Putin is the One Playing 4-D Chess, Level EXPERT

And he’s making us all look like amateurs.

Here’s what we know: the Russian government hacked into political party servers early 2016, intent on releasing information that they hoped would influence the election.

As an avid reader of the WikiLeaks dumps throughout the election season, and as an initial undecided voter who was swayed towards Trump, at least in part, by the information revealed in those dumps, I am not saying the election should be reversed, or Trump shouldn’t be given full support as the rightful president-elect.

However, Russian’s un-checked infiltration into our political process should be frightening to all of us. Barrack Obama seemingly ‘sent a message’ to Russia warning them that meddling with our servers would result in consequences, but, nothing ever came of it (surprise, surprise), and now Russia knows they can continue to do the same to us, or our allies, with basically no repercussions.

Many insiders think Russian influence in social media is to blame for Austria narrowly avoiding electing anti-EU Norbert Hofner earlier this year. France has an election in 2017 where anti-EU Marine Le Pen is close to the front-runner in the polls. Germany has their Bundestag elections in 2017, and have already warned of a major campaign of Russian hacking. MI6 (British Intelligence) Chief Alex Younger has also conceded that they have seen the same thing in England, as well as across Europe, including France.

Face it: Putin wants a disorganized and disjointed West, and using tried-and-true hacking tactics, with no repercussions, is the sure way to influence countries to his liking.

I understand the Putin love from many stems from the fallout of eight years of having a mom-jean wearing, limp-wristed liberal nerd as president (if we’re being honest), but make no mistake; Russia is bullying us around, and it’s a disservice to all our countrymen who served in the Cold War to not take this threat for what is it.

I hope the right advisors can show Trump the light, and we hit Russia in the eye when they take advantage of us and our allies like this.