Russian involvement in, and hacking of, the U.S. democratic election has been a major topic during this past presidential election. Many, including trusted and renowned news groups such as CNN, MSNBC, NBC, as well as other politicians, have speculated whether or not Russia had a role, on any level, in the election. 

On page 11 of the “US Intelligence Report” on Russia’s involvement with the previous election states, in bold lettering: “Putin Ordered Campaign To Influence US Election.”

This report was put together by top intelligence officials who testified in front of the Senate Armed Services Committee about the issue and their report. The opening sentence of the main report says, “We assess with high confidence that Russian President Vladimir Putin ordered an influence campaign in 2016 aimed at the US presidential election, the consistent goals of which were to undermine public faith of the US democratic system, denigrate US secretary Hillary Clinton, ad harm her elect-ability and potential presidency.”

President-elect Donald Trump has repeatedly disputed the allegation of Russian hacking, resulting in a direct impact of the outcome of the election. Trump has said, “They have no idea if it’s Russia or China or somebody. It could be somebody sitting in a bed some place,” with  “they” referring to the US intelligence Agency.

Trump, however, did briefly acknowledge the possibility of Russian involvement by saying, “it could be Russia” that hacked Democrats. “I don’t really think it is, but who knows? I don’t know either. They don’t know and I don’t know.”

However, they, the various intelligence agencies do know. We, the informed people know. Russia did work to try to impact the US election. “The General Staff’s Main Intelligence Directorate (GRU) probably began cyber operations aimed at the US election by March 2016. We assess that the GRU operations resulted in the compromise of the personal email accounts of Democratic Party Officials and political figures.” It is safe to assume that the GRU is not a “morbidly obese fourteen year old sitting in their bed,” which was previously hypothesized by the future US President, Donald J. Trump.

The report goes on to say, “Russian Intelligence accessed elements of multiple state or local electoral boards. Since early 2014, Russian intelligence has researched US electoral processes and related technology and equipment.”

The intelligence report also seems to anticipate that this will not be the only time Russia will try impact the US elections. “We assess Moscow will apply lessons learned from its campaign aimed at the US presidential election to future influence efforts in the United States and worldwide, including against US allies and their election processes. We assess the Russian intelligence services would have seen their election influence campaign at least a qualified success because of their perceived ability to impact public discussion.”

It is this writer’s opinion that Russia attempted to hack, impact, and manipulate the outcome of the 2016 US Presidential election, which has been clearly stated in the US Intelligence Report. It is so clearly, blatantly stated, that anybody, with the unfortunate exception of the future US president, is capable of understanding. Russia may not have been successful, but the mere idea of them being able to have the tools, and means, to manipulate the American democratic system is frightening. It is something we need to be aware of; something we need to know how to prevent. 

For a copy of the report, please click on this link.
http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2017/01/read-us-intelligence-report-russian-hacking-2016-campaign

The Golden Globe Awards is a ceremony where the most esteemed actors and actresses are recognized for their work. This year Meryl Streep, a well known actress, was honored with the Cecil B. DeMille Award. While stepping onto the stage and quieting the crowd, Streep had a few things to say to our soon to be president, Donald Trump. She spoke of the comment Trump made when he imitated a mentally disabled reporter, and how she felt it was absolutely unacceptable. Although Streep’s speech wasn’t the longest ever given, many of the other people attending the ceremony were nearly in tears or gazing in awe.

When she went up to give her speech many things happened: she started out by saying how thankful she was for the award, she then moved on to name many actors, and actresses, then she listed where they were from, and explained that if we take out all the foreigners from Hollywood then we wouldn’t have anything entertaining, art filled, or even meaningful.

Streep then went on to say how we have let someone who is insensitive, and not speaking for the greater good, into our most cherished and honored seat of our country. She talked about how having our president elect making fun of disabled people makes Americans feel ashamed and hurt.

Meryl Streep was standing up for America, and then got dragged under the bus by that very same president elect for exercising her first amendment rights.

When he heard what Streep had to say about him, our president elect, Donald Trump, went to Twitter to share his opinions on the actress. He went on to call her a “Hillary flunky who lost big,” as well as “overrated.”

The Internet was enraged by his comments, with many pointing out how unprofessional it was. An international hashtag regarding the feud was started: #ThingsTrumpThinksAreOverrated. Many disagreed with his statement and went to Twitter to share their opinions. The tag was filled with tweets agreeing with Streep’s statement against Trump’s controversial and hateful comments.

Even though Streep had her supporters, there were still many people who agreed with Trump and defended the comments he made. For example, Tomi Lahren, an online video host for TheBlaze had multiple comments for Streep. Lahren called the people at the ceremony an “Overrated collection of liberals” and “Out of touch with the rest of America.” Many others along with Lahren sided with Trump and began to bash Streep.

Whatever your views are, we hope we can all get along under the new president.

Since Tuesday, November 8, 2016 the amount of hate crimes and many other types of discrimination have gone up rapidly.

The amount of threats, vandalism and harassment that we have seen all over the news and social media are much more than what we saw after the terrorist attacks on 9/11 according to experts. Although some of these hate crimes that we see on social media are not all true, there are still many that have been happening in our country.

Many of these hate crimes, and threats, have been towards Muslims, African-Americans, Mexicans and the LGBT (Lesbian Gay Bisexual Transgender) community. Obviously, they are not the only groups that have been attacked, but these are the groups that have been attacked the most. For example, in Ohio, a black male was beaten by two white males just because he was an African-American.

While browsing the web I came across an image that was very disturbing. On a wall, in an alley, there was the words “Black lives don’t matter” spray painted on it.

There was also a case in New York where a white male banged on the door and window of a Muslim woman’s car, with her children and grandpa in the car. Also in New York, two men threw rocks at a young male because he “looked gay.”

As a country we all need to stick up for one another instead of putting each other down. Now more than ever.