Tag Archives: Russia
The Russians Are Stealing Our Photos!
Playing Puppet
At a certain point, it stopped being surprising that Donald Trump would take Vladimir Putin’s side in regards to…well anything really. He has made it perfectly clear that he admires the man, and that he’ll take the man’s word over his own intelligence networks. But now Trump is at the point where he’s parroting the man’s talking points in his own interviews. When Trump starts acting as a surrogate or representative of the Putin Regime…I mean seriously, where are we then? When does it stop being a joke that Putin is really leading the country?
Double Un-Standard
Remember when Trump railed on people for invoking the 5th Amendment right against self incrimination when it had to do with Hillary Clinton? It was a maneuver that only criminals and mob members did? Why invoke it if you have nothing to hide? Right Donald? So of course he sticks to his guns when that pendulum of self preservation swings back his way!
Of course not!
When Roger Stone plead the 5th in regards to the investigation into Trump’s potential collusion with a hostile foreign power, you can bet your but that not only was he in favor of the 5th Amendment, but he went on Twitter to declare the man a national hero!
The New Look of Patriotism
So the new look in Conservative Patriotism is memorabilia with a slogan that says “I’d Rather Be A Russian than Democrat”. You’ll see these t-shirts floating around Trump rallies and GOP conventions. You see, it’s the next great message in making America great again. It shows how far Conservatism has come. You see, 2 years ago, the GOP considered Russia a hostile foreign power. They bashed liberals over the head with even the whiff of a notion of being soft on Russia and Vladimir Putin. But then suddenly, the winds changed, Putin was a wonderful leader, and Russia should be reached out to. Russia stopped being the enemy, and people with opposing political values took their place. “I’d Rather Be A Russian than Democrat” is the slogan of our country’s political divide, perfectly encapsulating this near civil war mentality between ideologies. And yet for all of that, I can’t find where these pieces of memorabilia first originated. Several vendors are putting them out, but for all the research that I’ve done, I don’t know who came up with it. But I can imagine Donald Trump might be kind of tickled by this. It shows how effective his sales pitch has been.
Going Home
Donald Trump, Jr. might be looking at a bit of trouble for his participation in a meeting in Trump Tower during the 2016 election. For those not in the know, Don Jr, potentially (probably) with the knowledge of his father, took a meeting with a Russian lawyer in the hopes of getting dirt on Hillary in the election. The more information that becomes public, especially as it relates to a statement by Jr, probably drafted by Sr, the less good it looks for Jr. And I guess Papa Trump might be getting worried as well. Whether that is genuine concern over the welfare of his son or concern for himself over the blowback is up to whoever is telling the story. But whichever the case, it’s certainly causing Trump and his legal team time and energy. And the flip flopping over Don Sr.’s level of knowledge of the incident before it happened is only causing more waves. All I can imagine is that Trump would rather Jr. be out of reach for the time being.
The Real Russian Conspiracy
Oh Donald. Donald, Donald, Donald! It is truly a bold move to come out and suggest that the Russians would be meddling in our midterms, but they would be interfering on behalf of the Democrats. I mean, honestly, it’s hilariously stupid, and I have to imagine that even your base will have to do some pretty impressive mental gymnastics to follow you on that logic, but I know they’ll get there. They manage to follow you no matter where you go. But this one has the sort of Donald Trump flair that we’ve come to know and hate. It’s truly a “You” move. Suggesting that Russia for some reason wants you and yours out of the picture is delightfully stupid. Putin has said, very vocally, only days ago, how happy he is to have you doing what you’re doing. You say you’re the toughest President on Russia, but the reality is you watch the government around you be tough on Russia, and complain that they’re destroying your budding relationship with a monster. But keep trying to make your sell. I mean, it’s actually even kind of devious on your part. If, by some magical miracle, the Dems have their blue wave, and knock it out of the park during midterms, you’ve started early in building your conspiracy!
Football Season
Football season is on the horizon, and that’s a good season for Donald Trump as it turns out. It’s amazing how quickly he can quarterback a distraction. The season isn’t even in full swing yet, and he’s already expertly misdirecting the public attention of his very worrying behavior in Helsinki with Putin by talking about the national anthem at football games. It’s an embarrassingly transparent maneuver, and yet his base and media outlets are going to eat it up, because that’s how this kind of thing works, and Trump knows it. I know it sounds cynical, but it’s so obvious at this point. Trump doesn’t care about the National Anthem, and I’ll bet he’ll never stand for it again as soon as it’s not politically relevant to do so, but as long as he can use it as a prop for his partisan sleight of hand, he’s gonna do it with relish, because it’s easy.
Perfectly Clear
So I’ve been really trying to process how Trump plays to this Russia backlash. Obviously it’s a big deal when even some of his most ardent supporters are really turned off by his rhetoric. And publicly siding with Russia regarding the election meddling was kind of a shocker. GOP stalwarts were essentially calling his behavior treasonous. It was bad. So when he walked back his statements the next day only by suggesting that when he said “would” instead of “wouldn’t” when saying he didn’t know why it would be Russia who interfered, it was a total slip of the tongue…well I expected such a blatant lie not to work as well as it did. I mean it wasn’t just one switch up of “would” and “wouldn’t”. He went on several diatribes on Monday, both in his initial statement, in his Hannity Interview and his Tucker Carlson interview, shoring up the position that he didn’t have faith in his intelligence community, that he thinks Putin is great, and that Putin’s word holds more water. The idea that he could simply claim this was a slip of the tongue issue is a lie, for no other reason than that it literally contradicts 24 hours of statements to the contrary. Yet, GOP congressmen, apologist pundits, and generally everyone who had this moment of clarity regarding who Trump is, immediately seemed to say “That makes sense” and went back to calling the liberals a bunch of liars distorting the truth. And the world around us all collectively sighed…
Witch Hunt
I feel like the term “witch hunt” has taken on a new sort of resonance since the special investigation into Russia’s interference in the 2016 elections began. President Donald Trump uses the word publicly several times a week to refer to Special Counsel Robert Mueller III’s investigation because he has decided that it’s a liberal conspiracy to bring him and his administration down (OR he he’s trying to hide his malfeasance and/or criminal behavior…that’s a possibility as well). But you see, the term “witch hunt” is supposed to imply that you’re searching for something that isn’t there or doesn’t exist, and as a result, innocent people get burned. But it’s important to note that if you’re on a witch hunt and you find ACTUAL witches, e.g. You find exactly the bad things you suspected you might find, then it CAN’T be a witch hunt. In the case of the Russia investigation, besides uncovering Russian spies and several conspirators working with Russia who had key roles in Trump’s campaign, it also uncovered specific examples of Russia explicitly attempting to collude with Donald Trump’s campaign. Whether Trump or his campaign did anything wrong remains up in the air, but Mr. Trump! Your witch hunt has turned up witches! You can’t run from that anymore!
Mind the Exit 