Tags
21st Century Neo-Feudalism, American elections, domestic affairs, foreign affairs, polarization, political extremism, Trump
Americans have seen the American and Israeli flags burned outside of the Democratic National Convention.
Americans also have seen a stink raised about potentially high value State Department e-mail allegedly mishandled by candidate Clinton — and they have witnessed Trump spin the same story into an attack perhaps facetiously wishing that Moscow would recover the cache, despite the possibility of the same containing state secrets — and the opposition has picked up on that to throw the mud pie right back at him.
Into that mess comes this comes this header from the “lesser media”: “Trump & Putin. Yes, It’s Really a Thing” (Talking Points Memo, July 25, 2016). At the top, editor and writer Josh Marshall remarks, “My weekend post on Russia, Vladimir Putin, and Trump . . . has been one of if not the most read pieces I’ve ever written for TPM.”
Marshall’s observations synch in one respect with BackChannels note on the Trump-Manafort connection.
Whatever the truth may be as regards either Clinton or Trump, the domestic atmosphere for elections has been poisoned by the polarized and strident politics enabled and perhaps encouraged in both camps. For the presence of “Red-Green” — old comrades in the “Solidarity Mode” — see, for example —
http://www.blackforpalestine.com/
I post the URL because I like its unmistakable Red-Green branding in relation to that movement within the Democratic Party that has been developing for many years, and this year appears as part of a hate-America-first crowd that has been burning flags.
As regards the GOP, it’s doubtful that Trump would take office as what this blog refers to as a “New Nationalist” (in the manner of Orban in Hungary and Erdogan in Turkey). However, with the employment of Paul Manafort and an uncertain relationship with Putin, the idea that a Trump Administration might react to domestic and foreign affairs with an authoritarian hand also appears to worry Americans.
Add in the leading foreign affairs element: Putin’s efforts to destabilize NATO would seem to be advancing.
Just one breathtaking event may tell of change on that front: Putin has in recent weeks not only elicited an apology from Turkey’s President Erdogan in relation to a downed Russian jet, an event for which Erdogan refused apology back in November (see also on YouTube, “Erdogan: We won’t apologize for downing a Russian plane”– 11/26/2015), but has witnessed through the vehicle of “Coup and Countercoup” the Turkish state practically flipped into a first stage of fascism — mass arrests and firings, and there’s been this apparent mob attack on a “Gulen bookstore in Malatya”:
Imagine Moscow’s delight at what comes next in the process: “Turkey ready to resume pipeline project with Russia.” Associated Press, Business Insider, July 26, 2016.
BackChannels has often stated in relation to dictatorships: “Different Talks — Same Walk”.
Again, in different words, the Democratic Party has been infiltrated or swelled by the presence of “fascists on the left”; the GOP frontrunner has been smeared as authoritarian and nationalist in predisposition; and NATO now hosts two states — Hungary and Turkey — in which the political style of each president has departed from standards shepherding the classically liberal values of other open and democratic societies.
Call it “Syndicate Red Brown Green” or Moscow’s efforts to play “ends against the middle”, the states of affairs for Americans in the middle — on both domestic and foreign affairs fronts — is looking rough.
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