Aside from the suspicious level of confidence, the lack even a vague hint as to how they figured it out, and the aggrandised claims about the scale of the attacks, it's really not controversial. It's perfectly possible that the Russian government ordered their intelligence agencies to find dirt on Hillary to boost Trump. It's even less controversial since it looks like all they did was supply the press with correct and accurate information. But the US response suggests that there's either much more to it, or (as I chose to believe) much less to it.
why is it reasonable for you to speculate about obama's motives and behavior without direct evidence, but unreasonable for me to do the same regarding putin and russia?
ultimately i doubt we diverge much on this issue. i completely agree that, to date, no direct evidence of russian involvement has been provided, and it would be shortsighted to assert that the intelligence community must be correct. that said, i don't think it's fair to say there's
no evidence; these events didn't occur in a context-less vacuum, so to speak. i think we can make some reasonable inferences based on what we already know about russia's motivations and capabilities. my guess is that the intelligence community's assessment is based, in part, on exactly that: prior knowledge of russia's clandestine operations.
maybe a more succinct way of putting it is this: if you'd asked me 18 months ago if i thought russia willing and able to use clandestine services, cyber or otherwise, to either try to affect the outcome of the general election, or at least stir the pot, then i would've said yes without equivocation. it would genuinely surprise me if they didn't. there are plenty of well-documented examples of the us doing precisely the same thing. i mean shit there probably hasn't been a genuinely free election in south america in like...i dunno, forever.
fwiw i also just don't think any of it matters. even if the cia were to produce a video recording of putin himself sitting at a laptop and sending phishing links, what difference would it make? i don't think it discredits the results of the general election in any way, and i don't think it ultimately has much of an impact on us-russia relations. it's too boilerplate. sure, the democrats are pissed, but whatever, they'll get over it.
this was way too long-winded a way to say that i agree absolute confidence is wholly unwarranted, but i think moderate-to-high confidence is perfectly well-warranted based on what we already know about russia's intelligence community.
diplomatic conflicts with Russia, Israel (America's puppet state), and by extension the UK.
we'll probably have to agree to disagree, but i think everyone's making a mountain of a molehill. expelling some diplomats is hardly an international incident, and presidential activism in the waning months of an administration is hardly unusual.
as i understand it, the speculation among former members of the intelligence community is that these diplomats were already known affiliates of russian clandestine services, and expelling them was more about signaling than anything else.
i'm almost patently unwilling to believe the argument that obama is intentionally trying to sabotage america to fulfill some vendetta against trump. i know a very wise person who once said something to the effect that there's no need to assert malice where incompetence suffices.