Vladimir Putin’s goal is to weaken the United States by using President Donald Trump. In order to propel Trump into the White House, Russian hackers infiltrated United States political organizations. The Kremlin used sensitive information to undermine Hillary Clinton. In addition, Russian hackers used American social media to influence the American electorate to vote for Trump.
This raises the question. Why Trump? The Russian dictator possibly has information that could severely damage Trump. It is clear that Trump and several team members, five of whom have been indicted, have ties to several influential Russian elitists. In addition, Trump’s goal is to extend his commercial empire to Russia. Does Trump owe tens of millions of dollars to Kremlin banks and Russian oligarchs? Does he have something to conceal?
When one pieces the puzzle together, a vivid picture emerges of the Trump-Putin relationship.
Why did Trump yank the Russian incursion of Ukraine plank out of the 2016 GOP platform? Why does Trump continue to refuse to chastise Putin? Why does Trump threaten to pull out of NATO under the pretext that its members do not pay their fair share?
Why did Trump announce that ISIS had been defeated and that United States troops would be withdrawn? That left Russia alone in Syria.
Why did Trump announce that he would terminate the 1987 Intermediate-Range Nuclear Force Treaty? Western missiles would no longer be pointed at Russia.
Why did Trump refuse to have a note-taker and translator present each time when he met with Putin? Why did Trump grab the transcript from the Russian translator?
This is neither a Republican nor a Democratic issue. It is an American issue. Putin is emerging the winner. He is using Trump to isolate the United States from its allies.
James Huchthausen
Cambria
This article appears in Weddings 2019.
Respecting the questions concerning Trump and Russia; I remain confused. The prior administration sold the Russians 20% of our yellowcake (uranium) supply, and the arranging bank paid Mr. Clinton $500,000 for a speech in Moscow contemporaneously. In some fashion, the then Secretary of State’s “charitable foundation” received $140 MILLION from sources who were also related to this transaction. We don’t actually know whether there was collusion then, but the facts are truly suspicious.
There has been no outrage. Mr. Mueller was then head of our FBI.
Mr. Trump appears the most dangerous president to Russian interests we have had among the last 5 presidents. He’s a hawk on defense and is forcing our European allies to increase their armaments budgets.
I do not know more than this; but little which I have heard in the press seems more than speculation. I understand the political rhetoric, but that falls more into the Ted Kennedy Chappaquiddick kind of press inaccuracy problem which requires us to have a certain level of divorced objectivity.
In response to clovis dad; I am as tired of hearing about the bs uranium deal as I am with HRC’s emails! Talk about deflections….Trumps people on his team have lied, twisted and turned states evidence. Face it, he is the president, not HRC or Obama, they are in the history books and Trump’s teem needs oversight…..based on results. He is a divider and chief, nothing mor
Trump is a Russian asset, a depraved, narcissistic, pathologically lying, moronic, racist piece of shit & his followers are stupid, lowlife, sadistic Nazi scum.
Jay has given us all an excellent example of the kind of clear thinking and great prose we cab expect from some folks.
Jay does not know he is supporting the party that thought the Nazis were great until ww2 started. Jay only lives and sees through others opinions which he repeats and amplifies. Do you think your opinions about Trump would be the same if he got fair press coverage instead of constant and unremitting attacks. If Obama had gotten the same press coverage as Trump you would hate him, like you do Trump. I do not like being manipulated by the people who own the media, you do not seem to mind serving in their interests.
It goes both ways Richard……if you watch faux news you get to see the type of people who spread trumps fear based control bs. Granted there are 2 liberal stations that play to the other side of the bird. Either way, the left wing of the eagle is attached to the same eagle the right wing is…..and it is one dirty ass bird!
Wew Lad! HAHAHA! Good one. Is this a joke article? If not, I can’t believe people are still buying into this. I guess boomer memes die hard. You’ve been watching too much TV news. Yea, some Russian eccentric buying $4000 worth of Facebook ads defeated Hillary’s $2 Billion and the entire Western media establishment. Cool story bro. Maybe, just maybe, the Democrat party is as awful as anything else and people are sick of it. Just a guess.
I’m not even going to bring up the $30 million Hillary laundered through Russian crime cartels, or the Hatian child trafficking rings run through the Clinton Foundation, or Libya.. they have slavery now thanks to Hillary. The death queen lost, get over it. But don’t worry, Trump isn’t a threat to whatever you are worried about, he’s capitulated on everything just like they all do.
Let me humor the old people who still watch broadcast televisions for a moment.
Lets see how Russian involvement could happen. Yeah, it can happen. A few hundred million strategically spent could tip the balance, given America is in such volatile state. I mean what would Manafort’s fee normally be – somewhere in the multi-millions? That’s a few million of illegal money right there, plus everyone knows a good campaign manager can win it for the underdog. (I mean drug money basically elected Frida Kahlo, but lets leave that for now)
Hilary needed to spend billions, because what she was selling didn’t enjoy popular support. Whereas Trump being a celebrity, could guarantee 30 percent of the vote for no outlay, because 30 percent of the population is basically impressed by celebrity. So someone like Manafort offering his services free-of-charge to a Right-wing celebrity candidate could make the difference. Put it this way, if John Podesta offered his services free-of-charge to the Anti-Putin opposition, what would the Kremlin think? They’d naturally think – he’s working for the State Department or whatever. They’d probably arrest him or kick him out the country. But like I say, in no way am I jumping to the deffence of America’s election rules;, the US have broke the rules of other countries’ on hundreds of occasions, so they’re getting a little of their own medicine, just spelling out objectively, that Russia could’ve won it for Trump. Manafort could have been the straw that broke the camel’s back. Mind you, that just demonstrates how open to subversion the US really is. With 40 years of Neo Liberal policies, it doesn’t take much to tip the balance, America was prone to go Right, Russia just pushed it over the finishing line.
Ok, now here’s what’s wrong with this obsession with Russia.
Basically Trump won, period.
And he won in the most legitimate way since… FDR? Hillary’s 95% brainwashing from control of the media/intelligence organs of the state and 5% popularity couldn’t beat Trumps 99% popularity + 1% Russian sourced intelligence about Hilarys nefarious activities (we’re assuming that the Dems are correct about all that). That’s the thing about this, if the Democrats are correct, it still means they lost and lost in a big way, like they lost in a way elections haven’t been lost in America before. That’s why you are seeing 24/7 royal flip out on corporate/military industrial complex controlled media. All pointing at that tiny bit that Russia may have influenced, completely ignoring (or covering up) the fact that they have lost control of the narrative.
It reminds me of when Jill Stein the green party candidate spent millions to force a recount in order to pay tribute to Hillary because she knew people would blame her for Trump. Her recount ended up turning a few more electoral college members against Hillary. There is a great realignment happening. Maybe the Democrats should focus on Americans in despair, not being able to secure a home and start families, the decline of the white birth rate, opiate addiction and the suicide rate. Naaaah, let’s start WW3 with Russia.