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Trump: Year One
by Justin Raimondo Posted on November 06, 2017
Well, I’ve got a lot of catching up to do since my last column, but first the question that rises from my lips as I step away from my sick bed is: what happened to all the wars President Trump was supposed to have started? Just before my recent illness the commentariat was filled with predictions of fire and brimstone as Trump called out Kim Jong Un, blustering, braying, and bloviating a mix of insults and warnings of imminent military action. And yet – nothing came of it.
Months after the “crisis” took center stage, it’s all talk, and no action – which is about par for the course with the Trump administration. Coming on a year into the Trump presidency, that the media still isn’t getting this shows just how dumb these people are: they really believe the noise, or, at least, they want to believe it, as it confirms their low opinion of the President. Pundits whose prejudices are usually in favor of war write pieces like “https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/josh-rogin/wp/2017/11/01/can-anyone-stop-trump-from-attacking-north-korea/?utm_term=.229861618d35 (Can Anyone Stop Trump From, Attacking North Korea?)” in which the President is depicted as a malevolent toddler playing with nuclear weapons that could go off at any moment – and yet it hasn’t happened. One can almost feel the disappointment of the Never Trumpers as the earth continues to spin on its axis and Doomsday fails to dawn.
We were told that if Trump decertified Iran compliance with the nuclear deal that the result would certainly be war – so where’s the fireworks? Gee, it looks like “decertification” is a less serious matter than we were led to believe: instead of signaling World War III, it merely meant that a bunch of US Senators would get to strike poses and utter complete nonsense while taking in money from the Israel lobby. Whoop de-doo!!!
And what, pray tell, has happened to the “Russia-gate” hoax? After all the supposedly secret meetings, the cloak-and-dagger, the evidence of “collusion” and hints of “treason” – and now, suddenly, the tables are turned and the very people hurling accusations of “treason” and “collusion” are now exposed as vulnerable to the very same charges. This song-and-dance about “Russian influence” over the 2016 election has been playing on the congressional jukebox for over a year and yet we seen not one iota of evidence that any of it is real: all we’ve got are a few Facebook ads that very few people saw and even fewer were swayed by. And what were these storied ads about, anyway? Not the election, or any candidate – just “divisive” issues like gay rights, race, and immigration, supposedly meant to simply cause “turmoil.” As if this could possibly represent a threat to a free society.
To reiterate: by this point, the Trumpocalypse – which one might visualize as a combination of nuclear winter, global warming, and the opening up of the mouth of Hell – should already have been well underway. And yet nothing of the kind has happened. Why not? Could it be that the hysterical response of the “mainstream” media to Trump’s victory at the polls was way out proportion to the actual threat? Is it possible that a national security Establishment with real policy differences with the President sought to poison his presidency from the beginning?
Despite the attempt to frame Trump as a madman capable of anything – a characterization of Richard Nixon that may have actually benefited the conduct of US foreign policy at the time – the reality is that I doubt he cares about foreign policy issues enough to provoke a real crisis. Before he was threatening Kim Jong Un, he was telling the South Koreans that maybe it’s time to reconsider the US troop presence and that they’ve got to start paying for their own defense. What Trump really cares about is domestic politics: immigration, taxes, and infrastructure. Wait until he gets his hands on the money he plans to spend on new roads, airports, etc.: then you’ll see the President in his element, wasting huge amounts of money on monuments to himself.
There was always the chance that Trump would allow himself to get dragged into yet another Mideastern war, or some conflict with either Russia or China, by our ever-present always-active War Party, as part of his initiation into the presidential club. As if to prove he didn’t really mean all that “America First” “isolationist” guff, and that it was all just talk for the benefit of the rubes. And that is still all too possible,– but it’s not very likely because it’s not his natural inclination. Here is a man who, above all, wants to be liked: starting wars at the drop of a hat seems the wrong road to that goal.
As the one year anniversary of Trump’s triumph approaches, the pathetic remnants of American liberalism still haven’t recognized its meaning, or reconciled themselves to their loss of State power. They dream of impeachment, or even an outright coup: their contempt for the Great American Middle – “the deplorables!” – defines their politics, which, by now, are almost entirely negative: anti-Trump, anti-Russia, anti-bourgeois.
The great hopes many of us had for Trump in the foreign policy realm – at least having a serious discussion about NATO and our Pacific alliances – have not come to fruition, and indeed have been frustrated by the internationalists (of both parties) who have wriggled their way back into the corridors of power. The big problem is that there aren’t enough good personnel, with the right “America First” credentials, to staff Trump’s foreign policy councils. The careerists are all internationalists, whether of the “liberal” variety or the neoconservative type.
On the other hand, while Trump’s more radical foreign policy proposals have been forgotten, or put on the back burner, he’s managed to avoid getting involved in any new conflicts. If Hillary Clinton had won the election, we would almost certainly be deep into a Cuba-missile-crisis type event with the Russians somewhere in eastern Europe.
While Democrats screech that we’re in a state of war with Vladimir Putin’s Russia, President Trump avoided a near head-on collision in Syria and has kept the diplomatic lines open despite the Democrats’ contention that peace with Russia is treasonous. Presidents rarely get credit for not starting World War III. It’s kind of taken for granted: but in today’s world it shouldn’t be. It’s to Trump’s credit that he hasn’t allowed himself to get pushed into a “crisis” with the Russians – at least not yet.
In any case, Trump is neither monster nor savior, and that is surely evident on this first anniversary of the Trump victory. Like with all successful demagogues, people see what they want to see in Trump. And that goes for his enemies as well as his friends. The former see a world-destroying Devil, while the latter thought he might restore the slogan and policy of “America First” in its original meaning. At the end of Year One, we can say that neither extreme has been observed or achieved.
Bloomberg Politics has just published a remarkable interview with the Russian lawyer who famously met with President Trump’s son, son-in-law and campaign chairman at Trump Tower in June 2016. There are a number of lingering questions about the account, and healthy skepticism about the messenger and her message is certainly warranted.
However, this is a notable moment, because it would appear to constitute a direct allegation that Donald Trump Jr. actively requested Russian assistance in harming Hillary Clinton, as opposed to having been merely receptive to such assistance.
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Let’s also put this new interview in its larger context. As part of his plea agreement with special counsel Robert S. Mueller III, Trump campaign adviser George Papadopoulos has said that he was informed in April 2016 that the Russians had collected “dirt” on Clinton in the form of “thousands of emails,” and tried to set up a meeting between Russian officials and Trump campaign higher-ups. It is not yet known whether Papadopoulos explicitly told his superiors about the existence of this Russian “dirt.” But he is cooperating with investigators, so he may be in a position to shed more light on just how much they knew about it.
We know now as a matter of fact, however, that the June 2016 meeting was held for the explicit purpose of getting a dump-truck’s worth of Russian “dirt” on Clinton — Donald Trump Jr.’s email chain confirms it. And let’s not forget, as https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/trump-dictated-sons-misleading-statement-on-meeting-with-russian-lawyer/2017/07/31/04c94f96-73ae-11e7-8f39-eeb7d3a2d304_story.html?utm_term=.f1f33a9cef3c (The Post has reported), that Trump himself helped dictate an initial statement from Donald Trump Jr. that misleadingly claimed the meeting was “primarily” about Russian adoptions. This was later proven false, which means Trump himself has been directly implicated in an effort to mislead the country about his own top campaign officials’ eagerness to benefit from help from the Russian government. Whatever legal conclusions Mueller ends up reaching, we now know that Trump’s top campaign officials were eager to collude with Russia to help him win the election and that Trump himself helped to cover that up.
Mueller is also reportedly looking hard at the process leading up to the issuing of that misleading statement, though it’s also unclear what legal relevance that might end up having. Veselnitskaya told Bloomberg she’s prepared to meet with Mueller, which will presumably happen. Again, we should approach anything Veselnitskaya says with caution. But any light shed on that meeting may help explain why the president and his son initially wanted to cover up what happened at it.
The blizzard of Russia connections between members of Trump’s team, including his son Donald Trump Jr. (who attended the June 2016 Trump Tower meeting and received an ample speaking fee from French allies of the Russian government) and son-in-law, top members of his administration (the attorney general, former national security adviser Flynn) and his campaign (Manafort, George Papadopoulos, Page), coupled with the utter lack of candor about such ties, all take place in the context of an election in which Russia executed a sophisticated plan to interfere in our democracy. Trump tried to stop Comey from investigating Flynn and then fired Comey, who was investigating the Russia connection.
At best, Trump might claim he was surrounded by Russian dupes with bad memories. Rather than hire “the best people,” it seems he hired a band of misfits in bed with a foreign power. Even then, his obsession with shutting down Comey and discrediting Mueller makes no sense if this was all innocent conduct unrelated to him and the election.
“The constant deception and lying from this administration when it comes to Russia makes it abundantly clear that they have something to hide,” says Bergmann. “It also raises real questions about whose interests they are actually representing — theirs? The Russians’? It certainly seems the American people come last in that order.”
And with all this, we still don’t know the truth about Trump’s own direct financial ties, if any, to Russia because he will not disclose his tax returns or provide a full accounting of his businesses. Is there any doubt why Trump’s business deals should be investigated? If he’s actually free from Russian connections, he might be unique in this administration.
