Needless to say, Obama is intent on making sure he stays in the news and stays “relevant” right to the very end of his tenure at the White House. Why else would he throw Israel under the bus, have the Japanese Prime Minister visit Pearl Harbor, continue the war on the west with two more land grabs, and sanction/thumb his nose at Putin and Trump all within the space of one week?

Oh I know why! Its because he can, he said so!

Yeah, he’s “flexible” alright. Needless to say, sanctioning Russia had nothing to do with the election. Instead, as I pointed out here, it was ALL the DNC. Not only that, but it was also about things like wire tapping, wire fraud, and identity theft. But NOT hacking the election. So why in the world did he poke the Russian Bear?! Because he wants to leave Trump a huge mess to clean up and because he KNOWS that Putin has never liked him.

In other words, Obama is DARING Trump and Putin to do something…anything. How did President-Elect Trump respond?

“It’s time for our country to move on to bigger and better things,” Trump said in a written response released four hours after the announcement. “Nevertheless, in the interest of our country and its great people, I will meet with leaders of the intelligence community next week in order to be updated on the facts of this situation.”

And people immediately threw a fit saying, in essence, his response wasn’t good enough. But is that REALLY what he said? Lets read it again. Think about this. Perhaps he, like I did, took the time to read the 13 page FBI/DHS Grizzly Steppe report. The one that highlighted for all of two pages that the DNC got phished big time. No election hack there. Or perhaps he read Obama’s statement about the sanctions.

Read the statement by @POTUS on U.S. actions in response to Russian malicious cyber activity and harassment:https://t.co/4IO178lrkW pic.twitter.com/nRBYmhyNVz

— White House Archived (@ObamaWhiteHouse) December 29, 2016

Does it say anything about the election hack? Bueller? Bueller? No, it certainly doesn’t. Thus, Trump’s first line indicating that we should move on to bigger and better things is apropos. Secondly, Trump realizes that cyber security is for crap among our government agencies. So calling for meetings next week to start the process of figuring this out and perhaps lighting a fire under said government agencies to actually Get. Things. Done. concerning cyber security is a good thing!

Meanwhile Russia’s response includes epic trolling.

https://twitter.com/RussianEmbassy/status/814564127230271489?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw

Along with the Russian foreign ministry strongly suggesting expulsion of the 31 US diplomats from Moscow, the four residing in St. Petersburg, banning them from their holiday homes (dachas), and ensuring that “Russia’s adequate and mirror response will make Washington officials feel very uncomfortable as well” Vladimir Putin had a very different response in mind. First he says that Russia will not expel.. ANYONE. Then he says this:

“We reserve the right to retaliate, but we will not sink to the level of this irresponsible ‘kitchen’ diplomacy. We will take further moves on restoring Russian-American relations based on the policies that the administration of President-elect Donald Trump adopts” [Emphasis Added]

Yes, you read that correctly. Guess who just took the high road in mega style??!!

Pleased to see a mature response from Putin. A @realDonaldTrump presidency can't come soon enough.

— Nigel Farage (@Nigel_Farage) December 30, 2016

In this case, Farage is correct. Two major and mature responses to a narrative that 98% of the media and those in the DC bubble are still pushing. Russia did hack the DNC – actually they phished it. But did they hack our election machines all over the country? No. Did the Russian’s hack our paper ballots? No. Is there any evidence that definitively points to a Russian/Wikileaks collusion? No.

Zero Hedge nails it. With that one short pithy statement from Putin, Obama lost the diplomatic war with Russia. Heckuva job Barry! Heckuva job.