Altering the timeline: Russian interference

We turn our attention to the media....and ourselves

“The cover up is always worse than the crime.” — Common Axiom

With all due respect to the folks that came up with that little gem above, it is complete horseshit. The cover up is hardly ever worse than the crime. Imagine the idiocy of focusing on a mass murderer covering up the evidence of their crimes instead of the crimes themselves. This is where we are as a country. This is where the media is. This is where we are as a people.

I say all of this because we are doing it again. MAGA is trying to divert our attention from the Epstein files by claiming Barack Obama was behind the “Russian hoax.” The notion is silly and yet it plays right into the biases of the public and media. Scandal, malfeasance, and scumbaggery has to occur in secret. That is what we all have been led to believe.

It could be a lack of shame. It could be by cunning design. It could be just a character flaw. Whatever the case may be, Donald Trump has a consistent pattern of doing everything out in the open. Therefore, it can it can’t be corrupt. This is where we are with the Russian interference story. He can openly ask for interference on live television and yet he they have somehow discovered an under the radar scandal where Obama and company engineered the whole thing only so they could lose anyway.

We can approach this from any number of angles and I will certainly bang on the media more than a few times. Let’s start with the fact that independent studies have shown that Russian interfered. Obviously, beyond that the story gets a little more murky. However, there are serious reports that the Trump campaign colluded with the Russians.

However, let’s suspend disbelief for a moment and assume they did not. The story still lines up. Which administration was going to do more for the Russians? What has happened since the Russians interfered? Sanctions have been dropped. They have invaded Ukraine. All the while, Trump was taking Vlad Putin’s side over his own intelligence agencies. Who benefits more from Russian interference and who do they benefit the most from?

The easiest things in the world are the things that are right in front of us. There usually isn’t a bogeyman under the bed. There usually isn’t a grand conspiracy to it all. Some evil exists in the shadows, but this evil is being played out right in front of us. They aren’t hiding and never really have. They haven’t because they know we are trained to continue looking in the shadows.

This is why we spent looking at all of Hillary’s and Biden’s “crimes” over and over again. We found nothing but we had to keep digging. They had to be covering it up because if you don’t find something then it means they were covering it up. The cover up is always worse than the crime. We continue on this idiotic loop no matter what scumbaggery happens right in front of our face.

Instead of focusing on the obvious things happening on live television we focus on an “obvious cover up” of how old Joe Biden is. The last I checked he was an octogenarian. There can be no cover up there. Again, the decline happened before our very eyes. Again, the obvious things are usually the ones that get you. Maybe Watergate was about the cover up, but that doesn’t mean it is always about a cover up.

How much did Russian interference impact the 2016 race? It’s really hard to calculate. It’s not like they physically changed votes or stuffed the ballot box. It was more of a long con on the voters themselves. The irony (or maybe not) was that much of Trump’s rhetoric matched old KGB propaganda techniques. “Your corrupt. I’m corrupt. We are all corrupt, so it really doesn’t matter.” The media bought it hook, line, and sinker. The depth and breadth of his illegal activity was treated the same as her emails.

Thus, we get to the companion blind spot for the media. I have said this one thousand times and I’ll say it one thousand more. Their job is to call balls and strikes and not to make sure there are just as many balls as strikes. If one pitcher is wild and outside the zone you call it like it is. There are a number of problems with this situation. The email story is one story. You had Trump University, Trump charities, the Hollywood Access tapes, Epstein files (even then), over 20 credible accusations of sexual assault, and the Russian interference case itself. All of those are arguably worse than the emails, and when you have half a dozen scandals versus one there is absolutely no defense for treating the two candidates equally.

Fair coverage is not equal coverage. That is the biggest problem with the media. You cover corruption wherever you find it. If it happens to come from one source more than the other than so be it. Some people are worse than others. Anyone paying attention over the last decade has to admit that. Our government and country have been dragged through the mud and Russia is laughing all the way to the bank. It’s almost as if they designed it that way.