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It defeats bureaucratic inertia from cutting the purchasing power of payment recipients that happens because of inaction rather than purposeful cuts. Take ACIP for instance. The tier that many of us are likely in has been $650 per month for approx. 25 years...and it's purchasing power has been eroded by inflation almost every single year. $650 in 1990 buys way more booze and hookers than in 2016. Bar napkin math (and an online historical inflation calculator) say that $650 in 1990 dollars has the same purchasing power as $1,179 in 2015 dollars. This effect amounts to real cuts in pay over time. Do you believe that Congress and DoD has purposefully lessened the incentives for aviators to fly in the service, or have those cuts happened simply due to inaction and the fact that they happen slowly over a long period of time? What I'm saying is that our appointed leaders in DoD and elected officials are free to reduce expenditures on personnel. BUT, make them (namely Congress) stand up and vote for cuts rather than allowing them to slyly let costs decrease due to inflation. Go on the record saying you're reducing a program or budget line item rather than doing nothing, which in effect is a small cut year after year after year Same goes for all payments the government makes or programs it funds. Someone or some program shouldn't get more purchasing power out of a dollar received from a program just because that received that dollar in the past. By god, if $650 per month was what seems fair to pay air crew in 1990, then $1,179 should seem equally fair today. The apollo program took us to the moon for around $20B over 15 years...today spending $20B on a space program with similar goals wouldn't get us to shit.

Almost every payment or budget item in the government should be pegged to chained CPI to account for inflation. So often programs or departments or specific payments erode over time simply due to bureaucratic and legislative inaction and gridlock. Even when the intent is not to cut, cuts take place because dollar amounts don't matter much, purchasing power is what matters. If legislators want to cut budgets, great, but make them vote for cuts rather than allowing them to slowly and silently enact cuts by just failing to allow payments to keep up with inflation.

My thoughts: 1. Our current President, Senate Majority Leader, Speaker of the House, DNI, FBI Director, etc. etc. etc. et al are convinced that it was Russia. There is public evidence it was Russia but obviously there is also classified evidence that I'm guessing the vast majority of us are not privy to. I'm very supportive of a joint select committee in Congress to investigate (that will be controlled by Republicans) and the release of more evidence publically up to the point that it would compromise sources and methods. The President-Elect claims he has counter-evidence and that he'd release some of it this coming Tuesday or Wednesday. Let's see what the leading skeptic has to back up his stance. 2. I disagree that the DNC "rigged" the election. They showed a clear bias toward Hillary, which is not ideal. Big picture though, she was a long-time party insider and Bernie is an independent Senator who only briefly switched his official party affiliation to Democratic in order to run. Despite being a long-time member of Congress, he had few allies in the party. Is it really a revelation that the party supported Hillary? I don't approve of some of the seemingly illicit assistance that was given to her, she didn't need extra assistance from the DNC to win the nomination. By the same token, it was very clear that the RNC did not support Trump and would have preferred just about any other nominee, right up until the point that he won. They perhaps did a better job of at least appearing more neutral, I'll give you that. Hillary won 54.8% of pledged delegates in the 2016 primary. By contrast, Obama won 51% of pledged delegates in 2008 even though Hillary actually won more votes in that set of primaries. If anyone was ever screwed out of a nomination by their party's system of super delegates and delegate apportionment compared to vote totals, it was Hillary in 2008. 3. I'm honestly not a fan of the U.S. interfering in foreign elections. We have a terrible track record in general. Clearly we have national interests that may be served better or worse by one particular candidate or another, but we need to take the high road and let other countries that are free and fair democracies do their thing. Does not apply nearly as much to places that are not democracies. I strongly believe Bibi is leading Israel into a really bad spot and I'd love to see different leadership there, but regardless, we need to let the Israelis (and everyone else) decide on their PM relatively free of our opinions or our dollars. 4. The IC concluded that the Russians hacked the DNC and John Podesta (among others), while an FBI investigation turned up no signs that Hillary's private server suffered the same fate. So although we should be skeptical, I'll take the investigators at their word. There were issues with the FBI investigation into Hillary (access, cooperativeness, etc.), and her decisions in terms of INFOSEC were very poor, but the conclusions of each investigation reached different conclusions WRT hacking by the Russians. 5. When WE, the U.S., the good guys, conduct offensive operations, I'm clearly gonna be more supportive than when our enemies do the same to us. I'd rather us take the high road when able and not do the same stuff we condemn, but I'm a realist and sometimes we have to take actions we would not want done to us in return. I would have greatly preferred a more robust response to cyber attacks on the U.S. under Obama, especially the Chinese hack of the OPM data I'm sure we're all familiar with. It can be a tough spot because you don't want to automatically escalate and make things worse. Overall, the thing that troubles me the most is that we have several other true peers in terms of cyber, where as in conventional and nuclear power, we are clearly superior to all comers. I want us to speak softly and have the biggest stick by far.

So if a foreign nation hacked the re-election campaign computer networks of President Trump in the run-up to 2020 and released, say, his tax return, his medical records, evidence of his internal political dialogue or strategy, etc., you're ok with that? See the lengthy Rubio quote I posted earlier. The intellectually honest answer would be that if you're ok with Russia hacking the DNC and the Hillary campaign, you're also ok with them or the Chinese or some other state hacking the RNC or the Trump campaign next time around. Playing Red Team / Blue Team on this stuff is not the right way to handle national security issues IMHO. I will stand up and say no. As much as I want Trump to be defeated in 2020, I don't want a hostile foreign power hacking his campaign or the RNC and I refuse to support any Democratic candidate or movement in the future that might think to use hacked information for political gain. I do absolutely place campaign infrastructure and party infrastructure as part of our "democratic institutions" and they should be protected. Obviously hacking voting machines or state voter databases is a higher level of provocation, but it's all part of our election system and foreigners or domestic bad actors need to keep out. Someone earlier said they want a full-up bicameral, bipartisan Congressional investigation...my magic 8 ball says you may get what you asked for in the new Congress.

It's almost like there should have been some kind of warning given or some reporting on this... The FBI informed the DNC that one of their computer systems has been compromised by Russian-linked hackers. Link. from 13 Dec 2016, but referencing FBI actions in September of 2015. In April 2016 DNC leadership finally wised-up that their systems were compromised, and in May they hired a private cyber security firm to help them. Link from 25 Jul 16 Intel agencies report to the White House that they had "high confidence" that Russia was behind the DNC hack. Link from 26 Jul 16 More reporting on Russians probing state election databases and systems, with FBI Director Comey's testimony. Link from 29 Sep 16 Russian hacking discussed during the first Presidential debate, 26 Sep 16 Joint DHS/ODNI Statement on Election Security. Link from 7 Oct 16 Russian hacking discussed during the second Presidential debate, 10 Oct 16 Mike Pence says there's "...more and more evidence that (sic) implicates Russia..." during an interview on Meet the Press, Link from 16 Oct 16 Trump is asked to condemn Russian hacking very directly by the moderator at the third Presidential debate, which he did, 19 Oct 16 Special thanks to NPR for the timeline above All of those events were pre-election, back when most voters (D & R alike) thought Hillary Clinton was going to win. Post-election, there have been more developments, with some unverified leaks and speculation as well as some evidence and official analysis released: President Obama orders the IC to conduct a full review of of foreign hacking in order to influence the election, Link from 9 Dec 16 Unverified leak from the CIA claims that Russia was specifically trying to help Trump win, Link from 9 Dec 16 Republican leaders in Congress call for Congressional investigations into Russian hacking, Link from 12 Dec 16 Unverified leak from "US intelligence officials" claims that Putin personally involved in the election-related hacking, Link from 15 Dec 16 President Obama says the hacks were, "...initiated at the highest levels of the Russian government..." during a press conference, 16 Dec 16 President Obama imposes sanctions and expels 35 Russian intelligence operatives in retaliation for recent hacking, Link from 29 Dec 16 IC Joint Analysis Report released detailing specific IP addresses and other digital markers used by Russian hackers against U.S. election-related targets, Link from 29 Dec 16 So really, when you sit down and think about it, these conclusions kinda came from nowhere and have no evidence to back them up /sarcasm Not to shit on ya too much dude, but let's cut the crap about being uncertain when there's a wealth of reproting and evidence available publically as well as behind classified closed doors, evidence that has convinced our nation's leaders across the political spectrum with approximately 99.9% efficiency. Can we work together to keep the Ruskies out of our elections and the Chinese out of our businesses and everyone uncleared out of our USG systems? I no more want our geopolitical foes hacking the RNC or President-elect Trump than I wanted them hacking the DNC or President Obama.

I'll agree that there is no evidence Russia was able to affect the actual votes, I don't think anyone is really claiming that they did. The election results were what they were. #MAGA That being said, it's not like they didn't try. More than 20 states faced cyberthreats during the election, although as is pointed out in the story, state databases and digital systems are probed and pinged pretty much constantly. Luckily for us all our election systems are very, very decentralized and our state election cyber folks seem to have better security practices than the inept idiots at the DNC. I would argue that our major political parties and political campaigns are a part of our "democratic institutions." They have confidential data about our national leaders as well as future Presidents. Parties have opposition research on both the other guys as well as their own candidate - potential health issues, financial vulnerabilities, non-public financial disclosures, strength/weakness assessments, etc. As long as we run elections through political parties, I don't want the Russians or any other foreign country or group to have access to that kind of data, data that can be used against an incoming Presidential administration or the country as a whole. John Podesta's emails would not have been "revealed" by an investigative journalist...the Russians literally hacked his password through spearphishing. If a journalist would have done that, they would be put in jail. So yea, sunshine is the best disinfectant, but it's a slippery slope to wish for your adversary's "dirty laundry" to be aired via hacking. Marco Rubio, whom I disagree with on many things, had the right take on this. He said: “I will not discuss any issue that has become public solely on the basis of Wikileaks. As our intelligence agencies have said, these leaks are an effort by a foreign government to interfere with our electoral process and I will not indulge it. Further, I want to warn my fellow Republicans who may want to capitalize politically on these leaks: Today it is the Democrats. Tomorrow it could be us. Just think about this: Do we really want to be a country where foreign leaders or foreign intelligence agencies can blackmail our elected officials and say to them that unless you do what we want you to do, we’re gonna release emails from your campaign manager, your wife, your daughter, your son, and we’re gonna embarrass you. So unless you wanna be embarrassed you better do what we want you to do. Is that what we want? Because I’ll tell you that’s what Vladimir Putin does. I think there’s plenty of material in which to line up and take on Secretary Clinton. I think this one is an invitation to chaos and havoc in the future."

Dude, you're at quibbling level MAX here. I'm sitting here telling myself to shut up because hearing this from the token liberal member of the forums won't change your mind, but I just can't. This should not and cannot become a partisan issue. Russia, our chief state-actor geopolitical foe for the last 70+ years conducted a cyberattack against our country's democratic institutions and processes and we need to be unified in standing up and saying we're not going to take that lying down. Let's review the facts: The October 7th Joint DHS and ODNI Election Security Statement was put out by, you guessed it, the Department of Homeland Security and the Office of the Director of National Intelligence. If the DNI's support seems to be what you're hung up on, go back and read that statement. The first sentence reads, "The U.S. Intelligence Community (USIC) is confident that the Russian Government directed the recent compromises of e-mails from US persons and institutions, including from US political organizations." In support of that October 7th statement, additional analysis was released yesterday. In the second paragraph of the new Joint Analysis Report, it says, "This determination expands upon the Joint Statement released October 7, 2016, from the Department of Homeland Security and the Director of National Intelligence on Election Security." This new JAR is a direct follow-up to the October 7th DHS/ODNI statement, meaning that both DHS and the ODNI support its conclusions, along with the entire rest of the intelligence community. It's almost like Homeland Security and the FBI are the relevant agencies to analyze an attack on the homeland and they were tasked by the ODNI to lead the analysis that backs up the ODNI's October statement... Let's be clear: there is only one primary incoming policymaker in particular who denies that the IC has reached a consensus or that Russia is behind the hacking...the President-Elect. His personal staffers and cabinet members are following the boss' lead. Look at a sampling of Congressional leaders from the President-Elect's own party for some contrast: Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, “Any foreign breach of our cybersecurity measures is disturbing, and I strongly condemn any such efforts. The Russians are not our friends.” Speaker of the House Paul Ryan, “As I’ve said before, any foreign intervention in our elections is entirely unacceptable. And any intervention by Russia is especially problematic because, under President Putin, Russia has been an aggressor that consistently undermines American interests.” Senator John McCain, “We need to get to the bottom of this. There’s no doubt they [Russia] were interfering. There’s no doubt. The question is now, how much and what damage? And what should the United States of America do?” If you'd like a bipartisan statement, on December 11th, Senators McCain (R), Graham (R), Schumer (D) and Reed (D) said: "For years, foreign adversaries have directed cyberattacks at America’s physical, economic, and military infrastructure, while stealing our intellectual property. Now our democratic institutions have been targeted. Recent reports of Russian interference in our election should alarm every American. This cannot become a partisan issue [emphasis mine]. The stakes are too high for our country. We are committed to working in this bipartisan manner, and we will seek to unify our colleagues around the goal of investigating and stopping the grave threats that cyberattacks conducted by foreign governments pose to our national security." There's so much we can disagree on political and policy-wise in this country...let's not choose to completely disregard the facts and disagree about an attack by another hostile state upon our own.

Related to cyber security, see attached for the Joint Analysis Report on the Russian hacking of U.S. targets put out by DHS and the FBI. Report-on-Russian-Hacking.pdf Link if you prefer that.

If you had to guess, how much USG money do you think has been spent on this jet? I'm surprised you think there's a lack of mission...even if this isn't the right solution, there's been a robust discussion both here and in more official circles about the need (or at least desire) for something that can do the ISR/light strike/armed reconnosiance/buzzword of the day mission more economically. The same mission many US aircraft are getting tasked toward today and have been tasked toward for close to 15 years now. F-16, F-15E, F-18, B-1, B-52, A-10, AC-130, MQ-1, & MQ-9 among others have all done parts and pieces of the mission in question here, and scorpion or something a similar could do it cheaper per flight hour than most of them.

If the mission systems were setup like a Viper or a Hawg, you could fly it by yourself. But with dual-FMV sensors that lack some of the more automatic lasing tools present on true targeting pods, other INT systems, Vortex and other datalinks that aren't exactly "pilot proof," plus flying the jet itself, you need more than one person. Not that one or the other is better (ok...I think more than 1 is better but then again I'm a nav...), but the systems have to be designed with the crew in mind. You can't fly a gunship with a crew of 1, it just can't be done. Same here based on how things are currently architected. The mission systems could be designed for a single pilot, but I can tell you with absolute certainty that in this case they are not, and flying solo with more gas would inhibit you from performing the ISR/strike mission to the full capes of the systems.

BLUF: lots of text here. Feel free to skip. Merry Christmas. I'll check out of this thread for a while and let others have the floor...PM me if you want to discuss further. M2, First of all, I'm not sure where that graphic is from, but it is not an accurate representation of the county-by-county Presidential election results in 2016. Hillary won Dallas county, Harris and Fort Bend counties (Houston area), Bexar county (San Antonio) and Travis county (Austin) among others. I may not be the Texas expert you are, but those counties are not depicted as blue in your graphic. Jefferson and Newton counties are also depicted as blue despite the fact that Trump won those counties. Honest mistake I'm sure, but I encourage you to check your sources more carefully if you're gonna come off the top rope claiming to be some kind of expert on the state and calling me out. You said there were no born-and-bred and proud Texans that voted for Hillary and challenged me for some facts. My initial argument is that 3.8 million people voted for Hillary in Texas under full GOP control in terms of setting up and running the election...I assumed that was proof enough. But if you wanna go into the weeds even further, let's do it! Look at what's been called the most Republican county in the whole United States, King county, Texas. There were 159 votes cast in King county in the 2016 general election, and Donald Trump received 149 of them. A total ass-kicking indicative of the county being extremely conservative, no doubt. But Hillary received 5 votes in King county, not zero. Five votes in a county whose election process is almost certainly run by extremely conservative republicans who would not be inclined to allow for errant Hillary votes to be counted. The state also has a voter ID requirement. Are you telling me there were 5 people who cheated your Republican-run system in King county on election day? In a county where everyone almost certainly knows everyone? If you think that's the case, you should probably contact the election officials from that county. While you're making phone calls (or a road trip!), maybe it would be more productive to see if you can find any of those 5 Hillary voters in King county and talk to them, see where they're coming from. Are they illegal latinos on welfare looking for a handout like you implied? Maybe hold-out Johnson Democrats who've been voting blue for their whole lives? Or young people rebelling against their Republican parents? There's one way to find out for sure, and you're much closer than me. My entire argument is basically this - Trump voters in blue states are not all racists who wanna grab America by the pussy and punch Muslim refugees; Hillary voters in red states are not all welfare queen illegal transgendered people who want their own special snowflake bathroom. Try to understand the other side, work on a positive political message, build more coalitions and do less identity politics. I was hopeful that might be a more broadly agreeable message even in deep-red territory like BO.net. On Texas being one of the most conservative states in the U.S., in many ways that you pointed out, you're right. But in terms of Presidential electoral politics that simply wasn't the case in 2016. Texas was the 15th closest state in terms of the margin between the winner and the loser (Trump +9.0%). There were 20 other state more Republican than Texas in terms of Trump's margin. So yes, Texas is quite Republican and a 9-point victory is still a solid victory, but you guys should check your 6 down there the same way that Democrats should have checked ours in MI, WI, and MN and ME (all states in the top 8 closest that Hillary won [minus MI that she lost] yet are not normally thought of as "swing states"). Look, I'm trying to forward a message that the both parties need to do a better job of representing all of their voters and all Americans in general. I want the Democrats to pay more attention to the non-college educated white christian men from the south, midwest and rust belt who feel alienated by some of the liberal cultural war issues and left behind by the modern economy. Not a lot of those voters voted for Democrats in 2016, but some did and others maybe would have with a different message and candidate. Democrats need to stand up for and speak for those Americans. By the same token I want the Republicans to pay more attention to young voters, people of color and religious and ethnic minorities who feel alienated by some of the recent GOP rhetoric on immigration and civil rights in particular and who feel scared by the incoming administration. Not many voted Republican in 2016 (some did), but I would encourage the GOP to try to better represent those Americans too. if you made it this far and still give a damn.

p.s. - Merry Christmas to all! Who else is looking forward to President Trump's White House Christmas ornament next year? I bet it will be extremely gold-plated

2004 came down to OH, which was very close and the election hung in the balance. President Bush won with the 52nd most electoral votes out of 55 previous elections, meaning the vast majority of previously elected Presidents won many more electoral votes. In 2012, with a similar popular vote margin, the EC was not particularly close. President Obama with the 37th of 57 previous elections. Not a blowout by any means, but no one state of even combination of two states (unless they were CA and TX that were split anyways) that could have de-throned him. It was a middling EC win, but not nearly as close as 2004. 2016's margin is much closer to 2004 than 2012 percentage wise if you want to compare apples or oranges or whatever. Trump won 56.5% of the electors, 2004 W. Bush won 53.1%, and 2012 Obama won 61.7% of the electors. The delta in winning margins is more than 1.5x comparing Obama to Trump vs Trump to Bush. BL: 2012 was a somewhat under-average win for a President EC wise, 2004 was very very close EC wise compared to all past elections, and 2016 was highly unusual in that it was relatively close EC wise and the popular vote was skewed in the opposite direction by a healthy margin. So what you're trying to get me to say I think is that the EC matters...which it obviously does. It's the only thing that matters in terms of deciding who is President. I happen to also think the popular vote matters in helping to give the President and his party political legitimacy to govern. I would greatly prefer for all elected Presidents to have won the popular vote because it helps them govern better and would confirm that our system, which is complicated for some very good reasons, gives outcomes that seem fair on a very basic level. The person with the most overall votes should win in all but the most exceptionally close contests. The second part of your statement is true in that the left will now suffer the political consequences of the imperial presidency, just like the right did under Obama. The presidency has been getting more and more powerful for a variety of reasons, and both parties have used that to their advantage. It has caused wild swings in US policy that I think are hurting the country, but there really aren't a lot of easy answers either when the main check on the President (the legislature) can't work together and doesn't stand up for it's own institutional rights.

I would like to see some changes that retain the good things about the EC but help prevent outcomes like we saw in 2016. Assigning electoral votes by congressional district plus some number of votes per state depending on the state-wide vote winner may work but I'm not married to the idea. When the popular vote is very very close, like in 2000, it's gonna come down to 1-2 states (which themselves may be very close), so that's not necessarily a bug, especially if that outcome only happens very infrequently. 1960 was very very close as well but the popular vote winner also won the EC. But when you lose the popular vote by millions of votes, the system should ideally reflect that basic little "d" democratic outcome IMHO. The EC is good in that it ensures that smaller states get a voice if they are politically divided and prevents candidates from solely campaigning for base turnout, but in some ways those advantages have broken down. Base turnout really is one of if not the key in many recent elections. Small states have a voice sort of (in the primaries more so), but large swing states like OH and FL and PA and NC still receive a very outsized portion of the attention compared to smaller swing states like NH, IA or NV.. Overall, it goes against my basic sense of fairness to have the popular vote winner not win the election, especially when the popular vote was not incredibly close. The fact that it happened 2x in 16 years and benefited the same party is extra frustrating (or extra lucky depending on your political beliefs), and highlights that some changes may be in order i.e. that the 2000 outcome maybe wasn't just an expected, unlikely outlier. As of today, the EC is all that matters and whoever wins is the legitimate President, but I think it's helpful for the President to have a democratic mandate from the people. Winning the popular vote nation-wide is the best example of that. It strengthens the President's ability to govern successfully, and at the end of the day I want all of our Presidents to succeed in broad terms because that means that the country is succeeding.

That is the attitude I'm talking about! The population of Austin is like 800K people and Hillary won 3.8 million votes in Texas. As much as it may rub up against conventional wisdom, there are lots and lots (i.e. hundreds of thousands to millions) of cowboy hat-wearing, truck-driving, Don't Mess With Texas Hillary voters in Texas. Just like there are lots and lots of latte-sipping Californians stuck on the 405 who voted for Trump. Not a majority of those people in either state voted that way obviously, but many more than you might think and we shouldn't discount those people's voices in our politics.

I would argue it's not meaningless at all. Yea, obviously there are way more total people in Texas than Massachusetts, or California than Alabama, we all know that. The point is that we shouldn't get too wrapped up on our stereotypes. There are literally millions of likely born-and-bred and proud Texans who cast votes for Hillary, just like there were millions of Best Coast Californians who voted for Trump. My comment was meant to demonstrate that we're more alike than different when you zoom out a little bit, and that Americans with diverse backgrounds can come to similar conclusions. Trump voters in California in many ways are pretty different than Trump voters from Alabama, but they agreed that he was the man for the job. Same goes for Hillary voters in Massachusetts and Texas.

FWIW there were nearly 2x more Hillary voters in Texas than in Massachusetts. There were also more than 3x more Trump voters in California than in Alabama. Its easy to just assume that all Hillary voters are hippy late-sipping costal elites or that all Trump voters are slack-jawed white nationalists from flyover country, but the facts say otherwise. If as a country we're going to continue having close Presidential elections (2000, 2004, 2016) and divided government in Washington (most years), we need to do a better job of working to find common ground rather than assuming the worst about the "other side." That can be tough, but we need to try harder if we actually want to fix Washington rather than just talk about fixing it or railing against it. Most voters aren't nearly as polarized as the parties would have you believe.

Ok, y'all are focusing on a tiny piece of the argument here, the Lavrov quote about not denying it. Regardless of what the shifty Russians say... The United States government officially, jointly, universally, and unequivocally said, via the joint DNI-DHS statement and numerous on-the-record discussions since then, that Russia is responsible for the hacks against the DNC and John Podesta. They said this on October 7th, well before the election was over. These are the good guys, our guys saying this. The "why" is not a settled issue yet and may be not be knowable with certainty unless we have agents high-up inside the Russian government, but the "what" i.e. that the Russian government directed the hacking, is settled among the numerous US intel agencies. You kind of either have to believe this is an Iraq WMD-level intel screw up, or you can accept the assessment as true. The former is always possible, but the later is much more likely. Is anyone willing to speak up about why they have doubts?

I'm putting the 37217 zip into here: https://www.defensetravel.dod.mil/site/bahCalc.cfm

+$147...local economy is booming so not surprised. Booya!

In terms of who should be investigated...the victims of the hacking were the DNC, campaigns on both sides, and individuals like John Podesta and Colin Powell. Not exactly under the purview of the USG to guarantee the cyber security of every single person, but I'm sure there is some legwork being done to help put up better defenses in the future. Personally, I agree with Rubio in that no matter who the victim is, we should not take political advantage of hacks conducted by a hostile foreign government. It's very hard to defend everyone and everything all the time, but we can choose not to take advantage of other people's misfortune. If/when the Russians start hacking the USG or GOP campaigns/institutions under President Trump we should combat it and retaliate and I will not be a fan of any future Democratic political campaigns that take advantage of hacked information. I am pissed at the current administration for not reacting more strongly back in October based on what they apparently knew at the time. It's a tough problem, you don't want to politicize intelligence but in the final stretch of a Presidential campaign everything is political...how would you have responded differently given what's known to the public now? As for a response, it's apparently been ongoing behind the scenes with more actions forthcoming. Although with a new administration taking over in a month that doesn't believe the hacks even happened, I'm not sure there will be a lasting effect unfortunately...the Russian perpetrators will likely face very minor consequences for a major act of aggression. It was Russia. 100%. That is a fact. The Russians don't even deny it. The entire US intelligence community is united in disagreeing with you. The Democratic President, the Republican Speaker of the House, the Republican Majority Leader of the Senate, and many other congressional leaders on both sides of the aisle agree it was the Russians. The GOP-controlled Senate is planning hearings on the subject. All of these national leaders are basing this belief that it was Russia on having access to the entire breadth of classified sources and methods at the disposal of the USG. What are you basing your opinion on?

What's your source for POTUS saying the Russians played no part? I would genuinely like to read/hear/watch that if you have a link. Election rigging via voter fraud (Trump's accusation) and election meddling via hacking/leaking (intelligence community's assessment) aren't the same thing. And we're not taking about not accepting the results of the election. Hillary conceded and is off walking in the woods still. Obama has met with Trump and there will be a peaceful transition of power in January. Those things are settled facts as well. I point back to the DNI/DHS statement from October, back when Hillary was leading in the polls. That was the United States and the Obama administration officially accusing Russia of meddling in the election. The statement was put out when Obama's preferred successor appeared to be winning and wasn't a sour grapes maneuver as the election hadn't happened yet. The argument could be made that Obama wasn't nearly forceful enough in denouncing Russian interference at that time. This is part of why political debates are so frustrating today. There are apparently no facts and no bipartisan national objectives anymore. It is a fact, according to public statements by the US intelligence community, that Russian state actors deployed cyber attacks to meddle in our election (exact intent is still up for debate). Russia is a geopolitical adversary and we should not accept their interference in our critical internal national affairs. I would hope those two statements would be agreed upon and agreeable to everyone...if not I'll show myself out and I wish you all good luck in thawing relations with Russia in a way that's beneficial to the United States. In all seriousness, I sincerely hope that when Trump is President he follows Congress' lead and brings the full weight of the USG to bear on this investigation because no matter who benefited or who was hurt politically, the integrity of our democratic process was hurt by Russian actions and that's a wound we shouldn't accept lightly.

The DNI absolutely said that the Russians conducted offensive cyber operations to interfere with the US election process. That much is not in disputed whatsoever. https://www.dni.gov/index.php/newsroom/press-releases/215-press-releases-2016/1423-joint-dhs-odni-election-security-statement What is currently up for debate is what the Russians' intent was. Was it to sow general confusion and disruption or were their efforts specifically intended to hurt Clinton and help Trump? The CIA apparently concluded in a classified assessment briefed to Congress that the intent was specific. https://mobile.nytimes.com/2016/12/11/us/politics/cia-judgment-intelligence-russia-hacking-evidence.html The DNI apparently isn't 100% sold on those conclusions, and communicated while they don't disputed the CIA's conclusions, they can't prove them either. https://thehill.com/homenews/campaign/310112-dni-not-sold-on-cia-assessment-of-russian-hacking-report Look, I'm not in the camp saying Russians hacked the election and that's the reason Hillary lost. There were a lot of factors at play, including her own weaknesses as a candidate and Trump's particular strengths in the states that ended up mattering. Trump won the electoral college and will be the next President - that's a fact. But the reason a bipartisan group of senators is investigating Russian involvement is because it 100% happened and no matter the intent, it's bad. https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/congress/amp/sen-mcconnell-backs-senate-investigations-russian-breach-n694876 I don't want foreign powers interfering in our elections to help either my allies or my political opponents and neither should anyone else. The Russians do not have our interests at heart and I don't want them hacking the RNC or the Trump administration any more than I want them hacking the DNC or the Obama administration.

25 years is apparently what changed. Your point is my point exactly - the Russians don't have our best interests in mind and I trust our own intelligence community more than I trust RT and the Kremlin propaganda machine. Can the same be said uniformly across the right? Now look to the President-elect's administration as the one wanting closer ties to Russia, as not believing the CIA's assessment that Russian hacks were meant to help get Trump elected, etc. Flynn and Tillerson (National Security Adviser and Secretary of State to be [rumored]) have extensive ties with Russia, as did Paul Manafort, Trump's one-time campaign manager. That's why I find it ironic. The "liberals are commies and love Russia!" meme doesn't quite hold today the same way it did in the 80s. Some liberals are commies and fuck 'em, I agree, but let's allow our distain for Russian intersts to cross party lines when necessary as well. Today it's the incoming GOP administration that can rightfully be charged with cozying up to Putin, not the Democrats. Edit to add: I'll also say that I remember laughing when Obama mocked Romney during the 2012 Presidential debates re: Russia. "The 80s want their foreign policy back, etc." I was wrong then and so was the President, Romney was right to identify the Russians as the biggest (or top 2) geopolitical threats to the U.S. VEOs aren't an existential threat...Russian undermining of Western institutions (EU/NATO/U.S.), grabbing land in Europe and energy deals in the Middle East and offering a shitty alternative to Western-back norms and power is an existential threat, and that's what Romney was getting at I think.

Wait, you're insinuating that it's the liberals who are sympathetic to Russian sources of news these days? That's pretty funny man...ask Gen. Flynn about how legit RT is if you run into him around the White House. Reagan is rolling over in his grave re: Trump's ongoing connections to the Russians and apparently even the GOP NATSEC crowd is finally taking notice.