Friday during his meeting with his Mexican counterpart, Enrique Peña Nieto. On the sidelines of the G-20 summit in Hamburg, Germany, an Associated Press reporter asked Trump, ‘Do you still want Mexico to pay for the wall?’ The president responded, ‘absolutely,’ according to a pool report. Trump praised Nieto as his ‘friend,’ despite the Mexican president canceling what was supposed to be one of the administration’s first White House guest visits. Nieto has insisted that Mexico will not pay for the border wall, and Trump has floated alternatives, such as paying for the wall with solar panels.”
Hackers Are Targeting Nuclear Facilities, the Homeland Security Department and the F.B.I. say, The New York Times, Nicole Perlroth, Friday, 7 July 2017: “Since May, hackers have been penetrating the computer networks of companies that operate nuclear power stations and other energy facilities, as well as manufacturing plants in the United States and other countries. Among the companies targeted was the Wolf Creek Nuclear Operating Corporation, which runs a nuclear power plant near Burlington, Kan., according to security consultants and an urgent joint report issued by the Department of Homeland Security and the Federal Bureau of Investigation last week. The joint report was obtained by The New York Times and confirmed by security specialists who have been responding to the attacks. It carried an urgent amber warning, the second-highest rating for the sensitivity of the threat. The report did not indicate whether the cyberattacks were an attempt at espionage — such as stealing industrial secrets — or part of a plan to cause destruction. There is no indication that hackers were able to jump from their victims’ computers into the control systems of the facilities, nor is it clear how many facilities were breached.”
Continue reading Week 25, Friday, 7 July – Thursday, 13 July 2017:
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