Does the Russian DNC hack help Trump?

[Averroës Nix]

Consider this: This is happening in the midst of (1) a surprisingly normal-looking convention bounce for Trump and (2) about a month of consistent movement toward Trump in the polls since he bottomed out at -7 in mid-June. So, while it seems pretty unlikely that this will actually have a substantive effect on the election, it is extremely likely that we are about to see a couple of weeks of commentary that treats it as if it really has.

[Averroës Nix]

Do we have it 100% confirmed that it was the Russians?

Hardly: Mook and Podesta were looking to deflect attention from Clinton and needed an immediate plausible answer. Obviously, their response will look dumb and deceitful if this turns out to be someone else. (And, honestly, given what we know about the technical details of the hack it could have been almost anyone.) But that could be weeks or even months from now, by which time the entire affair will probably be reduced to an inconsequential footnote.