Obama reluctantly answers post-election phone call from the 80s, decides Cold War might not be over

**Written by Doug Powers

Not all that long ago, President Obama was openly mocking Mitt Romney:

But that was months ago — 50 to be exact. At that time there were still four years to go before the loss of the Democrat nominee who presented Russia with a piece of relationship reset symbolism that somehow turned out to be a giant “log in” button for John Podesta’s email account.

Now, with his second term almost over, Obama’s decided to take action on Russia:

The Obama administration struck back at Russia on Thursday, imposing sanctions against its intelligence apparatus and expelling 35 diplomats in retaliation for the alleged orchestration of hacking attacks designed to interfere in the presidential election.

The sweeping actions, outlined by the White House three weeks before the new administration takes office, include:

  • Shutting down two compounds, one in Maryland and one in New York, “used by Russian personnel for intelligence-related purposes.”
  • Sanctions against the GRU, the Russian military intelligence service, and the FSB, the spy agency that succeeded the KGB, and four high-ranking officers of the GRU.
  • Sanctions against two suspected hackers, both wanted by the FBI in earlier cybercrime cases, and three companies that allegedly provided support to the GRU’s cyber operations.
  • Releasing technical information about Russian cyber activity, “to help network defenders in the United States and abroad identify, detect, and disrupt Russia’s global campaign of malicious cyber activities.”

    • […]
    Obama’s statement said the U.S. had declared 35 Russian “intelligence operatives” persona non grata. The State Department said the 35 are diplomats “who were acting in a manner inconsistent with their diplomatic or consular status” and also accused Russia of harassing U.S. diplomats overseas with arbitrary police stops, physical assaults and the release of personal details putting them at risk.

    The MSM keeps referring to what happened as an “election hack,” which, as misleading a headline as that is, probably is way easier than inquiring as to why all of this was allowed to ferment during Obama’s time in charge. In fairness though, it should be pointed out there’s no evidence that in the last eight years the Russian government was able to hack Obama’s RateMySwing account.

    None of the Obama admin’s Russia sanctions would have happened if Hillary had won. But don’t take my word for it:

    The Obama administration didn’t respond more forcefully to Russian hacking before the presidential election because they didn’t want to appear to be interfering in the election and they thought that Hillary Clinton was going to win and a potential cyber war with Russia wasn’t worth it, multiple high-level government officials told NBC News.

    “They thought she was going to win, so they were willing to kick the can down the road,” said one U.S official familiar with the level of Russian hacking.

    Apparently now it’s “worth it.”

    **Written by Doug Powers

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