DNC Hacker Releases Clinton Foundation Documents (washingtonexaminer.com) 156
An anonymous reader writes: Following a report that Russian hackers penetrated the DNC's database, a hacker, who identifies himself as "Guccifer 2.0" after a popular Romanian hacker who hacked various American political figures, most notably Hillary Clinton and her private server, has published documents on Tuesday that he says came from the party's digital files. The documents detail Clinton's weaknesses as a candidate, and include a collection of negative press clips about the Clinton Foundation and a list of defenses against attacks on her private email use. Washington Examiner reports: "Another document, titled '2016 Democrats Positions Cheat Sheet,' listed major policy issues and indicated where Clinton, Bernie Sanders, Martin O'Malley, Jim Webb, Lincoln Chaffee, Elizabeth Warren and Joe Biden -- all former or possible rivals for the Democratic nomination -- stood on each issue." The documents contain information ranging from how the Clinton Foundation and its allies should respond to criticisms of the Clinton Foundation's revenue sources to how Chelsea Clinton wasn't able to answer questions about Clinton Foundation donations and other instances in which Bill Clinton was called a "sexual predator" for his past indiscretions. Even though the cybersecurity breach was blamed on the Russian government, the Kremlin has denied any involvement. The DNC also has yet to confirm or deny the authenticity of the leaked documents.
Re:It was probably.... (Score:5, Funny)
I guess they changed it (Score:4, Funny)
I guess they changed it. When I logged in, the first password was FuckBernie. An internal password was ClintonsDNC
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And you reek of someone reading off talking points trying just a little too hard to act disinterested. Yet you are completely misinformed because of your "what difference does it make now" bullshit. Gee, who else does that sound like.
Torrent Magnet Link to the Documents (Score:5, Informative)
Torrent Magnet Link to the Documents [magnet]
Re:Torrent Magnet Link to the Documents (Score:5, Informative)
Less creative than it could have been (Score:5, Interesting)
There is some excellent analysis and commentary here [nakedcapitalism.com], focusing on the metadata and and how it exposes the political/financial connections.... I *highly* recommend you scroll down and go thru the comments there, keeping in mind the Clinton foundation was accepting multi-million dollar gifts from mideastern countries while she was arranging arms deals as Secretary of State. BTW the site I linked is starting to remind me more and more of the old Groklaw.
I always see things like that and wonder whether anyone, anywhere can play a higher level of game.
The person releasing the documents could have thought through what would happen. Knowing and with reasonable prediction, he *could* have placed some false and condemning documents in with the stash - something that would be outrageous if true.
For the right and subtly-constructed data, the press would leap on it in a heartbeat and it be a sensation for a few days. Then it would be roundly disproven, and then it would cast doubt on all the other documents.
The end result would be a lot of people chaotically talking about that specific candidate for a few days. Depending on the persuasion dimension, that could be crafted to be good or bad for the chosen candidate. Misleading identity would be bad for the candidate: something that causes the public to give the candidate a derogatory nickname. Misleading facts would be good for the candidate: cause a lot of talk, easily dis-proven, and doesn't apply to their persona.
All we really see in this world is straightforward and transparent actions.
I'd like to see someone hatch a conspiracy or elaborate prank on the world, just to show that there are people who can do it.
Thank prank has been done... (Score:3, Insightful)
I'd like to see someone hatch a conspiracy or elaborate prank on the world, just to show that there are people who can do it.
Trump 2016
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I'm waiting for Trump to announce Hillary as his running mate, and Hillary to announce the other way. That would make the whole election a great big troll.
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I'm waiting for Trump to announce Hillary as his running mate, and Hillary to announce the other way. That would make the whole election a great big troll.
That's the way it used to work. Not with the running mates, but runner-up was VP. it was an extra layer of gridlock where the VP could vote against executive interest with the deciding vote if there was a tie in the Senate, just to stick it to the President. Now tie votes are assured to follow executive branch interests.
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Well, with a politician as un-charismatic as Clinton, it doesn't take much to generate a scandal; if you were going to salt the documents then all it would take is light hand.
That said, having looked at them myself I see no actual revelations. The strategy documents you could easily reverse engineer from the commonplace lines of attack the Republicans have been using and the public responses. The donor list contains no revelations, either.
So the document corpus doesn't appear to have been salted. It's ju
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I'd like to see someone hatch a conspiracy or elaborate prank on the world, just to show that there are people who can do it.
Why go through all that trouble when you can just run a Word doc through a fax machine [wikipedia.org] and the media will buy it?
Re:Torrent Magnet Link to the Documents (Score:4, Interesting)
I often think of the foreign emoluments clause of the US Constitution. If a corporation is controlled by the leadership of a foreign country and a gift is accepted, or campaign contribution, is that a violation?
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On a side note, American Colonels don't make that kind of money.
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The foreign emoluments clause only applies at the Federal level.
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After re-reading that it seems ambiguous as a person may need to be in office.
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"Then, that eliminates any American corporation, from giving to either campaign. Even, the telcos are foreign controlled. And where are the gambling houses making their monies?"
Close but not on the money. They must be controlled by "foreign princes" which I interpert as:
1) At lest partly state controlled or
2) The leaders of a country own a significant stake in it.
If you had said "Saudi Arabia" I would have said "BINGO!"
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"the Clinton foundation was accepting multi-million dollar gifts from mideastern countries while she was arranging arms deals as Secretary of State."
Was it intentional or unintentional that you forgot to mention the two separate oversight processes to approve those contributions in order to avoid conflict of interest? There was one approval process in State and one in the White House.
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Watch the press not talk about it, as they focus on something happening with the Kardashians or Paris Hilton.
Or Trump saying something stupid ... again ...
That's TRUMP'S playbook, literally in his book (Score:5, Interesting)
>> Watch the press not talk about it, as they focus on ... again ...
> Trump saying something stupid
That's Trump's playbook. He spent way less than most candidates, and got much more coverage. One of his books has a chapter about publicity. It can be summarized as "be outrageous, the press is always looking for a story that's not boring." It's LITERALLY his playbook, available on Amazon.
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...be outrageous, the press is always looking for a story that's not boring...
Nobody denies it is the way to act, if you are a celebrity for no other reason that you are able to place yourself on front pages, but how well will that work when you are the president? Promising to "act SO presidential..." just doesn't inspire a lot of confidence; it's like the winner of Big Brothel saying "I'll be SO scientific..." - one rather suspects they don't quite know what they are talking about.
Re:That's TRUMP'S playbook, literally in his book (Score:4, Funny)
it's like the winner of Big Brothel saying "I'll be SO scientific..." -
Now there's a reality show I'll watch :-)
Totally agreed. Too bad, he was effective (Score:1)
I totally agree. I quite disappointed that he's taken the path he has. Quite disappointed that he's the "R" nominee (much to the chagrin the R leadership) also. His publicity antics are an embarrassment.
Prior to the campaign, I saw him as an effective executive who hires really good people and works well with them, and someone who is very good at understanding the other party's position and getting a mutually agreeable deal done. Many months ago, I had hoped he might be able to help break the deadlock in C
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Big Brothel
Funny you say that, as that would be a good name for the White House while Bill was president. He was so presidential committing rape in the oval office.
BTW, it is called rape when you get sexual favors while being someone's superior. It is termed quid pro quo.
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BTW, it is called rape when you get sexual favors while being someone's superior. It is termed quid pro quo.
I admit that I don't quite understand the American idea of what rape is; I'm used to the idea that it simply means forcing somebody to have sex against their will. Consensual sex, even if it is prohibited under the law, should not be called rape. Not even if the reasons for prohibition are entirely sensible, because it only serves to make the concept controversial and less clear in people's minds. When an important, legal concept is changed in this way, it tends to bring the law and the legal practice into
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Sorry for replying to my own post - I forgot to add that I am not commenting on whether or not Clinton did anything illegal in the White House when he had sex with an intern, or whether it was consensual or not. I know too little about the subject - at least too few facts. Also, I'm somewhat puzzled that Mr Clinton's behaviour has been used as a weapon against Mrs Clinton - I would have thought that if anything, she is the aggrieved party and deserves some sympathy on that account, at least.
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Oh, you're such a pard.
Not Again (Score:4, Informative)
Every time a story is posted about this it includes the claim that Guccifer hacked into Clinton's server.
IT NEVER HAPPENED!
Guccifer guessed password reset questions, he lacked the technical skills to actually hack a server.
Guccifer loved the notoriety of "hacking" famous people, he would never have broken into Clinton's server and then not published anything or told anyone because the emails were "not interesting".
Guccifer is in now in jail, is it so hard to believe that the hacker who publicly gloated over hacking famous people would now decide to make an unverifiable claim that he hacked the infamous emails of a super famous politician?
He's just trolling for attention and /. is obliging.
Re:Not Again (Score:5, Insightful)
Who cares about exactly how? "Guccifer guessed password reset questions" means that he got unauthorized access to the server. Hell, the fact that password reset questions even existed and were enabled in the first place makes it WORSE.
He didn't claim to access her webmail.
He claimed to have actual admin access enabling him to see other people logged into the server, are you aware of many servers where you answer a password reset question to get admin access?
But don't worry, he actually doesn't claim to have used a password reset. Just look at the original article [foxnews.com]:
Asked if he was curious about the address, Lazar merely smiled. Asked if he used the same security question approach to access the Clinton emails, he said no – then described how he allegedly got inside.
“For example, when Sidney Blumenthal got an email, I checked the email pattern from Hillary Clinton, from Colin Powell from anyone else to find out the originating IP. When they send a letter, the email header is the originating IP usually,” Lazar explained.
He said, “then I scanned with an IP scanner."
Lazar emphasized that he used readily available web programs to see if the server was “alive” and which ports were open. Lazar identified programs like netscan, Netmap, Wireshark and Angry IP, though it was not possible to confirm independently which, if any, he used.
So yeah, this is his entire explanation of how he hacked the system:
1) Port scan.
2) ??????
3) 1337 Hacker!
Re:Not Again (Score:4, Interesting)
"Lazar said he did extensive research on the web and then guessed Blumenthal’s security question. Once inside Blumenthal's account, Lazar said he saw dozens of messages from the Clinton email address."
He did not get admin access. He got access to an account and leapfrogged from there. Pentesting 101 material. Access is access no matter how it was done. Leave the leetspeak and elitism back in the 90s.
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"Lazar said he did extensive research on the web and then guessed Blumenthal’s security question. Once inside Blumenthal's account, Lazar said he saw dozens of messages from the Clinton email address."
He did not get admin access.
That he got into Blumenthal's email account, and read emails to/from Clinton in Blumenthal's account, is a well established fact.
This is about the completely separate claim he hacked into Clinton's emails/server specifically (he was quite vague but seemed to describe seeing admin level stuff).
He got access to an account and leapfrogged from there. Pentesting 101 material. Access is access no matter how it was done. Leave the leetspeak and elitism back in the 90s.
I find "leapfrogged" and "pentesting" is a bit vague.
Hacking a sever involves a hell of a lot more than getting an email from that server and then running a port scanner.
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Right. Out of the box there are serious problems and the number increases every bugtraq perusal. Without a team dedicated to security on the server it really is as simple as running some rudimentary scans, cross-referencing CVEs and then popping an appropriate script / command procedure. That the server was likely administered remotely and definitely had no on-site 24/7 presence to monitor only makes the task easier.
This conversation feels like a handful of ACs talking to someone that does not know how infosec works let alone how attackers operate.
And what evidence do you have that Guccifer knew how to do any of those things? Just because you have the knowledge so it's easy for you doesn't mean he could do the same. (You're also assuming they never actually installed any updates)
Kinda sad for a tech site for someone to put the word pentesting in quotes and call it vague. Welcome to IT quantaman. This is how security is broken on systems incompetently ran from someone's basement.
I put it in quotes because the poster didn't know what the frack they were talking about. They conflated hacking Blumenthal's account with hacking Clinton, like logging into Blumenthal's webmail meant Guccifer had already partially compromised Clinton's server.
Getting Blument
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So yeah, this is his entire explanation of how he hacked the system:
1) Port scan.
2) ??????
3) 1337 Hacker!
Sigh, you must be new here, kid. FIRST, Your citation is from Faux News, FAIL. SECOND, you are assuming that the hacker in question did not give more information which the reported failed to comprehend, FAIL. THIRD, you are claiming that someone is not a hacker because they may have been unwilling to give full details of the hack to Fox News, FAIL. Did you just wake up on the fail side of the bed?
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i think he wins troll of the year, since he was happy to be extradited here....
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The 'hacker' could be a charlatan who got lucky. Or, maybe not.
Imagine you are a world class burglar. You approach the target and find that they have left a key under the door mat, with the security system password written on the key chain that is attached. Easy entry. You could have picked the locks and used gymnastic flips to jump through the laser alarm system. But there was no need. The target was obviously a chump. It doesn't mean you aren't at the top of your game.
Imagine you're walking around a city and the cops just caught a pickpocket.
The pickpocket shouts, "Aha! You know I also broke into the Art Gallery last week! I bypassed their security system and took all the paintings off the wall! But didn't like any so I put them back and left."
Now, the pickpocket could be telling the truth, that he knows how to bypass security systems and steal valuable art, but instead pays his bills with the proceeds of picking pockets.
He could be telling the truth, but I'm giving his
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So gaining unauthorized access to a system by the path of least resistance doesn't count all of a sudden?
Whether you call guessing password reset questions "hacking" or not doesn't matter, what he did was fundamentally social engineering and demonstrates none of the level of technical competence he'd require to hack Clinton's server.
Why go through a bunch of Mission: Impossible vent crawling bullshit when they leave the front door wide open and the cameras off?
Fine, he didn't 'hack' the server. But he still likely gained unauthorized access. And you look like an idiot.
Why do you think he gained access? Because he said he did? Then why didn't he brag about it at the time and demonstrate proof like he did for every other hack he did?
You're putting a lot of faith in the vague unsubstantiated word of an imprisoned social engineer.
Putin's just showing he likes Trump (Score:3, Interesting)
Putin's just showing he likes Trump, after all one dictator can recognize a rising dictator. He'd love to see America in Trumps meglomaniac hands, the US would alienate all it's traditional allies and he's destroy our military power in short order invading countries that insult him.
Re:Putin's just showing he likes Trump (Score:4, Insightful)
As opposed to RIGHT NOW, where many of our current allies (Israel) are already alienated, our military is in shambles, and every time a Muslim kills a lot of Americans, the President rushes on TV to lecture us about Islamophobia. Oh and workforce participation is an all-time low, income inequality is horrible, food stamps way up, illegal immigration way up, and economic growth sucks. But it's racist to point any of this out.
Re:Putin's just showing he likes Trump (Score:4, Insightful)
-we have more allies than just Israel. and most of them were alienated by bush the lesser, and those relationships repaired by Obama.
-our military is in NO WAY in shambles
-labor participation is dropping regardless of anything any one does. it has to do with the boomers retiring, not the economy.
-inequality is horrible, but its not thanks to the current occupant, but rather the past several decades of structural issues in the economy
-maybe you forgot, but the economy crashed a few years ago. of course stamps are up, and will remain up until people get back to where they were. that's what they are for
-illegal immigration is at an all time low. deportations at a record high. next immigration across the Mexican border is flowing the other way....back to mexico.
-economic growth does not suck, and has been positive for 74 consecutive months. the last president to do this well with the economy was Clinton.
-its racist because they're mostly false claims directed at the black guy because he's black
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You mean you have one neighbor. Not countries on the other side of the planet from them. And that neighbor having "islamic extremists" in it - something American Exceptionalists bomb with gusto, but not on their borders. So, you were deflecting?
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Putin's just showing he likes Trump, after all one dictator can recognize a rising dictator. He'd love to see America in Trumps meglomaniac hands, the US would alienate all it's traditional allies and he's destroy our military power in short order invading countries that insult him.
Trump isn't going to be invading anywhere is he gets impeached on day one.
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Please point out the "High Crimes and Misdemeanors" that Trump has committed, which would get the US House of Representatives to vote on Articles of Impeachment on "day one."
Yeah, I didn't think so. He may be an asshole, and you may not like him - that's perfectly fine. But don't throw around terms and processes that have actual legal meaning that you don't understand.
If you're not in a swing state, vote libertarian (Score:4, Interesting)
My state is solidly Republican, so my vote couldn't possibly affect whether Hillary or Trump wins.
However, in this election the Libertarian candidate is polling higher than ever. Both major parties have to notice this and think about adopting some libertarian views next time. I can encourage this by voting Libertarian. No, the Libertarian won't get elected this time, but the Republicans and Democrats WILL notice "gee, a lot of voters like libertarian policies. Maybe we should think about offering those voters some of what they want."
Re:If you're not in a swing state, vote libertaria (Score:4, Interesting)
However, in this election the Libertarian candidate is polling higher than ever. Both major parties have to notice this and think about adopting some libertarian views next time.
It happened after Perot.....both parties got serious about the deficit after that. Didn't last very very long, but it was good while it lasted.
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Or, there was an economic boom in the mid to late 90s, reducing the deficit.
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Or, there was an economic boom in the mid to late 90s, reducing the deficit.
That's definitely part of it, but it's not normal for politicians to get money and not spend it. There was a real focus on both sides of the aisle to reduce the deficit, that lasted through the Gore/Bush election (but Bush trashed it, and it hasn't been an issue since).
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True, we were doing good and you can point to both sides of the aisle for helping there. But then we went to war and spent more money than we had on it all while being told "just go about your daily business as if we weren't at war, otherwise the terrists win."
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Politicians like to think short term, because most of the voters only think short term. Worrying about what will happen 10 years from now will lose you the election even though it's the sort of thinking smart people would like the politicians to have. When times are good politicians ignore the deficit, except in order to bring up how bad it was in the past under a different party. When times are bad they point to the deficit, build up panic, then trot out their standard tried-and-failed approaches to re
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Good advice, and this applies no matter what direction your state votes, and no matter your own political orientation.
If you're conservative and you live in California where all your state's electors will go to Hillary no matter what, you should still vote Libertarian.
If you're liberal and you live in California, you should also vote Green. You're not going to let Trump win, Hillary's getting all your state's electors anyway.
If you're liberal and you live in whatever solid-red state raymorris here is from,
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Grats on drinking the kool-aid. She talks out both sides of her mouth. Watch when she actually takes impromptu questions and has to think about what to say. She'll give a speech to one group of people one day, saying one thing, then the next day in front of a different crowd, say the opposite. She has scandal after scandal following her and all she can say is "vast right wing conspiracy". Her email scandal was all about hiding information from the public. Her foundation is a scam. There's till the li
Re: We got some real winners in poltics (Score:1)
Please list her accomplishments. What has she excelled at other than occupying important sounding positions?
Re: We got some real winners in poltics (Score:5, Insightful)
Please list her accomplishments. What has she excelled at other than occupying important sounding positions?
She's got a ton of shit done, all of it fucking people over. It's not that she's not accomplished, it's that what she accomplishes is evil and we'd like her to accomplish a lot less.
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reality would like a word with you, but doesn't have the time to type everything up for the 20 millionth time. so here:
https://slashdot.org/comments.... [slashdot.org]
https://slashdot.org/comments.... [slashdot.org]
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How about, just maybe for a change, I know most people might consider silly and many others consider it worthless, maybe, just, maybe, HONESTY.
Nah, honesty as the best qualification for a politician, what a stupid idea. Right down there with those other stupid ideas, like INTEGRITY, can have that any of that either.
So let's all sing the "Hopey Changey Song", just imagine it in Sarah Palin's voice, here don't imagine it https://www.youtube.com/watch?... [youtube.com].
Long form birth certificate (Score:2, Funny)
I think it's about time Trump demands the release of Chelsea's long form birth certificate so that we can better determine the true nature of the relationship between Bill and Hillary.
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http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2015/10/13/inside-the-slimy-world-of-chelsea-clinton-conspiracy-theories.html [thedailybeast.com]
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The first married same sex couple?
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What's the defense for starting a civil war in Syria against all recommendations of the Department of Defense that directly aided ISIS and other Islamic extremist groups, killed 400k people, displaced millions of migrants, and then taking at least $10 million in donations from the Saudis who were the only ones to gain from the whole ordeal?
You sure we're talking about the same Syria? I don't recall the US starting any civil wars there. Iran and Russia have been helping Assad while Turkey was actually giving some help to ISIS, but the US has generally been on the sidelines.
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You take away the bible thumpers and you've lost 30% of the GOP.
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Perhaps, but it is the bible thumpers who are driving away Libertarians who otherwise would flock to the GOP.
That's the best they have? Really? (Score:2)
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I would expect the Clintons are pretty good these days at not leaving anything damning in documents, though I'm sure they're thinking more about legal discovery than hackers.
You seem to not understand the basics (Score:1)
We do not have proof that this document is legitimate, but for the sake of the discussion, I'll assume it is.
This document is NOT some attack document produced by Hillary opponents, Republicans, etc.
In the US, political parties and candidates generally do "opposition research" on their opponents to find all their weaknesses in order to maximize the effectiveness of political attacks and messaging - which is obvious...... but then knowing that the other side is doing the same thing, the parties and the candi
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The Russian word for truth is "Pravda" or " "
Ironic, isn't it?
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What's the Russian word for "reset"? Preferably the snootiest, most elitist usage.
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ASCII-7 is overkill. Baudot was good enough for grandpa so it's good enough for me!
Yes Madelaine Albright (Score:1)
It is all sooooo sad about Russia.
Putin the evil KGB man persecuted and sabotaged all your nice friends like Chodorkovsky, Nuland, Abramovitch, Timoshenko and the like. All they wanted to do is to have a little freedom to loot Russia's resources and transfer the money to New York and London. A nice little bit of freedom to make money, can't these Russians just comply with that ?
Really evil people these KGBers and the ordinary Russians ! They simply do not allow you nice chaps to rape them.
Time to inflame th
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