It takes some work, amidst all the Washington posturing and
spin and claims and counter-claims, to work out what really happened in the
last election. But by now a few things are pretty clear.
1. The
Russians, or at least some subgroup probably not officially part of the
government but actually under government sponsorship, did try to stir things up
via social media, and by hacking the poorly protected emails servers of several
political groups. In general the effort seems to have been pretty ham-handed, especially
the social media part. None of this is surprising – the US has a history of
doing the same to other nations; indeed, the CIA has even actively promoted coups
on more than one occasion, as we all now know. So the political outrage at the
possibility of Russian interference is pretty hypocritical, but I guess it
makes good copy for the more rabid liberal and conservative groups.
2. It
seems to me highly unlikely that whatever Russian interference there was had
any appreciable effect on the election. It
seems to me the election was actually decided by the Democrat’s choice of an
exceedingly poor and problematic candidate, by the resentment of the Sanders
wing of the party and how they were treated at the convention, by the incompetence
of the Clinton campaign strategists, and by then FBI director Comey’s off-again
on-again handling of the email scandal. I don‘t think the Russians had much
effect in the face of so much incompetence.
3. In
fact, it appears that the major, and perhaps most worrying election interference
came from within our own government’s judicial and intelligence communities.
The public evidence available to date increasingly points to
politically-motivated interference and spying directed by senior FBI and
intelligence agency managers. The desperate attempts by the FBI and the
intelligence community to avoid providing key documentation to the Senate and
House oversight committees investigating suggest they are very worried about
what will be revealed. And I note that although special prosecutor Muller has
indicted several lesser people for lying to the FBI, no one has yet indicted
ex-FBI director Comey, his top aid Andrew McCabe, ex-national intelligence director
James Clapper, or CIA director John Brennan for lying to the FBI and/or Congress,
although they have all subsequently publically admitted to doing so, or have been shown by public records to have done so.. Perhaps
the upcoming Inspector General’s report, if it is truly impartial and hasn’t
also been politically tainted, will deal with some of this.
In general, I think my prediction of some months ago that
the Democrats may well come to regret opening the whole Russian can of worms is coming true. The investigations haven’t
yet much affected Trump, but they have certainly badly damaged the legacy of
Obama and his administration, and worse may yet come.
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