When the Russians do it for a favored candidate, obviously.
As I have had to point out to people, routinely....
Showing that Russian action occurred in a fashion that was beneficial to Trump and harmful to Clinton does not necessarily indicate a "favoring" of one candidate over another.
There is a potential legitimate strategically reason why an entity such as Russia,
if it was looking into sowing discord in our election process, would go the route of pumping up Trump and hurting Clinton. Going into the general election, it was a largely forgone conclusion that Hillary Clinton would win, and likely win significantly. Leaking out information to hurt Trump....which, frankly, was occurring
continually throughout the campaign on it's own...would not have been nearly as much "bang for your buck" in terms of creating mistrust within the American electorate. Rather, it would simply make Clinton's victory that much more inevitable, lowering the focus on the Presidential race and lessening the amount of chaos and discontent found within the American people.
Going after Clinton DOES however have benefits. It helps Trump out, turning what many figured would be a boring and one sided campaign into one that ultimately was tightly contested. This kept the American people focused on the campaign more than a one sided contest would, and specifically kept them arguing. It created a situation where, no matter
who won, significant levels of distrust would exist. If the LIKELY scenario happened, Hillary won, then Russia could have figured they'd significantly damaged her ability to gain any coalition within the American political spectrum due to the various leaks and information that came out on her. If the UNLIKELY scenario happened, and Trump won, then he'd be embroiled in controversy from the onset for the appearance of outside influence as we're seeing here.
Helping Hillary in the election would be a "lose / lose" type of situation for the Russians....helping Trump would potentially be a "win/win". Putin, historically, is the type of political calculator that likes to shoot for "win/win" scenarios.
Is it feasible that they simply see Trump as the friendly candidate towards Rusia? Sure (though debatable). Is it feasible that they actively "favored" Trump? Sure. Is it feasible that they have dirt on Trump and wanted him in there to blackmail him? Sure, I guess in theory. But those are just that...theories, guesses. And there's just as plausible and legitimate of a theory that their attacking of Clinton (there's been FAR more of that, then there has been direct support of Trump) had far less to do with any true "favoring" of one candidate over the other, but rather that it was simply strategically the best move for Russia's interests because of the chaos it would cause to ensue.
