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Comment by BillyParadise | Hacker News Reader

Extraterritorial corporate interests manipulating a decision arguably more important than a single election?

Please, help me explore how this is significantly different than the Russia vs US election issue on the other side of the pond.

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Well, one obvious difference is that it's a private entity rather than a government. But you don't have to look very hard to find instances of the american government interfering in foreign elections. It's one of their favorite pastimes.

Arguably the Marshall Plan is one of the best examples of this

Arguably given the context, Obama visiting the UK to tell the British that the USA would ignore them if they voted out (send them to the "back of the queue") would be the best example of this: direct intervention by a foreign leader into a national referendum.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5xflVUa4M_8

Robert Reich says that Brexit and the Trump victory happened because the economic recovery after the 2008 crash wasn't quite a big hit (contrary to what we all might have hoped for).

Now that may be due to changing economic realities, i think that people blamed transnational entities (EU, NAFTA, TTIP) and the elites that supported these developments for what happened. The only entity that could change the status quo were the populists (due to the neo-liberal consensus that erased any real differences between right and left) [1]. Now the backlash against the populists might come either from a reformed left or from a reformed right, go figure.

I don't think that financial support by a moneybag could have changed the global picture in any significant way. For every right wing sponsor there is one on the left.

[1] in Britain they had Boris Johnson, who played a major role throughout the referendum campaign.

Given that CA worked for the Trump campaign, hardly different at all.

Mercer provided Bannon and Conway to the Trump campaign as well. The Mercer family is invested in Breitbart news.

Robert Mercer and daughter Rebekah. Excellent WashPo coverage:

https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/pro-trump-megadonor-...

It is somewhat astounding that Mercer/CA were able to attain so much political influence -- by following the data collected and providing a candidate that was anti-establishment. Quote from Mercer:

“America is finally fed up and disgusted with its political elite. Trump is channeling this disgust, and those among the political elite who quake before the boombox of media blather do not appreciate the apocalyptic choice that America faces on Nov. 8.”

I assume this statement is derived from data.

https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2017/01/no-one-...

Somewhere there's a demagoguery handbook.

In a political domain in which a large portion of the population is disenchanted, it's relative, possibly frighteningly, easy to preach a simple and easily digested and accepted message of salvation. It is almost always false. It is hugely appealing.

Trump has tapped that nerve, with the help of a number of others, the Mercers among them. I'd add Thiel to the list also.

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