Michael Flynn resigns as President Trump's security adviser. The fear was due to his briefing of Vice President Pence he could be blackmailed. General Petraeus is being considered as a replacement. Good choice. Discuss.

Russian influence on American election.. Is there an election america doesn't influence?

I like that line of thinking. It's better to accept a wrong doing than to admit hypocrisy. It goes well with the divide and conquer strategy of calling the behavior of X acceptable because it is better than the behavior of Y. And of course, let the behavior of an individual always be the definition for the group.

I agree (don't forget China). International politics is often the "best of a bad situation".

I mean, if the USA went all hugbox-mode like the left wants, we'd be okay and have great relations. ... For a decade or so. And then other countries that don't play fair (Russia/China) would start overtaking us and then what? Build a time machine?

However, the way the USA doesn't protect its own citizens from hacking is downright disturbing. It should be throwing CEOs in jail who allow info to leak (a few "examples" of high-level management in jail would push the entire business ecosystem toward spending billions on security). The USA should be running awareness campaigns. "Viruses are the STDs of the computer world. Are you sure you're protected?" with a bigass picture of a condom. It should be taught in schools. The USA should have a department whose sole job is security audits and handing out certifications to businesses so that nobody does business (or buys a product from) someone without a basic level of certification.

And the fact the USA doesn't do that, leans me strongly to believe that the USA treats its citizens as antagonists--not allies. It's not looking out for us. It's looking out for itself and we're just as dangerous ("muh evil whistleblowers exposing THE THINGS WE ACTUALLY DID.") if not more so than foreign nations in their eyes.

Like did you know, under Obama, the amount of classified documents has exploded EXPONENTIALLY?

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Note that we didn't BEGIN any new wars that year. We didn't fight any new foes. There aren't any new nation-states with nukes and aircraft carriers. We're still fighting the same people those years. So what changed? The butthole Obama ran on a platform of "transparency" and we gobbled it up like sheep. And then? He exponentially increases the amount of NON-transparent documents.

Why? My contention is pretty simple and harks back to basic human nature. Those classified documents are not to keep nation-states out. The number of foreign threats is the same as it's been for a decade. No, those documents are to keep citizens from filing FOIA requests and finding out what they're doing. They're abusing classified documents to simply protect their own butts--to hide their activities from the voting public... the people who are supposed to hold their government accountable.

Whatever Snowden and Manning exposed, was a tiny tip of a huge iceberg and the government didn't actually give two craps about their releases. It was just beating the drum to take peoples eyes elsewhere and focus on old, outdated, useless data, while the new (and serious) unethical stuff has been completely forgotten about.

All that said, one more minor point. It can be argued that the USA should hack until technology or culture renders that obsolete. However, it's much harder to argue the USA overthrowing other people's elections. Even if it's "in the best interest" of the USA, as we've seen with Saddam Hussein: One generation's savior, is the next generation's Hitler.

Humanity's vision is imperfect, and international politics is significantly less clear, so the idea of overthrowing entire countries to help us "today" is a seriously dangerous venue. If you could argue for it, you'd be on the edge of a very short ethical cliff. There's so much that can go wrong, and so many people that are hurt (even ourselves in the future), that only in the most razor-thin of situations should that be allowed.

And further, the fact that we overthrow their elections and then give them aid (as if we actually care about them) once everything blows up? That's so sick. To piss on someone and then hand them tissues while you proudly beat your chest and tell them you're the "good guys".

On the other hand, there is a little "but", due to the fact U.S. is being stronger, in order to avoid escalation it has to show good will, and do it first.
Well, with Russia. Always (after USSR is no more) it was done quite the opposite, strength was used to force "good" will from the weaker opponent. I guess this thesis could apply to most confrontations, no explicitly about hacking.

Now it's all mostly irrelevant, and is just noise. What's happening is that China is taking over, and all U.S. attempts to compete for influence are noise as well. Smaller, slower growing economy with government fighting for public opinion clearly can't compete for influence with a larger economy with a government that HAS public opinion, and is working to get things done, rather than look nice. In order to look nice they can just say they're nice. Make the press repeat it enough times. And well, it's correct in most cases anyways, so why not.

From my standpoint I can enjoy the fact Russia doesn't have any disputes with China, although they may rise as China grows its influence all over.