A little humility, please
According to The Washington Post, the CIA has concluded that Russia “intervened in the 2016 election to help Donald Trump win the presidency.”
That’s an incredible claim, one that requires thorough analysis to understand how the CIA arrived at that assessment and their confidence in the conclusion. Unfortunately for the citizens of the country, very few people will get briefed on the agency’s analysis and have sufficient information and perspective to formulate an independent judgment. We must rely on Congress to do that assessment and hope that the press can provide insight without compromising the CIA’s sources.
Following a deeply polarized campaign and amidst the post-election recounts and lawsuits, I can understand that the cynical among us may feel that the CIA story is an attempt to deprecate or overturn Donald Trump’s victory. Even if they feel this way, the president-elect and his team don’t yet have the insight or ability to judge the validity of the CIA’s claim. Yet there’s no indication of any uncertainty in the statement released by the Trump transition team (reported by Slate and others).
These are the same people that said Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction. The election ended a long time ago in one of the biggest Electoral College victories in history. It’s now time to move on and “Make America Great Again.”
This reeks of hubris.
Even if “these are the same people,” they may be right. How would you know they are wrong if you have not examined the data and logic that led to the conclusion?
I’m not sure why “the election ended a long time ago” is relevant. Nonetheless, the election was one month ago, plus one day when the transition team’s statement was released.
If the Electoral College votes as expected, although there are arguments for why it should not, Donald Trump will be our next president. However, Hillary Clinton received the most number of votes: 65,737,041 compared to 62,896,704 for Donald Trump. That’s a difference of 2,840,337, not a small number. That’s roughly the population of Nevada, where I was born.
A little humility, please.
