Writes Peter Collins:

Lew,
Because the NYT is basically a mouthpiece for the CIA, one has to wonder why the CIA wanted attention to their Russian utility hacking program right now and who they intended as an audience.

First, the audience wasn’t the Russians. If it was news to them the program would have stayed in the shadows.

If the audience was Trump or the US public, was the CIA trying to derail an imminent Trump-led rapprochement with Putin? Or was the CIA revealing an old program they were keeping from Trump to embarrass him and remind everyone that – even if the Muller report didn’t prove collusion – Trump can’t be trusted because he’s soft on Russia? In any case, the Deep State is obviously not done with Trump vis-à-vis the Russians.