Hacked!

Those who control Russia's government have been a devious and manipulative bunch for at least one full century (this year marks the centennial of the Bolshevik Revolution!) but in a strange twist, that makes the current allegations about Russia "meddling in our election" less serious, not more.

Since I have blogged against Vladimir Putin since more than eight years ago, I am more than comfortable saying I don't trust him any further than I could throw a MiG-31 jet while standing on a Siberian glacier wearing figure skates. With that in mind, I am also more than comfortable saying that the attention being given to this whole story -- which revolves entirely around the release of Democratic National Committee and John Podesta emails via WikiLeaks -- is absurd. As Kevin Williamson put it, "the DNC leak is a jaywalking case that we're prosecuting while our enemies are plotting something more like an electronic 9/11."

To recap: 1) The emails that got released on WikiLeaks were authentic; nobody, not even those who were embarrassed and/or revealed to be corrupt by them, denies their authenticity... 2) The things revealed by the emails were things the public deserves to know... 3) Despite #2, the vast majority of the public still doesn't know what the emails revealed because the MSM has chosen not to say, instead opting to speculate about who leaked rather than report what leaked... 4) Every sentient person with an IQ higher than a tuna's knows that every nation spies on every other nation, including its own friends... 5) Despite #4, the leaked emails do not reveal any national security information nor do they reveal anything that would put our agents or informers in peril... 6) Despite some "intelligence sources" claiming near certainty that the leaks came from Russian hacking, such claims deserve an arched eyebrow of skepticism when you consider that the DNC withheld evidence the FBI asked to examine during its investigation, and when you consider that the joint intelligence agencies' report is full of holes... and 7) If Russia was the hacker and this is all they got, they suck at hacking so why get upset?

In short, the specific actions Russia has been accused of are the most benign and inconsequential kind that anyone could imagine them engaging in. So why the high dudgeon?

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Throughout the eight long years of Barry H. Obama's reign, Russia has no doubt tried to hack us, sometimes successfully, every single day. So too have China, North Korea, and Iran. So too have freelance players like Guccifer and Anonymous. China stole the personal information of 21.5 million Americans, including bribe-susceptible government officials, when it hacked into the Social Security Administration.

Obama responded to those attacks with yawning, shoulder-shrugging passivity. Nothing to see here, sayeth he, and America's lapdog media responded by downplaying the stories (often ignoring them altogether) because they always believe him. They do whatever Barry H. Obama wants them to do when he pats their heads, for he is their bow and they are his fiddle and he plays them like a Stradivarius.

Which brings us to the current spectacle. If we are to believe that Obama's behavior and manners are sincere, we have no choice but to believe that he is more opposed to American citizens knowing the truth about Democrats than he is to America's enemies learning how to kill us and rob us of our livelihoods. We also have no choice but to believe that he is more opposed to Americans knowing the truth about Democrats than he is to innocent people being slaughtered and enslaved by dictatorships.

We are obliged to believe these things because Obama exhibited no concern about the above cyber attacks; turned his back on Ukraine when it was invaded by Russia; and spoke not a word in support of Iran's freedom-seeking citizens who tried to overcome Iran's murdering dictatorship in 2009. Instead, he became animated only when a handful of his fellow Democrats were embarrassed by their own emails and one of his fellow Democrats lost an election to Donald Trump.

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Now let's take the standard I just applied to Obama and apply it to America's mainstream media. If we are to believe that their priorities are revealed by their choices about which stories to spotlight versus which ones to bury, then we have no choice but to believe they are more opposed to American citizens knowing the truth about Democrats than they are to America's enemies learning how to kill us and rob us of our livelihoods. And we also have to believe that the media are more opposed to Americans knowing the truth about Democrats than they are to innocent people being slaughtered and enslaved by dictatorships.

It's not surprising that the prejudices held by Obama and his party are the same as those held by the press (I don't call it the Democrat Media Complex for nothin') but it's infuriating that they lie about the hacking allegations by using incendiary and fraudulent inaccurate phrases like "Russia hacked the election."

Many times I have heard the "hacked the election" canard fall from the mouths of radio newsreaders and TV bubbleheads. I have also seen it in print. What the phrase implies is that the Russian government hacked into ballot-counting machines and altered vote totals to make Trump appear to win an election he really lost. At least one recent survey found that more than half of registered Democrats have come to that conclusion based on what they hear and see in the media.

But if you read the actual allegations, nobody -- literally nobody -- has claimed that Russia did anything of the sort. The only allegation is that it was Russia (as opposed to some Democratic Party whistleblower) who gave those authentic and relevant emails to WikiLeaks.

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Something else that's infuriating is how the Democrat Media Complex papers over its grotesque Russo-hypocrisy while trying to make an issue of Republican skepticism about whether the emails influenced the election.

Ever since, oh, let's say about November of 1917, American liberals (not all of whom are/were Democrats) have been deeply in love with Russian totalitarianism, so much so that they even thought ol' Adolf Hitler was the bee's knees until he stopped being an ally of their beloved Soviet Union. Meanwhile, American conservatives (not all of whom are/were Republicans) have always considered Russia to be conniving at best, evil at worst.

In 1983, the famous Democratic Senator Teddy Chappaquidick Kennedy flat out asked the Soviets to meddle in America's 1984 election help Democrats in their efforts to defeat Ronald Reagan the following year.

As recently as Obama's first term, American liberals were boasting of "resetting" our foreign policy when it comes to Russia, while Obama himself mocked Mitt Romney for suggesting that Russia is our biggest geopolitical foe.

And now they suddenly want us to believe that they are anti-Russia hawks and conservatives are Kremlin-cuddling cupcakes? Please.

The basic conservative position is that the information in the emails did not portray Hillary & Co. in a new light, but merely supported what people already thought about Hillary & Co., and thus they did not swing the election... especially when you recall that there was very little reporting about what was in them... though even if they had impacted the election, the impact would have been based on truthful and relevant info, not misinformation or triviality -- so big whoop.

That position is backed by mountains of evidence and is entirely logical, so much so that only a fool or blind partisan could argue against it with a straight face.

And no, conservatives do not trust Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin, neither today nor at any time in the past (though some of us, myself included, do wish that America's outgoing president was as shrewd and daring as Putin when it comes to international affairs).

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What about WikiLeaks? Back when it was releasing material that embarrassed Republicans, liberals were singing its praises and speaking of Julian Assange as if he was some kind of Tiananmen protester speaking truth to power while the tanks bore down. But now that it has released information embarrassing to Democrats, liberals are acting like it's a paragon of dishonesty and Assange is some kind of Benedict Arnold.

And of course, they would have you believe that conservatives have gone from distrusting WikiLeaks to thinking of it as a modern day Common Sense with Assange assuming the role of Thomas Paine. Never mind that many conservatives depict Assange as a paid Putin front who is likely guilty of rape, and never mind that even those conservatives who point to WikiLeaks's record of accuracy are quick to caution that it often discloses things without regard to consequences, and that its motives are often bad.

(I do have to say that Sean Hannity is an exception to this rule. Although objectivity has never been Hannity's strong suit, it evaporated altogether when he started verbally fellating Donald Trump 24/7 sometime in 2015, and lately he seems to be granting that same bent-over service to Assange. But then again, it takes an exception to prove a rule.)

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If you don't mind me kind of quoting General Anthony McAuliffe, this is nuts. Everything about the "Russia hacked the election" story is nuttier than a squirrel's den at the start of winter.

American liberals, angry that the truth about their leaders was revealed to Americans at large, spray absurd accusations across the political landscape like a blind shooter refusing to release the trigger of his AK-47.

And American conservatives, blessed with a sense of proportion and able to tell the difference between nonsense and common sense, roll their eyes and go about their business because they have things to do.

The problem is that most Americans are neither liberal nor conservative, and get their sense of what's happening by glancing at headlines and hearing snippets uttered on the radio and TV -- and all they are hearing is that "Russia hacked the election."

Unfortunately, the Democrat Media Complex is a master at the art of deception repetition. They know that the more you say something, the more it becomes accepted as truth in the public's mind, even if it's a load of crap that stinks worse than a pile of steaming camel dung atop a Sahara dune in the heart of August.

There is a method to the madness. The Democrat Media Complex intends to make the bulk of America think that the incoming president was not legitimately elected, and once it cements that idea in the public mind, it will use it to twist public opinion in the direction it desires -- a direction that history tells us will usually go against the best interests of America's average citizens.

I am on record as being leery of Trump's qualifications for office. But I am also on record as being even more leery of Clinton's, and I am eternally on guard against the tyrannical impulses of the Left.

And I am here to say that we can not let the Left get away with its current strategy, or we and our offspring will rue the day because of the precedent it will set.