The Most Dangerous Game

[applegrove]

By Jamelle Bouie at Slate

How long can Republicans risk everything to pretend Russia is no big deal?

http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/politics/2017/07/republicans_are_downplaying_russia_at_great_risk.html

"SNIP..........


Last September, in a classified briefing, the CIA told senior lawmakers that Russia was working to elect Donald Trump president. In that meeting, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell expressed skepticism of the intelligence and questioned its veracity. And he made a threat of sorts. At the time, the Washington Post reported that McConnell “made clear to the administration that he would consider any effort by the White House to challenge the Russians publicly an act of partisan politics.” Put simply, if President Obama spoke out on Russian interference, McConnell would turn it into a partisan football. The president kept quiet.

Of the turning points that brought us to our present crisis, this is among the most consequential. McConnell’s stance in that briefing didn’t just enable Russian hacking, it precluded official scrutiny and criticism of that hacking and effectively gave cover to key members of Team Trump as they sought information to use against Hillary Clinton. McConnell downplayed Russian interference for what were likely partisan reasons, with little knowledge of the scope of and even less fear for the far-ranging implications of what he was covering up. And in that, he presaged the response of the entire Republican Party, which didn’t just utilize the hacked and leaked information but has looked the other way at every sign of something untoward involving Donald Trump and the Russian government.

Republicans are still looking the other way, even as that stance becomes more and more untenable. And they are looking away—as well as downplaying the seriousness of the issue—despite the real chance that the truth is more damning than what we know at the present, and that it may damage our country more than we want to believe. This “see no evil” response is especially egregious given recent revelations around Donald Trump Jr. and his efforts to obtain favorable information for his father’s campaign. We now know Trump Jr. responded enthusiastically to what was communicated as “part of Russia and its government’s support for Mr. Trump” and arranged a meeting between himself, the lawyer in question, Jared Kushner, and then–campaign manager Paul Manafort—as well as, we’ve just learned, a former Soviet intelligence official.

The Trump Jr. meeting is just the latest revelation in a kaleidoscope of connections that, even if not illegal (that we’re aware of as yet), should be alarming to anyone regardless of party. We know of a GOP operative who said he had contacted Russian hackers in an effort to find deleted emails from Hillary Clinton’s private server, and we know the operative said he was coordinating with Trump loyalist (and later short-time national security adviser) Michael Flynn. We know that Jared Kushner and Attorney General Jeff Sessions have had several contacts with Russian officials—including Russian Ambassador Sergey Kislyak—that they omitted from official documents, and we know of various contacts and meetings and relationships between various Trump associates and assorted Russian business. It is true we have no concrete evidence of direct cooperation between Team Trump and the Russian government. There is no fire, so far. But there are thick bellows of smoke. We at least know that Trump’s campaign was receptive to Russian help, even if they didn’t coordinate or “collude.”

.............SNIP"

[SHRED]

1. And here's the irony...

The Republicans are blaming Democrats reducing the attack to a partisan issue when in fact it is they who have done this. They have made even this a partisan issue.

[Sneederbunk]

2. Same old, same old until the indictments come down.