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*
The explanation below assumes Trump is capable of organized thought.
T
-Original Message-
>From: Anthony Boynton via Marxism
>Sent: May 15, 2017 11:42 PM
>To: Thomas F Barton
>Subject: [Marxism] Russia/Trump
>
> POSTING RULES & NOTES
>#1 YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message.
>#2 This mail-list, like most, is publicly & permanently archived.
>#3 Subscribe and post under an alias if #2 is a concern.
>*
>
>*Reading the tea leaves*
>
>
>This list has a tea leaf reading session going on about why FBI Director
>Comey was fired by President Donald Trump.
>
>
>After stirring them again, and examining them under a magnifying glass, I
>have come up with the following reasoning.
>
>First of all Donald Trump is in deep trouble over the issue of Russia. It’s
>not just the Democrats who have an anti-Russia program, it is the
>“internationalist” Republicans of the John McCain ilk. In fact, there is
>little evidence that any significant sector of the Republican party
>supports Trump’s Russian turn.
>
>
>The Russian intervention into the elections was not an invention of
>hysterical Democrats or of the New York Times. Cyber-warfare has been going
>on world-wide for some time among businesses and states. The North Korean
>cyber-attack against the Sony Films picture *The Interview *may have been
>the funniest moment, but there have been plenty of serious moments
>including the very recent attack against hospitals in the UK. In any case,
>Trump’s infatuation with Vladimir Putin and Putin’s support for Trump were
>both on the record in the media of the world. Why wouldn’t Putin try to
>help Trump? He would have been an idiot not to.
>
>
>The Russian state remains a competitor to the American state in
>geopolitics. It has the only nuclear arsenal that can compete with that of
>the USA, and it is aggressively countering US/NATO pressure on it: most
>notably by its land grab in the Ukraine and its genocidal role in Syria.
>
>
>Although both US and Russian imperialism are counter-revolutionary through
>and through, that does not mean that their geopolitical interests are
>identical. The French and German empires of 1914 were thoroughly
>counterrevolutionary, but their geopolitical interests clashed.
>
>
>What interests are at stake?
>
>
>First of all client states. Every client state an imperial power has is a
>client! Who buys arms from the biggest arms merchant in the world? (that
>would be the USA) It’s client states!
>
>
>Who buys arms from the Russians? Not too many client states these days, but
>the market of the old Soviet Union is still holding up. Oh, and then there
>is Syria.
>
>
>Nevertheless, a significant sector of big US corporations are heavily
>invested in Russia, and the GOP is still the party of business despite the
>Clinton’s efforts to bring them all into the Democratic party family.
>Corporations heavily invested in Russia include not only Mr. Tillerson’s
>alma mater Exxon, but Boeing, Pepsi, Ford, Procter & Gamble, McDonald's,
>Mondelez International, General Motors, Johnson & Johnson, Cargill, Alcoa,
>General Electric, and Morgan Stanley.
>
>
>They would like to have their cake and eat it, too. Keep the geopolitical
>power of the United States, diminish Russian power still further, but get
>rid of the sanctions against Russia so that they could get on with business.
>
>
>Fat chance.
>
>
>One significant overlap of ideology and interest between Putin and Trump is
>on global warming. It doesn’t exist! But, if it did, opening up the arctic
>to oil exploration and development would be just that much easier. Why not
>make the Arctic Ocean navigable – and drillable - 365 days a year!
>
>
>So far there is no evidence that President Trump is a deep thinker or
>strategist. Trump appears to be a blow-hard idiot and a bully who was the
>right man, in the right place at the right time. His Russia turn could be
>no more than admiration and attraction for other blow-hard bullies.
>
>
>But, maybe the man is more than he seems.
>
>
>At the very least, he is a cunning and corrupt real estate developer.
>Certainly, he has been attracted to doing business with the cunning and
>corrupt operators in Moscow. Apparently, he has made no big deals in
>Russia, but Trump is a man who has not released his income tax returns, and
>who has built an opaque business empire of interlocking private
>partnerships that no one has yet deciphered. What kinds of dirty deals are
>hiding in that labyrinth can only be guessed at, but