John Chuckman
COMMENT – THOUGHTS ON THE TALE OF RUSSIA AGAIN TRYING TO INFLUENCE AMERICA’S ELECTION
Political and ideological tales in America enjoy a remarkably long shelf life. I think the fact has to do with unchanging, iron-bound ideology and a simple lack of imagination.
Already, the stuff about Russia working to influence the approaching American election has resurfaced like a bloated corpse floating in a stagnant pond. It’s being repeated by American intelligence officials, American media, and Democratic politicians. 2016 redux.
Hillary Clinton used it as one of several fall-back explanations for her loss, something she had a brutally difficult time accepting as reality, having spent more money than some nations’ space programs have at their disposal. About 1.2 billion dollars.
The charges about Russia were silly then, and they are only sillier now.
But it is an intimidation tool in a country which listened to J. Edgar Hoover blubber for decades about “the communist conspiracy,” trying to tell voters that their votes are supporting Russia.
Russia wouldn’t dream of getting caught trying to manipulate an American election. There really is no reward important enough to be worth the risk.
Of course, facts make no difference in this kind of mumbo-jumbo, but Julian Assange already told us that Russia did not give him the damaging material about the Democrats in 2016.
Several distinguished American technical experts have repeatedly said that the material came from downloading to memory sticks by someone with access to DNC computers, not from hacking. That is the kind of statement that can be made definitively in such matters by an expert who recognizes the telltale signs.
Anyway, what has Trump done for Russia that possibly could have rewarded an effort on his behalf? Nothing.
Of course, individual Russians, both politicians and others, and news sources have their election favorites, just as is the case in America.
I believe a fair part of the Russian establishment does favor Trump, but there are some easy-to-understand explanations for the fact, and they have nothing to do with conspiracy.
First, Russia is a remarkably conservative country. This fact jumps out at you if you read some of its news sources, as I do regularly.
Second, while both American political parties are Pentagon-embracing War Parties with very little real difference between them, the Democrats do seem to make the most noise around hostility towards Russia.
Third, Putin is a very clever and subtle man. He knows what a hopeless putz Trump really is. There are reports of Putin and associates making fun of Trump in private.
If he does favor Trump, it is only because he knows how bad Trump is for America’s interests, America being a nation with about a century of hostility towards Russia. A poor leader like Trump making blunders and creating enemies with everything he does is a lovely situation to chuckle over with some vodka in Moscow.
Putin wouldn’t dream of doing anything to influence the matter, beyond his influence over Russia’s own now extensive English-speaking press, but so what? America’s press never stops talking about Russia, and in disparaging terms, calling it everything from a “regime” to a “kleptocracy.” And it is overwhelmingly the case that most Americans never see the Russian press.
