With the recent news that Obama has renewed sanctions on Russia due to their hacking and interfering in our elections, I think it is a good time to stop and take a moment to consider the full ramifications of what this situation indicates.
Through all of this, I have endeavored to keep my sight on the larger picture, for instance, not to get bogged down in divisive battles within our party.
So when the first Wikileaks dump of DNC emails came out about attacking Bernie Sanders, I was one of the few kossacks at the time urging people not to fall for the clearly-orchestrated efforts to divide us and mire us in infighting.
And even before the Russian ties to the leaks was as evident as it is now, I was writing about how the ties between Russia, Trump and his allies needed to be fully investigated, not just for the integrity of our elections, but for basic national security concerns.
And so now that the evidence of Russia’s interfering in our elections seems to be well-established, supported by the broad consensus of our intelligence community, and compelling enough to push Obama to impose new sanctions and expel Russian nationals, I still think the full extent of the scandal has not been fully uncovered.
For example, if one wants to think about Putin’s motives, things tend to get a bit more dicey. Some think it was purely to undermine the elections. Some think it was specifically to help Trump win. And in any case, any sort of controversy in the elections would be to Russia’s gain. But considering some of the circumstances, these explanations for his motives do not seem like the full picture.
So, I think it is not necessarily the fundamental starting point to think that Putin interfered in the American elections driven solely out of self-interest.
I think at this point, it is just as conceivable that people within the Republican Party put Putin up to it, to hacking our elections.
While it is pretty plain to see that there are indeed reasons why Putin would want to interfere in our elections, and even go so far as to help one candidate or another win, that does not mitigate the great risks involved in such an endeavor. Such interference, if uncovered, would obviously become a major international conflict; indeed, it seems already to have reached that point. It has already affected US foreign policy already, such as in Syria.
So sure, it is easy to point to what Putin had to gain, and say that is reason enough for him to get involved; but if I were in his shoes, considering all the resources that were apparently invested, I do not think he would have orchestrated such actions unless the rewards greatly outweighed enough of the risks.
Which brings us to the targeting of the DNC: the groundwork for such a massive hacking operation had to have been laid well before the results of Trump winning the Republican primaries came about. So for us to assume Putin was deliberately trying to help Trump, one would have to presume that such operations began well before Trump even clinched the nomination.
Then there are all the campaign staffers close to Trump, who also had known ties to Russia. Paul Manafort is the classic example, but he is far from the only one. What else did they have in common, other than strong ties to Russia? Most, if not all, are also deeply tied to the Republican Party, having worked for other high-ranking Republicans in the past.
It is quite possible that Donald Trump was not the only Republican signaling to Russia that the US under President Trump would soon take a softer stance towards Russia. Hell, Rex Tillerson alone should be enough to prove that Trump is far from alone in sending good vibes towards Moscow.
Let’s not also forget that shortly after the election, there were reports that Russian diplomats were in contact with members of the Trump campaign. Why, then assume that such communications only happened one-way? It is just as reasonable to think that the same channels could be used by Republicans to solicit Russia’s involvement in the first place.
Paul Ryan, Mitch McConnell, and other Republicans have already stalled investigating the Russian hacking on numerous occasions. While this may not be evidence of their involvement, it further illustrates why it is just as likely to think one of them solicited Russia’s interference in the first place.
As much as we want to think Putin had all these reasons to benefit from interfering in our elections, it can also easily be counted that the Republican Party had even more to gain.
Whether or not Trump is Putin’s guy, or whether or not Trump is even their guy, the Republican Party was surely preferring to their guy win, and the Democratic Party’s side lost. That is about as clear as any other motive as there would be to get Russia involved, acting as their sabotage network. And it would not even be the only example in this cycle of Republicans doing whatever is in their power to undermine our democratic values, and throw a monkey wrench in our electoral process.
Perhaps there is a strong inclination to dismiss this as the type of CT stuff that is typically relegated to the Pizzagate crowd. Would so many Americans within the Republican Party really collude with Russia to hijack and undermine our elections, just to get their candidate installed, whoever that may be?
On the other hand, supposedly President Obama has taken the theory out of the conspiracy theory. Supposedly there is enough evidence to take significant action. So if that really is the case, I would also expect President Obama to perform his due diligence, as someone sworn to defend the country. When a conspiracy is uncovered, you leave no stone unturned looking for co-conspirators — even if it points to wolves in the henhouse.
Whether or not that sounds crazy to you, I think, considering what we already know, there is enough reasonable suspicion that, if Obama thinks Russia is implicated enough, at the very least, he should be directing the FBI and Justice Department to fully investigate members of the Trump organization as well as the Republican Party who may have had the strings to get Russia involved in the first place.
Considering the actions Obama has taken towards Russia, if he is being intellectually honest in truly believing there is evidence of such involvement, then it would be a strong indication that members of the Republican Party could also have been involved in the first place, and so it would be a dereliction of his duties to ignore the full implications of such evidence.