Posts Tagged ‘Putin’

President Trump is now blaming Obama for Russian hacking. A month ago he did not think there was hacking, but now that it’s getting harder to lie about it, like always, it is Obama’s fault.

Trump calls CNN, ABC, fake news, among others, only deciding that Fox is real news at a press conference in front of an international audience. He even refused to take questions from CNN, something no other President has ever done.

Trump claims our respect overseas has gone up since he became President. The opposite is true! He had to meet the Queen of England in the boonies, where he managed not to bow, walked in front of her, and was only given a very short tea because there were massive demonstrations against his visit in London. President Obama and his wife were given a tea, a state dinner, and invited to stay overnight in the Palace. Then he went to Scotland to golf, more massive protests, you could even hear the protestors the whole time he was golfing!

He insults the leaders of our best allies, calling Canada a threat to our security and insulting Justin Trudeau, although not to his face! Made statements that Germany is in thrall to Russia, and that Theresa May was a bad leader and that he had told her how to do Brexit but she ignored him and that her political competitor would make a great Prime Minister! The first time an American President has inserted himself into a foreign allies politics! He did these things on record, some on video, then tried to say they were fake news when he was accosted by the news media, all fake of course!

Trump is still trumpeting his successful talks with Kim Jung Un while North Korea is still secretly building and enhancing their nuclear arsenal! China has hired workers under the guise of an educational program, who send all their wages back to their government. This also gives North Korea a way to buy luxury electronics and other goods to keep its rich and powerful supporters of Kim happy!

American satellite surveillance and Japanese ships have observed oil transfers from Chinese tankers to Korean tankers. Russia also participates in the Korean worker/slave scheme and has increased the number of workers recently. Both Russia and China ignore any economic sanctions they can surreptitiously get around. I don’t think Russia or China really want a nuclear North Korea, but both like slave labor in their factories, and both want to take advantage of an American President who they can manipulate just like the Howdy Doody of old he resembles!

Trump admires the political strongman and desires to emulate them. He is a bully and like most bullies a coward. He makes nice in front of our allies, then tweets nasty at them from the safety of his aircraft or throne room! He tells lies that I see his party scrambling to explain or justify. Lies that are so blatant and so easily proven to be a lie. This is one thing you can check for yourself. He will say one thing in a statement, or a tweet, and then in a tweet or statement hours later say exactly the opposite. So one has to be the lie, pick the one you like best!

Diane Ravich writes;

I posted this article a few days ago with the warning that I could not vouch for the source. I have since checked out the website–WhoWhatWhy–and conclude that it is a highly reputable source for honest investigative journalism. I think if you scan the website, see who writes for it, who edits it, who is on the board of directors, you will agree this is not fake news. Why the FBI Can’t Tell All About Trump — Diane Ravitch’s blog

 

The Federal Bureau of Investigation cannot tell us what we need to know about Donald Trump’s contacts with Russia. Why? Because doing so would jeopardize a long-running, ultra-sensitive operation targeting mobsters tied to Russian President Vladimir Putin — and to Trump.

But the Feds’ stonewalling risks something far more dangerous: Failing to resolve a crisis of trust in America’s president. WhoWhatWhy provides the details of a two-month investigation in this 6,500-word exposé.

The FBI apparently knew, directly or indirectly, based upon available facts, that prior to Election Day, Trump and his campaign had personal and business dealings with certain individuals and entities linked to criminal elements — including reputed Russian gangsters — connected to Putin.

The same facts suggest that the FBI knew or should have known enough prior to the election to justify informing the public about its ongoing investigation of potentially compromising relationships between Trump, Putin, and Russian mobsters — even if it meant losing or exposing a valued informant.

***

It will take an agency independent of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) to expose Donald Trump’s true relationship with Moscow and the role Russia may have played in getting him elected.

Director James Comey recently revealed in a congressional hearing for the first time that the FBI “is investigating … the nature of any links between individuals associated with the Trump campaign and the Russian government and whether there was any coordination between the campaign and Russia’s efforts.”

However, a two-month WhoWhatWhy investigation has revealed an important reason the Bureau may be facing undisclosed obstacles to revealing what it knows to the public or to lawmakers.

Our investigation also may explain why the FBI, which was very public about its probe of Hillary Clinton’s emails, never disclosed its investigation of the Trump campaign prior to the election, even though we now know that it commenced last July.

Just Some Thoughts

I know, OMG, right? I will try and refrain from politics and just try for some history, geography, and of course, some basic editorializing by yours truly. Hey, it’s my blog! Just been thinking about the human condition and trying to understand it.

Let’s start with Ukraine and the Crimea since it is in the news right now. I have been checking news reports from Crimea itself, most of the people there, as far as I can tell, are of ethnic Russian descent and feel like they are not treated the same as most of Ukraine’s citizenry. Now if you look at Crimea, basically it is a peninsula, connected to the main part of the country by a fairly narrow strip of land. The Crimea has always been an area of contention; today’s problems are actually old hat.

Way back in the 13th century Crimea was the capital of the Golden Horde. Under the protection of the Ottoman Empire for about 300 years until Catherine the Great snatched it up in 1783. As you will see if you peruse the maps I have included, you will see that all of Ukraine has been passed around like vodka at a toga party. You will notice also that Ukraine shares a common border with Russia, and that it has changed in size and shape several times. During world wars it seemed to change owners much like a used car with bad brakes. So changing various political entities and countries have claimed the Ukraine and it’s peninsula off and on throughout history, leaving their stamp on the population.  This in turn has caused confusion about who it is and what it stands for.  This is my uneducated opinion of course, but I think accurate.

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So not surprising that since Ukraine was a Soviet Socialist Republic until 1991 that this is still a pebble in the shoe of Mr. Putin, who is old school and used to be KGB right up to 1991 when it was still the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic. Wow, that was a mouthful! Hard to type too! Vladimir also has control issues, just look at him strut when he walks, and has to broadcast himself kicking some protagonists butt in a personal defense demonstration. If you poll Russians on who they voted for, you cannot get a lot of response, but out of the response you do get, very few people seemed to have voted for Vlad, but he still wins with comfortable majorities, go figure.

So what should we do? Well whatever we do it should not be trying to play the blame game. As I have stated, I think the President is weak when it comes to foreign policy, but part of that problem is our congress and president not speaking with one voice when it is critical that we do so. Recognizing when that needs to happen is something congress should know and do, but not this congress.

Do we have a right to interfere? That is the debate isn’t it? You see most of the demonstrators in Crimea wanting to return to Russian rule. So who are we to tell them different? Did Putin send in troops to protect ethnic Russians? I think not, my opinion is that he would like the borders of Russia to start to revert back to the way they were when it was the Soviet Union.  With the breakup of the Soviet Union in 1991, Crimea became part of an independent Ukraine. Crimea’s communist authorities proclaimed self-government in 1992, which ultimately led to the territory being granted expanded autonomous rights by Kiev. Just today they voted to return to Russian control, but of course that is not the way Kiev wants it. So just be aware that this author thinks that it is important not to let Putin have whatever he wants without opposition, he is a dangerous man. Better to pay attention now than later.