The Kaiju of the 2016 Election
Many have expressed relief that the 2016 Election is drawing to a close. For many it has seemed to be ugly, overwhelming, and worse than others. For me, it's been as close as I could get to being in a Godzilla film (or any Japanese inspired Kaiju film), specifically it's been like being that one kid who tries to tell the soldiers that the big monster is really good if you don't listen to the hysteria. But it fits the model: two Titans clashed, and then banded together to fight off the threat to mankind. Old enemies resurfaced (from the 90's to now), evil geniuses banded together to throw everything they could at the monsters--and we all ran around trying not to get squished.
But for me, this wasn't a bad election cycle. It wasn't even bad from a historical perspective, for example, during the American Suffrage movement, at time of Susan B. Anthony, a popular argument against women's voting rights was that politics get too ugly with mudslinging and rants to be any kind of a place for a lady. For me this election has actually been refreshing:
Trump isn't a politician--that's been his appeal to his base. It's also been his appeal to me... in the sense that he has delivered a regular Republican platform, but without the skilled political-speak that trained politicians have, and thus everything that he has proposed has come out in the blunt artless terms in which they were conceived. This exposes Republican ideology for it's flaws in social responsibility--but it also makes it less likely to be adopted into everyday speak. This gets at what the miracle of the 2016 Election has been for me. Trump stole the stage from his own platform. Instead of feeding us bullet points of the Republican agenda, this whole election has been about what Trump said.
What has really hurt me in past elections is when I have seen people who I respect, innocently echoing the Right's talking points as if they were equally viable options for our society. It has in the past been hate-speech, in easily digestible little tabs, and it has eased us into keeping a bygone political party on life support, to the point where roughly 50% of voters cast their ballots for a party that represents the interests of just 1% of the population. By internalizing the discussion and trying to be fair, we have inch-by-inch worked our way to the Right-Wing side of the scale. Reagan in 1980 represented ideology that would be further left than that of a "Blue-Dog" Democrat today. But to hear friends of mine contemplating labor problems that would result from mass citizenship of undocumented Latinos (not a real threat, it'd be a boon), Or mass unemployment from higher minimum wage (a fairytale), Death taxes hurting Farmers (they still have yet to find a case), or reasons why there are WMD's in Iraq, nuclear proliferation, an axis of evil, etc.--this is what has really hurt me in past elections, friends pitted against friends, and having to make the judgment call of challenging the fallacy of a friend vs. allowing the myth to perpetuate and infect the common knowledge of my fellow citizens. I resent the form of politics that will say anything that might stick with anyone just to get elected--and then come-what-may after that.
So an election that remained "did you hear what he said now?" was a nice change. Sure it made people angry enough to rally against him--but I'd much rather have angry mobs on my side in defense of one another, than cool and calm talk about why some of us should be denied rights, why some people should be bombed or executed, or any number of mass tragedies that have come out of calm rational discussions that failed to rule out the ideas beneath our standards of decency.
RED DAWN (1984) was a PROPHECY of the RED DON of 2016
By Jonah E.R. Loeb jonahloeb@gmail.com
In the 1984 film Red Dawn, first-time filmmaker Kevin Reynolds envisioned an alternate geopolitical universe where the United States was vulnerable to surprise attack from Russian invaders (then the U.S.S.R.) along with a coalition of their allies. The film opens with High School students witnessing foreign paratroopers descending on their small Colorado town, shooting the place up, and captured territory in the name of their motherland. It is then up to a small rag-tag team of American children called “The Wolverines,” to single-handedly wage an armed resistance against the full force of an expanding Superpower.
I doubt that even Kevin Reynolds could have imagined that just 32 years later, Russia would be launching an invasion into America, claiming state after state like a red stain across the map. The only difference is that instead of paratroopers, tanks, AK-47’s, helicopters, missile launchers, bazookas, dogs, gulags, P.O.W. brainwashing records playing day and night over flimsy stadium speakers, or any of that. Instead, the 2016 version of the Russian Invasion was launched in the form of one man, Donald J. Trump. Sure he has the backing of an army of hackers, two international media organizations, and a ground game provided by a small population of morally bereft political relativists who hijacked a political party by steering it’s agenda into incoherent platitudes that serve no purpose other than selling countless books on the subject.
To me, watching the 2016 US Presidential Election process, it seems clear that there is an attempt by Putin to either influence a susceptible political candidate, by easily manipulating his Narcissistic Personality Disorder with some simple flattery, and get him to either do Putin’s bidding, or at least, to collaborate in the candidate’s campaign in order to throw the US into turmoil with the rise of an absolute incompetent into office, after the US just finished cleaning up the mess from the Bush incompetency. Or this is all just fun and games for Putin, a little “F-You” between world leaders, at all of our expense.
There is no mistaking that there is a connection between U.S. Presidential Candidate Donald Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin—The problem is that nobody knows exactly what that direct connection is. The lighthearted viewpoint characterizes their relationship as a “Bro-mance.” However more politically savvy observers express concern that if this political manipulation proves to be correct, they would constitute the largest act of treason this country has experienced since its founding. This statement is not hyperbole and it is not without precedent.
Putin has used similar schemes of influence recently, with eerie parallels to concerns raised in the US elections. The online news source Slate recently exposed many of Putin’s foreign interventions such as in France, where Putin pumped money into the Ultra Right-wing populist political candidate Marie LaPen, as well as promoting Berlusconi in Italy, Right-wing movements in Greece, Bulgaria, and Hungry. Russia also provided propaganda in support of the Brexit movement in the UK which might account for the surprise surge in support, fueled in hindsight by the proliferation of misinformation and sound-bites, that shockingly won the majority vote. Also glowing about the success of Brexit was Donald Trump, who likened his own campaign to Brexit in America. Why would he do that? One might ask. He wouldn’t have reason to appeal to UK voters. Did he simply see similarities in his plans to abandon trade deals and isolate a county from immigration trade and global citizenship? Or was it because he recognized that when Putin endorses an underdog, they can defy the odds and win? Maybe that could explain the glee that Trump seemed to feel in the aftermath of the Brexit vote, knowing that he too had the endorsement of the same global puppet-master?
For a perspective on the severity of foreign influences on US Politics, look to the case study from exactly 20 years ago, when there was a scandal in which the People’s Republic of China (PRC) were accused of directly trying to influence American elections in the form of direct or thinly veiled campaign contributions to the Democratic Party. The republican party was so outraged by this prospect, that they launched the most expensive investigation ever conducted at the time ($7.4 Million) which ultimately didn’t expose the vast conspiracy that they had hoped that it would, and it became just one of the many Republican spending sprees conducted in their effort to tarnish the Clinton name (Bill in this case). For those keeping score, the Republicans latest Elmer Fudd inspired Clinton hunt, the Benghazi investigation is currently costing us $8.4 million (and possibly our sanity). There is however very real instances of foreign subversive influences in foreign politics that have effectively resulted in the collapse of those governments or it has resulted in inserting sympathetic governments that have capitulated with the interfering nations and essentially handing them a proxy annexation without all of the messy declarations of war.
Russia is notorious for using this kind of international manipulation, which is what makes the evidence pointing to collusion between the Putin administration and the proposed Trump administration all the more concerning. Without any “direct” or “Causal” evidence that the Republican ticket is really a PUTIN/TRUMP candidacy, we are left with just a list of the historical evidence and fingers crossed that the nation can band together Wolverine style against the attempted invasion.
PUTIN/TRUMP The Beginning, a.k.a. Flirtations:
10/2007: Trump tells Larry King that “Putin is doing a good job.”
12/2011: Trump praises Putin in book Time To Get Tough.
6/2013: Trump muses in a tweet if he and Putin will be new best friends now that Miss Universe will be in Moscow and if Putin will attend?
10/2013: On Larry King, Trump complained that Putin was “Outsmarting us” by intervening in the Syrian Chemical weapons incident.
7/2015: Trump said about Putin “I just think we’d get along”
10/2015: Trump cited a 60-Minutes special that featured both Trump and Putin: “We had good ratings together.
11/2015: Referring to the Putin/Trump pairing on 60-Minutes as being “stable-mates”
12/17/2015: Trump responds to Putin’s public comments that ‘Trump is a talented person’ and ‘the absolute leader in the Presidential Race.’ Trump: “We should work well together for World Peace.”
12/18/2015: When confronted with the allegations that Putin has had journalists killed, Trump responded: “He’s running his country, and at least he’s a Leader!”
2/2016: “I’d be crazy to disavow Putin’s praise [misquoting Putin’s words] “Plus, wouldn’t it be a good thing to be friendly with Russia?”
4/2016: On Bill O’Reilly, when asked about friendship with Putin: “Maybe we will, maybe we won’t –it’d be tremendous, I’d love to try it.”
7/2016: “I’ll be firm—But there’s nothing I want more than to have Russia friendly. [Then Later] “I’m not going to tell Putin what to do.” [and Later] “He doesn’t have any respect for Clinton, He respects ME.”
10/7/2016: Vitaly Churkin, Russia’s ambassador to the U.N. filed a verbal “Demarche” against the U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights, Ra’ad al-Hussein, for his public criticism of Trump.
Then on 10/12/2016 Vladimir Zhirinovsky of the pro-Kremlin Liberal Democratic Party of Russia (LDPR) said in an interview with Reuters: "Americans voting for a president on Nov. 8 must realize that they are voting for peace on Planet Earth if they vote for Trump. But if they vote for Hillary it's war.”
PUTIN/TRUMP Passing Notes with Friends and Family:
Trump has several close advisers and associates meeting within Putin’s inner sanctum.
Paul Manafort: Before becoming Trump’s Campaign manager, and then media surrogate for Trump, Manafort had an office in Ukraine advising Victor Yanukovych, The Ukraine President who was accused of being a puppet for Putin and who fled to Russia when the “civil” war broke out.
Carter Page: Yahoo reporter Michael Isaikoff reported on 9/23/16 that Trump “Adviser” Carter Page is invested in Gazprom, the Russian State owned Gas Co. and Page is under investigation for possibly holding talks with Russia lining up a deal if Trump wins election. Page’s alleged meetings took place with sanctioned business connections Igor Sechin (described as being “utterly loyal to Putin”) and Igor Diveykin, a former Security official and current Deputy Chief for Internal Policy.
RT News: In The United States, the Cable channel RT News is owned by the Russian Governments and serves as the voice of Russia on American airwaves. They have been supportive of the Trump Et Al. camp.
Trump is Vulnerable to Big Money: A recent Bloomberg article reports Trump’s known outstanding debt to be $650 Million, whereas his liquid assets (cash, or whatever else you use to buy things) has gone down to $170 Million (not including the $100 Million that he’s pledged to his campaign, and that he supposedly still owes $34 Million of). That Make’s Trump extra incentivized to the seduction of his Russian business partners like the Crocus Group (worth $1.3 Billion) and the untold riches of the Putin business/politics syndicate.
PUTIN/TRUMP It sure smells like a deal has been consummated in here:
The Hacked emails from the DNC and John Podesta, almost certainly originated from Russian hackers, and with a degree or so less certainty the hacking effort was done for the benefit of Russian State Officials. The programming used in the hack apparently bears the same kind of author signature clues as narrative voice and handwriting styles can identify a traditional writer. These telltale signs point directly to a Russian effort. If the 1% chance were true, and that it was not conducted as forensic exerts have concluded, then the email hacking effort would have had to have had the dual purpose of framing the Russians for the crime, and there is even less logical motivation for anyone to have done this.
But in addition to Russian hacks, and the dumb campaign maneuver by Trump to publicly taunt Russian hackers to try and find additional Clinton private server emails, there seems to be another computer related link between Trump and Putin.
Franklin Foer, writing for Slate, published an expose on 10/31/2016 that shows compelling evidence that there was a server set up with the express purpose of hosting secretive email communications between the Trump Organization and Alfa Bank of Moscow, a bank that Putin himself is closely tied. The servers appear to have been set-up to communicate directly with only a hand-full of individuals and the activity of their use seems to spike in direct correlation to key moments of Trump campaign activity and during office hours in both the US and in Moscow (suggesting the use by live human beings and not automated systems). This appears to be evidence that a direct connection might have existed between the Trump camp and the Putin camp, if not between the two men themselves. Foer was later compelled to write a followup article on November 2nd based on the challenges from Trump and Alfa Bank, however the counter arguments only succeed to interject implausible explanations into the discussion to obscure the important findings of the expose.
The net result of Trump working directly with Putin, or not, seems to be the same either way. If Putin were to stop-by the Trump campaign headquarters to give his two cents, his input would likely be along the lines of:
1. Cast doubt on the US position on Syria, Iran, and Russia.
2. Weaken or dismantle the NATO alliance
3. Keep the US and Europe out of the Ukraine conflict
As luck would have it, these happen to also be Trumps position on these issues. From extorting NATO allies for protection money, to deference to Russia’s hostile actions in Ukraine, Syria, or in any of their questionable international plays.
The "Wolverines" Cast of Red Dawn ('84)
In all, there is no single smoking gun connecting Putin and Trump—just terrible campaign of divisive policies and rancor tearing it’s way across America like an ideological Sherman’s March. Weather it’s a Russian takeover plot, a masterful practical joke by Putin on the American people, or if it’s just a coincidentally similar platform or moral ambiguity and personal vanity, either way—every American value that’s worth saving is being threatened in this election, and it’s up to each of us Wolverines to cast our votes in opposition to the assault. If the powers that be prevent you from voting, a true Wolverine wouldn’t let that stop you from volunteering, campaigning and participating in the process. So, what do you say? I say it’s time to end the Red Scare of 2016.