Krauthammer’s Take: On Russia, ‘The Passivity of Barack Obama in the Face of This Is Simply Staggering’

https://youtube.com/watch?v=xvolHi_sges

After hearing news of Barack Obama failing to deter Russian hackers who targeted Democrats, Charles Krauthammer expressed his astonishment that Obama did not stand up to Putin:

The overall concern is real. The idea that it gave the election to Donald Trump, I think, is absurd. The intelligence agencies themselves are split. There is no way really to discern intent without having a source inside and we don’t. But the real issue is this: There is extensive report on how this thing developed over 18 months with the Obama administration knowing about this. Knowing about all kinds of intrusions by the Russians through others, and the passivity of Barack Obama in the face of this is simply staggering. It quotes officials as saying that in the end there were people saying we had to do something, some kind of retaliation to prevent or deter the Russians and/or others, and Obama never did. In part because he didn’t want to lose influence with Russia in Syria.

Well we can see how well that influence went today when Aleppo essentially fell. This is a president who let it go at a time when he could have done something. We are going to have to be very clear to the Russians: If they ever try anything like this again they will suffer.