Russians trying to throw shade on our election ... wonder where they got that idea
Just when you think 2016 couldn't get any weirder:
OKLAHOMA CITY — Oklahoma has turned down a request from Russia to have personnel in the state to study the Nov. 8 election, Bryan Dean, Oklahoma State Election Board spokesman, said Thursday.Louisiana and Texas received similar requests in an election in which the GOP nominee, Donald Trump, has said the election is rigged and others have alleged that he is in cahoots with Russia as it tries to influence the U.S. election in his favor. […]
Keith Gaddie, chairman of the Political Science Department at the University of Oklahoma, said Russia is "trying to throw shade on our election process."
It's absolutely what they're trying to do, as ham-handed as the effort is. Because the nation and the rest of the world will really believe that the U.S. elections system needs to be monitored by Russia? No, this is a sign that Putin has given up on the idea that he'll have his puppet Trump in the White House come January. The next best thing would be to delegitimize Hillary Clinton's presidency by pushing this "rigged" election claim. He wants to weaken her as president even before she takes office. Something that he has in common with the GOP.
It's not just these ridiculous requests to "monitor" our election. U.S. law enforcement and intelligence officials are warning states "that hackers with ties to Russia's intelligence services could try to undermine the credibility of the presidential election by posting documents online purporting to show evidence of voter fraud." Our elections system is too diverse and mostly too antiquated for hackers to actually change the outcome of the election, so the best they can do is amplify Trump's "rigged" complaints. Manufacturing the voter fraud he's constantly carping about is one way to do it.
President Obama nailed this. He said Trump is "doing the work of our adversaries for them" when he suggests he won't accept the results of the election. That's the definition of "puppet" and Trump fits it to a T.