{"id":18576,"date":"2016-12-13T14:01:24","date_gmt":"2016-12-13T14:01:24","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/?p=18576"},"modified":"2016-12-13T14:01:24","modified_gmt":"2016-12-13T14:01:24","slug":"heres-how-you-could-have-handled-the-russia-problem","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/?p=18576","title":{"rendered":"Here’s how you could have handled the Russia problem"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
Tweet<\/a><\/div>\n

\"President<\/a><\/p>\n

Donald J. Trump didn’t ask me for my opinion on this, but I’ll give it to him anyway … not that it matters in Trump World.<\/p>\n

CIA officials have concluded that Russian computer hackers had some impact on the 2016 presidential election. To what end, they haven’t disclosed; it’s highly classified at the moment.<\/p>\n

They aren’t alone in that assessment. Other intelligence agencies and independent experts also have reached that conclusion.<\/p>\n

So, what does the president-elect do? He dismisses the CIA’s findings. He says he doesn’t believe them. He says the Russians didn’t do what has been alleged. He blames Democrats for fomenting a false allegation. How does he know any of that? He doesn’t.<\/p>\n

A better response would have been for Trump to do the following: Stand before the media and issue a statement.<\/p>\n

Thank you, ladies and gentlemen of the press. I want to issue a brief statement. There’ll be no questions.<\/em><\/p>\n

The news from the CIA is troubling in the extreme. I hereby join President Obama in calling for a full review of the findings and a public disclosure — to the extent that it is possible — of what, if anything, transpired in the Kremlin that might have had an impact on the election.<\/em><\/p>\n

I am acutely aware of my statements throughout the campaign that the election would be “rigged” in favor of my opponent, Hillary Clinton. As I’ve noted on other campaign-related matters,\u00a0I said some things for “dramatic effect.” The “rigged election” allegation was one of them.<\/em><\/p>\n

I did not envision the “rigged election” charge coming back on me and my campaign in this matter.<\/em><\/p>\n

Do I believe the Russians tilted the election in my favor? No. But you shouldn’t just take my word for it.<\/em><\/p>\n

I remain confident that a thorough review of the evidence and the facts will determine we would have won anyway.<\/em><\/p>\n

But let’s find out the truth of what happened, starting with the review that the president has demanded from the intelligence community.<\/em><\/p>\n

He didn’t say anything like that. Instead, he has denigrated the intelligence community, as he has done with many\u00a0other facets of government.<\/p>\n

Trump’s stubborn denial of any possible hanky-panky — and his stated disbelief in the work of the CIA’s\u00a0professional intelligence officers\u00a0— only darkens the clouds forming over his administration.<\/p>\n

The questions only will deepen the distrust many Americans are expressing at this moment over what might have transpired on Election Day.<\/p>\n\n

Tweet<\/a><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Donald J. Trump didn’t ask me for my opinion on this, but I’ll give it to him anyway … not that it matters in Trump World. CIA officials have concluded that Russian computer hackers had some impact on the 2016 presidential election. To what end, they haven’t disclosed; it’s highly classified at the moment. They … Continue reading Here’s how you could have handled the Russia problem<\/span> →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[5,13,14],"tags":[989,1424,2139,2696,4050],"class_list":["post-18576","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-international-news","category-national-news","category-political-news","tag-cia","tag-donald-trump","tag-hillary-clinton","tag-kremlin","tag-russia"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18576","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=18576"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18576\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":18578,"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18576\/revisions\/18578"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=18576"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=18576"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=18576"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}