A few days ago I urged friends to grow a pair of ears sensitive to bullshit language. How about adding a new nose?
That murky “Russian hacking” story fails – so far – to pass the smell test.
So called “news items” after item have been found to be false or half true. Newspapers like the Washington Post (but not yet NYTimes) have “walked back” the fabrications. (Putin cut off Vermont’s electricity supply, Putin caught Trump in a honey trap etc etc. – O that it were true!)
So we hate Trump for all the good reasons. Check. He’s a cruel and reckless monster. Check.
He’ll make our daily lives more miserable. Check.
Here’s what we know so far which isn’t much:
Balancing the odds, and listening to perhaps contradictory advice from his secret service and tech experts, Putin decided to mess with America in Trump’s favor – in some as yet unspecified, unsourced and unproven ways.
There is NO independent verification EXCEPT secret reports from the CIA-FBI-Homeland Security apparatus.
And we know how honest unblemished unbiased unpolitical and disinterested they are in the current fevered atmosphere. Oh, please.
It’s so hard for us to face the harsh, complicated reality that Trump won due to a perfect storm of boring sociological factors like the catastrophic decline in union membership (up to now a shield against racism), “de-industrialization” of whole regions, the plague of state right to work laws, the loss of jobs through automation and anti pollution regulations and massive outsourcing – and oh yes an unpopular Democratic candidate running a dumb campaign.
Until Putin comes crawling on his hands and knees before a Congressional committee to confess his intervention sins, you best go down to the corner grocery and buy a barrel of salt to pour on this Russian-hacking story.
Haven’t we been here before with Saddam Hussein’s invisible – except to neo-cons with eyes fixed on war – chemical and nuclear weapons?
Fake, fake, fake – until we have MULTIPLY-SOURCED EVIDENCE BASED proof that smells fresh and good.
That comes from other than the “intelligence community”. Since when do we trust them on a political issue in which they have their own pot to stir?
It takes no genius to figure out that any Russian, high or low, bad or good, would prefer a blustering salesman like Trump who has money interests to protect in Russia over Hillary a high minded war hawk who, rightly, has condemned Putin’s bloody imperialist adventures in the Crimea and Ukraine.
Paging Judith Miller!
