When We Go Low, They Go High

President Vladimir Putin said Moscow would not expel anyone in response to Washington's decision to throw out 35 suspected Russian spies and sanction intelligence agencies it believes were involved in computer hacking in the 2016 presidential election.

Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov earlier proposed expelling 35 U.S. diplomats after outgoing U.S. President Barack Obama ordered the expulsions and sanctions on Thursday.

But Putin said he would wait for the actions of President-elect Donald Trump, who will take office on Jan. 20, before deciding on any further steps in relations with the United States.

[...]

In withering remarks, Putin even invited U.S. diplomats and their families to a party in the Kremlin.

  Reuters

Taking the opportunity to look magnanimous. We've been handing Putin gold lately - increasingly since invading Iraq, and ramping up with the Snowden affair.

It appears to me that the US is awfully close to exchanging places with Russia in the global political sphere. Will future movies show the US as a repressive, evil government, torturing and spying on its own citizens, while Russia is depicted as an open, democratic society?

The U.S. sanctions also closed two Russian compounds in New York and Maryland that the administration said were used by Russian personnel for "intelligence-related purposes".

[...]

The Russians have 72 hours to leave the United States, the official said. Access to the two compounds will be denied to all Russian officials as of noon on Friday.

[...]

Russian officials have portrayed the sanctions as a last act of a lame-duck president and suggested that Trump could reverse them when he takes over the White House.

"Further steps towards the restoration of Russian-American relations will be built on the basis of the policy which the administration of President D. Trump will carry out," said Putin.

[...]

Russian Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev was more outspoken in his criticism. "It is regrettable that the Obama administration, which started out by restoring our ties, is ending its term in an anti-Russia death throes. RIP," he wrote on his official Facebook page.

Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova called the Obama administration "a group of embittered and dimwitted foreign policy losers".

There are very few adults left in politics.

...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.