slate - "Trump Is Russia's Press Secretary"

[NRaleighLiberal]

http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/politics/2017/01/donald_trump_is_russia_s_press_secretary.html

No one defends the Kremlin’s interests like the American president-elect.

On Wednesday, Donald Trump held his first press conference in more than half a year. He presented himself as the victim of a scurrilous dossier—compiled by a former intelligence operative and published by BuzzFeed—that recounted a series of allegations about Trump’s personal and financial ties to Russia, as well as purported collusion between Trump associates and associates of the Russian government. Trump used the dossier to shame the media and to deflect attention from credible evidence against Russia, most notably in an intelligence community report that was presented to Trump on Friday.

The press conference was a blizzard of evasions, diversions, hedges, excuses, rationalizations, and stonewalling. Trump’s arguments minimized the case against Russia, and several of his statements flatly contradicted the intelligence community’s report. A week before he assumes the presidency of the United States, Trump continues to behave like a press secretary for Russia. Here’s how he bobbed and weaved.

1. Russia did it … maybe. Trump was asked whether he accepted the IC’s assessment “that Vladimir Putin ordered the hack of the DNC.” He replied: “I think it was Russia. But I think we also get hacked by other countries and other people.” Later, Trump hedged his answer. A reporter told him: “You said just now that you believe Russia indeed was responsible for the hacking of the DNC and John Podesta’s emails, et cetera.” Trump disputed that description of his view. “It could have been others also,” he said.

snip - he covers 9 points total...worth a read.