For several years Russia’s Vladimir Putin has been attacking American democracy through assets named Donald Trump and Tucker Carlson who, I daresay, are involved in subverting America.
The former president possesses the quintessential personality that America’s geopolitical enemies seek to exploit. Ad nauseam, he alleges personal grievances combined with political grievances while claiming he is a victim of persecution by the United States government. He is in debt and asks for donations like a subway train peddler. Trump is desperate to stay out of jail and seeks revenge against American institutions and individuals having proclaimed to his throng at rallies “I am your retribution”.
Vladimir Putin is anxious to help Trump get a second term as president. This time simply undermining democracy will not suffice. I suspect Putin wants his puppet Trump to be the first American dictator and also aspires to dismantle NATO.
And like his doppelganger, Trump is anti-NATO and even encouraged Putin to “do whatever the hell they want” to NATO countries who don’t provide the designated amount of defense spending into their military. Russia is America’s geo-political enemy, yet Trump praises Putin and supports the Kremlin over America.
According to the Associated Press in 2018, in a meeting with Putin in Helsinki, Trump questioned the findings of American intelligence agencies that concluded Russia meddled in the 2016 presidential election and sided with Putin, accepting and believing Putin’s insistence that Russia did not meddle in the election. Trump stated, “I will tell you that President Putin was extremely strong and powerful in his denial today. He just said it’s not Russia. I will say this. I don’t see any reason why it would be.”
For almost a decade Trump has called America’s free press the “enemy of the people”.
Like a “scarlet letter”, Trump has sewn a “fake news” epithet on media organizations and members of the press that are critical of him exposing them to mockery and violence.
Freedom of the press is the essence of democracy.
According to a Washington Post article in May of 2017, one day after firing F.B.I. Director James Comey, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov and Russian Ambassador to the United States Sergey Kislyak met with Trump in the White House where Trump “revealed highly classified information” to the Russians. One U.S. official said, “Trump revealed more information to the Russian ambassador than we have shared with our own allies”.
Recently, Tucker Carlson raved about Moscow’s trains and shopping carts claiming Moscow is better than any city in America and like the fictional character Regan MacNeil in “The Exorcist,” vomited Russia’s anti-American propaganda into the face of the world.
On Feb. 12, four days before the death of Putin’s outspoken critic Alexei Navalny, Carlson was interviewed by Egyptian journalist Emad Eldin Adeeb. Adeeb challenged Carlson citing the Putin interview, saying Carlson didn’t discuss “freedom of speech in Russia, Navalny or assassination”. Carlson responded asserting he has concluded “every leader kills people, including my leader… some kill more than others. Leadership requires killing people.” Carlson sounds like a Kremlin spokesperson normalizing and downplaying Putin’s behavior toward his dissenters.
During Trump’s two impeachments, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell staunchly supported Trump, mitigated the alleged high crimes and misdemeanors, and influenced other GOP Senators not to find Trump guilty, which would have resulted in removing Trump from office.
On Dec. 19, 2019, then Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi stated, “Our founders, when they wrote the Constitution, they suspected that there could be a rogue president, I don’t think they suspected that we could have a rogue president and rogue leader in the Senate at the same time”.
With Trump as his puppet, Carlson as his stooge, and die-hard Republicans who offer unyielding support for the Kremlin, Putin has a loyal army of radicalized groupies and apologists disguised as politicians and talking heads inside the United States propping up Russia and the Kremlin and striking American ideology and institutions with nihilistic sorties from within our own borders.
Looking down the barrel of Trumpism, Russia’s political sharpshooters have in their crosshairs a clear shot at an already wounded American democracy.
