I've been wondering this about the Russia situation:

[The Velveteen Ocelot]

Last edited Sun Feb 26, 2017, 07:49 PM - Edit history (1)

Was the reason for their interference because they specifically wanted to sabotage Hillary, or because they specifically wanted Trump to be elected? We know Putin hates Hillary because of her work as SoS regarding the sanctions, but what if the GOP had nominated someone other than Trump - Jeb!, for example. Would they still have hacked the DNC? As far as we know Jeb! has never played financial footsy with the Russians, or partaken of other, more personal activities in a Russian hotel, so if the Russians had hacked the DNC anyhow that would mean all they cared about was defeating Hillary.

Or, what if the Dems had nominated Sanders or O'Malley (I'll call that theoretical candidate "Nothillary" so as to forestall any unnecessary dead-horse-beating)? So the Dems nominate Nothillary and the GOP nominates Trump - do the Russians do their dirty deeds to be sure Trump wins, presumably because he'd be more friendly toward them (Nothillary would probably continue the Obama admin's Russia policies), and because of his previous relations with them, whatever those might be?

And what if neither Hillary nor Trump had been the respective parties' candidates? Would Putin have decided not to get involved at all? Even the GOP hasn't been all that friendly toward Russia until Trump came along.

And did the Russians do anything to help Trump win the GOP primary?

I'm guessing that Putin was more interested in getting Trump elected than in sabotaging Hillary, and I hope we find out exactly what the game was. I'm betting kroner to krugerrands that the Trump campaign was in collusion with Russia long before the election.

[leftstreet]

1. Excellent questions

[mercuryblues]

2. they want a republican

to win, and trump was their #1 pick. They knew they could blackmail and threaten him into getting rid of the sanctions and staying out of the Ukraine/Crimea mess they created.

With all the interest trump is still showing about the D primary, I suspect he knows the R primary was rigged for him to win.

[The Velveteen Ocelot]

3. I think they wanted *that* Republican to win.

Other GOPers have not been nearly as buddy-buddy with Putin and probably would not have been much of an improvement over Hillary from their perspective. I suspect they fiddled with the GOP primaries in some way to be sure Trump won because he's the only one who was overtly friendly (or because he was the only one they could blackmail).

[Wellstone ruled]

4. From The overseas Press,

it does appear that Putin and his Tech Crews were the key to a Trump win as well as many other GOP candidates. As time goes by,we will see Ryan and McConnell rolled up in this. Our so called Media had the same info as the Foreign Press and refused to act on it.

Putin's Country is basically broke. Their main source of Revenue is Oil and his Subjects are getting restless because of cut backs in Services. Remember,Putin increase several Taxes in 2015 and that almost snuffed out a purchasing power of most Russians.

[Docreed2003]

5. Anyone looked back at primary results and compared polls for any signs of shenanigans??

[bettyellen]

6. He's got his bit farms and would have deployed them to destabilize the electorate

No matter what. His way is to bolster the fringe right and left and eat away at rational discourse, as well
as voters' confidence in the process.

[oasis]

7. IMO, Putin's interest grew stronger once Trump got momentum in GOP

Primary. Trump's released taxes will tell us much more.

[mopinko]

8. i think they put him up to running in the first place.

his "self funding" really meant "pootie funding"

but i think they just pick fights to watch people fighting each other, and not noticing what they are up to.
driving wedges to divide us, because chaos is such great cover.