This isn’t just another Trumpist folly. This is the central goal of the Russian strategy. My alarm bells first went off with Trump in March 2016, which was when he first publicly attacked NATO. This was an utterly pointless thing to do, especially in the context of a Republican primary. Also Trump obviously had no independent thoughts or knowledge about NATO. That’s when I thought, Huh.
6 Likes
Another bell went off when Trump hired Manafort, who for 20 years had been working for pro-Kremlin interests and who had a $10 million a year contract to promote pro-Putin policies.
5 Likes
Let’s play a game of compare-contrast.
As a former community organizer, President Obama believed in the power of consensus, of leadership that works to solve problems and bring people together to work toward shared interests and mutually beneficial goals.
In the interests of upholding Ukrainian sovereignty, he enlisted a skittish energy-dependent Europe to support imposing tough economic sanctions on Russia.
He also brought the world’s powers together to hammer out the landmark agreement that limits Iran’s nuclear program to peaceful uses, and more recently he successfully forged an historic global agreement among almost 200 countries — including China, the world’s largest carbon polluter — to address climate change.
In announcing the successful conclusion of negotiations that led to the Iran nuclear agreement, President Obama said, “We are stronger not when we are alone, but when we bring the world together.”
As such he supported communities of interests such as the EU, NATO, the Organization of American States, and the Association of Southeast Asian Nations.
This, in contrast to Trump’s stated intent to unilaterally build a wall on our southern border and make Mexico pay for it, to expel an estimated 11 million undocumented immigrants in what would surely be a new Trail of Tears, to block Muslims from entering the country, and impose American economic hegemony under the threat of protectionism.
He has also stated his admiration for Putin and other authoritarian leaders, said that NATO might be obsolete, that perhaps Japan, South Korea, and Saudi Arabia might be better off with their own nuclear weapons, and that he would not rule out nuking Europe to combat ISIS.
We face a choice between two competing visions and sets of values. One calls for us to work within and strengthen a community of nations, and to coexist and resolve problems peacefully without a desire to dominate another people.
The other calls for us to look to other nations with suspicion, to cynically find common cause with dictators and authoritarians, to enact policies that provide additional benefits and privileges to the richest and most powerful among us, and act as the ‘muscle’ behind a new global colonialism driven by moneyed interests and unaccountable dealmakers loyal to no country’s flag.
3 Likes
This simply confirms that he’s an agent of influence for Russia. He may in fact be the stupidest motherfucker ever to imagine he had something to say in public life, but he knows what the point of NATO is. He knows that much. Something has to be done about this. I don’t think we can wait two years.
9 Likes
Maybe this should be mainstreamed by other voices.
In fact, Rachel last nite had on a Mr. Laufman, highly regarded DOJer who pretty much sounded General Quarters.
We have maybe months left as a real Republic.
2 Likes
I feel that Trump’s trajectory will soon mirror UK Prime Minister Teresa May, who is set to be humiliated, and possibly ousted, when Parliament take up a vote today on her plan to leave the European Union.
Parliament is expected to hand her the biggest defeat of a Prime Minister in almost a century.
Many expect the collapse of her government to be imminent, as pro-EU sentiment is starting to supplant Brexit hysteria which was largely founded on the same anti-immigrant and anti-globalist claptrap that Trump rode to the White House.
5 Likes
They found some of the shredded notes and put them back together.
I certainly hope so. It’s time for Congress to pass appropriations bills with veto-proof majorities, and just get on with governing. When your toddler falls to the ground screaming, kicking, and crying because you won’t let him drive the car to the grocery store, letting him drive the car is not the solution.
2 Likes
I’d like to think it’s because the dam is finally starting to break. The people within government who know about and are revolted by this behavior are finally willing to speak up (even if anonymously).
1 Like
also the light-fingered touch of Cambridge Analytic helped
1 Like
Trump very publicly lobbied for Britain’s exit from the EU. His fingerprints are all over May’s failures.
2 Likes
The release of this story was probably a precursor to him making the announcement during the state of the union address. It would likely be after declaring a national emergency to get the funding to build the wall and declaring that he will sign an executive order negating the 14th amendment. He sees the clock ticking and has his finger on the dead man trigger.
1 Like
Republicans will have a hard time convincing me that this was not an attempt at treason.
I forgot to make another point.
From Politico: US Congress members slam State Department for EU downgrade
There was also a story recently – sorry, I didn’t save the article – that the Trump administration and NSA John Bolton were considering withdrawing from the START nuclear reduction treaty signed by President Reagan.
“Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold;
Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world,”
1 Like
Drumpf’s supporters act like they are a majority of the population.
Just like the whites of Apartheid South Africa did.
It was only when the oppressed started using their power did this BUDGE.
As @tena has pointed out 345,374 times,
WE ARE THE MAJORITY
1 Like
Exactly, @emiliano4.
And I agree with @tena. We are the majority, and ultimately we will win.
1 Like
I agree with you, but I think there is more going on, too: it’s the confluence of interests between the hard right and the hard left on international issues. The hard right’s comfort zone is dictatorships, where power is centralized in a cult, while dissent is brutally put down and big business is accommodated by big profits. The hard left’s comfort zone is a naieve isolationism that hides its head in the sands of indifference to ideologically interesting dictatorships. We have seen this before in our history: the America First movement in the run up to WW II, as well as in the post war politics of the Truman and Eisenhower years. In both those eras, however, an alliance of center right and center left politics, Republicans and Democrats, kept America on track - sometimes barely - and served up the consensus for America as the arsenal of democracy during WWII, as well as the glue that kept the democratic alliance together during the Cold War. I wish I could be optimistic that that alliance of the center could hold today, but there is scant evidence that it can.
2 Likes