Bernie Sanders says he has been told that Russia is trying to get him elected.

Senator Bernie Sanders. Gage Skidmore.

Bernie Sanders has said that he has been told that Russia is trying to help his campaign. Fox News. Sanders confirmed that Russia may be trying to help his campaign but disavowed those efforts. Sanders was briefed by the US government who informed him of the issue. Sanders says that the news came out today in order to hurt his chances in the Nevada Caucus. The new report follows continued allegations that Russia was also trying to get President Trump reelected. Russia for their part laughed off the accusations saying that the reports were false and paranoid. 

My Comment:

Isn't it funny how everyone the Democratic Party leadership hates gets accused of working with Russia? It's like it's the only playbook they have left, if someone is beating you accuse them of working with the Russians. They did it with President Trump and now they are doing it to Bernie Sanders as well. 

Not that Sanders is innocent here at all. He went along with the attacks against President Trump throughout the past few years even when it was clear that Russia had no real effect on the outcome of the election. And during this week's debate he answered a question about some of his supporters being jackasses by saying that it was probably the Russians. As far as I am concerned he deserves this. 

The fact of the matter is that every country with an interest in our elections, which is almost all of them, tries to interfere in one way or the other. It's apparently not a problem when China, the UK or Israel does so but when Russia does it? It's the biggest deal in the world. 

I also think it's telling that nobody is saying how the Russians are supposedly helping Bernie Sanders (and President Trump). Did they launch a new twitter account that's saying the exact same things that everyone else in the Sanders and Trump campaigns is (like the @TEN_GOP account did)? Are they buying facebook ads? Are they organizing another rally for Michael Moore?

None of these things that Russia supposedly did in the 2016 election effected the outcome and I doubt anything they are doing now will effect the outcome again. Their actions in 2016 amounted to pretty much nothing and I doubt anything they will do in 2020 will accomplish anything either. 

I also have to wonder why Russia would want to support Sanders and Trump in the first place. For Trump it's almost nonsensical given how poor relations with Russia are right now and the fact that we killed a whole lot of Russian soldiers, excuse me, "mercenaries" in Syria. Trump might have been more acceptable than Hillary Clinton was but if Putin wanted Trump to win he probably regrets it now. 

As for Sanders the only thing I can think of is that it's so obvious that Sanders would wreck the economy that they want him elected. He's also kind of dovish compared to the other Democrats but even that seems kind of dumb. 

It should be clear that I'm extremely skeptical of these reports. It's no secret that the intelligence community doesn't like Trump or Sanders and I wouldn't put it past them to make this crap up to hurt both candidates politically. If that's the case then I don't think it matters as I doubt even one Trump or Sanders supporter is going to stop supporting them because of this accusation. 

But even if these reports are true, I don't think they are a big deal. As I stated before pretty much every country with the power to do so tries to interfere with our elections and it wasn't until President Trump got elected that anyone had a problem with it. Indeed, it's only when candidates the media and the Demcoratic Party doesn't like that anyone cares.