Hacking focus shouldn’t be on Russia; it should be about cyber security

The assertions by the print media and all the televised political pundits at the network and cable news outlets that the hacking of the DNC has somehow affected and influenced our national election and the election process is just silly and childish.

To begin with, other than mentioning the hacking and its link to Russia as the source of the hacking, no discussion of this act ever proceeds to a specific instance of influence or interference as regards our election or the electoral process. Everyone - Democrats, members of the media and the puppet political pundits - appears to display outrage over Russian interference and influence over our election and the election process yet never mention any specific instance as to why this belief is asserted yet one is left to imagine that it's all about Hillary Clinton losing.

To say that exposing these emails somehow influenced the voters is ridiculous and absolutely proper. Ridiculous in that the information made public truly had little, if any, affect on the outcome. There were those who favored either candidate and were not swayed regardless of the hacked emails. Then there were those who were already either leaning towards or away from Donald Trump and the exposure of the emails probably just confirmed for those voters how they were already inclined to vote.

The hacking and the ultimate exposure of the emails is no different than all the hundreds of millions of dollars of smear ads perpetrated on the public by all the PACs that we jokingly call appropriate political campaigning. And let's be honest, although the hacking is not what is considered an appropriate way for us to get the information concerning what those at the DNC really think about the stupid voting public at large, it's interesting to note that they do think that way.

Further, why is it considered undo influence for us to know this?

The print media and the network and cable pundits are way too concerned with the political hacking rather than the possible hacking of our military, as well as our power grid and other such necessary systems. Either way, the issue shouldn't be that we were hacked; it should be more about the old sports adage, “If you want us to stop running up the score - stop us!”

I do not know this for a fact, but it does not take a rocket scientist to imagine that attempts to hack our systems goes on all the time; and I imagine we are doing the same.

We need to quit whining about the hacking and get better at cyber security. Period.

The writer lives in Garden City Beach.

This story was originally published February 5, 2017 at 8:25 AM with the headline "Hacking focus shouldn’t be on Russia; it should be about cyber security."